40 (return)
[ There were two Dibras,
the upper and lower, the Bulgarian and Albanian: the former, 70 miles from
Croya, (l. i. p. 17,) was contiguous to the fortress of Sfetigrade, whose
inhabitants refused to drink from a well into which a dead dog had
traitorously been cast, (l. v. p. 139, 140.) We want a good map of
Epirus.]
41 (return)
[ Compare the Turkish
narrative of Cantemir (p. 92) with the pompous and prolix declamation in
the ivth, vth, and vith books of the Albanian priest, who has been copied
by the tribe of strangers and moderns.]
42 (return)
[ In honor of his hero,
Barletius (l. vi. p. 188—192) kills the sultan by disease indeed,
under the walls of Croya. But this audacious fiction is disproved by the
Greeks and Turks, who agree in the time and manner of Amurath's death at
Adrianople.]
43 (return)
[ See the marvels of his
Calabrian expedition in the ixth and xth books of Marinus Barletius, which
may be rectified by the testimony or silence of Muratori, (Annali
d'Italia, tom. xiii. p. 291,) and his original authors, (Joh. Simonetta de
Rebus Francisci Sfortiæ, in Muratori, Script. Rerum Ital. tom. xxi. p.
728, et alios.) The Albanian cavalry, under the name of Stradiots,
soon became famous in the wars of Italy, (Mémoires de Comines, l. viii. c.
5.)]
44 (return)
[ Spondanus, from the best
evidence, and the most rational criticism, has reduced the giant
Scanderbeg to the human size, (A.D. 1461, No. 20, 1463, No. 9, 1465, No.
12, 13, 1467, No. 1.) His own letter to the pope, and the testimony of
Phranza, (l. iii. c. 28,) a refugee in the neighboring isle of Corfu,
demonstrate his last distress, which is awkwardly concealed by Marinus
Barletius, (l. x.)]
45 (return)
[ See the family of the
Castriots, in Ducange, (Fam. Dalmaticæ, &c, xviii. p. 348—350.)]
46 (return)
[ This colony of Albanese
is mentioned by Mr. Swinburne, (Travels into the Two Sicilies, vol. i. p.
350—354.)]
In the long career of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, I have reached at length the last reign of the princes of Constantinople, who so feebly sustained the name and majesty of the Cæsars. On the decease of John Palæologus, who survived about four years the Hungarian crusade, 47 the royal family, by the death of Andronicus and the monastic profession of Isidore, was reduced to three princes, Constantine, Demetrius, and Thomas, the surviving sons of the emperor Manuel. Of these the first and the last were far distant in the Morea; but Demetrius, who possessed the domain of Selybria, was in the suburbs, at the head of a party: his ambition was not chilled by the public distress; and his conspiracy with the Turks and the schismatics had already disturbed the peace of his country. The funeral of the late emperor was accelerated with singular and even suspicious haste: the claim of Demetrius to the vacant throne was justified by a trite and flimsy sophism, that he was born in the purple, the eldest son of his father's reign. But the empress-mother, the senate and soldiers, the clergy and people, were unanimous in the cause of the lawful successor: and the despot Thomas, who, ignorant of the change, accidentally returned to the capital, asserted with becoming zeal the interest of his absent brother. An ambassador, the historian Phranza, was immediately despatched to the court of Adrianople. Amurath received him with honor and dismissed him with gifts; but the gracious approbation of the Turkish sultan announced his supremacy, and the approaching downfall of the Eastern empire. By the hands of two illustrious deputies, the Imperial crown was placed at Sparta on the head of Constantine. In the spring he sailed from the Morea, escaped the encounter of a Turkish squadron, enjoyed the acclamations of his subjects, celebrated the festival of a new reign, and exhausted by his donatives the treasure, or rather the indigence, of the state. The emperor immediately resigned to his brothers the possession of the Morea; and the brittle friendship of the two princes, Demetrius and Thomas, was confirmed in their mother's presence by the frail security of oaths and embraces. His next occupation was the choice of a consort. A daughter of the doge of Venice had been proposed; but the Byzantine nobles objected the distance between an hereditary monarch and an elective magistrate; and in their subsequent distress, the chief of that powerful republic was not unmindful of the affront. Constantine afterwards hesitated between the royal families of Trebizond and Georgia; and the embassy of Phranza represents in his public and private life the last days of the Byzantine empire. 48
47 (return)
[ The Chronology of
Phranza is clear and authentic; but instead of four years and seven
months, Spondanus (A.D. 1445, No. 7,) assigns seven or eight years to the
reign of the last Constantine which he deduces from a spurious epistle of
Eugenius IV. to the king of Æthiopia.]
