Instead, Alexios Doukas used his access to the palace to arrest the emperors.

Heavily beholden to the crusaders, Alexios IV was unable to meet his obligations and his vacillation caused him to lose the support of both his crusader allies and his subjects.

Alexios I, who had requested only some western knights to serve as mercenaries to help fight the Seljuk Turks, blockaded these armies in the city and would not permit them to leave until their leaders swore oaths promising to restore to the Empire any land formerly belonging to it that they might conquer on the way to Jerusalem.

Raymond was furious and argued that the city should be handed over to Alexios, as they had agreed when they left Constantinople in 1097, but Godfrey, Tancred, Robert, and the other leaders, faced with a desperate situation, gave in to his demands.

As a result, Alexios and Constantine, Maria's son, were now adoptive brothers and both Isaac and Alexios took an oath that they would safeguard his rights as emperor.

Anna then protested that the family was in fear for their lives, her sons were loyal subjects ( Alexios and Isaac were discovered absent without leave ), and had learned of a plot by enemies of the Komnenoi to have them both blinded and had, therefore, fled the capital so they may continue to be of loyal service to the emperor.

Alexios dealt with the first disorganized group of Crusaders, led by the preacher Peter the Hermit, by sending them on to Asia Minor, where they were massacred by the Turks in 1096.

Alexios IV Angelos, the son of the deposed Isaac II, had recently escaped from Constantinople and now appealed to the crusaders, promising to end the schism of East and West, to pay for their transport, and to provide military support to the crusaders if they helped him to depose his uncle and sit on his father's throne.

The crusaders, whose objective had been Egypt, were persuaded to set their course for Constantinople before which they appeared in June 1203, proclaiming Alexios IV as Emperor and inviting the populace of the capital to depose his uncle.

The refugees reached Mosynopolis, the base of the deposed emperor Alexios III Angelos, where they were initially well received, and Alexios V married Eudokia Angelina.

After the European armies laid siege to the city and penetrated the walls, they were surprised to awake the next morning to see the Roman flags of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos flying over the city.

Alexios accompanied Boniface back to the Crusader fleet, which had moved on to Corcyra, and the Venetians were in favour of the plan when they learned of it.

Enraged mobs seized and brutally murdered any foreigner they could lay hands upon, and the Crusaders felt that Alexios had not fulfilled his promises to them.

When Alexios Angelos asked the crusaders to help him become Emperor, they could not refuse.

Tatikios explained to the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos that Bohemund had informed him that there was a plan to kill him, as they believed Alexios was secretly encouraging the Turks.

On the way back to Constantinople, Stephen and the other deserters met Alexios, who was on his way to assist the crusaders, and did not know they had taken the city and were now under siege themselves.

Andronikos had Alexios II sign the order for his mother's execution, and appointed his own son Manuel and the sebastos George to execute her, but they refused.

As a result, Alexios and Constantine, Maria's son, were now adoptive brothers and both Isaac and Alexios took an oath that they would safeguard his rights as emperor.

Anna then protested that the family was in fear for their lives, her sons were loyal subjects ( Alexios and Isaac were discovered absent without leave ), and had learned of a plot by enemies of the Komnenoi to have them both blinded and had, therefore, fled the capital so they may continue to be of loyal service to the emperor.

Alexios IV was soon strangled by Alexios Doukas Mourtzouphlos, the lover of Euphrosyne's daughter Eudokia, who then proclaimed himself emperor as Alexios V. In April 1204 Euphrosyne fled the city along with her daughter and Alexios V, and they made their way to Mosynopolis, where Euphrosyne's husband Alexios III had taken refuge.

Unfortunately for Constantinople, Alexios III's misgovernment had left the Byzantine navy with only 20 worm-eaten hulks by the time the Crusaders arrived.

As Emperor Alexios lay dying in his imperial bedchamber, John, according to Choniates, arrived and “ secretly ” took the emperor ’ s ring from his father during an embrace “ as though in mourning .” In 1118, Alexios I Komnenos died.

* 1203 – Isaac II Angelos, restored Eastern Roman Emperor, declares his son Alexios IV Angelos co-emperor after pressure from the forces of the Fourth Crusade.

Alexios I Komnenos, Latinized as Alexius I Comnenus (, 1056 – 15 August 1118 — note that some sources list his date of birth as 1048 ), was Byzantine emperor from 1081 to 1118, and although he was not the founder of the Komnenian dynasty, it was during his reign that the Komnenos family came to full power.

Alexios became estranged from Maria, who was stripped of her imperial title and retired to a monastery, and Constantine Doukas was deprived of his status as co-emperor.

Next, Alexios had to deal with disturbances in Thrace, where the heretical sects of the Bogomils and the Paulicians revolted and made common cause with the Pechenegs from beyond the Danube.

