Maintained by: Christian Raffensperger (craffensperger@wittenberg.edu) and David J. Birnbaum (djbpitt@gmail.com) Last modified: 2021-03-01T12:09:18-0500 About this site: http://genealogy.obdurodon.org/about.php
Introduction | About | Browse | Query | Sources | Maps
The PVL records that in 1104 a daughter of Volodar′ Rostislavič was sent to Constantinople to marry a carevič, the son of Emperor Alexius Comnenus. [5] Baumgarten identifies this carevič as Sebastocrator Issac. [6] However, Isaac would only be eleven years old at this time, and thus this seems unlikely. Kazhdan, in reviewing the scholarship and sources on this marriage, cannot find any support for the identification of the carevič as Isaac or as any son of Alexius. [7] The only Byzantine source that offers the hope of identification is “The Typikon of the Nunnery of the Theotokos” founded by Alexius’s wife Irene, which mentions two daughters–in–law, both of whom were also named Irene. [8] This source, however, does not identify the women any further, with place of origin or perhaps their name before Irene, leaving the situation unresolved. The PVL identifies the daughter of Volodar′ Rostislavič as marrying a Comnenian carevič, but this cannot be verified by other sources. Rusian chroniclers may also have used the title carevič indiscriminately, which leads to modern problems of identification. As far as an explanation for such a marriage, the Rostislaviči were still holding on to their positions in the west of Rus′. As such, they were the closest to the Byzantine–held lands of Bulgaria and to the more Byzantine–influenced land of Hungary, so there might have been an interest in maintaining such ties. Some decades later there was a great deal of interaction between a Rostislavič ruler, Jaroslav Osmomysl (who was the nephew of this Volodarovna), and the Comneni, as described by John Kinnamos. [9] Though the PVL mentions this marriage, there is nothing to substantiate that mention and it must retain an air of mystery. It may be accepted that a Volodarovna married a Byzantine, but exactly who he was and what his position was is as yet unknown.