andriollo luisa, aristocracy and literary production final edition libre

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Luisa Andriollo

Aristocracy and Literary Production in the 10th

Century

1 Introduction

During the 9th and 10th centuries some Byzantine aristocratic lineages succeeded in

obtaining the highest civil and military offices: they gained economic power, socialprestige, political weight and came closer to the imperial throne. The rise of thesearistocratic families is a well-known historical and social phenomenon.

This paper aims to ascertain whether the emergence of these new groups left any

trace in literary production. Can we trace a specifically aristocratic-inspired literaturein 10th century Byzantium – one intended to strengthen the memory and the prestigeof certain families? And if the answer is in the positive, to what extent were tradition-al literary forms used to promote the image of emerging interest groups, and con-struct new social and cultural models? Finally, as the aristocratic ideology seemsto maintain some provincial and local traits, do literary works also show the samefeatures?

In order to answer such questions I will provide examples of aristocratic writingbelonging to different literary genres, so as to shed new light on their audience and

purposes. I will first and foremost address the personality and the literary work of John Geōmetrēs, contextualizing his production against the background of contem-porary historiography and letter-writing.

As pointed out by Herbert Hunger and further highlighted by MarcLauxtermann, “the Byzantines on the whole preferred contemporary subjects.”This holds true even if the literary forms used by Byzantine authors were character-ized to a variable extent by imitation and re-employment of ancient models. JohnGeōmetrēs’ work offers an interesting example of how traditional motifs were at-

On this topic, see especially Jean-Claude Cheynet, Pouvoir et contestations à Byzance (963‒1210)(Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 1990), 321‒36; Id., “L’aristocratie byzantine (VIIIe-XIIIe siècle),”

Journal des Savants (2000): 281‒322 (repr. as “The Byzantine aristocracy (8th-13th centuries),” In The Byzantine Aristocracy and its Military Function, Variorum Collected Studies Series 859 [Aldershot-Burlington: Ashgate 2006], I). Herbert Hunger, “On the Imitation (ΜΙΜΗΣΙΣ) of Antiquity in Byzantine Literature,” DOP 23‒24(1969‒1970): 17‒38. Marc D. Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry from Pisides to Geometres: Texts and Contexts, WienerByzantinistische Studien 24.1, vol. 1 (Vienna: Verlag der österreicher Akademie der Wissenschaften2003), 118‒23. Ed. John Anthony Cramer, Anecdota graeca e codd. manuscriptis bibliothecae regiae parisiensis,vol. 4 (Oxford: e Typographeo Academico, 1841), 265‒388; Emilie M. van Opstall, Jean Géomètre.

Poèmes en hexameters et en distiques élégiaques, The Medieval Mediterranean 75 (Leiden: Brill, 2008).

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tuned to the new historical and social circumstances. What is more, John’s writingshelp us better understand the role and the position of a poet in 10th -century Byzan-tium. Historical reality makes its way into his work in the form of both autobiograph-ical references and allusions to contemporary facts and persons.

2 John Geōmetr ēs as a court poet

The only information about John’s life on which we can rely is to be found in his ownwork, a circumstance that makes any biographical reconstruction risky. However,three epitaphs inform us that John’s father was a “ready servant” (ὀτρηρὸς θεράπων)of the emperor: he served in Asia, where he died, and his body was finally broughtback to Constantinople by his two sons, of whom John was the younger. As a son of an imperial officer and a member of a well-established Constantinopolitan family,

John received a good education and he had apparently both a military and a literary career, as we shall see later. Other references to contemporary figures or emperorsallow us to date his activity to the second half of the 10th century: we have poemsdedicated to Theodore Dekapolitēs, who was patrikios and kuaist ōr under Constan-tine VII and magistros under R ōmanos II, to Nik ēphoros Phōkas, John I Tzimisk ēs,

the parakoimomenos Basil Lakapēnos and Grēgoria, Bardas Sklēros’ mother; inother texts he also refers to contemporary events, as the civil (986‒989) and the Bul-garian wars at the beginning of Basil II’s reign. In what follows I will analyze a few passages of his poems in order to single out and interpret references to contemporary

events and to the author’s social position, as well as his ideology and poetics.

On the work and life of John Geometres see also: Herbert Hunger, Die hochsprachliche profane Literatur der Byzantiner , vol. 2, Philologie, Profandichtung, Musik, Mathematik und Astronomie, Na-turwissenschaften, Medizin, Kriegswissenschaft, Rechtsliteratur , Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft12.5.2, Byzantinisches Handbuch 5.2 (Munich: Beck, 1978), 169; Alexander Kazhdan, with Lee F. Sherry and Christine Angelidi, A History of Byzantine Literature (650‒850), Research Series 2 (Athens: Εθνικό

Ίδρυμα Ερευνών [ΕΙΕ], Ινστιτούτο Βυζαντινών Ερευνών, 1999), 249‒72. Different hypotheses about John’s biography are presented and discussed by Kazhdan, A History ,249‒50. 15‒17 van Opstall (pp. 280,13‒21; 280,22‒25; 280,26‒29 Cramer). 96 van Opstall (pp. 297,28‒298,12 Cramer). Poems in elegiac couplets: 61 (p. 290,1‒13 Cramer), 80 (p. 295,8‒21 Cramer) and 147 van Opstall(pp. 305,24–306,2 Cramer). Poems in dodecasyllables: p. 266,20‒267,21 (erroneously considered by the editor to be dedicated to Nikephoros I, see Cramer, p. 266, no a); 283,15‒26; 305,1‒3 Cramer. SeeMarc D. Lauxtermann, “John Geometres: Poet and Soldier,” Byzantion 68 (1998): 367, n. 48. References in Lauxtermann, ibid.: p. 267,22‒269,19 Cramer (but the editor erroneously identifies thisemperor John with John Staurakios, Nik ēphoros I’s son, see Cramer, Anecdota, 267, no d); p. 286,4‒8Cramer. Pp. 276,3‒278,20 et 308,1‒309,13 Cramer (see Lauxtermann, “Poet and Soldier,” 373‒78). P. 266,1‒19 Cramer. Pp. 271,31‒273,29; 282,21‒27; 282,28‒283,8; 322,11‒325,16; 274,15‒275,3 Cramer; 90 van Opstall (p.296,21‒25 Cramer) and 91 van Opstall (p. 296,26‒29 Cramer).

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Let us first turn our attention to one of three fictive epitaphs that John devoted to theemperor Nik ēphoros Phōkas. These texts belong among the few examples of impe-rial epitaphs bequeathed to us by manuscript tradition. They are written in elegiaccouplets and revolve around the rhetorical figure of ethopoiia: the dead emperor

speaks and addresses the reader, according to a well-established narrative and rhet-orical strategy. But, if in purely rhetorical ethopoiiai “Christian or contemporary top-ics were the exception,” in the case of epitaphs, and especially in imperial epi-taphs, we come across actual historical figures and events. Furthermore, incontrast with the majority of first-person epitaphs, usually entailing a confessionof sins and a statement of repentance, John’s poem features a solemn and eulogistictone, as it is to be expected from a poem devoted to the emperor. The text is filledwith a number of references to epos and tragedy. The style is thus attuned to Nike-phoros’ fate, which can be regarded as both heroic and tragic.

Ε ἰ ς τὸν κ ύ ριον Νικηφό ρον τὸν βασιλ έα

Ἑξάετες λαο ῖ ο θεόφρονος ἡ νία τεί νας,τόσσ ’ ἐπ’ ἔτη Σκυθῶ ν Ἄρεα δῆσα μέ γαν,A̓σσυρίων δ’ ἔκλινα πόλεις καὶ Φοί νικας ἄρδην,Ταρσ ὸ ν ἀμαιμακέτην ε ἷ λον ὑπὸ ζ ύ γιον·

νήσους δ’ ἐξεκάθηρα καὶ ἤλασα βάρβαρον αἰχμή ν,εὐμεγέθη Κρήτην, Κύπρον ἀριπρεπέα,ἀ νατολίη τε δύσις τε ἐμὰς ὑπέτρεσσαν ἀπειλάς,ὀλβοδότης Νε ῖ λος καὶ κραναὴ Λιβύη.Πίπτω δ’ ἐ ν βασιλαίοις μέσσοις, οὐδὲ γυναικὸςχε ῖ ρας ὑπεξέφυγον, ἆ τάλας ἀ νδρανίης.

Ἦ ν πόλις, ἦ ν στρατός, ἦ ν καὶ διπλόον ἔ νδοθι τε ῖ χος,ἀλλ’ ἐτεὸ ν μερόπων οὐδὲ ν ἀκιδνότερον.

