page_title: Principality of Theodoro
section_title: Princes of Theodoro
hierarchical_section_title: Principality of Theodoro / Princes of Theodoro
caption_attribution_description: Stone with simbols of Theodoro principality in Funa fortress, Crimea
context_page_description: The Principality of Theodoro, also known as Gothia or the Principality of Theodoro-Mangup, was a Greek-speaking
  principality in the south-west of Crimea. It represented both the final rump-state of the Byzantine Empire and the last territorial vestige of the Crimean Goths until its conquest by the Ottoman Turks in 1475. Its capital was Doros, also sometimes called Theodoro and now known as Mangup. The state was closely allied with the Empire of Trebizond.
context_section_description: The historian Alexander Vasiliev identifies the first prince as Demetrios, attested at the Battle of Blue Waters in c. 1362/3. According to Vasiliev, he is possibly to be identified with the hekatontarches Khuitani, who erected the stone inscription mentioning the name "Theodoro" on the walls of Mangup at about the same time.
  The princes following after Demetrios are known solely through Russian sources. The prince Stephen ("Stepan Vasilyevich Khovra"), emigrated to Moscow in 1391 or 1402 along with his son Gregory. His patronymic implies the existence of a father named Basil, who possibly preceded him as prince (and was in turn possibly Demetrios' son). Stephen and Gregory became monks, and Gregory later founded the Simonov Monastery in Moscow. The Russian noble families of Khovrin and Golovin claimed descent from them. In Gothia, Stephen was succeeded by another son, Alexios I, who ruled until his death in 1444–45 or 1447. Alexios' heir was his eldest son John, who was married to Maria Asanina, a lady connected to the Byzantine imperial dynasty of the Palaiologoi and the noble lines of Asanes and Tzamplakon. The couple had a son, also named Alexios, who died young c. 1446/7, probably at Trebizond. His epitaph, titled "To the Prince's son" (τῷ Αὐθεντοπούλῳ), was composed by John Eugenikos and offers unique genealogical data on the family. John's reign appears to have been very short, or he may indeed not have reigned at all – A. Vasiliev speculates that he left Gothia for Trebizond as soon as Alexios I died – so another son of Alexios I, Olubei, succeeded as prince in c. 1447 and ruled until c. 1458. A daughter of Alexios I, Maria of Gothia, became in 1426 the first wife of the last Trapezuntine emperor, David.
  Olubei is no longer mentioned after c. 1458, and no princes are known by name for some while; Genoese documents only mention "the lord of Theodoro and his brothers" (dominus Tedori et fratres ejus). In 1465, prince Isaac is mentioned, probably Olubei's son and hence possibly reigning already since c. 1458. In the face of the mounting Ottoman danger, he engaged in a rapprochement with the Genoese at Caffa and wed his sister Maria Asanina Palaiologina to Stephen the Great, ruler of Moldavia. His increasingly pro-Ottoman stance in later years, however, led to his overthrow by his brother Alexander, with Stephen the Great's backing. This came too late to save Theodoro: in December 1475, after conquering the other Christian strongholds along the Crimean coast, the Ottomans captured the city after a three-month siege. Alexander and his family were taken captive to Constantinople, where the prince was beheaded. His son was forcibly converted to Islam, and his wife and daughters became part of the Sultan's harem.
caption: Stone inscription of the Principality at the fortress of Funa
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