Decline & Fall - Byzantium 03 (59 page)

Here was a disaster not only for the Serbs, but for Byzantium and indeed for the whole of Christendom. No longer was there any barrier to keep the invaders from overrunning Serbia, Macedonia and Greece. The few surviving members of the Serbian nobility were not altogether dispossessed; henceforth, however, they would be mere vassals of their Turkish overlords, bound to recognize the suzerainty of the Ottoman Sultan (as Murad now styled himself), to pay him tribute and - the ultimate humiliation — to lend him military assistance on demand. Curiously enough, one of these vassals — Vukashin's so
n Marko
Kralyevich
1
- was to become the greatest of Serbian folk heroes, whose name is still remembered and regularly invoked during his people's all-too-frequent periods of military crisis.
2

Where Byzantium itself was concerned, there was one small consolation: Manuel Palaeologus had taken advantage of the situation by riding out from his base at Thessalonica and occupying the territories of Uglesha, including the city of Serres itself. But he was not to hold them for long, and meanwhile his father had been obliged by the steadily worsening financial situation to appropriate one half of the monastic property in what was left of the Empire. It was made clear to the monasteries that their lands would be returned to them if the situation improved; but the situation did not improve. On the contrary, the government was soon afterwards forced to take still more stringent measures, while John himself became progressively more defeatist. By 1573 he had become a Turkish vassal, as had the Bulgarian Tsar; thus it was that within twenty years of the first permanent Ottoman settlement on European soil, the three chief powers in the Balkan peninsula were all dependencies of the Sultan.

Since contemporary sources, such as they are, are silent on the subject, the terms of John V's compact with Murad are not altogether clear. Negotiations between them seem to have begun towards the end of 1372, about a year after the Emperor's return, and to have reached fruition two or three months later. John's motive was probably sheer despair. With the Turks in control of both Serbia and Bulgaria, any effective Crusade - always unlikely - was impossible. Byzantium, now completely cut off by land from the West, could no longer put up even a show of resistance. Only by joining forces with the Sultan could John perhaps hope to save something from the wreckage of his Empire. Murad might at least bring the wandering bands of Turkish marauders in Macedonia and Thrace under some sort of control; he might also

The Serbian language is unique among those using the Cyrillic
script in having a recognized le
tter-for-letter system of transliteration, since Croatian - which is essentially the same tongue, as close as American is to English - uses the Latin alphabet. It might therefore be more scholarly to use this system for Serbian proper names; but this would mea
n writing Dusan, Ugljesa, Kralje
vic, etc., which the average reader would find a lot more bewildering.

'Prodigiously strong, he carried for weapon a mace weighing sixty pounds of iron, thirty pounds of silver and nine pounds of gold. His horse, Piebald, was the fleetest in the world and understood the human tongue; and from one side of its saddle swung the mace and from the other a counterweight of red wine in a skin, for Marko was a hard drinker though he was never drunk.' Rebecca West,
Black Lamb and
Grey Fa/con,
Vol. ii, pp. 167-8.

strengthen John's own hand against his son Andronicus, who was causing him increasing anxiety.

But vassalage also involved disagreeable duties; and in May 1373 — within a few months of the signing of the agreement - John found himself in Anatolia, campaigning at the Sultan's side. This in itself must have been humiliation enough; but soon word reached him from the capital that Andronicus (who probably resented his father's growing attachment to Manuel) had taken advantage of his absence to come out in open revolt - allying himself, curiously enough, with Murad's own discontented son Sauji, who had also taken up arms against his father. Fortunately the insurrection was unsuccessful: the rebels were both quickly brought to heel. The furious Sultan had Sauji blinded - the wretched youth died soon after - and demanded that the Emperor insist on a similar penalty, both for Andronicus and his young son, who had taken no part in the revolt. John, much as he hated the brutality, knew that he could not
refuse; he did, however, secretl
y arrange for some mercy to be shown to the victims. They did not entirely lose their sight but were imprisoned in Constantinople, Andronicus being formally deprived of his right to the succession. His position as heir-apparent was taken by Manuel, now twenty-three years old, who was hastily summoned from Thessalonica and, on 25 September, crowned co-Emperor.

