Eudocia

(Εὐδοκία), the name of several Byzantine princesses.

1. Wife of the emperor Theodosius II. She was the daughter of the sophist Leontius, or Leon, or, as he is called in the Paschal Chronicle, Heracleitus of Athens, where she was born. The year of her birth is doubtful. Nicephorus Callisti, who has given the fullest account of her, states (14.50) that she died in the fourth year of the emperor Leo, which corresponds to A. D. 460-61, aged sixty-seven; and that she was in her twentieth year when she married Theodosius. According to this statement, she must have been born A. D. 393-4, and married A. D. 413-14. But the age of Theodosius (born A. D. 401) leads us to prefer, for the marriage, the date given by the Paschal or Alexandrian Chronicle and by Marcellinus (Chron.), viz. the consulship of Eustathius and Agricola, A. D. 421. We must then give up the calculation of Nicephorus as to the time of her death, or as to her age at that time or at her marriage. Possibly she came to Constantinople in her twentieth year, in 413-14, but was not married till 421. She was called originally Athenais, and having excellent natural abilities, was educated by her father and by the grammarians Hyperechius and Orion in every branch of science and learning then cultivated. She was familiar with Greek and Latin literature, rhetoric, astronomy, geometry, and the science of arithmetic. She was also eminent for her beauty; and in consideration of these advantages, natural and acquired, her father at his death left her no share in his property, all of which he bequeathed to her two brothers Valerius and Aetins, called Genesius by Zonaras, or Gesius in the Paschal Chronicle, saying that her good fortune and the fruits of her education would be a sufficient inheritance.

From dissatisfaction either at this arrangement, or at some wrong she had suffered, Athenais went to Constantinople to appeal against her brothers; and Pulcheria, sister of Theodosius, who managed alike him and his empire, fixed on her as a suitable wife for him. Athenais was a heathen; but her heathenism yielded to the arguments or persuasions of Pulcheria and of Atticas. patriarch of Constantinople, by whom she was baptized, receiving at her baptism the name of Eudocia, and being adopted in that ordinance by Pulcheria as a daughter--an expression apparently indicating that she had that princess for a sponsor. The date of her marriage (A. D. 421), given by Marcellinus and the Paschal Chronicle, is probably correct, though Theophanes places it one if not two years earlier.

Most historians mention only one child of this union, Eudoxia, who, according to Marcellinus, was born in the thirteenth consulship of Honorius, and the tenth of Theodosius, i. e. A. D. 422, and betrothed, in the consulship of Victor and Castinus, A. D. 424, to her cousin Valentinian, afterwards emperor of the West as Valentinian III. Tillemont thinks there are notices which seem to show that there was a son, Arcadius, but he must have died young. Marcellinus mentions another daughter of the emperor Theodosius, and therefore (if legitimate) of Eudocia also, Flacilla; but Tillemont suspects that Marcellinus speaks of a sister of Theodosius so named. Flacilla died in the consulship of Antiochus and Bassus, A. D. 431. The marriage of Valentinian with Eudoxia was celebrated, not, as at first appointed, at Thessalonica, but at Constantinople (comp. Socrates, Hist. Eccles. 7.44; Niceph. Call. Hist. 14.23; Marcellin. Chron. Aetio II et Sigisuldo Coss), in the year 436 or 437, most likely the latter. In 438, Eudocia set out for Jerusalem, in discharge of a vow which she had made to visit " the holy places" on occasion of her daughter's marriage; and returned the year following to Constantinople, bringing with her the reputed relics of Stephen the proto-martyr. It was probably in this journey that she visited Antioch, addressed the people of that city, and was honoured by them with a statue of brass, as related by Evagrius. At her persuasion Theodosius enlarged the boundaries and the walls of Antioch, and conferred other marks of favour on that city. She had received the title of Augusta A. D. 423.

Hitherto it is probable that Eudocia had interfered but little with the influence exercised by Pulcheria in public affairs. Nicephorus says, she lived twenty-nine years in the palace, "submitting to (ὑπό) Pulcheria as mother and Augusta." As Nicephorus places Eudocia's marriage in 413-14, he makes 442-43 the period of the termination of Pulcheria's administration. He states, that Eudocia's administration lasted for seven years. which brings us to 449-50 as the date of her last journey to Jerusalem, a date which, from other circumstances, appears to be correct.

