Communication networks of officials in Pontos

Unfortunately, we know the exact find-spot of only a small fraction of the more than 80,000 Byzantine lead seals preserved today. It has, however, been established that most seals (at least 80%) discovered in a certain region originated with people located there.Footnote ⁶ Let us now see whether and how this works for the case of the Barber collection.

About half of the Byzantine lead seals of the Barber collection were issued by officials, that is people who mentioned on their seals their title or office in the state and ecclesiastical hierarchy. There are nine pieces issued by officials of the provincial administration, who also mentioned on their seals the area they exercised their duties.

Three were issued by civil thematic officials of Chaldia (one krites in the second quarter of the tenth century, one protonotarios and general kommerkiarios in the first half of the ninth century, and one anagrapheus in the mid-eleventh c.: see our nos. 1–3). They reflect the preponderance of the financial and civil aspects of the administration on local affairs. An unusually large number of kommerkiarioi are attested in Chaldia (33), in contrast to most themata where few kommerkiarioi are indicated.Footnote ⁷ This is obviously connected to the importance of international trade of Chaldia. In fact, in Chaldia more kommerkiarioi appear than strategoi or kritai, the two offices that usually produced proportionally the most seals related to thematic administration, since these were the actual governors of a thema. However, most of the lead seals of these kommerkiarioi of Chaldia have been discovered not in Chaldia but in Constantinople or other Black Sea regions.Footnote ⁸ Only one more lead seal of a kommerkiarios dating from the period of Herakleios (c. 630–642: SL-46) has been found in Chaldia. Although the region of competence of the kommerkiarios is not mentioned it is logical to assume that it is related to Pontos. I believe that the absence of more seals of kommerkiarioi of Chaldia in the Barber collection should be associated with the function of Trebizond as a transit station for international trade. The kommerkiarioi would inspect and seal products intended as imports or exports, would issue receipts of payment of the kommerkion and deal with related financial issues or requests.Footnote ⁹ However, the bulk of imported (especially luxury) products were not destined for the local market, but would eventually reach Constantinople with their accompanying documents and receipts (and thus with the seals of kommerkiarioi).

Another two of the nine lead seals come from officials of the relatively close – though not neighbouring – themata of Charsianon in central Asia Minor around Kaisareia (our no. 4) and Taron, south of Chaldia and west of Lake Van. The first one was an anagrapheus, a tax and property assessor, and the latter the ruler of the autonomous Armenian principality of Taron who received the title strategos of his own principality as a dependent governor by the emperor.Footnote ¹⁰

Importantly, however, the remaining four seals come from regions far from Chaldia: one belonged to a protonotarios from Sicily, on the other edge of the empire; one to a strategos of the maritime thema of the Kibyrraiotai in southern Asia Minor.Footnote ¹¹ Two come from the Aegean: one belonged to a kourator on the island of Mitylene (our no. 5) and one to a strategos of the Islands (SL-36). We do not know the provenance of the seal of the kourator of Mitylene, but the seal of the strategos of the Islands comes from Nikaia in Bithynia, still quite far from the thema of the Islands that encompassed the islands of the southern Aegean.Footnote ¹² What they all have in common is their origin in maritime regions, confirming that even in the most difficult times (such as the first half of the ninth century, when Arabs conquered Crete and then Sicily), maritime routes remained an important means of communication.

Three of these four seals date to the second half of the eleventh century, a period of high geographical and social mobility for provincial officials. For example, Nikephoros Botaneiates, before his accession to the throne (r. 1078–81), served in eight different themata with the office of doux across twenty years, as analysed by Olga Karagiorgou.Footnote ¹³ Therefore, apart from institutional cooperation between two authorities, it is not unlikely that some of these officials were in contact with relatives or friends who happened to be officials in these themata. This seems more obvious in the case of the anagrapheus of Charsianon, who as a tax assessor of a non-neighbouring thema is unlikely to have communicated with an official in Chaldia for purely administrative matters.

