Defection Across the Border of Islam and Christianity: Apostasy and Cross-Cultural Interaction in Byzantine-Seljuk Relations

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Defection across the Border of Islam and Christianity: Apostasy and Cross-Cultural Interaction in Byzantine-Seljuk Relations

By Alexander D. Beihammer

Not a word of goodbye, not even a note She gone with the man In the long black coat. (Bob Dylan, “Man in the Long Black Coat”)

An Islamic coffin discovered in the church of Maria Spilaiotissa near the old Seljuk capital of Konya in central Anatolia bears the following Greek inscription: “Here lies the descendant of men born in the purple, Michael Amiraslan, the grandson of the great-grandson of the blessed emperor born in the purple, Kyr John Komnenos Maurozomes, the son of the humble John Komnenos.”1 This text, dated November 1, 6809 (a.d. 1297), can be characterized as a relic of a family tradition of Greek dignitaries at the Seljuk court who for generations had maintained their Christian faith and the memory of their imperial ancestry. Paul Wittek, who published and thoroughly examined the inscription in the 1930s, reconstructed a genealogical tree of the family, whose roots go back to the Byz- antine aristocracy of the late twelfth century. But I am not concerned here with the validity of his arguments. More interesting at present is the fact that the inscription constitutes a monument in stone to a particular mode of political behavior that occurred with increasing frequency from the second half of the eleventh century until the end of the Nicaean Empire and that, therefore, can be deemed a typical feature of Byzantine-Seljuk relations during this period. I refer to the decision members of the Byzantine ruling class made from time to time to sever existing social bonds based on kinship, loyalty, as well as ethnic and reli-

Earlier versions of this paper were presented at a CIHS session organized by the Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East in Sydney 2005 (University of New South Wales) and at a symposium in honor of Prof. Roderich Reinsch organized by the Department of Byzantine and Mod- ern Greek Studies of the University of Cyprus. I thank all participants for their incisive comments and suggestions. My warmest thanks go to John S. Langdon (Los Angeles) for his numerous useful comments and to Chris Schabel (University of Cyprus) for his encouragement, careful reading, and numerous linguistic amendments. A constant source of inspiration was the recent book of Jean Schotz, Anadolu Selçuklu devleti zamanında kedi ve köpek arasındaki büyük kavgalar (Mazotos, Gazima- g˘usa [Famagusta], 2010). 1 Paul Wittek, “L’épitaphe d’un Comnène à Konia,” Byzantion 10 (1935), 505–15, Greek text at p. 507, and idem, “Encore l’épitaphe d’un Comnène à Konia,” Byzantion 12 (1937), 207–11 (pro- poses an emendation of his first reading Μιαλ µηρας& to µηρασλ νης). Speculum 86 (2011) doi:10.1017/S0038713411001138 597

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 598 Defection gious identity and to join the Seljuk sultan of Ru¯ m, the Danis¸mend emir, or other Muslim lords in Asia Minor in order to obtain their favor and protection. Sim- ilar patterns of behavior can be observed among members of the political elite in the Turkish states as well. Hence we can talk about a common phenomenon. Un- der certain circumstances, the political and religious archenemy, the morally and culturally inferior barbarian and infidel, could become an appreciated protector and ally against one’s own relatives, coreligious, and compatriots. Sometimes refugees even found a new home at the court that had given them shelter, converted to their hosts’ religion, and stayed there for the rest of their lives, as was obviously the case with Michael Amiraslan’s forefathers.

Defection in Byzantine-Muslim Political Culture

In the collective memories of twentieth-century postwar generations the notion of “defection,” that is, the act of abandoning one’s allegiance to a state or a political entity in exchange for another, acquired an emotionally and morally charged connotation, eliciting manifold ethical judgments and legal consider- ations. A spontaneous train of thought might range from Adolf Hitler’s Field- marshal Friedrich Paulus, who, after his failure at Stalingrad, instead of commit- ting suicide collaborated with the Soviets, to the Cold War period and the Berlin Wall as a symbol of East Germany’s coercive measures against Republiksflucht, to contemporary Muslim intellectuals persecuted by radical Islamic organiza- tions.2 Are there any parallels between our modern experiences and medieval or, more specifically, Byzantine and Muslim standards of identity, allegiance, and loyalty? To judge from the evidence provided by legal texts, obviously there are. A glance at Justinian’s Digesta and the Byzantine corpus of legal codifications and treatises leaves no doubt that Roman law had developed a clear attitude in treat- ing defectio (ατµλα) as a crime approaching high treason, which in all cases entailed the death penalty and, because of its seriousness, especially ignominious forms of execution. Only in the early tenth century did Emperor Leo the Wise introduce some modifications, arguing in one of his novels for milder penalties for defectors who were repentant of their deed.3 The religious-based legal system of the Islamic world considered defection primarily in terms of spiritual apostasy from Islam (ridda or irtida¯d), which, because of the theocratic character of Islamic state theories, implicitly included all forms of political defection from Mus- lim public authorities. Although pertinent statements in the Qur©a¯n are far from unambiguous, apostasy, from the earliest preserved collections of Islamic law onwards, came to be deemed as a “sin unto death,” even excluding the possibility of repentance (tawba), according to some opinions.4 However, the undisguised

2 For modern definitions of “defection” see, for example, J. A. Simpson and E. S. C. Weiner, The Oxford English Dictionary, 16 vols. (Oxford, 1989; repr. 1991), 4:374. 3 For “defection” in Byzantine law see Spyros Troianos, “πιν λις” τυ Εκλγαδυ: Συµλ εις την ιστραν της εελεως τυ πινικ δικαυ απ τυ Corpus iuris civilis µ!ρι των Βασιλικ#ν (Frankfurt am Main, 1980), pp. 21–23. 4 For Muslim attitudes toward apostasy in general, see Samuel M. Zwemer, The Law of Apostasy in Islam (New York, 1924), and the article of W. Heffening on “murtadd” in The Encyclopaedia of

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 599 condemnation of defection in both spheres’ moral and legal systems never prevented people involved in seditious movements from taking recourse to it, and, therefore, the history of Byzantine-Muslim contacts from the seventh century onwards provides a long list of prominent apostates, such as the Armenian general Saborius under Emperor Constans (641–69); the domestikos Manuel and the Per- sian rebel Nasខr-Theophobus during the reign of Theophilus (829–42); the Arab eunuch Samonas, for some years one of the most powerful men at the court of Leo VI; and Bardas Skleros, the legendary opponent of Emperor Basil II (976– 1025). The Byzantine epic of the “twyborn” hero Digenis Akritas, son of an Arab emir and a Greek general’s daughter, perfectly illustrates how familiar a phenomenon such close interaction across the Anatolian border had become over the centuries.5 For the period following the emergence of the Seljuk Turks in Asia Minor, modern scholars have repeatedly noted and discussed the sudden increase of testimo- nies of refugees, apostates, and outlaws living somewhere in the space in between the political and cultural spheres. The two main authorities in the field, Claude Cahen and Speros Vryonis, have considered the phenomenon within the wider context of Christian-Muslim coexistence in the conquered regions of Asia Minor, namely, with respect to the Seljuk sultanate’s attitudes toward its Chris- tian subjects and, especially, the integration of Christians into the Seljuk court life and administration.6 Both authors portray a society that, on the one hand,

Islam, new ed., 13 vols. (Leiden, 1960–2009), 7:635–36. For illustrative examples of early legal opinions on apostasy and the death penalty see Ma¯lik b. Anas, Kita¯b al-muwatខtខa©, ed. Najı¯b Ma¯jidı¯ (Bei- rut, 2000), 1444, pp. 411–12, and atខ-Tខabarı¯, Ja¯mi¨ al-baya¯n ¨an ta©wı¯l a¯y al-qur©a¯n al-ma¨ru¯ f tafsı¯r al-Tខabarı¯, ed. Muhខammad Sha¯kir, 30 parts in 16 vols. (Beirut, n.d.), 3/2:394–402. 5 For the mentioned incidents of defection see Andreas Kaplony, Konstantinopel und Damaskus: Gesandtschaften und Verträge zwischen Kaisern und Kalifen 639–750, Islamkundliche Untersuchung- en 206 (Berlin, 1996), pp. 51–75; Maria Leontsini, Κωνσταντνς ∆& (668–685): τελευτας πρωτυ'αντιν ς αυτκρ τρας [Constantine IV (668–685): The last emperor of the early Byzan- tine period], Institute of Byzantine Research, Monographs 7 (Athens, 2006), pp. 74–79 (Saborius); Jean-Claude Cheynet, “Théophile, Théophobe et les Perses,” in Η Βυ'αντιν Μικρ Ασα (6ς– 12ς αι.) [Byzantine Asia Minor (six–twelfth centuries)], ed. Stelios Lampakis, Institute for Byzan- tine Research, International Symposia 6 (Athens, 1998), pp. 39–50 (Nasខr-Theophobus); Juan Signes Codoñer, “Lust am Erzählen: Heiligenviten als Grundlage der Geschichtsschreibung im 10. Jahrhun- dert und der Weg nach Bagdad,” in L’écriture de la mémoire: La littéralité de l’historiographie. Actes du IIIe colloque international philologique, Nicosie, 6–8 mai 2004, ed. Paolo Odorico, Panagiotis A. Agapitos, and Martin Hinterberger, Dossiers Byzantins 6 (Paris, 2006), pp. 85–106 (Manuel); R. J. H. Jenkins, “The ‘Flight’ of Samonas,” Speculum 23 (1948), 217–35; Shaun Tougher, The Reign of Leo VI (886–912): Politics and People, The Medieval Mediterranean 15 (Leiden, 1997), pp. 200– 201, 208–15 (Samonas); and Alexander Beihammer, “Der harte Sturz des Bardas Skleros: Eine Fall- studie zu zwischenstaatlicher Kommunikation und Konfliktführung in der byzantinisch-arabischen Diplomatie des 10. Jahrhunderts,” Römische historische Mitteilungen 45 (2003), 21–57 (Bardas Skle- ros). For Digenis see Digenes Akrites: New Approaches to Byzantine Heroic Poetry, ed. Roderick Beaton and David Ricks, Centre for Hellenic Studies, King’s College London, Publications 2 (Alder- shot, Eng., 1993). 6 Claude Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey: A General Survey of the Material and Spiritual Culture and History c. 1071–1330 (New York, 1968), pp. 202–15; idem, The Formation of Turkey: The Seljukid Sultanate of Ru¯ m, Eleventh to Fourteenth Century, trans. Peter M. Holt (Harlow, Eng., 2001), pp. 123– 33; also the same author’s case study on the Gavras family: “Une famille byzantine au service des

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 600 Defection shows some awareness of traditional Islamic rules concerning the restrictions on non-Muslim subjects and, on the other, is surprisingly tolerant toward Chris- tians, so that several sultans were born of Greek women and a considerable number of Byzantine aristocrats, both locals and refugees, became high-ranking officials at the court of Konya. Cahen even suggests that Byzantine and Seljuk refugees shared a special preference for each other, which was stronger than the ties with their respective coreligious in the Slavic lands or in Muslim Syria and assumes a common consciousness of belonging to one cultural entity, the “Roman land” (bila¯d al-Ru¯m).7 Vryonis, whose view of the Turkish conquest of Asia Minor is overwhelmingly negative, presenting it as a process of decay of Christian Helle- nism, at least admits that Christian officials and apostates at the Seljuk court formed a significant force for bridging the gap between the conquerors and the vanquished by offering opportunities to the Turks to become familiar with Chris- tian society’s customs and habits.8 Charles Brand has devoted an article to the opposite phenomenon, that is, the Turkish element in the Byzantine world in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.9 He lists nineteen persons who either lived permanently at or visited the Byzan- tine imperial court, and he briefly discusses related issues such as the integration process through grants of titles and incomes, baptism and marriage, and the role of Turkish mercenaries in the Comnenian army. More recent studies of Alain Du- cellier and Michel Balivet,10 which are concerned with general aspects of Byzantine- Turkish coexistence, acculturation, and mutual perception, further develop the positive perspective of Claude Cahen by stressing the manifold phenomena of cross-cultural contacts and permeation during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries: Turkish mercenaries offering their services to the imperial government, Turk- ish merchants living among other Muslim inhabitants of Constantinople and en- joying full religious freedom in the framework of their own mosque, an overwhelming majority of Greek-speaking subjects in the sultanate of Konya, a great number of Greek court officials including Greek notaries in the Seljuk chancery, and features of Byzantine imperial ideology incorporated into Seljuk cer-

Seldjuqides d’Asie Mineure,” in Polychronion: Festschrift Franz Dölger zum 75. Geburtstag, ed. Pe- ter Wirth (Heidelberg, 1966), pp. 145–49; Speros Vryonis, The Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the Process of Islamization from the Eleventh through the Fifteenth Century (Berke- ley, Calif., 1971), Greek translation by Katia Galatariotou, 2nd ed. (Athens, 2000), pp. 199–213, esp. pp. 203–8. 7 Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 211; idem, Formation, p. 130. 8 Vryonis, Decline, p. 205. 9 Charles M. Brand, “The Turkish Element in Byzantium, Eleventh–Twelfth Centuries,” Dumbar- ton Oaks Papers 43 (1989), 1–25. 10 Alain Ducellier, “Mentalité historique et realités politiques: L’islam et les musulmans vus par les Byzantins du XIIIeme siècle,” Byzantinische Forschungen 4 (1972), 31–63; idem, Chrétiens d’Orient et islam au moyen âge, VIIe–XVe siècle (Paris, 1996), pp. 260–75; Michel Balivet, Romanie byzantine et pays de Rûm turc: Histoire d’un espace d’imbrication gréco-turque, Les Cahiers du Bosphore 10 (Istanbul, 1994), pp. 30–39, 47–53; idem, “Entre Byzance et Konya: L’intercirculation des idées et des hommes au temps des Seldjoukides,” in idem, Mélanges byzantins, seldjoukides et ottomans, Analecta Isisiana 81 (Istanbul, 2005), pp. 47–79; idem, “Intégration et exclusion des chrétiens dans le sultanat seldjoukide d’Asie-Mineure (XIIe–XIIIe s.),” ibid., pp. 107–24.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 601 emonies of lordship. All these circumstances, their argument goes, point to a high degree of “Greek-Turkish familiarity” and a relationship “that goes far beyond occasional alliances.”11 In this respect, the declarations Byzantine authors frequently pronounce concerning the barbarian character of the Muslims, describ- ing them as ferocious, cruel, unreliable, greedy, and, in general, much inferior to the Romans,12 should not be taken at face value since they reflect inherited stereotypes and literary conventions rather than everyday experiences and prevailing attitudes. Hence, Balivet repeatedly underlines the historical importance of the axis of exchange between Constantinople and Konya, even pointing to sym- metrical features in the evolutional process of the states, such as the predomi- nance of centrifugal dynamics in the later part of the twelfth century.13 The coming and going of political and military leaders served as an additional means for the transfer of cultural attitudes and knowledge to each other.14 The present study aims to show that the phenomenon of Byzantine-Turkish defection encompasses much more ambivalence and complexity than hitherto observed. No doubt, there actually existed a strong tendency toward acculturation between Byzantine and Turkish elites in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but the interpretative model of cross-cultural interaction by no means explains the situation exhaustively. In what follows I will argue that defection was not just a result of acculturative processes but, first and foremost, constituted an essential element of Byzantine-Seljuk political culture. It was an important means of ex- erting pressure in several directions, whether as an immediate expression of dis- content or as a threat enabling political opponents to make their claims and to reach compromises. Furthermore, defection was an effective weapon of political propaganda that was frequently accompanied by a sequence of publicly performed symbolic gestures and ritual acts and allowed a defector’s hosting court to celebrate the event as a moral victory over the enemy. A necessary prerequisite for an appropriate understanding of these forms of political behavior is the reconstruction of their chronological development. For example, the fact that cases of defection are mentioned even in the oldest reports on the first Seljuk invasions into Byzantine territory clearly indicates that the phenomenon, at least at this early stage, could not have resulted from a sort of mental proximity and common identity. It goes without saying that within a span of

11 Balivet, Romanie byzantine, pp. 52–53; Ducellier, Chrétiens d’Orient, p. 264: “Grecs et Turcs . . . avaient fini par comprendre que leur destin était de vivre ensemble.” For similar views see Nevra Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines (Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries),” in The Turkish Speaking Peo- ples: 2000 Years of Art and Culture from Inner Asia to the Balkans, ed. Ergun Cag˘atay (Munich, 2006), pp. 255–65, at p. 255: “. . . bonds of solidarity . . . were formed between native Greeks and the Turkish newcomers through neighbourly relations . . .,ahighdegree of coexistence and symbi- osis, despite the ongoing Byzantine-Turkish wars.” 12 Ducellier, “Mentalité historique,” pp. 31–35. 13 Balivet, Romanie byzantine, p. 46: “Les phénomènes sont rigoureusement symétriques à By- zance et à Konya.” 14 Ibid. p. 47: “les multiples occasions de contacts micrasiatiques . . . finissent par engendrer des cadres politiques et militaires presque ‘interchangeables.’ . . . [L]a présence et les activités d’une élite originaire du monde adverse . . . joue dans le sens d’une meilleure connaissance de la société rivale et d’une accentuation des échanges turco-byzantins.”

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 602 Defection almost two centuries the motives of defectors changed according to the evolutional framework of particular political and social circumstances. In addition, the intermediary role of the available narrative sources, on which we exclusively depend, compels us to shift the focus from the factual level of defection as historical event to the imaginative level of defection as a matter of historiographical discourse. The perceptive patterns of our source material are to a large extent conditioned by the retarding burden of literary traditions and inherited stereotypes. But there is also a close interplay between fact and memory, and in most cases historical events, especially when they touch upon highly sensitive points, such as political order and moral standards, become vehicles for expressing the views and interests of contemporary and later observers. Consequently, our informants describe the behavior of individual defectors and their hosts in accordance with the conceptual and ideological framework determining the narrative macrostructure and the chief arguments of their text.15 As will be shown below, an essential part of the historiographical discourse in question consists of narrative representations of mental conditions and emotional reactions related to the breaking and the reestablishment of bonds of allegiance.16 Another constantly oc- curing leitmotif concerns the ritualized behavior of all sorts that figures in official encounters, reception ceremonies, peace negotiations, and reconciliation scenes.17 Therefore, the primary focus of the following analysis revolves around

15 For concepts and patterns in medieval historiography see, for instance, Hans-Werner Goetz, Ge- schichtsschreibung und Geschichtsbewußtsein im hohen Mittelalter, Vorstellungswelten des Mittelal- ters 1 (Berlin, 1999), and idem, “Die Wahrnehmung von ‘Staat’ und ‘Herrschaft’ im frühen Mittel- alter,” in Staat im frühen Mittelalter, ed. Stuart Airlie, Walter Pohl, and Helmut Reimitz, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters 11 (Vienna, 2006), pp. 39–58, at pp. 39–44. 16 For emotions in Byzantine historiographical texts see Martin Hinterberger, “Φ +ω κατασεισθες: τα π θη τυ ανθρ#πυ και της αυτκρατρας στν Μιαλ Ατταλει τη: Τ αιτιλγικ σ στηµα εν ς ιστριγρ ␸υ τυ 11υ αι#να,” in Η αυτκρατρα σε κρση; Τ Βυ' ντι τν 11 αι#να (1025–1081) [The empire in crisis? Byzantium in the eleventh century (1025–1081)], ed. Vassiliki Vlyssidou, Institute for Byzantine Research, International Symposia 11 (Athens, 2003), pp. 155–67; idem, “Tränen in der byzantinischen Literatur: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Emotionen,” Jahr- buch der österreichischen Byzantinistik 56 (2006), 27–51; and Michael Grünbart, “Der Kaiser weint: Anmerkungen zur imperialen Inszenierung von Emotionen in Byzanz,” Frühmittelalterliche Studien 42 (2008), 89–108. For a comparison with the medieval West see the articles collected in Anger’s Past: The Social Uses of an Emotion in the Middle Ages, ed. Barbara H. Rosenwein (New York 1998), and Gerd Althoff, “Empörung, Tränen, Zerknirschung: ‘Emotionen’ in der öffentlichen Kommuni- kation des Mittelalters,” Frühmittelalterliche Studien 30 (1996), 60–79. A very useful general survey of the current state of research on emotions in medieval studies can be found in Rudolf Schnell, “His- torische Emotionsforschung: Eine mediävistische Standortsbestimmung,” Frühmittelalterliche Stu- dien 38 (2004), 173–276. 17 Basic guides to recent approaches to medieval ceremonies and rituals are Hagen Keller, “Die In- vestitur: Ein Beitrag zum Problem der ‘Staatssymbolik’ im Hochmittelalter,” Frühmittelalterliche Stu- dien 27 (1993), 51–86; Gerd Althoff, Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter: Kommunikation in Frieden und Fehde (Darmstadt, 1997); Hagen Keller, “Ritual, Symbolik und Visualisierung in der Kultur des ottonischen Reiches,” Frühmittelalterliche Studien 35 (2001), 23–59; Philippe Buc, The Dangers of Ritual: Between Early Medieval Texts and Social Scientific Theory (Princeton, N.J., 2001); and Da- vid A. Warner, “Ritual and Memory in the Ottonian Reich: The Ceremony of Adventus,” Speculum 76 (2001), 255–83. The most comprehensive monograph on rituals in the field of Byzantine studies is Michael McCormick, Eternal Victory: Triumphal Rulership in Late Antiquity, Byzantium and the Early Medieval West (Cambridge, Eng., 1986).

