Aegean Sea (theme)
Encyclopedia
The Theme of the Aegean Sea was a Byzantine
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

 province in the northern Aegean Sea
Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea[p] is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkan and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey. In the north, it is connected to the Marmara Sea and Black Sea by the Dardanelles and Bosporus...

, established in the mid-9th century. As one of the Byzantine Empire's three dedicated naval themes (Greek: ), it served chiefly to provide ships and troops for the Byzantine navy
Byzantine navy
The Byzantine navy was the naval force of the East Roman or Byzantine Empire. Like the empire it served, it was a direct continuation from its imperial Roman predecessor, but played a far greater role in the defense and survival of the state then its earlier iterations...

, but also served as a civil administrative circumscription.

History

The theme has its origins in the late antique civil province
Roman province
In Ancient Rome, a province was the basic, and, until the Tetrarchy , largest territorial and administrative unit of the empire's territorial possessions outside of Italy...

 of the islands , which encompassed the islands of the southeastern and eastern Aegean up to Tenedos
Tenedos
Tenedos or Bozcaada or Bozdja-Ada is a small island in the Aegean Sea, part of the Bozcaada district of Çanakkale province in Turkey. , Tenedos has a population of about 2,354. The main industries are tourism, wine production and fishing...

. The term "Aigaion Pelagos" appears for the first time as an administrative circumscription in the early 8th century, when seals of several of its kommerkiarioi (customs officials) are attested. One seal, dated to 721/722, even refers to an official in charge of all the Greek islands, possibly implying an extension of the old province over the islands of the northern and western Aegean as well. Militarily, the Aegean islands came under control of the Karabisianoi
Karabisianoi
The Karabisianoi , sometimes anglicized as the Carabisians, were the mainstay of the Byzantine navy from the mid-7th century until the early 8th century. The name derives from the Greek karabos or karabis for "ship", and literally means "people of the ships, sea-men"...

corps and later of the Cibyrrhaeot Theme
Cibyrrhaeot Theme
The Cibyrrhaeot Theme, more properly the Theme of the Cibyrrhaeots , was a Byzantine theme encompassing the southern coast of Asia Minor from the early 8th to the late 12th centuries...

 during the 7th and 8th centuries. From the late 8th century, however, two separate commands appear in the Aegean: the droungarios of the Aegean Sea (Aigaion Pelagos), apparently controlling the northern half, and the droungarios of the Twelve Islands (Dodekanesos) or the Gulf (Kolpos), in charge of the south. The latter command eventually evolved into the theme of Samos
Samos (theme)
The Theme of Samos was a Byzantine military-civilian province, located in the eastern Aegean Sea, established in the late 9th century. As one of the Byzantine Empire's three dedicated naval themes , it served chiefly to provide ships and troops for the Byzantine navy.-History:The dates of...

, while the former evolved into the theme of the Aegean Sea, encompassing both the islands of the northern Aegean as well as the Dardanelles
Dardanelles
The Dardanelles , formerly known as the Hellespont, is a narrow strait in northwestern Turkey connecting the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara. It is one of the Turkish Straits, along with its counterpart the Bosphorus. It is located at approximately...

 and the southern coasts of the Propontis. The theme of the Aegean Sea must have been created in 843: its governing strategos
Strategos
Strategos, plural strategoi, is used in Greek to mean "general". In the Hellenistic and Byzantine Empires the term was also used to describe a military governor...

does not appear in the Taktikon Uspensky
Taktikon Uspensky
The Taktikon Uspensky or Uspenskij is the conventional name of a mid-9th century Greek list of the civil, military and ecclesiastical offices of the Byzantine Empire and their precedence at the imperial court. Nicolas Oikonomides has dated it to 842/843, making it the first of a series of such...

of 842/843, which still lists the droungarios, but he is elsewhere attested as being active at Lesbos in 843.

