International congress of byzantine studies belgrade, 22 27 august 2016

THE LATE BYZANTINE EMPIRE – PART 1
Chairs:
 Antonia Kiousopoulou, Maja Nikolić
Nafsika Vassilopoulou
, 
Match-Making in the Palaeologan Dynasty (1258–1453): 
Some Remarks on Imperial Ideology, Practice, Politics
Francesco Dall’Aglio
, 
Strategies of Usurpation: 
Boril, Ivan Asen II and the Concept of Legitimacy in Bulgarian Royal Accession
Michal Pawlak
, 
Infertility and Statesmanship: The Case of John VIII Palaiologos (1392‒1448)
Tatiana Kushch
, 
Political Elite under Manuel II Palaiologos
Jelena Vukčević
, 
Monemvasia and Despot of Morea, Theodore I Palaiologos
Alexandru Stefan Anca
, 
Emperor, Patriarch, and the Catalans. 
A Triad of Power in Byzantium at the Beginning of the 14
th
Century
Miriam R. Salzmann
, 
How Byzantine Was the Cypriot Aristocracy in the 15
th
Century? – 
Aspects of Prosopography and Centres of Power

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576
Nafsika Vassilopoulou
National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece; 
[e-mail]
Match-Making in the Palaeologan Dynasty (1258–1453): 
Some Remarks on Imperial Ideology, Practice, Politics
During the two centuries that the Palaeologan emperors ruled the Byzantine Empire, diplomatic 
marriages were one of their most powerful weapons in order to gain allies and avert costly warfare.
The nearly hundred royal marriages negotiated between the Empire and other states from the 
ascend of Michael VIII to the throne, in 1258, until the Fall of Constantinople, in 1453, reveal aspects 
concerning foreign affairs and diplomacy, imperial ideology and correlation between religion and 
politics. Other matters like prosopography, implications concerning canon law and doctrine, as well 
as the married life of the «grooms» and «brides» in question, are also taken into consideration.
The key factor to all the parameters mentioned above is the political profit made out of such 
marital unions. The Palaeologi utilized every member of their family, from the emperor to his 
distant in-laws, to ensure an appropriate and politically useful spouse. A mere browse of the royal 
proposals, betrothals and marriages, both attempted and concluded, portrays in detail the place of 
the Empire in the world from the 13
th
to the 15
th
centuries.
The aim of this paper is to roughly present the politics involved in the negotiation and 
realization of diplomatic nuptials. The matter is dealt mainly in two axes. The first is the imperial 
ideology and its place in the diplomatic strategy of political unions. To what extent was the imperial 
family willing to disregard nobles of “inferior birth” compared to the emperor? The second axe 
concerns the implications brought by the role of religion in the domestic and international relations 
of the Byzantine emperor. In which cases were the Palaeologi able to set aside obstacles raised by the 
civil and canon law? And how the empire was coping with the hesitation of Roman Catholic rulers, 
led by the Pope, to form lasting alliances with an Orthodox state?
In this context we are able to briefly address to these matters referring to characteristic 
examples as described in various Byzantine sources, historiographical, legal and other. The 
emperors themselves, imperial confidants, scholars and historiographers of the Palaeologan era, 
all provide information in their writings about the imperial match-making between the 13
th
and 
the 15
th
century. The combination of these sources depict the necessary diplomatic manoeuvres in 
Byzantium’s contacts with Central and Western Europe, the Italian maritime cities, the lands of the 
Balkans, the Mongols and the Ottomans, that helped the Empire to stay temporarily intact, before 
the inevitable fall.

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