As for Alexei's religiosity, it is doubtful that it was completely sincere and flowed from a pure heart. It must be said that Zonaras, who clearly indicates the moral virtues of Alexios, for some reason does not say anything about the piety of the emperor. This is hardly a mere coincidence. In any case, his religiosity almost bore to some extent the peculiarity which distinguished the activity of this emperor, a peculiarity which consisted in cunning and subtle calculation; Thanks to this character trait, the emperor very often was not who he really was. It is remarkable that when Alexei was on his deathbed, Irene, his wife, in spite of the solemnity and significance of the moment, deceived about the succession to the throne, could not refrain from exclaiming, addressing the dying man: "Husband, even during your lifetime you were distinguished by all kinds of treachery, loving to say things other than what you thought, and now, parting with your life, you do not betray what you loved before." The historian who relays these words of Irene, for his part, does not consider it necessary to remain silent about the fact that he considers Alexei "a man who could not be more secretive," i.e., one whose actions were not in accordance with his inner dispositions. It is also worth noting that the Empress Irene spoke the above words after she saw that Alexei "raised his hands to heaven" in gratitude for the fact that he had succeeded in disappointing his wife's hopes, despite his promises to fulfill the wishes of the latter. Let us suppose that Alexei did the right thing this time, destroying his wife's hopes; but it is still very strange to meet with breaking promises, deceit, and prayer at the same time.

Despite some restrictions, Alexios, in his religious and moral character, should be attributed not to the worst, but to the best Byzantine sovereigns of the period under study.

We consider it not superfluous to say a few words about Irina, Alexei's wife. The historian Anna praises the virtues and piety of Irene, her mother. [99] There is no reason to deny the historian's testimony. Irina, indeed, in many respects is a gratifying phenomenon. Among her other deeds of piety, a prominent place is occupied by her concern for the spread and well-being of female monasticism in Constantinople. Thus, it is known for the establishment of a convent here in the name of the Blessed Virgin of Grace. This monastery was under the personal supervision of Empress Irene herself. She drew up a rule for the monastery, which had the goal of placing this monastery on the height of moral and religious life. This rule is drawn up in detail and carefully. [100] It is possible that it was written by the hand of Irene herself, a woman very educated and well-read in theological works. But while acknowledging the merits of Irene's life and behavior, especially her piety, one should not at the same time exaggerate them, as the biased historian Anna does. Irene was undoubtedly proud and haughty, if we compare the simplicity and accessibility of Alexius Comnenus with Irene's too great adherence to strict court etiquette, which was embarrassing for the persons surrounding this royal personage. It is evident that the latter was very fond of letting it be known that she was the queen and that everyone should tremble before her and feel their insignificance. [101] But even more important is the fact that Irene, loving her daughter Anna to the point of passion, was ready to transgress law and justice for the sake of this love. She made every effort to have her husband Alexei recognize Anna as the successor to his power, bypassing the legitimate heir John, his son. [102] Such a desire of Irene, naturally, brought disharmony into the family relations of the royal house and forced the family members to become almost hostile to each other. Of course, no one will put such plans of Irene and the consequences arising from these plans in the dignity of this royal personage. True, Irene did not achieve her goal: John became the heir of his father, but whoever reads the historical legends that tell about the circumstances of John's accession to the throne will confess that Irene cannot claim a high place among the most worthy empresses of Byzantium. In general, she was a little better than her husband. [103]

The son and successor of Alexios Comnenus, John Comnenus (1118-1143), is one of the rarest examples of highly moral emperors who occupied the Byzantine imperial throne. John was an emperor to whom historians do not say a single bad word. [104] During his 25-year reign, meekness and mercy constituted the rules of state administration. Under his sceptre, the death penalty ceased to exert its power, as it had marked itself in previous centuries. The emperor showed remarkable examples of meekness and mercy on the following occasions. His sister, the famous Anna Comnena, did not want to reconcile herself to the accomplished fact – John's accession to the throne; She did not want to reconcile herself to the fact that the imperial throne, which she had counted on thanks to her mother's assistance in this respect, was occupied by something else. About a year after John's accession to the throne, she made an attempt to take the royal throne from her brother by means of a coup. And this is done by Anna, the same Anna who everywhere displays such modesty and femininity in a well-known historical work! But her plans did not come to fruition, it seems, thanks to the conscientiousness of her husband, of whom on this occasion she spoke with obscene irony ("in the most shameful terms") that nature had mistakenly mixed the sexes of people and Bryennius had given a woman's soul instead of a man's. According to Byzantine customs, Anna was to be executed and her property confiscated. But the