Theodora Doukaina Selvo

Theodora Anna Doukaina (Θεοδώρα Δούκαινα) (1058– after 1075) was a Byzantine princess and dogaressa.

Life
Born in Constantinople, Theodora Doukaina was the second daughter of Byzantine emperor Constantine X Dukas by his second wife, Eudokia Makrembolitissa. After 1071 she became the wife of Domenico Selvo, Doge of Venice, who received the title of protoproedros at the occasion.

As she is mentioned as alive in the work of Michael Psellos (1075), it is assumed she died after this last date. It is not known if she had children, and she is not mentioned otherwise.

Confusion with Maria Argyropoulaina
Peter Damian, the Cardinal Bishop of Ostia, wrote a chapter entitled "De Veneti ducis uxore quae prius nimium delicata, demum toto corpore computruit" ("Of the Venetian Doge's wife, whose body, after her excessive delicacy, entirely rotted away.") about an unnamed Byzantine princess whose manners he considered scandalously lavish and which brought to her a horrible death as a divine punishment. This woman has been mistakenly (since Damian died 1072) identified with Domenico Selvo's wife by later Venetian chroniclers (incl. Andrea Dandolo and Marino Sanuto the Younger) followed afterwards by various modern authors; however since the work in which Damianus' chapter is contained is dated ca 1059 it refers probably to Maria Argyropoulaina who had died a half century before.

Works confusing Theodora and Maria

 * Henisch, Bridget Ann (1976), Fast and Feast: Food in Medieval Society ISBN 0-271-01230-7
 * Staley, Edgcumbe (c1910), The Dogaressas of Venice