MICHAEL I. (Rhangabe), Eastern emperor, succeeded Stauracius, son of Nicephorus I., in 811. Nicephorus, in whose reign the reverses of the Greek empire may be said to have commenced, bore a character stained with odious vices; nor was his want of virtue redeemed by any superior talents. He was vanquished by the Saracens, and slain by the Bulgarians, who in 811 utterly exterminated an imperial army which the monarch commanded in person. His son and heir, Stauracius, escaped from the field with a mortal wound; and on the near prospect of his decease, Michael, the great master of the palace, and who was espoused to Procopia sister of Stauracius, was named as his successor by the inhabitants of the capital. The dying prince was the only opponent, but was at last compelled to yield; and Michael received the sceptre even before Stauracius expired, which event, however, took place very shortly afterwards. The mild virtues of Michael were better adapted for private life than for a throne. He evinced little ability and success in checking the inroads of the barbarians; and this circumstance soon changed the reverence of his soldiers into contempt. After a fruitless campaign the emperor left at Thrace, in winter-quarters, a murmuring army under the command of disaffected officers; and the latter speedily persuaded the troops to renounce their allegiance, degrade Michael from the supreme dignity, and elect a new ruler in his stead. They marched to Constantinople, where a numerous party still adhered to the imperial cause; but civil war was prevented by Michael's resolution to offer no resistance. Gaining in this way an easy triumph, the leading conspirators agreed to spare his life; and the fallen monarch passed thirty-two years in religious solitude after he had been thus ignominiously divested of the purple. Michael's deposition occurred in 813.—J. J.
MICHAEL II., surnamed the Stammerer, Eastern emperor, was, along with Leo the Armenian and Thomas the Cappadocian, a general in the Thracian camp when the army rose in revolt against Michael I., as already described. Leo, the prime mover of the mutiny, was rewarded with the empire by his successful soldiers, and reigned seven years and a half. He repaid the assistance of his companion, Michael the Phrygian, with both riches and honours; but the latter did not long rest satisfied with a subordinate, however exalted post. Ultimately, having engaged in some treasonable project against Leo, he was sentenced to be burned alive in the furnace of the baths. A brief delay in the execution of the inhuman order proved fatal to the emperor's life. On the morning of Christmas-day in 820 a body of conspirators, disguised in the ecclesiastical habit and with swords under their robes, forced their way into Leo's private chapel, and assailed him as he was commencing his devotions. After a vain attempt to defend himself he fell, covered with wounds, at the foot of the altar. The Phrygian was carried from the prison to the throne, reigning for nine years under the title of Michael II. By ignoble vices he disgraced the purple, and also lost his provinces with the most supine indifference. Thomas the Cappadocian, his old fellow-soldier, endeavoured to dispute his title, but failed in the attempt. Vanquished in his siege of Constantinople, he fell into Michael's power. His limbs were amputated by order of the conqueror, and he was otherwise treated with revolting cruelty. The reign of this depraved monarch terminated in 829.—J. J.
MICHAEL III., Eastern emperor, succeeded his father Theophilus in 842. At this time he was only five years old, and under the regency of his mother Theodora; but, on advancing to manhood, he soon flung off the maternal yoke, and commenced a career that was marked by vices of the most flagrant character. He literally seemed to glory in reviving the old imperial sins of Nero and Heliogabalus. The safety of the realm was at the same time neglected. He silenced, we are informed, the messenger of an invasion, who presumed to divert his attention at the most critical moment of a horse-race; he profaned, in impious and shameful fashion, the ceremonies of religion; and he revived the four factions that had long agitated the peace of the capital. Let us hasten from the loathsome picture. Fortunately for his subjects, the rule of Michael, at once so sanguinary and so contemptible, ended in 867. In an hour of intoxication he was assassinated in his apartment, and the sceptre passed to the founder of a new dynasty.—J. J.