During the seven years of her administration, in A. D. 444, according to the Paschal Chronicle, but later according to Theophanes, occurred the incident which was the first step to her downfall. An apple of remarkable size and beauty had been brought to Constantinople, which the emperor purchased and presented to his wife. She sent it to Paulinus, the magister officiorum, who was then confined by a fit of the gout; and Paulinus, deeming it a suitable offering, sent it to the emperor. Theodosius recognized it as the one which he had given to Eudocia; and, without mentioning the reason to her, enquired what she had done with it. She, apprehensive of his displeasure at having parted with his gift, replied that she had eaten it, and confirmed her assertion by an oath. This falsehood increased the emperor's suspicions that Eudocia regarded Paulinus with undue affection; and he banished him to Cappadocia, where he was either then or afterwards put to death. Marcellinus places his death in the fifth consulship of Valentinian A. D. 440; but we prefer the statement of Nicephorus, that his banishment was after 442-3, and are disposed to place his death in A. D. 449-50. Eudocia, however, soothed for a time the jealousy of her husband, but it was not eradicated, as subsequent events shewed. Gibbon rejects the whole story of the apple " as fit only for the Arabian Nights ;" but his scepticism appears unreasonable.

The quarrels of the ecclesiastics were the immediate occasion of her downfall. Chrysaphius, the eunuch and head chamberlain, a supporter of the monk Eutyches, wished to procure the deposition of Flavian, patriarch of Constantinople, who had just been elected, A. D. 447. Chrysaphius, finding that Flavian was supported by Pulcheria, who, though no longer directing the government, retained considerable influence, applied to Eudocia, whom he reminded of the grievances she had sustained "on Pulcheria's account." Eudocia, after a long continued effort, at last succeeded in alienating her husband from his sister. Pulcheria was forbidden the court, and retired from Constantinople; and in the second or pscudo-council of Ephesus (A. D. 449), known as "the council of robbers" (ή ληστρική), Flavian was deposed, and so roughly treated by the assembled prelates, that he died of their violence a few days after. But Theodosius was soon led to take up the cause of the murdered patriarch. He banished Chrysaphius, and stripped him of all his possessions; and shewed his anger with Eudocia by reviving the quarrel about the apple; so that she begged and obtained permission to retire to Jerusalem. Pulcheria was recalled, and resumed the now vacant management of affairs, which she retained during the short remainder of the reign of Theodosius and that of her husband Marcian, who succeeded him.

Eudocia might possibly have been reconciled to her husband, but for an event recorded by Marcellinus, which rendered the breach irreparable. Saturninus, who held the office of comes domesticorum, being sent for the purpose by Theodosius, on what account is not stated, but probably through jealousy, slew two ecclesiastics, Severus, a priest, and Johannes or John, a deacon, who were in the service of Eudocia at Jerusalem. She, enraged, put Saturninus to death, and was in return stripped of the state and retinue of empress, which she had been hitherto allowed to retain. Marcellinus places these sad events in the eighteenth consulship of Theodosius, A. D. 444; but this date is altogether inconsistent with the facts mentioned by Nicephorus. Theophanes placed them in A. M. 5942, Alex. era (A. D. 450), which is probably correct; if so, it must have been before the death of Theodosius, which took place in that year.

Eudocia spent the rest of her life in the Holy Land, devoting herself to works of piety and charity. She repaired the walls of Jerusalem, conversed much with ecclesiasties, built monasteteries and hospitals, and a church in honour of the proto-martyr Stephen on the spot where he was said to have been stoned; enriched existing churches with valuable offerings, and bestowed great sums in charity on the priests and the poor. But she was, for some years, obnoxious to the imputation of heresy. The opinion of Eutyches on the union of the two natures in Christ, which she held, and which had triumphed in the " council of robbers" at Ephesus (A. D. 449), was condemned in another council held at Chalcedon (A. D. 451), soon after the death of Theodosius. The decrees of this latter council Eudocia for some years rejected. When, however, she heard of the captivity of her daughter Eudoxia [Eudoxia], whom, with her two daughters, Genseric, king of the Vandals, had carried into Africa (A. D. 455), sle sought to be reconciled to Pulcheria, that she might interest her and her husband, the emperor Marcian, in behalf of the captives. By the intervention of Olybrius, to whom one of the captive princesses was betrothed, and of Valerius, the reconciliation was effected; and Pulcheria anxiously sought to restore Eudocia to the communion of the church. She engaged her brothers and daughters (according to Nicephorus) to write to her for this purpose: from which it may be gathered that the brothers of Eudocia had become Christians, and were still living. According to the Paschal Chronicle, they had been advanced to high offices, Aetius or Gesius in the provinces, and Valerius at court. Possibly the Valerius who had been one of the mediators between the princesses, was one of them. Who "the daughters," of Eudocia were, is not clear. We read only of two, Eudoxia, now in captivity, and Flacilla, long since dead. If the letters were from the captive princesses, we must understand daughters in the more extended sense of female descendants. These letters and the conversations which Eudocia held with Symeon the Stylite, and Euthymius, an eminent monk of Jerusalem, determined her to renounce Eutychianism; and her conversion led many others to follow her example; but it is honourable to her that she continued her gratuities to those who retained as well as to those who renounced these opinions. She died at Jerusalem in the fourth year of the reign of Leo I. A. D. 460-61, and was buried in the church of St. Stephen, which she herself had built. Theophanes places her death in A. M. 5947 Alex. era (A. D. 455), but this is too early. Her age has been already noticed. She solemnly declared at her death that she was free from any guilty connexion with Paulinus. Works

