Hellas and the Peloponnese

Who he is

Name

Michael Stryphnos, megas doux; the resident praetor on 1 January 1200 is not pinned

Title

Megas doux (commander of the fleet and governor-in-chief of the joint province of Hellas and the Peloponnese), governing through a resident praetor (also called protopraetor) at Thebes

Since

Stryphnos has been megas doux since about 1195, when his brother-in-law Alexios III took the throne

Born

not pinned

Family

Stryphnos is married to Theodora Kamatera, sister of the empress Euphrosyne (the court and the Kamateroi are written by the Constantinople researcher).

Confidence

medium

Wikipedia (Michael Stryphnos: he governed the joint province; Hellas (theme): the megas doux over the joint province with a local praetor); Miller (1908): praetor at Thebes, unpaid; Michael Choniates's letters through Miller. Named praetors of the 1180s (Nikephoros Prosouch under Andronikos I, 1182-1185) are too early to stand for 1200.

Overlord

Alexios III Angelos

What it holds

• Thebes, the praetor's seat, and Boeotia with Phocis and Locris (the horion of Thebes and Euripos; a doux of Thebes and Euripos is attested after the mid-twelfth century)
• Euboea (Euripos, with Karystos and Oreos)
• Athens with Attica, Megara, Salamis and Aegina (the horion of Athens; the 1204 partition still speaks of 'the horion of Athens with the appurtenance of Megara')
• Corinth and the Corinthia (a horion)
• Argos and the Argolid outside Nauplia (modern accounts call Sgouros governor of 'the Argolid and Nauplia', but the citadel of Argos was not his until about 1201-1202)
• Patras and the western Peloponnese (the horion of Patras and Methone in 1204, holding the estates of the Branas and Kantakouzenos families and villages of the emperor's daughter Irene)
• Arcadia and the central uplands (district not pinned)
• Lakedaimon and Laconia (the 'province of Lakedaimon' of 1204, with Kalavryta joined to it then)
• Imperial taxes, the ship levy and the customs of the Gulf ports

How it was acquired

Imperial province since the reconquest of the Peloponnese from the Slavs (ninth century); joined under the megas doux by the end of the eleventh century; subdivided into horia and episkepseis during the twelfth.

Allies and rivals

The praetor works with the town archontes and the metropolitans (Michael Choniates at Athens) and against them: Choniates went over his head to the emperor with a memorandum on the province's abuses. Rivals inside the province: Leo Sgouros of Nauplia. The Venetian merchants' posts: Venetians have traded toll-free at Methone, Koron, Nauplia, Corinth, Thebes, Athens and Euripos (and at Chios in the islands) since Alexios I's chrysobull of 1082 (place list as printed by Tafel and Thomas, not re-checked in this run), and keep colonies of resident merchants at Thebes, Euripos and Athens, buying Theban silk above all.

Alexios III's chrysobull of November 1198 confirms their exemption and lists the provinces by name (it names Karystos); Miller, dating it 1199, reads it as covering Patras, Methone, Corinth, Argos, Nauplia, Thebes, the district of Athens, Euboea, Crete and the islands. Venice holds no land in Greece before 1204. Pisans and Genoese trade here too, and their corsairs prey on the coasts.

How things stand that morning

Quiet and under imperial rule on 1 January 1200, with no revolt in progress. Nauplia is governed by its hereditary archon Leo Sgouros (separate record); Monemvasia governs itself under the emperor (town record); the Chamaretos family hold much of Laconia (separate record, thin). Ground across the borders: Thessaly and the Spercheios valley (Zetounion) to the north are Byzantine (the Macedonia and Thessaly researcher); Naupaktos and Aetolia across the Gulf of Corinth are Byzantine (the Epirus researcher); Zakynthos and Kefalonia to the west belong to the count palatine (the kefalonia realm).

Wealth

The silk and purple cloth of Thebes and Corinth; the trade of Euripos, Corinth's two harbours and Patras; olive oil of Koron and Messenia; wine, grain and honey; the land tax and the ship levy of the horia; the episkepseis of great houses and the imperial family. No figures in the sources.

Military

No standing field army in the province. Defence rests on citadels (the Acropolis of Athens, the Kadmeia of Thebes, Euripos, Acrocorinth, the Larissa of Argos, Acronauplia, Patras, Monemvasia), local levies and the ships owed by the horia. The fleet itself is run down under Stryphnos. In 1201-1202 Stryphnos will come in person and fail to check Sgouros (later).

Threats

• Pirates in the Saronic Gulf and the Cyclades
• Over-mighty archons (Sgouros at Nauplia)
• A rising in Thessaly that would cut the land road to Constantinople (Kamytzes, 1200-1201)
• Discontent over taxes and the praetors' exactions

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. 1200-1201 (French Wikipedia: 1201)Manuel Kamytzes, captured by Ivanko in 1199 and freed through Dobromir Chrysos, rises with Chrysos in Thessaly and Macedonia; the land road from Constantinople to southern Greece is cut (detail with the Macedonia and Thessaly researcher).Depends on: Kamytzes's quarrel with Alexios III over his captivity and ransom. Stopped by: A reconciliation with Kamytzes, or a quick imperial victory in Thessaly.