Emperor John graciously decides to spare her life and only orders the confiscation of her property. But even this last order was not carried out: at the request of a person close to him (Aksuch), John canceled his order[105] and limited himself in relation to the guilty with reproaches and censures. With the same unparalleled condescension John treats his brother Isaac, who allowed an act very similar to that of Anna. Having quarreled with his brother over some trifles, Isaac withdrew from the borders of the state, there he visited various peoples in order to find allies who could take the throne from his brother. But the search for Isaac was fruitless. He returned with his head to the tsar in Byzantium. How did the tsar receive his criminal brother? Instead of any punishments, "he caressed him and embraced him heartily; he did not conceal in his heart any secret dislike for Isaac; he was no more happy about the 0 victory than about the return of his brother." [106] Nicetas Choniates gives the following characterization of the Emperor John in the moral sense. "He was a man who ruled the kingdom excellently, and lived a godly life", he was far from licentious, temperate, generosity was a trait of his character. According to the same historian, John was an enemy of the insane luxury that almost always prevailed in the Byzantine court, and served as an excellent example of simplicity of life for the whole of Byzantium. Nicetas said: "Like a murderous infection, he expelled from the royal palace idle talk (flattery?) and excessive luxury in clothing and table; and desiring that all the household would imitate him, he did not cease to practice all forms of abstinence." [107] In general, the Emperor John, even according to Gibbon, who was so far from flattering the Byzantine emperors, was morally "strict with himself and indulgent with others, he was chaste and temperate, and even the philosopher Marcus Aurelius would not have despised his artless virtues, which flowed from the heart, and not borrowed from the schools. Under the rule of such a monarch, innocence was nothing to fear, and the widest field was open to personal merit. John's virtues were beneficial and unstained. He was, according to the historian, the best and greatest of the Komnenos." [108] On the other hand, John's religiosity and piety are a subject of praise for historians. Warm faith, fervent prayer to the Most Holy Theotokos constituted for him strength in troubles and delight amidst the joys of life. Thus, if there was danger during the war, "he would stand," according to Nicetas, "before the icon of the Mother of God, and looking at it with a cry and an imploring look, shedding tears hotter than the sweat of soldiers." Victory over the enemy prompted the emperor to express his religious feeling in some laws of piety visible to all. Thus, having once won a victory over the Pechenegs, he, upon his return to Constantinople, instituted a special holiday as a sign of gratitude to God, which the Byzantines called the holiday of the Pechenegs. [109] Or on another occasion, after defeating the enemies, the king expressed his gratitude to God for the victory he had bestowed upon him in the following way, clearly showing that John's religiosity far left behind the pride of the victor. Byzantine historians describe John's triumphal entry into Byzantium after his victory over the Persians. When the day came for the solemn procession, the streets were decorated with carpets speckled with gold and purple, and fabrics fluttered, on which the faces of Christ and the Saints were embroidered by an artistic hand. A magnificent triumphal chariot, pulled by horses whiter than snow, was assigned to the king. But the tsar, not wanting to seem a proud victor, did not sit on it, but placed an icon of the Mother of God on it, since this icon accompanied him on campaigns· Ordering the first nobles to lead the horses under the bridle, entrusting his close relatives with the supervision of the chariot, he himself went ahead, carrying the cross. And when he came to the St. Sophia church, he gave thanks to God in the face of all the people. However accustomed the Byzantines were to religious ceremonies, this combination of pomp and royal pious modesty caused such surprise that one of the historians considers it necessary to make a note about such a phenomenon. [110] The historian Nicetas Choniates, taking into account the high merits of John, recognizes him as the ideal of the Byzantine kings. He says: "To this day (the beginning of the thirteenth century) all are glorified with praise and considered, so to speak, the crown of all the kings who sat on the Byzantine throne from the Comnenian family. But in relation to many of the ancient and best emperors, it can be said that he equaled some of them, and even surpassed others." [111] This flattering review is all the more remarkable because Nicetas judges the other emperors of the twelfth century, and the wife of the Emperor John, according to another historian, Kinnam, was also an example of a highly moral life. A foreigner by birth (she was the daughter of the Hungarian king), Irene, according to him, was a sovereign, distinguished above all others by modesty and full of virtue. Everything that she received from her husband and from the state treasury, she did not save, like a miser, but she did not spend it on clothes and luxury, and throughout her life she did good deeds to everyone who asked for her help. She built a monastery in Byzantium in the name of the Almighty, which, according to the historian, was remarkable in all respects. [112]