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 603 emotions and rituals as key elements of the preserved narratives on the phenomenon of defection, interpreting shifts in the discursive approaches as indications of changing circumstances and attitudes in the historical process. As far as the general framework of power politics between Constantinople and the newly established Turkish lordships of Asia Minor is concerned, the overall situation after the first great wave of Seljuk invasions from the 1040s until the late 1070s and throughout the twelfth century, despite tendencies of cross-cultural permeation and assimilation on some levels, can be characterized as highly unstable and, in certain periods, even relentlessly hostile. Given the state of affairs following the destruction of the Turkish emirate of Nicaea and the reconquest of the western coastal regions in the wake of the passage of the First Crusade (1097), it is obvious that diplomatic contacts and peace treaties never led to a long-term stabilization of the border regions and that temporary alliances mainly aimed at taking advantage of internal conflicts among Turkish rivals without having positive effects on the general conditions of Byzantine-Turkish relations. After Alex- ios I fought his final battles with the sultanate of Konya in Bithynia and Phrygia (1112–13 and 1116), his son John II, either reacting to Turkish attacks or on his own initiative, undertook a series of seven campaigns within his reign of almost twenty-five years, which among other directions led him to Laodicea in the Me- ander valley, to Sozopolis in Pisidia (both 1119), to Kastamon and Gangra in Paphlagonia (1130 and 1134), into the valley of the Sangarios River (1138), to Neokaisareia in Cappadocia (1139), and to Lake Pusguse (Beys¸ehir Gölü) in Phry- gia (1141). Manuel I, in the first years of his reign, managed to fortify the borderlands of Bithynia and undertook a large-scale campaign against the Seljuk sultanate, culminating in a number of military successes in Phrygia and the siege of Konya in 1146. The difficulties that the Second Crusade encountered during the march through southwestern Asia Minor, however, clearly indicate how strong a political and military factor the Seljuk Turks had become in the decades since Alexios I’s death. In the years of his European wars against the Normans and in Italy, Manuel took advantage of the ambitions of Sultan Mas¨u¯ d (1116–55) to expand his authority over Danis¸mend provinces and Frankish and Armenian regions in the southeast of Asia Minor. The peace treaty with Sultan Kılıc Arslan II (1162) had no lasting effect, so that from 1165 onwards the situation was marked by an increasing number of Turkish incursions into Byzantine territory, against which Emperor Manuel fortified strongholds in the border region (Neokas- tra, Dorylaion, Subleon) and finally decided to launch a major offensive against Konya, leading to the catastrophe of Myriokephalon in 1176. The decay of the Byzantine imperial government in the last two decades of the twelfth century brought about a destructive interplay of local uprisings and Turkish incursions, which did not cause immediate losses of Byzantine provinces to the Seljuk sultanate, most likely only because of the succession wars following Kılıc Arslan’s death in 1192.18 Hence, the words that Niketas Choniates put into the mouth of

18 For the events see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 91–106; idem, Formation, pp. 7–33; Vryo- nis, Decline, pp. 103–18; and Paul Magdalino, The Empire of Manuel I Komnenos, 1143–1180 (Cam- bridge, Eng., 1993), pp. 35–36, 42, 76–78, 95–98. The most comprehensive account of the events from the viewpoint of modern Turkish historiography is Osman Turan, Selçuklar zamanında Türkiye:

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 604 Defection King Louis VII addressing his soldiers at the bank of the Meander River in 1147 appear as a programmatic statement on a major goal of Byzantine imperial policy in that period: “I do not know why the Romans, as if they were their sacri- ficial animals, bring up these wolves and shamefully fatten them with their blood. They should protect themselves and think reasonably so that they expel them from their lands and cities like wild animals from the herds.”19 In a prayer inserted into his report on Emperor Manuel’s contacts with Kılıc Arslan II, Choniates characterizes the Turks as “a silly and unwise people who are far from being full of pious praise and faith toward you,” as “crafty aliens,” and “our wicked neighbors,” against whom God should protect his heritage and recuperate the lands and cities of the Romans.20 Accordingly, what “the ruler of the Turks,” Mas¨u¯ d, shared with his relatives are in fact “territories of the Ro- mans,”21 and his death as an infidel leads to nothing short of a trip to hell.22 Such statements, to which one could add many similar ones, leave no doubt that the official stance of the Byzantine political and ecclesiastical elite toward the Turks was overwhelmingly hostile. Decades of warfare, in which the empire had suffered major setbacks and had lost the greater part of its eastern provinces, made the traditional discourse on the “barbarian threat” an essential part of the Byz- antine experience and perception of the Turkish foe. In other words, inherited stereotypes came to express prevailing attitudes and political concepts, which left hardly any room for justifications of crossing the border to the enemy’s camp, especially in cases where members of the political elite were involved. Yet contemporary narratives still reveal some serious reasons why high-ranking individuals under certain circumstances were ready to ignore their scruples and viewed switching sides to the barbarians as a tempting choice. A case in point is one of Choniates’s comments on the political situation in the years of Alexios III (1195–1203), when he refers to the dangers that defectors posed for the safety of the provinces and the existence of the empire itself: “If there is a main reason that the state of the Romans fell to its knees, that lands and cities suffered sub- jugations, and, finally, that the state itself was destroyed, it is these people who broke away from the Comnenians, being eager to become emperors, because by

Siyâsi Tarih Alp Arslan©dan Osman Gazi©ye (1071–1318), 3rd ed. (Istanbul, 1993), pp. 95–236, esp. pp. 153–61, 167–77, 180–86, 190–211, 213–16. For a brief survey of general characteristics of Byzantine-Seljuk relations in the twelfth century see Ralph-Johannes Lilie, “Twelfth-Century Byzan- tine and Turkish States,” Byzantinische Forschungen 16 (1991), 35–51 (whose views of a peaceful coexistence in spite of continuous warfare seem to me, however, somewhat questionable); in addition, see idem, “Die Schlacht von Myriokephalon (1176): Auswirkungen auf das byzantinische Reich im ausgehenden 12. Jahrhundert,” Revue des études byzantines 35 (1977), 257–75. 19 Niketas Choniates, Historia, ed. Jan Louis van Dieten, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae 11/1 (Berlin, 1975), p. 70; trans. Harry J. Magoulias, O City of Byzantium: Annals of Niketas Choni- ates (Detroit, 1984), p. 41 (quotations draw on Magoulias’s translation but also include frequent changes and corrections according to my own understanding of the original text). 20 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 116–17, trans. Magoulias, p. 66. 21 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 117, lines 8–9, trans. Magoulias, p. 66: τ. των& /Ρωµαων σινσµατα. 22 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 116, lines 70–71, trans. Magoulias, p. 66: 1ν δ2 τ+ω& µ!λλειν 1 νθρ#πων γνεσθαι κα3 τα&ις 1κε&ιθεν κλ σεσιν 4ς σες παραπ!µπεσθαι.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 605 becoming guests of nations that did not have friendly intentions toward the Ro- mans they became their fatherland’s ruin, although, as long as they stayed with us, they were completely incompetent and the most useless and foolish of all people in handling, taking over, and controlling state affairs.”23 Here defection appears as a highly effective instrument for expressing discon- tent and initiating revolts, something that undermines the existing political order by turning powerful opponents against the empire and, therefore, engenders di- sastrous consequences for the ruling elite’s stability. Equally noteworthy are the contemptuous and disdainful characterizations Choniates uses for members of the Byzantine aristocracy who sought to strengthen their position by securing the support of the empire’s enemies. Portraying them as feebleminded, incompetent, and foolish outsiders, Choniates presents them in an extremely negative light, which, instead of revealing to us their actual motives and intentions, reflects the court aristocracy’s precarious situation a few years before the final collapse of 1204. Contemporary observers like Choniates perceived the tensions and conflicts among the various factions of the ruling elite as dangerous results of the irrationality and excessive ambitions of certain individuals. Another passage from the same author informs us that defection was also a powerful instrument of conflict resolution. During the peace negotiations between Emperor Isaac II Angelos and the former supporters of the rebel Alexios Branas, who in 1187 lost his life on the battlefield at the hands of Conrad of Montferrat,24 the emissaries threatened the emperor with going over to the enemy if he was not willing to grant them full amnesty: “. . . they will flee from the emperor’s face and seek their last residence with nations hostile to the Ro- mans, and they will do against the Romans whatever is useful to the people they take refuge with, for it is nothing new if someone goes to his rival and flatters him as a friend, when he finds his relative as an enemy.”25 Obviously, in situations where rebels were caught in a hopeless impasse, the threat of defection could exert pressure on the other side, so that it prepared the ground for an acceptable compromise and ensured the opponents’ personal safety. Another aspect of defection that has to be taken into account is the foreign ruler’s moral obligation to grant protection to refugees he has agreed to shelter at his court. This was not just a matter of diplomatic etiquette but a basic principle of righteous behavior toward a guest, the breach of which could have serious consequences for a ruler’s claim to legitimacy. An illustrative example is Sul- tan Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Kaykhusrau’s decision in 1192/93 to hand over the Byzantine aristocrat Theodore Mangaphas to Emperor Isaac II in return for promises concerning the rebel’s security: “. . . his brothers, who had taken over their father’s

23 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 529, lines 25–31, trans. Magoulias, p. 290: Ε5 τι ν& α6τι#τατν τυ& τν /Ρωµαων ρν 1ς γ νυ καταπεσε&ιν κα3 ωρων& κα3 π λεων ειρ#σεις παθε&ιν, 7στατα δ2 κα3 ατν 1απλωλ!ναι, τυτ& 8 1κ Κµνηνων& γεγ νασιν ␸ιστ µενι κα3 ασιλειωντες9& παρ. γ.ρ :θνεσι καταλ ντες µ ␸λα /Ρωµαις νυσι& της& πατρδς ;σαν& παν#λεια, καπερ 1ν τ+ω& παρ< =µ&ιν µ!νειν πρ γµασιν 1γειρσειν >λε&ιν τε κα3 κρατσειν νεπιτηδει τατι ?ντες κα3 π ντων ρει τατι κα3 σκαι τατι. 24 Charles M. Brand, Byzantium Confronts the West, 1180–1204 (Cambridge, Mass., 1968), pp. 80– 84. 25 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 390, trans. Magoulias, p. 214.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 606 Defection rule along with him, considered the sultan’s deed so repulsive that they would have raised weapons against him, for in return for gifts he seized and gave away to the emperor of the Romans a man who had come to him voluntarily, if he [the sultan] had not formulated a nice-sounding answer stating that he sent the man on the basis of agreements and by no means gave him away but rather, as the man was a vagrant, he led him back to his homeland so that he might stop pursuing or being pursued.”26 Thus, treacherous behavior toward a guest not only damaged the ruler’s image, which was propagated in the framework of his contacts with the outside world, but also detracted from his overall moral standing in the eyes of his own relatives and subjects. But let us turn now to the very on- set of Byzantine-Seljuk contacts in order to explore the grounds on which the aforementioned practices and attitudes were built.

Turkish Warlords and Potentates Visiting the Imperial Court (ca. 1050–1118)

The first known incidents of defection occurred in the years of the earliest Sel- juk campaigns in the eastern provinces of Byzantium. Along with the increasing intrusion of Turkish tribes into Asia Minor and the creation of Turkish strongholds and local lordships from the 1070s onwards, the coming and going of high- ranking individuals from both sides became a more or less constant phenomenon, which engendered the development of new ideological attitudes and patterns of behavior. By the end of Alexios I’s reign one can talk about the existence of firmly established practices in the handling of defectors from either side. Considering the overall picture provided by the sources, it appears that in this early period the Byzantine court was much more attractive for the Turkish invaders than Seljuk territories were for the Byzantines. In fact, the empire had an ancient tradition of enrolling barbarian forces into its army and of integrating former prisoners of war into its administrative and military apparatus, thereby enabling them to become members of the Byzantine court elite.27 From an ideological point of view, these practices were underpinned by a strong consciousness of cultural, political, and moral superiority.28 This attitude is most clearly expressed in idealized portrayals of contact situations, such as Michael Atta- leiates’s description of the encounter between Sultan Tog˘rıl Beg and the Geor- gian prince Liparites, who was taken prisoner by Ibra¯hı¯m Inal’s forces during the battle of Kapetrou in 1048. Other sources inform us that the sultan released

26 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 401, trans. Magoulias, p. 220. 27 For foreign units serving in the imperial forces see John Haldon, Warfare, State and Society in the Byzantine World, 565–1204 (London, 1999), pp. 119–20, 125–26, 227–28. For the Byzantine army in the eleventh century see idem, “Approaches to an Alternative Military History of the Period ca. 1025–1071,” in Η αυτκρατρα σε κρση; (above, n. 16), pp. 45–74. For Turks in Byzantine service see Brand, “Turkish Element” (above, n. 9), pp. 12–25. 28 For concepts of superiority in Byzantium see, for example, Alexander Kazhdan, “The Notion of Byzantine Diplomacy,” in Byzantine Diplomacy: Papers from the Twenty-Fourth Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Cambridge, March 1990, ed. Jonathan Shepard and Simon Franklin (Alder- shot, Eng., 1992), pp. 3–21, esp. at pp. 14–20; and Jonathan Franklin, “Byzantine Diplomacy, A.D. 800–1204: Means and Ends,” ibid., pp. 41–71.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 607 Liparites from captivity without demanding a ransom in the course of the peace negotiations with Emperor Constantine IX in 1049. According to Attaleiates, however, the sultan’s decision was due to his deep admiration for Liparites’s Roman virtues, that is, his noble descent, his fame, his bravery, and his steadfastness.29 Attaleiates obviously intended to present the empire’s military defeat as a moral victory over the Turkish barbarians, who, though superior on the battlefield, were still overwhelmed by Roman cultural values. The same concept underlies John Skylitzes’s account of the first recorded attempt of defection. Interestingly, according to this source the series of Turkish apostates starts with Tog˘rıl Beg’s famous cousin Kutlumus¸, who through his son Sulayma¯n became the forefather of the Seljuk sultans of Ru¯ m in Asia Minor. Sky- litzes’s highly confused account of the discord between the sultan and his favor- ite commander, which broke out in about 1057, does not deserve much cre- dence. In particular, the detail that Kutlumus¸ sent a message to the Byzantine emperor asking him to grant him refuge so that he would become an “ally and friend of the Romans”30 cannot be confirmed by other sources. Yet the ideological framework of the story deserves our attention: the Seljuk family’s seditious member is portrayed as a victim of the sultan’s irrational anger, which induces Kutlumus¸ to acknowledge the Byzantine emperor’s superior sense of justice and the righteousness of his rule. Kutlumus¸’s alleged proposal to become the emperor’s subject might reflect later knowledge about his sons’ temporary alliance with Emperor Nikephoros III. Be that as it may, in the years between 1056 and 1078 we know about several military leaders who in fact took refuge with the Byzantine emperor. No matter what their original rank within the Seljuk hierarchy had been, they were all received with much honor and respect and subsequently served as commanders in the ranks of the imperial forces. A certain Amertikes, who has been identified with a Tur- coman chief called Ibn Kha¯n al-Turkuma¯nı¯, the amı¯r al-Ghuzz (leader of the Oghuz Turks), was received by Emperor Michael VI in about 1056/57 “with great friendliness.”31 Attaleiates calls him a “distinguished man,” but, as his military force after his entering the service of the Mirda¯sid emirs ¨Atខı¯ya and Mahខmu¯d of Aleppo in 1064 did not comprise more than five hundred warriors, he most likely was a man of mediocre standing.32

29 Michael Attaleiates, Historia, ed. and trans. Immaculada Pérez Martín, Nueva Roma 15 (Ma- drid, 2002), p. 34. For the event and the other sources see Werner Felix, Byzanz und die islamische Welt im früheren 11. Jahrhundert: Geschichte der politischen Beziehungen von 1001 bis 1055, Byzan- tina Vindobonensia 14 (Vienna, 1981), p. 170. 30 Ioannes Skylitzes, Synopsis historiarum, ed. Johannes Thurn, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzan- tinae 5 (Berlin, 1973), p. 474, esp. lines 91–93; trans. Bernard Flusin and Jean-Claude Cheynet, Jean Skylitzès, Empereurs de Constantinople, Réalités Byzantines 8 (Paris, 2003), p. 391: πρσδεθηναι& κα3 σ µµας κα3 ␸λς γεν!σθαι /Ρωµαων. For the historical background see Claude Cahen, “Qut- lumush et ses fils avant l’Asie Mineure,” Der Islam 39 (1964), 14–27, repr. in idem, Turcobyzantina et Oriens Christianus, Collected Studies Series 34 (London, 1974), no. 5. 31 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, p. 71, line 24: µεγ λων τυ@ν δει#σεων. 32 On this person see Claude Cahen, “La première pénétration turque en Asie-Mineure (seconde moitié du XIe s.),” Byzantion 18 (1946–48), 5–67, at pp. 25–26, repr. in Turcobyzantina, no.1.The main sources are Ghars al-Ni¨ma, extensively quoted in the chronicle of Sibtខ b. al-Jawzı¯, Mir©a¯t al-

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 608 Defection In contrast, Arı¯sghı¯ (Erisgen) or Chrysoskoulos, who in 1070 fled to Ro- manos IV Diogenes, is designated by a contemporary Arabic source as “the hus- band of the sultan’s sister,” that is, Alp Arslan’s brother-in-law.33 Hence, he must have been one of the highest commanders in the Seljuk army. Both Byzantine and Arabic sources agree that his flight into Byzantine territory was due to his discord with the sultan, who had dispatched al-Afshı¯n, another famous military leader, to pursue him. After a decisive victory over the Byzantine forces of Man- uel Komnenos, Arı¯sghı¯ came to an agreement with the latter and followed him to Constantinople.34 On this occasion Attaleiates gives us the oldest extant description of an official reception ceremony held for a Turkish refugee during a gathering of the senate in the imperial palace’s throne hall, the Chrysotrikli- nos.35 On the one hand, the ceremony emphasized the cultural gap dividing the Roman-Christian and the barbarian worlds through a gesture of undisguised dis- respect, namely, shouts of astonishment pronounced by the attending senators while the “ugly Scythian” was entering the hall. On the other hand, it projected the barbarian’s acceptance within the ranks of the Byzantine court hierarchy through the benevolence of the emperor, who bestowed the title of proedros upon him. Eight years later, in early 1078, the sons of Kutlumus¸ presented themselves before Nikephoros III Botaneiates in Nicaea. Attaleiates describes them as Persian noblemen of royal descent who competed with the Seljuk overlord (Malik Sha¯h) for the sultanate.36 According to the highly encomiastic character of Attaleiates’s account of Botaneiates’s ascent to the throne, the event appears as one of the great successes of the newly acclaimed emperor. The author especially stresses the significance of the prostration that “these people of royal rank, who would not do this for any Persian king,” performed before the emperor, while the emperor “made them through his prudent words and gestures more decent and well disposed, induced them to submit themselves and to be faithful to him, and made

zama¯n fı¯ta¯rı¯kh al-a¨ya¯n, ed. Ali Sevim (Ankara, 1968), pp. 101, 122, 124, 132, 136, esp. p. 122 (“Ibn Kha¯n al-Turkuma¯nı¯ and the Oghuz Turks [al-Ghuzz] who were with him, numbering approx- imately 500 ghula¯m”); and Kama¯l al-Dı¯n b. al-¨Adı¯m, Zubdat al-Hខ alab min ta¯rı¯kh Hខ alab, ed. Su- hayl Zakka¯r, 2 vols. (Damascus, 1997), 1:250–54, 256, 259, 269, 289, esp. pp. 253–54 (“Ibn Kha¯n al-Turkı¯ and the Turcomans who have joined him,” “al-Malik Ha¯ru¯ n b. Kha¯n, the lord of the Turks”). The latter speaks of a “thousand bows,” i.e., “warriors,” but considering the general elusiveness of medieval authors regarding figures of military forces, Ghars al-Ni¨ma seems to provide a more reli- able lectio difficilior. 33 On this person see Cahen, “Première pénétration,” pp. 27–28; Brand, “Turkish Element,” p. 2; and Turan, Türkiye, pp. 19–20. For his relationship with the sultan see Sibtខ b. al-Jawzı¯, ed. Sevim, p. 144. 34 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, pp. 106–7; Nikephoros Bryennios, Histoire, ed. and trans. Paul Gautier, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae 9 (Brussels, 1975), 1.11, pp. 101–3; Sibtខ b. al-Jawzı¯, ed. Sevim, pp. 146–47. 35 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, pp. 106–7. 36 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, p. 191, lines 9–13: τινες των& επατριδων& της& Περσδς δελ␸3 κατ. σ ρκα κα3 ␸ σιν Bπ ρντες κα3 τν τυ& Κυτλυµ ση 1πωνυµαν 1κ πατρ+#ας πρσηγρας 1␸!λκντες, της& συλτανικης& δ2 µερδς κα3 1υσας ντιπι µενι κα3 τ+ω& 1θν ρ+η των& Cννων ντιταττ µενι κα3 κατ. τυτ& τ+η& /Ρωµαων πρσ␸ιτσαντες γ+η&.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 609 them fervent supporters of his majesty.”37 Here Attaleiates uses the Turkish defectors’ submission as a means of reinforcing the future emperor’s claims to legitimacy. Consequently, in contrast to Arı¯sghı¯’s case, where the narrative dwells on the classical motif of the barbarians’ inferiority, the predominant feature in the portrayal of the Kutlumus¸ brothers is their outstanding nobility, which causes them to deny recognition to their own sovereign but, nonetheless, does not pre- vent them from expressing their willingness to become subjects of the Byzantine emperor. Thus we see how incidents of defection, through the pen of one and the same historian, could be interpreted in totally different ways according to the conceptual matrix in which the event is embedded. As for the factual framework, we can safely assume that the submission of the Kutlumus¸ brothers was based on a balanced agreement that in return for their ritual humiliation guar- anteed them important advantages and favors. Alexios I’s rise to power marks not only a crucial turning point on the political scene of the empire but also the starting point of Anna Komnene’s independent narrative of her father’s reign, which for most events of this period is our only source.38 During the series of upheavals between Nikephoros III’s march to Constantinople and Alexios’s coronation in early April 1081, the Turkish warriors of Sulayma¯n created a permanent stronghold in Nicaea of Bithynia, whence they undertook raids on the coastal areas. In most parts of Asia Minor the political situation was very unstable at that time. Central control had largely col- lapsed, and Byzantine rebels, local governors, and short-lived Turkish lordships were alternating quickly.39 Facing the threat of the imminent Norman attack, in about June 1081 Alexios concluded a peace treaty with Emir Sulayma¯n, which for the first time in Byzantine-Seljuk relations included the recognition of a border within the empire’s territory and, thus, the acceptance of a status quo of Sel- juk political authority in the region beyond the Drakon River.40 Turkish auxil-

37 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, p. 191, lines 14–19: Κα3 Dπερ Eν δεν3 ασιλε&ιτων& Περσων& , γ!νυς ?ντες ασιλικυ&, Cτε /Ρωµαων κατεδ!αντ πρααι& , τυτ& πρFς ατFν παραδ ως π!δειαν9 γ νυ τε κλναντες.... Gς δ κα3 λ γις κα3 τρ πις εσυν!τις κσµιωτ!ρυς κα3 ενϊκωτ!ρυς περγασ µενς, 7τως ε6ς τν >αυτυ& δ λωσιν κα3 πστιν διεθ!ρµανε κα3 της& ατυ& ασιλεας 1ραστ.ς πειργ σατ. 38 For recent studies on Anna Komnene see the collective volume Anna Komnene and her Times, ed. Thalia Gouma-Peterson, Garland Reference Library of the Humanities 2201, Garland Medieval Casebooks 29 (London, 2000). 39 For the political situation see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 74–78; idem, Formation, pp. 8– 10; Vryonis, Decline, pp. 102–4, 132–33, 140–41, 144–49; Turan, Türkiye, pp. 53–66; Jean-Claude Cheynet, “La résistance aux Turcs en Asie Mineure entre Mantzikert et la première croisade,” in Εψυα: Μélanges offerts à Hélène Ahrweiler, Byzantina Sorbonensia 16 (Paris, 1998), pp. 129–47; George A. Lebeniotis, Η πλιτικ κατ ρρευση τυ Βυ'αντυ στην Ανατλ: Τ ανατλικ σ νρ και η κεντρικ Μικρ Ασα κατ τ & µισυ τυ 11υ αι#να [The political collapse of Byzantium in the East: The Eastern frontier and central Asia Minor in the second half of the eleventh century], 2 vols., Byzantine Texts and Studies 43 A–B (Thessalonica, 2007), passim. 40 Anna Komnene, Alexias, ed. Diether Roderich Reinsch and Athanasios Kambylis, Corpus Fon- tium Historiae Byzantinae 40/1–2 (Berlin, 2001), 3.11.4–5, p. 116; trans. Diether Roderich Reinsch, Anna Komnene, Alexias, 2nd ed. (Berlin, 2001), p. 137: τ. περ3 ε6ρνης ν!πεισε τFν συλτ νν µ λα θερµως& 1αιτε&ισθαι ...Jσµενς τFν περ3 ε6ρνης δ!εται λ γν ...Kµα κα3 δ#ρις δειωσ µενς, 1ει σατ ε6ς ε6ρηνικ.ς πνευσαι& σπνδ ς. κα3 Dρν ατ&ις καλ µενν ∆ρ κντα πταµFν δεδωκ@ς µ Bπερανειν Dλως ατυ& µτ! πτε πρFς τ. Dρια Βιθυνων& 1ρµαν& :πεισεν. See further

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 610 Defection iary forces continued to fight for the Byzantines in the wars against the Normans, but through the treaty of 1081 the former invaders had become much more than the emperor’s faithful douloi, who received generous rewards for their services; they had gained a new legal status as officially recognized holders of an auton- omous lordship. The image of the Anatolian Seljuk Turks as given in Anna Komnene’s Alexias in several aspects differs significantly from that of previous sources. The perspective of the early 1140s, when this text was written, entails not only a certain number of inaccuracies as far as persons and events are concerned but also different views and judgments about forms of political behavior and historical developments. The arrival of armed pilgrims waging a religiously motivated war against the infidels from 1096 onwards and the establishment of a Seljuk sultanate in Konya marked by a distinct Muslim character must have had a strong impact on Anna’s Gedankenwelt and in particular on her perception of Anatolian reali- ties.41 Thus, she talks about a soultanikion, that is, “a sultan’s residence,” in Nicaea,42 which most probably merely reflects her knowledge about the sultanate of Konya. Likewise, Alexios’s efforts to draw Turkish rulers and dignitaries into his sphere of influence are ascribed to the emperor’s religious zeal, and baptism appears as one of the main goals of imperial policy toward the barbarians.43 This new attitude is clearly illustrated by Anna’s depiction of two cases of defection during Alexios’s reign, namely, that of the Turkish emissary Siaous, who was sent to Constantinople by Sultan Malik Sha¯h in the period of his takeover in Syria in 1086, and that of the local ruler Elchanes, who in about 1092 ruled the coastal area around Apollonias and Kyzikos.44 Anna’s portrayal of Alexios’s

