Emperor John Ii Komnenos Rebuilding New Rome 1118 1143 Maximilian C G Lau Full Chapter

Emperor John II Komnenos: Rebuilding
New Rome 1118-1143 Maximilian C. G.

Lau
Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://ebookmass.com/product/emperor-john-ii-komnenos-rebuilding-new-rome-1118
-1143-maximilian-c-g-lau/
OX F O R D S T U D I E S I N B Y Z A N T I UM
Editorial Board
jaś elsner cat h erine hol m e s
jam es h oward- joh nston e liz a b eth j e f f reys
hu gh kennedy marc l au xte r m a n n
pau l magdali no h e nry m ag u ire
cy ri l mango marlia m a n g o
cl au dia rapp jean- pierre s odin i
jonat han sh epa rd
OX F O R D ST U D I E S I N B Y Z A N T I UM
Oxford Studies in Byzantium consists of scholarly monographs and editions on the

history, literature, thought, and material culture of the Byzantine world.
Theodoros Prodromos: Miscellaneous Poems
An Edition and Literary Study
Nikos Zagklas
John Zonaras’ Epitome of Histories
A Compendium of Jewish-Roman History and Its Reception
Theofili Kampianaki
Symeon Stylites the Younger and Late Antique Antioch
From Hagiography to History
Lucy Parker
Homer the Rhetorician
Eustathios of Thessalonike on the Composition of the Iliad
Baukje van den Berg
Depicting Orthodoxy in the Russian Middle Ages
The Novgorod Icon of Sophia, the Divine Wisdom
Ágnes Kriza
The Beginnings of the Ottoman Empire
Clive Foss
Church Architecture of Late Antique Northern Mesopotamia
Elif Keser Kayaalp
Byzantine Religious Law in Medieval Italy
James Morton
Caliphs and Merchants
Cities and Economies of Power in the Near East (700–950)
Fanny Bessard
Social Change in Town and Country in Eleventh-Century Byzantium
James Howard-Johnston
Innovation in Byzantine Medicine
The Writings of John Zacharias Aktouarios (c.1275–c.1330)
Petros Bouras-Vallianatos
Emperors and Usurpers in the Later Roman Empire
Civil War, Panegyric, and the Construction of Legitimacy
Adrastos Omissi
The Universal History of Stepʻanos Tarōnecʻi
Introduction, Translation, and Commentary
Tim Greenwood
The Letters of Psellos
Cultural Networks and Historical Realities
Edited by Michael Jeffreys and Marc D. Lauxtermann
Holy Sites Encircled
The Early Byzantine Concentric Churches of Jerusalem
Vered Shalev-Hurvitz
Emperor John II
Komnenos
Rebuilding New Rome 1118–1143
M A X I M I L IA N C . G . L AU
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP,
United Kingdom
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of
Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries
© Maximilian C. G. Lau 2023
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics
rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above
You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Data available
Library of Congress Control Number: 2023941099
ISBN 978–0–19–888867–3
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198888673.001.0001
Printed and bound by
CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY
Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and
for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials
contained in any third party website referenced in this work.
Acknowledgements
This monograph would never have been possible without the support of many
people at Oriel College, St Benet’s Hall, Worcester College, the programme in
Late Antique and Byzantine Studies, Oxford, the Oxford University Byzantine
Society, the University of St Andrews, Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo, the Muintir
Uí Chroidheáin in Blackrock (‘the working group’), the Stabi in Berlin, and many
in Guernsey too.
Without Mary Whitby and Ida Toth, I would never have been able to translate
all that Greek. This work would never have been as critical without the ideas and
feedback from my doctoral examiners and readers Paul Magdalino and Catherine
Holmes, nor my editors James Howard-Johnston and Marc Lauxtermann. Further
feedback and ideas came from Peter Frankopan, Elizabeth and Michael Jeffreys,
Yasuhiro Otsuki, Jonathan Lewis, Ian Forrest, Kirsty Stewart, Tim Greenwood,
John Ritzema, Aoife Ní Chroidheáin, and João Dias. Equally, I have immense
thanks to many other scholars who were very willing to share their work early so
that it could be included in this publication. Above all, I would like to thank my
late, great supervisor Mark Whittow for setting me down this path, and I wish he
could have seen the final result.
The best part of this research was the fieldwork across the Balkans and the
Middle East, where people were incredibly welcoming and helpful, especially
when I was still a postgraduate scholar very much out of my depth. Of particular
note are Sami and his people at the hostel in Jericho in the West Bank, and the
variety of characters at the Old Town Hostel in Pristina, Kosovo. I would never
have been able to do this research without grants from All Souls, Oriel and the
British Institute at Ankara, and without the companionship of Aoife Ní
Chroidheáin (all of those Pontic backroads), Douglas Whalin (getting lost in
Serbia and fortress hunting in Bithynia), Hal Bigland (the Konya-Antakya road
trip), Benjy Mason, Will Yates (Georgian auto-repair), and then those two with
Rufus Stirling and Esteban Ramírez (down and out in Israel and Palestine).
Finally, I would like to thank my parents and Aoife for supporting me through-
out this journey, as well as my school teachers Chris Fothergill, Ronnie
Womersley, and Peter Brakewell for getting me into history in the first place.
Contents
Maps ix
Author’s Notes xi
Abbreviations xiii
List of Figures xvii
Introduction: Overshadowed by Father and Son? 1
One: Sources: Problems and Opportunities 9
Two: Young Emperor John and the Rule of Constantinople 42
Three: The Horizons of 1118 77
Four: Nomad Invasion 102
Five: Client Management and the Crisis of 1126 120
Six: The Raškan Insurrection and the Hungarian War 140
Seven: Betrayal and Conquest in Anatolia 170
Eight: The Great Eastern Campaign for Cilicia and Syria 193
Nine: The Last Campaigns 247
Ten: Fortresses, the Provinces, and the Army 272
Eleven: The Church under John: Philanthropy and Ecumenism 306
Conclusion: New Rome Rebuilt? 332
Bibliography 341
Index 377
Maps
Map One: Eastern Mediterranean 41

Map Two: Black Sea 101
Map Three: The Venetian War 126
Map Four: The Balkans 37, 139
Map Five: John’s Balkan Fortress Network 165
Map Six: Anatolia, c.1130 169
Map Seven: Cilicia and the Levant 192
Map Eight: John’s Anatolian Fortress Network 38, 289
Map Nine: Eastern Campaign, spring/summer 1137 200
Map Ten: Eastern Campaign, autumn/winter 1137 224
Map Eleven: Eastern Campaign, spring/summer 1138 230
Map Twelve: Danishmendid Civil War, 1142 259
Author’s Notes
Note on Transliteration
In general, I have transliterated Greek names and terms as closely as possible, but
not with absolute consistency. Common names, places and ethnonyms are given
in their most familiar form, for example, ‘Kinnamos’ and ‘Komnene’ are used but
alongside ‘Constantinople’, ‘Choniates’, and ‘Cuman’ rather than Konstantinoupolis,
Khoniates, and Kouman. I tend to have used ‘Latins’ rather than ‘Franks’ for clar-
ity, though the terms are both used in Greek, Syriac, Armenian, and Arabic texts
to refer to western Europeans.
Note on Citation
Where one page number is given for a primary text, it will refer to the text in its
original language. Where two page numbers are given (e.g. NC, p. 14; tr. p. 10),
the first will be to the text in its original language, and the second to the transla-
tion. Where two numerals such as ‘10.5’ are used, they refer to the book and
chapter, respectively. All maps and photos are the author’s own from fieldwork in
2014 and 2015 unless otherwise stated. Numerals given to poems and seals are
those used in the published editions, e.g. ‘Prodromos XV’ refers to Hörandner’s
numbering.
Note on Translations
Greek and Latin translations of the court sources are my own unless otherwise
stated. When translations to aid clarification for common sources such as
Choniates are required, standard editions are used unless otherwise stated.
French, German and Italian have been consulted first hand. For other languages
such as Russian, Hungarian, Syriac, or Norse, I have either used standard transla-
tions or consulted fellow scholars at Oriel College, Oxford and the Central
European University, Budapest. I am hugely indebted to them for these additional
translations.
Abbreviations
AIPHOS L’Annuaire de l’Institute de Philologie et d’Histoire Orientales et Slaves

AK Anna Komnene, Annae Comnenae Alexias, ed. D.R. Reinsch and
A. Kambylis (Berlin, 2001)
al-Azimi F. Monot, F, ‘La chronique abrégée d’al- Azimi années
518–538/1124–1144’, Revue des études islamiques 59 (1991),
pp. 101–64
BMGS Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies
Byzantion Byzantion: Revue internationale des études byzantines
BZ Byzantinische Zeitschrift
CFHB Corpus fontium historiae byzantinae
CFHH Catalogus fontium historiae Hungaricae, ed. F. A. Gombos, 4 vols
(Budapest, 1937–43)
Chron. 1234 Anonymi Auctoris Chonicon ad A.C. 1234 Pertinens, vol. II, ed.
I. Chabot (Leuven, 1974); English tr.: A. Tritton and H. Gibb (ed.
and tr.) ‘The First and Second Crusades from an Anonymous Syriac
Chronicle’, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and
Ireland 1 and 2 (1933)
CSHB Corpus scriptorum historiae Byzantinae
DHGE Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie ecclésiastiques
DO Catalogue of Byzantine seals at Dumbarton Oaks and in the Fogg
Museum of Art, ed. J. Nesbitt and N. Oikonomides, 7 vols
(Washington, DC, 2001–20)
DOC Catalogue of Byzantine Coins in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection and
in the Whittemore Collection. Vol. IV: Alexius I to Michael VIII
1081–1261, ed. M. Hendy (Washington, DC, 1999)
DOP Dumbarton Oaks Papers
FRA Fontes Rerum Austriacarum
FSI Fonti per la Storia d’Italia
Gregory the Priest ‘Continuation of Matthew of Edessa’, Armenia and the Crusades:
Tenth to Twelfth Centuries: The Chronicle of Matthew of Edessa, tr.
A. E. Dostourian (Belmont, MA, 1993)
IRAIK Izvestija Russkago Archeologičeskago Instituta v Konstantinopole
Italikos Michael Italikos, Michel Italikos Lettres et Discours, ed. P. Gautier
(Paris, 1972)
JK John Kinnamos, Ioannis Cinnami Epitome rerum ab Ioanne et
Alexio Comnenis gestarum, ed. A. Meineke (Bonn, 1836); Deeds of
John and Manuel Comnenus by John Kinnamos, English tr.
C. M. Brand (New York, 1976)
JÖB Jahrbuch der österreichischen Byzantinistik
xiv Abbreviations
KC Kleinchroniken, Die byzantinischen Kleinchroniken, vol. 1, ed.

P. Schreiner (Vienna, 1975)
Matt. Ed. Armenia and the Crusades: Tenth to Twelfth centuries: the Chronicle
of Matthew of Edessa, tr. A. E. Dostourian (Belmont, MA, 1993)
MB Μεσαιωνικὴ βιβλιοθήκη, ed. K. Sathas, 8 vols (Venice, 1872–94)
MDAI, AA Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Athenische
Abteilung
MGH (S) Monumenta Germaniae Historica (Scriptores)
Mich. Syr. Michael the Syrian, Text and Translations of the Chronicle of Michael
the Great. Vol. 1: The Edessa-Aleppo Syriac Codex of the Chronicle of
Michael the Great, ed. G. Ibrahim, English Text Summary by
S. Brock (New Jersey, 2009). French tr. J. Chabot, Chronique de
Michel le Syrien, Patriarche Jacobite d’Antioche (1166–1199)
(Brussels, 1963)
MM Acta et Diplomata graeca medii aevi sacra et profana, ed.
F. Miklosich and J. Müller, 6 vols (Vienna, 1968)
MPH Monumenta Poloniae Historica, ed. A. Bielowski, 6 vols (Lwów,
1864–93)
Muses ‘Die Musen des Kaisers Alexios I’, ed. P. Maas, BZ 22 (1913),
pp. 348–59; English Translation: The Alexian Komnenian Muses,
R. H. Jordan, C. Roueché et al. (Belfast Agreed Translation, unpub-
lished, 1989)
NC Niketas Choniates, Nicetae Choniatae Historia, ed. J. L. van Dieten
(Berlin, 1975); English Translation: O City of Byzantium, Annals of
Niketas Choniates, tr. H. J Magoulias (Detroit, 1984)
ODB The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, ed. in chief A. Kazhdan (3 vols.,
Oxford, 1991)
Pantokrator Typikon ‘Le Typikon du Christ Sauveur Pantocrator’, ed. and tr. P. Gautier,
REB 32 (1974), pp. 1–145; English tr. R. Jordan, ‘Pantokrator:
Typikon of Emperor John II Komnenos for the Monastery of Christ
Pantokrator in Constantinople’, Byzantine Monastic Foundation
Documents, ed. J. Thomas, and A. Constantinides Hero (Washington,
DC, 2000), pp. 725–81
PG Patrologia graeca, ed. J. Migne
PL Patrologia latina, ed. J. Migne
Priest of Diokleia Το Χρονικό του Ιερέα της Διοκλείας: Κείμενο, Μετάφραση, Σχόλια,
τα Πρόσωπα και ο Χώρος, tr. Angeliki Papageorgiou
(Thessalonike, 2012)
Prodromos Theodore Prodromos, Theodoros Prodromos: historische Gedichte,
ed. W. Hörandner (Vienna, 1974)
PSRL Polnoe sobranie russkih letopisej
PVL Povestʹ vremennyh let
REB Revue des études byzantines
RHC Recueil des historiens des croisades
RIS Rerum Italicarum Scriptores
Abbreviations xv
RP G. Rallis, and M. Potlis, Σύνταγμα τῶν θείων καὶ ἱερῶν κανόνων,

6 vols (Reprinted Athens, 1966)
Smbat Sparapet La Chronique attribuée au connétable Smbat, tr. G. Dédéyan
(Paris, 1980)
SRD Scriptores Rerum Danicarum
SRH Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum
TIB Tabula Imperii Byzantini
TM Travaux et Mémoires
Zonaras John Zonaras, Ioannis Zonarae Epitome Historiarum libri XIII–XVIII,
CSHB 49, Vol III, ed, T. Büttner-Wobst (Leipzig, 1897)
ZRVI Zbornik radova Vizantološkog Instituta
List of Figures
1. South-east corner Tower of Lopadion 35

2. South-western towers of Achyraous 35
3. Pantokrator Monastery/Zeyrek Camii 35
4. Church of Hagioi Anargyroi, Kastoria 36
5. Church of Hagios Nikolaos tou Kasnitze, Kastoria 36
6. Walls of Belgrade Castle 144
7. Northern view from the hilltop site of Braničevo 145
8. Northern view from the summit of Stari Ras 150
9. North-westerly view from the summit of Stari Ras 151
10. Rebuilt amphitheatre of Viminacium 159
11. View of Ram and the Danube 160
12. View taken from the north of Zvečan, looking south 162
13. View of Zvečan from the south looking north 162
14. Komnenian style cloisonné masonry at Zvečan 163
15. The river valley leading south towards Jeleč 164
16. The valley surrounding Studenica Monastery 164
17. Kastamon Fortress 2013 178
18. Model representing John’s offensive strategy in Anatolia 182
19. Gangra 2014 187
20. Cisterns at Gangra and view from the citadel 188
21. Southern wall of Korykos 202
22. The twin castles of Korykos and Kızkalesi 203
23. The Cilician Gates 1935 205
24. The Cilician Gates 2019 205
25. Fortress of Gülek Gates and view of the northern walls 206
26. Cilician campaign order according to each source 208
27. Mopsuestia 210
28. The ‘main route’ up to Anazarbos 210
29. Alternative approach to Anazarbos from the south-east 211
30. Komnenian brick courses at Anazarbos 211
31. Anazarbos 1861 212
xviii List of Figures
32. Fortress of Tell Hamdun 214

