October 815-821 A.D. Theodotus I Kassiteras—Constantinople’s 81st; Court Bureaucrat; Iconoclast
October 815-821 A.D. Theodotus I Kassiteras—Constantinople’s 81st; Court Bureaucrat; Iconoclast
Theodotus I of
Constantinople
References
Theodotus I of
Constantinople
From Wikipedia, the free
encyclopedia
Theodotos
I Kassiteras, Latinized as Theodotus I Cassiteras (Greek: Θεόδοτος Α΄ Κασσιτεράς), Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople from April 1, 815 to January 821.
Theodotos was born in Nakoleia
as the son of the patrikios Michael
Melissenos by
the sister of Eudokia, the last wife of Emperor Constantine V. Theodotos had become attached to the court bureaucracy
and was a confidant of Emperor Michael I Rangabe. He served as an administrative official (spatharokandidatos), and retained imperial favor by espousing the
cause of the usurping Emperor Leo V. After Leo's accession, Theodotos convinced the
emperor in the righteousness of Iconoclasm, priming a saintly ascetic to urge Leo to adopt the
example of Emperor Leo III the
Isaurian.
After deposing the Orthodox
Patriarch Nikephoros in 815, Emperor Leo V had Theodotos tonsured and appointed
him patriarch. The elderly official is described as meek, uneducated, and
virtuous, although his previous actions had exhibited a taste for intrigue.
Theodotos was charged with holding luxurious and frivoulous banquets,
scandalizing some of the more conservative members of the clergy. Theodotos
presided over the synod of Constantinople in 815 which reinstituted Iconoclasm, although much
of the Iconoclast effort was driven by other clerics, including the
later Patriarchs Antony I and John VII. In the aftermath of this
synod Theodotos is representing as torturing by starvation at more than one Iconodule abbot in an attempt to force them into agreement
with his ecclesiastical policy.
References
·
J.B.
Bury, A History of the Eastern
Roman Empire from the Fall of Irene to the Accession of Basil I (A.D. 802–867),
London, 1912.
Patriarch of
Constantinople
815–821 |
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