Turan, Türkiye, p. 61; Franz Dölger and Peter Wirth, Regesten der Kaiserurkunden des oströmischen Reiches, 2: Regesten von 1025–1204, rev. 2nd ed. (Munich, 1995), no. 1070a. 41 For Anna Komnene and the First Crusade see Ralph-Johannes Lilie, “Der Erste Kreuzzug in der Darstellung Anna Komnenes,” in Varia, 2: Beiträge von Albrecht Berger, Lucy-Anne Hunt, Ralph- Johannes Lilie, Claudia Ludwig und Paul Speck, Πικλα Βυ'αντιν 6 (Bonn, 1987), pp. 49–148; idem, “Anna Komnene und die Lateiner,” Byzantinoslavica 54 (1993), 169–82; and idem, Byzan- tium and the Crusader States, 1096–1204 (Oxford, 1993), pp. 1–95. For a summary of his views see now idem, Byzanz und die Kreuzzüge, Kohlhammer Urban Taschenbücher 595 (Stuttgart, 2004), pp. 36–63. The most important contributions of English scholars are Jonathan Shepard, “When Greek Meets Greek: Alexios Comnenus and Bohemund in 1097–98,” Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 12 (1988), 185–277; and R. D. Thomas, “Anna Comnena’s Account of the First Crusade: History and Politics in the Reigns of Alexios I and Manuel I Comnenus,” Byzantine and Modern Greek Stud- ies 15 (1991), 269–312. 42 Anna Komnene 3.11.1, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, p. 114, trans. Reinsch, pp. 135–36: τυ& Σλυµα& ...περ3 τν Νκαιαν αλι'µ!νυ (B& κα3 τF συλτανκιν ;ν& , Dπερ Eν =µε&ις ασλειν Mνµ - σαιµεν. For a discussion of the problem see Turan, Türkiye, pp. 62–66. 43 For a detailed analysis see Alexander Beihammer, “Die Ethnogenese der seldschukischen Türken im Urteil christlicher Geschichtsschreiber des 11. und 12. Jahrhunderts,” Byzantinische Zeitschrift 102 (2009), 1–26. 44 On both men see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 81; idem, Formation, p. 10; Brand, “Turkish Element,” p. 4; Balivet, “Entre Byzance et Konya” (above, n. 10), pp. 51–52; and Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines,” p. 256. The Greek form <Ελ νης is usually explained as derivative of the Turkish title I¯lkha¯n; see Gyula Moravcsik, Byzantinoturcica, 2: Sprachreste der Türkvölker in den byzantinischen Quellen, 3rd ed. (Berlin, 1983), p. 124. In Islamic and other Eastern sources, however, the

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 611 encounter with Siaous can be viewed as a counterpart of Tog˘rıl Beg’s meeting with Liparites described by Attaleiates. Here it is the Byzantine emperor who was impressed by his guest’s qualities, namely, his prudence and his mixed origin from a Georgian mother and a Turkish father. As a result, Alexios made every effort to persuade him to become a Christian and be baptized. The emperor, of course, was successful. On his behalf Siaous removed Turkish commanders from Sinope and other Anatolian cities and was rewarded with rich gifts and a post as dux of Anchialos.45 Likewise, Elchanes’s defection to the emperor was rewarded not only with rich gifts but also with “holy enlightenment.” Many of his relatives and companions, attracted by the emperor’s generosity, followed his example.46 Alexios took recourse in exactly the same practices his predecessors had employed so suc- cessfully with Turkish refugees over the previous decades. The only difference lies in the fact that the tightening of diplomatic contacts with Malik Sha¯h’s court and the increasing number of Turkish local lords in the western parts of Asia Minor enabled him to apply these methods more systematically. What actually changed is the retrospective interpretation of this strategy by Anna Komnene, who, most probably under the influence of experiences with the crusades, gave her father’s policy a religious dimension by presenting him as a preacher of the true faith.47 From the first Byzantine-Seljuk exchange of emissaries in 104948 until Alexios I’s rise to power, the only representative of the Seljuk Turks whom the Byzantine government recognized as a holder of political authority was the dynasty’s supreme head and sultan in Persia and, from 1055 onwards, in Baghdad.49 Alexios I’s treaty of June 1081 with Emir Sulayma¯n marked the appearance of a new independent ruler representing the Seljuk dynasty’s Anatolian branch. As a result, cases in which these newly recognized sovereigns sought the emperor’s protection demanded a redefinition of their relationship with the imperial government according to the customs and rules of Byzantine diplomacy. Consequently,

title does not appear before being adopted by the Mongol khan Hülegü in the 1250s (see, for instance, David Morgan, The Mongols, 2nd ed. [Malden, Mass., 2007], pp. 130–39); the issue seems to need further discussion. 45 Anna Komnene 6.9.4–6, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 187–88, trans. Reinsch, pp. 215–16: πλλν πραγµατεαν 1πεπητ Nστε τυ& θευ απτσµατς τυτν& τυε&ιν ...κντευθεν& τυ& θευ απτσµατς τετυηκ@ς κα3 πλλων& δωρεων& 1παπλα σας δO <Αγι λυ πρειρ'εται. 46 Anna Komnene 6.13.4, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 198–99, trans. Reinsch, p. 229: ατFς δ2 µετ. των& καθ< α&8µα πρσηκ ντων ατµλε&ι πρFς τFν ασιλ!α κα3 µυρων µ2ν 1παπλα ει δωρεων& , τυγ νει δ2 κα3 τυ& µεγστυ, τυ& Pγυ ␸ηµ3 ␸ωτσµατς. In particular, Anna mentions a certain Skaliarios (the Persian title of sala¯r, i.e., “commander, chief,” is clearly recognizable in the Greek form) and another person being granted the title of hyperperilampros. 47 Anna Komnene 6.13.4, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, p. 199, trans. Reinsch, p. 229. 48 Dölger and Wirth, Regesten, no. 890d (mission of George Drosos to Sultan Tog˘rıl Beg in about early 1049). In the same year the sultan replied by dispatching an emissary bearing the title of sharı¯f to Constantinople; see Claude Cahen, “La diplomatie orientale de Byzance face à la poussée seld- jukide,” Byzantion 35 (1965), 10–15, repr. in idem, Turcobyzantina, no. 3. 49 For Tog˘rıl Beg’s rise to the sultanate see Clifford Edmund Bosworth, “The Political and Dynas- tic History of the Iranian World (A.D. 1000–1217),” in The Cambridge History of Iran, 5: The Sal- juq and Mongol Periods, ed. J. A. Boyle (Cambridge, Eng., 1968), pp. 1–202, at pp. 42–48; and A. C. S. Peacock, Early Selju¯ q History: A New Interpretation, Routledge Studies in the History of Iran and Turkey 7 (London, 2010).

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 612 Defection the Seljuk rulers of Asia Minor obtained a higher status at the Byzantine court and came into closer contact with the imperial sphere. During Alexios I’s reign the palace of Constantinople witnessed the arrival of two famous potentates, Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim of Nicaea (1084/86–1092), lieutenant and successor of Sulayma¯n; and Sultan Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h of Konya (1107–16), second son of Sultan Kılıc Arslan I (1093–1107).50 Before their flight to the emperor, both had suffered severe military setbacks and were threatened by dangerous internal opponents: the first by the Seljuk commander Bursuq, who on behalf of Sultan Malik Sha¯h besieged Nicaea over several months, the second by his brother Mas¨u¯ d, who was prepar- ing a plot against Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h. In each case the conclusion of a peace treaty with the emperor preceded the trip to Constantinople.51 The main difficulty for an assessment of these contacts and their consequences is that Anna highlights different aspects of each event. Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim’s reception in Constantinople is depicted as a successful ruse of the emperor, who was trying to divert the emir’s attention from his efforts to construct a stronghold in the vicinity of Nicomedia. The model she refers to is a maneuver used by the Athe- nian hero Alcibiades against the Spartans.52 The conceptual framework consists of the polarity between the barbarian’s mental inferiority and the Byzantines’ skill- fulness.53 Anna mainly speaks of the splendid gifts and all sorts of amusements the imperial court offered, such as bathing, hunting, and horse racing.54 The lux- uries and comforts of Constantinopolitan court life had a seductive impact on the barbarian’s mind and made him forget his caution in military affairs. In addition, the author interlaces the motif of the barbarian’s greed for Byzantine lux- uries with allusions to the political situation, which was conditioned by Bursuq’s threat and the emperor’s support for Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim’s cause.55 These factors, most likely, were the true reasons for the emir’s visit to Constantinople. Yet Anna still kept a crucial detail of Byzantine court ceremonies in her report, namely, the fact that Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim was granted the title of sebastos.56 Given that this title had

50 On these potentates see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 77, 78–80, 88–89, 91–93; idem, For- mation, pp. 9–10, 13, 16–18; Turan, Türkiye, pp. 83–87, 153–58; Jonathan Shepard, “‘Father’ or ‘Scorpion’? Style and Substance in Alexios’s Diplomacy,” in Alexios I Komnenos: Papers of the Sec- ond Belfast Byzantine International Colloquium, 14–16 April 1989, ed. Margaret Mullett and Dion Smythe (Belfast, 1996), pp. 68–132, at pp. 78–79, 83; and Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines” (above, n. 11), p. 256. 51 Turan, Türkiye, pp. 85, 158; Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 80, 92; idem, Formation, pp. 10, 18; Dölger and Wirth, Regesten, no. 1163 (letter of Alexios I to Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim concerning the treaty), no. 1269 (erroneously mentions Sultan Malik Sha¯h as the emperor’s treaty partner). 52 Anna Komnene 6.10.8–11, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 191–92, trans. Reinsch, pp. 219–20. For the comparison with Alcibiades see ibid., p. 192, lines 72–80, trans. Reinsch, p. 221. 53 For this concept and its antique prototype see Yves Albert Dauge, Le barbare: Recherches sur la conception romaine de la barbarie et de la civilisation (Brussels, 1981). 54 Anna Komnene 6.10.9–10, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 191–92, trans. Reinsch, p. 220: πεθεται Q <Απελασµ, κα3 ε6σελθ@ν ε6ς τν ασιλε υσαν παντας ιυται& ␸ιλ␸ρσ νης ...τ+ω& δ! γε <Απελασµ καθεκ στην ρµατα διδOς κ 1νεδδυ ε6ς αλανε&ια τ2 πρτρεπ µενς κα3 8ππηλασας κα3 κυνηγ!σια. 55 Anna Komnene 6.10.8, 6.11.1–2, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 191, 192–93, trans. Reinsch, pp. 219–20, 221–22. 56 Anna Komnene 6.10.10, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, p. 192, trans. Reinsch, p. 221: πλεσι δωρεα&ις τυτν& µειψ µενς τ+ω& των& σεαστων& τ2 ι#µατι τιµσας κα3 1π3 πλ!ν τ.ς συνθκας 1µπεδ#σας.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 613 been created by Alexios I for close relatives of the emperor,57 its bestowal upon the Seljuk ruler of Nicaea signaled his symbolic integration into the imperial family. Considering that until the middle of the eleventh century even the most important Muslim allies of the empire hardly reached titles higher than magistros, with the exception only of two proedroi, Emir Thima¯l of Aleppo and the aforementioned Arı¯sghı¯ (Chrysoskoulos) in 1051/52 and 1070 respectively,58 the im- pressive upgrading of Seljuk lords within the system of the Byzantine court hierarchy becomes all the more significant. Concerning Sultan Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h, Anna gives a detailed description of his first encounter with Emperor Alexios on a plain near Akroinon in 1116,59 but she completely omits the sultan’s subsequent sojourn in Constantinople, which we can derive only from other sources.60 The focus lies on the peace negotiations following the campaign of 1116, and, therefore, rituals and gestures play a central role in the description. What matters, above all, is the public spectacle projecting the relationship between the two rulers in the framework of a carefully choreographed sequence of ritual acts performed in the presence of a large crowd of court officials, military commanders, and common soldiers. While the members of Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h’s entourage prostrated themselves before the emperor in the customary way, several times Alexios prevented the sultan himself from getting off his horse in order to follow his companions’ example. Eventually, the sultan demonstrated his deference by kissing the emperor’s foot. In return, Alexios took him by the hand and ordered him to mount one of his dignitaries’ horses. While the sultan and the emperor were riding side by side, Alexios took his cape and threw it on the sultan’s shoulders.61 What at first sight might appear as a spontaneous performance conveys messages that are too complicated to be the result of mere coincidence. The whole scene obviously aimed at propagating a new hierarchical relationship between the Byzantine emperor and the Seljuk sultan, which was to be confirmed for- mally by the subsequent conclusion of a peace treaty. The emperor rewarded the sultan’s gesture of humiliation with symbolic acts of graciousness, displaying signs

57 For the significance of the title, which in Alexios’s early years was limited to a rather small group of dignitaries related to the emperor by blood or marriage, see Lucien Stiernon, “Notes de titulaire et de prosopographie byzantine: Sébaste et gambros,” Revue des études byzantines 23 (1965), 222– 43; Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, pp. 181–83; Stauros G. Georgiou, “ι τιµητικ ττλι επ Κµνην#ν (1081–1185)” (Ph.D. thesis, Thessalonica, 2005), pp. 110–38 (until the end of the twelfth century only about 10 percent of the known sebastoi were foreigners). 58 For court titles bestowed upon Muslim rulers see Franz Dölger and Andreas E. Müller, with Al- exander Beihammer, Regesten der Kaiserurkunden des oströmischen Reiches, 1/2: Regesten von 867– 1025 (Munich, 2003), nos. 758b, 790c, 793a, 801b, 801c; and Felix, Byzanz und die islamische Welt, pp. 113, 117, 121. 59 Anna Komnene 15.6.5–6, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 477–78, trans. Reinsch, pp. 530–31. 60 Michael the Syrian, Chronique, ed. and trans. Jean-Baptiste Chabot, 4 vols. (Paris, 1899–1910), 15.10, 3:194–95 (trans.), 4:593, col. B, lines 10–18 (Syriac text). 61 Anna Komnene 15.6.5, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, p. 478, trans. Reinsch, p. 531: τFν δ2 συλτ νν πλλ κις τυ& Rππυ πηναι& 1πιειρσαντα Q ατκρ τωρ υνε#ρει. λλ< 1κε&ινς ταO πε'ε σας τFν π δα τ τυ ;σπ σατ. κα3 Sς ε&ιρα τ2 δOς ατ+ω& κα3 Rππν των& 1κκρτων 1πιηναι& 1κ!λευσεν. 1πι ντα δ2 τυτν& κα3 περ3 θατ!ραν πλευρ.ν τυ& ατκρ τρς πρσεγγσαντα, παραρηµα& τF Jµ␸ιν S περιε!λητ λ σας, τ&ις Tµις 1κενυ 1π!θετ.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 614 Defection of proximity and intimacy to the sultan. The Seljuk lord, who acknowledged the emperor’s superiority by kissing Alexios’s foot, has become a fully recognized sovereign and friend of the emperor. In summary, a clear line of development can be observed from the first Turk- ish apostates, who from the 1050s onwards were accepted in Constantinople as the emperor’s allies for military purposes, to Turkish local rulers and dignitaries, who in return for their voluntary surrender were granted incomes, posts, and sen- atorial titles, to Seljuk chiefs, who from the treaty of 1081 onwards were de facto recognized as independent rulers and on the occasion of meetings with the emperor were granted titles reserved for the dynasty’s inner circle and symbols of friendship. Moreover, Anna Komnene ex eventu interpreted her father’s attitudes toward Turkish apostates in terms of religious zeal aiming at the barbarians’ conversion and baptism.

Christian Frontier Lords Turning to Islam (ca. 1050–1118)

As regards the first known incidents of Christian defectors who took refuge with the Turks in the early period of Byzantine-Seljuk contacts, we do not know of any member of the empire’s court elite who took this action. As will be shown below, this phenomenon appears for the first time during the reign of John II (1118–43). The well-known episode of Emperor Romanos IV’s one-week captivity in Sul- tan Alp Arslan’s camp following the battle of Mantzikert (August 1071) resulted in a face-to-face meeting of the supreme heads of both empires.62 Later works of Muslim historiography celebrate this event as a major triumph of Islam in general and the Seljuk sultan in particular over the most powerful representative of the Christian world, portraying the latter as a humiliated subject full of gratitude for the sultan’s generosity and leniency. Byzantine sources agree with the Muslim authors on the sultan’s magnanimous and respectful behavior toward the emperor. Both traditions, along with the peace treaty, refer to a series of ritual acts projecting the new relationship between the rulers, such as gestures of com- passion, common meals, and the bestowal of honorary clothes.63 On his way back

62 On the battle of Mantzikert and Romanos IV’s captivity see Claude Cahen, “La campagne de Mantzikert d’après les sources musulmanes,” Byzantion 9 (1934), 628–42, repr. in idem, Turcoby- zantina, no. 2; Jean-Claude Cheynet, “Mantzikert: Un désastre militaire?” Byzantion 50 (1980), 410– 38; Speros Vryonis, “The Greek and Arabic Sources for the Battle of Mantzikert, 1071 A.D.,” in Byzantine Studies: Essays on the Slavic World and the Eleventh Century, ed. Speros Vryonis (New Rochelle, N.Y., 1992), pp. 125–40; idem, “A Personal History of the History of the Battle of Mantzi- kert,” in Η υ'αντιν Μικρ Ασα (above, n. 5), pp. 225–44; idem, “The Greek and Arabic Sources on the Eight Day Captivity of the Emperor Romanos IV in the Camp of the Sultan Alp Arslan after the Battle of Mantzikert,” in Novum millennium: Studies on Byzantine History and Culture Dedi- cated to Paul Speck, ed. Claudia Sode and Sarolta Takács (Aldershot, Eng., 2001), pp. 439–50. 63 The main source, on which almost all later Byzantine accounts are based, is Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, pp. 121–23, for example, p. 122, lines 4–5: νθρωπνως κα3 νυνεως& τF πρτ!ρηµα της& νκης 8 Τυρκι& 1δ!αντ, µτε µεγαλαυσαντες, and p. 122, lines 18–22: Qµ δν κατ. τν τιµν πιησ µενς ...µηδ2 µ!ρι κα3 ραυτ τυ λ γυ πρFς τυτν& 1µπεπαρ+ωνηκ@ς. The most important Syrian and Armenian sources are Michael the Syrian 15.3, ed. Chabot, 3:169–70 (trans.),

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 615 home Romanos IV wore “a Turkish dress,” and Muslim sources maintain that he was accompanied by Turkish guards holding Islamic flags.64 Henceforth this event served as a precedent for Muslim attitudes toward defeated Christian opponents and as a model case for idealized presentations of contact situations between victorious Seljuk lords and Byzantine men of rank. Leading personalities of the imperial entourage in the 1070s, such as Alexios’s brothers Manuel and Isaac Komnenos and Caesar John Doukas, were taken captive during their expeditions against the Turks, but none of them seems to have been tempted to switch sides in that period.65 Things were different among the local aristocracy in the eastern border region, mainly Armenian noblemen, who in the general disorder of the 1060s and 1070s were acting as independent commanders or local lords. Unfortunately, there is no extant Muslim source of that period revealing early Turkish attitudes toward Christian defectors and their mech- anisms of integrating them into their ranks. Our knowledge, therefore, is based exclusively on Byzantine or Oriental Christian (Syrian or Armenian) authors, who primarily treat these people as traitors against their compatriots and faith. While Turkish refugees could be presented as symbols of the empire’s moral strength, Christian defectors would prove the opposite and, therefore, had to be brought into disrepute. Moreover, historians relating the fate of these men were forced to find sound explanations for their deviation from commonly accepted norms of behavior. Generally speaking, the immediate threat to life, rank, and property was considered a reasonable justification for attempts to come to terms with the enemy, but it did not excuse defection or conversion to Islam. A case in point is a diplomatic maneuver of the Bagratid king of Kars, Gagik- Abas II, who shortly before his abdication in 1064 received an envoy of Sultan

4:578–79 (Syriac text), for example, p. 578, col. B, lines 7–9: “malka¯dគe¯n d-Tu¯rka¯ye¯esˇtawdı¯dគ-en zkគa¯ l-Ro¯ma¯ye¯ wa-lbគakគ l-Dı¯yu¯gı¯n rahខma¯ ¨bគad ¨law(hy) w-bគa-sˇla¯ma¯ mhappekគ le¯h l-atគra¯” (The king of the Turks promised that, if he defeated the Romans and took Diogenes captive, he would show him clemency and send him back home peacefully); Aristakes of Lastivert, Récit des malheurs de la na- tion arménienne, trans. M. Canard and H. Berbérian, Bibliothèque de Byzantion 5 (Brussels, 1973), 25, pp. 127–28: “Il inspira au féroce roi de Perse l’amour et la sollicitude que l’on éprouve pour un frère bien-aimé”; and Matthew of Edessa, Chronicle, trans. Ara Edmond Dostourian, in Armenia and the Crusades, Tenth to Twelfth Centuries: The Chronicle of Matthew of Edessa (Lanham, Md., 1993), 2.57, p. 135. For the Islamic sources see the text collection with Turkish translations by Faruk Sümer and Ali Sevim, I˙slâm kaynaklarına göre Malazgirt savas¸ı (metinler ve çevirileri), Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları, 19. Dizi–sa. 3a, 2nd ed. (Ankara, 1988). For a new English translation of these sources with extensive commentary see Carole Hillenbrand, Turkish Myth and Muslim Symbol: The Battle of Manzikert (Edinburgh, 2007). For the diverging opinions on the interpretation of this source material see Cahen, “Campagne de Mantzikert”; Vryonis, “Greek and Arabic Sources”; and Hillen- brand, Turkish Myth, pp. 3–25. Speros Vryonis is currently finishing his new monograph on Manzi- kert, containing the results of his almost lifelong research on the topic. 64 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, pp. 106 and 123, line 21: µετ. τυρκικης& της& στλης& . Sibtខ b. al- Jawzı¯, ed. Sevim, p. 151, mentions a qaba¯© (an Islamic dress) and a qalansu¯wa (a hat worn by Mus- lim dignitaries). 65 Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, pp. 104–5, 106 (Manuel Komnenos is taken captive in the battle of Sebasteia, 1070), 136; Bryennios 2.5, ed. Gautier, pp. 149–51 (Isaac Komnenos is taken captive in a battle near Kaisareia); Attaleiates, ed. Pérez Martín, pp. 140–41; Bryennios 2.18, ed. Gautier, pp. 179–81 (John Doukas and Rouselios are taken captive).

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 616 Defection Alp Arslan, to whom he demonstrated his grief for Sultan Tog˘rıl Beg’s death by being “dressed up in a black garment of mourning.”66 Deeply impressed by this gesture, the sultan “offered Gagik his friendship,” which was confirmed by an exchange of gifts and a rich banquet. Matthew of Edessa presents this ritual act, by which the king expressed emotional commitment and deference to the Seljuk dynasty, as a clever ruse creating the basis for a peaceful relationship with the sultan. In this way the author praises King Gagik’s sagacious handling of the Turk- ish threat but by no means criticizes him for his appeasing attitude. Offended honor was another motive that in the eyes of contemporaries might offer a reasonable explanation for collaboration with the enemy. The Armenian nobleman George Shirakats©i of Ani, for example, was severely maltreated and insulted by the people of Antioch. As a result he allied himself with a group of five hundred Turkish warriors, ravaged the territory of Antioch, and slaughtered his captives in front of the city’s gate. Matthew of Edessa, instead of condemning this behavior, rebuked the townspeople for doing injustice to the nobleman.67 Military defeat, under certain circumstances, might result in forced conversion to Islam, as we learn from an incident recorded by Bar Hebraeus. In a.h. 460 (November 11, 1067–October 30, 1068), while on patrol, the Armenian patrician Aristakis and his two hundred soldiers were attacked by the Seljuk emir Shir- wa¯n Sha¯h.68 In an attempt to save their lives, the Armenians declared that they were on the way to the sultan in order to become Muslims. Thus, against their will they were received with honor at the sultan’s court and circumcised, and the patrician was awarded an annual income of twenty thousand dinars. Eventually they managed to escape and return to their Christian faith. Defection and conversion are presented here as acts of despair, which subsequently were corrected. Even high honors and rich grants could not keep them from returning to their paternal faith, so that their initial failure is excused. The most renowned defector of this period, no doubt, was the Armenian lord Philaretos Brachamios, who had been appointed domestikos by Romanos IV.69 Following the overthrow of his former lord, he rose up against the regime of Mi- chael VII and created a short-lived lordship in Cilicia and northern Syria com- prising major urban centers such as Mar¨ash, Edessa, Melitene, and, in 1078, even Antioch. All sources are very ill disposed toward him, and they agree on the fact that, because of the increasing pressure exerted by the Seljuk leaders in the Syr- ian border region, in about 1085 Philaretos decided to submit to Sultan Malik Sha¯h and convert to Islam, something that eventually caused the collapse of his lordship.

