The Chronographia

The Chronographia is a historical account of the rule of fourteen Byzantine emperors (11 emperors and three empresses), chronologically, from 976 to 1077. Michael Psellos, who served the Byzantine emperors for over thirty years as a senior minister, described in these fourteen biographies the emperors as humans, with all their faults and merits.

Psellos lived in a society which underwent dramatic changes: he lamented the citizen's growing greediness, the loss of values and order, the Nouveau Riches of his days and warned against the inflation of honorary titles and benefactions which were offered to the citizenry by weak emperors who sought the population's political support.

The eleventh century was a watershed in the history of the Byzantine empire. At the beginning of the century, Byzantium stood at the height of its political and cultural strength. Prosperity began to decline when the Seljuq Turks started raiding eastern Anatolia in the 1030's. The rule of the central government in the eastern parts of the empire declined until these areas were finally lost in the wake of the Manzikert battle of 1071.

Although Psellos did not focus on the description of battles but rather on the imperial court and the capital's politics, the Chronographia is one of the important sources of 11th century Byzantium. A literary, no less than a historical work, the Chronographia brings to life emperors and empresses, lovers, mistresses, rebels and even the ordinary people of Constantinople, in an unwavering effort to reveal the human traits of its heroes.

Translated from the Greek with introduction and Notes by Shay Eshel