Family Tree of the Second Bulgarian Empire
23 reigning rulers across four dynasties — with their consorts, kin and the family's Byzantine branch
The Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396) was ruled by four successive dynasties — the Asen, Terter, Smilets and Shishman houses — from the uprising of the brothers Peter and Asen against Byzantium to the fall of Tarnovo to the Ottomans. This family tree charts every tsar and their relatives across those two centuries, together with the Asens in Byzantium: the descendants of Ivan Asen III, who lived on in Constantinople as the noble Asanes family. Switch between the houses with the tabs, expand a branch to follow a line, and select any name for their reign, family ties and the primary sources behind each fact.
Michael Komnenos Asen
- Parents
- Spouse
Michael Komnenos Asen was a son of the sevastokrator Constantine Palaiologos Asen and, on his father's side, a grandson of Tsar Ivan Asen III (John III Asen). Besides Asen he also bore the prestigious Byzantine family names Komnenos and Tornikes.
Through his marriage to Irene Komnene Kantakouzene Palaiologina Asenina — daughter of the grand constable John Palaiologos — he linked his branch to the descendants of the sevastokrator Constantine, brother of Emperor Michael VIII, interweaving the Asen family still more closely with the high Byzantine aristocracy.
- “Неговият син Михаил (II, № 23) използува патронимите Комнин и Торник.”— Genealogy and Prosopography of the Asen Dynasty 1186–1460, p. 290