George Amiroutzes
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George Amiroutzes (; 1400–1470) was a
Pontic Greek Pontic Greek ( pnt, Ποντιακόν λαλίαν, or ; el, Ποντιακή διάλεκτος, ; tr, Rumca) is a variety of Modern Greek indigenous to the Pontus region on the southern shores of the Black Sea, northeastern Anatolia, ...
Renaissance scholar, philosopher and civil servant of the late Byzantine era. He was praised and respected for his outstanding knowledge, not only of theology and
philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
, but also of the natural sciences, medicine,
rhetoric Rhetoric () is the art of persuasion, which along with grammar and logic (or dialectic), is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. Rhetoric aims to study the techniques writers or speakers utilize to inform, persuade, or motivate parti ...
and poetry, all of which earned him the epithet ''the Philosopher'' (o Φιλόσοφος). He is a controversial figure due to his role in the
fall of Trebizond The siege of Trebizond was the successful siege of the city of Trebizond, capital of the Empire of Trebizond, by the Ottomans under sultan Mehmed II, which ended on 15 August 1461. The siege was the culmination of a lengthy campaign on the Otto ...
and his later behavior as a servant of Sultan
Mehmed II Mehmed II ( ota, محمد ثانى, translit=Meḥmed-i s̱ānī; tr, II. Mehmed, ; 30 March 14323 May 1481), commonly known as Mehmed the Conqueror ( ota, ابو الفتح, Ebū'l-fetḥ, lit=the Father of Conquest, links=no; tr, Fâtih Su ...
.


Life

Amiroutzes was born in Trebizond. His first appearance in the historical record was as a lay advisor to the imperial delegation from Trebizond to the
Council of Ferrara-Florence The Council of Florence is the seventeenth ecumenical council recognized by the Catholic Church, held between 1431 and 1449. It was convoked as the Council of Basel by Pope Martin V shortly before his death in February 1431 and took place in ...
. There he strongly supported the union of churches but upon return to Constantinople he made statements against the papal primacy and Filioque. According to a papal document 100
florin The Florentine florin was a gold coin struck from 1252 to 1533 with no significant change in its design or metal content standard during that time. It had 54 grains (3.499 grams, 0.113 troy ounce) of nominally pure or 'fine' gold with a purcha ...
s were given to '' protonotarios'' George as a subsidy; it was conjectured that Amiroutzes was thus bribed to support the union. The Genoese archives document Amiroutzes leading a diplomatic mission on behalf of Emperor John IV, seeking marriage alliance between a member of the Komnenos family, and a daughter of the Genoese doge
Lodovico di Campofregoso Lodovico di Campofregoso (1415–1489) was an Italian nobleman who was three times doge of Genoa. Biography The son of Bartolomeo di Campofregoso and Caterina Ordelaffi, he was the brother of Giano I di Campofregoso. He studied under humanist Bar ...
. However, he was denounced by his fellow Greeks as an opportunist, a traitor and a renegade for his familiarity with Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror. He was a nephew to the
Grand Vizier Grand vizier ( fa, وزيرِ اعظم, vazîr-i aʾzam; ota, صدر اعظم, sadr-ı aʾzam; tr, sadrazam) was the title of the effective head of government of many sovereign states in the Islamic world. The office of Grand Vizier was first ...
Mahmud Pasha of the Ottoman Empire, and while serving as '' protovestiarios'' Amiroutzes helped speed the fall of the
Empire of Trebizond The Empire of Trebizond, or Trapezuntine Empire, was a monarchy and one of three successor rump states of the Byzantine Empire, along with the Despotate of the Morea and the Principality of Theodoro, that flourished during the 13th through to t ...
by persuading Emperor David to surrender to the
Ottomans The Ottoman Turks ( tr, Osmanlı Türkleri), were the Turkic founding and sociopolitically the most dominant ethnic group of the Ottoman Empire ( 1299/1302–1922). Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks remains scarce, ...
to prevent bloodshed to its inhabitants. Mehmed sent the Emperor, his family, and nobles (including Amiroutzes himself) to Constantinople on one of his ships. He divided the rest of the inhabitants of Trebizond into three classes: the first became the servants and slaves of Mehmed and his followers; the second were transported to Constantinople to settle there; and the third part were exiled from the city. Some years later, David, was executed. The traditional story says that David received a letter from his niece, Theodora, the wife of
Uzun Hassan Uzun Hasan or Uzun Hassan ( اوزون حسن; fa, اوزون حسن; 1423 – January 6, 1478; where ''uzun'' means "tall" in Oghuz Turkic) was a ruler of the Turkoman Aq Qoyunlu state and is generally considered to be its strongest ruler. Ha ...
of the
Ak Koyunlu The Aq Qoyunlu ( az, Ağqoyunlular , ) was a culturally Persianate,Kaushik Roy, ''Military Transition in Early Modern Asia, 1400–1750'', (Bloomsbury, 2014), 38; "Post-Mongol Persia and Iraq were ruled by two tribal confederations: Akkoyunlu (Wh ...
, asking that one of his sons or his nephew Alexios be sent to her. This letter fell into the hands of Amiroutzes, who passed it on to Mehmed in order to prove his loyalty to the Sultan. The Sultan claimed the letter was proof of treason and executed the inconvenient former emperor and his sons. George Amiroutzes himself was very popular with the Ottoman court, and one of the advisors of Mehmed on Christianity and Greco-Roman philosophy. He was granted land by the Ottoman Sultan and one of his sons, named after Mehmed, was charged with responsibility for the Greek ''scriptoria'' in the Empire. After Athens fell to the Ottoman forces, Amiroutzes fell in love with one of the prisoners from that conquest, the widow of the last Duke of Athens. He desired to marry her, despite the fact his own wife and children were still alive. When the patriarch Joasaph Kokkas refused to consent to this marriage, Amiroutzes, helped by his cousin Mahmud Pasha, dethroned the patriarch and compelled him to shave his beard as punishment. Amiroutzes also punished the high ecclesiastical official, whom he unsuccessfully tried to bribe to assist him convince the patriarch, by having the man's nose slit. Amiroutzes met his end while playing at dice.Miller, ''Trebizond'', p. 112


Known works

* ''Dialogus de fide'' * Letter to Bessarion on the Fall of Trebizond * Letters to
Theodore Agallianos Theodore may refer to: Places * Theodore, Alabama, United States * Theodore, Australian Capital Territory * Theodore, Queensland, a town in the Shire of Banana, Australia * Theodore, Saskatchewan, Canada * Theodore Reservoir, a lake in Saskatche ...
about Agallianos's book ''On Providence'' * A letter on the Council at Florence, authenticity disputed * various poems dedicated to Mehmed II and others


See also

* Greek scholars in the Renaissance


References


External links


Touloumakos Pantelis, "Amiroutzis, Georgios", Encyclopaedia of the Hellenic World, Asia Minor
{{DEFAULTSORT:Amiroutzes, George 1400 births 1470 deaths 15th-century Byzantine people 15th-century Greek people Greek Renaissance humanists People of the Empire of Trebizond People from Trapezus Protovestiarioi Byzantine people of the Byzantine–Ottoman wars Ottoman Pontians 15th-century Greek scientists 15th-century Greek writers 15th-century Greek educators 15th-century Greek physicians 15th-century Greek politicians 15th-century Greek philosophers