The Downfall of the Lekapenoi Pt. 1

Life, Achievement/ Win

It has been six years and Constantine is now ready to move. After his niece (Christopher's daughter) is married to the new Bulgarian Empire, he starts gathering supporters and causing friction between courtiers. In 931, he secures wife and asks Syres to murder Christopher. Afterward, Constantine steps up, supporting Romanos like a son and so convinces him not to promote his other sons any further. He further supports his wife and gains more admiration from his subjects for doing so. He then sends Syres to battle against the Arabs in 933. Upon a victorious return, Constantine tells Syres about his own victory: Helena is finally pregnant.

In 927, as part of a peace agreement, Christopher's daughter Maria, renamed Irene ("peace") for the occasion, was married to the Bulgarian emperor Peter I (r. 927–969). Romanos used the occasion to advance Christopher before Constantine Porphyrogennetos, making him first among the rather large group of co-emperors (in 924, Christopher's younger brothers Stephen and Constantine had also been crowned as co-emperors). In 928, his father-in-law, the patrikios Niketas, unsuccessfully tried to incite Christopher to depose his father, and was banished. The motive behind this was perhaps Christopher's poor health, and fears by his wife and her father that, should he die prematurely, they would lose their status. In the event, Christopher died in August 931, much mourned by his father, who shed tears "like the Egyptians" and thereafter increasingly became devoted to religious pursuits.   Romanos appointed the brilliant general John Kourkouas commander of the field armies (domestikos ton scholon) in the East. John Kourkouas subdued a rebellion in the theme of Chaldia and intervened in Armenia in 924. From 926 Kourkouas campaigned across the eastern frontier against the Abbasids and their vassals, and won an important victory at Melitene in 934. The capture of this city is often considered the first major Byzantine territorial recovery from the Muslims.