Caesar (title)

The first known individual to bear the cognomen of "Caesar" was Sextus Julius Caesar, who is likewise believed to be the common ancestor of all subsequent Julii Caesares.[1] Sextus' great-grandson was (Gaius) Julius Caesar. After Julius Caesar seized control of the Roman Republic following his war against the Senate, he adopted the title of dictator perpetuo or "dictator in perpetuity" – a title he only held for about a month before he was infamously assassinated. Julius Caesar's death did not lead to the restoration of the Republic, and instead led to the rise of the Second Triumvirate, three dictators including Julius' adopted son Gaius Octavius, who divvied up and ruled the land for nearly two decades. During his rule, Octavius styled himself as "Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus", often simplifying it to merely "Gaius Caesar",[2] to emphasize his relationship with Julius Caesar. Eventually, distrust and jealousy between the three dictators led to the alliance crumbling, and a lengthy civil war which ultimately ended with Octavius gaining control of the entire Roman Principate. Now in control of all the land, Octavius declared himself "Imperator" ("commander") and the Republic formally became the Roman Empire. Upon assuming the throne, Octavius again took a new name, "Imperator Caesar Augustus",[3] the honorific Augustus being added by the Roman Senate. As a matter of course, Augustus' own adopted son and successor, Tiberius, followed his (step)father's example and bore the name "Caesar" following his adoption on 26 June 4 AD, restyling himself as "Tiberius Julius Caesar". Upon his own ascension to the throne, he took the name of "Tiberius Caesar Augustus", and the precedent was then set: the Emperor designated his successor by adopting him and giving him the name "Caesar".

The fourth Emperor, Claudius, was the first to assume the name "Caesar" upon accession, without having been adopted by the previous emperor; however, he was at least a member by blood of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, being the maternal great-nephew of Augustus on his mother's side, the nephew of Tiberius, and the uncle of Caligula. Claudius, in turn, adopted his stepson and grand-nephew Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, giving him the name "Caesar" in the traditional way; his stepson would rule as the Emperor Nero. The first emperor to assume the position and the name simultaneously without any real claim to either was the usurper Servius Sulpicius Galba, who took the imperial throne under the name "Servius Galba Imperator Caesar" following the death of Nero in 68 AD. Galba helped solidify "Caesar" as the title of the designated heir by giving it to his own adopted heir, Lucius Calpurnius Piso Frugi Licinianus.

Galba's reign did not last long, however, and he was soon deposed by Marcus Otho. At first, Otho opted to style himself as emperor with the name "Nero", adopting the title of "Caesar" only later in his reign. Otho was then defeated by Aulus Vitellius, who acceded with the name "Aulus Vitellius Germanicus Imperator Augustus". Vitellius did not adopt the cognomen "Caesar" as part of his name, and may have intended to replace it with "Germanicus", as he bestowed the name upon his own son and heir later that year.

Nevertheless, Caesar had become such an integral part of the imperial dignity that its place was immediately restored by Titus Flavius Vespasianus ("Vespasian"), whose defeat of Vitellius in 69 AD put an end to the period of instability and began the Flavian dynasty. Vespasian's son, Titus Flavius Vespasianus became "Titus Flavius Caesar Vespasianus".

By this point the status of "Caesar" had been regularised into that of a title given to the Emperor-designate (occasionally also with the honorific title Princeps Iuventutis, "Prince of Youth") and retained by him upon accession to the throne (e.g., Marcus Ulpius Traianus became Marcus Cocceius Nerva's designated heir as Caesar Nerva Traianus in October 97 and acceded on 28 January 98 as "Imperator Caesar Nerva Traianus Augustus"). After some variation among the earliest emperors, the style of the Emperor-designate on coins was usually Nobilissimus Caesar "Most Noble Caesar" (abbreviated to NOB CAES, N CAES etc.), though Caesar (CAES) on its own was also used.

The Roman emperor Constantine the Great, mosaic in Hagia Sophia, Constantinople

Caesar or Kaisar (Καῖσαρ) was a senior court title in the Byzantine Empire. Originally, as in the late Roman Empire, it was used for a subordinate co-emperor or the heir apparent, and was first among the "awarded" dignities. From the reign of Theodosius I, however, most emperors chose to solidify the succession of their intended heirs by raising them to co-emperors. Hence the title was more frequently awarded to second- and third-born sons, or to close and influential relatives of the Emperor: thus for example Alexios Mosele was the son-in-law of Theophilos (ruled 829–842), Bardas was the uncle and chief minister of Michael III (r. 842–867), while Nikephoros II (r. 963–969) awarded the title to his father, Bardas Phokas.[4][5] An exceptional case was the conferment of the dignity and its insignia to the Bulgarian khan Tervel by Justinian II (r. 685–695, 705–711) who had helped him regain his throne in 705.[5] The title was awarded to the brother of Empress Maria of Alania, George II of Georgia in 1081.

