Cantacuzene,

Jau. 8.

A. D. 1355.

takes up arms a

Reign of John I hasten to conclude the personal | of mediation: she returned without success; and A. D. 1347.' history of John Cantacuzene.1 He unless Anne of Savoy was instructed by adversity, triumphed and reigned; but his reign we may doubt the sincerity, or at least the fervour, January. and triumph were clouded by the dis- of her zeal. While the regent grasped the sceptre content of his own and the adverse faction. His with a firm and vigorous hand, she had been infollowers might style the general amnesty, an act of structed to declare, that the ten years of his legal pardon for his enemies, and of oblivion for his administration would soon elapse: and that after a friends in his cause their estates had been for- full trial of the vanity of the world, the emperor feited or plundered; and as they wandered naked Cantacuzene sighed for the repose of a cloister, and and hungry through the streets, they cursed the self- was ambitious only of a heavenly crown. Had these ish generosity of a leader, who, on the throne of the sentiments been genuine, his voluntary abdication empire, might relinquish without merit his private would have restored the peace of the empire, and inheritance. The adherents of the empress blushed his conscience would have been relieved by an act to hold their lives and fortunes by the precarious of justice. Palæologus alone was re- John Palæologus favour of an usurper; and the thirst of revenge was sponsible for his future government; gainst him, concealed by a tender concern for the succession, and whatever might be his vices, they A. D. 1353. and even the safety, of her son. They were justly were surely less formidable than the calamities of a alarmed by a petition of the friends of Cantacuzene, civil war, in which the barbarians and infidels were that they might be released from their oath of alle- again invited to assist the Greeks in their mutual giance to the Palæologi; and intrusted with the destruction. By the arms of the Turks, who now defence of some cautionary towns; a measure sup- struck a deep and everlasting root in Europe, Canported with argument and eloquence; and which tacuzene prevailed in the third contest in which he was rejected (says the imperial historian)" by my had been involved; and the young emperor, driven sublime, and almost incredible, virtue." His repose from the sea and land, was compelled to take shelwas disturbed by the sound of plots and seditions; ter among the Latins of the isle of Tenedos. His and he trembled lest the lawful prince should be insolence and obstinacy provoked the victor to a stolen away by some foreign or domestic enemy, who step which must render the quarrel irreconcilable: would inscribe his name and his wrongs in the ban- and the association of his son Matthew, whom he ners of rebellion. As the son of Andronicus adinvested with the purple, established the succession vanced in the years of manhood, he began to feel in the family of the Cantacuzeni. But Constantiand to act for himself; and his rising ambition was nople was still attached to the blood of her ancient rather stimulated than checked by the imitation of princes; and this last injury accelerated the restorhis father's vices. If we may trust his own profes- ation of the rightful heir. A noble Genoese espoused sions, Cantacuzene laboured with honest industry the cause of Palæologus, obtained a promise of his to correct these sordid and sensual appetites, and to sister, and achieved the revolution with two galleys raise the mind of the young prince to a level with and two thousand five hundred auxiliaries. Under his fortune. In the Servian expedition, the two the pretence of distress, they were admitted into the emperors showed themselves in cordial harmony to lesser port; a gate was opened, and the Latin shout the troops and provinces; and the younger colleague of," Long life and victory to the emperor, John was initiated by the elder in the mysteries of war Palæologus!" was answered by a general rising in and government. After the conclusion of the peace, his favour. A numerous and loyal party yet adPalæologus was left at Thessalonica, a royal resi- hered to the standard of Cantacuzene: but he asserts dence, and a frontier station, to secure by his ab- in his history (does he hope for belief?) that his tensence the peace of Constantinople, and to withdraw der conscience rejected the assurance of conquest; his youth from the temptations of a luxurious that, in free obedience to the voice of religion and capital. But the distance weakened the powers of philosophy, he descended from the throne, and emcontrol, and the son of Andronicus was surrounded braced with pleasure the monastic habit and profes with artful or unthinking companions, who taught sion," So soon as he ceased to be a prince, his suchim to hate his guardian, to deplore his exile, and cessor was not unwilling that he should be a saint: to vindicate his rights. A private treaty with the the remainder of his life was devoted cral or despot of Servia, was soon followed by an to piety and learning; in the cells of Cantacuzene, open revolt; and Cantacuzene, on the throne of the Constantinople and mount Athos, the January. elder Andronicus, defended the cause of age and monk Joasaph was respected as the temporal and spiprerogative, which in his youth he had so vigorously ritual father of the emperor; and if he issued from his attacked. At his request, the empress-mother un- retreat, it was as the minister of peace, to subdue the dertook the voyage of Thessalonica, and the office obstinacy and solicit the pardon of his rebellious son.

