The Church and Internal Conflicts in Byzantium: The Catalans’ Presence in the Empire in the Early 14th Century According to the Correspondence of Athanasios I, Patriarch of Constantinople

Abstract

Introduction. The present research is related to the problem of the image of Other in Byzantine sources, but the focus is on its single aspect, namely the problem of the Byzantine attitude towards “the Latins” and, in particular, Western mercenaries which will be considered on the example of Athanasios I, patriarch of Constantinople’s (1289–1293, 1303–1309) relation to mercenaries of the Catalan Company staying for a long time (1303–1309) on the territory of the empire. It represents source analysis of the patriarch’s correspondence that is, we believe, the most underrated historical sources in this respect. Our goals are to find out the position of the Byzantine church towards the Catalan company and to determine the value of the Athanasios’ epistolary as a source for studying the Byzantine-Catalan conflict. The subject of research is 10 letters of Athanasios somehow reflecting his views on the Catalans’ presence in the empire. Methods and materials. The principles of the hermeneutic method allow us to interpret holistically the letters of the patriarch. Analysis and results. It is concluded that Athanasios who saw the Catalans, representatives of the West, as a threat to the existence of the Byzantine state and church from the very beginning was against their involvement in the empire to defend its eastern boundaries. After the Catalans’ arrival, three main themes can be distinguished in his criticism of them which the patriarch expressed in his letters sent mainly to the emperor: he opposed lawlessness and violence on their part towards the local population; warned the basileus about inadmissibility of the Catalans’ interference in state affairs; feared that their long stay in Byzantium would be harmful to the church and the Orthodox population in the ways that it was at the time of the Fourth Crusade and Latin Domination. These letters contain not much factual information but they allow to confirm and even complement data of other sources, mainly narrative ones, as well as to deepen our knowledge on relations between state and church in Byzantium under conditions of internal crisis in the early 14th century.