explicitly named. As the historian Anthony Kaldellis comments, this was a formidable assemblage, as the families represented in it, all of them descended from military men promoted by the warrior-emperor Basil II, would define "the future of the empire for the next thirty years, indeed for the next century and more". Psellos himself was an eyewitness at the reception of the generals' delegation, and claims that the emperor began abusing them at once; he then made Isaac, as the leader of the deputation, and his second, Kekaumenos, stand forth, and proceeded to denounce him, claiming that he was responsible for "all but losing Antioch" and "corrupting his army", being a coward and incompetent, and of having misappropriated army funds for his own use. John Skylitzes, who wrote later in the century, reports that the emperor treated the generals courteously, but agrees that he refused outright to consider the honours they claimed for themselves, notably the promotion of Isaac and Kekaumenos to the rank of proedros. The effect of the emperor's attitude on the army leadership was profound, and turned them against Michael. A second delegation to the chief minister, the protosynkellos Leo Paraspondylos, was received in similar manner, and according to Psellos Isaac could barely restrain his colleagues from attacking the emperor then and there, in his own throne room. At length, a plot was formed against the emperor, and despite Isaac's own reluctance, according to Psellos, he was nominated as its leader. The conspirators contacted the veteran general Nikephoros Bryennios, who had unsuccessfully tried to usurp the throne from Theodora but had recently been recalled by Michael VI as commander of the Macedonian army, and he apparently agreed to support them. Soon after, however, Bryennios left with his troops for Asia Minor, to campaign against the Turks. Once in the Anatolic Theme he quarreled with the army treasurer, threw him in prison, and appropriated the funds to pay his soldiers as he saw fit. This was seen by another local commander as a sign of rebellion; Bryennios was arrested and blinded. Proclamation of Isaac as emperor and the Battle of Hades Fearing that their plot was about to be discovered, the eastern generals hastened to act: the conspirators resident in the Anatolic Theme, Romanos Skleros, Michael Bourtzes, Nikephoros Botaneiates and the sons of Basil Argyros, hastened to find Isaac Komnenos at his estates near Kastamon in Paphlagonia, and on