There are a handful of seals in the collection from provincial officials who chose not to mention their jurisdiction area, such as Kourkouas, katepano (SL-38),Footnote ¹⁴ Ioannes Raphael, protospatharios and strategos (SL-43), and the famous Theodoros Gabras, sebastos and doux (SL-6). Theodoros Gabras is known to have been appointed doux of Trebizond (that is, of Chaldia), once he became an in-law of the emperor Alexios I. He had defended this region in the 1070s and 1080s against Turkish incursions and subsequently ruled, only nominally recognizing imperial authority, until he was killed by the Turks in 1098.Footnote ¹⁵ Therefore, even if Theodoros does not mention the region on his seal, he used it while he was a doux of Trebizond. Ioannes Raphael is known to have been katepano of Italy in 1046–1047.Footnote ¹⁶ It is not unlikely that he served before or after that date in other regions of the empire as strategos (that is, in or around Chaldia), whence our seal may originate. If, however, the career of Ioannes Raphael was confined to Italy, this seal, found in the region of Trebizond, would demonstrate the contacts provincial officials had between the two edges of the empire. Seals of the katepano Kourkouas have been found in Bulgaria, in Cyprus, and in the Crimea. The Kourkouas family was of Armenian stock and originated from the thema of the Armeniakoi, just west and south of Chaldia. The find of this seal in the area of Trebizond signifies either the bonds between the members of the family serving in different provinces, or the economic and social links with northeast Asia Minor that the family still maintained.

It is conceivable that some of the civil officials were not located in the provinces but remained in Constantinople, especially in cases when they were simultaneously holding a post in the central administration. The anagrapheus of Charsianon, in our case, was also serving as an imperial notarios of the herds. These officials could have remained in the capital, sending their employees to fulfill their tasks, while they would in turn seal the most important documents.Footnote ¹⁷ This may have worked smoothly in some services, such as tax collection or assessment; however, it could not operate for military or judicial offices, and especially in provinces not located more than a few days journey to Constantinople. Even when they held concurrently an office in the central administration, they would either commute from time to time between Constantinople and the provinces or take a break for their Constantinopolitan tasks. Besides, the correspondence of Byzantine authors, such as Michael Psellos, reveals that some provincial officials were indeed moving, at least temporarily, to the provinces and that there was no commutation for their period of term.Footnote ¹⁸ Therefore, the provincial officials of the seals of the Barber collection had probably relocated to the particular province where they had been appointed.

The links between widespread regions are confirmed by the relative lack of seals from the Constantinopolitan heartland. There are no imperial seals in the collection and few seals of officials from the central administration in Constantinople: a krites of both the hippodrome and of the belon and mystographos (our no. 7), a chartoularios of the Orphanotropheion (our no. 8), and a symponos (SL-60).Footnote ¹⁹ All these are middle-ranking officials; there is only one seal of a high-ranking official included in the collection, that of sakellarios Leontios, and it is from Carthage (SL-26).

Of the ecclesiastical seals of the collection two were issued by metropolitans of Trebizond, Konstantinos (ca. 1027–28)Footnote ²⁰ and Niketas (late twelfth century).Footnote ²¹ At the same time, however, there is the seal of a metropolitan of Sardeis (our no. 9), the seal of an abbot of the monastery of Kedron, possibly in Bithynia (our no. 10), the seal of a kouboukleisios and oikonomos of the Great Church (SL-53, which was found in Amaseia, inland Pontos), and a seal issued by the bishopric of Konstantia in Cyprus (SL-52). The seal of one more archbishop of Cyprus, Epiphanios (ca. 870), is included in the collection, but was found in Constantinople.Footnote ²²

The analysis of the collection thus demonstrates that, although many seals found in a region were issued by officials of that same region, there is a relatively high number of seals from other regions of the empire. Whether these seals testify to a correspondence of a private or of an official nature cannot be ascertained, but they date mainly to the eleventh century, a time of high social and geographical mobility in the empire, as we have noted.

