The Greek Emperors of Nice and Constantinople. Elevation and Reign of Michael Palaeologus. His False Union with the Pope and the Latin Church. Hostile Designs of Charles of Anjou. Revolt of Sicily. War of the Catalans in Asia and Greece. Revolutions and Present State of Athens
Restoration of the Greek empire.
The loss of Constantinople restored a momentary vigour to the Greeks. From their palaces, the princes and nobles were driven into the field; and the fragments of the falling monarchy were grasped by the hands of the most vigorous or the most skilful candidates. In the long and barren pages of the Byzantine annals, (1) it would not be an easy task to equal the two characters of Theodore Lascaris, A.D. 1204-1222. Theodore Lascaris and John Ducas Vataces, (2) who replanted and upheld the Roman standard at Nice in Bithynia. The difference of their virtues was happily suited to the diversity of their situation. In his first efforts, the fugitive Lascaris commanded only three cities and two thousand soldiers: his reign was the season of generous and active despair: in every military operation he staked his life and crown; and his enemies of the Hellespont and the Maeander, were surprised by his celerity and subdued by his boldness. A victorious reign of eighteen years expanded the principality of Nice to the magnitude of an empire. John Ducas Vataces, A.D. 1222-1255, October 30. The throne of his successor and son-in-law Vataces was founded on a more solid basis, a larger scope, and more plentiful resources; and it was the temper, as well as the interest, of Vataces to calculate the risk, to expect the moment, and to insure the success, of his ambitious designs. In the decline of the Latins, I have briefly exposed the progress of the Greeks; the prudent and gradual advances of a conqueror, who, in a reign of thirty-three years, rescued the provinces from national and foreign usurpers, till he pressed on all sides the Imperial city, a leafless and sapless trunk, which must full at the first stroke of the axe. But his interior and peaceful administration is still more deserving of notice and praise. (3) The calamities of the times had wasted the numbers and the substance of the Greeks; the motives and the means of agriculture were extirpated; and the most fertile lands were left without cultivation or inhabitants. A portion of this vacant property was occupied and improved by the command, and for the benefit, of the emperor: a powerful hand and a vigilant eye supplied and surpassed, by a skilful management, the minute diligence of a private farmer: the royal domain became the garden and granary of Asia; and without impoverishing the people, the sovereign acquired a fund of innocent and productive wealth. According to the nature of the soil, his lands were sown with corn or planted with vines; the pastures were filled with horses and oxen, with sheep and hogs; and when Vataces presented to the empress a crown of diamonds and pearls, he informed her, with a smile, that this precious ornament arose from the sale of the eggs of his innumerable poultry. The produce of his domain was applied to the maintenance of his palace and hospitals, the calls of dignity and benevolence: the lesson was still more useful than the revenue: the plough was restored to its ancient security and honour; and the nobles were taught to seek a sure and independent revenue from their estates, instead of adorning their splendid beggary by the oppression of the people, or (what is almost the same) by the favours of the court. The superfluous stock of corn
and cattle was eagerly purchased by the Turks, with whom
Vataces preserved a strict and sincere alliance; but he
discouraged the importation of foreign manufactures, the
costly silks of the East, and the curious labours of the
Italian looms.
"The demands of nature and necessity," was he accustomed to say, "are indispensable; but the influence of fashion may rise and sink at the breath of a monarch;"
and both his precept and example recommended simplicity of manners and the use of domestic industry. The education of youth and the revival of learning were the most serious objects of his care; and, without deciding the precedency, he pronounced with truth, that a prince and a philosopher (4) are the two most eminent characters of human society. His first wife was Irene, the daughter of Theodore Lascaris, a woman more illustrious by her personal merit, the milder virtues of her sex, than by the blood of the Angeli and Comneni that flowed in her veins, and transmitted the inheritance of the empire. After her death he was contracted to Anne, or Constance, a natural daughter of the emperor Frederic the Second; but as the bride had not attained the years of puberty, Vataces placed in his solitary bed an Italian damsel of her train; and his amorous weakness bestowed on the concubine the honours, though not the title, of a lawful empress. His frailty was censured as a flagitious and damnable sin by the monks; and their rude invectives exercised and displayed the patience of the royal lover. A philosophic age may excuse a single vice, which was redeemed by a crowd of virtues; and in the review of his faults, and the more intemperate passions of Lascaris, the judgment of their contemporaries was softened by gratitude to the second founders of the empire. (5) The slaves of the Latins, without law or peace, applauded the happiness of their brethren who had resumed their national freedom; and Vataces employed the laudable policy of convincing the Greeks of every dominion that it was their interest to be enrolled in the number of his subjects.
Theodore Lascaris II. A.D. 1255, October 30-A.D. 1259, August
A strong shade of degeneracy is visible between John Vataces
and his son Theodore; between the founder who sustained the
weight, and the heir who enjoyed the splendour, of the
Imperial crown. (6) Yet the character of Theodore was not
devoid of energy; he had been educated in the school of his
father, in the exercise of war and hunting; Constantinople
was yet spared; but in the three years of a short reign, he
thrice led his armies into the heart of Bulgaria. His
virtues were sullied by a choleric and suspicious temper:
the first of these may be ascribed to the ignorance of
control; and the second might naturally arise from a dark
and imperfect view of the corruption of mankind. On a march
in Bulgaria, he consulted on a question of policy his
principal ministers; and the Greek logothete, George
Acropolita, presumed to offend him by the declaration of a
free and honest opinion. The emperor half unsheathed his
cimeter; but his more deliberate rage reserved Acropolita
for a baser punishment. One of the first officers of the
empire was ordered to dismount, stripped of his robes, and
extended on the ground in the presence of the prince and
army. In this posture he was chastised with so many and
such heavy blows from the clubs of two guards or
executioners, that when Theodore commanded them to cease,
the great logothete was scarcely able to rise and crawl away
to his tent. After a seclusion of some days, he was
recalled by a peremptory mandate to his seat in council; and
so dead were the Greeks to the sense of honour and shame,
that it is from the narrative of the sufferer himself that
we acquire the knowledge of his disgrace. (7) The cruelty of
the emperor was exasperated by the pangs of sickness, the
approach of a premature end, and the suspicion of poison and
magic. The lives and fortunes, the eyes and limbs, of his
kinsmen and nobles, were sacrificed to each sally of
passion; and before he died, the son of Vataces might
deserve from the people, or at least from the court, the
appellation of tyrant. A matron of the family of the
Palaeologi had provoked his anger by refusing to bestow her
beauteous daughter on the vile plebeian who was recommended
by his caprice. Without regard to her birth or age, her
body, as high as the neck, was enclosed in a sack with
several cats, who were pricked with pins to irritate their
fury against their unfortunate fellow-captive. Minority of John Lascaris, A.D. 1259, August. In his last
hours the emperor testified a wish to forgive and be
forgiven, a just anxiety for the fate of John his son and
successor, who, at the age of eight years, was condemned to
the dangers of a long minority. His last choice entrusted
the office of guardian to the sanctity of the patriarch
Arsenius, and to the courage of George Muzalon, the great
domestic, who was equally distinguished by the royal favour
and the public hatred. Since their connection with the
Latins, the names and privileges of hereditary rank had
insinuated themselves into the Greek monarchy; and the noble
families (8) were provoked by the elevation of a worthless
favourite, to whose influence they imputed the errors and
calamities of the late reign. In the first council, after
the emperor's death, Muzalon, from a lofty throne,
pronounced a labored apology of his conduct and intentions:
his modesty was subdued by a unanimous assurance of esteem
and fidelity; and his most inveterate enemies were the
loudest to salute him as the guardian and saviour of the
Romans. Eight days were sufficient to prepare the execution
of the conspiracy. On the ninth, the obsequies of the
deceased monarch were solemnized in the cathedral of
Magnesia, (9) an Asiatic city, where he expired, on the banks
of the Hermus, and at the foot of Mount Sipylus. The holy
rites were interrupted by a sedition of the guards; Muzalon,
his brothers, and his adherents, were massacred at the foot
of the altar; and the absent patriarch was associated with a
new colleague, with Michael Palaeologus, the most
illustrious, in birth and merit, of the Greek nobles. (10)
Family and character of Michael Palaeologus.