33. Gastin/Baghras Castle 218
34. Early nineteenth-century drawing of the Syrian Gates 219
35. Early nineteenth-century drawing of Antioch 220
36. Iron Gates of Antioch 220
37. Vakha Castle 228
38. Aleppo Citadel 234
39. Shayzar Fortress and modern town from the Orontes 237
40. River Kelkit/Lykos from the ‘Kundu’ road bridge 250
41. Western view across Neokaisareia’s citadel 253
42. Lake Beyşehir 261
43. Plan of Lopadion 275
44. Bridge over the Rhyndakos 276
45. Achyraous from across the dam 277
46. Sultançayır Makestos Constantinian bridge in 2014 278
47. Plan of the Makestos Bridge 279
48. The towers of Kotyaion 280
49. Walls and Harbour of Attaleia 281
50. Pegae towers 283
51. View from Kalanoros/Alanya Citadel northeast 285
52. Detail of Kalanoros citadel chapel and inner walls 285
53. Kızılcaşehir 286
54. Classical Street in Syedra and Komnenian brick in the Syedra citadel chapel 286
55. Sydran Outer Wall with Komnenian brick, and the view from Syedra Citadel 287
56. Iotape 287
57. Antiocheia-ad-Craggum 287
58. Kisleçukuru 296
59. Floor plan of the three Pantokrator churches 309
60. John and Piroska-Eirene mosaic of Hagia Sophia 329
61. Dedication Image in Tetraevangelion, Vat. Urb. gr. 2 330
Introduction
Overshadowed by Father and Son?
John II Komnenos has the intriguing honour of being one of Edward Gibbon’s
few Byzantine heroes: the eighteenth-century historian, usually disdainful of all
things Byzantine, judged that Marcus Aurelius, as a true Roman exemplar, ‘would
not have disdained’ his successor of a millennium later.1 This generous appreci
ation of the twelfth-century emperor is a nearly word-for-word translation of the
judgement made by Niketas Choniates at the end of his account of John’s life in
his Χρονικὴ Διήγησις, or History of the Roman Empire from 1118 to 1207, with
both Gibbon and Choniates calling him the greatest of the Komnenos dynasty.2
Gibbon’s reiteration of Choniates is indicative of a problem that has affected
scholarship ever since: what we understand concerning John II Komnenos’ reign
has been shackled to its presentation in the writings of Choniates, and his fellow
twelfth-century historian John Kinnamos.
Unlike John’s father Alexios I Komnenos, and John’s son Manuel I, there is no
detailed major primary source for John, such as Anna Komnene’s Alexiad for
Alexios and Kinnamos’ and Choniates’ fuller biographies for Manuel. Instead,
there are only the summary accounts found in the histories of Kinnamos and
Choniates. They present seductively clear accounts of major events, their causes
and effects, in spite of the passage of four or more decades between John’s reign
and the times of writing. But modern histories of John’s reign have tended to do
little more than recycle this limited material, presenting the reign as a sequence of
campaigns by an active soldier-emperor, before concurring with Choniates’ and
Gibbon’s original judgement.
However, there is much more to be said about this ‘overshadowed’ period, a
reign which had a direct impact on the vast geopolitical changes that swept
Eurasia and Africa in the twelfth century. The emergence of territorial lordships
under permanent western European rule in the Levant as a consequence of the
First Crusade and responses in the Islamic world to these developments were only
the most obvious of these changes. Old empires such as John’s in Constantinople
were in competition with rising powers in an increasingly interconnected world,
1 E. Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. 3, ed. D. Womersley
(London, 1994), pp. 70–2.
2 NC, pp. 46–7; tr. p. 72, cf. Gibbon.
Emperor John II Komnenos: Rebuilding New Rome 1118–1143. Maximilian C. G. Lau, Oxford University Press.
© Maximilian C. G. Lau 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198888673.003.0001
2 Emperor John II Komnenos: Rebuilding New Rome 1118–1143
as political and military developments in central Asia and Western Europe were
felt acutely in the lands between. John’s reign therefore merits closer scrutiny, in
light of a wider range of sources than the histories of Kinnamos and Choniates
alone. Foreign affairs need to be viewed holistically, and placed in their proper
diplomatic and military context. Account must be taken at all times of the domes-
tic context: the selection of key personnel, celebration of victory at court, and the
Church. New questions should be asked of the sources, and more light cast on the
state of New Rome in this period. Alexios’ beleaguered realm of the late eleventh
century was transformed into Manuel’s grand empire of the mid and later-twelfth:
John’s role in this metamorphosis should be examined.
A survey of modern work reveals the stranglehold of Choniates and Gibbon’s
judgement on scholarly interpretations. The most important recent publication is
that which resulted from a workshop held in 2014: John II Komnenos, Emperor of
Byzantium, ed. A. Bucossi and A. Rodriguez Suarez (London, 2016). The conclu-
sion, that John deserved the favourable opinion of historians on the basis of his
military achievements but that ‘otherwise no significant political events took
place’, do him insufficient justice. Nor does it alter the image of John conveyed in
popular works, such as John Julius Norwich’s Byzantium: Decline and Fall
(London, 1995), A. Carr’s The Komnene Dynasty: Byzantium’s Struggle for Survival
1057–1185 (Barnsley, 2018), or K. Lygo’s The Emperors of Byzantium (London,
2022). These all relate John’s life as one of continuous campaigning, with the
emperor being a man of spartan tastes, characterized by faithfulness to his wife,
who built a major monastery dedicated to Christ Pantokrator in Constantinople,
but who was otherwise far less interesting than the rest of his family.
Bucossi and Rodriguez Suarez’s volume opens with an historiographical essay
by Stathakopoulos, who summarizes scholarship on John as an emperor per-
ceived as ‘very important on the one hand, and yet apparently not worthy enough
of being the subject of a dedicated monograph’.3 The closest thing to such a study
is the first part of the second volume on the Komnenian dynasty by Ferdinand
Chalandon published more than a century ago in 1912.4 This too echoes
Choniates and Gibbon by portraying the reign as one of perpetual campaigning,
with John himself being a morally upright and hardworking emperor as shown by
his relationships with his family.5 This torch was passed undimmed to George
Ostrogorsky who once echoed Choniates directly by calling John ‘the greatest of
the Comneni’, again based upon his campaigning and personal character.6
3 D. Stathakopoulos, ‘John II Komnenos: A Historiographical Essay’, John II Komnenos, Emperor of

Byzantium: In the Shadow of Father and Son, ed. A. Bucossi and A. Rodriguez Suarez (London, 2016), p. 8.
4 F. Chalandon, Jean II Comnène, 1118–1143, et Manuel I Comnène, 1143–1180, 2 vols (repr, New
York, 1912).
5 Ibid., vol. II, pp. 9–10. Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, p. 8.
6 G. Ostrogorsky, History of the Byzantine State, tr. J. Hussey (New Brunswick, 1969), p. 377;
Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, pp. 8–9.
Introduction 3
This judgement has tended to be refined rather than re-examined since then:
Angold, Karayannopoulos, and Magdalino have offered short evaluations as part
of their broader studies of eleventh- and/or twelfth-century Byzantium.7 Into
these appraisals, John’s reign is squeezed into a gap between what are implied to
have been more dynamic periods of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. They dis-
cuss some elements of continuity and change between Alexios and Manuel, and
offer an updated examination of the sources, but the overall analysis of John as
the campaigning, moral emperor remains largely the same.8 From these studies,
Stathakopoulos chooses Magdalino’s contribution to the 2008 Cambridge History
of the Byzantine Empire as one that summarizes the consensus on John: (a) he
campaigned in order to prove himself a legitimate emperor to a domestic audi-
ence rather than necessarily to expand the empire, and (b) the great change he
could have brought about by reconquering the east was left undone by his early
death. Stathakopoulos also echoes one of Ostrogorsky’s points: John did as much
for the empire as was possible at the time.9
Angold and Magdalino’s consideration of John’s reign in the context of a
broader historical investigation is replicated across the rest of the field.
Examples from his reign are integrated into wider studies such as those on
Byzantium and the Crusades by Harris and Lilie, or Byzantium and the Balkans
by Stephenson and Madgearu. Only a very few works, notably Birkenmeier’s
Development of the Komnenian Army, Stanković and Zlatar’s analyses of
Komnenian Constantinople, or studies on the monastery of Christ Pantokrator,
devote substantial sections to John.10 By contrast, in Angold’s Church and
Society in Byzantium under the Comneni, John is barely mentioned, except as
7 M. Angold, The Byzantine Empire, 1025–1204. A Political History (London, 1984), pp. 181–90;
I. Karayannopoulos, Ιστορία Βυζαντινού Κράτους, Vol. III: Ιστορία Υστέρας Βυζαντινής Περιόδου
(1081–1453), Part 1: Τελευταίες Λάμψεις (Thessalonike, 1990), pp. 108–23; P. Magdalino, Empire of
Manuel I Komnenos 1143–1180 (Cambridge, 1993), passim, but especially pp. 35–41.
8 Although Karayannopoulos offers a more negative assessment of John’s strategic choices.
9 P. Magdalino, ‘The Empire of the Komnenoi (1118–1204)’, Cambridge History of the Byzantine
Empire c.500–1492, ed. J. Shepard (Cambridge, 2008), pp. 629–34; Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical
Essay’, p. 10; Ostrogorsky, History of the Byzantine State, p. 377.
10 J. Harris, Byzantium and the Crusades (London, 2007); R-J. Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader
States, 1096–1204 (Oxford, 1993), pp. 96–141; Lilie, ‘Twelfth-century Byzantine and Turkish States’, ed.
A. Bryer and M. Ursinus (Amsterdam, 1991), pp. 35–52; P. Stephenson, Byzantium’s Balkan Frontier:
A Political Study of the Northern Balkans, 900–1204 (Cambridge, 2000); A. Madgearu, Byzantine Military
Organization on the Danube, 10th–12th Centuries (Leiden, 2013); J. Birkenmeier, The Development of
the Komnenian Army 1081–1204 (Leiden, 2003), especially pp. 85–99; The Pantokrator Monastery in
Constantinople, ed. S. Kotzabassi (Berlin, 2013). V. Stanković, Komnini u Carigradu 1057–1185:
Evolucija jedne vladarske prodice (Belgrade, 2006); Z. Zlatar, Golden Byzantium: Imperial Power in
Komnenian Constantinople (1081–1180) (Istanbul, 2015); Zlatar, Red and Black Byzantium: Komnenian
Emperors and opposition (1081–1180) (Istanbul, 2016). Additionally, see the corresponding thematic
chapter sections in the Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire, especially: P. Stephenson, ‘Balkan
Borderlands (1018–1204)’, Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c.500–1492, ed. J. Shepard
(Cambridge, 2008), pp. 678–82; D. Korobeinikov, ‘Raiders and Neighbours: The Turks (1040–1304)’,
Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c.500–1492, ed. J. Shepard (Cambridge, 2008), pp. 710–11,
being preoccupied with campaigning and with little time for the church—a
view echoed in the Cambridge History of Byzantium, where Magdalino charac-
terizes John as remarkably non-interventionist, with domestic matters in general
being ‘conspicuously uneventful’.11 Stathakopoulos is right, therefore, when he
remarks that John’s reign has often been included in studies ‘for reasons of com-
pleteness, and quite half-heartedly’, even if he excuses this as being ‘due to the
constraints of the source material’.12
Beyond these general studies, there are a few that focus more directly on John
and his era. These include the recently published PhD thesis on John by
Papageorgiou as well as the various studies in the Shadow of Father and Son
volume of essays on John edited by Bucossi and Rodriguez Suarez, which are
complemented by the research presented in the recent Piroska and the Pantokrator
volume.13 In the Shadow of Father and Son mainly contains studies that attempt,
in Stathakopoulos’ words, to paint the shadows of John’s reign as ‘a chiaroscuro
place of texture and nuance’, and to a great extent these studies and Papageorgiou’s
thesis and the Pantokrator volume succeed in doing much of the foundational
work needed for an extended study on John. Papers by Vučetić, Rodriguez Suarez,
Jeffreys, Bucossi, and Ousterhout in the Shadow of Father and Son volume con
textualize John’s reign within current research on how Byzantine emperors inter-
acted with foreign rulers, and dealt with western intellectual culture, literary
trends, the filioque controversy, architecture and patronage, even if the distinct
iveness of John’s reign in this volume remains in its transitional character, as a
‘chiaroscuro’, an interval between better illuminated periods of history.14 John is
more prominent in the chapters contributed by Stanković, Magdalino, Linardou,
and Papadopoulou. They cover, respectively, John’s life before 1118, his triumph
of 1133, the hidden references to John’s brother Isaac, and coinage and monetary
policy.15 Finally, Stouraitis and Papageorgiou’s papers in the same volume tackle
together with: E. Baraton, La Romanie orientale. L’empire de Constantinople et ses avatars au Levant à
l’époque des Croisades (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Rouen-Normandie, 2018).
11 M. Angold, Church and Society in Byzantium under the Comneni, 1081–1261 (Cambridge, 1995);
Magdalino, ‘Empire of the Komnenoi’, p. 634. This tends to be typical of similar general studies, for
example M. Angold, The Byzantine Aristocracy IX to XIII Centuries (Oxford, 1984), where most papers
tend to cluster around the earlier and later periods and brush over the section in the middle with very
few exceptions. A partial exemption can be found in: J. Roskilly, Λογιώτατοι ποίμενες: Les évêques et
leur autorité dans la société byzantine des XIe–XIIe siècles (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of
Paris I, 2017), which though focused on bishops rather than emperors uses evidence from John’s reign
to make general conclusions as to the Komnenian emperors and bishops.
12 Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, p. 10.
13 A. Papageorgiou, Ο Ιωάννης Βʹ Κομνηνός και η εποχή του (1118–1143) (Athens, 2017), see all:
Papageorgiou, ‘Βυζάντιο και Σέρβοι: το ζήτημα των εκστρατειών του Ιωάννη Β´ Κομνηνού εναντίον
των Σέρβων’, Εώα και Εσπερία 8 (2008–12), pp. 353–67.
14 John II Komnenos, Emperor of Byzantium: In the Shadow of Father and Son, ed. A. Bucossi and
A. Rodriguez Suarez (London, 2016), pp. 71–120, 135–54.
15 Ibid., pp. 11–21, 53–70, 155–200. Linardou’s study is supplemented by: A. Rodrigues Suarez,
‘The Sebastokrator Isaac Komnenos: Manuel’s Latinophile Uncle?’, Byzantium in Dialogue with the
Mediterranean History and Heritage, ed. D. Slootjes and M. Verhoeven (Leiden, 2019), pp. 182–98.
Introduction 5
the big question of re-evaluating John’s campaigns and political ideology.16 They
come to very different conclusions as to whether John acted according to some
form of crusader ideology in particular, with the former advocating that John’s
ideology operated within the traditional scope of the Roman emperors, whilst
Papageorgiou champions John as an emperor who adopted the crusading ideol-
ogy of the west. A similar range of papers is to be found in the Piroska and the
Pantokrator volume. Refreshingly in this publication, John’s wife and empress
takes centre stage. Of particular importance is Bárány’s re-evaluation of the polit
ics surrounding Eirene-Piroska’s marriage to John. The papers by Sághy, Jeffreys,
Franchi, Mielke, Demirtiken, Kiss, Shlyakhtin, and myself focus on what the evi-
dence tells us about her as an empress, and those by Ousterhout, Wolford, and
Jeffreys update scholarship on the Pantokrator.17
These studies have already highlighted some new methodological approaches
that this investigation will also adopt. In the first place, they confirm that the nar-
rative accounts by Choniates and Kinnamos should be appreciated as carefully
wrought pieces of literature with defined rhetorical purposes. They were not writ-
ten to let readers know what occurred, but they were instead texts that used his-
torical events to make a convincing argument, and should therefore be used with
the utmost care. This can be done by reading them in context with the many other
written sources that have not hitherto been exploited to their full potential. The
most useful, because they are concerned with the people and events of the time,
are those non-Byzantine histories written in neighbouring regions. These exist in a
variety of languages, such as Latin, Arabic, Armenian, and Syriac, and though
some were written at a similar distance to events as the histories of Kinnamos and
Choniates, others were written almost as these events occurred. These texts give us
unique insights, above all into a more contemporary, non-Constantinopolitan, and
non-Emperor-focused view on events. Of particular relevance are the Chronicle of
the so-called Priest of Diokleia and the history of Michael the Syrian: regional
texts that allow us to focus on developments in areas outside Constantinople that
Choniates and Kinnamos gloss over in favour of what the emperor was doing, or
what occurred in the capital. In addition, there are numerous non-historical or
semi-historical Byzantine sources: letters (official and private), documents, legal
texts, saints’ lives, and, most important of all, contemporary poetry and orations
that celebrated the emperor’s achievements. John’s reign can be better understood
in the light of these texts: the political pulse of the time is contained within them;
they allow us a window into how John, his administration, and his rivals wished
16 I. Stouraitis, ‘Narratives of John II Komnenos’ Wars: Comparing Byzantine and Modern