The local provenance of sealers

Seals without any indication of a place name or an office are predominantly local. Only the most prominent members of the local elite were able to acquire the higher dignities. The only such example in the Barber collection is the sebastos Theodoros Gabras, an imperial in-law. Instead, the dignities held by our Pontic sample of sealers – whether or not they held office – were almost exclusively lower and middle ranking. Other than the explicitly provincial officials mentioned above (who likely were not locals), most sealers between the seventh and the tenth centuries held the dignities of spatharios and spatharokandidatos. Only one with the high dignity patrikios is recorded and he was not local: Theophobos, a general during the reign of Theophilos (829–842), of Persian or Kurdish stock, whose seal may relate to a failed expedition he undertook against the nearby Abasgia (modern Abkhazia).Footnote ²³ In the eleventh century, the most frequent dignities that appear on the seals of the Barber collection are spatharokandidatos and protospatharios. Both dignities were no longer prestigious: they had declined rapidly in status, and after the middle of the eleventh century were only ascribed to lesser officials of the central and provincial administration.Footnote ²⁴ In the twelfth century, the mention of dignities on seals declined, as the fashion of literary metrical seals and the praise of family origin grew. Now usually only the higher dignities, those associated with the Komnenian clan (derived from the epithet sebastos), were recorded on seals and these people almost exclusively resided at Constantinople. No twelfth-century dignities are recorded on our Pontic sample of seals.

In contrast, the largest collection of Byzantine lead seals, at Dumbarton Oaks –formed primarily of Constantinopolitan and not provincial finds – includes a broadly equal number of seals mentioning the higher dignities of magistros and patrikios and those identified with the middle-ranking dignities of spatharios and spatharokandidatos.Footnote ²⁵ The higher dignities were largely confined to Constantinople apart from a few higher officials who were sent to the provinces, mainly the strategoi and the kritai. Besides, officials of all ranks in the provinces would communicate with Constantinople, the government and the palatine services, which brings the balance to the Dumbarton Oaks sample of seals. A simple dignitary, with no office, would in normal conditions remain in one place and would not have to move because of his office. His correspondence would be primarily of a private nature with few contacts away from his place of residence. Most of the simple dignitaries whose seals are now in the Barber collection were then, probably locals and held no higher dignities.Footnote ²⁶

That most of the Barber seals were owned by locals is also supported by the relatively few seals with a patronymic, only one of which names a renowned Constantinopolitan family: a Promoundenos of the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century, hailing probably from an originally Constantinopolitan family that produced quite a few civil officials in the middle and late eleventh century.Footnote ²⁷ Thereafter, however, the family did not retain its position. There are only two Promoundenoi known in the twelfth century, Theophanios (without any office or dignity) and Theodoros, probably a simple notary in the central ministries,Footnote ²⁸ plus two Promoundenoi in Makedonia in the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century, one of whom was a servant to the despot Ioannes Palaiologos.Footnote ²⁹ Trebizond was the centre of an entirely different state (the Grand Komnenoi). Rather than positing a connection with the contemporary Promoundenoi in distant Makedonia, we would thus favour a local origin, a view supported by the fact that a few Constantinopolitan families migrated after the fall of Constantinople in 1204 to other Greek states, including to the Pontic empire of the Grand Komnenoi.Footnote ³⁰ In short, the seals of people who do not mention any office or dignity seem to come primarily from the Pontos.

Iconography and local particularities

The importance of faunal iconography on the seals of the Barber collection is noteworthy. About 20% of the Byzantine seals that come from the area of Trebizond are decorated with depictions of animals, and these all date between the late ninth and the eleventh century. One can find lions, peacocks, eagles, birds, ducks, and the mythical griffin. Faunal iconography was not uncommon on seals of the tenth century, but it seems to have persisted longer on the Pontic seals. In contrast, on the ninth- to eleventh-century seals in the collection of the Istanbul Archaeological Museum, faunal iconography barely reaches 1%. This is true of other collections as well, such as in the private collection of Y. Tatıs, formed primarily of seals coming from Western Asia Minor, and the collection at Dumbarton Oaks.Footnote ³¹

Whether these kinds of motifs on Byzantine seals adapt contemporary eastern (not necessarily Islamic) motifs reflecting a cosmopolitan court, or revive classical motifs and thus reflect the cultural learned spirit of the period, is uncertain.Footnote ³² An analysis of their attestation reveals that these motifs proliferated more among certain groups of officials, primarily the epi ton barbaron (heads of foreign mercenary units) and some kommerkiarioi not only restricted to the East,Footnote ³³ that the same kind of officials used sometimes clearly classical (and not eastern) motifs on their seals,Footnote ³⁴ and that faunal iconography was not uncommon among Roman and early Byzantine seals until the seventh century, that is before the rise of Islamic art.Footnote ³⁵ This iconography is found seldom in seals of higher officials, although classical motifs were certainly familiar to the educated elite of Constantinople in the tenth century.