Of those who are proud of their ancestors, the far greater
part must be content with local or domestic renown; and few
there are who dare trust the memorials of their family to
the public annals of their country. As early as the middle
of the eleventh century, the noble race of the Palaeologi
(11) stands high and conspicuous in the Byzantine history: it
was the valiant George Palaeologus who placed the father of
the Comneni on the throne; and his kinsmen or descendants
continue, in each generation, to lead the armies and
councils of the state. The purple was not dishonoured by
their alliance, and had the law of succession, and female
succession, been strictly observed, the wife of Theodore
Lascaris must have yielded to her elder sister, the mother
of Michael Palaeologus, who afterwards raised his family to
the throne. In his person, the splendour of birth was
dignified by the merit of the soldier and statesman: in his
early youth he was promoted to the office of constable or
commander of the French mercenaries; the private expense of
a day never exceeded three pieces of gold; but his ambition
was rapacious and profuse; and his gifts were doubled by the
graces of his conversation and manners. The love of the
soldiers and people excited the jealousy of the court, and
Michael thrice escaped from the dangers in which he was
involved by his own imprudence or that of his friends. I.
Under the reign of Justice and Vataces, a dispute arose (12)
between two officers, one of whom accused the other of
maintaining the hereditary right of the Palaeologi The cause
was decided, according to the new jurisprudence of the
Latins, by single combat; the defendant was overthrown; but
he persisted in declaring that himself alone was guilty; and
that he had uttered these rash or treasonable speeches
without the approbation or knowledge of his patron Yet a
cloud of suspicion hung over the innocence of the constable;
he was still pursued by the whispers of malevolence; and a
subtle courtier, the archbishop of Philadelphia, urged him
to accept the judgment of God in the fiery proof of the
ordeal. (13) Three days before the trial, the patient's arm
was enclosed in a bag, and secured by the royal signet; and
it was incumbent on him to bear a red-hot ball of iron three
times from the altar to the rails of the sanctuary, without
artifice and without injury. Palaeologus eluded the
dangerous experiment with sense and pleasantry.
"I am a soldier," said he, "and will boldly enter the lists with my accusers; but a layman, a sinner like myself, is not endowed with the gift of miracles. Your piety, most holy prelate, may deserve the interposition of Heaven, and from your hands I will receive the fiery globe, the pledge of my innocence."
The archbishop started; the emperor smiled; and the absolution or pardon of Michael was approved by new rewards and new services. II. In the succeeding reign, as he held the government of Nice, he was secretly informed, that the mind of the absent prince was poisoned with jealousy; and that death, or blindness, would be his final reward. Instead of awaiting the return and sentence of Theodore, the constable, with some followers, escaped from the city and the empire; and though he was plundered by the Turkmans of the desert, he found a hospitable refuge in the court of the sultan. In the ambiguous state of an exile, Michael reconciled the duties of gratitude and loyalty: drawing his sword against the Tartars; admonishing the garrisons of the Roman limit; and promoting, by his influence, the restoration of peace, in which his pardon and recall were honourably included. III. While he guarded the West against the despot of Epirus, Michael was again suspected and condemned in the palace; and such was his loyalty or weakness, that he submitted to be led in chains above six hundred miles from Durazzo to Nice. The civility of the messenger alleviated his disgrace; the emperor's sickness dispelled his danger; and the last breath of Theodore, which recommended his infant son, at once acknowledged the innocence and the power of Palaeologus.
His elevation to the throne.
But his innocence had been too unworthily treated, and his
power was too strongly felt, to curb an aspiring subject in
the fair field that was opened to his ambition. (14) In the
council, after the death of Theodore, he was the first to
pronounce, and the first to violate, the oath of allegiance
to Muzalon; and so dexterous was his conduct, that he reaped
the benefit, without incurring the guilt, or at least the
reproach, of the subsequent massacre. In the choice of a
regent, he balanced the interests and passions of the
candidates; turned their envy and hatred from himself
against each other, and forced every competitor to own, that
after his own claims, those of Palaeologus were best
entitled to the preference. Under the title of great duke,
he accepted or assumed, during a long minority, the active
powers of government; the patriarch was a venerable name;
and the factious nobles were seduced, or oppressed, by the
ascendant of his genius. The fruits of the economy of
Vataces were deposited in a strong castle on the banks of
the Hermus, in the custody of the faithful Varangians: the
constable retained his command or influence over the foreign
troops; he employed the guards to possess the treasure, and
the treasure to corrupt the guards; and whatsoever might be
the abuse of the public money, his character was above the
suspicion of private avarice. By himself, or by his
emissaries, he strove to persuade every rank of subjects,
that their own prosperity would rise in just proportion to
the establishment of his authority. The weight of taxes was
suspended, the perpetual theme of popular complaint; and he
prohibited the trials by the ordeal and judicial combat.
