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THE  LATINS  IN  THE  LEVANT 


"Nach  Elis  zichn  der  Franken  Heere, 
Messene  sei  der  Sachscn  Loos, 
Normanne  reinige  die  Meere 
Und  Argolis  erschaff'  er  gross." 

GOETHB,  Faust,  Part  II. 


THE    LATINS    IN 
THE    LEVANT 

A  HISTORY  OF  FRANKISH   GREECE 

(1204-1566) 

BY    WILLIAM    MILLER,    M.A. 

AUTHOR   OP   "THE  BALKANS,"   "TRAVELS   AND   POLITICS  IK   THE   NEAR 

EAST,"  "  GREEK   LIPE  IX  TOWN    AND  COUNTRY  " 

ASSOCIATE  OP  THE  BRITISH   SCHOOLS   AT   ATHENS   AND   ROME 


WITH    MAPS 


NEW  YORK 
E.  P.  DUTTON  AND  COMPANY 

1908 

C 


PrinUd  in  Great  Britain 


ahdjvlw  ho..  $&\:ixi , 

APR  v!'  '909 
—  Lf  0i?a«<  v.  — 


€o,  U7 


PREFACE 

PROFESSOR  KRUMBACHER  says  in  his  History  of  Byzantine 
Literature,  that,  when  he  announced  his  intention  of  devoting 
himself  to  that  subject,  one  of  his  classical  friends  solemnly 
remonstrated  with  him,  on  the  ground  that  there  could  be 
nothing  of  interest  in  a  period  when  the  Greek  preposition 
airo  governed  the  accusative  instead  of  the  genitive  case. 
I  am  afraid  that  many  people  are  of  the  opinion  of  that 
orthodox  grammarian.  There  has  long  prevailed  in  some 
quarters  an  idea  that,  from  the  time  of  the  Roman  Conquest 
in  146  B.C.  to  the  day  when  Archbishop  German6s  raised 
the  standard  of  Independence  at  Kalavryta  in  1821,  the 
annals  of  Greece  were  practically  a  blank,  and  that  that 
country  thus  enjoyed  for  nearly  twenty  centuries  that  form 
of  happiness  which  consists  in  having  no  history.  Forty 
years  ago  there  was,  perhaps,  some  excuse  for  this  theory : 
but  the  case  is  very  different  now.  The  great  cemeteries  of 
mediaeval  Greece — I  mean  the  Archives  of  Venice,  Naples, 
Palermo,  and  Barcelona — have  given  up  their  dead.  We 
know  now,  year  by  year — yes,  almost  month  by  month — the 
vicissitudes  of  Hellas  under  her  Frankish  masters,  and  all 
that  is  required  now  is  to  breathe  life  into  the  dry  bones,  and 
bring  upon  the  stage  in  flesh  and  blood  that  picturesque  and 
motley  crowd  of  Burgundian,  Flemish,  and  Lombard  nobles, 
German  knights,  rough  soldiers  of  fortune  from  Catalufta 
and  Navarre,  Florentine  financiers,  Neapolitan  courtiers, 
shrewd  Venetian  and  Genoese  merchant  princes,  and  last 
but  not  least,  the  bevy  of  high-born  dames,  sprung  from  the 
oldest  families  of  France,  who  make  up,  together  with  the 
Greek  archons  and  the  Greek  serfs,  the  persons  of  the 
romantic  drama  of  which  Greece   was  the  theatre  for  250 

ril 


viii  PREFACE 

years.     The  present  volume  is   an   attempt  to  accomplish 
that  delightful  but  difficult  task. 

Throughout  I  have  based  the  narrative  upon  first-hand 
authorities.  I  can  conscientiously  say  that  I  have  consulted 
all  the  printed  books  known  to  me  in  Greek,  Italian,  Spanish, 
French,  German,  English,  and  Latin,  which  deal  in  any  way 
with  the  subject;  and  I  have  endeavoured  to  focus  all  the 
scattered  notices  concerning  the  Frankish  period  which  have 
appeared  in  periodical  literature,  and  in  the  documents  of 
the  epoch  which  have  been  published.  These  I  have 
supplemented  by  further  research  in  the  archives  of  Rome 
and  Venice.  My  aim  has  been  to  present  as  complete  an 
account  as  is  possible  in  the  existing  state  of  our  knowledge 
of  this  most  fascinating  stage  in  the  life  of  Greece.  I  have 
also  visited  all  the  chief  castles  and  sites  connected  with 
the  Frankish  period,  believing  that  before  a  writer  can  hope 
to  make  the  Franks  live  on  paper,  he  must  see  where  they 
lived  in  the  flesh.  Enormous  as  is  the  debt  which  every 
student  of  mediaeval  Greek  history  owes  to  the  late  Karl 
Hopf,  it  was  here  that  he  failed,  and  it  was  hence  that  his 
Frankish  barons  are  labelled  skeletons  in  a  vast,  cold  museum, 
instead  of  human  beings  of  like  passions  with  ourselves. 

One  word  as  to  the  arrangement  of  the  book.  The 
historian  of  Frankish  Greece  is  confronted  at  the  outset 
with  the  problem  of  telling  his  tale  in  the  clearest  possible 
manner.  He  may  describe,  like  Finlay,  the  history  of  each 
small  state  separately — a  course  which  not  only  involves 
repetition,  but  prevents  the  reader  from  obtaining  a  view  of 
the  country  as  a  whole ;  or  he  may,  like  Hopf,  combine  the 
separate  narratives  in  one — a  policy  which  inevitably  leads 
to  confusion.  I  have  adopted  an  intermediate  course. 
The  three  states  of  the  Morea  and  continental  Greece — the 
principality  of  Achaia,  the  duchy  of  Athens,  and  the  Despotat 
of  Epiros — were  so  closely  connected  as  to  form  a  fairly 
homogeneous  whole ;  and  with  them  naturally  go  the  island 
county  of  Cephalonia  and  the  island  of  Euboea.  The  duchy 
of  the  Archipelago  and  the  Venetian  colony  of  Corfu,  on  the 
other  hand,  form  separate  sections,  for  their  evolution  differed 
widely  from  the  other  states.  I  have  therefore  treated  them 
apart    Crete  I  have  omitted  for  two  reasons :  it  is  not  yet 


PREFACE  ix 

a  part  of  the  Greek  kingdom,  and  it  so  happens  that  Frankish 
Greece  almost  exactly  coincided  with  the  area  of  modern 
Greece ;  moreover,  the  history  of  Venetian  Crete  cannot  be 
written  till  the  eighty-seven  volumes  of  the  "  Duca  di  Candia  " 
documents  at  Venice  are  published. 

I   owe  thanks  to  many  friends    for    help    and  advice, 
especially  to  K.  A.  M.  Idrom&ios  of  Corfii. 

W.  M. 
Rome,  December  1907. 


a  2 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  I 

GREECE  AT   THE  TIME  OF  THE   FRANKISH   CONQUEST 

p. 
Administrative  divisions.  The  Ionian  islands.  Thessaly.  Sla- 
vonic elements.  Tzalcones.  Jews.  Italians.  Byzantine 
oppression.  Piracy.  Local  tyrants.  The  Church.  Material 
condition  of  Athens.  The  Ancient  Monuments :  the  Par- 
thenon, the  Erechtheion,  the  Theseion.  Byzantine  Churches. 
Monasteries.  Culture.  English  at  Athens.  Thebes.  Chalkis. 
The  Peloponnese.    Corfu.    The  Cyclades 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   FRANKISH  CONQUEST  (1204-1207) 

The  deed  of  partition.  Sale  of  Crete  to  Venice.  Boniface  of 
Montferrat  marches  into  Greece.  Leon  Sgour6s  besieges 
Athens.  Bestowal  of  baronies  in  Thessaly.  Marquisate  of 
Boudonitza.  Barony  of  Salona.  Capture  of  Athens  by  the 
Franks.  Akomin&os  in  Exile.  Attica  and  Boeotia  bestowed 
on  Othon  de  la  Roche.  D'Avesnes  takes  Eubcea.  Siege  of 
Corinth.  Geoflroy  de  Villehardouin  lands  in  Messenia. 
Meeting  with  Champlitte.  Conquest  of  the  Morea.  Battle 
of  Koundoura.  Doxapatres.  Champlitte  "Prince  of  all 
Achaia."  Venice  takes  Modon  and  Coron.  Death  of 
Boniface.  Michael  I.  Angelos  founds  the  Despotat  of  Epiros. 
Marco  I.  Sanudo  founds  the  duchy  of  the  Archipelago. 
The  triarchs  of  Eubcea.  The  Venetians  colonise  Corfu. 
Crete         ........        37 

xi 


xii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  III 

THE  ORGANISATION   OF  THE  CONQUEST  (1207-1214) 

PAGE 

Departure  of  Champlitte.  Villehardouin  bailie  of  Achaia.  The 
baronies  of  Achaia.  Feudal  Society :  the  prince,  the  great 
barons,  the  Greeks,  the  serfs.  Continuation  of  the  conquest 
m  of  Achaia.  Treaty  with  Venice.  Geoffrey  I.  becomes 
"  Prince  of  Achaia."  Capture  of  Corinth,  Nauplia,  and  Argos 
Organisation  of  the  Church  in  Achaia.  Society  in  Attica. 
Othon  de  la  Roche  :  his  family  and  dominions.  The  Athenian 
Church.  Death  of  Akomin&os.  The  Lombard  rebellion. 
The  Parliaments  of  Ravenika.  Venice  obtains  a  footing  in 
Eubcea.     Michael  I.  of  Epiros  captures  Corfu  :  his  death      .        49 

CHAPTER  IV 

THE  ZENITH  OF   FRANKISH   RULE  (1214-1262) 

Fall  of  the  Kingdom  of  Salonika.  Theodore  of  Epiros  becomes 
its  Emperor.  Marriage  and  reign  of  Geoffrey  II.  of  Achaia  : 
he  builds  Chloumoutsi :  his  quarrel  with  the  Church :  the 
Concordat  of  1223 :  his  services  to  the  Latin  Empire. 
Reign  and  retirement  of  Othon  de  la  Roche  of  Athens  :  Guy 
I.  succeeds  him.  Union  of  the  Greek  Empires  of  Nice  and 
Salonika.  Michael  II.  "Despot  of  Hellas/  Prince  William 
of  Achaia.  Siege  and  surrender  of  Monemvasia.  Building  of 
Mistra,  Old  Maina,  and  Beaufort.  Splendour  and  commercial 
prosperity  of  Achaia.  The  mint  at  Chloumoutsi.  The 
Eubcean  war.  Frankish  Athens  fights  Frankish  Sparta: 
battle  of  Karydi.  The  Parliament  of  Nikli.  Guy  I.  becomes 
Duke  of  Athens :  history  of  the  title.  William  of  Achaia 
becomes  involved  in  Epiros.  Battle  of  Pelagosta.  Imprison- 
ment of  the  prince.  The  Emperor  Baldwin  II.  at  Athens. 
The  "  Ladies'  Parliament"  Cession  of  the  three  fortresses. 
Treaty  of  Thebes.    General  situation  in  1263    ...        82 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  GREEK  REVIVAL  (i 262- 1 278) 
Franco-Greek  war  in  the  Morea.     Battle  of  Prinitsa.    The  Turks 


CONTENTS  xiii 


PAOB 


desert  to  the  Franks.  Battle  of  Makryplagi.  First  Settlement 
of  Turks  in  the  Morea.  Treaty  of  Viterbo.  The  Angevin 
connection.  Prince  William  at  Tagliacozzo.  Marriage  of 
Princess  Isabelle  with  Philip  of  Anjou.  Resumption  of  the 
war  in  the  Morea.  Death  of  Michael  II.  of  Epiros. 
Division  of  the  Despotat :  the  duchy  of  Neopatras.  War 
between  Byzantium  and  Neopatras.  John  of  Athens  aids 
the  duke.  Naval  battle  off  Demetrias.  Rise  and  career  of 
Licario  in  Eubcea.  Capture  of  John  of  Athens  :  his  release 
and  death.  Feudal  difficulties  in  Achaia :  the  cases  of  Skortd 
and  Akova.  Death  of  Prince  William.  Condition  of  the  great 
baronies.  The  Gasmules.  General  situation  of  Frankish 
Greece  in  1278.  Commerce  and  agriculture.  Culture: 
Leonardo  of  Veroli's  library.  Piracy.  General  insecurity. 
Frankish  nomenclature   .  .  .  .120 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  ANGEVINS   IN   GREECE  (1278-1307) 

Charles  I.  of  Anjou  Prince  of  Achaia.  Rule  of  his  bailies  :  Galeran 
d'lvry,  Filippo  de  Lagonessa,  and  Guy  de  la  Tr&nouille. 
William,  Duke  of  Athens  and  bailie  of  Achaia.  Nicholas  de 
St  Omer  bailie :  he  builds  the  castles  of  St  Omer  and  Avarino. 
Origin  of  the  name  Navarino.  Geoffroy  de  Bruyeres  captures 
Bucelet.  Florent  of  Hainault  marries  Isabelle  de  Villehar- 
douin  and  becomes  Prince  of  Achaia.  The  Angevins  in 
Epiros.  Capture  of  Sully.  Latin  coalition  against  the  Greek 
Empire :  treaty  of  Orvieto.  Effect  of  the  Sicilian  Vespers  on 
Greece.  Collapse  of  the  coalition.  War  between  the  Greeks 
in  Thessaly.  Seven  years'  peace  in  Achaia.  Condition  of 
Epiros :  Florent  intervenes  there.  History  and  origin  of  Sta. 
Mavra.  Philip  of  Taranto  marries  Thamar  of  Epiros  and 
becomes  suzerain  of  all  the  Frankish  states.  The  Angevins 
at  Lepanto.  Roger  de  Lluria  ravages  the  Morea.  Surprise 
of  Kalamata.  Unpopularity  of  the  Flemings :  story  of  Photios. 
The  market  at  Vervaina :  capture  of  St  George.  Death  of 
Florent  Coming  of  age  of  Guy  II.  of  Athens :  the  scene  at 
Thebes.  Boniface  of  Verona.  Guy  II.  marries  Matilda  of 
Hainault  Isabelle  of  Achaia  at  the  Jubilee  of  1300:  her 
marriage  with  Philip  of  Savoy.  Philip  as  Prince  of  Achaia  : 
his  quarrel  with  St  Omer:  his  extortionate  government 
Guy  II.  of  Athens  guardian  of  Thessaly:  spread  of  French 
influence  there :  his  campaign  against  Epiros.    The  tourna- 


xiv  CONTENTS 

PAGK 

ment  on  the  Isthmus.  Charles  II.  of  Anjou  makes  Philip  of 
Taranto  Prince  of  Achaia.  Exile  and  death  of  Princess 
Isabelle.  The  Savoyard  "Princes  of  Achaia."  Great  pros- 
perity of  Athens.     Review  of  the  Frankish  states  in  1307  161 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY  (1302-1311) 

Origin  of  the  Catalan  Grand  Company.  Roger  de  Flor.  The 
Company  enters  the  Byzantine  service.  Quarrels  with  the 
Emperor.  Ravages  Thrace  and  Macedonia.  The  Infant 
Ferdinand  of  Majorca.  His  arrest  with  Muntaner  at  Negro- 
ponte.  His  imprisonment  at  Thebes.  The  Catalans  negotiate 
with  Duke  Guy  II.  They  murder  their  captains.  Death  of 
Guy  II.  The  disputed  succession:  decision  of  the  High 
Court  of  Achaia.  Duke  Walter  of  Brienne.  The  Catalans 
in  Thessaly.  Walter  employs  them  against  the  Greeks.  His 
quarrel  with  them.  Battle  of  the  Kephiss6s  ( 1 5 th  March  1 3 1 1 ). 
The  Catalans  occupy  the  duchy  of  Athens.  Memorials  of 
the  French  dukes  .  .  .211 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR   NEIGHBOURS 
(I3II-I333) 

The  Company  places  the  duchy  under  Sicilian  protection.  Man- 
fred of  Sicily  Duke  of  Athens.  Estanol  sent  as  governor. 
Organisation  of  the  Catalan  duchy.  The  vicar-general.  The 
marshal  The  veguers,  captains,  and  castellanos.  Represen- 
tative and  municipal  institutions.  Code  of  law  and  language. 
Ecclesiastical  organisation.  Treatment  of  the  Greeks.  Fin- 
ances. EstanoPs  administration.  Alfonso  Fadrique  head  of 
the  Company.  His  Euboean  marriage  and  campaign.  Truce 
with  Venice  in  13 19.  Importance  of  the  Piraeus.  Turkish 
danger.  Death  of  the  last  Greek  Duke  of  Neopatras  :  break- 
up of  his  dominions.  Venice  takes  Pteleon.  The  Catalan 
duchy  of  Neopatras.  First  appearance  of  the  Albanians  in 
Thessaly.  The  Venetian  marquisate  of  Boudonitza.  End  of 
the  Angeli  in  Epiros.  The  Orsini  in  Epiros.  Their  crimes 
and   Greek  culture.    The  principality  of  Achaia :  Louis  of 


CONTENTS  xv 

PAOB 

Burgundy  marries  Matilda  of  Hainault  and  becomes  prince. 
Tragic  end  of  the  Lady  of  Akova.  Civil  war  in  Elis :  expe- 
dition of  Ferdinand  of  Majorca.  Death  of  both  claimants. 
John  of  Gravina  Prince  of  Achaia.  The  last  of  the  Villehar- 
douins.  Expansion  of  the  Byzantine  province:  loss  of 
Arkadia.  First  mention  of  the  Acciajuoli.  Achaia  exchanged 
for  Durazzo.  Walter  of  Brienne  attempts  to  recover  Athens. 
Destruction  of  the  castle  of  St  Omer.  Subsequent  career  of 
Walter.    Condition  of  Greece  in  1333  ....      235 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI  ( 1 333- 1 373) 

Catherine  of  Valois  in  Achaia.  Niccolo  Acciajuoli.  Byzantine 
annexation  of  Epiros.  The  Achaian  barons  treat  with  James 
II.  of  Majorca:  report  on  the  principality  in  1344.  The 
papacy  recognises  the  Catalans  at  Athens.  Frederick  III.  of 
Sicily  becomes  Duke  of  Athens.  Condition  of  the  duchies. 
Moncada  vicar-general.  The  Serbs  in  Thessaly.  Greek 
revival  in  the  Morea :  the  Cantacuzenes  at  Mistri.  Character 
of  the  Moreot  archons:  revolt  of  Lampoudios.  Manuel's 
national  policy.  Franco-Greek  alliance  against  the  Turks. 
Roger  de  Lluria  invites  the  Turks  to  Thebes.  Their  defeat 
at  Megara.  The  Emperor  Robert  Prince  of  Achaia.  Niccolo 
Acciajuoli  receives  Corinth.  Death  of  Prince  Robert:  a 
disputed  succession.  Exploits  of  Carlo  Zeno,  canon  of 
Patras.  Nerio  Acciajuoli's  origin  and  establishment  at 
Corinth.  Rise  of  the  Tocchi.  Leonardo  Tocco  becomes 
Count  of  Cephalonia  and  Duke  of  Leucadia.  Epiros  divided 
between  Serbs  and  Albanians.  Foundation  of  Meteora. 
Condition  of  Athens :  dissensions  between  Lluria  and  Pedro 
de  Pou.  Lluria  vicar-general.  Schemes  of  the  house  of 
Enghien  for  the  recovery  of  Athens.  State  of  the  Venetian 
colonies.    General  position  of  the  Frankish  states  in  1373  269 


CHAPTER  X 

THE    NAVARRESE  COMPANY  (1373-I388) 