Of the published seals of thematic officials of Chaldia, the seals of just three officials (out of a total of ninety-eight) display an animal motif: two kommerkiarioi and one domestikos, a lesser military official.Footnote ³⁶ We cannot know the place of origin of the kommerkiarioi, but lesser military officials mostly originated from the region in which they served. This small number is nonetheless important, for in other themata of the central and western Asia Minor with even larger corpora of officials (such as Opsikion and the Anatolikoi) there is barely an official with faunal iconography on his seal.Footnote ³⁷ Faunal iconography is met with on seals of provincial officials from Chaldia and Seleukeia to Sicily, the Peloponnese and Nikopolis. It is difficult to establish a geographical pattern, although officials of the southern Balkan provinces exhibited seemingly more faunal iconography in proportion to officials of the Asia Minor provinces.Footnote ³⁸ If the motifs were indeed related to contacts with the Islamic East, why they cannot be found in themata neighbouring the southeastern frontier: Kappadokia, Charsianon, Lykandos and the Anatolikoi, or even Mesopotamia?Footnote ³⁹ It is worth remarking that the Barber collection includes no seal of a provincial official (who might have been sent to Chaldia from Constantinople) or other higher dignitary/official who used such motifs on his seal. The faunal motifs exclusively decorate seals of medium-ranking and lesser dignitaries or the so-called ‘private people’, that is people who probably originated from Pontos (for example, our nos. 11, 12, 14).

It would be, however, a mistake to consider that the ‘private persons’ (i.e., those not mentioning any office or title on their seals) who displayed such motifs on their seals, were necessarily merchants, considering that they used on their seals motifs found on products (such as clothes) they were selling.Footnote ⁴⁰ Some of these ‘private persons’ were in fact officials who did not bother mentioning all or any of their offices and titles on their seals.Footnote ⁴¹ Secondly, the few merchants and other artisans who issued seals did mention their occupation (e.g. σηρικοπράτης, πραγματευτής) on their seals. With just two exceptions, I know of no other Byzantine merchants who used such motifs on their seals.Footnote ⁴²

The appearance of such motifs may be indeed associated to the trade routes and the contacts with foreigners, and thus they decorate proportionately seals of officials such as the epi ton barbaron and the kommerkiarioi. Their persistence on Pontic seals, however, much more than any other region of the empire, seems to reflect more a local fashion, which in turn may show an opposition to the more traditional values and fashion of the capital.

Otherwise, there is little local iconography. Although Eugenios was a local saint, his portrait is encountered on just one late thirteenth-century seal (SL-85). Even someone named Eugenios in the eleventh century preferred to portray St Niketas on his seal (SL-72).Footnote ⁴³ Curiously, no middle Byzantine metropolitan of Trebizond ever bore on his seals a depiction of St Eugenios, the supposed patron of the city.Footnote ⁴⁴ As Jan Olof Rosenqvist has argued, the cult of St Eugenios, although firmly established and connected with Trebizond since the sixth century, was limited until the advent of the Grand Komnenoi. All this changed once these rulers turned the cult of St Eugenios from a popular to an imperial one from the middle of the thirteenth century and later, making him the patron-saint of their capital and their empire.Footnote ⁴⁵ The Barber seals pre-date this expansion.

To conclude, the Barber seals are associated primarily with people from the eastern Pontos. At the same time, they reveal that, owing to the sea routes, eastern Pontos had contacts with other provinces of the empire, even as far as Sicily, and that these contacts were not strictly institutional, but also social. In turn, the Byzantine state had minimal interest for this region, other than its governance and taxation, particularly the levy of the trade tax through the kommerkiarioi. This lack of interest was manifested on the low integration of the local elite to the imperial system, as very few of the locals had access to the most prestigious offices and dignities. The side-effect of this practice was the growth of local particularities in culture, which, once the central control thinned in the late eleventh century, evolved into separatism, represented by the autonomous rule of Theodoros Gabras.

