Romanos I Lakapenos or Lekapenos (Greek: Ῥωμανός Λακαπηνός or Λεκαπηνός, Rōmanos Lakapēnos or Lekapēnos; c. 870 – 15 June 948),[1] Latinized as Romanus I Lecapenus, was Byzantine emperor from 920 until his deposition in 944, serving as regent for and senior co-ruler of the young Constantine VII.

[2] It is found mostly as Lakapenos in the sources, although English-language scholarship in particular prefers the form Lekapenos, in large part due to Sir Steven Runciman's 1928 study on the emperor.

[3] He was the son of a peasant with the remarkable name of Theophylact "the Unbearable" (Theophylaktos Abastaktos), who had rescued the Emperor Basil I from the enemy in battle at Tephrike and had been rewarded by a place in the Imperial Guard.

[5][6] Byzantinist Anthony Kaldellis contests this, saying that Armenian ancestry is not mentioned in the many Byzantine sources which discuss Romanos, and that Theophylaktos' alleged ethnicity is an assumption based on his being born in humble circumstances in the Armeniac Theme.

[3] Although he did not receive any refined education (for which he was later abused by his son-in-law Constantine VII), Romanos advanced through the ranks of the army during the reign of Emperor Leo VI the Wise.

In the aftermath of the disastrous Byzantine defeat at the Battle of Acheloos in 917 by the Bulgarians, Romanos sailed to Constantinople, where he gradually overcame the discredited regency of Empress Zoe Karvounopsina and her supporter Leo Phokas.

Initially, he was named magistros and megas hetaireiarches, but he moved swiftly to consolidate his position: in April 919 his daughter Helena was married to Constantine VII, and Lekapenos assumed the new title basileopator.

Romanos strengthened his position by marrying his daughters to members of the powerful aristocratic families of Argyros and Mouseles, by recalling the deposed patriarch Nicholas Mystikos, and by putting an end to the conflict with the Papacy over the four marriages of Emperor Leo VI.

In September 927 Peter arrived before Constantinople and married Maria (renamed Eirene, "Peace"), the daughter of Romanos' eldest son and co-emperor Christopher, and thus his granddaughter.

On this occasion Christopher received precedence in rank over his brother-in-law Constantine VII, something which compounded the latter's resentment towards the Lekapenoi, the Bulgarians, and imperial marriages to outsiders (as documented in his composition De Administrando Imperio).

As the price for his withdrawal, Kourkouas obtained one of Byzantium's most prized relics, the mandylion, the holy towel allegedly sent by Jesus Christ to King Abgar V of Edessa.

The new patriarch did not achieve renown for his piety and spirituality, but he added theatrical elements to the Byzantine liturgy and was an avid horse-breeder, allegedly leaving mass to tend to one of his favorite mares when she was giving birth.

Romanos' later reign was marked by the old emperor's heightened interest in divine judgment and his increasing sense of guilt for his role in the usurpation of the throne from Constantine VII.

In his De Administrando Imperio manual written for his son and successor, Romanos II, he minces no words about his late father-in-law: "the lord Romanus the Emperor was an idiot and an illiterate man, neither bred in the high imperial manner, nor following Roman custom from the beginning, nor of imperial or noble descent, and therefore the more rude and authoritarian in doing most things ... for his beliefs were uncouth, obstinate, ignorant of what is good, and unwilling to adhere to what is right and proper.