Eudocia was an author. She wrote-- 1. A poem on the victory obtained by the troops of her husband Theodosius over the Persians

A. D. 421 or 422. This was in heroic verse, and is mentioned by Socrates. (Hist. Eccles. 7.21.) 2. A paraphrase of the Octateuch

also in heroic verse. Photius describes it as consisting of eight books, according to the division of that part of Scripture which it embraced ; and says it was well and perspicuously written, and conformable to the laws of the poetic art; but that the writer had not allowed herself the poetic licences of digression and of mingling fiction with truth, having kept very close to the sense of the sacred books. 3. A Paraphrase of the Prophecies of Daniel and Zechariah

in the same measure. 4. A poem on the history and martyrdom of Cyprian and Justina

In the same measure and in three books. Justina suffered in the persecution under Diocletian. Photius gives a pretty full account of this poem. 5. Homero-Centones

Zonaras and Joannes Tzetzes ascribe to Eudocia Homero-Centones; and a poem under that title, composed of verses and parts of verses from Homer, and having for its subject the history of the fall and of the redemption of man by Jesus Christ, has been repeatedly published, both in the original and in a Latin version. In one edition, it is said to be by Eudocia Augusta, or Patricius Pelagius. The genuineness of this work is, however, very disputable, and even the fact of Eudocia having ever written anything of the kind, is not quite clear. Further Information

Socrates, Hist. Eccles. 7.21; Evagrius, Hist. Eccles. 1.20, 21, 22; Nicephorus Callisti, Hist. Eccles. 14.23, 47, 49, 50; Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. p. 34-37, ed. Basil. 1557; Marcellinus, Chronicon ; Chironicon Alexandrinum sive Paschale; Joannes Malalas, Chronogra/phia, lib. xiv. Theophanes, Chronographia ab A. M. 5911 ad 5947, Alex. era; Joannes Tzetzes, Historiar. Variar Chilias. X Hist. 306; Cedrenus, Compendium, p. 590-91, ed. Bonn; Michael Glycas, Annales, pars iv. pp. 484-5, ed. Bonn; Photius, Biblioth. codd. 183, 184; Tillemont, Hist. des Emp. vol. i.; Gibbon, Decl. and Fall. ch. xxxii.; Cave, Hist. Lit. vol. i. p. 403, ed. Oxford, 1740-43; Oudin, De Scriptor. Eccles. vol. i. p. 1258; Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. i. p. 552, &c., vol. x. p. 730, &c.

2. Daughter of Valentinian 11. and of Eudoxia, daughter of Theodosius II., and consequently grand-daughter of the subject of the precediug article. She was carried captive to Carthage by Genseric, king of the Vandals, when he sacked Rome (A. D. 455), together with her mother and her younger sister Placidia. Genseric married Eudocia (A. D. 456), not to one of his younger sons, Gento, as Idatius says, but to his eldest son Hunneric (who succeeded his father, A. D. 477, as king of the Vandals); and sent Eudoxia and Placidia to Constantinople. After living sixteen years with Hunneric, and bearing him a son, Hulderic, who also afterwards became king of the Vandals, Eudocia, on the ground of dislike to the Arianism of her husband, secretly left him, and went to Jerusalem, where she soon after died (A. D. 472), having bequeathed all she had to the Church of the Resurrection, and was buried in the sepulchre of her grandmother, the empress Eudocia. (Evagrius, Hist. Eccles. 2.7; Marcellinus, Chronicon; Idatius, Chronicon; Nicephorus Callisti, Hist. Eccles, 15.11; Procopius, de Bello Vandalico, 1.5; Theophanes, Chronographia, A. M. 5947 and 5964, Alex. era; Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. p. 40, ed. Basil, 1557; Tillemont, Hist. des Emp. vol. vi.)

