Michael the Scholar released her as soon as Diogenes was dead, and she returned to Constantinople, to watch and work. She had something of the spirit of her father, who had sent so many of the enemy to the land of shades that he had won the name of Alexius Charon: her mother had been of the great family of the Delasseni. The feebleness of Michael and the insipidity11 of Nicephorus gave promise of a successful revolution, and198 Anna and her two sons were shrewd enough not to force the opportunity. The youth had first to learn the mastery of legions and to marry. There were, in fact, four women in Constantinople, all able and ambitious, who sought the throne for their children, and a stupendous amount of intrigue12 must have been expended13. The four were: Anna Comnena, the Empresses Eudocia and Maria, and the wife of Andronicus, son of the C?sar John Ducas. Andronicus had been fatally wounded in war, and condemned14 to a lingering death, and his wife pressed the C?sar to find good alliances for her three daughters. She was one of those virile15 and beautiful Bulgarian princesses who had found the way to Constantinople, and her eldest16 daughter, Irene, was now just marriageable.
The wife of Andronicus—we do not know her name—shrewdly concluded that an alliance with the Comneni would best serve her ambition, and she pressed her father-in-law to bring about a marriage between Irene and Alexis, the elder of Anna’s two sons. Alexis was a very promising17 and successful commander who had recently lost his first wife, and he was not unwilling18 to wed19 the fair Irene. Anna Comnena (the younger) describes the pair for us, with her usual verbosity20 and inexactness, premising that it is beyond the power of art to reproduce their comeliness21. Alexis was, it seems, a man of medium height, with very broad shoulders and massive chest, eyes of “terrible splendour,” and a look that was “at once both truculent22 and bland23.” He seems, in fact, to have been a very ordinary young man, with an extraordinary capacity for ruse24 and intrigue. Irene (Anna’s mother) was, of course, a paragon25. Her face was “like the moon,” though not quite so round, and her rosy26 cheeks and fine blue eyes make the simile27 somewhat weak; her look, like that of her husband, was “at once sweet and terrible”—the look of “a Minerva of heavenly splendour”—and calm and storm succeeded each other, as on the sea, in her expressive28 blue eyes;199 her arms and hands were like carven ivory, and her constant gestures extremely graceful29. In other words, Irene was a very pretty maiden30 of thirteen summers at the time, with a large share of the spirit and temper of her Bulgarian mother. These fragments of Anna Comnena’s art may serve to illustrate31 Gibbon’s indulgent complaint that it is more feminine than the artist herself.
The prospect32 of so significant a marriage released a fresh flood of intrigue. Anna, the mother of Alexis, remembered that it was John Ducas who had driven her into exile, and would not hear of a match with his daughter-in-law. The Emperor Michael regarded the marriage with distrust; his brother Constantine wanted to marry Alexis to his sister Zoe, Eudocia’s youngest daughter. Through this thicket33 of obstacles and intrigues34 the wife of Andronicus fought her way with spirit, and not a little bribery35, and the marriage took place. We may assume that this was in the second or third year of Nicephorus, when Irene, who was only fifteen at her coronation, cannot have been more than thirteen or fourteen years old.
The Empress Eudocia had now played her last card, and resigned herself to the life of the monastery36; it remained to secure the favour of the lovely Empress Maria. Isaac Comnenus had married her cousin Irene, and had therefore the entrée of her palace. The Slavonian ministers of Nicephorus watched him and his brother with concern, but he won the affection of Maria and, by generous distribution of money, the service of her eunuchs. It was presently announced that the Empress Maria proposed to adopt the successful young commander of the troops, Alexis Comnenus, and when this ceremony had been performed both brothers were at liberty to make lengthy37 visits to the Empress. It is not difficult to accept the rumour38 that the relation of Alexis to his “mother” was not entirely39 filial. Alexis was no ascetic40, and he notoriously strayed from his girl-wife. On the other hand, Maria had not shown much delicacy200 in marrying the white-haired sensualist, and the privilege of intimacy41 with a handsome young general of thirty-seven, her eunuchs being bribed42 in his and her favour, would be appreciated by her. Her mind was not strong and penetrating43 enough to see through the trickery of Alexis. He posed as an unambitious general, loyally devoted44 to her reign and that of her son.
The Emperor Nicephorus probably felt that the young men would await the natural termination of his imperial orgies before seizing the throne, and seems to have regarded them with a certain genial45 indifference46. His ministers, however, knew that their fortunes were ruined if Alexis came to the throne, and they insisted that Nicephorus must name a successor. He chose his nephew, a handsome young noble named Synadenus. Maria was now seriously alarmed, since the accession of Synadenus would mean the monastery for her and, possibly, death for her son, and she allowed the Comneni to witness her tears. They were, they said, devoted to her cause. Nay47, they swore on the holy cross that they would acknowledge no rulers but Maria and her son, and she promised, in return, that they should be informed of any step that might be contemplated48 against them in the palace. I am following, almost entirely, the narrative of Anna Comnena, who enlarges with the most candid49 pleasure on the deceit of her father, and assures us that her grandmother, Anna, was the soul of the plot. In the palace of the Comneni councils were held daily, and the virile mother directed the movements of her sons. It was a time of great anxiety. One night Nicephorus invited Alexis and Isaac to his banquet, and Anna depicts50 them nervously51 glancing round them during the meal for the guards or assassins who might have been summoned to despatch52 them. But Alexis, a master of ruse and insinuation, won the Emperor, and, when a charge of treason was afterwards brought against him, he easily cleared himself.