It remains to be regretted that such deeply religious and highly moral personalities as the Emperor John and his wife Irene were very rare phenomena on the Byzantine throne. John's heir, his son Manuel Comnenus (1143-1180), was already a man of a different character and tendency. The Byzantine people, admiring the stateliness and beauty of the new emperor, imagined in the simplicity of their souls that the new ruler would combine with the forces of youth the wisdom of old age. [113] But this was a cruel mistake. He inherited his military talents from his father, but it was as if John took his social virtues with him to the grave. Manuel spent most of his 37-year reign in endless wars, and it seemed that he came to Byzantium only to waste money, indulge in luxury and debauchery. He surrounded himself with foreigners who robbed him as much as they wanted; having appointed strict and thrifty people to manage the financial part of the state, Manuel, however, in a vain desire to be famous for his generosity, according to the historian (Nicetas), "without any measure distributed and squandered what he had accumulated. Its splendor and luxury, like an abyss, absorbed state revenues." He was in a shameful and open relationship with his own niece, with whom he feasted and rejoiced on the beautiful islands of the Propontis. This passion of the emperor was a heavy burden on the state. According to the historian, "the son born to the tsar from Theodora (that was the name of his niece), and then other children, transferred whole seas of money to themselves." [114] Manuel is the first clear model of the period we are describing, an example of that mixture of good and bad qualities which we have noticed as a characteristic feature of the Byzantine emperors from the twelfth to the middle of the fifteenth centuries. On the contrary, in the midst of the world, in Byzantium, he can live only in luxury, drowning in voluptuous. [115] Religiously, it is the same mixture of good and evil. Manuel is deeply attached to the faith and the Church, he humbly bows his violent head before the holiness of the Church, but this does not prevent him from being a pitiful but convinced superstition at the same time. As a fact proving the piety of Manuel, the historian Kinnam describes the behavior of the emperor when transferring to Byzantium one, however, very suspicious, sacred relic. This historian relates: "Manuel with great triumph transferred to Byzantium the sacred stone that had long lain in Ephesus and added it to the other sacred monuments of the capital. What kind of stone it was, says the historian, is revealed by the following story. When Christ died and was laid on the stone, the Mother of God, falling down before him, wept bitterly. These tears, having fallen on the stone then, remain indelible to this day. Taking this stone, Mary Magdalene sailed on it directly to Rome in order to appear before the emperor Tiberius and accuse Pilate and the Jews, the murderers of Christ, before him. But somehow brought into the harbor of Ephesus, it left a stone here. From that time to the present, the stone has remained in Ephesus. This stone was now carried with radiant solemnity. The entire Senate, all the clergy and monasticism of the capital participated in the solemn procession, as well as Tsar Manuel· Manuel, the historian notes with special emphasis, even supported the stone with his shoulder," and according to another legend: "The king laid the stone on his spine," for "in such cases," continues Kinnam, "Manuel humbled himself more than necessary, and usually approached such objects with humiliation." [116] But apparently devoted to the Christian religion, Manuel is at the same time a man thoroughly saturated with superstition. He asks the fortune-tellers how long the series of kings from the Comnenian family will last; receives the answer that the Greek word άιμα determines the duration of the reign of his surname; from this 0N concludes that after the Comneni had already reigned with names beginning with the letter a (alpha) — Alexei, ι (iota) — John, and the letters μ (mi) — he, Manuel, still had to reign alone with a name having the initial letter a (alpha); he is worried about who will reign after him, since he did not have male children at first; looks incredulously at relatives with names beginning with this suspicious letter alpha; then he calls his son Alexei, so that in fulfillment of the prophecy it is his son, Alexis, with the initial letter alpha in his name, who will reign after him; he consulted astrologers during his wife's pregnancy,[117] etc. At the end of his life, Manuel became a monk, but why? Not because he wanted to atone for the vices of his life by feats of piety, but solely because the illness that befell him was fatal. With what unexpectedness the dying Manuel wanted to put on the monastic order, this is evident from the fact that in the palace there were no monastic clothes suitable for this occasion, why they put on Manuel somewhere in a hurry found an old and short mantle, which barely reached the knees of the newly-ordained monk. [118]

The last emperor of the Komnenos family, who occupied the royal throne in Byzantium in the second half of the twelfth century, was morally incomparably worse than Manuel. In him one can already notice a decisive preponderance of evil and immorality over the best qualities of the soul. Such was Manuel's cousin Andronicus Comnenus, who for a short time (1183-1185) occupied the Byzantine imperial throne. Andronicus's youth was a kind of epic debauchery. Criminal relations with women were now established, then broken, in a word, changed like clothes. He began his exploits in this regard by incest with his cousin Eudocia. [119] When he was reproached for such a relationship, he calmly justified himself by saying that his whole family was like that; he said that people of the same breed were always somehow similar to one another, and that he was only imitating his relatives (an ironic