Only three years later, John had cause to regret his forbearance. In March 1376, a squadron of ten Venetian ships arrived in Constantinople, carrying ambassadors from the Doge. With Andronicus out of the way, they pointed out, there was no reason why the agreement reached in Venice six years before should not now be implemented. In return for the cession of Tenedos, the Venetians were willing to make a further payment of 30,000 ducats and to return the crown jewels. They would also guarantee freedom of worship to the population of the island, whose Greek element would remain under the authority of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Finally, they promised, the imperial standard would continue to fly over the island, alongside the banner of St Mark.

John Palaeologus was only too happy to agree; as was to be expected, however, the Genoese colony in Constantinople felt very differently. Once again, they were determined to prevent the passing of Tenedos into Venetian hands; once again, their thoughts turned to their ally Andronicus. In July 1376 they somehow contrived to engineer his escape from prison. Ferried secretly across to Galata, he made contact with Murad, who — perhaps surprisingly in the circumstances - provided him with a mixed force of cavalry and infantry; then, after a month's siege, he bludgeoned his way into the capital. John and the rest of his family were able to hold out for a few days in the fortress of the Golden Gate, but they were soon forced to surrender; Andronicus had the pleasure of consigning them to the dungeons in the Tower of Anemas
1
that he himself had so recently left. One of his first actions after his assumption of power - it had probably been a condition of his escape -was to make a formal grant of Tenedos to Genoa. A year later, on 18 October 1577, he had himself crown
ed as Andronicus IV and his littl
e son as his co-Emperor, John VII.

But the Genoese never received their reward. The Byzantine Governor of Tenedos refused to surrender the island to them - though he was happy to yield it shortly afterwards to the Venetians, who immediately sent a fleet to claim what they understandably believed was their due. To show his good faith, Andronicus was obliged to support a Genoese attempt to recover it by force - 'for which purpose', wrote Demetrius Cydones, 'he is preparing munitions and ships and is compelled to hire soldiers, a thing which is for him more difficult than flying'
2
- but the attempt was predictably unsuccessful. Sultan Murad was more fortunate. He had no love for Androni
cus, for whom he had only recentl
y recommended blinding; and he had supported him in his later insurrection on one condition, which was immediately fulfilled - the restitution of Gallipoli, captured by Amadeus of Savoy ten years before. By the end of 1377 this all-important bridgehead was once again in his possession; once again his dominions in Europe were united with those in Asia Minor, immeasurably strengthening his position for the next stage of his advance.

The captive Emperors, father and son, languished for three years in the Tower of Anemas. How they regained their liberty is not entirely clear. The initiative seems to have been their own, although it is possible that the Venetians were implicated in much the same way as the Genoese had assisted the escape of Andronicus. In any case they somehow managed to escape across the Bosphorus to the only refuge available to them, Murad's camp near Chrysopolis. Once there, Manuel - who seems to have done the negotiating - promised the Sultan, in return for the reinstatement of himself and his father, an increased tribute, additional

1
The ruins of this building, which had been one of the city's darkest and most dreaded prisons since the days of Alexius Comnenus three hundred years before, still survive at the northern end of the Land Walls, where it adjoined the Palace of Blachernae.

2
Letters,
No. 167. Quoted (as is the epigraph to this chapter, which is taken from the same letter) by Professor Nicol, op. cit., pp. 290-91.

military assistance as necessary and, most humiliating of all, the city of Philadelphia, the last remaining Byzantine outpost in Asia Minor. Agreement was quickly reached. The Turks provided an army; the Venetians, only too happy to be rid of the incurably pro-Genoese Andronicus, sent a small fleet; and on i July 1379 John V and Manuel II re-entered their capital by the Charisius Gate. Andronicus fled in his turn - to his Genoese friends in Galata, taking with him as hostages his mother the Empress Helena and her father the monk Joasaph, the former John VI, both of whom he suspected of complicity in arranging for John's and Manuel's escape.

