The Project Gutenberg eBook of Destruction Of The Greek Empire, by Edwin Pears

168 Mr. D. G. Hogarth in The Nearer East (London, 1902), on pp. 280–1, speaks of the country as a ‘Debateable Land distracted internally by a ceaseless war of influences, and only too anxious to lean in one part or another on external aid.’... ‘Macedonia has been torn this way and that for half a century.’ The whole chapter on ‘World Relation’ is valuable and suggestive. The same diversity of interests and hostility arising from differences in race and religion is well brought out in the best recent book on Turkey in Europe, by Odysseus.

169 The Turkish system of occupying conquered territories by military colonies and driving away the original inhabitants excited great opposition among the Serbians and led, says Von Ranke, to the struggle which ended in 1389 on the plains of Cossovo. (History of Serbia, Bohn’s edition, p. 16.)

170 Cantacuzenus, iv. 8.

171 The tradition of its destructiveness even in England, which it reached in 1348, and the panic-struck words of the Statutes which followed it, have, says J. R. Green, ‘been more than justified by modern researches. Of the three or four millions who then formed the population of England more than half were swept away by its repeated visitations’ (Green’s Short History of the English People), p. 241.

172 According to one contemporary writer, Murad had to relinquish the siege of Constantinople in 1422 on account of the appearance of plague in his army (Historia Epirotica). Mahomet the Second, however, according to Critobulus, attributed the necessity of raising the siege to hostility within his own family, doubtless alluding to the rising already mentioned in Asia Minor. He says, in substance, ‘The city was almost in the hands of my father, and he would certainly have taken it by assault, if those of his own family in whom he had confidence had not worked secretly against him.’ Crit. xxv.

173 Travels and Researches in Asia Minor, by Sir Charles Fellows. Professor Ramsay has also the same story to tell, though his own success in identifying lost cities has been exceptionally great.

174 La Brocquière, 340–7.

176 Compare this with Villehardouin’s statement that in 1204 Constantinople had ten times as many people as there were in Paris.

178 Another version says from 30,000 to 36,000 men.

179 P. 23. The ‘not more’ is from the edition of Dethier, p. 896. The version published in the Chronique de Charles VII gives 25,000 to 30,000 armed men. Dethier’s omits ‘armed.’

180 The Superior of the Franciscans says that 3,000 were killed on May 29 (Dethier’s Documents relating to the Siege, p. 940).

181 Bikelas, La Grèce Byzantine et Moderne, p. 153. His essays express this opinion in many other places.

182 ‘Les schismes sont chez eux [the Greeks] la conséquence du même esprit de tous les temps; c’est la théologie soumise au contrôle de l’intelligence pure, le dogme éprouvé par le mécanisme de leur logique brillante et rapide. Ces discussions théologiques, appliquées uniquement à la recherche de l’essence divine, à l’explication du fait divin, du mystère, prennent chez eux un caractère exclusivement scientifique.’ Montreuil, Histoire du droit byzantin, i. 418.

183 Krumbacher, Geschichte der Byzantinischen Litteratur, p. 219, says: ‘Kein Volk, die Chinesen vielleicht ausgenommen, besitzt eine so reiche historische Litteratur wie die Griechen. In ununterbrochener Reihenfolge geht die Überlieferung von Herodot bis auf Laonikos Chalkondylas. Die Griechen und Byzantiner haben die Chronik des Ostens über zwei Jahrtausende mit gewissenhafter Treue fortgeführt.’

184 Rambaud, L’empire de Grèce, p. 367. Bikelas and Finlay make the same comparison.

185 Constantine is usually called the Eleventh. Gibbon, however, counts the son of Romanus the First as Constantine the Eighth, and thus makes the last Emperor Constantine the Twelfth. He is often spoken of as Constantine Dragases, because his mother, Irene, belonged to a family of that name. She was a South Serbian princess.

186 Phrantzes, p. 205, represents Constantine as crowned. Apparently this ceremony was not regarded as a definite coronation, and hence Ducas calls John the last Emperor.

