326 The Eastern Empire. R, O 
to be named in his presence. One day, however, while he 
was conversing with one of his principal officers, a parrot, 
which had often heard a regret expressed for the unhappy 
prince, on a sudden broke out with, “ Alas! poor Leo.” 
The incident was improved by the solicitude of Leo’s friends; 
and the emperor at last consented to his liberation. For this 
prince he afterwards wrote excellent rules of government, 
comprised in sixty-six chapters. 
The glorious reign of Basil was terminated by an accident 
in the chace. A furious stag entangled his horns in the gir¬ 
dle of the emperor, and raised him from his horse. He was 
immediately rescued by the courage and activity of an at¬ 
tendant; but the fall, or consequent fever, exhausted the 
strength of the aged monarch, and he expired amidst the 
tears of his family and people, in the nineteenth year of his 
reign. 
Constantine, the eldest son of Basil, had died before his 
father; Stephen, the youngest, was content with the honours 
of a patriarch and a saint; and Leo and Alexander, the two 
other sons, were alike invested with the purple; but the 
power was solely executed by the elder brother, Leo the 
Sixth, surnamed the Philosopher. The only reason, how¬ 
ever, that can be given for applying this sage appellation to 
him is, that he was less ignorant than the generality of his 
contemporaries, and that several books of profane and eccle¬ 
siastical science were composed in his name, or by his pen. 
In his three first nuptial alliances he was unfortunate. 
His empresses died successively, without leaving him any 
issue. Leo required a female companion, and the empire 
a legitimate heir; but a fourth marriage was a scandal as yet 
unknown in the Christian church, and his forming a matri¬ 
monial union with the beautiful Zoe, who, as a concubine, 
had brought him a son, named Constantine, occasioned a 
schism among the Greek ecclesiastics. The patriarch refused 
his benediction, and even the people took part in the idle 
dispute; but matters being accommodated, Leo retained his 
fourth wife Zoe, and procured her son to be legitimated. 
During the greater part of this reign, war was carried on 
with the Saracens by his generals, who experienced various 
success. As for the emperor himself, he was busied with the 
government of the interior, and with literary pursuits. His 
reign, which lasted twenty-five years, with some few ex¬ 
ceptions, was advantageous to the people. 
Leo, when expiring, had abjured his brother Alexander, 
to whom he bequeathed the crown, to hold it only in charge 
for his nephew, Constantine; but the uncle soon formed the 
horrid design of rendering him incapable of wearing it, by 
castration. The young prince, however, was saved from 
this destiny, by its being represented to Alexander, that 
from his constitution he was not likely to be long-lived. 
Fortunately, the excesses of the uncle abridged his own ex¬ 
istence ; but in the space of one year he had rendered -him¬ 
self equally despicable and detestable. 
Constantine the Seventh derived the appellation of Por- 
phyrogenitus from the apartment of the Byzantine palace, 
which was reserved for the use of the empresses when in par¬ 
turition, and was lined with porphyry, or purple. On his 
father’s death he was but six years old, and therefore, for a 
long time, was rather a spectator than an actor on the pub¬ 
lic stage. His uncle had left him in the hands of guardians 
better qualified and more likely to corrupt than to form him 
to virtue. They at the same time exercised the office of 
regents; but the senate dismissed them, and Zoe, the mother 
of the young prince, who had been removed to a distance, 
being invited to return, assumed the reins of government. 
Scarcely, however, had she entered on her administration, 
when the Bulgarians, the perpetual enemies of the Greeks, 
by their daring irruptions, obliged Zoe to raise troops against 
them, which she committed to two generals, Romanus and 
Leo. These were no sooner placed at the head of the army, 
than they conceived the design of seizing on the empire for 
themselves, or dividing it with Constantine ; but the traitors 
disagreeing, and being jealous of each other’s success, the 
faction of Romanus obtained the ascendancy, which was 
immediately shewn by causing the eyes of Leo to be put 
M E. The Eastern Empire. 
out, and marrying the daughter of the successful general to 
Constantine. At the same time Romanus procured from the 
emperor the appointment of his son Christopher to be head 
of the allies, then the chief support of the empire. He next 
assumed the title of Caesar himself, and soon after that of 
emperor, with the full independence of royalty, which he 
held near five-and-twenty years. 
