Eudokia Ingerina

Eudokia Ingerina
Empress consort of the Byzantine Empire
Eudokia and her son Constantine, and Basil.
Byzantine Empress consort
Reign	24 September 867 – 882
Spouse	Michael III (as mistress) Basil I
Issue
Constantine Leo VI Patriarch Stephen I Alexander Anna Porphyrogenita Helena Porphyrogenita Maria Porphyrogenita
Dynasty	Macedonian
Father	Inger, a Varangian guard
Mother	a woman of the Martiniakoi family
Born	c. 840
Died	c. 882 (aged 41–42)
Burial	Church of the Holy Apostles, Constantinople

Eudokia (or Eudocia) Ingerina (Greek: Ευδοκία Ιγγερίνα) (c. 840 – c. 882) was the wife of the Byzantine emperor Basil I, the mistress of his predecessor Michael III, and the mother to both the Emperors Leo VI and Alexander and Patriarch Stephen I of Constantinople.

Contents 1 Family 2 Life 3 Children 4 Sources 5 References 6 External links

Family

Eudokia was the daughter of Inger, a Varangian guard in the emperor's service. Her mother was a Martinakia and a distant relative to the imperial family.^[1]

Life

Because her family was iconoclastic, the Empress Mother Theodora strongly disapproved of them. About 855 Eudokia became the mistress of Theodora's son, Michael III, who thus incurred the anger of his mother and the powerful minister Theoktistos. Unable to risk a major scandal by leaving his wife, Michael married Eudokia to his friend Basil but continued his relationship with her. Basil was compensated with the emperor's sister Thekla as his own mistress.

Eudokia gave birth to a son, Leo, in September 866 and another, Stephen, in November 867. They were officially Basil's children, but this paternity was questioned, apparently even by Basil himself. The strange promotion of Basil to co-emperor in May 867 lends some support to the possibility that at least Leo was actually Michael III's illegitimate son. The parentage of Eudokia's younger children is not a subject of dispute, as Michael III was murdered in September 867.

A decade into Basil's reign, Eudokia became involved with another man, whom the emperor ordered to be tonsured as monk. In 882, she selected Theophano as wife for her son Leo, and died shortly afterwards.

Children

Eudokia and Basil officially had six children:

• Symbatios, renamed Constantine (c. 865 – 3 September 879). Co-emperor to Basil from 6 January 868 to his death. According to George Alexandrovič Ostrogorsky, Constantine was betrothed to Ermengard of Provence, daughter of Louis II, Holy Roman Emperor and Engelberga in 869. The marrital contract was broken in 871 when relations between Basil and Louis broke down.
• Leo VI (19 September 866 – 11 May 912), who succeeded as emperor and may actually have been the son of Michael III.
• Stephen I (November 867 – 18 May 893), patriarch of Constantinople, who may also have been a son of Michael III.
• Alexander (c. 870 – 6 June 913), who succeeded as emperor in 912.
• Anna Porphyrogenita (d. 905/12 or after). A nun the convent of St Euphemia, Petron.
• Helena Porphyrogenita (d. 905/12 or after). A nun the convent of St Euphemia, Petron.
• Maria Porphyrogenita (d. 905/12 or after). A nun the convent of St Euphemia, Petron.

Royal titles
Preceded by Eudokia Dekapolitissa	Byzantine Empress consort 867–882	Succeeded by Theophano

Sources

• The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, Oxford University Press, 1991.
• Cyril Mango, "Eudocia Ingerina, the Normans, and the Macedonian Dynasty," Zbornik radova Vizantoloskog Instituta, XIV-XV, 1973, 17-27.

References

External links

• Her listing along with her husband in "Medieval lands" by Charles Cawley. The project "involves extracting and analysing detailed information from primary sources, including contemporary chronicles, cartularies, necrologies and testaments."

Persondata
Name	Ingerina, Eudokia
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	840
Place of birth
Date of death	882
Place of death