Pronoia
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| This article is part of the series on the military of the Byzantine Empire, 330–1453 AD | |
| Structural history | |
|---|---|
| Byzantine army: East Roman army, Middle Byzantine army (themes • tagmata • Hetaireia), Komnenian-era army (pronoia), Palaiologan-era army (allagia) • Varangian Guard • Generals (Magister militum • Domestic of the Schools • Grand Domestic • Stratopedarches • Protostrator) | |
| Byzantine navy: Greek fire • Dromon • Admirals (Droungarios of the Fleet • Megas doux) | |
| Campaign history | |
| Lists of wars, revolts and civil wars, and battles | |
| Strategy and tactics | |
| Tactics • Siege warfare • Military manuals • Fortifications (Walls of Constantinople) | |
The pronoia (plural pronoiai; Greek: πρόνοια, meaning "care" or "forethought") was a system of granting dedicated streams of state income to individuals and institutions in the late Eastern Roman Empire. Beginning in the 11th century and continuing until the empire's conquest in the 15th century, the system differed in significant ways from European feudalism of the same period.
A pronoia was a grant that temporarily transferred imperial fiscal rights to an individual or institution. These rights were most commonly taxes or incomes from cultivated lands, but they could also be other income streams such as water and fishing rights, customs collection, etc. and the various rights to a specific piece of geography could be granted to separate individuals. Grants were for a set period, usually lifetime, and revokable at will by the Emperor. When institutions, usually monasteries, received grants they were effectively in perpetuity since the institutions were ongoing. Grants were not transferable or (except for certain excepts late in the institution) hereditary; a pronoia gave the grantee possession, not ownership, which remained Imperial.
The limits and specifics of a pronoia was recorded in an Imperial document called praktika ("records"); holders of pronoia (the grantees, in other words) were called pronoiarios, and those working the income stream in question (for instance, farmers on the land) were called paroikoi in the documents. The word pronoia could refer to the grant itself (land, for instance), its monetary value, or the income it produced.
Although pronoia were often used to reward military service or other loyalties, they carried no specific military obligation (in contrast to feudal fiefs), although the threat of revocation provided coercive power for the state.
By the 11th century, Roman had ceased to hold any significant power. Honorific titles and power were granted by the emperor and competition was fierce; the most desired grants were those that involved governance and tax collecting in various pieces of the Empire. By the reign of Constantine IX in the middle part of the century they had also begun to assert sovereignty over various parts of the empire, collecting taxes for themselves and often plotting rebellions against the emperor.
In the late 11th century Alexius I attempted to reform the aristocracy, taking the pacifying measure of distributing Roman territory amongst its members. Doing so had the added benefit of removing them from Constantinople, making it harder for them to directly challenge the emperor's authority. Most pronoiai granted by Alexius, however, were to members of his own (Comnenus) family. Alexius simply legitimized the holding of land by aristocrats, and brought it under centralized state control.
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