For the next year there was civil war between John and Andronicus, Constantinople and Galata - supported respectively by the Venetians and the Genoese. The Sultan's position was more doubtful: ostensibly he too backed the legitimate Emperors, but it was greatly in his own interest to see the Byzantines divided among themselves, and he may well have given covert help to Andronicus from time to time, if only to keep the hostilities going. The fortress of Galata suffered a long and painful siege, and the fighting continued for nearly two years: not until April 1381 did the warring factions reach an agreement. By its terms Andronicus was reinstated as heir to the throne, with his son John to succeed him, and meanwhile granted a small appanage on the northern coast of the Marmara with its capital at Selymbria and including the cities of Panidus, Rhaedestum and Heraclea.

Manuel was away on campaign with Murad at the time that this agreement was reached, and his reaction to it is not recorded. He more than anyone had deserved well of his father: he had bought him - and brought him - back from Venice, shared his captivity in Constantinople and, in marked contrast to his brother, had always fought loyally at his side. Having been formally granted the right of succession eight years previously, he had good reason to resent its withdrawal, particularly in such circumstances. But he was anyway angry, unable to forgive his father's craven defeatism. He was perfectly prepared to fight, if he had to, for the Sultan against Murad's Muslim enemies in Anatolia; but he refused absolutely to accept the Turkish claim to the Balkan peninsula, which he still believed it was possible to defend. In the autumn of 1382 he returned to Thessalonica - no longer, however, as Governor in John's name but defiantly, as an Emperor in his own right, determined to have no more truck with this constant family bickering which served only to waste men, money and materials that should have been employed against the infidel invaders. It was fortunate indeed for him when - after one last insurrection against his father - the insufferable Andronicus IV died in June 1385, leaving him once again the legitimate co-inheritor of what was left of Byzantium.

The year 13 81, that had seen the end of this most recent outbreak of internecine strife, also brought to a close another, longer conflict - that between Venice and Genoa. Starting with the dispute over Tenedos, this contest had soon become generalized; and its last round had been fought on Italian soil and in Italian waters - the Tyrrhenian, the Adriatic and even in the Venetian lagoon itself. By now, however, the heat had gone out of the war, and the two exhausted republics gratefully accepted the offer of Count Amadeus of Savoy to mediate. Neither had won; after four years of devastation and bloodshed, both found themselves politically very much where they had been before - a situation confirmed by the Treaty of Turin, signed on 23 August, which provided for the continuation of trade in the Mediterranean and the Levant by both republics side by side. As for Tenedos, it would be neutral ground, its fortifications razed, its population transferred to Crete and Euboea, its neutrality guaranteed by Amadeus himself. Finally, as an earnest of their good intentions, both Venice and Genoa promised to do everything in their power to bring about the conversion of the Roman Empire to the Catholic Faith.

But what was this Empire? If the truth be told, it was in fact no longer an Empire at all. Rather was it a group of four small states, ruled by four so-called Emperors and a Despot. After 1383 each of these was a member of the house of Palaeologus, but each remained effectively independent of the other three, if not of his Turkish overlords. John V continued to reign in Constantinople, though now as a vassal of the Ottoman Sultan and as little more than a plaything of Venice and Genoa; Andronicus IV - until his death - with his son and co-Emperor John VII, both of them still more dependent on Turkish favour, ruled over the north shore of the Marmara; Manuel II governed Thessalonica; while Theodore I, John V's fourth son, held sway over the Despotate of the Morea, with his capital at Mistra.

This last appointment needs a little explanation. For over thirty years southern Greece had been administered, with signal success, by John VI's son Manuel Cantacuzenus; but when Manuel had died without issue in 1380 John V had decided to appoint his son Theodore in his place. The old ex-Emperor, who was still recovering from the privations he had suffered as a hostage during the long and arduous siege of Galata, had raised no objection, and had
even decided to settle
at Mistra himself;
1
but one of his grandsons, who regarded the Despotate as his family's legal appanage, had enlisted the help of both the Turks and the local Latin princes to fight for it on his behalf. Eventually Theodore had managed to establish himself as ruler, though he too was obliged to accept Turkish vassalage; and from that time forward he was to make the Morea the strongest and most prosperous bastion of a tottering Byzantium.