The three sons of the usurper were successively adorned 
with the same honours, and the lawful emperor was degraded 
from the first to the fifth rank in this college of princes; but 
his studious temper and retired habits disarmed the jealousy 
of Romanus Lecapenus; and the grandson of Basil, with 
an equanimity and industry not usual among those who are 
born to elevated stations, and have afterwards fallen into 
disgrace, improved a scanty allowance by his skill as an artist, 
and by the exhibition and sale of his pictures. 
The fall of Lecapenus was occasioned partly by his own 
vices, but more particularly by the follies and crimes of his 
children. After the decease of Christopher, his eldest son, 
the two surviving brothers quarrelled with each other, but 
afterwards united in a conspiracy against their father. They 
surprised him in his palace, and dressing him in the habit 
of a monk, conveyed him to a small island in the Propontis, 
which had been assigned to a religious community. This 
domestic and unnatural revolution excited a tumult, from 
the effects of which Constantine Porphyrogenitus was re¬ 
stored to the throne ; and the sons of Romanus, by a decree 
of equal-handed justice, were sent to the same island to 
which they had previously transported their father, and were 
obliged to assume the sacerdotal character, as a security 
against fresh conspiracies. 
In the fortieth year of his age, Constantine the Seventh 
obtained the full possession of the empire of the East. Na¬ 
turally indolent, and somewhat addicted to intemperance, 
he relinquished the reins of government to the caprice of his 
wife Helena, the daughter of the banished Romanus; yet 
the birth, the connections, the learning, and iunocence of 
Constantine, endeared him to the Greeks, and he was la¬ 
mented by the unfeigned tears of his subjects. His death 
was imputed to poison, administered by his son Romanus. 
This monster presented a poisoned cup to his father; but the 
emperor’s foot slipping as he raised the draught to his lips, 
he spilt a considerable part of it, and thus prevented an 
iustant death, though it laid the foundation of a lingering 
dissolution. 
Romanus, however, who derived his name from his 
maternal grandfather, was allowed to mount the throne, 
A. D. 959 ; and his conduct as emperor did not alter the 
opinion that his parricidal attempt had created. He appears 
to have been one of the most debauched princes exhibited 
in the fertile annals of infamy. Whilst his two brothers, 
Nicephorus and Leo, triumphed over the Saracens, the hours 
of Romanus were devoted to the amusements of the circus, 
and the sensualities of the table. Though in strength and 
beauty he was distinguished above other men, yet these per¬ 
fections were insufficient to fix the affections of Theophano, his 
wife, a woman of low origin, masculine spirit, and flagi¬ 
tious manners, well according with those of her husband. 
After he had reigned four years, she mingled for the emperor 
the same deadly potion which he had composed for his fa¬ 
ther, and he fell a martyr to its effects. Romanus the 
Second, in order to pursue his pleasures without interruption, 
had delegated his principal authority to his great chamber- 
lain Joseph, a simple and credulous man, who continued 
for some time to conduct the administration of affairs in the 
name of Theophano, and the sons of the late emperor; but 
was afterwards immured, by a successful rival, within the 
walls of a convent, where he soon paid the debt of 
nature. 
Romanus had left two sons, Basil and Constantine, and 
two daughters, Theophano and Anne. The eldest was 
given in marriage to the second emperor of the West; and 
the youngest became the wife of Wolodomir, great duke and 
apostle of Russia. After the death of her husband, Theo¬ 
phano found it in vain to endeavour to reign with the assist¬ 
ance 