[To the lord emperor Nik ē phoros Phōkas

During six years I held the reins of the holy people / and for so many years I put in chains thegreat Scythians’ Ares, / I wholly pulled down the Assyrian and the Phoenician cities, / I subju-gated the invincible Tarsos; / I cleansed the islands and drove off the barbarian spear / (from)the vast Crete, (from) the famous Cyprus, / East and West shrank back before my threats, / and(so did) the bliss-giving Nile and the rocky Libya. / And I fall in the middle of the palace, I didn ’t

escape / the hands of a woman, oh wretched for my weakness! / I had a City, I had an army, Ieven had a double wall within, / but, indeed, nothing is weaker than human beings.]

The first eight verses recall Nik ēphoros Phōkas’ military achievements with epics ac-cents: the victorious fight against the Bulgarians, whose “great Ares” the emperor put

61 van Opstall (p. 290,1‒13 Cramer). There are two more first-person epigrams devoted to Nike-phoros II: 80 and 147 van Opstall (pp. 295,8‒21 and 305,24‒306,2 Cramer). Hunger, “On the Imitation,” 21. 61 van Opstall (p. 290,1‒13 Cramer). All the translations, when not otherwise indicated, are mine.

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in chains, thus imitating the Giant Ephialtes, with a personification of war thereby placing Nikephoros on a superhuman, almost titanic dimension; the submission of eastern Arab cities (“the Assyrian and the Phoenician cities” and “the invincible Tar-sos”); the recapture of Crete and Cyprus and the victories against the Fatimides, to

which John alludes by mentioning the Nile river and Libya. In this section the au-thor’s main models are Gregory of Nazianzos, (echoed almost verbatim in the poem’sfirst verse and inspiring a later passage) and Homer. The latter is John’s mytholog-ical source (the image of Ares in chains) and provides the model for many morpho-logical and lexical elements (τόσσ ’ v. 2 ; ἀριπρεπέα, v. 6 ; ὑπέτρεσσαν, v. 7; κραναή, v.8), as we can expect from such an eulogistic and heroic context.

The references to Homer and Gregory of Nazianzos, whose autobiographical andgnomic poems represented an important model for many middle- and late-Byzantineauthors, are not surprising per se. However, the coexistence of the two models with-

in the same text, as well as the incipit of the poem, echoing an epitaph in honor of Basil of Caesarea, are noteworthy. The stylistic register and the literary models select-ed by John are consistent with his ideal of virtue, combining military bravery, secularwisdom and Christian piety. As we shall see, such an ideal also seems to be in tune

Homerus, Ilias 5,385‒91: τλῆ μὲ ν Ἄρης, ὅτε μιν Ὦτος κρατερός τ᾿ Ἐφιάλτης, / πα ῖ δες A̓λωῆος,δῆσαν κρατερῷ ἐ νὶ δεσμῷ˙ / χαλκέῳ δ᾿ ἐ ν κεράμῳ δέδετο τρισκαίδεκα μῆ νας˙ / καί νύ κεν ἔ νθ᾿ἀπόλοιτο Ἄρης ἆτος πολέμοιο, / εἰ μὴ μητρυιή, περικαλλὴς Ἠερίβοια, / Ἑρμέᾳ ἐξή γγειλεν˙ ὁ δ᾿ἐξέκλεψεν Ἄρηα / ἤδη τειρόμενον, χαλεπὸς δέ ἑ δεσμὸς ἐδάμνα [“So suffered Ares, when Otus and

mighty Ephialtes, the sons of Aloeus, bound him in cruel bonds, and in a brazen jar he lay bound forthirteen months; and then would Ares, insatiate of war, have perished, had not the stepmother of thesons of Aloeus, the beauteous Eeriboea, brought tidings unto Hermes; and he stole forth Ares, thatwas now sore distressed, for his grievous bonds were overpowering him”: trans. Augustus T. Murray,The Iliad, vol. 1, Loeb Classical Library (London-Cambridge, Mass.: William Heinemann-HarvardUniversity Press, 1971), 222‒23]. In 960‒961, when he was still domestic of the Scholai, Nik ēphoros Phōkas led the reconquest of Crete. In 962 the conquest of Cilicia began: Adana fell in 964, Mopsuestia and Tarsus fell in 965; in thesame year Cyprus was annexed. In 969 the Byzantine forces took Antioch, while Alep surrendered,thus becoming a tribute-paying client state of Byzantium. If it is true that the Fatimides could not stopthe Byzantines in the East and in the eastern Mediterranean, John seems to exaggerate Nik ēphoros’

successes in the West: the expedition against the African Arabs settled in Sicily led in 964 by Nik ēphoros’ nephew Manuel ended in a failure. In 967, the refusal to pay the tribute to the Bulgariansand the capture of a few fortresses on the Bulgarian frontier caused a military crisis and opened theway to Bulgaria to the Svyatoslav ’ Rus’. On the military achievements of Nik ēphoros Phōkas see Mark Whittow, The Making of Orthodox Byzantium, 600‒1025 (Houndmills-London: Macmillan, 1996), 325‒34; Jean-Claude Cheynet, ed., Le monde byzantin, vol. 2, L’ Empire byzantin (641‒1204) (Paris: PressesUniversitaires de France, 2006), 32‒34. Cf. Anthologia Palatina VIII 10,3 (ed. Pierre Waltz, Anthologie grecque. Première partie: anthologie

palatine, vol. 6, Livre VIII , Collection des universités de France. Série grecque 99 [Paris: Les BellesLettres, 1960], 37), epitaph in honor of Saint Basil of Caesarea: ὀκτάετες λαο ῖ ο θεόφρονος ἡ νία τεί νας. V. 7: ἀ νατολίη τε δύσις τε, see Gregorius Nazianzenus, Carmina I 2,1,129 and II 1,1,97 (PG 37:532and 977). Cf. Hunger, Die hochsprachliche, 159.

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with Nik ēphoros Phōkas’ self-promoted public image. Nik ēphoros is often portrayedas both a successful general and an ascetic. Historiography would further reinforcesuch a self-representation after the emperor’s murder. Moreover, the literary refer-ences in the first lines indirectly prepare, I argue, the transition to the last four lines

of the epitaph, where the author evokes the emperor’s death, as well as the ephem-eral nature of human glory and life.

The epigram’s last part entails a sharp change of perspective: instead of the largeborders of the empire we find the double wall built by Nik ēphoros II all around theimperial palace. The victorious emperor does not fall on the battlefield, fightingagainst barbarian enemies, but in his own palace, at the hand of a woman. Sucha shift resonates with epic and tragedy, as testified by the verb ὑπεξέφυγον (v. 10),used in Odyssey 2,383‒84, where Odysseus introduces his account of the Greek war-riors murdered by their wives upon returning home from Troy. The poem ends with a

moral reflection on human weakness, in tune with the penitential tone usually char-acterizing first person epitaphs. The final gnomē is taken (almost) word by word fromGregory of Nazianzos, who in turn was inspired by a famous Homeric line, oftenquoted in rhetorical and literary texts.

As for the poem’s historical content, John Geōmetrēs glosses over the role playedby John I Tzimisk ēs in Nik ēphoros Phōkas’ murder: the whole responsibility for thiscrime is ascribed to a woman, the empress Theophanō, who is not mentioned by name either. Apparently, John Geōmetrēs’ career continued to flourish after Nik ē-phoros II’s death, as shown by the poems he devoted to the new emperor. He also

wrote a long first-person epitaph in dodecasyllables for John I,

giving voice tothe emperor himself. In both imperial epitaphs such a strategy can be construed, Iargue, as a way to keep a distance from the dead emperor. Here, by having Tzimisk ēs

Cf. Rosemary Morris, “The Two Faces of Nikephoros Phokas,” BMGS 12 (1988), 83‒115. On theideal of warrior and ascetic piety embodied by Nik ēphoros II, and especially on his relationship withAthanasios of Athos, see the article by Angeliki Laiou, “The General and the Saint: Michael Maleinosand Nikephoros Phocas,” In Eupsychia. Mélanges offerts à Hélène Ahrweiler (Paris: Publications de laSorbonne, 1998), 399‒412. Carmina I 2,15,42 (PG 37:769): ἦ ῥ’ ἐτεὸ ν μερόπων οὐδὲ ν ἀκιδνότερον. Odyssea 18,130: οὐδὲ ν ἀκιδνότερον γα ῖ α τρέφει ἀ νθρώποιο [nothing feebler does earth nurturethan man: trans. Augustus T. Murray, The Odyssey , vol. 2, Loeb Classical Library (London-Cambridge,Mass.: Heinmann-Harvard University Press, 1966), 206‒07]. See van Opstall, Jean Géomètre, 211, n. to

verse 12. Pp. 267,22‒269,19 Cramer.





