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Información de la obra y contexto de creación

Ana Comnena wrote her work near the end of her life, when her father Alexius I and her brother Jonh I had already passed through the Byzantine throne, and her nephew Manuel I was occupying it.

The Alexiad is a gem of world literature written around 1148 by a great medieval historian, Anna Comnena (1083-1153). It recounts the political career and turbulent campaigns of her father, Emperor Alexius I Comnenus.

The work belongs to the Renaissance period of Byzantine literature, in which its authors returned to the Attic Greek language and emulated the classical Greek authors: Homer, Hesiod, lyric poetry, drama, Herodotus, Thucydides, Plato, Aristotle, etc.

The work, which is divided into a prologue and fifteen books, is neither a biography, nor a encomium, nor an epic work, but history, as the author states. Her aim, therefore, was to protect events worthy of memory from the passage of time and to tell them as they actually occurred. This supposed impartiality is diluted by the fact that the purpose of the work is to record the deeds of an exceptional person, Alexius I, but the author's historical contributions should not be underestimated.

The Alexiad is a work of transcendental importance for several reasons: it is a first-hand document for understanding the situation in the Empire between 1071 and 1081 (the rise to power and reign of Alexius I); it is an indispensable source for gaining insight into the mentality and ideology of one of the two factions at the court of Constantinople, the military aristocracy; and it is the only testimony to the Byzantine view of the phenomenon of the First Crusade, in addition to Latin and Arabic sources.

It provides accurate data on the diplomatic and military relations between the Byzantine Empire of the time and the Western world, as well as an evocative psychological portrait of the great characters. It also provides information on three generations of determined women, Alexius' mother, Anna Dalasena, his wife Irene Ducas, and his daughter Anna.

The sources used by the author were first-hand; some were from informants who were still alive during the writing of the work, others were writings, such as the unfinished work of her husband Nicephorus Brienius, and government papers which the author could easily consult due to her status as a princess.

The last pages are devoted to the agony of Alexius I, as well as to the grief of the empress Irene and of Anna Comnena herself, but not a single word on the question of the legitimate heir (her brother John): "Anna Comnena was a woman of outstanding education, and of even more outstanding rancour" (Díaz Rolando, 2020, p. 31).

Walter Scott's novel Count Robert of Paris is considered by German scholar Karl Krumbacher to be "an unfortunate copy" of the Alexiad.

In the words of Judith Herren in her book Byzantium, "no other woman in the Middle Ages, East or West, had the vision, confidence, and ability to undertake such an ambitious project".

Anna Comnena (12th century) was surrounded by a family circle of great women such as Irene Ducas (mother), Maria of Bulgaria (maternal grandmother), Anna Dalasena (paternal grandmother), and Maria of Alania (mother-in-law), who taught her everything she needed to know to stand out in the world of power and knowledge, thinking that she would be the empress of the great Byzantine Empire, a goal for which she fought all her life, without achieving it.

However, many other women achieved this rank and enjoyed immense political power, such as Theodora, the co-regent empress with Justinian, defender of women's rights (6th century); Irene, the first Byzantine empress to occupy the throne on her own (8th century) or Zoe, co-ruler with three different emperors and, for a short time, with her sister Theodora Porphyrogenet (11th century).

Aristocratic and imperial women also played an important role in Byzantine culture through their artistic patronage, some of them being writers: Anicia Juliana (5th-6th c.) sponsored the construction and decoration of the church of San Polieucto; Anna Comnena, besides being the author of the historical work the Alexiad, sponsored other scholars such as Eustratius of Nicaea; her contemporary Irene Sevastokratorissa commissioned the famous historian Constantine Manasses to write the text Synopsis Chronike, an account of the history of the world; the religious poet Cassia (9th c.) was one of the first female composers from whose works we preserve notated transcriptions, and Theodora Raulena (13th c.) wrote the Life of the iconodule brothers Theodore and Theophanes Grapti.

In the 12th century, outside the Byzantine sphere, we find innumerable women who excelled in different fields: the polymath Hildegard of Bingen, the philosopher Eloise of Paraclete, the writer of the Lais Mary of France, the troubadour Countess of Dia, the great scientist Trotula of Salerno or Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, among others.

Indicaciones

-CUC: Block Continuity of cultural heritage. Literature, art, and science.

-Greek Baccalaureate: Block The text: comprehension and translation; Block Literary education.

-Spanish Language and Literature ESO: Literary Education Block.

-Universal Literature 1st Baccalaureate: Interpretation of fragments from the Byzantine period of different genres and themes.

-History 2 ESO: Societies and territories block, referring to the Byzantine Empire.

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