Peter of Aliphas | |
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House | Petraliphas |
Religion | Christianity |
Peter Aliphas was an 11th-century Frankish knight who served first under Robert Guiscard and later under the Byzantine Empire.
Peter Aliphas is typically identified with the Provençal knight Peter of Aulps although some consider him to be related to Robert of Caiazzo who was also lord of Alife in Southern Italy. [1]
Peter took part in Robert Guiscard's invasion of the Balkan against the Byzantine Empire in 1081. He was the second-in-command to the Count of Brienne who had been assigned to hold the town of Kastoria. The Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos besieged the town in October 1083 and after storming the gates the Count of Brienne surrendered and Peter among many others entered Byzantine services. [2] [3] Alexios' daughter Anna Komnene later described him as "a glorious warrior in battle and faithful to the emperor". [1]
Peter accompanied the army of the First Crusade during its campaign in Anatolia in the Byzantine contingent of general Tatikios and became governor of Placentia. [4] He left his post in 1098 and met Emperor Alexios together with Stephen of Blois in Philomelium, warning him that a huge army of Turks was approaching, thus making Alexios turn away from relieving the Franks at the siege of Antioch. [5] Peter appeared again in the Balkans in 1107 when he assisted emperor Alexios fighting the invasion of Bohemond of Antioch and was a witness for Alexios to the Treaty of Devol. [5] Peter settled finally in Didymoteichon in Thrace. [6]
The descendants of Peter Aliphas became the Petraliphas family, a prominent family in later Byzantine history.
Alexios I Komnenos, Latinized as Alexius I Comnenus, was Byzantine emperor from 1081 to 1118. Inheriting a collapsing empire and faced with constant warfare during his reign, Alexios was able to curb the Byzantine decline and begin the military, financial, and territorial recovery known as the Komnenian restoration. His appeals to Western Europe for help against the Seljuk Turks were the catalyst that sparked the First Crusade. Although he was not the first emperor of the Komnenian dynasty, it was during his reign that the Komnenos family came to full power and initiated a hereditary succession to the throne.
Year 1083 (MLXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar.
Manuel I Komnenos, Latinized as Comnenus, also called Porphyrogenitus, was a Byzantine emperor of the 12th century who reigned over a crucial turning point in the history of Byzantium and the Mediterranean. His reign saw the last flowering of the Komnenian restoration, during which the Byzantine Empire experienced a resurgence of military and economic power and enjoyed a cultural revival.
John II Komnenos or Comnenus was Byzantine emperor from 1118 to 1143. Also known as "John the Beautiful" or "John the Good", he was the eldest son of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos and Irene Doukaina and the second emperor to rule during the Komnenian restoration of the Byzantine Empire. As he was born to a reigning emperor, he had the status of a porphyrogennetos. John was a pious and dedicated monarch who was determined to undo the damage his empire had suffered following the Battle of Manzikert, half a century earlier.
The Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) was a Latin Christian armed expedition called by Pope Innocent III. The stated intent of the expedition was to recapture the Muslim-controlled city of Jerusalem, by first defeating the powerful Egyptian Ayyubid Sultanate. However, a sequence of economic and political events culminated in the Crusader army's 1202 siege of Zara and the 1204 sack of Constantinople, rather than the conquest of Egypt as originally planned. This led to the Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae or the partition of the Byzantine Empire by the Crusaders and their Venetian allies leading to a period known as Frankokratia, or "Rule of the Franks" in Greek.
Baldwin II, also known as Baldwin of Courtenay, was the last Latin Emperor ruling from Constantinople.
Bohemond I of Antioch, also known as Bohemond of Taranto or Bohemond of Hauteville, was the prince of Taranto from 1089 to 1111 and the prince of Antioch from 1098 to 1111. He was a leader of the First Crusade, leading a contingent of Normans on the quest eastward. Knowledgeable about the Byzantine Empire through earlier campaigns with his father, he was the most experienced military leader of the crusade.
The Treaty of Deabolis was an agreement made in 1108 between Bohemond I of Antioch and Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos, in the wake of the First Crusade. It is named after the Byzantine fortress of Deabolis. Although the treaty was not immediately enforced, it was intended to make the Principality of Antioch a vassal state of the Byzantine Empire.
The Battle of Dyrrhachium took place on October 18, 1081 between the Byzantine Empire, led by the Emperor Alexios I Komnenos, and the Normans of southern Italy under Robert Guiscard, Duke of Apulia and Calabria. The battle was fought outside the city of Dyrrhachium, the major Byzantine stronghold in the western Balkans, and ended in a Norman victory.
The Alexiad is a medieval historical and biographical text written around the year 1148, by the Byzantine princess Anna Komnene, daughter of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. It was written in a form of artificial Attic Greek. Anna described the political and military history of the Byzantine Empire during the reign of her father, thus providing a significant account on the Byzantium of the High Middle Ages. Among other topics, the Alexiad documents the Byzantine Empire's interaction with the Crusades and highlights the conflicting perceptions of the East and West in the early 12th century. It does not mention the schism of 1054 – a topic which is very common in contemporary writing. It documents firsthand the decline of Byzantine cultural influence in eastern and western Europe, particularly in the West's increasing involvement in its geographic sphere. The Alexiad was paraphrased in vernacular medieval Greek in mid-14th century to increase its readability, which testifies to the work's lasting interest.
Tatikios or Taticius was an Eastern Roman general of Turkish origin during the reign of Alexios I Komnenos. His name is also rendered as Tetigus, Tatizius, Tatitius, Tatic, or Tetig.
Constantine Doukas or Ducas was Byzantine junior emperor from 1074 to 1078, and again from 1081 to 1087. He was born to Emperor Michael VII Doukas and Empress Maria of Alania in about 1074, and elevated to junior emperor probably in the same year. He was junior emperor until 1078, when Michael VII was replaced by Nikephoros III Botaneiates. Because Constantine was not made junior emperor under Nikephoros III, his betrothal to Olympias, the daughter of Robert Guiscard, was broken, which Robert Guiscard used as a pretext to invade the Byzantine Empire. John Doukas forced Nikephoros to abdicate in favor of Alexios I Komnenos in 1081, and shortly afterwards Alexios elevated Constantine to junior emperor. Constantine married Alexios's daughter Anna Komnene, and remained junior emperor until 1087, when Alexios had a son, John II Komnenos. Constantine died in c. 1095.
The Komnenian restoration is the term used by historians to describe the military, financial, and territorial recovery of the Byzantine Empire under the Komnenian dynasty, from the accession of Alexios I Komnenos in 1081 to the death of Andronikos I Komnenos in 1185. At the onset of the reign of Alexios I, the empire was reeling from its defeat by the Seljuk Turks at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071. The empire was also being threatened by the Normans of Robert Guiscard, who were invading the Balkans from their base in southern Italy. All this occurred as the empire's military institution was in disarray and had grown increasingly reliant on mercenaries. Previous emperors had also squandered the large gold deposits of Constantinople, so the defense of the empire had broken down, and there were few troops to fill the gaps.
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