3. Eudocia Fabia, wife of the emperor Heraclius. She was the daughter of a certain African noble, and was at Constantinople (A. D. 610) when Heraclius, to whom she was betrothed, having assumed the purple in Africa, sailed to Constantinople to dethrone the tyrant Phocas. Phocas shut her up in a monastery with the mother of Heraclius; but his fall led to their release. She was married on the day of Heraclius's coronation, and crowned with him, and, according to Zonaras, received from him the name of Fabia; but Cedrenus makes Fabia her original name, which is more likely. She had by Heraclius, according to Zonaras, three children, a daughter Epiphania, and two sons, the elder named Heraclius and the younger Constantine. She died soon after the birth of the youngest child. Cedrenus assigns to them only a daughter and one son, who was, according to him, called both Heraclius and Constantine. He places the death of Eudocia in the second year of Heraclius, A. D. 612. (Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. pp. 66, 67, ed. Basil, 1557 ; Cedrenus, Compendium, pp. 713-14, ed. Bonn, 1838-9.)

4. Eudocia, daughter of Incer or Inger, and concubine of the emperor Michael III., by whom she was given in marriage (about A. D. 866) to Basil the Macedonian, afterwards emperor. She bore Basil a son, afterwards the emperor Leo the Philosopher, so soon after their marriage, that it was said that Michael was the child's father, and that she was pregnant at the time of her marriage. Cedrenus speaks of the marriage of Basil with Eudocia, whose noble birth and beauty he celebrates; but, far from making her the concubine of Michael, speaks of her as excelling in modesty. (Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. p. 132, ed. Basil, 1577; Cedrenus, Compendium, vol. ii. p. 198, ed. Bonn, 1838-9.)

5. Eudocia, third wife of the emperor Constantine V. (Copronymus). She was crowned and received the title of Augusta from her husband in the twenty-eighth year of his reign, A. D. 768. (Cedreni Compendium, vol. ii. p. 16, ed. Bonn.)

6. Eudocia, third wife of Leo the Philosopher, son of Basil the Macedonian and of Eudocia. (No. 3.) She died in childbirth soon after, and the child died also. She was the daughter, or of the race of Opsicius. Of the date of her marriage and death we have no account. It was probably near the beginning of the tenth century; at any rate before A. D. 904. (Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. p. 143, ed. Basil, 1567; Cedrenus, Compendium, p. 492, ed. Basil, 1566.)

7. Eldest daughter of the Byzantine emperor Constantine IX., became a nun in consequence of some disease by which she was disfigured. She appears to have survived her father, who died A. D. 1028. (Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. p. 182, ed. Basil, A. D. 1557.)

8. Of Macrembolis, wife of the emperors Constantine XI. (Ducas) and Romanus IV. (Diogenes). She was married to Constantine while he was yet in a private station, and bore him two sons, Michael and Andronicus, before his accession in A. D. 1059, and one son, Constantine. born afterwards; they had also two daughters, Theodora and Zoe. On the accession of Constantine she received the title of Augusta and on his death, A. D. 1067, he bequeathed the empire to her and to their three sons, Michael VII. (Parapinaces), Andronicus I., and Constantine XII. (Porphyrogenitus). He bound Eudocia by an oath not to marry again. Eudocia had in fact the management of the government, the children being all young. Perceiving that the protection of the eastern frontier, which was threatened with invasion, required a stronger hand, she married Romanus IV. (Diogenes). Romanus, who was eminent for his fine figure, strength, and warlike qualities, had, on the death of Constantine XI., prepared to seize the throne, but was prevented by Eudocia, who threw him into prison, and exiled him; but, either for reasons of state, or from affection, soon recalled him, and raised him to the command of the army. Her oath not to marry had been given in writing, and committed to the custody of the patriarch of Constantinople; but by a trick she recovered it, and, within eight months after her husband's death (A. D. 1068), married Romanus, and raised him to be colleague in the empire with herself and her sons. She had hoped to govern him, but was disappointed, and his assertion of his own will led to quarrels between them. During the captivity of Ronmanus, Joannes or John Ducas, brother of the late Constantine, who had been invested with the dignity of Caesar, declared Michael Parapinaces sole emperor, and banished Eudocia to a convent which she had herself built on the shore of the Propontis. On the death of Diogenes, who on his release had fallen into the hands of Andronicus, the eldest son of Joannes Ducas, and died from the cruel usage he received, A. D. 1071 [Romanus IV. (Diogenes)], Eudocia buried her unhappy husband with great splendour. She appears to have long survived this event. (Zonaras, Annales, vol. iii. pp. 218-226, ed. Basil, 1557; Michael Glycas, Annales, pars iv. p. 606, &c., ed. Bonn.) Works Dictionary of History and Mythology

