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Michael Kantakouzenos (died 1264)
Michael Kantakouzenos (died 1264) was ''megas konostaulos'' of the Byzantine Empire under Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos. According to Pachymeres, this Michael Kantakouzenos was amongst the officers under the command of John Palaiologos the Emperor Michael sent in 1263 to campaign against Michael II, Despot of Epirus. After this campaign, Michael Kantakouzenos was created ''megas konostaulos'' or "Grand Constable". The ''Chronicle of the Morea'' mentions a Kantakouzenos, of unknown first name, who was '' kephale'' or governor of the Byzantine province in the Peloponnese in 1262. This Kantakouzenos relayed reports of the aggression of William II of Villehardouin, which led to Michael VIII sending an army to the Peloponnese against William. He was renowned as a soldier, and his death at the beginning of the Battle of Makryplagi had a demoralizing effect on the Byzantine side, which led to their defeat. Donald Nicol notes that "it is tempting to identify this unnamed Kantakouzenos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Megas Konostaulos
''Konostaulos'' or ''konostablos'' ("constable", in Greek variously ), later corrupted to ''kontostaulos''/''kontostablos'' (κοντόσταυλος), was a late Byzantine title, adopted from the Normans. The derivative dignity of ''megas konostaulos'' (μέγας κονόσταυλος, "Grand Constable") became one of the highest court posts in the Palaiologan period (1261–1453) and was awarded to high-ranking generals. History It was adopted in the 11th century, under influence from the Normans of Sicily, from the French ''connétable'' (cf. English "constable"), which in turn derived from the Latin ''comes stabuli'' ("count of the stable").. In the 11th–12th centuries, the ''konostaulos'' appears to have been a purely honorary title, although it may also have replaced the middle Byzantine ''komēs tou staulou'', the direct descendant of the late Roman ''comes stabuli'', in his functions. In the last years of the reign of the Nicaean emperor John III Vatatzes (), the post ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William II Of Villehardouin
William of Villehardouin (french: Guillaume de Villehardouin; Kalamata, 1211 – 1 May 1278) was the fourth prince of Achaea in Frankish Greece, from 1246 to 1278. The younger son of Prince Geoffrey I, he held the Barony of Kalamata in fief during the reign of his elder brother Geoffrey II. William ruled Achaea as regent for his brother during Geoffrey's military campaigns against the Greeks of Nicaea, who were the principal enemies of his overlord, the Latin Emperor of Constantinople Baldwin II. William succeeded his childless brother in the summer of 1246. Conflicts between Nicaea and Epirus enabled him to complete the conquest of the Morea in about three years. He captured Monemvasia and built three new fortresses, forcing two previously autonomous tribes, the Tzakones and Melingoi, into submission. He participated in the unsuccessful Egyptian crusade of Louis IX of France, who rewarded him with the right to issue currency in the style of French ro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kantakouzenos Family
The House of Kantakouzenos ( Kantakouzenoi; el, Καντακουζηνός, pl. Καντακουζηνοί), Latinized as Cantacuzenus and anglicized as Cantacuzene, was one of the most prominent Greek noble families of the Byzantine Empire in the last centuries of its existence. The family was one of the Empire's wealthiest and provided several prominent governors and generals, as well as two Byzantine emperors. The Kantakouzenoi intermarried extensively with other Byzantine noble families such as the Palaiologoi, the Philanthropenoi, the Asen, and the Tarchaneiotes. The feminine form of the name is Kantakouzene ( el, Καντακουζηνή), Latinized as Cantacuzena. Etymology The origin of the family's surname, to follow Donald Nicol, "lies between romantic guesswork and philological conjecture." Prince Michael Cantacuzino, an 18th-century Romanian aristocrat of the Cantacuzino family who traced his ancestry to this Byzantine family, provides examples of the first kind, suc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
13th-century Byzantine People
The 13th century was the century which lasted from January 1, 1201 ( MCCI) through December 31, 1300 ( MCCC) in accordance with the Julian calendar. The Mongol Empire was founded by Genghis Khan, which stretched from Eastern Asia to Eastern Europe. The conquests of Hulagu Khan and other Mongol invasions changed the course of the Muslim world, most notably the Siege of Baghdad (1258), the destruction of the House of Wisdom and the weakening of the Mamluks and Rums which, according to historians, caused the decline of the Islamic Golden Age. Other Muslim powers such as the Mali Empire and Delhi Sultanate conquered large parts of West Africa and the Indian subcontinent, while Buddhism witnessed a decline through the conquest led by Bakhtiyar Khilji. The Southern Song dynasty would begin the century as a prosperous kingdom but would eventually be invaded and annexed into the Yuan dynasty of the Mongols. The Kamakura Shogunate of Japan would be invaded by the Mongols. Goryeo resist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1264 Deaths
1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. In conventions of sign where zero is considered neither positive nor negative, 1 is the first and smallest positive integer. It is also sometimes considered the first of the infinite sequence of natural numbers, followed by 2, although by other definitions 1 is the second natural number, following 0. The fundamental mathematical property of 1 is to be a multiplicative identity, meaning that any number multiplied by 1 equals the same number. Most if not all properties of 1 can be deduced from this. In advanced mathematics, a multiplicative identity is often denoted 1, even if it is not a number. 1 is by convention not considered a prime number; this was not universally accepted until the mid-20th century. Additionally, 1 is the s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John VI Kantakouzenos