allusion to the then Emperor Manuel). [120] For the purpose of love affairs, Andronicus undertook a journey to Antioch, since he had heard about the existence there of an extraordinary beauty, named Philippa. [121] In order to captivate this beauty, he enthusiastically gives himself up to luxury, reaches the extreme refinement in his dress, walks with pomp through the streets, surrounded by bodyguards with silver bows, in a word, as Nicetas remarks, he fully "devotes himself to the service of Aphrodite." In this way he tried, according to the expression of the same historian, to captivate the one who had captivated him, in which he succeeded. [122] Continuing to paint the morally dissolute image of Andronicus, Nicetas describes his further adventures in the following lines. "From Antioch, Andronicus sets off for Jerusalem, remembering like a cat about meat, about his former victories, and is engaged in new tricks. And since he was not accustomed to be ashamed in life, and loving women to the point of madness, indiscriminately, like a horse, satisfied his lusts, then here also he entered into a criminal love affair with Theodora,"[123] and this Theodora was the daughter of his cousin. [124] And it was this juir who was destined to become the emperor of Byzantium. His reign was a real misfortune for the empire. At first, he approaches the throne as guardian of the infant Emperor Alexios, son of Manuel (1180-1183), and then paves his way to the throne through crimes. Andronicus crept into the confidence of the unreasonable Byzantine people and with this trust stole the royal crown. One of the first victims of Andronicus' cruelty was the Empress Maria, the wife of Manuel, and the tyrant was so ingenious that he tortured the unfortunate woman before his death and forced her son, the young Alexios, to sign his mother's death warrant. [125] She was followed by the turn of her helpless son, despite the fact that Andronicus solemnly swore that he would take care of the welfare of the infant emperor. The unfortunate youth was strangled with a bowstring during the night, and Andronicus, trampling the corpse with his feet with contempt, ordered to cut off his head, to present it to himself, and, marking it with the imperial seal, ordered the head to be thrown into one place, and the corpse into another. [126] With the young wife of Alexios, with whom the latter had married only fictitiously—a minor could not be a real husband—with this special Andronicus, old, hunched, worn out, and frail, was not ashamed to forcibly marry. [127] But this strange marriage, of course, did not chastise the dissolute Andronicus. With the establishment on the Byzantine throne, he gave full scope to his passions. The historian Nicetas writes: "He often left the capital and spent time with a crowd of prostitutes and concubines in solitary places, where the air was more dissolved; he liked to choose poetic natural caves in the mountains and cool groves, and took mistresses with him, like a rooster of chickens or a goat of goats in the pasture. Only to his courtiers, and even then to few, he showed himself, and to singers and prostitutes he always had open access: he received them at all times. He loved bliss and luxury," the historian continues, "like Sardanapalus, who wrote on his grave: I have only what I have eaten and done. In a word," says the historian, "he remained an Epicurean, an extremely depraved man and devoted to voluptuousness to the point of frenzy." [128] To what we have said, many other very disadvantageous features characterizing Andronicus were added. It cost him nothing to behave in the most humiliating way if he wanted to achieve any favorable result: then, in the words of the historian, he "caressed like a dog." [129] He knew how to cry so pitifully on occasion that by his art of pretending he could deceive even non-simple-minded people. [130] But next to this, he was implacably cruel when he knew that he would easily get away with his cruelty. Executions and exiles were the main subject of his royal orders. Soon after his entry into the administration of state affairs, "some of the nobles," according to the historian, "were expelled from their homes and fatherland and separated from everything dear to their hearts; others were imprisoned in prisons and iron fetters, others were deprived of sight — and always without any obvious guilt." [131] His most diligent servants could not be sure for an hour of their safety. "To whom yesterday he presented a piece of bread," Nikita notes, "whom he gave with fragrant, whole wine, today he dealt with in the most evil way." [132] Murder followed murder, his tyranny extended decidedly to everyone. "The day," the historian writes, "when he was returning to Byzantium from his mad on the Propontis Islands, was the most unhappy day. It seemed that he returned with nothing else but to destroy and slaughter people whom he suspected of plotting against him. Being deeply imbued with cruelty, this man considered the day when he did not blind anyone to be lost. There was no mercy even for the weaker sex." [133] The Byzantine people, mainly of the upper classes, finally lost patience, and Andronicus became the victim of a popular revolt. [134] But even in Andronicus, this lost man, one can observe a characteristic feature of the other Byzantine emperors — the presence in him of the good element side by side with the evil. It is said of Andronicus that he used to read the epistles of Ap. He loved to sprinkle his letters with the sayings of the great Apostle and did not spare precious metal for the decoration of his icons. In the words of Nicetas Choniates, Andronicus resembled a sphinx: "Being in part a beast, adorned with the face of a man, he did not quite cease to be a man"[135] and, we may add, even a Christian.

No better than the last Comnenos, but much worse in moral terms, were the few representatives of the new dynasty of Angels who occupied the Byzantine throne at the end of the twelfth and at the very beginning of the thirteenth centuries. Let us point out some emperors from the Angels family. Isaac the Angel (1185-1195) spent all his time feasting. As Nikita aptly put it, "he immersed all his thoughts in the empty dishes." [136] The most common guests at "Solomon's, as the historian calls them, dinners of Isaac were some spoiled monks of Constantinople; these were people, in the words of Nicetas, "who took on the monastic image in mockery of themselves, chased only after royal dinners, devoured, like Isaac himself, all sorts of the freshest, fattest fish, and drank the most whole old fragrant wine." [137] These feasts were called "Solomon's" because they "represented whole mountains of loaves, a kingdom of beasts (due to a multitude of meat foods), a sea of fishes, and an ocean of wine." [138] Sometimes these feasts were accompanied by the wildest, most barbarous entertainments. When "one day," as the historian wittily put it, "the hottest siege of dishes in the palace began, Isaac, in the form of a merry episode or in the form of dessert, ordered the head of a murdered rebel, Vrana, to be served; She was brought in with a distorted mouth, with her eyes closed, thrown to the floor and like a ball began to be thrown from side to side in different directions with darts." [139] Other pleasant occupations of the reigning Isaac consisted of the following: "He hung himself with various clothes, like a ship with haberdashery goods, curled. Dressing up like a peacock, he did not allow himself to wear the same dress twice. Loving fun and enjoying the songs of the gentle muse, the tsar filled the palace with jesters and dwarfs, opened wide the doors for all comedians and buffoons." All this was accompanied by drunkenness and impudent voluptuousness. [140] Strange as it may seem, Isaac, for all his moral laxity, showed himself to be a religious man and a friend of the suffering and the poor. In relation to churches and monasteries, he was distinguished by remarkable generosity. He decorated some of them, corrected others. He made many precious casings for icons. Isaac turned one large house into a hospice, arranging in it a table for a hundred people, an equal number of beds and the same number of stalls for horses, so that the poor travelers who stayed there could live in the shelter without any payment for several days. Isaac also turned one palace into a hospital and built an excellent almshouse. When a fire destroyed the northern part of Constantinople, he ordered money to be distributed to relieve the victims. During Holy Week, he scattered gifts to poor widows and poor brides. [141] But side by side with such manifestations of piety and mercy in the history of the reign of Isaac, we also encounter the plundering of church treasures. Such contrasts could exist, it seems, only among the Byzantine emperors, who understood piety in a purely formal sense. The historian Nicetas relates that Isaac took away sacred vessels from churches and gave them everyday use. Instead of mash goblets at his table, there were precious cup-shaped articles that hung over the royal tombs; priestly washbasins were turned into his washstands, removing expensive casings from crosses and the Gospel, he made necklaces and chains from them. When someone remarked to the emperor that this was sacrilege, Isaac replied that he was doing the same as Constantine, who had put the nails of Christ into the bridle of his horse and helmet. [142] With his false piety peacefully coexisted superstition of the lowest grade. In one of the cities along the northwestern coast of the Sea of Marmara there lived a certain half-witted charlatan named Vasilyushka; He was known as a harbinger of the future. His hut was always crowded with many idle people, especially from the lower classes: shepherds, peasants, sailors; His prophecies were intricate, fragmentary chatter, and sometimes this diviner indulged in wild and indecent escapades, especially in his treatment of women. And yet, when Isaac was in the city where this Vasilyushka lived, he did not fail to visit this, as he called him, Father Basil. The forerunner of future destinies did not prophesy anything sensible to the emperor, but limited himself to disfiguring the portrait