At last a message came to the mansion53 of the Comneni from Maria that Barilas (one of the Slav ministers)201 intended to seize the throne and put out the eyes of Alexis; and it was decided54 that the time had come for action. Alexis hastily made a tour of the city, persuading some, bribing55 others, until he had a large number of officers and Senators bound by secret oath to support him. Anna meantime made preparations for the flight of the family during the night. The chief weakness of their position was that a young relative of the Emperor had recently married a young girl of their family, and lived, with a tutor, in an outlying part of their mansion. Anna, regarding the tutor as a spy, locked them in their rooms when they were asleep, and before dawn the whole Comneni family set out on foot to cross the city. At that hour of the night there was little watch in Constantinople, and the nervous band—the mother, the two brothers with their wives, children, and sisters, and a few servants—passed safely and silently down the colonnaded56 main street as far as the Forum57 of Constantine, where horses awaited the men. They bade each other farewell in the darkness of the early spring morning, and the brothers galloped58 to the Blachern? palace, where they broke into the stables, chose the swiftest horses, hamstrung the rest of the horses, and fled to the army which awaited them in Thrace.
The women and children made their way noiselessly back along the Mese to the cathedral. As they went along the street, the glare of a torch appeared in the distance and they found themselves inconveniently59 accosted60 by the tutor spy. Anna kept her presence of mind, however. They had heard, she said, that they were accused of some crime and they were going at once to St Sophia, but as soon as the day broke they would go to the palace to demand justice, and she begged the tutor to go on to the palace to announce their intention. As soon as he had gone, they made for the house of Bishop61 Nicholas, an annexe of the cathedral into which fugitives62 were admitted during the night. Rousing the doorkeeper, they announced themselves—they202 were all heavily veiled—as a party of women who had just landed at the quays63 from the east, and who would render thanks to the Almighty64 before repairing to their homes. They were admitted to the church, and, when the officers of the infuriated Emperor arrived, in the early morning, they found that nothing less than a violation65 of the sanctuary66 would put the women in the power of Nicephorus. Anna, in fact, clung to the gates of the sanctuary, and exclaimed that the soldiers would have to cut off her hands to remove her from the church, as the Slav ministers threatened. Isaac’s wife Irene, an Iberian princess like her cousin Maria, followed the example of her mother-in-law, and we must imagine the younger Irene and the children standing67 by, with large and tearful blue eyes, taking their first lesson in Byzantine politics. Nicephorus temporized68, and swore to spare their lives. Anna shrewdly stipulated69 that his oath should be taken on the large cross which the Sybarite Emperor always wore, and, when this had been brought and the oath guaranteed to them, the women passed from the church to the palace-fortress-monastery at Petrion, on the Golden Horn. There they were soon joined by the wife and mother-in-law of George Paleologus, a dashing young commander who had fled with the Comneni, and, by sharing their delicate meats and wines liberally with their jailers, they secured a constant account of the progress of the insurgent70 brothers.
They heard presently that Alexis and Isaac had safely reached the camp in Thrace, and that it had needed only a little further intrigue on the part of Alexis for the troops to proclaim him Emperor. The next news of importance was that the brothers were encamped with their troops on the higher ground without the city walls, and Nicephorus was distracted and terrified. But we may tell in few words the success of the Comneni. The formidable walls of Constantinople were held by the Varangian guards and Immortals71, on whose blind fidelity72 a ruling (and paying) Emperor could always rely. But the extravagance203 of Nicephorus had in three years exhausted73 the treasury74—its doors stood open for any man to enter the empty building—the troops were few, and uncertain mercenaries had to be enlisted75 in the defence. Alexis bribed the German soldiers who held the tower overlooking the Blachern? gate, and at dawn of Maundy Thursday (1081) his troops poured into the city.
It is one of the few points in favour of Alexis that he here made a very human blunder which might have cost him his life and his ambition. Instead of holding his troops to scatter76 the guards, who had retreated upon the palace, he rode at once to Petrion to see that the women were safe, and his soldiers—a motley and savage77 crowd of Thracian and Macedonian mercenaries—spread with fiendish delight over the city, violating nuns78 in the monasteries80 and burdening themselves with wine and loot. Paleologus saved them by a bold and crafty81 seizure82 of the fleet, cutting off the Emperor’s retreat to Asia. Nicephorus wavered between the vigorous counsels of his ministers and the command of the patriarch that he should abdicate83 and prevent civil war, but his hesitation84 enabled the troops to rally, and, with a melancholy farewell to his perfumed baths and opulent banquets, he suffered himself to be shipped to the opposite shore and shaved into a monk85.
The Empress Maria is described as trembling in her palace during these critical days of the Holy Week, clinging to her boy Constantine, a pretty seven-year-old lad with curly golden hair and pink and white complexion86. Alexis had apparently87 deceived her, and the Comnenian women would have little consideration for her. For some days, however, she remained in quiet possession of her apartments, and a very keen discussion took place in Constantinople as to the intentions of Alexis. He had put Irene, with her mother and sisters, in the lower and older palace, while he, his mother, brother, and other relations had taken residence in the more important Bucoleon palace, by the water. Did he204 propose to put away his doll-wife and wed the riper beauty? Such things had happened before, and the careful reader of Anna Comnena’s discreet88 narrative will easily believe that that was the intention, or the disposition89, of Alexis. He had treated Irene with coldness and disdain90 (other chroniclers tell us), and been unfaithful to her. But the little Irene had her party, or Maria had her enemies, and the indecision of Alexis was forced. Paleologus drew up the fleet before Bucoleon. When Alexis sent orders to him that the sailors must not acclaim91 Irene, he boldly replied that he had “not done all this for Alexis, but for Irene,” and her name rolled from galley92 to galley. Next the C?sar John Ducas intervened, and urged Maria to retire; probably he sought favour with Anna. Alexis still hesitated, and Irene was not crowned with him.