66 Matthew of Edessa 2.23, trans. Dostourian, p. 104. 67 Matthew of Edessa 2.79, trans. Dostourian, p. 148. 68 Barhebraeus, Chronicon Syriacum, ed. Paul Bedjan (Paris, 1890), p. 244; trans. Ernest Alfred Wallis Budge, The Chronography of Gregory Abû©l-Faraj, 1225–1286, the Son of Aaron, the He- brew Physician Commonly Known as Bar Hebraeus (London, 1932), p. 218. 69 For Philaretos see C. J. Yarnley, “Philaretos: Armenian Bandit or Byzantine General?” Revue des études arméniennes 9 (1972), 331–53; and Gérard Dédéyan, Les arméniens entre grecs, musulmans et croisés: Étude sur les pouvoirs arméniens dans le Proche-Orient méditerranéen (1068– 1150), 2 vols. (Lisbon, 2003), 1:287–357; for his title see Anna Komnene 6.9.2, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, p. 187, trans. Reinsch, p. 214.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 617 Matthew of Edessa connects his fate with the deplorable state of affairs in his hometown during the period of Philaretos’s rule, thus calling him an “impious and most wicked chief,” “the very offspring of Satan,” and a “perfidious man, who indeed was a precursor of the abominable Antichrist.”70 According to Mat- thew’s version, Philaretos first sought Sultan Malik Sha¯h’s benevolence; but when the sultan became angry because of Edessa’s decay, Philaretos fell into complete despair: “At that moment [he] abjured his Christian religion, renouncing the faith of Christ . . . for by so doing, he thought he would be honored by the Persians, but this was not the case . . . and he came to be cursed and despised by both God and men.”71 Hence, conversion to Islam appears as a self-destructive act of surrender to treacherous forces that eventually leads to material and moral downfall. Michael the Syrian arrives at a similar conclusion, stating that Philaretos, having returned from his trip to Baghdad and Khurasan, found all his territories in Turkish hands: “When he gave up his faith for his lordship, he was deprived of his lordship as well.”72 Anna Komnene establishes a direct causal link between Philaretos’s defection and the ruin of Antioch. Philaretos’s son, she tells us, failed to dissuade his father from his decision to become a Muslim. Hence he fled to Emir Sulayma¯n of Nicaea to offer him rule over Antioch.73 The sequence of events as presented by Anna is highly illogical, but the conceptual framework of the story is much the same as in the versions of Matthew and Michael.74 De- fection and conversion are patterns of behavior that characterize people who have lost self-control and are led into a state of despair. Their decision, unavoidably, has destructive results for both themselves and the people depending on them. By the beginning of the twelfth century defection had become a common experience for both sides. Contemporary and later chroniclers had developed interpretative patterns and conceptual frameworks, on the basis of which these experiences were transformed into discursive events and narratives. The ideological background was provided by the ancient model of barbarism, by questions of legitimacy and lawfulness, and by moral judgments.

Comnenian Aristocrats and Court Officials Wandering about Anatolia (1118–1260)

In the following sections of this essay I will examine the phenomenon of Byzantine-Seljuk defection from Alexios I’s death in 1118 until ca. 1260, which can be considered a logical turning point inasmuch as the Mongol protectorate over the Seljuk sultanate of Ru¯ m and Michael VIII Palaiologos’s rise to power in the Empire of Nicaea brought about a totally new political equilibrium in Asia Minor. The available source material resembles that of the previous period in that we depend mainly on Byzantine historians, most essentially Niketas Choniates

70 Matthew of Edessa 2.60, trans. Dostourian, pp. 137–38. 71 Matthew of Edessa 2.85, trans. Dostourian, pp. 152–53. 72 Michael the Syrian 15.4, ed. Chabot, 3:173 (trans.), 4:580–81 (Syriac text): “w-kគadគ l-hayma¯nu¯tគa¯ dគ-ı¯tគ-(h)wa¯le¯h awbedគ metខtខul re¯sˇa¯nu¯tគa¯w-a¯p¯ men re¯sˇa¯nu¯tគa¯p¯adគ.” 73 Anna Komnene 6.9.2, ed. Reinsch and Kambylis, pp. 186–87, trans. Reinsch, p. 214. 74 For Philaretos’s struggle with the Seljuk Turks see Dédéyan, Les arméniens, 1:338–43, 346–49.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 618 Defection and George Akropolites,75 while Oriental authors, whether Christian or Mus- lim, provide us only a few glimpses of the phenomenon of defection. Our perspective, therefore, remains to a certain extent biased and unbalanced. Only the chronicle Al-Awa¯mir al-¨ala¯©ı¯ya fı¯ l-umu¯ r al-¨ala¯©ı¯ya, written in about 1281 by Ibn Bı¯bı¯, the first historical work exclusively devoted to the Seljuk sultanate of Ru¯m,76 gives us more substantial information in this respect. Like the sources discussed above, whenever twelfth-century narratives refer to incidents of defection, they are mainly concerned with aspects of political ideology and offer moralizing interpretations. Niketas Choniates, as will be shown below, also introduces innovative features into the description of these events, placing special emphasis on the role of emotions as motives for action and forms of behavior. While leaving aside or intentionally ignoring matters of internal strife, power politics, and military conflicts, he highlights spontaneous irrational reactions and emotional conditions dominating the actions of men, like fear and envy, as the main factors causing people to disregard their natural bonds and take refuge with the enemy. Thus, Niketas’s approach, though not very helpful for providing a look behind the scenes, reveals a new form of perception that embeds apostasy and defection into a context of mental conditions. Interestingly, this approach is by no means applied uniformly; the quality of emotions and the degree of an individual’s irrationality vary according to his social status and his proximity to the empire’s inner circle of power. In addition one has to take into account the intrinsic logic and thought struc- ture on which a given work’s historiographical discourse is based. Choniates’s admiration for Emperor John II, for instance, necessarily makes his brother Isaac appear as a disturbing dissonance within a perfect political harmony, whereas George Akropolites’s hatred for Theodore II Lascaris shows Michael Palaiologos in the light of a righteous opponent of a tyrannical regime.77 On account of these parameters we might distinguish several types of Byzan- tine defectors during the period in question. (See the Appendix below for a synopsis of the instances of defection considered in this essay.) Undoubtedly, the most prominent defectors were members of the ruling dynasty and close relatives of the emperor. In fact, this series of defections starts with members of the Comne- nian family, namely, John II’s brother, the sebastokrator Isaac, and his two sons John and Andronikos. Choniates repeatedly underlines Isaac’s love for and devotion to his brother and stresses the decisive role he played in the establishment of John’s rule during the succession crisis of 1118.78 As a sign of honor John con-

75 George Akropolites, Historia, ed. August Heisenberg, in Georgii Acropolitae opera, rev.ed.,2 vols. (Stuttgart, 1978), 1:1–189; trans. Ruth Macrides, George Akropolites: The History (Oxford, 2007). 76 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, Mukhtasខar-i Salju¯ qna¯mah, ed. Martijn Theodoor Houtsma, in Histoire des Seldjouci- des d’Asie Mineure d’après l’abrégé du Seldjoukna¯meh d’Ibn Bı¯bı¯, Recueil de Textes Relatifs à l’Histoire des Seldjoucides 4 (Leiden, 1902); trans. Herbert W. Duda, Die Seltschukengeschichte des Ibn Bı¯bı¯ (Copenhagen, 1959). 77 For these two cases see the discussion below, pp. 619–21 and 627–29. 78 For a biographical sketch see Konstantinos Varzos, Η γενεαλγα των Κµνην#ν [The geneal- ogy of the Comnenians], 2 vols. (Thessalonica, 1984), 1:238–54, no. 36.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 619 ceded to his brother a place of equal rank on the imperial throne and at the imperial table.79 Nevertheless, some years later—from Michael the Syrian’s account the incident can be dated to the summer of 1130, during Emperor John’s campaign against the Danis¸mends in Kastamon80—“Isaac broke off relations with his brother and departed from the land of the Romans, taking with him John, his eldest son, as companion and fellow wanderer.”81 Choniates and other Byzantine authors, reflecting the imperial court’s viewpoint, solved the problem of giving a reasonable explanation for Isaac’s behavior by keeping silent about the true causes for the brothers’ discord and by min- imizing its real dimensions. These can only be discerned through reports from outside the empire, namely, through Michael the Syrian, who explicitly refers to a “conspiracy” of Isaac and some magnates.82 Obviously, the emperor’s brother was the leader of an unsuccessful coup d’état supported by elements of the Con- stantinopolitan ruling elite. Whether they were motivated by personal ambition or by political aims, there must have been a deep-rooted rivalry between Alexios I’s two sons. This conflict most probably took shape long before its outbreak in 1130, so that Choniates’s insistence on the brothers’ equality in rank seems to reveal the deeper causes of a serious dynastic problem. When Isaac eventually was forced to leave the empire, he consequently chose to take refuge with Em- peror John’s most dangerous eastern enemy at that time, Gümüs¸tekin Gha¯zı¯ (1104–34), son and successor of Danis¸mend. Thus, for the first time a member of the Constantinopolitan elite adopted a practice that until then had been employed only by Seljuk apostates fleeing in the opposite direction from Asia Mi- nor to the imperial court.83 Byzantine accounts, in their attempt to downplay the extent of the discord, restrict themselves to elusive hints. Choniates talks about a “futile grief,”84 and in one of his poems Theodore Prodromos refers to the fateful power of envy (␸θ νς),85 without going into further detail. Instead they focus on the reconcil-

79 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 6, trans. Magoulias, pp. 6–7. 80 Michael the Syrian 16.4, ed. Chabot, 3:230 (trans.), 4:612, col. B, lines 29–32 (Syriac text). 81 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 32, lines 33–36, trans. Magoulias, p. 19: τυ& Qµγνυ δια'ευθε3ς κα3 ␸υγ.ς π ρας 1κ της& /Ρωµαων, συν!κδηµν κα3 συµπλαντην :ων τFν <Ιω ννην τFν των& παδων πρωτ τκν. 82 Michael the Syrian 16.4, ed. Chabot, 3:230 (trans.), 4:612, col. B, lines 31–32 (Syriac text): “etគnkគel ¨law(hy) ahខu¯ (h)y w-na¯sˇı¯n men rawrbគa¯naw(hy)” (his brother and some people of his great men con- spired against him). 83 For Isaac’s conspiracy and flight see Ferdinand Chalandon, Les Comnène: Jean II Comnène (1118– 1143) et Manuel I Comnène (1143–1180) (Paris, 1912), pp. 83–85; Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 94; Ralph-Johannes Lilie, “Des Kaisers Macht und Ohnmacht: Zum Zerfall der Zentralgewalt in Byzanz vor dem Vierten Kreuzzug,” in Varia, 1: Beiträge von Ralph-Johannes Lilie und Paul Speck, Πικλα Βυ'αντιν 4 (Bonn, 1984), pp. 9–120, at pp. 60–61; Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:239–43; Chey- net, Pouvoir, p. 105; and Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines” (above, n. 11), p. 258. 84 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 32, line 33: κατ. γ.ρ µικρλυπαν. 85 Theodoros Prodromos, Historische Gedichte, ed. Wolfram Hörandner, Wiener Byzantinistische Studien 11 (Vienna, 1974), 41, lines 10–12: λλ< W τ ης κ λινδρς, W τρFς υ,/ε5λη␸εν 6σOν κα3 καθ< =µων& Q ␸θ νς / κα3 ␸ευδιε& &ιλε τν υ συµψυαν. For other allusions to the event see ibid. 2, line 26, and 40, lines 53–54 (Isaac’s return).

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 620 Defection iation that took place in 1138/39, perhaps shortly after John II’s stay in Anti- och.86 The rejoicing over the reestablished peace turns the previous hostility into a temporary misfortune, the reasons for which have no further significance. This attitude seemingly reflects propagandistic efforts that celebrated Isaac’s return and the reestablished dynastic order as part of the emperor’s triumphal entrance in Constantinople. Thus, the inhabitants of the Byzantine capital not only hailed the emperor’s military exploits but also expressed their joy at Isaac’s arrival.87 Because of the sources’ elusiveness it remains unclear to what extent Isaac’s exile in Asia Minor had an impact on the political situation in the region. Yet housing a guest who was second in rank to the emperor no doubt was an event of the highest significance for the sovereigns in the East. Michael the Syrian states that Gümüs¸tekin Gha¯zı¯ “was very glad of his presence and honored him mag- nificently,”88 and accordingly Choniates observes that Isaac “was treated with respect, for he was most imperial in bearing and very noble because of his family.”89 His high standing also allowed him to come into contact with other Chris- tian and Muslim lords of Asia Minor who had a common hostility against Con- stantinople.90 Isaac visited Constantine Gabras of Trebizond, an ally of the Danis¸mend emir, and spent the winter together with Gümüs¸tekin and his son-in- law, Sultan Mas¨u¯ d of Konya, in Melitene. His next stop was the court of Leo of Cilicia, who at that time was a tributary of the Danis¸mends. An alliance based on a marriage between Leo’s daughter and Isaac’s son failed on account of a dis- agreement between the two potentates, so Isaac went back to Sultan Mas¨u¯d. Choniates’s statement that “he was planning to make attacks against Roman territories and to become Satan for John”91 suggests that Isaac constantly endeav- ored to pursue his conspiratorial plans and to create a network of adversaries against his brother, but we do not know how active a role he was in fact able to play within the existing political equilibrium. From the perspective of Byzantine imperial propaganda the power and prestige that Emperor John II had gained on account of his military exploits posed too dangerous a threat for the eastern lords to offer any effective support to their guest. On the other hand, the fact that Isaac stayed nearly a decade in Asia Mi- nor seems to reveal a certain inability on the part of the emperor to prevail upon his opponents. Consequently, the reconciliation between the brothers coincided chronologically with the culmination of John’s expansionist policy toward Anti- och and the Crusader States. The event was preceded by a pilgrimage by Isaac to the Holy Sepulchre, on the occasion of which he financed the construction of an

86 See Michael Italikos’s speech to Emperor John II on the occasion of his campaign to Syria in 1138: Michel Italikos, Lettres et discourse, ed. P. Gautier, Archives de l’Orient Chrétien 14 (Paris, 1972), 43, p. 265, lines 11–17: Συνηδ µεθ σι, ασιλευ&, κα3 συνεαρµεν κα3 1π3 τ+η& της& δραγµης& εBρ!σει9 δραγµν δ2 λ!γων, τν ασιλικν ε6κ να σηµανω, τFν σFν τριπ θητν δελ␸ ν. 87 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 33, trans. Magoulias, p. 19. 88 Michael the Syrian 16.4, ed. Chabot, 3:230 (trans.), 4:612, col. B, lines 32–33 (Syriac text): “wa- hខdគı¯bគe¯h saggı¯w-ı¯qre¯h rawrbគa¯©ı¯tគ.” 89 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 32, lines 45–47, trans. Magoulias, p. 19: κα3 παρ< &8ς κατ!λυε δι< α6δυς& γ µενς 4ς τF ε&6δς τυραννικ#τατς κα3 τF γ!νς 1πισηµ τατς. 90 Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:240–42. 91 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 32, trans. Magoulias, p. 19.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 621 aqueduct for the monastery of John the Baptist on the Jordan River.92 These were most likely preparatory measures that can be interpreted as both gestures of penitence and signs of agreement with the aims of Byzantine imperial policy, namely, the emperor’s ascendancy over the holy places. In this way Isaac purified himself from the stigma of having mingled with Muslims for almost a decade and re- stored his image as an Orthodox Christian and member of the imperial family. Especially noteworthy is Choniates’s focus on emotional aspects, which in his narrative constitute causal links in a sequence of decisions and actions. Grief leads to hatred, which is finally overcome by the inborn feeling of love between the two brothers, which, in turn, is celebrated with their subjects’ overwhelming joy. The reconciliation of 1138/39, however, did not result in a lasting peace between the two branches of the Comnenian family. Already the following year, during the siege of Neokaisareia, another incident occurred. This time it was Isaac’s son John93 who, shortly before the battle with the Danis¸mend forces began, switched sides in the framework of an exciting spectacle: “He mounted another horse and full of annoyance he took the lance under his arm and rushed in the direction of the enemies’ ranks. After advancing a short distance, he turned the short lance to the rear, placing it on his shoulder and, removing the helmet from his head, he defected to the Persians.”94 Once more, Choniates’s argument goes, it was an insignificant occasion that triggered an excessive emotional reaction: the emperor had asked for John’s horse, to hand over to a horseless Frankish mer- cenary. What followed was due to John’s “unreasonable and self-willed vanity and his wholly uncontrollable passion,” “his obstinacy and excessive arrogance.”95 Without doubt the incident shows that the reconciliation of the preceding year was built on fragile foundations and that, during their stay in Konya and other Muslim centers, Isaac and his son had developed close ties with their hosts. John’s defection seems to have been provoked by an offense against his personal feeling of honor, while it remains unclear whether the emperor insulted his nephew on purpose or not. Obviously, Choniates tried to conceal the persisting dynastic tensions by ascribing the incident to John’s personal deficiencies. John’s estrangement from his family and his advanced assimilation into the Muslim-Turkish mi- lieu are evidenced by the fact that, in contrast to his father Isaac, John broke with his past forever and eventually converted to Islam, marrying the Seljuk sultan’s daughter.96 For the first time in the history of Byzantine-Seljuk relations a member of the ruling dynasty became a permanent resident and fully integrated

92 Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:242–43 (with a different interpretation of the event). 93 For a biographical sketch see Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:480–85. 94 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 36, lines 51–55, trans. Magoulias, p. 21: µετακελλητσας δ< ε6ς Xτερν θυµας πλρης τF δ ρυ γκινησ µενς κατ. της& των& πλεµων παρατ εως ␸!ρεται. µικρFν δ! τι πρ.ς τFν λγρη κντFν ε6ς τπσω ντ!στρεψε κα3 τ+ω& ν#τ+ω 1παναθ!µενς πρFς Π!ρσας ατ µλς γνεται, τF κρ νς της& κε␸αλης& ␸ελ µενς. 95 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 35, lines 40–41, and 36, line 46, trans. Magoulias, p. 21: τυ&␸ς Jλγς ατθελς κα3 θυµFς παντ πασιν κυ!ρνητς ...Qδ2␸ρνηµατας Wν κα3 γαυρς& πλ!ν τυ& δ!ντς. 96 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 36, trans. Magoulias, p. 21. See also Chalandon, Les Comnène, pp. 179–80; Turan, Türkiye, p. 176; Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:482–83 and 484–85 (concerning the myth that regards John as ancestor of the Ottomans); and Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines,” p. 258.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 622 Defection dignitary of the sultan’s court in Konya. Accordingly, Choniates’s emphasis on emotional aspects in comparison to Isaac’s case is here even stronger. Irrationality and uncontrollable passion appear as the predominant motives for action for other Comnenian defectors as well. No less spectacular an event than John’s flight is that of his younger brother, the enfant terrible Andronikos Kom- nenos,97 who, after an adventurous life full of conspiracy, imprisonment, and exile, became reconciled with his cousin Manuel I in 1166 and was appointed governor in Cilicia. It comes as no surprise that this crucial position, which gave him control over the revenues of Cyprus and enabled him to pursue his own political ambitions with respect to Thoros of Cilicia and the principality of Anti- och, very soon led him to a new clash with the emperor, which compelled him once more to flee from the emperor’s wrath, first to the Kingdom of Jerusalem and subsequently to several eastern lords, eventually ending up at the court of the Turkish emir Saltuk of Erzurum, where he stayed until shortly before Man- uel’s death in 1180.98 The extant narratives on these events, written by William of Tyre,99 John Kin- namos,100 and Niketas Choniates,101 pass over in silence all political aspects and focus exclusively on Andronikos’s love affairs with Philippa, sister of Bohemond III of Antioch and Manuel’s wife Maria, and with Theodora, daughter of An- dronikos’s cousin Isaac and widow of King Baldwin III of Jerusalem. While Wil- liam contents himself with underlining the fraudulent and shameless nature of Andronikos’s deeds,102 the Byzantine reports blame the impulse of erotic passion and sexual licentiousness, which made Andronikos forget decency, lawfulness, and loyalty, so that he rose up against his brother’s will. According to Choniates, An- dronikos, facing defeat at the hands of the Armenian lord Thoros, forgot about warfare and devoted himself to the orgies of Aphrodite, being “love-smitten by hearsay” and behaving himself “as a horse in heat covering mare after mare beyond reason.”103

97 For his biography see Oktawiusz Jurewicz, Andronikos I. Komnenos (Amsterdam, 1970); Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:493–638; and Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, pp. 197–201. For aspects of Androni- kos’s image in Choniates’s work see Niels Gaul, “Andronikos Komnenos, Prinz Belthrandos und der Zyklop: Zwei Glossen zu Niketas Choniates’ Yρνικ διγησις,” Byzantinische Zeitschrift 96 (2003), 623–60. 98 For the events see Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:518–28. For a thorough discussion of the political background and possible Byzantine reactions to Andronikos’s reception by King Amalric, who enfeoffed his guest with Beirut, see Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader States, pp. 193–95. 99 William of Tyre, Chronicon, ed. R. B. C. Huygens, CCCM 63–63A (Turnhout, 1986), 20.2.1– 14, 21.12.40–46, pp. 913–14, 978–79. 100 Ioannes Cinnamus, Epitome rerum ab Ioanne et Alexio Comnenis gestarum, ed. August Meineke (Bonn, 1836), 6.1, pp. 250–51; trans. Charles M. Brand, Deeds of John and Manuel Comnenus by John Kinnamos (New York, 1976), pp. 188–89. 101 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 137–42. 102 William of Tyre 20.2.9–13, ed. Huygens, p. 914: “dominam Theodoram . . . fraudulenter, ut dicitur, abduxit et in terram hostium, Damascum prius, deinde in Persidem favente Noradino trans- vexit”; ibid. 21.12.44–46, ed. Huygens, p. 979: “dominam Theodoram . . . inpudenter nimis sed et inpudice non minus clam abduxit.” 103 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 139, line 36, trans. Magoulias, p. 79: ;ν& γ.ρ 1 κης& 1ρωτ ληπτς; and Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 141, lines 88–90, trans. Magoulias, p. 80: 4ς Rππς

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 623 Meanwhile, Manuel is presented as growing more and more enraged at his cousin’s indecent and unlawful liaisons, so that he made every possible effort to cap- ture and punish him. The emperor’s wrath, in turn, made Andronikos fear for his safety, so he left Antioch for Jerusalem, where he became involved in a new affair with Theodora. An imperial letter signed with red ink, ordering the lords of the kingdom to imprison and blind his cousin,104 horrified Andronikos to such an extent that he made the decision to desert to the empire’s enemies. But even under these precarious circumstances he still demonstrated his deceitfulness, se- ducing Theodora to follow him as companion and fellow wanderer.105 The rest of the story is quite reminiscent of sebastokrator Isaac’s exile in the 1130s. An- dronikos was received and greatly honored at many courts; if we trust Kinna- mos, from Saltuk’s realm he undertook a series of incursions into Byzantine territory, for which he was excommunicated by the church of Constantinople.106 Seemingly, just like his father, for some years Andronikos attempted to exert pressure on the imperial government in order to force the emperor to make concessions or to recognize his rights as a member of the ruling dynasty. Be this historical truth or sensational fiction, the fact is that, in his presentation of An- dronikos’s defection to the Turks, Choniates draws clear parallels with his father Isaac and his brother John, adding to the emotional conditions that motivated the behavior of the latter, that is, extreme sensitivity and youthful arrogance, a combination of sexual passion and craftiness. Andronikos possesses the worst of a whole series of negatively connoted characteristics. Going against the principles of righteous rule, they exclude a person exhibiting them from a share in imperial power. Andronikos’s return fourteen years later, once more, was motivated by emotions and realized through a skillfully choreographed sequence of ritual acts. An- dronikos’s love for his mistress and their children drove him to seek the emper- or’s pardon after Theodora had been kidnapped and brought to Constantinople with the aid of the governor of Trebizond. An embassy asking the emperor for

θηλυµανς τα&ις παραλ γις 1πιθρν µενς µεσιν 1γρπτει σαρκικως& κα3 1νασελγανει κλ στως τ+η& τυ& πρ#τυ 1αδ!λ␸υ θυγατρ3 Θεδ#ρ+α. 104 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 141, lines 1–2, trans. Magoulias, p. 80: 1ρυθρδ ν+ω 1νσηµανθ2ν ␸ηκε& γραµµ τιν. See also Dölger and Wirth, Regesten, no. 1471 (ca. 1167). Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader States, p. 195, correctly in my opinion, suggests 1168, given that Andronikos arrived in Jerusalem shortly before Amalric’s marriage to Maria in August 1167 and that the love affair needed some time to develop. Choniates somewhat inadequately calls the recipients of the letter τOς κατ. Κλην Συραν 6σ ντας, but logically one has to think of King Amalric and the royal entourage. That the letter might have been handed over by the embassy of Alexander of Gravina (Dölger and Wirth, Regesten, no. 1481 [arrival in summer 1168]), as Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader States, p. 194 n. 218, assumes, seems quite convincing. William’s words, according to which Andronikos fled “favente Noradino” via Damascus to Persia (a region farther east or Seljuk territory?), do not necessarily mean that he was actually received by Nu¯ r al-Dı¯n or collaborated with him to the detriment of the Crusader States (Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader States, p. 195). 105 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 142, lines 16–22, trans. Magoulias, p. 81: σ␸ιστςδ2Wνκα3 πατε@ν κα3 ατν ππλαν+α& Θεδ#ραν ...συν!κδηµν κα3 συµπλανητιν& >κυσαν& 1πεσπ σατ Jκυσαν. 106 Kinnamos 6.1, ed. Meineke, p. 251, trans. Brand, pp. 188–89.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 624 Defection amnesty prepared his restoration to his former position.107 Afterwards, Androni- kos appeared before Manuel carrying a heavy iron chain around his neck that reached down to his feet, stretched himself out on the floor, and, shedding tears, begged forgiveness. In the end he even insisted on being dragged by the chain before the throne.108 Andronikos, drawing on gestures and symbols pertaining to the sphere of slaves and prisoners of war, demonstrated his unconditional sub- jugation and extreme humility before the imperial court. This enabled the emperor to show mercy and grant a pardon without undermining his prestige as head of the dynasty.109 For Choniates, who constantly interprets Andronikos’s deeds in the light of his subsequent insurrection against the dynasty’s legitimate heirs, the whole scene is nothing but another example of Andronikos’s cunning and hypocrisy.110 Given that in the summer of 1180, perhaps apart from the emperor’s imminent death, the future state of affairs was not yet foreseeable, this opinion seems highly doubtful. In all likelihood, the sequence of ritual acts described, in all its details, was agreed upon in the course of the preliminary talks as a precondition for the defector’s re- integration into the court and the imperial family. While in 1139 the restoration of dynastic peace could be publicly celebrated through the emperor’s triumphal entrance into the capital, in 1180 Manuel I had no political success to commem- orate. An honorable reconciliation could be achieved only through a gesture of humiliation, projecting the emperor’s clemency toward his penitent relative.111