1 From his return to Constantinople, Cantacuzene continues his his. tory and that of the empire, one year beyond the abdication of his son Matthew, A. D. 1357. (1. iv. c. 1-50. p. 705-911.) Nicephorus Gregoras ends with the synod of Constantinople, in the year 1351; (1. xxii. c. 3. p. 660. the rest, to the conclusion of the twenty-fourth book, p. 717. is all controversy;) and his fourteen last books are still MSS. in the king of France's library.

m The emperor (Cantacuzen. 1. iv. c. 1.) represents his own virtues,

Abdication of

A. D. 1355.

and Nic. Gregoras (1. xv. c. 11.) the complaints of his friends, who suffered by its effects. I have lent them the words of our poor cavaliers after the restoration.

The awkward apology of Cantacuzene, (l. iv. c. 39-42.) who relates, with visible confusion, his own downfall, may be supplied by the less accurate, but more honest, narratives of Matthew Villani, (l. iv. c. 46. in the Script. Rerum Ital. tom. xiv. p. 268.) and Ducas, (c. 10, 11) o Cantacuzene, in the year 1375, was honoured with a letter from

Dispute concern.

mount Thabor,

eternal light; and this beatific vision of the saints had been manifested to the disciples on mount Thabor, in the transfiguration of Christ. Yet this distinction could not escape the reproach of polytheism; the eternity of the light of Thabor was fiercely denied; and Barlaam still charged the Palamites with holding two eternal substances, a visible and an invisible God. From the rage of the monks of mount Athos, who threatened his life, the Calabrian retired to Constantinople, where his smooth and specious manners introduced him to the favour of the great domestic and the emperor. The court and the city were involved in this theological dispute, which flamed amidst the civil war; but the doctrine of Barlaam was disgraced by his flight and apostasy; the Palamites triumphed; and their adversary, the patriarch John of Apri, was deposed by the consent of the adverse factions of the state. In the character of emperor and theologian, Cantacuzene presided in the synod of the Greek church, which established, as an article of faith, the uncreated light of mount Thabor; and, after so many insults, the reason of mankind was slightly wounded by the addition of a single absurdity. Many rolls of paper or parchment have been blotted; and the impenitent sectaries, who refused to subscribe the orthodox creed, were deprived of the honours of christian burial; but in the next age the question was forgotten; nor can I learn that the axe or the faggot were employed for the extirpation of the Barlaamite heresy.'