Other officials

1. 7. Anonymous (Laktantios?), krites of the hippodrome, of the belon and mystographos (Fig. 7 a–b)

   • SL-29. Dunn, Handlist, no. 29 [sixth–seventh century]; read as Konstantinos, … hippodromou (?)…

   • Provenance. Unknown.

   • Dating. Mid-eleventh century.

   • Obv. Inscription in five (?) lines (four surviving):

   • 

   • Rev. Inscription in six lines (four surviving):

   • 

   • SL-108. Dunn, Handlist, no. 108 [eighth–ninth century]; read simply as Konstantinos.

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. Mid-eleventh century.

   • Obv. Inscription in five (?) lines (four surviving):

   • 

   • Rev. Inscription in six lines (four surviving):

   • 

   • Combined reading of the reverse: [κριτ(ῇ) ἐπ]ὶ τ(οῦ) [Ἱππ(ο)]δρό[μ(ου) τ(οῦ)] βήλ[ου κ]ὲ μυ[στ(ο)]γρά[φ(ῳ)]

   • Close examination of these two specimens reveals that they were struck by the same boulloterion. In both, the seal was struck on a surface smaller than the die, which was also damaged (partially flattened), and this has caused the loss of most of the original inscription. On the reverse the combined reading can be safely reconstituted as krites of the hippodrome, of the belon and mystographos. I was unable, however, to restore the inscription on the obverse containing the first name and possibly an additional office of the owner. The surviving letters do not support Dunn's reading of the name as Konstantinos, nor do the last two lines support the reading of any known title, though the letters -κτην on the fourth line may indicate the office epeiktes (in accusative).

   • A different overall structure of the inscription, such as invocation – name – surname (obverse), offices (reverse), is possible.Footnote ⁶⁴ If so, the ending -λφῳ in the last line of the obverse (which cannot represent any known office or title), would belong to a surname, and the letters κτα on the third line could indicate the first name of the owner, perhaps Laktantios.

   • A mystographos was a secretarial official possibly assigned to record the proceedings of imperial councils. The office remained closely connected to the judicial administration, and many mystographoi served also as judges (kritai of the hippodrome and/or of the belon) as here.Footnote ⁶⁵

   

   Fig. 7. Anonymous (Laktantios?), krites of the hippodrome, of the belon and mystographos.

2. 8. Nikolaos, protospatharios and chartoularios of the Orphanotropheion (Fig. 8)

   • SL-28. Dunn, Handlist, no. 28; read as Nikolaos, spatharios and chartoularios of the … (?) [tenth/eleventh century].

   • Provenance. Istanbul.

   • Dating. Mid-eleventh century.

   • Obv. St Nicholas (bust) holding a book (l. hand); vertical inscription on the right side: , ; border of dots

   • Rev. Inscription in six lines; border of dots:

   • 

   • [Ὁ ἅγιος Νι]κόλ(αος). // + Κ(ύρι)ε β(οή)θ(ει) Νικολ(άῳ) (πρωτο)σπαθ(αρίῳ) (καὶ) χαρτο[υλ(αρίῳ)] τ(οῦ) Ὀρ[φαν(ο)]τρ[οφ(είου)]

   • The orphanotrophos was a civil official ranked relatively highly, among the other ministers of the empire (the logothetai); he had his own sekreton associated with one of the greatest charitable institutions of the empire, the orphanage of St Paul in Constantinople. The office of orphanotrophos is attested since the fifth century; the most famous was undoubtedly the eunuch Ioannes the Orphanotrophos, a leading figure in the politics of the empire around the period that our seal was engraved; he managed to raise to the throne his brother Michael IV (1034–1041) and his nephew Michael V (1041–1042).Footnote ⁶⁶ Curiously, a significant number of orphanotrophoi are associated with the Pontos region. At least three were also, and at the same time, judges in the Armeniakoi;Footnote ⁶⁷ another chartoularios of the Orphanotropheion was bishop of Ionopolis on the Black Sea;Footnote ⁶⁸ while Ioannes Orphanotrophos came from Paphlagonia. It is not unlikely that the Orphanotropheion possessed estates in the region with which it funded its charitable activities. Our seal may have been related to these activities in the Pontos region.

