Demetrios I Kantakouzenos (; 1343 – 1384) was a governor of the Morea and the grandson of Emperor John VI Kantakouzenos. Demetrios was the son of Matthew Kantakouzenos, governor of Morea, and Irene Palaiologina. Demetrios was given the title of ''

sebastokrator ''Sebastokrator'' (, ; ; ), was a senior court title in the late Byzantine Empire. It was also used by other rulers whose states bordered the Empire or were within its sphere of influence (Bulgarian Empire, Serbian Empire). The word is a compound ...

'' by Emperor John V Palaiologos in December 1357 and went to the

Peloponnese The Peloponnese ( ), Peloponnesus ( ; , ) or Morea (; ) is a peninsula and geographic region in Southern Greece, and the southernmost region of the Balkans. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmus of Corinth land bridg ...

with his father and grandfather in 1361. One of the sons of Matthew Kantakouzenos, he disputed the succession to the Despotate of the Morea with Theodore I Palaiologos, the son of John V between 1380 and 1384. Our only information for this event is a cryptic reference in the Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos' funeral oration for his brother Theodore, who remarks on the insubordination of the "son" of Matthew Kantakouzenos, who had usurped the government on the death of Manuel Kantakouzenos in 1380. The traditional view is that this son was John, not Demetrios; however, D.A. Zakythenos, a historian of the Despotate of the Peloponnese, was inclined to believe that the son was Demetrios. According to the Byzantinist Donald Nicol, "This problem can hardly be satisfactory solved on the basis of the documentary evidence available". He was the brother, among others, of Theodore Kantakouzenos, the Byzantine ambassador to

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and

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.Donald M. Nicol, ''The Byzantine Family of Kantakouzenos: Some Addenda and Corrigenda, Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Vol. 27'' (1973), p. 312-3

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* * 14th-century Byzantine government officials 14th-century Despots of the Morea Byzantine governors Palaiologos dynasty Demetrios Demetrios 1 Sebastokrators Year of birth uncertain 1384 deaths {{Byzantine-bio-stub