Everything about Leo Vi The Wise totally explained
» This article is about the Byzantine Emperor. There is also an article on Pope Leo VI
Leo VI "the Wise" or "the Philosopher" (
Greek: Λέων ΣΤ΄,
Leōn VI), (
September 19,
866 –
May 11,
912) was
Byzantine emperor from 886 to 912 during one of the most brilliant periods of the state's history.
Background
Leo was born to
Eudokia Ingerina who was at the time mistress of Emperor
Michael III and wife of his
Caesar Basil. Which of the two men was his biological father is uncertain. Basil legally acknowledged as his son but his later treatment of Leo might suggest that he regarded Leo as Michael's son.
In
867, Michael was assassinated by Basil who succeeded him as Emperor
Basil I. As the second eldest son of the Emperor, Leo was associated on the throne in 870 and became the direct heir on the death of his older half-brother Constantine in 879. However, he and his father hated each other and Basil almost had Leo blinded as a teenager. On
August 29,
886, Basil died in a hunting accident, though he claimed on his deathbed that there was an
assassination attempt in which Leo was possibly involved.
Domestic policy
One of the first actions of Leo VI after his succession was the reburial of Michael III in
Constantinople, which may have contributed to the suspicion that he was Michael's son. Seeking political reconciliation, the new emperor secured the support of the officials in the capital, and surrounded himself with bureaucrats like Stylianos Zaoutzes and the eunuch Samonas. His attempts to control the great aristocratic families (for example, the Phokadai and the Doukai) occasionally led to serious conflicts. Leo also attempted to control the church through his appointments to the patriarchate. He dismissed the
Patriarch Photios of Constantinople, who had been his tutor, and replaced him with his own 19-year old brother
Stephen in December
886. On Stephen's death in
893, Leo replaced him with Zaoutzes' nominee, Antony II Kaleuas, who died in 901. Leo then promoted his own imperial secretary (
mystikos)
Nicholas, but replaced him with his spiritual father Euthymios in 907.
Leo completed work on the
Basilica, the
Greek translation and update of the
law code issued by
Justinian I, which had been started during the reign of Basil.
Bishop
Liutprand of Cremona gives an account similar to those related about caliph
Harun al-Rashid, stating that Leo would sometimes disguise himself and look for injustice or corruption. On one account, he was even captured by the city guards during one of his investigations. He wanted to know if the city patrol was doing its job appropriately. Late in the evening, he was walking alone and disguised. Though he bribed two patrols for 12 nomismata, and moved on, the third city patrol arrested him. When a terrified guardian recognized the jailed ruler in the morning, the arresting officer was rewarded for doing his duty, while the other patrols were dismissed and punished severely.
Foreign policy
Leo VI wasn't as successful in battle as Basil had been. In indulging his chief counselor Stylianos Zaoutzes, Leo provoked a war with
Simeon I of Bulgaria in 894, but was defeated. Bribing the
Magyars to attack the
Bulgarians from the north, Leo scored an indirect success in 895. However, deprived of his new allies, he lost the major
Battle of Boulgarophygon in 896 and had to make the required commercial concessions and to pay annual tribute.
The
Emirate of Sicily took
Taormina, the last Byzantine outpost on the island of
Sicily, in 902.
In 904 the renegade
Leo of Tripolis sacked
Thessalonica with his Muslim pirates (an event described in
The Capture of Thessalonica by
John Kameniates). In
907 Constantinople was attacked by the
Kievan Rus' under
Oleg of Novgorod, who was seeking favourable trading rights with the empire. Leo paid them off, but they attacked again in
911, and a
trade treaty was finally signed.
Fourth marriage dispute
Leo VI caused a major scandal with his numerous marriages which failed to produce a legitimate heir to the throne. His first wife
Theophano, whom Basil had forced him to marry, died in 897, and he married
Zoe Zaoutzaina, the daughter of his adviser Stylianos Zaoutzes, though she died as well in 899. Upon this marriage Leo created the title of
basileopatōr ("father of the emperor") for his father-in-law.
After Zoe's death a third marriage was technically illegal, but he married again, only to have his third wife
Eudokia Baïana die in 901. Instead of marrying a fourth time, which would have been an even greater sin than a third marriage (according to the Patriarch
Nicholas Mystikos) Leo took as mistress,
Zoe Karbonopsina. He married her only after she'd given birth to
a son in 905, but incurred the opposition of the patriarch. Replacing Nicholas Mystikos with Euthymios, Leo got his marriage recognized by the church, but opened up a conflict within it and allowed new grounds for
papal intervention into Byzantine affairs when he sought and obtained papal consent.
Succession
The future Constantine VII was the illegitimate son born before Leo's uncanonical fourth marriage to Zoe Karbonopsina. To strengthen his son's position as heir, Leo had him crowned as co-emperor on
May 15,
908, when he was only two years old. Leo VI died on
May 11,
912. He was succeeded by his younger brother
Alexander, who had reigned as emperor alongside his father and brother since 879.
Works
A collection of oracular poems and some short divinatory texts, at least in part based on earlier Greek sources, were attached to the emperor's name in later centuries.
He is credited with
translating the
relics of
St. Lazarus to Constantinople in the year
890. There are several
stichera (hymns) attributed to him which are chanted on
Lazarus Saturday in the
Eastern Orthodox Church.
Further Information
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