The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• The Works of Edward Gibbon
• List of Illustrations
• The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
• Chapter Lxi
• Chapter Lxii
• Chapter Lxiii
• Chapter Lxiv
• Chapter Lxv
• Chapter Lxvi
• Chapter Lxvii
• Appendix Additional Notes By the Editor
• 1.: Authorities
• 2.: The Acciajoli — ( P. 92 )
• 3.: The Island Dynasties After the Latin Conquest — ( P. 89 )
• 4.: Mongol Invasion of Europe, 1241 — ( P. 146 , 147 )

APPENDIX

ADDITIONAL NOTES BY THE EDITOR

1.

AUTHORITIES

Laonicus Chalcondyles1 belonged to a good Athenian family. He went twice as an ambassador to the Sultan Murad, and was on both occasions imprisoned. His History in 10 books covers the period 1298-1463, and thus includes the fall of the Empire of Trebizond. He was a man of great ability, and, though we may wish that he had not set it before himself to imitate Herodotus and Thucydides, we must recognise the talent which he displayed in handling a most intractable period of history. It is very interesting to pass from his predecessors in the series of the Byzantine historians to this writer. We no longer watch events from the single and simple standpoint of Constantinople. The true theme of Chalcondyles is not the decline of the diminished empire, but the growth and development of the Ottoman State.2 The centre of events shifts with the movements of the sultan. The weakest point of Chalcondyles is his chronology. (Ed. Baumbach (Geneva), 1615; ed. Bekker (Bonn), 1843.)

Ducas was a grandson of Michael Ducas (a scion of the imperial family of that name), who is mentioned as having taken part in the struggle between Cantacuzenus and John Palaeologus in the 14th century. He was secretary of the Genoese podestà at Phocaea, before the siege of Constantinople, and afterwards he was employed by the Gattilusi of Lesbos as an ambassador to the sultan. His connection with the Genoese helped, probably, to determine his ecclesiastical views; he was a hearty supporter of union with the Latin Church, as the great safeguard against the Turks. His History covers the period 1341-1462; he is more accurate than Chalcondyles. In language he is not a purist; his work is full of foreign words. (Ed. Bullialdus (Paris), 1649; ed. Bekker (Bonn), 1834, with a 15th cent. Italian translation, which fills up some gaps in the Greek.)

George Phrantzes (cp. above, p. 250, note 33), born 1401, was secretary of the Emperor Manuel, whose son Constantine he rescued at Palias in 1429. In 1432 Protovestiarios, he was made Prefect of Sparta in 1448, and then elevated to the post of Great Logothete. See further above, p. 250 and p. 322 sqq. Taken prisoner on the capture of Constantinople (cp. vol. xii. p. 47), he fled to the Peloponnesus, visited Italy, and ended his life as Brother Gregory in a monastery of Corfu, where he composed his Chronicle. This work, when Gibbon wrote, was accessible only in the Latin translation of Pontanus (1604). The Greek original was first published by F. K. Alter (Vienna, 1796), from an inferior MS. An improved text was issued by Bekker in the Bonn series, 1838.3 The history covers a longer period than that of Chalcondyles; beginning 1258, it comes down to 1476, the year before the work was completed. Bk. 1 comes down to the death of Manuel, Bk. 2, to the death of John; Bk. 3 treats of the reign of Constantine and the capture of the city; Bk. 4 the events of the following twenty-three years. The high position which he held in the State and his opportunities of knowledge render Bks. 2 and 3 especially valuable. He is naturally a good hater of the Turks, from whom he had suffered so much. His style is not pedantic like that of Chalcondyles. (Biographical Monograph by G. Destunis in the Zhurnal Ministerstva narodn. prosv., vol. 287, p. 427 sqq., 1893.)

Critobulus of Imbros wrote a history of the deeds of Mohammad II. from 1451 to 1467. Although he is not out of sympathy with his countrymen, he has thrown his lot in with the conquerors, and he writes from the Turkish point of view. This is the interesting feature of his work, which is thus sharply contrasted with the histories of Chalcondyles and Ducas. He inscribes the book, in a dedicatory epistle, to Mohammad himself, whom he compares to Alexander the Great. Like Ducas and Chalcondyles, he describes the siege of Constantinople at second hand; but like theirs his very full description is a most valuable source for comparison with the accounts of the eyewitnesses. He can indeed be convicted of many small inaccuracies. For example, he states that Giustiniani was wounded in the chest, and that Constantine was slain near the Cercoporta; and in other parts of his work, his chronology is at fault. He was an imitator of Thucydides, and puts Thucydidean speeches into the mouth of Mohammad. But he does not scruple to use a “modern” foreign word like τούϕακες, “guns” (from the Turkish; cp. modern Greek τουϕέκι, a gun). The history of Critobulus is extant in an MS. at Constantinople, and it was first published by C. Müller, in the 2nd part of vol. v. of Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, p. 40 sqq., 1870, with very useful notes.

The description of Murad’s siege of Constantinople by John Cananus is mentioned above, p. 224, note 93; and that of the siege of Thessalonica in 1430, by John Anagnostes, on p. 302, note 14.

The chronicle of the last years of the empire is briefly told in the anonymous Ekthesis Chronike, a work of the 16th century, published by C. Sathas in Bibl. Graec. Med. Aev. vii. p. 556 sqq. (1894). A new edition of this little work by Prof. Lampros is in preparation.

It remains to mention the Anonymous Dirge concerning Tamurlane, Θρη̂νος περὶ Ταμυρλάγγου, written during the campaign of Timur into Asia Minor. It is published by Papadimitriu in the Lietopis ist.-phil. obschestva of Odessa (Vizant. Otdiel.), ii. p. 173 sqq. (Older, bad ed. in Wagner’s Medieval Greek Texts, p. 105 sqq.) Timur’s name also appears in this poem as Ταμυρλάνης (l. 47) and Τεμύρης (l. 41).

Rashīd ad-Dīn, born 1247 at Hamadān was originally a physician, but became Vizir of Persia, 1298. He was executed by Abū Said in 1318. In the preface to his Jāmi at-Tawārīkh he acknowledges his obligations to a minister of Mongol birth and name, who was versed in Turkish and Mongolian history. He refers to the Altan depter, a book of Mongol annals which was in the Khan’s treasury, text and Russian translation by J. N. Berezin, 1858 sqq.

Alā ad-Dīn Ata-mulk Juvainī composed a work entitled Jahān Kushāi (a history of the Conqueror of the World) on the last ten years of Chingiz, and coming down as far as 1257. Born in Khorāsān in 1227-8, he visited the court of Mangū Khān c. 1249. His work (of which there is a MS. in the British Museum) has never been printed, though he is one of the best authorities on the history of his time. But it has been largely used by D’Ohsson and others. For his biography see Fundgruben des Orients, i. 220-34.

Minhāj-i-Sirāj Jūzjānī, son of a cadi of the army of Mohammad Ghōrī, lived c. 1200-70, and wrote his history, the Tabākāt-i-Nāsirī, about the middle of the century, at the court of Nāsir ad-Dīn Mahmūd, King of Delhi. Beginning with the Patriarchs, he brought his history down to his own day, and Bk. 23 is occupied with the incursions of the Turks and Mongols, — the Karā-Khitāy Chingiz and his successors, to 1259. The author writes in a clear straightforward style, and supports his narrative by references to sources. The work was translated by Major Raverty in the Bibliotheca Indica (1848, etc.), and there are large extracts in Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own historians, ii. 266 sqq.

The second and third Books of the Memoirs of Tīmūr are the Institutions and Designs which were translated by Major Davy (1783) and used by Gibbon. Book iv. coming down to 1375 has since been translated by Major Charles Stewart, 1830 (The Mulfuzāt Timūry, or autobiographical Memoirs of the Moghul Emperor Timūr). The original memoirs were written in Turkish (in the “Jagtay Tūrky language”) and were rendered into Persian by Abū Tālib Husainī. The English translations are made from the Persian version.

Mirza Haidar lived in the 16th century and was a cousin of the famous Bābar. His Tarīkh-i-Rashīdī (transl. by Elias and Ross, see above p. 133, note 12, with learned apparatus of introduction and notes) is “the history of that branch of the Moghul Khans who separated themselves, about the year 1321, from the main stem of the Chaghatai, which was then the ruling dynasty in Transoxiana; and it is the only history known to exist of this branch of the Moghuls” (Elias, ib. p. 7). There are two parts of the work; the second contains memoirs of the author’s life, etc., which do not concern any events touched upon by Gibbon. In the first part, written in 1544-6 in Cashmir, the author follows the history of two dynasties: the Khans of Moghulistān, beginning with Tughluk Tīmūr; and their vassals the Dughlāt amīrs of Eastern Turkestan, from one of whom Haidar was descended. This part of the work is based largely on oral traditions, but the author also made use of the work of Sharaf ad-Dīn. Mr. Elias criticises “the weakness of the chronology and the looseness with which numbers and measurements are made.”

Of Chinese authorities for the history of the Mongols, the most important is the annals entitled Yuan Shi, of which Bretschneider (Mediaeval Researches for Eastern Asiatic Sources, 1888) gives the following account (vol. i. p. 180 sqq.). In 1369 “the detailed records of the reigns of the thirteen Yüan emperors were procured, and the emperor (Hungwu) gave orders to compile the history of the Yüan [Mongols], under the direction of Sung Lien and Wang Wei. The work, which occupied sixteen scholars, was begun in the second month of 1369 and finished in the eighth month of the same year. But as at that time the record of the reign of Shun ti (the last Mongol emperor in China) was not yet received, the scholar Ou yang Yu and others were sent to Pei p’ing to obtain the required information. In the sixth month of 1370 the Yüan Shi was complete.” There were various subsequent editions. “The Yüan Shi has been compiled from official documents. Perhaps we must except the biographies, for which the information was probably often derived from private sources. It seems that the greater part of the documents on which the Chinese history of the Mongols is based had been drawn up in the Chinese language; but in some cases they appear to have been translated from the Mongol. I conclude this from the fact that in the Yüan Shi places are often mentioned, not, as usually, by their Chinese names, but by their Mongol names represented in Chinese characters” (p. 183). The Yuan Shi (p. 185 sqq.) is divided into four sections: (1) consists of the lives of the 13 Mongol Khans in Mongolia and China, and the annals of their reigns from Chingiz to Shun ti (1368); (2) memoirs (geographical, astronomical, politico-economical notices; regulations on dress, rites, public appointments, etc.; military ordinances, etc.); (3) genealogical tables and lists; (4) about a thousand biographies of eminent men of the period [Bretschneider observes that these biographies “bear evidence to the liberal views of the Mongol emperors as to the acknowledgment of merit. They seem never to have been influenced by national considerations”]; and notices of foreign lands and nations south and east of China (e.g., Korea, Japan, Burma, Sumatra).

An abstract of the annals of the Yüan shi is contained in the first ten chapters of the Yüan shi lei pien (an abbreviated History of the Mongols) which were translated by Gaubil in his Histoire de Gentchiscan (see above p. 133, note 11). From this abstract, and the Yüan shi and another work entitled the Shi Wei (Woof of History), Mr. R. K. Douglas compiled his Life of Jinghiz Khān, 1877.

The Yüan ch‘ao pi shi, Secret History of the Mongol dynasty, is a Chinese translation of a Mongol work, which was completed before 1240. It contains the early history of the Mongols, the reign of Chingiz, and part of the reign of Ogotai; and it was translated into Chinese in the early period of the Ming dynasty. An abridgment of this work was translated into Russian by Palladius, and published in 1866 in the Records of the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission at Peking, vol. 4. It was only six years later that Palladius found that the work was extant in a fuller form. Bretschneider says: This document “corroborates generally Rashid-eddin’s records, and occasionally we find passages in it which sound like a literal translation of the statements of the Persian historiographer. This proves that Rashid had made use of the same source of information as the unknown author of the Yüan ch‘ao pi shi. As to the dates in the latter work, they are generally in accordance with the dates given by the Mohammadan authors; but in a few cases the Yüan ch‘ao pi shi commits great chronological blunders and misplacements of events, as, for instance, with respect to the war in the west.”

