Isidore I Boucheiras

   Patriarch of Constantinople (qq.v.) from 1347-1350. He and his two successors (Kallistos I and Philotheos Kokkinos [qq.v.]) were fervent Hesychasts and friends of Gregory Palamas (qq.v.). Like Kallistos I, he was also a pupil of Gregory of Sinai (q.v.). In 1347 Isidore performed the second coronation of John VI Kantakouzenos (q.v.), who had been crowned first in Adrianople (q.v.) the previous year. This second coronation was carried out without the crown jewels, for they were still pawned to Venice (q.v.), and without the traditional setting of Hagia Sophia (q.v.), due to its dilapidated state. Such was the poverty of the Byzantine state at the time.