Fall 1058 to Summer 1059
Keroularios knew well how to blaze up a smoldering fire. The people of the city, unhappy about Isaac's higher taxes, made a great show of begging the patriarch for his blessing when he passed through the streets, while Isaac dared not venture beyond the Great Palace walls without a guard. Keroularios would use any conversation, any sermon as an excuse to blame all the empire's problems on Emperor Isaac.
The patriarch did not again wear the forbidden purple garments, but paraded through the city as though he ruled, not Isaac. Never before had any patriarch made such an effort to overthrow an emperor. I could not sleep many nights with worrying that mobs might storm the Great Palace.
Keroularios had to be the most popular patriarch in decades. He had a distinguished demeanor and a beguiling influence. He strutted through the streets in his golden robes at the slightest excuse, wearing a beatific expression that belied his worldly ambitions. Priests surrounded him carrying icons and images of saints emblazoned on banners, sprinkling holy water as they passed the pious crowds.
Did Keroularios play chess? He was playing to win but had only pawns. Bishops, though powerful pieces, could not win without knights and castles. Isaac had all the knights and castles.
Isaac held his temper and tongue, biding his time and making no overt challenge to the patriarch. This goaded the priest to increase his criticisms from the Hagia Sophia's marble ambo, as the incense swirled around him. In his pride, he must have thought the emperor humbled. Isaac kept his eye on the man and quietly put his knights and castles to work in his defense.
His first move was to plant a spy in the patriarch's household to learn his schedule. An opportunity arose when the spy informed him that Keroularios planned to visit the Nine Angels monastery for its official opening ceremony. It lay outside the city's walls in the sparsely populated countryside. The patriarch planned to leave the city in early November, escorted by only a few monks.
Isaac's old friend, Katakalon Kekaumenos, gave control over his soldiers in the Imperial Guard to his nephew, Peter. This enterprising officer took a squad of ten well-armed men to arrest the patriarch and swiftly bundle him onto a ship waiting in the Golden Horn. Keroularios would be held there until he signed the abdication document. The monks with him were to be held in one of the towers in the city's walls until that was accomplished.
Peter and his soldiers carried out the assignment brilliantly, arresting and transporting the angry priest to the ship without being noticed. That part of the operation could not have worked out better. I felt a guilty pleasure at the thought of how Eudokia's uncle, who had condemned her to a marriage with Ducas, was now feeling the heavy hand of authority carrying him off to an unavoidable fate. Not very Christian of me, I suppose, but very human.
Peter reported back to Isaac late the same afternoon.
"That cranky old geezer is on the ship; we're anchored a few miles out in the Marmara. He's kept below decks, out of sight. I told him you wanted his abdication. He outright refused. He's totally unwilling, thinks the people will rally around him. I pointed out that they won't do that if they don't know what's happened to him. He almost spat in my face." The young man looked disgusted. "No question he's stubborn. Got any suggestions on what to do next with him?"
Isaac sat pensively on his throne, stroking his beard and glanced over at Kekaumenos. They had known each other since childhood and Isaac trusted his advice more than any other's.
Kekaumenos massaged his maimed hand before commenting. "Well, we can't let anyone know where he is. Peter, just keep him out of sight with only your most trustworthy men. He's bound to come to his senses in a few days."
Isaac nodded. "I agree. Peter, get back to the ship and explain to Keroularios that I demand his abdication. John, we can't forget his two nephews; they might start asking questions when Keroularios doesn't return. Send men to arrest them, but keep it quiet."
The men nodded agreement.
We all believed that Keroularios would soon realize how his position had changed and that his best recourse would be to accept it.
Two weeks later the impasse continued. Isaac had the patriarch moved to a lonely monastery housing a half dozen elderly monks on a tiny spit of an island Psellus had found in the Marmara. If anything, this made the patriarch's defiance worse. Peter relayed that Keroularios not only continued to refuse to abdicate, but tried to convince Peter to take his side.
"He told me that if God wanted him to leave his patriarchal seat, He would have done so without the emperor's help. Then he blessed me and said he must return to his prayers. That man is stubborn as a mule. If he wasn't a priest, I'd be tempted to beat him the way I would a mule."
"He's behaving ridiculously," said Catherine, her mouth tight with outrage over his defiance of her husband, the emperor. "He has to realize that Isaac will not allow him to return. He's simply delaying the inevitable."