In his work cited above Bretschneider has rendered accessible other Chinese documents bearing on Mongol history, especially some relations of Chinese travellers and envoys; for example, an extract (i. p. 9 sqq.) from the Si Yu Lu (Description of Journey to the West) of Ye-lü Ch’u ts‘ai, a minister of Chingiz who attended him to Persia, 1219-24. (There is a biography of this Ye-lü in the Yüan Shi.) Bretschneider makes valuable contributions to the difficult subject of geographical identifications, and discusses among other documents the account of the Armenian prince Haithon’s visit to Mongolia, written by Guiragos Gandsaketsi. This Haithon I. must not be confounded with Haithon, the monk of Prémontré, mentioned by Gibbon (above p. 133, note 13). The account of Guiragos was translated into French by Klaproth (Nouv. Journ. Asiat., p. 273 sqq., 1833) from a Russian version by Argutinski; but the history of Guiragos has since been translated by Brosset.

Ssanang Ssetsen, a prince of the tribe of Ordus and a descendant of Chingiz, born 1604, wrote in Turkish a history of the eastern Mongols which he finished in 1662. It was thus written after the Manchus had conquered China and overthrown the Mongols. The earlier part of the book is practically a history of Tibet. The account of the origin of the Mongols is translated from Chinese sources. The author is a zealous Buddhist and dwells at great length on all that concerned the interests of his religion; other matters are often dismissed far too briefly. The relation of the career of Chingiz is marked by many anachronisms and inaccuracies. The work was made accessible by the German translation of I. J. Schmidt, under the title: Geschichte der Ostmongolen und ihres Fürstenhauses, 1829.

Modern Works. Finlay, History of Greece, vol. iii. J. von Hammer, Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches, vol. i. 1834. J. W. Zinkeisen, Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches in Europa, vol. i., 1840. Sir H. H. Howorth, History of the Mongols (see above, p. 133, note 12). Gregorovius, History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages (see vol. xii. p. 66, note 2).

For a sketch of the history of the Ottoman Turks: S. Lane-Poole, Turkey (Story of the Nations); La Jonquière, Histoire de l’empire Ottoman.

For the laws, constitution, etc., of the Ottoman empire, the chief work is Mouradja d’Ohsson’s Tableau général de l’empire Ottoman, 7 vols. 1788-1824.

2.

THE ACCIAJOLI — (P. 92)

If Gibbon had been more fully acquainted with the history of the family of the Acciajoli, he would have probably devoted some pages to the rise of their fortunes. They rose to such power and influence in Greece in the 14th century that the subjoined account, taken from Finlay (vol. iv. p. 157 sqq.) — with a few additions in square brackets — will not be out of place.

“Several members of the family of Acciajoli, which formed a distinguished commercial company at Florence in the thirteenth century, settled in the Peloponnesus about the middle of the fourteenth, under the protection of Robert, king of Naples. Nicholas Acciajoli was invested, in the year 334, with the administration of the lands which the company had acquired in payment or in security of the loans it had made to the royal House of Anjou; and he acquired additional possessions in the principality of Achaia, both by purchase and grant, from Catherine of Valois, titular empress of Romania and regent of Achaia for her son prince Robert. [It is disputed whether he was her lover.] The encroachments of the mercantile spirit on the feudal system are displayed in the concessions obtained by Nicholas Acciajoli in the grants he received from Catherine of Valois. He was invested with the power of mortgaging, exchanging, and selling his fiefs, without any previous authorisation from his suzerain. Nicholas acted as principal minister of Catherine during a residence of three years in the Morea; and he made use of his position, like a prudent banker, to obtain considerable grants of territory. He returned to Italy in 1341 and never again visited Greece; but his estates in Achaia were administered by his relations and other members of the banking house at Florence, many of whom obtained considerable fiefs for themselves through his influence.

“Nicholas Acciajoli was appointed hereditary grand seneschal of the kingdom of Naples by Queen Jeanne, whom he accompanied in her flight to Provence when she was driven from her kingdom by Louis of Hungary. On her return he received the rich country of Amalfi, as a reward for his fidelity, and subsequently Malta was added to his possessions. He was an able statesman and a keen political intriguer; and he was almost the first example of the superior position the purse of the moneyed citizen was destined to assume over the sword of the feudal baron and the learning of the politic churchman. Nicholas Acciajoli was the first of that banking aristocracy which has since held an important position in European history. He was the type of a class destined at times to decide the fate of kingdoms and at times to arrest the progress of armies. He certainly deserved to have his life written by a man of genius, but his superciliousness and assumption of princely state, even in his intercourse with the friends of his youth, disgusted Boccaccio, who alone of Florentine contemporaries could have left a vivid sketch of the career which raised him from the partner of a banking-house to the rank of a great feudal baron and to live in the companionship of kings. Boccaccio, offended by his insolence, seems not to have appreciated his true importance as the type of a coming age and a new state of society; and the indignant and satirical record he has left of the pride and presumption of the mercantile noble is by no means a correct portrait of the Neapolitan minister. Yet even Boccaccio records in his usual truthful manner that Nicholas had dispersed powerful armies, though he unjustly depreciates the merit of the success, because the victory was gained by combinations effected by gold, and not by the headlong charge of a line of lances. [Boccaccio dedicated his Donne illustri to Niccolo’s sister Andrea, the countess of Monte Oderisio.]

“Nicholas Acciajoli obtained a grant of the barony and hereditary governorship of the fortress of Corinth in the year 1358. He was already in possession of the castles of Vulcano [at Ithome], Piadha near Epidauros, and large estates in other parts of the Peloponnesus. He died in 1365;1 and his sons Angelo and Robert succeeded in turn to the barony and government of Corinth. Angelo mortgaged Corinth to his relative [second cousin], Nerio Acciajoli, who already possessed fiefs in Acbaia, and who took up his residence at Corinth on account of the political and military importance of the fortress as well as to enable him to administer the revenues of the barony in the most profitable manner.

“Nerio Acciajoli, though he held the governorship of Corinth only as the deputy of his relation, and the barony only in security of a debt, was nevertheless, from his ability, enterprising character, great wealth, and extensive connections, one of the most influential barons of Achaia; and, from the disorderly state of the principality he was enabled to act as an independent prince.”

“The Catalans were the constant rivals of the Franks of Achaia, and Nerio Acciajoli, as governor of Corinth, was the guardian of the principality against their hostile projects. The marriage of the young countess of Salona [whose father Count Lewis died 1382] involved the two parties in war. The mother of the bride was a Greek lady; she betrothed her daughter to Simeon [Stephen Ducas], son of the prince of Vallachian Thessaly; and the Catalans, with the two Laurias at their head, supported this arrangement. But the barons of Achaia, headed by Nerio Acciajoli, pretended that the Prince of Achaia as feudal suzerain of Athens was entitled to dispose of the hand of the countess. Nerio was determined to bestow the young countess, with all her immense possessions, on a relative of the Acciajoli family, named Peter Sarrasin.2 The war concerning the countess of Salona and her heritage appears to have commenced about the year 1386 [1385]. The Catalans were defeated; and Nerio gained possession of Athens, Thebes, and Livadea.”

“About the commencement of the year 1394 Ladislas, king of Naples, conferred on him by patent the title of Duke of Athens — Athens forming, as the king pretended, part of the principality of Achaia.”

Nerio died in 1394. His illegitimate son Antonio inherited Thebes and Livadia, and wrested to himself the government of Athens, which Nerio’s will had placed under the protection of Venice on behalf of his daughter (the wife of Count Tocco of Cephalonia). Under Antonio “Athens enjoyed uninterrupted tranquillity for forty years. The republic of Florence deemed it an object worthy of its especial attention to obtain a commercial treaty with the duchy, for the purpose of securing to the citizens of the republic all the privileges enjoyed by the Venetians, Catalans, and Genoese.” The conclusion of this treaty is almost the only event recorded concerning the external relations of Athens during the long reign of Antonio. The Athenians appear to have lived happily under his government; and he himself seems to have spent his time in a joyous manner, inviting his Florentine relations to Greece, and entertaining them with festivals and hunting parties. Yet he was neither a spendthrift nor a tyrant; for Chalcocondylas, whose father lived at his court, records that, while he accumulated great wealth with prudent economy, he at the same time adorned the city of Athens with many new buildings. He died in 1435, and was succeeded by Nerio II., grandson of Donato, the brother of Nerio I.

[Buchon, Nouvelles Recherches, vols. i. and ii.; L. Tanfani, Niccolo Acciajoli, 1863; Hopf, Hist. Duc. Att. Fontes; Gregorovius, Geschichte der Stadt Athen im Mittelalter, vol. ii.]

3.

THE ISLAND DYNASTIES AFTER THE LATIN CONQUEST — (P. 89)

The facts about the history of the Greek islands during the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries were enveloped in obscurity, and fictions and false hypotheses were current, until the industry of Professor C. Hopf drew the material from the archives of Vienna and Venice. His publications rendered the work of Buchon and Finlay obsolete so far as the islands are concerned. He won the right of referring with contempt to Buchon’s schönrednerische Fabeleien und Finlays geistreich-unkritischer Hypothesenwust. The following list of the island-lordships is taken from his Urkunden und Zusätze zur Geschichte der Insel Andros und ihrer Beherrscher in dem Zeitraume von 1207 to 1566, published in the Sitzungsberichte of the Vienna Academy, 1856, vol. 21, p. 221 sqq.

[See further Hopf’s Griechische Geschichte (cited above, vol. xi. App. 1. ad fin.); on Carystos, his art. in the Sitzungsber. of the Vienna Acad., 11, p. 555 sqq. (1853); on Andros, ib., 16, p. 23 sqq. (1855); on Chios, his article on the Giustiniani in Ersch and Gruber’s Enzyklopädie, vol. 68, p. 290 sqq., 1859 (and see T. Bent, The Lords of Chios, Eng. Hist. Rev. 4, p. 467 sqq., 1889); on the Archipelago his Veneto-byzantinische Analekten, 1860, and his article on the Ghisi in Ersch and Gruber, vol. 64, p. 336 sqq., 1857; on Negroponte, see J. B. Bury, The Lombards and Venetians in Euboea, in Journal of Hellenic Studies, 7, p. 309 sqq., 8, p. 194 sqq., 9, p. 91 sqq. (1886-8); and L. de Mas Latrie in the Rev. de l’Orient Latin, 1, p. 413 sqq. (1893).]

4.

MONGOL INVASION OF EUROPE, 1241 — (P. 146, 147)

It is only recently that European history has begun to understand that the successes of the Mongol army which overran Poland and occupied Hungary in the spring of 1241 were won by consummate strategy and were not due to a mere overwhelming superiority of numbers. But this fact has not yet become a matter of common knowledge; the vulgar opinion which represents the Tartars as a wild horde carrying all before them solely by their multitude, and galloping through Eastern Europe without a strategic plan, rushing at all obstacles and overcoming them by mere weight, still prevails. It will therefore not be amiss to explain very briefly the plan and execution of the Mongol campaign. The nominal commander-in-chief was Batu, but there is no doubt that the management of the expedition was in the hands of Subutai.

The objective of Subutai was Hungary, — the occupation of Hungary and the capture of Gran (Strigonium), which was then not only the ecclesiastical capital but the most important town in the country. In advancing on Hungary, his right flank was exposed to an attack from the princes of Poland, behind whom were the forces of Bohemia and North Germany. To meet this danger, Subutai divided his host into two parts, which we may call the northern and the southern army. The duty of the northern army was to sweep over Poland, advance to Bohemia, and effectually prevent the princes of the north from interfering with the operations of the southern army in Hungary. Thus strategically the invasion of Poland was subsidiary to the invasion of Hungary, and the northern army, when its work was done, was to meet the southern or main army on the Danube.

