ABSTRACT
The reign of Queen Tamar of Georgia at the end of the twelfth century (1184-1213) raises an important question about the issue of royal renewal in the Byzantine world. In a system used primarily to promote men, how could the idea of renewal be adapted to fit a woman ruler? Could a woman ruler be a new Constantine, or even a new Helena, or did the idea of renewal a valid means of expressing the aims of the reign of a woman, particularly in the case of Queen Tamar, who was the first woman to rule in Georgia in her own right? What impact did gender have on how the reign could be represented?