John VI Kantakouzenos or Cantacuzene ( el, , ''Iōánnēs Ángelos Palaiológos Kantakouzēnós''; la, Johannes Cantacuzenus; – 15 June 1383) was a Byzantine Greek nobleman, statesman, and general. He served as grand domestic under Andronikos III Palaiologos and regent for John V Palaiologos before reigning as Byzantine emperor in his own right from 1347 to 1354. Deposed by his former ward, he was forced to retire to a monastery under the name and spent the remainder of his life as a monk and historian. At age 90 or 91 at his death, he was the longest-lived of the Roman emperors. Early life Born in Constantinople, John Kantakouzenos was the son of Michael Kantakouzenos, governor of the Morea; Donald Nicol speculates that he may have been born after his father's death and raised as an only child. Through his mother Theodora Palaiologina Angelina, he was related to the then-reigning house of Palaiologos. He was also related to the imperial dynasty through his wife Ir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donald Nicol
Donald MacGillivray Nicol, (4 February 1923 – 25 September 2003) was an English Byzantinist. Life Nicol was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, to a Church of Scotland minister, and received a classical education at King Edward VII School in Sheffield and St Paul's School in London. Registering as a conscientious objector in 1941, he served in 1942–1946 in the Friends' Ambulance Unit, with which he first visited wartime Greece in 1944–1945, visiting Ioannina and the Meteora monasteries. After earning his first Classics degree at Cambridge University, he returned to Greece in 1949–1950 as a member of the British School at Athens. During this time, he also visited Mount Athos, spending Easter 1949 at the Hilandar Monastery, and revisited Meteora. In 1950, Nicol married Joan Mary Campbell, with whom he had three sons. He completed his doctoral thesis for Pembroke College, Cambridge, in 1952. The thesis, on the medieval Despotate of Epirus, led to his first book, ''The Des ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Makryplagi
The Battle of Makryplagi or Makry Plagi was fought between the forces of the Byzantine Empire, and the Latin Principality of Achaea. The Byzantines had been weakened and demoralized by the defection of their numerous Turkish mercenaries to the Achaeans. At Makryplagi, the Byzantines suffered a heavy defeat, which together with their defeat at the Battle of Prinitza the previous year ended their attempted reconquest of the Morea. Background After the Battle of Pelagonia (1259), the Byzantine emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos (r. 1259–1282) acquired a number of fortresses in the southeastern Peloponnese (Morea), ceded by the captured Prince of Achaea William II of Villehardouin (r. 1246–1278) in exchange for his release. William also pledged to become Michael's vassal, but as soon as he returned to the Morea he renounced this oath, and began negotiating with the Pope and other Latin powers for a joint effort against the Byzantines. War broke out in late 1262 or 1263, when Micha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peloponnese
The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic regions of Greece, geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmus of Corinth land bridge which separates the Gulf of Corinth from the Saronic Gulf. From the late Middle Ages until the 19th century the peninsula was known as the Morea ( grc-x-byzant, Μωρέας), (Morèas) a name still in colloquial use in its demotic Greek, demotic form ( el, Μωριάς, links=no), (Moriàs). The peninsula is divided among three administrative regions of Greece, administrative regions: most belongs to the Peloponnese (region), Peloponnese region, with smaller parts belonging to the West Greece and Attica (region), Attica regions. Geography The Peloponnese is a peninsula located at the southern tip of the mainland, in area, and constitutes the southernmost part of mainland Greece. It is connected to the mainlan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople. It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire remained the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in Europe. The terms "Byzantine Empire" and "Eastern Roman Empire" were coined after the end of the realm; its citizens continued to refer to their empire as the Roman Empire, and to themselves as Romans—a term which Greeks continued to use for themselves into Ottoman times. Although the Roman state continued and its traditions were maintained, modern historians prefer to differentiate the Byzantine Empire from Ancient Rome ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kephale (Byzantine Empire)
In the late Byzantine Empire, the term ''kephale'' ( gr, κεφαλή, kephalē, head) was used to denote local and provincial governors. It entered use in the second half of the 13th century, and was derived from the colloquial language. Consequently, it never became an established title or rank of the Byzantine aristocracy and bureaucracy, Byzantine imperial hierarchy, but remained a descriptive term.. In essence, the ''kephalē'' replaced the Komnenian period, Komnenian-era ''dux, doux'' as the civil and military governor of a territorial administrative unit, known as a ''katepanikion'' (κατεπανίκιον, ''katepaníkion''),Not to be confused with the very different katepano, katepanates of the 10th-11th centuries. but also termed a ''kephalatikion'' (κεφαλατίκιον, ''kephalatíkion''). In size, these provinces were small compared to the earlier ''Theme (Byzantine district), themata'', and could range from a few villages surrounding the ''kephales seat (a ''kast ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chronicle Of The Morea
The ''Chronicle of the Morea'' ( el, Τὸ χρονικὸν τοῦ Μορέως) is a long 14th-century history text, of which four versions are extant: in French, Greek (in verse), Italian and Aragonese. More than 9,000 lines long, the ''Chronicle'' narrates events of the Franks' establishment of feudalism in mainland Greece. West European Crusaders settled in the Peloponnese (called Morea at the time) following the Fourth Crusade. The period covered in the ''Chronicle'' was 1204 to 1292 (or later, depending on the version). It gives significant details on the civic organization of the Principality of Achaia. The extant texts of the ''Chronicle of the Morea'' The Greek text is the only text written in verse. The French, Italian and Aragonese texts are written in prose.Jean-Claude Polet, ''Patrimoine littéraire européen'', De Boeck Université, 1995, Greek text The verses of the Greek text are written in a 15-syllable political verse. The verses are accented but not r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