The northern army advanced in three divisions. The main force under Baidar marched through the dominions of Boleslaw the Chaste, and took Cracow; then bearing north-westward it reached Oppeln on the Oder, where it defeated Prince Mieczyslaw; and descended the Oder to Breslau. At the same time Kaidu advanced by a more northerly route through the land of Conrad, prince of Mosovia and Cujavia; while on the extreme right a force under Ordu terrified the Lithuanians and Prussians and crossed the Lower Vistula. The three divisions reunited punctually at Breslau, the capital of Henry II. of Lower Silesia; and all took part in the battle of Liegnitz (April 9), for which King Wenzel of Bohemia arrived too late. Just one day too late: the Mongol generals had skilfully managed to force Prince Henry to fight before his arrival. Wenzel discreetly withdrew beyond the mountains into Bohemia; all he could hope to do was to defend his own kingdom. Saxony now lived in dread that its turn had come. But it was no part of the plan of Subutai to launch his troops into Northern Germany. They had annihilated the forces of Poland; it was now time for them to approach the main army in Hungary. The Mongols therefore turned their back upon the north, and marched through Upper Silesia and Moravia, capturing town after town as they went. Upon Wenzel who watched them with a large army, expecting them to invade Bohemia, they played a trick. He was posted near the defile of Glatz and the Mongols were at Ottmachau. They were too wary to attack him in such a position; it was necessary to remove him. Accordingly they marched back as if they purposed to invade Bohemia by the pass of the Königstein in the north. Wenzel marched to the threatened point; and when the Mongols saw him safely there, they rapidly retraced their steps and reached Moravia (end of April, beginning of May).

Meanwhile the main army advanced into Hungary in three columns converging on the Upper Theiss. The right wing was led by Shaiban, a younger brother of Batu, and seems to have advanced on the Porta Hungariae — the north-western entrance to Hungary, in the Little Carpathians. The central column under Subutai himself, with Batu, marched on the Porta Rusciae, the defile which leads from Galicia into the valley of the Theiss. The left column, under Kadan and Buri, moved through Transylvania towards the Körös.

The Porta Rusciae was carried, its defenders annihilated, on March 15; and a flying column of Tartars shot across Hungary, in advance of the main army. On March 15 they were half a day’s journey from Pest, having ridden about 180 miles in less than three days. On the 17th they fought and defeated an Hungarian force, and on the same day Shaiban’s right column captured Waitzen, a fort near the angle where the Danube bends southward. The object of Subutai in sending the advance squadron Pestward was doubtless to multiply difficulties for the Hungarians in organising their preparations. These preparations were already hampered by the conflicts and jealousies between the king and his nobles; and then towards the end of March befell the murder of Kutan, the chief of the Cumans, and the consequent revolt of the Cumans, — mentioned by Gibbon, — which demolished the defence of Eastern Hungary. Meanwhile Kadan’s left column had advanced through Transylvania and passed the Körös and Theiss; in the first days of April it advanced to the Danube, in the neighbourhood of Pest. Subutai had in the meantime arrived himself with the main central column, and the three columns of the central army were now together in position on the left bank of the Danube from Waitzen to Pest. But the Hungarian army with its German allies and Slavonic contingents had united at Pest, about 100,000 strong; and it was impossible for the Mongols to cross in the face of such a host. Accordingly Subutai began a retreat, drawing the enemy after him. He retired behind the Sajó, not far from the confluence of that river with the Theiss, — a central position on the route from Pest to Galicia, where he was in touch with his own base of operations near Unghvar and the Porta Rusciae. The Hungarians took up their position on the opposite bank in the plain of Mohi. By skilful tactics the Mongols surrounded their camp and cut them to pieces on April 11, two days after the northern army had gained the battle of Liegnitz.

It was wonderful how punctually and effectually the arrangements of the commander were carried out in operations extending from the Lower Vistula to Transylvania. Such a campaign was quite beyond the power of any European army of the time; and it was beyond the vision of any European commander. There was no general in Europe, from Frederick II. downward, who was not a tiro in strategy compared to Subutai. It should also be noticed that the Mongols embarked upon the enterprise, with full knowledge of the political situation of Hungary and the condition of Poland; they had taken care to inform themselves by a well-organised system of spies: on the other hand, the Hungarians and Christian powers, like childish Barbarians, knew hardly anything about their enemies.

The foregoing summary is founded on the excellent study of G. Strakosch-Grassmann, Der Einfall der Mongolen, in Mitteleuropa in den Jahren 1241 und 1242, 1893, and the vivid account of L. Cahun, in his Introduction à l’Histoire de l’Asie, p. 352 sqq. The chief defect in Strakosch-Grassmann’s book is that he does not give to Subutai his proper place. The important Chinese biography of Subutai is translated in the first vol. of Bretschneider’s Mediæval Researches from Eastern Asiatic Sources, 1888. All the western authorities have been carefully studied and analysed by Strakosch-Grassmann. (The account of the Mongol campaigns in Köhler’s Die Entwicklung des Kriegswesens und der Kriegführung in der Ritterzeit, vol. 3, pt. 3, 1889, may also be compared.)

[23 ]The Greek and Turkish history of Laonicus Chalcondyles ends with the winter of 1463, and the abrupt conclusion seems to mark that he laid down his pen in the same year. We know that he was an Athenian, and that some contemporaries of the same name contributed to the revival of the Greek language in Italy. But in his numerous digressions the modest historian has never introduced himself; and his editor Leunclavius, as well as Fabricius (Bibliot. Græc. tom. vi. p. 474), seems ignorant of his life and character. For his descriptions of Germany, France, and England, see l. ii. p. 36, 37 [p. 70 sqq.], 44-50 [p. 85 sqq].

[24 ]I shall not animadvert on the geographical errors of Chalcondyles. In this instance, he perhaps followed and mistook Herodotus (l. ii. c. 33), whose text may be explained (Herodote de Larcher, tom. ii. p. 219, 220), or whose ignorance may be excused. Had these modern Greeks never read Strabo, or any of their lesser geographers?

[25 ]A citizen of new Rome, while new Rome survived, would have scorned to dignify the German Ῥήξ with the titles of Βασιλεύς, or Αὐτοκράτωρ Ῥωμαίων; but all pride was extinct in the bosom of Chalcondyles; and he describes the Byzantine prince and his subject, by the proper, though humble names of Ἕλληνες, and Βασιλεὺς Ἑλλήνων. [Cp. above, vol. x. p. 279.]

[26 ]Most of the old romances were translated in the xivth century into French prose, and soon became the favourite amusement of the knights and ladies in the court of Charles VI. If a Greek believed in the exploits of Rowland and Oliver, he may surely be excused, since the monks of St. Denys, the national historians, have inserted the fables of Archbishop Turpin in their Chronicles of France.

[27 ]Λονδύνη . . . δέ τε πόλις δυνάμει τε προέχουσα τω̂ν ἐν τῃ̑ νήσῳ ταύτῃ πασω̂ν πόλεων, ὅλβῳ τε καὶ τῃ̑ ἄλλῃ εὐδαιμονίᾳ οὐδεμια̂ς τω̂ν πρὸς ἑσπέραν λειπομένη [ii. p. 93 ed. Bonn]. Even since the time of Fitzstephen (the xiith century), London appears to have maintained this pre-eminence of wealth and magnitude; and her gradual increase has at least kept pace with the general improvement of Europe.

[28 ]If the double sense of the verb κύω (osculor, and in utero gero) be equivocal, the context and pious horror of Chalcondyles can leave no doubt of his meaning and mistake (p. 49). [There is no ambiguity. Chalcondyles uses the middle form κύεσθαι instead of the active κύειν which is used in classical Greek; but there is no second sense. Neither κύω nor κυω̂ is ever used in the sense of κυνω̂ (kiss). It is only in the aorist (ἔκῡσα: ἔκῦσα) that there would be a danger of confusion. — Cp. Phrantzes, iii. 2.]

[29 ]Erasmus (Epist. Fausto Andrelino) has a pretty passage on the English fashion of kissing strangers on their arrival and departure, from whence, however, he draws no scandalous inferences.

[30 ]Perhaps we may apply this remark to the community of wives among the old Britons, as it is supposed by Cæsar and Dion (Dion Cassius, l. lxii. tom. ii. p. 1007 [c. 6]), with Reimar’s judicious annotation. The Arreoy of Otaheite, so certain at first, is become less visible and scandalous, in proportion as we have studied the manners of that gentle and amorous people.

[31 ][Manuel composed in 26 dialogues a defence of orthodox Christianity against Islam. The whole work was entitled Διάλογος περὶ τη̂ς τω̂ν Χριστιανω̂ν θρησκείας πρός τινα Πέρσην, and grew out of conversations which Manuel had had at Ancyra in 1390 with a Turkish muterizis. Only the two first dialogues have been published (Migne, P.G. 156, p. 126 sqq.). Manuel wrote much, and most of his published works will be found in Migne, tom. cit. His letters have been edited by Legrand, 1893, and this volume contains the interesting essay of Manuel, “What Timur may have said to the conquered Bajazet.” There is an excellent monograph on Manuel and his writings by Berger de Xivrey in the Mémoires de l’Institut de France, Ac. des Inscr. xix. 1 sqq. (1853).]

[32 ]See Lenfant, Hist. du Concile de Constance, tom. ii. p. 576; and for the ecclesiastical history of the times, the Annals of Spondanus; the Bibliothèque of Dupin, tom. xii.; and xxist and xxiid volumes of the History, or rather the Continuation, of Fleury.

[33 ]From his early youth, George Phranza, or Phranzes, was employed in the service of the state and palace; and Hanckius (de Script. Byzant. p. i. c. 40) has collected his life from his own writings. He was no more than four and twenty years of age at the death of Manuel, who recommended him, in the strongest terms, to his successor: Imprimis vero hunc Phranzen tibi commendo, qui ministravit mihi fideliter et diligenter (Phranzes, l. ii. c. 1). Yet the emperor John was cold, and he preferred the service of the despots of Peloponnesus.

[34 ]See Phranzes, l. ii. c. 13. While so many manuscripts of the Greek original are extant in the libraries of Rome, Milan, the Escurial, &c. it is a matter of shame and reproach that we should be reduced to the Latin version, or abstract, of James Pontanus, ad calcem Theophylact. Simocattæ (Ingolstadt, 1604), so deficient in accuracy and elegance (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. vi. p. 615-620). [See Appendix 1.]

[35 ]See Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 243-248.

[36 ]The exact measure of the Hexamilion from sea to sea, was 3800 orgygiæ, or toises, of six Greek feet (Phranzes, l. i. c. 38), which would produce a Greek mile, still smaller than that of 660 French toises, which is assigned by d’Anville as still in use in Turkey. Five miles are commonly reckoned for the breadth of the Isthmus. See the Travels of Spon, Wheler, and Chandler.

[37 ]The first objection of the Jews is on the death of Christ: if it were voluntary, Christ was a suicide; which the emperor parries with a mystery. They then dispute on the conception of the Virgin, the sense of the prophecies, &c. (Phranzes, l. ii. c. 12, a whole chapter).

[38 ]In the treatise delle Materie Beneficiarie of Fra Paolo (in the ivth volume of the last and best edition of his works), the papal system is deeply studied and freely described. Should Rome and her religion be annihilated, this golden volume may still survive, a philosophical history and a salutary warning.

