Vasilief, A History of the Byzantine Empire

The Empire of Nicaea (1204-1261)

The role of Bulgaria in the Christian East under Tsar John Asen II 

Page 6

The relations between Frederick and John Vatatzes were so close that, at the end of the fourth decade of the thirteenth century, the Greek troops fought in Italy in Frederick's army. But the relations of the two anti-papal emperors became still closer after the death of the first wife of John Vatatzes, Irene, daughter of Theodore I Lascaris. The widower-Emperor, said a source, being unable to bear his loneliness married Constance of Hohenstaufen, the daughter of Frederick II, then only eleven or twelve years old, who, when she joined the Greek church, took the Greek name of Anna. There exists a long poem written by Nicolaus Irenikos (Eirenikos) on the occasion of the nuptial festivities at Nicaea; the first two lines of the poem are:

Around the lovely cypress-tree, the ivy gently windeth;
The Empress is the cypress-tree, my Emperor is the ivy.

Constance-Anna survived her husband by many years, which were full of vicissitudes and adventures. She ended her days in the Spanish city of Valencia, where, in the little church of St. John-of-the-Hospital, the coffin of the former basilissa (empress) of Nicaea has been preserved. It bears the epitaph: Here lies the lady Constance, the august Empress of Greece.

Frederick's ecclesiastical ideas, which give some scholars grounds for comparing him to the king of England, Henry VIII, under whom the reformation in England began, are reflected in his correspondence with John Vatatzes. In one of his letters Frederick stated that he was actuated not only by his personal affection for Vatatzes, but also by his general zeal for supporting the principles of monarchic government: All of us, kings and princes of the earth, especially zealous for the orthodox (orthodoxe) religion and faith, cherish an enmity towards the bishops and an inward opposition to the primates of the Church. Then, inveighing against the abuses of liberty and the privileges of the western clergy, the Emperor exclaimed: O happy Asia! O happy Powers in the East! they do not fear the arms of their subjects nor dread the interference of the pontiffs.

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