CHAP. mosch was completed, before Togrul presumed to lay the foundations of a palace." LVII. He delivers A.D. 1055. With the belief of the Koran, the son of Seljuk the caliph of Bagdad, imbibed a lively reverence for the successor of the prophet. But that sublime character was still disputed by the caliphs of Bagdad and Egypt, and each of the rivals was solicitous to prove his title in the judgment of the strong, though illiterate, barbarians. Mahmud the Gaznevide had declared himself in favour of the line of Abbas; and had treated with indignity the robe of honour which was presented by the Fatimite ambassador. Yet the ungrateful Hashemite had changed with the change of fortune; he applauded the victory of Zendecan, and named the Seljukian sultan his temporal vicegerent over the Moslem world. As Togrul executed and enlarged this important trust, he was called to the deliverance of the caliph Cayem, and obeyed the holy summons, which gave a new kingdom to his arms. In the palace of Bagdad, the commander of the faithful still slumbered, a venerable phantom. His servant or master, the prince of the Bowides, could no longer protect him from the insolence of meaner tyrants; and the Euphrates and Tigris were oppressed by the revolt of the Turkish and Arabian emirs. The presence of a conqueror was implored as a blessing; and the transient mischiefs of fire and sword were excused as the sharp but salutary remedies which alone could restore the health of the republic. At the head of an irresistible force, the sultan of Persia marched from Hamadan: the proud were crushed, the prostrate were spared; the prince of the Bowides disappeared; the heads of the most obstinate rebels were laid at the feet of Togrul; and u Hist. Generale des Huns, tom. iii. p. 165, 166, 167. M. de Guignes quotes Abulmahasen, an historian of Egypt. ▾ Consult the Bibliothéque Orientale, in the articles of the Abbassides, Caher, and Caiem, and the Annals of Elmacin and Abulpharagius. LVII. titure, he inflicted a lesson of obedience on the people of CHAP. Mosul and Bagdad. After the chastisement of the guilty, and the restoration of peace, the royal shepherd accepted the reward of his labours; and a solemn comedy represented the triumph of religious prejudice over barbarian power." The Turkish sultan em- His invesbarked on the Tigris, landed at the gate of Racca, and made his public entry on horseback. At the palace-gate he respectfully dismounted, and walked on foot, preceded by his emirs without arms. The caliph was seated behind his black veil: the black garment of the Abbassides was cast over his shoulders, and he held in his hand the staff of the apostle of God. The conqueror of the East kissed the ground, stood some time in a modest posture, and was led towards the throne by the vizir and an interpreter. After Togrul had seated himself on another throne, his commission was publicly read, which declared him the temporal lieutenant of the vicar of the prophet. He was successively invested with seven robes of honour, and presented with seven slaves, the natives of the seven climates of the Arabian empire. His mystic veil was perfumed with musk; two crowns were placed on his head; two scimitars were girded to his side, as the symbols of a double reign over the East and West. After this inauguration, the sultan was prevented from prostrating himself a second time; but he twice kissed the hand of the commander of the faithful, and his titles were proclaimed by the voice of heralds and the applause of the Moslems. In a second visit to Bagdad, the Seljukian prince again rescued the caliph from his enemies; and devoutly, on foot, led the bridle of his mule from the prison to the palace. Their alliance was cemented by the marriage of To For this curious ceremony, I am indebted to M. de Guignes (tom. iii. p. 197, 198), and that learned author is obliged to Bondari, who composed in Arabic the history of the Seljukides (tom. v. p. 365). I am ignorant of his age, country, and character. LVII. A. D. 1063. CHAP. grul's sister with the successor of the prophet. Without reluctance he had introduced a Turkish virgin into his haram; but Cayem proudly refused his daughter to the sultan, disdained to mingle the blood of the Hashemites with the blood of a Scythian shepherd; and protracted the negotiation many months, till the gradual diminution of his revenue admonished him that he was still in the hands of a master. The royal nuptials and death, were followed by the death of Togrul himself;* as he left no children, his nephew Alp Arslan succeeded to the title and prerogatives of sultan; and his name, after that of the caliph, was pronounced in the public prayers of the Moslems. Yet in this revolution, the Abbassides acquired a larger measure of liberty and power. On the throne of Asia, the Turkish monarchs were less jealous of the domestic administration of Bagdad; and the commanders of the faithful were relieved from the ignominious vexations to which they had been exposed by the presence and poverty of the Persian dynasty. The Turks invade the A.D. 1050. Since the fall of the caliphs, the discord and deRoman em- generacy of the Saracens respected the Asiatic propire, vinces of Rome; which, by the victories of Nicephorus, Zimisces, and Basil, had been extended as far as Antioch and the eastern boundaries of Armenia. Twenty-five years after the death of Basil, his successors were suddenly assaulted by an unknown race