Speculation93 in the city was now seething94, but a curious circumstance soon ended the hesitation of Alexis. His mother was devoted to monks95 generally, and one in particular she so esteemed96 that she insisted on his being appointed at once patriarch of Constantinople. The actual patriarch, Cosmas, swore that he would not resign in favour of the monk until he had crowned Irene, and Anna had now an additional incentive97 to press her son. Within a week of the coronation of Alexis the second coronation took place, and Irene began to share the bed and the throne of her husband. The last hope of Maria had gone down before her more virile and older antagonist98, and she prepared to retire. Her son Constantine was clothed with the imperial dignity, and an imperial rescript, written in the red or purple ink and signed with the golden seal of the Emperor, guaranteed their safety. With this precious document Maria retired99, accompanied by her son, to a somewhat remote palace in the imperial domain100, and we may briefly101 dismiss her from the story. Some years later a pretext102 was found to remove her from her semi-imperial state and lodge103 her in a monastery. Her last recorded act is that she205 bethought herself of her first and real husband, who still lived in Constantinople as titular104 Bishop of Ephesus, and asked and obtained forgiveness.
Alexis now hastened to form about his throne a bulwark105 of loyal, and richly rewarded, friends, and the Court resounded106 with sonorous107 new titles and glittered with new insignia. Another noble, Nicephorus Melissenus, had sought the throne at the same time as Alexis; he was disarmed108 with the dignity of C?sar and the remote governorship of Thessalonica. Isaac received the newly created dignity of Sebastocrator; Michael Taroneita, who had married a sister of Alexis, rejoiced in the opulent name of Panhypersebastos; and younger brothers were created Protosebastos and Sebastos.26 When we recollect109 that the wife of each had a corresponding title and state, we appreciate the splendour of the processions which now constantly fed the enthusiasm of Constantinople.
For a time, however, life in the palace wore a humorously mournful complexion. The appalling110 outrages111 of Alexis’s troops had sown bitterness in the minds of the people, and the memory of them had to be obliterated112. Any other Emperor would have at once provided a glorious series of chariot races and flung gold in showers from his chariot. Alexis Comnenus found a less expensive device; unless we care to attribute the scheme to his mother, whom he consulted. The new patriarch was humbly113 begged to impose a penance114 on all the royal inmates115 of the palace, and he decided that forty days of fasting and prayer would efface116 the stain. Alexis himself generously went beyond the letter of the penance; he slept nightly on the ground and wore a hair shirt—and took care that all the citizens knew it. His brothers, his mother and the other women of the family embraced their share of the imposition, and for five or six weeks the Bucoleon palace resembled a monastery.
206 When the period of mourning came to an end Alexis turned to face the numerous and pressing enemies of his Empire, and his mother became the active ruler. Her granddaughter would have us believe that the elder Anna had no ambition to wield117 power; she was disposed to retire at once into a monastery, and it was only in obedience118 to a solemn decree of Alexis that she consented to remain in the palace and use the powers of her absent son. But Anna Comnena, the royal historian, possessed119 in a considerable degree the faculty120 for ruse and duplicity which distinguished her family,27 and we have little difficulty in seeing that the older Anna claimed and clung to power. Irene was, of course, still a negligible child. Anna at once set about the restoration of discipline in the palace, which had been so grossly neglected under Nicephorus and Maria. Hours were fixed121 for meals and prayers and the chanting of hymns122, and her table was rarely without the blessing123 of some priest or monk who would discuss with her the sacred books and theological issues in which she was interested. Sober in diet, liberal to the poor and the Church, awake beyond the hours of most mortals with her long prayers, yet up early in the morning for those imperial duties which the golden bull of her son had laid on her, Anna was at least not unworthy of the power she had intrigued125 to secure. We must, however, not exaggerate her political influence. A few years later we find Alexis, when he sets out for the field, entrusting126 the reins127 of government to his brother, and no doubt Isaac generally controlled the administration.
Of Irene we hear little until the latter part of her husband’s reign, when her services as nurse make him appreciate her value. In spite of the glowing assurances207 of their daughter, we perceive confidently that Irene was slighted, both by the mother and the son, and we shall ultimately find her dismissing him from the world with an assurance of her profound disdain. For two years the chronicles are silent about her, and the one reference to her in twenty years is that she bore children to her spouse128. As Christmas approached in 1083 she began to feel the first pangs129 of travail130. Alexis was expected home from his campaign against Robert Guiscard in two days, and Anna Comnena, who is not hypersensitive in her narrative, relates that the young mother signed her body with a cross and said: “Stay where you are, my boy, until your father arrives.” It was not a boy, but the historian herself, who saw the light two days later, and Anna—a fierce and murderous rebel against her brother—asks us to applaud her very early practice of the virtue131 of obedience.
In view of this silence concerning the Empresses we will hold ourselves dispensed132 from following Alexis through the campaigns, plots and counter-plots of the next twenty years. Five years were spent in struggle with Robert Guiscard of Italy: five in repelling133 the wild Patzinaks of Scythia: five more in suppressing conspiracies134, or alleged135 conspiracies, against the throne. It may seem ungenerous to suspect that the hard-working Alexis invented these conspiracies in order to rid his camp and Court of suspected relatives or nobles, but Byzantine historians not obscurely hint such a suspicion. One conspiracy136 only need be related, since Irene appears on the stage at the time.
Some years after his accession to the throne—the date is uncertain—Alexis consented to the retirement137 of his mother into the monastery to which, her granddaughter says, her heart had always turned. Very probably Irene, as she grew to womanhood, resented the older woman’s restraint and piety138, and insisted on her removal. She died, a nun79, a few years afterwards. From that time Alexis drew nearer to Irene, and used to take her with208 him on his campaigns. In 1092 or 1093 there was trouble in Dalmatia, and Irene accompanied her husband and shared his tent in the camp. It was noticed with some alarm by the officers that Nicephorus Diogenes, son of Eudocia, who had received imperial dignity in his infancy139 and might aspire140 to regain it, pitched his tent nearer to that of the Emperor than courtesy permitted. Alexis scouted141 their suspicions, and retired to rest with Irene; but in the middle of the night the maid who was engaged in keeping the flies, or other insects, off the royal sleepers145, aroused them with the news that Nicephorus had entered the tent with a drawn146 sword. One hesitates to say which is the more remarkable147: that there should be no guard to the imperial tent, or that Alexis should take no notice of this attempt on his life. A few days later, Anna assures us, Nicephorus renewed the attempt, and was detected with drawn sword near the Emperor’s bath. He was now put to the torture and provided a list of nobles who were obnoxious148 to the Emperor and were duly punished. It is interesting to find that the ex-Empress Maria was included among the conspirators149, and it was possibly on this occasion that she was sent to a nunnery. But the narrated150 details of the conspiracy are so clumsy, and the issue proved so profitable to Alexis, that historians regard it with grave suspicion.
