In the
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 Constantinopl ...
, the menologem (Greek μηνολόγημα, ''menologema'', or μηνολόγιον, ''menologion'') was a dating clause used in certain types of official acts, such as the ''
prostagma A ''prostagma'' ( el, πρόσταγμα) or ''prostaxis'' (πρόσταξις), both meaning "order, command", were documents issued by the Byzantine imperial chancery bearing an imperial decision or command, usually on administrative matters.
''P ...
'' and ''
sigillion
A ''sigillion'' ( gr, σιγίλλιον, plural ''sigillia'', σιγίλλια), was a type of legal document publicly affirmed with a seal, usually of lead.
Origin and Byzantine usage
The term ''sigillion'' derives from the Latin ''sigillum'', ...
''. It recorded the month and the
indiction
An indiction ( la, indictio, impost) was a periodic reassessment of taxation in the Roman Empire which took place every fifteen years. In Late Antiquity, this 15-year cycle began to be used to date documents and it continued to be used for this p ...
(but not the day) and was always written by the issuer's own hand. It thus functioned as a signature. The
emperor
An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereignty, sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), ...
alone was allowed to write the menologem in red ink, while the
Patriarch of Constantinople
The ecumenical patriarch ( el, Οἰκουμενικός Πατριάρχης, translit=Oikoumenikós Patriárchēs) is the archbishop of Constantinople (Istanbul), New Rome and '' primus inter pares'' (first among equals) among the heads of th ...
was permitted to use black. Until the late thirteenth century, only the senior emperor if there was more than one bearing the title simultaneously had the right to use red ink. In the fourteenth century, the
Metropolitan of Thessalonike also used black.
The earliest use of the menologem dates from the reign of
Constantine IV
Constantine IV ( la, Constantinus; grc-gre, Κωνσταντῖνος, Kōnstantînos; 650–685), called the Younger ( la, iunior; grc-gre, ὁ νέος, ho néos) and sometimes incorrectly the Bearded ( la, Pogonatus; grc-gre, Πωγων ...
(654–85). It was discontinued by
Manuel II in 1394, when he ordered the
year of the world to be added to the date.
In the
Latin Empire
The Latin Empire, also referred to as the Latin Empire of Constantinople, was a feudal Crusader state founded by the leaders of the Fourth Crusade on lands captured from the Byzantine Empire. The Latin Empire was intended to replace the Byzanti ...
founded by
Franks
The Franks ( la, Franci or ) were a group of Germanic peoples whose name was first mentioned in 3rd-century Roman sources, and associated with tribes between the Lower Rhine and the Ems River, on the edge of the Roman Empire.H. Schutz: Tools, ...
in 1204, a hybrid menologem was used in Latin documents. For example, on 5 August 1243 the Latin emperor
Baldwin II authenticated a letter by writing a dating formula with his own hand in red ink, but he dropped the indiction and added to the day the
year of the Lord, the place of signature (Constantinople) and his
regnal year
A regnal year is a year of the reign of a sovereign, from the Latin ''regnum'' meaning kingdom, rule. Regnal years considered the date as an ordinal, not a cardinal number. For example, a monarch could have a first year of rule, a second year of ...
. Among the Byzantine successor states after 1204, the authentic red menologem of the emperors was kept alive only in the
Empire of Nicaea
The Empire of Nicaea or the Nicene Empire is the conventional historiographic name for the largest of the three Byzantine Greek''A Short history of Greece from early times to 1964'' by W. A. Heurtley, H. C. Darby, C. W. Crawley, C. M. Woodhouse ...
.
Notes
Sources
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Medieval documents