Gregory Pakourianos
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Gregory Pakourianos (Greek: Γρηγοριος Πακουριανός, Georgian: გრიგოლ ბაკურიანის-ძე, Grigol Bakurianis-dze; Armenian: Գրիգոր Բակուրյան, Grigor Bakurian) (died 1086) was an Armeno-Georgian[1][2] politician and military commander in the Byzantine service. He is primarily known as the founder of the then-Georgian Orthodox Bachkovo Monastery in Bulgaria and the author of its typicon.
He was born into a prominent noble family[3] from the Tao/Tayk region which had been annexed by the Byzantines as the theme of Iberia since 1001. Engaged in a military service since at least the early 1060s, he served in the Byzantine-controlled Georgian, Armenian, Syrian, and Balkan Peninsula lands. He participated in the unsuccessful defense of Ani against the Seljuk leader Alp Arslan in 1064. He served afterwards under Michael VII Ducas (1071–78) and Nicephorus III Botaniates (1078–81) in various responsible positions on both the eastern and the western frontiers of the empire. As the Seljuk advance forced the Byzantines to evacuate the eastern Anatolian fortresses and the Theme of Iberia, he ceded the control over Kars to King George II of Georgia in 1072-1073 but this did not prevent the invaders from capturing the city.
Later he was involved in a coup that removed Nicephorus III. The new Emperor Alexius I Comnenus appointed him megas domestikos of All the West and gave him many more properties in the Balkans. He possessed numerous estates in various parts of the empire and was afforded a variety of privileges by the emperor, including exemption from certain taxes.
In 1081, he commanded left flank in the battle against the Normans at Dyrrachium. A year later he evicted the Normans from Moglena, the present day Greece. He died in 1086 fighting the Pechenegs at the battle of Beliatoba, charging so vigorously he crashed into a tree.
He was also known as a noted patron and promoter of Christian culture. He together with his brother Apasios made in 1074 a significant donation to the Georgian Orthodox Iviron monastery on Mount Athos. In 1083, he founded the Georgian Orthodox monastery of Petritzos (Petritsoni) (the present day Bachkovo Monastery) and wrote the regulations (typicon) for it. He signed his name in Armenian characters rather than Greek.[4]
[edit] Notes
- ^ Guillou, André (1974). La Civilasation Byzantine. Arthaud. ISBN 2700300203.
- ^ Robert W. Edwards The Vale of Kola: A Final Preliminary Report on the Marchlands of Northeast Turkey: Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Vol. 42, 1988, p. 139
- ^ "...this man was "small indeed in stature, but a mighty warrior," [Iliad 5:801] as the poet says, and descended from a noble Armenian family.” Medieval Sourcebook: Anna Comnena: The Alexiad, Book 2, IV. Translated by Elizabett A. S. Dawes, 1928. Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies, New York, 2006, [1]
- ^ Mango, Cyril Alexander (2002). The Oxford History of Byzantium. Oxford University Press, p. 12. ISBN 0198140983.
[edit] Literature
- A. Chanidze, "Au sujet du batisseur de monastere de Petritsoni Grigol Bakourianis-dze (en Bulgarie)," BK 38 (1980), 36; idem, "Le grand domestique de l'occident, Gregorii Bakurianis-dze, et le monastere georgien fonde par lui en Bulgarie," BK 28 (1971), 134;
- Anna Comnena. “The Alexiad”, Translated by E.R.A. Sewter, Pengium Books Ltd., London, 1969, (reprinted in 2003), Pp. 560.
- Louis Petit, Typikon de Grégoire Pacourianos pour le monastère de Pétritzos (Bachkovo) en Bulgarie, texte original, Viz. Vrem., XI, Suppl. no 1, SPB 1904, XXXII+63 p.
- Nina Garsoian. “The Byzantine Annexation of the Armenian Kingdoms in the Eleventh Century”. In: The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times, vol. 1, New York, 1977, 192 p.
- Н.Я. Марр. Аркаун – монгольское название христиан..., СПб., с. 17 -31.
- Арутюновой – Фиданян, В. А. Типик Григория Пакуриана. Введение, перевод и комментарий. Ереван, 1978, с. 249.