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as a persona loquens, John can both praise and judge the emperor without gettingpersonally involved. In so doing he also can justify his further career at the imperialcourt:

Ε ἰ ς τὸν κ ύ ριον Ἰ ωάννην τὸν βασιλ έα ἐπιτύ μβια

Ἐ γὼ πατρὸς φὺς εὐ γενοῦς ἐξ ὀσφύος,βλάστημα ῥίζης, πτόρθος ἰσχύος γέμων,πολλῷ παρῆλθον φύ ντας εἰς εὐτολμίανοὔπω γὰρ ἦ ν πα ῖ ς, καὶ φρενῶ ν εὐανδρίᾳἤστραπτον ὅπλοις, ἐ ν μέσ ῃ γῇ βαρβάρων.Οὔπω μὲ ν ἱππεὺς, ἀλλ’ ἀριστεὺς ἦ ν ἅμα.Οὔπω δὲ πυρσο ῖ ς ἐσκίαζον τὴ ν γέ νυνπρώτοις ἰούλοις, ἀλλ’ ἐπλήρουν τὴ ν χθό ναἐμῶ ν τροπαίων, πᾶσαν ἥ ν περ Εὐφράτηςκύκλῳ διαρρε ῖ , καὶ περιρρέει Τί γρις.

Ἐμὰς ὁ Χαβδᾶ ν χε ῖ ρας ἔφριξε μό νας.Τὴ ν ἵ ππον ηὐτρέπισεν εἰς φυγὴ ν Ἄραψ.

Ἐ γὼ διδάσκω πρῶτος Αὐσ ό νων γέ νοςστῆ ναι πρὸς ἀστράπτουσαν αὐ γὴ ν τοῦ ξίφους,κρά νος τὲ καὶ πρόσωπον ἐχθρῶ ν ἐ ν μάχαις.(…)῞Еως μὲ ν οὖ ν ἦ ν δεξιὰ σκέπουσ ά μεἄ νωθεν, ἠρίστευον, ἤ νθουν, ἐκράτουν,πᾶσαν μικροῦ τέθεικα δούλην τῷ κράτει,ἣ ν ἐξανίσχων ἥλιος πρῶτος φλέ γει.

Ἐπεὶ δ’ ἔρως με τῆς κακίστης ἐ ν βίῳτυραννίδος κατέσχε, φεῦ δυσβουλίας …

[ Funerary verses to the lord and emperor John

…

Me, born from a noble father, / offspring of (his) root, young branch full of force, / by far I sur-passed my parents in courage: / I wasn’t a child yet, and I hurled lightening with the arms / inthe middle of the barbarians’ land, because of my soul’s bravery. / I wasn’t a horseman yet, butat the same time I excelled in valour. / The reddish bloom of the first beard didn’t shade my cheeks yet, but I filled the earth with my trophies, all (the land) / through which the Euphratesflows in circle, and that the Tigris surrounds. / Chabdan shuddered just (at the sight of) my hands. / The Arab prepared his horse to the flight. / I first taught the race of the Ausones /to keep steady before the glancing light of the swords, / before the helmets and the faces of the enemies in battle. (…) / As long as I had the right (hand of God) protecting me / fromabove, I was the bravest, I flourished, I dominated, / I spent in service of the empire almostevery (day) / that the rising sun enlightens. / But after the desire for the tyranny, the worstthing in life, seized me, oh ill counsel…]

In the last lines the text takes the form of a confession, with the emperor begging Godto forgive him for his sins. And yet, this holds true only for the second part of the

Pp. 267,27‒268,8; p. 268,18‒23 Cramer.

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poem, which follows the lines quoted above. Here the deceased ruler evokes his

“desire for the tyranny,” the “ill counsel” pushing him to soak his hand in bloodand to seize the imperial scepter, as well as the regret which he felt ever after. By con-trast, in the first 31 lines the deceased emperor, after addressing an imaginary

passer-by (ὦ ξέ νε), recalls propria voce his noble origins, his illustrious careerand his military success, following the blueprint of the enk ōmion as well as that of the basilikos logos.

Thus, John Geōmetrēs’ career as a court poet began around the fifties of the 10 th

century under Nik ēphoros Phōkas, continued under John Tzimisk ēs, and further

flourished during Basil Lakapēnos’ regency, for whom John also probably composeda few poems, as shown by Marc Lauxtermann. In spite of his conspicuous appre-ciation for Nik ēphoros Phōkas, John did not hesitate to write verses for his successorand murderer. In a further poem, for example, Geōmetrēs has John Tzimisk ēs utter

a short epigram arguably concerning some wreaths hanging from the right hand of asacred effigy, possibly an icon or a statue, or else a reliquary. If we are to believe thetext, the ritual object represented the holy hand of Christ, according an iconographicscheme attested also on John Tzimisk ēs’ coins and seals. By describing John Tzi-misk ēs as protected by Christ’s right hand – both in this epigram and in the epitaph–, Geōmetrēs supported the emperor’s efforts to wipe away, as it were, the crimethanks to which he had gained the throne. Indeed, the official propaganda depictedthe new emperor as a ruler blessed by the Theotokos and appointed by the manus

Dei, just as he is depicted on imperial seals. John Geōmetrēs obliged, adapting to

Pp. 268,22‒269,19 Cramer. P. 267,23‒26 Cramer (this passage immediately precedes the lines quoted and translated above):ἐ νταῦθά μοι στὰς μικρὸ ν, ὦ ξέ νε, χρό νον, / καὶ προσβαλὼ ν φίλοικτον ὄμμα τῷ τάφῳ,/κλαῦσον τὰθνητὰ, τὰς ἐμὰς βλέπων τύχας. / Καὶ σπέ νδε θερμὸ ν δάκρυό ν μοι κειμέ νῳ [Stopping here a bit, ostranger, and looking at the grave with your sorrow-loving eye / do cry for the mortal lot, seeing my destiny, and pour warm tears on me, who lie here]. The two genres were codified by Menander Rhetor between the 3rd and the 4th century. See DonaldA. Russel and Nigel G. Wilson, Menander Rhetor (Oxford: Oxford Clarendon Press, 1981), xi-xlvi and76‒95. The relevant texts are pp. 276,3‒278,20 Cramer (lengthy ekphrasis of a suburban palace) andpp. 308,1‒309,13 Cramer (praise of an anonymous individual identifiable with the parakoimomenos):see Lauxtermann, Poet and Soldier , 373‒78. P. 286,4‒8 Cramer. We know other similar objects of this kind, such as the reliquary of Saint John the Forerunner ’sright arm, in Pharo’s church, or the one of Saint Stephen’s arm, preserved in the eponymous chapel inthe imperial palace: see Ioli Kalavrezou, “Helping Hands for the Empire: Imperial Ceremonies and theCult of Relics at Byzantine Court,” In Byzantine Court Culture from 829 to 1204, ed. Henry Maguire(Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1997), 53‒79. On Tzimisk ēs’ imperial seals and coins see : George Zacos and Alexander Veglery, Byzantine LeadSeals, vol. 1, part 1 (Basel: Verlag J. J. Augustin, 1972), no 74; John Nesbitt, Catalogue of Byzantine Seals

at Dumbarton Oaks and in the Fogg Museum of Art , vol. 6, Emperors, Patriarchs of Constantinople, Addenda [Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 2009], no 66,1 ; Philip





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the social transformations and political instability of the time, which made any kindof permanent patronage impossible. To put it in Marc Lauxtermann’s words:

Before the year 1000 (…) the emperor was officially, and often also in practice, the main source

from which power emanated; but even the emperor depended on the support of different fac-tions at court. These factions changed all the time. There were not stable political pressuregroups, but temporary coalitions of various individuals seeking (with the backing of their rela-tives) to protect their own interests.

In this context of “continuous power struggle” court intellectuals tried to define their

own position: dependent on imperial favour for future advancement and always ex-posed to political reverses, they were ready to support the strongest faction, in orderto ensure their career’s longevity and success.

3 Literary production and aristocratic warrior culture

Conforming to contemporary social mutations and to shifts in the balance of power,John Geōmetrēs gave voice to the military ideology and warrior culture of 10 th-centu-ry emerging aristocracy, turning it into a dignified literary product. In this respect thetwo imperial epitaphs quoted above are exemplary. Marc Lauxtermann connects thefunerary epigram for Nik ēphoros Phōkas to the epitaph for Basil II quoted by Pachymerēs and to an epigraphic fragment possibly coming from the epitaph en-graved on John Tzimisk ēs’ tomb. According to Lauxtermann these texts share the

same emphasis on military valour, the location – a private burial site for at leasttwo of them – and a common source, a lost epitaph inscribed on R ōmanos Lakapē-nos’ tomb at Myrelaion. However possible, such a reconstruction is not the only oneimaginable. Besides the Myrelaion epitaph, which to my knowledge, is never men-tioned by the sources, not even indirectly, there is further evidence substantiatingthe links between John Geōmetrēs’ imperial epitaphs and 10th -century aristocraticand warrior culture. Contemporary chronicles, as well as the iconographic patternsof private and imperial seals, point to the very same cultural background.

