The book represents the first attempt at a detailed biography of the Byzantine emperor Alexios I Komnenos (1048–1118) in Russian. The life of this man takes place against the backdrop of the textbook events of his era: the First Crusade and the Seljuk conquests in Asia Minor. Usually historians evaluate them from the point of view of Western Europeans. The author tried to move away from Eurocentric schemes and show Byzantine civilization as an independent phenomenon of world history. The relaxed style of presentation makes reading fascinating, and many relevant allusions provide material for understanding modernity.