These Barbaric institutions were already abolished or
undermined in France (15) and England; (16) and the appeal to
the sword offended the sense of a civilized, (17) and the
temper of an unwarlike, people. For the future maintenance
of their wives and children, the veterans were grateful: the
priests and the philosophers applauded his ardent zeal for
the advancement of religion and learning; and his vague
promise of rewarding merit was applied by every candidate to
his own hopes. Conscious of the influence of the clergy,
Michael successfully labored to secure the suffrage of that
powerful order. Their expensive journey from Nice to
Magnesia, afforded a decent and ample pretence: the leading
prelates were tempted by the liberality of his nocturnal
visits; and the incorruptible patriarch was flattered by the
homage of his new colleague, who led his mule by the bridle
into the town, and removed to a respectful distance the
importunity of the crowd. Without renouncing his title by
royal descent, Palaeologus encouraged a free discussion into
the advantages of elective monarchy; and his adherents
asked, with the insolence of triumph, what patient would
trust his health, or what merchant would abandon his vessel,
to the hereditary skill of a physician or a pilot? The youth
of the emperor, and the impending dangers of a minority,
required the support of a mature and experienced guardian;
of an associate raised above the envy of his equals, and
invested with the name and prerogatives of royalty. For the
interest of the prince and people, without any selfish views
for himself or his family, the great duke consented to guard
and instruct the son of Theodore; but he sighed for the
happy moment when he might restore to his firmer hands the
administration of his patrimony, and enjoy the blessings of
a private station. He was first invested with the title and
prerogatives of despot, which bestowed the purple ornaments
and the second place in the Roman monarchy. It was
afterwards agreed that John and Michael should be proclaimed
as joint emperors, and raised on the buckler, but that the
preeminence should be reserved for the birthright of the
former. A mutual league of amity was pledged between the
royal partners; and in case of a rupture, the subjects were
bound, by their oath of allegiance, to declare themselves
against the aggressor; an ambiguous name, the seed of
discord and civil war. Palaeologus was content; but, on the
day of the coronation, and in the cathedral of Nice, his
zealous adherents most vehemently urged the just priority of
his age and merit. Michael Palaeologus emperor, A.D. 1260, January 1. The unseasonable dispute was eluded by
postponing to a more convenient opportunity the coronation
of John Lascaris; and he walked with a slight diadem in the
train of his guardian, who alone received the Imperial crown
from the hands of the patriarch. It was not without extreme
reluctance that Arsenius abandoned the cause of his pupil;
out the Varangians brandished their battle-axes; a sign of
assent was extorted from the trembling youth; and some
voices were heard, that the life of a child should no longer
impede the settlement of the nation. A full harvest of
honours and employments was distributed among his friends by
the grateful Palaeologus. In his own family he created a
despot and two sebastocrators; Alexius Strategopulus was
decorated with the title of Caesar; and that veteran
commander soon repaid the obligation, by restoring
Constantinople to the Greek emperor.
Recovery of Constantinople, A.D. 1261, July 25.
It was in the second year of his reign, while he resided in
the palace and gardens of Nymphaeum, (18) near Smyrna, that the first messenger arrived at the dead of night; and the
stupendous intelligence was imparted to Michael, after he
had been gently waked by the tender precaution of his sister
Eulogia. The man was unknown or obscure; he produced no
letters from the victorious Caesar; nor could it easily be
credited, after the defeat of Vataces and the recent failure
of Palaeologus himself, that the capital had been surprised
by a detachment of eight hundred soldiers. As a hostage,
the doubtful author was confined, with the assurance of
death or an ample recompense; and the court was left some
hours in the anxiety of hope and fear, till the messengers
of Alexius arrived with the authentic intelligence, and
displayed the trophies of the conquest, the sword and
sceptre, (19) the buskins and bonnet, (20) of the usurper
Baldwin, which he had dropped in his precipitate flight. A
general assembly of the bishops, senators, and nobles, was
immediately convened, and never perhaps was an event
received with more heartfelt and universal joy. In a
studied oration, the new sovereign of Constantinople
congratulated his own and the public fortune.
"There was a time," said he, "a far distant time, when the Roman empire extended to the Adriatic, the Tigris, and the confines of Aethiopia. After the loss of the provinces, our capital itself, in these last and calamitous days, has been wrested from our hands by the Barbarians of the West. From the lowest ebb, the tide of prosperity has again returned in our favour; but our prosperity was that of fugitives and exiles: and when we were asked, which was the country of the Romans, we indicated with a blush the climate of the globe, and the quarter of the heavens. The divine Providence has now restored to our arms the city of Constantine, the sacred seat of religion and empire; and it will depend on our valour and conduct to render this important acquisition the pledge and omen of future victories."
Return of the Greek emperor, A.D. 1261,August 14.
So eager was the impatience
of the prince and people, that Michael made his triumphal
entry into Constantinople only twenty days after the
expulsion of the Latins. The golden gate was thrown open at
his approach; the devout conqueror dismounted from his
horse; and a miraculous image of Mary the Conductress was
borne before him, that the divine Virgin in person might
appear to conduct him to the temple of her Son, the
cathedral of St. Sophia. But after the first transport of
devotion and pride, he sighed at the dreary prospect of
solitude and ruin. The palace was defiled with smoke and
dirt, and the gross intemperance of the Franks; whole
streets had been consumed by fire, or were decayed by the
injuries of time; the sacred and profane edifices were
stripped of their ornaments: and, as if they were conscious
of their approaching exile, the industry of the Latins had
been confined to the work of pillage and destruction. Trade
had expired under the pressure of anarchy and distress, and
the numbers of inhabitants had decreased with the opulence
of the city. It was the first care of the Greek monarch to
reinstate the nobles in the palaces of their fathers; and
the houses or the ground which they occupied were restored
to the families that could exhibit a legal right of
inheritance. But the far greater part was extinct or lost;
the vacant property had devolved to the lord; he repeopled
Constantinople by a liberal invitation to the provinces; and
the brave volunteers were seated in the capital which had
been recovered by their arms. The French barons and the
principal families had retired with their emperor; but the
patient and humble crowd of Latins was attached to the
country, and indifferent to the change of masters. Instead
of banishing the factories of the Pisans, Venetians, and
Genoese, the prudent conqueror accepted their oaths of
allegiance, encouraged their industry, confirmed their
privileges, and allowed them to live under the jurisdiction
of their proper magistrates. Of these nations, the Pisans
and Venetians preserved their respective quarters in the
city; but the services and power of the Genoese deserved at
the same time the gratitude and the jealousy of the Greeks.
Their independent colony was first planted at the seaport
town of Heraclea in Thrace. They were speedily recalled,
and settled in the exclusive possession of the suburb of
Galata, an advantageous post, in which they revived the
commerce, and insulted the majesty, of the Byzantine empire.
(21)
Palaeologus blinds and banishes the young emperor, A.D. 1261, Dec. 25.
The recovery of Constantinople was celebrated as the aera of
a new empire: the conqueror, alone, and by the right of the
sword, renewed his coronation in the church of St. Sophia;
and the name and honours of John Lascaris, his pupil and
lawful sovereign, were insensibly abolished. But his claims
still lived in the minds of the people; and the royal youth
must speedily attain the years of manhood and ambition. By
fear or conscience, Palaeologus was restrained from dipping
his hands in innocent and royal blood; but the anxiety of a
usurper and a parent urged him to secure his throne by one
of those imperfect crimes so familiar to the modern Greeks.