187 Constantine’s wife, Catherine Catalusio, died in 1442, after being married about ten months.

189 As they were opposed in philosophy, so also were they on the great question before these Councils. Pletho insisted that the Union should be effected by the submission of the Greek Church to the Latin formula, while Scholarius endeavoured to frame a form of words which could be accepted by both parties. Had his advice been acted upon, it is possible that he and his companions would on their return to the capital have been able to persuade their countrymen to accept the Union in sincerity. For the life and writings of George Scholarius, afterwards the Patriarch Gennadius, see Krumbacher’s Geschichte des Byzantinischen Litteratur, p. 119, and works there quoted.

190 The MS. of Critobulus was found in the Seraglio Library about thirty-five years ago by Dr. Dethier. It was published by Karl Müller with excellent notes. Dr. Dethier also prepared an edition with notes and documents relating to the siege, which were printed by the Academy of Buda-Pest but never published. Through the courtesy of the Council and of Dr. Arminius Vambéry I have been presented with copies. They are especially valuable for their topographical criticisms.

191 Lonicerus, p. 22.

192 M. Léon Cahun, in his introduction to the History of the Turks and Mongols, says: ‘L’Islamisme est une règle qu’on respecte et qu’on défend, mais qu’on ne se permettrait pas de discuter. Les Turcs ont toujours été trop inaccessibles au sentiment religieux pour jamais devenir hérétiques; ils sont les derniers des hommes capables de comprendre Oportet haereses esse. Ils ne demandent pas mieux que de croire, mais ils ne tiennent pas du tout à comprendre.’

193 Phrantzes, i. 30.

194 Von Hammer, note iii. p. 429.

195 Ducas, p. 129; Chalcondylas says, ‘Peremit, cum, aqua infusa, spiritum ejus interclusisset;’ Montaldo, ‘fratre obtruncato.’

196 Von Hammer, iii. 68.

197 Zorzo Dolfin, p. 986.

198 Orchan was the Turkish member of the house of Othman who still remained in Constantinople and was either the son or grandson of Suliman, brother of Mahomet I.

199 Chal. vii.; Ducas, xxxiv.

202 Crit. viii. The account given by Ducas represents the reply of the sultan as much more brutal. He dismissed the ambassadors with the remark that he would not have the question reopened; he was within his rights, and if they returned he would have them flayed alive.

203 Phrantzes, p. 233; Ducas, xxxiv.; Crit. ix.

204 Critobulus gives the width at seven stadia. It is really half a nautical mile. Probably it is unwise to suppose that Critobulus had any means of measuring it with any degree of accuracy, or the distance given by him would be very valuable as indicating what contemporary writers meant by a stadium. It is important, however, in reference to other statements of distance given by Critobulus which will be noted later.

206 Phrantzes, 234, and Barbaro, p. 2. Barbaro was a Venetian ship’s doctor who was in the city before and during the siege and who kept a diary which is simply invaluable, though for the part written day by day, internal evidence shows that it was subsequently revised after the siege. It was published in 1856.

207 The speech of Mahomet, of which I have given the substance, can of course only be taken as a reproduction of what Critobulus had heard or possibly of what an intelligent writer who knew the Turks well thought it probable Mahomet would say. As such it is valuable. It is of course formed by Critobulus, following the example of the Greek Byzantine historians generally, on the model of those given by Thucydides and other classical authors.

210 Barb., and Crit. ch. xxv.

211 La Brocquière says this foss, on his visit, was two hundred paces long.

212 Barbaro says that the emperor employed an Italian to place the boom in position.

213 The present Tower of Galata was called the Tower of Christ. See Paspates, Meletai, p. 180.

214 Barb. p. 25. Tetaldi states that there were nine galleys and thirty other ships (p. 25). The fact that the Turks soon found that it was impossible to take possession of the chain or to drive away the defending fleet tends to show that the Greek fleet was respectable in number of ships. On the other hand, when it became of extreme importance to send ships outside the chain to aid ships from Genoa coming to the relief of the city, the fact that none were sent out is evidence to show that no ships could be spared from the defence of the chain or that no sufficient number of galleys, triremes, or other vessels independent of wind for propulsion were at hand to take the offensive. There were probably many smaller merchant ships and boats of which no account was taken.

