Andronikos of Sardis

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Andronikos of Sardis was the metropolitan bishop of Sardis from about 1250 to 1260, and again in 1283–84. He played a central role in the church’s political fights of his time. In 1253/4 he and George Kleidas, the Metropolitan of Cyzicus, led an embassy to Rome for the Nicaean emperor John III Doukas Vatatzes to discuss a possible union of the churches with the pope. The mission was delayed by Conrad IV and reached Rome in April 1254. They proposed terms that would return Constantinople to the Greeks and restore Orthodox bishops in Latin-held areas in exchange for papal primacy, but nothing came of it. On their return, Vatatzes’ successor Theodore II Laskaris rebuked them for how the negotiations were handled.

Andronikos opposed Michael VIII Palaiologos. According to the historian George Akropolites, he agitated against the emperor in Paphlagonia. In 1260 he was deposed and tonsured as a monk named Athanasios at the Monastery of the Saviour at Selymbria by Joannicius, Metropolitan of Philadelphia. Patriarch Arsenios Autoreianos tried to restore him between 1261 and 1265, but the church synod blocked these efforts.

In 1283 Andronikos II Palaiologos, who sought a middle course between the Arsenite faction and their opponents, restored Andronikos of Sardis to his see and even made him the emperor’s personal confessor. After Patriarch Joseph I died in 1283, the Arsenites expected one of their own to be chosen, but Gregory II was appointed instead, a neutral choice that intensified demands to punish those who had supported the union with Rome. Andronikos stood out for his stubborn stance at the synod at Blachernae, where several church leaders and Empress-dowager Theodora Palaiologina were forced to recant. The dispute continued and flared again at Adramyttion in 1284. The synod wrestled with Gregory II’s legitimacy, and one pupil even accused Andronikos of lese majeste. Hoping to become patriarch himself, Andronikos was deposed again and returned to life as a monk. In a dramatic moment, the Metropolitan of Larissa, Nikandros, mockingly removed his bishop’s mitre and gave him a monk’s cowl in front of the assembly.