Yet in the cloister, the mind of ing the light of Cantacuzene was still exercised by A. D. 1341-1351. theological war. He sharpened a controversial pen against the Jews and Mahometans ; and in every state he defended with equal zeal the divine light of mount Thabor, a memorable question, which consummates the religious follies of the Greeks. The fakirs of India, and the monks of the oriental church, were alike persuaded, that in total abstraction of the faculties of the mind and body, the purer spirit may ascend to the enjoyment and vision of the Deity. The opinion and practice of the monasteries of mount Athos will be best represented in the words of an abbot, who flourished in the eleventh century. "When thou art alone in thy cell," says the ascetic teacher, "shut thy door, and seat thyself in a corner; raise thy mind above all things vain and transitory; recline thy beard and chin on thy breast; turn thy eyes and thy thought towards the middle of thy belly, the region of the navel; and search the place of the heart, the seat of the soul. At first, all will be dark and comfortless; but if you persevere day and night, you will feel an ineffable joy; and no sooner has the soul discovered the place of the heart, than it is involved in a mystic and ethereal light." This light, the production of a distempered fancy, the creature of an empty stomach and an empty brain, was adored by the Quietists as the pure and perfect essence of God himself; and as long as the folly was confined to mount Athos, the simple solitaries were not inquisitive how the divine essence could be a material substance, or how an immaterial substance could be perceived by the eyes of the body. But in the reign of the younger Andronicus, these monasteries were visited by Barlaam, a Calabrian monk, who was equally skilled in philosophy and theology; who possessed the languages of the Greeks and Latins; and whose versatile genius could maintain their opposite creeds, according to the interest of the moment. The indiscretion of an ascetic revealed to the curious traveller the secrets of mental prayer; and Barlaam embraced the opportunity of ridiculing the Quietists, who placed the soul in the navel; of accusing the monks of mount Athos of heresy and blasphemy. His attack compelled the more learned to renounce or dissemble the simple devotion of their brethren; and Gregory Palamas introduced a scholastic distinction between the essence and operation of God. His inaccessible essence dwells in the midst of an uncreated and the pope. (Fleury. Hist. Eccles. tom. xx. p. 250) His death is placed by respectable authority on the 20th of November 1411. (Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 260.) But if he were of the age of his companion Andronicus the younger, he must have lived 116 years; a rare instance of longevity, which in so illustrious a person would have attracted uni

versal notice.

P His four discourses, or books, were printed at Basil, 1543. (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. vi. p. 473.) He composed them to satisfy a proselyte who was assaulted with letters from his friends of Ispahan. Can. tacuzene had read the Koran: but I understand from Maracci, that he adopts the vulgar prejudices and fables against Mahomet and his religion.

See the Voyages de Bernier, tom. i. p. 127.

Mosheim, Institut. Hist. Eccles. p. 522, 523. Fleury, Hist. Eccl. tom. xx. p. 22. 24. 107-114, &c. The former unfolds the causes with the judgment of a philosopher, the latter transcribes and translates with the prejudices of a catholic priest.

Pera, or Galata,

For the conclusion of this chapter, I Establishment of have reserved the Genoese war, which the Genoese at shook the throne of Cantacuzene, and A. D. 1261-1347. betrayed the debility of the Greek empire. The Genoese, who, after the recovery of Constantinople, were seated in the suburb of Pera or Galata, received that honourable fief from the bounty of the emperor. They were indulged in the use of their laws and magistrates; but they submitted to the duties of vassals and subjects: the forcible word of liegemen" was borrowed from the Latin jurisprudence; and their podesta, or chief, before he entered on his office, saluted the emperor with loyal acclamations and vows of fidelity. Genoa sealed a firm alliance with the Greeks; and, in a case of a defensive war, a supply of fifty empty galleys and a succour of fifty galleys completely armed and manned, was promised by the republic to the empire. In the revival of a naval force, it was the aim of Michael Palæologus to deliver himself from

Basnage (in Canisii Antiq. Lectiones, tom. iv. p. 363-368.) has investigated the character and story of Barlaam. The duplicity of his opinions had inspired some doubts of the identity of his person. See likewise Fabricius. (Bibliot. Græc. tom. x. p. 427-432.)

t See Cantacuzene, (l. ii. c. 39, 40. 1. iv. c. 3. 23, 24, 25.) and Nic. Gregoras, (1. xi. c. 10. l. xv. 3, 7. &c.) whose last books, from the nineteenth to the twenty-fourth, are almost confined to a subject so interesting to the authors. Boivin, (in Vit. Nic. Gregora,) from the unpublished books, and Fabricius, (Bibliot. Græc, tom. x. p. 462-473.) or rather Montfauçon, from the MSS. of the Coislin library, have added some facts and documents.

u Pachymer (1. v. c. 10.) very properly explains A.Čiovs (ligios) by totous. The use of these words in the Greek and Latin of the feudal times, may be amply understood from the Glossaries of Ducange. (Græc. p. 811, 812. Latin. tom. iv. p. 109-111.)