of barbarians, who united the Scythian valour with the fanaticism of new proselytes, and the art and riches of a powerful monarchy. The myriads of * Eodem anno (A.H. 455) obiit princeps Togrulbecus. . . . rex fuit clemens, prudens, et peritus regnandi, cujus terror corda mortalium invaserat, ita ut obedirent ei reges atque ad ipsum scriberent. Elmacin, Hist. Saracen. p. 342. vers. Erpenii. y For these wars of the Turks and Romans, see in general the Byzantine histories of Zonaras and Cedrenus, Scylitzes the continuator of Cedrenus, and Nicephorus Bryennius Cæsar. The two first of these were monks, the two latter statesmen; yet such were the Greeks, that the difference of style and character is scarcely discernible. For the Orientals, I draw as usual on the wealth of D'Herbelot (see titles of the first Seljukides) and the accuracy of De Guignes (Hist. des Huns, tom. iii. 1. x). LVII. A.D. 1063 Turkish horse overspread a frontier of six hundred CHAP. miles from Tauris to Arzeroum, and the blood of one hundred and thirty thousand Christians was a grateful sacrifice to the Arabian prophet. Yet the arms of Togrul did not make any deep or lasting impression on the Greek empire. The torrent rolled away from the open country; the sultan retired without glory or success from the siege of an Armenian city; the obscure hostilities were continued or suspended with a vicissitude of events; and the bravery of the Macedonian legions renewed the fame of the conqueror of Asia. The name of Alp Arslan, the valiant lion, is Reign of expressive of the popular idea of the perfection of man; and the successor of Togrul displayed the fierce--1072. ness and generosity of the royal animal. He passed the Euphrates at the head of the Turkish cavalry, and entered Cæsarea, the metropolis of Cappadocia, to which he had been attracted by the fame and wealth of the temple of St. Basil. The solid structure resisted the destroyer: but he carried away the doors of the shrine incrusted with gold and pearls, and profaned the relics of the tutelar saint, whose mortal frailties were now covered by the venerable rust of antiquity. The final conquest of Armenia and Georgia Conquest of was achieved by Alp Arslan. In Armenia, the title and Georgia, of a kingdom, and the spirit of a nation, were anni- A. D. 1065 hilated: the artificial fortifications were yielded by the mercenaries of Constantinople; by strangers without faith, veterans without pay or arms, and recruits without experience or discipline. The loss of this important frontier was the news of a day; and the Catholics were neither surprised nor displeased, that 2. Εφερετο γαρ εν Τουρκοις λογος, ὡς ειη πεπρωμένον καταστραφηναι το Τουρκων γενος απο της τοιαυτης δυναμεως, ὅποιαν ὁ Μακεδων Αλεξανδρος εχων κατεστρέψατο Περσας. Cedrenus, tom. ii. p. 791. The credulity of the vulgar is always probable; and the Turks had learned from the Arabs the history or legend of Escander Dulcarnein (D'Herbelot, p. 317, &c.). Armenia -1068. CHAP. The em peror Ro a people so deeply infected with the Nestorian and Eutychian errors had been delivered by Christ and his mother into the hands of the infidels. The woods and valleys of Mount Caucasus were more strenuously defended by the native Georgians' or Iberians: but the Turkish sultan and his son Malek were indefatigable in this holy war: their captives were compelled to promise a spiritual, as well as temporal, obedience; and, instead of their collars and bracelets, an iron horse-shoe, a badge of ignominy, was imposed on the infidels who still adhered to the worship of their fathers. The change, however, was not sincere or universal; and, through ages of servitude, the Georgians have maintained the succession of their princes and bishops. But a race of men, whom nature has cast in her most perfect mould, is degraded by poverty, ignorance, and vice; their profession, and still more their practice, of Christianity is an empty name; and if they have emerged from heresy, it is only because they are too illiterate to remember a metaphysical creed. The false or genuine magnanimity of Mahmud the manus Dio- Gaznevide was not imitated by Alp Arslan; and he attacked without scruple the Greek empress Eudocia genes, A.D. 1068 -1071. • Οι και Ιβηρίαν και Μεσοποταμίαν, και Αρμενιαν οικουσιν· και δι την Ιουδαίκην του Νεστορίου και των Ακεφαλων θρησκευουσιν αίρεσιν (Scylitzes, ad calcem Cedreni, tom. ii. p. 834. whose ambiguous construction shall not tempt me to suspect that he confounded the Nestorian and Monophysite heresies). He familiarly talks of the unvis, xolos, ogyn, Osov, qualities, as I should apprehend, very foreign to the perfect Being; but his bigotry is forced to confess, that they were soon afterwards discharged on the orthodox Romans. b Had the name of Georgians been known to the Greeks (Stritter, Memoriæ Byzant. tom. iv. Iberica), I should derive it from their agriculture, as the Exvéas yswgy of Herodotus (1. iv. c. 18. p. 289. edit. Wesseling). But it appears only since the crusades, among the Latins (Jac. a Vitriaco, Hist. Hierosol. c. 79. p. 1095) and Orientals (D'Herbelot, p. 407), and was devoutly borrowed from St. George of Cappadocia. • Mosheim, Institut. Hist. Eccles. p. 632. See in Chardin's Travels (tom. i. p. 171-174) the manners and religion of this handsome but worthless nation. See the pedigree of their princes from Adam to the present century, in the Tables of M. de Guignes (tom. i. p. 433-438). |