City · The Byzantine Empire (the Empire of the Romans) · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Thebes

Thebes is the capital of Hellas and the chief silk town of Greece.

By the middle of the twelfth century it was the biggest producer of silk in the empire; the Normans sacked it in 1147 and carried silk workers off to Palermo, but the industry recovered. Benjamin of Tudela, about 1165, found some 2,000 Jews there, 'the most skilled artificers in silk and purple cloth throughout Greece'. Venetian merchants buy its silk under imperial privileges.

The praetor lives here, and the town is the seat of provincial government for all of southern Greece.

Who holds it

Name
The praetor (not pinned) and the Theban archontes
Title
Imperial town, residence of the praetor of Hellas and the Peloponnese
Confidence
medium

Lord in 1200

The emperor's praetor of Hellas and the Peloponnese resides here (name not pinned); the metropolitan of Thebes (name not pinned) and the local archontes lead the town.

How things stand that morning

Imperial seat of the province; quiet.

Charter

No town charter known.

Council

The archontes; no formal council known.

Communities

Greeks; a large Jewish community of silk and purple workers (about 2,000 in Benjamin of Tudela's time, about 1165); Venetian merchants (a Venetian colony at Thebes is recorded).

Militia

Not recorded.

Walls and castle

The Kadmeia, the citadel on the town's hill; the town walls (circuit not pinned).

Trade and crafts

Silk weaving and purple dyeing, the finest in Greece; the grain of the Boeotian plain; Venetian buyers.

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.

  1. 1204-1205 (later)Sgouros takes Boeotia; then the crusaders take Thebes (1205).Depends on: Sgouros's rise and the Fourth Crusade. Stopped by: Any check to either.

Places of note

  • Kadmeia: Citadel

Where the sources disagree

  • Wikipedia's Thebes article dates the Norman sack to 1147; its Hellas (theme) article says 1148. The usual date, 1147, is followed.

Evidence: Silk and the Jewish community are well attested (Benjamin, Choniates, modern studies); the officers of 1200 are not named.

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.

Sources and studies

  1. Thebes, Greece (Wikipedia: silk industry, the Norman sack of 1147, Venetian buyers)
  2. Benjamin of Tudela, Itinerary (journey about 1165-1173), trans. M. N. Adler (1907), Project Gutenberg text
  3. W. Miller, The Latins in the Levant (1908), ch. 1 'Greece at the time of the Frankish conquest' (archive.org full text; old but uses Michael Choniates's letters)
  4. Hellas (theme) (Wikipedia)

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.