The loss of sight incapacitated the young prince for the
active business of the world; instead of the brutal violence
of tearing out his eyes, the visual nerve was destroyed by
the intense glare of a red-hot basin, (22) and John Lascaris
was removed to a distant castle, where he spent many years
in privacy and oblivion. Such cool and deliberate guilt may
seem incompatible with remorse; but if Michael could trust
the mercy of Heaven, he was not inaccessible to the
reproaches and vengeance of mankind, which he had provoked
by cruelty and treason. His cruelty imposed on a servile
court the duties of applause or silence; but the clergy had
a right to speak in the name of their invisible Master; and
their holy legions were led by a prelate, whose character
was above the temptations of hope or fear. After a short
abdication of his dignity, Arsenius (23) had consented to
ascend the ecclesiastical throne of Constantinople, and to
preside in the restoration of the church. His pious
simplicity was long deceived by the arts of Palaeologus; and
his patience and submission might soothe the usurper, and
protect the safety of the young prince. On the news of his
inhuman treatment, the patriarch unsheathed the spiritual
sword; and superstition, on this occasion, was enlisted in
the cause of humanity and justice. is excommunicated by the patriarch Arsenius, A.D. 1262-1268. In a synod of bishops,
who were stimulated by the example of his zeal, the
patriarch pronounced a sentence of excommunication; though
his prudence still repeated the name of Michael in the
public prayers. The Eastern prelates had not adopted the
dangerous maxims of ancient Rome; nor did they presume to
enforce their censures, by deposing princes, or absolving
nations from their oaths of allegiance. But the Christian,
who had been separated from God and the church, became an
object of horror; and, in a turbulent and fanatic capital,
that horror might arm the hand of an assassin, or inflame a
sedition of the people. Palaeologus felt his danger,
confessed his guilt, and deprecated his judge: the act was irretrievable; the prize was obtained; and the most rigorous penance, which he solicited, would have raised the sinner to the reputation of a saint. The unrelenting patriarch
refused to announce any means of atonement or any hopes of mercy; and condescended only to pronounce, that for so great a crime, great indeed must be the satisfaction.
"Do you require," said Michael, "that I should abdicate the empire?"
and at these words, he offered, or seemed to offer, the sword of state. Arsenius eagerly grasped this pledge of sovereignty; but when he perceived that the emperor was unwilling to purchase absolution at so dear a rate, he indignantly escaped to his cell, and left the royal sinner kneeling and weeping before the door. (24)
The schism of the Arsenites, A.D. 1266-1312.
The danger and scandal of this excommunication subsisted
above three years, till the popular clamour was assuaged by
time and repentance; till the brethren of Arsenius condemned
his inflexible spirit, so repugnant to the unbounded
forgiveness of the gospel. The emperor had artfully
insinuated, that, if he were still rejected at home, he
might seek, in the Roman pontiff, a more indulgent judge;
but it was far more easy and effectual to find or to place
that judge at the head of the Byzantine church. Arsenius
was involved in a vague rumour of conspiracy and
disaffection; some irregular steps in his ordination and government were liable to censure; a synod deposed him from the episcopal office; and he was transported under a guard
of soldiers to a small island of the Propontis. Before his
exile, he sullenly requested that a strict account might be
taken of the treasures of the church; boasted, that his sole
riches, three pieces of gold, had been earned by
transcribing the psalms; continued to assert the freedom of
his mind; and denied, with his last breath, the pardon which
was implored by the royal sinner. (25) After some delay,
Gregory, bishop of Adrianople, was translated to the Byzantine throne; but his authority was found insufficient
to support the absolution of the emperor; and Joseph, a
reverend monk, was substituted to that important function.
This edifying scene was represented in the presence of the
senate and the people; at the end of six years the humble
penitent was restored to the communion of the faithful; and
humanity will rejoice, that a milder treatment of the
captive Lascaris was stipulated as a proof of his remorse.
But the spirit of Arsenius still survived in a powerful
faction of the monks and clergy, who persevered about
forty-eight years in an obstinate schism. Their scruples
were treated with tenderness and respect by Michael and his
son; and the reconciliation of the Arsenites was the serious
labor of the church and state. In the confidence of
fanaticism, they had proposed to try their cause by a
miracle; and when the two papers, that contained their own
and the adverse cause, were cast into a fiery brazier, they
expected that the Catholic verity would be respected by the
flames. Alas! the two papers were indiscriminately
consumed, and this unforeseen accident produced the union of
a day, and renewed the quarrel of an age. (26) The final
treaty displayed the victory of the Arsenites: the clergy
abstained during forty days from all ecclesiastical
functions; a slight penance was imposed on the laity; the
body of Arsenius was deposited in the sanctuary; and, in the
name of the departed saint, the prince and people were
released from the sins of their fathers. (27)
Reign of Michael Palaeologus, A.D. 1259, Dec. 1-A.D. 1282, Dec.11.
The establishment of his family was the motive, or at least
the pretence, of the crime of Palaeologus; and he was
impatient to confirm the succession, by sharing with his
eldest son the honours of the purple. Reign of Andronicus the Elder, A.D. 1273, Nov. 8-A.D. 1332, February 13. Andronicus, afterwards
surnamed the Elder, was proclaimed and crowned emperor of
the Romans, in the fifteenth year of his age; and, from the
first aera of a prolix and inglorious reign, he held that
august title nine years as the colleague, and fifty as the
successor, of his father. Michael himself, had he died in a
private station, would have been thought more worthy of the
empire; and the assaults of his temporal and spiritual
enemies left him few moments to labor for his own fame or
the happiness of his subjects. He wrested from the Franks
several of the noblest islands of the Archipelago, Lesbos,
Chios, and Rhodes: his brother Constantine was sent to
command in Malvasia and Sparta; and the eastern side of the
Morea, from Argos and Napoli to Cape Thinners, was
repossessed by the Greeks. This effusion of Christian blood
was loudly condemned by the patriarch; and the insolent
priest presumed to interpose his fears and scruples between
the arms of princes. But in the prosecution of these western
conquests, the countries beyond the Hellespont were left
naked to the Turks; and their depredations verified the
prophecy of a dying senator, that the recovery of
Constantinople would be the ruin of Asia. The victories of
Michael were achieved by his lieutenants; his sword rusted
in the palace; and, in the transactions of the emperor with
the popes and the king of Naples, his political acts were
stained with cruelty and fraud. (28)
His union with the Latin church, A.D. 1274-1277.