"Is there someone we can send that he might listen to?" asked John in his gentle voice, his forehead lined with concern. My husband desired peace between emperor and patriarch, though I knew he doubted it could ever happen with this patriarch.
I pressed my lips closed in frustration, even while conceding that John's suggestion might work. I looked around the room. Everyone else had a reason to dislike Keroularios. Psellus had his old grudge against him, almost as old as mine on Eudokia's behalf. Isaac and Catherine were outraged at the priest's blatant attempt to control the throne. Kekaumenos and his nephew gave Isaac their unquestioning loyalty as their emperor and friend.
Michael Psellus cleared his throat before making a suggestion. "I think John Xiphilinos might be willing to speak to him; I know one or two other priests who could accompany him. It's worth trying."
Xiphilinos had been a respected judge before becoming a monk about five years earlier, so it was a sensible suggestion. Psellus had his uses.
The next morning a ship carrying Xiphilinos and two other priests set sail for Keroularios's wind-swept island. They returned late that afternoon.
"Your Majesty, the patriarch is adamant he will not abdicate. He appears even more stubborn than before, preaching the word of God to us, fasting, his strength of will undiminished . . ." Xiphilinos's voice trailed off apologetically. "We tried to convince him, but with no success."
Isaac flushed red at that. He dismissed the priests, leaving only family, Kekaumenos and his nephew, and Psellus in the room.
"I need ideas. I want that man off the patriarchal throne," Isaac said in a clipped voice.
Catherine scowled. "Can't we just appoint another patriarch and send Keroularios into exile? Someplace in the Aegean? Does he actually have to abdicate?"
"Perhaps, but who would be willing to take the post under such conflicted circumstances?" I pointed out.
Psellus quirked an eyebrow before speaking.
"Augusta Catherine," he began, "Lady Anna is correct; we could do that, but there would always be a question of the legitimacy of the new patriarch. We should avoid that. I do have another idea, though."
All eyes were on the secretary.
"Let's hear it, then," demanded Isaac.
"Keroularios has written and done many things in his position as patriarch over the past fifteen years. I think it is likely that in those many years he has done or written some things that we could argue were heretical. In fact, I believe I know of a few incidents in his writings that might qualify as such. I could dig through the records and assemble a case to put him on trial for heresy—and possibly treason. He might even abdicate if we just let him know of the case we will present rather than face a trial."
January 1059
Over the next week, Psellus collected writings that, put together, made a strong argument against Keroularios, a case for both heresy and treason. I began to realize how uninformed I had been about the patriarch. Psellus was not the only man he had threatened; Isaac was not the only emperor he had schemed against. He had intimidated and threatened many men in the city with trumped-up accusations to get his way. These senators, dynatoi, even other priests and monks, were eager to whisper what they knew or suspected into Psellus's ear. I was not so naive as to assume all their stories were true, but the priest had acquired an impressive number of enemies.
Once the case against Keroularios was prepared, Isaac sent Psellus out to see if this threat might at last force his abdication. This situation was dragging out for so long and it did not put the emperor in a good light.
"Put your case to that old fool, let him see what we have against him. Tell him none of this will become public if he abdicates. He should relent once he realizes the amount of material we have," Isaac said to his secretary as we walked down to the quay beside the Boukoleon Palace.
The January day was clear and cold with a good westerly wind, as good a sailing day as you could have in the winter season. Psellus had a set jaw and a confident walk as he carried the satchel full of evidence that would put an end to the career of the man who had tried to destroy him.
"I'll do my best, Your Majesty," he said, bowing deeply to Isaac.
Psellus stepped onto one of the emperor's personal ships and we watched as it sailed with the morning tide.
Late the next day, Psellus returned, breathless with suppressed excitement.
"So what did he say?" asked Isaac, leaning forward in his chair in anticipation.
Psellus began recounting his journey, but his first comment did not give us any hope.
"Your Majesty, I presented our case to him, as you instructed. I covered all the evidence we collected in detail. It took all day to tell him what we had. It only caused him to become angrier, his eyes bulging out and face scarlet when he told me to take these accusations and throw them into the sea. He was not going to abdicate. He was outraged and intense about his determination to continue as patriarch."