Indeed, as shown by the fundamental studies of Alexander Kazhdan and Atha-

nasios Markopoulos, the chronicles written in the court milieu under the patronage of Constantine VII – especially the various versions of the so called chronicle of theLogothetēs and the chronicle of Theophanēs Continuatus – were rearranged and ex-

Grierson, Catalogue of the Byzantine Coins in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection and in the WhittemoreCollection, vol. 3, Leo III to Nikephoros III, 717 ‒1071 (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks Center forByzantine Studies, 1973), plate XLII, nos 1‒6c. Cf. also Luisa Andriollo, “Les Kourkouas (IXe–XIe

siècle),” Studies in Byzantine Sigillography 11 (2012), 75‒76. Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry , 36. Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry , 236‒37. Lauxtermann, ibid., 240.

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tended during the reign of Nik ēphoros Phōkas and afterwards. Therefore, we canreasonably suppose that these and other texts (such as the history of Leo the Deacon)composed or reworked at a time when eastern aristocratic families were highly influ-ential testify to the ideology of these social groups. It is highly likely that such texts

convey the self-representation of aristocratic families and reflect the social and po-litical conflicts of their time. Thus, if we compare a few passages from the chronicleof Theophanēs Continuatus with the imperial epitaphs penned down by John Geō-metrēs, similarities in content, register and textual structure emerge quite clearly.

First, by comparing John Tzimisk ēs’ epitaph with a passage Theophanēs Contin-uatus devotes to the future emperor Nik ēphoros Phōkas, we observe that both textscontain a praise of the hero’s strategic skills: this is a traditional military quality whose appreciation in 10th-century Byzantium is also attested in military treatises.Both figures are told to have taught Romans soldiers how to keep steady before

the enemies; they both fought the impious Chambdan (that is Alep’s emir Saif ad-Dawla), leaving the enemies astonished and terrified by their bravery:

Ἄ νδρα ἐ ν πολλο ῖ ς καὶ διαφόροις πολέμοις εὐδοκιμήσαντα καὶ ἄριστον ἀ ναφανέ ντα· καὶ τῇ ἡδυ-τάτῃ διαλαλιᾷ καὶ θωπείᾳ αὐτοῦ κοσμήσας τὰ στρατεύματα καὶ πρὸς τοὺς πολεμίους A̓ γαρηνοὺςἐχώρει, ὡς πά ντα τὰ στρατεύματα θαρρε ῖ ν καὶ ὡς ἐ ν ἰδίῳ χώρῳ παροικίαν ποιήσασθαι· καὶ μήτεκρυπτομέ νων ἢ βακχευό ντων ἢ ὑποστρεφό ντων, ὡς ἔθος ἦ ν αὐτο ῖ ς· ἀλλὰ πά ντες τομῶςἐχώρουν πρὸς τοὺς πολεμίους τα ῖ ς ἀσπίσι περιφραξάμενοι καὶ το ῖ ς δόρασιν ἀμυνόμενοι καὶκατὰ κράτος τοὺς ᾿A γαρηνοὺς ἀφανίζοντες. Καὶ ἦ ν ἰδε ῖ ν θάμβος καὶ ἔκπληξιν το ῖ ς ὁρῶσιν τὸ ν

νικητὴ ν Νικηφόρον τὰς παρατάξεις καὶ δυνάμεις καὶ φοῦλκα τοῦ ἀθέου Χαμβαδᾶ συγκόπτοντακαὶ ἀπορραπίζοντα, καὶ τὴ ν τύχην τοῦ νικητοῦ ἀριστέως θαμβε ῖ σθαι καὶ μεγαλύ νειν το ῖ ς ὁρῶσιν

(…) καὶ δὴ πρὸς τὸ ν πιστὸ ν Κωνσταντ ῖ νον ἀφικόμενος ἐπαί νων καὶ τιμῶ ν παρ’ αὐτοῦ ἠξιώθη,ο ἷ ον ἐ ν το ῖ ς πάλαι χρό νοις οἱ Ῥωμαίων στρατηγοὶ ἄ ν ἐκτήσαντο.

[A man who distinguished himself and displayed his excellence in many different battles; and,after arraying the army with his very sweet and flattering words, he moved against the Agarenenemy, so that the whole army was of good courage and even though in a foreign land they feltlike at home. And they didn’t hide, nor guzzled neither turned back, as was usual to them, butthey all advanced sharply against the enemies, fenced around by the shields and defended by the spears, destroying the Agarens by storm. And you should have seen the terror and the aston-ishment of those watching the victorious Nik ēphoros while smashing and driving away the im-pious ranks, troops and regiments [φοῦλκα] of Chambdan, and the fortune of the brave con-

queror, astonishing and gaining great glory at the eyes of those who saw it. (…

) And, after hecame back to the loyal Constantine, he was judged by him worthy of the honours gained in an-cient times by the Roman generals.]

Alexander Kazhdan, “Chronika Simeona Logofeta,” Vizantitijskij Vremennik 15 (1959), 125‒43;Athanasios Markopoulos, “Sur les deux versions de la Chronographie de Syméon Logothète,” BZ 76(1983), 279‒84 ; Id., “Byzantine History Writing at the end of the First Millennium,” In Byzantium inthe Year 1000, The Medieval Mediterranean 45, ed. Paul Magdalino [Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2003], 183‒97. Theophanes Continuatus, Chrononographia VI 41 (ed. Immanuel Bekker, Theophanes Continuatus,

Ioannes Cameniata, Symeon Magister, Georgius Monachus, Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae[Bonn: Weber, 1838], 459‒60).





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On the other hand the funerary epigram in honour of John I Tzimisk ēs also showssome analogies with the encomium for John Kourkouas, the emperor’s great-uncle,written by Theophanēs Continuatus. This emerges quite clearly from the textualstructure: following the classical model, both Theophanēs and John praise their

heroes’ noble birth and their military achievements, thanks to which the empire ’sborders were extended as far as the Tigris and the Euphrates:

Οὗτος ἐκ γέ νους τῶ ν A̓ρμενιακῶ ν ἦ ν ἀπὸ Δόκιαν χωρίου Δαρβιδοῦ ν, πατρὸς μὲ ν τῶ ν οὐκ ἀσ ή-μων παλατί νου πά νυ πλουσ ίου υἱοῦ Ἰωά ννου δομεστίκου τῶ ν ἱκανάτων. Λέ γεται δὲ καὶ τὰ ἱερὰ

γράμματα ἐκπεπαιδεῦσθαι παρά Χριστοφόρου μετροπολίτου Γαγγρῶ ν τοῦ συγγενοῦ αὐτοῦ. (…)Πολλὰς γὰρ καὶ πλείστας πόλεις καὶ κάστρα καὶ χώρας καὶ καστέλλια καὶ τόπια τῶ ν A̓ γαρηνῶ νἐχειρώσατο, καὶ τὴ ν Ῥωμανίαν διπλῆ ν κατεστήσατο, πρότερον οὖσαν καὶ κατεχομέ νην ὑπὸ τῶ νἀρνητῶ ν τοῦ Χριστοῦ μέχρι τοῦ Χαρσιανοῦ κάστρου καὶ τῆς Ὑψηλῆς καὶ τοῦ Ἅλυ ποταμοῦ. Ὁ δὲπιστὸς καὶ σπουδα ῖ ος πρὸς Ῥωμανὸ ν αὐτοκράτορα Ἰωά ννης δομέστικος τῶ ν σχολῶ ν μέχρι τοῦΕὐφράτου καὶ τοῦ Τί γρη τὰ ὅρια τῶ ν Ῥωμαίων ἐστήσατο καὶ προ ῖ κα καὶ δῶρα τῇ Ῥωμανίᾳ προ-σ ή νεγκεν (…) καὶ ἦ ν ἰδε ῖ ν τὸ ν ἄ γρυπνον Ἰωά ννην τὸ ν Κουρκούαν ἐπὶ παρατάξεως πολεμικῆς δια-λαλια ῖ ς καὶ παραινέσεσι πιθανα ῖ ς το ῖ ς Ῥωμαίοις χρώμενον, καὶ ἄλλον Τραϊανὸ ν ἢ Βελισ άριον εἰ-κάσαι καὶ ὀ νομάσαι τοῦτον. Καὶ εἴ τις πρὸς τούτους παραθήσει τὸ ν ἄ νδρα, εὑρήσει πλείονας τὰςτοῦ Κουρκούα ἀ νδραγαθίας καὶ ἀριστείας. οἱ δὲ λαμπρῶς ποθοῦ ντες καὶ θέλοντες μαθε ῖ ν τὰς τοῦ

Ἰωά ννου Κουρκούα ἀριστείας καὶ συγγραφὰς εὑρήσουσιν ἐ ν ὀκτὼ βιβλίοις ἐκτεθείσας παρὰ Μαν-ουὴλ πρωτοσπαθαρίου καὶ κριτοῦ.