Congress  at  Thebes.  Nerio  Acciajuoli  seizes  Megara.  Death  of 
King  Frederick  III.  of  Sicily :  disputed  succession  at  Athens. 
The  majority  proclaims  Pedro  IV.  of  Aragon  as  duke.  Inter- 
vention of  the  Navarrese  Company.  Its  origin.  Jacques  de 
Baux  claims  Achaia.    Queen  Joanna  I.  of  Naples  Princess  of 


xvi  CONTENTS 


1»AUK 


Achaia.  The  principality  pawned  to  the  Knights  of  St  John. 
Heredia  in  Greece.  The  Albanians  capture  Lepanto.  The 
Navarrese  in  Attica.  Capture  of  Thebes.  The  Akropolis 
defended  by  Bellarbe.  The  capitulations  of  Athens  and 
Salona.  Pedro  IV.  and  the  Akropolis.  Rocaberti  vicar- 
general.  The  head  of  St  George.  Albanian  immigration  into 
Attica.  The  Navarrese  Company  established  in  the  Morea. 
Various  claimants  to  the  principality.  Growth  of  Venetian 
influence  in  Argolis  and  Euboea.  Rocaberti  recalled.  Nerio 
Acciajuoli  seizes  Attica.  Pedro  de  Pau  defends  the  Akropolis  : 
its  surrender.  Fate  of  the  survivors :  Catalan  families  still 
left  in  Greece.  Memorials  of  Catalan  rule :  the  Catalan 
Madonna.  State  of  Athens  in  the  Catalan  period.  "  Catalan  " 
as  a  term  of  reproach.  The  Florentines  in  Epiros :  Esau 
Buondelmonti  becomes  Despot.    Review  of  Greece  in  1388    .      505 


CHAPTER  XI 
FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN   ATHENS  (1388-1415) 

Restoration  of  the  Greek  see  of  Athens.  Nerio's  philhellenic 
policy.  Greek  becomes  the  official  language.  Venice  pur- 
chases Argos  and  Nauplia.  Theodore  Palaiol6gos  seizes 
Argos.  Nerio  the  prisoner  of  the  Navarrese :  his  release : 
he  strips  the  Parthenon  to  pay  his  ransom.  His  alliance 
with  Amadeo  of  Savoy.  List  of  the  Achaian  baronies  in  1391. 
The  Turks  in  Greece:  Evrenosbeg  ravages  Attica.  Tragic 
end  of  the  last  Countess  of  Salona.  Nerio  created  "  Duke  of 
Athens " :  his  death  and  will :  feud  between  his  heirs. 
Venice  accepts  the  city  of  Athens.  The  Venetian  administra- 
tion. Description  of  Athens  in  1395.  Fresh  Turkish 
inroads.  Antonio  Acciajuoli  master  of  Athens.  Venice 
acquires  Lepanto.  Further  Venetian  gains :  condition  of 
Negroponte.  State  of  the  Morea :  Albanian  colonisation : 
Theodore  Palaiol6gos  sells  Corinth  to  the  Knights  of  St  John. 
Centurione  Zaccaria  last  Prince  of  Achaia.  The  Duchess 
Francesca  Tocco's  court  at  Cephalonia :  Froissarfs  descrip- 
tion. Carlo  I.  Tocco  conquers  Epiros.  End  of  the  mar- 
quisate  of  Boudonitza      ......      334 


CHAPTER  XII 
THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA  (1415-1441) 
The  Emperor  Manuel  II.   restores  the  Hexamilion.     Platonic 


CONTENTS  rvii 


PAOK 


proposals  of  Gemist&s  Python.  The  satire  of  Mazaris. 
Civilisation  of  Maina.  Extension  of  the  Venetian  colonies  in 
Messenia :  purchase  of  Navarino.  Venice  meditates  buying 
the  Morea :  report  on  its  condition  in  1422  :  Turakhan  invades 
it.  Constantine  PalaiohSgos  in  the  Morea.  He  captures  Patras. 
End  of  the  Frankish  principality  of  Achaia.  The  Turks  take 
Salonika  and  Joannina:  Carlo  II.  Tocco  a  tributary  of  the 
sultan.  Antonio  Acciajuoli's  successful  rule  at  Athens. 
Florentine  society  there.  The  Akropolis  under  the  Acciajuoli : 
their  palace  in  the  Propylaea :  the  Frankish  Tower.  Other 
Florentine  buildings  at  Athens.  Literary  culture.  Depopu- 
lation :  slavery  at  Athens.  Death  of  Antonio  :  conspiracy  of 
Chalkokondyles.  Nerio  II.  proclaimed.  Antonio  II.  sup- 
plants him.    Nerio  II.'s  restoration.      ....      377 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST  (144I-I460) 

Quarrels  of  the  Palaiol6goi  brothers.  State  of  the  Morea.  Con- 
stantino's triumphs  in  Northern  Greece:  Athens  tributary 
to  him.  Battle  of  Varna.  Murad  II.  storms  the  Hexamilion. 
Constantine  crowned  emperor  at  Mistra.  End  of  Italian  rule 
in  Akarnania.  Cyriacus  of  Ancona  visits  Greece :  the  anti- 
quary at  Athens.  Death  of  Pl&hon.  Turakhan  invades  the 
Morea  :  battle  of  Dervenaki.  Effect  of  the  taking  of  Constan- 
tinople on  Greece.  Albanian  insurrection  in  the  Peloponnese. 
Centurione's  son  claims  the  principality.  The  rising  subdued 
by  Turkish  aid.  The  Palaiol6goi  omit  to  pay  their  tribute. 
Mohammed  II.'s  campaign  in  the  Morea.  Surrender  of 
Corinth.  Turkish  province  constituted.  Death  of  Nerio  II. 
Usurpation  of  Chiara  Zorzi  at  Athens :  her  tragic  end.  Franco 
Acciajuoli.  Omar  takes  Athens  :  end  of  Frankish  rule  there. 
Mohammed  visits  Athens.  The  anonymous  account  of  the 
antiquities.  The  sultan  in  Bceotia  and  Negroponte.  Fratri- 
cidal war  in  the  Morea.  Mohammed's  second  Peloponnesian 
campaign  :  surrender  of  Dem&rios.  Monemvasia  holds  out 
and  becomes  papal  territory.  Flight  of  Thomas.  Heroic 
defence  of  Salmenikon.  Fate  of  the  Palaiol6goi.  End  of 
Phrantzes.  Murder  of  Franco  Acciajuoli.  End  of  the  duchy 
of  Athens.  Subsequent  history  of  the  Acciajuoli.  Condition 
of  the  Venetian  colonies :  acquisition  of  ^Egina  and  of  the 
Northern  Sporades  ......      407 


xviii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XIV 

THE   VENETIAN   COLONIES  (1462-1540) 

PAOK 

Removal  of  St  George's  head  from  ALg'ma.  to  Venice.  Turco- 
Venetian  war  of  1463.  Greeks  and  Albanians  rise  against  the 
Turks.  The  Venetians  rebuild  the  Isthmian  wall  Death  of 
Bertoldo  d'Este  at  Corinth.  Monemvasia  becomes  Venetian. 
Sigismondo  Malatesta  in  the  Morea.  Siege  of  Mistra. 
Python's  remains  removed  to  Rimini.  Vettore  Cappello 
captures  Athens.  Second  anonymous  description  of  the  city. 
Venetian  defeats  at  Patras  and  Kalamata.  Death  of  Cappello  in 
Euboea.  Siege  of  Negroponte  :  Canale's  fatal  inaction.  Fall 
of  Negroponte :  indignation  in  Venice.  Fate  of  the  survivors. 
The  Turks  repulsed  at  Lepanto.  Peace  of  1479.  Origin  of 
the  stradioti.  Venice  abandons  the  Tocchi.  Prosperity  of 
Cephalonia  and  Zante  under  Leonardo  III.  The  Turks  con- 
quer the  palatine  county.  Antonio  Tocco  recovers  Zante  and 
Cephalonia.  Venice  dislodges  him,  and  keeps  Zante.  Later 
history  of  the  Tocchi.  The  twenty  years'  peace  :  insurrection 
of  Kork6deilos  Kladas :  schemes  of  Andrew  Palaiol6gos. 
Turco- Venetian  war  of  1499.  Loss  of  Lepanto.  Condition 
of  Modon,  and  its  capture  by  the  Turks.  Loss  of  Navarino  and 
Coron.  Venice  takes  Cephalonia  and  Sta.  Mavra.  Cession 
of  Sta.  Mavra.  Peace  of  1502-3.  State  of  the  remaining 
Venetian  colonies :  Nauplia,  jEgina,  Monemvasia.  The 
Knights  of  St  John  seize  Modon.  Andrea  Doria  captures 
Coron.  Its  abandonment  by  the  Spaniards.  Fate  of  its 
inhabitants.  Turco- Venetian  war  of  1537.  Sack  of  j£gina 
by  Barbarossa.  Heroic  defence  of  Nauplia.  Peace  of  1540. 
Cession  of  Nauplia  and  Monemvasia :  disappearance  of 
Venice  from  the  Greek  mainland  ....      464 


CHAPTER  XV 
corfO  (1214-1485) 

Corfu  under  the  Despots  of  Epiros :  zenith  of  the  Greek  Church. 
Civil  administration.  Filippo  Chinardo.  Charles  I.  of  Anjou 
master  of  Corfu.  Disestablishment  of  the  Greek  Church : 
Catholic  predominance.  Jewish  immigration.  Angevin  ad- 
ministration :  the  Captain,  the  Magister  Mas  sarins ^  the  Curia 
Regis,  the  "annual  judges."  The  four  bailiwicks.  The  feudal 
system.  Economic'  value  of  the  island.  Philip  of  Taranto 
"  Lord  of  Corfu."  Robert  and  Philip  1 1 .    Origin  of  the  Corfiote 


CONTENTS  xix 

PAOI 

gypsies.  Joanna  I.  of  Naples  Lady  of  Corfu.  The  Navarrese 
Company  conquers  the  island  for  Jacques  de  Baux.  Charles 
III.  of  Naples  its  ruler.  Venice  occupies  Corfu.  The 
Venetian  charter.  Formal  purchase  of  the  island.  Effects 
and  traces  of  Angevin  sway.  Venetian  administration  :  the 
bailie,  councillors,  zn&proweditore.  The  prowedi tore  gentrale 
del  Levante.  Local  government :  the  General  Assembly  and 
the  Council  of  15a  The  "Golden  Book."  The  dependencies 
of  Corfu:  Butrinto,  Parga,  the  islands  of  the  Harpies. 
Ecclesiastical  organisation.  The  Jews.  The  feudal  system. 
The  gypsies1  fief.  The  serfs.  Neglect  of  education.  The 
Greek  language.  Trade.  Taxes.  Present  memorials  of 
Venetian  rule.  Aspect  of  the  town  in  Venetian  times. 
Genoese  attacks.  The  Turkish  peril.  Greek  exiles  in  Corfu 
after  1453.    St  Spiridion.    Services  of  the  Corfiotes  to  Venice      512 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE   IONIAN   ISLANDS   UNDER   VENICE  (1485-1540) 

Acquisition  of  Zante.  Its  colonisation  and  administration.  The 
Catholic  Church.  The  Greek  Church.  Cephalonia  a  Vene- 
tian colony :  its  administration.  Character  of  the  Cephalonians. 
Ithaka.  Prosperity  of  Zante  and  Cephalonia.  First  Turkish 
siege  of  Corfu.  History  of  Cerigo :  the  Venieri :  the  Mono- 
yannai.  Cerigo  a  Venetian  colony.  Its  partial  restoration  to 
the  Venieri.  Its  organisation.  Barbarossa's  raid.  The 
Ionian  islands  in  1540     ......      550 


CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO  (1207-1463) 

Marco  I.  Sanudo  does  homage  to  the  Emperor  Henry.  Creation 
of  the  duchy.  Marco's  treachery  in  Crete.  His  capture  by 
the  Greeks  of  Nice.  His  religious  tolerance.  Foundation  of 
the  Catholic  Church  in  the  Cyclades.  Angelo  Sanudo  a  vassal 
of  the  Prince  of  Achaia.  He  imitates  his  father  in  Crete.  The 
castles  of  the  Cyclades.  Marco  II.  Loss  of  the  Northern 
Sporades  and  many  other  islands.  Venice  claims  suzerainty 
over  the  duchy.  Piracy.  War  of  the  Ass.  The  worship  of 
St  Pachys.  Recovery  of  the  lost  Cyclades.  New  Latin 
families  established  there.  The  Knights  of  St  John  at  Delos. 
Exploits  of  Niccol6 1.  Sanudo.     State  of  the  Archipelago  about 


xx  CONTENTS 

PAOS 

1330.  John  I.  taken  by  the  Genoese.  Prosperity  of  Seriphos. 
The  Duchess  Fiorenza  :  struggle  for  her  hand.  Evil  reign  of 
her  son,  Niccol6  dalle  Carceri.  Francesco  Crispo  assassinates 
him  and  seizes  the  duchy.  He  pacifies  Venice.  First  appear- 
ance, and  origin  of  the  Sommaripa.  Venice  inherits  Tenos 
and  Mykonos.  Popularity  of  Venetian  rule  :  the  case  of 
Seriphos.  State  of  the  Archipelago  about  1420.  Giacomo  I. 
institutes  the  Salic  law.  His  visit  to  England.  John  II. 
succeeds  as  a  Venetian  nominee.  Genoese  invasion.  The 
Sommaripa  in  Andros.  Culture  in  the  Archipelago :  visit  of 
Cyriacus  of  Ancona.  The  Knights  of  St  John  at  Naxos. 
Eruption  of  Santorin.    William  II.  pays  tribute  to  the  sultan       570 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO  (1463-1566) 

Sufferings  of  the  Archipelago  during  the  Turco- Venetian  war. 
The  Idyll  of  Santorin.  The  Pisani  case.  Tyranny  of  John 
III.  Venice  administers  the  duchy.  State  of  the  Archipelago. 
Venice  restores  the  duchy  to  the  Crispi.  The  Mad  Duke  of 
Naxos.  Second  Venetian  administration.  Life  in  the  islands. 
John  IV.  His  capture  by  Corsairs.  The  question  of  Paros. 
Barbarossa's  fatal  cruise.  Capture  of  Paros.  Naxos  tributary 
to  the  Turks.  The  duke's  letter  to  the  Powers.  Loss  of 
Mykonos.  Barbarossa's  second  cruise.  Capture  of  the 
Northern  Sporades.  Venetian  report  on  the  Cyclades  in  1 563. 
Giacomo  IV.  the  last  Christian  duke.  End  of  the  duchy. 
Selim  II.  bestows  it  upon  Joseph  Nasi.  The  Jewish  duke 
and  his  deputy  Coronello.  Temporary  restoration  and  death 
of  Giacomo  IV.  Condition  of  the  Archipelago  under  Nasi. 
The  duchy  annexed  to  Turkey.  The  Gozzadini  retain  seven 
islands.     Feudalism  under  the  dukes.    Culture  611 


Table  of  Frankish  Rulers  .651 

Bibliography           .  655 
Index  .........      665 

Maps  :— 

Greece  in  1214     ......  Face  p.    81 

Greece  in  1278     .            .  151 

Greece  in  1388     .            .  532 

Greece  in  1462                                                     .  464 


THE  LATINS  IN  THE  LEVANT 

CHAPTER   I 

GREECE  AT  THE  TIME  OF  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

The  history  of  Frankish  Greece  begins  with  the  Fourth 
Irusade — that  memorable  expedition  which  influenced  for 
enturies  the  annals  of  Eastern  Europe,  and  which  forms 
he  historical  basis  of  the  Eastern  question.  We  all  know 
low  the  Crusaders  set  out  with  the  laudable  object  of  freeing 
the  Holy  Sepulchre  from  the  Infidel,  how  they  turned  aside 
to  the  easier  and  more  lucrative  task  of  overturning  the 
eldest  empire  in  the  world,  and  how  they  placed  on  the 
hrone  of  all  the  Caesars  Count  Baldwin  of  Flanders  as  first 
latin  emperor  of  Constantinople.  The  Greeks  fled  to  Asia 
Amor,  and  there,  at  Nice,  the  city  of  the  famous  council,  and 
t  Trebizond,  on  th$  shores  of  the  Black  Sea,  founded  two 
mpires,  of  which  the  former  served  as  a  basis  for  the  re- 
onquest  of  Byzantium,  while  the  latter  survived  for  a  few 
ears  the  Turkish  Conquest  of  the  new  Rome. 

At  the  time  of  the  Latin  Conquest,  most  of  Greece  was  still 
ominally  under  the  authority  of  the  Byzantine  emperor.  The 
ystem  of  provincial  administration,  which  had  been  completed 
»y  Leo  the  I  saurian  early  in  the  eighth  century,  was,  with  some 
Iterations,  still  in  force,  and  the  empire  was  parcelled  out 
ito  divisions  called  Themes — a  name  originally  applied  to  a 
egiment,  and  then  to  the  district  where  it  was  quartered 
Continental  Greece,  from  the  Isthmus  to  the  river  Peneios 
i  the  north  and  to  iEtolia  in  the  west,  composed  the  Theme 
f  Hellas,  which  thus  included  Attica,  Bceotia,  Phokis,  Lokris, 
art  of  Thessaly,  and  the  islands  of  Euboea  and  iEgina ; 
'eloponnese  gave  its  name  to  a  second  Theme,  but  at 

A 


the 

this  ^^m 

M 


2      GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

time  these  two  Themes  were  administered  together  by  the 
same  official1  Nikopolis,  the  Roman  colony  which  Octavian 
had  founded  to  commemorate  the  battle  of  Actium,  formed  a 
third  Theme,  which  included  Akarnania,  jEtolia,  and  Epiros. 
Of  the  islands,  the  Cyclades,  or  Dodekanesos,  as  they  were 
then  called,  were  included  in  the  iEgean  Theme,  the  Northern 
Sporades  in  that  of  Salonika,  while  Crete,  since  its  restoration 
to  the  Byzantine  Empire  from  the  Saracens  two-and-a-half 
centuries  earlier,  was  governed  by  an  imperial  viceroy. 
But  most  of  the  Ionian  islands  no  longer  formed  part  of 
the  emperor's  dominions.  Five  years  before  the  Latins 
conquered  Constantinople,  a  bold  Genoese  pirate  named 
Vetrano  had  made  himself  master  of  the  then  rich  and 
fertile  island  of  Corfii,  which  he  may  have  still  held ;  while 
Cephalonia,  Zante,  and  Ithaka  had  been  permanently  severed 
from  the  empire  by  the  invasion  of  the  Normans  from  Sicily 
twenty  years  before,  and  had  been  occupied  by  their  admiral, 
Margaritone  of  Brindisi.2  At  the  time  of  the  Fourth  Crusade, 
they  were  in  the  possession  of  a  Count  Maio,  or  Matthew,  a 
member  of  the  great  Roman  family  of  Orsini,  who  seems  to 
have  been  a  native  of  Monopoli  in  Apulia  and  to  have  married 
the  daughter  of  the  admiral,  acknowledging  the  suzerainty 
of  the  king  of  Sicily.  A  considerable  Italian  colony  from 
Brindisi  had  settled  in  Cephalonia  under  the  auspices  of 
these  Apulian  adventurers.8 

In  Thessaly,  too,  the  imperial  writ  no  longer  ran. 
Benjamin  of  Tudela,4  who  travelled  through  Greece  about 
forty  years  before  the  Latin  Conquest,  found  a  part  of  that 
province  in  the  possession  of  the  Wallachs,  whose  confines 
extended  as  far  south  as  Lamia.  Whatever  may  have  been 
the  origin  of  this  mysterious  and  interesting  race,  which  still 
dwells  in  summer  on  the  slopes  of  Pindos  and  on  the  banks 
of  the  Aspropotamos,  migrating  in  winter  to  the  plains  of 

1  Ldmpros,  M*x«^X  'Ako/uv&tov,  i.f  157,  160;  Ai  'ABijvat  re  pi  rA  r  A17  roC 
8u>&€K&tov  aluvos,  25-6. 

*  Benedict  of  Peterborough,  Gesta  Regis  Ricardi,  ii.,  199,  in  Rolls 
Series. 

3  Ubro  de  los  fechosy  53-4 ;  Epistola  lnnocentii  I//.,  vol.  ii., 
PP-  16,  73 ;  A  Dandolo  apud  Muratori,  Rerum  ltalicarum  Scriptores^ 
*&>  336;  Archivh  Veneto,  xx.,  93. 