48 (return)
[ Phranza (l. iii. c. 1—6)
deserves credit and esteem.]
The protovestiare, or great chamberlain, Phranza sailed from Constantinople as the minister of a bridegroom; and the relics of wealth and luxury were applied to his pompous appearance. His numerous retinue consisted of nobles and guards, of physicians and monks: he was attended by a band of music; and the term of his costly embassy was protracted above two years. On his arrival in Georgia or Iberia, the natives from the towns and villages flocked around the strangers; and such was their simplicity, that they were delighted with the effects, without understanding the cause, of musical harmony. Among the crowd was an old man, above a hundred years of age, who had formerly been carried away a captive by the Barbarians, 49 and who amused his hearers with a tale of the wonders of India, 50 from whence he had returned to Portugal by an unknown sea. 51 From this hospitable land, Phranza proceeded to the court of Trebizond, where he was informed by the Greek prince of the recent decease of Amurath. Instead of rejoicing in the deliverance, the experienced statesman expressed his apprehension, that an ambitious youth would not long adhere to the sage and pacific system of his father. After the sultan's decease, his Christian wife, Maria, 52 the daughter of the Servian despot, had been honorably restored to her parents; on the fame of her beauty and merit, she was recommended by the ambassador as the most worthy object of the royal choice; and Phranza recapitulates and refutes the specious objections that might be raised against the proposal. The majesty of the purple would ennoble an unequal alliance; the bar of affinity might be removed by liberal alms and the dispensation of the church; the disgrace of Turkish nuptials had been repeatedly overlooked; and, though the fair Maria was nearly fifty years of age, she might yet hope to give an heir to the empire. Constantine listened to the advice, which was transmitted in the first ship that sailed from Trebizond; but the factions of the court opposed his marriage; and it was finally prevented by the pious vow of the sultana, who ended her days in the monastic profession. Reduced to the first alternative, the choice of Phranza was decided in favor of a Georgian princess; and the vanity of her father was dazzled by the glorious alliance. Instead of demanding, according to the primitive and national custom, a price for his daughter, 53 he offered a portion of fifty-six thousand, with an annual pension of five thousand, ducats; and the services of the ambassador were repaid by an assurance, that, as his son had been adopted in baptism by the emperor, the establishment of his daughter should be the peculiar care of the empress of Constantinople. On the return of Phranza, the treaty was ratified by the Greek monarch, who with his own hand impressed three vermilion crosses on the golden bull, and assured the Georgian envoy that in the spring his galleys should conduct the bride to her Imperial palace. But Constantine embraced his faithful servant, not with the cold approbation of a sovereign, but with the warm confidence of a friend, who, after a long absence, is impatient to pour his secrets into the bosom of his friend. "Since the death of my mother and of Cantacuzene, who alone advised me without interest or passion, 54 I am surrounded," said the emperor, "by men whom I can neither love nor trust, nor esteem. You are not a stranger to Lucas Notaras, the great admiral; obstinately attached to his own sentiments, he declares, both in private and public, that his sentiments are the absolute measure of my thoughts and actions. The rest of the courtiers are swayed by their personal or factious views; and how can I consult the monks on questions of policy and marriage? I have yet much employment for your diligence and fidelity. In the spring you shall engage one of my brothers to solicit the succor of the Western powers; from the Morea you shall sail to Cyprus on a particular commission; and from thence proceed to Georgia to receive and conduct the future empress."—"Your commands," replied Phranza, "are irresistible; but deign, great sir," he added, with a serious smile, "to consider, that if I am thus perpetually absent from my family, my wife may be tempted either to seek another husband, or to throw herself into a monastery." After laughing at his apprehensions, the emperor more gravely consoled him by the pleasing assurance that this should be his last service abroad, and that he destined for his son a wealthy and noble heiress; for himself, the important office of great logothete, or principal minister of state. The marriage was immediately stipulated: but the office, however incompatible with his own, had been usurped by the ambition of the admiral. Some delay was requisite to negotiate a consent and an equivalent; and the nomination of Phranza was half declared, and half suppressed, lest it might be displeasing to an insolent and powerful favorite. The winter was spent in the preparations of his embassy; and Phranza had resolved, that the youth his son should embrace this opportunity of foreign travel, and be left, on the appearance of danger, with his maternal kindred of the Morea. Such were the private and public designs, which were interrupted by a Turkish war, and finally buried in the ruins of the empire.