   

   Fig. 8. Nikolaos, protospatharios and chartoularios of the Orphanotropheion.

Ecclesiastical seals

1. 9. Niketas (metropolitan) of Sardeis (Fig. 9)

   • SL-123. Dunn, Handlist, no. 123: read as ‘… of Sardis’.

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. Mid-twelfth century, probably after 1147 and c. 1166.

   • Obv. Indistinct figure of a standing holy figure wearing a long heavy tunic, possibly Theotokos; border of dots.

   • Rev. Inscription in five lines: ; border of dots: Ἡ σφραγὶς αὕτη [ἔ]λαχεν [Ν]ικήτ(ᾳ) τον Σαρδ(έων)

   • This seal was allotted to Niketas (metropolitan) of Sardeis

   • This seal was only partially read by Dunn and therefore not indexed in the Corpus of metrical seals; nor does it appear in prosopographical studies. Although the seal is worn and the surface corroded, the inscription is quite clear; we hesitate only between the reading of τοῦ or τῶν before Σαρδέων. The omission of the metropolitan office from the inscription is quite common, particularly on metrical seals of the eleventh century and later. Another metropolitan of Sardeis in this period wrote on his seal: Τὸν Σάρδεον Στέφανον, Ἁγνή, με σκέποις (Oh Pure [Virgin], protect me, [metropolitan] of Sardeis).Footnote ⁶⁹

   • The long heavy tunic of the figure on the obverse is the usual dress of the Theotokos. This is compatible with the fact that, with one exception, all known metropolitans of Sardeis portrayed the Theotokos on the obverse of their seals.Footnote ⁷⁰ A metropolitan of Sardeis named Niketas participated in the Synod of 1166 in Constantinople,Footnote ⁷¹ and may have been the owner of our seal. If so, Niketas was appointed metropolitan after 1147, when another metropolitan of Sardeis, Ioannes, participated in a synod.Footnote ⁷²

   

   Fig. 9. Niketas (metropolitan) of Sardeis.

2. 10. Timotheos, abbot of Kedron (Fig. 10)

   • SL-55. Dunn, Handlist, no. 55 [eleventh century].

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. Mid-tenth century.

   • Obv. Cross patriarchal on four steps, flanked by fleurons rising up to lower vertical crossbar; circular inscription: , ; border of dots

   • Rev. Inscription in four lines; border of dots:

   • 

   • Κ(ύρι)ε βοήθῃ τῷ σῷ δούλ(ῳ) // + Τ[ι]μο[θέ]ῳ [ἡ]γουμένῳ [τ]οῦ Κεδρόνος

   • A monastery by the name τῶν Κεδρώνων, not located in Constantinople or its immediate environs, is known from three letters, all dated sometime before 870/871, of Patriarch Photios to its abbot Dorotheos.Footnote ⁷³ Another abbot of the same monastery from the mid-ninth century, Iakobos, is known from a seal located in the Dumbarton Oaks collection.Footnote ⁷⁴ The name of the monastery on that seal appears as , which the editors (faithful in the edition of the Letters of Photios), transcribed as [τ(ῶν)] Κεδρόνο(ν). Nevertheless, we prefer to transcribe Κεδρόνος, due to the spelling of our seal, and to the reading of a letter that is likely a C instead of the abbreviation sign.

   • Nothing else is known about this monastery; however, the editors of Photios’ letters suggested that, since Dorotheos opposed Photios, it may have been located on Mount Olympus in Bithynia, near several other monasteries that opposed the patriarch. This proposition is strengthened by John of Ephesos, who noted a toponym ‘Qerdonian’ near Pythia in Bithynia. Indeed, in the same area several centuries later existed the toponym [ἡ] Κεδρωνέα.Footnote ⁷⁵ This foundation should not be, however, related to the monastery τὰ Καθαρὰ.Footnote ⁷⁶

   

   Fig. 10. Timotheos, abbot of Kedron.