of the emperor painted on his wall with a stick. Those present interpreted this, however, as a bad omen for the emperor. [143] The second Byzantine emperor from the House of Angels was Isaac's brother, Alexius III (1195-1203). He cannot be reckoned among the good sovereigns. The boundless extravagance that characterized the reign of Alexei Angel led to the exhaustion of the state treasury. Finding himself without money, he wants to take away all the precious sacred vessels from the churches, with the exception of the chalices. But he met resistance and limited himself to plundering the royal tombs. [144] The historian Nicetas pays tribute to this wretched emperor at least for the fact that "he did not gouge out his eyes, cut off neither hands nor legs, like bunches from grapes, was not a butcher in relation to his subjects." [145] This means that this was already considered by contemporaries to be a great blessing of fate. The wife of this emperor, Euphrosyne, with her love affairs, was the subject of inexhaustible stories, which supplemented the already rich scandalous chronicle of Byzantium. [146]

At the beginning of the thirteenth century, Constantinople fell under the rule of the Latin Crusaders. The imperial Byzantine throne was transferred to Dicea. This misfortune brought to their senses the Byzantine sovereigns who followed the path of impiety. Thunder struck, and the Byzantines were startled, but at least some of the Byzantine emperors at Nicaea proved themselves to be models of morality and religiosity. Such was especially the Emperor John Vatatzes (1222-1255). [147] Instead of the insane extravagance that distinguished many of the Byzantine emperors of the twelfth century, he shows an example of purely rural life. He starts farming, breeds cows, sheep, horses, and sells natural products of his farm. An unprecedented idyllic simplicity of morals dominates the emperor's palace. All of John's relatives and his nobles follow the example of the king. Luxury was banished both from the royal palace and from the houses of the nobles. The emperor forbade the purchase of expensive foreign fabrics made by Italians, Babylonians, and Assyrians. [148] Works of charity and religiosity occupied the first place in the activities of John Vatatzes. He established hospitals and almshouses, the income from some plots of land belonging to the patrimony of the emperor was assigned to feed the elderly, the sick and the poor. Here and there the emperor built churches in honor of the Holy Cross, the Mother of God and the Baptist, provided them with estates and incomes, and did not leave the monasteries without his attention. As a weakness in the behavior of John Vatatzes, the historian Nicephorus Gregoras, who describes this reign in detail, points to the case of the emperor's infatuation with a court lady to the point of forgetting his family duties, but the same historian notes that John did not remain unrepentant of this offense either: he, as the historian remarked, felt reproaches from his conscience, as from a needle, and asked God for forgiveness of his sin. [149] Historians also portray another emperor of the Nicene period, the son of John Vatatzes, Theodore II (1255-1258). The historian Pachymerus characterizes this sovereign as follows: "There was neither day nor night, nor time of sorrows, nor hours of joy, nor sunrise, nor sunset, when it was seen or heard that the king did not lavish blessings either personally or disposing others to do so." In spite of this, according to the historian, he, nevertheless, seemed to his nobles to be a difficult sovereign, because he appointed people positions and honored them, paying attention not to the nobility of origin and family ties with the royal house, but to his own qualities. The historian, moreover, praises this sovereign for loving the sciences and doing good to all scientists. [150]