49 (return)
[ Suppose him to have been
captured in 1394, in Timour's first war in Georgia, (Sherefeddin, l. iii.
c. 50;) he might follow his Tartar master into Hindostan in 1398, and from
thence sail to the spice islands.]
50 (return)
[ The happy and pious
Indians lived a hundred and fifty years, and enjoyed the most perfect
productions of the vegetable and mineral kingdoms. The animals were on a
large scale: dragons seventy cubits, ants (the formica Indica) nine
inches long, sheep like elephants, elephants like sheep. Quidlibet
audendi, &c.]
51 (return)
[ He sailed in a country
vessel from the spice islands to one of the ports of the exterior India;
invenitque navem grandem Ibericam quâ in Portugalliam est
delatus. This passage, composed in 1477, (Phranza, l. iii. c. 30,) twenty
years before the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, is spurious or
wonderful. But this new geography is sullied by the old and incompatible
error which places the source of the Nile in India.]
52 (return)
[ Cantemir, (p. 83,) who
styles her the daughter of Lazarus Ogli, and the Helen of the Servians,
places her marriage with Amurath in the year 1424. It will not easily be
believed, that in six-and-twenty years' cohabitation, the sultan corpus
ejus non tetigit. After the taking of Constantinople, she fled to Mahomet
II., (Phranza, l. iii. c. 22.)]
53 (return)
[ The classical reader
will recollect the offers of Agamemnon, (Iliad, c. v. 144,) and the
general practice of antiquity.]
54 (return)
[ Cantacuzene (I am
ignorant of his relation to the emperor of that name) was great domestic,
a firm assertor of the Greek creed, and a brother of the queen of Servia,
whom he visited with the character of ambassador, (Syropulus, p. 37, 38,
45.)]
The siege of Constantinople by the Turks attracts our first attention to the person and character of the great destroyer. Mahomet the Second 1 was the son of the second Amurath; and though his mother has been decorated with the titles of Christian and princess, she is more probably confounded with the numerous concubines who peopled from every climate the harem of the sultan. His first education and sentiments were those of a devout Mussulman; and as often as he conversed with an infidel, he purified his hands and face by the legal rites of ablution. Age and empire appear to have relaxed this narrow bigotry: his aspiring genius disdained to acknowledge a power above his own; and in his looser hours he presumed (it is said) to brand the prophet of Mecca as a robber and impostor. Yet the sultan persevered in a decent reverence for the doctrine and discipline of the Koran: 2 his private indiscretion must have been sacred from the vulgar ear; and we should suspect the credulity of strangers and sectaries, so prone to believe that a mind which is hardened against truth must be armed with superior contempt for absurdity and error. Under the tuition of the most skilful masters, Mahomet advanced with an early and rapid progress in the paths of knowledge; and besides his native tongue it is affirmed that he spoke or understood five languages, 3 the Arabic, the Persian, the Chaldæan or Hebrew, the Latin, and the Greek. The Persian might indeed contribute to his amusement, and the Arabic to his edification; and such studies are familiar to the Oriental youth. In the intercourse of the Greeks and Turks, a conqueror might wish to converse with the people over which he was ambitious to reign: his own praises in Latin poetry 4 or prose 5 might find a passage to the royal ear; but what use or merit could recommend to the statesman or the scholar the uncouth dialect of his Hebrew slaves? The history and geography of the world were familiar to his memory: the lives of the heroes of the East, perhaps of the West, 6 excited his emulation: his skill in astrology is excused by the folly of the times, and supposes some rudiments of mathematical science; and a profane taste for the arts is betrayed in his liberal invitation and reward of the painters of Italy. 7 But the influence of religion and learning were employed without effect on his savage and licentious nature. I will not transcribe, nor do I firmly believe, the stories of his fourteen pages, whose bellies were ripped open in search of a stolen melon; or of the beauteous slave, whose head he severed from her body, to convince the Janizaries that their master was not the votary of love. 701 His sobriety is attested by the silence of the Turkish annals, which accuse three, and three only, of the Ottoman line of the vice of drunkenness. 8 But it cannot be denied that his passions were at once furious and inexorable; that in the palace, as in the field, a torrent of blood was spilt on the slightest provocation; and that the noblest of the captive youth were often dishonored by his unnatural lust. In the Albanian war he studied the lessons, and soon surpassed the example, of his father; and the conquest of two empires, twelve kingdoms, and two hundred cities, a vain and flattering account, is ascribed to his invincible sword. He was doubtless a soldier, and possibly a general; Constantinople has sealed his glory; but if we compare the means, the obstacles, and the achievements, Mahomet the Second must blush to sustain a parallel with Alexander or Timour. Under his command, the Ottoman forces were always more numerous than their enemies; yet their progress was bounded by the Euphrates and the Adriatic; and his arms were checked by Huniades and Scanderbeg, by the Rhodian knights and by the Persian king.
1 (return)
[ For the character of
Mahomet II. it is dangerous to trust either the Turks or the Christians.
The most moderate picture appears to be drawn by Phranza, (l. i. c. 33,)
whose resentment had cooled in age and solitude; see likewise Spondanus,
(A.D. 1451, No. 11,) and the continuator of Fleury, (tom. xxii. p. 552,)
the Elogia of Paulus Jovius, (l. iii. p. 164—166,) and the
Dictionnaire de Bayle, (tom. iii. p. 273—279.)]
2 (return)
[ Cantemir, (p. 115.) and
the mosques which he founded, attest his public regard for religion.
Mahomet freely disputed with the Gennadius on the two religions, (Spond.
A.D. 1453, No. 22.)]
3 (return)
[ Quinque linguas præter
suam noverat, Græcam, Latinam, Chaldaicam, Persicam. The Latin translator
of Phranza has dropped the Arabic, which the Koran must recommend to every
Mussulman. * Note: It appears in the original Greek text, p. 95, edit.
Bonn.—M.]
4 (return)
[ Philelphus, by a Latin
ode, requested and obtained the liberty of his wife's mother and sisters
from the conqueror of Constantinople. It was delivered into the sultan's
hands by the envoys of the duke of Milan. Philelphus himself was suspected
of a design of retiring to Constantinople; yet the orator often sounded
the trumpet of holy war, (see his Life by M. Lancelot, in the Mémoires de
l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. x. p. 718, 724, &c.)]
5 (return)
[ Robert Valturio published
at Verona, in 1483, his xii. books de Re Militari, in which he first
mentions the use of bombs. By his patron Sigismund Malatesta, prince of
Rimini, it had been addressed with a Latin epistle to Mahomet II.]
6 (return)
[ According to Phranza, he
assiduously studied the lives and actions of Alexander, Augustus,
Constantine, and Theodosius. I have read somewhere, that Plutarch's Lives
were translated by his orders into the Turkish language. If the sultan
himself understood Greek, it must have been for the benefit of his
subjects. Yet these lives are a school of freedom as well as of valor. *
Note: Von Hammer disdainfully rejects this fable of Mahomet's knowledge of
languages. Knolles adds, that he delighted in reading the history of
Alexander the Great, and of Julius Cæsar. The former, no doubt, was the
Persian legend, which, it is remarkable, came back to Europe, and was
popular throughout the middle ages as the "Romaunt of Alexander." The
founder of the Imperial dynasty of Rome, according to M. Von Hammer, is
altogether unknown in the East. Mahomet was a great patron of Turkish
literature: the romantic poems of Persia were translated, or imitated,
under his patronage. Von Hammer vol ii. p. 268.—M.]
7 (return)
[ The famous Gentile
Bellino, whom he had invited from Venice, was dismissed with a chain and
collar of gold, and a purse of 3000 ducats. With Voltaire I laugh at the
foolish story of a slave purposely beheaded to instruct the painter in the
action of the muscles.]
701 (return)
[ This story, the
subject of Johnson's Irene, is rejected by M. Von Hammer, vol. ii. p. 208.
The German historian's general estimate of Mahomet's character agrees in
its more marked features with Gibbon's.—M.]
8 (return)
[ These Imperial drunkards
were Soliman I., Selim II., and Amurath IV., (Cantemir, p. 61.) The sophis
of Persia can produce a more regular succession; and in the last age, our
European travellers were the witnesses and companions of their revels.]
In the reign of Amurath, he twice tasted of royalty, and twice descended from the throne: his tender age was incapable of opposing his father's restoration, but never could he forgive the viziers who had recommended that salutary measure. His nuptials were celebrated with the daughter of a Turkman emir; and, after a festival of two months, he departed from Adrianople with his bride, to reside in the government of Magnesia. Before the end of six weeks, he was recalled by a sudden message from the divan, which announced the decease of Amurath, and the mutinous spirit of the Janizaries. His speed and vigor commanded their obedience: he passed the Hellespont with a chosen guard: and at the distance of a mile from Adrianople, the viziers and emirs, the imams and cadhis, the soldiers and the people, fell prostrate before the new sultan. They affected to weep, they affected to rejoice: he ascended the throne at the age of twenty-one years, and removed the cause of sedition by the death, the inevitable death, of his infant brothers. 9 901 The ambassadors of Europe and Asia soon appeared to congratulate his accession and solicit his friendship; and to all he spoke the language of moderation and peace. The confidence of the Greek emperor was revived by the solemn oaths and fair assurances with which he sealed the ratification of the treaty: and a rich domain on the banks of the Strymon was assigned for the annual payment of three hundred thousand aspers, the pension of an Ottoman prince, who was detained at his request in the Byzantine court. Yet the neighbors of Mahomet might tremble at the severity with which a youthful monarch reformed the pomp of his father's household: the expenses of luxury were applied to those of ambition, and a useless train of seven thousand falconers was either dismissed from his service, or enlisted in his troops. 902 In the first summer of his reign, he visited with an army the Asiatic provinces; but after humbling the pride, Mahomet accepted the submission, of the Caramanian, that he might not be diverted by the smallest obstacle from the execution of his great design. 10
9 (return)
[ Calapin, one of these
royal infants, was saved from his cruel brother, and baptized at Rome
under the name of Callistus Othomannus. The emperor Frederic III.
presented him with an estate in Austria, where he ended his life; and
Cuspinian, who in his youth conversed with the aged prince at Vienna,
applauds his piety and wisdom, (de Cæsaribus, p. 672, 673.)]
901 (return)
[ Ahmed, the son of a
Greek princess, was the object of his especial jealousy. Von Hammer, p.
501.—M.]
902 (return)
[ The Janizaries
obtained, for the first time, a gift on the accession of a new sovereign,
p. 504.—M.]
10 (return)
[ See the accession of
Mahomet II. in Ducas, (c. 33,) Phranza, (l. i. c. 33, l. iii. c. 2,)
Chalcondyles, (l. vii. p. 199,) and Cantemir, (p. 96.)]
The Mahometan, and more especially the Turkish casuists, have pronounced that no promise can bind the faithful against the interest and duty of their religion; and that the sultan may abrogate his own treaties and those of his predecessors. The justice and magnanimity of Amurath had scorned this immoral privilege; but his son, though the proudest of men, could stoop from ambition to the basest arts of dissimulation and deceit. Peace was on his lips, while war was in his heart: he incessantly sighed for the possession of Constantinople; and the Greeks, by their own indiscretion, afforded the first pretence of the fatal rupture. 11 Instead of laboring to be forgotten, their ambassadors pursued his camp, to demand the payment, and even the increase, of their annual stipend: the divan was importuned by their complaints, and the vizier, a secret friend of the Christians, was constrained to deliver the sense of his brethren. "Ye foolish and miserable Romans," said Calil, "we know your devices, and ye are ignorant of your own danger! The scrupulous Amurath is no more; his throne is occupied by a young conqueror, whom no laws can bind, and no obstacles can resist: and if you escape from his hands, give praise to the divine clemency, which yet delays the chastisement of your sins. Why do ye seek to affright us by vain and indirect menaces? Release the fugitive Orchan, crown him sultan of Romania; call the Hungarians from beyond the Danube; arm against us the nations of the West; and be assured, that you will only provoke and precipitate your ruin." But if the fears of the ambassadors were alarmed by the stern language of the vizier, they were soothed by the courteous audience and friendly speeches of the Ottoman prince; and Mahomet assured them that on his return to Adrianople he would redress the grievances, and consult the true interests, of the Greeks. No sooner had he repassed the Hellespont, than he issued a mandate to suppress their pension, and to expel their officers from the banks of the Strymon: in this measure he betrayed a hostile mind; and the second order announced, and in some degree commenced, the siege of Constantinople. In the narrow pass of the Bosphorus, an Asiatic fortress had formerly been raised by his grandfather; in the opposite situation, on the European side, he resolved to erect a more formidable castle; and a thousand masons were commanded to assemble in the spring on a spot named Asomaton, about five miles from the Greek metropolis. 12 Persuasion is the resource of the feeble; and the feeble can seldom persuade: the ambassadors of the emperor attempted, without success, to divert Mahomet from the execution of his design. They represented, that his grandfather had solicited the permission of Manuel to build a castle on his own territories; but that this double fortification, which would command the strait, could only tend to violate the alliance of the nations; to intercept the Latins who traded in the Black Sea, and perhaps to annihilate the subsistence of the city. "I form no enterprise," replied the perfidious sultan, "against the city; but the empire of Constantinople is measured by her walls. Have you forgot the distress to which my father was reduced when you formed a league with the Hungarians; when they invaded our country by land, and the Hellespont was occupied by the French galleys? Amurath was compelled to force the passage of the Bosphorus; and your strength was not equal to your malevolence. I was then a child at Adrianople; the Moslems trembled; and, for a while, the Gabours 13 insulted our disgrace. But when my father had triumphed in the field of Warna, he vowed to erect a fort on the western shore, and that vow it is my duty to accomplish. Have ye the right, have ye the power, to control my actions on my own ground? For that ground is my own: as far as the shores of the Bosphorus, Asia is inhabited by the Turks, and Europe is deserted by the Romans. Return, and inform your king, that the present Ottoman is far different from his predecessors; that his resolutions surpass their wishes; and that he performs more than they could resolve. Return in safety—but the next who delivers a similar message may expect to be flayed alive." After this declaration, Constantine, the first of the Greeks in spirit as in rank, 14 had determined to unsheathe the sword, and to resist the approach and establishment of the Turks on the Bosphorus. He was disarmed by the advice of his civil and ecclesiastical ministers, who recommended a system less generous, and even less prudent, than his own, to approve their patience and long-suffering, to brand the Ottoman with the name and guilt of an aggressor, and to depend on chance and time for their own safety, and the destruction of a fort which could not long be maintained in the neighborhood of a great and populous city. Amidst hope and fear, the fears of the wise, and the hopes of the credulous, the winter rolled away; the proper business of each man, and each hour, was postponed; and the Greeks shut their eyes against the impending danger, till the arrival of the spring and the sultan decide the assurance of their ruin.
11 (return)
[ Before I enter on the
siege of Constantinople, I shall observe, that except the short hints of
Cantemir and Leunclavius, I have not been able to obtain any Turkish
account of this conquest; such an account as we possess of the siege of
Rhodes by Soliman II., (Mémoires de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom.
xxvi. p. 723—769.) I must therefore depend on the Greeks, whose
prejudices, in some degree, are subdued by their distress. Our standard
texts ar those of Ducas, (c. 34—42,) Phranza, (l. iii. c. 7—20,)
Chalcondyles, (l. viii. p. 201—214,) and Leonardus Chiensis,
(Historia C. P. a Turco expugnatæ. Norimberghæ, 1544, in 4to., 20 leaves.)
The last of these narratives is the earliest in date, since it was
composed in the Isle of Chios, the 16th of August, 1453, only seventy-nine
days after the loss of the city, and in the first confusion of ideas and
passions. Some hints may be added from an epistle of Cardinal Isidore (in
Farragine Rerum Turcicarum, ad calcem Chalcondyl. Clauseri, Basil, 1556)
to Pope Nicholas V., and a tract of Theodosius Zygomala, which he
addressed in the year 1581 to Martin Crucius, (Turco-Græcia, l. i. p. 74—98,
Basil, 1584.) The various facts and materials are briefly, though
critically, reviewed by Spondanus, (A.D. 1453, No. 1—27.) The
hearsay relations of Monstrelet and the distant Latins I shall take leave
to disregard. * Note: M. Von Hammer has added little new information on
the siege of Constantinople, and, by his general agreement, has borne an
honorable testimony to the truth, and by his close imitation to the
graphic spirit and boldness, of Gibbon.—M.]
12 (return)
[ The situation of the
fortress, and the topography of the Bosphorus, are best learned from Peter
Gyllius, (de Bosphoro Thracio, l. ii. c. 13,) Leunclavius, (Pandect. p.
445,) and Tournefort, (Voyage dans le Levant, tom. ii. lettre xv. p. 443,
444;) but I must regret the map or plan which Tournefort sent to the
French minister of the marine. The reader may turn back to chap. xvii. of
this History.]
13 (return)
[ The opprobrious name
which the Turks bestow on the infidels, is expressed Kabour by Ducas, and
Giaour by Leunclavius and the moderns. The former term is derived
by Ducange (Gloss. Græc tom. i. p. 530) from Kabouron, in vulgar Greek, a
tortoise, as denoting a retrograde motion from the faith. But alas! Gabour
is no more than Gheber, which was transferred from the Persian to
the Turkish language, from the worshippers of fire to those of the
crucifix, (D'Herbelot, Bibliot. Orient. p. 375.)]