[39 ]Pope John XXII. (in 1334) left behind him, at Avignon, eighteen millions of gold florins, and the value of seven millions more in plate and jewels. See the Chronicle of John Villani (l. xi. c. 20, in Muratori’s Collection, tom. xiii. p. 765), whose brother received the account from the Papal treasurers. A treasure of six or eight millions sterling in the xivth century is enormous, and almost incredible.

[40 ]A learned and liberal Protestant, M. Lenfant, has given a fair history of the councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basil, in six volumes in quarto; but the last part is the most hasty and imperfect, except in the account of the troubles of Bohemia. [For the Council of Pisa see Erler, Zur Geschichte des Pisaner Conzils, 1884. The history of the Council of Constance has been rewritten by L. Tosti, Storia del concilio di Costanza, 1853 (in 2 vols.), a work which has been translated into German by W. Arnold (1860). See also F. Stuhr, Die Organisation und Geschäftsordnung des Pisaner und Costanzer Konzils, 1891; and the document (Ein Tagebuch-fragment über das Kostanzer Konzil) edited by Knöpfler in the Historisches Jahrbuch der Görresgesellschaft, vol. xi. p. 267 sqq., 1890. Gibbon does not mention the big work of Hardt: Magnum oecumenicum Constantiense concilium (6 vols.), 1697-1700 (Index, 1742).]

[41 ]The original acts or minutes of the council of Basil are preserved in the public library, in twelve volumes in folio. Basil was a free city, conveniently situate on the Rhine, and guarded by the arms of the neighbouring and confederate Swiss. In 1459, the university was founded by Pope Pius II. (Æneas Sylvius), who had been secretary to the council. But what is a council, or an university, to the presses of Froben and the studies of Erasmus? [The first 3 vols. (1853-94) of the Vienna Monumenta conciliorum generalium are devoted to the council of Basil. For the union question see Mugnier, L’Expédition du concile de Bâle à Constantinople pour l’union de l’église grecque à l’église latine (1437-8), 1892.]

[42 ]This Turkish embassy, attested only by Crantzius, is related with some doubt by the annalist Spondanus, 1433, No. 25, tom. i. p. 824.

[43 ]Syropulus, p. 19. In this list, the Greeks appear to have exceeded the real numbers of the clergy and laity which afterwards attended the emperor and patriarch, but which are not clearly specified by the great ecclesiarch. The 75,000 florins which they asked in this negotiation of the pope (p. 9) were more than they could hope or want.

[44 ]I use indifferently the words ducat and florin, which derive their names, the former from the dukes of Milan, the latter from the republic of Florence. These gold pieces, the first that were coined in Italy, perhaps in the Latin world, may be compared, in weight and value, to one third of the English guinea.

[45 ]At the end of the Latin version of Phranzes, we read a long Greek epistle or declamation of George of Trebizond, who advises the emperor to prefer Eugenius and Italy. He treats with contempt the schismatic assembly of Basil, the Barbarians of Gaul and Germany, who had conspired to transport the chair of St. Peter beyond the Alps: οἳ ἄθλιοι (says he) σὲ καὶ τὴν μετὰ σον̂ σύνοδον ἔξω τω̂ν Ἡρακλείων στηλω̂ν καὶ πέρα Γαδήρων ἐξάξουσι. Was Constantinople unprovided with a map? [The writings of the humanist George of Trebizond, on the union question, will be found in Migne, P.G. vol. 161, 829 sqq.]

[46 ]Syropulus (p. 26-31) attests his own indignation, and that of his countrymen; and the Basil deputies, who excused the rash declaration, could neither deny nor alter an act of the council.

[47 ]Condolmieri, the pope’s nephew and admiral, expressly declared, ὄτι ὸρισμὸν ἔχει παρὰ τον̂ Πάπα ἵνα πολεμήσῃ ὄπου ἃν εὕρῃ τὰ κάτεργα τη̂ς Συνόδου, καὶ εἰ δυνήθῃ καταδὑσῃ καὶ ἀϕανίσνῃ. The naval orders of the synod were less peremptory, and, till the hostile squadrons appeared, both parties tried to conceal their quarrel from the Greeks.

[48 ]Syropulus mentions the hopes of Palæologus (p. 36), and the last advice of Sigismond (p. 57). At Corfu, the Greek emperor was informed of his friend’s death; had he known it sooner, he would have returned home (p. 79).

[49 ]Phranzes himself, though from different motives, was of the advice of Amurath (l. ii. c. 13). Utinam ne synodus ista unquam fuisset, si tantas offensiones et detrimenta paritura erat. This Turkish embassy is likewise mentioned by Syropulus (p. 58); and Amurath kept his word. He might threaten (p. 125, 219), but he never attacked, the city.

[50 ]The reader will smile at the simplicity with which he imparted these hopes to his favourites: τοιαύτην πληροϕορίαν σχήσειν ἤλπιζε καὶ διὰ τον̂ Πάπα ἐθάρρει ἐλευθερω̂σαι τὴν ἐκκλησίαν ἀπὸ τη̂ς ἀποτεθείσης αὐτον̂ δουλείας παρὰ τον̂ βασιλέω (p. 92). Yet it would have been difficult for him to have practised the lessons of Gregory VII.

[51 ]The Christian name of Sylvester is borrowed from the Latin Calendar. In modern Greek, πουλος, as a diminutive, is added to the end of words; nor can any reasoning of Creyghton, the editor, excuse his changing into Sguropulus (Sguros, fuscus) the Syropulus of his own manuscript, whose name is subscribed with his own hand in the acts of the council of Florence. Why might not the author be of Syrian extraction? [The name Syropulos occurs repeatedly in the Collection of Letters (dating from the 14th century) in the Florentine Codex S. Marco 356. See Krumbacher, Gesch. der byzantinischen Litteratur, p. 485.]

[52 ]From the conclusion of the history, I should fix the date to the year 1444, four years after the synod, when the great ecclesiarch had abdicated his office (sectio xii. p. 330-350). His passions were cooled by time and retirement; and, although Syropulus is often partial, he is never intemperate.

[53 ]Vera historia unionis non veræ inter Græcos et Latinos (Hagæ Comitis, 1660, in folio) was first published with a loose and florid version, by Robert Creyghton, chaplain to Charles II. in his exile. The zeal of the editor has prefixed a polemic title, for the beginning of the original is wanting. Syropulus may be ranked with the best of the Byzantine writers for the merit of his narration, and even of his style; but he is excluded from the orthodox collections of the councils.

[54 ]Syropulus (p. 63) simply expresses his intention: ἴν’ οὔτω πομπἁων ἐν Ἰτάλοις μέγας βασιλεὺς παρ’ ἐκείνων νομίζοιτο; and the Latin of Creyghton may afford a specimen of his florid paraphrase. Ut pompâ circumductus noster Imperator Italiæ populis aliquis deauratus Jupiter crederetur, aut Crœsus ex opulentâ Lydiâ. [In the Greek citation πομπάων is unintelligible, but so it stands in Creyghton’s text. Evidently Syropulus wrote πομπεύων.]

[55 ]Although I cannot stop to quote Syropulus for every fact, I will observe that the navigation of the Greeks from Constantinople to Venice and Ferrara is contained in the ivth section (p. 67-100), and that the historian has the uncommon talent of placing each scene before the reader’s eye.

[56 ]At the time of the synod, Phranzes was in Peloponnesus; but he received from the despot Demetrius a faithful account of the honourable reception of the emperor and patriarch, both at Venice and Ferrara (Dux . . . sedentem Imperatorem adorat), which are more slightly mentioned by the Latins (l. ii. c. 14-16).

[57 ]The astonishment of a Greek prince and a French ambassador (Mémoires de Philippe de Comines, l. vii. c. 18) at the sight of Venice abundantly proves that in the xvth century it was the first and most splendid of the Christian cities. For the spoils of Constantinople at Venice, see Syropulus (p. 87).

[58 ]Nicholas III. of Este reigned forty-eight years ( 1393-1441), and was lord of Ferrara, Modena, Reggio, Parma, Rovigo, and Commachio. See his life in Muratori (Antichità Estense, tom. ii. p. 159-201).

[59 ]The Latin vulgar was provoked to laughter at the strange dresses of the Greeks, and especially the length of their garments, their sleeves, and their beards; nor was the emperor distinguished, except by the purple colour, and his diadem or tiara with a jewel on the top (Hody de Græcis Illustribus, p. 31). Yet another spectator confesses that the Greek fashion was piu grave e piu degna than the Italian (Vespasiano, in Vit. Eugen. IV. in Muratori, tom. xxv. p. 261).

[60 ]For the emperor’s hunting, see Syropulus (p. 143, 144, 191). The pope had sent him eleven miserable hawks: but he bought a strong and swift horse that came from Russia. The name of Janizaries may surprise; but the name, rather than the institution, had passed from the Ottoman to the Byzantine court, and is often used in the last age of the empire.

[61 ]The Greeks obtained, with much difficulty, that, instead of provisions, money should be distributed, four florins per month to the persons of honourable rank, and three florins to their servants, with an addition of thirty more to the emperor, twenty-five to the patriarch, and twenty to the prince or despot Demetrius. The payment of the first month amounted to 691 florins, a sum which will not allow us to reckon above 200 Greeks of every condition (Syropulus, p. 104, 105). On the 20th October 1438, there was an arrear of four months; in April 1439, of three; and of five and a half in July, at the time of the union (p. 172, 225, 271).

[62 ]Syropulus (p. 141, 142, 204, 221) deplores the imprisonment of the Greeks, and the tyranny of the emperor and patriarch.

[63 ]The wars of Italy are most clearly represented in the xiiith volume of the Annals of Muratori. The schismatic Greek, Syropulus (p. 145), appears to have exaggerated the fear and disorder of the pope in his retreat from Ferrara to Florence, which is proved by the acts to have been somewhat more decent and deliberate.

[64 ]Syropulus is pleased to reckon seven hundred prelates in the council of Basil. The error is manifest, and perhaps voluntary. That extravagant number could not be supplied by all the ecclesiastics, of every degree, who were present at the council, nor by all the absent bishops of the West, who, expressly or tacitly, might adhere to its decrees.

[65 ]The Greeks, who disliked the union, were unwilling to sally from this strong fortress (p. 178, 193, 195, 202, of Syropulus). The shame of the Latins was aggravated by their producing an old MS. of the second council of Nice, with filioque in the Nicene creed. A palpable forgery! (p. 173).

[66 ]ᾩς ἐγὼ (said an eminent Greek) ὅταν εἰς ναὸν εἰσέλθω Λατίνων οὐ προσκυνω̂ τινα τω̂ν ἐκεɩ̂σε ἁγἱων, ἐπεὶ οὐδὲ γνωρἰζω τινά (Syropulus, p. 109). See the perplexity of the Greeks (p. 217, 218, 252, 253, 273).

[67 ]See the polite altercation of Mark and Bessarion in Syropulus (p. 257), who never dissembles the vices of his own party, and fairly praises the virtues of the Latins. [The works of Bessarion are collected in Migne’s Greek Patrology, vol. clxi., where Bandini’s monograph on his life and writings (1777) is reprinted. There are two recent monographs: Le Cardinal Bessarion, by H. Vast (1878), and a Russian monograph by A. Sadov (1883). The writings of his opponent Markos Eugenikos, metropolitan of Ephesus, will be found in Migne, P.G. vols. clx. and clxi. There is a Greek work on these two men by N. Kalogeras (Μάρκος ὁ Εὐγενικὸς καὶ Βησσαρίων ὀ Καρδινάλις, 1893). Cp. J. Dräseke, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, iv. p. 145 sqq.]

[68 ]For the poverty of the Greek bishops, see a remarkable passage of Ducas (c. 31). One had possessed, for his whole property, three old gowns, &c. By teaching one-and-twenty years in his monastery, Bessarion himself had collected forty gold florins; but of these, the archbishop had expended twenty-eight in his voyage from Peloponnesus, and the remainder at Constantinople (Syropulus, p. 127).

[69 ]Syropulus denies that the Greeks received any money before they had subscribed the act of union (p. 283); yet he relates some suspicious circumstances; and their bribery and corruption are positively affirmed by the historian Ducas.

[70 ]The Greeks most piteously express their own fears of exile and perpetual slavery (Syropul. p. 196); and they were strongly moved by the emperor’s threats (p. 260).

[71 ]I had forgot another popular and orthodox protester: a favourite hound, who usually lay quiet on the foot-cloth of the emperor’s throne; but who barked most furiously while the act of union was reading, without being silenced by the soothing or the lashes of the royal attendants (Syropul. p. 265, 266).

[72 ]From the original Lives of the Popes, in Muratori’s Collection (tom. iii. p. 2, tom. xxv.), the manners of Eugenius IV. appear to have been decent, and even exemplary. His situation, exposed to the world and to his enemies, was a restraint, and is a pledge.

[73 ]Syropulus, rather than subscribe, would have assisted, as the least evil, at the ceremony of the union. He was compelled to do both; and the great ecclesiarch poorly excuses his submission to the emperor (p. 290-292).

[74 ]None of these original acts of union can at present be produced. Of the ten MSS. that are preserved (five at Rome, and the remainder at Florence, Bologna, Venice, Paris, and London), nine have been examined by an accurate critic (M. de Brequigny), who condemns them for the variety and imperfections of the Greek signatures. Yet several of these may be esteemed as authentic copies, which were subscribed at Florence before (26th August 1439) the final separation of the Pope and emperor (Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xliii. p. 287-311). [On these copies see Hefele, Conciliengeschichte, vol. vii. part 2, p. 757 sqq. The true original is the copy which is kept under glass in the Laurentian Library at Florence. The text of the Union decree — in Greek, in Latin, and a German translation — is given in Hefele, ib. p. 742-753.]

[75 ]Ἡμɩ̂ν δὲ ὡς ἄσημοι ἐδόκουν ϕω̂ναι (Syropul. p. 297).

[76 ]In their return, the Greeks conversed at Bologna with the ambassadors of England; and, after some questions and answers, these impartial strangers laughed at the pretended union of Florence (Syropul. p. 307).

[77 ]So nugatory, or rather so fabulous, are these reunions of the Nestorians, Jacobites, &c. that I have turned over, without success, the Bibliotheca Orientalis of Assemanus, a faithful slave of the Vatican.

[78 ]Ripaille is situate near Thonon in Savoy, on the southern side of the lake of Geneva. It is now a Carthusian abbey; and Mr. Addison (Travels into Italy, vol. ii. p. 147, 148, of Baskerville’s edition of his works) has celebrated the place and the founder. Æneas Sylvius, and the fathers of Basil, applaud the austere life of the ducal hermit; but the French and Italian proverbs most unluckily attest the popular opinion of his luxury.

[79 ]In this account of the councils of Basil, Ferrara, and Florence, I have consulted the original acts, which fill the xviith and xviiith tomes of the edition of Venice, and are closed by the perspicuous, though partial, history of Augustin Patricius, an Italian of the xvth century. They are digested and abridged by Dupin (Bibliothèque Ecclés. tom. xii.), and the continuator of Fleury (tom. xxii.); and the respect of the Gallican church for the adverse parties confines their members to an awkward moderation. [An English translation of Gorski’s (Russian) History of the Council of Florence appeared in 1861 (ed. by Neale). Kalligas wrote an important essay on it, which is published in his Μελέται καὶ λόγοι (1882), p. 1-181. See also Dräseke Zum Kircheneinigungsversuch des Jahres 1439, in Byz. Zeitsch. v. p. 572 sqq.; Frommann, Kritische Beiträge zur Geschichte der florentinischen Kircheneinigung, 1862. The full story of the Councils of Constance, Basil, Ferrara, and Florence is contained in vol. vii., parts i. and ii., of Hefele’s Conciliengeschichte.]

[80 ]In the first attempt, Meursius collected 3600 Græco-Barbarous words, to which, in a second edition, he subjoined 1800 more: yet what plenteous gleanings did he leave to Portius, Ducange, Fabrotti, the Bollandists, &c.! (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. x. p. 101, &c.). Some Persic words may be found in Xenophon, and some Latin ones in Plutarch; and such is the inevitable effect of war and commerce; but the form and substance of the language were not affected by this slight alloy. [On foreign words in Greek see: G. Meyer, Neugriechische Studien, ii. (Slavonic, Albanian, and Roumanian loanwords in modern Greek), iii. and iv. (Latin and Romance loanwords), in the Sitzungsberichte of the Vienna Academy, vol. cxxx., 1894, and vol. cxxxii., 1895. Also F. Miklosich, Die slavischen Elemente im Neugriechischen, ib. vol. lxiii., 1870; and Die türkischen Elemente in den südosteuropäischen Sprachen, in the Denkschriften of the Vienna Acad., vols. xxxiv., xxxv., xxxviii. (1884, 1886, 1890).]

[81 ]The life of Francis Philelphus, a sophist, proud, restless, and rapacious, has been diligently composed by Lancelot (Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions, tom. x. p. 691-751), and Tiraboschi (Istoria della Letteratura Italiana, tom. vii. p. 282-294), for the most part from his own letters. His elaborate writings, and those of his contemporaries, are forgotten; but their familiar epistles still describe the men and the times. [G. Voigt, Die Wiederbelebung des klassischen Alterthums, 3rd ed., 1893; T. Klette, Beiträge zur Geschichte und Litteratur der italienischen Gelehrtenrenaissance, 1890 (part iii. contains Greek Letters of Philelphus). Legrand, Centdix lettres grecques de François Filelfe, 1892.]

[82 ]He married, and had perhaps debauched, the daughter of John, and the grand-daughter of Manuel, Chrysoloras. She was young, beautiful, and wealthy; and her noble family was allied to the Dorias of Genoa and the emperors of Constantinople.

[83 ]Græci quibus lingua depravata non sit . . . ita loquuntur vulgo hâc etiam tempestate ut Aristophanes comicus, aut Euripides tragicus, ut oratores omnes, ut historiographi, ut philosophi . . . literati autem homines et doctius et emendatius. . . . Nam viri aulici veterem sermonis dignitatem atque elegantiam retinebant in primisque ispæ nobiles mulieres; quibus cum nullum esset omnino cum viris peregrinis commercium, merus ille ac purus Græcorum sermo servabatur intactus (Philelph. Epist. ad ann. 1451, apud Hodium, p. 188, 189). He observes in another passage, uxor illa mea Theodora locutione erat admodum moderatâ et suavi et maxime Atticâ.

[84 ]Philelphus, absurdly enough, derives this Greek or Oriental jealousy from the manners of ancient Rome.

[85 ]See the state of learning in the xiiith and xivth centuries, in the learned and judicious Mosheim (Institut. Hist. Eccles. p. 434-440, 490-494).

[86 ]At the end of the xvth century, there existed in Europe about fifty universities, and of these the foundation of ten or twelve is prior to the year 1300. They were crowded in proportion to their scarcity. Bologna contained 10,000 students, chiefly of the civil law. In the year 1357, the number at Oxford had decreased from 30,000 to 6000 scholars (Henry’s History of Great Britain, vol. iv. p. 478). Yet even this decrease is much superior to the present list of the members of the university. [These numbers are grossly exaggerated. See Mr. H. Rashdall, Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, vol. ii., pt. ii., where a short chapter (xiii.) is devoted to the subject. He concludes (p. 589) that “the maximum number at Oxford was something between 1500 and 3000. By about 1438 the numbers had fallen to under 1000.” He thinks it improbable that the number at Bologna or at Paris ever went beyond about 6000 or 7000.]

[87 ]Of those writers, who professedly treat of the restoration of the Greek learning in Italy, the two principal are Hodius, Dr. Humphrey Hody (de Græcis Illustribus, Linguæ Græcæ Literarumque humaniorium Instauratoribus; Londini, 1742, in large octavo), and Tiraboschi (Istoria della Letteratura Italiana, tom. v. p. 364-377, tom. vii. p. 112-143). The Oxford professor is a laborious scholar, but the librarian of Modena enjoys the superiority of a modern and national historian. [Cp. above note 81. Legrand, Biographie hellénique, vol. i., 1885. J. A. Symonds, The Renaissance in Italy, ii., The Revival of Learning, 1877. Therianos, in the first volume of his biography of Koraês (Ἀδαμάντιος Κοραη̂ς, 1889), gives a good summary of the movement. G. Fioretto, Gli umanisti, o lo studio del Latino e del Greco nel secolo xv. in Italia, 1881. See also the excellent monograph on Vittorino da Feltre, dealing with the education of the Humanist teachers in Italy, by W. H. Woodward, 1897.]

[88 ]In Calabriâ quæ olim magna Græcia dicebatur, coloniis Græcis repletâ remansit quædam linguæ veteris cognitio (Hodius, p. 2). If it were eradicated by the Romans, it was revived and perpetuated by the monks of St. Basil, who possessed seven convents at Rossano alone (Giannone, Istoria di Napoli, tom. i. p. 520). [Greek is still spoken by a population of about 20,000 in both the heel and the toe of Italy — in the land of Otranto and in the territory of Bova; these two dialects differ considerably. Comparetti, Saggi dei dialetti greci dell’ Italia meridionale, 1866; Morosi, Studi sui dialetti greci della Terra d’Otranto, 1870, and Dialetti romaici del mandamento di Bova in Calabria, 1874; Pellegrini, Il dialetto greco-calabro di Bova, 1880; H. F. Tozer, The Greek-speaking Population of Southern Italy, in Journal of Hellenic Studies, x. p. 11 sqq.]

[89 ]Ii Barbari (says Petrarch, the French and Germans) vix non dicam libros sed nomen Homeri audiverunt. Perhaps, in that respect, the xiiith century was less happy than the age of Charlemagne. [Barlaam was a native of Seminaria in Calabria. His work (against the Roman church) περὶ τη̂ς ἀρχη̂ς τον̂ πάπα is published in Migne, P.G. 151, p. 1256 sqq. There is an account of Barlaam’s work in T. Uspenski’s essay, Philosophskoe i bogoslovskoe dvizhenie v xiv viekie, printed in his Ocherki, p. 246-364 (1892).]

[90 ]See the character of Barlaam in Boccace de Genealog. Deorum, l. xv. c. 6.

[91 ]Cantacuzen. l. ii. c. 36.

[92 ]For the connection of Petrarch and Barlaam, and the two interviews at Avignon in 1339, and at Naples in 1342, see the excellent Mémoires sur la Vie de Pétrarque, tom. i. p. 406-410, tom. ii. p. 75-77. [G. Mandolori, Fra Barlaamo Calabrese, maestro del Petrarca, 1888; P. de Nolhac, Pétrarque et l’humanisme, 1892. On Petrarch see further below chap. lxx. ad init.]

[93 ]The bishopric to which Barlaam retired was the old Locri, in the middle ages Scta Cyriaca, and by corruption Hieracium, Gerace (Dissert. Chorographica Italiæ medii Ævi, p. 312). The dives opum of the Norman times soon lapsed into poverty, since even the church was poor; yet the town still contains 3000 inhabitants (Swinburne, p. 340).

[94 ]I will transcribe a passage from this epistle of Petrarch (Famil. ix. 2): Donasti Homerum non in alienum sermonem violento alveo derivatum, sed ex ipsis Græci eloquii scatebris, et qualis divino illi profluxit ingenio. . . . Sine tuâ voce Homerus tuus apud me mutus, immo, vero ego apud illum surdus sum. Gaudeo tamen vel adspectu solo, ac sæpe illum amplexus atque suspirans dico, O magne vir! &c.

[95 ]For the life and writings of Boccace, who was born in 1313, and died in 1375, Fabricius (Bibliot. Latin. medii Ævi, tom. i. p. 248, &c.) and Tiraboschi (tom. v. p. 83, 439-451) may be consulted. The editions, versions, imitations of his novels are innumerable. Yet he was ashamed to communicate that trifling and perhaps scandalous work to Petrarch his respectable friend, in whose letters and memoirs he conspicuously appears.

[96 ]Boccace indulges an honest vanity: Ostentationis causâ Græca carmina adscripsi . . . jure utor meo; meum est hoc decus, mea gloria scilicet inter Etruscos Græcis uti carminibus. Nonne ego fui qui Leontium Pilatum, &c. (de Genealogiâ Deorum, l. xv. c. 7, a work which, though now forgotten, has run through thirteen or fourteen editions). [It was Leontius Pilatus himself who translated Homer.]

[97 ]Leontius, or Leo Pilatus, is sufficiently made known by Hody (p. 2-11), and the Abbé de Sade (Vie de Pétrarque, tom. iii. p. 625-634, 670-673), who has very happily caught the lively and dramatic manner of his original.

[98 ]Dr. Hody (p. 54) is angry with Leonard Aretin, Guarinus, Paulus Jovius, &c. for affirming that the Greek letters were restored in Italy post septingentos annos; as if, says he, they had flourished till the end of the viith century. These writers most probably reckoned from the last period of the exarchate; and the presence of the Greek magistrates and troops at Ravenna and Rome must have preserved, in some degree, the use of their native tongue.

[99 ]See the article of Emanuel, or Manuel Chrysoloras, in Hody (p. 12-54), and Tiraboschi (tom. vii. p. 113-118). The precise date of his arrival floats between the years 1390 and 1400, and is only confined by the reign of Boniface IX. [The Greek grammar of Chrysoloras was printed in Venice in 1484. For the chronology of his life cp. Klette, op. cit. part i.]

[100 ]The name of Aretinus has been assumed by five or six natives of Arezzo in Tuscany, of whom the most famous and the most worthless lived in the xvith century. Leonardus Brunus Aretinus, the disciple of Chrysoloras, was a linguist, an orator, and an historian, the secretary of four successive popes, and the chancellor of the republic of Florence, where he died, 1444, at the age of seventy-five (Fabric. Bibliot. medii Ævi, tom. i. p. 190, &c.; Tiraboschi, tom. vii. p. 33-38).

[101 ]See the passage in Aretin. Commentario Rerum suo Tempore in Italiâ gestarum, apud Hodium, p. 28-30.

[102 ]In this domestic discipline, Petrarch, who loved the youth, often complains of the eager curiosity, restless temper, and proud feelings, which announce the genius and glory of a riper age (Mémoires sur Pétrarque, tom. iii. p. 700-709).

[103 ]Hinc Græcæ Latinæque scholæ exortæ sunt, Guarino Philelpho, Leonardo Aretino, Caroloque, ac plerisque aliis tanquam ex equo Trojano prodeuntibus, quorum emulatione multa ingenia deinceps ad laudem excitata sunt (Platina in Bonifacio IX.). Another Italian writer adds the names of Paulus Petrus Vergerius, Omnibonus [Ognibene da Lonigo], Vincentius, Poggius, Franciscus Barbarus, &c. But I question whether a rigid chronology would allow Chrysoloras all these eminent scholars (Hodius, p. 25-27, &c.). [Vergerius (who was one of his pupils) wrote the epitaph on Chrysoloras which is to be seen in the kitchen of the Hôtel Insel at Constance.]

[104 ]See in Hody the article of Bessarion (p. 136-177). Theodore Gaza [of Thessalonica], George of Trebizond, and the rest of the Greeks whom I have named or omitted, are inserted in their proper chapters of his learned work. See likewise Tiraboschi, in the 1st and 2d parts of the vith tome. [See Legrand’s work quoted above, note 87.]

[105 ]The cardinals knocked at his door, but his conclavist refused to interrupt the studies of Bessarion: “Nicholas,” said he, “thy respect hath cost thee an hat, and me the tiara.”

[106 ]Such as George of Trebizond, Theodore Gaza, Argyropulus, Andronicus of Thessalonica, Philelphus, Poggius, Blondus, Nicholas Perrot, Valla, Campanus, Platina, &c. Viri (says Hody, with the pious zeal of a scholar) nullo ævo perituri (p. 156).

[107 ]He was born before the taking of Constantinople, but his honourable life was stretched far into the xvith century ( 1535). Leo X. and Francis I. were his noblest patrons, under whose auspices he founded the Greek colleges of Rome and Paris (Hody, p. 247-275). He left posterity in France; but the counts de Vintimille, and their numerous branches, derive the name of Lascaris from a doubtful marriage, in the xiiith century, with the daughter of a Greek emperor (Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 224-230).

[108 ]Two of his epigrams against Virgil, and three against Tully, are preserved and refuted by Franciscus Floridus, who can find no better names than Græculus ineptus et impudens (Hody, p. 274). In our own times, an English critic has accused the Æneid of containing multa languida, nugatoria, spiritu et majestate carminis heroici defecta; many such verses as he, the said Jeremiah Markland, would have been ashamed of owning (præfat. ad Statii Sylvas, p. 21, 22).

[109 ]Emanuel Chrysoloras, and his colleagues, are accused of ignorance, envy, or avarice (Sylloge, &c. tom. ii. p. 235). The modern Greek pronounces the B as a V consonant, and confound three vowels (η ι υ) and several diphthongs [ει, οι, υι]. Such was the vulgar pronunciation which the stern Gardiner maintained by penal statutes in the University of Cambridge; but the monosyllable βη represented to an Attic ear the bleating of sheep; and a bell-wether is better evidence than a bishop or a chancellor. The treatises of those scholars, particularly Erasmus, who asserted a more classical pronunciation, are collected in the Sylloge of Havercamp (2 vols. in octavo, Lugd. Bat. 1736, 1740); but it is difficult to paint sounds by words; and in their reference to modern use they can be understood only by their respective countrymen. We may observe that our peculiar pronunciation of the θ to th is approved by Erasmus (tom. ii. p. 130) [θ is so pronounced in modern Greek].

[109a ][It is to be observed however that the system of accent-notation was first introduced by the Alexandrines. Gibbon assumes that the meaning of the accents was in ancient times entirely different from their meaning in modern Greek. This is improbable. But it is still a problem how the Greeks conciliated their accentuation with the rhythms of their verses.]

[110 ][On Theodore Gaza see the biographical essay of L. Stein in the Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, ii. p. 426 sqq., 1889.]

[111 ]George Gemistus Pletho, a various and voluminous writer, the master of Bessarion and all the Platonists of the times. He visited Italy in his old age, and soon returned to end his days in Peloponnesus. See the curious Diatribe of Leo Allatius de Georgiis, in Fabricius (Bibliot. Græc. tom. x. p. 739-756). [The study of Plato was revived in the 11th century by Michael Psellus. For Plethon see H. F. Tozer, A Byzantine Reformer, in the Journal of Hellenic Studies, vii. p. 353 sqq., 1886; and F. Schultze, Geschichte der Philosophie der Renaissance, vol. i., 1874. The Memoir on the state of the Peloponnesus, which he addressed to the emperor Manuel, is edited by Ellissen in his Analekten der mittel- und neugriechischen Litteratur, vol. iv., part ii., with a German translation. Plethon’s works are collected in Migne’s P.G. vol. clx. On the theological side of his works see W. Gass, Gennadius und Pletho, Aristotelismus und Platonismus in der griechischen Kirche, 1844.]

[112 ]The state of the Platonic philosophy in Italy is illustrated by Boivin (Mém. de l’Acad. des Inscriptions, tom. ii. p. 715-729) and Tiraboschi (tom. vi. p. i. p. 259-288).

[113 ]See the life of Nicholas V. by two contemporary authors, Janottus Manettus (tom. iii. p. ii. p. 905-962), and Vespasian of Florence (tom. xxv. p. 267-290), in the collection of Muratori; and consult Tiraboschi (tom. vi. p. i. p. 46-52, 109), and Hody in the articles of Theodore Gaza, George of Trebizond, &c.

[114 ]Lord Bolingbroke observes, with truth and spirit, that the popes, in this instance, were worse politicians than the muftis, and that the charm which had bound mankind for so many ages was broken by the magicians themselves (Letters on the Study of History, l. vi. p. 165, 166, octavo edition, 1779).

[115 ]See the literary history of Cosmo and Lorenzo of Medicis, in Tiraboschi (tom. vi. p. i. l. i. c. 2), who bestows a due measure of praise on Alphonso of Arragon, king of Naples, the dukes of Milan, Ferrara, Urbino, &c. The republic of Venice has deserved the least from the gratitude of scholars.

[116 ]Tiraboschi (tom. vi. p. i. p. 104), from the preface of Janus Lascaris to the Greek Anthology, printed at Florence, 1494. Latebant (says Aldus in his preface to the Greek Orators, apud Hodium, p. 249) in Atho Thraciæ monte. Eas Lascaris . . . in Italiam reportavit. Miserat enim ipsum Laurentius ille Medices in Græciam ad inquirendos simul et quantovis emendos pretio bonos libros. It is remarkable enough that the research was facilitated by Sultan Bajazet II.

[117 ]The Greek language was introduced into the University of Oxford in the last years of the xvth century, by Grocyn, Linacer, and Latimer, who had all studied at Florence under Demetrius Chalcondyles. See Dr. Knight’s curious Life of Erasmus. Although a stout academical patriot, he is forced to acknowledge that Erasmus learned Greek at Oxford and taught it at Cambridge.

[118 ]The jealous Italians were desirous of keeping a monopoly of Greek learning. When Aldus was about to publish the Greek scholiasts on Sophocles and Euripides, Cave (say they), cave hoc facias, ne Barbari istis adjuti domi maneant, et pauciores in Italiam ventitent (Dr. Knight, in his Life of Erasmus, p. 365, from Beatus Rhenanus).

[119 ]The press of Aldus Manutius, a Roman, was established at Venice about the year 1494. He printed above sixty considerable works of Greek literature, almost all for the first time; several containing different treatises and authors, and of several authors two, three, or four editions (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. xiii. p. 605, &c.). Yet his glory must not tempt us to forget that the first Greek book, the Grammar of Constantine Lascaris, was printed at Milan in 1476; and that the Florence Homer of 1488 displays all the luxury of the typographical art. See the Annales Typographici of Mattaire and the Bibliographie Instructive of De Bure, a knowing bookseller of Paris. [A. F. Didot, Alde Manuce et l’hellénisme à Venise, 1875.]

[120 ]I will select three singular examples of this classic enthusiasm. 1. At the synod of Florence, Gemistus Pletho said in familiar conversation to George of Trebizond, that in a short time mankind would unanimously renounce the Gospel and the Koran for a religion similar to that of the Gentiles (Leo Allatius, apud Fabricium, tom. x. p. 751). 2. Paul II. persecuted the Roman academy which had been founded by Pomponius Lætus; and the principal members were accused of heresy, impiety, and paganism (Tiraboschi, tom. vi. p. i. p. 81, 82). [Cp. Burckhardt, Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien, ii. 252.] 3. In the next century, some scholars and poets in France celebrated the success of Jodelle’s tragedy of Cleopatra by a festival of Bacchus; and, it is said, by the sacrifice of a goat (Bayle, Dictionnaire, Jodelle; Fontenelle, tom. iii. p. 56-61). Yet the spirit of bigotry might often discern a serious impiety in the sportive play of fancy and learning.

[121 ]The survivor of Boccace died in the year 1375; and we cannot place before 1480 the composition of the Morgante Maggiore of Pulci, and the Orlando Inamorato of Boyardo (Tiraboschi, tom. vi. p. ii. p. 174-177).