The office enjoyed extensive privileges, great prestige and power. When Alexios I Komnenos created the title of sebastokrator, kaisar became third in importance, and fourth after Manuel I Komnenos created the title of despot, which it remained until the end of the Empire. The feminine form was kaisarissa. It remained an office of great importance, usually awarded to imperial relations, as well as a few high-ranking and distinguished officials, and only rarely awarded to foreigners.

According to the Klētorologion of 899, the Byzantine Caesar's insignia were a crown without a cross, and the ceremony of a Caesar's creation (in this case dating to Constantine V), is included in De Ceremoniis I.43.[6] The title remained the highest in the imperial hierarchy until the introduction of the sebastokratōr (a composite derived from sebastos and autokrator, the Greek equivalents of Augustus and imperator) by Alexios I Komnenos (r. 1081–1118) and later of despotēs by Manuel I Komnenos (r. 1143–1180). The title remained in existence through the last centuries of the Empire. In the Palaiologan period, it was held by prominent nobles like Alexios Strategopoulos, but from the 14th century, it was mostly awarded to rulers of the Balkans such as the princes of Vlachia, Serbia and Thessaly.[5]

Seal of the Caesar Michael Angelos

In the late Byzantine hierarchy, as recorded in the mid-14th century Book of Offices of pseudo-Kodinos, the rank continued to come after the sebastokratōr. Pseudo-Kodinos further records that the Caesar was equal in precedence to the panhypersebastos, another creation of Alexios I, but that Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos (r. 1259–1282) had raised his nephew Michael Tarchaneiotes to the rank of protovestiarios and decreed that to come after the Caesar; while under Andronikos II Palaiologos (r. 1282–1328) the megas domestikos was raised to the same eminence, when it was awarded to the future emperor John VI Kantakouzenos (r. 1347–1354).[7] According to pseudo-Kodinos, the Caesar's insignia under the Palaiologoi were a skiadion hat in red and gold, decorated with gold-wire embroideries, with a veil bearing the wearer's name and pendants identical to those of the despotēs and the sebastokratōr. He wore a red tunic (rouchon) similar to the emperor's (without certain decorations), and his shoes and stockings were blue, as were the accouterments of his horse; these were all identical to those of the sebastokratōr, but without the embroidered eagles of the latter. Pseudo-Kodinos writes that the particular forms of another form of hat, the domed skaranikon, and of the mantle, the tamparion, for the Caesar were not known.[8]

Mehmed II and Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople Gennadios.

"Caesar" is the title officially used by the Sasanid Persians to refer to the Roman and Byzantine emperors.[9][10] In the Middle East, the Persians and the Arabs continued to refer to the Roman and Byzantine emperors as "Caesar" (in Persian: قیصر روم Qaysar-i Rum, "Caesar of the Romans", from Middle Persian kēsar). Thus, following the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the victorious Ottoman sultan Mehmed II became the first of the rulers of the Ottoman Empire to assume the title (in Ottoman Turkish: قیصر روم Kayser-i Rûm).

After the Fall of Constantinople, having conquered the Byzantine Empire, Mehmed took the title Kayser-i Rûm, claiming succession to the Roman imperium.[11] His claim was that, by possession of the city, he was emperor, a new dynast by conquest, as had been done previously by the likes of Heraclius and Leo III.[12] Contemporary scholar George of Trebizond wrote "the seat of the Roman Empire is Constantinople ... and he who is and remains Emperor of the Romans is also the Emperor of the whole world".[13]

Gennadius II, a staunch antagonist of the West because of the Sack of Constantinople committed by the Western Catholics and theological controversies between the two Churches, had been enthroned the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople-New Rome with all the ceremonial elements and ethnarch (or milletbashi) status by the Sultan himself in 1454. In turn, Gennadius II formally recognized Mehmed as successor to the throne.[14] Mehmed also had a blood lineage to the Byzantine Imperial family; his predecessor, Sultan Orhan I had married a Byzantine princess, and Mehmed may have claimed descent from John Tzelepes Komnenos.[15] Ottoman sultans were not the only rulers to claim such a title, as there was the Holy Roman Empire in Western Europe, whose emperor, Frederick III, traced his titular lineage from Charlemagne who obtained the title of Roman Emperor when he was crowned by Pope Leo III in 800, although he was never recognized as such by the Byzantine Empire.