F

Victory of the
Genoese over the
Greeks,

Venetians and

A. D. 1352.
Feb. 13.

But the emperor was soon solicited to violate the treaty, and to join his arms with the Venetians, the perpetual enemies of Genoa and her colonies. While he compared the reasons of peace and war, his moderation was provoked by a wanton insult of the inhabitants of Pera, who discharged from their rampart a large stone that fell in the midst of Constantinople. On his just com

people, of either sex and of every age, the wall was raised, and the ditch was sunk, with incredible speed. At the same time, they attacked and burnt two Byzantine galleys; while the three others, the remainder of the imperial navy, escaped from their hands: the habitations without the gates, or along the shore, were pillaged and destroyed; and the care of the regent, of the empress Irene, was confined to the preservation of the city. The return of Cantacuzene dispelled the public conster-plaint, they coldly blamed the imprudence of their nation; the emperor inclined to peaceful counsels; but he yielded to the obstinacy of his enemies, who rejected all reasonable terms, and to the ardour of his subjects, who threatened, in the style of Scrip2 ture, to break them in pieces like a potter's vessel. Yet they reluctantly paid the taxes, that he imposed for the construction of ships, and the expenses of the war; and as the two nations were masters, the one of the land, the other of the sea, Constantinople and Pera were pressed by the evils of a mutual siege. The merchants of the colony, who had believed that a few days would terminate the war, already murmured at their losses; the succours from their mother-country were delayed by the factions of Genoa; and the most cautious embraced the opportunity of a Rhodian vessel to remove their families and effects from the scene of hostility. In the spring, the Byzantine fleet, seven galleys and a train of smaller vessels, issued from the mouth of the harbour, and steered in a single line along the shore of Pera; unskilfully presenting their sides to the beaks of the adverse squadron. The crews were composed of peasants and mechanics; nor was their ignorance compensated by the native courage of barbarians: the wind was strong, the waves were rough; and no sooner did the Greeks perceive a distant and inactive enemy, than they leaped headlong into the sea, from a doubtful, to an inevitable, peril. The troops that marched to the attack of the lines of Pera were struck at the same moment with a similar panic; and the Genoese were astonished, and almost ashamed, at their double victory. Their triumphant vessels, crowned with flowers, and dragging after them the captive galleys, repeatedly passed and repassed before the palace: the only virtue of the emperor was patience; and the hope of revenge his sole consolation. Yet the distress of both parties interposed a temporary agreement; and the shame of the empire was disguised by a thin veil of dignity and power. Summoning the chiefs of the colony, Cantacuzene affected to despise the trivial object of the debate; and, after a mild reproof, most liberally granted the lands, which had been previously resigned to the seeming custody of

Destruction of
his fleet,
A. D. 1349.

his officers.4

The events of this war are related by Cantacuzene (l. iv. c. 11.) with obscurity and confusion, and by Nic. Gregoras (l. xvii. c. 1-7.) in a clear and honest narrative.' The priest was less responsible than the prince for the defeat of the fleet.