Approaches’, Shadow of Father and Son, ed. A. Bucossi and A. Rodriguez Suarez, pp. 22–36;
A. Papageorgiou, ‘The Political Ideology of John II Komnenos’, pp. 37–52, in ibid.
17 M. Sághy and R. Ousterhout (eds.), Piroska and the Pantokrator: Dynastic Memory, Healing and
Salvation in Komnenian Constantinople (Budapest, 2019), pp. 11–38, 63–96, 97–120, 121–42, 143–52,
153–73, 175–94, 195–224, 225–60, 261–90, 291–304, respectively.
events to be portrayed. These texts are a portal into the type of world in which
these authors lived and the one they sought to construct, and, equally, the means
to understand better why their authors represented their worlds in specific ways.
Beyond the written word, not much use has been made of the growing volume of
material evidence. This category of evidence allows us to read texts in entirely new
ways, especially in the case of the archaeological remains of the many fortifications
John built. Far from there being few extant sources, there is in fact a plethora of
evidence that survives testifying to John’s reign: however, it must be identified and
a means found to piece it together, and thus evidence is the focus of the first chapter
of this volume.
Following the opening chapter, attention turns to the events of John’s life. It
may seem surprising to say so, but the chronology of John’s reign is far from
secure. Byzantinists have been inclined to adopt a thematic approach within the
framework of the more general studies mentioned above. This approach does not
take account of the evolving priorities of John and his contemporaries from year
to year, and at times even from one day to the next, as circumstances developed,
and goals shifted. Choniates and Kinnamos also give a deceptive impression that
John dealt with the various challenges facing him sequentially, and that he dealt
with them according to some form of grand plan. On closer inspection, it
becomes clear that his choices, and the events themselves, can be better under-
stood once it is acknowledged that the emperor had to balance multiple demands
at once, often facing various challenges in the same year, and therefore having to
change his priorities accordingly. The significance of a number of key events
changes radically once they are seen in a context which is sensitive to chronology.
The fundamental principle governing the arrangement of the majority of the
material in this book is therefore chronology. The aim is to watch policy as it
evolved in time, in carefully documented changing circumstances. At first sight,
such an approach may appear dated compared to modern scholarship, more in
keeping with the work of J. B. Bury, Steven Runciman, or latterly John Julius
Norwich.18 However, it is only when the two Byzantine histories (by Kinnamos
and Choniates) are supplemented with previously unused textual and non-textual
evidence, and when developments are placed in their specific historical contexts,
that a full understanding of the pressures upon John and his empire, and the
emperor’s responses to those pressures, can be obtained, and more probing his-
torical analysis can be undertaken.
18 I take them as examples of hugely popular but traditionalist authors and scholars, whom I recall
as an undergraduate being told that if I truly wanted to be inspired by the medieval world I should
read and enjoy, but whom I should never cite in a serious academic essay or in works such as this
book. From Bury in particular I also take my cue that I am not a ‘Byzantinist’ but a medieval Roman
historian: J. B. Bury, A History of the Later Roman Empire from Arcadius to Irene, 2 vols (London,
1889); S. Runciman, A History of the Crusades, 3 vols (Cambridge, 1951–54); J. J. Norwich, Byzantium:
The Decline and Fall (London, 1995).
Introduction 7
Chapter Two therefore covers the first thirty years of John’s life before the death
of his father and his succession. This is a stage of John’s life which has rarely been
examined before, but during which we can see the policies and personnel of John’s
government taking shape. This chapter will, therefore, also include an overview of
twelfth-century imperial government. Moving on from domestic affairs, Chapter
Three examines the world as it appeared to John from Constantinople, providing
a tour of the recent history of the emperor’s geographical and political neighbours
near and far. This is followed by a consideration of the key military and diplo-
matic events in Alexios’ last years, and of the ways in which John sought to com-
plete his father’s plans in both the Balkans and Anatolia. Chapter Four focuses on
the emperor’s response to the nomad invasion of 1122–3, perhaps his greatest
victory, and then the disposition of his Danubian lands thereafter. Chapter Five
covers the years 1123–6, which focus on the potential gains and pitfalls of client
management in this period. At this time, John involved himself in the affairs of
Turks, Serbs, and Hungarians while battling the Venetians over trading privileges.
He ended up overextending his resources, and was forced temporarily to abandon
some of his initiatives in order to salvage his position. John’s decision to focus on
the Balkans led to war with Hungary as well as with the Serb prince of Raška; this
1127–9 conflict is covered in Chapter Six. John’s victory there settled the Balkans,
such that he could return to Anatolia in the 1130s. Anatolia is therefore the focus
of Chapter Seven, although John’s engagement in this region was as much driven
by his brother Isaac’s attempted coup as any vision of reconquest. Both old and
new dynamics were, however, at play with regards John’s greatest campaign dur-
ing the years 1136–9, when he conquered Cilicia and brought his battle-hardened
army to the Levant and Syria. His successes and failures in this region resulted in
an even more intense set of campaigns from 1140–3, which took John from the
rugged mountains of northern Anatolia to the lakes of the central plateau and
then back to the Levant, before his sudden death left his designs stillborn.
Despite this sudden end to John’s life, the two final chapters of this investiga-
tion look deeper into what the emperor was able to achieve, and the scope of his
plans for both his empire and his church. Chapter Ten examines John’s fortifica-
tion building programme and how that led to the re-establishment of secure
Byzantine provinces in Anatolia in particular. Coupled with this, it takes a closer
look at John’s army and its successes. Chapter Eleven finally turns to ecclesiastical
history, highlighting that for all of John’s campaigning he also poured resources
into philanthropic, legal and ecumenical initiatives that attest to both his personal
piety and hint at further objectives had he lived out his last years in Constantinople.
These last two chapters draw on material from John’s entire reign, and they point
ahead to the conclusion of the book, where this previously overshadowed
emperor can at last be brought into the light.
Across the book as a whole, we come to appreciate how John rebuilt New Rome
on the battlefield, in the landscape, and in the capital city. He did this through
campaigning and the construction of a network of fortifications and monasteries;

with these achievements he left his mark on the ideology of crusading, the icon
ography of imperial coinage, and in the positive judgement he received from both
his own court and many outside his realm. We can also acknowledge that his
ambitions stretched yet further, even if imperfectly accomplished: the encircle-
ment of the Anatolian plateau and further territorial gains in the west, and the
advancement of ecumenical relations and legal reform bold initiatives that were
first delayed by his missteps, and which were then left incomplete at his early
death. His reign was therefore just as dynamic as any of his contemporaries, and it
is only as memories faded, and New Rome with it, that his legacy became obscured.
One
Sources
Problems and Opportunities
‘We are not served well by Byzantine historians on John.’1 This judgement is true
of both medieval and modern Byzantine historians, and yet it is overly pessimistic.
By including evidence that is not Byzantine, not by historians, and even that
which is ostensibly not concerned with John, we can discover that this period is
far richer than the ‘half-hearted’ presentation it often receives.
The lack of a major unifying source on John, such as Anna’s Alexiad for Alexios,
or Choniates and Kinnamos’ accounts for Manuel, actually permits us to see the
wood through the trees more easily. When flaws or falsehoods emerge, other
sources can act as crucial controls: the viability of the historical accounts can be
tested by reading them alongside texts written by authors who were not histor
ians, accounts from outside the Byzantine sphere, and non-textual evidence bases.
This chapter will therefore introduce and re-evaluate the sources on John’s reign,
beginning with the problems and opportunities in the Greek histories, before
turning to the controls we have on them.
Working through Choniates and Kinnamos
These histories are far from neutral accounts conveniently passing on to us what
occurred. Rather, they were written to convey their authors’ views to readers, as
works of literature in their own right rather than historical records.2 However,
once the authors’ agendas are acknowledged along with the literary nature of the
texts themselves, these histories can still be very useful in assessing John’s reign,
especially when read together with other sources.
Although there are a few short chronicles that give yearly notes on John’s reign,
for those who want to investigate the twelfth century in more detail, the first stop
has to be the seemingly comprehensive History of Niketas Choniates, whose last
name derives from Chonai, the town of his birth in Anatolia (though he may also

2 Cf. M. Lau, ‘Rewriting the 1120s: Chronology and Crisis under John II Komnenos’, Making and
Remaking Byzantium, Limes Plus Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities (Belgrade, 2016), pp. 87–91.
Emperor John II Komnenos: Rebuilding New Rome 1118–1143. Maximilian C. G. Lau, Oxford University Press.
© Maximilian C. G. Lau 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198888673.003.0002
have borne the family name of Akominatos).3 Choniates served as a tax official
from around 1180, and though he resigned as an imperial secretary under
Emperor Andronikos I Komnenos (r.1183–5), he returned under Isaac II Angelos
(r.1185–95) rising through several positions before becoming logothetes ton sekre-
ton, among the highest bureaucratic positions, as we shall see in the next chapter.4
His twenty-one book history of the empire from 1118 to 1206 was written in three
drafts: the first under Alexios III Angelos (r.1195–1203), the second shortly after-
wards and then final edits were carried out around a decade later, when he joined
other Constantinopolitan exiles in Nicaea after the fall of the capital to the forces
of the Fourth Crusade.5 There are drawbacks to his account of John’s reign: first,
that only one book of the total twenty-one deals specifically with John, and sec-
ond, that each draft of Choniates’ History was composed in an ever-diminishing
empire, with the final one written from exile, with Choniates’ life as a formerly
rich and prestigious civil servant now in ruins.6 Thus, his writings increasingly
had to explain how both his own life and the empire had come to such dire straits.
John’s reign therefore appears in his work as a distant golden age from which
everything declined. Choniates is consequently fairly free with his chronology
and descriptions in order to present John in the best possible light.7 The third
3 The name Akominatos derives from the manuscript tradition, for discussion of this possibility,
see: J. L. van Dieten, Niketas Choniates: Erläuterungen zu den Reden und Briefen nebst einer Biographie
(Berlin, 1971, repr 2012), pp. 4–8.
4 A. Kazhdan and S. Franklin, ‘Nicetas Choniates and Others: Aspects of the Art of Literature’,
Studies on Byzantine Literature of the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries, ed. iidem (Cambridge, 1984),
pp. 256–7.
5 NC, pp. VII-CV; A. Kazhdan, ‘Der Körper im Geschichtswerk des Niketas Choniates’, Fest und
Alltag in Byzanz, ed. G. Prinzing and D. Simon (Munich 1990), pp. 91–105; A. Simpson, ‘Introduction’,
Niketas Choniates A Historian and Writer, ed. A. Simpson, and S. Efthymiadis (Geneva, 2009), p. 16;
R. Maisano, ‘Varianti d’autore in Niceta Coniata?’, Problemi di ecdotica e esegesi di testi bizantini e
grecomedievali, ed. R. Romano (Naples, 1994), pp. 63–80; A. Simpson, ‘Before and After 1204: The
Versions of Niketas Choniates’ Historia’, DOP 60 (2006), pp. 189–221; J. Niehoff- Panagiotidis,
‘Narrative Bewältigungsstrategien von Katastrophenerfahrungen: Das Geschichswerk des Nikitas
Choniatis’, Klio 92/1 (2010), pp. 170–210; A. Simpson, Niketas Choniates: a historiographical study
(Oxford, 2014), p. 2, 68–77; Simpson, ‘Niketas Choniates’, Franks and Crusades in Medieval Eastern
Christian Historiography, ed. A. Mallett (Turnhout, 2021), pp. 93–124.
6 A. Kaldellis, ‘Paradox, Reversal and the Meaning of History’, Niketas Choniates A Historian and
Writer, ed. A. Simpson and S. Efthymiadis (Geneva, 2009), pp. 75–99; Efthymiadis, ‘Introduction’,
Niketas Choniates A Historian and Writer, p. 45; Kazhdan et al, NC, XLI–XLII; L. Neville, Heroes and
Romans in Twelfth-Century Byzantium: The Material for History of Nikephoros Bryennios (Cambridge,
2012), p. 22; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 11–14; B. Garcia, ‘Politics, History and Rhetoric: On the
Structure of the First Book of Niketas Choniates’ History’, Byzantinoslavica 56 (1995), pp. 423–8;
Simpson, ‘Before and After 1204’, pp. 189–221; Simpson, Niketas Choniates, pp. 2–3, 68–77; L. Neville,
Guide to Byzantine Historical Writing (Cambridge, 2018), p. 220. Urbainczyk disagrees with the view
that Choniates presents John as the perfect emperor, noting how Choniates goes out of his way to cast
suspicion on John’s succession in particular, cf. Chapter Two. Urbainczyk, Writing about Byzantium:
Niketas Choniates, pp. 122, 130, 315. Stouraitis’ focus is on John’s wars, remarking that Choniates’ judge-
ment was not based merely on the success of his territorial conquests, but on his ‘ability to maintain the
internal coherence of the imperial system’. Stouraitis, ‘Narratives of John II Komnenos’ Wars’, esp. p. 31.
7 This appears in deliberate contrast to his respect for chronology in the rest of his work, which he
stresses in what may be a deliberate criticism of Kinnamos, see below and: Simpson, Niketas Choniates,
pp. 135–6.
Sources: Problems and Opportunities 11
disadvantage is that the passage of forty to sixty years between the events and the
time of writing limited the sources available to Choniates and their value is some-
times questionable. It is hard to believe his claim that he interviewed soldiers who
had campaigned with John, although, given the full accounts of some of the later
campaigns, we should not entirely discount use of military sources of some sort.8
Otherwise, his text is reminiscent of the so-called ‘rhetorical’ court sources, which
is both a strength and a weakness, as will be discussed below.9
Finally, there is what may be termed a twist, which results from the literary
character of Choniates’ history. The large number of surviving manuscripts (43)
suggests that it was a popular work. This may mean that rather than being viewed as
simply a work of history full of errors and one-sided portrayals, it can also be seen
as a meticulously researched and vibrant politico-historical novel set at John’s court,
written by someone from the next generation.10 Choniates’ purpose, like Tolstoy’s
in War and Peace, may have been to provide insights into the functioning of society
and the state from the perspective of a man who lived half a century on. Certainly,
as has been argued recently, Choniates’ writings can be shown to cast fresh light on
the court and the wider world of Byzantium in the second quarter of the twelfth
century, especially when they are used in conjunction with other works.11
Before the literary turn in historical source criticism, the conventional response
when faced by the shortcomings of Choniates as a historian would have been to
compare his History with John Kinnamos’ Epitome, in the hope of obtaining some
form of historical truth. Although care is needed in undertaking such compari-
sons, there is something to this approach. For Kinnamos’ portrayal of John is
often at odds with that of Choniates: where Choniates’ portrayal of John is often
overly flattering, Kinnamos’ narrative can veer into open criticism.
8 NC, p. 4; Simpson, Niketas Choniates, p. 139; W. Treadgold, The Middle Byzantine Historians
(London, 2013), pp. 412–13.
9 Simpson, Niketas Choniates, pp. 131–5, 223; Maisano, ‘Tipologia delle fonti di Niceta Coniata’,
pp. 394–5.
10 On surviving manuscripts see: Simpson, ‘Before and After 1204’, pp. 189–221. Maisano,
‘Varianti d’autore in Niceta Coniata?’, pp. 63–80; Niehoff-Panagiotidis, ‘Narrative Bewältigungsstrategien’,
pp. 170–210. On the ‘shortcomings’ of Choniates as a historian, see: C. Brand, Byzantium Confronts
the West, 1180–1204 (Cambridge MA, 1968), p. 113; H. Hunger, Die hochsprachliche profane Literatur
der Byzantiner I (Munich, 1978), p. 437; Magdalino, Manuel, pp. 1–26; Magdalino, ‘Prophecy and
Divination in the History’, Niketas Choniates: A Historian and a writer, ed. A. Simpson, and
S. Efthymiadis (Geneva, 2009), pp. 59–74. On its value as literature, see: Kazhdan and Franklin,
‘Nicetas Choniates and Others’, pp. 256–86.
11 R-J. Lilie, ‘Reality and Invention: Reflections on Byzantine Historiography’, DOP 68 (2012), pp.
157–210, see particularly pp. 159–60, ns.9, 10 and 11; W. Treadgold, ‘The Unwritten Rules for Writing
Byzantine History’, Proceedings of the 23rd International Congress of Byzantine Studies Belgrade, 22–27
August 2016 Plenary Papers (Belgrade, 2016), pp. 277–92; A. Kaldellis, ‘The Manufacture of History in
the Later Tenth and Eleventh Centuries: Rhetorical Templates and Narrative Ontologies’, Proceedings
of the 23rd International Congress of Byzantine Studies Belgrade, 22–27 August 2016 Plenary Papers
(Belgrade, 2016), pp. 293–306, particularly n. 2. Also see: R. Macrides (ed.), History as Literature in
Byzantium (Farnham, 2010). Vilimonović makes the same argument in her recent study on the
Alexiad, also drawing on Lilie. Further discussion below, L. Vilimonović, Notes, Structures and Features
of Anna Komnene’s Alexiad: Emergence of a Personal History (Amsterdam, 2019), esp. pp. 27–9.
John Kinnamos, born c.1143, was an imperial secretary who accompanied

