★ A highly interesting rare seal of a high rank byzantine officer ★

Byzantine lead Seal of Andronikos Doukas,
protoproedros, protovestiarios and domestikos of the Scholai of the East.
A highly interesting rare seal of a high rank byzantine officer
(11th/12th cent.)
Obverse: Bust of the Virgin holding the medallion of Christ before her. Sigla: ΜΡ-ΘΥ (Mother of God), circular inscription in upper half, +Θ(ΕΟΤΟ)ΚΕ ΒΟΗ[ΘΕ]Ι = Θεοτόκε βοήθει (Mother of God, help), all within dotted border.

Reverse: Inscription of eight lines, ΑΝΔΡΟΝΙ/ΚΩΠΡΩΤ,ΠΡΟ/ΕΔΡΩΠΡΩΤΟ/ ΒΕCΤΙΑΡΙΩS/ΔΟΜΕCΤΙΚΩ/ΤΩΝCΧΟΛΩΝ/ΤΗCΑΝΑΤΟΛ(ΗC)/ΤΩΔΟΥΚΑ = Ἀνδρονίκῳ πρωτοπροέδρῳ, πρωτοβεστιαρίῳ, καὶ δομεστίκῳ τῶν σχολῶν τῆς Ἀνατολῆς τῷ Δούκᾳ.
Translation of the whole inscription: Mother of God, help Andronikos Doukas protoproedros, protovestiarios, and domestikos of the Schools of the East.
Commentary: Same owner as BZS.1958.106.1355.
Andronikos Doukas was son of the Caesar John Doukas and Eirene Pegonitissa. His father was a brother of Emperor Constantine X Doukas. His maternal grandfather was Niketas Pegonites. Andronikos himself was a first cousin of Michael VII Doukas. In 1071 Andronikos was the commander of a section of the Byzantine army in the campaign of Romanos IV Diogenes against the Seljuk Turks of Alp Arslan. Commanding the rearguard of the army during the Battle of Manzikert, Andronikos announced that the emperor had been cut down and deserted from the battlefield. He was widely blamed for causing the crushing defeat of the Byzantine forces and the subsequent capture of Romanos IV by the enemy. In 1072, after Romanos had been released by Alp Arslan, Andronikos and his brother Constantine were sent out by Michael VII and their father the Caesar John to intercept him. They defeated Romanos and hunted him down in Cilicia. It was Andronikos who finally obtained Romanos' surrender and conducted him towards Constantinople. In spite of his former hatred for the deposed emperor, Andronikos is said to have opposed his blinding on 29 June 1072. In an act of 1073, he is recorded with his titles as protoproedros, protovestiarios and megas domestikos, which Michael Attaleiates clarifies as being the post of domestikos ton scholon of the East, which he had been given when sent against Diogenes. In 1074, together with his father, Andronikos commanded the imperial army against the rebel mercenaries led by Roussel de Bailleul. Both were captured by the rebels, who released the badly wounded Andronikos to allow him to seek proper medical treatment in Constantinople. There he recovered for a few years, but died of an edema, as the monk Antonios on 14 October 1077.
See Polemis, Doukai, 55-59; cf. Zacos-Veglery, 1473 and Patmos, II, no. 50. See also BZS 1958.106.2491.
From an administrative point of view, the term Anatole was used until the 10th century to indicate (a) the territories that had previously belonged to the praefectura praetorio per Orientem that is, essentially, all the themes of Asia Minor together with those of Thrace and Macedonia; or, more realistically, (b) the territories situated to the east of Constantinople, that is, Asia Minor. In the 10th century the army command of the East was separated from that of the West (that is, Europe), Listes, 329, 341-42; cf. Oikonomides, Évolution, 141-42 and AP 35 [1978] 300, 328-29. The seals published here (and some others, such as the one of the stratopedarches of the East: Zacos-Veglery, no. 2780; Lihačev, Molivdovuly, 104, pl. LXIII,9; Seyrig, no. 159; or the hikanatoi of the East: Seyrig, no. 154) show that in the 10th and 11th centuries the entity called the East comprised only military commands. It should be noted, however, that in some cases the term Anatole seems to have been used to indicate a strategos of the Anatolikoi (cf. Winkelmann, Ämterstruktur, 78-79); and several civilian officials defined as ton Anatolikon could well wave authority over territories covering the East, well beyond the boundaries of the theme (see DO Seals 3, § 86, nos. 86.9, 86.17, 86.34).

Condition: Very Fine

Weight: 14.20 gr
Diameter: 25 mm