The Lost World of Byzantium by Jonathan Harris

Author:Jonathan Harris
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi, pdf
ISBN: 9780300178579
Publisher: Yale University Press

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Long Shadow

For [the Phokas family] held perpetual dominance, I daresay, until we came on the scene.

Land Law of Basil II (996)

Of the three groups contending for power in 976, the Macedonian dynasty must have looked the least likely to succeed. It had now been many years since an effective emperor of the ruling family had actually directed affairs of state and some observers might have assumed that it would shortly die out or be elbowed aside. They were wrong. The Macedonians were to shape Byzantium’s destiny for another eighty years. They were to preside over a further extension of the empire’s borders and a period of relative peace and prosperity. They were also to widen the gulf between Constantinople and the provinces that was to lead to another of the desperate crises that were a recurring feature of Byzantine history. The survival, the expansion, the peace, the prosperity and to some extent the eventual crisis were all the work of the man who ruled the empire for fifty years and whose long shadow dominated it for another fifty thereafter: the gloomy tyrant, Basil II (976–1025), known as the Bulgar slayer.

* * *

Back in 976 it had naturally been assumed, especially in the armies of Asia Minor, that the power vacuum left by the death of John I Tzimiskes would be filled by some other warlord or other who would step forward to take up the role of emperor and protector of the legitimate rulers, Basil II and his younger brother Constantine VIII. The obvious candidate was Bardas Skleros, brother-in-law of the late Emperor John. Skleros had an outstanding military record. He had served with distinction in Tzimiskes’s campaign against Svyatoslav, where he was credited with having sliced a Russian in two in single combat. It was he too who had put a stop to the younger Bardas Phokas’s bid for the throne in 970. The post of Domestic of the Scholai having been divided, he now held the rank of Domestic of the East and had all the credentials for a strong man to fill Tzimiskes’s shoes.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.