Emperor Manuel I on campaign.12 His Epitome covers the years 1118–76 and is a
biography of Manuel, with John’s reign forming a prelude. As such, it suffers from
the same basic problem as Choniates’ history. John’s reign is again presented in
summary form, but, in contrast to Choniates’ account, the tone is often critical, as
the true hero is Manuel who always surpasses his father.13 Incidentally, there is
every possibility that Choniates had read Kinnamos’ work, and produced his
positive portrayal of John as a deliberate reaction against it.14 Although Kinnamos,
writing nearer the time, could certainly have spoken to more people who were
participants or eyewitnesses, he like Choniates appears to have used panegyrical
material from John’s court, with both works evoking such literature in distinct
sections of their texts, especially in descriptions of John’s military triumphs.15
This suggests that one way of slipping the shackles imposed by both these histor
ians may be to read them alongside court rhetorical sources and documentary
evidence.
Some mentions of John’s early life are also to be found in the works of the his
torians of John’s father, Alexios: Anna Komnene and John Zonaras. Both were in
prime positions to witness the events of 1118 at the end of Alexios’ reign, with
Zonaras serving as protasekretis (a combined legal-chancery role, as discussed in
the next chapter) while Anna tells us she served food to her dying father around
this time.16 Zonaras retired some time after the death of Alexios, becoming a
12 JK, pp. 4–5; C. Hobbs, ‘John II Kinnamos’, Franks and Crusades in Medieval Eastern Christian
Historiography, ed. A. Mallett (Turnhout, 2021), pp. 65–7.
13 JK, p. 1. C. Neumann, Griechische Geschichtsschreiber und Geschichtsquellen im zwölften
Jahrhundert: Studien zu Anna Comnena, Theod. Prodromus, Joh. Cinnamus (Leipzig, 1888), pp. 79–80,
100–1; P. Stephenson, ‘John Cinnamus, John II Comnenus, and the Hungarian Campaign of
1127–1129’, Byzantion 66 (1996), pp. 177–87; Neville, Historical Writing, p. 186; Hobbs, ‘John
Kinnamos’, pp. 12–13. Treadgold, Middle Byzantine Historians, pp. 410–11, 279–80. Though it has
been suggested the text could have been abridged, Hobbs notes that Kinnamos specifically tells us he
is relating John’s reign ‘ἐν κεφαλίῳ’, in summary, as the writer was not knowledgeable about the reign
as a good historian should be, therefore it seems likely that the text we have is the complete text.
14 Stathakopoulos is keen to point out that Kinnamos’ portrayal of John as ‘sometimes prone to
anger’ and ‘pious’ are, nevertheless, ‘trivial facts’ in comparison to Anna Komnene’s fuller character
izations in her Alexiad. Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, p. 2; Treadgold, Middle Byzantine
Historians, pp. 237–8, 412–13; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 13–14; Hobbs, ‘John Kinnamos’, p. 6.
15 On campaign rhetoric, see: M. Lau, ‘The Power of Poetry: Portraying the Expansion of the
Empire under John II Komnenos’, Landscapes of Power—Selected Papers from the XV Oxford University
Byzantine Society International Graduate Conference, ed. M. Lau, C. Franchi, and M. Di Rodi (Oxford,
2014), pp. 195–214; Lau, ‘Rewriting History at the Court of the Komnenoi: Processes and Practices’,
Rewriting History in the Central Middle Ages, 900–1300, ed. E. Winkler and C. Lewis (Turnhout,
2022), pp. 121–47. Simpson’s textual and historiographical summary on whether Choniates had
read Kinnamos can be found at: Simpson, Niketas Choniates, p. 215, n. 4 in particular, in addition to
pp. 215–18 for the reign of John in particular, and pp. 220–3 on later reigns; supported in
Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, p. 2. On the triumphs, see: Prodromos, III, V, and VI; JK,
pp. 13–14; NC, pp. 18–19. For full discussion of the triumph, see: Lau, ‘Power of Poetry’, and
P. Magdalino, ‘The Triumph of 1133’, John II Komnenos, Emperor of Byzantium: In the Shadow of
Father and Son, ed. A. Bucossi and A. Rodriguez Suarez (Abingdon, 2016), pp. 53–70.
16 Zonaras was a judge and held the positions of Droungarios tes Viglas and Protoasekretis under
Alexios, ODB, p. 2229; R. Macrides and P. Magdalino, ‘The Fourth Kingdom and the Rhetoric of
monk in the monastery of St Glykeria where he wrote his Epitome Historion,

covering the entirety of history, from creation until 1118.17 Although it has been
suggested that he may have opposed John’s accession, and that his resignation or
dismissal was the direct result of John’s success in assuming full imperial power,
Zonaras himself tells us that he became a monk after his wife died, and in his
account he has Alexios clearly name John as the purple-born Autokrator, rather
than Anna’s possibly more ambiguous ‘successor’.18 He provides independent evi-
dence about Alexios’ last years, though he does not discuss John’s relationship
with his sister Anna.
John is barely mentioned in the Alexiad, and never by name. A few passages
are usually (but not always) viewed as indicating deep antagonism. In particular,
Anna’s description of her father’s deeds has been taken to be veiled criticism of
John and Manuel’s policies.19 Anna’s hostility is viewed as deriving from her sup-
posed involvement in unsuccessful coups against her brother in 1118 and 1119,
and the bitterness she is alleged to have harboured for many years.20
Hellenism’, The Perceptions of the Past in the Twelfth-Century Europe, ed. P. Magdalino (London, 1992),
p. 127; R. Macrides, ‘Nomos and Kanon, on Paper and in Court’, Church and People in Byzantium, ed.
R. Morris (Birmingham, 1986), pp. 72–3; Neville, Historical Writing, p. 192; AK, 15.11, pp. 494–5. On
the varying opinions of Anna’s sources, see: K. Sinclair, ‘Anna Komnene and Her Sources for Military
Affairs in the Alexiad’, Estudios bizantinos 2 (2014), pp. 179–83; P. Frankopan, ‘Aristocratic Family
Narratives in Twelfth- century Byzantium’, Reading in the Byzantine Empire and Beyond, ed.
T. Shawcross and I. Toth (Cambridge, 2018), pp. 317–35.
17 C. Mango, ‘Twelfth-Century Notices from cod. Christ Church Gr. 53’, JÖB 42 (1992), pp. 221–8;
see: Treadgold, Middle Byzantine Historians, pp. 388–99. On the date of the text, a terminus ante quem
of 1150 is suggested based on the Alexiad being written by Anna in response to Zonaras’ work, while a
terminus post quem has also been suggested by Macrides based on a scholion to canon 7 of the council
of Neakaisareia regarding an emperor’s second marriage, implying he wrote after Manuel was remar-
ried in 1161. This is in addition to several phrases implying that Alexios’ policies were still in place
after ‘succeeding generations’ which also suggests a later date. See: RP III, p. 80; Zonaras, 18.22, p. 741;
R. Macrides, ‘The Pen and the Sword: Who Wrote the Alexiad?’, Anna Komnene and Her Times, ed.
T. Gouma-Petersen (New York, 2000), p. 73; Neville, Historical Writing, pp. 193–4; N. Matheou, ‘City
and Sovereignty in East Roman Thought, c.1000–1200. Ioannes Zonaras’ Historical Vision for the
Roman State’, The City and the Cities, ed. N. Matheou, L. Bondioli and T. Kampianaki (Leiden, 2016),
p. 42, n. 4; Vilimonović, Structures and Features, pp. 63–8.
18 K. Ziegler, ‘Zonaras’, Paulys Realencylopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft X A.1 (1972),
cols 720–1; Mango, ‘Twelfth-Century Notices’, pp. 221–2 and 226–7; T. Banchich and E. Lane, The
History of Zonaras: From Alexander Severus to the Death of Theodosius the Great (Oxford, 2009), pp. 3–7.
Neville, Historical Writing, p. 193; A. Karpozilos, Vyzantinoi historikoi kai chronographoi III (Athens,
1997), p. 467; Treadgold, Middle Byzantine Historians, pp. 389–92. On the successor issue: ‘ὁ τῆς
βασιλείας διάδοχος’, AK, 15.11, pp. 497–8; Vilimonović, Structures and Features, p. 317. Further dis-
cussion in Chapter Three.
19 P. Magdalino, ‘The Pen of the Aunt: Echoes of the Mid-Twelfth Century in the Alexiad’, Anna
Komnene and Her Times, ed. T. Gouma-Petersen (New York, 2000), pp. 15–44; contra: Treadgold,
Middle Byzantine Historians, pp. 384–5. See also: J. Shepard, ‘Anna Komnene as a Source for the
Crusades’, Franks and Crusades in Medieval Eastern Christian Historiography, ed. A. Mallett (Turnhout,
2021), pp. 25–64. The first comment on this relationship was likely Chalandon, Jean II, p. 4; but this
opinion has been echoed since. See: L. Neville, Anna Komnene: The Life and Work of a Medieval
Historian (Oxford, 2016), p. 141, n. 1.
20 For the recent argument that Anna’s hatred has been overstated, see: Neville, Anna Komnene,
esp. pp. 101, 114, 153–74. Contra: G. Buckler, Anna Comnena: A Study (London, 1929), p. 249;
C. Diehl, Byzantine Empresses (New York, 1963), p. 185; M. Hatzaki, ‘The Good, the Bad, and the
Contemporary Court Sources
The first, and highly significant, supplementary texts are works of rhetorical char-
acter, written primarily in or for the court, in verse and prose. As occasional
pieces, produced for immediate consumption, they are useful controls on the his-
tories written long afterwards, but they are undoubtedly tendentious, their aim
being to celebrate the emperor and his regime. They are also inclined to suppress
or downplay unpleasant truths, and to magnify any successes. However, they con-
vey the messages that the authorities wished to broadcast at the time, initially to
the court, and through the court to the wider world. They act then as time cap-
sules, transmitting political messages that allow us to take the political pulse of
the regime and, thus, assess what John and his government were attempting to
accomplish. The overt bias is therefore profoundly useful in assessing these con-
temporary messages, as well as filling in various gaps in the accounts of Choniates
and Kinnamos.21
Their role was not that played by modern press releases, but they were more
akin to comment pieces in newspapers and magazines. They embroidered official
reports, rendering them into ornate, erudite verse and prose, thick with clas
sical, biblical, and historical similes, with messages and forms tailored to spe-
cific audiences.22 But beneath the surface and behind the overt thrust of these
writings, there may be detected material derived from contemporary official
documents, referring to specific events and policies, providing us with contem-
porary information we could not otherwise obtain.23 The most useful docu-
ments would have been dispatches sent by the emperor from the field, and the
court circulars issued to officialdom, though unfortunately none of these sur-
vives. Both had vital political functions, sustaining the emperor’s authority at
home, and reassuring those far from the battlefield that all was well.
Ugly’, A Companion to Byzantium, ed. L. James (Malden, 2010), p. 97; V. Stanković, ‘Lest We Forget:
History Writing in Byzantium of the Komnenoi and the Use of Memories’, Memory and Oblivion in
Byzantium, ed. A. Milanova and V. Vatchkova (Sofia, 2011), p. 65; W. Treadgold, ‘Review of
Leonora Neville, Anna Komnene, The Life and Work of a Medieval Historian’, Medioevo Greco 17
(2017), pp. 516–17; Shepard, ‘Anna Komnena as a Source for the Crusades’, esp. pp. 8–11;
Stanković, Komnini u Carigradu, pp. 198–223; Vilimonović, Structure and Features, passim, esp.
pp. 79, 101, 118–194, 266, 325–8, 340–2; Carr, Komnene Dynasty, p. 5.
22 See Chapter Seven, and Lau, ‘Power of Poetry’, pp. 195–214; Lau, ‘Rewriting History at the Court
of the Komnenoi’, pp. 121–47.
23 W. Hörandner, ‘Zur kommunikativen Funktion byzantinischer Gedichte’, XVIII Mezdunarodnyj
̌
kongress vizantinistov. Plenarnye doklady, ed. I. Ševcenko and G. Litavrin (Moscow, 1991), pp. 94–7;
A. Kazhdan and S. Franklin, ‘Theodore Prodromos: A Reappraisal’, Studies on Byzantine Literature of the
Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries (Cambridge, 1984), p. 106. See also: M. Mullett, ‘Did Byzantium Have a
Court Literature?’, The Byzantine Court: Source of Power and Culture, ed. A. Odekan, N. Necipoğlou,
and E. Akyurek (Istanbul, 2013), pp. 173–82; M. Lau, ‘Power of Poetry’, pp. 195–214; N. Zagklas, ‘ “How
Many Verses Shall I Write and Say?”: Poetry in the Komnenian Period (1081–1204)’, A Companion to
Byzantine Poetry, ed. W. Hörandner, A. Rhoby and N. Zagklas (Leiden, 2019), pp. 237–63.
Regarding the latter, the Alexiad relates one specific example of Alexios send-
ing messages from the battlefield, while personal letters from our principal
rhetors to officials on campaign remark on the process of receiving dispatches
and converting them into poetry.24 Michael Italikos tells us that he was ‘publish-
ing’ or ‘broadcasting’ [δημοσιεύων] the emperor’s struggles, both to report on the
emperor’s deeds and to fire up support for the regime.25 Theodore Prodromos
remarks that many were working on poems but he had finished his first, implying
that speed of propagation was also important.26 Nikephoros Basilakes and Italikos
contend that by celebrating John’s deeds in grand style they make those achieve-
ments even greater.27 It is equally noteworthy that three long rhetorical works for
John’s great eastern expedition to Cilicia and Syria by three different authors all
survive, demonstrating how John maintained connections and support in the
capital, despite being away for so long. Indeed, the effects of John’s deeds outside
the capital appear to have mattered first and foremost in how these deeds would
be received in the political theatre of Constantinople.28 Beyond the capital, there
is also clear evidence that these texts helped disseminate news and views in the
provinces. The letter networks of Prodromos and Italikos attest that literati lived
in other major cities, such as Trebizond and Philippopolis (though these literati
often complain that they missed the intellectual life of the capital), and one par-
ticular letter maintains that Prodromos’ poems were read in Philippopolis at
least.29 Correspondingly, there is a speech by Eustathios of Thessalonike in 1191
that was delivered to the Emperor Isaac II Angelos at Philippopolis, where he
mentions that after returning to his see he will announce the victory to the people
24 AK 14.6, p. 449. In the ninth century there was also the rebellious general Thomas the Slav who
sent letters around Anatolia to tell of his victories, see: John Skylitzes, Ioannis Scylitzae Synopsis
Historiarum, ed. H. Thurn (Berlin, 1973), p. 36.
25 Italikos 40 and 42, pp. 232 and 257, respectively; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 313–14.
26 Prodromos, ‘Τοῦ αὐτοῦ τῷ λογοθέτῃ’ (Letter 15), tr. M. Op de Coul, Théodore Prodrome Lettres et
Discours: Édition, Traduction, Commentaire (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Paris IV,
2007), pp. 125–6; Prodromos, XIX, lines 1–10.
27 Basilakes, Or. 1, p. 54, lines 19–22; Italikos 40, p. 232.
28 Cf. Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 419–34; Papageorgiou, John II Komnenos; Lau, ‘Power of
Poetry’, pp. 195–214, and Lau, ‘Ioannoupolis: Lopadion as “City” and Military Headquarters under
Emperor Ioannes II Komnenos’, From Constantinople to the Frontier: The City and the Cities ed.
N.S.M. Matheou, T. Kampianaki and L.M. Bondioli (Leiden, 2016), pp. 435–64.
29 See Prodromos, LXXIX for Prodromos’ verses where he considers leaving the capital and joining
his teacher Stephen Skylitzes there if he cannot find work soon. Prodromos also writes a letter to his
teacher expressing the same sentiment: Theodore Prodromos, ‘Τῷ μητροπολίτῃ Τραπεζοῦντος’ (Letter 5),
tr. Op de Coul, Théodore Prodrome Lettres et Discours, pp. 94–100; commentary: pp. 302–7. The letter
where Italikos mentions he heard the poems: Italikos 1, p. 64. Cf. S. Papaioannou, ‘Language Games,
Not the Soul’s Beliefs: Michael Italikos to Theodoros Prodromos, on Friendship and Writing’,
Byzantinische Sprachkunst. Studien zur byzantinischen Literatur gewidmet Wolfram Hörandner zum 65.
Geburtstag (byzantinisches Archiv 20), ed. M. Hinterberger and E. Schiffer (Munich, 2007), pp. 223−224;
W. Hörandner, ‘Zur kommunikativen Funktion byzantinischer Gedichte’, pp. 104–18. Zagklas,
Prodromos, p. 59.
of Thessalonike too.30 As such, it appears likely that either Constantinopolitan

orations and poems were distributed to the provinces too, or local rhetors con-
veyed their own versions of the news from public or private communiqués.
Such correspondence highlights the fact that beyond the texts specifically
addressed to the emperor, the court, and the people of Constantinople, we have
more personal poems, letters, and even some satires, novels, commentaries, epi-
grams, and prayers to draw from as well. The intended audiences of such texts
include those attending theatra: literary salons or other performance venues such
as churches or palaces at which rhetors performed. These were often patronized
by aristocrats, such as John’s mother Eirene, his sister Anna and her husband
Nikephoros Bryennios.31 This setting would have included not only courtiers but
also lower ranked civil and ecclesiastical officials and scholars. Some of these texts
(schedoi) would also have been used in a teaching setting.32 Therefore, though
many of these poems and letters have an identifiable recipient, texts were written
as literary exercises as well.
To introduce the rhetors and their works, the exemplar par excellence is
Theodore Prodromos, whom recent scholarship has acclaimed the ‘poet laure-
ate’ of his day, though it must be acknowledged that he declared this role for
himself as well as having it ascribed to him by others.33 His life is only known
through his work, where we can track how he began writing in the service of
John’s mother, Eirene, in the 1120s before being taken on by John’s regime in
the 1130s, having a lean period in the 1140s when he considered moving to
Trebizond, before writing again for Manuel. During this period he was prodi-
gious, he produced more than 17,000 verses in multiple genres, from satire to
classical commentary.34 Of particular relevance besides his learning was that he
was not a cleric, and so supported himself by teaching when he had no commis-
sions, though he is also known for a number of so-called ‘begging poems’.35
30 Eustathios of Thessalonike, Opuscula, ed. T. Tafel (Frankfurt-am-Main, 1832, repr. Amsterdam,

