Note 33 — Chapter XVIII · ANI, AND THE ARMENIAN KINGDOM OF THE MIDDLE AGES

John Sembat, A.D. 1020–1041.Upon the death of King Gagik the eldest of his three sons ascended the ancestral throne. Rare natural intelligence belonged to John Sembat—the monarch is known under either name; but these mental qualities were perhaps clouded by an excessive corpulency. On the other hand, his brother AshotAshot IV., A.D. 1020–1040.33 displayed the union of physical symmetry to ardent courage and passion for war. The man of action chafed under the supremacy of the peaceable civilian; and no sooner was the natural heir in possession of his heritage than his ambitious brother broke into open revolt. A peace was at length concluded upon the terms that John should reign in Shirak, with the capital Ani, and Ashot over the remainder of his father’s dominions.34 This compact was observed at least so far that Ashot the Fourth was never permitted by his jealous colleague to enter the capital.35 But the civil war loosened the bonds which attached the feudatories to their king, and the neighbouring states to a dynasty in its strength. The one partner was obliged to have recourse to the Cæsar Basil; and it was not without the assistance of a contingent of imperial troops that Ashot IV. imposed his rule upon his allotted territories. The other was defeated at the commencement of his reign by the Bagratid king of Abkhasia and Georgia, whose troops entered and pillaged Ani.36 These events appear to have been followed by a period of comparative tranquillity, during which either monarch was enabled to recover breath. But the Mussulman emirs were encroaching; the Seljuk Turks were harrying the frontiers; and the Armenian nation, the natural bulwark against their invasions, was distracted by the separate counsels of the king with Ani and the king without Ani, of the king of Lori and the king of Kars. The king of Van, upon whom the brunt of the Mussulman and Turkish incursions had fallen, was preparing or had already accomplished the cession of his kingdom to the Cæsar, in despair of withstanding these unceasing assaults.