In diplomatic writings between the Ottomans and Austrians, the Ottoman bureaucracy was angered by their use of the Caesar title when the Ottomans saw themself as the true successors of Rome. When war broke out and peace negotiations were done, the Austrians (Holy Roman Empire) agreed to give up the use of the Caesar title according to Treaty of Constantinople (1533) (though they would continue to use it and the Roman imperial title until the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806). The Russians, who defined Moscow as the Third Rome, were similarly sanctioned by the Ottomans, who ordered the Crimean Khanate to raid Russia on numerous occasions.[16] The Ottomans would lose their political superiority over the Holy Roman Empire with the Treaty of Zsitvatorok in 1606, and over the Russian Empire with the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca in 1774, by diplomatically recognising the monarchs of these two countries as equals to the Ottoman Sultan for the first time.

Byzantine nobles

• Tervel, khan of the Bulgars, named in 705 by Justinian II
• Alexios Mosele, likely named in 831 by his father-in-law Theophilos
• Bardas, named on 22 April 862 by his nephew Michael III
• Bardas Phokas, named in late 963 by his son Nikephoros II
• Nikephoros Bryennios the Younger, named by his father-in-law Alexios I
• John Doukas, named in 1074 by his brother Constantine X
• George II of Georgia, named in 1081 by his brother-in-law Nikephoros III
• Nikephoros Melissenos, named in 1080 by Alexios I
• Isaac Komnenos, named in 1104 by his father Alexios I
• John Rogerios Dalassenos, named c. 1130 by his father-in-law John II.
• Renier of Montferrat, named in 1180 by his father-in-law Manuel I
• John Kantakouzenos, named in 1186 by Isaac II
• Conrad of Montferrat, named in 1187 by his father-in-law Isaac II
• Manuel Maurozomes, named c. 1200 by Alexios III
• Leo Gabalas, named by Theodore I Laskaris (r. 1205–1221)
• Constantine Palaiologos, named in 1259 by his brother Michael VIII
• Alexios Strategopoulos, named in 1259 by Michael VIII
• Roger de Flor, leader of the Catalan Company, named in 1304 by Andronikos II
• John Palaiologos, named in 1326 by his uncle Andronikos II
• Hrelja, likely named by John VI Kantakouzenos (r. 1347–1354).

Serbian rulers

• Alexios Angelos Philanthropenos, named in 1373 by despot Thomas Preljubović
• Manuel Angelos Philanthropenos, named in 1390 by despot Esau de' Buondelmonti
• Grgur Golubić, named in 1347 by Stefan Uroš IV Dušan.
• Vojihna, named in 1347 by Uroš IV.
• Preljub, named in 1348–9 by Uroš IV.
• Uglješa Vlatković, named by Uroš V.
• Nikola Radonja, named by Uroš V.
• Novak, named by Uroš V.

Ottoman rulers

• Mehmed II, assumed title in 1453 (Kayser-i Rûm).
• Bayezid II, inherited from predecessor.
• Selim I, inherited from predecessor.
• Suleiman I, inherited from predecessor.
• Selim II, inherited from predecessor.
• Murad III, inherited from predecessor.
• Mehmed III, inherited from predecessor.
• Ahmed I, inherited from predecessor.
• Mustafa I, inherited from predecessor.
• Osman II, inherited from predecessor.
• Murad IV, inherited from predecessor.
• Ibrahim, inherited from predecessor.
• Mehmed IV, inherited from predecessor.

• Augustus (title)
• Caesaropapism
• Khosrow (word)

• Bury, J. B. (1911). The Imperial Administrative System of the Ninth Century – With a Revised Text of the Kletorologion of Philotheos. London: Oxford University Press. OCLC 1046639111 – via Archive.org.
• Jones, A.H.M.; J.R. Martindale & J. Morris (1971–1992). Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-07233-6.
• Kazhdan, Alexander, ed. (1991). The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-504652-8.
• Kienast, Dietmar; Werner Eck; Matthäus Heil (2017). Römische Kaisertabelle: Grundzüge einer römischen Kaiserchronologie. Darmstadt: WBG. ISBN 978-3-534-26724-8.
• Peachin, Michael (1990). Roman Imperial Titulature and Chronology, A.D. 235–284. Amsterdam: Gieben. ISBN 90-5063-034-0.
• Verpeaux, Jean, ed. (1966). Pseudo-Kodinos, Traité des Offices (in French). Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique.

• Ferjančić, Božidar (1970). "Севастократори и кесари у Српском царству" [Sebastocrators and Caesares in the Serbian Empire]. Зборник Филозофског факултета. Belgrade: 255–269.
• Pauly-Wissowa – Realencyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft