Phokas (Byzantine family)

As one of the leading families of the Anatolian military aristocracy, the Phokades were also involved in a series of rebellions that laid claim to power and challenged the emperors at Constantinople.

The Byzantine official and historian Michael Attaleiates, writing in the second half of the 11th century, claimed to have come across the genealogical tree of the family in an old book, and presented its descent from Constantine the Great, and even further back from the ancient Roman families of Fabia and Scipiones;[1][2][3] according to Byzantinists Ivan Đurić, Athanasios Markopoulos, and Nathan Leidholm, this narrative was very likely made-up with the purpose of glorifying the recently crowned Emperor Nikephoros III Botaneiates, who claimed descent from the Phokades.

[5][6] Đurić, in particular, wrote that this story could be based on a local folktale, and that al-Athir, who was from a different time and place, was ignorant of the emperor's ancestors who were attested in Byzantine sources; such as his actual father, Bardas Phokas the Elder, who was neither a Muslim nor from Tarsos.

[9][13][15][16] His son, Leo Phokas the Elder, was also Domestic of the Schools, but was defeated by the Bulgarian tsar Symeon (r. 893–927), and later unsuccessfully opposed the rise of Romanos Lekapenos to the throne in 919, being captured and blinded.

[21][22] Bardas himself, already in his mid-sixties when named commander-in-chief, proved a mediocre general, suffering a string of defeats at the hands of the Hamdanid emir Sayf al-Dawla.

With the aid of Leo, who had already established himself through victories of his own, and his nephew John Tzimiskes, Nikephoros achieved a series of successes, recovering Crete and Cyprus and repeatedly defeating Sayf al-Dawla's forces.

His father Bardas was named Caesar, and his brother Leo received the high court rank of kouropalates and the office of logothetes tou dromou (postal minister).

Basil's edict of 996, directed against the often illegal accumulation of vast estates by the Anatolian magnates, specifically names the Phokades and the closely allied Maleinoi as targets of the emperor's legislation.

Nevertheless, the prestige attached to the family name remained considerable for a time after their end: the historian Michael Attaleiates praised Nikephoros III Botaneiates (r. 1078–1081) for being related to the Phokades, "whose glory stretches over all the land and the sea".