The New International Encyclopædia/Alexis I. Comnenus

ALEXIS, or ALEX′IUS I., COMNE′NUS (1048–1118) (Gk. Ἀλέξιος Κομνηνός, Alexios Komnenos). One of the ablest rulers of the Byzantine Empire. He was born at Constantinople, the son of John Comnenus, brother of the Emperor Isaac Comnenus. In his youth Alexis gave brilliant promise of the vigorous military genius which he afterward manifested, and at length, after a series of anarchic reigns of brief duration, his soldiers succeeded in elevating him to the throne, while the old and feeble Nicephorus Botaniates, his predecessor, was obliged to retire to a monastery (1081). Gibbon graphically paints the position and achievements of Alexis in the forty-eighth chapter of his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Everywhere he was encompassed with foes. The Scythians and Turks were pouring down from the north and northeast, the fierce Normans, who had violently effected a lodgment in Italy and Sicily, were menacing his western provinces; and, finally, the myriad warriors of the First Crusade burst into his Empire on their way to Palestine, and encamped around the gates of his capital. Yet he contrived to avoid all perils and disgraces by the wisdom of his policy, the mingled patience and promptitude of his character, and his discipline in the camp. He reigned for thirty-seven years, and if it had been possible to preserve the Byzantine Empire in its integrity, a ruler like Alexis might have done it.

Undoubtedly, the great interest which attaches to Alexis arises from his relations to the Crusaders. Historians differ as to the purity and sincerity of his conduct toward them. His daughter Anna (q.v.), who wrote his life, defends his “policy” with filial piety; but it is clear that he entertained a profound dread and suspicion of the half-civilized Franks, and, knowing the weakness of his own Empire, was compelled to dissimulate. He promised them help, and persuaded them to go off into Asia; but he did not fulfill his promises, and simply used them as his instruments to reconquer from the Turks the islands and coasts of Asia Minor. Perhaps, however, little apology is needed for a monarch who “subdued the envy of his equals, restored the laws of public and private order, caused the arts of wealth and science to be cultivated, and transmitted the sceptre to his children of the third and fourth generations.”