1964), p. 45; Roskilly, Les évêques et leur autorité, p. 370.
31 On their particular literary activities, see: Chapters Two and Three. On theatra in general, see:
M. Mullett, ‘Aristocracy and Patronage in the Literary Circles of Comnenian Constantinople’, The
Byzantine Aristocracy from IX to XIII Centuries, ed. M. Angold (Oxford, 1984), pp. 173–201.
32 See Zagklas, Prodromos, pp. 73–87.
33 M. Lauxtermann, ‘The Velocity of Pure Iambs: Byzantine Observations on the Metre and
Rhythm of the Dodecasyllable’, JÖB 48 (1998), p. 13. For the most detailed recent analysis and full
historiography of Prodromos’ work, see: N. Zagklas, Theodore Prodromos: The Neglected Poems and
Epigrams (Edition, Commentary and Translation) (unpublished doctoral thesis, Vienna, 2014),
pp. 52–7. For his personal declaration of office, see: M. Bazzani, ‘The Historical Poems of Theodore
Prodromos, the Epic- Homeric Revival and the Crisis of Intellectuals in the Twelfth Century’,
Byzantinoslavica 65 (2007), pp. 214–18.
34 Zagklas, Prodromos, p. 52, 58–72, esp. p. 63 for the three stages of Prodromos’ life, based upon
the work of Hörandner, whose study is still the primary edition for Prodromos’ poetry, see: Prodromos,
pp. 21–35, and also Bazzani, ‘Historical Poems of Prodromos’, pp. 211–14; E. Jeffreys, Four Byzantine
Novels (Liverpool, 2012), pp. 3–7.
35 Ibid. H. Eideneier, Ptochoprodromos (Cologne, 1991), I–IV; R. Bouchet, Satires et parodies du
Moyen Âge grec (Paris, 2012), pp. 3–47. See in particular: Zagklas, Prodromos, pp. 66–7; Bazzani,
‘Historical Poems of Prodromos’, p. 225; P. Agapitos, ‘New Genres in the Twelfth Century: The
Schedourgia of Theodore Prodromos’, Medioevo Greco 15 (2015), pp. 1–41.
These ostensibly asked for money and patronage, but are in fact part of a genre
which satirizes the ideas that a person of his sort would have to beg for money.36
Overall, Prodromos’ court writings are most useful for reconstructing John’s
reign regarding the events of the 1130s and 1140s when he often wrote multiple
works for each campaign, specifically the poems numbered I to XXIX, and these
poems are themselves supported by a handful of letters, especially those to his
friend Michael Italikos.
This brings us to Italikos himself, and his clerical colleague Nikephoros
Basilakes, both of whom served the emperor alongside their ecclesiastical careers.
Italikos’ life can be accurately tracked through his letters in particular, as though
he too began his career in the theatron, and therefore household, of the Empress
Eirene (as one of Prodromos’ teachers), he also served as John’s envoy to Rome
in either 1126 or 1137.37 Though we do not know exactly what this embassy
concerned—it was perhaps part of the extensive theological debates that took
place across this period between Rome and Constantinople—one of Italikos’
many promotions can likely be attributed to success on this mission. In 1130,
he was named didaskalos (literally: teacher, though closer to a professor) of the
doctors—a secular appointment—before being promoted at some point to the
ecclesiastical didaskalos of the Psalms, from which he was further promoted to
didaskalos of the Epistles in c.1136.38 Perhaps due to appeals for promotion in
other letters, he was named didaskalos of the Gospels by Patriarch Leo Stypes in
1142, before being made Bishop of Philippopolis, where he was given the specific
task of stamping out heresy around the time of John’s death in 1143.39 He remained
a servant of Emperor Manuel after this, as he was involved in negotiations with the
36 M. Alexiou, ‘The Poverty of Écriture and the Craft of Writing: Towards a Reappraisal of the
Prodromic Poems’, BMGS 10 (1986), pp. 1–40; R. Beaton, ‘The Rhetoric of Poverty: The Lives and
Opinions of Theodore Prodromos’, BMGS 11 (1987), pp. 1–28; Kazhdan and Franklin, ‘Theodore
Prodromos: A Reappraisal’, pp. 23–86; I. Nilsson, ‘Komnenian Literature’, Byzantine Culture Papers from
the Conference ‘Byzantine Days of Istanbul’ May 21–23 2010, ed. D. Sakel (Istanbul, 2015), p. 129;
M. Janssen and M. Lauxtermann, ‘Authorship Revisited: Language and Metre in the Ptochoprodromika’,
Reading in the Byzantine Empire and Beyond, ed. R. Shawcross and I. Toth (Cambridge, 2018), pp. 558–84.
37 Italikos 1 and 23, pp. 64–5 and 173–175, respectively, if the later date is used then Italikos might
have been the ‘philosopher’ sent to the western Emperor Lothar in 1137 to debate theological and
ecclesiological issues, mentioned in the ‘Chronica Monasterii Casinensis’, ed. H. Hoffmann, MGH SS
34 (Hannover, 1980), p. 590; Prodromos, p. 25; Roskilly, Les évêques et leur autorité, pp. 74–5.
38 Italikos 33 and 10, pp. 209–210, 124–5, respectively. Whether his first position refers to doctors
of the church or doctors of medicine is unknown, though ‘ἰατροί’ is taken to mean medical doctors in
contemporary texts.
39 Italikos 37 and 10, pp. 222–4 and 118–25. Italikos’ mission as bishop to root out heresy is referenced
in a letter to him from Theodore Prodromos on his appointment. This highlights the interconnectivity of
those academics in imperial service, both clerics and laymen, with Prodromos too also writing letters to
figures in the imperial administration such as Meles: Op de Coul, Théodore Prodrome Lettres et Discours,
Letters 2, 15, 24 in particular, pp. 81–82, 125–6, 149–51. Roskilly suggests that Italikos may have been
made a bishop just after the deaths of John and Patriarch Leo Styppeiotes, as either Manuel or the new
Patriarch Michael II Kourkouas would have wanted to install their own favourites to these positions.
However, considering a bishopric was the end goal of most of these didaskaloi, it was likely only a matter
of time before Italikos was given a see anyway. See Chapter Fourteen and Roskilly, Les évêques et leur
autorité, p. 84. Also see Roskilly, p. 65, for Italikos’ career in general.
Germans of the Second Crusade, which in itself demonstrates the symbiotic rela-
tionship between an ecclesiastical career and a career in imperial service.40 In
addition to a number of letters to officials and friends, some of whom were on
campaign with John and which discuss the news of the day, he also wrote a few
formal orations, with one on John’s great eastern campaign being especially
informative.
Basilakes’ career, on the other hand, was less successful. He first appears as an
imperial notary and then didaskalos of the Apostles in c.1140, and he is later
recorded as didaskalos of the Epistles in 1157, although given that these two
offices were of similar rank, it appears that his career did not progress far in
almost twenty years. At this synod of 1157, he was also accused of heresy, and
though found innocent, he also went to Philippopolis afterwards.41 Like Italikos,
his principal value for an investigation of John’s reign is his lengthy oration on the
emperor’s great eastern campaign, but there are also orations to megas domestikos
[commander-in-chief] John Axouch and John’s cousin Adrian, later to be known
as Archbishop John IV of Ohrid (in office c.1143–60), both of which give unique
insights into their lives and careers. Beyond these three rhetors, as with Zonaras
and Anna there are a few authors principally known as sources for other emperors
that can throw some light on John reign. The life of Archbishop Theophylact of
Ohrid (c.1055–1126), a man later renowned for his biblical commentaries, is
known through his extensive correspondence. From this, we find him master of
rhetors and then didaskalos of the Gospels before he became Archbishop in 1089,
and within his correspondence he mentions the doctor and scholar Nicholas
Kallikles.42 The latter is mentioned in the Alexiad as being one of the few compe-
tent doctors to tend to the dying Alexios, though we know little else of his life
beyond his writings.43 He composed an epitaph for John’s wife, an encomium for
new decorations commissioned by John for the Blachernai Palace, which were
perhaps carried alongside the building of new living quarters, and an epigram for
a renovated icon John donated to the Pantokrator monastery.44 Theophylact
meanwhile gives us an oration to Alexios on John’s birth, and his writings on the
40 Odo of Deuil, De profectione Ludovici VII in orientem, ed. V. G. Berry (New York, 1948), p. 42;
NC, p. 63.
41 A. Pignani, Niceforo Basilace, Progimnasmi e monodie (Naples, 1983), pp. 235–52; On his heresy
trial see: I. Sakellion, ‘Τόμος συνοδικός’, Πατμιακὴ Βιβλιοθήκη (Athens, 1890), pp. 316–17. Basilakes
also mentions that because of his ‘scholarly character’ he did not often visit the homes of the rich for
patronage, which lends credence to the fact that his only career was in the church. See Basilakes, p. 5;
Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 336–7; Nilsson, ‘Komnenian Literature’, p. 129.
42 ODB, p. 2068; M. Mullett, Theophylact of Ohrid: Reading the Letters of a Byzantine Archbishop
(Aldershot, 1997). Theophylact of Ohrid, Lettres, pp. 151, 379–81, 491. Regarding Kallikles, Theophylact
requested copies of Galen, Hippocrates, and Plato from Kallikles’ library, see pp. 477–9, 535–7.
43 AK, 15.11, p. 494; ODB, p. 1093.
44 Nicholas Kallikles, Carmi, ed. Roberto Romano (Naples, 1980); R. Shlyakhtin, ‘ “A New Mixture
of Two Powers”: Nicholas Kallikles and Theodore Prodromos on Empress Eirene’, Piroska and the
Pantokrator: Dynastic Memory, Healing and Salvation in Komnenian Constantinople, ed. M. Sághy and
R. Ousterhout (Budapest, 2019), pp. 295–6; I. Vassis, ‘Das Pantokratorkloster von Konstantinopel in
workings of the church and relations with the Latins comprise important back-
ground to these developments throughout John’s reign. From the other end of
John’s life, a few letters of the great poet and scholar John Tzetzes (c.1110–80)
are informative. Tzetzes had a Greek father but was Georgian on his mother’s
side, according to his Book of Histories, usually referred to as the Chiliades
[‘Thousands’—after its arbitrary division into 1,000-line books by its first editor],
which is a miscellaneous collection of literary, historical, and theological inves-
tigations: a text that neatly represents his many interests and competencies.45 In
addition to various asides in the Chilades that give insight into daily life at this
time, Tzetzes’ letters to officials concerning tax receipts, his work and pay as an
official himself, all shed light on government functions far beyond any detail
recorded in our historical accounts.46 Finally, there is the anonymous author of
a text which more than any other should be seen as a major political statement
on John’s regime: the so-called Muses of Alexios. This text is particularly sig-
nificant as unlike all of the previous texts, which comment on events as they
occurred and shortly thereafter, the author of the Muses claims to be advice
given by Alexios to John for his reign.
Despite what the text alleges, we know that Alexios could barely talk during his
final illness, and the author even admits that this advice had come to the author
‘mystically, secretly’: as such, this text is far more likely to be a legitimizing piece
written for John’s succession, and the author is using poetic licence to attribute
the text to Alexios.47 The text discusses John’s youth and how he should now rule,
before going into detail regarding the threats of foreign powers. Frustratingly,
der byzantinischen Dichtung’, The Pantokrator Monastery in Constantinople, ed. S Kotzabassi (Berlin,
2013), pp. 221−224.
45 John Tzetzes, Chiliades: Ioannis Tzetzae Historiarum variorum chilades Graecae, ed. T. Kiessling
(1963 repr. Leipzig, 1826), 5.24, pp. 179–80.
46 Ioannes Tzetzes, Epistulae, ed. P. Leone (Leipzig, 1972).
47 Muses I, line 42. Alexios authoring the Muses is assumed by Mullett, Angold, and Magdalino:
M. Mullett, ‘Alexios I Komnenos and Imperial Renewal’, New Constantines. The Rhythm of Imperial
Renewal in Byzantium, 4th–13th Centuries, ed. P. Magdalino (Aldershot, 1994), p. 265; M. Angold,
‘Alexios I Komnenos: An Afterword’, Alexios I Komnenos-Papers, ed. M. Mullett and D. Smythe
(Belfast, 1996), pp. 408–10; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 27–30. Mullett discusses the possibility
of attribution to John rather than Alexios, and there is further discussion in: D. Reinsch,
‘Abweichungen vom traditionellen Kaiserbild in Byzanz in 11. und 12. Jahrhundert’, L’éducation au
gouvernement et à la vie. La tradition des ‘règles de vie’ de l’Antiquité au Moyen La tradition des ‘règles
de vie’ de l’Antiquité au Moyen Âge. Actes du colloque international, Pise, 18–19 mars 2005, ed.
P. Odorico (Paris, 2009), pp. 115–28; Reinsch, ‘Bemerkungen zu einigen Byzantinischen,
Fürstenspiegeln´ des 11. und 12. Jahrhunderts’, Synesios von Kyrene: Politik—Literatur—Philosophie,
herausgegeben von Helmut Seng und Lars M. Hoffmann (Turnhout, 2013), pp. 412–17; M. Mullett,
‘Whose Muses? Two Advice Poems Attributed to Alexios I Komnenos’, La face cachée de la littérature
byzantine. Le texte en tant que message immédiat. Actes du colloque international, Pise, 5–7 juin
2008, ed. P. Odorico (Paris, 2012), pp. 195–220; Stanković, Komnini u Carigradu, pp. 148–65;
Stanković, ‘John II Komnenos before the Year 1118’, p. 20; M. Lauxtermann, ‘His, and Not His: The
Poems of the Late Gregory the Monk’, The Author in Middle Byzantine Literature, ed. A. Pizzone
(Berlin, 2014), p. 81, n. 17; Zagklas, ‘Poetry in the Komnenian Period’, pp. 241–2.
however, the second of the two Muses cuts off abruptly at line 81 (the first is 400
lines), and there is every possibility there could have been further Muses.48 At all
events, from what we do have it is probable that this text sets out what amounts to
John’s initial political manifesto, and in the next two chapters we can compare
these intentions to what is related in our other sources, assessing how successfully
he actualized the plans set out in the Muses.
Further Byzantine Sources
Although John’s reign is not as well documented as those of his father and son,
there is a fair amount of supplementary material that can flesh out what is
reported in the histories proper. There is a lengthy text detailing the new system
of taxation instituted by Alexios.49 There are a handful of other documents from
John’s reign, including four pieces of legislation and one decree promulgated by
him personally (all concerning property, both ecclesiastical and civil), the con
firmation of privileges granted to the monastery of St. John on Patmos, an arbitra-
tion by John concerning the monastic lands of Mt Athos, and, most importantly
on account of the light they cast on diplomatic history, two letters to Pope
Innocent II (1130–43), and one to the German King Conrad III (who was anti-
king in opposition to Emperor Lothar III between 1127 and 1135, and then
unopposed king between 1137 and 1152).50 Official seals, giving names, titles,
48 Muses I, lines 272–6, lines 287–90, Muses II, lines 52–3, 65, 81.
49 The text was composed during a tax indiction year, while Alexios is referred to as dead. Hendy
proposed an 1118–19 date as the text concerns Alexios’ last tax reform, and so he presumed it would
be for tax officials still coming to grips with the new system; however, Svoronos was an advocate for
1134/5 due to the exchange rate between the trachy and the nomisma at that time being 1/48, around
6 folleis, as related in the 1136 Pantokrator Typikon, pp. 90–112, 759–67. See: M. Hendy, Coinage and
Money in the Byzantine Empire, 1081–1261 (Washington, DC, 1969), pp. 50–65, esp. 50; N. Svoronos,
‘Recherches sur le cadaster byzantin et la fiscalité aux XIe et XIIe siècles: le cadaster de Thèbes’, Bulletin
de Correspondence Hellénique 83.1 (1959), p. 108, n. 2. The text itself can be found in Jus Graeco-
romanum, ed. J. Zepos and P. Zepos (Aalen, 1962), pp. 326–40, and a translation with commentary in
C. Morrisson, ‘La Logarikè: Réforme monétaire et réforme fiscale sous Alexis Ier Comnène’, TM 7
(1979), pp. 419–64.
50 Legislation: Regesten der Kaiserurkunden des oströmischen Reiches von 565–1453, Vol. 3: Regesten
von 1025–1204, ed. F. Dölger and P. Wirth (Munich, 1995), pp. 186–99; J-A-B. Mortreuil, Histoire du
droit byzantin ou du droit romain dans l’empire d’orient vol. III (Reprint of the 1843–1846 edition,
Osnabrück, 1966), pp. 167–8, 485–6; Jus Graeco-romanum, ed. J. Zepos and P. Zepos, pp. 363–5;
J. Darrouzès, ‘Un décret d’Isaac II Angélos’, REB 40 (1982), esp. pp. 136–7, 139; Patmos Grant:
E. Vranousi, Βυζαντινὰ ἔγγραφα τῆς μονῆς Πάτμου, Αʹ: Αὐτοκρατορικά (Athens, 1980), no. 8, 78–88.
Mt. Athos Arbitration: Actes de Lavra. Première partie: Des origines à 1204, Archives de l’Athos V, ed.
and tr. P. Lemerle, A. Guillou and N. Svoronos (Paris, 1970), p. 332. Letters: Digital Vatican Library,
https://digi.vatlib.it/; S. Lambros, ‘Ἀυτοκρατόρων του Βυζαντίου χρυσόβουλλα και χρυσά γράμματα
αναφερόμενα εις ένωσιν των εκκλησιών’, Νέος Ἑλληνομνήμων 11 (1914), pp. 94–128; O. Kresten and
A. E. Müller, ‘Die Auslandsschreiben der byzantinischen Kaiser des 11. und 12. Jahrhunderts:
Specimen einer kritischen Ausgabe’, BZ 86/7 (1993–4), pp. 422–9; Otto of Freising ‘Chronicon Ottonis
episcopi Frisingensis’, MGH (S) 20, ed. G. Waitz (Hannover, 1912), p. 207; Chalandon, Jean II
Comnène, p. VII; Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, p. 5.
and offices of postholders provide useful information about the apparatus of gov-
ernment and the regime’s personnel.51 Coins do likewise for the economy and
ideology.52 From an ecclesiastical context, we also have three hagiographies
(Leontios of Jerusalem, St Gregory of Assos, and Bishop Niketas of Chonai) and
records from the monasteries of Lembos and Stylos in western Anatolia, though
these add little beyond incidental detail to our knowledge of imperial or ecclesias-
tical administration.53 Expanding this, however, are further sources which evi-
dence three important projects that enable us to view John’s initiatives away from
the battlefield, revealing three areas of particular concern to him.
The first of these projects represents one of the few exceptions to John’s usually
‘overshadowed’ reign, as its associated texts and archaeological remains have
received a relatively in-depth amount of scholarly analysis. This project is the
monastery of Christ Pantokrator, the remains of which are now the Zeyrek Camii,
Istanbul. This is one of the few Byzantine monasteries where we have surviving
buildings to go alongside its typikon [foundation charter], and even more associ-
ated texts such as poetic ekphrases.54 Though the typikon describes the function-
ing of the Pantokrator in 1136, the remains tell us that the plan for the complex
changed from its conception to its completion.55 These changes are dramatized in
an extract from the Synaxarion of Constantinople, where a tearful Eirene asks her
husband to make the Pantokrator the greatest monastery in the city, while the
typikon tells us that John and Eirene worked on the monastery together before
her death left John to finish this project alone.56
51 On seals, notable collections include: A Collection of Dated Byzantine Lead Seals, ed.
N. Oikonomides (Washington, DC, 1986); Cartulaire générale de Paris, ed. R. de Lasteyrie (Paris,
1887); Catalogue of Byzantine seals at Dumbarton Oaks and in the Fogg Museum of Art, ed. J. Nesbitt
and N. Oikonomides, 7 vols (Washington, DC, 2001–20); Corpus of Byzantine seals from Bulgaria, ed.
Jordanov, 2 vols (Sofia, 2003 and 2006); Les sceaux byzantins de la collection Henri Seyrig, ed.
J.-C. Cheynet (Paris, 1991). On individuals in general, the Prosopography of the Byzantine World has
been an invaluable resource: http://db.pbw.kcl.ac.uk/jsp/index.jsp.
52 Cf. the works of Papadopoulou, to whom I am grateful for advance copies of her papers at vari-
ous points in the writing of this study.
53 Hagiographies: The Life of Leontios, Patriarch of Jerusalem: Text, Translation and Commentary,
ed. and tr. D. Tsougarakis (Leiden, 1993); F. Halkin, ‘Saint Grégoire d’Assos: Vie et synaxaire inédits
(BHG et Auctar. 710a et c)’, Analecta Bollandiana 102 (1984), pp. 5–34; Μιχαὴλ Ἀκομινάτου τοῦ
Χωνιάτου τὰ σωζόμενα 1, ed. S. Lambros (Athens, 1879–80, repr. Groningen, 1968). Monastic
Archives: MM IV, pp. 62–3, 324–5, 329; H. Ahrweiler, ‘L’histoire et la géographie de la région de
Smyrne entre les deux occupations turques (1081–1317), particulièrement au XIIIe siècle’, TM 1
(1965), pp. 128–9; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 128–9; E. Ragia, ‘Η αναδιοργάνωση των θεμάτων
στη Μικρά Ασία τον δωδέκατο αιώνα και το θέμα Μυλάσσης και Μελανουδίου’, Byzantine Symmeikta 17
(2008), pp. 223–38.
54 Pantokrator Typikon; P. Magdalino, ‘The Foundation of the Pantokrator Monastery in Its Urban
Setting’, The Pantokrator Monastery in Constantinople, ed. S. Kotzabassi (Boston, 2013), p. 34.
55 See Chapter Eleven.
56 Synaxarium Ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae. Propylaeum ad Acta Sanctorum Novembris, ed.
H. Delehaye (Brussels, 1902), pp. 887–90; tr. P. Magdalino, ‘Appendix’ (2013), p. 34; Pantokrator
Typikon, p. 29, p. 738; Ousterhout, ‘Pantokrator: Reassessing the Architectural Evidence’, pp. 226–7;
Magdalino, ‘The Pantokrator Monastery in its Urban Setting’, passim; Jeffreys, ‘Piroska and the
Komnenian Dynasty’, pp. 109, 117.
Though, unfortunately, most of the opening, biographical, section of the