[He was of Armenian origins, from the village of Dokeia Darbidoun, and his father wasn ’t anobscure individual, but a very rich palatine, son of John, the domestic of the Hikanatoi. They say that he was educated in the Scriptures by his relative Christopher, the metropolitan of Gang-rai. (…) He seized many Agaren cities and fortresses, villages and castles and lands, and he dou-

bled Romania’s territory, which was previously shut in by the enemies of the Christian faith [lit.“Christ-deniers”] between the kastron of Charsianon and the Hypseles and Halys rivers. But thedomestic of the Scholai John, loyal and zealous to the autocrat R ōmanos, enlarged the Romanfrontiers to the Euphrates and to the Tigris, and he brought gifts and presents to Romania ( …)And you should have seen the vigilant John Kourkouas facing the enemy ranks, giving orders,exhorting and persuading the Romans, and you could have equated him to a second Trajan orBelisarius, and have called him this way. And if you compare this man to them, you will find thatKourkouas’ prowess and feats are greater. Those who want to learn magnificently John Kour-kouas’ deeds will find them collected in eight books, written by the pr ōtospatharios and judgeManuel.]

Not only do Theophanēs’ Continuators celebrate the heroic deeds of the Phōkas andof the Kourkouas, what is more they devote several lines to praising the Argyroi,

Theophanes Continuatus, Chronographia VI 40‒41, pp. 426‒28 Bekker. Cf. also Iohannes Scy-litzes, Synopsis Historiarum, ΡΩΜΑΝΟΣ Ο ΛΑΚΑΠΗΝΟΣ 32 (ed. Hans Thurn, Ioannis Scylitzae Syn-opsis Historiarum, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae. Series Berolinensis 5 [Berlin-New York: deGruyter, 1973], 230). See the passages concerning Nik ēphoros Phōkas the Elder: Chronographia V 71 and VI 10, pp. 313and 360 Bekker; Leo Phōkas: Chronographia VI 45, p. 462, Bekker; Theophilos Kourkouas: Chrono-

graphia VI 42, p. 428 Bekker; John Tzimisk ēs and R ōmanos Kourkouas: Chronographia VI 42, pp. 428‒29 Bekker.

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notably Eustathios and Leo. In all of these passages, as in the two presented above,we can note some striking details: first of all, the authors display a high, almost epicregister, and a number of images and lexical elements are repeated as if they wereformulaic (καὶ ἦ ν ἰδε ῖ ν; references to the force of the hero’s hand, to his eloquence

in exhorting the army, to the fear his sight inspires to the enemies). Second, wefind the reference to and the comparison with ancient generals, belonging to the glo-rious Roman past or to early Byzantine times. Such references usually serve the pur-pose of reaffirming the excellence of the praised subject. Finally, the emphasis is laidon the impiety of the Arabs enemies as well as on the religious character of the war:Byzantine warriors fight with God’s help to defend the Christians and the empire.

Such an ideology was supported by the emperor Nik ēphoros Phōkas in the firstplace. As the sources show, he proposed to celebrate the soldiers fallen while fight-ing against the Muslims as if they were martyrs. The synod and the Patriarch even-

tually rejected the proposal. And yet, both the emperor’s attitude and the texts hith-erto analyzed reflect the ongoing Christianization of traditional military virtues thatbecame complete during the 10th century. Such a phenomenon ensued from the riseof many provincial lineages, mainly coming from Asia Minor, to the highest ranks of society. Their representatives made brilliant careers thanks to their victories againstthe Arabs, gaining wealth and power. An austere piety, characterized by a strong as-cetic attitude, as well as by a warrior ethos, was typical of many prominent familiesbelonging to 10th-century military aristocracy, such as the Phōkas and the Kourkouas.Such an ideological construction aimed to strengthen the success and the prestige of

the relevant families, and was often associated with the cult of family saints, patron-age of existing religious institutions or relationships with clergymen distinguished by their ascetic virtue, their knowledge of the Scriptures and their prophetic skills.

Chronographia VI 22 and 27 respectively, pp. 368‒69 and 374 Bekker. The notion of “just” or “holy war” in Byzantium has been long discussed by scholars, andliterature on this topic is very extensive: see, among others, Patrick Viscuso, “Christian Participationin Warfare: A Byzantine View,” In Peace and War in Byzantium: Essays in Honor of George T. Dennis,eds. Timothy S. Miller and John Nesbitt (Washington DC: The Catholic University of America Press,1995), 33‒40; Athēna Kolia-Dermitzak ē, Ο βυζαντιν ός “ ιερός π ό λεμος .” Η έννοια και η προβολ ή τουθρησκευτικού πολ έ μου στό Βυζ άντιο, Ιστορικές μονογραφίες 10 (Athens: Ιστορικές Εκδόσεις Στ. Δ.Βασιλόπουλος, 1991); Georges T. Dennis, “Defenders of the Christian People: Holy War in Byzantium,”In The Crusades from the perspective of Byzantium and the Muslim World, eds. Angeliki E. Laiou andRoy Parviz Mottahedeh (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 2001),31‒39; Angeliki E. Laiou, “The Just War of Eastern Christian and the Holy War of the Crusaders,” InThe Ethics of War: Shared Problems in Different Traditions, eds. Richard Sorabji and David Rodin(Aldershot-Burlington: Ashgate, 2006), 30‒43; Jean-Claude Cheynet, “Légitimer la guerre à Byzance,”

Mélanges de l’ Université St.-Joseph 62 (2009), 233‒51. See Iohannes Scylitzes, Synopsis historiarum, ΝΙΚΗΦΟΡΟΣ Ο ΦΩΚΑΣ 18, pp. 274‒75 Thurn. On aristrocratic piety, family cults and family saints, see: Laiou, “The General and the Saint”;Sophie Métivier, “Aristocrate, et saint: le cas d’Eudokimos,” In Les réseaux familiaux. Antiquité

Tardive et Moyen Âge, Monographies Centre d’histoire et civilisation de Byzance 37, ed. BéatriceCaseaw (Paris: Association du Centre d’histoire et civilisation de Byzance, 2012), 95 –112.





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This cultural change is also connected to the increasing popularity of military saints, such as Dēmētrios or the two Theodores, Tirōn and Stratelatēs. In the 11th cen-tury they are often represented on seals belonging to military officers. John Geōme-trēs too devoted a few epigrams to Dēmētrios and the Theodores, possibly designed

to complement icons with an apotropaic function. Not only do these short textspoint to the contemporary cultural and religious atmosphere, they also are in tunewith the artistic fashion of the time, which was appreciated and shared by John Geō-metrēs.

Thus, in the poems that we have considered, John Geōmetrēs voices the ideology of the military aristocracy, just as contemporary chronicles do in a number of passag-es. As we have seen, chronicles include textual portions characterized by peculiarstylistic traits and a distinctive content. Such passages have a peculiar tone of their own, grandiloquent and eulogistic. Moreover, in their effort to celebrate aristo-

cratic families and/or individuals, they also show a textual structure akin to tradi-tional enk ōmia. Standing out from and marking a break in the continuum of thechronicle narrative, these passages may point to earlier, external materialincorporated into the text by the author-compilers. As such, they may testify to a ar-istocratic literary production that left scarce a trace behind. Such a production mighthave included treatises, chronicles, or poems designed to recount and celebrate theglorious deeds of famous family members. Texts of this sort could have served as asource for both Theophanēs Continuatus and John Geōmetrēs. The epitaphs engravedon aristocratic tombs studied by Lauxtermann may well be part of this production,

just like works such as the De Velitatione, a military treatise composed in the Phō

kascircle that testifies to the strategic successes achieved by the akritic guerrilla and by the officers based in the far eastern parts of the Empire. About a century later, a textlike Kekaumenos’ Strat ē gikon continues the genre of family memoires, providing val-uable information about military strategy, aristocratic mentality and lifestyle, and so-cial networks in the provinces.

