Warning! My depiction below will be graphic and those who has strong objection is advised not to continue further. And like before please don’t take it too seriously, this is only a popular history. I shamelessly cut and paste the pieces from Wikipedia and roman-emperors.com.
Like many kingdoms before and after it, Byzantine also had its moments of glory and darkness. But under the Komnenos dynasty (1081 – 1185) Contantinople once again reached a new height. With a population of almost 1 million people, and the vast amount of wealth gained from the trades, Constantinople can be considered as the first cosmopolitan city in the history. It didn’t hurt that the first crusade had successfully gained territory in the Middle East, since more trade opportunities arouse from the conquest.
One of the most brilliant kings from this dynasty is Manuel Komnenos. He continued conquering territories enlarging the empire and maintained a solid, well-functioning government to administer the vassals. Manuel had a cousin in the name of Prince Andronikos Komnenos which was very close to him. Andronikos is a fascinating character. He was reportedly handsome and eloquent, but also immoral. He was courageous, a great general and an able politician.
Most of the life of Andronikos was spent on womanizing. He left no chances and slept with all kind of women; from street prostitute to noble ladies, from 12-years old to older women. When he wasn’t busy bedding woman, he was entertaining his imperial ambition by continuously trying to take the throne from his own cousin. As a result, most of his life was also spent in exile far from Constantinople. He avoided harsher punishment only because Manuel’s repeated pardons. But Andronikos was not a man of compassion, as we can see below.
Manuel died in 1180 and left the throne to his 11 years-old son: Alexius II Porphyrogenitus, who ruled under the guardianship of the empress Maria of Antioch and her lover the Protosebastos Alexius. She didn’t rule wisely and her conduct displeased the population, who turned to Andronikos for an alternative, which gave him a pretext to step in.
And then, here’s an excerpt from the chronicle of Nikeas Choniates (1155-1215)
“Andronikos marched to the capital in 1182. The Protosebastos was blinded and Andronikos took further measures to consolidate his own position: poisoning Maria Porphyrogenita (Alexius II’s older sister) and her husband Kaiser Renier of Montferrat, having Maria of Antioch accused on a charge of treason and strangled. Finally, once he had been declared co-emperor with Alexius II, having the boy throttled with a bowstring. The reign of terror had begun”
A chilling way to start your reign. Surprisingly Andronikos was a popular ruler among the commoners, because he reformed taxes and continuously provided money for the poor. But to the nobles he was tyrannical and cruel. He was fearful that they might take his throne, no doubt because he had tried similar thing. Those suspected of treason were punished by blinding / gouging, impaling, roasting, mutilating and many other forms of horrendous torture.
His reign didn’t last long. In 1185 a popular noble revolt overthrown him. What awaited Andronikos was horrible. Again, an excerpt from the chronicle of Nikeas.
“He was confined in the prison of Anemas. Then he was paraded in front of the new emperor Isaac. His beard was torn out, his head shaved, teeth pulled out and he was made the sport of those who were present, being battered even by women whose husbands he had executed or had blinded.
Finally, his right hand was cut off with an axe, and several days later one of his eyes was gouged out and he was seated on a camel and paraded in the marketplace. Further indignities followed, including blows on the head from clubs and befouling of his nostrils with cow dung and the like. He was pelted with stones and one prostitute poured a pot of hot water over his face. He was led into the arena, and suspended by his feet.
Despite all these indignities, however, Andronicus held up bravely and remained speechless, not uttering a single moan. Worse followed, with assaults on his genitals. Some were trying to put the lump of what had been his right hand into his mouth. And then there was the thrust of a sword down his throat and further wounds, resulting in an agonizing death. The Constantinopolitan populace had by now had their fill of Andronicus' tyranny and cruelty”
The graphical account of the cruelty made me dizzy even now, long after the first time I read that. Let me ask you this: have you ever known any other species conduct such cruelties toward their own kind? To torture their own kind out of hatred? Whoever says that human is created in perfection from the image of God must be either wrong (or insane), or has long admitted that there’s a shade of evil in God’s image.
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