107 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 226, trans. Magoulias, p. 128. 108 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 226–27, trans. Magoulias, pp. 128–29. 109 For Western parallels of public demonstrations of humility from the ninth century onwards see Geoffrey Koziol, Begging Pardon and Favor: Ritual and Political Order in Early Medieval France (Ithaca, N.Y., 1992); Gerd Althoff, “Das Privileg der deditio: Formen gütlicher Konfliktbeendigung in der mittelalterlichen Adelsgesellschaft,” in Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter (above, n. 17), pp. 99–125. The rope around the neck was a commonly understood symbol of captivity used during tortures and executions; see, for example, an eleventh-century depiction of Christ on the way to Cal- vary preserved in Elmali Kilise in Cappadocian Göreme (Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, La Cappadoce médiévale: Images et spiritualité [Paris, 2001], plate 141) and the portrayal of the flagellation and blinding of the rebel Lampros in Skylitzes Matritenses, fol. 225v, miniature 550 (Vasiliki Tsamakda, The Illustrated Chronicle of Ioannes Skylitzes in Madrid [Leiden, 2002], p. 250, fig. 534). I am especially grateful to Dr. Maria Parani (University of Cyprus) for these references to the field of Byz- antine iconography. 110 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 226, line 86, trans. Magoulias, p. 128: Πλυµανς δ< Wν <Ανδρ νικς κα3 παντις δ λις κα' µενς. Varzos, Γενεαλγα, 1:528–29, does not understand the meaning of the described ceremony. 111 Very similar model patterns of conflict resolution can be observed in the Latin West from the tenth century onwards: Gerd Althoff, “Königsherrschaft und Konfliktbewältigung im 10. und 11. Jahrhundert,” in Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter, pp. 21–56, esp. p. 36: “Die Gegner des Königs aus den Führungsschichten und seiner eigenen Familie können auf weitestgehende Schonung rech- nen....Voraussetzung für diese Schonung war jedoch, daß sie sich zur bedingungslosen Unterwer- fung bereiterklärten....Dersich bedingungslos Unterwerfende brachte ja einen beträchtlichen Teil seiner dignitas in die Konfliktbereinigung ein.” For the crucial significance of intermediaries and preliminary negotiations preceding public reconciliation ceremonies see Hermann Kamp, Friedensstifter und Vermittler im Mittelalter (Darmstadt, 2001), esp. pp. 64–82 (“Das Bitten um Nachsicht und Milde”). For the idea of showing pity to captives in the framework of twelfth-century chivalrous moral codes see Yvonne Friedman, Encounter between Enemies: Captivity and Ransom in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, Cultures, Beliefs and Traditions 10 (Leiden, 2002), pp. 65–72.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 625 Two other cases of defection among members of the ruling dynasty are at- tested in the years of the Angeloi emperors. Isaac Komnenos, grandson of Man- uel’s brother Isaac and ex-ruler of Cyprus,112 after his release from Frankish captivity in Palestine, probably in late 1195, fled to the court of Sultan Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Kaykhusrau of Konya.113 Likewise, in about 1200 Michael Angelos- Doukas, dux of the thema Mylassa and bastard son of the sebastokrator John Doukas and, therefore, Alexios III’s cousin, fled to Kaykhusrau’s brother Rukn al-Dı¯n after his rebellion had failed and imperial troops defeated him in battle.114 In Choniates’s narrative the behavior of the two rebels is molded on exactly the same model as that of the sebastokrator Isaac and his sons: Isaac Komnenos’s decision resulted from his excessive lust for power. We are told that he became very annoyed at letters of Emperor Alexios III recalling him to Constantinople: “I have learned to rule,” he angrily responded, according to Choniates, “not to be ruled, and to lead, not to obey others.”115 His attempts failed, however, for neither the sultan nor other Turkish lords in Anatolia were prepared to support him. Likewise, the arrogance of his youth led Michael to sedition and defection.116 Yet, since his flight coincided with a serious estrangement between Con- stantinople and Konya, including an attempt on Rukn al-Dı¯n’s life, Michael was much more successful in gaining the sultan’s military support and undertook a series of raids against the towns in the Meander valley, “proving himself an even more pitiless murderer than the barbarians.”117 There is a clear parallel between Isaac’s elder son John and Michael, who were both accused of excessive arrogance resulting from their youthful impetuosity. Before proceeding to a further interpretation of the aforementioned incidents, a second group of Byzantine apostates, consisting of military commanders and court officials who fell from grace, should be considered. The most prominent cases are the protostrator Alexios Axouch, whom Emperor Manuel discharged from his post in 1167,118 and the megas kontostablos Michael Palaiologos, who

112 He gained fame in crusader chronicles because of his confrontation with King Richard I in April 1191; see John Gillingham, Richard I (New Haven, Conn., 1999), pp. 140–54; and A. Nicolaou- Konnari, “The Conquest of Cyprus by Richard the Lionheart and Its Aftermath: A Study of Sources and Legend, Politics and Attitudes in the Years 1191–1192,” Επετηρδα τυ Κ!ντρυ Επιστηµνικ#ν Ερευν#ν 26 (2000), 25–123. 113 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 463–64, trans. Magoulias, pp. 254–55; Cheynet, Pouvoir, pp. 130– 31, no. 183. 114 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 529, trans. Magoulias, p. 290; Cheynet, Pouvoir, p. 134, no. 190. 115 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 464, lines 92–93, trans. Magoulias, p. 254: ασιλε ειν, µν ασιλε εσθαι λ!γων µαθε&ιν, κα3 Jλλων 1ηγε&ισθαι, µ γυν& >τ!ρις πεθεσθαι. For the bad image of Isaac Komnenos in Byzantine and Western sources as a cruel tyrant see Nicolaou-Konnari, “Con- quest of Cyprus,” pp. 77–88. 116 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 529, line 19, trans. Magoulias, p. 290: ν!ς Wν κα3 αθ δης. 117 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 529, lines 23–24, trans. Magoulias, p. 290: ερων των& λλ␸ λων κα3 νηλε!στερς νδρ␸ νς δεικν µενς. 118 Alexios was the son of the Great Domestic John Axouch, a former Turkish prisoner of war, who grew up at the imperial court and held the supreme military command under John II. Alexios was married to Maria, a daughter of Manuel’s elder brother Isaac. For Alexios Axouch’s role at Man- uel’s court see Brand, “Turkish Element” (above, n. 9), pp. 5–6, 8–10; Magdalino, Manuel Kom- nenos, pp. 6, 7, 19, 61–62, 107, 218–19, 224; Cheynet, Pouvoir, pp. 109, no. 148, and 415–16;

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 626 Defection in 1256 came into conflict with Emperor Theodore II Laskaris.119 In spite of the chronological distance of nearly a century, there are some remarkable similarities between the two incidents. Both Alexios and Michael were members of highly esteemed families, enjoyed an important position among the military leaders of the empire, and were related to the ruling dynasty through marriage. Both were suspected of seditious plans against the emperor. As a result they lost his favor and were seriously threatened in their social and political position. The basic motif of the historiographical narrative in both cases is the breach of allegiance and the question of guilt resulting from it: does the responsibility lie with the emperor or with his official? As for Alexios Axouch, it is John Kin- namos who talks about secret contacts with and a sort of ideological defection to the Seljuk sultan,120 whereas Niketas Choniates suggests that the reason for the conflict was the emperor’s envy of individuals who distinguished themselves by their personal abilities. Manuel could not stand Alexios’s respectability and the high esteem he enjoyed among the soldiers and military commanders. Be- sides, he had an eye on Alexios’s wealth.121 Therefore the emperor gave the or-

Balivet, “Entre Byzance et Konya” (above, n. 10), pp. 54–55; and Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzan- tines” (above, n. 11), p. 257. 119 For matters of chronology see Albert Failler, “Chronologie et composition dans l’histoire de Georges Pachymère,” Revue des études byzantines 38 (1980), 5–103, at pp. 16–17, esp. n. 46. For the circumstances of Michael’s flight to Sultan ¨Izz al-Dı¯n II, his sojourn at the Seljuk court, and his participation in the battle of Akseray against the Mongols in the fall of 1256 see Deno John Geana- koplos, Emperor Michael Palaeologus and the West, 1258–1282: A Study in Byzantine-Latin Rela- tions (Cambridge, Mass., 1959), pp. 28–30; Günter Prinzing, “Ein Mann τυραννδς Jις: Zur Darstellung der rebellischen Vergangenheit Michaels VIII. Palaiologos,” in Lesarten: Festschrift für Athanasios Kambylis zum 70. Geburtstag dargebracht von Schülern, Kollegen und Freunden, ed. Io- annis Vassis (Berlin, 1998), pp. 180–97; and the comments in Macrides’s Akropolites translation, pp. 314–15, 317–19. The significance of the event in the broader context of Byzantine-Mongol relations is carefully analyzed by John S. Langdon, “Byzantium’s Initial Encounter with the Ching- gisids: An Introduction to the Byzantino-Mongolica,” Viator: Medieval and Renaissance Studies 29 (1998), 95–140, at pp. 132–33 and esp. n. 218; idem, “Twilight of the Byzantine Lascarid Basileia in Anatolian Exile, 1254–1258: Continuity and Change in Imperial Geopolitical Strategy,” Viator: Medieval and Renaissance Studies 34 (2003), 187–207, at pp. 188–94, esp. p. 193 n. 65, where the author stresses the importance of the marriage between a daughter of John III Vatatzes and Sultan ¨Izz al-Dı¯n II, which made Emperor Theodore II the sultan’s brother-in-law. For a new examination of Michael VIII’s relations with the sultanate of Konya see Dmitri A. Korobeinikov, “Michail VIII Paleolog v Rumskom Sultanate,” Vizantiiskii Vremennik 64 (2005), 77–98, and his forthcoming monograph based on his 2004 Oxford D.Phil. thesis, Byzantium and the Turks in the Thirteenth Century. 120 Kinnamos 6.6, ed. Meineke, pp. 265–66, 267, trans. Brand, pp. 199–201. 121 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 143–44, lines 70–72, trans. Magoulias, pp. 81–82: 1κ τυτFν& Jνδρα Qραν& κα3 στρατηγ&ις κα3 στρατι#ταις 1ρ#µενν κα3 ␸ιλτµ+ω γν#µ+η κα3 ειρ3 ␸ιλδ#ρ+ω πρFς Kπαντας ρ#µενν, 5σως δ2 κα3 τυ& πρσ ντς ατ+ω& πλ τυ Bπτ ␸ων :␸εσιν. For the role of envy in the strictly hierarchically organized court culture of Byzantium, mainly on the basis of historiographical and autobiographical texts, see Martin Hinterberger, “ ␸θ νς ανθρ#πινη αδυναµα και κινητρια δ ναµη” [Envy: Human weakness or moving force?], in Byzantium Ma- tures: Choices, Sensitivities, and Modes of Expression (Eleventh to Fifteenth Centuries), ed. Chris- tine Angelidi, Institute for Byzantine Research, International Symposia 13 (Athens, 2004), pp. 299– 312.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 627 der to take Alexios into custody, charging him with sorcery, although Alexios had always maintained his deference and loyalty toward Manuel.122 On the contrary, Kinnamos suggests that for a long time Alexios had been thinking of apostasy.123 Therefore, when he was entrusted with an expedition against Cilicia, he deliberately visited the sultan of Konya in order to win him over to his conspiracy.124 Moreover, in one of his palaces outside Constantinople Alexios ordered some frescoes to be painted that, instead of depicting hunting scenes or the emperor’s military exploits, showed victorious campaigns of the sultan, “foolishly making public in painting in his residence what should have been concealed in darkness.”125 Regardless of whether the episode can claim any historical authen- ticity, it is clearly based on the idea that Alexios, though a faithful member of the imperial entourage and a man of Christian Roman identity in the second gen- eration, still could be suspected of having a certain proclivity to the world of his barbarian ancestors and thus of being susceptible to any kind of temptation offered by the Turkish-Muslim enemy to the detriment of the empire.126 One can observe a very similar argumentation with respect to Michael Palaio- logos. All sources agree that Theodore II Lascaris constantly threatened him with his anger and severity. In his autobiographical account Michael gives us his own interpretation of the incident: “When the empire of the Romans passed to his son [Theodore II], along with many others who tried them, we, too, had to en- dure the arrows of envy. But how did God keep us undamaged in this situation and how did he lead us from this grief to success? In summary, he offered us refuge with the Persians. Here, too, he holds my right hand and gloriously cares about me.”127 Michael appears as the victim of envy (␸θ νς), which, in turn, forms part of a divine plan, on the account of which Michael is led to the imperial throne.128 The historiographical sources on Michael’s flight unanimously stress his great fear of the emperor’s imminent punishment. Yet they give different ex-

122 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 144, trans. Magoulias, p. 82. 123 Kinnamos 6.6, ed. Meineke, p. 265, line 16, trans. Brand, p. 199: 1κ πλλυ& µ2ν πστασαν Tδινε. 124 Kinnamos 6.6, ed. Meineke, pp. 265, line 23–266, line 2, trans. Brand, p. 199: 1πτηδες 1ς <Ικ νιν συγγεγν@ς τ+ω& συλτ.ν ε5ς τε ␸ιλαν ατFν Bπηγ γετ κα3 των& ε6ς τυραννδα τειν ντων διελ!ατ τ τ+ω πλλ . 125 Kinnamos 6.6, ed. Meineke, p. 267, lines 14–16, trans. Brand, p. 200: τ.ς τυ& συλτ.ν νεστλυ στρατηγας, νπις Kπερ 1ν σκ τ+ω ␸υλ σσειν 1ρην& ταυτα& 1π3 δωµ των ατFς δηµσιε ων κατ. τν γρα␸ν. 126 Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, p. 219, quite imprecisely talks about an “ethnic factor” in Alex- ios Axouch’s party. 127 H. Grégoire, “Imperatoris Michaelis Palaeologi de vita sua opusculum necnon Regulae quam ipse monasterio S. Demetrii praescripsit fragmentum,” Byzantion 29–30 (1959–60), 447–76, at pp. 452–53. 128 For Michael VIII’s “autobiography,” a sort of introduction to a monastic foundation docu- ment, see Martin Hinterberger, Autobiographische Traditionen in Byzanz, Wiener byzantinistische Studien 22 (Vienna, 1999), pp. 46, 60–61, 127–29, 134–37, 188–90, 266–76 (in general Michael perceives his role as a mere instrument of the wonderful deeds of God). For the motif of envy and emotion-based interpretative models in Byzantine literature see the studies of Martin Hinterberger, cited above, nn. 16 and 121.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 628 Defection planations for Theodore’s anger. According to George Akropolites,129 who embedded the discussion of the reasons of Michael’s flight into a dialogue between himself and the emperor, Theodore II had frequently threatened Michael and openly expressed his wish to blind him. Nikephoros Gregoras, like Michael himself, makes use of the motif of envy: “When he realized how envy everywhere got stronger and stronger, how insidious words secretly came to his ears, and how the emperor started to think of and faintly talk about punishments that normally would be imposed only on barbarian enemies, he could no longer get any peace.”130 The severity and irascibility of the emperor along with the malicious conspiracies of insidious people caused Michael to set off for the Seljuk court.131 Only George Pachymeres hints at the possibility of disloyal behavior on the part of the ambitious commander, since suspicions openly spoken against him put him in a state of permanent fear. When his uncle, the megas chartularios Michael, was taken into custody for a careless word, he decided to leave the country.132 Byzantine authors juxtapose rulers’ envy and uncontrollable anger with their seditious subjects’ irrationality and greed. Unhinged emotions can dominate actions and forms of behavior on either side. Drawing a comparison between the two categories of apostates, members of the dynasty versus high-ranking officials, one comes across very similar motifs, such as the destructive force of envy (the sebastokrator Isaac, Michael Palaiologos), fear of the emperor’s punishment (Andronikos Komnenos, again Michael Palaiologos), and lust for power (Isaac Komnenos, Alexios Axouch). There are, however, remarkable differences with respect to their function. The members of the imperial dynasty formed the back- bone of the state’s stability. This holds true especially for the Comnenian system of government, which was based on the practice of conferring the most important offices and military posts on the emperor’s relatives and in-laws, thereby giving them a significant share in imperial power.133 The defection of persons pertaining to the empire’s inner circle was inevitably viewed as an extremely dangerous threat to the very existence of the state. As a result, these individuals were portrayed in a manner that actually disqualified them from imperial ranks. They had lost their minds and turned out to be completely

129 Akropolites 64, ed. Heisenberg, 1:134–35, trans. Makrides, pp. 312–13. 130 Nikephoros Gregoras, Byzantina historia, ed. Ludwig Schopen, 1, Corpus Scriptorum Histo- riae Byzantinae 19 (Bonn, 1829), p. 58; trans. Jan Louis van Dieten, Nikephoros Gregoras: Rhomäische Geschichte (Historia Rhomaïke), Bibliothek der griechischen Literatur 4 (Stuttgart, 1973), pp. 91– 92. 131 Gregoras, ed. Schopen, p. 58, lines 5–15, trans. van Dieten, p. 92: 1δεδει γ.ρ τF τυ& ασιλ!ως πρFς τ.ς τιµωρας π τµ ν τε κα3 πην2ς κα3 M [\πν ...κα3 µεγ λας διαλ.ς ...,]ς 8 ␸θνυντες& κατ< ατυ& συνεκ κησαν κα3 τ.ς τυ& ασιλ!ως κ.ς 1µπεπλκασιν ... ␸υγ+η& τν σωτηραν πρ'εσθαι !λτιν π σης 1τθει υλης& . 132 George Pachymeres, Relations historiques, ed. Albert Failler, trans. Vitalien Laurent, 1, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae 24/1 (Paris, 1984), 1.9, pp. 43–45, esp. p. 43, lines 13–14: τFν ε3 περ3 >αυτ+ω& δεδι τα δι. τν Bπτρ!υσαν της& ρης& Bπψαν. 133 For the Comnenian system and the court hierarchy from Alexios I’s reign onwards see Lilie, “Macht und Ohnmacht” (above, n. 83), pp. 11–58; Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, pp. 180–201; Cheynet, Pouvoir, pp. 249–301; and Michael Angold, Church and Society in Byzantium under the Comneni, 1081–1261, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, Eng., 2000), pp. 15–41 (concerning the changing relationship between the emperor and the church until Alexios I’s rise to power).

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 629 incapable of participating in the imperial government. Only genuine penitence expressed through publicly performed gestures of humiliation and the emperor’s clemency could restore them to their former status. On the contrary, high-ranking officials, in a system that depended largely on personal loyalty, had to live under the constant threat of opponents who were able to influence the emperor and win him over for their own ambitions. Byzantine society did not provide the se- curities of the Western feudal system, where the lord was obliged to protect his vassal and the latter, in case of a breach of allegiance, had a legal right to resist his lord. In Byzantium, oaths of allegiance were normally one-sided, from the official to the emperor.134 It comes as no surprise that the idea of the emperor’s wrath was especially horrifying and could even be employed as a reasonable justification for apostasy. In this case, defection seems to have been, if not a legal, then at least an understandable form of reaction to a threat to one’s position. Of course, this model worked only if a rebel’s undertaking was crowned by success, as was the case with Michael Palaiologos, the future emperor and “New Con- stantine.” If he failed, as did Alexios Axouch, who ended his life as a monk, the rebel’s deeds were either ascribed to his insanity or deliberately concealed. To judge from Akropolites’s account, Michael’s attempt to seek the sultan’s protection was by no means an isolated case in the years of the so-called empire in exile but forms part of a general pattern of behavior among Byzantine aristocrats fleeing the emperor’s wrath. Andronikos Nestongos, a member of an influential family at the court of Nicaea and head of a failed conspiracy against Em- peror John III Vatatzes in 1224/25, managed to escape from the fortress of Magnesia by running off to Muslim territory, where he spent the rest of his life.135 When in 1237 the blinded ex-emperor Theodoros Angelos returned from his Bul- garian captivity to Thessalonica, he exiled his brother, the despotes Manuel An- gelos, to Attaleia, where he was treated with clemency by the local Seljuk authorities and, according to his wish, sent to Emperor John III.136 In 1259 an opponent of Michael VIII’s ascent to the imperial throne, the protovestiarites The- odore Karyanites, also tried to take flight to the sultanate. Yet he was less fortu- nate than his predecessors, for on his way he was captured, robbed, and killed by a band of Turcomans.137

134 For oaths in the Western Latin sphere see, for instance, Charles E. Odegaard, “Carolingian Oaths of Fidelity,” Speculum 16 (1941), 284–96; and idem, “The Concept of Royal Power in Carolingian Oaths of Fidelity,” Speculum 20 (1945), 279–89. For Byzantine oaths see Nikos Svoronos, “Le ser- ment de fidelité à l’empereur byzantin et sa significance constitutionelle,” Revue byzantine 9 (1951– 52), 106–42; Angeliki Laiou, “The Emperor’s Word: Chrysobulls, Oaths and Synallagmatic Rela- tions in Byzantium (11th–12th C.),” Travaux et mémoires 14 (2002), 347–62; the article of Alexander Kazhdan, “Eid, B I. Byzantinisches Reich,” in Lexikon des Mittelalters, 9 vols. (Munich, 2002), 3:1689–90, esp. col. 1690: “Der Eid des Kaisers gegenüber einem Untertanen, einem Privatmann, war dagegen selten, aber nicht unmöglich.” 135 Akropolites 23, ed. Heisenberg, 1:37, lines 23–25, trans. Macrides, pp. 169–70, with comments on pp. 170–71: Sς κα3 νυκτFς ␸υγ@ν περ3 τ. των& Μυσυλµ νων 1␸#ρµησε, κα3 διηγεν& 1κε&ισεµ!ριτης& ατυ& τελευτης& . 136 Akropolites 38, ed. Heisenberg, 1:61, lines 16–17, trans. Macrides, pp. 206–7, with comments on pp. 208–9: ␸ιλανθρωπ+α µαλλν& πρFς ατFν ρησαµ!νυς. 137 Akropolites 77, ed. Heisenberg, 1:160, line 1, trans. Macrides, pp. 346–47, with comments on p. 349 n. 7: Q δ2 πδρ.ς περ3 τ. των& Περσων& +Tετ.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 630 Defection Akropolites’s judgment on these cases follows the same principles as the incidents discussed above, clearly reflecting the author’s personal stance toward political developments and contesting factions. While the rebel Nestongos, having disregarded kinship and bonds of friendship with the emperor, simply lost his right to be considered a Byzantine aristocrat, the despotes Manuel appears as a victim of his brother’s wrath, being saved by the Turks’ and John III’s clemency. The author accuses Theodore Karyanites of having murdered the Mouzalon brothers, so that his own death at the Turks’ hand is but just punishment. We will never learn whether the true reasons for Karyanites’s violent death lay else- where, perhaps in the especially cordial relations between Michael VIII and Sul- tan ¨Izz al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯ s II, which a few years later would prepare the sultan’s own flight to the imperial court.138

Local Rebels Collaborating with the Enemy (1118–1260)

