Empire of Trebizond

• 1. Introduction

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  Cervantes described the hero of Don Quixote as imagining himself "already crowned at least Emperor of Trebizond." Rabelais gave the same ambition to his character Picrochole, the ruler of Piedmont, who declared he wanted to be Emperor of Trebizond. Two of the most celebrated writers of the sixteenth century reached for the same distant city as the symbol of impossible glory. The Empire of Trebizond was a Byzantine successor state that held a narrow strip of the Black Sea coast for more than two centuries. Its reputation stretched far beyond its borders. In Italian, the expression perdere la Trebisonda means to be bewildered. Trebizond gave that phrase to the language because sailors could reach it from every direction across the Black Sea. It was a reliable shelter when storms came. How did such a small state acquire that kind of legendary standing? How did it outlast Constantinople itself? And what combination of geography, trade wealth, and diplomacy kept it alive for so long?

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• 2. The Brothers Komnenos

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  Alexios Komnenos was proclaimed emperor at Trebizond in April 1204, at the age of twenty-two. He and his brother David were the grandsons of Andronikos I Komnenos, the last Komnenian Byzantine emperor. Their father Manuel had been blinded - the traditional Byzantine punishment for treason - and died not long after. The brothers eventually found refuge at the court of their relative, Queen Tamar of Georgia.

  Tamar gave them troops to march on Byzantine territory. Why she did so has been disputed by historians ever since. Alexander Vasiliev argued she intended to create a buffer state to protect Georgia from the Seljuk Turks. Michel Kurskanskis believed the brothers wanted to depose the reigning emperor and restore the Komnenos dynasty to Constantinople. Both agreed on one shared motive, however. Emperor Alexios III Angelos had stolen gifts that Tamar sent with a group of monks passing through Constantinople.

  The brothers marched from Georgia and occupied Trebizond in April 1204. Vasiliev noted that they had begun marching before the Crusaders' Sack of Constantinople on the 13th of April 1204 could have reached them. News of that sack could not have arrived in either Trebizond or Georgia in time. That timing suggested their original goal was a new domain carved from Byzantine territory, not a rescue mission for the lost capital.

  The Gabras family had governed Trebizond for generations before the Komnenoi arrived, minting their own coinage while nominally part of the Byzantine Empire. Anna Komnene recorded that Theodore Gabras treated Trebizond and its hinterlands as "a prize which had fallen to his own lot." Emperor Alexios I Komnenos confirmed him as governor but kept his son at Constantinople as a hostage.

  Alexios I of Trebizond ruled his new empire for eighteen years before dying in February 1222. The historian Sergey Karpov identified a lead seal of Alexios that he interpreted as marking the date of the conquest. Karpov proposed the 23rd of April 1204 - the feast day of Saint George, two days before Easter that year.

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• 3. The Silk Road Dividend

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  In 1258, Hulagu Khan destroyed Baghdad, and the western terminus of the Silk Road shifted north toward the Black Sea. Trebizond, at the southeastern corner of that sea, found itself the natural gateway between Asia and European markets. Marco Polo passed through the city on his return to Europe in 1295. He was one of many western travelers who used Trebizond as their starting point for journeys into Asia.

  Genoese and Venetian merchants paid taxes on goods transiting Trebizond, forming one pillar of the empire's economy. The surrounding hills yielded Pontic silver, copper, and alum, while the agricultural hinterland produced wine and hazelnuts for export. Manuel I, who ruled from 1238 to 1263, captured Sinope in 1254. He was the first Trapezuntine ruler to issue silver coins, known as aspers.

  The historian Anthony Bryer cautioned against viewing Trebizond as a purely mercantile state. By his calculation, as much as three quarters of an emperor's income came from land. That income flowed either directly from imperial estates or indirectly from taxes on other properties. The trade revenues were substantial by Byzantine standards, but land remained the dominant base.

  The Pontic Alps formed a southern barrier that limited Turkish and Turkmen raids to a volume the emperors could manage. The empire controlled the coast from the mouth of the Yesilirmak, a region the Trapezuntines called Limnia. Its eastern reach extended possibly as far as Akampsis, a zone then known as Lazia. Anthony Bryer also argued that six of the seven banda of the Chaldia theme remained in working order until the empire's end.

  The long reign of Alexios II, from 1297 to 1330, brought a period of prosperity and influence. For a time around the 1310s, the city of Erzurum also fell under Trapezuntine occupation. The death of Alexios II in 1330 opened a turbulent period of repeated depositions and assassinations that would test every resource the empire possessed.

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• 4. The Roman Title

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  In the mid-thirteenth century, the scholar George Pachymeres would not call the rulers of Trebizond emperors. He referred to them as princes of the Laz. A century later, Demetrios Kydones argued that Constantinople had simply granted Trebizond its state. For the emperors in the city, Trebizond was at best a rebellious vassal that had broken loose and proclaimed itself.

