John IV Laskaris
1250 – 1305 · Generation XXXV · Emperor (r. 1258–1261)
John (AD 1250 – 1305). Emperor (r. 1258–1261). Son of Theodore II; deposed and blinded by Michael VIII. He came to the throne at seven, and his first regent, George Mouzalon, was murdered by the nobility, opening the way for Michael Palaiologos. The blinding — carried out on his eleventh birthday — made him ineligible to rule; it brought Michael excommunication by the patriarch and provoked a revolt around a false John near Nicaea. He passed the rest of his long life as a monk at Dacibyza. In 1290 Michael’s son Andronikos II came to ask forgiveness for his father’s crime, an encounter one historian calls embarrassing for both men. After his death he came to be venerated as a saint, his memory honoured in fourteenth-century Constantinople.
Line of descent: Basil Vatatzes → John III Vatatzes → Theodore II Laskaris → John IV Laskaris.
Parents
- Theodore II Laskaris (1222 – 1258)
- Elena Asenina (1223 – 1252)