Another category of defectors consists of local lords in the Anatolian border regions of the empire, mainly in the Pontus and in the Upper Meander valley. Their vicinity to Muslim areas brought about increased contacts with Turkish populations and tendencies of mutual acculturation. Naturally, this situation sometimes resulted in various forms of political cooperation and even defection. “Thus, custom, reinforced by time, is stronger than race and religion,” Choniates as- serts with respect to the Greek inhabitants of the Lake Pousgouse region (Beys¸e- hir Gölü), who by mingling with the Turks of Konya had strengthened their mutual friendship and their commercial ties to such an extent that they regarded the Byzantines as their enemies.139 Similar phenomena can be observed among the lords of the Pontus region, such as Constantine Gabras of Trebizond, who in the years 1126–40 governed the region as an independent ruler, simultaneously maintaining close contacts with the Danis¸mend emir Gümüs¸tekin Gha¯zı¯, or the local ruler Kassianos, who in 1130 submitted to the same emir, delivering to him his fortresses in the coastal region of the Pontus.140 These phenomena became more frequent in the years between Andronikos I’s seizure of power (1182/83) and the fall of Constantinople in 1204. As is generally known, this period is characterized by the decay of central authority and the appearance of independent rulers in the provinces.141 Individuals who, under these sociopolitical circum-

138 See below, pp. 643–47. 139 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 37, lines 92–93, trans. Magoulias, p. 22: 7τω ρ ν+ω κρατυνθ2ν :θς γ!νυς κα3 θρησκεας 1στ3ν 6συρ τερν. 140 Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 94; Anthony Bryer, “A Byzantine Family: The Gabrades, c. 979–c. 1653,” University of Birmingham Historical Journal 12 (1970), 164–87, at p. 170; idem, with Ste- phanos Fassoulakis and Donald M. Nicol, “A Byzantine Family: The Gabrades, an Additional Note,” Byzantinoslavica 36 (1975), 38–45, at p. 39, both articles reprinted in idem, The Empire of Trebi- zond and the Pontos, Collected Studies Series 117 (London, 1980), nos. 3a, 3b; Cheynet, Pouvoir, pp. 104–5, nos. 137–38, and 404–5, 417. See also Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 34, trans. Magou- lias, p. 20; and Michael the Syrian 16.3, ed. Chabot, 3:227 (trans.), 4:610, col. B, lines 25–27 (Syr- iac text). 141 For this process see Jürgen Hoffmann, Rudimente von Territorialstaaten im byzantinischen Reich (1071–1210): Untersuchungen über Unabhängigkeitsbestrebungen und ihr Verhältnis zu Kaiser und

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 631 stances, defected to the Turks either were members of the provincial aristocracy or attempted to obtain the backing of the provincial population. Flight to the Seljuk neighbors could be motivated by the desire to muster military support in order to initiate an insurrection against the central government. In other cases apostates were compelled to seek refuge with the Turks because they had lost the support of the local Byzantine population. That was the case with Manuel and Alexios, the sons of the megas domestikos John Vatatzes, who in Phrygian Philadelphia in 1182 resisted the usurpation of Andronikos I.142 After John’s sudden death, the inhabitants of the city decided to recognize the new regime in Constantinople, so that the two brothers, facing the pressure of the townspeople, had no choice other than to flee to the court of Sul- tan Kılıc Arslan.143 The Vatatzes brothers, however, did not pursue any plans for further resistance. In contrast, in the following years, some new leaders of local insurrections aimed at military cooperation with the neighboring Turks. The “ex-emperor” Theodore Mangaphas of Philadelphia in 1191, despite the guarantees of Isaac II, was forced by the dux of Thrakesion, Basil Vatatzes, to seek refuge in Konya.144 The two Pseudo-Alexioi, in 1191 and 1195 respectively,145 pretended to be Manuel’s murdered son and legitimate emperor Alexios II. All three of them convinced Turkish lords to support their cause, if not with reg- ular troops, then at least with the permission to recruit warriors from the Tur- coman nomads who were settling along the frontier regions of the Seljuk sultan-

Reich, Miscellanea Byzantina Monacensia 17 (Munich, 1974); Lilie, “Macht und Ohnmacht,” passim; and Cheynet, Pouvoir, pp. 427–40, 446–58. 142 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 262–64, trans. Magoulias, pp. 146–47; Cheynet, Pouvoir, p. 113, no. 154; John S. Langdon, “Backgrounds to the Rise of the Vatatzai to Prominence in the Byzantine Oikoumene, 997–1222,” in ΤF /Ελληνικ ν: Studies in Honor of Speros Vryonis, Jr., 1: Hellenic An- tiquity and Byzantium, ed. John S. Langdon et al. (New Rochelle, N.Y., 1993), pp. 179–212, at pp. 197–98 n. 35. 143 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 264, lines 55–57, trans. Magoulias, p. 147: 8 δ2 τυ& µεγ λυ δµεστκυ υ83 δεσαντες, µ συσεθε&ιεν κα3 καταπρδθε&ιεν <Ανδρνκ+ω, µεθστανται 1κε&ιθεν κα3 τ+ω& <Ικνιε&ι συλτ.ν πρσρ νται. In addition, see August Heisenberg, “Kaiser Johannes der Barm- herzige: Eine mittelgriechische Legende,” Byzantinische Zeitschrift 14 (1905), 160–233, edition of the vita at pp. 193–233 (Βς τυ& Pγυ <Ιω ννυ ασιλ!ως τυ& <Ελεµνς), esp. p. 205, lines 12– 14: πδρ ντε τνυν ε6ς <Ικ νιν ␸ικ!σθην, σµ!νως σ␸ωε& τυτ& ης& #ρας =γεµ νς δεαµ!νυ κα3 ␸ιλ␸ρ νως (in this version the Vatatzes brothers are called Nikephoros and Theodore). 144 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 399–401, esp. p. 400, lines 81–82, trans. Magoulias, pp. 219– 20: <Αλλ< Bτς& τ+ω& τ υ& <Ικνυ συλτ.ν πρσρυες, +4=κλ& ησις& Καϊσρ ης. See also Cheynet, Pouvoir, p. 123, no. 168. Michael the Syrian 21.3, ed. Chabot, 3:394–95 (trans.), 4:728, col. C, lines 1–44 (Syriac text), quotes a letter of Kılıc Arslan II mentioning a “nephew of the king of the Ro- mans” (“bar ahខa¯dគ-malka¯dគ-Ro¯ma¯ye¯”) who had arrived from Philadelphia and had declared his submission before the sultan’s throne. The sultan considered the event as a sign of God’s favor, to which Michael had significantly contributed through his prayers. In spite of some inconsistencies with respect to the details mentioned by Choniates, the “nephew” might be identified with Theodore Man- gaphas. For Kılıc Arslan II’s contacts with Michael the Syrian see Dorothea Weltecke, Die “Beschrei- bung der Zeiten” von Mo¯ r Michael dem Großen (1126–1199): Eine Studie zu ihrem historischen und historiographiegeschichtlichen Kontext, Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, Sub- sidia 110 (Louvain, 2003), pp. 107–9. 145 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 420–22, 461–63, trans. Magoulias, pp. 231–32, 253–54. See also Cheynet, Pouvoir, pp. 123–24, no. 169, and p. 130, no. 182.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 632 Defection ate.146 While Mangaphas can be regarded as an exponent of the provincial aristocracy, aiming at political autonomy on a local scale, the two Alexioi were descendants of obscure origin from Constantinople and Cilicia respectively.147 The particularity of their undertaking lies in the fact that they presented themselves before both the Byzantine provincial population and the Turkish sovereigns with insidiously obtained claims for legitimate rights to the imperial throne. “He [the first of the two Pseudo-Alexioi] embodied the hero of the drama so perfectly,” Choniates remarks, “and imitated the appearance of Emperor Alexios so skillfully that he even dressed his blond hair in the same way as he did and simu- lated the lisp of the imperial child’s tongue.”148 Apart from creating local strongholds in the Meander valley or the border regions around Ankyra,149 it remains unclear whether the two pretenders were actually trying to seize power in Con- stantinople as well. At least there were some court officials who were attracted by the rebels.150 Be that as it may, Choniates judges these defectors quite differently from the aforementioned categories of apostates. They are not blamed for their disloyalty to the ruling dynasty or the central government, for it was the excessive cruelty of Andronikos I and the incapacity of the Angeloi emperors that had provoked the disintegration of the empire. What discredits them is their malicious misbe- havior against their fellow countrymen and coreligionists. Outbursts of cruelty during their raids on Byzantine territory make them even worse than their Turk- ish allies. With respect to Theodore Mangaphas, Choniates talks about the un- restrained burning and pillaging that destroyed the livelihood of the peasantry in the Meander valley. The rebel insulted Turks who took pity on Christian people, delivered Christian captives into the hands of barbarians, and even allowed the famous church of the Archangel Michael in Chonai to be burned to the ground by Turkish raiders.151 It is no longer the act of defection itself that is criticized but rather the behavior ensuing from it. With his actions, this type of apostate goes against basic principles of what in Byzantine eyes constitute divinely or- dained harmony and social order, that is, philanthropy and piety, and, therefore, he has severed his ties with the Christian-Roman moral sphere.152

146 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 420, lines 24–26, trans. Magoulias, p. 231: πρFς τF <Ικ νιν Jπεισι κα3 τ+ω& γ!ρντι M␸θε3ς συλτ.ν ...4ς υ8Fς ληθινFς τυ& ατκρ τρς Μανυλ; Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 421, lines 44–48, trans. Magoulias, p. 232: Τ+η& συν+η& δ< Dµως τυ& νεανυ 1κλιπαρσει Q Περσ ρης καθυπενδOς ...συνε#ρησε δ< ν& Dµως δι. συλτανικυ& γρ µµατς, D ␸ασιν 8 Τυρκι& µυσ ριν, Dσυς Eν ση των& BπF τν 1κενυ ρν Bππισασθαι δεως& ; Choni- ates, ed. van Dieten, p. 461, lines 16–18, trans. Magoulias, p. 253: τ+ω& τ ης& π λεως <Αγκ ρας σατραπε ντι πρσρυηναι& κα3 Bπ< ατυ& πρσδεθηναι& 4ς υ8Fν ληθητ& υ& ατκρ τρς Μανυλ. 147 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 420, 461, trans. Magoulias, pp. 231, 253. 148 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 420, trans. Magoulias, p. 231. 149 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 421, 461, trans. Magoulias, pp. 231, 253. 150 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 421, trans. Magoulias, p. 231. 151 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 400, trans. Magoulias, p. 220. See further Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines” (above, n. 11), p. 260. 152 For the conceptual framework see Demetrios J. Constantelos, Byzantine Philanthropy and So- cial Welfare (New Brunswick, N.J., 1968); for philanthropy and piety in Byzantine imperial ideology see Herbert Hunger, Elemente der byzantinischen Kaiseridee in den Arengen der Urkunden, Wiener byzantinistische Studien 1 (Vienna, 1964).

The Seljuk Sultans of Konya Begging for the Emperor’s Protection (1118–1260)

Let us now pick up the thread we left with Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h’s reception by Alexios I in 1116 and follow the sequence of Seljuk defectors who in the course of the twelfth century sought refuge at the Byzantine imperial court. Interestingly, while Byzantine aristocrats were increasingly tempted to try their luck with powerful Anatolian Turkish lords, Sultan Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h, too, seems to have set an enticing precedent for his successors. Michael the Syrian—the main source for the internal situation of many Turkish emirates during the twelfth century—tells us that this development was mainly due to the civil strife among Kılıc Arslan I’s surviv- ing sons, Masü¯d,Ärab, and Tog˘rıl Arslan, a conflict that also involved Masü¯d’s father-in-law, Gümüs¸tekin Gha¯zı¯, and other local lords in the Upper Euphrates region.153 “All these things happened among the Turks,” Michael concludes, “who because of the anger they nurtured against each other fled to the Christians.”154 Gha¯zı¯’s seizure of Melitene from Tog˘rıl Arslan’s and his mother’s hands (De- cember 10, 1124) triggered the fraternal discord. On the pretext of taking re- venge against his brother’s treacherous behavior toward the family, Ärab attacked Masü¯ d with a huge military force, compelling him to flee to Emperor John. With the support of Byzantine money, Masü¯ d, along with his ally Gümüs¸tekin Gha¯zı¯, took up the war against his brother Ärab. In the summer of 1127, together with Turkish and Armenian allies, Ärab fought a series of fierce battles against Gha¯zı¯ and his sons and, after having suffered several defeats, was forced to take flight to Byzantium. Michael the Syrian, mainly focusing on the situation in eastern Asia Minor, devotes no more than a few words to the Seljuk lord’s stay in Constantinople. That “Emperor John received Masü¯ d joyfully”155 might hint at an official ceremony celebrating the guest’s arrival in the framework of imperial propaganda, as had been the case during the meeting with his deceased brother Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h, but there is no way to make further inferences about the ceremony’s form and contents. In Ärab’s case we cannot even be sure that he was actually received at the imperial court, for Michael mentions only his flight “to the Greeks” and his subsequent death.156 In any event, the fact that the Byz- antine emperor granted sanctuary to three of Kılıc Arslan’s four sons within a decade of internal disorder demonstrates how important an instrument of political practice defection had become for both the refugees and the hosts. Perhaps the frequent arrival of Seljuk opponents in Constantinople was an additional factor inducing the sebastokrator Isaac to set off in the opposite direction three years later.

153 For the political situation see Chalandon, Les Comnène, pp. 42–46, 77–81; Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 92–94; idem, Formation, pp. 15–20; and Turan, Türkiye, pp. 167–70. 154 Michael the Syrian 16.2, ed. Chabot, 3:224 (trans.), 4:609, col. A, lines 13–14 (Syriac text): “ha¯lle¯n kullhe¯n hway bayna¯t Tu¯rka¯ye¯dគa-bគ-ru¯g¯zho¯n d-¨al hខdគa¯dគe¯bគa-Kគ ristខya¯ne¯metគgawwası¯n-(h)waw.” 155 Michael the Syrian 16.2, ed. Chabot, 3:223 (trans.), 4:608, col. B, lines 36–37 (Syriac text): “I¯wanı¯ malka¯hខaddı¯ya¯©ı¯tគ qabbel l-Mas¨u¯d.” 156 Michael the Syrian 16.2, ed. Chabot, 3:224 (trans.), 4:609, col. A, line 12 (Syriac text): “wa- ¨raq lwa¯tគ Yu¯na¯ye¯ w-ebគadគ.”

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 634 Defection Almost three decades passed before another Seljuk ruler—this time Sultan Mas¨u¯ d’s son and successor Kılıc Arslan II (1155–92)—showed up for a visit in the Byzantine capital. The circumstances of his flight resemble the state of affairs prevailing in 1125–27 in Asia Minor, but with the difference that in about 1160 the empire’s expansionist policy in the East had reached its apogee. Man- uel’s winter–spring campaign of 1158–59 to Cilicia and Antioch resulted in the recognition of his supremacy by Reynald of Châtillon, King Baldwin III of Jeru- salem, and the Armenian lord Thoros, as well as in a peace treaty with Nu¯ r al- Dı¯n of Mosul and Aleppo.157 Since September 1158 Baldwin III had been married to Manuel’s niece Theodora. The negotiations over Manuel’s marriage with Constance of Antioch’s daughter Maria were well under way.158 In short, the emperor had managed to establish a network of alliances with the most powerful lordships on Anatolia’s southeastern fringe, and his position was impressively strong when he got involved in Seljuk affairs. Fortunately, in this case the available source material is relatively rich and detailed, so that we get a rather clear and manifold insight into the political setting, ideological dimensions, and contemporary perceptions of Kılıc Arslan’s reception at the imperial court. The most thoughtful observer, Niketas Choniates, presents the sultan’s arrival as an event of major significance in the framework of a detailed report on Byzantine-Seljuk affairs covering the period from Sultan Mas¨u¯ d’s death in 1155 until the eve of the battle of Myriokephalon in 1176.159 After referring to the divisions of Anatolian territories among Seljuk and Danis¸mend princes ensuing from the death of Gümüs¸tekin Gha¯zı¯’s son and successor Muhខammad (ca. 1134– ca. 1141), the author mainly dwells on the conflict between Kılıc Arslan and Muhខammad’s brother Yag˘ı-basan (<Ιαγυπασ ν; d. 1164), who is described as lord of Amaseia, Ankyra, and the province of Cappadocia.160 Emperor Manuel appears as a cunning diplomat striving for the downfall of both potentates and instigating them through secret messages to wage war against each other. As a result of this conflict the sultan undertook his trip to Constantinople.161 Despite the peace treaty that was concluded during his stay and the enormous amounts of money and gifts he received from the emperor, the sultan turned out to be a traitor in that he continued to pursue his expansionist plans against his relatives

157 For the political background see Chalandon, Les Comnène, pp. 442–55; Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader States, pp. 176–83; Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, pp. 70–71; and Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines,” pp. 261–62. For the diplomatic contacts and agreements concluded at this occasion see Dölger and Wirth, Regesten, nos. 1428–32 (dating the treaty with Nu¯ r al-Dı¯n to May 1159) and nos. 1435–36. 158 Lilie, Byzantium and the Crusader States, pp. 175–76, 184–87; Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, pp. 69–70, 72. 159 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 116–25, trans. Magoulias, pp. 66–71. 160 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 116, 117–18, trans. Magoulias, pp. 66–67. For the details see Chalandon, Les Comnène, pp. 431–35, 456–66; Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 100–101; idem, Formation, pp. 21–25; Turan, Türkiye, pp. 197–201; and Magdalino, Manuel Komnenos, pp. 76– 78. 161 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 118, lines 29–31, trans. Magoulias, p. 67: κα3 πρFς καιρFν τ. Dπλα καταθ!µενι, Q µ2ν 1π!µενε κατ. #ραν, Qδ2συλτ.ντ+ω& ασιλε&ι πρ σεισιν.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 635 and the Danis¸mends. He managed to extend his power significantly, expelling mighty lords such as Yag˘ı-basan, Muhខammad’s son Dhu¯ l-Nu¯n (∆αδ νης), and his own brother Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h and seizing important cities in eastern Asia Minor such as Amaseia (1171), Sebasteia (1174), and Melitene (1177).162 Very soon, he also neglected the commitments made in his treaty with the empire, so that the Byzantine-Seljuk border region underwent a new period of incessant raids and counterattacks.163 Interestingly, Choniates, apart from a faint allusion to the sultanate’s internal instability, does not explain why the sultan actually decided to go to Constanti- nople. Nor does the second main witness, John Kinnamos, who restricts himself to the laconic observation that “the sultan came to Byzantium as a defector in order to petition the emperor regarding matters advantageous to him.”164 Only Michael the Syrian explicitly refers to a conspiracy of Yag˘ı-basan and other emirs in favor of the sultan’s brother Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h, so that the sultan was compelled to seek the emperor’s backing.165 In accordance with the event’s highly official character, the narratives on Kılıc Arslan’s visit are structured along the sequence of publicly performed ceremonial acts projecting various ideological and propagandistic aspects, such as both rulers’ status and honor, the newly established hierarchical relationship between them, gestures of devotion and benevolence, and other current practices of Byz- antine diplomacy.166 We get additional insights via a panegyric composed by the court rhetorician Euthymios Malakes on the occasion of Manuel’s triumphal entrance in 1162,167 an intriguing text that embeds the Seljuk sultan’s arrival into

162 For the details see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 101–4; idem, Formation, pp. 26–32; and Turan, Türkiye, pp. 202–5. 163 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 121–25, esp. p. 121, lines 27–28, trans. Magoulias, pp. 68–71: Q δ2 πατε@ν Wν κα3 µηδ2 τ 1στιν Dλως λθεια 1γνωκ#ς πτε των& τε συνθηκων& 1πελ θετ; Choni- ates, ed. van Dieten, p. 123, lines 68–69, trans. Magoulias, p. 70: τ τε δ2 πλυδ ναµς γεγν@ς τF πρFς τFν ασιλ!α α6δηµν& πε σατ. 164 Kinnamos 5.3, ed. Meineke, pp. 204, line 22–205, line 1, trans. Brand, p. 156: Κλιτ'ιεσθλ.ν Q συλτ.ν 1ς Βυ' ντιν ατ µλς ;λθε& περ3 των& ατ+ω& συµ␸ ρων ασιλ!ως δεησ µενς. The translation of Brand, Deeds, p. 156, renders ατ µλς as “voluntarily,” but since the term is constantly used for persons who shift to the enemy’s side, it is clear that the Byzantine authors use the term in its modern sense: “defector.” 165 Because of some missing folios in the manuscript, Chabot’s edition completes the passage using Bar Hebraeus’s chronicle: Michael the Syrian 18.8, ed. Chabot, 3:319 (trans.); compare with Bar He- braeus, Chronicon, p. 328, lines 15–26. The original text is more accurately preserved in the Arme- nian version of Michael’s chronicle partly published as Extrait de la chronique de Michel le Syrien, Recueil des Historiens de Croisades, Documents Arméniens 1 (Paris, 1869), pp. 309–409, at pp. 355– 56. 166 Kazhdan, “Byzantine Diplomacy” (above, n. 28). For a useful summary of Byzantine theoreti- cal concepts of the empire’s relationship with the outside world see Evangelos Chrysos, “Τ Βυ' ντι και η διεθνς κινωνα τυ µεσαωνα” [Byzantium and the medieval international community], in Byzantium as Oecumene, ed. idem, Institute for Byzantine Research, International Symposia 16 (Ath- ens, 2005), pp. 59–78. 167 The text is edited by Anastasios Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Noctes Petropolitanae (Saint Peters- burg, 1913; repr., Leipzig, 1976), pp. 162–87: Τυ& ατυ& ε6ς τFν ατκρ τρα κ ριν Μανυλ τFν Κµνην ν, 1κ␸ωνηθε3ς Dτε ε6σηλθεν& ε6ς Κωνσταντιν πλιν Q συλτανς& πρσελθ@ν ατ+ω&.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 636 Defection the conceptual matrix of classical imperial encomia.168 On the basis of this material the main steps of the ceremonial procedure can be summarized as follows: 1. Preliminary negotiations conducted by the sultan’s chancellor Christopher, which resulted in an oath sworn by the emperor on the sultan’s safe-conduct (Michael the Syr- ian, Armenian version, p. 355) 2. Planned triumphal entrance with the emperor and the sultan standing together on the imperial chariot—the plan failed because of an earthquake (Kinnamos, pp. 206, line 12–207, line 2; Choniates, pp. 118, line 38–119, line 54) 3. Solemn audience granted to the sultan in the imperial palace (Kinnamos, pp. 205, line 5–206, line 11): • self-presentation of the imperial family in a prokypsis ceremony • the sultan’s prostration before the emperor (Malakes, p. 165, lines 15–23) • the sultan’s taking a seat on a lower throne beside the emperor (Malakes, p. 167, lines 18–20; Kinnamos, p. 206, lines 9–10) • the sultan’s adoption as the emperor’s spiritual son (Malakes, p. 167, lines 9–12; Kinnamos, p. 208, lines 7–8; Choniates, p. 123, lines 76–78) 4. Opulent meals, gifts, and every sort of kind treatment (Kinnamos, p. 207, lines 9–11; Michael the Syrian, Armenian version, p. 355) 5. Games in the hippodrome (Kinnamos, p. 207, lines 11–14; Choniates, pp. 119, line 55–120, line 81) 6. Conclusion of a peace treaty (Kinnamos, pp. 207, line 15–208, line 5) 7. The sultan’s reconciliation with emissaries of other Eastern potentates (Kinnamos, p. 208, lines 6–16) 8. Farewell reception, on the occasion of which the sultan received huge amounts of money and gifts (Choniates, pp. 120, line 90–121, line 22) A close examination of the three versions written from the Constantinopoli- tan perspective reveals that the event underwent a successive reinterpretation, dis- torting the idealized image of imperial rhetoric into a harsh criticism of the emperor’s attitudes and decisions. Euthymios Malakes’s panegyric shows many similarities with Attaleiates’s presentation of Nikephoros III’s encounter with the Kutlumus¸ brothers. In order to depict Kılıc Arslan’s arrival as a major success of Manuel’s policy, Malakes exalts the sultan’s royal prestige, placing him in one lineage with the ancient kings of Persia Darius and Xerxes.169 Accordingly, Malakes especially highlights the symbolic value of the sultan’s prostration as a sign of his voluntary humiliation and reduction to the status of the emperor’s faithful servant.170 In return, Manuel is described as having excelled even Alex- ander the Great and King Solomon, for the emperor not only defeated his foe on