*  Asher,  The  Itinerary  of  Benjamin  of  Tudela^  i.,  459. 


WALLACHS  AND  SLAVS  3 

Boeotia,  they  had  firmly  established  themselves  in  Northern 
Greece  by  the  middle  of  the  twelfth  century,  and  the  district 
where  they  lived  already  bore  the  name  of  Great  Wallachia.1 
That  the  Wallachs  are  of  Roman  descent  scarcely  admits  of 
doubt  At  the  present  day  the  Roumanians  claim  them  as 
belonging  to  the  same  family  as  themselves;  but  the 
worthy  Rabbi  of  Tudela  argued,  from  their  Jewish  names 
and  the  fact  that  they  called  the  Jews  "  brethren,"  that  they 
were  connected  with  his  own  race.  They  showed,  however, 
their  brotherly  love  by  contenting  themselves  with  merely 
robbing  the  Israelites,  while  they  both  robbed  and  murdered 
the  Greeks,  when  they  descended  from  their  mountains  to 
pillage  the  plains.  A  terror  to  all,  the  Vlachi  would  submit 
to  no  king ;  and,  twenty  years  before  the  fall  of  the  Byzantine 
Empire,  the  foolish  attempt  of  Isaac  II.  Angelos  to  place  a 
tax  upon  their  flocks  and  herds  caused  a  general  rising, 
which  led  to  the  formation  of  the  second  Bulgarian,  or 
Bulgaro-Wallachian  Empire,  in  the  Balkans.  Their  dis- 
affection and  readiness  for  revolt  was  further  proved,  only 
three  years  before  the  Conquest  of  Constantinople,  when  an 
ambitious  Byzantine  commander,  Manuel  Kam^tzes,  made 
himself  master  of  Thessaly  with  the  aid  of  a  Wallachian 
officer,  and  disturbed  the  peace  of  both  continental  Greece 
and  the  Peloponnese,  till  the  revolt  was  suppressed.2 

The  population  of  Greece  at  this  time  was  not  exclusively 
Hellenic  Besides  the  Wallachians  in  Thessaly,  another 
alien  element  was  represented  by  the  Slavs  of  the  Arkadian 
and  Lakonian  mountains,  descendants  of  those  Slavonian 
colonists  who  had  entered  the  Peloponnese  several  centuries 
before.  No  one  now  accepts  the  once  famous  theory  of 
Fallmerayer,  that  the  inhabitants  of  modern  Greece  have 
"  not  a  single  drop  of  genuine  Greek  blood  in  their  veins." 
No  unbiassed  historian  can,  however,  deny  the  immigration 
of  a  large  body  of  Slavs  into  the  Peloponnese,  where  such 
names  as  Charvati  (the  village  near  Mycenae)  and  Slavochorio 
still  preserve  the  memory  of  their  presence.  But  the  wise 
measures  of  the  Emperor  Nikeph6ros  I.  in  the  ninth 
century  and  the  marvellous  power  of  the  Hellenic  race  for 

1  So  Nik&as  Choniites  (p.  841)  calls  it. 
8  Nik&as  ChonUtes,  708-9. 


4       GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

absorbing  and  Hellenising  foreign  races — a  power  like  that  of 
the  Americans  in  our  day — had  prevented  the  Peloponnese 
from  becoming  a  Slav  state — a  Southern  Servia  or  Bulgaria. 
At  this  time,  accordingly,  they  were  confined  to  the  mountain 
fastnesses  of  Arkadia  and  Taygetos  (called  in  the  Chronicles 
"  the  mountain  of  the  Slavs  "),*  where  one  of  their  tribes,  the 
Melings,  is  often  mentioned  as  residing.  In  the  Peloponnese, 
too,  were  to  be  found  the  mysterious  Tzikones — a  race 
which  is  now  only  existing  at  Leonidi,  in  the  south-east  of 
the  peninsula,  and  in  the  adjacent  villages,  but  was  then 
apparently  occupying  a  wider  area.  Opinions  differ  as  to 
the  origin  of  this  tribe,  which  has,  to  this  day,  a  dialect  quite 
distinct  from  that  spoken  anywhere  else  in  Greek  lands, 
and  which  was  noticed  as  a  "barbarian"  tongue  by  the 
Byzantine  satirist,  Mdzaris,  in  the  fifteenth  century.  But  the 
first  living  authority  on  their  language,  who  has  lived  among 
them,  regards  them  as  descendants  of  the  Lakonians  and 
calls  their  speech  "  New  Doric," 2  and  both  Mdzaris  and  the 
Byzantine  historians,  Pachym6res  and  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys, 
expressly  say  that  their  name  was  a  vulgar  corruption  of  the 
word  "  Ldkones."  Scattered  about,  wherever  money  was  to 
be  made  by  trade,  were  colonies  of  Jews.  We  read  of  Jews 
at  Sparta  in  the  tenth  century,  and  I  have  myself  seen 
numbers  of  later  Jewish  inscriptions  at  MistriL  Benjamin  of 
Tudela  found  the  largest  Hebrew  settlement  at  Thebes> 
where  the  Jews  were,  in  his  day,  "the  most  eminent 
manufacturers  of  silk  and  purple  cloth  in  all  Greece."  Among 
the  2000  Jewish  inhabitants  of  that  ancient  city  there 
were  also  "many  eminent  Talmudic  scholars,"  indeed,  the 

1  Ubro  de  las  fechosy  48-9 ;  Td  Xpovucbv  rod  Moplws,  1L  3040,  4605 ; 
Le  Livre  de  la  Conqueste%  95,  100. 

2  Dr  DefTner  of  Athens,  who  has  written  a  Tzakonic  grammar.  See 
his  Zakomsches  in  Monatsbericht  der  k.  Akademie  der  Wissenschaften  zu 
Berlin.  Features  of  their  language  are  the  Doric  a  for  the  ordinary 
Greek  y,  and  the  digamma  in  some  words.  Dr  DefTner  regards  TftUowas 
as  a  corruption  of  roin  Adtcwas,  and  Mazaris  says  the  Lakonians  "  are 
now  called  Tzdkones."  Constantine  Porphyrogenitus  (i.,  696)  mentions 
Ttf/cctfi'ff  in  the  tenth  century,  Pachym&es.  (i.,  309)  and  Nikephoros  (i.,  98) 
Tfdjrwtf  in  the  thirteenth.  It  is  difficult,  in  the  face  of  this  evidence,  to 
understand  how  Hopf  could  have  believed  them  to  be  Slavs.  The  name 
is  still  common  as  a  proper  name,  e.g.  the  leading  surgeon  at  Athens  is 
so  called. 


JEWS  AND  ITALIANS  5 

enthusiastic  Rabbi  says  that "  no  scholars  like  them  are  to 
be  met  with  in  the  whole  Grecian  Empire,  except  at 
Constantinople."  Next  came  Halmyros  with  "  about  400 
Jews,"  Corinth  with  "  about  300,"  Negroponte  with  200,  and 
Crissa,  now  the  squalid  village  of  Chryso,  on  the  way  up  to 
Delphi,  with  the  same  number,  who  "  live  there  by  themselves 
on  Mount  Parnassos  and  carry  on  agriculture  upon  their  own 
land  and  property" — an  example  of  rural  Judaism  to  be 
paralleled  to-day  near  Salonika.  Naupaktos  and  Ravenika 
had  100  Jews  apiece,  Patras  and  Lamia,  or  Zetounion,  as  it 
was  then  called,  about  half  that  number,  and  there  were  a 
few  in  iEtolia  and  Akarnania.  The  present  large  Jewish 
colony  at  Corfu  was  then  represented  by  only  one  man. 

The  Italian  element  had  become  prominent  commercially 
long  before  the  Latin  Conquest  made  the  Franks  territorial 
masters  of  Greece.  A  century  earlier,  Atexios  I.  had  con- 
ceded immense,  and,  as  it  proved,  fatal  privileges  to  the 
Venetians,  in  return  for  their  aid  against  the  Norman 
invaders ;  and  Manuel  I.,  in  order  to  counteract  the  embar-  * 
rassing  Venetian  influence,  gave  encouragement  to  the 
trading  communities  of  Pisa,  Genoa,  and  Amalfi.  The 
Genoese  asked  in  particular  for  the  same  privileges  as  their 
Venetian  rivals  in  the  Theban  silk  market.  Benjamin  of 
Tudela  had  found  Venetian,  Pisan,  Genoese,  and  many 
other  merchants  frequenting  "the  large  commercial  city" 
of  Halmyros  in  Thessaly,1  and  the  commercial  treaty  of 
1 199  between  Venice  and  Atexios  III.  granted  to  the 
subjects  of  the  republic  free-trade  not  only  at  Halmyros, 
but  at  numerous  other  places  in  Greece.  Among  them  we 
notice  the  Ionian  islands  of  Corfu,  Cephalonia,  Zante,  and 
Ithaka  (called  in  the  document  by  its  classical  name);  the 
towns  of  Patras,  Methone,  Corinth,  Argos,  and  Nauplia  in 
the  Peloponnese;  Thebes  and  "the  district  of  Athens"  in 
continental  Greece;  the  towns  of  Domok6,  Larissa,  and 
Trikkala  in  the  north ;  and  the  islands  of  Euboea,  Crete,  and 
the  Archipelago.2  But  there  cannot  have  been  much  love 
lost  between  the  Greeks  and  these  foreigners  from  the  west. 
Old  men  would  still  remember  the  sack  of  Thebes  and  Corinth 

1  Asber,  loc.  cit. 

2  Forties  Rerum  Austriacarum%  Abt.  II.,  B.  xil,  264-7. 


\ 


6      GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

by  the  Normans  of  Sicily;  middle-aged  men  would  have 
heard  of  the  horrors  of  the  sack  of  Salonika  by  a  later  Sicilian 
force ;  and  the  children  of  the  islands  or  coasts  must  have 
shuddered  when  they  were  told  that  the  dreaded  Genoese 
pirates,  Vetrano  or  Caffaro,  were  coming.  Moreover,  ever 
since  the  final  separation  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  churches 
in  the  middle  of  the  eleventh  century,  a  fanatical  hatred  had 
been  kindled  between  west  and  east,  which  is  not  wholly 
extinguished  to-day. 

But  even  the  rule  of  the  Franks  must  have  seemed  to 
many  Greeks  a  welcome  relief  from  the  financial  oppression 
of  the  Byzantine  Government.  Greece  was,  at  the  date  of 
the  Conquest,  afflicted  by  three  terrible  plagues :  the  tax- 
collectors,  the  pirates,  and  the  native  tyrants.  The  Imperial 
Government  did  nothing  for  the  provinces,  but  wasted  the 
money,  which  should  have  been  spent  on  the  defences  of 
Greece,  in  extravagant  ostentation  at  the  capital  One 
emperor  after  another  had  exhausted  the  resources  of  his 
dominions  by  lavish  expenditure,  and  Byzantine  officials 
sent  to  Greece  regarded  that  classic  land,  in  the  phrase  of 
Nik&as,1  as  an  "  utter  hole,"  an  uncomfortable  place  of  exile. 
The  Themes  of  Hellas  and  the  Peloponnese  were  at  this 
time  governed  by  one  of  these  authorities,  styled  prcetor, 
protoprator,  or  "general,"2  whose  headquarters  were  at 
Thebes.  We  have  from  the  pen  of  Michael  Akominatos,  the 
last  metropolitan  of  Athens  before  the  Conquest,  and  brother 
of  the  historian  Nik£tas,  a  vivid,  if  somewhat  rhetorical, 
account  of  the  exactions  of  these  personages.  Theoreti- 
cally, the  city  of  Athens  was  a  privileged  community.  A 
golden  bull  of  the  emperor  forbade  the  prator  to  enter  it 
with  an  armed  force,  so  that  the  Athenians  might  be  spared 
the  annoyance  and  expense  of  having  soldiers  quartered 
upon  them.8  Its  regular  contribution  to  the  imperial 
exchequer  was  limited  to  a  land-tax,  and  it  was  expected  to 

1  P.  78. 

3  npcdrwp,  TpurowpalTwp,  <rr/xiriry6s,  all  occur  on  two  leaden  seals  of 
governors  of  Hellas  and  the  Peloponnese  at  this  period.  Lampros, 
Al  A0i)vaif  25. 

1  Professor  Lampros  (ofi.  cit.)  points  out  that  the  idea  that  the  prcttor 
might  not  visit  Athens  at  all  is  erroneous  ;  his  infraction  of  the  city's 
privilege  consisted  in  coming  with  an  armed  following. 


FINANCIAL  OPPRESSION  7 

send  a  golden  wreath  as  a  coronation  offering  to  a  new 
emperor.  When  the  Byzantine  Government,  too,  following 
a  policy  similar  to  that  which  cost  our  King  Charles  I.  his 
throne,  levied  ship-money  on  the  Greek  provinces,  really  for 
the  purpose  of  its  own  coffers,  nominally  for  the  suppression 
of  piracy,  Athens  expected  to  be  assessed  on  a  lighter  scale 
than  the  far  richer  communities  of  Thebes  and  Chalkis,  and 
the  number  of  sailors  whom  it  had  to  furnish  was  fixed  by 
a  special  decree.  But,  in  practice,  these  privileges  were  apt 
to  be  ignored.  The  Athenians  were  compelled  to  contribute 
more  ship-money  than  either  of  those  cities,  not  only  to 
the  pratort  but  to  L6on  Sgour6s,  the  powerful  magnate  of 
Nauplia;1  while  the  Thebans,  who  were  less  exposed  to 
piracy,  managed,  no  doubt  by  judicious  bribery  at  Con- 
stantinople, to  obtain  a  golden  bull  releasing  them  from 
naval  service,  and  the  reduction  of  their  pecuniary  con- 
tributions below  those  of  Athens.  The  indignant  metro- 
politan complains  that  the  prtBtory  under  the  pretext  of 
worshipping  in  the  church  of  "Our  Lady  of  Athens,"2  as 
the  Parthenon  was  then  called,  visited  the  city  with  a  large 
retinue.  He  laments  that  one  of  these  imperial  governors 
had  treated  the  city  "more  barbarously  than  Xerxes,"  and 
that  the  leaves  of  the  trees,  nay  almost  every  hair  on  the 
heads  of  the  unfortunate  Athenians,  had  been  numbered. 
The  authority  of  the  pr<Btory  he  says,  is  like  Medea  in 
the  legend :  just  as  she  scattered  her  poisons  over  Thessaly, 
so  it  scatters  injustice  over  Greece — a  classical  simile  which 
had  its  justification  in  the  hard  fact  that  it  had  long  been 
the  custom  of  the  Byzantine  Empire  to  pay  the  governors 
of  the  European  provinces  no  salaries,  but  to  make  their 
office  self-supporting — a  practice  still  followed  by  the  Turkish 
Government  Thus,  as  we  learn  from  the  addresses  of  the 
worthy  metropolitan,  the  sufferings  of  the  Greeks  depended 

1  Lampros,  Mix<rt)X  * Akohut&tov,  i.,  308. 

1  Lampros  (Ai'A^reu,  35-9)  deduces  this  title  from  two  leaden  seals, 
one  of  which  was  probably  that  of  Michael.  Moreover,  a  bull  of  Isaac 
Angelos  in  11 86  mentions  Tijs  dcffroirrp  Bcot6kov  t^s  i*  'A&itvau  rf/uiyifr^f, 
Miklosich  und  M  tiller,  Acta  et  Diplomata  Graca  Medii  j£-uj\  vL>  121 
Mommsen  (Athena  Christiana y  p.  33)  has  shown  that  there  is  no  aui 
for  the  theory  that  the  Parthenon  was  dedicated  by  the  Christians 
Divine  Wisdom, 


8      GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

very  much  upon  the  personality  of  the  prator.  Worse,  how- 
ever, than  the  presence  of  this  high  official  was  that  of  his 
underlings;  so  that  the  Athenians  came  to  regard  his 
coming  in  person  as  much  the  minor  of  two  evils.  Yet,  we 
must  make  some  deduction  for  the  rhetorical  and  professional 
exaggeration  of  the  ecclesiastical  author.  At  that  time  the 
bishops  were,  as  they  still  are  in  Turkey,  the  representatives 
of  their  flocks,  and  Akomindtos  was  naturally  anxious  to 
make  out  as  good  a  case  as  possible  for  his  clients.  He 
admits  to  his  brother's  connections  that  the  annual  ship- 
money  extracted  from  Athens  amounted  to  no  more  than 
£320  of  our  money — which  may  be  taken  as  a  proof  of 
either  the  poverty  of  the  place  or  of  the  exaggeration  of  his 
complaints ;  and  he  boasts  that  he  had  "  lightened,  or  rather 
eradicated,  the  taxes."1  But,  at  the  same  time,  taxation 
had  become  so  oppressive  in  the  Theme  of  Nikopolis,  that  the 
people  arose  and  killed  their  tyrannical  governor,  and  we  are 
expressly  told  that  the  Corfiotes  had  welcomed  the  Normans 
half  a  century  earlier  because  of  the  heavy  taxation  of  their 
island.2 

Piracy  was  then,  as  so  often,  the  curse  of  the  islands  and 
the  deeply  indented  coast  of  Greece.  We  learn  from  the 
English  chronicle  ascribed  to  Benedict  of  Peterborough,3 
which  gives  a  graphic  account  of  Greece  as  it  was  in  1191, 
that  many  of  the  islands  were  uninhabited  from  fear  of 
pirates,  and  that  others  were  their  chosen  lairs.  Cephalonia 
and  Ithaka,  which  now  appears  under  its  mediaeval  name  of 
Val  di  Compare — first  used,  so  far  as  I  know,  by  the  Genoese 
historian  Caffaro,4  in  the  first  half  of  the  twelfth  century — 
had  a  specially  evil  reputation,  and  bold  was  the  sailor  who 
dared  venture  through  the  channel  between  them.  Near 
Athens,  the  islands  of  jEgina,  Salamis,  and  Makronesi, 
opposite  Lavrion,  were  strongholds  of  Corsairs,  before  whom 
most  of  the  iEginetan  population  had  fled,  while  those  who 

1  Ldmpros,    Mixai)A  'Akoiuv&tov,    ii.,    107  ;    'Iffropla  ttji  tt6\cu)s   'Adyvuv, 

".,  729. 

1  Nik&as  Chonidtes,  97. 

3  Gesta  Regis  Ricardt^  ii.,  197-200 ;  203-5. 

4  Uberatio   Orienlis^  apud  Pertz,  Monumenta   Germanic?  historica^ 
xviii.,  46. 


"\ 


NATIVE  TYRANTS  0 

remained  had  fraternised  with  the  pirates.  Attica  was  full 
of  persons  mutilated  by  these  robbers,  who  feared  neither. 
God  nor  man.  They  injured  the  property  of  the  Athenian 
church,  and  dangerously  wounded  the  nephew  of  the 
metropolitan,  who  found  it  almost  impossible  to  collect  the 
ecclesiastical  revenues  of  jEgina.1  The  dangers  run  by  the 
venerable  Akomindtos  himself  on  an  ecclesiastical  visitation 
to  Naupaktos  long  remained  celebrated,  and  we  find  allusions 
to  that  venturesome  journey  years  after  his  death.  The 
remedy  for  piracy  was,  as  we  have  seen,  almost  worse  than 
the  disease.  The  Lord  High  Admiral,  Michael  Stryphn6s, 
protected  by  his  close  relationship  with  the  Empress 
Euphrosyne,  sold  the  naval  stores  for  his  own  profit ;  and  a 
visit,  which  he  paid  to  Athens  for  the  ostensible  purpose  of 
laying  an  offering  in  the  church  of  Our  Lady,  was  regarded 
by  Akomin£tos  with  ill-concealed  alarm.  Well  might  the 
anxious  metropolitan  tell  his  unwelcome  guest  that  the 
Athenians  regarded  their  proximity  to  the  sea  as  the 
greatest  of  their  misfortunes.2 

Besides  the  Byzantine  officials  and  the  pirates,  the  Greeks 
had  a  third  set  of  tormentors,  in  the  shape  of  a  brood  of 
native  tyrants,  whose  feuds  divided  city  against  city,  and 
divided  communities  into  rival  parties.  Even  in  those  parts 
of  Greece  where  the  emperor  was  still  nominally  sovereign, 
the  real  power  was  often  in  the  hands  of  local  magnates,  who 
had  revived,  on  the  eve  of  the  Latin  Conquest,  the  petty 
tyrannies  of  ancient  Greece.  Under  the  dynasty  of  the 
Comneni,  who  imitated  and  introduced  the  usages  of  western 
chivalry,  feudalism  had  made  considerable  inroads  into  the 
east  At  the  time  of  the  Fourth  Crusade,  local  families  were 
in  possession  of  large  tracts  of  territory,  which  they  governed 
almost  like  independent  princes.  We  find  a  great  part  of 
fertile  Messenia  belonging  to  the  clans  of  Brands  and 
Cantacuzene ;  L£on  Chamdretos,  whom  a  modern  Greek 
writer8  has  made  the  hero  of  an  historical  novel,  owned  much 
of    Lakonia ;    the    impregnable    rock   of   Monemvasia,  the 

1  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  op.  city  iii.,  61. 

