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Alexios Doukas
Alexios V Doukas (; died December 1204), Latinized as Alexius V Ducas, was Byzantine emperor from February to April 1204, just prior to the sack of Constantinople by the participants of the Fourth Crusade. His family name was Doukas, but he was also known by the nickname Mourtzouphlos or Murtzuphlus (), referring to either bushy, overhanging eyebrows or a sullen, gloomy character. He achieved power through a palace coup, killing his predecessors in the process. Though he made vigorous attempts to defend Constantinople from the crusader army, his military efforts proved ineffective. His actions won the support of the mass of the populace, but he alienated the elite of the city. Following the fall, sack, and occupation of the city, Alexios V was blinded by his father-in-law, the ex-emperor Alexios III, and later executed by the new Latin regime. He was the last Byzantine emperor to rule in Constantinople until the Byzantine recapture of Constantinople in 1261. Origins and chara ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Basileus
''Basileus'' () is a Greek term and title that has signified various types of monarchs throughout history. In the English language, English-speaking world, it is perhaps most widely understood to mean , referring to either a or an . The title was used by sovereigns and other persons of authority in ancient Greece (especially during the Hellenistic period), the Byzantine emperors, and the List of kings of Greece, kings of modern Greece. The name Vassilios, Basileios (Basil (name), Basil), deriving from the term ''basileus'', is a common given name in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Syriac Orthodox Church for the Maphrian. The feminine forms are ''basileia'' (), ''basilissa'' (), ''basillis'' (), or the archaic ''basilinna'' (), meaning or . The related term ''basileia'' () has meanings such as 'sovereignty', 'royalty', 'kingdom', 'reign', 'dominion' and 'authority'. Etymology The etymology of ''basileus'' is uncertain. The Mycenean Greek, Mycenaean form was *''gʷasileus'' (L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexios III Angelos
Alexios III Angelos (; 1211), Latinized as Alexius III Angelus, was Byzantine Emperor from March 1195 to 17/18 July 1203. He reigned under the name Alexios Komnenos (; Aléxios Komnēnós) associating himself with the Komnenos dynasty (from which he was descended cognatically). A member of the extended imperial family, Alexios came to the throne after deposing, blinding and imprisoning his younger brother Isaac II Angelos. The most significant event of his reign was the attack of the Fourth Crusade on Constantinople in 1203, on behalf of Alexios IV Angelos. Alexios III took over the defence of the city, which he mismanaged, and then fled the city at night with one of his three daughters. From Adrianople, and then Mosynopolis, he attempted unsuccessfully to rally his supporters, only to end up a captive of Marquis Boniface I of Montferrat. He was ransomed and sent to Asia Minor where he plotted against his son-in-law Theodore I Laskaris, but was eventually captured and spe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Political Mutilation In Byzantine Culture
Mutilation was a common method of punishment for criminals in the Byzantine Empire, but it also had a role in the empire's political life. By blinding a rival, one would not only restrict his mobility but also make it almost impossible for him to lead an army into battle, then an important part of taking control of the empire. Castration was also used to eliminate potential opponents. In the Byzantine Empire, for a man to be castrated meant that he was no longer a man—half-dead, "life that was half death". Castration also eliminated any chance of heirs being born to threaten either the emperor's or the emperor's children's place at the throne. Other mutilations were the severing of the nose ( rhinotomy), or the amputating of limbs. Rationale The mutilation of political rivals by the emperor was deemed an effective way of side-lining from the line of succession a person who was seen as a threat. Castrated men were not seen as a threat, as no matter how much power they gained t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coup D'état
A coup d'état (; ; ), or simply a coup , is typically an illegal and overt attempt by a military organization or other government elites to unseat an incumbent leadership. A self-coup is said to take place when a leader, having come to power through legal means, tries to stay in power through illegal means. By one estimate, there were 457 coup attempts from 1950 to 2010, half of which were successful. Most coup attempts occurred in the mid-1960s, but there were also large numbers of coup attempts in the mid-1970s and the early 1990s. Coups occurring in the post-Cold War period have been more likely to result in democratic systems than Cold War coups, though coups still mostly perpetuate authoritarianism. Many factors may lead to the occurrence of a coup, as well as determine the success or failure of a coup. Once a coup is underway, coup success is driven by coup-makers' ability to get others to believe that the coup attempt will be successful. The number of successful cou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Doukas
The House of Doukas ( pl. Doukai; , pl. , feminine form Doukaina; ), Latinized as Ducas, was a Byzantine Greek noble family, whose branches provided several notable generals and rulers to the Byzantine Empire in the 9th–11th centuries. A maternally-descended line, the Komnenodoukai, founded the Despotate of Epirus in the 13th century, with another branch ruling over Thessaly. The continuity of descent amongst the various branches of the original, middle Byzantine family is not clear, and historians generally recognize several distinct groups of Doukai based on their occurrence in the contemporary sources. Polemis, who compiled the only overview work on the bearers of the Doukas name, in view of this lack of genealogical continuity "it would be a mistake to view the groups of people designated by the ''cognomen'' of Doukas as forming one large family". History Origins Nothing is known for certain about the family's origin. Later tradition, mentioned by the historian Nikepho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fourth Crusade
The Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) was a Latin Christian armed expedition called by Pope Innocent III. The stated intent of the expedition was to recapture the Muslim-controlled city of Jerusalem, by first defeating the powerful Egyptian Ayyubid Sultanate. However, a sequence of economic and political events culminated in the Crusader army's 1202 siege of Zara and the 1204 sack of Constantinople, rather than the conquest of Egypt as originally planned. This led to the Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae or the partition of the Byzantine Empire by the Crusaders and their Venetian allies leading to a period known as Frankokratia, or "Rule of the Franks" in Greek. In 1201, the Republic of Venice contracted with the Crusader leaders to build a dedicated fleet to transport their invasion force. However, the leaders greatly overestimated the number of soldiers who would embark from Venice, since many sailed from other ports, and the army that appeared could not pay the contracted price. I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sack Of Constantinople
The sack of Constantinople occurred in April 1204 and marked the culmination of the Fourth Crusade. Crusaders sacked and destroyed most of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire. After the capture of the city, the Latin Empire (known to the Byzantines as the '' Frankokratia'', or the Latin occupation) was established and Baldwin of Flanders crowned as Emperor Baldwin I of Constantinople in Hagia Sophia. After the city's sacking, most of the Byzantine Empire's territories were divided up among the Crusaders. Byzantine aristocrats also established a number of small independent splinter states—one of them being the Empire of Nicaea, which would eventually recapture Constantinople in 1261 and proclaim the reinstatement of the Empire. However, the restored Empire never managed to reclaim all its former territory or attain its earlier economic strength, and it gradually succumbed to the rising Ottoman Empire over the following two centuries. The Byzantine Empire ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Romanization Of Greek
Romanization of Greek is the transliteration ( letter-mapping) or transcription (sound-mapping) of text from the Greek alphabet into the Latin alphabet. History The conventions for writing and romanizing Ancient Greek and Modern Greek differ markedly. The sound of the English letter B () was written as in ancient Greek but is now written as the digraph , while the modern sounds like the English letter V () instead. The Greek name became Johannes in Latin and then John in English, but in modern Greek has become ; this might be written as Yannis, Jani, Ioannis, Yiannis, or Giannis, but not Giannes or Giannēs as it would be for ancient Greek. The word might variously appear as Hagiοs, Agios, Aghios, or Ayios, or simply be translated as " Holy" or "Saint" in English forms of Greek placenames. Traditional English renderings of Greek names originated from Roman systems established in antiquity. The Roman alphabet itself was a form of the Cumaean alphabet derived f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Greek Orthodox
Greek Orthodox Church (, , ) is a term that can refer to any one of three classes of Christian Churches, each associated in some way with Greek Christianity, Levantine Arabic-speaking Christians or more broadly the rite used in the Eastern Roman Empire. * The broader meaning refers to "the entire body of Orthodox (Chalcedonian) Christianity, sometimes also called 'Eastern Orthodox', 'Greek Catholic', or generally 'the Greek Church. * A second, narrower meaning refers to "any of several independent churches within the worldwide communion of (Eastern) Orthodox Christianity that retain the use of the Greek language in formal ecclesiastical settings". In this sense, the Greek Orthodox Churches are the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople and its dependencies, the Patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, the Church of Greece and the Church of Cyprus. * The third meaning refers to the Church of Greece, an Eastern Orthodox Church operating within the modern bor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Istanbul University
Istanbul University, also known as University of Istanbul (), is a Public university, public research university located in Istanbul, Turkey. Founded by Mehmed II on May 30, 1453, a day after Fall of Constantinople, the conquest of Constantinople by the Turks, it was reformed as the first Education in the Ottoman Empire, Ottoman higher education institution influenced by Decline and modernization of the Ottoman Empire, European approaches. The successor institution, which has been operating under its current name since 1933, is the first university in modern Turkey. The university has 58,809 undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral students studying in 112 academic units, including faculties, institutes, colleges, and vocational schools at 9 campuses. The main campus is adjacent to Beyazıt Square in Fatih, the capital district of the province, on the European side of the city. :Istanbul University alumni, Istanbul University alumni include Nobel Prize in Chemistry winner Aziz Sa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Angelos
The House of Angelos (; pl. Angeloi; , pl. ) was a Byzantine Greek noble family that produced several Emperors and other prominent nobles during the middle and late Byzantine Empire. The family rose to prominence through the marriage of its founder, Constantine Angelos, with Theodora Komnene, the youngest daughter of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. As imperial relatives, the Angeloi held various high titles and military commands under Emperor Manuel I Komnenos. In 1185, following a revolt against Andronikos I Komnenos, Isaac II Angelos rose to the throne establishing the Angeloi as the new imperial family that ruled until 1204. The period was marked by the decline and fragmentation of the Byzantine Empire, culminating in its dissolution by the Fourth Crusade in 1204 under Alexios IV Angelos. After the Fourth Crusade, another branch of the family managed to establish an independent state in Epirus, which quickly expanded to rule Thessaly and Macedonia. The members of this branch la ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eudokia Angelina
Eudokia Angelina (, also spelled ''Eudocia'', ; around 1173–died , or later) was the consort of Stefan the First-Crowned of Serbia from c. 1190 to c. 1200. She later remarried, to Alexios V Doukas, who briefly ruled as Emperor of Byzantium in 1204. She was a daughter of Alexios III Angelos and Euphrosyne Doukaina Kamatera. Life Eudokia first married Stefan, the second son of Stefan Nemanja, Grand Župan of Serbia. The marriage was arranged by her uncle, the emperor Isaac II Angelos, around 1190, while her father was in exile in Syria. In 1196, on her father-in-law's retirement to a monastery, Eudokia's husband became ruler of Serbia. According to the Byzantine historian Nicetas Choniates, Stefan and Eudokia quarrelled and separated, accusing one another of adultery, and therefore in 1200 or 1201, Eudokia was banished from Serbia. Eudokia fled on foot with only the clothes on her back, seeking refuge at the court of Stefan's brother Vukan, ruler of Zeta, who befriended her and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
