Manuel I Sarantenos or Karantenos or Charitopoulos (; died May or June 1222) was the

Patriarch of Constantinople The ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople () is the archbishop of Constantinople and (first among equals) among the heads of the several autocephalous churches that comprise the Eastern Orthodox Church. The ecumenical patriarch is regarded as ...

from May 1217 to May/June 1222.

Biography

He seems to have been called "the Philosopher",

George Akropolites George Akropolites ( Latinized as Acropolites or Acropolita; , ''Georgios Akropolites''; 1217 or 1220 – 1282) was a Byzantine Greek historian and statesman born at Constantinople. Life In his sixteenth year he was sent by his father, the logo ...

says he was "a philosopher, it seems, in deed, and so named by the people". Manuel I was Patriarch-in-exile as at the time his titular seat was occupied by the

Latin Patriarchate of Constantinople The Latin Patriarchate of Constantinople was an office established as a result of the Fourth Crusade and its conquest of Constantinople in 1204. It was a Roman Catholic replacement for the Eastern Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantino ...

, and he lived in

Nicaea Nicaea (also spelled Nicæa or Nicea, ; ), also known as Nikaia (, Attic: , Koine: ), was an ancient Greek city in the north-western Anatolian region of Bithynia. It was the site of the First and Second Councils of Nicaea (the first and seve ...

. Before the sack of 1204, Manuel was a

deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian denominations, such as the Cathol ...

and ''

hypatos ton philosophon The ''hypatos tōn philosophon'' () was a Byzantine title given to senior scholars in the 11th–14th centuries. The title first appears in 1047 and was probably introduced then or slightly earlier, for Michael Psellos. In the 11th and 12th cent ...

'' in Constantinople. This is likely the source of his epithet "the Philosopher". Under Manuel I,

Saint Sava Saint Sava (, ; Old Church Slavonic: ; Glagolitic: ; ; 1169 or 1174 – 14 January 1235/6), known as the Enlightener or the Illuminator, was a Serbs, Serbian prince and Eastern Orthodox Church, Orthodox monk, abbot of Studenica Monastery, Studeni ...

had become an archbishop and an autocephalous

Serbian Orthodox Church The Serbian Orthodox Church ( sr-Cyrl-Latn, Српска православна црква, Srpska pravoslavna crkva) is one of the autocephalous (ecclesiastically independent) Eastern Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodox Eastern Orthodox Church#Constit ...

was formed in the territory of the Serbian Kingdom of

Stefan the First-Crowned Stefan Nemanjić ( sr-Cyrl, Стефан Немањић, ), known as Stefan the First-Crowned (, ; – 24 September 1228), was the Grand Prince of Serbia from 1196 and the King of Serbia from 1217 until his death in 1228. He was the first Se ...

. Manuel I is noted for his role in a diplomatic interplay between the

Nicaean emperor The Empire of Nicaea (), also known as the Nicene Empire, was 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 (1967), p. 55: "There in ...

Theodore I Laskaris Theodore I Laskaris or Lascaris (; 1175November 1221) was the first emperor of Nicaea—a successor state of the Byzantine Empire—from 1205 to his death. Although he was born to an obscure aristocratic family, his mother was related t ...

and

Robert I, Latin Emperor Robert I (died 1228), also known as Robert of Courtenay, was Latin Emperor of Constantinople from 1221 until his death in 1228. He was a younger son of the emperor Peter II of Courtenay, and Yolanda of Flanders. When it became known in France tha ...

, in 1222. Robert I had approached Theodore I for a peace treaty and the latter offered his daughter Eudokia in marriage to cement the deal. But Theodore I had married Maria of Courtenay, Robert I's sister, in 1217. Manuel I is thus reported by

to have blocked the betrothal, twice negotiated, on religious-legal grounds: Robert, Theodore's brother-in-law, could not also become his son-in-law as this was an "illegal union" and constituted

incest Incest ( ) is sexual intercourse, sex between kinship, close relatives, for example a brother, sister, or parent. This typically includes sexual activity between people in consanguinity (blood relations), and sometimes those related by lineag ...

as it was within the third degree of kinship.George Akropolites (Ruth Macrides), ''The History'',

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 2007, Editor's notes, p. 158.

Notes and references

13th-century patriarchs of Constantinople People from the Empire of Nicaea 1222 deaths {{EasternOrthodoxy-bishop-stub