2  Ldmpros,  Mixa^X  'AtfOfuvdrot/,  ii.,  42,  43,  68,  75,   170,  238  ;  'loropia  Ttjt 
w6\£tas  'Aerjwv,  ii.,  702-8  ;  At  'Afloat,  56,  57,  86,  97. 

8  A.  Rhangab&S,  *0  aMirrrfs  rod  Moptas. 


10    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

Gibraltar  of  Greece,  which  had  enjoyed  special  liberties 
since  the  time  of  the  Emperor  Maurice,  belonged  to  the 
three  great  local  families  of  Mamonis,  Eudaimonoyinnes, 
and  Sophian6s,  the  first  of  which  is  not  yet  extinct  in 
Greece,1  and  L6on  Sgour6s,  hereditary  lord  of  Nauplia,  had 
extended  his  sway  over  Argos  of  the  goodly  steeds,  and  had 
seized  the  city  and  fortress  of  Corinth,  proudly  styling 
himself  by  a  high-sounding  Byzantine  title,  and  placing  his 
fortunes  under  the  protection  of  St  Theodore  the  Warrior.2 
North  of  the  Isthmus,  the  family  of  Petraleiphas,  of  Frankish 
origin,  hailing,  as  its  name  Petrus  de  Alpibus  implies,  from 
the  Alps,  held  its  own  in  the  mountains  of  Agrapha ;  while 
in  Crete,  the  scions  of  those  Byzantine  families  which  had 
gone  there  after  its  reconquest,  had  developed  into  hereditary 
lords,  whose  fiefs  were  confirmed  to  them  by  the  emperor's 
representative.8  In  addition  to  these  local  magnates,  members 
of  the  imperial  family  owned  vast  tracts  of  land  in  Greece. 
The  extravagant  Empress  Euphrosyne,  wife  of  Atexios  III., 
had  huge  estates  in  Thessaly,  and  Princess  Irene,  daughter 
of  Aldxios  III.,  owned  property  near  Patras.4  The  manners 
of  these  local  magnates  were  no  less  savage  than  those  of 
the  western  barons  of  the  same  period.  Sgour6s,  the  most 
prominent  of  them,  on  one  occasion  invited  the  metropolitan 
of  Corinth  to  dinner,  and  then  put  out  the  eyes  of  his  guest, 
and  hurled  him  over  the  rocks  of  the  citadel  of  Nauplia. 
The  contemporary  historian  Nik6tas,6  who  was  no  friend  of 
the  Franks,  has  painted  in  the  darkest  colours  the  character 
of  the  Greek  archons,  upon  whom  he  lays  the  chief  responsi- 
bility for  the  evils  which  befell  their  country.  He  speaks  of 
them  as  "  inflamed  by  ambition  against  their  own  fatherland, 
slavish  men,  spoiled  by  luxury,  who  made  themselves  tyrants, 
instead  of  fighting  the   Latins."    Thus,  on  the  eve  of  the 

1  PhrantzSs,  398. 

2  A  leaden  seal  of  Sgourds  has  been  preserved,  showing  St  Theodore 
on  one  side  and  invoking  his  protection  for  vcpaarovirtpraTQv  fit  Atorra 
2yovp6*  on  the  other.    Lampros,  Ai  kdrjvai,  99,  and  plate. 

3  Document  of  1182,  quoted  by  Hopf  apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  Allge- 
meine  Encyklopddie,  lxxxv.,  179  ;  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  op.  ciLy  iii.,  235-7. 

4  The  deed  of  partition  specially  mentions  the  villa  Kyreherinisyfilie 
Imperatoris  Kyrialexii.    Fontes  Rerum  Ausiriacarum,  Abt.  ii.,  B.  xii.,  470. 

6  Pp.  840-2  ;  Lampros,  Mi^o^X  'AKojuvdrov,  ii.,  170. 


THE  CHURCH  11 

Frankish  Conquest,  Greece  presented  the  spectacle  of  a  land 
oppressed  by  the  Central  Government,  and  torn  asunder  by 
the  jealousies  of  its  local  aristocracy. 

The  Church  still  occupied  an  important  place  in  Greek 
society.  Greece  at  this  time  was  ecclesiastically  under  the 
jurisdiction  of  the  oecumenical  patriarch,  and  contained  twelve 
metropolitan  sees,  of  which  Corinth  and  Athens  were  the  two 
most  important,  while  Patras,  Larissa,  Naupaktos,  Neopatras, 
Thebes,  Corfu,  Naxos,  Lacedaemonia,  Argos,  and  the  Cretan 
see  of  Gortyna  completed  the  dozen.1  Besides  these,  the 
islands  of  Leukas  and  iEgina,  and  the  town  of  Arta  were 
archbishoprics,  and  each  metropolitan  see  had  numerous 
bishops  under  it  Such  was  the  arrangement  which,  with 
a  few  alterations,  had  been  in  force  since  the  days  of 
Leo  the  philosopher,  three  centuries  earlier.  There  were 
still  among  the  higher  clergy  distinguished  men  of  learning, 
who  bore  aloft  the  torch  of  literature,  which  the  Greek 
Church  had  received  from  the  last  writers  of  antiquity.  Of 
these  the  most  eminent  then  living  was  Michael  Akominitos, 
the  metropolitan  of  Athens,  to  whom  allusion  has 
already  been  made.  Brother  of  the  statesman  and  his- 
torian, Nik£tas  of  Chonae,  or  Colossae,  he  had  sat  at  the  feet 
of  the  great  Homeric  scholar,  Eustithios,  afterwards  arch- 
bishop of  Salonika,  from  whom  he  imbibed  that  classical 
culture  which  inspires  all  his  numerous  productions.  In 
the  year  1175,  or,  according  to  others,  in  1180  or  1 182,  he 
was  appointed  to  the  see  of  Athens,  and  from  that  time  to 
the  Frankish  Conquest  he  never  ceased  to  plead  the  cause 
of  the  city,  to  write  to  influential  personages  in  Con- 
stantinople, and  to  address  memorials  to  the  emperor  on 

1  To  these  should  be  added  Monemvasia,  if  wc  may  trust  the  story  of 
the  fifteenth  century  historian  Phrantz£s  (pp.  398-9),  himself  a  Monem- 
vasiote,  accepted  by  Finlay,  that  it  became  a  metropolitan  see  under 
the  Emperor  Maurice.  But  an  ecclesiastical  document  of  1397  (Miklosich 
und  Miiller,  op.  cit.y  ii.,  287)  states  that  it  was  a  suffragan  bishopric  of 
Corinth  down  to  the  Latin  Conquest.  We  know  from  Phrantzgs  (loc.  cit.\ 
and  from  the  Golden  Bull  of  Andr6nikos  II.  in  the  National  Library  and 
the  Christian  Archaeological  Museum  at  Athens,  that  he  raised  it  to  be 
the  tenth  metropolitan  see  of  the  empire  in  1293,  and  gave  it  other 
privileges.  Cf.  Dor6theos  of  Monemvasia,  BipXlov  Urropuc6vt  p.  397  ;  Le 
Quien,  Oriens  Christianus,  ii.,  216. 


12    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANK1SH  CONQUEST 

its  behalf.  But  he  was  not  the  only  literary  light  of  the 
Church  in  Greece.  Among  his  contemporaries  were 
Euth^mios,  the  metropolitan  of  Neopatras,  the  modern 
Hypate,  near  Lamia,  who  wrote  on  theology ;  Ap6kaukos 
of  Naupaktos,  who  composed  tolerable  iambics  and  better 
letters;1  George  KoupharAs  of  Corfu,  whose  letters  to  the 
Emperor  Frederick  Barbarossa  and  other  eminent  personages 
of  his  day  have  been  preserved  in  translation,  and  the 
latter^  successors,  the  controversialist,  Pediadites,  and  the 
theologian  and  poet,  George  Barddnes.2  Somewhat  earlier, 
Nicholas,  bishop  of  Methone  in  Messenia,  had  issued  a  refuta- 
tion of  neo-Platonism,  two  polemics  against  Catholic  doctrines, 
and  a  life  of  Mel6tios,  the  reviver  of  monasticism  in  Greece ; 
a  Lacedaemonian  abbot  had  written  a  biography  of  St  Nikon, 
the  evangelist  of  Crete  and  the  patron  of  Sparta,  where  his 
memory  is  still  held  in  honour ;  and  Gregory,  metropolitan  of 
Corinth,  had  published  a  grammatical  work,  which  still  survives. 
But  Akominatos  has  left  us  a  sordid  picture  of  the  Athenian 
clergy  of  his  time,  and  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the  priests  of 
the  great  church  on  the  Akropolis  were  but  little  inspired 
by  the  majesty  of  their  surroundings.  The  metropolitan 
found  the  keeper  of  the  sacred  vessels  both  blind  and 
illiterate,  while  another  of  these  divines  had  cheated  his 
brother  out  of  his  property,  and  allowed  him  to  starve.  If 
such  was  the  state  of  the  clergy,  "the  wicked  Athenian 
priests,"  as  he  calls  them,  it  was  not  to  be  supposed  that  the 
monks  were  much  better.3  The  number  of  monastic  houses 
in  Greece  had  greatly  increased  under  the  dynasty  of  the 
Comneni.  It  was  then,  according  to  tradition,  that  the  still 
existing  Chozobi6tissa  monastery  was  founded  on  the  island 

1  Lampros,  op.  cit.^  ii.,  25-30 ;  35-8  ;  *l<rropla  rrjs  r6Xe«s  'Alipwir,  ii., 
730-7  ;  Bufavrtvd  Xpovucd,  Hi.,  240  sqq. 

8  Mustoxidi,  Delle  Cose  Corciresiy  417-22,  xl.-xlix. ;  lllustrazioni 
Corciresi,  ii.,  181 -4.  The  theory  of  Dr  Kurtz  {Byzantinische  Zeitschrift, 
xv.,  603-13)  that  all  these  letters  were  written  by  the  later  metropolitan  of 
Corfu,  George  Bardanes,  and  that  Frederick  is  therefore  not  Barbarossa 
but  Frederick  II.,  and  Manuel  not  the  emperor  but  the  Despot  of  Epiros, 
seems  to  me  disproved  by  the  phrase  in  which  the  writer  speaks  of 
Manuel  as  cognato  Imperii  luu  The  emperors  Manuel  I.  and  Conrad 
III.  married  sisters. 

3  Lampros,  MixerijA  'Ako/uixLtov,  ii.,  30,  240,  417. 


THE  MONKS  13 

of  Amorgos ; l  it  was  then,  too,  that  the  Boeotian  monastery 
of  Sagmat&s  received  a  piece  of  the  true  cross  and  the  lake 
of  Paralimni,  into  which  the  waters  of  the  Copais  now  drain.2 
A  Cappadocian  monk,  Mel6tios,  whose  monastery  may  still 
be  seen  from  the  road  between  Athens  and  Thebes,  had 
revived  monasticism  by  his  miracles  in  Greece  towards  the 
end  of  the  eleventh  century,  and  had  enjoyed  the  patronage 
of  the  Emperor  Al£xios  I.,  who  assigned  him  an  annuity  out 
of  the  taxes  of  Attica  To  him  was  largely  due  the  plague 
of  monks,  often  robbers  in  disguise,  of  whose  ignorance 
Eust£thios,  the  learned  archbishop  of  Salonika,  drew  up 
such  a  tremendous  indictment8  Then,  as  now,  the  thoughts 
of  the  Greek  monks  centred  mainly  on  mere  externals ; 
obeisances  in  church,  the  care  of  their  gardens,  and  such 
political  questions  as  arose,  occupied  their  ample  leisure; 
while  scandals  were  no  less  frequent  then  than  at  the  present 
day.  Akomindtos  rebukes  the  abbot  of  the  famous  monastery 
of  Kaisarian6,  at  the  foot  of  Hymettos,  for  misappropriating 
other  people's  bees.4  Yet  the  same  Akominitos  has  left  a 
funeral  oration  over  an  Athenian  archimandrite  of  that 
period,  which  shows  that,  even  on  the  eve  of  the  Frankish 
Conquest,  there  were  men  of  conspicuous  piety  and  self- 
sacrificing  life  in  the  Athenian  monasteries.6  The  Athenians 
of  that  day,  however,  seem  to  have  taken  their  religion  lightly, 
comparing  unfavourably  with  the  pious  folk  of  Euboea, 
though  nowhere  else  in  Greece  was  the  service  so  elaborate. 
Their  spiritual  pastor  found  them  irregular  in  their 
attendance  at  church,  even  though  that  church  was  that 
"  heavenly  house,"  the  Parthenon — a  cathedral  of  which  any 
bishop  and  any  congregation  might  have  been  proud.  Even 
when  they  did  attend,  they  spent  their  time  in  unseasonable 
conversation,  or  in  thinking  about  the  cares  of  their  daily 
lives.  Moreover,  the  metropolitan  himself  had  mundane 
cares  in  plenty.  Besides  his  task  of  defending  his  flock 
against  rapacious  governors,  whom  he  addressed  on  behalf  of 

1  Meliar£kes  in  AcXrlow  rijt  'lor.   koX  'E0V.    'Eraytoj,  L,   598-9 ;  Byzqn* 
timsche  Zeitschrift,  ii.,  294-6. 

2  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  op.  a/.,  v.,  253. 

3  *E*J<r*c^«  ptov  fiwax^oO  in  Eustathii  Opuscula  (cd.  Tafcl). 

4  L&npros,  op.  cit,  ii.,  311.  6  Ibid.,  i.,  259. 


14    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

the  city  at  their  arrival,  besides  missions  and  memorials  to 
Constantinople,  he  had  to  guard  the  revenues  of  the  see  from 
the  clutches  of  the  imperial  treasury  officials,  whom  its 
agent  at  the  capital,  the  so-called  mystik6sy  could  not  always 
keep  at  a  distance.1 

There  was  some  excuse  for  the  preoccupation  of  the 
Athenians  with  their  worldly  affairs,  when  we  consider  the 
material  condition  of  their  city  at  this  period.  From  the 
silence  of  almost  every  authority,  it  would  seem  that  the 
Norman  Invasion  of  1146,  which  fell  with  such  force  upon 
Thebes  and  Corinth,  had  spared  Athens.2  The  Athenians, 
perhaps,  owed  their  immunity  on  that  occasion  to  their 
insignificance.  Their  only  manufactures  at  the  time  of  the 
Frankish  Conquest  were  soap  and  the  weaving  of  monkish 
habits.  They  were  no  longer  engaged  in  the  dyeing  trade, 
of  which  traces  have  been  found  in  the  Odeion  of  Herodes 
Atticus,  but  the  ships  of  the  Piraeus  still  took  part,  with  those 
of  Chalkis  and  Karystos,  in  the  purple-fishing  off  the  lonely 
island  of  Gyaros — the  Botany  Bay  of  the  Roman  Empire. 
There  was  still  some  trade  at  the  Piraeus,  for  when  the 
Byzantine  admiral,  Stryphn6s,  visited  Athens,  he  found 
vessels  there,  and  Akomindtos  tells  us  of  ships  from 
Monemvasia  in  the  port;  while  we  may  infer  from  the 
mention  of  Athens  in  the  commercial  treaties  between 
Venice  and  the  Byzantine  Empire,  that  the  astute  republicans 
saw  some  prospect  of  making  money  there.  But  the  "  thin 
soil"  of  Attica  was  as  unproductive  as  in  the  days  of 
Thucydides,  and  yielded  nothing  but  oil,  honey,  and  wine, 
the  last  strongly  flavoured  with  resin,  as  it  still  is,  so  that 
the  metropolitan,  wishing  to  give  a  friend  some  idea  of  its 
flavour,  wrote  to  him  that  it  "  seems  to  be  pressed  from  the 
juice  of  the  pine  rather  than  from  that  of  the  grape."  The 
harvest  was  always  meagre,  and  famines  were  common.  On 
one  occasion,  only  two  or  three  of  the  well-to-do  inhabitants 
could  afford  to  eat  bread ;  on  another,  the  Emperor  Andr6- 
nikos  I.  ordered  a  grant  of  corn  to  be  distributed  among  the 
starving  people,  and  we  find  A16xios  II.  remitting  arrears  of 

1  Ldmpros,  op.  cit^  i.,  310 ;  Pitra,  Analecta  Sacra,  vi.,  619. 
*  Otto  von  Freising  (De  Gestis  Friderici,  apud  Muratori,  Rerum  It 
Script^  vi.,  668)  alone  mentions  Athens. 


STATE  OF  ATHENS  15 

taxation  to  Athens,  Thebes,  and  Corinth,  so  great  was  their 
distress.  Even  ordinary  necessaries  were  not  always  obtain- 
able in  the  Athens  of  the  last  years  of  the  twelfth  century. 
Akominatos  could  not  find  a  good  carriage-builder  in  the 
place ;  and,  just  as  most  Athenian  coaches  are  now  built  at 
Thebes,  so  he  had  to  beg  the  bishop  of  Gardiki,  which 
Benjamin  of  Tudela  had  described  as  a  "  ruined  place,"  to  send 
him  some  coach-builders.  In  his  despair  at  the  absence  of 
blacksmiths  and  workers  in  iron,  he  was  constrained  to  apply 
to  Athens  the  words  of  Jeremiah  :  "  The  bellows  are  burnt." 
The  general  poverty  of  the  city  was  made  more  striking  by 
the  selfishness  of  the  few  who  were  comfortably  off,  who 
composed  a  "  rich  oligarchy,"  and  who  ground  down  the  face 
of  the  poor.  Under  these  circumstances,  it  is  not  remarkable 
that  emigration  was  draining  off  the  able-bodied  poor,  so 
that  the  population  had  greatly  diminished,  and  the  city 
threatened  to  become  what  Aristophanes  had  called  "a 
Scythian  wilderness." x 

Externally,  the  visitor  to  the  Athens  of  that  day  must 
have  been  struck  by  the  marked  contrast  between  the 
splendid  monuments  of  the  classic  age  and  the  squalid 
surroundings  of  the  new  town.  The  walls  were  lying  in 
ruins;  the  houses  of  the  emigrants  had  beep  pulled  down, 
and  their  sites  had  become  ploughed  land  ;  the  streets,  where 
once  the  sages  of  antiquity  had  walked,  were  now  desolate. 
Even  though  Akomin£tos  had  built  new  houses,  and  restored 
some  of  those  that  had  fallen,  Athens  was  no  longer  the 
"  populous  city,  surrounded  by  gardens  and  fields  "  which  the 
Arabian  geographer  Edrisi  had  described  to  King  Roger  II. 
of  Sicily  half  a  century  before  the  coming  of  the  Franks.2 
But  the  hand  of  the  invader  and  the  tooth  of  time  had,  on 
the  whole,  dealt  gently  with  the  Athenian  monuments. 
Although  the  Odeion  of  Periklfis  had  perished  in  the  siege  of 
the  city  by  Sulla,  it  had  been  restored  by  the  Cappadocian 
king,  Ariobarzanes  IL,  and  his  son ;  but  Sulla  had  carried 
off  a  few  columns  of  the  temple  of  Olympian  Zeus,  while  the 
pictures  of  Polygnotos,  which  the  traveller  Pausanias  had 

1  Lampros,  op.  at.,  i.,  174,  178,  307  ;  ".,  12,  25,  26,  29,  42,  54,  65,  137, 
275,3". 

*  Jaubert,  Geographic  (fEdrist,  ii.,  295. 