Later, on the likely course

1. about 1201-1202Leo Sgouros takes the citadels of Argos and Corinth and breaks away; Stryphnos winters at Athens (1201-1202) without stopping him.Depends on: The cutting of the land road and a weak imperial response. Stopped by: A firm praetor or megas doux with troops in the Peloponnese.

Places of note

• Kadmeia of Thebes: Citadel of Thebes, the praetor's residence town
• Acrocorinth: Mountain citadel above Corinth
• Larissa of Argos: Hill citadel of Argos
• Castle of Patras: Citadel of Patras

Where the sources disagree

• The Acrocorinth article on Wikipedia calls Acrocorinth the seat of the strategos of Hellas and later of the Peloponnese; for the late twelfth century Miller (from Michael Choniates's letters) puts the praetor at Thebes, which is followed here.
• Whether Hellas and the Peloponnese still had one praetor or separate ones in 1199 is not pinned; Wikipedia's Stryphnos article and Miller treat the province as one.
• The brief dates the Kamytzes-Chrysos revolt 1200-1201; French Wikipedia (Alexis III Ange) puts the rising in 1201, after Ivanko's fall in 1200. Either way it is after 1 January 1200.

Evidence: The structure (megas doux, praetor at Thebes, horia) is well described; the names of the praetor and district officers on 1 January 1200 are not pinned. District bounds below follow the 1204 partition and are approximate.

On the map: District bounds are reconstructed from the 1204 partition and the twelfth-century horia; they are rough. Sgouros's Nauplia and Monemvasia are separate records.

Primary sources for Byzantium

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Chronicle of Alberic of Trois-Fontaines, Alberic of Trois-Fontaines (about 1227 to 1241, at the Cistercian abbey of Trois-Fontaines in Champagne). The widest net of any Latin chronicle for 1200, compiled from dozens of sources, many now lost. Read online
• History of Niketas Choniates, Niketas Choniates (about 1185 to 1217, in stages, with a final revision in exile at Nicaea after 1204). The central narrative for the Byzantine Empire under Alexios III Angelos: the Bulgarian and Vlach war under Kaloyan, the breakaway of Ivanko in the Rhodopes and his capture by treachery in 1200, Dobromir Chrysos at Prosek and Strumica and the emperor's campaign and settlement with him, the Cuman raids into Thrace, John Komnenos the Fat's one-day revolt at Constantinople on 31 July 1200, the loosening of imperial control in the provinces and the rise of Leo Sgouros, and the court's fiscal abuses. Read online
• The Capture of Constantinople, Gunther of Pairis (about 1205 to 1210). Written at the Cistercian abbey of Pairis in Alsace from the account of its abbot Martin, who preached the crusade at Basel in 1200 (Gunther gives the sermon) and led a contingent from the Upper Rhine. Read online
• The Conquest of Constantinople, Robert de Clari, knight of Picardy (about 1205 to 1216). A rank-and-file crusader's account that begins with the preaching of the crusade and the taking of the cross in 1199 to 1200 by the counts of Flanders, Blois and Champagne and by the Picard lords, among them Peter of Amiens, Robert's own lord, then the negotiations with Venice. Read online
• The Palace Revolution of John Komnenos (31 July 1200), Nicholas Mesarites (1200 or soon after). An eyewitness narrative of the one-day coup of John Komnenos the Fat at Constantinople on 31 July 1200: the crowning of the usurper in Hagia Sophia, the mob's plunder of the Great Palace, the stand of the palace clergy and the guard at the church of the Virgin of the Pharos, where Mesarites was skeuophylax, and the recovery of the palace by Alexios III's men that night. Read online
• History of the doges of Venice (about 1229, with a continuation). The earliest surviving Venetian narrative close to the events. Read online
• The Conquest of Constantinople (Villehardouin), Geoffrey of Villehardouin (about 1207 to 1213). Opens with the preaching of Fulk of Neuilly and the tournament at Ecry (28 November 1199) where Theobald III of Champagne and Louis of Blois took the cross, then the taking of the cross by Baldwin of Flanders, Hugh of Saint-Pol, Geoffrey of Perche and others through early 1200, the assemblies at Soissons and Compiegne in 1200, and the six envoys sent to Venice in the winter of 1200 to 1201. Read online
• The History of the Seljuks of Rum, Ibn Bibi (Nasir al-Din Husayn ibn Muhammad) (about 1281 to 1285, at Konya). The main Seljuk narrative for Rum begins with Kilij Arslan II's partition of the sultanate among his sons and his death (1192), Kaykhusraw I's first reign at Konya, his deposition in 1196 to 1197 by Rukn al-Din Sulayman II, Kaykhusraw's wanderings to Cilician Armenia, Aleppo and Constantinople, Sulayman's reduction of his brothers' towns (Tokat, Malatya, Amasya, and Ankara by 1204) and his Erzurum and Georgian campaigns. Read online

7 more in the sources library for The Balkans and Byzantium.