  Alexios Komnenos, Trebizond's founder, adopted the title "Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans." His rivals in Nicaea and Epirus used the same style. For decades after the Nicaean reconquest of Constantinople in 1261, Trebizond's rulers continued to press their claim. They styled themselves the rightful heirs to Rome.

  In 1282, John II Komnenos chose a different path. He stripped off his imperial regalia before the walls of Constantinople itself. Then he entered the city to marry the daughter of Michael VIII Palaiologos. He accepted the subordinate legal title of despot. His successors, however, refused to abandon the imperial style entirely. They adopted a reformulated version: "Emperor and Autocrat of the entire East, of the Iberians and the Perateia." This title lasted until the empire's end.

  The Megas Komnenoi, the Great Komnenoi, never formally renounced the Roman imperial claim. Even as Constantinople changed hands around them, they maintained that their dynasty held the truest line of succession. A brief period of stability followed under Basil, who ruled from 1332 to 1340. After his reign ended, the factions that had long divided the court moved toward open conflict.

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• 5. The Princesses of Trebizond

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  Donald Nicol recorded the empire's most lasting reputation in one observation: "Most of the emperors were blessed with a progeny of marriageable daughters." He added that "the beauty of the ladies of Trebizond was as legendary as the wealth of their dowries." The marriages of Trebizond's princesses were among the empire's most durable survival tools.

  Two factions divided Trebizond during the crisis that followed: the Scholaroi, identified as pro-Byzantine, and the Amytzantarantes, representing the interests of the native archontes. The years 1347 to 1348 marked the worst of this lawless period. Turkish forces took advantage of the disorder, conquering Oinaion and besieging Trebizond. The Genoese seized Kerasus. The Black Death, spreading outward from Caffa, ravaged Trebizond and other Pontic cities. Emperor Michael abdicated in 1349 in favor of his nephew Alexios III. Alexios III gradually brought both factions under control, and under his rule the city was regarded as a wealthy and artistically distinguished center.

  It was under Alexios III that the strategy of marrying the imperial princesses to neighboring Turkish dynasts began in earnest. A daughter with a generous dowry could buy peace along a border that no army could permanently hold.

  Alexios IV, who ruled from 1417 to 1429, took the practice furthest. He gave one daughter to Jihan Shah, khan of the Kara Koyunlu, and another to Ali Beg, khan of the Ak Koyunlu. His eldest daughter Maria became the third wife of the Byzantine Emperor John VIII Palaiologos.

  John IV, who ruled from 1429 to 1459, gave his daughter Theodora, also called Despina Khatun, to a son of Uzun Hasan. Uzun Hasan was khan of the Ak Koyunlu and promised in return to defend Trebizond. The reach of those marriages extended further than anyone anticipated. Ismail I of the Safavid dynasty of Iran was Theodora's grandson. The Safavid rulers were, from the dynasty's very beginning, of partial Pontic Greek ancestry.

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• 6. The Ottoman Endgame

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  Ottoman Sultan Murad II launched the first direct assault on Trebizond by sea in 1442. High surf made the landings difficult, and the attempt was repulsed. Fourteen years later, while Murad's son Mehmed II was besieging Belgrade, the Ottoman governor of Amasya attacked Trebizond from the east. His forces were defeated, but they took many prisoners and extracted a heavy tribute.

  David, the last emperor, responded by reaching out to European powers. He spoke of schemes that included the conquest of Jerusalem. Mehmed II heard of these intrigues. David then made the situation worse by demanding that Mehmed remit the tribute his brother John IV had agreed to pay.

  Mehmed's response came in the summer of 1461. He collected a sizable army at Bursa and marched, in a surprise move, directly on Sinope. Its emir surrendered quickly. Mehmed then moved south across eastern Anatolia to cut off Uzun Hasan. With that alliance severed, he swept down on Trebizond before the inhabitants knew he was coming.

  David surrendered on the 15th of August 1461 after the city had held out for a month. He and his family were taken into captivity. The Despotate of Epirus had been occupied by the restored Byzantine Empire around 1340. It then passed to Serbian rule and later to Italian rulers, falling to the Ottomans in 1479. Trebizond had outlasted them all.

  The Principality of Theodoro in Crimea, an offshoot of Trebizond, held out for another fourteen years. On the 30th of December 1475, it too fell to Ottoman forces.

  The diocese of Trebizond itself outlasted the empire. Under Ottoman rule, it continued to operate well into the seventeenth century. The diocese of Rizaion was eventually abolished as the Laz population converted to Islam; the diocese of Cerasous likely followed for similar reasons.

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