We come next to the page of Byzantine history which is least unfamiliar151 to English readers, the page restored to life by Sir Walter Scott in his “Count Robert of Paris.”28 But, profoundly important as the passage of209 the first Crusaders is in Byzantine history and in the biography of Alexis, we have no decent pretext to enlarge on that fascinating episode in a biography of the Empresses. We need say only that Irene trembled with her husband, or more than her husband, at the formidable tide of the invasion. Thinking to secure a few thousand spears to assist him in his warfare152 with the Turks, Alexis had added a pathetic, if not hypocritical, plea to the eloquence153 of Peter the Hermit154. The response was, in 1096, a devouring155 and destructive army of locusts156: a flood of 300,000 men, women and children, who, before they could be persuaded to cross the straits and leave their bones on the plains of Asia Minor157, gravely embarrassed the Byzantine Court. In their train came a more formidable menace: Godfrey of Bouillon, Robert of Flanders, the princes of Western chivalry158, with their hawks159 and hounds and ladies, and their vast hordes160 of hungry and blustering161 men-at-arms. Their suspicions, ferocious162 outbursts, disdain, and greed of wealth, called out every diplomatic resource at the command of Alexis, and few will do more than smile at his duplicity in such circumstances. At one moment, when it was rumoured163 in their camp without the walls that Alexis had imprisoned164 some of their leaders, they flung themselves against the city, and a howl of terror was heard from Blachern? to the Sea of Marmora. How Alexis astutely165 drew them from the fascinations166 of his capital, and hovered167 in their rear, jackal-like, to recover the towns from which they expelled the Turk, and at last brought on a conflict of Latin and Greek, must be read in history. Seven further years of the reign of Alexis and Irene passed in these adventures.
The next decade was full of war against Bohemund, son of his former antagonist Robert Guiscard, and other Crusaders. In the course of the war, in 1105, we again catch a glimpse of Irene, who accompanied Alexis to the camp of Thessalonica. Apropos168 of the journey her daughter, who was now a mature eyewitness169 of events,210 depicts Irene’s character in phrases which we read with some discretion170. She was, it seems, so devoted to the reading of sacred books, the conversation of holy men and the discharge of her domestic duties, that she was reluctant to make these journeys; indeed, she could never appear in public without a nervous blush. It is not like the Irene whom we shall know more fully171 anon. But her husband needed her, and she obeyed. Plotters and conspirators surrounded him, and he suffered acutely from gout in the feet. Of the constant plots Anna offers no explanation; it is not from her that we learn how Alexis so far debased the coinage that his “gold” pieces (almost entirely bronze) were a thing of contempt throughout Europe, how he further oppressed his subjects with monopolies, and how savagely172 he could at times treat malcontents and heretics. His gout, however, she is eager to explain. It was due, not to any generosity173 of diet, but to an injury to his knee in early years, aggravated174 by the stupid “barbarians of the West” (the Crusaders), who kept the sacred Emperor standing for hours to listen to their unceasing torrents175 of talk. So Irene had to accompany her husband, to chafe176 his poignant177 limbs when the gout racked him and to scare away conspirators. She travelled with great modesty178, in a litter borne by two mules179 and so enwrapped with purple that “her divine body was not visible.”
In the following year a conspiracy was “detected” at Constantinople. A wealthy Senator named Solomon and four brothers of Saracenic origin were the chief plotters, and the treasury was enriched by their fortunes. Solomon’s mansion was given to Irene, who is said to have restored it to the wife of the Senator. For once Anna admits that her father could be truculent. Anna was at a window of the palace overlooking the Forum, or the streets near it, when the soldiers and mob passed with the four brother conspirators. They were mounted on oxen, and were derisively180 adorned181 with the horns and211 entrails of oxen by the theatrical182 folk to whom they had been entrusted183 before their eyes were put out; from another historian we learn that the hair had already been torn, by means of pitch, from their heads and chins. Anna called her mother, and the two women forced Alexis to put an end to the horrible display and spare the prisoners’ eyes.
A year or two later Irene is said to have saved her husband’s life from fresh conspirators. She had again set out with him for Thessalonica, and, as they camped at Psyllus on the way, a plot was formed to murder Alexis as soon as Irene should return to the city. Alexis would not part with her, and the impatient conspirators threw a parchment in his tent, deriding184 him for his reluctance185 to take the field and urging the dismissal of Irene. Shortly afterwards a more violent diatribe186 was placed under their bed while they slept, but one of Irene’s eunuchs was on guard and arrested the man, who betrayed the plotters. Then the death of Bohemund put an end to the war in the West, and the indefatigable187 Emperor turned to face the Turks and the Crusaders who had settled in the East. Irene became seriously ill when she accompanied Alexis to the Chersonesus in 1112, yet we find her with him at Philippopolis in the following year.
