Maria

770 – 823 · Generation XVIII · Empress

Maria of Amnia was the first wife of the emperor Constantine VI and the winner of the earliest recorded Byzantine bride-show. Born at Amnia in Paphlagonia, she was a granddaughter, through her mother Hypatia, of Saint Philaretos, a landowner of the Armeniakon theme remembered for his charity.

In 788 the empress-regent Irene, having broken off her son’s engagement to Rotrude, a daughter of Charlemagne, gathered thirteen candidates to choose him a bride, and chose Maria largely herself. The wedding took place that November. The marriage lasted about six years and produced two daughters, but no son, and according to the chronicler Theophanes, Irene turned her son against his wife.

In 794 Constantine took a mistress, Theodote, one of his mother’s ladies-in-waiting, and in January 795 he divorced Maria and sent her and their daughters to a convent on the island of Prinkipo. His marriage to Theodote that September, with Maria still alive, was condemned as legalised adultery and set off the Moechian controversy in the church, though Maria herself took no part in it. She lived the rest of her life as a nun and is last mentioned about 823. Her daughter Euphrosyne was taken from the convent, over her protests, to marry the emperor Michael II.

Read more on Wikipedia

Partners

• Married Constantine VI (771 – ?) in 788; the marriage was dissolved in 795 — one child together

Children

• Euphrosyne (790 – 839)

Life

• 770 — Born
• 788 — Married Constantine
• 795 — Parted from Constantine
• 823 — Died

Sources

1. Maria of Amnia · Wikipedia
2. Constantine VI · Wikipedia