Demetrius of Anacopia

Demetre of Anacopia was a Georgian prince of the Bagrationi royal dynasty, and a claimant to the throne of Georgia. He was the younger son of George I of Georgia by his second wife Alda, daughter of the king of Alania.

After the death of King George, some Georgian nobles wished to enthrone Demetre instead of his half-brother Bagrat IV (r. 1027-1072) without success. Alda and Demetre lived in their fief at Anacopia, a fortified maritime town in Abkhazia, which had been bequeathed to them by the late king George I. The efforts by Bagrat’s mother Mariam to win Demetre’s loyalty to the crown also went in vain. Threatened by Bagrat, Alda defected to the Byzantines and surrendered Anacopia to the emperor Romanos III who honored her son Demetre with the rank of magistros. This happened in 1033.

In 1039, Demetre returned to Georgia with Byzantine troops. Liparit IV, of the Liparitid clan, the most powerful noble in Georgia, supported the insurgent prince and launched a successful campaign against Bagrat’s army. However, Demetre died unexpectedly in 1042. Alda, with Demetre’s son David, fled to her native Alania. The 18th-century Georgian scholar Prince Vakhushti argues that David’s descendants flourished in Alania and produced a line of local princes of which came David Soslan, the second husband of Queen Tamar of Georgia (r. 1184-1213).

Anacopia, ceded by Alda and Demetre to the emperor, would remain under the Byzantine sway until being recovered by Bagrat’s son and successor George II in 1074. This happened after the Battle of Manzikert (1071). Profiting by the defeat of the Byzantines at the hands of the Seljuqids, Georgia regained a number of key territories lost to the Empire in the course of the 11th century, including Anacopia as well as the fortresses located in the Thema of Iberia.

Demetre (Georgian: დემეტრე, Latizined and Hellenized as Demetrius and Demetrios, respectively) (died 1042) was a Georgian prince of the Bagrationi royal dynasty, and a claimant to the throne of Georgia. He was the younger son of George I of Georgia by his second wife Alda, daughter of the king of Alania.

After the death of King George, some Georgian nobles wished to enthrone Demetre instead of his half-brother Bagrat IV (r. 1027-1072) without success. Alda and Demetre lived in their fief at Anacopia, a fortified maritime town in Abkhazia, which had been bequeathed to them by the late king George I. The efforts by Bagrat’s mother Mariam to win Demetre’s loyalty to the crown also went in vain. Threatened by Bagrat, Alda defected to the Byzantines and surrendered Anacopia to the emperor Romanos III who honored her son Demetre with the rank of magistros. This happened in 1033.[1]

In 1039, Demetre returned to Georgia with Byzantine troops. Liparit IV, of the Liparitid clan, the most powerful noble in Georgia, supported the insurgent prince and launched a successful campaign against Bagrat’s army.[2] However, Demetre died unexpectedly in 1042. Alda, with Demetre’s son David, fled to her native Alania. The 18th-century Georgian scholar Prince Vakhushti argues that David’s descendants flourished in Alania and produced a line of local princes of which came David Soslan, the second husband of Queen Tamar of Georgia (r. 1184-1213).[3]

Anacopia, ceded by Alda and Demetre to the emperor, would remain under the Byzantine sway until being recovered by Bagrat’s son and successor George II in 1074. This happened after the Battle of Manzikert (1071). Profiting by the defeat of the Byzantines at the hands of the Seljuqids, Georgia regained a number of key territories lost to the Empire in the course of the 11th century, including Anacopia as well as the fortresses located in the Thema of Iberia.[4]

References

^ Alemany, Agusti (2000). Sources of the Alans: A Critical Compilation, p. 222. Brill Publishers, ISBN 9004114424.

^ Robert Bedrosian, "Liparit IV Orbēlean", p. 586. In: Joseph Reese Strayer (1983), Dictionary of the Middle Ages. Scribner, ISBN 0684167603.

^ Alemany, p. 321.

^ Mariam D. Lordkipanidze. "Concerning the History of Byzantine-Georgian Relations in the Seventies of the Eleventh Century", in: Actes du XVe congrès international d'études byzantines, Athènes, Septembre 1976, 1979: 192-4.