Decline & Fall - Byzantium 03 (78 page)

As for those ordinary Greeks who had escaped the massacre, the Sultan had decided that they should comprise a self-governing community within his Empire under a leader, elected by themselves, who would be responsible to him for their behaviour; and with the elimination of virtually the entire Byzantine aristocracy this leader could only be the Patriarch. The last incumbent, Gregory III, had resigned three years before and had fled to Rome. Since, however, he was a unionist this was just as well: Mehmet instinctively mistrusted any Byzantine who had links with the West. His choice now fell - wisely - on the monk Gennadius, the former George Scholarius who, having attended the Councils of Ferrara and Florence, had renounced his earlier unionist views and become leader of the pro-Orthodox party. Together with his fellow-monks, he had been sold off into slavery; but he was eventually run to earth as a menial in the household of a rich Turk of Adrianople and almost immediately appointed Patriarch. In January
1454
he was enthroned - not in St Sophia (which was now a mosque) but in the church of the Holy Apostles. His insignia of office - robe, staff and pectoral cross - being formally handed to him by the Sultan, just as former Patriarchs had received it from the
basileus.

In this way Mehmet declared himself protector of his Greek subjects, granting them an accepted place within his Empire and guaranteeing them freedom of Christian worship. They might no longer have an Emperor; but at least they retained their Patriarch, to provide a focus not only for their religion but also for their national feelings.
1
Gennadius was to serve three separate terms in the Patriarchal Chair, during which he strove successfully to establish a
modus vivendi
with the Turkish conquerors. He made only one serious mistake: a few months after his installation he voluntarily abandoned the church of the Holy Apostles in favour of that of the Theotokos Pammakaristos, thereby giving the Sultan the excuse to demolish it, replacing it on the summit of the fourth of the city's seven hills with the present Fatih (Conqueror) Mosque.
2
The Pammakaristos remained the Patriarchal church until
1568;
five years later it too became a mosque, and is now known under the name of Fethiye Camii.
3

Not until
1601
did the Patriarchate settle in its present site in the Fener quarter on the Golden Horn. And yet, to the Orthodox faithful,

1
This act of the Sultan's set the pattern for the Greek Orthodox Church that is illustrated by such relatively recent ecclesiastics as the Archbishops Damaskinos, Regent of Greece
1945-6,
and Makarios, President of Cyprus
1959-74
and
1975-7.
For nearly five hundred years the Church fulfilled this dual religious and nationalistic function, and the tradition is still very much alive.

2
The church was o
riginally erected by Constantine
the Great as a burial-place for himself and his successors (see
Byzantium: The Early Centuries,
pp.
78-9).
Rebuilt by Justinian, it was later restored by Basil I and decorated with a cycle of mosaics. The Fatih Mosque, with the vast complex of buildings around it, was built between
1463
and
1470,
and is the earliest major Ottoman monument in the city.

3
The Pammakaristos is still well worth visiting. The early fourteenth-century
parecclesion
on the south side contains a fine series of mosaics, roughly c
ontemporary with those of Kariye
Camii and recently restored by the Byzantine Institute of America.

far more important than its precise location is the fact that the Patriarch, now the Ecumenical Patriarch of the whole Greek Church, remains firmly based in modern Istanbul. His local congregation is minute: although until the end of the Balkan War in
1913
the Greeks living within the Ottoman Empire were far more numerous - and on the whole a good deal richer - than those in the Kingdom of Greece, they have now almost all departed. Today the principal responsibility of the Patriarch of Constantinople is to minister to the Orthodox communities in Western Europe, America and Australia. For this his place of residence is something less than ideal; but its symbolic value to every Greek is immense, being as it is a constant reminder of his Byzantine heritage. Though the imperial line ended with the death of Constantine Dragases, the line of Patriarchs stretches back over sixteen hundred years, in virtually unbroken succession to the fourth century. It was in Constantinople that the Orthodox Church was born; its heart is still there today.

Western Europe, for all its deep and genuine dismay, was not profoundly changed by the fall of the Byzantine Empire. The two states most immediately affected, Venice and Genoa, lost no time in making the best terms they could with the Sultan. The Venetian relief fleet - equipped largely by Pope Nicholas - was anchored off Chios, waiting for a favourable wind to continue its journey to Constantinople, when some of the Genoese ships that had escaped from Galata drew alongside with news of the disaster. Its captain, Giacomo Loredan, promptly withdrew to Euboea until such time as he should receive further orders. Not till
3
July did Alvise Diedo and the Venetian ships from Constantinople reach the lagoons. On the day following Diedo made a full report to the Senate. Now, perhaps for the first time, the Venetians began to appreciate the full significance of what had occurred. It was not just the fall of the capital of Eastern Christendom; that may have been an emotional shock, but Byzantium had long since ceased to have any real political importance. Nor was it the annihilation of a valuable trading post, although Venice could now estimate her casualties at some
5
50
Venetians and Cretans, killed during or immediately after the siege, and her financial losses at
300,000
ducats. There was a third consideration more serious still than these: the fact that the victorious Sultan could henceforth undertake any new conquests that he might choose. Everything now depended on securing his good will.

On
5
July further orders were sent to Loredan and to the selected Venetian ambassador, Bartolomeo Marcello. The former was to take whatever steps he thought necessary for the protection of Euboea ensuring that any merchandise passing through it bound for Constantinople would be diverted to Modone in the Peloponnese until further notice. As for Marcello, his orders were to emphasize to Mehmet the Republic's firm intention to respect the peace treaty concluded with his father and confirmed by himself, and to request the restitution of all Venetian ships remaining in Turkish hands, pointing out that these were not warships but merchantmen. If the Sultan agreed to renew the treaty, Marcello was to ask that Venice should be allowed to maintain her trading colony in the city, with the same rights and privileges that she had enjoyed under Greek rule, and was to press for the return of all Venetians still in captivity. If he refused, or sought to impose new conditions, the ambassador should refer back to the Senate. Meanwhile he was given authority to spend up to
1,200
ducats on presents for Mehmet and his court officials, to help the negotiations along.

Marcello soon found, as many another ambassador was to find after him, that Mehmet was a hard bargainer. It was only the following spring, after the best part of a year's negotiation, that an agreement was concluded. The remaining ships and prisoners were released and the Venetian colony allowed back under a new
bailo;
Girolamo Minotto had been put to death after the siege. No longer, however, would it enjoy those territorial and commercial concessions on which its former power and prosperity had depended. For two years Marcello stayed in Constantinople, trying to persuade the Sultan to change his mind. He failed. The Latin presence in the East had already begun its decline.

The Genoese had even more at stake than the Venetians, and had continued to play their double game. In Galata, their
podesta
— equivalent to the Venetian
bailo -
had opened the gates the moment the Turks had appeared, and had done everything he could to prevent his countrymen's unseemly exodus. At the earliest opportunity he had sent two envoys to Mehmet to congratulate him on his victory and to express the hope that the conditions governing the existence of the colony should remain unchanged; but the Sultan had driven them angrily away. Two days later, a second embassy found him in a more charitable mood. The Genoese of Galata would remain inviolate and in possession of their property, and might practise their religion unhindered so long as they rang no bells and built no new churches. They were free to travel and trade by land and sea throughout the Ottoman dominions; but they must surrender their arms and destroy thei
r Land Walls and citadel. Every
male citizen must pay a capitation tax; there would be no more special privileges as in the past. Galata would in future be in precisely the same position as any other Christian community which had made voluntary submission to its Turkish conquerors. Theoretically the Genoese trading colonies along the northern shore of the Black Sea - including the prosperous port of Caffa in the Crimea - would be allowed to continue; but since the death of Antonio Rizzo few sailors ventured through the straits and few merchants were prepared to pay the immense tolls demanded. With the exception of the island of Chios - which remained Genoese till
1566
- by the end of the century Genoa's commercial Empire was gone.

In Rome, Pope Nicholas showed none of the cynicism and self-interest of the merchant republics. He did his utmost to galvanize the West for a Crusade, a cause which was enthusiastically supported not only by the two Greek cardinals, Isidore and Bessarion, but also by the Papal Legate in Germany Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, the future Pope Pius II. But it was no use. The Western Emperor Frederick III had neither the means nor the authority to do more than write a few pious letters, France and England were exhausted after the Hundred Years' War, while Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy - the richest prince in Europe - made an impressive outward show of zeal but failed, when the moment came, to lift a finger. Only Ladislas of Hungary longed passionately for action; but he could do nothing without allies — and least of all without John Hunyadi, with whom he was unfortunately not on speaking terms.

From the point of view of Byzantium it hardly mattered. With the Turkish army at its present strength Constantinople could not conceivably be recaptured, nor was it possible to resurrect the Empire. The time for action was past. A century before, concerted action by the powers of Western Christendom against the Ottoman threat might have saved the situation - or, at least, have postponed the inevitable. Such action, though endlessly discussed, was not taken; and while Europe dithered, Byzantium died.

Among the Christians of the East there could obviously be no question of a Crusade; they could only strive to give what help they could to their defeated brethren and to obtain what terms they could for themselves. Their ambassadors arrived thick and fast at the Sultan's court - from George Brankovich in Serbia, from the Despots Demetrius and Thomas in the Morea, from the Emperor John Comnenus of Trebizond, from the Gattilusio lord of Lesbos and Thasos, from the Grand Master of the Knights of St John. To all, Mehmet's reply was the same: he had no quarrel with them, provided only that they recognized him as their suzerain and paid him increased tribute. All agreed except the Knights; they refused to do either on the grounds that they needed papal authority, which would obviously never be given. Mehmet let them go; there would be plenty of time to deal with them later.

In fact the Knights lasted longer than any of their fellow-Christians. Mehmet eventually moved against Rhodes in
1480
but failed to capture it and died the next year; it was left to his great-grandson
Suleyman
the Magnificent to take the island by storm in
1520.
1
Brankovich and Hunyadi both died in
1456.
The Despotate of the Morea, already torn apart by the constant squabbling of the two brothers, was finally annihilated in
1460
and in the following year, on
15
August — two hundred years to the day since Michael V
III had regained Constantinople
-
David Comnenus, last Emperor of Trebizond, surrendered to the Sult
an the last throne of the Byzanti
ne world. Two years later he, his older children and his nephew were executed in Constantinople; their remains were thrown to the dogs outside the walls.

The house of Palaeologus, however, lived on a little longer. The Despot Demetrius died a monk in Constantinople; his only known child, a daughter named Helena, was taken with her mother into the Sultan's harem. His brother Thomas fled to Rome, bringing with him the head of St Andrew as a present to Pope Pius II.
2
His baby sons were brought up by Cardinal Bessarion. The elder, Andrew, born in the year of the fall, proved something of a disappointment. While continuing to style himself
imperator Constantinopolitanus,
he married a Roman prostitute and died a pauper in
1502,
having sold all his tides to Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. The younger, Manuel, returned to Constantinople, where he married, had two sons - John and another Andrew (who adopted Islam)