Irene was little more than nurse to the gouty monarch188 during these campaigns, yet we must, in order to understand her last fierce word to him, glance for a moment at the conduct she observed in him. She had for years seen how he conducted wars and diplomacy189 chiefly by guile190 and deceit, and she now saw how he converted heretics. A few years before he had set out to refute the tenets of the “Bogomilians,” one of the many sects143, mingling191 Eastern and Western ideas, in which age after age the protestant feeling against the superstitions192 and corruption194 of the Greek Church found expression. By the use of torture Alexis discovered that the leader of the sect144 was a staid and venerable monk named Basil,212 invited the monk to visit him in the palace, and, by a grossly hypocritical pretence195 that he himself leaned to the sect, induced him to talk freely of their doctrines196. When he had “vomited his heresy,” Alexis drew aside a curtain, and showed the man that a shorthand-writer had secretly taken down his words. Basil was imprisoned, and Alexis spent hours in argumentation with him; and a few years later the “archsatrap of Satan” and large numbers of his followers197 were burned alive for refusing to see the force of the imperial logic124. Similar tactics were now adopted at Philippopolis, where Alexis and Irene spent the greater part of 1113. It was an important seat of the Paulicians (a modified Manich?an sect), and Alexis spent days in disputation with their leaders; when persuasion198 failed, he resorted to bribery and coercion199.
These few instances will suffice to illustrate the relations of Irene and Alexis, and we may hasten to the final scene. The last years were occupied with a campaign against the Turks, but Alexis was now seriously ill and the enemy advanced and reviled200 him for his cowardice201. In their camp they bore about a bed with an effigy202 of Alexis pretending that gouty feet prevented him from taking the field. Irene was awakened203 one night with the news that the Turks were upon them, and Alexis was forced to let her return to the capital. There is no doubt that she accompanied Alexis on these later campaigns only because he compelled her, and one wonders whether he was not afraid to leave her in the palace. He retreated, and recalled her at once to Nicomedia. Here she found that his own subjects were singing, on the streets, comic songs about the gout of the great Emperor and his flight before the Turks. He was undoubtedly204 very ill, and in the spring of 1118 he was brought back to the palace to die. Then arose a fierce struggle for the throne.
Anna Comnena, the princess born in 1083, had been betrothed205, in her tender years, to the Empress Maria’s213 pretty boy Constantine. The boy died, however, and in time she was married to the distinguished and ambitious noble, Nicephorus Bryennius, who received the title of C?sar and then that of Panhypersebastos (“the august above all others”). Bryennius was a scholar: Anna a prodigy206 of female learning, a cyclop?dia of arts and philosophy, a most imposing207 writer, and—strange to say—a spirited and ambitious princess. The brilliance208 of this imperial pair dazzled the Court and the capital, and it was very naturally suggested that the crowns could not be placed on wiser and more fitting heads than theirs. Such was the opinion of Irene. But Alexis and Irene had three sons (John, Andronicus and Isaac) and three daughters (Maria, Eudocia and Theodora) besides the gifted Anna, and the crown belonged, by such right as was recognized in Byzantium, to the eldest son. John was a plain, quiet youth of—as events proved—sterling character and no ostentation209. His father appreciated him, though few others knew him. He observed with sullen210 eyes the efforts of his mother to displace him, and secretly engaged officers and nobles to support him against her; and Irene retorted by forbidding them to have any intercourse211 with John. This struggle was now to reach the height of passion round the deathbed of the Emperor.
The last ten pages of Anna’s narrative give a vivid account of the progress of her father’s illness. She was appointed to a kind of presidency212 over the skilled medical men who were summoned from all parts of the Empire to check the “mysterious” illness—of a gouty old man of seventy. I will quote only that, when relics213 failed to improve his condition, they applied214 a red-hot iron to his stomach—to counterpoise the pain at the extremities215, perhaps—and, when this brought about no relief, removed him to the Mangana palace, near what is now known as the Seraglio Point. Irene watched her husband night and day (carefully excluding John), and, although the monks assured her that he would live to214 visit the Holy Sepulchre, she shed “more tears than the waters of the Nile,” Anna says.
In the afternoon of 15th August 1118, Alexis lay dying on his purple couch. The description of the scene, which closes Anna’s narrative, has reached us only in a torn and fragmentary condition, but the chronicle of the monk Zonaras, who lived about this date, is full and authoritative216, and it is supported by the chronicle of Nicetas. Their account of that last scene in the life of Alexis shows that Anna Comnena crowns her work with a masterpiece of deliberate lying. She depicts her mother overwhelmed with sorrow at the impending217 loss of her husband, crying that thrones and crowns are vanity, and calling for the black robe of a nun, if not actually shearing218 her golden tresses, before the last breath has left her husband’s body. Of the real features of the scene there is merely a faint and vague report that John is hurrying to the main palace and the city is disturbed. The truth is less touching219, more dramatic.
Availing himself of a temporary absence of his mother—probably bribing the guards—John entered the room and approached the bed of the dying and speechless monarch. Alexis was still conscious; but whether he gave his ring to John, or the son detached it from his finger, the chroniclers are not agreed. No doubt Alexis was too feeble to detach and give it, and merely looked assent220 when John detached it; Alexis had always favoured John. By the time Irene returned John was galloping221 across the imperial domain to the chief palace (either Daphne or, more probably, Bucoleon), and the Empress was furious. She angrily observed to Alexis that his son was seizing the throne while he yet lived. Alexis feebly, and equivocally—though some writers say that he smiled—lifted his hands and eyes toward heaven, as if to intimate that there was the only throne about which he was now concerned. Nicephorus Bryennius was summoned, and Irene urged him to unite with her in claiming the throne. He refused, and she215 returned to her husband. The last words, loudly and harshly spoken, which she gave the dying man were: “Husband, while you lived, you were full of guile, saying one thing and thinking another; you are no better now that you are dying.”29 We may assume that Alexis had deceived her about the succession. He died that evening, so completely deserted222 that there were no ministers to perform the ceremonial services over his remains223. The interest had passed to the main palace.