But towards the end, if I may say so, of the Nicene imprisonment of the Byzantine emperors, with the transfer of the capital to Constantinople in the second half of the thirteenth century,[151] the emperors are for the most part sad examples of moral depravity, of moral weakness. Michael Palaiologos (1261-1282), who forced the Latins to leave Constantinople and retook the throne of Constantine the Great, was far from being a lover of virtue. By transgression he attains the throne. He orders the blinding of the infant Emperor John, the son of Theodore Vatatzes, entrusted to his care, and thus gets rid of this rival child of his. This crime is all the less recommended by the moral character of Michael Palaiologos, the more inventive it was. It was decided to make John incapable of reigning, and for this purpose it was chosen to blind him by the slow destruction of his eyesight. "His eyes were ruined," writes the historian Pachymeres, "not by a red-hot iron suddenly, but by some kind of trinket that was heated and turned before his eyes, so that the child's eyesight first weakened, and then little by little completely extinguished." Then the blinded crown-bearer was imprisoned in the fortress. "And those oaths," the historian notes, "which Michael Palaiologos gave regarding the protection of John's life, were swallowed by the tsar like a cucumber." The royal youth John was not the only victim of Michael's cruel soul – John's adherents also suffered much from him. "Some of them he expelled from service, others he subjected to punishment." [152] A rhetorician named Olovol suffered a great deal: his nose and lips were cut off and he was tonsured a monk. Subsequently, Olovol had to endure many more insults from the cruelty of the tyrant. Being once angry with Tin, Michael gave orders "to hang him with sheep's entrails with all the impurities in them, he gave orders to beat him on the lips with sheep's liver without ceasing, and in this form to lead him along with some other persons through the streets of Byzantium." [153] Michael Palaiologos in general was a man who knew how to calm his sinful conscience in a purely Jesuit way. With such a sacred thing as an oath, he treated in a peculiar way. Let's tell you one case. His son Andronicus, sent with an army against the Serbs, persuaded the Serbian leader Kotanitsa to surrender, and swore an oath that he would not tolerate anything bad from the tsar. Michael Palaiologos, however, decided to blind Kotanitsa. "After all, it was not I who swore," he reasoned, "but my son without my permission." Learning of his father's intention, Andronicus came to him with an intercession on behalf of the unfortunate Kotanitsa The father, in response to his son's intercession and to the argument he had adduced that if Kotanitsa were to be blinded, he, Andronicus, would be an oathbreaker, began to prove to him that there would be no perjury, because he, Andronicus, would keep the oath, and the king, as free from the oath given without intercourse with him, could act as security required. To the credit of Andronicus, it must be said that he tried to take measures to save Kotanitsa from danger. [154] And how little Michael valued religious interests is evident from the fact that he made every effort to subordinate the Greek-Latin Church in the so-called union. Such was Michael Palaiologos. But it would be unfair to think that works of piety were alien to Michael. And this sovereign, like many of his predecessors, was able to combine the apparently incompatible—the depravity and fragility of moral principles with religiosity. The autobiography of Michael Palaiologos has survived to this day, in which he shows a rare care for the improvement of monasteries. He restored the monastery of the Holy Martyr Demetrius in Byzantium, provided it with inexhaustible revenues, carefully worked out for it something like a rule, determined the staff of the monastery, assigned it for all time to be under the protection of Byzantine sovereigns, etc. In the same way he took care of many other monasteries listed in his autobiography. [155] Michael took care of the decoration and enrichment of the famous St. Sophia Church[156] and so on.

Better in religious and moral terms was Michael's successor, his son Andronikos II Palaiologos (1282-1328). As the ruler of the empire, Andronicus is considered an incapable sovereign. But in this respect it is impossible to judge Andronicus very harshly: the intricate and difficult circumstances of the time would have made it difficult to govern the Byzantine state even for an emperor more intelligent and skillful. Meek, loving science and enlightenment, wishing to be useful to all, Andronicus would have stood at the height of his vocation if he had lived and reigned in more peaceful and tranquil times, for example, at least in the twelfth century. His personal virtues are not tarnished by any historian. His social virtues also paint the image of Andronicus from the best sides.