215 The elder Mordtmann makes the suggestion that the Bashi-Bazouks are in this estimate excluded, and I agree with him. The same remark applies also to Philelphus who gives 60,000 foot and 20,000 horse. Other writers include all those who were present with Mahomet and thus make the number of the besiegers very much higher. Ducas’s estimate is 250,000; Montaldo’s, 240,000 (of whom 30,000 were cavalry, ch. xxvii.). Phrantzes states that 258,000 were present; Leonard the archbishop, with whom Critobulus and Thysellius agree, gives 300,000 men, while Chalcondylas increases this to 400,000.

216 Tetaldi’s Information de la prinse de Constantinoble, p. 21.

217 Leonard and others say 15,000, but the smaller estimate is in accord with many Turkish statements that the number of Janissaries was, until the time of Suliman, limited to 12,000.

218 The connection between the Dervish order of Bektashis and the Janissaries endured as long as the Janissaries themselves, and when the latter were massacred, in June 1826, with the cry of ‘Hadji Bektash’ on their lips, the order of Bektashis was also suppressed. Etat militaire Ottoman, par Djavid Bey (Constantinople, 1881), and Walsh’s Two Years in Constantinople (1828).

220 Permission to marry was not granted to Janissaries till the time of Suliman, a century later.

221 When, contemporaneously with the murder of the Janissaries in 1826, the Order of Bektashis was suppressed, Sultan Mahmoud assigned as a reason that jars of wine were found in the cellars of their convents stoppered with leaves of the Koran. The statement was probably false, but was intended to create the worst possible impression against the Bektashis.

222 Early Travels in Palestine, p. 365. La Brocquière made a careful study of the Turkish methods of fighting and of how they might be defeated by a combination of European troops among which he would have placed from England a thousand men at arms and ten thousand archers. As his visit was in 1433, it is not improbable that Agincourt was in his mind.

223 The Turks have rarely failed in obtaining able European soldiers. Moltke was in the Turkish service. The first Napoleon narrowly escaped taking a like service. (See Von Hammer.) More recently they have had in General Von der Golz one of the ablest German soldiers.

224 Dethier suggests that the casting of the largest gun was done at Rhegium, the present Chemejie, about twelve miles from Constantinople, and that the transport spoken of by Ducas was either of smaller ones or of the brass required for the large one (p. 991; Dethier’s notes on Z. Dolfin).

225 Phrantzes, p. 237, gives the arrival on April 2.

226 Critobulus, xxix., gives the description of the construction of a cannon the barrel of which was forty spans or twenty-six feet eight inches long. The bronze of which it was cast was eight inches in thickness in the barrel. Throughout half the length its bore was of a diameter of thirty inches. Throughout the other half, which contained powder, the bore was only one third of that width. The σπιθαμὴ or palmus or span was in the Middle Ages, says Du Cange, eight inches long. Two stone balls still existing at Top-Hana (that is, the Cannon Khan) are forty-six inches in diameter. These would answer the description of Tetaldi, that the ball reached to his waist. A great Turkish cannon which is now in the Artillery Museum at Woolwich weighs about nineteen tons. It was cast fifteen years after the siege of Constantinople and is an excellent specimen of the great cannon of the period (Artillery; its Progress and Present Stage, by Commander Lloyd and A. G. Hadcock, R.E., p. 19).

229 Barbaro gives the arrival on April 12. Dr. Dethier maintains that Diplokionion was at Cabatash and that subsequently to the Conquest the people and the name were transferred to Beshiktash. Barbaro says it was two Italian miles, equal to one and a third English mile, from the city, which is in accord with Dethier’s view, but in presence of Bondelmonti’s map, drawn in 1422 and given in Banduri, showing the Two Columns, and of other evidence, it is difficult to credit Dethier’s statement.