typikon does not survive, the surviving text includes detailed descriptions of how
the monks were to live, the ceremonies they should carry out, lists of individuals
to be commemorated, the properties with which John and Eirene endowed the
monastery, and, most importantly, the workings of the attached Pantokrator hos-
pital and its associated philanthropy.57 This text is therefore profoundly useful for
investigating aspects of John’s familial relations, personal piety, and the ideologies
and policies of his regime, with the typikon additionally being the only text that
includes the claim that it was written by John personally.
Though the scale of the Pantokrator has previously marked it out as being
John’s most important non-military act, his other two projects may have com-
pletely dwarfed it had the emperor been able to complete them: the patronage of
ecclesiastical and civil law, and his ecumenical project: the attempted reunifica-
tion of the Greek Church with that of the Latin West and the Armenian East.
John’s place within ecclesiastical legal history in particular has been completely
overlooked due to the dominance of the late twelfth-century commentaries of
Theodore Balsamon (c.1140–99) in this field.58 Balsamon’s work is full of contem-
porary cases that illustrate his commentary, and yet these contemporary texts
include no ecclesiastical legislation from John’s reign.59 With Balsamon as the
primary lens through which twelfth-century canon law is examined, John’s reign
is a black hole, and yet beyond Balsamon our picture changes completely.
Commentaries were also written by Alexios Aristenos, John’s cousin the
Archbishop of Ohrid, and later by Zonaras, while there are also texts by a certain
Doxapatres in addition to anonymous works.60 Reconstructing these men’s
careers can be most successfully done in the cases of Zonaras, above, and of
Aristenos, who is mentioned in the letters of Theodore Prodromos, as well as in
encomia by Prodromos and Basilakes.61 Aristenos emerges as a figure who had a
career that bridged ecclesiastical and imperial offices, similar to Italikos, and who
was specifically commissioned by John to write his commentary, completing it in
57 M. Hinterberger, Autobiographische Traditionen in Byzanz (Vienna, 1999), p. 270; The Pantokrator

Monastery in Constantinople, ed. S. Kotzabassi (Berlin, 2013); Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’,
pp. 6–8.
58 E. Herman, ‘Balsamon, DDC II’, cols. 76–83; S. Troianos, ‘Byzantine Canon Law from the
Twelfth to the Fifteenth Centuries’, The History of Byzantine and Eastern Canon Law to 1500, ed.
W. Hartmann and K. Pennington (Washington, DC, 2012), pp. 180–3; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel,
pp. 293–7; Macrides, ‘Nomos and Kanon’, pp. 71–85; M. Angold, Church and Society in Byzantium
under the Comneni 1081–1261 (Cambridge, 1995), p. 101.
59 G. Stevens, De Theodoro Balsamone: Analysis operum ac mentis iuridicae (Rome, 1969), pp. 298–305;
Angold, Church and Society, p. 75.
60 Alexios Aristenos, Kommentar zur ‘Synopsis canonum’, ed. E. Papagianni, S. Troianos,
L. Burgmann, and K. Maksimovič (Berlin, 2019). For the anonymous works, see: S. Troianos,
‘Η νομονοκανονική συλλογή του Cod. Cryptof. Zy VII’, Χαριστείον Σεραφείμ Τίκα (Thessalonike,
1984), pp. 453–73; History of Byzantine Canon Law, p. 192.
61 J. Darrouzès, Georges et Dèmètrios Tornikès, Lettres et Discours (Paris, 1970), pp. 53–7; Macrides,
‘Nomos and Kanon’, pp. 71–2; Troianos, ‘Byzantine Canon Law’, pp. 178–80.
c.1130.62 Zonaras too had his career split between state and church, and wrote his
commentary alongside his more famous history.63 This work was, however, not
completed until 1161, perhaps because of his split workload, and likely also
because his work is far longer than that of Aristenos. More of a mystery, though,
is the identity of the patron who commissioned Zonaras.64 Someone who would
commission such a commentary alongside these others suggests that the patron
disagreed with some of the conclusions reached by Aristenos, or perhaps one who
was competing with the emperor in some way. Comparison of Aristenos’ com-
mentary with Zonaras’ reveals several aspects of policy and opinion that date
specifically to John’s reign. Further understanding of these aspects is aided by the
commentary attributed to another of John’s cousins, a figure originally named
Adrian but later named as Archbishop John of Ohrid, who wrote either late in
John’s reign or early in Manuel’s. It is a commentary on the Syntagma of Canons
found in a still unedited manuscript.65 Finally, there is Doxapatres. He was previ-
ously thought to be the author of a canonical commentary that was in fact a copy
of Aristenos’ work, but a seal dating to c.1125 lists the occupation of a figure named
Doxapatres as a judge. It is likely that this figure went into exile in Sicily after rivals
forced him out, where he appeared as ‘Neilos’ Doxapatres and wrote texts that com-
mented on canonical issues in ways that are intriguingly pro-Byzantine.66
These commentaries have always been considered to be relatively unimportant
as, unlike Balsamon, these canon lawyers rarely used contemporary examples in
their works.67 However, what they do demonstrate is that the emperor was per-
sonally invested in improving the study of canon law, with John directly commis-
sioning Aristenos, and perhaps the others.
Such investment can also be seen in the production of the Ecloga Basilicorum: a
selection of civil laws with commentary from the first ten of the sixty-book
corpus of laws known as the Basilica, originally begun under Emperor Basil I in
62 Ibid.; ‘Alexii Aristeni Nomophylacis’, PG 133, pp. 63–112; Macrides, ‘Nomos and Kanon’, p. 72.
63 Troianos, ‘Byzantine Canon Law’, pp. 176–8; Macrides, ‘Nomos and Kanon’, pp. 72–3.
64 Macrides, ‘Nomos and Kanon’, p. 73, based on the mention of Manuel’s second marriage,
G. Rallis and M. Potlis, Σύνταγμα τῶν Θείων καὶ ἱερῶν κανόνων III (Athens, 1856), p. 80.
65 S. Vailhé, ‘14. Adrien’, DHGE 1, ed. A. Baudrillart, A. Meyer, and R. Aubert (Paris, 1912),
pp. 613–14; H. Beck, Kirche und theologische Literatur im byzantinischen Reich (Munich, 1959),
p. 659; Troianos, ‘Byzantine Canon Law’, p. 191.
66 Seal: V.S. Šandrovskaja and W. Seibt, Byzantinische Bleisiegel der Staatlichen Eremitage mit
̌
Familiennamen, 1 Teil: Sammlung Lichacev— Namen von A bis I (Vienna, 2005), no. 73. His supposed
commentary on the Nomokanon attests he originally came from Nicaea, was a deacon of Hagia Sophia,
nomophylax, notarios to the patriarch and president of the protosynkelloi, which would give him a
similarly prestigious career to the other commentators. His work is unpublished. For an overview taking
the source as real, see: Mortreuil, Histoire du Droit Byzantin, pp. 483–5. For doubts expressed as to
the manuscript, see: Troianos, ‘Byzantine Canon Law’, p. 191, nos. 77–8. For the possible link with the
Sicilian canonist Neilos Doxapatres, see: J. Morton, ‘A Byzantine Canon Law Scholar in Norman Sicily:
Revising Neilos Doxapatres’ Order of the Patriarchal Thrones’, Speculum 92.3 (2017), pp. 724–54, where
his past is discussed on pp. 732–6, which especially notes that Neilos hoped ‘with tears’ that the emperor
would learn the ‘hidden things’ concerning the ‘envious men’ who conspired against him.
67 Macrides, ‘Nomos and Kanon’, pp. 75–85.
the ninth century.68 These books primarily concern matters of jurisdiction and
the organization of courts, their processes and appeals, and so in addition to
being an invaluable source for reconstructing how civil courts operated in this
period, they testify to John’s own interest in the efficiency of the courts.69
Compiled in c.1142 by an unknown jurist (who mentions judging a case personally),
the author not only wrote under John but also may have been commissioned
by the emperor personally as was the case with Aristenos. The fact that the project
was aborted after the emperor’s death in 1143 strongly suggests this.70 There is
even potential intertextuality between the work of Aristenos and the author of the
Ecloga Basilicorum, which dangles before us the tantalizing possibility that John
had commissioned a team of legal scholars to examine both canon and civil law as
part of a large-scale project of a sort not contemplated in many centuries.71 Had
John lived to old age in Constantinople, the image in our sources might have been
that of the great patron of jurisprudence, whose younger days only were spent on
military campaigns.
As if being the emperor who could have presided over a revision of Roman
Law was not enough, the commonly held opinion that John was uninterested in
ecclesiastical matters demands reappraisal considering the number of high-
profile theological debates that took place during his reign, in addition to his
direct correspondence with Pope Innocent II mentioned above. Though there
are allusions to further debates whose proceedings have not survived, we have
full accounts for two: the better- known Latin text by Bishop Anselm of
Havelberg on his disputations with Bishop Niketas of Nikomedeia in 1136, and
the less well-known dialogues of Niketas of Thessalonike that were likely writ-
ten around the same time.72 We also have a profession of faith written by the
Armenian Katholikos, Grigor III Pahlavuni (in office 1113–66) to John, which
the opening of the letter declares was requested by John himself.73 Furthermore,
the canonical commentaries discussed above give opinions on the relationship
68 Ecloga Basilicorum, ed. L. Burgmann (Frankfurt am Main, 1988), pp. vii–xviii.

69 Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, p. 263; R. Macrides, ‘The Competent Court’, Law and Society in
Byzantium: Ninth–Twelfth Centuries (Washington, DC, 1994), pp. 117–29; D. Penna, ‘A Witness of
Byzantine Legal Practice in the 12th Century. Some Remarks on the Construction of the Ecloga
Basilicorum’, Subseciva Groningana X (2019), pp. 139–62.
70 Ecloga Basilicorum, pp. xviii and 42; Macrides, ‘Competent Court’, p. 118; Penna, ‘Witness of
Legal Practice’, pp. 155–7. Penna notes how the commentator talks about practice ‘σήμερον’ (today),
and so it should certainly be seen as describing legal practice in the years prior to 1142, see: Penna,
p. 154, citing Ecloga Basilicorum, p. 28.
71 Ecloga Basilicorum, p. x; N. van der Wal and J. Lokin, Historiae iuris graeco-romani delineation:
les sources du droit byzantin de 300 à 1453 (Groningen, 1985), p. 107.
72 Anselm of Havelberg, Anticimenon, ed. and comm. H. J. Sieben (Münster, 2010); A. Criste and
C. Neel, Anticimenon: On the Unity of the Faith and the Controversies with the Greeks (Collegeville,
MN, 2010); A. Bucossi, ‘The Six Dialogues of Niketas “of Maroneia”: A Contextualizing Introduction’,
Dialogues and Debates from Late Antiquity to Late Byzantium, ed. A. Cameron and N. Gaul (Abingdon,
2017), pp. 137–52.
73 J. Darrouzès, ‘Trois documents de la controverse gréco-arménienne’, REB 48 (1990), p. 133;
M. Lau, ‘A Dream Come True? Matthew of Edessa and the Return of the Roman Emperor’, Dreams,
between patriarchies in the early church, and we have several short mentions of
communications between John and members of other churches, with highlights
including a late 1130s letter from Abbot Peter of Cluny to John, and the Abbot
of St Victor, Marseilles, giving John a relic from his eponymous saint.74
Together, these sources evoke a policy of outreach and rapprochement on the
part of John personally, such that, as with his legal patronage, if John had lived
beyond 1143 he might have been remembered as much for his role in fostering
ecumenical relations as for his martial campaigns.
Non-Byzantine Sources
Non-Greek histories are among the richest sources of supplementary material

