Maria Assenina

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Maria Assenina ( Bulgarian Мария Асенина , scientific transliteration Marija Asenina, also Maria von Assen ) was a Bulgarian noblewoman from the house of Assen . Her parents were Tsar Iwan Assen II and Irene Komnene . Tsar Michael II Assen was her brother.

As a child, Maria became the wife of the mighty boyar Mizo , who was nicknamed Assen through marriage . The initiative for this marriage probably came from her mother, Irene Komnene, who tried to strengthen the power of the underage Tsar Michael II Assen.

After Tsar Michael II Assen had lost the lands in Thrace in the Byzantine-Bulgarian War in 1255 and concluded a "humiliating" peace for the Bulgarian Boljars with the Nicaea Empire , the voices against him increased. In 1256 he was murdered during a hunt and the Boljar conspiracy raised Kaliman II Assen , the other grandson of Ivan Assen I, to the new tsar. At the same time, other powerful Boljars, including Mizo Assen, split from the Bulgarian Empire and a bloody civil war ensued.

In the same year Kaliman II. Assen (???) was murdered by another Boljar conspiracy, which crowned the Boljar Mizo Assen as the new tsar and Maria Assenina as the tsarina. It is believed that she held the title until 1263. At the same time, the Great Boljar Council raised Konstantin Tich Assen to tsar. The following year Mizo Assen lost the war against Constantine and withdrew with his family via Preslaw to Mesambria (now Nessebar ). He exchanged his lands in Eastern Thrace with the Byzantine Emperor for lands in Asia Minor , near Troy , and finally fled to Constantinople . So Maria and her husband settled in Byzantium, where the former Bulgarian tsarina lived until her death. Her exact date of death is unknown.

Maria and Mizo Assen had two children:

  1. the later Tsar Ivan Assen III. (1279-1280)
  2. Kira-Maria Assenina ∞ (married) 1279 with Georgi I. Terter (1280–1292)

literature

  • John VA Fine, Jr .: The Late Medieval Balkans. A Critical Survey from the Late Twelfth Century to the Ottoman Conquest. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor 1987, ISBN 0472100793
  • Plamen Pavlov: Търновските царици. Publishing house ДАР-РХ, Veliko Tarnovo, 2006
personal data
SURNAME Maria Assenina
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Maria von Assen; Мария Асенина (Bulgarian); Maria Asenina
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Bulgarian nobles
DATE OF BIRTH 13th Century
DATE OF DEATH 13th century or 14th century