230 Phrantzes, p. 241; Ducas gives the total number as 300, Leonard as 250, Critobulus as 350. The independent accounts of two men who had been at sea, like the French soldier Tetaldi and the Venetian Barbaro, are not far apart. The first says there were 16 to 18 galleys, the second 12. The estimate of the long boats is 60 to 80 by Tetaldi, as against 70 to 80 by Barbaro; while the transport barges or parandaria are described by one as from 16 to 20, by the other as from 20 to 25. Chalcondylas (p. 158) states that 30 triremes and 200 smaller vessels arrived from Gallipoli. Leonard says that there were 6 triremes and 10 biremes.

231 The following illustration shows the arrangement of the boats.

arrangement of the boats

A.A.A.A. represent four rowlock ports, through each of which three oars pass, in the case of a trireme, pulled by three men on the seat marked with circles. It will be noticed that the second man sits a little forward of the first, and the third of the second.

232 Ancient Ships, by Mr. Cecil Torr.

233 I have been indebted to Yule’s valuable notes on Marco Polo for his researches on the construction of ships. Unfortunately, Mr. Cecil Torr’s monograph on Ancient Ships (Cambridge, 1896) does not bring their history so late down as the fifteenth century. For the period of which it treats it is simply perfect.

235 As may be seen from the note in the Appendix on the position of the St. Romanus Gate, I believe that when Top Capou, which beyond doubt had been known as the Gate of Saint Romanus, was closed, the Pempton was generally spoken of as the St. Romanus Gate. The Italians, who had the largest share in the defence in the Lycus valley, probably ignorant of any name for the Military Gate which led from the city into the peribolos, called it by the name of the nearest Civil Gate. Hence I propose to speak of the Pempton as the Romanus Gate and of the Civil Gate crowning the seventh hill by its present Turkish name of Top Capou—that is, Cannon Gate—a name which it probably acquired by a reversal of the process which had led the Italians to speak of the Pempton as St. Romanus.

238 The Greek πέρα = trans, over or beyond.

239 It is usually stated that Stamboul or Istamboul is a corruption of εἰς τὴν πόλιν, though Dr. Koelle disputes this derivation and considers that it is a mere shortening of the name Constantinople by the Turks, analogous to Skender or Iskender from Alexander. Koelle’s Tartar and Turk.

240 In 1204 the Venetians and Crusaders under Dandolo and Monferrat entered the city by capturing the western portion of the walls on the side of the Horn.

241 The position of the walls and gates is fully and admirably described in Professor Van Millingen’s Byzantine Constantinople, who, however, does not suggest that the Pempton was the Romanus Gate of the chroniclers of the siege.

242 This was destroyed in the time of Suliman and replaced by a mosque which is called after his daughter Miramah, though the Greeks were allowed to build a church of St. George almost alongside it.

243 Dr. Mordtmann is my authority for this statement. See note in the Appendix on the position of the Romanus Gate.

244 Paspates claims that there was always water in the foss during a siege, though it was of no great depth. See p. 42 of his Παλιορκία τῆς Κωνσταντινουπόλεως. It is remarkable, however, that no mention is made of water by the contemporary writers on the last siege.

245 Byzantine Constantinople, p. 86.

246 Barbaro describes it as the place ‘dove che sun la più debel porta de tuta la tera,’ p. 21. The weakest gate he calls ‘San Romano.’

247 Quite a considerable number of towers in the Outer Wall bear inscriptions showing that they were repaired after the Turkish siege of 1422.

249 ‘Antemurale solum urbis vallumque sat videbatur tutari posse,’ p. 93. ‘Operosa autem protegendi vallum et antemurale nostris fuit cura,’ p. 95.

