first modest reluctance might be the natural dictates of discretion and tenderness, but his obstinate and successful perseverance, however it may dazzle with the show of virtue, must be censured as a criminal desertion of his duty and a rare offence against his family and country.[1] The purple which he had refused was accepted by Constantine Ducas, a friend of the Comnenian house, and whose noble birth was adorned with the experience and reputation of civil policy.[2] In the monastic habit, Isaac recovered his health, and survived two years his [in the Abbey of Studion] voluntary abdication. At the command of his abbot, he observed the rule of St. Basil, and executed the most servile offices of the convent; but his latent vanity was gratified by the frequent and respecful visits of the reigning monarch, who revered in his person the character of a benefactor and a saint,
Constantine Xi. [X.]
Ducas. A.D. 1059, Dec. 25
If Constantine the Eleventh were indeed the subject most
worthy of empire, we must pity the debasement of the age and
nation in which he was chosen. In the labour of puerile
declamations he sought, without obtaining, the crown of eloquence, more precious in his opinion than that of Rome; and
in the subordinate functions of a judge he forgot the duties of a
sovereign and a warrior.[3] Far from imitating the patriotic
indifference of the authors of his greatness, Ducas was anxious
only to secure, at the expense of the republic, the power and
prosperity of his children. His three sons, Michael the Seventh,
Andronicus the First, and Constantine the Twelfth, were invested
in a tender age with the equal title of Augustus ; and the
succession was speedily opened by their father's death.
Endocia. A.D. 1067, May His
widow, Eudocia,[4] was entrusted with the administration ; but
experience had taught the jealousy of the dying monarch to
protect his sons from the danger of her second nuptials ; and
her solemn engagement, attested by the principal senators, was
deposited in the hands of the patriarch. Before the end of seven
months, the wants of Eudocia, or those of the state, called aloud
for the male virtues of a soldier ; and her heart had already
chosen Romanus Diogenes, whom she raised from the scaffold
- ↑ ["Gibbon accepts the statement of Nicephorus Bryemius (i. 20) that John refused the imperial crown; but it appears to be merely a flourish of family pride, for Scylitzes expressly declares that Isaac set aside his brother " (Finlay, Hist, of Greece, ii. , p. 12, n. 2). Isaac was married to a Bulgarian princess Aikaterina, the daughter probably of John Vladislav, as Scylitzes says (p. 628 ; cp. Miidler, Op. cit. p. 13).]
- ↑ [Especially financial policy.]
- ↑ [For the anti-military policy adopted by Constantine Ducas, and in general for the condition of the empire at this period, see C. Neumann's excellent work, Das Byzantinische Reich vor den Kreuzziigen.]
- ↑ [For the literary work and influence of Eudocia, see below, chap, liii.]