Eudocia compiled a dictionary of history and mythology, which she called Ἰωνιά, i. e. Collection or bed of Violets. It was printed for the first time by Villoison, in his Anecdota Graeca, 2 vols. 4to. Venice, 1781. It is prefaced by an address to her husband Romanus Diogenes, in which she describes the work as " a collection of genealogies of gods, heroes, and heroines, of their metamorphoses, and of the fables and stories respecting them found in the ancients; containing also notices of various philosophers." The sources from which the work was compiled are in a great degree the same as those used in the Lexicon of Suidas. The sources are examined and described by Meineke in his Observationes in Eudociae Violetum, in the fifth and sixth volumes of the Bibliothek der allen Litteratur und Kunst, Göttingen, 1789.

9. Daughter of Andronicus Comnenus, second son of the Byzantine emperor Calo-Joannes. She was married, but to whom is unknown; and after her husband's death lived in concubinage with Andronicus, her cousin, afterwards emperor as Andronicus I. Her second husband was Michael Gabras, to whom she was married. We can give no exact dates of the few incidents known of her life. She lived in the middle of the twelfth century. (Michael Glycas, Manuel Comnenus, Lib. iii. pp. 135, 136, Lib. iv. p. 173, ed. Bonn.) [J.C.M]

EUDO´CIA (Εὐδοκία), the name of four different towns in Asia Minor mentioned in the Synecdemus of Hierocles: one situated in Phrygia Pacatiana; the second in Pamphylia, in the neighbourhood of Termessus; the third in Lycia; and the fourth in Cappadocia. The last had formerly belonged to the Anatolian Thema, but was incorporated with Cappadocia by Leo VI. (Constant. Porph. de Admin. Imp. 50.)

(Εὐδοκία). (1) A Roman empress, wife to Theodosius the Younger. Her original name was Athenaïs, and she was the daughter of Leontius, an Athenian philosopher; but on her marriage she embraced Christianity, and received the baptismal name of Eudocia. She was a woman of beauty and talent. She versified several books of the Old Testament, and wrote several paraphrases on some of the Jewish prophets; but became suspected by her husband of conjugal infidelity, and, being degraded, she was allowed to seek a refuge in the Holy Land. Here she devoted herself to religious studies, but the jealousy of her suspicious husband still pursued her; and having learned that two priests, whom she had chosen as the companions of her exile, were accustomed to pay her frequent visits and were loaded by her with presents, Theodosius sent Saturninus, one of the officers of his court, to Jerusalem, who put to death the two priests without even the formality of a trial. Irritated at this new insult, Eudocia caused Saturninus to be slain—a deed more likely to darken than avenge her innocence. The emperor contented himself with depriving her of all the badges of her rank, and reducing her to the conditions of a private individual. She lived twenty years after this event, in the bitterest penitence, and died at the age of sixty-seven years, in A.D. 460.

The principal work ascribed by some to Eudocia is Homerocentra (Ὁμηρόκεντρα), or a life of the Saviour, in 2443 hexameters, formed from verses and hemistichs selected from the poems of Homer. (See Cento.) Others, however, make Pelagius, surnamed Patricius, who lived in the fifth century, its author. Eudocia left, also, a poem on the martyrdom of Cyprian. The best edition of the Homerocentra is that of Teucher (Leipzig, 1798).

(2) The Younger, daughter of the preceding and of Theodosius II., married Valentinian III. After the assassination of her husband by Petronius Maximus, she was obliged to marry the usurper. Eudocia, out of indignation and revenge, called in Genseric, king of the Vandals, who came to Italy, plundered Rome, and carried Eudocia with him to Africa. Some years afterwards she was sent back to Constantinople, where she died, A.D. 462.

(3) The widow of Constantine Ducas, married to Romanus Diogenes, an officer of distinction, A.D. 1068, and associated him with her upon the throne. Three years after, Michael, her son, by means of a revolt, was proclaimed emperor, and caused his mother to be shut up in a convent, where she spent the rest of her life. She left a treatise on the genealogies of the gods and heroes, which displays an extensive acquaintance with the subject. It is printed in Villoison's Anecdota Graeca (Venice, 1781).