Alexius I Comnenus 1048-1118
Byzantine emperor

Born in Constantinople (Istanbul), he was founder of the Comnenian dynasty (see Comnenus). The nephew of the Emperor Isaac I, Comnenus, he was commander of the western Byzantine armies when he was brought to the throne by a military coup, succeeding Nicephorus III Botaneiates (1081). By making strategic alliances, he was able to defeat invasions by the Normans of Sicily under Robert Guiscard and Bohemond I (1107), and later the Pechenegs, who had threatened Constantinople (1091). He built up a new fleet and co-operated with the First Crusade (1096-1100) to recover Crete, Cyprus, and the western coast of Anatolia, but was unable to regain the interior, or Syria. Although unwilling to limit the power of the Byzantine nobles, he reformed the army and administration but undermined the financial stability of the empire by debasing the coinage. His reign is well known from the Alexiad, the biography written by his daughter Anna Comnena.