The second war is darkly told by Cantacuzene, (1. iv. c. 18. p. 24, 25. 28-32.) who wishes to disguise what he dares not deny. I regret this part of Nic. Gregoras, which is still in MS. at Paris.

engineer; but the next day the insult was repeated, and they exulted in a second proof that the royal city was not beyond the reach of their artillery, Cantacuzene instantly signed his treaty with the Venetians; but the weight of the Roman empire was scarcely felt in the balance of these opulent and powerful republics. From the straits of Gibraltar to the mouth of the Tanais, their fleets encountered each other with various success; and a memorable battle was fought in the narrow sea, under the walls of Constantinople. It would not be an easy task to reconcile the accounts of the Greeks, the Venetians, and the Genoese ; and while I depend on the narrative of an impartial historian, I shall borrow from each nation the facts that redound to their own disgrace, and the honour of their focs. The Venetians, with their allies the Catalans, had the advantage of number; and their fleet, with the poor addition of eight Byzantine galleys, amounted to seventy-five sail; the Genoese did not exceed sixty-four; but in those times their ships of war were distinguished by the superiority of their size and strength. The names and families of their naval commanders, Pisani and Doria, are illustrious in the annals of their country; but the personal merit of the former was eclipsed by the fame and abilities of his rival. They engaged in tempestuous weather; and the tumultuary conflict was continued from the dawn to the extinction of light. The enemies of the Genoese applaud their prowess: the friends of the Venetians are dissatisfied with their behaviour; but all parties agree in praising the skill and boldness of the Catalans, who, with many wounds, sustained the brunt of the action. On the separation of the fleets, the event might appear doubtful; but the thirteen Genoese galleys, that had been sunk or taken, were compensated by a double loss of the allies; of fourteen Venetians, ten Catalans, and two Greeks; and even the grief of the conquerors expressed the assurance and habit of more decisive victories. Pisani confessed his defeat, by retiring into a fortified harbour, from whence, under the pretext of the orders of the senate, he steered with a broken and flying squadron for the isle of Candia, and abandoned to his rivals the sovereignty of the sea. In a public

f Muratori (Annali d'Italia, tom. xii. p. 144.) refers to the most an. cient Chronicles of Venice, (Caresinus, the continuator of Andrew Dandolus, tom. xii. p. 421, 422.) and Genoa, (George Stella, Annales Genuenses, tom. xvii. p. 1091, 1092.) both which I have diligently consulted in his great Collection of the Historians of Italy.

g See the Chronicle of Matteo Villani of Florence, l. ii. c. 59, 60. p. 145-147. c. 74, 75. p. 156, 157. in Muratori's Collection, tom. xiv.

Their treaty with the empire, May 6.

have long since asserted my claim to introduce the nations, the immediate or remote authors of the fall of the Roman empire; nor can I refuse myself to those events, which, from their uncommon magnitude, will interest a philosophic mind in the history of blood."

A. D. 1206-1227.

epistle, addressed to the doge and senate, Petrarch | agitated and altered the surface of the globe. I employs his eloquence to reconcile the maritime powers, the two luminaries of Italy. The orator celebrates the valour and victory of the Genoese, the first of men in the exercise of naval war: he drops a tear on the misfortunes of their Venetian brethren; but he exhorts them to pursue with fire and sword the base and perfidious Greeks; to purge the metropolis of the east from the heresy with which it was infected. Deserted by their friends, the Greeks were incapable of resistance; and three months after the battle, the emperor Cantacuzene solicited and subscribed a treaty, which for ever banished the Venetians and Catalans, and granted to the Genoese a monopoly of trade, and almost a right of dominion. The Roman empire (I smile in transcribing the name) might soon have sunk into a province of Genoa, if the ambition of the republic had not been checked by the ruin of her freedom and naval power. A long contest of one hundred and thirty years was determined by the triumph of Venice; and the factions of the Genoese compelled them to seek for domestic peace under the protection of a foreign lord, the duke of Milan, or the French king. Yet the spirit of commerce survived that of conquest; and the colony of Pera still awed the capital and navigated the Euxine, till it was involved by the Turks in the final servitude of Constantinople itself.

CHAP. LXIV.