The theme of the Aegean Sea was a regular theme, subdivided into tourmai and banda
Bandon (Byzantine Empire)
The bandon was the basic military and territorial administrative unit of the middle Byzantine Empire. Its name derived from Latin bandum, "ensign, banner", which in turn had a Germanic origin. The term was used already in the 6th century as a term for a battle standard, and soon came to be applied...

and with a full complement of military, civil, and fiscal officials. In the areas of the Dardanelles and the Propontis, however, the droungarios and later the strategos of the Aegean probably shared authority with the Count of the Opsician Theme, to whose jurisdiction these territories properly belonged. The Count of the Opsicians probably retained authority over civil administration and local defence, while the Aegean theme was solely responsible for equipping ships and raising the men to man them from these areas. A similar procedure existed in the theme of Samos as well. This is strengthened by the fact that the Opsicians, and especially the Slavs (Sklabesianoi) living in the theme, are attested serving as marines in the 10th century. According to Constantine VII
Constantine VII
Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos or Porphyrogenitus, "the Purple-born" was the fourth Emperor of the Macedonian dynasty of the Byzantine Empire, reigning from 913 to 959...

, in the early 10th century the theme included Lesbos (the seat of the strategos), Lemnos
Lemnos
Lemnos is an island of Greece in the northern part of the Aegean Sea. Administratively the island forms a separate municipality within the Lemnos peripheral unit, which is part of the North Aegean Periphery. The principal town of the island and seat of the municipality is Myrina...

, Imbros
Imbros
Imbros or Imroz, officially referred to as Gökçeada since July 29, 1970 , is an island in the Aegean Sea and the largest island of Turkey, part of Çanakkale Province. It is located at the entrance of Saros Bay and is also the westernmost point of Turkey...

 and Tenedos
Tenedos
Tenedos or Bozcaada or Bozdja-Ada is a small island in the Aegean Sea, part of the Bozcaada district of Çanakkale province in Turkey. , Tenedos has a population of about 2,354. The main industries are tourism, wine production and fishing...

, Chios
Chios
Chios is the fifth largest of the Greek islands, situated in the Aegean Sea, seven kilometres off the Asia Minor coast. The island is separated from Turkey by the Chios Strait. The island is noted for its strong merchant shipping community, its unique mastic gum and its medieval villages...

 (later transferred to Samos), the Sporades
Sporades
The Sporades are an archipelago along the east coast of Greece, northeast of the island of Euboea, in the Aegean Sea. It consists of 24 islands, of which four are permanently inhabited: Alonnisos, Skiathos, Skopelos and Skyros.-Administration:...

 and the Cyclades
Cyclades
The Cyclades is a Greek island group in the Aegean Sea, south-east of the mainland of Greece; and a former administrative prefecture of Greece. They are one of the island groups which constitute the Aegean archipelago. The name refers to the islands around the sacred island of Delos...

. According to Hélène Ahrweiler
Helene Ahrweiler
Helene Ahrweiler, née Glykatzi is an eminent Greek university professor and Byzantinologist. She is also a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador for Greece. In the 2008 show Great Greeks, she was named amongst the 100 greatest Greeks of all time.- Life :...

, the Cyclades were probably transferred to it when the Dodekanesos/Kolpos naval command was broken up and the theme of Samos established from it in the late 9th century. In 911, the forces of the naval theme of the Aegean are recorded as being 2,610 oarsmen and 400 marines.

The province survived until the late 10th/early 11th century, when it became progressively split up into smaller commands. As the Cyclades and Sporades, Chios and the region of Abydos acquired their own strategoi, the theme of the Aegean became a purely civil province comprising only the coasts of the Propontis and the region around Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...

. By the late 11th century, what remained of the old thematic fleet was subsumed into the unified imperial navy at Constantinople, under the command of the megas doux
Megas Doux
The megas doux was one of the highest positions in the hierarchy of the later Byzantine Empire, denoting the commander-in-chief of the Byzantine navy. It is sometimes also given by the half-Latinizations megaduke or megadux...

. Thereafter, some time in the 12th century, the theme of the Aegean seems to have been fused with the Opsician theme into a single province, as attested in the Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae
Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae
The Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae was a treaty signed after the sack of the Byzantine capital, Constantinople, by the Fourth Crusade in 1204...

in 1204. The theme ceased to exist after the dissolution of the Byzantine Empire by the Fourth Crusade
Fourth Crusade
The Fourth Crusade was originally intended to conquer Muslim-controlled Jerusalem by means of an invasion through Egypt. Instead, in April 1204, the Crusaders of Western Europe invaded and conquered the Christian city of Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire...

in 1204.

Sources

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