Alexios I Komnenos 29The most important medieval poems about Alexan-
der are the Latin Alexandreisof Gautier de Châtillon from
between 1178 and 1182 and the French Roman d’Alexan-
dre.Gautier compares Alexander favorably to his great
rival Darius, the Persian emperor, but is critical of
Alexander for his cruelty. It basically portrays him as an
ideal pagan prince blessed by good fortune and God’s
providence, a model for a Christian prince, especially in
terms of magnanimity and control of his troops.
Nonetheless, Alexander might be a fine pagan prince but
he was too motivated by the vanities of this world and
was still destined to perish. According to this tradition he
illustrated better than anyone the vanity and emptiness of
all earthly success.
Further reading:The Medieval “Roman d’Alexandre,”
7 vols. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1937–1976); George Cary, The Medieval Alexander(Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1956); Legends of
Alexander the Great,trans. and ed. Richard Stoneman
(London: J. M. Dent, 1994); Pseudo-Callisthenes, The
Romance of Alexander the Great,trans. Albert Mugrdich
Wolohojian (New York: Columbia University Press,
1969); Peter Noble, Lucie Polak, and Claire Isoz, eds.,
The Medieval Alexander Legend and Romance Epic: Essays
in Honour of David J. A. Ross(Millwood, N.Y.: Kraus
International, 1982).
Alexandria (Askandarujya, al-Iskandariyya) A city
founded by Alexander the Great on the northern coast of
Egypt, west of the Nile, Alexandria was the chief city of
Byzantine Egypt. With the ascendancy of the patriarchate
of CONSTANTINOPLE, to whom the see of Alexandria
answered after the division of the Roman Empire in 364,
the local church adopted MONOPHYSITISM, or the belief in
the single nature and physical divinity of Christ, as a way
of asserting its independence. Despite the rejection of
monophysitism by the Council of CHALCEDONin 451, the
Alexandrian church resisted Constantinople’s attempts to
bring it into line. An underground church developed to
oppose the established one and became a focus of Egyp-
tian loyalties. Such disaffection with Byzantine rule helped
create the conditions in which Alexandria fell to the Per-
sians in 616, and then to the ARABSin 642. The Arabs
occupied Alexandria without resistance. With the excep-
tion of a short interlude in 645, when the city was briefly
retaken by a Byzantine fleet, Alexandria’s fortunes were
from then on linked to the new faith and culture, ISLAM.
Alexandria was soon eclipsed politically by the new Mus-
lim capital at AL-FUSTATand that city became the strategic
prize for those wanting to control Egypt. Alexandria con-
tinued to flourish as a maritime trading center for textiles
and luxury goods. The city was important as a naval base,
especially under the FATIMIDSand the MAMLUKS. On the
other hand, it was contracting in size, as the walls rebuilt
in the 13th and 14th centuries enclosed less than half the
area of the Greco-Roman city. Alexandria survived the
early CRUSADESrelatively unscathed, and the city had a
commercial rebirth with the development of an East–West
spice trade. The loss of this trade after the discovery of a
sea route to India in 1498 by the Portuguese, combined
with Turkish conquest of Egypt in 1517, were among the
final blows to the city’s prosperity. As a cultural center,
however, it had had few peers in the East, rivaling Con-
stantinople in every respect. Its university was renowned
in the distinguished tradition of the famous Library of
Alexandria, perhaps destroyed by fire in 476, which had
been the greatest library of the Late Roman world. The
church of Alexandria produced strong bishops, such as
CYRILand ATHANASIUS, who were often in conflict with
the Jews and persecuted the pagans in the city.
Further reading:E. M. Forster, Alexandria: A History
and a Guide(1961; reprint, Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook
Press, 1974); Morsi Saad El-Din, Alexandria: The Site and
the History, ed. Gareth L. Steen with photographs by
Araldo de Luca (New York: New York University Press,
1993).Alexiad SeeKOMNENA,ANNA.Alexios I Komnenos (Alexius Comnenus)(ca. 1048–
1018)Byzantine emperor
Nephew of the Emperor Isaac I Komnenos (r. 1057–59),
Alexios was born about 1048 and was raised by his
strong-willed mother, Anna Dalassena. Even as a youth,
he was noted for his great military success. Surviving
changes in regime, Alexios was a strong supporter of suc-
cessive emperors while putting down a number of rebel-
lions. At last driven to revolt, he secured the support of
other aristocratic leaders and was proclaimed emperor on
April 4, 1081.
When Alexios assumed power, the empire seemed
about to collapse. Internal affairs were in chaos, and
external enemies closed in on all sides. ANATOLIA, the
empire’s heartland and chief source of labor and revenue,
was all but lost since the disastrous Battle of MANZIKERT
in 1071. That defeat had exposed Anatolia to devastation
and occupation by the SELJUKTurks. To the north, the
Asiatic Petchenegs threatened the Balkan frontiers. And
Robert GUISCARD, the Norman chieftain from southern
ITA LY, was planning to attack the empire to establish a
great Eastern realm of his own.
Alexios had few resources, so he accepted humiliat-
ing terms with the Turks, scraped together hasty forces,
and purchased naval aid from VENICEto face the NORMAN
threat. The Normans were repulsed, and Alexios devoted
the next years to freeing the Balkan provinces from the
combined menaces of a Bulgarian revolt and invasions by
the Petchenegs and the CUMANS. Despite defeats, Alexios
played them off against each other, and with Cuman help
he defeated the Petchenegs overwhelmingly at Levurnion