John had found before the door a regiment224 of the Varangians, who, even when he showed his father’s ring, refused to allow him to enter. But they grounded their formidable two-edged axes, and stood aside, when he swore (a false oath) that his father was already dead, and had appointed him successor. He at once secured the palace and the crown, and the reign of Irene Comnena was over, the hope of Anna Comnena shattered. John would not even issue to attend the funeral of Alexis, so determined225 he was to hold the palace. The women were beaten by the quiet, ugly little youth they had despised, and a few words of the chroniclers dismiss them from the stage of history.
Irene, changing her name to that of Xene, retired to a monastery which she had built in the city. Curiously226 enough, a manuscript copy of the rules of this monastery has survived, and been published,30 so that we have an interesting glimpse of Irene’s later years and of the monastic life of the time. The inmates were to number between thirty and forty, were to sleep in a common dormitory, and were to elect a prefect. Besides the steward227, who was to be a eunuch, and the two chaplains, who must be monks and eunuchs, no man was ever to enter the monastery, and the reception of visitors was strictly228 controlled. There was midnight office to be chanted, and the remaining offices and meals and other216 details were planned much as in a modern “convent” (a Latin word unknown in the East). Each nun was permitted to have a bath once a month. Irene little dreamed, when she sanctioned this ascetic scheme, that she would one day be forced to adopt it. But the last glimpse we catch of her in the chronicles suggests that she did not embrace it in all its rigour. Fifteen years later, when another Irene came from the West to wed the Emperor Manuel, she noticed, among the crowd of notabilities who welcomed her to the city, an aged142 lady whose dark monastic robe was relieved by strips of purple and edges of gold. When she asked the name of this royal nun, she learned that it was the widow of the great Alexis. Probably Irene tempered the diet and prayers, as well as the robe, of the monastery. She was then seventy-seven years old, and cannot have lived much longer.
Anna Comnena seems to have retained her liberty and rank at the accession of her brother. He soon proved his worthiness229 of the crown, and the corrupt193 nobles and ministers, shrinking from his inflexible230 justice, gathered darkly about Anna and Bryennius. Anna was the most active spirit in the plot, and it would have succeeded but for the irresolution231, or humanity, of Bryennius. The doorkeeper of the palace was bribed, and John might have been murdered in his bed. When Bryennius failed to use the advantage, Anna turned upon him with fury. Nicetas tells us that she complained, “in somewhat obscene language,” that Nature had made her a woman and him a man. John was content to confiscate232 their property; though, when he gave Anna’s luxurious233 palace and all it contained to his Turkish minister, that strange type of Byzantine official begged his master to lay aside his anger and permit him to restore the palace to Anna. Some years later she entered her mother’s monastery—probably when her husband died in 1128—and lived there at least twenty years, writing her famous work, the “Alexiad,” a chronicle of her father’s deeds.217 That work—affected, insincere and ambitious—reflects the character of its author, nor can its lavish234 use of the art of suppressing some facts and enlarging others efface from our memory the ignoble235 attitude of Irene and Anna by the bedside of the dying Alexis and toward his legitimate236 heir.
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1
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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apparition
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| n.幽灵，神奇的现象 | |
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reign
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| n.统治时期，统治，支配，盛行；v.占优势 | |
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regain
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| vt.重新获得，收复，恢复 | |
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brandished
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| v.挥舞( brandish的过去式和过去分词 )；炫耀 | |
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expedient
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| adj.有用的，有利的；n.紧急的办法，权宜之计 | |
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condemn
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| vt.谴责，指责；宣判(罪犯)，判刑 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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insipidity
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| n.枯燥无味，清淡，无精神；无生气状 | |
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intrigue
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| vt.激起兴趣，迷住；vi.耍阴谋；n.阴谋，密谋 | |
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expended
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| v.花费( expend的过去式和过去分词 )；使用（钱等）做某事；用光；耗尽 | |
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14
condemned
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| adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
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virile
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| adj.男性的；有男性生殖力的；有男子气概的；强有力的 | |
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eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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promising
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| adj.有希望的，有前途的 | |
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unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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wed
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| v.娶，嫁，与…结婚 | |
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verbosity
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| n.冗长，赘言 | |
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comeliness
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| n. 清秀, 美丽, 合宜 | |
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truculent
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| adj.野蛮的，粗野的 | |
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bland
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| adj.淡而无味的，温和的，无刺激性的 | |
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ruse
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| n.诡计，计策；诡计 | |
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paragon
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| n.模范，典型 | |
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rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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simile
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| n.直喻，明喻 | |
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expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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29
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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30
maiden
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| n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的 | |
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31
illustrate
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| v.举例说明，阐明；图解，加插图 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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33
thicket
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| n.灌木丛，树林 | |
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34
intrigues
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| n.密谋策划( intrigue的名词复数 )；神秘气氛；引人入胜的复杂情节v.搞阴谋诡计( intrigue的第三人称单数 )；激起…的好奇心 | |
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35
bribery
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| n.贿络行为，行贿，受贿 | |
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monastery
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| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
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37
lengthy
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| adj.漫长的，冗长的 | |
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38
rumour
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| n.谣言，谣传，传闻 | |
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39
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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40
ascetic
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| adj.禁欲的；严肃的 | |
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41
intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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42
bribed
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| v.贿赂( bribe的过去式和过去分词 )；向（某人）行贿，贿赂 | |
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43
penetrating
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| adj.（声音）响亮的，尖锐的adj.（气味）刺激的adj.（思想）敏锐的，有洞察力的 | |
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44
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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45
genial
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| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
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46
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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47
nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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48
contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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candid
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| adj.公正的，正直的；坦率的 | |
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50
depicts
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| 描绘，描画( depict的第三人称单数 )； 描述 | |
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51
nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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52
despatch
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| n./v.(dispatch)派遣；发送；n.急件；新闻报道 | |
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53
mansion
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| n.大厦，大楼；宅第 | |
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54
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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55
bribing
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| 贿赂 | |
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56
colonnaded
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| adj.有列柱的，有柱廊的 | |
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57
forum
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| n.论坛，讨论会 | |
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58
galloped
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| （使马）飞奔，奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 )； 快速做[说]某事 | |
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59
inconveniently
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| ad.不方便地 | |
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60
accosted
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| v.走过去跟…讲话( accost的过去式和过去分词 )；跟…搭讪；（乞丐等）上前向…乞讨；（妓女等）勾搭 | |
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61
bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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62
fugitives
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| n.亡命者，逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 ) | |
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63
quays
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| 码头( quay的名词复数 ) | |
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64
almighty
