David Tiberius
630 – ? · Generation XIII · Caesar
David, who reigned as Tiberius, was, for a few months in 641, one of three boys ruling Byzantium as co-emperors. He was a son of the emperor Heraclius and his niece and second wife, the empress Martina, and Theophanes dates his birth to 7 November 630, the very day his nephew Constans II was born. His parents had visited Jerusalem while he was in the womb, and his name, unlike his brothers’, was chosen to link the dynasty with the biblical King David. Several of the couple’s children had been born sickly or died in infancy, and the silver David Plates may have been made to celebrate his birth.
On 4 July 638 he was made Caesar in a ceremony in the Palace of Daphne, receiving the cap his elder brother Heraclonas had worn until that moment, as Heraclonas was crowned co-emperor.
Heraclius died in February 641, when David was ten. After a struggle between the branches of the family, he was raised to co-emperor beside Heraclonas and their nephew Constans II, with Martina governing as regent while the Arabs conquered Egypt. Martina was deeply unpopular, not least for her marriage to her uncle, and her regime was overthrown, probably by January 642. In an early case of Byzantine political mutilation, her tongue was cut out and her sons’ noses slit, and they were exiled to Rhodes. Nothing more is recorded of David.
Line of descent: Heraclius the Elder → Heraclius → David Tiberius.
Parents
Siblings
- Heraclius Constantine (612 – 641) (half)
- Heraclonas (626 – 641)
Sources
- David (son of Heraclius) · Wikipedia
- Heraclonas · Wikipedia