Jean-Claude Cheynet, “Le culte de Saint Théodore chez les officiers de l’armée d’Orient,” In Id., La société byzantine. L’ apport des sceaux , vol. 1 (Paris: Association des amis du Centre d’histoire et

civilisation de Byzance, 2008), 307‒21. Epigrams on Saint Demetrius: 58, 62 and 63 van Opstall (pp. 289,9‒11; 290,14‒16; 290,17‒18Cramer); epigrams on Saint Theodore: 67 and 68 van Opstall (pp. 292,1‒8 and 292,8‒18 Cramer). Lauxtermann sharply analyzes the epitaphs of a Bardas, who died while serving as a military officer in Crete, and of Katakalōn, strat ē gos of Thessaloniki: Byzantine Poetry , 225‒27. Gilbert Dagron and Haralambie Mihaescu, Le traité sur la guerilla de l’ empereur Nicéphore Phocas(963‒969) (Paris: Editions du CNRS, 1986). Maria Dora Spadaro, Cecaumeno. Raccomandazioni e consigli di un galantuomo (Alessandria:Edizioni dell’Orso, 1998). For some important remarks concerning content, style and literary back-ground of Kekaumenos’ text see Bernard in this collection (pp. 46 –47) as well as Paul Lemerle,

Prolégomènes à une édition critique et commentée des “ Conseils et Récits” de Kékauménos, Mémoires

de l’Académie Royale de Belgique 54, fasc. 1 (Brussels: Académie Royale de Belgique/KoninklijkeAcademie van België, 1960); Charlotte Roueché, “The Literary Background of Kekaumenos,” In Li-

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We can also infer the existence of some sort of family epic and historiography,otherwise attested for the 10th century. It is well possible that such production,with its peculiar stylistic features and literary structures, left some traces in contem-porary chronicles. Formulaic traits and stereotypical descriptions of heroic

individuals that are occasionally to be found in the chronicles could derive from pop-ular production whose existence is granted by a scholium to Arethas of Caesarea. Thetext refers to Paphlagonian bards who, “having composed I do not know whichsongs about the adventures of famous heroes, go from door to door to sing themand collect money.” On the other hand, family historiography possibly employeda higher register and more elaborated rhetoric forms, such as the basilikoi logoi.Thus, after praising the achievements of John Kourkouas, the Continuators of Theo-phanēs explicitly refer to a historical work in eight books, concerning the feats of John and composed by the pr ōtospatharios and judge Manuel.

We are left wondering about the precise nature and contents of these works: didthey give voice to a popular and provincial milieu like the songs of the akritic cycle acentury later? Do they testify to the willingness of the aristocratic families to providetheir members with a heroic model, an ideal self-image? Likewise, it would be inter-esting to have more information about the identity of the authors involved in such aproduction, about their education and cultural background, as well as their degree of integration into the military and provincial aristocracy that they celebrated. Unfortu-nately, for lack of better evidence, we can just assume the provincial character of ar-istocratic and family literature, while we are left assessing the influence of aristocrat-

ic warrior culture only through its Constantinopolitan expressions.

4 John Geōmetr ēs’ “self-assertiveness” and

his ideal of virtue

The work and figure of John Geōmetrēs, I argue, belong precisely to the high Con-stantinopolitan culture. John himself provides us with such a self-representation.John’s authorial presence, his “self-assertiveness,” as Marc Lauxtermann labels

teracy, Education and Manuscript Transmission in Byzantium and Beyond, The Medieval Mediterra-nean 42, eds. Catherine Holmes and Judith Waring (Leiden-Boston-Cologne: Brill, 2002), 111‒38; Ead.,“The Rhetoric of Kekaumenos,” In Rhetoric in Byzantium, Publications of the Society for the Pro-motion of Byzantine Studies 11, ed. Elizabeth Jeffreys (Aldershot-Burlington: Ashgate, 2003), 23‒37. “Ayant fabriqué je ne sais quelles chansons traitant des aventures des héros fameux, (ils) vont leschanter de maison en maison pour ramasser des sous:” the text is presented in Henri Grégoire, “L’âgehéroïque de Byzance,” In Id., Autour de l’ épopée byzantine, Variorum Collected Studies Series 40(London: Variorum Reprints, 1975),VII, 385. See also Hans-Georg Beck, Geschichte der byzantinischen

Volksliteratur , Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 12.2.3, Byzantinisches Handbuch 2.3 (Munich:Beck, 1971), 50‒51.





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it, seems to emerge clearly in the poems, in spite of the traps set for the reader by the “poetic I”.

As we have seen, John was the younger son of an imperial official and he tooapparently had a military career in the service of the emperor. In the poems he

often refers to his participation in expeditions and battles, and takes great pridein his military valour:

στέλλομαι ἐς στρατιάς τε καὶ α ἵ ματα καὶ μόθον αἰ νὸ νκαὶ χαλεπὴ ν στομάτων λύσσαν καὶ ἄ γρια φῦλα.

[I’m sent to expeditions, to bloodshed and horrible fights,to the terrible and furious mouths, to the wild tribes.]

πολλὰ μό γησα, καὶ α ἷ μα κέ νωσα, σ ύχνον τ’ ἐπὶ το ῖ σιἡμετέρου προμαχῶ ν πλῆθος ἐ ν πολέμοις.

[much I endured and I spilt my blood, oftenfighting in the first rank of our troops at war.]

Furthermore, in a manuscript John bears the title of pr ōtospatharios, and thanks toanother text we know that he was the proud owner of a beautiful oikos with a gardenat the Mesomphalos, a neighbourhood in the centre of Constantinople. We do notknow if he inherited this property from his parents or if he obtained it as a reward forhis services. Be that as it may, evidence suggests that he belonged to the elite of theimperial officers, just like many members of other powerful families. And yet, unlike

many 10

th

-century successful aristocrats, John Geō

metrē

s did not claim provincialorigins: his family appears to have been steadily established in the capital, whileAsia, where the poet’s father died, is described as “far from homeland,” “farfrom the family.” Therefore, it must be in Constantinople that John attended schooland had his education. He devoted some poems to his professor Nik ēphoros, whomight have been Nik ēphoros Erōtikos, geometry professor at the imperial school cre-ated by Constantine VII. This fact could explain also John’s nickname, “Geōmetrēs.”Many other texts offer significant glimpses into John’s education, testifying to anoriginal model of wisdom that merges Greek paideia and Christian thought. As pre-

Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry , 37‒38. 65,25‒26 van Opstall (p. 291,18‒19 Cramer). P. 318,9‒10 Cramer. Bodl. Barocc. 25. See: Anthony R. Littlewood, The Progymnasmata of Ioannes Geōmetr ēs (Amsterdam: Hakkert,1972), 3‒11; Lauxtermann, Poet and Soldier , 359 and n. 12. In another short poem John celebrates the generosity and magnanimity of Nik ēphoros Phōkas,who possibly favored John’s career (p. 305,1‒3 Cramer): ἡ δεξιὰ χεὶρ δεσπότου Νικηφόρου / Πάκτωλόςἐστιν καὶ ῥέει τὸ χρυσ ίον [“The right hand of our lord Nikephoros / is like (the river) Paktolos flowingwith gold”]. See Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry , 35. 16,3 van Opstall (p. 280,24 Cramer): πόρρω πατρίδος. 15,4 van Opstall (p. 280,17 Cramer): πόρρω συγγενέων.

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dictable, Gregory of Nazianzos plays a preeminent role among John’s models. Johnwrote several poems in his honor. However, John also expresses his admirationfor pagan intellectuals, such as the neoplatonists Iamblichos and Porphyrios, Aris-totle‘s commentator Simplicius, and the ancient philosophers Archytas of Taranto,

Plato and Aristotle, among others.In an untitled poem John praises the glory of God through a priamel which

looks back to Gregory of Nazianzos and, via his mediation, to archaic poetry and Sap-pho in particular.

Ἄλλοις μὲ ν παράκοιτις, τέκνα, φίλοι, θρό νος αἰπύς,τερπωλὴ βιότου, χρυσοφόρος σπατάλη,ἀ νδραπόδων ἑσμοί, δόμοι, ἄλσεα, γνῶσις ἀ νάκτων,ο ἷ ς φρονέουσι φίλα καὶ λαλέουσι φίλα.Αὐτὰρ ἔμοιγε Θεὸς μό νος ἥλιος, ὄλβος ἀπείρων,

ἐλπὶς ἀμαιμακέτη, τέρψις ὅλη βιότου.[For some people a wife, children, friends, an high throne / (are) the pleasure of life, a goldendelight; / a crowd of slaves, palaces, sacred woods, the rulers’ acquaintance, / (this is) what they cherish in their thoughts and words. / But for me God alone is the sun, the infinite good, / theunfaltering hope, the whole pleasure of life.]