250 Dethier argues that it was not. The Italians who were present in the city complain that the Greeks showed a want of patriotism in not being ready to give all their wealth for the defence of the empire. But the complaint is supported by very slight evidence. The Superior of the Franciscans (Dethier’s Siege of Constantinople, p. 490) says that the city was lost through the avarice of the Greeks, because they would not consent to pay its defenders. He instances the case of a woman who had jewels and money of the value of 150,000 ducats, and of a man whose wealth in moveables amounted to 80,000 ducats. Jagarus and Neophytus, who are mentioned by Leonard, had been charged with the repairs of the walls, for which money had been given them, but, according to him, had misappropriated it. When the city was captured, 70,000 gold pieces were discovered by the Turks. But it is noteworthy that Phrantzes, who was in a better condition to know the truth in such a matter, has nothing but praise for Jagarus (p. 225). The statement of Leonard regarding them is examined by Dethier, who suggests that the sentence regarding the finding of the coin is due to the incorporation of a marginal note. Zorzo Dolfin, whose narrative is largely copied from Leonard, gives a somewhat different version.

As stated on the preceding page, the inscriptions on the Outer Wall still show that many towers had been repaired in the interval between Murad’s siege and that of Mahomet, and two inscriptions at least, which may perhaps be taken as intended to apply to all the towers so repaired, bear the name of Jagarus himself. (Professor Van Millingen, p. 108, and Dethier’s notes on Leonard, 593–5.)

251 Riccherio (often quoted as Sansovino, who was the editor of Riccherio and has written a bright account of the conquest) says, ‘La speranza della difesa era tutta nel antimuro.’ (Dethier’s Siege, p. 955.)

252 Chalcondylas, p. 95, Ven. edition.

254 Crit. xxviii., and Barbaro.

256 See Note in Appendix claiming that during the siege the Pempton was usually called the Gate of St. Romanus.

257 Pusculus also gives these three places, but with the difference that he mistakes the Second Military Gate for the Third.

261 παρὰ τὰ πλάγια.

262 See Prof. Van Millingen, 85–92. Barbaro states that the cannon were stationed at four places: opposite the Pegè Gate, by which he means the Third Military Gate (Triton); opposite the Palace, by which he probably means in the angle now occupied by the Greek cemetery opposite the Palace of Porphyrogenitus or Tekfour Serai; opposite the Cresu Gate, probably the Chariseus or Adrianople Gate, and opposite the Romanus Gate. Philelphus also mentions the Pegè Gate as one of the chief places of attack (ii. 809).

263 Pusculus gives fourteen palms as the circumference; Phrantzes and Critobulus, twelve; while Barbaro gives thirteen to fourteen.

264 P. 241, κοσμικούς τε καὶ μοναχούς.

265 See ante, p. 193.

267 ὅπου καὶ ἐν ἐκείνοις τοῖς μέρεσιν ἡ πόλις ἦν ἐπικίνδυνος. Phrantzes, p. 253.

268 P. 1013. The locus arduus of the Myriandrion is the highest site of the city walls. Professor Van Millingen makes it identical with the Mesoteichion (p. 85), but Critobulus distinguishes between the two places (ch. xxvi.).

269 Leonard; but Phrantzes says, p. 253, that Manuel, a Genoese, was in command at the Golden Gate.

270 See Professor Van Millingen as to position of this gate, pp. 230–234. There were probably two Imperial Gates on the Golden Horn.

271 According to Pusculus, Trevisano was from the first at Aivan Serai, the extreme west of the walls on the Horn and close to the Xyloporta.

273 Phrantzes states that the reserve was under Cantacuzenus and Nicephorus Palaeologus, and that the Grand Duke was in charge of the region from the Petrion to the Gate of St. Theodosia.

274 Leonard’s account hardly varies from that of Phrantzes and others, except that, with his strong religious prejudices, he prefers to name foreigners rather than Greeks. The distributions of the defenders of the city given by Zorzi Dolfin and Pusculus do vary, however, from those given by Phrantzes and Barbaro. These differences are set out in Dr. Mordtman’s Esquisse Topographique, p. 23. See also Krause’s Eroberungen von Constantinopel, p. 169.