New Data on the Connections between the South-Western Taurica and the Imperial Military Department ca. 1000

Abstract

In the large array of archaeological finds of the Byzantine periods from the byzantine Cherson and his environs there are hanging lead seals, which are especially interesting for reconstruction of administrative and political development of this center and region of the South-Western Taurica. They allow the scholar to obtain valuable information of the South-Western Taurica region’s relations with state authorities, its war partners and contacts with different regions of the empire. The seals of Byzantine military men outline a quite definite circle of contacts between military and political authorities of Taurica and the commandment of imperial provinces (magister militum of Byzacena, comes of Opsikion, strateges of Hellas, Thessaloniki, Sicily, Armeniakoi and Cephalonia), military and naval units (komes tes kortes, tourmarches, logothetes ton agelon, parathalasites, comes, topoterites and droungaries tou ploimou), and various branches of the military departments in the capital (epi tou maglabiou of the palace Lampra, of the grand chartoularios tou stratiotikon). The seal of the member of the corps of grand hetaireia discovered in the environs of Byzantine Cherson underlines again the existence of the said connections as long as ca. 1000 and introduces into the scholarship a new and previously unknown unit (for local contacts) of elite imperial guards plausibly composed of the natives of Cherson and other peoples who entered the Byzantine service.

Keywords

• история византии, византийский херсон, сфрагистика, византийские печати, моливдовулы, дворцовая стража, ἐπὶ τῆς μεγάλης ἑτειρείας, императорская этерия