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| adj.全能的，万能的；很大的，很强的 | |
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65
violation
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| n.违反(行为)，违背(行为)，侵犯 | |
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66
sanctuary
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| n.圣所，圣堂，寺庙；禁猎区，保护区 | |
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67
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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68
temporized
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| v.敷衍( temporize的过去式和过去分词 )；拖延；顺应时势；暂时同意 | |
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69
stipulated
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| vt.& vi.规定；约定adj.[法]合同规定的 | |
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70
insurgent
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| adj.叛乱的，起事的；n.叛乱分子 | |
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71
immortals
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| 不朽的人物( immortal的名词复数 )； 永生不朽者 | |
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72
fidelity
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| n.忠诚，忠实；精确 | |
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73
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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74
treasury
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| n.宝库；国库，金库；文库 | |
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75
enlisted
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| adj.应募入伍的v.（使）入伍， （使）参军( enlist的过去式和过去分词 )；获得（帮助或支持） | |
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76
scatter
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| vt.撒，驱散，散开；散布/播；vi.分散，消散 | |
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77
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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78
nuns
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| n.（通常指基督教的）修女， （佛教的）尼姑( nun的名词复数 ) | |
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nun
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| n.修女，尼姑 | |
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80
monasteries
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| 修道院( monastery的名词复数 ) | |
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81
crafty
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| adj.狡猾的，诡诈的 | |
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82
seizure
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| n.没收；占有；抵押 | |
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83
abdicate
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| v.让位，辞职，放弃 | |
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84
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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85
monk
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| n.和尚，僧侣，修道士 | |
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complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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disdain
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| n.鄙视，轻视；v.轻视，鄙视，不屑 | |
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91
acclaim
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| v.向…欢呼，公认；n.欢呼，喝彩，称赞 | |
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92
galley
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| n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇； | |
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speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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seething
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| 沸腾的，火热的 | |
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monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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esteemed
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| adj.受人尊敬的v.尊敬( esteem的过去式和过去分词 )；敬重；认为；以为 | |
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incentive
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| n.刺激；动力；鼓励；诱因；动机 | |
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antagonist
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| n.敌人，对抗者，对手 | |
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retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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domain
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| n.(活动等)领域，范围；领地，势力范围 | |
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briefly
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| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
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pretext
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| n.借口，托词 | |
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103
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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titular
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| adj.名义上的，有名无实的；n.只有名义（或头衔）的人 | |
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bulwark
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| n.堡垒，保障，防御 | |
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106
resounded
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| v.（指声音等）回荡于某处( resound的过去式和过去分词 )；产生回响；（指某处）回荡着声音 | |
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107
sonorous
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| adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇 | |
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108
disarmed
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| v.裁军( disarm的过去式和过去分词 )；使息怒 | |
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109
recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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outrages
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| 引起…的义愤，激怒( outrage的第三人称单数 ) | |
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112
obliterated
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| v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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113
humbly
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| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
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114
penance
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| n.（赎罪的）惩罪 | |
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115
inmates
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| n.囚犯( inmate的名词复数 ) | |
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116
efface
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| v.擦掉，抹去 | |
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117
wield
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| vt.行使，运用，支配；挥，使用(武器等) | |
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118
obedience
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| n.服从，顺从 | |
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119
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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120
faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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121
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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122
hymns
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| n.赞美诗，圣歌，颂歌( hymn的名词复数 ) | |
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123
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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124
logic
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| n.逻辑(学)；逻辑性 | |
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125
intrigued
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| adj.好奇的，被迷住了的v.搞阴谋诡计(intrigue的过去式)；激起…的兴趣或好奇心；“intrigue”的过去式和过去分词 | |
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126
entrusting
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| v.委托，托付( entrust的现在分词 ) | |
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127
reins
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| 感情，激情； 缰( rein的名词复数 )； 控制手段； 掌管； （成人带着幼儿走路以防其走失时用的）保护带 | |
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128
spouse
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| n.配偶(指夫或妻) | |
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129
pangs
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| 突然的剧痛( pang的名词复数 )； 悲痛 | |
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130
travail
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| n.阵痛；努力 | |
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131
virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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132
dispensed
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| v.分配( dispense的过去式和过去分词 )；施与；配（药） | |
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133
repelling
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| v.击退( repel的现在分词 )；使厌恶；排斥；推开 | |
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134
conspiracies
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| n.阴谋，密谋( conspiracy的名词复数 ) | |
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135
alleged
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| a.被指控的，嫌疑的 | |
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136
conspiracy
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| n.阴谋，密谋，共谋 | |
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137
retirement
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| n.退休，退职 | |
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138
piety
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| n.虔诚，虔敬 | |
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139
infancy
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| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
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140
aspire
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| vi.(to，after)渴望，追求，有志于 | |
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141
scouted
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| 寻找，侦察( scout的过去式和过去分词 )； 物色（优秀运动员、演员、音乐家等） | |
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142
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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143
sects
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| n.宗派，教派( sect的名词复数 ) | |
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144
sect
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| n.派别，宗教，学派，派系 | |
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145
sleepers
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| n.卧铺（通常以复数形式出现）；卧车( sleeper的名词复数 )；轨枕；睡觉（呈某种状态）的人；小耳环 | |
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146
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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147
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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148
obnoxious
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| adj.极恼人的，讨人厌的，可憎的 | |
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149
conspirators
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| n.共谋者，阴谋家( conspirator的名词复数 ) | |
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150
narrated
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| v.故事( narrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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151
unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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152
warfare
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| n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突 | |
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153
eloquence
