Ivailo of Bulgaria

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ivailo (Bulgarian: Ивайло), nicknamed Bărdokva ("radish" or "lettuce") or Lakhanas in greek ("cabbage") was a rebel leader in Bulgaria in 1277 and reigned as emperor (tsar) of Bulgaria from 1278 to 1279.

Ivailo was a commoner who lived humbly and herded swine for payment. He imagined himself capable of accomplishing great deeds and ridding Bulgaria of its troubles, including above all the frequent incurisons by the Mongols of the Golden Horde under Nogai Khan. By 1277, Ivailo had put his words into actions, and had acquired leadership of the discontented. An attempt to subdue him by the Bulgarian monarch Constantine I ended in utter failure, and Ivailo himself is credited with killing the emperor in his chariot. Although Ivailo was able to extend his authority across much of the country, he also met with resistance, and the capital Tărnovo remained under the control of the legitimate emperor Michael Asen II and his mother Maria Kantakouzena.

Ivailo's successes troubled the Byzantine Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos, who at first decided to neutralize the potential danger by seeking an alliance with Ivailo and to offer him his daughter as wife. Later Michael VIII changed his plan, married his eldest daughter Eirene to Ivan Asen III, a descendant of Bulgaria's ruling dynasty living at the Byzantian court, and dispatched troops to place him on the throne.

This caused an alliance between Ivailo and Maria Kantakouzena, and Ivailo married the widowed empress and was recognized as Bulgarian emperor in 1278, without deposing or disinheriting the minor Michael Asen II. Although Ivailo proved to be an abusive husband, he led a successful defense of the Balkan passes against the Byzantine campaigns to assert Ivan Asen III. Ivailo had met with success against casual Mongol raids, but a major Mongol army blockaded him in the fortress of Drăstăr (Silistra) on the Danube for three months in 1279. A rumor of Ivailo's death caused panic in Tarnovo, where the nobility surrendered to a new Byzantine army and accepted Ivan Asen III as emperor. Ivan Asen III was enthroned, while Maria Kantakouzena and Michael Asen II were sent into exile to Byzantium.

Shortly after this, still in 1279 Ivailo suddenly appeared before Tărnovo with an army, but failed to take the well-fortified city. He nevertheless defeated a larger Byzantine relief force in the battle of Devnya and another numbering 5,000 in the Balkan passes. Despairing of relief, Ivan Asen III fled Tărnovo in 1280, while his brother-in-law George Terter I seized the throne. The new ruler temporarily united the factuous aristocracy, and Ivailo gradually lost support. In 1280 or 1281, he traveled to the Mongol chieftain Nogai Khan, accepting his overlordship and seeking his support to recover his throne. Nogai was simultaneously approached by Ivailo's rival Ivan Asen III, who was seeking his own restoration. Eventually Nogai had Ivailo murdered, preferring the claim of Ivan Asen III, who was his brother-in-law (both Nogai and Ivan Asen III were married to daughters of Michael VIII of the Byzantine Empire).

Ivailo's rebellion has been hailed as the first great Peasant Revolt in European history by Marxist historians. While the troubles social conditions in the 1270s certainly contributed to the revolt, Ivailo's rise to power may be more closely comparable to a nationalist reaction such as that led (albeit with divine inspiration) by Joan of Arc. Like other charismatic leaders, Ivailo lived on in imagination and there were Pseudo-Ivailos who appeared (mostly on Byzantine territory) in the late 13th century and early 14th century.

[edit] Family

By his marriage to Maria Kantakouzena, Ivailo had one daughter, who is unnamed in the sources. She was not yet born in 1279, when her pregnant mother was captured by the Byzantines and exiled to Constantinople.