I 


16    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

seen  in  the  Painted  Porch,  had  excited  the  covetousness  of 
an  imperial  governor  under  Theodosius  II.  The  temple  of 
Asklepios  had  fallen  a  victim  to  Christian  fanaticism;  the 
gold  and  ivory  statue  of  Athena,  the  work  of  Phidias,  had 
long  ago  vanished  from  the  Parthenon,  and  Justinian  had 
adorned  the  new  church  of  the  Divine  Wisdom  at  Con- 
stantinople with  pillars  from  Athens.1  Akomindtos  laments 
that  the  closest  investigation  could  not  discover  a  trace  of 
the  Heliaea,  the  Peripatos,  or  the  Lyceum,  and  found  sheep 
grazing  among  the  few  remains  of  the  Painted  Porch.  "  I 
live  in  Athens,"  he  wrote  in  a  poem  on  the  decay  of  the  city, 
"  yet  it  is  not  Athens  that  I  see."  But  still  Athens  possessed 
many  memorials  of  her  former  greatness  at  the  close  of  the 
twelfth  century.  The  Parthenon,  converted  long  before  into 
the  cathedral  of  Our  Lady  of  Athens,  was  then  almost  as 
entire,  and  as  little  damaged  by  the  injuries  of  time,  as  if  it 
had  only  just  been  built  The  metopes,  the  pediments,  and 
the  frieze  were  still  intact  On  the  walls  were  the  frescoes, 
traces  of  which  are  still  visible,  executed  by  order  of  the 
Emperor  Basil  II.,  "the  slayer  of  the  Bulgarians,"  when  he 
had  offered  up  thanks  at  that  shrine  of  the  Virgin  for  his 
victories  over  the  great  enemies  of  Hellenism,  nearly  two 
centuries  earlier.  Within,  in  the  treasury,  were  the  rich  gifts 
which  he  had  presented  to  the  church.  Over  the  altar  was 
a  golden  dove  representing  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  ever  flying 
with  perpetual  motioa  In  the  cathedral,  too,  was  an  ever- 
burning lamp,  fed  by  oil  that  never  failed,  which  was  the 
marvel  of  the  pilgrims.  Every  year  people  flocked  thither 
from  the  highlands  and  islands  to  the  feast  of  the  Virgin,  and 
so  widely  spread  was  the  fame  of  the  Athenian  minster,  that 
the  great  folk  of  Constantinople,  in  spite  of  their  supercilious 
contempt  for  the  provinces  and  dislike  of  travel,  came  to  do 
obeisance  there — personages  of  the  rank  of  Stryphn6s,  the 
Lord  High  Admiral,  with  his  wife,*  the  sister  of  the  empress, 
and  Kamaterds,  brother-in-law  of  the  emperor ;  while,  as  we 
saw,  the  prator  made  a  pilgrimage  to  St  Mary's  on  the 
Akropolis  an  excuse  for  raising  money  out  of  the  city. 
Akominitos  was  intensely  proud,  as  well  he  might  be,  of  his 

1  L£mpros,  op.  cit.%  i.,  160 ;  ii.,  398. 

2  Ibid.,  i.,  319,  325,  332 ;  no^Ratrtr^,  vii.,  23. 


THE  ANCIENT  BUILDINGS  1? 

cathedral  He  tells  us  that  he  "  further  beautified  it,  provided 
new  vessels  and  furniture,  increased  its  property  in  land 
and  in  flocks  and  herds,  and  augmented  the  number  of  the 
clergy."1 

Of  the  other  ancient  buildings  on  the  sacred  rock,  the 
graceful  temple  of  Nike  Apteros  had  been  turned  into  a 
chapel;  the  Erechtheion  had  become  a  church  of  the 
Saviour,  or  a  chapel  of  the  Virgin ;  while  the  episcopal 
residence,  which  is  known  to  have  then  been  on  the  Akro- 
polis,  was  probably  in  the  Propylaea,  where  the  discovery 
of  a  fresco  of  St  Gabriel  and  St  Michael  seventy  years  ago 
indicates  the  existence  in  Byzantine  times  of  a  chapel  of 
the  archangels.2  The  whole  Akropolis  had  for  centuries 
been  made  into  a  fortress,  the  only  defence  which  Athens 
then  possessed,  strong  enough  to  have  resisted  the  attack  of 
a  Greek  magnate  like  Sgour6s,  but  incapable  of  repulsing  a 
Latin  army. 

Like  the  Parthenon,  the  Theseion  had  become  a  Christian 
church,  dedicated  to  St  George.  Akomindtos  calls  it  "St 
George  in  the  Kerameik6s,"  and  at  the  time  of  the  Frankish 
Conquest  it  was  entrusted  to  the  care  of  a  monk  named 
Luke.  In  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  centuries  a  monastery 
and  a  nunnery  seem  to  have  stood  there,  for  the  names  of 
various  abbots  and  nuns  with  dates  of  that  period  have 
been  scratched  on  some  of  the  pillars,  just  as  we  learn 
the  names  of  AkominAtos's  three  immediate  predecessors, 
Nicholas  Hagiotheodorites,  George  Xer6s,  and  George 
Boiirtzes,  from  similar  scrawls  on  the  pillars  of  the  Par- 
thenon.3 Under  the  splendid  ruins  of  the  temple  of  Zeus 
Olympios  had  grown  up  a  chapel  of  St  John,  surnamed  "  at 
the  columns,"  and  Byzantine  inscriptions  on  some  of  the 
huge  pillars  still  preserve  the  prayers  of  the  priests.  On 
one  of  them  in  the  Middle  Ages  an  imitator  of  St  Simeon 

1   Lampros,  'leropia  -rip  ir6\cwf  *A0rjvQp%  ii.,  729. 

*  Ibid.  Mtxo^X  'A/co/aydrou,  ii.,  12.  The  inscription,  invoking  the 
Virgin,  found  in  the  Erechtheion  (Neroutsos  in  AeXrlov  r^'Ior.  'Eraipiat, 
iii.,  25),  may,  however,  only  prove  that  "the  humble  chorister  of  the 
cathedral  of  Athens,"  who  invokes  her  aid,  resided  with  other  members 
of  the  clergy  in  the  Erechtheion.     Cf.  A.  Mommsen,  op.  tit,  40-1. 

3  J  bid.,  Mtxo^X  'Ako/kwLtoi/,  ii.,  238,  and  Ai  'A$ijvat%  21.  Kampoii- 
roglos,  'liTTopia  t&v  'ABrivatwv,  ii.,  308-9,  293.     Bys.  Zeitschrift,  ii.,  589. 

B 


18    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

Stylites  had  taken  up  his  aerial  abode.  Already  strange 
legends  and  new  names  had  begun  to  grow  round  some  of 
the  classical  monuments.  The  choragic  monument  of 
Lysikrates  was  already  popularly  known  as  "  the  lantern  of 
Demosthenes,"1  its  usual  designation  during  the  Turkish 
domination,  when  it  became  the  Capuchin  convent,  serving 
in  1811  as  a  study  to  Lord  Byron,  who  from  within  its  walls 
launched  his  bitter  poem  against  the  filcher  of  the  Elgin 
marbles — and  the  credulous  West  was  told  that  Jason  had 
founded  the  Propylaea.  But  even  at  the  beginning  of  the 
thirteenth  century,  many  of  the  ancient  names  of  places, 
sometimes  names  and  nothing  more,  lingered  in  the  mouths 
of  the  people.  The  classically  cultured  metropolitan  was 
gratified,  as  a  good  Philhellene,  to  hear  that  the  Piraeus 
and  Hymettos,  Eleusis  and  Marathon,  the  Areopagos  and 
Kallirrhoe,  Psyttaleia,  Salamis,  and  ;Egina  were  still  called 
by  names  which  the  contemporaries  of  Periklfis  had  used, 
even  though  Eleusis  and  ;Egina  were  devastated  by  pirates, 
the  Areopagos  was  nothing  but  a  bare  rock,  the  plain  of 
Marathon  yielded  no  corn,  and  the  "beautifully-flowing" 
fountain  had  ceased  to  flow.  But  new,  uncouth  names  were 
beginning  to  creep  in;  thus,  the  partition  treaty  of  1204 
describes  Salamis  as  "Culuris"  (or,  "the  lizard"),  a  vulgar 
name,  derived  from  the  shape  of  the  island,  which  I  have 
heard  used  in  Attica  at  the  present  day.2 

Besides  the  remains  of  classical  antiquity,  Athens  was 
then  rich  in  Byzantine  churches,  of  which  not  a  few  have 
still  survived  the  storms  of  the  War  of  Independence  and  the 
Vandalism  of  those  who  laid  out  the  modern  town.  Tradition 
has  ascribed  to  the  two  Athenian  Empresses  of  the  East, 
Eudokia  and  Irene,  the  foundation  of  many  churches  in  their 
native  city,  and  the  modern  inscription  inside  the  curious 
little  Kapnikaraea  church  embodies  the  popular  belief  that 
the  former  had  been  its  founder.  The  charming  little 
Gorgoep^koos  church,  wrongly  called  the  Old  Metropolis, 
may  have  been  the  work  of  the  latter,  and  was  probably 
standing  at  this  period.      We  know  for  certain,  however, 

1  Ldmpros,  M«x«^X  'Akoiuv&tov,  i.,  98. 

2  Ibid*)  ii.,  13,  14,  26^  44  ;  Fontes  Rerum  Austriacarum^  Abt.  ii.,  B. 
xii.,  469. 


CULTURE  AT  ATHENS  19 

from  the  inscription  over  the  door  of  St  Theodore's,  that 
that  church  had  been  erected  a  century  and  a  half  before 
the  Frankish  Conquest,  and  there  then  lay  just  outside 
the  city  the  church  of  the  Athenian  martyr  Leonidas, 
who  had  died  upon  the  cross.1  Attica  possessed,  too,  many 
monasteries,  built  in  pleasant  spots,  as  Greek  monasteries 
always  are.  There  was  the  beautiful  abbey  of  Kaisarian£, 
with  its  plenteous  springs  of  water,  in  a  leafy  glen  at  the 
foot  of  Hymettos ;  there  was  the  monastery  of  St  John  the 
Hunter,  still  a  white  landmark  on  the  spur  of  the  mountain 
visible  from  all  parts  of  Athens,  and  founded  or  restored  by 
the  above-mentioned  monk  Luke  at  this  very  time.2  Finer 
than  all,  there  was  that  gem  of  Byzantine  art,  the  monastery 
of  Daphni  in  the  pass  between  Athens  and  Eleusis,  of  which 
we  find  mention  about  the  end  of  the  eleventh  century,3  and 
which  a  later  popular  tradition  connected  with  the  romantic 
story  of  the  fair  Maguelonne  and  her  lover,  Pierre  de 
Provence, 

Of  the  intellectual  condition  of  Athens  we  should  form 
but  a  low  estimate,  if  we  judged  entirely  from  the  lamenta- 
tions of  the  elegant  Byzantine  scholar  whom  fate  had  made 
its  metropolitan.  Akominatos  found  that  his  tropes  and 
fine  periods  and  classical  allusions  were  far  over  the  heads  of 
the  Athenians  who  came  to  hear  him,  and  who  talked  in  his 
cathedral,  even  though  that  cathedral  was  the  Parthenon. 
He  wrote,  like  Apollonios  of  Tyana  before  him,  that  his 
long  residence  in  Greece  had  made  him  a  barbarian.  Yet  he 
was  able  to  add  to  his  store  of  manuscripts  in  this  small 
provincial  town,  where  a  copyist  of  theological  treatises  was 
probably  then  working.  Moreover,  that  Athens  still  produced 
persons  of  some  culture,  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  one  of 
Akomindtos's  own  correspondents,  John,  metropolitan  of 
Salonika,  was  an  Athenian  ;  while  the  future  metropolitan  of 
Corfii,  Barddnes,  if  not  an  Athenian  by  birth,  may  have 
owed  his  surname  of  Atticus  to  the  Attic  eloquence  which 
he  had  learned  from  Akominatos — a  surname  already  applied 

1  L&npros,  op.  cit^  i.,  151. 

8  Ibid.y  iL,  247  ;  Kainpouroglos,  op.  cit%  ii.,  204-15. 
3  Millet,  Le  Monastlrt  de  Daphni,  18 ;   Kampouroglos,  M^/ieta,  ii. 
230;  Spon,  Voyage  y  ii.,  211. 


20    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

to  the  scholarly  Kosm&s  of  iEgina,  who  half  a  century  earlier 
had  mounted  the  patriarchal  throne  at  Constantinople.1 
There  is,  too,  some  evidence  to  prove  that,  even  at  this  late 
period,  Athens  was  a  place  of  study,  whither  English  came 
from  the  West  to  obtain  a  liberal  education.  Matthew  Paris  2 
tells  us  of  Master  John  of  Basingstoke,  archdeacon  of 
Leicester  in  the  reign  of  Henry  III.,  who  used  often  to  say 
that  whatever  scientific  knowledge  he  possessed  had  been 
acquired  from  the  youthful  daughter  of  the  Archbishop  of 
Athens.  This  young  lady  could  forecast  the  advent  of 
pestilences,  thunderstorms,  eclipses,  and  earthquakes.  From 
learned  Greeks  at  Athens  Master  John  professed  to  have 
heard  some  things  of  which  the  Latins  had  no  knowledge ; 
he  found  there  the  testaments  of  the  twelve  patriarchs,  now 
in  the  Cambridge  University  library,  and  he  brought  back 
to  England  the  Greek  numerals  and  many  books,  including  a 
Greek  grammar  which  had  been  compiled  for  him  at  Athens. 
The  same  author8  tells  us,  too,  of  "certain  Greek  philo- 
sophers " — that  is,  in  mediaeval  Greek  parlance,  monks — who 
came  from  Athens  at  this  very  time  to  the  court  of  King 
John,  and  disputed  about  nice  sharp  quillets  of  theology  with 
English  divines.  The  only  difficulty  about  these  statements 
is  that  Akominatos  expressly  says  that  he  had  no  children, 
while  he  might  have  been  expected  to  mention  any  adopted 
daughter  of  such  talent.  An  eminent  Paris  doctor  of  this 
period,  John  ^Egidius,  is  also  reported  to  have  studied  at 
Athens4;  but  it  is  possible  that  this  is  merely  a  repetition 
of  the  story  that  a  much  earlier  yEgidius,  or  Gislenus,  had 
imbibed  philosophy  in  its  ancient  home  during  the  seventh 
century.6  One  is  tempted  to  believe  the  romantic  story  that 
the  Georgian  poet,  Chota  Roustav£li,  together  with  others  of 
his  countrymen  spent  several  years  there  at  the  end  of  the 
twelfth  century ;  and  that,  two  or  three  generations  earlier, 
the  enlightened  Georgian  monarch,  David  II.,  prompted  by 

1  Lampros,   M*x«^X  'Ajco/urdroi/,    ii.,   118,   289;    Uap¥a<r<r6u   vi.,    159; 
Niketas,  105,  106. 

3  Chronica  Majorca  v.,  285-7,  in  Rolls  Series, 

3  Historia  Minor,  ii.,  194  ;  Hi.,  64. 

4  Lcyscr,  Historia  Poetarum  Medii  JEvi,  499. 
6  Acta  Sanctorum,  October  ;  iv.,  1030. 


THEBES  21 

his  Greek  wife,  Irene,  founded  a  monastery  "  on  a  mountain 
near  Athens,"  and  sent  twenty  young  people  every  year  to 
study  in  the  schools  there.1  But  neither  the  thirteenth 
century  Armenian  historian,  Wardan,  nor  Tschamtschian 
makes  any  mention  of  Georgians  at  Athens,  and  the  story 
seems  to  have  arisen  through  a  confusion  between  Athens 
and  Mount  Athos,  where  there  were  many  Iberian  monks 
two  hundred  years  earlier,  and  where  the  "  Monastery  of  the 
Iberians  "  still  preserves  their  name.2 

While  such  was  the  material  and  the  intellectual  condition 
of  Athens,  there  were  other  places  in  Greece  far  more 
prosperous.  Thebes,  the  residence  of  the  Byzantine  governor, 
had  recovered  from  the  ravages  of  the  Normans  from  Sicily 
half  a  century  before,  when  they  had  ransacked  the  houses 
and  churches,  and  had  dragged  off  the  most  skilful  weavers 
and  dyers  to  Palermo.  Benjamin  of  Tudela,  as  we  saw,  had 
found  the  Theban  silk  manufacture  still  flourishing  even 
after  the  Norman  invasion ;  Akomindtos  specially  says  that 
the  luxurious  inhabitants  of  Constantinople  obtained  their 
silken  garments  from  Theban  and  Corinthian  looms ;  and 
the  forty  pieces  of  silk,  with  which  Atexios  III.  purchased 
the  friendship  of  the  Sultan  of  Angora,  were  made  by  his 
Theban  subjects.  Even  to-day  though  there  are  no  silks 
manufactured  there,  I  have  seen  mulberry-trees  growing  in 
the  little  Boeotian  town,  and  the  memory  of  the  silk-worms, 
which  fed  upon  their  leaves,  lingers  on  in  the  name  of 
mordkampos  ("the  mulberry  plain"),  still  applied  by  the 
peasants  to  the  flat  land  near  Thebes.  The  population  of 
the  city  was  numerous,  and  the  castle,  the  ancient  Kadmeia, 
was  strong,  if  resolutely  defended.  Nor  was  Thebes  the 
only  important  commercial  town  in  Northern  Greece.  Both 
Benjamin  of  Tudela  and  Edrisi  describe  Halmyros  as  a  big 
emporium  ;  Larissa  produced  figs  and  wine ;  the  fertile  plain 
of  Thessaly  to  which  Horace  had  alluded  in  his  day,  and 
which  now  yields  splendid  harvests,  provided  the  capital  of 
the  empire  with  bread ;  and  the  even  richer  Lelantian  plain 
of  Euboea,  and  the  vineyards  of  Pteleon  at  the  entrance  of 

1  Freygang,  Lettres  sur  le  Caucase,  109. 

2  Kindly  communicated  by  Mr  F.  C.  Conybeare  of  Oxford,  our  lead- 
ing authority  on  that  subject.     Cf.  Neroutsos  in  AeXWov,  Hi.,  52-3. 