"I can't believe it. We've given him so many chances and he's thrown them all back in our faces," Catherine burst out angrily. She turned to a window overlooking one of the gardens Thomas so diligently cared for, barren now in winter, just past the feast of Epiphany. Every muscle in her body was tense with frustration. "We'll have to bring him before the judges after all."
John deflated at this setback. Isaac's face turned an angry red. I felt exasperated as I realized Isaac had few options left, and none of them good.
Psellus held up a hand. "Wait."
We all looked at him.
"As we had planned, I spent the night at the monastery before taking the ship back today. It is my duty to inform you that the Patriarch Michael Keroularios died in his sleep last night."
In the days that followed, Isaac looked as though a great weight had been lifted. John and Catherine were relieved that God's will had finally coincided with Isaac's. Michael Psellus and I, while usually not on the best of terms, exchanged furtive knowing glances. We shared a sense that maybe, in this instance at least, justice was somehow accomplished.
Eudokia had no great fondness for the uncle who had married her off to Constantine Ducas. Even so, she worried at the same time if, without her uncle as protector, Ducas would become more brazen in his efforts to put her aside and marry Isaac's daughter.
Isaac now curried favor with the people of the city by showing great respect for the deceased by holding a magnificent funeral service in the Hagia Sophia. He also named a new, more agreeable, patriarch, someone Psellus recommended: Constantine Leichoudes.
This recent conflict with the patriarch had dragged on for months, from September into deepest winter, far beyond the campaigning season. Isaac and John began planning for a spring attack on the barbarian Pechenegs who had started moving across the border near the Danube. The empire was fortunate in this. If the Pechenegs had invaded a year earlier Isaac would not have had the money to pay the soldiers or order supplies. Now he did. Word also arrived from the Hungary that its king was threatening our border near Serdica in Bulgaria. Isaac planned a campaign to demonstrate to both that the Roman Empire was now ruled by a soldier capable of making war.
One day in March, John burst in on me while I was in the nursery with the children. The weather had warmed, but there were still a few of them with runny noses from winter colds. Our niece Anastasia had recently married Peter Kekaumenos and left for her own household, so I'd lost her help. Eudokia was often there, but not that day. Her daughter, baby Theodora, born soon after my little Adrian, had been colicky, and she was keeping the child in her rooms. The older children were in their classroom for lessons, leaving me with the littlest ones when John appeared looking flustered.
"Isaac doesn't want me in this campaign," he said without preamble. "I have to stay behind and govern as regent in his place."
"John, that's wonderful. I know there's no one he trusts more than you." I hoisted a squirming three-year-old Alexios onto my hip to keep him out of mischief. The monkeys some people kept as pets got into less trouble than this son of mine.
John frowned, impatience in his voice. "Maybe, but he knows I'd rather be with him in the field. It means I'll have to put up with all the nonsense that goes on around here, the bloodsuckers yammering at me for favors, gifts.."
I bit my lip, trying to keep my patience. Isaac had to choose his own brother, the man he named Caesar, his second-in-command and presumptive heir until Marika wed. It made no sense to me that John would complain about it.
"You've been at Isaac's right hand your whole life, and he knows you'll rule as he would, that's why he trusts you." John always preferred the clarity, the black and white, of the battlefield to the shadows and false faces of court life. I couldn't blame him for that. But the title of Caesar came with responsibilities. John needed this experience if he was ever called to the throne himself. He had an important role to play.
"You don't understand. I just don't want this." His voice grew louder in frustration with me.
"It's not about wants. John, you're the Caesar. Who else is there?" I responded, stunned that he would even think to shirk this responsibility. "Kekaumenos? He's Isaac's friend, but his health isn't strong. Or Ducas? Who could trust him? Or would you prefer some self-serving bureaucrat, like Psellus?"
John folded his arms across his chest. "I'm not sure I care."
"Well, you can't turn Isaac down. You do that and he'll be so upset with you that he won't want you on campaign either." John's stubbornness irritated me. "After all he's done for you? What are you thinking?"
John had expressed similar feelings to me a few times in the year and a half since Isaac had been crowned, but never so bluntly. I thought he had just needed time and encouragement to become accustomed to the responsibility. Instead, he stood looking at me, more like a cranky little boy than a grown man.
"I know I can't disappoint Isaac." He fumed. "But I don't like it."