168 For rhetorical rules and models of Byzantine imperial panegyrics see now Dimiter Angelov, Imperial Ideology and Political Thought in Byzantium, 1204–1330 (Cambridge, Eng., 2007), pp. 51– 64. 169 Malakes, ed. Papadopoulos-Kerameus, p. 165, lines 15–16: ρηγFς Bτ& ς 1στι Περσδς, µαλλν& δ2 των& ρηγ ντων 1ν ατ+η& τF κε␸ λαιν ...Bτς& 1κε&ινς Q ∆αρευ κα3 ^!ρυ των& της& Περσδς αηµ των π γνς. 170 Malakes, ed. Papadopoulos-Kerameus, p. 167, lines 9–10: Q µ2ν γ.ρ δυλν& >αυτFν καλε&ικα3 τ. των& δ λων θ!λει πιε&ιν κα3 πρσκυνσας ε&6τα παρσταται.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 637 the battlefield but adopted the sultan, thus including him in the circle of his relatives and granting him a seat below his own.171 Those details refer to the festive setting, which publicly visualized the sultan’s hierarchical elevation resulting from his symbolic act of deference to the emper- or’s supremacy. In this way, Kılıc Arslan, just like Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h in 1116, was cer- emoniously acknowledged as a member of the imperial entourage, but with the difference that as the emperor’s spiritual son he had gained one of the most honorable positions a foreign sovereign could obtain in Byzantium.172 Kinnamos informs us that the sultan’s reception formed part of a prokypsis ceremony, a new court ritual introduced by Manuel I, displaying the imperial family in an especially magnificent public appearance on a lit platform accompanied by music and encomiastic poems.173 The sharp contrast with the 1116 meeting, where the emperor and the sultan expressed their proximity by riding side by side, reveals the high degree of refinement that Comnenian court ceremonies regarding rep- resentatives of the Seljuk sultanate had reached since the early twelfth century. A comparison with the nearly contemporary meetings with King Baldwin III of Jerusalem in Manuel’s camp in Cilicia (early 1159) and with King Amalric in Constantinople (1171)174 clearly demonstrates that the lower throne on which the sultan came to sit was a common feature of reception ceremonies for foreign rulers, symbolizing the emperor’s ascendancy within the universal hierarchical system of political authority. In contrast, Kılıc Arslan’s adoption as Manuel’s spiritual son, with respect to the Muslim orbit, constitutes a remarkable novelty in the sphere of Byzantine court rituals. In the ninth and tenth centuries this distinction used to be con- ferred upon the Bulgarian king, while in Alexios I’s reign there are some instances of adoptions of crusader lords such as Godfrey of Bouillon.175 The only known precedent as far as Byzantium’s eastern neighbors are concerned is the adoption of the Persian king Khusrau II Parwiz by Emperor Maurice in 590.176

171 Malakes, ed. Papadopoulos-Kerameus, p. 167, lines 10–12: Qδ2κα3πα&ιδα πιε&ιται κα3 τ&ις 6κεις 1γγρ ␸ει κα3 ι&ι κα3 της& παρ< ατ+ω& καθ!δρας, =ς& κα3 µεγ λι ασιλε&ις 1πεθ µησαν; ibid., p. 167, lines 18–20: τFν >αυτων& ασιλ!α λαµπρFν λαµπρως& 1νθ δε πρθρνι' µενν κα3 τFν µ!γαν τFν Περσων& ρηγ!την ατ+ω& καλως& Bππδι' µενν. 172 For this usage see Franz Dölger, “Die Familie der Könige im Mittelalter,” Historische Zeitschrift 60 (1940), 397–420, repr. in idem, Byzanz und die europäische Staatenwelt: Ausgewählte Aufsätze und Vorträge (Darmstadt, 1964), pp. 34–69, esp. pp. 41–42; Evangelos Chrysos, “Byzantine Diplo- macy, A.D. 300–800: Means and Ends,” in Byzantine Diplomacy (above, n. 28), pp. 25–39, at pp. 25– 28; and Jasmin Moysidou, Τ Βυ' ντι και ι ρειι γετν!ς τυ τν 10 αι#να [Byzantium and its northern neighbors during the tenth century], Historical Monographs 15 (Athens, 1995), pp. 51–63. 173 For prokypsis see Ernst H. Kantorowicz, “<Ανατλ τυ& δεσπ τυ,” in Das byzantinische Herr- scherbild, ed. Herbert Hunger, Wege der Forschung 341 (Darmstadt, 1975), pp. 258–80; and An- gelov, Imperial Ideology, pp. 41–42 (with further bibliographical references). 174 For Baldwin III see Kinnamos 4.20, ed. Meineke, p. 185, lines 18–19, trans. Brand, p. 141: Xδραν τ! τινα θαµαλν καθι'ησαι& παρ!θετ. For King Amalric see William of Tyre 18.24, ed. Huy- gens, p. 846, lines 23–24: “secus eum in sede honesta, humiliore tamen, locatus est.” 175 Dölger, “Familie der Könige,” pp. 48–49. 176 Michael Whitby, The Emperor Maurice and His Historian: Theophylact Simocatta on Persian and Balkan Warfare (Oxford, 1988), pp. 287–89.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 638 Defection This late-antique model case of a royal refugee seeking the emperor’s protection might have inspired Manuel’s court to revive this practice. The possibilities and techniques of Byzantine court propaganda are clearly illustrated by the panegyric of Malakes, who brings the Persian past and Seljuk- Turkish present into an unbroken line of continuity by drawing parallels between the Seljuk sultan and the ancient Persian kings. Hence the sultan of Konya, from an ideological point of view, becomes the emperor’s most extolled partner among the rulers of the Muslim world. Accordingly, Kinnamos characterizes the sultan’s arrival as “something sublime and wonderfully great, which, as far as I know, never happened to the Romans before.”177 That a barbarian ruler was granted the privilege of mounting the imperial chariot along with the emperor apparently caused anger and indignation among the people of Constantinople. Kinnamos explicitly refers to the resistance of Patri- arch Luke Chrysoberges (1157–70), who declared that “impious people should not be allowed to pass through divine objects and sacred decorations.”178 This was indeed a well-established principle of Byzantine court ceremonies, repeatedly confirmed by older sources such as the tenth-century treatise De administrando imperio of Constantine VII.179 Hence Manuel, in his attempt to present himself publicly together with his newly adopted spiritual son, acted contrary to customary attitudes and religious sensibilities. The narratives argue that the vio- lation of this taboo provoked divine interference, causing a strong earthquake in Constantinople and thwarting the whole triumph. Kinnamos and Choniates agree that the earthquake was a conspicuous sign of God’s wrath. Later events, culminating in the emperor’s ignominious defeat in 1176, prove that the earthquake was in fact a bad omen for imminent disasters.180 In this way the triumphal entrance—one of the most momentous state ceremonies in Byzantium181—turned into a symbol of the emperor’s personal failure; in other words, because of the emperor’s deviation from traditional rules and the ensuing lack of unanimity, right order was seriously disturbed. As a result historical memory inverted a “good” ritual into a “bad” one, thereby compromising both Manuel’s political purposes and the ideological context of the sultan’s visit to the Byzantine capital.182 Another important aspect of the sultan’s stay in Constantinople consisted of amusements, gifts, and games. Anna Komnene interpreted these features as ef-

177 Kinnamos 5.3, ed. Meineke, p. 205, lines 1–2, trans. Brand, p. 156: πραγµα& Bψηλ ν τε κα3 δαιµνως Bπ!ργκν κα3 Dσα 1µ2 ε6δ!ναι Cπτε Jλλτε /Ρωµαις ετυηθ2ν πρ τερν. 178 Kinnamos 5.3, ed. Meineke, p. 206, lines 15–18, trans. Brand, p. 157. 179 See, for instance, Constantine’s famous prohibitive statement on the sending of imperial dia- dems or state robes to barbarian recipients: Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De administrando imperio, ed. György Moravcsik, trans. R. J. H. Jenkins, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae 1 (Wash- ington, D.C., 1967), 13, pp. 66–68. 180 Kinnamos 5.3, ed. Meineke, pp. 206–7, trans. Brand, pp. 157–58; Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 119, lines 43–50, trans. Magoulias, p. 67: θεFς δ< ;κ ρωσε τ. της& =µ!ρας 1κενης λαµπρ ... µηνειν τF θε&ιν κα3 µηδ< Dλως ν!εσθαι πρκ ψειν Dλως ε6ς θραµν µ θεσεεας Jνδρα µετεσηκ τα. 181 McCormick, Eternal Victory. 182 My interpretation relies on Buc, Dangers of Ritual, pp. 70, 72 (with similar examples from the early-medieval West).

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 639 fective instruments through which Alexios played out his ruse against his guest Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim.183 Conversely, William of Tyre’s report on King Amalric’s visit in 1171 highlights the positive effects of generous gifts honoring the king and his companions, the display of relics stored in the imperial treasuries, and various sorts of spectacles.184 Interestingly, in Choniates’s account these elements were used with a sarcastic intention. The unsuccessful “parachute jump” of an otherwise unspecified “descendant of Hagar”—most probably a man of the sultan’s entourage—from a tower erected above the hippodrome’s starting line induced the silversmiths in the marketplaces to mock the sultan.185 What is more, Choni- ates reduces Manuel’s diplomatic strategy toward the sultan to absurdity by con- trasting the ritual of a farewell reception with a derisive comment allegedly ut- tered by the sultan at some later moment. All kinds of luxurious items and precious objects, piled up in a glamorous reception hall, formed the setting of the conclud- ing meeting between the two rulers, in which the generous emperor, displaying his irresistible power over his enemies, is contrasted with the astonished and greedy barbarian, who promises to deliver the city of Sebasteia.186 Afterwards the author turns the scene’s imagery into ridicule through ironic words put into the mouth of the sultan, who jeers at the empire’s strategy to buy off barbarian allies with huge amounts of money: “The sultan ironically used to say to his intimates that the more injuries he inflicted on the Romans, the more treasures he received from the emperor: ‘for whoever is able to be superior,’ he says, ‘usually receives the gifts as well, so that his victories do not increase further,’ because festering dis- eases require more treatments for them to subside and to cease to spread.”187 In summary, Kılıc Arslan II’s flight to Constantinople appears, on the one hand, as the apogee of the Seljuk defection movement to the imperial court, which in this case was willing to make hitherto inconceivable concessions to a non-Christian foreign ruler, and, on the other, as the culmination of Manuel’s misplaced policy toward the Seljuk Turks, which caused internal discord, violated basic principles of Byzantine court rituals, and turned out to be to the advantage of Kılıc Ar- slan’s expansionist plans without having any positive results for the empire. In the course of the subsequent rivalries among the Turkish lords in Anatolia, Constantinople continued to offer shelter to overthrown princes, such as the last Danis¸mend ruler Dhu¯ l-Nu¯ n, who, after succeeding his assassinated nephew Isma¯¨ı¯l in the lordship of Sebasteia in early 1173, had been expelled by Sultan Kılıc Ar- slan in the summer of 1175, and the sultan’s brother Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h, who lost the remainder of his political influence after the failure of a large coalition of the sultan’s enemies under the leadership of Nu¯ r al-Dı¯n in 1172.188 Apart from a Byz-

183 See above, p. 612. 184 William of Tyre 20.23, ed. Huygens, pp. 944–45. 185 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 119–20, trans. Magoulias, pp. 67–68. 186 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 120–21, trans. Magoulias, pp. 68–69. 187 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, pp. 124–25, trans. Magoulias, pp. 70–71. 188 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 123, trans. Magoulias, p. 70; Michael the Syrian 20.1, ed. Chabot, 3:357 (trans.), 4:708, col. A, lines 34–35 (Syriac text), and 3:368 (trans.), 4:714, col. B, lines 43–44 (Syriac text). In addition, see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 102–3; idem, Formation, pp. 29–30; and Turan, Türkiye, pp. 203–5.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 640 Defection antine attempt to reconquer Neokaisareia on behalf of Dhu¯ l-Nu¯ n in 1176,189 we do not know anything about the imperial government’s attitudes toward these people and about the role they played henceforth at the Byzantine court. It comes as no surprise that, during the critical years of the central government’s decay under Andronikos I and the Angeloi emperors, Constantinople to a certain extent lost its attractiveness for Seljuk defectors. While, as discussed above, several Byzantine local rebels were eager to secure their Turkish neighbors’ support, we know of only one anonymous dignitary from Konya who seemingly fled to Isaac II Angelus shortly after the conquest of Konya by Emperor Frederick I’s German crusaders in May 1190.190 The series of twelfth-century Seljuk sultans who came as refugees to Constan- tinople ends with Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Kaykhusrau.191 One of the ten sons of Kılıc Arslan II, he had obtained the city of Sozopolis192 as a result of the old sultan’s succession arrangements, and, after his father’s death in 1192, he succeeded him on the throne of Konya, while the greatest part of the Seljuk Empire remained in the hands of his elder brother Qutខb al-Dı¯n Maliksha¯h (d. 1195). A few years later Kaykhusrau was expelled by another brother, Rukn al-Dı¯n Sulayma¯nsha¯h (1196–1204), thus being forced to lead the life of a homeless prince wandering from one potentate to another.193 Kaykhusrau’s stay in the Byzantine capital, which lasted until Alexios III’s overthrow in July 1203, was in many respects decisive for the subsequent developments in Byzantine-Seljuk relations. Notably, Emperor Alexios III both adopted and baptized the dethroned sultan in the years of his stay in the imperial palace,194 so that his ideological and spiritual ties with the Byzantine court elite and the ruling dynasty became even more intertwined than his father’s had been. In addition, Kaykhusrau married the daughter of Manuel Maurozomes, a high- ranking aristocrat,195 with whom he presumably was closely connected by a net-

189 Michael the Syrian 20.4, ed. Chabot, 3:368–69 (trans.), 4:714–15 (Syriac text); Turan, Türkiye, p. 207. 190 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 414, trans. Magoulias, p. 228. 191 For the event and its political background see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 116; Alexis G. C. Savvides, Byzantium in the Near East: Its Relations with the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum in Asia Minor, the Armenians of Cilicia and the Mongols, A.D. 1192–1237, Byzantine Texts and Studies 17 (Thessalonica, 1981), p. 82; and T. Baykara, I. Gıyaseddin Keyhusrev (1164–1211) Gazi-S¸ehit, Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınları 24. Dizi, no. 20 (Ankara, 1997), pp. 22–24. The various interpretations of Kaykhusrau’s defection in Byzantine and Oriental narratives have been recently analyzed at length in Alexander Beihammer, “Der Vierte Kreuzzug und die Eroberung Konstantinopels im Spiegel orien- talischer Quellen,” in The Fourth Crusade Revisited: Atti della conferenza internazionale nell’ottavo centenario della IV Crociata, 1204–2004, ed. Piarantonio Piatti, Pontificio Comitato di Scienze Storiche, Atti e Documenti 25 (Vatican City, 2008), pp. 244–74, at pp. 260–66. 192 For Sozopolis (modern Uluborlu) in Phrygia, which was not incorporated into the Seljuk sultanate until after 1180, see Klaus Belke and Norbert Mersich, Phrygien und Pisidien, Tabula Imperii Byzantini 7 (Vienna, 1990), pp. 387–88. 193 Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 111, 114–15; idem, Formation, pp. 39–42; Turan, Türkiye, pp. 237–41. 194 Akropolites 8, ed. Heisenberg, 1:14, lines 12–14, trans. Macrides, p. 124: ␸υγ.ς παρ. τν Κωνσταντνυ +Tετ κα3 τ+ω& ασιλε&ι Bπδ!δεκται <Αλε+ω, απτ'ετα τε παρ< ατυ& κα3 υ8θετε&ιται. 195 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 626, trans. Magoulias, p. 343; Ibn al-Athı¯r, Al-Ka¯mil fı¯ l-Ta¯rı¯kh, 9 vols. (Beirut, 1994), 7:470, lines 17–18; trans. Donald S. Richards, The Chronicle of Ibn al-Athı¯r

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 641 work of common interests. Once Alexios III decided to leave Constantinople under the threat of the Fourth Crusade’s military forces, the Seljuk prince fled along with his father-in-law to a fortress on the latter’s landed estates.196 In March 1205, only a few months after the conquest of Constantinople and the ensuing downfall of the Byzantine imperial government, Kaykhusrau managed to regain the throne of Konya, replacing his nephew Kılıc Arslan III.197 On account of his bonds of spiritual kinship, marriage, and personal friendship with leading figures of the Angeloi regime, the sultan became immediately involved in the conflicts resulting from Theodore Laskaris’s attempts to create his “Byzantine successor state” in Nicaea and to lay claim to the imperial title. In 1205 Kaykhusrau supported the plans of his father-in-law, Manuel Maurozo- mes, to get rid of his rival Theodore, launching attacks in the region of the Me- ander valley.198 Several years later, at the instigation of the ex-emperor Alexios, who after an adventurous odyssey had been offered shelter in Konya, Kaykhus- rau started a new war against the emperor of Nicaea, which came to an end in 1211 with the sultan’s death on the battlefield near Pisidian Antioch (modern Alas¸ehir).199 Most notably, for the first time we are able to derive abundant information from Muslim sources, namely, the universal chronicle of Ibn al-Athı¯r and Ibn Bı¯- bı¯’s Seljuk chronicle, so in this case we can judge the sultan’s stay at the imperial court from the Seljuk perspective as well. This is all the more important insofar as the details the Byzantine authors provide are quite limited and contradictory. Niketas Choniates basically rejects any successful outcome of Kaykhusrau’s visit, whereas George Akropolites merely notes the refugee’s adoption and baptism.200 Instead, Ibn al-Athı¯r and especially Ibn Bı¯bı¯ highlight the respectful reception the Byzantine emperor granted to his guest, primarily dwelling on ritual and formal aspects of the encounter and the ensuing relationship between the two rulers.201 In the highly idealized and rhetorically elaborated Persian narrative of the Seljuk

for the Crusading Period from al-Ka¯mil fı¯©l-ta©rı¯kh, 3: The Years 589–629/1193–1231: The Ayyu¯ bids after Saladin and the Mongol Menace (Aldershot, Eng., 2008), p. 83; Aksarayli, Musa¯marat al- akhba¯r (Mogollar zamanında Türkiye Selçukluları Tarihi), ed. Osman Turan, Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayınlarından, III. Seri, 1 (Ankara, 1944), p. 31. See further Necipog˘lu, “Turks and Byzantines” (above, n. 11), p. 261. 196 Ibn al-Athı¯r, 7:470, lines 19–20, trans. Richards, p. 83. 197 Ibn al-Athı¯r, 7:470, lines 12–13, trans. Richards, p. 83 (dates to Rajab a.h. 601 [February 22– March 23, 1205]); Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 26–29, trans. Duda, pp. 38–41; Aksarayli, ed. Turan, p. 32. 198 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 626, trans. Magoulias, p. 343. 199 Akropolites 10, ed. Heisenberg, 1:16–17, trans. Macrides, pp. 131–32. For Manuel Maurozo- mes and the battle of Alas¸ehir see now Ilias Giarenis, Η συγκρ τηση και η εδραωση της Αυτκρατρας της Νκαιας: αυτκρ τρας Θε δωρς Α& Κµνην ς Λ σκαρις [Establishment and consolidation of the Empire of Nicaea: The Emperor Theodoros I Komnenos Laskaris], Institute for Byzantine Research 12 (Athens, 2008), pp. 62–82, 122–28. 200 Choniates, ed. van Dieten, p. 522, lines 7–8, trans. Magoulias, pp. 286–87: Καϊσρ ης δ2 ρα!α Jττα ␸ιλ␸ρνηθε3ς κα3 των& 1ν ν+ω& δ< Dσν ε6πε&ιν 1νδε!στερα. For Akropolites see above, n. 194. 201 Ibn al-Athı¯r, 7:470, lines 17–18; Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 14–18, trans. Duda, pp. 27–31.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 642 Defection chronicle, Kaykhusrau is portrayed as an exiled, but still legitimate, sovereign who received recognition and honor as such from his brothers in Elbistan and Melitene, from King Leo I of Lesser Armenia, and from many Muslim lords in northern Syria.202 Consequently, his arrival in Constantinople is described as the coming, not of a refugee, but of a guest of the highest rank and significance: “The basileus ( fa¯silyu¯s) of that time [Alexios III] deemed the sultan’s arrival a great benefit and considered his share or even his independence in his kingdom necessary. When they met they used to sit together on the throne and to show each other friendship and kindness.”203 More specifically, the emperor’s benevolent attitude is explained by the sultan’s self-presentation as the immediate descendant of the great Seljuk sultans of Baghdad and as heir to their political traditions and claims: “My forefathers had conquered the world from East to West, and your forefathers used to send trib- ute and taxes to their treasuries. And you walked with me on the same path.”204 Hence, Ibn Bı¯bı¯ constructs a bridge linking the ideological tradition of the Seljuk- Persian sultanate and the Byzantine imperial sphere, both of which came to form a part of Kaykhusrau’s twofold royal identity. He appears as the heir of Alp Ar- slan and Malik Sha¯h and, at the same time, as a sovereign worthy of sharing the throne with the Byzantine emperor. After 1204 the Byzantine imperial concept underwent a deep crisis with the establishment of a Latin empire in Constantinople and the emergence of numerous claimants to legitimate succession within the remnants of the Byzantine state. This constellation allowed the Seljuk sultan to take his share in the imperial heritage. Greek documents originating from the sultanate’s diplomatic correspon- dence with the Frankish king of Cyprus and the Venetian podestà of Constanti- nople attest to the usage of Byzantine imperial honorifics for Kaykhusrau’s son ¨Izz al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯ s (1211–20).205 From the Byzantine perspective, too, things had radically changed with the events of 1204. As the old center had ceased to exist, fleeing to collaborate with the sultan was no longer considered a seditious act deserving of condemnation. What mattered was, above all, survival amidst the fierce struggles with internal and external opponents. Theodore Laskaris took refuge with the sultan shortly before he seized power in Nicaea, and Theodore Angelos, the future ruler of Epi- rus and Thessalonica, probably did the same.206 Manuel Maurozomes, after his

202 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 9–13, trans. Duda, pp. 23–27. 203 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, p. 14, lines 2–4, trans. Duda, p. 27. 204 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, p. 15, lines 1–5, trans. Duda, p. 28. 205 For details see M. E. Martin, “The Venetian-Seljuk Treaty of 1220,” English Historical Review 95 (1980), 321–30; Alexander Beihammer, Griechische Briefe und Urkunden aus dem Zypern der Kreuzfahrerzeit: Die Formularsammlung eines königlichen Sekretärs im Vaticanus Palatinus 367, Texts and Studies on the History of Cyprus 57 (Nicosia, 2007), p. 170; and idem, “Multilingual Literacy at the Lusignan Court: The Cypriot Royal Chancery and Its Byzantine Heritage,” Byzantine and Mod- ern Greek Studies 35 (2011; forthcoming). 206 Akropolites 6, ed. Heisenberg, 1:11, lines 2–3, trans. Macrides, p. 118: κα3γ.ρ1ντ+ω& µεταO κα3 περ3 τFν περσ ρην ␸κετ συνθη τ τ+ω τελυντα& , κα3 συµµααν πρσελη␸ε. For possible references to the same event in orations of Niketas Choniates and for the chronological sequence see Macrides, p. 119 n. 7; for Theodore Angelos’s relations with the Turks see Macrides, p. 209 n. 9.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 643 attempt to win the imperial crown had failed, paid homage to his son-in-law and became a loyal servant at the sultan’s court of Konya.207 Kaykhusrau’s godfather and ex-emperor Alexios hoped to regain the imperial throne with the aid of the sultanate’s military forces.208 This altered situation is clearly illustrated in the chronicle of George Akropolites, who now describes the sultan as the exiled emperor’s “friend” (συνθης) and as the mighty protector of Alexios’s legitimate imperial rights: “And an embassy on the part of the sultan reached him [The- odore I] that announced the arrival of the emperor and father-in-law [Alexios III] and expressed the opinion that he [Theodore] illegally had usurped the sovereign rights of someone else. The emperor got excited about these words and he was seized by rather great fear. For the sultan used the Emperor Alexios only as a pretext, in fact intending to attack and to plunder or to subjugate the whole state of the Romans. Things were so to speak on the razor’s edge for the Em- peror Theodore. Thus he called together all his followers and checked if they were on his side or on that of his father-in-law, the Emperor Alexios.”209 Likewise, Akropolites presents Michael Palaiologos’s flight to Sultan ¨Izz al- Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯ s II (1246–61) in 1256 in a way that projects Michael’s claims to the throne. Despite his defection Michael is still “well disposed toward the empire,”210 and the Turkish dignitaries in the sultan’s court consider him “worthy of being emperor,”211 thus putting a prediction of Michael’s future rise to power into the mouths of Muslim leaders. Highlighting the enemy’s admiration for the talents of an outstanding Roman commander certainly is a widely used motif of classicizing Byzantine historiography. With respect to the historical situation in the late 1250s, however, it also reflects the new level that Byzantine-Seljuk relations had reached by that time in terms of both realpolitik and ideology. All these aspects are embodied in the person of the last prominent defector to be examined in this essay, Sultan ¨Izz al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯ s II (1246–61), the first- born son of Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Kaykhusraw II (1237–46).212 Because of the conflicts with the Mongols in the period preceding Hülegü’s major onslaught against