22    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

the  Pagasaean  gulf  sent  it  cargoes  of  wine.1  Negroponte,  as 
the  Italians  called  first  the  town  of  Chalkis  and  then  the  island 
of  Euboea,  from  a  corruption  of  the  word  Euripos,  the  fitful 
channel  which  separates  the  island  from  the  mainland,  was 
"a  large  city  to  which  merchants  resorted  from  all  parts," 
and  whose  seamen  were  engaged  in  the  purple-fishery  of  the 
i£gean.  Thirty-five  years  before  the  Conquest,  the  island 
was  rich  enough  to  equip  six  galleys  for  the  imperial  fleet, 
and  the  fortifications  of  Chalkis  strong  enough  to  resist  the 
attack  of  the  Venetians.  Akominatos  pays  a  tribute,  which 
every  modern  visitor  must  endorse,  to  the  beauty  of  its 
situation,  and  he  contrasts  the  strength  of  the  island  capital, 
united  to  the  continent  by  a  narrow  bridge,  which  could 
easily  be  defended,  with  the  defenceless  condition  of  the  city 
of  Athens.  "  I  admired,"  he  told  the  islanders, "  your  numbers 
and  your  devotion  to  your  spiritual  pastor,"  who  was  one  of 
his  suffragans.2 

The  Peloponnese,  half  a  century  before  the  Conquest,  had 
contained  thirteen  cities  and  many  fortresses,  but  we  are 
told  that  the  Franks  found  only  twelve  castles  in  the  whole 
peninsula.  At  the  time  of  the  Norman  raid,  the  strength  of 
Akrocorinth  had  excited  the  wonder  of  the  Sicilian  admiral, 
and  the  lower  town,  "the  emporium"  as  it  was  then  called, 
had  yielded  him  an  even  richer  booty  than  Thebes,  for  its 
two  harbours  made  it  doubly  prosperous,  while  the  ancient 
tramway  was  still  used  for  dragging  small  ships  across  the 
isthmus.  Its  silk  manufactories  still  existed,  and,  at  the  date 
of  the  Frankish  invasion,  it  was  defended  by  walls  and  towers. 
The  noble  citadel  was  held  by  the  dread  archon  of  Nauplia, 
L£on  Sgour6s,  whose  enormities  Akominatos,  his  deadly  enemy, 
has  depicted  with  all  the  resources  of  Byzantine  eloquence.    Of 

1  Nik&as,  608;  Lampros,  op.  cit.,  i.,  315  ;  ii.,  83. 

1  Ibid.,  i.,  1 8 1,  182,  315  ;  ii.,  106.  Euripos  appears  as  a  name  for 
Chalkis  in  Akomina'tos  and  Niketes.  This  was  corrupted  into  Egripos 
(u  >Egripons "  in  Innocent  III.'s  Letters,  voL  ii.,  267),  then  from  the 
accusative  efc  Td»*EypiTo»  was  formed  Negripon,  which  popular  etymology, 
from  a  supposed  connection  with  the  bridge  at  Chalkis  over  the  Euripos, 
converted  into  Negroponte.  Similarly,  eh  tAt  'A$fyat  became  Setines,  efc 
r*\v  *t>\w  Stamboul,  efc  r^v  A^fivov  Stalimene.  Villehardouin,  La  Conquite 
de  Constantinople  (I.,  80,  ch.  lxii.)  calls  Euboea  "Nigre"  and  Chalkis 
"  Nigrepont"    Cf.  Bury,  The  Lombards  and  Venetians  in  Euboiay  i.,  5. 


THE  PELOPONNESE  23 

the  other  two  cities  which  owned  the  tyrant's  sway,  Argos  lay 
spread  out  "  like  a  tent "  in  the  rich  plain  at  the  foot  of  the 
imposing  castle,  the  mighty  Larissa  on  the  hill  above  ;  while 
Nauplia,  across  the  beautiful  bay,  was  strongly  protected 
against  attack,  though  the  lofty  eminence  of  Palamidi,  where 
the  convict-prison  now  stands,  was  then  unfortified ;  the  modern 
town  was  then  covered  by  the  shallow  water,  and  the  city  con- 
sisted of  the  rocky  peninsula  of  Itsh  Kaleh  alone.  Farther 
to  the  south,  and  stronger  still,  lay  the  "sacred  city"  of 
Monemvasia,  the  Malmsey  of  our  ancestors,  accessible  by 
the  narrow  causeway  alone  (jiovtj  e/ijSao-i?)  to  which  it  owed 
its  name.  Thanks  to  its  natural  position,  to  the  wisdom  of 
its  three  archons,  and  to  the  liberties  which  its  inhabitants 
enjoyed,  it  had  repelled  the  Norman  attack ;  its  trading  vessels 
were  seen  in  the  Piraeus,  and  its  chief  artistic  treasure,  the 
famous  picture  of  Christ  being  "dragged,"  which  gave  its 
name  to  the  'EX/to/ieww  Church,1  had  attracted  the  covetous- 
ness  of  the  Emperor  Isaac  II.  On  the  west  of  the  Pelopon- 
nese,  Patras,  whose  wealth  had  been  almost  fabulous  three 
centuries  before,  must  still  have  had  considerable  commerce 
to  attract  a  Jewish  colony  and  to  make  it  worth  while  for 
the  Venetians  to  secure  trading  facilities  there  in  their  last 
treaty  with  the  Byzantine  Empire.  In  the  fertile  plain  of 
Elis  the  finest  place  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest  was  the 
unwalled  town  of  Andravida,  now  only  a  squalid  village 
which  the  traveller  passes  on  the  railway  to  Olympia.  On 
the  west  coast,  farther  to  the  south,  Kyparissia,  then  called 
Arkadia,  was  in  Edrisi's  time  a  large  place  with  a  much- 
frequented  harbour — a  position  which  it  is  now  recovering 
since  the  new  railway  has  connected  it  with  Kalamata  and 
Patras.  The  Franks  considered  the  anchorage  bad ;  but  on 
the  hill,  which  commands  the  whole  rich  plain  of  Triphylia, 
and  enjoys  a  prospect  of  the  sea  as  far  as  Zante,  Cephalonia, 
and  the  islands  of  the  Harpies,  "  the  giants,"  so  the  country- 
folk said,  had  built  the  strong  Hellenic  tower,  which  forms 
the  nucleus  of  the  present  castle. 

1  T&  Xpotuctor  roG  Mopfot,  11.  1406,  1462,  1525-6;  Nik&as,  97-100, 
581-2 ;  Lampros,  op.  cit^  ii.,  83,  137,  171  ;  Phrantz^s,  397-8 ;  of  course, 
the  remarkable  pictures  in  the  present  'EXx^vof  church,  which  was 
restored  in  1697,  are  of  Venetian  origin  and  workmanship. 


V 


24    GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

The  Messenian  port  of  Methone,  or  Modon,  destined  to 
play  so  important  a  part  in  Frankish  times  as  a  half-way 
house  between  Venice  and  the  East,  then  lay  deserted,  for  in 
1 125  the  Venetians  had  destroyed  this  nest  of  corsairs  who 
had  preyed  on  their  merchantmen  homeward-bound  from  the 
Levant,  and  the  Sicilian  admiral  had  again  made  it  a  heap 
of  ruins.  The  other  Messenian  station  of  Korone,  or  Coron, 
which  we  shall  find  always  associated  with  it  under  the  rule 
of  Venice,  produced  such  a  quantity  of  olive  oil  that  no  other 
place  in  the  world,  so  it  was  said,  could  compare  with  it.  In 
the  far  south  of  the  peninsula,  the  people  of  Maina  had  a  bad 
reputation  among  the  Crusaders,  whom  the  waves  cast  on 
their  iron-bound  coast ;  while  the  fertility  of  the  rich  Messenian 
plain,  in  which  Kalamata  lies,  was  no  less  extraordinary  than 
now,  though  the  fortress  which  should  have  defended  the 
place  was  weak.  At  the  other  end  of  the  picturesque 
Langada  gorge,  on  the  low  hills  near  the  right  bank  of  the 
Eurotas,  stood  the  large  city  of  Lacedaemonia,  the  Byzantine 
town  which  had  succeeded  the  classic  Sparta ;  in  the  tenth 
century  Venetian  merchants  had  frequented  this  prosperous 
mart,  and  the  efforts  of  St  Nikon  to  expel  the  Jews  from  the 
community  afford  a  further  proof  of  its  commercial  importance 
at  that  period.  The  excavations  of  the  British  school  have 
brought  to  light  curious  pieces  of  Byzantine  pottery  and 
Byzantine  coins,  and  the  traveller  may  still  see  the  remains 
of  the  fine  walls  and  towers,  which,  as  the  Chronicle  of  the 
Morea  tells  us,  surrounded  Lacedaemonia  at  the  time  of  the 
Frankish  Conquest.  Towards  the  centre  of  the  peninsula, 
"  the  middle  land,"  or  Mesarea,  as  Arkadia  was  then  called, 
there  had  arisen  near  the  site  of  the  classic  Tegea  the 
important  and  well-fortified  Byzantine  town  of  Nikli,  a  trace 
of  which  may  still  be  found  in  a  Christian  font  in  the  little 
museum  of  the  squalid  village  of  Piali ;  while,  due  south  of 
Megalopolis,  the  city  of  Veligosti,  now  a  mere  name,  was 
then  sufficiently  flourishing  to  be  coupled  by  the  chronicler 
with  Nikli  as  one  of  the  "  chief  places  in  all  the  Morea." l 

1  T6  Upovucbv  roG  Mop*w?t  11.  1 426-9,  1680,  1 690-4,  1712,  1 740- 1,  1 75 3, 
2052-3 ;  Le  Livre  de  la  Conqueste,  44 ;  Benedict  of  Peterborough,  loc. 
cit  I  accept  the  derivation  of  Mesarea,  given  by  the  Italian  version  of 
the  Chronicle  (p.  428)  and  by  Hatzidalcis,  as  more  probable  than  that  of 
Meliar£kes  (AfArfe?,  iv.,  262)  from  the  Italian  tnassa 


THE  ISLANDS  25 

Of  the  islands,  Corfii  is  described  as  "  rich  and  fertile  "  by 
everyone  who  visited  it  at  that  period.  We  are  told  in  1 191 
that  it  paid  "  15  quintals"  (or  1500  lbs.)  "of  the  purest  gold" 
into  the  imperial  treasury  every  year,  the  equivalent  of  about 
9,000,000  drachmai,  or  more  than  the  total  amount  raised  by 
the  present  Greek  exchequer  from  all  the  Ionian  islands. 
Dotted  about  the  beautiful  hillsides  were  various  towns  and 
many  strong  castles.  But  what  most  interested  returning 
Crusaders  was  the  local  legend  that  the  deserted  castle  of 
Butentrost,  or  Butrinto,  on  the  opposite  coast  of  Epiros, 
which  scholars  associate  with  the  voyage  of  iEneas,  was  the 
birthplace  of  Judas  Iscariot — a  legend  which  we  find  at  Corfu 
centuries  later,  and  which  may  have  arisen  out  of  a  popular 
etymology,  connecting  the  surname  of  the  traitor  with 
Scheria,  the  Homeric  name  of  Corfu,  still  enshrined  in  the 
Corfiote  village  of  Skaria.1  The  Cyclades,  or  Dodekanesos,  had 
suffered  so  much  from  pirates,  that  many  of  them  had  been 
abandoned,  while  in  some  fortified  positions,  like  the  Byzantine 
castle  of  Apaliri  at  Naxos,  corsairs  had  established  themselves. 
The  "Queen  of  the  Cyclades,"  however,  even  then  raised 
cattle,  as  she  still  does ;  Andros,  the  second  island  of  the 
group,  was  very  populous,  though  it  had  been  recently 
overrun  by  the  Crusaders  on  their  way  to  Constantinople, 
and  the  ancient  Panachrdntou  monastery,  ascribed  by 
tradition  to  Nikeph6ros  Phok&s,  the  conqueror  of  Crete, 
together  with  the  beautiful  little  Byzantine  church  of  the 
Archangel  Michael  at  Messaria,  the  Byzantine  capital  of  the 
island,  which  dates  from  the  time  of  Manuel  I.,  are  evidence  of 
its  importance  in  the  last  two  centuries  before  the  Conquest 
Its  geographical  position  on  the  direct  course  of  ships  on 
their  way  from  Italy  to  Constantinople  made  it  also  a  good 
place  for  hearing  news.  But  the  school  of  philosophy  for 
which  Andros  had  been  celebrated  much  earlier,  and  which 
was  revived  within  the  memory  of  many  now  living  in  the 
person  of  KaTres,  had  long  ceased  to  exist2  Another  island, 
then  populous,  was  Amorgos,  the  ancient  home  of  Simonides  ; 
while  Keos,  the  birthplace  of  his  namesake,  was,  as  we  shall 

1  Villehardouin,  op.  cit^  i.,  74,  ch.  lviii. ;  Benedict  of  Peterborough, 
op.  ctf.y  ii.,  204  ;  Roman6s,  Tpariavb*  Z4rf>p,  120-!, 
*  L&npros,  op.  r/'A,  ii.,  145. 


26     GREECE  AT  TIME  OF  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

presently  see,  by  no  means  a  luxurious  exile  for  an  educated 
man  accustomed  to  live  even  in  the  Athens  of  the  twelfth 
century. 

Such  was  the  condition  of  Greece  when  the  Latin 
conquerors  of  Constantinople  entered  the  land  which  the 
strangest  of  accidents  had  placed  at  their  mercy.  Such  was 
the  El  Dorado  which  was  to  provide  principalities  and 
duchies,  marquisates  and  baronies,  for  the  adventurous 
younger  sons  of  the  Western  nobility. 


\ 


CHAPTER  II 

THE    FRANKISH    CONQUEST  (1204-I207) 

When,  in  October  1204,  the  Crusaders  and  their  Venetian 
allies  sat  down  at  Constantinople  to  partition  the  Byzantine 
Empire,  they  paid  as  little  heed  as  any  modern  congress  of 
diplomatists  to  the  doctrine  of  nationalities,  or  to  the  wishes 
of  the  peoples  whose  fate  hung  upon  their  decisions.  It  had 
been  agreed  by  a  preliminary  compact,  that  a  fourth  part  of 
the  Byzantine  dominions  should  be  first  set  aside  to  form 
the  new  Latin  Empire  of  Romania,  of  which  Baldwin,  Count 
of  Flanders,  was  elected  Emperor.  The  remaining  three- 
fourths  were  then  to  be  divided  in  equal  shares  between 
the  Venetian  Republic  and  the  Crusaders,  whose  leader  was 
Boniface,  Marquis  of  Montferrat,  the  rival  of  Baldwin  for  the 
throne  of  the  East.  The  Greek  provinces  in  Asia  and  "  the 
isle  of  Greece,"  as  the  French  chronicler  calls  the  Pelopon- 
nese,  had  originally  been  intended  as  the  portion  of  the 
unsuccessful  competitor,  who  was  to  do  homage  to  the 
emperor  for  his  dominions.1  But  this  arrangement  did  not 
suit  the  plans  of  the  crusading  chief,  who  wished  to  exchange 
the  promised  land  of  Asia  Minor  for  a  compact  extent  of 
territory  nearer  home.  His  marriage  with  the  Dowager 
Empress  Margaret,  widow  of  Isaac  II.,  and  daughter  of  the 
King  of  Hungary,  made  him  the  more  desirous  to  be 
established  somewhere  in  the  Balkan  peninsula,  within 
easier  reach  of  her  native  land.2    His  brother,  Rainer,  had 

1  Villehardouin,  op.  ciL%  i.,  178,  ch.  cxxxiii.  A  various  reading  is 
Piste  de  CrlU;  but  that  already  belonged  to  Boniface.  (Del  Carretto  and 
Sangeorgio  in  Histories  patrict  Monument^  v.,  1141 ;  1322.) 

2  lbid,y  i.,  182,  ch.  exxxvii. ;  Robert  de  Clary  apud  Hopf,  Chromques 
grico-romanes,  76. 


K 


28  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

received  from  Manuel  I.,  twenty-five  years  before,  the  title  of 
King  of  Salonika,  after  his  marriage  with  that  emperor's 
daughter  Maria,  and  the  marquis  now  sought  to  convert  his 
dead  brother's  empty  title  into  a  living  reality.1  Baldwin  I. 
was,  however,  in  no  mood  to  accept  an  arrangement  which 
effectually  severed  the  connection  between  the  Empire  of 
Romania  and  Greece  proper  at  the  very  outset  He  had 
actually  occupied  Salonika,  and  civil  war  menaced  the  Latin 
dominion  in  the  Levant  before  its  foundations  had  been 
securely  laid.  But  the  intervention  of  the  old  doge  Dandolo, 
assisted  by  influential  nobles  of  the  crusading  army,  men 
like  Ravano  dalle  Carceri  of  Verona,  the  Burgundian 
Othon  de  la  Roche,  the  Fleming  Jacques  d'Avesnes,  and 
Guillaume  de  Champlitte,  styled  rt  of  Champagne,"  who  are 
described  as  being  "  most  highly  esteemed  in  the  councils  of 
the  marquis,"  succeeded  in  preventing  this  catastrophe. 
Boniface  took  an  oath  of  allegiance  to  the  Latin  emperor  for 
his  kingdom  of  Salonika,  which  was  to  include  a  large  part  of 
Greece,  as  yet  unconquered.  "  I  am  your  man  in  respect  of 
it,"  he  said,  "and  I  hold  it  from  you."2 

The  deed  of  partition,  which  was  obviously  based  on  the 
last  commercial  treaty  between  Venice  and  the  Emperor 
Al&rios  III.,  assigned  to  Boniface  and  his  army  of  Crusaders 
in  Greece  "  the  district  of  Larissa,  the  province  of  Wallachia 
(*>.  Thessaly),  with  the  private  and  monastic  property  which 
they  contained,  the  estates  of  the  ex-Empress  Euphrosyne, 
viz.,  Vessena  (near  Pelion),  Pharsala,  Domok6,  Ravenika, 
Upper  and  Lower  Halmyros,  and  Demetrias."  It  also 
awarded  them  "the  territory  of  Neopatras"  (the  modern 
Hypate),  Velestino,  the  village  near  the  modern  battlefield, 
and  "the  district  of  Athens  with  the  territory  of  Megara." 
But  the  Venetians,  with  their  shrewd  commercial  instincts 
and  their  much   more  intimate  knowledge   of  the  country, 

1  Robertas  dc  Monte  in  Rerum  German.  Scriptores%  iii.,  924 ;  Mem- 
oriole  Potestatum  Regiensium;  and  B.  de  S.  Georgio,  Historia  Montis - 
ferratt,  apud  Muratori,  Rerum  Ital.  Scriptores,  viii.,  1 165 ;  xxiii.,  373  ; 

which  prove  that  this  grant  was  not  a  subsequent  invention  to  justify 
Boniface's  title,  as  Finlay  (iii.,  149)  imagined. 

2  Villehardouin,  op.  cit^  I.,  183,  192,  198,  358,  chs,  cxxxvii.,  cxlv.,  cl., 
cclxxiii, 


\ 


THE  PARTITION  TREATY  29 

had  secured  in  the  partition  treaty  all  the  best  harbours, 
islands,  and  markets  in  the  Levant  Their  share  included 
in  the  Peloponnese  "  the  province  of  Lacedaemonia,  Kalavryta, 
the  districts  of  Patras  and  Methone  with  all  their  appurten- 
ances, viz.,  the  territory  of  the  Brands  family,  the  territory 
of  the  Cantacuzene  family,  and  the  towns  belonging  to 
Princess  Irene,  daughter  of  Al£xios  III."  In  Epiros  the 
republic  had  obtained  "Nikopolis,  with  the  territory  of 
Arta;"  in  iEtolia  "Acheloos  and  Anatoliko."  The  Ionian 
islands  of  Corfu,  Cephalonia,  Zante,  and  Leukas  had  also 
fallen  to  her  share.  Oreos  in  the  north,  and  Karystos  in 
the  south,  of  Euboea  were  to  belong  to  Venice;  in  the 
Saronic  Gulf,  iEgina  and  "  Culuris,"  as  Salamis  was 
described  in  the  partition  treaty,  were  marked  as  hers ;  and 
finally,  *  the  province  of  Sunium  with  the  Cyclades,"  among 
which  Andros,  and  perhaps  Naxos,  are  specially  mentioned, 
rounded  off  the  Venetian  possessions.  In  addition,  the 
Marquis  of  Montferrat,  by  a  solemn  "deed  of  Refutation," 
signed  August  12,  1204,  had  sold  Crete,  which  had  been 
"given  or  promised"  to  him  by  Atexios  IV.  during  his  stay 
at  Corfu  fifteen  months  earlier,  to  the  Venetians  for  1000 
marks  of  silver  down  and  the  promise  of  possessions  in  the 
western  part  of  the  empire  sufficient  to  bring  him  in  an 
income  of  10,000  gold  hyperpers  (^4480).  The  only  items 
of  the  emperor's  share  which  concern  our  subject  are  the 
islands  of  Lemnos,  Tenos,  and  Skyros ;  the  rest  of  his 
portion  was  outside  the  limits  of  Greece  proper.1 

Besides  these  territorial  acquisitions,  the  careful  republic 
had  stipulated  that  all  the  commercial  privileges  which  she 
had  enjoyed  in  the  time  of  the  Byzantine  Empire  should  be 

1  FonUs  Rerutn  Austriacarutn,  Abt.  ii.,  B.  xii.,  468-73,  476-7,  486-8, 
513-15;  Da  Canal,  La  Chronique  des  Veniciens  in  Archivio  Storico 
lialianoy  viii.,  340-4.  Colonie  would  seem  to  be  Sunium  (Cape  Colonna). 
The  chief  difficulty  is  whether  the  Cyclades  fell  to  the  Venetians  or  to 
the  Crusaders.  The  text  of  the  deed  assigns  the  Dodecanisos  to  the  latter, 
and  Spruner-Menke  {Handatlas  fur  die  Geschichte  des  Mittelalters^  p.  40) 
and  Mr  Fotheringham  accept  this  statement.  But  the  Dodecanisos  occurs 
in  the  midst  of  places  in  Macedonia,  next  to  Prespa.  Can  it  be  a  corrup- 
tion for  the  island  on  Ochrida,  the  former  Bulgarian  capital  ?  I  follow 
Tafel  and  Thomas,  who  conjectured  cum  Cycladibus  for  Conchilari  in  the 
Venetian  portion,  to  which  the  Cyclades  would  naturally  belong. 