[1 ]The epistle of Emanuel Chrysoloras to the emperor John Palæologus will not offend the eye or ear of a classical student (ad calcem Codini de Antiquitatibus C. P. p. 107-126). The superscription suggests a chronological remark that John Palæologus II. was associated in the empire before the year 414, the date of Chrysoloras’s death. A still earlier date, at least 1408, is deduced from the age of his youngest sons Demetrius and Thomas, who were both Porphyrogeniti (Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 244, 247).

[2 ]Somebody observed, that the city of Athens might be circumnavigated (τις εἴπεν τὴν πόλιν τω̂ν Ἀθηναίων δύνασθαι καὶ παραπλεɩ̂ν καὶ περιπλεɩ̂ν). But what may be true in a rhetorical sense of Constantinople cannot be applied to the situation of Athens, five miles from the sea, and not intersected or surrounded by any navigable streams.

[3 ]Nicephorus Gregoras has described the colossus of Justinian (l. vii. 12); but his measures are false and inconsistent. The editor, Boivin, consulted his friend Girardon; and the sculptor gave him the true proportions of an equestrian statue. That of Justinian was still visible to Peter Gyllius, not on the column, but in the outward court of the seraglio; and he was at Constantinople when it was melted down and cast into a brass cannon (de Topograph. C. P. l. ii. c. 17). [The equestrian statue of Justinian was in the Augusteum. What seems to be the base of the statue has been found near the Church of SS. Sergius and Bacchus (the Kutchuk Aya Sophia) with an inscription beginning: Ἐπιβίσι (sic) ἐπὶ τοὺς ἵππους σου καὶ ἡ ἱππασία σου σωτηρία (from Habakkuk, iii. 8). See Mordtmann, Esquisse topographique, § 97 (p. 55).]

[4 ]See the decay and repairs of St. Sophia, in Nicephorus Gregoras (l. vii. 12; l. xv. 2). The building was propped by Andronicus in 1317, the eastern hemisphere fell in 1345. The Greeks, in their pompous rhetoric, exalt the beauty and holiness of the church, an earthly heaven, the abode of angels, and of God himself, &c. [Cp. Cantacuzenus, i. p. 30, ed. Bonn. See Lethaby and Swainson, Sancta Sophia, p. 124 and p. 152.]

[5 ]The genuine and original narrative of Syropulus (p. 312-351) opens the schism from the first office of the Greeks at Venice to the general opposition at Constantinople of the clergy and people.

[6 ]On the schism of Constantinople, see Phranza (l. ii. c. 17), Laonicus Chalcondyles (l. vi. p. 155, 156 [pp. 292 sqq. ed. B.]), and Ducas (c. 31); the last of whom writes with truth and freedom. Among the moderns we may distinguish the continuator of Fleury (tom. xxii. p. 338, &c., 401, 420, &c.) and Spondanus ( 1440-80). The sense of the latter is drowned in prejudice and passion, as soon as Rome and religion are concerned.

[7 ][Since the publication of the De Ecclesiae occidentalis atque Orientalis perpetuâ consensione of Leo Allatius, it has been generally supposed that a Synod, held at St. Sophia in 1450, under the auspices of the Emperor Constantine, repudiated the Acts of the Council of Florence. Allatius (c. 1380) gave an account of the “Acts” of this Synod, and condemned them as spurious, on account of some obvious blunders which appeared in their Title. An edition of these Acts was shortly afterwards published by Dositheus, Patriarch of Jerusalem, in his Τόμος καταλλαγη̂ς, p. 454 sqq.; but in the Title, in his edition, the blunders were corrected, and he defended the genuineness of the document. But, quite apart from the title, the document is marked by anachronisms and blunders which have been recently exposed by Ch. Papaioannu. This Russian scholar has submitted the Acts to a thorough-going criticism (Akty tak nazyvaemago posliedniago Sophiiskago Sobora (1450 g.) i ich istoricheskoe dostoinstvo, in Vizantiiskii Vremennik, ii. p. 394 sqq., 1895), and has shown convincingly not only that the Acts are spurious but that no such Synod was ever held. The first Synod that rejected the decrees of Florence was that of 1484. The Synod of 1450 was invented and the Acts forged probably not later than the beginning of the 17th century. One of the anachronisms which the unknown forger committed was making Marcus of Ephesus take part in the Synod. But Marcus had died before 1448; probably (as Papaioannu shows, p. 398-399) in 1447.]

[8 ]Isidore was metropolitan of Kiow, but the Greeks subject to Poland have removed that see from the ruins of Kiow to Lemberg or Leopold [Lvov] (Herbestein, in Ramusio, tom. ii. p. 127). On the other hand, the Russians transferred their spiritual obedience to the archbishop, who became, in 1588, the patriarch of Moscow (Levesque, Hist. de Russie, tom. iii. p. 188, 190, from a Greek MS. at Turin, Iter et labores Archiepiscopi Arsenii).

[9 ]The curious narrative of Levesque (Hist. de Russie, tom. ii. p. 242-247) is extracted from the patriarchal archives. The scenes of Ferrara and Florence are described by ignorance and passion; but the Russians are credible in the account of their own prejudices.

[10 ]The Shamanism, the ancient religion of the Samanæans and Gymnosophists, has been driven by the more popular Bramins from India into the northern deserts; the naked philosophers were compelled to wrap themselves in fur; but they insensibly sunk into wizards and physicians. The Mordvans and Tcheremisses, in the European Russia, adhere to this religion, which is formed on the earthly model of one King or God, his ministers or angels, and the rebellious spirits who oppose his government. As these tribes of the Volga have no images, they might more justly retort on the Latin missionaries the name of Idolaters (Levesque, Hist. des Peuples soumis à la Domination des Russes, tom. i. p. 194-237, 423-460).

[11 ]Spondanus, Annal. Eccles. tom. ii. 1451, No. 13. The epistle of the Greeks, with a Latin version, is extant in the college library at Prague.

[12 ]See Cantemir, History of the Othman Empire, p. 94. Murad, or Morad, may be correct; but I have preferred the popular name to that obscure diligence which is rarely successful in translating an Oriental into the Roman alphabet. [A Burgundian knight, Bertrandon de la Brocquière (see below p. 326, note 62) gives the following description of Murad: —

“He is a little short thick man, with the physiognomy of a Tartar. He has a broad and brown face, high cheek bones, a round beard, a great and crooked nose, with little eyes; but they say he is kind, good, generous, and willingly gives away lands and money. . . . He is thought not to love war, and this seems to be well founded. . . . He loves liquor and those who drink hard.” He threw a Moor into prison who ventured to admonish him against indulgence in wine (T. Wright’s Early Travels in Palestine, p. 346-347).]

[13 ]See Chalcondyles (l. vii. p. 186, 198), Ducas (c. 33), and Marinus Barletius (in Vit. Scanderbeg, p. 145, 146). In his good faith towards the garrison of Sfetigrade he was a lesson and example to his son Mahomet.

[14 ][There is an account of Murad’s conquest of Thessalonica, 1430, by John Anagnostes (publ. at the end of the Bonn edition of Phrantzes, p. 484 sqq.), written in imitation of the account of the Saracen siege in 904 by Cameniates. Two popular Greek ballads on the capture are given in Passow’s Popularia Carmina Graeciae recentioris, cxciv. cxcv. (cp. Miss F. M.‘Pherson, Journal of Hellenic Studies, x. p. 86, 87). The lines occur: —

• πη̂ραν τὴν πόλι, πη̂ραν τὴν, πη̂ραν τὴν Σαλονίκη,
• πη̂ραν καὶ τὴν ἀγιὰ Σοϕιὰ, τὸ μέγα μοναστη̂ρι.]

[15 ]Voltaire (Essai sur l’Histoire Générale, c. 89, p. 283, 284) admires le Philosophe Turc; would he have bestowed the same praise on a Christian prince for retiring to a monastery? In his way, Voltaire was a bigot, an intolerant bigot.

[16 ]See the articles Dervische, Fakir, Nasser, Rohbaniat, in d’Herbelot’s Bibliothèque Orientale. Yet the subject is superficially treated from the Persian and Arabian writers. It is among the Turks that these orders have principally flourished.

[17 ]Rycaut (in the Present State of the Ottoman Empire, p. 242-268) affords much information, which he drew from his personal conversation with the heads of the dervishes, most of whom ascribed their origin to the time of Orchan. He does not mention the Zichidæ of Chalcondyles (l. vii. p. 286), among whom Amurath retired; the Seids of that author are the descendants of Mahomet.

[18 ]In the year 1431, Germany raised 40,000 horse, men at arms, against the Hussites of Bohemia (Lenfant, Hist. du Concile de Basle, tom. i. p. 318). At the siege of Nuys [Neuss] on the Rhine, in 1474, the princes, prelates, and cities sent their respective quotas; and the bishop of Munster (qui n’est pas des plus grands) furnished 1400 horse, 6000 foot, all in green, with 1200 waggons. The united armies of the king of England and the duke of Burgundy scarcely equalled one third of this German host (Mémoires de Philippe de Comines, l. iv. c. 2). At present, six or seven hundred thousand men are maintained in constant pay and admirable discipline by the powers of Germany.

[19 ]It was not till the year 1444, that France and England could agree on a truce of some months (see Rymer’s Fœdera, and the chronicles of both nations).

[20 ]In the Hungarian crusade, Spondanus (Annal. Eccles. 1443, 1444) has been my leading guide. He has diligently read, and critically compared, the Greek and Turkish materials, the historians of Hungary, Poland, and the West. His narrative is perspicuous; and, where he can be free from a religious bias, the judgment of Spondanus is not contemptible.

[21 ]I have curtailed the harsh letter (Wladislaus) which most writers affix to his name, either in compliance with the Polish pronunciation, or to distinguish him from his rival the infant Ladislaus of Austria. Their competition for the crown of Hungary is described by Callimachus (l. i. ii. p. 447-486), Bonfinius (Decad. iii. l. iv.), Spondanus, and Lenfant.

[22 ]The Greek historians, Phranza, Chalcondyles, and Ducas, do not ascribe to their prince a very active part in this crusade, which he seems to have promoted by his wishes and injured by his fears.

[23 ]Cantemir (p. 88) ascribes to his policy the original plan, and transcribes his animating epistle to the king of Hungary. But the Mahometan powers are seldom informed of the state of Christendom; and the situation and correspondence of the knights of Rhodes must connect them with the sultan of Caramania.

[24 ][For this expedition see Katona, Histor. crit. reg. Hung. Stirpis mixtae, vi. p. 245 sqq.; Nesri (in Thúry’s Török történetírók, vol. i.), p. 58; the Anonymous of 1486, ib. p. 18, 19; Sad ad-Din, ib. p. 136 sqq.; Zinkeisen, Gesch. des osmanischen Reiches, i. 611 sqq.]

[25 ]In their letters to the emperor Frederic III. the Hungarians slay 30,000 Turks in one battle, but the modest Julian reduces the slaughter to 6000 or even 2000 infidels (Æneas Sylvius in Europ. c. 5, and epist. 44, 81, apud Spondanum).

[26 ]See the origin of the Turkish war, and the first expedition of Ladislaus, in the vth and vith books of the iiid Decad of Bonfinius, who, in his division and style, copies Livy with tolerable success. Callimachus (l. ii. p. 487-496) is still more pure and authentic.

[27 ]I do not pretend to warrant the literal accuracy of Julian’s speech, which is variously worded by Callimachus (l. iii. p. 505-507), Bonfinius (Dec. iii. l. vi. p. 457, 458), and other historians, who might indulge their own eloquence, while they represent one of the orators of the age. But they all agree in the advice and arguments for perjury, which in the field of controversy are fiercely attacked by the Protestants and feebly defended by the Catholics. The latter are discouraged by the misfortune of Varna.

