Alexios IV of Trebizond

Alexios IV Megas Komnenos or Alexius IV (Greek: Αλέξιος Δ΄ Μέγας Κομνηνός, "Alexios IV Megas Komnēnos"), (1382 – 1429), Emperor of Trebizond from March 5, 1417 to October 1429. He was the son of Emperor Manuel III and Gulkhan-Eudokia of Georgia.

Reign

Alexios IV had been associated in authority and given the title of despotes by his father as early as 1395. Nevertheless, the two quarreled as Alexios was impatient to assume supreme power. When his father died in 1417, Alexios was accused by some of having expedited his death. He inherited a conflict with the Genoese, who defeated the fleet of Trebizond and seized a local monastery, which they converted into a fortress. By 1418 he had signed a peace agreement and paid reparations to the Genoese until 1422. A new dispute arose over the emperor's obligations in 1425 and was not resolved until 1428. Relations with the Republic of Venice were generally better.

After the death of Tamerlane, most of Asia Minor descended into chaos. Kara Yusuf, ruler of the Kara Koyunlu or "Black Sheep" Turks, devastated much of Armenia and defeated the Emir of Arsinga and the chieftain of the Ak Koyunlu or White Sheep Turks. Alexios sought to avoid hostility by marrying off daughters to his powerful Muslim neighbors. One married Kara Yusuf's son Jihan Shah in c. 1420, and Alexios agreed to pay his son-in-law the same amount of tribute that had previously been due to Tamerlane. Another daughter perhaps married 'Ali, the son of Kara Yülük Osman, the ruler of Ak Koyunlu. Though Osman himself was likely the groom.

Alexios' marital policy also extended to his Christian neighbors, and his daughter Maria of Trebizond was married off to the Byzantine Emperor John VIII Palaiologos in 1428. Her sister Eudokia had married Niccolò Crispo, the Italian lord of Syros - they became the biological grandparents of Catherine Cornaro.

According to George Finlay, Alexios IV spent much of his time in pursuit of pleasure and accomplished relatively little, but this like so many of that historian's passages is a figment of his imagination, for which there is no evidence in contemporary sources. Following tradition, he associated his eldest son, John IV, in power, and conferred on him the courtly title of despotes in 1417. Bad relations between father and son were perhaps also becoming traditional, and in 1426 John murdered the Treasurer, alleging an affair between him and the Empress Theodora Kantakouzene, and attempted to eliminate his parents. The nobles prevented the attempt and John fled to Georgia.

When Alexios IV's wife Theodora died in 1426, he was so distraught that Bessarion wrote him no less than three monodias, which help to shed some light on this otherwise dark period lacking in sources.

After his son John's lack of familiar affection, Alexios IV made his younger son Alexander despotes and married him off to Maria Gattilusio, a daughter of Dorino of Lesbos. Eventually John left Georgia for the Genoese colony at Caffa, where he enlisted a galley and its crew to help him recover his position in Trebizond. Alexios IV marched out to resist his son, but was murdered during the night by nobles who had been won over by John, sometime in October 1429. Alexander of Trebizond according to our source for the period Laonicus Chalcondyles fled either to his father-in-law or Constantinople.

Marriage and children

In 1395, Alexios married Theodora Kantakouzene. Her parents were Theodore Kantakouzenos and Euphrosyne Palaiologina. They would have at least five children [ [http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/TREBIZOND.htm#AlexiosIVTrebizondB Profile of Alexios IV and his children in "Medieval Lands" by Charles Cawley] ] :

*John IV of Trebizond (c. 1403 - 1459).
*Maria of Trebizond (c. 1404 - 1439). Married John VIII Palaiologos.
*Alexander of Trebizond. Co-Emperor with his father. Married Maria Gattilusio, a daughter of Dorino of Lesbos.
*David of Trebizond (c. 1408 - 1463).
*A daughter. Married Jahan Shah.

Two further daughters have been attributed by later genealogies [ [http://genealogy.euweb.cz/byzant/byzant2.html#MMK Listing of the Megaloi Komnenoi of Trebizond] ] Both have also been attributed to John IV. [ [http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/TREBIZOND.htm#AlexiosIVTrebizondB Profile of Alexios IV and his children in "Medieval Lands" by Charles Cawley] ] . They are :
*Theodora of Trebizond, wife of Kara Yülük Osman
*Eudokia-Valenza of Trebizond, wife of Niccolò Crispo, Lord of Syros.

References

*W. Miller, "Trebizond: The Last Greek Empire of the Byzantine Era", Chicago, 1926.

External links

* [http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/TREBIZOND.htm#AlexiosIVTrebizondB His listing in "Medieval lands" by Charles Cawley.]
* [http://genealogy.euweb.cz/byzant/byzant2.html#MMK A listing of the Megas Komnenos line, including Alexios]