Empire of Trebizond - Foundation

Foundation

The Empire of Trebizond was founded in early April 1204, when Alexios Komnenos and his brother David Komnenos, taking advantage of the preoccupation of the central Byzantine government with the encampment of the soldiers of the Fourth Crusade outside their walls (June 1203 – mid-April 1204), seized the city of Trebizond and the surrounding province of Chaldia with troops provided by their relative, Tamar of Georgia. Henceforth, the links between Trebizond and Georgia remained close, but their nature and extent have been disputed.

During the beginning years after the establishment of the Komnenos Dynasty, the Empire of Trebizond probably existed as a vassal state of Georgia. Throughout its existence it may be considered somewhat of a Caucasian state due to its reliance upon the Laz people and its continued close relationship with the Bagrationi Dynasty of Georgia which resulted in several unions of marriage.

Alexios Komnenos was a grandson of the last Komnenian Byzantine emperor, Andronikos I Komnenos, through that man's son Manuel Komnenos, who, in turn, had married Rusudan, daughter of George III of Georgia. Andronikos I had usurped the throne in 1183 and after a two year reign of terror was tortured and killed by the populace of Constantinople after being deposed by Isaac II Angelos. His son, Manuel had been blinded (a traditional Byzantine punishment for treason) and died not long after. Alexius and his brother, David, were only saved through the actions of their mother, Rusudan, who fled Constantinople. It is unclear whether Rusudan fled to her native Kingdom of Georgia or to Paphlagonia the Byzantine province on the southern coast of the Black Sea where the Komnenos family had established itself in the mid-11th Century.

The rulers of Trebizond called themselves Megas Komnenos ("Great Comnenus") and – like their counterparts in the other two Byzantine successor states, the Empire of Nicaea and the Despotate of Epirus – initially claimed supremacy as "Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans." However, after Michael VIII Palaeologus of Nicea recaptured Constantinople and was recognized as Roman Emperor and as Trebizond suzerain, the Commenian insistence on being styled "Emperor" became a sore point. In 1282, John II Komnenos stripped off his imperial regalia before the walls of Constantinople before entering to marry Michael's daughter and accept his legal title of despot. In Trebizond, however, far from the weakening reach of Constantinople, he simply revised his title to "Emperor and Autocrat of the entire East, of the Iberians and the Perateia" which remained in use until the Empire's end in 1461. The state is sometimes called the Comnenian empire from its ruling dynasty.

Trebizond initially controlled a contiguous area on the southern Black Sea coast between Soterioupolis and Sinope, comprising the modern Turkish provinces of Sinop, Ordu, Giresun, Trabzon, Bayburt, Gümüşhane, Rize and Artvin. In the thirteenth century, the empire controlled Perateia, which included Cherson and Kerch on the Crimean peninsula. David Komnenos, the younger brother of Alexios, expanded rapidly to the west, occupying first Sinope, then Paphlagonia and Heraclea Pontica (modern Samsun province and the coastal regions of Kastamonu, Bartın and Zonguldak) until his territory bordered the Empire of Nicaea founded by Theodore I Laskaris. The expansion was short-lived however: the territories west of Sinope were lost to the Empire of Nicaea by 1206, and Sinope itself fell to the Seljuks in 1214.