Information in Kekaumenos’ Strategicon about “Eastern” Peoples: To the Question of the Author’s Service on the Eastern Frontier of the Roman Empire
State Academic University of the Humanities
Financing: state assignment of the Ministry of Sciences and Higher Education of the Russian Federation: topic FZNF-2020-0001 “Traditions and values of society: mechanisms of formation and transformation in the context of global history” (at the State Academic University for the Humanities).
For citation: Drobyshev, Мaksim I. Information in Kekaumenos’ Strategicon about “Oriental” Peoples: To the Question of the Author’s Service on the Eastern Frontier of the Roman Empire // Drevneishie gosudarstva Vostochnoi Evropy (The Earliest States of Eastern Europe). 2021: Eastern Europe and the World of Islam. In honor of Tatjana M. Kalinina. Editors of the volume B.E. Rashkovskiy, E.V. Litovskikh, E.A. Melnikova. Moscow: Dmitry Pozharsky University, 2021. S. 536–544.
DOI: 10.32608/1560-1382-2021-42-536-544
Abstract: The article provides an overview of pierces of information about the Eas tern peoples in the Byzantine treatise Strategikon by Kekaumenos. Strategikon was written between 1075 and 1078 and it is preserved in a single manuscript. Strategikon belongs to the genre of “private his tory” as the author’s presence is clearly expressed, the author’s assessments are formulated and there are indications of events of his life, as well as the deeds of his relatives and ances tors. There are also mentions of people with the patronymic “Kekaumenos” in the Synopsis of Byzantine His tory of John Skylitzes and in the Alexiad of Anna Comnina. The Synopsis of Byzantine His tory was written in the early 1090s, and Anna Comnina’s Alexiad was written around 1144. The Synopsis of Byzantine His tory includes relatively frequent references to Katakalon Kekaumenos in the description of the events of the 1040s — 1050s, and in the Alexiad Katakalon Kekaumenos appears as one of the conspirators against Byzantine emperor Alexey Komnin (1081–1118) in 1094. According to the work of John Skylitzes, Katakalon Kekaumenos had extensive experience of fighting on the wes tern and eas tern borders of the Byzantine Empire. Some researchers suggest, that John Skylitzes wrote about two personages named Katakalon Kekaumenos.
Mention of persons with the patronymic “Kekaumenos” in the description of the events of the second half of 11th — early 12th century gave rise to attempts to identify them with the author of Strategikon. The most popular was identification of the writer with Kekaumenos Katakalon told about in the Synopsis of Byzantine History by John Skylitzes, because this Kekaumenos is mentioned in the context of the events of military his tory of the second half of 11th century.
Scarce information about Eastern peoples in Strategicon contrary to the detailed description of many other events in the Balkan region shows that Kekaumenos, the author of this text, did not serve in the eas tern frontier regions of the Byzantine empire. This fact allows us to reconsider the identification of the author of the Strategikon with the Katakalon Kekaumenos, accepted in his toriography.
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