Michael IX Palaiologos
1277 – 1320 · Generation XXXVI · co-emperor (r. 1294–1320) · Palaiologos
Michael (AD 1277 – 1320). co-emperor (r. 1294–1320). Married Rita around AD 1294. Eldest son of Andronikos II; predeceased his father. Crowned in Hagia Sophia and ruling as his father’s equal, he carried the empire’s wars on his shoulders — a soldier the Catalan chronicler Ramon Muntaner called one of the bravest knights in the world, willing to sell his own jewels to ransom captured troops. Fortune rarely matched his courage: mutinous Alan mercenaries unravelled his campaign at Magnesia in 1302, and against the Bulgarians at the Skafida river a collapsing bridge turned a battle nearly won into a rout. Peace cost him his daughter Theodora, married to the victorious Bulgarian tsar. His death at forty-three was ascribed partly to grief, after retainers of his elder son accidentally killed his younger son Manuel. Byzantines remembered him as “the most pious lord.”
One of 20 people of Palaiologos (1190–1503) in this archive. The last and longest-lived house — it retook the city in 1261 and lost it in 1453.
Line of descent: Manuel Komnenos → John Komnenos → Alexios I Komnenos → Theodora Komnene → Andronikos Angelos Doukas → Alexios III Angelos → Irene Angelina → Theodora Palaiologina → Michael VIII Palaiologos → Andronikos II Palaiologos → Michael IX Palaiologos.
Parents
- Andronikos II Palaiologos (1259 – 1332)
- Anna (1259 – 1281)
Partners
- Married Rita (1278 – ?) in 1294 — one child together
Children
- Andronikos III Palaiologos (1297 – 1341)
Life
- 1277 — Born
- 1294 — Married Rita
- 1320 — Died