Sometimes I felt as though we were tugging on the same rope, only in opposite directions, John pulling back to a soldier's life, while I pulled him toward his duty to Isaac and the empire. We hadn't expected or wanted our lives to go this way, but God had decreed otherwise. Uncle Costas had warned me before John and I wed that we could be pulled into palace power struggles. I hadn't believed him then, but he had been correct. Generations of the Comnenus and Dalassenus families had been raised to be loyal and defend the empire when they were needed. We could not shirk that duty, no matter our personal preferences. What his brother, the emperor, was asking was not so difficult; he had already been doing it alongside Isaac for over a year. John should have expected this could happen. His unwillingness infuriated me.
Alexios wriggled out of my arms and proceeded to chase after a cat I knew was faster than his short legs could run.
"John," I said, looking straight at him, my own voice rising, "Isaac thinks you're ready for the job he's giving you. You'll have me here to help you, and Catherine will be here. She's learned a lot, and there's always Psellus. You can manage it. Isaac wouldn't give you this responsibility if he didn't have complete confidence in you."
He pulled a face at me, rolling his eyes. "You think I should confer with you or Catherine before I make a decision? What kind of man do you take me for? What do you think people will say if they see me taking orders from women? You almost sound like you agree with me that I shouldn't be taking this on." His mouth was tight, and his eyes bulged out.
"No, of course that's not it," I said in a lower voice, surprised at his quick temper as well as my own anger. "I just meant . . ." I tried to think what it was I had meant. "I just meant that you'll always have my support and help. Of course, you don't need my advice. And Catherine is the empress, but it will be important for people to see you have her support. That's all I meant."
He raised his hand to stop me. "This is a stupid discussion. I thought you would at least understand."
We glared furiously at each other. He had never spoken to me this way before. He had to know he was the logical choice to stay behind. I could not imagine why he didn't understand that.
"I'm going for a ride," he finally said and left.
John tried to hide his reluctance to act as regent over the next weeks as the army made its preparations. He apologized for his angry outburst and admitted he could manage in his brother's absence, but he still seemed distant. I hoped that being on his own, without Isaac around, would build John's confidence. He never wanted to disappoint his older brother.
Isaac spent weeks mustering the needed men from around the empire, ordering the horses from Cappadocia, and paying the armorers for the weapons and equipment he needed, so he did not depart until several weeks after Pascha. The new patriarch and his priests came out on that warm spring day to bless Isaac and the army, praying for their success in the coming battles. The people of the city had become halfheartedly reconciled to Isaac since Keroularios's death. Many of them gathered outside the walls to cheer the emperor in his shining armor and the soldiers eager to fight back against the vicious invaders, flinging sweet-smelling garlands of flowers at them. The sun shone bright on the men and horses with the promise of sure victory.
After rising from the patriarch's blessing, Isaac embraced Catherine and Marie, me and John in farewell. He looked me in the eye, embraced me, and whispered in my ear "I trust you'll give John all your support. I know he needs it." I flushed with embarrassment, knowing that he realized John's ambivalence.
We all waved and cheered the army as it began the long journey north to the Danube River and the Pechenegs.
John met daily with Psellus and Catherine to go over the many requests and issues requiring an imperial ruling. Those that were trivial appointments or judgments built his confidence, but more serious questions left him tossing and sleepless at night. How much to send to the eastern themes begging for soldiers and arms against marauding Turks? Did a criminal deserve execution? How to put off a dynatoi from a powerful family asking for a court appointment? And the most contentious of all were the religious disputes that bubbled up in distant parts of the empire.
John and Catherine appeared to be in agreement on most matters, but I sensed that my sister-in-law was impatient with the slow and cautious way my husband came to a decision. Catherine was efficient and quick to decide—sometimes too quickly. John's caution meant cases could drag on, but he avoided some mistakes. I thought they balanced each other, even if they exasperated each other.
In the meantime, I continued working with Thomas to manage the palace's expenses. With that and the nursery, my day was filled from dawn to sunset. I could not have managed without Thomas's sharp eye and years of experience in the palace.
"Caesarissa, I think we've gotten palace expenses to where they should be," said Thomas.