Conquests of Zingis Khan and the Moguls from China to Poland.-Escape of Constantinople and the Grecks. Origin of the Ottoman Turks in Bithynia.-Reigns and victories of Othman, Orchan, Amurath the first, and Bajazet the first.Foundation and progress of the Turkish monarchy in Asia and Europe.-Danger of Constantinople and the Greek empire.

FROM the petty quarrels of a city and her suburbs, from the cowardice and discord of the falling Greeks, I shall now ascend to the victorious Turks; whose domestic slavery was ennobled by martial discipline, religious enthusiasm, and the energy of the national character. The rise and progress of the Ottomans, the present sovereigns of Constantinople, are connected with the most important scenes of modern history; but they are founded on a previous knowledge of the great eruption of the Moguls and Tartars; whose rapid conquests may be compared with the primitive convulsions of nature, which have

h The Abbé de Sade (Memoires sur la Vie de Petrarque, tom. iii. p. 257-263.) translates this letter, which he had copied from a MS. in the king of France's library. Though a servant of the duke of Milan, Petrarch pours forth his astonishment and grief at the defeat and despair of the Genoese in the following year, (p. 323-332.),

a The reader is invited to review the chapters of the fourth and sixth volumes; the manners of pastoral nations, the conquests of Attila and the Huns, which were composed at a time when I entertained the wish, racher than the hope, of concluding my history.

b The khans of the Keraites were most probably incapable of reading the pompous epistles composed in their name by the Nestorian mission.

From the spacious highlands be- Zingis Khan, tween China, Siberia, and the Caspian first emperor of the Moguls and sea, the tide of emigration and war Tartars, has repeatedly been poured. These ancient seats of the Huns and Turks were occupied in the twelfth century by many pastoral tribes, of the same descent and similar manners, which were united and led to conquest by the formidable Zingis. In his ascent to greatness, that barbarian (whose private appellation was Temugin) had trampled on the necks of his equals. His birth was noble: but it was in the pride of victory, that the prince or people deduced his seventh ancestor from the immaculate conception of a virgin. His father had reigned over thirteen hordes, which composed about thirty or forty thousand families: above two thirds refused to pay tithes or obedience to his infant son; and at the age of thirteen, Temugin fought a battle against his rebellious subjects. The future conqueror of Asia was reduced to fly and to obey: but he rose superior to his fortune, and in his fortieth year he had established his fame and dominion over the circumjacent tribes. In a state of society, in which policy is rude and valour is universal, the ascendant of one man must be founded on his power and resolution to punish his enemies and recompense his friends. His first military league was ratified by the simple rites of sacrificing a horse and tasting of a running stream: Temugin pledged himself to divide with his followers the sweets and the bitters of life; and when he had shared among them his horses and apparel, he was rich in their gratitude and his own hopes. After his first victory, he placed seventy caldrons on the fire, and seventy of the most guilty rebels were cast headlong into the boiling water. The sphere of his attraction was continually enlarged by the ruin of the proud and the submission of the prudent; and the boldest chieftains might tremble, when they beheld, enchased in silver, the skull of the khan of the Keraites; who, under the name of Prester John, had corresponded with the Roman pontiff and the princes of Europe. The ambition of Temugin condescended to employ the arts of superstition; and it was from a naked prophet, who could ascend to heaven on a white horse, that he accepted the title of Zingis, the most great; and a divine right to the

aries, who endowed them with the fabulous wonders of an India

kingdom. Perhaps these Tartars (the presbyter or priest John had Bibliet.

Orient. tom. iii. p. ii. p. 487---503.)

e Since the history and tragedy of Voltaire, Gengis, at least French, seems to be the more fashionable spelling; but Abulgha Khan must have known the true name of his ancestor. His etymology appears just: Zin, in the Mogul tongue, signifies great, and gis is the superlative termination. (Hist. Genealogique des Tartars, part. 194, 195) From the same idea of magnitude, the appellation of Zinga

is bestowed on the oceap.