Apart from all of his external enemies, a host of rebels also sought to overthrow Alexios from the imperial throne, thereby posing another major threat to his reign.

She excluded her young son from power, entrusting it instead to Alexios the prōtosebastos ( a cousin of Alexios II ), who was popularly believed to be her lover.

Alexios III Angelos () ( c. 1153 – 1211 ) was Byzantine Emperor from 1195 to 1203.

By 1190 Alexios Angelos had returned to the court of his younger brother, from whom he received the elevated title of sebastokratōr.

Alexios captured Isaac at Stagira in Macedonia, put out his eyes, and thenceforth kept him a close prisoner, though he had been redeemed by him from captivity at Antioch and loaded with honours.

In the east the Empire was overrun by the Seljuk Turks ; from the north Bulgarians and Vlachs descended unchecked to ravage the plains of Macedonia and Thrace, and Kaloyan of Bulgaria annexed several important cities, while Alexios squandered the public treasure on his palaces and gardens and attempted to deal with the crisis through diplomatic means.

Alexios III finally took action, and led 17 divisions from the St. Romanus Gate, vastly outnumbering the crusaders.

Isaac II, drawn from his prison and robed once more in the imperial purple, received his son, Alexios IV, in state.

Alexios attempted to organize a resistance to the new regime from Adrianople and then Mosynopolis, where he was joined by the later usurper Alexios V Doukas Mourtzouphlos in April 1204, after the definitive fall of Constantinople to the crusaders and the establishment of the Latin Empire.

Later Alexios V was blinded and deserted by his father-in-law, who fled from the crusaders into Thessaly.

By the beginning of 1204, Isaac II and Alexios IV had inspired little confidence among the people of Constantinople in their efforts to defend the city from the Latins and Venetians, who were restless and rioted when the money and aid promised by Alexios IV was not forthcoming.

When the populace rebelled in late January 1204, the emperors barricaded themselves in the palace and entrusted Alexios Doukas with a mission to seek help from the crusaders.

Brought back to Constantinople, Alexios V was condemned to death for treason against Alexios IV, and was thrown from the top of the Column of Theodosius.

Many historians maintain that the main concern of Pope Urban II, when calling for the First Crusade, was the threat to Constantinople from the Turkish invasion of Asia Minor in response to the appeal of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos.

In 1074, the western mercenaries led by Roussel de Bailleul rebelled in Asia Minor, but Alexios successfully subdued them by 1076.

Transferring each contingent into Asia, Alexios promised to supply them with provisions in return for their oaths of homage.

The crusaders believed their oaths were made invalid when the Byzantine contingent under Tatikios failed to help them during the siege of Antioch ; Bohemund, who had set himself up as Prince of Antioch, briefly went to war with Alexios in the Balkans, but was blockaded by the Byzantine forces and agreed to become Alexios ' vassal by the Treaty of Devol in 1108.

" As he Emperor Alexios I knew that the Pisans were skilled in sea warfare and dreaded a battle with them, on the prow of each ship he had a head fixed of a lion or other land-animal, made in brass or iron with the mouth open and then gilded over, so that their mere aspect was terrifying.

Defeated by Alexios Komnenos in 1078, Nestor remained with the Patzinaks, and retreated with them back to Paradunavum.

Several thousand went in the army of Alexios I Komnenos against the Norman, Robert Guiscard ; but, deserting the emperor, many of them ( 1085 ) were thrown into prison.

Boniface and Alexios discussed diverting the Crusade to Constantinople so that Alexios could be restored to his father's throne ; in return, Alexios would give them 10, 000 Byzantine soldiers to help fight in the Crusade, maintain 500 knights in the Holy Land, the service of the Byzantine navy ( 20 ships ) in transporting the Crusader army to Egypt, as well as money to pay off the Crusaders ' debt to the Republic of Venice with 200, 000 silver marks.

Once at the pass Manuel decided to attack, despite the danger from further ambushes, and also despite the fact that he could have attempted to bring the Turks out of their positions to fight them on the nearby plain of Philomelion, the site of an earlier victory won by his grandfather Alexios.

In return, Alexios gave them guides and a military escort.

In 1098, when Antioch had been captured after a long siege and the Crusaders were in turn themselves besieged in the city, Alexios marched out to meet them, but, hearing from Stephen of Blois that the situation was hopeless, he returned to Constantinople.

The Crusaders, who had unexpectedly withstood the siege, believed Alexios had abandoned them and considered the Byzantines completely untrustworthy.

In particular, Alexios I was often reduced to reacting to events rather than controlling them ; the changes he made to the Byzantine army were largely done out of immediate necessity and were pragmatic in nature.