Theodore III Laskaris

## Theodore III LaskarisΘεόδωρος Γ΄ Λάσκαρις

Fresco of Theodore III in the Pantognostis monastery, by Manuel Panselinos

**Theodore III Melissenos Laskaris** (Greek: Θεόδωρος Γ΄ Μελισσηνός Λάσκαρις *Theodōros III Melissenos Laskaris*, born 1 February 1290, Constantinople) is the current Byzantine emperor.

He succeeded to the throne following the Constantinople bread riots of 1313, which led to his father Romanos VI's overthrow by the hand of Theodore's mother, Eudoxia Laskarina. Although Eudoxia, as co-empress, dominated much of her son's reign, Theodore III was deeply involved with religious affairs as a supporter of his dethroned uncle, the former emperor John IV Laskaris, and the Eusebian movement. During his reign he convened the controversial and influential Council of Nymphaeum and oversaw the creation and implementation of the *Exétasis.*

## Early Life

Theodore III was born as the eldest son of Romanos VI Melissenos and Eudoxia Laskarina. His father was the grandson of Romanos V Melissenos, who had come to the throne following the unexpected death of Skantarios Laskaris at the Battle of Seleucia, and his mother the daughter of Theodore II Laskaris. From birth, Theodore was an important instrument to legitimize the rule of the Melissenid dynasty, whose rulers were unpopular and who were perceived as illegitimate usurpers by the population of Constantinople, who supported the Laskaris family instead. Theodore III received the name of his maternal grandfather to blurry the lines between Laskaris and Melissenos and help strengthen Melissenid rule. Due to his heritage, he was raised from birth as a future emperor. Shortly after the death of Romanos V, he was raised to the position of junior co-emperor and crowned in the Hagia Sophia, at age two.

His mother, Empress Eudoxia, arranged a scholarly education for him, in accordance with Laskarid traditions, and in his adolescence Theodore III was tutored by the brilliant Byzantine scholar Nikephoros Choumnos, himself a former pupil of the late Ecumenical Patriarch Gregory II (who had in turn studied under George Akropolites). His father's efforts to develop his son's martial prowess were unsuccessful, partially because of young Theodore's fragile health as a child and his still frail constitution as an adult. Significantly, Theodore suffered from recurring epilepsy from an early age, and his frequent seizures have made him wary of the public eye and outdoor activities, such as hunting and *tzykanion*.

Nonetheless, in spite of his education, Theodore III became no scholar, although it would be incorrect to state that he was not a patron of the letters and the lettered, as he continued to perform the traditional Laskarid patronage of the arts throughout his life. His frailty, illness and general disinterest in public life and martial affairs made him a private and introverted young man, in an eerie retelling of his uncle John IV Laskaris' reign, which was a cause of concern for his mother, who had witnessed John IV's fall. Theodore, as a young adult, was particularly interested in the mysteries of astronomy and alchemy, finding a greater calling in science than in his namesake Theodore II's political and natural philosophy.. The exception to this rule would be Theodore III's interest in theology. Although he was not as prolific a writer as his grandfather before him, Theodore III would author treatises on theological matters, while the imperial court would become a safe haven for theologians and doctors of the Church, who had found no favor in the reign of Romanos VI.

## Reign

Theodore III became senior emperor, sharing joint rule with his mother Eudoxia, in August 1312, when riots in Constantinople over the high price of bread spiraled out of control and quickly plunged the city into chaos and devastation, with the popular demand being the overthrow of the incumbent emperor, Romanos VI Melissenos. Faced with popular anger, Empress Eudoxia, who still retained her popularity with the masses, staged a palace coup which dethroned Romanos VI and installed her son in his place. While Theodore III was acclaimed as senior emperor by the Constantinopolitan mob, his father was sent into monastic exile on the Princes' Island, where he died of depression the following year.

The overthrow of his father by his own unwilling hand deeply disturbed young Theodore III in the beginning of his reign, grief and guilt which only intensified after Romanos' death in exile. The contemporary Byzantine historian Pachymeres claims that Theodore was determined to resolve the spiritual disturbance that had infected the empire, accrediting his father's overthrow and death to the rising religious tensions within the country that Romanos VI had refused to properly address. Leaving the imperial administration to his mother and ministers, Theodore III moved his household to the Laskarid imperial winter residence of Nymphaion, a palatial town next to Smyrna, and announced the convening of an episcopal synod and Church council. At the time, he invited the leader of the Eusebian movement, his uncle the monk and deposed emperor John-Eusebios Laskaris, to the palace. An accomplished scholar and theologian, John-Eusebios became Theodore III's tutor and teacher in theological matters for a short time, which however left a deep impression in the young emperor.

