1213–1214, but was thwarted in his attempt to push further north into Zeta. He was assassinated soon after in his sleep, and was succeeded by his half-brother Theodore Komnenos Doukas. Early life Michael was the illegitimate son of the sebastokrator John Doukas. His paternal grandparents were Constantine Angelos and Theodora, a daughter of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos (). Michael's uncle, Andronikos, was the father of the future emperors Isaac II Angelos () and Alexios III Angelos (), who were thus Michael's first cousins. Despite this kinship, he never used the surname "Angelos", which has been applied by some modern scholars to Michael and his dynasty. The few documents surviving from his own hand and a couple of lead seals show his name as "Michael Doukas" or "Michael Komnenos Doukas" (Μιχαήλ Κομνηνός ὁ Δούκας), evidently in an effort to emphasize his relation to the revered Doukas and Komnenos dynasties, rather than the disastrous reign of the Angeloi. The only medieval sources to use the surname "Angelos" to refer to Michael were later pro-Palaiologos historians hostile to him and the Epirote state's rival claims to the Byzantine inheritance. It is unknown when Michael was born; the only relevant information is the statement of Niketas Choniates that he was a "young man" in 1201. The Greek scholar Konstantinos Varzos places his birth approximately in 1170. Michael is first mentioned on 14 February 1190, when he, along with other imperial relatives, served as a hostage to Frederick I Barbarossa () during the passage of the Third Crusade through Byzantine territory. He then went on to serve as governor (doux and anagrapheus) of the theme of Mylasa and Melanoudion in Asia Minor during the last years of Isaac II's first reign. Many scholars assign him the rank of sebastos from a seal attributed to him, but this is disputed by Lucien Stiernon, as he is nowhere else mentioned with this title. Alexios III re-appointed him to the same province, probably in 1200. Demetrios Polemis, in his study on the Doukas family, reports that he was reappointed to the post by Alexios IV (), but as Varzos remarks, this is evidently an error by Polemis. In early 1201, for unknown reasons, Michael rose in revolt against the emperor. Alexios III campaigned against him in the summer 1201 and defeated him, forcing Michael to seek refuge at the court of the Seljuk Turk Sultan of Rûm, Süleymanshah