30  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

continued  to  her.  Thus,  the  Venetian  lion  had  secured  the 
lion's  share.  Well  might  the  doge  describe  himself,  as  he 
did  for  the  next  century  and  a  half,  "  ruler  of  one  quarter 
and  half  a  quarter  of  the  whole  Empire  of  Romania." 1  Long 
after  that  ephemeral  empire  had  fallen,  the  Venetians  kept 
their  hold  on  the  Levant,  and  to-day  many  a  fortress,  from 
Candia  to  Chalkis,  from  Nauplia  to  Corfu,  preserves  on  its 
walls  the  winged  lion  of  the  evangelist  But,  for  the  moment, 
the  lion  had  obtained  more  than  he  could  digest.  Imposing 
as  the  Venetian  share  looked  on  paper,  much  of  it  required 
to  be  conquered.  Besides  the  places  which  were  still  occupied 
by  the  Byzantine  garrisons  or  by  local  Greek  magnates, 
Corfu  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Genoese  pirate  Vetrano, 
while  Zante  and  Cephalonia  belonged  to  Count  Maio,  or 
Matteo,  Orsini.  In  short,  it  soon  became  evident,  that  the 
allies  had  partitioned  the  empire  much  as  mediaeval  popes 
drew  lines  of  demarcation  on  the  map  of  Africa. 

Having  settled  his  differences  with  the  Emperor  Baldwin, 
Boniface  set  out  in  the  autumn  of  1204  to  conquer  his  Greek 
dominions.  The  new  King  of  Salonika  belonged  to  a  family 
which  was  no  stranger  to  the  ways  of  the  Orient  One  of 
his  brothers,  as  we  saw,  had  married  the  daughter  of  the 
Emperor  Manuel  I.  Another  brother  and  a  nephew  of 
Boniface  were  kings  of  Jerusalem — a  vain  dignity  which  has 
descended  from  them,  together  with  the  marquisate  of 
Montferrat,  to  the  present  Italian  dynasty.  Married  to  the 
affable  widow  of  the  Emperor  Isaac  II.,  Boniface  was  a 
sympathetic  figure  to  the  Greeks,  who  had  speedily  flocked 
in  numbers  to  his  side,2  and  several  of  them  accompanied 
him  on  his  march  through  Greece,  among  them  his  stepson, 
Manuel  Angelos,  and  a  much  more  dangerous  member  of 
the  same  family,  the  bastard  Michael,  first  cousin  of  Isaac  II.3 
With  the  King  of  Salonika  there  went,  too,  a  motley  crowd  of 
Crusaders  in  quest  of  fiefs,  men  of  many  nationalities, 
Lombards,  Flemings,  Frenchmen,  and  Germans.  There 
were  Guillaume  de  Champlitte,  Viscount  of  Dijon,  who 
derived  his  name  from  the  village  of  Champlitte  in  Franche- 

1  Akropolita,  15  ;  X.  t.  M.,  11.  1025,  sqq.,  L.  d.  C,  21. 

2  Villehardouin,  op.  cii.y  i.,  194,  196,  chs.  cxlviii.,  cxlix. 

3  Ibid.%  i.,  210,  ch.  clix. 


BONIFACE'S  COMRADES  31 

Comt6,  but  who  was  surnamed  le  Champenois  after  his 
grandfather,  the  Count  of  Champagne ;  Othon  de  la  Roche, 
son  of  a  Burgundian  noble,  Ponce  de  la  Roche-sur-Ognon,1 
a  castle  which  still  commands  the  rolling  plains  of  the 
Haute-Sadne ;  Jacques  d'Avesnes,  son  of  a  Flemish  Crusader 
who  had  been  at  the  siege  of  Acre,  and  his  two  nephews, 
Jacques  and  Nicholas  de  St  Omer ;  Berthold  von  Katzenel- 
lenbogen,  a  Rhenish  warrior  who  had  given  the  signal  for 
setting  fire  to  Constantinople ;  the  Marquis  Guido  Pallavicini, 
youngest  son  of  a  nobleman  from  near  Parma  who  had  gone 
to  Greece  because  at  home  every  common  man  could  hale  him 
before  the  courts ;  Thomas  de  Stromoncourt,  and  Ravano  dalle 
Carceri  of  Verona.2  To  record  his  deeds,  the  king  of  Salonika 
took  with  him  Rambaud  de  Vaqueiras,  a  troubadour  from 
Provence,  who  afterwards  boasted  in  one  of  the  letters  in 
verse,  which  he  addressed  to  his  patron,  that  he  "  had  helped 
to  conquer  the  empire  of  the  East  and  the  kingdom  of 
Salonika,  the  island  of  Pelops,  and  the  duchy  of  Athens."8 
There  was  one  man  still  left  in  Greece  who  might  have 
been  expected  to  offer  a  determined  resistance  to  the 
invaders.  L£on  Sgour6s,  the  proud  lord  of  Nauplia,  Argos, 
and  Corinth,  was  the  strongest  of  the  native  archons,  but  he 
showed  more  desire  to  profit  by  his  country's  misfortunes 
than  to  fight  against  its  enemies.  He  had  long  cast  covetous 
glances  at  Athens,  whence  he  had  once  already  levied 
blackmail,  and  he  availed  himself  of  the  general  confusion, 
consequent  on  the  invasion  of  the  capital  by  the  Franks,  to 
attack  the  Athenians  by  land  and  sea.  The  noble  metro- 
politan proved  himself  at  this  crisis  a  worthy  representative 
of  those  classic  heroes  whose  lives  he  had  so  carefully  studied  ; 
and  his  brother,  the  historian  Nik&as,  might  well  interrupt 
his  stilted  narrative  to  express  his  pride  at  being  the  near 
kinsman  of  such  a  man.  From  the  sacred  rock  of  the 
Akropolis  he  solemnly  warned   the  selfish  magnate  of  the 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches%  L,  lxxxiv.-lxxxix. 

2  Litta,  Lefamiglie  celebri  Ilaliane>  vol.  v.,  plate  xiv. 

3  Schultz-Gora,  Le  Epistole  del  Trovatore  Rambaldo  di  Vaqueiras, 

p.  6. 

"  Ai  vo8  aiudat 
"  A  conquerre  cm'pcri  c  regnat 
"  d'aquetta  terra  e  Vis  la  *7  augat." 


32  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

double  iniquity  of  a  Greek  fighting  against  Greeks,  a  Christian 
against  Christians.  He  made  a  personal  appeal  to  an  assailant, 
whom  he  had  counted  among  his  spiritual  children,  who  had 
never  refused  him  the  titles  of  father  and  pastor.  But  the 
archon  of  Nauplia  was  unmoved  by  these  spiritual  arguments ; 
he  cynically  replied  that,  at  the  time  when  the  capital  of  the 
empire  was  in  the  hands  of  the  foe,  it  behoved  everyone  to 
look  after  his  own  interests ;  and,  as  an  excuse  for  his  attack, 
demanded  the  surrender  of  an  Athenian  youth  of  notoriously 
bad  character.  The  metropolitan  refused  to  give  up  even 
the  least  worthy  of  his  flock,  and  defended  the  walls  of  the 
Akropolis  with  engines  of  war.  His  material  proved  better 
than  his  spiritual  weapons,  and  SgounSs  had  to  content 
himself  with  setting  fire  to  the  houses  of  the  town,  and 
carrying  off  a  nephew  of  the  metropolitan  as  a  page,  whom 
he  afterwards  murdered  in  a  fit  of  passion  for  his  clumsiness 
in  breaking  a  glass  cup.  From  Athens  he  marched  upon 
Thebes,  which,  though  a  stronger  position,  afforded  an 
instance  of  the  truth  of  Thucydides*  saying,  that  it  is  not 
walls,  but  the  men  who  man  them  that  make  a  city.  The 
chief  town  in  Greece  yielded  to  the  first  attack,  and  the  victor 
continued  his  march  unchecked  to  Larissa.  There  he  met 
the  fugitive  Emperor  Atexios  III.,  who  bestowed  upon  him 
the  hand  of  his  daughter  Eudokia,  a  lady  who  had  already 
been  thrice  married  to  one  monarch  after  another.1 

It  was  at  this  moment  that  Boniface  and  his  army 
traversed  the  classic  vale  of  Tempe  and  entered  the  fertile 
plain  of  Thessaly.  At  the  news  of  his  approach  Sgour6s — 
"Lasgur,"  as  the  Franks  called  him — retreated  to 
Thermopylae,2  allowing  the  invaders  to  occupy  Larissa.  The 
king  of  Salonika  bestowed  that  ancient  city  upon  a  Lombard 
noble,  who  henceforth  styled  himself  Guglielmo  de  Larsa 
from  his  Thessalian  fief,  and  who  also  received  the  important 
town  of  Halmyros  where  the  Venetian  and  Pisan  colonies 
continued  to  flourish.  Velestino,  the  ancient  Pherae,  the 
scene  of  the  legend  of  Admetos  and  Alkestis,  fell  to  the 
share  of  Count  Berthold  von  Katzenellenbogen,  whose  name 

1  Niketas,  799-807  ;  Ldmpros,  Mixa^X  'Ako/up&tov,  ii.,  162-87  ;  Libro  de 
losfcchos,  15. 

2  Villchardouin,  op.  cit%  i.,  210,  ch.  clix. 


MARQUISATE  OF  BOUDONITZA  33 

must  have  proved  a  stumbling-block  to  his  Thessalian  vassals.1 
The  army  then  took  the  usual  route  by  way  of  Pharsala  and 
Domok<5 — names  familiar  in  the  ancient  and  modern  history 
of  Greek  warfare,  down  to   Lamia,  and   thence  across  the 
Trachinian  plain  to  Thermopylae,  where  Sgour6s  was  await- 
ing it     But  the  memories  of  Leonidas  failed  to  inspire  the 
archon  of  Nauplia  to  follow  his  example.     Nik^tas 2  tells  us 
that  the  mere  sight  of  the  Latin  knights  in  their  coats  of 
mail  sufficed  to  make  him  flee  straight  to  his  own  fastness 
of  Akrocorinth,  leaving  the  pass  undefended.     Conscious  of 
its  strength — for  Thermopylae  must  have  been  far  more  of  a 
defile    then    than    now — Boniface    resolved     to    secure     it 
permanently    against  attack.       He    therefore  invested  the 
Marquis    Guido    Pallavicini,     nicknamed     by    the    Greeks 
"  Marchesopoulo,"     with     the     fief    of    Boudonitza,  which 
commanded  the  other  end   of  the   pass.     Thus   arose   the 
famous  marquisate  of  Boudonitza,  which   was  destined  to 
play  an  important  part  in  the  Frankish  history  of  Greece, 
and  which,  after  a  continuous  existence  of  over  two  centuries, 
as  guardian  of  the  northern  marches,  has  left  a  memory  of 
its  fallen  greatness  in  the  ruins  of  the  castle  and  chapel  of  its 
former  lords,  of  whose  descendants,  the   Zorzi   of  Venice, 
there  are  still  living  some  thirty  representatives  in  that  city. 
Following    the    present    carriage-road   from   Lamia  to  the 
Corinthian  Gulf,  Boniface  established  another  defensive  post 
at  the  pass  of  Gravia,  so  famous  centuries  afterwards  in  the 
War  of  Independence,  conferring  it  as  a  fief  on   the  two 
brothers,  Jacques  and  Nicholas  de  St  Omer.8    At  the  foot  of 
Parnassos,  on  the  site  of  the  ancient   Amphissa,  he  next 
founded    the    celebrated    barony    of   Salona,   which  lasted 
almost  as  long  as  the  marquisate  of  Boudonitza.     Upon  the 
almost    Cyclopean  stones   of  the  classic   Akropolis,  which 
Philip  of  Macedon  had   destroyed   fifteen  centuries  before, 
Thomas  de  Stromoncourt  built  himself  the  fortress,  of  which 
the  majestic  ruins — perhaps  the  finest  Frankish  remains  in 
Greece — still  stand  among  the  corn-fields  on  the  hill  above 
the  modern  town.     According  to  the  local  tradition,   the 

1  Epistola  InnocenHi  UIn  vol.  iL,  pp.  214,  464-51  549  \  DocununH 
sulU  relation*  toscam  toll  *Orientey  pp.  88-90. 

1  P.  799.  8  L-  <*-  c->  4*3- 

C 


34  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

name  of  Salona,  which  the  place  still  bears  in  common 
parlance,  despite  the  usual  official  efforts  to  revive  the 
classical  terminology,  is  derived  from  the  King  of 
Salonika,  its  second  founder.  The  lord  of  Salona  soon 
extended  his  sway  down  to  the  harbour  of  Galaxidi,  and  the 
barony  became  so  important  that  two  at  least  of  the  house 
of  Stromoncourt  struck  coins  of  their  own,  which  are  still 
preserved1 

Boniface  next  marched  into  Boeotia,  where  the  people, 
glad  to  be  relieved  from  the  oppression  of  Sgour6s,  at  once 
submitted.  Thebes  joyfully  opened  her  gates,  and  then  the 
invaders  pursued  their  way  to  Athens.  The  metropolitan 
thought  it  useless  to  defend  the  city,  and  a  Frankish  guard 
was  soon  stationed  on  the  Akropolis.  The  Crusaders  had 
no  respect  for  the  great  cathedral.  To  these  soldiers  of 
fortune  the  classic  glories  of  the  Parthenon  appealed  as 
little  as  the  sanctity  of  the  Orthodox  Church.  The  rich 
treasury  of  the  cathedral  was  plundered,  the  holy  vessels 
were  melted  down,  the  library  which  the  metropolitan  had 
collected  was  dispersed.  Unable  to  bear  the  sight, 
Akominatos,  like  his  colleague  of  Thebes,  quitted  the  scene 
of  his  long  labours,  and  after  wandering  about  for  a  time  in 
Salonika  and  Euboea,  perhaps  in  the  hope  of  coming  to  terms 
with  the  Papal  Legate,  finally  settled  down  in  the  island  of 
Keos,  one  of  the  eleven  suffragan  bishoprics,  which  had,  in 
happier  times,  owned  his  benevolent  sway.  From  there  he 
could  at  least  see  the  coast  of  Attica — that  Attica  which  he 
had  once  described  as  "a  Scythian  wilderness,"  but  which 
he  now  lamented  as  "  a  garden  of  Eden." 2 

Thebes  with  Boeotia,  and  Athens  with  Attica  and  the 
Megarid  were  bestowed  by  the  King  of  Salonika  upon  his 
trusty  comrade  in  arms,  Othon  de  la  Roche,  who  had 
rendered  him  a  valuable  service  by  assisting  to  settle  the 
dispute  between  him  and  the  Emperor   Baldwin,  and  who 

1  S&has,  T6  XpcviKto  toO  ra\a£€i8lovt  201.  This  chronicle,  compiled  in 
1703  from  old  documents,  ascribes  to  Thomas  I.  the  title  of  Count, 
whereas  the  Chronicle  of the  More  a  (11.  3294,  3633),  describes  Thomas  II. 
of  Salona  as  simply  "  lord,"  &<pivTip.  Sa*thas  (op.  cit.\  gives  a  coin  of 
Thomas  II.,  and  another  of  Thomas  III. 

1  NiWtas,  805  ;  Lampros,  Mexa^X  'Atcotuvdrov,  i.,  357,  H.,  146,  178,  259, 
295>  312. 


OTHON  DE  LA  ROCHE  AT  ATHENS  35 

afterwards  negotiated  the  marriage  between  Boniface's 
daughter  and  Baldwin's  brother  and  successor  on  the  throne. 
Thus,  in  the  words  of  a  monkish  chronicler,  "  Othon  de  la 
Roche,  son  of  a  certain  Burgundian  noble,  became,  as  by  a 
miracle,  Duke  of  the  Athenians  and  Thebans."  l  The 
chronicler  was  only  wrong  in  the  title  which  he  attributed  to 
the  lucky  Frenchman,  who  had  thus  succeeded  to  the  glories 
of  the  heroes  and  sages  of  Athens.  Othon  modestly  styled 
himself  Sire  dAthhus,  or  Dominus  Athenarum,  in  official 
documents,  which  his  Greek  subjects  magnified  into  "the 
great  Lord"  (Meya?  icvp,  or  Meya?  icvpw),  and  Dante,  who 
had  probably  heard  that  such  had  been  the  title  of  the 
first  Frankish  ruler  of  Athens,  transferred  it  by  a  poetic 
anachronism  to  Pisistratos.2  Contemporary  accounts  make 
no  mention  of  any  resistance  to  the  Lord  of  Athens  on  the 
part  of  the  Greeks.  Later  Venetian  writers,  however, 
actuated  perhaps  by  patriotic  bias,  propagated  a  story,  that 
the  Athenians  sent  an  embassy  to  offer  their  city  to  Venice, 
but  that  their  scheme  was  frustrated,  "  not  without  bloodshed, 
by  the  men  of  Champagne  under  the  Lord  de  la  Roche."8 

Meanwhile,  the  soldierly  Fleming,  Jacques  d'Avesnes, 
leaving  the  main  body  of  the  Franks,  had  received  the 
submission  of  Eubcea — an  island  where  they  had  already 
stopped  on  their  way  to  Constantinople.  After  building  a 
fortress  in  the  middle  of  the  Euripos  and  garrisoning  the 
place,4  d'Avesnes  hastened  to  join  the  King  of  Salonika  and 
the  Lord  of  Athens  in  their  attack  upon  the  strongholds  of 
Sgourds   in    the    Peloponnese.       The    Franks    routed    the 

1  Albericns  Trium  Fontium,  Chromcon,  ii.,  439;  Henri  de  Valen- 
ciennes! ch.  xxxv. 

*  X.  r.  M.,  1L  1555,  2595,  3194  sqq.%  4365.  Epistola  Innocentii  ///., 
bk.  xL,  No.  244 ;  bk.  xiii.,  No.  16.  Buchon,  Recherches,  ii.,  385  sqq. 
Dante,  Purgatorioy  xv.,  97.  Ducange,  Histoire  de  P Empire  de  Con- 
stanUnople,  i.,  436-7. 

