Count of the Tent

The Count of the Tent (Greek: κόμης της κόρτης, komēs tēs kortēs) was a Byzantine provincial administrative office attested from the 8th to the early 12th centuries.

History and functions

The title derives from korte, "tent". According to the 10th-century Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos, during imperial campaigns through the provinces (themes), the Count and his subordinates, the kortinarioi, were responsible for pitching the imperial tent and assisting the Drungary of the Watch in keeping watch over the camp at night.^[1][2]

The Count is attested in seals and documents from the 8th to the early 12th centuries, and was an official attached to the staff of a strategos, the military governor of a theme; on seals, the province where he served is often denoted.^[1] The emperor often had a Count of the Tent in his own, personal service, the most famous of whom was Michael the Amorian under Nikephoros I (r. 802–811).^[2] The office's functions are not clear, but based on his role in narrative sources the Count seems to have been mostly involved with police and judicial matters;^[1] Nicolas Oikonomides views him as "a sort of chief of staff".^[3] They seem to have borne mid-level court ranks such as spatharios and kandidatos.^[2]

References

Sources

• Bury, John Bagnell (1911). The Imperial Administrative System of the Ninth Century - With a Revised Text of the Kletorologion of Philotheos. London: Oxford University Press. 
• Kazhdan, Alexander Petrovich, ed. (1991). Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-504652-6. 
• Oikonomides, Nicolas (1972). Les Listes de Préséance Byzantines des IXe et Xe Siècles (in French). Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique.