Vasilief, A History of the Byzantine Empire

The Empire of Nicaea (1204-1261)

Byzantine feudalism 

Page 12

In the political life of the Empire a very striking analogy may be drawn between western European feudal lords, dukes (duces) and counts (comites) and the exarchs of the close of the sixth century, who under Emperor Maurice (582-602) stood at the head of the two vast territorial organizations, the exarchates of Ravenna and of Carthage or Africa. The exarchs or the governors general, first of all military officers, gradually concentrated in their hands the administrative and judicial functions and had the final word in the management of church affairs in the exarchate. Whenever the exarch arrived at Rome, he was accorded an almost imperial reception. The protocol of his entry into Rome became the model of the reception of Frankish kings or German emperors. The reception of Charlemagne in Rome in 774, for instance, was modeled after that of the exarch, and it remained authoritative for all imperial receptions in Rome during the Middle Ages. It is not surprising that from time to time the exarchs raised the banner of revolt both at Carthage and at Ravenna and advanced claims to the imperial throne. At the opening of the seventh century, the revolt of the African exarch Heraclius resulted in the establishment of a new dynasty in Byzantium in the person of his son, also Heraclius.

It is relevant to emphasize the fact that the same Emperor Maurice under whom the two almost independent exarchates were instituted made a will when he was seriously ill several years before his death. This will was apparently not known during his lifetime; it was discovered and opened later, under Heraclius. In it Maurice divided his Empire among his children: he assigned Constantinople and the eastern provinces to his eldest son; Rome, Italy, and the islands to his second son; and distributed the rest of the Empire among his younger sons. This will was not carried into effect because of the revolution of 602 when Maurice was overthrown; but it is interesting as an attempt at a typical feudal division such as often took place in the West in the epoch of the Merovingians and Carolingians as well as in Old Russia in the so-called appanage period.

The process of formation of a new provincial or, to use the Byzantine term, theme organization may also furnish some material for feudal analogies. In the seventh century in connection with the Persian, Arab, Bulgarian, and Slavonic dangers a reorganization of the provincial administration was carried out by appointing at the head of some vast territories military governors general who gradually obtained complete superiority over the civil authorities. These provincial governors later in the ninth and tenth centuries sometimes handed down their power and functions in their own families from generation to generation; they became as it were hereditary governors in their respective provinces and thus evaded direct control by the imperial power. Their position was analogous to that of the hereditary counts and dukes of the West.

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Reference address : https://ellopos.net/elpenor/vasilief/feudalism.asp?pg=12