In texts like this John acknowledge the supreme value of God and of the Christianfaith; he also wrote religious and penitential poems, sometimes intended for collec-tive performances. And yet, Christian contents are expressed in literary forms filled

with classical echoes, as far as language, meter and classical references are con-cerned. John Geōmetrēs uses the inherited literary language, complete with Homericechoes and references to ancient authors, adapting it to the reality of his time, to con-temporary fashion, beliefs and values, and also to his own needs. Thus, as these fea-tures suggest, John Geōmetrēs appears to be completely integrated into the 10th- and11th-century Constantinopolitan culture, into the “Byzantine humanism” describedby Paul Lemerle. In his poems John often gives voice to the renewed relation be-tween “l’héllenisme chrétien, par définition parachevé et imperfectible comme laRévélation qui le fonde, et l’héllenisme profane, dont on reconnaît qu’il l’a préparé

See, for example, 22 van Opstall (281,13‒15 Cramer). 22 van Opstall (p. 281,13‒14 Cramer). 23 and 24 van Opstall (281,16‒20 Cramer). 26 van Opstall (282,16‒20 Cramer). 57 van Opstall (289,1‒8 Cramer). 57,1‒6 van Opstall (289,1‒6 Cramer). Cf. Sappho fr. 16 (ed. Eva Maria Voigt, Sappho et Alcaeus.

Fragmenta [Amsterdam: Athenaeum – Polak & van Gennep, 1971], 42‒43). Paul Lemerle, Le premier humanisme byzantin. Notes et remarques sur enseignement et culture à

Byzance des origines au X e siècle (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1971).





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et parfois même annoncé, et dont il faut par consequent conserver ce qui est

‘utile’.”

Moreover, John often describes his own ideal of καλοκαγαθία as a blend of σοφίαand τόλμη. As for wisdom, John’s knowledge seems to consist of a mix of basic phil-

osophical education, advanced rhetoric skills and scientific notions. On the otherhand, the combination of knowledge and courage that he claims to embody seemsto look back to classical models more than to contemporary Christianized military values. This trait partially distinguishes him from the provinceral aristocratic culturethat we have tried to outline in the previous paragraphs. Even when he admits thatall his qualities have been granted to him by the Holy Virgin, or when he calls uponthe Trinity for his valor to be recognized, one cannot find in Geōmetrēs’ self-presen-tation the ascetic piety admired by contemporary monks and aristocrats, nor theChristianized warlike attitude emphasized by chronicle writers.

5 Evolutions and continuity in cultural life during the

reign of Basil II

As Marlene van Opstall stresses, “Jean est loin de l’idéal chrétien de l’humilité.”

Such an attitude surfaces clearly in the poems where the author complains aboutthe envy of his fellow citizens. If at the age of eighteen his knowledge of “things di-vine and profane” and his “magnificent courage” had provoked not only admira-

tion but also envy, hostility would arise much more seriously later on, when John be-came the target of evil tongues, while his fellow citizens laid their hands on hispossessions. In several poems the author refers to his falling out of imperialfavor, which in all likelihood entailed his dismissal from military service. As a con-sequence, he probably entered the Kyrou monastery, as suggested by the epithet “Ky-riotēs,” which John is given in some manuscripts, as well as in one of his own

Lemerle, Le premier humanisme, 304‒05. These elements surface on several occasions in the work of our author, who declares to be afollower of the Muses Calliope and Ourania, and who often embellishes his verses with references tostars, constellations and to the world’s structure: see, for instance, 40, 65, 96 and 255 van Opstall(pp. 285,3‒5; 290,21‒291,27; 297,28‒12 and 329,13‒15 Cramer). Cf. for instance, Xenophon on Epaminondas: Hellenica VII 5,8. 280 van Opstall (p. 333,9‒13 Cramer). 65 van Opstall (p. 290,21‒27 Cramer). Van Opstall, Jean Géomètre, 27‒28. 280 van Opstall (p. 333,9‒13 Cramer). 53,7‒9 van Opstall (p. 287,19‒21 Cramer). Lauxtermann, Poet and Soldier , 358, n. 10; the relevant manuscripts are: Ambros. E 100 sup., f.135; Genuensis 32, f. 242; Bodl. Barocc. 25, f. 280.

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poems. These events date doubtless to Basil II‘s autocratic reign, that is to the pe-riod after 985. The “wicked Pharaoh” putting John “in a bitter old age,” as John him-self says in an epigram for Saint Theodore Tirōn, might well be Basil. As a matter of fact, the sources describe Basil II as an unsympathetic and harsh autocrat, acting

against the interests of the powerful families who tried to rob him of the imperialpower. In all likelihood Basil II could hardly appreciate the services of John Geōme-trēs, a former and enthusiastic supporter of Nik ēphoros Phōkas who had compro-mised with John I Tzimisk ēs and Basil Lakapēnos.

In the poems dating to this later period John Geōmetrēs appears as a harsh criticof his own times. The mindset of his contemporaries is contrasted with his own per-sonal model. The latter, he argues, is unfortunately rejected by the rulers and by so-ciety at large. A very significant passage reads as follows:

Κῆπος ἔην θαλέθων, πολυήρατος ἄ νθεσι πᾶσιν,καρπο ῖ ς ἀρετάων ἔβριθον οὐκ ὀλί γοιςἦ ν λό γος αὐτόχυτος, σοφίης στόμα, ἦ ν νόος αἰπύς,ἦ ν τόλμα κραδίης, ἦ ν σθέ νος ἐκ μελέων,ἦ ν δρόμος ἐ ν ποσ ὶ κούφοις ἅλμασιν αἰθέρα βαί νων,ἦ ν φάος ὀξυτάτοις ὄμμασι δερκόμενον,ἦ ν πό νος ἡδύς, ἐπ’ ἄεθλα, θῆρας, γνώσιας, εὐχάς,καὶ χάρις ἐκ στομάτων ἔρρεε τῇ Τριάδι.(…)ἔ νθεν γλῶσσα κακὴ καὶ ἀτάσθαλος ἤρξατο δαίμων,καὶ φθό νος οὐκ ὀλί γος ἔρρεεν ἐκ στομάτων

ὡς μό νος ἦ ν σοφίης θάλος, ἦ ν δ’

ἄρεος πρόμος ο ἶ ος,εὐκραδίως μίξας νοῦ ν σοφὸ ν ἠ νορέῃ,ἡ δ’ ἀρετὴ κακίη, γέ νος ἄθλιον, ὦ γέ νος αἰσχρό ν,οὐτιδανό ν, φθονερό ν, ἀ ντίπαλον σοφίης.

Ἣ μαλακὸ ν σοφὸ ν ἔμμεν’, ἢ ἄρρενα γνώσιος ἐχθρό ν,ὧδε θέλουσι νέοι νομοθέται κακίης.

[I was a flourishing garden, charming with all flowers, / I was fraught with the copious fruits of virtue; / I had easy eloquence, words of wisdom, I had a profound mind, / there was courage inmy heart, there was force in my limbs, / my feet went in the air with light leaps, / my eyesglanced luminous and penetrating, / effort was sweet to me, in sight of rewards, hunting, knowl-edge, prayers, / and from my mouth flowed blessings to the Trinity. (…) / Then the malicious

The epithet Kyriotēs, used with reference to the author, appears in one of Geōmetrēs’ epigrams (p.297,2 Cramer; cf. Lauxtermann, Poet and Soldier , 358, n. 10). Other texts refer to his monastic ordi-nation or to life in the Kyriou monastery (p. 335,4‒9; p. 305,4‒8 ; 340,21‒22 Cramer). 68,7‒8 van Opstall (p. 292,16‒17 Cramer). The bibliography on Bardas Sklēros’ and Bardas Phōkas’ revolts is very extensive; among others,see: Werner Seibt, Die Skleroi. Eine prosopographisch-sigillographische Studie (Vienna: Verlag derösterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1976), 42‒58; Cheynet, Pouvoir et contestations, 31‒34; Catherine Holmes, Basile II and the Governance of the Empire (976‒1025) (Oxford: Oxford Uni-versity Press, 2005), 240‒98. Lauxtermann, Poet and Soldier , 367‒71; van Opstall, Jean Géomètre, 10‒13. 211,13‒20 and 25‒32 van Opstall (pp. 317,20‒27 and 317,32‒318,6 Cramer).