14 (return)
[ Phranza does justice to
his master's sense and courage. Calliditatem hominis non ignorans
Imperator prior arma movere constituit, and stigmatizes the folly of the
cum sacri tum profani proceres, which he had heard, amentes spe vanâ
pasci. Ducas was not a privy-counsellor.]
Of a master who never forgives, the orders are seldom disobeyed. On the twenty-sixth of March, the appointed spot of Asomaton was covered with an active swarm of Turkish artificers; and the materials by sea and land were diligently transported from Europe and Asia. 15 The lime had been burnt in Cataphrygia; the timber was cut down in the woods of Heraclea and Nicomedia; and the stones were dug from the Anatolian quarries. Each of the thousand masons was assisted by two workmen; and a measure of two cubits was marked for their daily task. The fortress 16 was built in a triangular form; each angle was flanked by a strong and massy tower; one on the declivity of the hill, two along the sea-shore: a thickness of twenty-two feet was assigned for the walls, thirty for the towers; and the whole building was covered with a solid platform of lead. Mahomet himself pressed and directed the work with indefatigable ardor: his three viziers claimed the honor of finishing their respective towers; the zeal of the cadhis emulated that of the Janizaries; the meanest labor was ennobled by the service of God and the sultan; and the diligence of the multitude was quickened by the eye of a despot, whose smile was the hope of fortune, and whose frown was the messenger of death. The Greek emperor beheld with terror the irresistible progress of the work; and vainly strove, by flattery and gifts, to assuage an implacable foe, who sought, and secretly fomented, the slightest occasion of a quarrel. Such occasions must soon and inevitably be found. The ruins of stately churches, and even the marble columns which had been consecrated to Saint Michael the archangel, were employed without scruple by the profane and rapacious Moslems; and some Christians, who presumed to oppose the removal, received from their hands the crown of martyrdom. Constantine had solicited a Turkish guard to protect the fields and harvests of his subjects: the guard was fixed; but their first order was to allow free pasture to the mules and horses of the camp, and to defend their brethren if they should be molested by the natives. The retinue of an Ottoman chief had left their horses to pass the night among the ripe corn; the damage was felt; the insult was resented; and several of both nations were slain in a tumultuous conflict. Mahomet listened with joy to the complaint; and a detachment was commanded to exterminate the guilty village: the guilty had fled; but forty innocent and unsuspecting reapers were massacred by the soldiers. Till this provocation, Constantinople had been opened to the visits of commerce and curiosity: on the first alarm, the gates were shut; but the emperor, still anxious for peace, released on the third day his Turkish captives; 17 and expressed, in a last message, the firm resignation of a Christian and a soldier. "Since neither oaths, nor treaty, nor submission, can secure peace, pursue," said he to Mahomet, "your impious warfare. My trust is in God alone; if it should please him to mollify your heart, I shall rejoice in the happy change; if he delivers the city into your hands, I submit without a murmur to his holy will. But until the Judge of the earth shall pronounce between us, it is my duty to live and die in the defence of my people." The sultan's answer was hostile and decisive: his fortifications were completed; and before his departure for Adrianople, he stationed a vigilant Aga and four hundred Janizaries, to levy a tribute on the ships of every nation that should pass within the reach of their cannon. A Venetian vessel, refusing obedience to the new lords of the Bosphorus, was sunk with a single bullet. 171 The master and thirty sailors escaped in the boat; but they were dragged in chains to the Porte: the chief was impaled; his companions were beheaded; and the historian Ducas 18 beheld, at Demotica, their bodies exposed to the wild beasts. The siege of Constantinople was deferred till the ensuing spring; but an Ottoman army marched into the Morea to divert the force of the brothers of Constantine. At this æra of calamity, one of these princes, the despot Thomas, was blessed or afflicted with the birth of a son; "the last heir," says the plaintive Phranza, "of the last spark of the Roman empire." 19
15 (return)
[ Instead of this clear
and consistent account, the Turkish Annals (Cantemir, p. 97) revived the
foolish tale of the ox's hide, and Dido's stratagem in the foundation of
Carthage. These annals (unless we are swayed by an anti-Christian
prejudice) are far less valuable than the Greek historians.]
16 (return)
[ In the dimensions of
this fortress, the old castle of Europe, Phranza does not exactly agree
with Chalcondyles, whose description has been verified on the spot by his
editor Leunclavius.]
