Coronation of the Byzantine emperor
The coronation (Greek: στέψιμον, romanized: stépsimon, or στεφάνωσις, stephánosis[2]) was the main symbolic act of accession to the throne of a Byzantine emperor, co-emperor, or empress.
Founded on Roman traditions of election by the Senate or acclamation by the army, the ceremony evolved over time from a relatively simple, ad hoc affair to a complex ritual.
[9] Already from the earliest days of the Roman Empire, during the Principate, several ruling emperors were able to designate their own successors, usually a close relative by blood or adoption, but the principle of a dynastic succession was never enshrined in law.
[10][11] The fact that a usurper—usually an army officer—could successfully install himself on the throne and become accepted as a legitimate emperor led modern historians to describe the government of the later Roman Empire as "absolutism tempered by the right of revolution", in the words of Byzantinist Peter Charanis.
This began to change during the social transformations of the so-called "Byzantine Dark Ages" of the 7th–8th centuries, which enhanced the principle of dynastic legitimacy, exemplified by the creation of the highly prestigious epithet porphyrogennetos (lit.
[17] From the time of Constantine the Great (r. 306–337) on, following ancient Near Eastern tradition, a diadem was adopted as a sign of the openly monarchical power the imperial office had assumed during the Dominate.
[19] The first evidence of a coronation ceremony is recorded during the acclamation of Julian in 361: the soldiers raised the new emperor on a shield, proclaimed him Augustus, and crowned him with a standard-bearer's neck torc in lieu of a diadem, since he had none.
After he was elected by the army's leaders, Valentinian mounted a tribunal in front of the assembled troops, was clad in the imperial vestments and diadem, and proclaimed by the soldiers as Augustus.
It was otherwise nearly identical to the ceremony used by Valentinian: Leo mounted a tribunal and as crowned with a torc by the army's drill master (campiductor); the standards were raised and Leo was acclaimed by the soldiers as God-crowned Augustus; he donned the imperial cloak and diadem, and took a lance and a shield; the officials came to pay homage (proskynesis) according to their rank; and an official addressed the troops on the new emperor's behalf, promising them the customary donative.
[28] In stark contrast to the purely military affair of Valentinian's acclamation, the coronation of Leo I was a civilian matter: the Senate ratified his nomination, and the new emperor received the crown.
[37] The ceremonies of the period shared broad similarities: Once the election was affirmed by the Senate, the new emperor proceeded from the Great Palace directly to the imperial box (kathisma) in the adjacent Hippodrome via a covered passage, in the company of the patriarch and other high dignitaries.
[47] After the acclamation, the new emperor assumed the remainder of the imperial garb, namely the purple, ankle-length cloak, decorated with a golden square (tablion) and fastened by a bejeweled fibula clasp.
[21] The emperor, dressed in the skaramangion tunic and the sagion cloak, began his coronation procession at the Hall of the Augusteus in the Great Palace, escorted by the eunuch officials of the privy chamber, the kouboukleion, headed by the praipositoi.
[70][71] The emperor, wearing the crown, then moved to sit on the throne (sella), and the various dignitaries came and paid homage to him by performing the proskynesis and kissing his knees, in groups of twelve, by order of precedence: first the magistroi, then the patrikioi and strategoi, then the protospatharioi, and so on down to the subaltern officers of the tagmata regiments and the Imperial Fleet.
A less detailed description is also included in the History (I.41) of John VI Kantakouzenos, while the De Sacro Templo of Symeon of Thessalonica discusses the religious elements of the ceremony from a theological point of view.
[80] At dawn on the next day, the imperial relatives, aristocracy, and officials assembled at the Augustaion, the square between the Great Palace and the Hagia Sophia, along with the populace of Constantinople and the army.
It began with a pledge of adherence to the Orthodox doctrine and canon law (Pseudo-Kodinos provides a full text, including the Nicene Creed), a promise to respect the privileges of the Church, and to govern with justice and benevolence.
[84][85] Upon entering the cathedral, the emperor changed his clothes in a specially constructed small wooden chamber (equivalent to the earlier metatorion), donning the imperial tunic (sakkos) and the loros, after they were first blessed by bishops.
He was then blessed by the patriarch and the bishops, kissed their hands, and went to the gallery reserved for the catechumens, where a wooden platform was erected, with "ordinary" thrones and hidden from view with gold curtains.
[110][109] Even though it is generally acknowledged that the Byzantines conceived of imperial power as a "gift from God", many modern scholars follow Sickel's opinion, and stress that although coronation by the patriarch granted prestige and legitimacy, from a constitutional point of view, it was not strictly necessary.
[111] This view was summarized by the historian Wilhelm Ensslin in his chapter on the Byzantine government in The Cambridge Medieval History: the acclamation was the "decisive act in appointing an emperor", but unlike the Pope's role in coronations in the Holy Roman Empire, "in the East the Patriarch at first acted as the representative not of the Church but of the electors, and his participation was not regarded as an essential element in making an imperial election constitutionally valid".
Bury (who notably vacillated in his views), Gavro Manojlović, George Ostrogorsky, André Grabar, and Peter Charanis, have voiced the different opinion that the patriarch's participation had a constitutional significance, to the effect that the new ruler had to be a Christian, and that the conferment of the crown signalled the Church's acceptance of him.
Despite a later tradition that he was crowned there by the Metropolitan of Lacedaemonia, this appears to be inaccurate, although the local populace and garrison likely filled in the roles prescribed by the ceremonial for their Constantinopolitan counterparts.
[117][118] A regular coronation ceremony was not repeated in Constantinople, as Patriarch Gregory III Mammas was shunned by the local populace due to his pro-Unionist stance with regards to the Catholic Church, and Constantine himself was, at least publicly, also a supporter of the Union.
[126] This oath was not only a safeguard of religious orthodoxy, but also contained guarantees of the Church and its privileges and promises to rule with justice; according to Charanis, it was the "nearest Byzantine document to a constitutional charter".
[74] A number of middle Byzantine sources make references to anointing of emperors, for example for Basil I the Macedonian, but this usage is metaphorical and inspired by the Biblical example; the act of unction is not mentioned either by Constantine VII or by the euchologia.
Nevertheless, Ostrogorsky firmly argued in favour of a post-1204 innovation at the court of Nicaea, in imitation of the ritual used at the coronation of the Latin Emperor Baldwin I,[136] and has been followed by other scholars since, such as Dimiter Angelov, who placed its adoption in the context of the rising importance and influence of the Church vis-à-vis the imperial office in the final centuries of the Byzantine Empire's existence.
[137] However, Donald M. Nicol pointed out that Theodore I Laskaris, being intent on restoring Byzantine traditions, was unlikely to have copied a ritual from the Latins occupying Constantinople, and that when writing about the coronation of Laskaris' rival, Theodore Komnenos Doukas, as emperor in Thessalonica in 1225, the contemporary sources seem to consider the unction as a normal, time-honoured and fixed part of a new emperor's accession, along with the acclamation and the coronation.
[143] When the Grand Prince of Muscovy, Ivan the Terrible, was crowned Tsar of Russia on 16 January 1547, the 1498 ceremony was drawn upon, as well as a description of Manuel II Palaiologos' coronation in 1392 by the archdeacon Ignatius of Smolensk [ru], as well as other 14th-century Byzantine sources.
Some elements, namely the acclamation by the people and the raising on a shield, were omitted, while the distribution of largess was misinterpreted and the newly crowned ruler instead showered with coins.