for John’s reign, providing us with individually unique, non-Constantinopolitan-
based, voices. Several were written in neighbouring regions (in Syriac, Turkish,
Armenian, and Arabic) at the time and later. These clarify what occurred within
Anatolia and adjoining lands, as well as comment on relations between Byzantium
and other powers. They are, however, outnumbered by Latin sources: the atten-
tion of Latin Christendom had been pulled eastwards by its abiding concern for
the Crusader states established in the Levant in the early years of the twelfth
century, and the ebb and flow in relations between the western powers and
Byzantium, especially the German Empire, France, and the Italian merchant
cities. Finally, there is a miscellany of other sources. One, the Chronicle of the
Priest of Diokleia/Duklja (modern south-eastern Montenegro), is useful despite
the problems raised by its fraudulent authorship, while others view Byzantium
from the distant north.
Memory and Imagination in Byzantium, ed. B. Neil and E. Anagnostou-Laoutides (Leiden, 2018),
pp. 160–79.
74 Peter the Venerable, The Letters of Peter the Venerable, ed. G. Constable (Cambridge, 1967), nos.
75, 76, pp. 208–10; J. Gay, ‘L’Abbaye de Cluny et Byzance au debut du XIIe siècle’, Echos d’Orient 30
(1931), pp. 84–90; Chalandon, Jean II Comnène, p. 162; K. Ciggaar, Western Travellers to Constantinople:
The West and Byzantium, 962–1204: Cultural and Political Relations (Leiden, 1996), p. 40. Gay dates
the letter earlier, but only because he assumes it is contemporary with the letters of John to the Papacy,
which as shown by Lilie date to the time of John’s eastern expeditions. St. Victor: P. Riant, Exuviae
sacrae constantinopolitanae II, (Geneva, 1878), pp. 23–4. This relic diplomacy followed precedents set
by Alexios I and former emperors going back to the fourth century, and it would be continued by
John’s successors. See: H. Klein, ‘Eastern Objects and Western Desires: Relics and Reliquaries between
Byzantium and the West’, DOP 58 (2004), pp. 283–314; P. Frankopan, The First Crusade: The Call From
the East (London, 2012), p. 106; J. Shepard, ‘How St James the Persian’s Head Was Brought to
Cormery: A Relic Collector around the Time of the First Crusade’, Zwischen Polis, Provinz und
Peripherie: Beiträge zur byzantinischen Geschichte und Kultur, ed. L. Hoffmann (Wiesbaden, 2005),
pp. 287–336; J. Shephard, ‘The “muddy road” of Odo Arpin from Bourges to Charité-sur-Loire’, The
Experience of Crusading II: Defining the Crusader Kingdom, ed. P. Edbury and J. Phillips (Cambridge,
2003), pp. 22, 26–8. However, crucially this example demonstrates that under John, relic diplomacy
went from west to east as well as east to west.
The most important eastern source is the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian,
Patriarch of the Syrian Church (sometimes referred to as ‘Jacobite’), with corrob-
oration and some additional information provided by the Syriac Anonymous
Chronicle of 1234. These previously overlooked texts for Byzantine history com-
pletely change our analysis of what occurred in Anatolia in this period, especially
when supported by Armenian texts such as the Chronicle of Matthew of Edessa,
and its continuation by Gregory the Priest.75
The Chronicle of Michael the Syrian was written in Melitene in the final dec-
ades of the twelfth century before Michael’s death in 1199.76 With his patriarchate
under the rule of the Danishmendid Turkish dynasty, he provides the closest his-
torical account possible to a Danishmendid perspective from this era: his detailed
knowledge of the politics of the Turks of Asia Minor is second to none—
unsurprising given his geographical and chronological proximity to events.77
Equally, his position as Syrian Jacobite Patriarch and partiality in favour of his
faith makes him peculiarly even-handed in his judgements: for though he is no
friend of his Islamic overlords, he is equally hostile to the Chalcedonian Churches
of Constantinople and Rome.78 Despite this, he evidences a genuine interest in
events in Constantinople, and appears to know of Balkan events too through a
certain Basil of Edessa who was present at least for John’s victory at Berroia in
1122.79 This man is likely to be Metropolitan Basil bar Çabuni, a well-read writer
of Greek who was excommunicated by Syrian Jacobite Patriarch Athanasius VII
and so may have fled to John, and may have therefore authored a lost account
used by Michael.80 The Chronicle fills in a number of almost empty years in
Kinnamos and Choniates’ accounts, with some corroborating detail also found in
the lacunae-filled Anonymous Chronicle of 1234. This was also written from the
late twelfth century onwards contemporaneously with Michael, with the author
75 Cf. P. Guevara, Aftershocks of Byzantium: The Komnenian restoration through Twelfth and
Thirteenth Century Syriac Chronicles (unpublished master’s thesis, Oxford University, 2019), esp.
pp. 5–11, 16–8, 54–7 for Michael the Syrian and John.
76 Michael the Syrian’s biography is sketched in Mich. Syr. ‘Preface’, pp. ix–xii, and further analysed
by Spinei, ‘Michael the Syrian’, pp. 169–76, who also summarizes the available historiography of the
patriarch. Both are based upon details in the text and the life given by the thirteenth-century chronic
ler Bar Hebraeus, Chronicon Ecclesiasticum Vol. 1 (Leuven, 1872), p. 575. See also: D. Weltecke,
‘Michael the Great’, Franks and Crusades in Medieval Eastern Christian Historiography, ed. A. Mallett
(Turnhout, 2021), pp. 213–42.
77 See M. Lau and R. Shlyakhtin, ‘Mas’ūd I of Ikonion: The Overlooked Victor of the Twelfth-
century Anatolian Game of Thrones’, Byzantinoslavica LXXVI/1–2 (2019), pp. 230–52; S. Solmaz.,
‘Danișmend Gazinin anadoluya geliși’, Selçuk Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Dergisi 14 (2002),
pp. 229–49.
78 Mich. Syr. 19.5, lost in the Syriac text, though preserved in an Armenian revision and Bar
Hebraeus, see: Chabot, p. 334, n. 3; tr. 334–6; V. Spinei, ‘An Oriental Perspective on the Ethnic Realities
of the Balkans in the Eleventh–Twelfth Centuries: Michael the Syrian’, Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevi
20 (2013), pp. 174–5; Magdalino, Empire of Manuel, pp. 75–6.
79 Mich. Syr. 15.12, p. 600; tr. p. 207; Guevara, Aftershocks of Byzantium, esp. pp. 32, 39. See Chapter
Four for more on the date of this battle.
80 Ibid., 15.7–9, p. 587, 590–2, 600; tr. pp. 185, 190–1, 200–1, 207; Spinei, ‘Michael the Syrian’, p. 195.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
128. ‘Like Samson,’ etc. Cowper, The Task, V. 737.
‘The worst of every evil,’ etc. Cf. Temistocle, Act III. Sc. 2.
129. ‘A world,’ etc. Cf. Wordsworth, Personal Talk, l. 34.
‘A foregone conclusion.’ Othello, Act III. Sc. 3.
130. ‘We see the children,’ etc. Cf. Wordsworth, Ode, Intimations
of Immortality, 170–1.
Paul Clifford. Bulwer’s Paul Clifford appeared in 1830.
‘Lively,’ etc. Coriolanus, Act IV. Sc. 5.
‘The true pathos,’ etc. Burns, Epistle to Dr. Blacklock.
FOOTMEN
Republished in Sketches and Essays.
PAG
E Sewell and Cross’s. Linen-drapers and silk-mercers, 44 and
131. 45 Old Compton Street, Soho.
The Bazaar. Established in 1815.
‘The Corinthian capitals,’ etc. Cf. Burke’s Reflections on the
Revolution in France (Select Works, ed. Payne, II. 164).
132. As I look down Curzon Street. The essay would seem to have
been written at 40 Half-Moon Street, where Hazlitt lodged
from 1827 to 1829.
133. ‘Brothers of the groves.’ Cf. vol. VIII. note to p. 467.
Mr. N——. Sketches and Essays prints ‘Northcote.’
‘High Life Below Stairs.’ By James Townley (1714–1788),
produced in 1759.
Mr. C——.? Coleridge.
Cassock. Sketches and Essays prints hassock.
The fate of the footman, etc. See Lady Mary Wortley
Montagu’s Epistle from Arthur Grey, the Footman, to Mrs.
Murray.
134. ‘Vine-covered hills,’ etc. From lines ‘Written in 1788’ by
William Roscoe and parodied in The Anti-Jacobin.
‘As pigeons pick up peas.’ Cf. Love’s Labour’s Lost, V. 2.
135. ‘No more—where ignorance,’ etc. Gray, On a Distant
Prospect of Eton College.
M. de Bausset. Louis François Joseph, Baron de Bausset (b.
1770), author of Mémoires anecdotiques sur l’intérieur du
palais (1827–8).
136.
Wear green spectacles. These three words, which seem to
have a personal application, were omitted in Sketches and
Essays. Cf. post, p. 217.
ON THE WANT OF MONEY
Republished in Literary Remains.
137. ‘The heaviest stone,’ etc. Sir T. Browne, Hydriotaphia, chap.

IV.
138. ‘That Mr. Moore,’ etc. Moore’s Life of Sheridan appeared in

1825. This sentence was omitted in Literary Remains.
139. Note. ‘Such gain,’ etc. Cymbeline, Act III. Sc. 3.
140. ‘Screw one’s courage,’ etc. Cf. Macbeth, Act I. Sc. 7.
‘As kind,’ etc. Dryden, The Hind and the Panther, I. 271.
141. ‘Of formal cut.’ As You Like It, Act II. Sc. 7.
The fair Aurora. Gil Blas, Livre IV.
Monsieur de Very. See ante, note to p. 104.
Apicius. Marcus Gabius Apicius, the notorious Roman
epicure, referred to by Pliny, X. 48, 68, § 133.
Amelia’s hashed mutton. Amelia, Book X. chap. V.
142. ‘And ever,’ etc. L’Allegro, 135–6.
‘We called,’ etc. Cf. Colonel Jack, chap. 1.
‘The Colonel,’ etc. Ibid.
The City Madam. See Massinger’s, The City Madam, III. 3.
‘Spanish Rogue.’ Hazlitt refers to Mateo Aleman’s Guzman de
Alfarache (1599). Cf. vol. VIII. (Lectures on the Comic
Writers), p. 111.
142. Mr. Lamb has referred, etc. See Lamb’s Specimens, note to
Rowley’s A New Wonder (Works, ed. E. V. Lucas, IV. 126).
Note. ‘His daughter and his ducats.’ The Merchant of Venice,
Act II. Sc. 8.
143. ‘By their so potent art.’ Cf. The Tempest, Act V. Sc. 1.
144. ‘We know,’ etc. Hamlet, Act IV. Sc. 5.
‘Within that lowest deep,’ etc. Cf. Paradise Lost, IV. 76–77.
146. I never knew but one man, etc. ? Jeffrey.
‘With wine,’ etc. Cf. Milton’s Sonnet, Lawrence, of virtuous
father, etc.
149. ‘Pure in the last recesses of the mind.’ Dryden, The Second
Satire of Persius, 133.
Mr. Thomas Wedgwood. Thomas Wedgwood (1771–1805),
Coleridge’s friend.
‘We can hold,’ etc. Richard II., Act I. Sc. 3.
ON THE FEELING OF IMMORTALITY IN
YOUTH
Republished with many omissions and variations in Literary
Remains and Winterslow.
PAG
E ‘Life is a pure flame,’ etc. Sir T. Browne, Hydriotaphia, chap.
150. V.
My brother’s. John Hazlitt (1767–1837), the miniature-

painter. See Mr. W. C. Hazlitt’s Four Generations of a
Literary Family, I. 210–18.
151. ‘The vast,’ etc. Cf. ‘The wide, the unbounded prospect, lies
before me.’ Addison, Cato, Act V. Sc. 1.
‘Bear a charmed life.’ Macbeth, Act V. Sc. 8.
‘Bidding,’ etc. Collins’s Ode, The Passions, 32.
‘This sensible,’ etc. Measure for Measure, Act III. Sc. 1.
152. ‘Wine of life,’ etc. Cf. Macbeth, Act II. Sc. 3.
‘As in a glass darkly.’ Cf. 1 Corinthians xiii. 12.
‘So am not I.’ Sterne, Tristram Shandy, vol. V. chap. vii.
Note. The Art of War (1795) by Joseph Fawcett (d. 1804), an
early friend of Hazlitt’s. See vol. VI. (Table-Talk), 224–5
and Mr. W. C. Hazlitt’s Memoirs, etc., I. 75–79.
153. ‘The feast of reason,’ etc. Pope, Imitations of Horace, Sat. I.
128.
‘Brave sublunary things.’ Cf. ‘Those brave translunary
things.’ Michael Drayton, To Henry Reynolds.
‘The stockdove,’ etc. Cf. Thomson, The Castle of Indolence, I.
St. 4.
Note. ‘Had it not been,’ etc. Works, II. 254.
Note. She says of Richardson. See Works, II. 285 et seq. and
222.
Note. Monstrum ingens biforme. Cf. Æneid, III. 658.
Note. ‘His spirits,’ etc. Works, II. 283.
156. ‘The purple light of love.’ Gray, The Progress of Poesy, 41.
‘The Raphael grace,’ etc. Cf. ‘Match Raphael’s grace with thy
loved Guido’s air. ‘Pope, Moral Essays, VIII. 36.
‘Gain new vigour,’ etc. Cowper, Charity, 104.
157. ‘Beguile,’ etc. Cf. ‘Lose and neglect the creeping hours of
time.’ As You Like It, Act II. Sc. 7.
158. ‘Robbers.’ Schiller’s play, produced in 1782.
‘From the Dungeon,’ etc. Coleridge, Sonnet, ‘To the Author of
The Robbers.’
Don Carlos. Schiller’s play (1787).
158. ‘That time is past,’ etc. Cf. Wordsworth, Lines composed a
few miles above Tintern Abbey, 83–85.
159. ‘Even from the tomb,’ etc. Gray’s Elegy, 91–92.
‘All the life,’ etc. Cf. ‘For a’ the life of life is dead.’ Burns,
Lament for James, Earl of Glencairn, st. 6.
‘From the last dregs,’ etc. Cf. Dryden, Aurengzebe, Act IV. Sc.
1.
160. ‘Treason domestic,’ etc. Cf. Macbeth, Act III. Sc. 2.
‘Reverbs its own hollowness.’ Cf. King Lear, Act I. Sc. 1.
ON READING NEW BOOKS
Published with omissions in Sketches and Essays. The essay was
written at Florence. See Mr. W. C. Hazlitt’s Memoirs, etc. II. 154.
PAG
E Note. See vol. VIII. (Lectures on the Comic Writers), p. 22 and
161. note.
162. ‘Has just come,’ etc. Cf. Richard III., Act I. Sc. 1.
164. A Manuscript of Cicero’s. Hazlitt probably refers to Cardinal
Angelo Mai’s (1782–1854) discoveries.
A Noble Lord. The Marquis of Blandford, who bought
Valdarfer’s edition of Boccaccio for £2260 at the Roxburgh
sale in 1812. Cf. ante, p. 43.
Mr. Thomas Taylor. Thomas Taylor (1758–1835), the
Platonist. The ‘old Duke of Norfolk’ (Bernard Edward, 12th
Duke, 1765–1842) was his patron, and locked up nearly the
whole of Taylor’s edition of Plato (5 vols., 1804) in his
library.
Ireland’s celebrated forgery. The main forgery, Vortigern, by
William Henry Ireland, was produced at Drury Lane on
April 2, 1796.
Note. Mr. G. D.’s chambers. Lamb’s friend George Dyer
(1755–1841) lived in Clifford’s Inn from 1792. His History
of the University and Colleges of Cambridge, etc. was
published in 2 vols. in 1814. In reference to the number of
corrections in this work, Lamb spoke of Dyer as
‘Cancellarius Magnus.’
Note. Another friend of mine, etc. Leigh Hunt. See his essay
‘Jack Abbot’s Breakfast’ reprinted in Men, Women, and
Books (1847).
166. ‘Proud as when,’ etc. Cf. Troilus and Cressida, Act I. Sc. 3.
167. ‘Like sunken wreck,’ etc. Cf. Henry V., Act I. Sc. 2.
168. ‘Full of wise σατυς,’ etc. Cf. As You Like It, Act II. Sc. 7.
‘An insolent piece of paper.’ ‘A piece of arrogant paper.’
Massinger, A New Way to pay Old Debts, Act IV. Sc. 3.
‘Somewhat musty.’ Cf. ‘Something musty.’ Hamlet, Act III. Sc.
2.
Longinus complains, etc. See Longinus, On the Sublime, IX.
169. Irving’s orations. Cf. vol. IV. (The Spirit of the Age), p. 228.
The Jew’s letters. Dr. Philip le Fanu published in 1777 a
translation of the Abbé Guenée’s Lettres de certaines
Juives à M. Voltaire.
That Van Diemen’s Land of letters. These words were
omitted in Sketches and Essays.
Flocci-nauci, etc. Shenstone, Letter xxi. 1741 (Works, 1791, III.
49).
‘Flames in the forehead,’ etc. Lycidas, 171.
170. Mr. Godwin composed an Essay, etc. Hazlitt perhaps refers
to the letter added by ‘Edward Baldwin’ to his own English
Grammar. See vol. VI. p. 388.
Note. A certain poet. This note was omitted in Sketches and
Essays.
171. ‘By Heavens,’ etc. Wordsworth Sonnet, The world is too
much with us.
171. ‘Trampled,’ etc. Cf. Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in
France (Select Works, ed. Payne, II. 93).
‘Kept like an apple,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act IV. Sc. 2.
172. Note. ‘Speak evil of dignities.’ 2 Peter ii. 10.
Note. The Queens matrimonial-ladder. One of William
Hone’s squibs, published in 1820, and illustrated with
fourteen cuts by Cruikshank.
ON DISAGREEABLE PEOPLE
Republished in Sketches and Essays.
174. ‘Discourse of reason,’ etc. Loosely quoted from Hamlet. Cf.

