The Personality of Emperor Nikephoros Phocas and His Connections with Athanasius the Athonite
Institute of World History of the Russian Academy of Sciences
For citation: Vankova, Anna B. The Personality of Emperor Nikephoros Phocas and His Connections with Athanasius the Athonite // Graphosphaera. 2023. Vol. 3. № 2. P. 134–152. URL: http://writing.igh.ru/index.php?id=2023-3-2-134-152
DOI: 10.32608/2782-5272-2023-3-2-134-152
Abstract: The paper deals with the relations that connected the Monk Athanasius of Athos (between 925 and 930 – the end of the 10th – † beginning of the 11th century) with the Emperor Nikephoros Phokas (c. 912 – † 11.12.969, emperor since 963), analyses the passages of the sources connected with the name of the founder of the Great Lavra, which contain any characteristics of the emperor. The comparison of these data with the data of Leo the Deacon and John Skylitzes is carried out. As a result of the conducted research the following conclusions are made. The emperor’s image that John Skylitzes and Leo the Deacon draw – the image of a warrior and a statesman – was supplemented with the information of hagiography, namely the Lives of Athanasius of Athos and his Typikon. The result was a three-dimensional polychrome image. The silence of Leo the Deacon and John of Scylitzes about the relationship between the monk and the warrior can be explained by the fact that their writings emphasized military and political history. We can trust the Typikon of the Monk Athanasius of Athos, which gives us the opinion of one of the two participants in this spiritual union, as well as the information from his Lives, which allows us to conclude that these two outstanding personalities had a close, albeit relatively short-lived, relationship that resulted in the creation of the Great Lavra, the oldest monastery on Athos today.
Key words: Athanasius the Athonite, Nikephoros Phokas, John Skylitzes, Leo the Deacon, The Monastery of Great Lavra on Mount Athos
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