The Council of Nymphaeum took the remainder of 1312 and almost all of 1313 to be concluded, during which time Theodore III divided his time between the palaces at Smyrna, Magnesia and Theodoropolis, although Nymphaion remained his main residence. The Nymphene creed, the final document of the Council, set the tone for religious life and debate in the Byzantine 14th century, with the consolidation of hesychasm as church doctrine, the rejection of notions of holy wars, the forced christianization of Muslim Turks and consequentially the establishment of the *Exétasis*. An unpopular union with the Armenian Church was also successfully negotiated at the Council of Nymphaeum, which re-organized the chaotic religious administration of Cilician Armenia (which Romanos VI had neglected), but which would take time to be spiritually implemented among Armenian Christians.

### Religious and Anatolian policy

As a consequence of the outcome of the Council of Nymphaeum, religious strife among Byzantine Christians decreased during Theodore III's reign. However, the Nymphene creed introduced the novel problem of crypto-Muslims for Byzantine state to handle, i.e. former Muslims who had publicly converted to Christianity, but privately maintained their faith, who ranked in the thousands in post-Nymphaeum Anatolia. The Byzantine state was at first unsuited to deal with this new issue, but eventually developed institutions during Theodore III's and his successors' reigns that were able to successfully police the Anatolian inhabitants of the empire to suppress crypto-Muslims

Theodore III has been the target of severe criticism by modern historians and even medieval humanists of his time for the violence and brutality with which he handled religious affairs in the Anatolian half of the empire. Although few crypto-Muslims would be ultimately executed by the *Exétasis*, the new department of imperial administration effectively installed what could be called a confessional police state in central and Eastern Anatolia, creating social unrest under a reign of fear and terror, which deeply divided the local communities and gave the Orthodox Church a vast amount of influence over the region. Furthermore, in time the *Exétasis* outgrew its original religious purpose and became an intelligence-gathering and spying and counter-spying agency in the service of the Byzantine state that eventually began to target the Christian population of Anatolia itself, becoming an indispensable instrument of imperial authority and enforcement in the region already in Theodore III's reign.

Furthermore, Theodore III's post-Nymphaeum religious policy has also come under deep scrutiny for its practices and activities, which, modern scholars have noted, amounted to little else than religious persecution, religious and political violence, forced deportation and, in extreme cases, ethnic cleansing, especially through the mass expulsion and exodus of Turkish Muslims from central and Eastern Anatolia in the beginning of Theodore III's reign, to enforce the Nymphene creed and to violently seize possession of the lands and property of the former Muslim Turkish landowners. Indeed, in his final writings Pachymeres rebelliously wrote that imperial authorities were not allowing many Turkish landowners and local rulers to convert, instead confiscating their estates for the State and the Church and expelling them from the empire.

In the wake of the Nymphene creed, much of Theodore III's reign would be plagued by the problems that arose from mass deportation (in addition to the previously mentioned issues with crypto-Muslims): underpopulation, increased indefensibility of the Eastern frontier, localized economic crisis resulting from land speculation and the disruption of local production, increased raiding and banditry, and chaos in the Purple Horde, which undermined the Eastern provinces in Anatolia. Famine, too, was a problem in the first years following Nymphaeum, as the forced conversion had been more successful with the urban population of Anatolia rather than the rural population, who were expelled from their homes and had their property seized by the state or the Church.

In the following years, Theodore III would promote a re-settling program that moved the local population from the region's large urban areas, such as Iconium, Ancyra and Caesarea. The population exchange programs did not only involve Byzantine Turks, but also (and, in several cases, most of all) Christian refugees from beyond the Danube, fleeing the Teutonic Order's reign of terror, and from the land of the Rus. To a lesser extent, the re-population efforts involved the purchase of Christian Rus slaves, in cooperation with the Jochid Sultanate, which drew contemporary criticism for Theodore III for his collaboration with Jochid oppression of the Christian Rus. Nonetheless, the Black Sea slave trade thrived in the first half of the fourteenth century because of Theodore III's state-sponsored importation of Rus and Circassian slaves. On the other hand, the Cumans were another people to greatly (and voluntarily) benefit from the population exchange, settling much of the Anatolian plateau and mountains and becoming a competent counter-raiding local force, supported by the imperial military structure.