Principality of Soskert

The Principality of Soskert was an Armenian buffer state erected on the eastern border of the Roman Empire by the Domestikos Jordan of Aversa in the reign of Manuel Komnenos. The loyalist Armenian Sargis Aghsartan was set up as Prince of Soskert, and was followed by his son Thoros. With the disintegration of imperial power in the East after the death of John II, however, Soskert increasingly turned away from Constantinople's orbit, and gravitated towards the rising united Armenian kingdom of Smbat of Syunik. Sargis' grandson Stephane was one of the princes who crowned Smbat as King of Kings in Ani in 1197, and the principality thereafter became part of the restored kingdom, its princely line marrying into the Smbatids.