Act I. Sc. 2 and Act IV. Sc. 4.
‘The whole,’ etc. Cf. S. Matthew ix. 12.
‘As when,’ etc. Thomson, The Castle of Indolence, St. 64.
177. ‘Yea, into our heart of hearts.’ Cf. Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 2.
‘The volumes,’ etc. Roscommon, Horace’s Art of Poetry.
‘That dallies,’ etc. Cf. Twelfth Night, Act II. Sc. 4.
178. ‘Wit at the helm,’ etc. Cf. ‘Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at
the helm.’ Gray, The Bard, 74.
179. A butt, according to the Spectator, etc. See The Spectator,
No. 47.
181. ‘Hew you,’ etc. Cf. Julius Cæsar, Act II. Sc. 1.
Tempora, etc. Cf. Æneid, IV. 293–4.
‘Not to admire,’ etc. Pope, Imitations of Horace, Epistles I. vi.
1–2.
The Westminster School of Reform. Hazlitt refers to the
writers, including Bentham and James Mill, associated
with The Westminster Review, founded in 1824.
182. ‘Milk of human kindness.’ Macbeth, Act I. Sc. 5.
ON MEANS AND ENDS
Published in Literary Remains with many variations presumably
introduced by the editor, and again in the same form in Winterslow.
PAG
E ‘We work by wit,’ etc. Othello, Act II. Sc. 3.
184. ‘Leaps at once,’ etc. Cowper, The Task, V. 686.
185. ‘From Indus,’ etc. Pope, Eloisa to Abelard, 58.
Hinc illæ lachrymæ. Horace, Epistles, I. xix. 41.

187. ‘Constrained by mastery.’ Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, The
188. Franklin’s Tale, 36; Wordsworth quotes the line in The
Excursion, VI. 162–5.
189. ‘Makes a sunshine,’ etc. The Faerie Queene, I. iii. 4.
190. David’s and Girodet’s pictures. Jacques Louis David (1748–
1825) and Anne Louis Girodet (1767–1824).
‘Potations, pottle-deep.’ Othello, Act II. Sc. 3.
192. ‘In a phantasma,’ etc. Julius Cæsar, Act II. Sc. 1.
‘Courage,’ etc. Paradise Lost, I. 108.
193. ‘His thoughts,’ etc. Cf. Ibid., IX. 467.
Note. Strong passion, etc. Cf. The Rambler, No. 1.
Note. ‘The lunatic,’ etc. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act V.
Sc. 1.
194. ‘Set but a Scotsman,’ etc. Cf. Burns, The Author’s Earnest Cry
and Prayer, Postscript, St. 4.
‘And it alone,’ etc. Cf. Twelfth Night, Act I. Sc. 1.
‘We read his works.’ Lamb’s Essay ‘On the Genius and
Character of Hogarth’ (Works, ed. E. V. Lucas, I. 71).
195. ‘The darlings of his precious eye.’ Cf. ‘Make it a darling like
your precious eye.’ Othello, Act III. Sc. 4.
196. ‘The jovial thigh,’ etc. Cf. Cymbeline, Act IV. Sc. 2.
197. ‘They are careful,’ etc. Cf. S. Luke X. 41–42.
198. ‘And with their darkness,’ etc. Cf. Paradise Lost, I. 391.
‘They also serve,’ etc. Adapted from Milton’s Sonnet, No. XX.,
‘When I consider how my light is spent,’ etc.
ON PERSONAL IDENTITY
Published with some omissions in Winterslow.
‘Ha! here be,’ etc. King Lear, Act III. Sc. 4.

‘If I were not Alexander,’ etc. The saying is given by Plutarch.
Note. Zoffani. Johann Zoffany, or Zaufelly (1733–1810).
Note. Reynolds’s Speculation. A comedy by Frederick
Reynolds, produced in 1795. George III. was much amused
by it. See Life of Reynolds, II. 208–210.
199. ‘Wishing to be,’ etc. Cf. Shakespeare, Sonnet XXIX.
‘The rub,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 1.
‘Put off,’ etc. Ibid.
200. ‘What more felicity,’ etc. Spenser, Muiopotmos, St. 27.
201. ‘That something,’ etc. Cf. Pope, An Essay on Man, IV. 3–4.
‘Very choice Italian.’ Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 2.
‘Vows,’ etc. Cf. Paradise Lost, IV. 97.
‘The native hue,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 1.
202. ‘Shut up,’ etc. Macbeth, Act II. Sc. 1.
‘I’d sooner,’ etc. Cf. Julius Cæsar, Act IV. Sc. 3.
Sir Thomas Lethbridge. A sturdy Tory, member for
Somersetshire. He is possibly the L—— referred to in vol. VI.
(Table-Talk), p. 94. Though a staunch Protectionist, he
voted for Reform and Catholic Emancipation.
203. ‘Ethereal braid,’ etc. See vol. IV. (The Spirit of the Age), note
to p. 216.
Had I been a lord I should have married, etc. This sentence
and the next were omitted in Winterslow.
204. ‘Give me,’ etc. Cf. 3 Henry VI., Act I. Sc. 4.
‘Monarchise,’ etc. Richard II., Act III. Sc. 2.
‘Tenth transmitters,’ etc. Richard Savage, The Bastard.
‘In the catalogue,’ etc. Cf. Macbeth, Act III. Sc. 1.
‘Swinish multitude.’ Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in
205. ‘The fair,’ etc. Cf. As You Like It, Act III. Sc. 2.
The person who bought Punch. Cf. post, p. 353.
206. Why will Mr. Cobbett, etc. Cobbett had recently (1826)
unsuccessfully contested Preston.
The bird described by Chaucer. See Chaucer, The Canterbury
Tales, The Manciple’s Tale, 59 et seq., and The Squiere’s
Tale, 603 et seq.
You say there is a common language, etc. These words, down
to ‘And he will laugh in your face,’ were omitted in
Winterslow.
207. ‘A certain tender bloom,’ etc. Cf. ‘A certain tender gloom
o’erspread his face.’ Thomson, The Castle of Indolence, I.
St. 57.
208. ‘Stuff o’ the conscience.’ Othello, Act I. Sc. 2.
‘Laggard age.’ Collins, Ode, The Passions, 112.
209. Like Benvenuto Cellini, etc. See Life of Benvenuto Cellini,
Part II. lxxviii.
APHORISMS ON MAN
Now republished for the first time. In The Monthly Magazine they
appeared as follows: I.–XI. October 1830; XII.–XXXVI. November 1830;
XXXVII.–XLVII. December 1830; XLVIII.–LV. April 1831; LVI.–LXVI. May
1831; LXVII.–LXX. June 1831. They are described as ‘by the late William
Hazlitt.’
PAG
E Monmouth-street. In St. Giles’s, now partly occupied by
210. Shaftesbury Avenue. Allusions to its old-clothes shops are
very frequent in eighteenth-century literature.
211. ‘In the deep bosom,’ etc. Richard III., Act I. Sc. 1.
‘At one fell swoop.’ Macbeth, Act IV. Sc. 3.
214. O’Connell. Hazlitt no doubt refers to the proceedings of
O’Connell after his election for Co. Clare in 1828.
215. ‘The soft collar,’ etc. Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in
‘The iron rod,’ etc. Cf.
‘When the scourge inexorably, and the torturing hour,
Calls us to penance.’ Paradise Lost, II. 90–2.
217. An editor. Cf. ante, p. 136.

218. ‘There goes my wicked self.’ Hazlitt was perhaps thinking of
the saying attributed to John Bradford (1510?–1555), who,
on seeing some criminals going to execution, is said to have
exclaimed: ‘But for the grace of God, there goes John
Bradford.’
‘To be honest,’ etc. Hamlet, Act II. Sc. 2.
L——.? Lamb.
219. ‘Leave others poor indeed.’ Cf. Othello, Act III. Sc. 3.
‘To be direct,’ etc. Othello, Act III. Sc. 3.
220. ‘Tout homme,’ etc. Cf. vol. I. (The Round Table), note to p.
117.
221. A popular author. Scott, no doubt.
‘Writes himself,’ etc. Cf. The Merry Wives of Windsor, Act I.
Sc. 1.
223. ‘To triumph,’ etc. Gray, The Bard, 142.
224. A certain bookseller. Sir Richard Phillips. See vol. VI. (Mr.
Northcote’s Conversations), p. 418.
225. ‘From every work,’ etc. The Faerie Queene, I. IV. 20.
226. ‘Melted,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act I. Sc. 2.
Beau Didapper. See Joseph Andrews, Book IV. chap. IX.
228. ‘Damned spot.’ Macbeth, Act V. Sc. 1.
229. ‘The web,’ etc. All’s Well that Ends Well, Act IV. Sc. 3.
The Devil’s Elixir, etc. The Devil’s Elixir, or the Shadowless
Man, a musical romance by Edward Fitzball (1792–1873),
produced at Covent Garden, April 20, 1829; The Bottle
Imp, a melodrama by Richard Brinsley Peake (1792–1847),
produced at the Lyceum, July 7, 1828, and at Covent
Garden, Oct. 17, 1828.
Mr. Farley. Charles Farley (1771–1859), the actor, to whose
skill as a theatrical machinist at Covent Garden Hazlitt here
refers.
230. ‘La Belle Assemblée’s dresses for May.’ Cf. ‘In the manner of
—Ackerman’s dresses for May’ (Moore, Horace, XI. ii.),
quoted elsewhere by Hazlitt.
M. Stultz. M. Stulz, the well-known tailor, referred to by
Bulwer in Pelham and (more than once) by Thackeray.
A CHAPTER ON EDITORS
Republished with some omissions in Sketches and Essays. In the
Magazine there is the following note by the Editor:—‘We give
insertion to this article, one of the posthumous papers of Mr. Hazlitt,
to shew that we do not consider ourselves implicated in the abuses
complained of; and that we have no right to any share of indignation
so whimsically lavished upon our fraternity. Ed.’
PAG
E ‘Our withers,’ etc. Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 2.
230. ‘Tittle-tattle.’ The phrase is so printed in the Magazine and in
Sketches and Essays, but Hazlitt probably wrote ‘kittle
cattle,’ a distinctively Scots expression for what he meant to
say.
‘Lay the flattering unction,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 4.
231. As Mr. Horne Tooke said, etc. See vol. IV. (The Spirit of the
Age), p. 236 and note.
232. We only know one Editor. Hazlitt possibly refers to the
Editor of Blackwood’s Magazine.
We will not mention names, etc. This sentence was omitted in
Sketches and Essays.
‘More subtle web,’ etc. The Faerie Queene, II. xii. 77.
233. The conductor, etc. This sentence and the next but one were
omitted in Sketches and Essays.
‘Here’s the rub.’ Cf. Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 1.
THE LETTER-BELL
Reprinted with considerable omissions in Sketches and Essays.
235 ‘One entire,’ etc. Othello, Act V. Sc. 2

Blue hills. Cf. vol. VI. (Table-Talk), p. 256.
236. ‘I should notice,’ etc. A long passage from this point to
‘accumulate to a tolerable sum’ (p. 237) was omitted from
Sketches and Essays.
From —— to ——. Sketches and Essays reads ‘From Wem to
Shrewsbury.’ Cf. My First Acquaintance with Poets, post,
p. 260.
‘And by the vision splendid,’ etc. Cf. Wordsworth’s Ode,
Intimations of Immortality, 73–74.
‘What though the radiance,’ etc. Ibid. 179–82.
‘Like morn,’ etc. Cf. Paradise Lost, v. 310–11.
And may he not yet greet the yellow light, etc. Cf. post, p.
271.
‘And from his neck so free,’ etc. The Ancient Mariner, 289–
91.
238. Vangoyen. Jan Van Goyen (1596–1666), one of whose
landscapes, it would seem, Hazlitt had copied.
‘The slow canal,’ etc. Goldsmith, The Traveller, 293–4.
‘While with an eye,’ etc. Wordsworth, Lines composed a few
miles above Tintern Abbey, 47–49.
‘The secrets,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act I. Sc. 5.
‘Entire affection,’ etc. Cf. The Faerie Queene, I. viii. 40.
‘His shame,’ etc. Cf. Goldsmith, The Deserted Village, 412.
‘Made good digestion,’ etc. Cf. Macbeth, Act III. Sc. 4.
239. An ingenious friend and arch-critic. ? Jeffrey.
‘More germain [germane],’ etc. Hamlet, Act V. Sc. 2.
240. ‘Hark!’ etc. Cowper, The Task, IV. 1, et seq.
Lord Byron denies, etc. See vol. VI. (Table-Talk), p. 210 and
note, and vol. XI. (Fugitive Writings), p. 492.
240. The telegraphs. A system of semaphores, presumably.
Electric telegraphs belong to a later date.
The new revolution. The Revolution of July 1830. Cf. post,
pp. 456, et seq.
The beacon-fires. See the Agamemnon of Æschylus, ll. 281–
316.
ON THE SPIRIT OF MONARCHY
Republished in Literary Remains. The essay was published (?
1835) as a pamphlet (together with ‘The Moral Effects of
Aristocracy,’ by Godwin).
PAG
E ‘And by the vision,’ etc. See ante, note to p. 236.
242. The madman in Hogarth. The Rake’s Progress, Plate VIII.
‘There goes,’ etc. Cf. ante, p. 218.

We once heard, etc. In vol. VI. (Mr. Northcote’s
Conversations), p. 387, this sentiment is attributed to a
‘Mr. R——.’ It is clear from the present passage that this
person was not Mr. Railton, but William Roscoe (1753–
1831), the well-known historian, and that therefore the
reading of The London Weekly Review was correct. See
note to vol. VI. p. 387.
243. ‘That within,’ etc. Cf. Hamlet, Act I. Sc. 2.
‘To fear,’ etc. Othello, Act I. Sc. 2.
244. ‘Peep through,’ etc. Macbeth, Act I. Sc. 5.
‘Great is Diana,’ etc. Acts xix. 28.
‘Your gods,’ etc. Cf. S. Matthew xiii. 13.
In contempt of their worshippers. Cf. Burke’s Reflections on
the Revolution in France (Select Works, ed. Payne, II. 17).
Note. Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel, I. 100–3.
245. ‘Gods partial,’ etc. Pope, An Essay on Man, III. 257–8.
‘Any mark,’ etc. Cf. I Henry IV. Act III. Sc. 2.
246. Note. See vol. III. (Political Essays), p. 298 and notes.
247. ‘From the crown,’ etc. Cf. Isaiah i. 6.

Emperor John Ii Komnenos Rebuilding New Rome 1118 1143 Maximilian C G Lau Full Chapter

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Emperor John Ii Komnenos Rebuilding New Rome 1118 1143 Maximilian C G Lau Full Chapter

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Emperor John II Komnenos: Rebuilding

New Rome 1118-1143 Maximilian C. G.

Oxford Studies in Byzantium consists of scholarly monographs and editions on the

Map One: Eastern Mediterranean 41

AIPHOS L’Annuaire de l’Institute de Philologie et d’Histoire Orientales et Slaves

KC Kleinchroniken, Die byzantinischen Kleinchroniken, vol. 1, ed.

RP G. Rallis, and M. Potlis, Σύνταγμα τῶν θείων καὶ ἱερῶν κανόνων,

1. South-­east corner Tower of Lopadion 35

32. Fortress of Tell Hamdun 214

3 D. Stathakopoulos, ‘John II Komnenos: A Historiographical Essay’, John II Komnenos, Emperor of

16 I. Stouraitis, ‘Narratives of John II Komnenos’ Wars: Comparing Byzantine and Modern

campaigning and the construction of a network of fortifications and monasteries;

Working through Choniates and Kinnamos

1 Stathakopoulos, ‘Historiographical Essay’, p. 1.

John Kinnamos, born c.1143, was an imperial secretary who accompanied

monk in the monastery of St Glykeria where he wrote his Epitome Historion,

Contemporary Court Sources

of Thessalonike too.30 As such, it appears likely that either Constantinopolitan

30 Eustathios of Thessalonike, Opuscula, ed. T. Tafel (Frankfurt-­am-­Main, 1832, repr. Amsterdam,

Further Byzantine Sources

Though, unfortunately, most of the opening, biographical, section of the

57 M. Hinterberger, Autobiographische Traditionen in Byzanz (Vienna, 1999), p. 270; The Pantokrator

68 Ecloga Basilicorum, ed. L. Burgmann (Frankfurt am Main, 1988), pp. vii–­xviii.

Non-­Greek histories are among the richest sources of supplementary material

137. ‘The heaviest stone,’ etc. Sir T. Browne, Hydriotaphia, chap.

138. ‘That Mr. Moore,’ etc. Moore’s Life of Sheridan appeared in

My brother’s. John Hazlitt (1767–1837), the miniature-

174. ‘Discourse of reason,’ etc. Loosely quoted from Hamlet. Cf.

Hinc illæ lachrymæ. Horace, Epistles, I. xix. 41.

‘Ha! here be,’ etc. King Lear, Act III. Sc. 4.

217. An editor. Cf. ante, p. 136.

235 ‘One entire,’ etc. Othello, Act V. Sc. 2

‘There goes,’ etc. Cf. ante, p. 218.

You might also like

Map One: Eastern Mediterranean 41

1. South-east corner Tower of Lopadion 35

32. Fortress of Tell Hamdun 214

30 Eustathios of Thessalonike, Opuscula, ed. T. Tafel (Frankfurt-am-Main, 1832, repr. Amsterdam,

68 Ecloga Basilicorum, ed. L. Burgmann (Frankfurt am Main, 1988), pp. vii–xviii.

Non-Greek histories are among the richest sources of supplementary material