I. The Vatican was the most natural refuge of a Latin
emperor, who had been driven from his throne; and Pope Urban
the Fourth appeared to pity the misfortunes, and vindicate
the cause, of the fugitive Baldwin. A crusade, with plenary
indulgence, was preached by his command against the
schismatic Greeks: he excommunicated their allies and
adherents; solicited Louis the Ninth in favour of his
kinsman; and demanded a tenth of the ecclesiastical revenues
of France and England for the service of the holy war. (29)
The subtle Greek, who watched the rising tempest of the
West, attempted to suspend or soothe the hostility of the
pope, by suppliant embassies and respectful letters; but he
insinuated that the establishment of peace must prepare the
reconciliation and obedience of the Eastern church. The
Roman court could not be deceived by so gross an artifice;
and Michael was admonished, that the repentance of the son
should precede the forgiveness of the father; and that faith
(an ambiguous word) was the only basis of friendship and
alliance. After a long and affected delay, the approach of
danger, and the importunity of Gregory the Tenth, compelled
him to enter on a more serious negotiation: he alleged the
example of the great Vataces; and the Greek clergy, who
understood the intentions of their prince, were not alarmed
by the first steps of reconciliation and respect. But when
he pressed the conclusion of the treaty, they strenuously
declared, that the Latins, though not in name, were heretics
in fact, and that they despised those strangers as the
vilest and most despicable portion of the human race. (30) It
was the task of the emperor to persuade, to corrupt, to
intimidate the most popular ecclesiastics, to gain the vote
of each individual, and alternately to urge the arguments of
Christian charity and the public welfare. The texts of the
fathers and the arms of the Franks were balanced in the
theological and political scale; and without approving the
addition to the Nicene creed, the most moderate were taught
to confess, that the two hostile propositions of proceeding
from the Father BY the Son, and of proceeding from the
Father AND the Son, might be reduced to a safe and Catholic
sense. (31) The supremacy of the pope was a doctrine more
easy to conceive, but more painful to acknowledge: yet
Michael represented to his monks and prelates, that they
might submit to name the Roman bishop as the first of the
patriarchs; and that their distance and discretion would
guard the liberties of the Eastern church from the
mischievous consequences of the right of appeal. He
protested that he would sacrifice his life and empire rather
than yield the smallest point of orthodox faith or national
independence; and this declaration was sealed and ratified
by a golden bull. The patriarch Joseph withdrew to a
monastery, to resign or resume his throne, according to the
event of the treaty: the letters of union and obedience were
subscribed by the emperor, his son Andronicus, and
thirty-five archbishops and metropolitans, with their
respective synods; and the episcopal list was multiplied by
many dioceses which were annihilated under the yoke of the
infidels. An embassy was composed of some trusty ministers
and prelates: they embarked for Italy, with rich ornaments
and rare perfumes for the altar of St. Peter; and their
secret orders authorized and recommended a boundless
compliance. They were received in the general council of
Lyons, by Pope Gregory the Tenth, at the head of five
hundred bishops. (32) He embraced with tears his long-lost
and repentant children; accepted the oath of the
ambassadors, who abjured the schism in the name of the two
emperors; adorned the prelates with the ring and mitre;
chanted in Greek and Latin the Nicene creed with the
addition of filioque; and rejoiced in the union of the East
and West, which had been reserved for his reign. To
consummate this pious work, the Byzantine deputies were
speedily followed by the pope's nuncios; and their
instruction discloses the policy of the Vatican, which could
not be satisfied with the vain title of supremacy. After
viewing the temper of the prince and people, they were
enjoined to absolve the schismatic clergy, who should
subscribe and swear their abjuration and obedience; to
establish in all the churches the use of the perfect creed;
to prepare the entrance of a cardinal legate, with the full
powers and dignity of his office; and to instruct the
emperor in the advantages which he might derive from the
temporal protection of the Roman pontiff. (33)
His persecution of the Greeks, A.D. 1277-1282.
But they found a country without a friend, a nation in which
the names of Rome and Union were pronounced with abhorrence.
The patriarch Joseph was indeed removed: his place was
filled by Veccus, an ecclesiastic of learning and
moderation; and the emperor was still urged by the same
motives, to persevere in the same professions. But in his
private language Palaeologus affected to deplore the pride,
and to blame the innovations, of the Latins; and while he
debased his character by this double hypocrisy, he justified
and punished the opposition of his subjects. By the joint
suffrage of the new and the ancient Rome, a sentence of
excommunication was pronounced against the obstinate
schismatics; the censures of the church were executed by the
sword of Michael; on the failure of persuasion, he tried the
arguments of prison and exile, of whipping and mutilation;
those touchstones, says an historian, of cowards and the
brave. Two Greeks still reigned in Aetolia, Epirus, and
Thessaly, with the appellation of despots: they had yielded
to the sovereign of Constantinople, but they rejected the
chains of the Roman pontiff, and supported their refusal by
successful arms. Under their protection, the fugitive monks
and bishops assembled in hostile synods; and retorted the
name of heretic with the galling addition of apostate: the
prince of Trebizond was tempted to assume the forfeit title
of emperor; and even the Latins of Negropont, Thebes, Athens, and the Morea, forgot the merits of the convert, to join, with open or clandestine aid, the enemies of
Palaeologus. His favourite generals, of his own blood, and
family, successively deserted, or betrayed, the sacrilegious
trust. His sister Eulogia, a niece, and two female cousins,
conspired against him; another niece, Mary queen of
Bulgaria, negotiated his ruin with the sultan of Egypt; and,
in the public eye, their treason was consecrated as the most
sublime virtue. (34) To the pope's nuncios, who urged the consummation of the work, Palaeologus exposed a naked
recital of all that he had done and suffered for their sake.
They were assured that the guilty sectaries, of both sexes
and every rank, had been deprived of their honours, their
fortunes, and their liberty; a spreading list of
confiscation and punishment, which involved many persons,
the dearest to the emperor, or the best deserving of his
favour. They were conducted to the prison, to behold four
princes of the royal blood chained in the four corners, and
shaking their fetters in an agony of grief and rage. Two of
these captives were afterwards released; the one by
submission, the other by death: but the obstinacy of their
two companions was chastised by the loss of their eyes; and
the Greeks, the least adverse to the union, deplored that
cruel and inauspicious tragedy. (35) Persecutors must expect
the hatred of those whom they oppress; but they commonly
find some consolation in the testimony of their conscience,
the applause of their party, and, perhaps, the success of
their undertaking. But the hypocrisy of Michael, which was
prompted only by political motives, must have forced him to
hate himself, to despise his followers, and to esteem and
envy the rebel champions by whom he was detested and
despised. While his violence was abhorred at
Constantinople, at Rome his slowness was arraigned, and his
sincerity suspected; till at length Pope Martin the Fourth
excluded the Greek emperor from the pale of a church, into
which he was striving to reduce a schismatic people. The union dissolved, A.D. 1283. No
sooner had the tyrant expired, than the union was dissolved,
and abjured by unanimous consent; the churches were
purified; the penitents were reconciled; and his son
Andronicus, after weeping the sins and errors of his youth
most piously denied his father the burial of a prince and a
Christian. (36)
Charles of Anjou subdues Naples and Sicily. A.D. 1266, February 26.
II. In the distress of the Latins, the walls and towers of
Constantinople had fallen to decay: they were restored and
fortified by the policy of Michael, who deposited a
plenteous store of corn and salt provisions, to sustain the
siege which he might hourly expect from the resentment of
the Western powers. Of these, the sovereign of the Two
Sicilies was the most formidable neighbour: but as long as
they were possessed by Mainfroy, the bastard of Frederic the
Second, his monarchy was the bulwark, rather than the
annoyance, of the Eastern empire. The usurper, though a
brave and active prince, was sufficiently employed in the
defence of his throne: his proscription by successive popes
had separated Mainfroy from the common cause of the Latins;
and the forces that might have besieged Constantinople were
detained in a crusade against the domestic enemy of Rome.