[28 ]Warna, under the Grecian name of Odessus, was a colony of the Milesians which they denominated from the hero Ulysses (Cellarius, tom. i. p. 374; d’Anville, tom. i. p. 312). According to Arrian’s Periplus of the Euxine (p. 24, 25, in the first volume of Hudson’s Geographers), it was situate 1740 stadia, or furlongs, from the mouth of the Danube, 2140 from Byzantium, and 360 to the north of a ridge or promontory of Mount Hæmus, which advances into the sea.

[29 ][It is difficult to understand what the Papal fleet was doing. The place where Murad crossed is uncertain. The Turkish sources differ; they agree only that he did not cross at Gallipoli. Cp. Thúry’s note, op. cit. p. 21.]

[30 ]Some Christian writers affirm that he drew from his bosom the host or wafer on which the treaty had not been sworn. The Moslems suppose, with more simplicity, an appeal to God and his prophet Jesus, which is likewise insinuated by Callimachus (l. iii. p. 516, Spondan. 1444, No. 8).

[31 ]A critic will always distrust these spolia opima of a victorious general, so difficult for valour to obtain, so easy for flattery to invent (Cantemir, p. 90, 91). Callimachus (l. iii. p. 517) more simply and probably affirms, supervenientibus Janizaris, telorum multitudine non tam confossus est quam obrutus.

[32 ]Besides some valuable hints from Æneas Sylvius, which are diligently collected by Spondanus, our best authorities are three historians of the xvth century, Philippus Callimachus (de rebus a Vladislao Polonorum atque Hungarorum Rege gestis, libri iii. in Bel. [= Schwandtner] Script. Rerum Hungaricarum, tom. i. p. 433-518), Bonfinius (decad iii. l. v. p. 460-467), and Chalcondyles (l. vii. p. 165-179). The two first were Italians, but they passed their lives in Poland and Hungary (Fabric. Bibliot. Latin. med. et infimæ Ætatis, tom. i. p. 324; Vossius de Hist. Latin. l. iii. c. 8, 11; Bayle, Dictionnaire, Bonfinius). A small tract of Fælix Petancius, chancellor of Segnia (ad calcem Cuspinian. de Cæsaribus, p. 716-722), represents the theatre of the war in the xvth century. [The story of the Varna campaign by Callimachus or Philip Buonaccorsi has recently been edited by Kwiatkovski in vol. vi. of the Monum. Polon. Hist. (1893). See also the authorities cited in Katóna, op. cit. vol. vi., and the Turkish writers cited above, note 24. A full description of the battle will be found in Hammer, i. p. 355-357, and in Zinkeisen, i. p. 689 sqq. There is a description of the battle in Greek verse by Paraspondylus Zoticus, who professes to have been an eye-witness. It has been edited (with Hungarian notes) by W. Pecz, 1894; and it was included in Legrand’s Collection de Monuments, Nouvelle série, v. p. 51 sqq.]

[33 ]M. Lenfant has described the origin (Hist. du Concile de Basle, tom. i. p. 247, &c.), and Bohemian campaign (p. 315, &c.), of Cardinal Julian. His services at Basil and Ferrara, and his unfortunate end, are occasionally related by Spondanus and the continuator of Fleury.

[34 ]Syropulus honourably praises the talents of an enemy (p. 117): τοιαν̂τά τινα εɩ̂̓πεν ὸ Ἰουλιανός, πεπλατυσμένως ἄγαν καὶ λογικω̂ς, καὶ μετ’ ἐπιστήμης καὶ δεινότητος ῥητορικη̂ς.

[35 ]See Bonfinius, decad iii. l. iv. p. 423. Could the Italian historian pronounce, or the king of Hungary hear, without a blush, the absurd flattery which confounded the name of a Walachian village with the casual though glorious epithet of a single branch of the Valerian family at Rome? [For the Walachian origin of Hunyady, cp. Xénopol, Histoire des Roumains, i. p. 264.]

[36 ]Philip de Comines (Mémoires, l. vi. c. 13), from the tradition of the times, mentions him with high encomiums, but under the whimsical name of the Chevalier Blanc de Valaigne (Valachia). The Greek Chalcondyles, and the Turkish Annals of Leunclavius, presume to accuse his fidelity or valour. [Teleki, A Hunyadiak kora Magyarországon (The Age of the Hunyadys in Hungary), vols. 1-5, 1852-7.]

[37 ]See Bonfinius (decad iii. l. viii. p. 492) and Spondanus ( 1456, No. 1-7). Huniades shared the glory of the defence of Belgrade with Capistran, a Franciscan friar; and in their respective narratives neither the saint nor the hero condescends to take notice of his rival’s merit. [On John Capistrano see Hermann, Capistranus triumphans seu historia fundamentalis de S. Joanne Cap., 1700; Cataneo, Vita di S. Giovanni da Capistrano, 1691; Guérard, S. Jean de Capistran et son temps, 1865. The last campaign of Hunyady is the subject of a monograph by Kiss (Hunyadi János utolsó hadjárata, 1857). The siege of Belgrade has been treated fully by Mr. R. N. Bain in the Eng. Historical Review for July, 1892.]

[38 ]See Bonfinius, decad iii. l. viii.-decad iv. l. viii. The observations of Spondanus on the life and character of Matthias Corvinus are curious and critical ( 1464, No. 1; 1475, No. 6; 1476, No. 14-16; 1490, No. 4, 5). Italian fame was the object of his vanity. His actions are celebrated in the Epitome Rerum Hungaricarum (p. 322-412) of Peter Ranzanus, a Sicilian. His wise and facetious sayings are registered by Galeotus Martius of Narni (528-568); and we have a particular narrative of his wedding and coronation. These three tracts are all contained in the first vol. of Bel’s Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum. [The best monograph on Matthias Corvinus is that of W. Franknói which has appeared in a German translation (from the Hungarian) in 1891. It is furnished with interesting illustrations.]

[39 ]They are ranked by Sir William Temple, in his pleasing Essay on Heroic Virtue (Works, vol. iii. p. 385), among the seven chiefs who have deserved, without wearing, a royal crown; Belisares, Narses, Gonsalvo of Cordova, William first prince of Orange, Alexander duke of Parma, John Huniades, and George Castriot, or Scanderbeg.

[40 ]I could wish for some simple authentic memoirs of a friend of Scanderbeg, which would introduce me to the man, the time, and the place. In the old and national history of Marinus Barletius, a priest of Scodra (de Vitâ, Moribus, et Rebus gestis Georgii Castrioti, &c. libri xiii. p. 367, Argentorat. 1537, in fol.), his gaudy and cumbersome robes are stuck with many false jewels. See likewise Chalcondyles, l. vii. p. 185 [p. 350, ed. B.]; l. viii. p. 229 [p. 432]. [Besides the contemporary authority, Barletius, we know indirectly of another contemporary source written by an anonymous man of Antivari. This work (Historia Scanderbegi edita per quendam Albanensem) was printed at Venice in 1480, but is now lost. But it is known to us through Giammaria Biemmi, who used it for his Istoria di Giorgio Castriota, detto Scander Begh, 1742. The best modern work on the life and exploits of Scanderbeg is that of Julius Pisko: Skanderbeg, 1894; a number of new documents are printed in an appendix.]

[41 ]His circumcision, education, &c. are marked by Marinus with brevity and reluctance (l. i. p. 6, 7).

[42 ]Since Scanderbeg died, 1466, in the 63d year of his age (Marinus, l. xiii. p. 370), he was born in 1403 [1404]; since he was torn from his parents by the Turks when he was novennis (Marinus, l. i. p. 1, 6), that event must have happened in 1412 [or 1413], nine years before the accession of Amurath II., who must have inherited, not acquired, the Albanian slave. Spondanus has remarked this inconsistency, 1431, No. 31; 1443, No. 14.

[43 ]His revenue and forces are luckily given by Marinus (l. ii. p. 44).

[44 ][Biemmi says that the total number of fighting men did not exceed 70,000; see Pisko, p. 47.]

[45 ]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. [The site of Sfetigrad is uncertain. It was in the Upper Dibre, and perhaps near Trebište. See Pisko, p. 18 note; and for the mode of its capture, p. 50, 51.]

[46 ]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.

[47 ]In honour 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 Hadrianople.

[48 ]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). [The date of Scanderbeg’s expedition to Italy is fixed by Pisko (p. 86-88) by means of new documents. According to Antonius Guidobonus, the ambassador of Milan at Venice, the troops which Scanderbeg took with him numbered 2000 foot and 1000 horse.]

[49 ]Spondanus, from the best evidence and the most rational criticism, has reduced the giant Scanderbeg to the human size ( 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 neighbouring isle of Corfu, demonstrate his last distress, which is awkwardly concealed by Marinus Barletius (l. x.).

[50 ]See the family of the Castriots in Ducange (Fam. Dalmaticæ, &c. xviii. p. 348-350).

[51 ]This colony of Albanese is mentioned by Mr. Swinburne (Travels into the Two Sicilies, vol. i. p. 350-354).

[52 ][Constantine is generally numbered as Constantine XI., but Gibbon (who counts Constantine, son of Romanus I., as Constantine VIII.; see above, vol. viii. p. 265) makes him Constantine XII. He was distinguished by the surname Dragases, derived through his mother Irene, who was daughter of Constantine Dragases, a Servian prince.]

[53 ]The chronology of Phranza is clear and authentic; but, instead of four years and seven months, Spondanus ( 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 Ethiopia.

[54 ][The ceremony was not renewed at Constantinople. The emperor desired to avoid any occasion for quarrels between the Unionists and anti-Unionists.]

[55 ]Phranza (l. iii. c. 1-6) deserves credit and esteem.

[56 ]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.

[57 ]The happy and pious Indians lived 150 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.

[58 ]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.

[59 ]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).

[60 ]The classical reader will recollect the offers of Agamemnon (Iliad I. v. 144) and the general practice of antiquity.

[61 ]Cantacuzene (I am ignorant of his relation to the emperor of that name) was a 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).

[62 ][A Burgundian knight, Bertrandon de la Brocquière, returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, visited Constantinople in 1432, and has left us a very interesting description of life in that city, and also of Murad’s court at Hadrianople. Legrand D’Aussy published this work (Voyage d’Outremer et Retour de Jérusalem en France) in 1804, and it has been re-edited by C. Schefer, 1892. An English edition appeared in T. Wright’s Early Travels in Palestine (ed. Bohn, 1848, p. 283-382).

Finlay writes (Hist. of Greece, iii. p. 492): “Court processions, religious ceremonies, and national vanity amused and consoled the Greeks as they hastened along the path of degradation and ruin. Dramatic representations of sacred subjects were performed in the Church of St. Sophia, as musical exhibitions had been celebrated in earlier days. Exercises of archery and imitations of Turkish horsemanship replaced the military pageants and the games of the hippodrome which had been the delight of the Byzantine populace in better days.”]

[1 ]Chalcondyles, for Chalc<oc>ondyles, is explained by Krumbacher as meaning the man with the bronze handle (Gesch. der byz. Litt., p. 305).

[2 ]This has been excellently brought out by Krumbacher, op. cit. p. 302.

[3 ]There is also extant an abbreviated version of the Chronicle in colloquial Greek, and it seems to have been prepared by Phrantzes himself. Cp. Krumbacher, op. cit. p. 308. It has been edited in Mai’s Class. Auct. ix. p. 594 sqq., 1837, and reprinted in Migne, P.G. 156.

[1 ][There is a great memorial of Niccolo at Florence, the Gothic Certosa San Lorenzo. Gregorovius calls it “the first monument of historical relations between Florence and Greece”; for just as Pisa used her revenue from Constantinople to build her cathedral, Niccolo devoted moneys from Greece to build San Lorenzo. His tomb is to be seen in a subterranean chapel.]

[2 ][His own brother-in-law; for he was married to Agnes Saraceno.]