He sat across from me in the small room in the Boukoleon I used for an office. I breathed in the lovely scent from the rosebushes blooming outside the window that floated in with the early summer breeze. We had worked together for a year and a half to cut unnecessary costs that had been eating up so much money, much of that due to pilferage and outright theft. We had brought the palace, not just the gardens, into respectable condition, getting doors and locks repaired, reinforcing sagging stairs and walls. The difficulty was that so many of the buildings were hundreds of years old, with chipped tiles, rotten beams, cracked marble, and filled with dank odors. Even the best maintained buildings will show their age when over a hundred years old. The funds were not there to accomplish more.
"Yes," I agreed, "but it wasn't easy. I still think about Georgios, trying to leave with the emperor's gold plates tucked in his boxes. I'm so grateful you caught him." Georgios, the wardrobe master, was one of the first eunuchs we had pensioned off in the early days of Isaac's reign, although there were others. We learned from that experience to not provide much opportunity for theft, hurrying the dismissed from the palace before items could be looted and disappear. "I've been wondering, though, if we might need to find replacements for a few of the staff who are gone."
Thomas gave me the speculative look he reserved when he had something to say that would surprise me.
"I agree. There are a few spots that we could fill. Can I make a suggestion?"
"Of course, Thomas. Anything."
He took a deep breath and let it out before continuing. "I want to suggest that we not fill them with eunuchs."
I sat back in surprise. The Great Palace had always been staffed with eunuchs. A hundred years earlier, Emperor Romanus had even had two of his six sons, one a bastard, castrated. The bastard had become parakoimomenos and chief minister to four emperors, and the other had become patriarch. Eunuchs made up the choir at the Hagia Sophia. "No eunuchs? But, Thomas, the palace has always had eunuchs. Why not?"
Thomas's face was red with embarrassment. "Church forbids castration but winks at it, and boys are still cut. This would stop if parents or slaveowners know the palace won't take them on. Besides, I know people say eunuchs can be more loyal to the emperor without wife or children, but we both know they can be just as evil or greedy as anyone else." He stopped, face flushed with suppressed anger and frustration.
I had never considered that perhaps eunuchs didn't want their status as the "third sex." I looked into Thomas's warm brown eyes, thinking about what lay behind his words. He would have been a fine father and husband, but that yearning had been thwarted before he'd had a chance to imagine it. A wave of sadness washed over me thinking of all the eunuchs in the palace, cut as babies or young children, and forced into a life they would never have chosen on their own.
"Yes," I said slowly, "you're right, no eunuchs."
Regular reports arrived from Isaac about his progress with hunting down the Pechenegs. He had first gone north to the city of Serdica to conclude negotiations begun earlier with the Hungarian king. That king backed down from his talk of war after seeing Isaac's army, but this diversion took up over two months in the summer with traveling over three hundred miles to reach Serdica. We received word in late July that the army was moving northeast into the mountains where the Pechenegs were camped.
John and I dined with Catherine and Marika most evenings, where we discussed the day's events and the news from Isaac. One evening in late July, John made a surprise suggestion.
"I've been thinking that I should like to take Anna and the children to her family's farm as we used to do almost every summer. It's been over three years since we were there last, and Alexios and Adrian have never been. I think we could all use a holiday, don't you, Anna?"
Catherine put down her fork.
I stared at John, almost not understanding what he said.
"John, you have responsibilities as regent. Isaac wants you here." I asked.
"It's summer, and as I said, we've had no holiday in years. Catherine, don't you think you can handle most of the palace business while we are gone? You'll have Psellus to advise you, and I won't be gone long."
Catherine's eyes narrowed as she raised an eyebrow at John.
"John, Isaac expects you to be here at the palace the entire time he's gone," Catherine said.
"Yes, but things are slow now it's the hottest time of the year, people leaving the city. Of course, if you need me, you can send for me and I'll come immediately. I don't think Isaac would expect us to stay cooped up in the palace the whole time he was gone."
Given the distance between the farm and the city, "immediately" could mean four or five days. John was right that palace business had diminished, but I doubted that Isaac expected us to decamp for the farm in his absence.
John's face had a stubborn, pleading look on it, almost as though he would go with or without Catherine's agreement.
Catherine pursed her mouth as she mulled over his words. It was clear she was unhappy with John's request. Finally, she said, "If you insist, I think we will be fine in your absence. I insist that a messenger be sent daily with dispatches, and you will return within three weeks."
John's face suddenly looked the happiest I had seen in many months.
"Thank you, Catherine. We'll be back in three weeks. You can depend on it."