The prize of her avenger, the crown of the Two Sicilies, was
won and worn by the brother of St Louis, by Charles count of
Anjou and Provence, who led the chivalry of France on this
holy expedition. (37) The disaffection of his Christian
subjects compelled Mainfroy to enlist a colony of Saracens
whom his father had planted in Apulia; and this odious
succour will explain the defiance of the Catholic hero, who
rejected all terms of accommodation.
"Bear this message," said Charles, "to the sultan of Nocera, that God and the sword are umpire between us; and that he shall either send me to paradise, or I will send him to the pit of hell."
The armies met: and though I am ignorant of Mainfroy's doom in the other world, in this he lost his friends, his kingdom, and his life, in the bloody battle of Benevento. Naples and Sicily were immediately peopled with a warlike race of French nobles; and their aspiring leader embraced the future conquest of Africa, Greece, and Palestine. The most specious reasons might point his first arms against the Byzantine empire; and Palaeologus, diffident of his own strength, repeatedly appealed from the ambition of Charles to the humanity of St. Louis, who still preserved a just ascendant over the mind of his ferocious brother. For a while the attention of that brother was confined at home by the invasion of Conradin, the last heir to the imperial house of Swabia; but the hapless boy sunk in the unequal conflict; and his execution on a public scaffold taught the rivals of Charles to tremble for their heads as well as their dominions. A second respite was obtained by the last crusade of St. Louis to the African coast; and the double motive of interest and duty urged the king of Naples to assist, with his powers and his presence, the holy enterprise. Threatens the Greek empire, A.D. 1270 etc. The death of St. Louis released him from the importunity of a virtuous censor: the king of Tunis confessed himself the tributary and vassal of the crown of Sicily; and the boldest of the French knights were free to enlist under his banner against the Greek empire. A treaty and a marriage united his interest with the house of Courtenay; his daughter Beatrice was promised to Philip, son and heir of the emperor Baldwin; a pension of six hundred ounces of gold was allowed for his maintenance; and his generous father distributed among his aliens the kingdoms and provinces of the East, reserving only Constantinople, and one day's journey round the city for the imperial domain. (38) In this perilous moment, Palaeologus was the most eager to subscribe the creed, and implore the protection, of the Roman pontiff, who assumed, with propriety and weight, the character of an angel of peace, the common father of the Christians. By his voice, the sword of Charles was chained in the scabbard; and the Greek ambassadors beheld him, in the pope's antechamber, biting his ivory sceptre in a transport of fury, and deeply resenting the refusal to enfranchise and consecrate his arms. He appears to have respected the disinterested mediation of Gregory the Tenth; but Charles was insensibly disgusted by the pride and partiality of Nicholas the Third; and his attachment to his kindred, the Ursini family, alienated the most strenuous champion from the service of the church. The hostile league against the Greeks, of Philip the Latin emperor, the king of the Two Sicilies, and the republic of Venice, was ripened into execution; and the election of Martin the Fourth, a French pope, gave a sanction to the cause. Of the allies, Philip supplied his name; Martin, a bull of excommunication; the Venetians, a squadron of forty galleys; and the formidable powers of Charles consisted of forty counts, ten thousand men at arms, a numerous body of infantry, and a fleet of more than three hundred ships and transports. A distant day was appointed for assembling this mighty force in the harbour of Brindisi; and a previous attempt was risked with a detachment of three hundred knights, who invaded Albania, and besieged the fortress of Belgrade. Their defeat might amuse with a triumph the vanity of Constantinople; but the more sagacious Michael, despairing of his arms, depended on the effects of a conspiracy; on the secret workings of a rat, who gnawed the bowstring (39) of the Sicilian tyrant.
Palaeologus instigates the revolt of Sicily, A.D. 1280.
Among the proscribed adherents of the house of Swabia, John
of Procida forfeited a small island of that name in the Bay
of Naples. His birth was noble, but his education was
learned; and in the poverty of exile, he was relieved by the
practice of physic, which he had studied in the school of
Salerno. Fortune had left him nothing to lose, except life;
and to despise life is the first qualification of a rebel.
Procida was endowed with the art of negotiation, to enforce
his reasons and disguise his motives; and in his various
transactions with nations and men, he could persuade each
party that he labored solely for their interest. The new
kingdoms of Charles were afflicted by every species of
fiscal and military oppression; (40) and the lives and
fortunes of his Italian subjects were sacrificed to the
greatness of their master and the licentiousness of his
followers. The hatred of Naples was repressed by his
presence; but the looser government of his vicegerents
excited the contempt, as well as the aversion, of the
Sicilians: the island was roused to a sense of freedom by
the eloquence of Procida; and he displayed to every baron
his private interest in the common cause. In the confidence
of foreign aid, he successively visited the courts of the
Greek emperor, and of Peter king of Arragon, (41) who
possessed the maritime countries of Valentia and Catalonia.
To the ambitious Peter a crown was presented, which he might
justly claim by his marriage with the sister of Mainfroy,
and by the dying voice of Conradin, who from the scaffold
had cast a ring to his heir and avenger. Palaeologus was
easily persuaded to divert his enemy from a foreign war by a
rebellion at home; and a Greek subsidy of twenty-five
thousand ounces of gold was most profitably applied to arm a
Catalan fleet, which sailed under a holy banner to the
specious attack of the Saracens of Africa. In the disguise
of a monk or beggar, the indefatigable missionary of revolt
flew from Constantinople to Rome, and from Sicily to
Saragossa: the treaty was sealed with the signet of Pope
Nicholas himself, the enemy of Charles; and his deed of gift
transferred the fiefs of St. Peter from the house of Anjou
to that of Arragon. So widely diffused and so freely
circulated, the secret was preserved above two years with
impenetrable discretion; and each of the conspirators
imbibed the maxim of Peter, who declared that he would cut
off his left hand if it were conscious of the intentions of
his right. The mine was prepared with deep and dangerous
artifice; but it may be questioned, whether the instant
explosion of Palermo were the effect of accident or design.
The Sicilian Vespers. A.D. 1282, March 30.
