The full title of Michael Panaretos's work is About the E mperors of Trabezond, the Grand Komnenoi, H ow and W hen and H ow L ong E ach R uled. It is a brief history of the empire of Trebizond from 1204– 1390. The text is twenty pages long in the modern edition. It is far more detailed for 1340– 1390, when Michael was an eyewitness. It is written in Pontic dialect of the fifteenth century.

Michael Panaretos is known only from self- references in his history. Michael served emperor Alexios III Komnenos (1349– 1390), the emperor of Trebizond. By 1363 he had the titles of protosebastos and protonotarios, but most likely had other offices before then, and he served Alexios in military as well as notarial capacities starting in the 1350s. He seems to have died after Alexios III.

Manuscripts, Editions, and Translations

Manuscripts

There is one manuscript Marcianus Graecus 608, of the fifteenth century.2

Edition

Lampsidēs, Odysseus. Michaēl tou Panaretou Peri tōn megalōn Komnēnōn; eisagōgē, ekdosis, scholia. Pontikai ereunai 2. Athens, 1958.

The text was published by Tafel in 1832 and by the infamous Jakob Fallmerayer (see the Chronicle of Monemvasia) in 1843. Spyrid ō n Lampros published it again in 1907.

Translation

Asp-Talwar, Annika. “ The Chronicle of Michael Panaretos.” In Byzantium's Other Empire: Trebizond, edited by Antony Eastmond, 173 – 212. Istanbul : Koç Üniversitesi, Anadolu Medeniyetleri Ara? tirma Merkezi, 2016.

An English translation by Scott Kennedy is forthcoming from the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library.

Greek

Lampsidēs, Odysseus. Michaēl tou Panaretou Peri tōn megalōn Komnēnōn; eisagōgē, ekdosis, scholia. Pontikai ereunai 2. Athens, 1958.

FURTHER READING

Asp- Talwar, Annika. “ The Chronicle of Michael Panaretos.” In Byzantium's Other Empire: Trebizond, edited by Antony Eastmond, 173 – 212. Istanbul : Koç Ü niversitesi, Anadolu Medeniyetleri Ara? tirma Merkezi, 2016.

Eastmond, Antony, ed. Byzantium's Other Empire: Trebizond. Istanbul : Koç Üniversitesi, Anadolu Medeniyetleri Ara? tirma Merkezi, 2016.

Hunger, Herbert. Die hochsprachliche profane Literatur der Byzantiner: Philosophie, Rhetorik, Epistolographie, Geschichtsschreibung, Geographie. Vol. 1. Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft, 12.5. Munich : Beck, 1978, 480.