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| n.雄辩；口才，修辞 | |
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154
hermit
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| n.隐士，修道者；隐居 | |
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155
devouring
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| 吞没( devour的现在分词 )； 耗尽； 津津有味地看； 狼吞虎咽地吃光 | |
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156
locusts
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| n.蝗虫( locust的名词复数 )；贪吃的人；破坏者；槐树 | |
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157
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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158
chivalry
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| n.骑士气概，侠义；（男人）对女人彬彬有礼，献殷勤 | |
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159
hawks
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| 鹰( hawk的名词复数 )； 鹰派人物，主战派人物 | |
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160
hordes
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| n.移动着的一大群( horde的名词复数 )；部落 | |
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161
blustering
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| adj.狂风大作的，狂暴的v.外强中干的威吓( bluster的现在分词 )；咆哮；（风）呼啸；狂吹 | |
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162
ferocious
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| adj.凶猛的，残暴的，极度的，十分强烈的 | |
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163
rumoured
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| adj.谣传的；传说的；风 | |
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164
imprisoned
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| 下狱，监禁( imprison的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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165
astutely
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| adv.敏锐地；精明地；敏捷地；伶俐地 | |
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166
fascinations
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| n.魅力( fascination的名词复数 )；有魅力的东西；迷恋；陶醉 | |
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167
hovered
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| 鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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168
apropos
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| adv.恰好地；adj.恰当的；关于 | |
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169
eyewitness
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| n.目击者，见证人 | |
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170
discretion
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| n.谨慎；随意处理 | |
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171
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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172
savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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173
generosity
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| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
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174
aggravated
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| 使恶化( aggravate的过去式和过去分词 )； 使更严重； 激怒； 使恼火 | |
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175
torrents
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| n.倾注；奔流( torrent的名词复数 )；急流；爆发；连续不断 | |
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176
chafe
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| v.擦伤；冲洗；惹怒 | |
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177
poignant
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| adj.令人痛苦的，辛酸的，惨痛的 | |
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178
modesty
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| n.谦逊，虚心，端庄，稳重，羞怯，朴素 | |
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179
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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180
derisively
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| adv. 嘲笑地，嘲弄地 | |
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181
adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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182
theatrical
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| adj.剧场的，演戏的；做戏似的，做作的 | |
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183
entrusted
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| v.委托，托付( entrust的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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184
deriding
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| v.取笑，嘲笑( deride的现在分词 ) | |
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185
reluctance
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| n.厌恶，讨厌，勉强，不情愿 | |
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186
diatribe
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| n.抨击，抨击性演说 | |
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187
indefatigable
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| adj.不知疲倦的，不屈不挠的 | |
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188
monarch
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| n.帝王，君主，最高统治者 | |
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189
diplomacy
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| n.外交；外交手腕，交际手腕 | |
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190
guile
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| n.诈术 | |
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191
mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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192
superstitions
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| 迷信，迷信行为( superstition的名词复数 ) | |
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193
corrupt
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| v.贿赂，收买；adj.腐败的，贪污的 | |
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194
corruption
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| n.腐败，堕落，贪污 | |
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195
pretence
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| n.假装，作假；借口，口实；虚伪；虚饰 | |
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196
doctrines
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| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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197
followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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198
persuasion
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| n.劝说；说服；持有某种信仰的宗派 | |
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199
coercion
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| n.强制，高压统治 | |
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200
reviled
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| v.辱骂，痛斥( revile的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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201
cowardice
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| n.胆小，怯懦 | |
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202
effigy
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| n.肖像 | |
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203
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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204
undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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205
betrothed
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| n. 已订婚者 动词betroth的过去式和过去分词 | |
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206
prodigy
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| n.惊人的事物，奇迹，神童，天才，预兆 | |
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207
imposing
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| adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的 | |
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208
brilliance
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| n.光辉，辉煌，壮丽，（卓越的）才华，才智 | |
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209
ostentation
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| n.夸耀，卖弄 | |
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210
sullen
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| adj.愠怒的，闷闷不乐的，(天气等)阴沉的 | |
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211
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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212
presidency
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| n.总统(校长，总经理)的职位(任期) | |
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213
relics
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| [pl.］n.遗物，遗迹，遗产；遗体，尸骸 | |
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214
applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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215
extremities
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| n.端点( extremity的名词复数 )；尽头；手和足；极窘迫的境地 | |
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216
authoritative
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| adj.有权威的，可相信的；命令式的；官方的 | |
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217
impending
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| a.imminent, about to come or happen | |
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218
shearing
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| n.剪羊毛，剪取的羊毛v.剪羊毛( shear的现在分词 )；切断；剪切 | |
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219
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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220
assent
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| v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可 | |
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221
galloping
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| adj. 飞驰的, 急性的 动词gallop的现在分词形式 | |
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222
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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223
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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224
regiment
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| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
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225
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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226
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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227
steward
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| n.乘务员，服务员；看管人；膳食管理员 | |
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228
strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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229
worthiness
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| 价值，值得 | |
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230
inflexible
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| adj.不可改变的，不受影响的，不屈服的 | |
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231
irresolution
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| n.不决断，优柔寡断，犹豫不定 | |
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232
confiscate
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| v.没收(私人财产)，把…充公 | |
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233
luxurious
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| adj.精美而昂贵的；豪华的 | |
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234
lavish
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| adj.无节制的；浪费的；vt.慷慨地给予，挥霍 | |
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235
ignoble
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| adj.不光彩的，卑鄙的；可耻的 | |
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236
legitimate
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| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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