On the vigil of Easter, a procession of the disarmed
citizens visited a church without the walls; and a noble
damsel was rudely insulted by a French soldier. (42) The
ravisher was instantly punished with death; and if the
people was at first scattered by a military force, their
numbers and fury prevailed: the conspirators seized the
opportunity; the flame spread over the island; and eight
thousand French were exterminated in a promiscuous massacre,
which has obtained the name of the SICILIAN VESPERS. (43) From every city the banners of freedom and the church were
displayed: the revolt was inspired by the presence or the
soul of Procida and Peter of Arragon, who sailed from the
African coast to Palermo, was saluted as the king and saviour
of the isle. By the rebellion of a people on whom he had so
long trampled with impunity, Charles was astonished and
confounded; and in the first agony of grief and devotion, he
was heard to exclaim, "O God! if thou hast decreed to humble
me, grant me at least a gentle and gradual descent from the
pinnacle of greatness!" His fleet and army, which already
filled the seaports of Italy, were hastily recalled from the
service of the Grecian war; and the situation of Messina
exposed that town to the first storm of his revenge. Feeble
in themselves, and yet hopeless of foreign succour, the
citizens would have repented, and submitted on the assurance
of full pardon and their ancient privileges. But the pride
of the monarch was already rekindled; and the most fervent
entreaties of the legate could extort no more than a
promise, that he would forgive the remainder, after a chosen
list of eight hundred rebels had been yielded to his
discretion. The despair of the Messinese renewed their
courage: Peter of Arragon approached to their relief; (44)
and his rival was driven back by the failure of provision
and the terrors of the equinox to the Calabrian shore. Defeat of Charles, October 2. At the same moment, the Catalan admiral, the famous Roger de
Loria, swept the channel with an invincible squadron: the
French fleet, more numerous in transports than in galleys,
was either burnt or destroyed; and the same blow assured the
independence of Sicily and the safety of the Greek empire.
A few days before his death, the emperor Michael rejoiced in
the fall of an enemy whom he hated and esteemed; and perhaps
he might be content with the popular judgment, that had they
not been matched with each other, Constantinople and Italy
must speedily have obeyed the same master. (45) From this
disastrous moment, the life of Charles was a series of
misfortunes: his capital was insulted, his son was made
prisoner, and he sunk into the grave without recovering the
Isle of Sicily, which, after a war of twenty years, was
finally severed from the throne of Naples, and transferred,
as an independent kingdom, to a younger branch of the house
of Arragon. (46)
The service and war of the Catalans in the Greek empire, A.D.1303-1307.
I shall not, I trust, be accused of superstition; but I must
remark that, even in this world, the natural order of events
will sometimes afford the strong appearances of moral
retribution. The first Palaeologus had saved his empire by
involving the kingdoms of the West in rebellion and blood;
and from these scenes of discord uprose a generation of iron
men, who assaulted and endangered the empire of his son. In
modern times our debts and taxes are the secret poison which
still corrodes the bosom of peace: but in the weak and
disorderly government of the middle ages, it was agitated by
the present evil of the disbanded armies. Too idle to work,
too proud to beg, the mercenaries were accustomed to a life
of rapine: they could rob with more dignity and effect under
a banner and a chief; and the sovereign, to whom their
service was useless, and their presence importunate,
endeavoured to discharge the torrent on some neighbouring
countries. After the peace of Sicily, many thousands of
Genoese, Catalans, (47) etc., who had fought, by sea and land, under the standard of Anjou or Arragon, were blended into
one nation by the resemblance of their manners and interest.
They heard that the Greek provinces of Asia were invaded by
the Turks: they resolved to share the harvest of pay and
plunder: and Frederic king of Sicily most liberally
contributed the means of their departure. In a warfare of
twenty years, a ship, or a camp, was become their country;
arms were their sole profession and property; valour was the
only virtue which they knew; their women had imbibed the
fearless temper of their lovers and husbands: it was
reported, that, with a stroke of their broadsword, the
Catalans could cleave a horseman and a horse; and the report
itself was a powerful weapon. Roger de Flor was the most
popular of their chiefs; and his personal merit overshadowed
the dignity of his prouder rivals of Arragon. The offspring
of a marriage between a German gentleman of the court of
Frederic the Second and a damsel of Brindisi, Roger was
successively a templar, an apostate, a pirate, and at length
the richest and most powerful admiral of the Mediterranean.
He sailed from Messina to Constantinople, with eighteen
galleys, four great ships, and eight thousand adventurers;
and his previous treaty was faithfully accomplished by Andronicus the elder, who accepted with joy and terror this formidable succour. A palace was allotted for his reception,
and a niece of the emperor was given in marriage to the
valiant stranger, who was immediately created great duke or
admiral of Romania. After a decent repose, he transported
his troops over the Propontis, and boldly led them against
the Turks: in two bloody battles thirty thousand of the
Moslems were slain: he raised the siege of Philadelphia, and
deserved the name of the deliverer of Asia. But after a
short season of prosperity, the cloud of slavery and ruin
again burst on that unhappy province. The inhabitants
escaped (says a Greek historian) from the smoke into the
flames; and the hostility of the Turks was less pernicious
than the friendship of the Catalans. The lives and
fortunes which they had rescued they considered as their
own: the willing or reluctant maid was saved from the race
of circumcision for the embraces of a Christian soldier: the
exaction of fines and supplies was enforced by licentious
rapine and arbitrary executions; and, on the resistance of
Magnesia, the great duke besieged a city of the Roman
empire. (48) These disorders he excused by the wrongs and passions of a victorious army; nor would his own authority
or person have been safe, had he dared to punish his
faithful followers, who were defrauded of the just and
covenanted price of their services. The threats and
complaints of Andronicus disclosed the nakedness of the
empire. His golden bull had invited no more than five
hundred horse and a thousand foot soldiers; yet the crowds
of volunteers, who migrated to the East, had been enlisted
and fed by his spontaneous bounty. While his bravest allies
were content with three byzants or pieces of gold, for their
monthly pay, an ounce, or even two ounces, of gold were
assigned to the Catalans, whose annual pension would thus
amount to near a hundred pounds sterling: one of their
chiefs had modestly rated at three hundred thousand crowns
the value of his future merits; and above a million had been
issued from the treasury for the maintenance of these costly
mercenaries. A cruel tax had been imposed on the corn of
the husbandman: one third was retrenched from the salaries
of the public officers; and the standard of the coin was so
shamefully debased, that of the four-and-twenty parts only
five were of pure gold. (49) At the summons of the emperor,
Roger evacuated a province which no longer supplied the
materials of rapine; but he refused to disperse his troops; and while his style was respectful, his conduct was independent and hostile. He protested, that if the emperor
should march against him, he would advance forty paces to
kiss the ground before him; but in rising from this
prostrate attitude Roger had a life and sword at the service
of his friends. The great duke of Romania condescended to
accept the title and ornaments of Caesar; but he rejected
the new proposal of the government of Asia with a subsidy of
corn and money, on condition that he should reduce his troops to the harmless number of three thousand men. Assassination is the last resource of cowards. The Caesar was tempted to visit the royal residence of Adrianople; in
the apartment, and before the eyes, of the empress he was
stabbed by the Alani guards; and though the deed was imputed
to their private revenge, his countrymen, who dwelt at
Constantinople in the security of peace, were involved in
the same proscription by the prince or people. The loss of
their leader intimidated the crowd of adventurers, who
hoisted the sails of flight, and were soon scattered round
the coasts of the Mediterranean. But a veteran band of
fifteen hundred Catalans, or French, stood firm in the
strong fortress of Gallipoli on the Hellespont, displayed
the banners of Arragon, and offered to revenge and justify
their chief, by an equal combat of ten or a hundred
warriors. Instead of accepting this bold defiance, the
emperor Michael, the son and colleague of Andronicus,
resolved to oppress them with the weight of multitudes:
every nerve was strained to form an army of thirteen
thousand horse and thirty thousand foot; and the Propontis
was covered with the ships of the Greeks and Genoese. In
two battles by sea and land, these mighty forces were
encountered and overthrown by the despair and discipline of
the Catalans: the young emperor fled to the palace; and an
insufficient guard of light-horse was left for the
protection of the open country. Victory renewed the hopes
and numbers of the adventures: every nation was blended
under the name and standard of the great company; and three
thousand Turkish proselytes deserted from the Imperial
service to join this military association. In the
possession of Gallipoli, the Catalans intercepted the trade
of Constantinople and the Black Sea, while they spread their
devastation on either side of the Hellespont over the
confines of Europe and Asia. To prevent their approach, the
greatest part of the Byzantine territory was laid waste by
the Greeks themselves: the peasants and their cattle retired
into the city; and myriads of sheep and oxen, for which
neither place nor food could be procured, were unprofitably
slaughtered on the same day. Four times the emperor
Andronicus sued for peace, and four times he was inflexibly
repulsed, till the want of provisions, and the discord of
the chiefs, compelled the Catalans to evacuate the banks of
the Hellespont and the neighbourhood of the capital. After
their separation from the Turks, the remains of the great
company pursued their march through Macedonia and Thessaly,
to seek a new establishment in the heart of Greece. (50)
Revolutions of Athens. A.D. 1204-1456.