207 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 26, lines 1–4, and 29, line 4, trans. Duda, pp. 38, 41. 208 Akropolites 8–9, ed. Heisenberg, 1:14–16, esp. p. 14, lines 8–10, trans. Macrides, pp. 124–30: Q ασιλεOς <Αλ!ις λεται πρFς τFν τυ& <Ικνυ συλτ.ν πελθε&ιν, Sν <Ιαθατνην `ν µα'ν9 ;ν& γ.ρ τ τ+ω συνθης. 209 Akropolites 9, ed. Heisenberg, 1:15, trans. Macrides, p. 129. 210 Akropolites 64, ed. Heisenberg, 1:134, lines 23–24: τF τυ& ␸ρνµατς 1πσταµαι ␸ιλρ#µαιν. Macrides, p. 312, translates: “I know him to be a friend of the Romans in his thinking.” My interpretation further specifies the meaning of the word philorhomaios in the sense of “being loyal to the Roman (i.e., Byzantine) state.” In the context of Michael’s defection to the sultan, this aspect obviously was much more important for the imperial government than his general affinity to the Ro- mans, which for a Byzantine aristocrat seems more or less self-evident. 211 Akropolites 65, ed. Heisenberg, 1:136, line 27–1:137, line 1, trans. Macrides, p. 315: 8 µετ. τυ& περσ ρυ µεγιστανες& τελυντες& ...κα3 S ␸ησ τις των& παλαιων& , τυραννδς Jιν :κριναν. For the use of Euripides’s phrase Jιν τυραννδς as an expression put into the mouth of enemies recognizing their opponent’s qualities see Prinzing, “Ein Mann τυραννδς Jις” (above, n. 118), pp. 196–97 n. 46, and Macrides, p. 317 n. 5. 212 On this person see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 271–79; idem, Formation, pp. 175–91; Turan, Türkiye, pp. 458–97; and Rustam Shukurov, “The Family of ¨Izz al-Din Kay-Kawus in Byzan- tium” [in Russian], Vizantiiskii Vremenik 67 (2008), 89–116.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 644 Defection the central Islamic lands (1258) and the internal struggle for power among the leading members of the Seljuk elite, Ïzz al-Dı¯n II in the years 1257–61 strengthened his precarious position by maintaining especially close ties with the Byzan- tine government. After his first overthrow following his army’s defeat in the battle of Aksaray against the Mongols (October 1256), he escaped via Attaleia and Laodicea to Byzantine territory, where in January 1257 he was received by Em- peror Theodore II in Sardis.213 With the support of Byzantine auxiliary forces offered by the emperor in exchange for the city of Laodicea, Ïzz al-Dı¯n in the spring of 1257 regained the throne of Konya and arrived at a new accommoda- tion with his younger brother Rukn al-Dı¯n Kılıc Arslan IV (1248–65), providing for shared rule over divided territories. The subsequent recognition of this status by Hülegü, however, brought no long-term stability in the sultanate, and in 1261 Ïzz al-Dı¯n II fell victim to the intrigues of internal opponents combined with re- newed Mongol pressure.214 As a result, the sultan was compelled to flee a second time to the Byzantine court, from which he was never to return.215 While Ïzz al-Dı¯n’s behavior at first glance may appear as just another link in a long chain of very similar patterns of action deeply embedded in the political culture of Anatolian Turkish principalities, a careful analysis of this sultan’s relations with Byzantium in the years 1257–61 reveals an unprecedented degree of intensity and intimacy. First and foremost, Sultan Ïzz al-Dı¯n was constantly surrounded by a strong Christian element within his entourage. His mother be- longed to a local Christian family and enjoyed an honorable position at the court of Konya, which Pachymeres highlighted by referring to her as “the old mother.”216 Among the court dignitaries were influential relatives of hers, such as Kir

213 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 288–90, trans. Duda, pp. 273–76 (mainly concentrating on the conflicts within the sultanate); Aksarayli, ed. Turan, p. 49. The meeting with Theodore II is described in detail by Akropolites 69, ed. Heisenberg, 1:143–44, trans. Macrides, pp. 325–27, along with The- odori Scutariotae additamenta 39, 47, ed. Heisenberg, 1:292, 294–95. For the date see ibid. 47, 1:295, lines 3–6. For further details concerning the flight see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 276–77; idem, Formation, pp. 186–87; Turan, Türkiye, p. 485 with n. 47; Langdon, “Byzantium’s Initial Encoun- ter” (above, n. 119), p. 134; and idem, “Twilight” (above, n. 119), pp. 192–93. For the battle of Aksaray see Turan, Türkiye, pp. 478–81; Langdon, “Byzantium’s Initial Encounter,” pp. 132–33 with n. 218; and idem, “Twilight,” pp. 188–89, 190–91. 214 Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, pp. 277–79; idem, Formation, pp. 187–90; Turan, Türkiye, pp. 485– 87, 493–96. 215 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 296–98, trans. Duda, pp. 282–84; Aksarayli, ed. Turan, p. 70. The most informative Byzantine source is Pachymeres 2.24, ed. and trans. Failler, pp. 182–85; in addition, see Gregoras 4.1, ed. Schopen, p. 82, trans. van Dieten, pp. 103–4. For further details see Geanakoplos, Michael Palaeologus, p. 81 with n. 28; Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 279; idem, Formation, pp. 190–91; and Turan, Türkiye, pp. 497–98. For the background with respect to Byzantine-Mongol relations in this period see David O. Morgan, “The Mongols and the Eastern Med- iterranean,” in Latins and Greeks in the Eastern Mediterranean after 1204, ed. Benjamin Arbel, Ber- nard Hamilton, and David Jacoby (London, 1989), pp. 198–211, at p. 204; and Langdon, “Byzan- tium’s Initial Encounter,” p. 135 with n. 227 and pp. 136–38 with n. 241. For ¨Izz al-Dı¯n’s further fate see Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 279; idem, Formation, p. 191; and Langdon, “Byzantium’s Initial Encounter,” p. 135 n. 227. 216 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, p. 213, trans. Duda, p. 204, calls her Bardu¯lı¯ya; Pachymeres 2.24, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 183, line 23: πρFς δ2 κα3 γηραι+α& µητρ, ριστιαν+η& 1ς τ. µ λιστα Cσ+η. For further details see Turan, Türkiye, p. 458; Cahen, Pre-Ottoman Turkey, p. 271; and idem, Forma-

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 645 Kadı¯d, the sultan’s shara¯bsala¯r (cellarer), who is designated as “maternal uncle.”217 Ïzz al-Dı¯n also patronized other persons of Byzantine-Christian pedi- gree, a case in point mentioned by Pachymeres being the so-called Basilikoi from Rhodes who are portrayed as rich megistanes and intimates of the sultan.218 More- over, the fact that in 1261 the metropolitan of Pisidia (Antioch) led Ïzz al-Dı¯n to Byzantine territory219 shows that he also maintained close relations with the remnants of the Greek ecclesiastical hierarchy in the sultanate. Open to further discussion is the question whether Ïzz al-Dı¯n was actually married to a Byzan- tine princess or even a daughter of John III Vatatzes, as a rather elusive piece of evidence in an Armenian source might suggest.220 Be that as it may, the strong Christian element at Ïzz al-Dı¯n’s court certainly contributed decisively to the successful communication with the imperial court during the period in question.221 The cordial relations with Emperor Theodore II persisted without rupture after the takeover of Michael VIII, who shortly after his first coronation in January 1259 dispatched an embassy to Konya announc- ing his rise to power and discussing the state of affairs in the sultanate.222 Back in Nymphaion, Michael received Seljuk emissaries and promised full support to Ïzz al-Dı¯n if he were forced to take refuge with him.223 In relating these contacts Pachymeres places special emphasis on the prevailing spirit of friendship,224 which in all likelihood went back to Michael’s stay at the sultan’s court in 1256. Against the background of the Mongol invasion of the Near East in 1258, Mi- chael VIII sought to secure his Anatolian territories through a policy of accom-

tion, p. 175, which refers to a different version according to which ¨Izz al-Dı¯nwasthesonof“a daughter of a Greek priest,” while his brother Kılıc Arslan IV was “the son of a Turkish woman of Konya.” Ibn Bı¯bı¯, however, speaks of a ja¯riya-yi Ru¯mı¯ya, i.e., “a Greek slave maid.” 217 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, p. 297, trans. Duda, p. 284. Aksarayli, ed. Turan, p. 40, also mentions a certain Kirkha¯ya Ru¯mı¯-ra¯ ki kha¯l-i u¯bu¯d (K. the Roman, who was his maternal uncle); see also Vryonis, Decline, p. 203, who interprets the Persian form as possibly reflecting the Greek name “Kyr Giannis.” 218 Pachymeres 2.24, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 183, lines 1–11. 219 Pachymeres 2.24, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 185, line 3: τυ& Πισσιδας πραγωγυντς& . 220 Langdon, “Byzantium’s Initial Encounter,” pp. 120, 134 (referring to the chronicle of Kirakos Gandzakets©i); and idem, “Twilight,” p. 188, argues for the reliability of the source and the political significance of this marriage. I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Dmitri A. Korobeinikov (Russian Academy of Sciences, Center of Byzantine Studies) for providing me with his translation of the pertinent passage from Kirakos Gandzakets©i, Patmut©iwn Hayots© [History of the Armenians], ed. K. A. Melik©-Ohanjanyan (Erevan, 1961), p. 318. On the basis of philological arguments Ko- robeinikov concludes that the sultan probably married a member of the large Dukai-Vatatzai clan, thereby becoming the emperor’s son-in-law. This and many other questions related to ¨Izz al-Dı¯n’s relations with Byzantium will be thoroughly analyzed in the same author’s forthcoming monograph, Byzantium and the Turks (see above, n. 119). 221 See also Vryonis, Decline, pp. 377–78, 391. 222 Pachymeres 2.6, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 141, lines 11–15. See further Franz Dölger and Peter Wirth, Regesten der Kaiserurkunden des oströmischen Reiches, 3: Regesten von 1204–1282, 2nd rev. ed. (Munich, 1977), no. 1859. 223 Pachymeres 2.10, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 149, lines 15–18. 224 Pachymeres 2.6, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 141, lines 14–15: Jλλ< 1ς τ. µ λιστα ␸λις σιν& ; ibid., p. 149, lines 16–17: Bπισνε&ιτ πρσωρσαντα τ+η& /Ρωµαων Bπταις τε δ!εσθαι ερσν.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 646 Defection modation toward the Ilkha¯nids and the Golden Horde in combination with a certain extent of control over the sultanate of Konya. These endeavors converged with Ïzz al-Dı¯n’s need for protection against possible Mongol encroachments and his internal opponents.225 This constellation resulted in an increasing tightening of personal bonds on the Konya-Nicaea axis, which, apart from the sultan himself, also encouraged other Seljuk dignitaries, both Christian and Muslim, to switch sides. The aforementioned Basilikoi fled to Michael VIII after his ascent to power and were granted important ranks as parakoimomenos tou koitonos and megas hetaireiarches respectively.226 Melik (Μελκ) or Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Masü¯d, Ïzz al- Dı¯n’s son, had already fled in 1258 to the imperial court, being viewed by his father for some time as a potential threat to his own ambitions.227 Älı¯ Baha¯dur, a Seljuk emir who had played an important role in the conflicts with Kılıc Ar- slan IV,228 defected shortly after Ïzz al-Dı¯n’s flight in 1261. The fact that by that time many of the sultan’s former supporters had been executed by the new regime in Konya229 rendered the Byzantine court even more important as a place of sanctuary. The events of 1261 also brought about a fundamental redefinition of the ideological relationship between the emperor and the Seljuk sultan, which mani- fested itself in unparalleled forms of imperial self-representation granted for the first time to a Turkish-Muslim lord. Ibn Bı¯bı¯ and Pachymeres agree as to the highly honorable treatment the Seljuk guest enjoyed at Michael VIII’s court. While Ibn Bı¯bı¯ somewhat elusively notes that “the lord of the Romans made extraordinary efforts in honoring him [the sultan], and they were all day long occupied with festivities,”230 the Byzantine historian, most likely referring to a prokypsis ceremony, relates that the sultan was sitting beside the emperor on an imperial po- dium, surrounded by terrifying bodyguards and making use of the symbols of lordship by wearing red sandals.231 By recalling the setting of Manuel I’s official appearance with Kılıc Arslan II in 1162, the much-elevated status that the Seljuk sultan had been granted in the hierarchical thinking of Byzantine court ceremonial becomes obvious. Instead of being placed below, he sat on the same level with the emperor, and, even more significant, he was entitled to present himself with one of the most distinctive insignia of imperial authority. The sultan’s privilege to appear publicly in red shoes is all the more remarkable in that the court of Nicaea unmistakably rebuked sim-

225 For details see Langdon, “Byzantium’s Initial Encounter,” pp. 135–37, and the bibliography cited there. 226 Pachymeres 2.24, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 183, lines 11–19, who with respect to the Basilikoi’s integration into the Byzantine court hierarchy uses the characteristic phrase κατ. /Ρωµαυς µετασηµατισθ!ντες (transformed into Romans). 227 Pachymeres 2.10, 24, ed. and trans. Failler, pp. 149, lines 18–21, and 183, lines 26–27; Grego- ras 4.1, ed. Schopen, p. 82, trans. van Dieten, p. 103. See further van Dieten’s comment ibid., p. 239 n. 132, and Vitalien Laurent, “Une famille turque au service de Byzance: Les Mélikès,” Byzanti- nische Zeitschrift 49 (1956), 349–68, at pp. 361–62, 368. 228 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, p. 297, trans. Duda, p. 284. 229 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, pp. 298–99, trans. Duda, p. 286. 230 Ibn Bı¯bı¯, ed. Houtsma, p. 297, trans. Duda, p. 283: “malik al-Ru¯ m dar ta¨zខı¯m-i u¯ muba¯laghaha¯ kard wa-hame ru¯z bi-¨aysh mashghu¯l bu¯ dand.” 231 Pachymeres 2.24, ed. and trans. Failler, p. 185, lines 7–9.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). Defection 647 ilar acts of its rival claimants for the imperial office in Epirus and Thessaloni- ca.232 In the Palaiologan period, according to the treatise of Pseudo-Kodinos, even the despotes, who were mostly sons of the senior emperor and second in rank to the basileis, wore two-tone shoes (δι λεα π!διλα).233 This distinction, therefore, cannot be explained as an extraordinary sign of courtesy or as recourse to the old bonds of spiritual kinship. Rather, it expresses a sort of recognition on the part of the Byzantine court of the general tendency of Konya to incorporate imperial elements into the sultan’s symbolism of authority, a trend that after 1204 had significantly intensified, as the formulaic patterns of the sultans’ official cor- respondence with Christian potentates reveal.234 Through ¨Izz al-Dı¯n’s arrival in 1261 these features found their way into Byzantine court ceremony, celebrating thus a kind of ideological unification of Muslim and Roman-Christian traditions of lordship. From Alexios I’s cape on Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h’s shoulders until the red shoes on ¨Izz al-Dı¯n’s feet, it was a long journey of nearly one and a half centuries.

This survey of two centuries of Byzantine-Seljuk apostasy and defection reveals a fascinating field of human behavior, where legal views, moral constraints, and ethnic stereotypes stood in sharp contrast to day-to-day practices and survival strategies in a conflict-ridden world. As for the historical facts, the story began in the 1050s with seditious Seljuk commanders arriving in Constantinople and offering their services to the Byzantine army in exchange for incomes and titles. During the following decades, the increasing Turkish pressure on the empire’s eastern borderlands caused Armenian lords and Byzantine local commanders to develop a modus vivendi with the invaders, ranging from pretense of deference to open collaboration and even conversion to Islam. The recognition of the Seljuk lordship of Nicaea as an independent political entity in 1081 prepared the ground for a new bilateral relationship, enabling the Byzantine emperor to present himself as the protector of threatened Seljuk lords who were coming as refugees to Constantinople and to establish bonds of spiritual kinship with them, so that the sultans of Ru¯ m gradually became integrated into the Byzantine Empire’s inner circle. This practice, among other factors, may have inspired discontented Com- nenian aristocrats from the 1130s onwards to set off in the opposite direction, taking refuge with powerful Turkish potentates, a practice that later on was adopted by Byzantine generals and local rebels as well. The events of 1204, once more, turned things upside down, with the sultan of Konya becoming directly involved in the contest of several claimants to the imperial title. Contemporary narrators referring to these events swayed between extol- ling successful attempts to win over dignitaries from the foe’s camp and condemning defectors abandoning their own ranks. Court rituals provided an appropriate framework for stressing concepts of superiority and projecting successful rulership. On the other hand, emotional outbursts emanating from a general atmo- sphere of contest and insecurity provided a good basis for justifying morally un-

232 See, for instance, Akropolites 38, ed. Heisenberg, 1:61, trans. Macrides, p. 207, concerning the adoption of red shoes and red ink by John, son of Theodore Angelos, in Thessalonica. 233 Pseudo-Kodinos, Traité des offices, ed. and trans. Jean Verpeaux (Paris, 1966), p. 274, line 12. 234 See above, n. 205.

This content downloaded from 129.128.216.034 on April 08, 2017 17:44:54 PM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c). 648 Defection acceptable forms of behavior. In some cases, however, our informants deliberately reversed these interpretative patterns, downplaying the significance of conflicts or dwelling on the failure of rituals. When the emperor himself became the object of harsh criticism, the Turkish barbarians, who in the eleventh century were regarded as uncivilized “Huns” or “Scythians,” susceptible to all manifestations of Roman cultural and moral superiority, could even be considered highly esteemed authorities, able to judge a Byzantine general’s suitability for the imperial throne. Moreover, the gradual elevation of fugitive Seljuk sultans seeking the emperor’s protection, who from the Comnenian court title of sebastos successively ascended to the status of the emperor’s “spiritual son” and “godchild,” eventually resulted in a remarkable synthesis of Byzantine and Seljuk-Muslim ideas of lordship. The fact that Michael Amiraslan, the Seljuk dignitary mentioned at the beginning of this essay, even on his coffin insisted on his family’s claims for a purple-born lineage is but one consequence of this ideological amalgamation.

Appendix The following tables provide a synopsis of the prosopographical data of all individuals involved in Byzantine-Muslim defection. The entries are arranged in chronological order and indicate each defector’s name and original status, the court he took refuge with, and the results of the defector’s stay at the foreign court.

Table 1 Turkish Warlords and Potentates (1050–1118)

Date Defector Sheltering court Outcome 1056/57 Ibn Kha¯n al-Turkuma¯nı¯, Michael VI service in the imperial army Turkish commander 1070 Arı¯sghı¯/Chrysoskoulos, Romanos IV title of proedros, service in Turkish commander, the imperial army brother-in-law of Sultan Alp Arslan 1078 Sulayma¯n b. Kutlumus¸ Nikephoros III support for Nikephoros’s and his brothers revolt, control over cities in Bithynia 1086 Siaous, Seljuk dignitary Alexios I baptism, support of Alexios’s of mixed Georgian-Turkish policy in Asia Minor, dux origin, emissary on behalf of Anchialos of Sultan Malik Sha¯h 1092 Elchanes, Turkish potentate Alexios I baptism, court titles in the region of Apollonia and Kyzikos 1092 relatives and companions of Alexios I baptism, court titles Elchanes, among them a certain Skaliarios 1092 Abu¯ l-Qa¯sim, Seljuk lord of Alexios I peace treaty, title of sebastos Nicaea 1116 Sha¯ha¯nsha¯h, Seljuk sultan of Alexios I reception ceremony project- Konya ing proximity, peace treaty

Date Defector Sheltering court Outcome 1067/68 Aristakis, Armenian Alp Arslan, sultan of the temporary conversion commander Great Seljuk Empire to Islam 1085 Philaretos Brachamios, Malik Sha¯h, sultan of the temporary conversion Armenian potentate Great Seljuk Empire to Islam in northern Syria 1085 Philaretos’s son Sulayma¯n b. Kutlumus¸, agreement concerning lord of Nicaea an attack on Antioch (Anna Komnene)

Table 3 Comnenian Aristocrats and Court Officials (1118–1260)

Date Defector Sheltering court Outcome 1130 Isaac, sebastokrator, Gha¯zı¯ Gümüs¸tekin, temporary stay brother of Emperor Danis¸mend emir; 1130–1138/39, John II Mas¨u¯ d, sultan of conspiracies against Konya John II 1140 John, son of the Gha¯zı¯ Gümüs¸tekin, conversion to Islam, sebastokrator Isaac Danis¸mend emir marriage with a daughter of the sultan of Konya 1167 Andronikos Komnenos, Saltuk, emir of temporary stay second son of the Erzurum (via 1167–80, raids on sebastokrator Isaac Antioch, Jerusalem, Byzantine territory and Syria) (John Kinnamos) 1167 Alexios Axouch, proto- Kılıc Arslan II, sultan accusations of strator, son of John of Konya conspiratorial plans Axouch (a former (John Kinnamos) Turkish slave, megas domestikos under John II) 1195 Isaac Komnenos, grand- Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n failed attempt to son of Manuel I’s Kaykhusrau, sultan conclude a military brother Isaac, ex-ruler of Konya alliance of Cyprus 1200 Michael Angelos-Doukas, Rukn al-Dı¯n, sultan raids on Byzantine dux of Mylassa, of Konya territory bastard son of the sebastokrator John and cousin of Alexios III 1204 Theodore Laskaris, Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n temporary stay before despotes, son-in-law Kaykhusrau, sultan his takeover in of Alexios III of Konya Nicaea 1204 Theodore Angelos-Doukas, Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n temporary stay before brother of Michael Kaykhusrau, sultan his flight to Angelos-Doukas of Konya western Greece (continued)

Date Defector Sheltering court Outcome

1224/25 Andronikos Nestongos, ¨Ala¯© al-Dı¯n Kayku- lifelong stay cousin of John III ba¯dh, sultan of Vatatzes and head of a Konya conspiracy 1237 Manuel Angelos, despotes Seljuk authorities of handed over to of Thessalonica, brother Attaleia John III Vatatzes of Theodore Angelos 1256 Michael Palaiologos, me- ¨Izz al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯s protection against gas kontostablos under II, sultan of Konya Theodore II, par- Theodore II ticipation in the battle of Aksaray against the Mongols (October 1256) 1259 Theodore Karyanites, Seljuk territory killed by Turcoman protovestiarites warriors

Table 4 Local Potentates and Rebels (1118–1260)

Date Defector Sheltering court Outcome 1126–40 Constantine Gabras, semi- Gha¯zı¯ Gümüs¸tekin, military alliance independent governor in Danis¸mend emir Trebizond 1130 Kassianos, semi- Gha¯zı¯ Gümüs¸tekin, submission, independent governor in Danis¸mend emir annexation of his the Pontus region territory 1182 Manuel and Alexios, sons Kılıc Arslan II, sultan protection against of the megas domestikos of Konya Andronikos I John Vatatzes based in Philadelphia 1191 Theodore Mangaphas, Kılıc Arslan II, sultan raids on Byzantine local potentate of of Konya territory, eventually Philadelphia handed over to the imperial government 1191 Pseudo-Alexios Kılıc Arslan II, sultan raids on Byzantine “Kausalones,” local of Konya territory rebel in the region of the Meander valley 1195 Pseudo-Alexios, local rebel Muhខyı¯ al-Dı¯n, emir of raids on Byzantine in the region of Ankyra Ankyra territory 1204 Manuel Maurozomes, Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n high offices at the potentate in Asia Kaykhusrau, sultan Seljuk court Minor of Konya 1211 Alexios III, ex-emperor Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n military support, Kaykhusrau, sultan campaign against of Konya Theodore I Laskaris

Date Defector Sheltering court Outcome

1125/26 Masü¯ d, sultan of Konya John II protection against internal opponents, temporary stay 1126/27 Ärab, brother of Sultan John II protection against internal Masü¯d opponents, died in Constantinople 1162 Kılıc Arslan II, sultan of Manuel I protection against internal Konya opponents, peace treaty, addressed as the emperor’s “spiritual son” 1175 Dhu¯ l-Nu¯ n, Danis¸mend Manuel I protection against internal ruler opponents 1196 Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Alexios III protection against internal Kaykhusrau, sultan of opponents, marriage with a Konya daughter of Manuel Maurozomes, baptism 1257 Ïzz al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯ s II, Theodore II military support for regaining sultan of Konya his throne 1258 Ghiya¯th al-Dı¯n Masü¯d II Michael VIII protection against internal (Melik), son of Ïzz opponents, temporary stay al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯s II until his flight to the Golden Horde 1278/79 1259 Basilikoi, dignitaries of Michael VIII offices of megas hetaireiarches Greek descent at the and parakoimomenos tou court of Konya koitonos 1261 Ïzz al-Dı¯n Kayka¯wu¯ s II, Michael VIII protection against internal sultan of Konya opponents, bestowal of imperial insignia, baptism, temporary stay until his flight to the Golden Horde in 1278/79 1261 Älı¯ Baha¯dur, Seljuk emir at Michael VIII protection against internal the court of Konya opponents

Alexander D. Beihammer is an Associate Professor in the Department of History and Ar- chaeology at the University of Cyprus (e-mail: [email protected]).

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