17 (return)
[ Among these were some
pages of Mahomet, so conscious of his inexorable rigor, that they begged
to lose their heads in the city unless they could return before sunset.]
171 (return)
[ This was from a model
cannon cast by Urban the Hungarian. See p. 291. Von Hammer. p. 510.—M.]
18 (return)
[ Ducas, c. 35. Phranza,
(l. iii. c. 3,) who had sailed in his vessel, commemorates the Venetian
pilot as a martyr.]
19 (return)
[ Auctum est Palæologorum
genus, et Imperii successor, parvæque Romanorum scintillæ hæres natus,
Andreas, &c., (Phranza, l. iii. c. 7.) The strong expression was
inspired by his feelings.]
The Greeks and the Turks passed an anxious and sleepless winter: the former were kept awake by their fears, the latter by their hopes; both by the preparations of defence and attack; and the two emperors, who had the most to lose or to gain, were the most deeply affected by the national sentiment. In Mahomet, that sentiment was inflamed by the ardor of his youth and temper: he amused his leisure with building at Adrianople 20 the lofty palace of Jehan Numa, (the watchtower of the world;) but his serious thoughts were irrevocably bent on the conquest of the city of Cæsar. At the dead of night, about the second watch, he started from his bed, and commanded the instant attendance of his prime vizier. The message, the hour, the prince, and his own situation, alarmed the guilty conscience of Calil Basha; who had possessed the confidence, and advised the restoration, of Amurath. On the accession of the son, the vizier was confirmed in his office and the appearances of favor; but the veteran statesman was not insensible that he trod on a thin and slippery ice, which might break under his footsteps, and plunge him in the abyss. His friendship for the Christians, which might be innocent under the late reign, had stigmatized him with the name of Gabour Ortachi, or foster-brother of the infidels; 21 and his avarice entertained a venal and treasonable correspondence, which was detected and punished after the conclusion of the war. On receiving the royal mandate, he embraced, perhaps for the last time, his wife and children; filled a cup with pieces of gold, hastened to the palace, adored the sultan, and offered, according to the Oriental custom, the slight tribute of his duty and gratitude. 22 "It is not my wish," said Mahomet, "to resume my gifts, but rather to heap and multiply them on thy head. In my turn, I ask a present far more valuable and important;—Constantinople." As soon as the vizier had recovered from his surprise, "The same God," said he, "who has already given thee so large a portion of the Roman empire, will not deny the remnant, and the capital. His providence, and thy power, assure thy success; and myself, with the rest of thy faithful slaves, will sacrifice our lives and fortunes."—"Lala," 23 (or preceptor,) continued the sultan, "do you see this pillow? All the night, in my agitation, I have pulled it on one side and the other; I have risen from my bed, again have I lain down; yet sleep has not visited these weary eyes. Beware of the gold and silver of the Romans: in arms we are superior; and with the aid of God, and the prayers of the prophet, we shall speedily become masters of Constantinople." To sound the disposition of his soldiers, he often wandered through the streets alone, and in disguise; and it was fatal to discover the sultan, when he wished to escape from the vulgar eye. His hours were spent in delineating the plan of the hostile city; in debating with his generals and engineers, on what spot he should erect his batteries; on which side he should assault the walls; where he should spring his mines; to what place he should apply his scaling-ladders: and the exercises of the day repeated and proved the lucubrations of the night.
20 (return)
[ Cantemir, p. 97, 98. The
sultan was either doubtful of his conquest, or ignorant of the superior
merits of Constantinople. A city or a kingdom may sometimes be ruined by
the Imperial fortune of their sovereign.]
21 (return)
[ SuntrojoV, by the
president Cousin, is translated père nourricier, most correctly
indeed from the Latin version; but in his haste he has overlooked the
Jnote by which Ishmael Boillaud (ad Ducam, c. 35) acknowledges and
rectifies his own error.]
22 (return)
[ The Oriental custom of
never appearing without gifts before a sovereign or a superior is of high
antiquity, and seems analogous with the idea of sacrifice, still more
ancient and universal. See the examples of such Persian gifts, Ælian,
Hist. Var. l. i. c. 31, 32, 33.]
23 (return)
[ The Lala of the
Turks (Cantemir, p. 34) and the Tata of the Greeks (Ducas, c. 35)
are derived from the natural language of children; and it may be observed,
that all such primitive words which deJnote their parents, are the simple
repetition of one syllable, composed of a labial or a dental consonant and
an open vowel, (Des Brosses, Méchanisme des Langues, tom. i. p. 231—247.)]