After some ages of oblivion, Greece was awakened to new
misfortunes by the arms of the Latins. In the two hundred
and fifty years between the first and the last conquest of
Constantinople, that venerable land was disputed by a
multitude of petty tyrants; without the comforts of freedom
and genius, her ancient cities were again plunged in foreign
and intestine war; and, if servitude be preferable to
anarchy, they might repose with joy under the Turkish yoke.
I shall not pursue the obscure and various dynasties, that
rose and fell on the continent or in the isles; but our
silence on the fate of ATHENS (51) would argue a strange
ingratitude to the first and purest school of liberal
science and amusement. In the partition of the empire, the
principality of Athens and Thebes was assigned to Otho de la
Roche, a noble warrior of Burgundy, (52) with the title of
great duke, (53) which the Latins understood in their own
sense, and the Greeks more foolishly derived from the age of
Constantine. (54) Otho followed the standard of the marquis
of Montferrat: the ample state which he acquired by a
miracle of conduct or fortune, (55) was peaceably inherited
by his son and two grandsons, till the family, though not
the nation, was changed, by the marriage of an heiress into
the elder branch of the house of Brienne. The son of that
marriage, Walter de Brienne, succeeded to the duchy of
Athens; and, with the aid of some Catalan mercenaries, whom
he invested with fiefs, reduced above thirty castles of the
vassal or neighbouring lords. But when he was informed of
the approach and ambition of the great company, he collected
a force of seven hundred knights, six thousand four hundred
horse, and eight thousand foot, and boldly met them on the
banks of the River Cephisus in Boeotia. The Catalans
amounted to no more than three thousand five hundred horse,
and four thousand foot; but the deficiency of numbers was
compensated by stratagem and order. They formed round their
camp an artificial inundation; the duke and his knights
advanced without fear or precaution on the verdant meadow;
their horses plunged into the bog; and he was cut in pieces,
with the greatest part of the French cavalry. His family
and nation were expelled; and his son Walter de Brienne, the
titular duke of Athens, the tyrant of Florence, and the
constable of France, lost his life in the field of Poitiers
Attica and Boeotia were the rewards of the victorious
Catalans; they married the widows and daughters of the
slain; and during fourteen years, the great company was the
terror of the Grecian states. Their factions drove them to
acknowledge the sovereignty of the house of Arragon; and
during the remainder of the fourteenth century, Athens, as a
government or an appanage, was successively bestowed by the
kings of Sicily. After the French and Catalans, the third
dynasty was that of the Accaioli, a family, plebeian at
Florence, potent at Naples, and sovereign in Greece.
Athens, which they embellished with new buildings, became
the capital of a state, that extended over Thebes, Argos,
Corinth, Delphi, and a part of Thessaly; and their reign was
finally determined by Mahomet the Second, who strangled the
last duke, and educated his sons in the discipline and
religion of the seraglio.
Present state of Athens.
Athens, (56) though no more than the shadow of her former
self, still contains about eight or ten thousand
inhabitants; of these, three fourths are Greeks in religion
and language; and the Turks, who compose the remainder, have
relaxed, in their intercourse with the citizens, somewhat of
the pride and gravity of their national character. The
olive-tree, the gift of Minerva, flourishes in Attica; nor
has the honey of Mount Hymettus lost any part of its
exquisite flavour: (57) but the languid trade is monopolized
by strangers, and the agriculture of a barren land is
abandoned to the vagrant Walachians. The Athenians are
still distinguished by the subtlety and acuteness of their
understandings; but these qualities, unless ennobled by
freedom, and enlightened by study, will degenerate into a
low and selfish cunning: and it is a proverbial saying of
the country, "From the Jews of Thessalonica, the Turks of
Negropont, and the Greeks of Athens, good Lord deliver us!"
This artful people has eluded the tyranny of the Turkish
bashaws, by an expedient which alleviates their servitude
and aggravates their shame. About the middle of the last
century, the Athenians chose for their protector the Kislar
Aga, or chief black eunuch of the seraglio. This Aethiopian
slave, who possesses the sultan's ear, condescends to accept
the tribute of thirty thousand crowns: his lieutenant, the
Waywode, whom he annually confirms, may reserve for his own
about five or six thousand more; and such is the policy of
the citizens, that they seldom fail to remove and punish an
oppressive governor. Their private differences are decided
by the archbishop, one of the richest prelates of the Greek
church, since he possesses a revenue of one thousand pounds
sterling; and by a tribunal of the eight geronti or elders,
chosen in the eight quarters of the city: the noble families
cannot trace their pedigree above three hundred years; but
their principal members are distinguished by a grave
demeanour, a fur cap, and the lofty appellation of archon.
By some, who delight in the contrast, the modern language of
Athens is represented as the most corrupt and barbarous of
the seventy dialects of the vulgar Greek: (58) this picture
is too darkly coloured: but it would not be easy, in the
country of Plato and Demosthenes, to find a reader or a copy
of their works. The Athenians walk with supine indifference
among the glorious ruins of antiquity; and such is the
debasement of their character, that they are incapable of
admiring the genius of their predecessors. (59)
| « NEXT » | « Fall In The East » | « Fall In The West » | « Comments on the Fall » | « Decline and Fall » |