Abstract:
Often a case of political necessity, the practice of intermarriage across cultures and faiths occurred throughout medieval Europe. Centring on the Byzantine Empire from the eleventh to the fifteenth centuries, this thesis will explore the theme of intermarriage and its consequences for the women involved. Intermarriage was an effective strategy of empire and diplomacy, utilised by emperors and kings to secure political, economic, and military alliances. However, this thesis aims to rethink and reframe the history away from intermarriage as simply the tools of men but consider what these alliances meant for the women involved. Focusing on the key themes of politics and diplomacy, religion, and culture, this thesis considers both foreign women marrying into the Byzantine Empire and Byzantine women marrying into foreign territories, to explore the possibilities for power, influence, authority, and agency of women within these alliances. Women in foreign marriage alliances were not merely passive victims of the strategies of emperors and kings, but had the potential for some form of power, authority, influence, and agency, and were crucial to the making and shaping of the Byzantine Empire.