Seals only with names

1. 11. Esdrael of Ioannes or Esdraelioannes (Fig. 11)

   • SL-112. Dunn, Handlist, no. 112; read as Ioannes [tenth/eleventh century].

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. Early tenth century.

   • Obv. Lion facing left; border of dots

   • Rev. Inscription in four lines; border of dots:

   • 

   • + Κ(ύρι)ε βοήθ(ει) Ἠσδραὴλ <τοῦ> Ἰωάννη

   • A seal similar to this belonged to the former G. Zacos collection. It bears the same decoration of the obverse (an advancing lion) with only minor differences (for example, the Zacos seal is framed with entwined tendrils between two borders of dots) but the owner identifies himself as ‘Esdrael, son of Ioannes’,Footnote ⁷⁷ whereas on our seal the name appears united, without the article τοῦ. In Greek popular tradition sons often assumed as a single name the compound of their first name with their patronymic and this might have been such a case. Esdrael is of Hebrew origin and means ‘God is my helper’; it is not elsewhere attested as a name in Byzantium.

   

   Fig. 11. Esdrael of Ioannes or Esdraelioannes.

2. 12. Sisinnios Hagiopolites (Fig. 12)

   • SL-61. Dunn, Handlist, no. 61 [11th c.].

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. First half of tenth century.

   • Obv. Lion facing left; border of dots.

   • Rev. Inscription in four lines; border of dots:

   • 

   • [+] Κ(ύρι)ε β(οή)[θ(ει)] Σισινήο [Ἁ]γηοπολήτ(ῃ)

   • Note again the unusual lack of the definite article (τῷ) before the surname. The course of the border on the reverse leaves insufficient space on the left of the third line or on the right of the second line for yet another letter, that is, for an abbreviated T.

   • The surname Hagiopolites is attested in other sources. On ascending the throne in 886, Leo VI ordered Ioannes Hagiopolites, magistros and ex logothetes of the dromos, to evict Photios from the patriarchate and send him to a monastery. He later took part in the trial of Photios.Footnote ⁷⁸ The seal of another Hagiopolites, Elias (equally without the definite article τῷ) from the 11th c. is located in the Hermitage.Footnote ⁷⁹

   

   Fig. 12. Sisinnios Hagiopolites.

3. 13. Stephanos Baltomerites (?) (Fig. 13)

   • SL-62. Dunn, Handlist, no. 62; read as Stephanos Latmo.ites

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. First half of eleventh century.

   • Obv. Theotokos (bust) holding with both hands a Christ in medallion; remains of a circular invocation: ; border of dots

   • Rev. Inscription in four lines; border of dots:

   • 

   • [Θ(εοτό)κε βοήθει τῷ σῷ] δούλ(ῳ) (?) // [+ Σ]τεφάνο Βαλτ(ο)μερίτι (?)

   • Dunn had read Latmo.ites; however, in the first letter of the third line one can see the middle line of the A, while the second letter has no middle line and thus is a Λ. The first letter of the surname is not well preserved and could either be Π or R. We would favour R (the open form of Beta) and read the first part of the word as βαλτο-, (i.e., βάλτα/βάλτος: marsh).

   

   Fig. 13. Stephanos Baltomerites (?).

4. 14. Strategios, … (Fig. 14)

   • SL-45. Dunn, Handlist, no. 45; read as Isaak, strategos [10th c.].

   • Provenance. Trabzon.

   • Dating. First half of tenth century.

   • Obv. Peacock in frontal position with an open tail; border of dots.

   • Rev. Inscription in four lines (three surviving):

   • 

   • + Κ(ύρι)ε βοήθ(ει) Στρ[α]τιγή[ῳ …]

   • Dunn read the owner's name as Isaak and his office as strategos, however, it is clear that the first name, Strategios, follows immediately after the invocation. At the bottom of the third line there are remains of letters from the fourth line that probably contained the dignity, the office or even the surname of the owner.

   

   Fig. 14. Strategios, …