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tongues and the presumptuous demon started, / and a great envy flowed from their mouth: /[they said] that I was the only offshoot of wisdom, I was [the only] bellicose leader / bravely com-bining wise mind and courage, / but valour was an evil, miserable kin, oh shameful kin, / cow-ard, jealous, enemy of wisdom. / The wise to be weak, or the virile to be enemy of knowledge, /this is what the new legislators of evil want.]

John Geōmetrēs’ complaints seem to be confirmed by a famous passage in Psellos’Chronography , where the author describes the anti-intellectual attitude of Basil II,who “paid no attention to men of learning; on the contrary, he affected utter scorn– towards the learned folk, I mean.” According to Psellos, in order to administrateand control his empire the emperor sought the support of men “who did not distin-guish themselves for wisdom, nor for their noble birth, neither for their literary education.” However, Michael Psellos himself remarks that, in in spite of the em-peror’s attitude, “no small crop of orators and philosophers sprang up in those

times.” In fact, if we look at other sources dating to Basil ’s II time, we get amore nuanced, and perhaps balanced, picture. Among Basil’s closest collaboratorswe find a learned general like Nik ēphoros Ouranos. In his correspondence Ouranosrefers to contemporary literary production as well as to reading and writing practicesof his own times. In a letter he asks the pr ōtospatharios and judge Peter to send himthe Atticist , a rhetorical work by Dionysos of Halicarnassus now lost. Such a re-quest reveals interest in rhetoric, atticism and imitation of the ancient models, incontrast (at least at first sight) with the simple and unaffected style that, accordingto Psellos, was appreciated by Basil II and used by the imperial chancellery. Nik ē-

phoros Ouranos’ letters, on the contrary, are filled with references to the classicalpast and myths, in accordance with specifically epistolographic topoi. One of hiscorrespondents, Leo metropolitan of Synada shows in his letters a good knowledge

Chronographia I 29,12‒14 (ed. Émile Renauld, Chronographie ou histoire d’ un siècle de Byzance(976‒1077), vol. 1, Série Byzantine [Paris: Les Belles Lettres 1926], 18): ὅθεν οὐδὲ προσε ῖ χε λογίοιςἀ νδράσιν, ἀλλὰ τούτου δὴ τοῦ μέρους, φημὶ δὲ τῶ ν λογίων, καὶ παντάπασι καταπεφρονήκει. Chronographia I 30,7‒9, p. 19 Renauld: οὔτε τὴ ν γνώμην λαμπρῶ ν, οὔτε μὴ ν ἐπισήμων τὸ γένος,οὔτε τὰ ἐς λόγους ἐς τὸ ἄ γαν πεπαιδευμένων. Chronographia I 29,16‒17, p. 18 Renauld: οὐκ ὀλίγη φορὰ φιλοσόφων καὶ ῥητόρων κατ’ ἐκείνουςτοὺς χρόνους ἐ γένετο. Epistula V 22 (ed. Jean Darrouzès, Épistoliers byzantins du X e siècle, Archives de l’Orient chrétien 6[Paris: Institut français d’études byzantines, 1960], 227‒28). Psellus, Chronographia I 30,13‒17, p. 19 Renauld: τοῦ γὰρ κομψῶς καὶ συντεταγμέ νως γράφειν ἢλέ γειν ἀπείχοντο παντελῶς […] καὶ δεινὸ ν οὐδὲ ν ὁ λό γος ε ἶ χεν, οὐδὲ περίεργον. See for instance, Epistula V 35 and 47, pp. 234‒35 and 245‒47 Darrouzès. On epistolographicconventional motives see: Hunger, “On the imitation”, 28‒29; Margaret Mullett, “The Classical Tra-dition in the Byzantine Letter,” In Byzantium and the Classical Tradition, eds. Margaret Mullett andRoger Scott (Birmingham: Centre for Byzantine Studies, 1981), 75‒93 (repr. in Ead. Letters, Literacy

and Literature in Byzantium, Variorum Collected Studies Series 889 [Aldershot-Burlington: Ashgate,2007], II).

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of classical authors (among others Diogenes Laertius, Plutarch, the tragic poets),and explicitly admits his immoderate passion for profane literature and, on theother hand, his lack of interest in religious texts.

What is more, Nik ēphoros Ouranos had a lively – and sometimes witty – corre-

spondence with others learned men and clergymen, such as his lieutenant PhilētosSynadēnos, Nik ētas, metropolitan of Amaseia, and Nicholas, metropolitan of Neocaesarea; to the latter he also asked to compose a work on the saints of theyear, maybe a versified calendar or a mēnologium, according to the model set by the work of Symeōn Metaphrastēs, completed at the end of the 10th century. Nik ē-

phoros Ouranos himself composed a Life of Saint Symeōn the Stylite and, afterSymeōn Metaphrastēs’ death, he wrote a poem in his honour. In addition, Nik ē-phoros Ouranos is the author of a military treatise, the Taktikon. The genre had along tradition: the emperor Leo VI as well as the Phōkas had tried their hands on

it in the previous century. Seen from this perspective, the cultural and spiritual at-mosphere of the time was fully in tune with the previous period: at the end of the 10th

century we still find some learned men among the imperial officers, combining clas-sical education with the practice of literary genres that were more “in the fashion.” Inparticular, a keen interest can be noticed in the production of religious and hagio-graphical literature, which seems to have been encouraged by the emperor BasilII. The basileus commissioned two beautiful illumined manuscripts, the Venice Psal-ter and the so-called Menologium of Basil II, now in the Vatican library. In the min-iatures of the Venice Psalter the emperor chose to be represented wearing his armour,

surrounded by military saints, both following and enhancing a current fashion, incontinuity with the warrior Christian culture promoted by his predecessors.Without delving into a detailed discussion about the cultural life under Basil II‘s

reign, a subject that has been already tackled in several studies and would deservemuch more space, we may say that the reign of Basil did not mark a sharp culturalbreak. The examples we have considered show that peculiar features emerged in By-zantine culture between the second half of the 10th and the beginning of the 11th cen-tury: the emphasis on military bravery and on ascetic and austere religious feelings

See, for instance, the allusions and references quoted ad Epistula III 32, 35 and 51 (pp. 191, 193 and203 Darrouzès). Epistula III 31, p. 188‒90 Darrouzès. Epistula V 18 and 21 respectively, pp. 225‒26 and 227 Darrouzès. Silvio G. Mercati, “Versi di Niceforo Uranos in morte di Simeone Matafraste,” AnBoll 68 (1950),126‒34. Alphonse Dain, La Tactique de Nicéphore Ouranos, Série Byzantine (Paris: Les Belles Lettres,1937); Barbara Crostini, “The Emperor Basil II‘s Cultural Life,” Byzantion 66 (1996), 66‒67. Crostini, “The Emperor Basil II‘s,” 67‒68. See, for instance, Barbara Crostini’s article (“The Emperor Basil II’s”), or Marc Lauxtermann,“Byzantine Poetry and the Paradox of Basil II’s Reign,” In Byzantium in the Year 1000, The MedievalMediterranean 45, ed. Paul Magdalino (Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2003), 199‒216.





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merged with secular culture and classical tradition, crucial to literary and rhetoricaleducation, especially among the Constantinopolitan elites.

As we have seen, the strong emphasis on bravery, on the Christianization of mili-tary virtues, and on a severe, charismatic spirituality reflects the taste of the emerg-

ing provincial and military aristocracy. During the 10th century members of these pro-vincial groups try to assert themselves at the centre of the empire, looking forlegitimization and social recognition at the imperial court and among the Constan-tinopolitan elites. Thus, aristocratic values find new expression in the classicizingforms of Byzantine highbrow literature, leaving back an echo that eventually reached

us. Authors like John Geōmetrēs resort to traditional language and classical modelsby adapting them to the new social actors and their needs, in a continuous effort tore-negotiate the past. In a context of political instability and radical social transfor-mations authors like Geōmetrēs also try to secure their own position and career,

showing a stronger “self-assertiveness” and emphasizing their identity and merits.At the same time, though, they also demonstrate a rather flexible, almost opportunistattitude towards the ruling emperors and the powerful aristocratic lineages for whichthey compose their work. The aristocratic values, first asserted in the aftermath of thesocial and political success of some families coming from the eastern provinces, werethus assimilated into Constantinopolitan court culture. This trend continues underBasil II, even if the emperor, by a political choice and/or because of personaltaste, did not favour the production of encomiastic literature. This is why Basil isstrikingly absent from contemporary literary works. He also promoted some renewal

within the court elite; such a turnover of the courtly elite brought upon the emperorthe criticism of the excluded intellectuals, such as John Geōmetrēs. John’s com-plaints seem therefore to be motivated by personal resentment rather than by a cul-tural and spiritual decline.

Lauxtermann, Byzantine Poetry , 121.

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