MICHAEL IV., Eastern emperor, who succeeded Romanus III. in 1034, was a Paphlagonian of low origin, whose first trade had been that of a money-changer, but who afterwards became the paramour of Zoe, the guilty wife of the childless Romanus. The latter died from the effects of poison administered by his unfaithful spouse; and his decease was immediately followed by Zoe's scandalous marriage to Michael, and his equally scandalous elevation to the Byzantine throne. But the husband of the royal adulteress was agitated by despair and remorse. After defeating the Bulgarians, who had crossed the frontiers of the empire, and even carrying the war into the haunts of the invaders, he surrendered the purple, and, retiring to a monastery, died there in 1041.—J. J.
MICHAEL V., surnamed Calaphates, Eastern emperor, was the son of a mechanic, and nephew and successor of the preceding. Although adopted as a son by Zoe, and nominated Cæsar ere the death of his uncle, he displayed, on the commencement of his brief reign, the basest ingratitude towards his benefactress. He caused her to be imprisoned; but the citizens of Constantinople compassionated the fate of Zoe, the descendant of a line of emperors; in her punishment they forgot her vices, and rose in rebellion against the new ruler. A formidable tumult, lasting for three days, terminated in the siege of the palace, the forcing open the gates, the recall of Zoe from prison, and the deposition of Calaphates. The reign of the latter was thus summarily ended after only four months' duration.—J. J.
MICHAEL VI. (Stratioticus), Eastern emperor, was nominated as her successor on the throne by Theodora, sister of Zoe, who after the death of the latter and of her third husband, Constantine X., alone swayed for nearly two years the reins of government. The surname of Michael denotes his military profession; but, at least from the time of his advancement to the empire in 1056, he seems to have been only in name a soldier. Deeply-rooted dissatisfaction with the choice of Theodora, especially in the army, was ere long manifested. The troops had served with reluctant loyalty a series of effeminate and degraded masters; and the elevation of the feeble Michael was deemed a personal insult by some of the more deserving generals. They secretly assembled in the sanctuary of St. Sophia to select a new sovereign; and Isaac, the first of the famous Comneni—a noble family from the shores of the Euxine, but of Italian origin—was chosen by common agreement. On the plains of Phrygia their designs were carried out, and the fate of Michael was decided. His cause was defended in a single battle; and its loss compelled him to submit to the victorious military. He exchanged the purple for the garment of a monk in 1057, and Isaac Comnenus was crowned emperor in his stead.—J. J.
MICHAEL VII., surnamed Parapinaces, Eastern emperor, was the son of Constantine XI., Ducas, who succeeded Isaac Comnenus in the imperial dignity. On the death of Constantine in 1067, his widow, Eudocia, was intrusted with the administration, and espoused Romanus IV., a brave soldier, by whom Alp Arslan was defeated while his hordes were ravaging Cilicia and Cappadocia. In a second campaign Romanus was taken prisoner, but restored to liberty on promise of a heavy ransom. In 1071, however, Eudocia's eldest son, Michael, was exalted to the throne. With inhuman cruelty he deprived Romanus of his sight, and shortly afterwards the heroic defender of the empire pined away in wretchedness. Like so many of his predecessors, Michael proved a weak and pusillanimous sovereign; and it soon became evident that he was altogether incapable of sustaining the sceptre of the Eastern monarchy. Never had that sceptre demanded a firmer and more vigorous grasp. Invaders were on all sides encompassing the realm and rapidly curtailing its previous proportions. In 1074 Soliman subjugated Romania, and chose Nice for his residence. Little of Asia Minor was now possessed by the Greeks, but the sea-coast and a few strong towns; and their Italian territories were seized by the conquering Normans. Michael himself was completely under the influence of an avaricious and incapable favourite. Once more the army interfered to save the realm from ruin. Renouncing allegiance to Michael, they proclaimed as emperor their general, Nicephorus III.; and the former wisely yielded to the tempest. In favour of Nicephorus he resigned the insignia of royalty in 1078, and was rewarded with the monastic habit and the title of archbishop of Ephesus.—J. J.
MICHAEL VIII. (Palæologus), Eastern emperor, was by birth the most illustrious of the Greek nobles. As early as the middle of the eleventh century the family of the Palæologi occupied an exalted position in Byzantine annals. A Palæologus placed the father of the Comneni on the throne, and through successive generations his posterity continued to lead the armies
