[1] Romanos Lekapenos had risen to power in 919, when he had managed to appoint himself regent over the young Constantine VII and marry his daughter Helena to him.

Their father wanted to have his eldest surviving grandson married to Euphrosyne, a daughter of his successful general John Kourkouas.

[7] Predictably, Stephen and Constantine opposed this decision, and prevailed upon their father, who was by this time ill and old, to dismiss Kourkouas in the autumn of 944.

[8][9] Romanos II instead married Bertha, an illegitimate daughter of King Hugh of Italy, who changed her name to Eudokia after her marriage.

[10] Their fellow conspirators included Marianos Argyros, the protospatharios Basil Peteinos, Manuel Kourtikes, the strategos Diogenes, Clado, and Philip.

The contemporary Lombard historian Liutprand of Cremona notes that the ambassadors and envoys from Amalfi, Gaeta, Rome, and Provence present in the capital also supported Constantine VII.

Bardas Phokas the Elder was appointed as the new Domestic of the Schools, and Constantine Gongyles as head of the Byzantine navy.

[14] On 27 January 945,[11] however, at the urging of their sister, the Augusta Helena, another coup removed the two Lekapenoi from power and restored the sole imperial authority to Constantine VII.

The Byzantine chroniclers have their father welcoming them by quoting a passage from the Book of Isaiah, specifically Chapter 1.2:[15] "Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for Jehovah hath spoken: I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.

[15] A plot by some members of the imperial government to restore him was discovered in December 947 and the conspirators were mutilated and publicly humiliated.