St. Gregory says of Michael's successor: "On the throne sat a dignified mind, which did not like hypocrisy and weighed everything according to its conscience, as before God." [157] And it must not be thought that the historian wants to flatter Andronicus. Andronicus was indeed like that. In this respect, the following example, related by another historian, Pachymer, is very remarkable. Once the emperor received an anonymous pamphlet, which contained a great many slander, including some slander and accusations against the emperor himself. What did Andronicus do? Someone else in his place would have torn up the manuscript without paying attention, or would have taken measures to find the slanderer. The king did not do so. Feeling innocent of the accusations brought against him, he decided to publicly read and expose the inventions of the pamphleteer. For this purpose, he gathers bishops, clerics, monks in the palace, and admits the people to the meeting. Here he examines paragraph by paragraph in the pamphlet. In this case, the emperor wants to act in his defense by word and reason, and not by the authority of power. [158] In our opinion, this act proves that the emperor really wanted to "weigh everything according to his conscience." The piety of Andronicus cannot be doubted either. In the sorrows and joys of life, he turns to God with prayer. He prayed especially fervently before the icon of the Mother of God, arranged solemn processions in honor of the Mother of God, and he himself set an example of the deepest reverence for the Heavenly Intercessor. [159] The restoration and decoration of temples was his favorite pastime; This he did with such generosity that the construction of new churches would not have required more expense than he had spent on the restoration and decoration of existing churches. [160] His zeal for piety explains why he showed such concern for the affairs of the Church and their well-being as few Byzantine emperors could boast of. Pachymerus says: "How close to the king's heart lay the affairs of the Church, how he cared for peace and tranquility, this is proved by many examples of the history of his reign." [161] It is true that this solicitude of the emperor seldom led to good results, but Andronicus is not to blame for this, with which Pachymerus, an impartial connoisseur of this reign, agrees. If it is true that the virtues of man are known in misfortunes, then we must recognize Andronicus as possessing high qualities of soul. At the end of his life he was dethroned by his grandson, Andronicus, and had to spend his life in oblivion and material deprivation. But the latter circumstance did not kill his inclination to generosity. Let us tell you two cases in which this inclination was expressed in a very vivid and self-sacrificing form. "Shortly before his death," says Gregora, "Andronicus needed a warm blanket because of his illness; The king had three gold coins in all the money, and it was on them that he had to make a purchase. But at this time, one of the servants tells him about his extreme poverty. Touched, the king gives him his last three coins." And here is another incident told by the same historian. One day, with his last money, he bought himself some sweet Arabian drink prescribed for him by the doctor. But before tasting the drink, one of the Emperor's servants asked him to help him in some way to alleviate his long-term illness. Having nothing, Andronicus gave him his drink. "So he was quick to help the suffering," says the historian, "and after death he had nothing left but debts." [163] It cannot be overlooked that, despite his many virtues, Andronicus had the defect that he was no less superstitious than the commoners. [164]

Without going into tiresome details about the other emperors who occupied the Byzantine throne in the fourteenth and first half of the fifteenth centuries, let us speak very briefly about the emperors of this time. The successor of Andronikos II, or the Elder, was his grandson Andronikos III, or the Younger (1328-1341), as he is called in contrast to his predecessor. Nothing good can be said about this Andronicus. In his youth, he stained himself with debauchery and showed himself disrespectful to his grandfather. His debauchery was the direct cause of the death of his brother Manuel and the indirect cause of his father, Michael. [165] He comes to such moral depravity that one day he comes to his grandfather in the palace with the intention of killing the latter, and only the tenderness of his grandfather stops his villainous intention. [166] What good can be expected from such a person? Of course, nothing. And indeed, his reign was the most miserable in all respects. He loved hunting and huntsmen more than the royal power itself. [167] Gregory points out some few good qualities in Andronicus the Younger,[168] but they pale before his moral laxity. Andronicus was a friend of Ioanncdes Cantacuzenus, that Cantacuzenus who later became Byzantine Emperor for a time (1347-1355). It is difficult to say on what basis this friendship was established, for there was nothing in common between Andronicus and Cantacuzenus. Andronicus's friend was of a completely different nature. Honesty, family virtues, piety, and remarkable diligence were the hallmarks of Kantakouzenos. [169]

Of the last Byzantine emperors – John, Manuel, again John and Constantine Palaiologos – it is hardly worth talking. They are sad images of religious and moral imperfections. [170] The only exception is Constantine Palaiologos, the last Byzantine emperor, but we shall have occasion to speak of him later.

Now let us report some information about the religious and moral state of Byzantine society as a whole in the same epoch (from the end of the eleventh to the middle of the fifteenth centuries) Byzantine historians, however stingy they may be in their remarks on the moral and religious life of the people, nevertheless give some interesting news in this respect; To this we will add the data found in other historical documents relating to the centuries we are studying. As we have seen, the religious and moral reputation of the Byzantine emperors was not enviable. From this we can safely conclude that the society itself was no better than the emperors. And this conclusion will be correct, because it is confirmed by historical facts. It is natural, therefore, that in our further narration the depiction of the ugly sides of life will occupy the most prominent place. [171]