3  Andrea  Dandolo,  Chronkon  Venetum,  apud  Muratori,  Rerum  I  tali - 
carum  Scriptores,  xii.,  335.  Laurentius  de  Monacis  (Chronicon,  143),  and 
Stefano  Magno,  apud  HopfJ  Chromques  grtco-romanes,  179,  repeat 
him.  Out  of  this,  and  a  misunderstanding  of  Othon's  title  the  historian 
Fanelli,  who  wrote  his  Atene  Attica  soon  after  Morosini's  victories,  states 
(p.  278)  that  the  embassy  was  imprisoned  by  a  certain  "Magaduce 
Tiranno"] 

4  Nike'tas,  806. 


36  THE  PRANKISH  CONQUEST 

Greek  army  at  the  Isthmus,  and,  while  Boniface  marched  on 
to  besiege  Nauplia,  Jacques  d'Avesnes  and  Othon  de  la  Roche 
attacked  Corinth.  The  lower  town,  though  strongly  fortified, 
was  taken  by  escalade,  but  Akrocorinth  proved,  in  the  hands 
of  Sgourds,  an  impregnable  fortress.  In  vain  the  Franks 
built  two  castles  to  coerce  it  into  submission,  one  on  the  hill 
to  the  south  of  Akrocorinth,  which  they  called  Montesquiou, 
a  name  now  corrupted  into  the  modern  Penteskouphia 
("  Five  Caps  "),  the  other  to  the  north.  Sgour6s  succeeded  in 
making  a  night  sortie  and  in  surprising  the  Franks  in  the 
lower  town ;  many  of  the  besiegers  were  slain,  and  their 
leader,  d'Avesnes,  was  wounded.1 

But  the  Greek  archoris  resolute  defence  of  Akrocorinth 
could  not  prevent  the  conquest  of  the  Peloponnese,  for  the 
attack  upon  that  peninsula  came  from  a  wholly  unexpected 
quarter.  It  chanced  that,  a  little  before  the  capture  of 
Constantinople,  Geoffroy  de  Villehardouin,  nephew  of  the 
Marshal  of  Champagne  and  quaint  chronicler  of  the  Fourth 
Crusade,  had  set  out  on  a  pilgrimage  to  Palestine.  On  his 
arrival  in  Syria,  he  heard  of  the  great  achievements  of  the 
Crusaders,  and  resolved  without  loss  of  time  to  join  them  at 
Constantinople.  But  his  ship  was  driven  out  of  her  course 
by  a  violent  tempest,  and  Geoffroy  was  forced  to  take  shelter 
in  the  harbour  of  Methone  on  the  coast  of  Messenia.  During 
the  winter  of  1204,  which  he  spent  at  that  spot,  he  received  an 
invitation  from  a  local  magnate  to  join  him  in  an  attack  on  the 
lands  of  the  neighbouring  Greeks.  Villehardouin,  nothing 
loth,  placed  his  sword  at  the  disposal  of  the  Greek  traitor, 
and  success  crowned  the  arms  of  these  unnatural  allies. 
But  the  Greek  archon  died,  and  his  son,  more  patriotic,  or 
more  prudent  than  the  father,  repudiated  the  dangerous 
alliance  with  the  Frankish  stranger.  But  it  was  too  late. 
Villehardouin  had  discovered  the  fatal  secret  that  the  Greeks 
of  the  Peloponnese  were  an  unwarlike  race,  and  that  their 
land  would  fall  an  easy  conquest  to  a  resolute  band  of  Latins. 
At  this   moment  tidings   reached  him  that    Boniface  was 

1  Nik&as,  807 ;  Villehardouin,  op.  city  L,  2 10,  226,  232,  chs.  clue, 
cbariv.,  clxxix. ;  X.  r.  M.f  11.  1528-38,  2805-8.  The  last  passage  gives  the 
name  of  the  fort,  but  places  its  construction  at  a  later  period  erroneously, 
as  Hopf  has  shown.     Cf.  L.  d.  C,  37,  87. 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  MOREA  37 

besieging  Nauplia,  and  he  at  once  set  out  on  a  six  days' 
journey  across  a  hostile  country  to  seek  his  aid.  Boniface 
endeavoured  to  detain  him  in  his  own  service  by  the  offer  of 
lands  and  possessions,  but  in  the  camp  Villehardouin  found 
an  old  friend  and  fellow-countryman,  Guillaume  de  Champ- 
litte,  who  was  willing  to  assist  him,  for  Villehardouin  came 
from  a  village  of  Champagne,  in  the  domain  of  Champlitte's 
ancestors,  a  place  between  Bar  and  Arcis-sur-Aube.  He 
described  to  Champlitte  the  richness  of  the  land  which  men 
called  "  the  Morea  " — a  term  which  now  occurs  for  almost  the 
first  time  in  history,  and  which  seems  to  have  been  originally 
applied  to  the  coast  of  Elis  and  thence  extended  to  the  whole 
peninsula,  just  as  the  name  Italy,  originally  confined  to  a 
part  of  Calabria,  has  similarly  spread  over  the  whole  country.1 
He  professed  his  willingness  to  recognise  Champlitte  as  his 
liege  lord  in  return  for  his  aid,  and  Boniface  finally  consented 
to  their  undertaking.  With  a  hundred  knights  and  some 
men-at-arms,  the  two  friends  rode  out  from  the  camp  before 
Nauplia  to  conquer  the  ancient  land  which  had  once  given 
birth  to  Spartan  men.2 

The  fate  of  the  Morea,  like  that  of  Saxon  England, 
was  decided  by  a  single  pitched  battle.  The  city  of  Patras 
was  captured  at  the  first  assault,  whereupon  the  castle  at 
once  surrendered  on  terms ;  from  the  defenceless  town  of 
Andravida,  the  capital  of  Elis,  the  magnates  and  the  com- 
munity issued  forth,  with  the  priests  bearing  the  cross  and 
the  sacred  eikons,  and  did   homage  to  Champlitte  on  con- 

1  The  derivation  of  the  word  "  Morea,"  which  is  first  found  in  a  MS. 
of  mi,  is  much  disputed.  The  traditional  explanation,  now  returning 
to  favour,  was  that  it  came  from  Awp6x  ("  mulberry-tree  "),  either  because 
of  the  trees  grown  there,  or  because  of  the  shape  of  the  peninsula.  The 
Slavonic  more  ("  sea  ") ;  a  former  town  on  the  coast  of  Elis  nearKatakolo  ; 
and  a  transformation  of  the  word  Romaia  have  all  been  suggested.  Both 
the  Greek  (e.g.  1L  1427,  16x0,  1642,  5708)  and  the  French  (p.  359)  versions 
of  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea  at  times  use  it  in  the  restricted  sense  of 
44  Elis."  Sdthas,  MvripeTa  'EXX^ur?*  'Itfrop/as,  i.,  pp.  xxx.-xxxviii.  ;  Papar- 
regopoulos,  'luropla  rod  'EXX^^ou  T&Ovovs,  v.,  88-92  ;  Hopf  apud  Ersch  u. 
Gruber,  Allgemeine  Encyktopadie,  lxxxv.,  264-7 ;  Finlay,  iv.  24 ; 
Hatzidikis  in  Byz.  Zeit.,  ii.,  284. 

1  I  have  here  followed  Villehardouin  (i.,  226-32),  who  is  naturally  a 
better  authority  for  what  concerns  his  nephew  than  is  the  much  later 
Chronicle  of  the  Morea,  which  narrates  these  events  differently. 


38  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

dition  that  he  respected  their  property;  the  archons  of 
the  rest  of  Elis  and  of  Mesarea,  "  the  middle  land,"  as  Arkadia 
was  then  called,  followed  the  example  of  Andravida;  the 
low-walled  fortress  of  Pontikokastro,  or  "  Mouse  Castle,"  the 
ruins  of  which  still  stand  on  the  hill  above  the  harbour  of 
Katakolo,  was  easily  taken  and  garrisoned.  The  tower  of 
"the  giants"  at  Arkadia  (or  Kyparissia)  and  the  castle  of 
Kalamata  did  indeed  hold  out  for  a  time;  but  of  the  two 
forts  on  either  side  of  the  Messenian  promontory,  Modon 
was  after  all  these  years  still  lying  deserted,  while  the  garrison 
of  Coron  soon  surrendered  when  their  houses  and  property 
were  guaranteed  to  them.  The  more  patriotic  and  energetic 
of  the  natives  did,  indeed,  succeed  in  collecting  an  army  some 
four  to  six  thousand  strong,  consisting  of  the  Greeks  of 
Nikli,  Veligosti,  and  Lacedaemonia,  the  warlike  Slavonic 
tribe  of  Melings,  who  had  been  so  troublesome  to  the  old 
Imperial  Government,  and  a  detachment  under  Michael 
Angelos,  who  had  quitted  Boniface  and  had  established 
himself  as  Lord,  or  Despot,  of  Epiros,  and  who  crossed 
over  the  Gulf  of  Corinth  to  attack  the  common  enemy. 
The  Hastings  of  the  Morea  was  fought  in  the  olive-grove  of 
Koundoura,  in  the  north-east  of  Messenia.  The  little 
Frankish  force,  numbering  between  five  and  seven  hundred 
men,  completely  routed  the  over-confident  Greeks ;  the 
Despot  retired  to  his  mountains,  and  one  place  after 
another  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Franks.  One  heroic 
warrior,  Doxapatres,  seems  to  have  held  manfully  the  small 
but  strongly  situated  castle  of  Araklovon,  which  commanded 
a  defile  of  the  Arkadian  mountains,  and  his  rare  heroism, 
dismissed  in  a  few  lines  of  the  Greek  Chronicle,  made  a 
lasting  impression  on  romantic  minds.  The  compilers  of 
the  Aragonese  version  say  that  no  man  could  lift  his  mace, 
and  that  his  cuirass  weighed  more  than  1 50  pounds  ;  a  local 
legend  has  kept  alive  the  splendid  courage  of  his  daughter, 
who  allowed  herself  to  be  hurled  to  death  from  the  castle 
tower  rather  than  become  the  conqueror's  mistress;  and  a 
modern  Greek  dramatist  has  made  Maria  DoxapatrS  the 
heroine  of  one  of  his  tragedies.1    Though  the  three  strong- 

1  X.  t.  M.,  11.  1410-41,  1641-3,  1661-1790;  L.  d.  C,  34-5>  38"44  ; 
Villehardouin,  loc.  cit\  Muntaner,  Cronaca,  ch.  cclxi.;  Libro  de  losfechosy 
27  ;  Bernarddkes,  Mopte  Ao^awarpij. 


VENICE  IN  MESSENIA  39 

holds  of  Sgour6s,  Corinth,  Nauplia,  and  the  Larissa  of  Argos, 
still  held  out;  though  Veligosti,  Nikli,  and  Lacedaemonia 
were  unconquered ;  though  the  isolated  rock  of  Monemvasia, 
whose  sailors  had  often  manned  the  imperial  navies,  whose 
soldiers  had  repelled  a  Latin  host  before,  still  preserved  its 
traditional  liberties;  though  the  Tzdkones  of  Leonidi  and 
the  Slav  tribe  of  Melings  in  the  fortresses  of  Taygetos  as 
yet  acknowledged  no  master,  Innocent  1 1 1.,  not  without  reason, 
already  styled  Champlitte  "  Prince  of  all  Achaia." x 

The  new  prince  rewarded  Villehardouin,  the  real  author 
of  this  daring  scheme  of  conquest,  with  the  town  of  Coron.* 
But,  at  this  point,  a  new  competitor  appeared  on  the  scene. 
It  will  be  remembered,  that,  by  the  deed  of  partition,  large 
portions  of  the  Peloponnese,  including  the  haven  of 
Modon,  had  fallen  to  the  share  of  Venice.  So  vast  were 
the  dominions  which  had  been  assigned,  to  the  republic, 
that  she  had  been  slower  than  the  other  parties  to  the  deed 
in  occupying  her  portion  of  the  former  Byzantine  Empire. 
Many  places,  indeed,  she  never  effectively  occupied  at  all. 
But  the  twin  stations  of  Modon  and  Coron  were  valuable 
stepping-stones  on  the  way  to  Crete  and  Egypt,  while  there 
was  always  danger  that  the  former,  in  foreign  hands,  might 
once  more  become  a  refuge  of  corsairs.  Accordingly,  in 
1206,  a  fleet  was  despatched  under  Premarini  and  the  son 
of  Dandolo,  which,  after  a  struggle  captured  both  places  from 
the  weak  garrisons  left  there  by  the  Franks.  Opinions  were 
divided  as  to  the  policy  of  maintaining  the  two  places ;  but 
Dandolo's  son  offered  to  keep  them  up  at  his  own  cost,  and 
thus  saved  them  for  the  republic  The  walls  of  Modon 
were  again  destroyed,  as  a  measure  of  precaution;  but 
Coron  seems  to  have  been  made  a  provisioning  station, 
where  all  passing  ships  could  receive  a  month's  rations — a 
custom  maintained,  we  are  told,  when  the  place  became  a 
regular  Venetian  colony.8  Thus  began  the  long  Venetian 
occupation  of  these  two  spots,  the  first  territorial  acquisition 

1  Epistolaybk.  viii.,  Lett.  153  (Nov.  19,  1205). 

*  Villehardouin,  loc.  cit. 

9  Martin  da  Canal  in  Archivio  Storico  Italiano,  viii.,  348-50;  A. 
Dandolo  apud  Muratori,  xil,  335  ;  E.  Dandolo,  "Cronaca  Veneta"  (MS.), 
fbL  43  ;  S&has,  Mwwirid,  i.,  318. 


40  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

of  the  republic  in  the  Greek  peninsula,  which  came  to  be 
"  the  receptacle  and  special  nest  of  all  our  galleys,  ships,  and 
vessels  on  their  way  to  the  Levant,"  as  a  Venetian  document 
quaintly  says,  and  about  which  there  is  a  whole  literature  in 
the  Venetian  archives. 

Thus,  almost  without  effort,  a  small  body  of  Lombards, 
Burgundians,  and  Germans  had  over-run  continental  Greece 
and  the  Morea.  The  local  leaders  had,  with  one  or  two 
exceptions,  preferred  to  cringe  to  the  conquerors  rather  than 
to  fight ;  there  was  no  hope  of  succour  from  other  nations ; 
the  people  were  disused  to  warfare,  oppressed  by  burdens, 
and  indifferent,  or  even  agreeable,  to  a  change  of  masters. 
It  was  remarked  by  a  Byzantine  historian1  that  the 
European  Greeks  were  weak  defenders  of  fortresses,  and 
ready  to  fall  at  the  feet  of  every  tyrant,  and  in  the  Morea 
fortresses  were  few.  Moreover,  the  conquerors  seem  to  have 
shown  a  great  amount  of  tact  towards  the  conquered,  when 
once  they  had  convinced  the  latter  that  they  had  come  to 
stay.  Thus,  Champlitte  promised  the  magnates  of  Elis  and 
Arkadia  to  respect  the  privileges  which  they  had  received 
from  the  Byzantine  Emperors  and  to  recognise  their  titles  to 
their  estates,  while  the  residue,  consisting  of  the  old  imperial 
domains  and  other  vacant  lands,  should  be  divided  among  the 
Franks.2  Six  Greek  archons  were  accordingly  invited  to  join 
the  same  number  of  Franks  in  a  preliminary  commission  for 
the  purpose  of  defining  these  lands  and  liberties  of  the  native 
and  the  Frankish  aristocracy.  Still,  the  poet  of  the  Conquest, 
Rambaud  de  Vaqueiras,  was  scarcely  exaggerating,  when  he 
wrote  that  neither  Alexander  nor  Charlemagne  had  achieved 
such  feats  as  the  men  of  the  Fourth  Crusade. 

But  fortune,  so  favourable  to  the  Franks  in  Greece,  had 
already  deserted  them  in  Macedonia.  The  first  Latin 
emperor,  within  a  year  of  his  coronation,  had  fallen  into  the 
hands  of  the  Bulgarian  Tsar,  whose  aid  the  Macedonian 
Greeks  had  invoked,  and  vanished  in  the  dungeons  of  the 
Bulgarian  capital.  Boniface,  on  hearing  the  news,  had 
abandoned  the  siege  of  Nauplia  to  defend  his  Macedonian 
dominions  from  this  new  enemy,  and  had   endeavoured   to 

1  Akropoiita,  178 ;  L.  <L  C,  58. 
8  X.  r.  M.,  II.  1649-50 ;  L.  d.  C,  39. 


THE  DESPOTAT  OF  EPIROS  41 

strengthen  the  Frankish  cause  by  doing  homage  for  his 
kingdom  to  the  new  Emperor  Henry  and  by  bestowing  upon 
him  the  hand  of  his  daughter — a  union  arranged  by  his 
trusty  friend,  Othon  de  la  Roche,  Lord  of  Athens.1  But  the 
chivalrous  King  of  Salonika  shortly  afterwards  met  his  fate 
in  an  obscure  skirmish  with  the  Bulgarians,  and  his  kingdom 
passed,  at  this  critical  moment,  to  his  infant  son  Demetrios, 
under  guardianship  of  Oberto,  the  ambitious  Count  of 
Biandrate,  a  town  between  Vercelli  and  Novara. 

Meanwhile,  in  three  other  directions,  the  Byzantine 
monarchy  had  shown  signs  of  revival.  At  Nice,  the  scene  of 
the  famous  council,  Theodore  Liskaris,  son-in-law  of  the 
Emperor  Atexios  III.,  founded  an  empire  which,  fifty-five 
years  later,  absorbed  the  ephemeral  Latin  realm  of  Romania ; 
at  Trebizond,  on  the  shores  of  the  Black  Sea,  another 
Al£xios,  the  grandson  of  the  Emperor  Andr6nikos  I., 
established  another  empire,  which  survived  the  Turkish 
capture  of  Constantinople ;  while  in  Europe,  the  bastard 
Michael  Angelos,  first  cousin  of  the  Emperor  Isaac  II., 
created  a  Greek  principality,  the  Despotat  of  Epiros,  Hellas, 
or  Arta,  as  it  was  variously  called,  which  played  a  great  part 
in  the  history  of  Frankish  Greece.  The  founder  of  this  new 
Greek  dynasty  in  Epiros  was  no  ordinary  man ;  son  of  a 
former  governor  of  that  province,  he  had  been  given  as  a 
hostage  in  earlier  life  to  the  Emperor  Barbarossa,  when 
that  monarch  was  on  his  way  to  the  Holy  Land,  and  he  had 
received  the  post  of  governor  of  the  Themes  of  Hellas  and  the 
Peloponnese  shortly  before  Constantinople  fell.  After  that 
catastrophe,  he  had  attached  himself,  as  we  saw,  to  Boniface 
in  the  hope  of  obtaining  some  advantage  from  him.  The 
discontent  of  the  Greeks  of  the  province  of  Nikopolis,  which 
included  Akarnania,  iEtolia  and  Epiros,  with  the  tyranny  of 
their  Byzantine  governor,  Senacherim,  at  this  moment 
reached  his  ears ;  he  slipped  away  from  the  Frankish  camp, 
went  to  Arta,  and,  finding  the  governor  dead,  married  his 
widow,  a  daughter  of  the  great  family  of  Melissen6s,  and 
established  himself  as  an  independent  Greek  sovereign, 
whose  sway  extended  from  his  capital  of  Arta  to  Joannina  in 
the  north,  to  Naupaktos  on  the  Gulf  of  Corinth  in  the  south, 
1  Villehardouin,  op.  ctl,  i.,  274,  358,  chs.  ccx.,  cclxxiii. 


42  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

and  apparently  included  the  island  of  Leukas  in  the  Ionian 
sea.1  Ere  long,  Durazzo  became  his  northern,  and  part  of 
Thessaly  his  eastern,  boundary,  and  he  succeeded  in 
enlisting  the  sympathies  of  the  three  different  races — Greeks, 
Albanians,  and  Wallachians,  who  formed  the  population 
of  his  dominions.  The  Greeks  naturally  welcomed  a  man 
whose  wife  was  a  native  of  the  country  and  whose  father  had 
been  its  governor.  The  Albanians  were  ready  to  serve  a 
ruler  who  paid  them  well  and  regarded  their  predatory 
habits  as  a  positive  benefit  when  they  were  exercised  at  the 
cost  of  his  foes.  The  Wallachians  of  Thessaly  sought 
protection  against  the  Franks,  and  all  three  races  recognised 
his  ability  and  experience.  Moreover,  the  machinery  of  the 
Byzantine  administration  lay  ready  to  his  hand.  There  was 
merely  a  change  of  name  but  not  of  system,  except  in  so  far 
as  the  taxes  were  now  expended  in  the  country  instead  of 
being  sent  to  the  distant  capital.  The  configuration  of 
Epiros  has  always  made  it  a  difficult  land  to  conquer ;  and 
in  the  first  years  of  his  reign,  Michael's  enemies  were  busy 
elsewhere.  He  felt  so  secure,  that  he  crossed  into  the 
Peloponnese  to  assist  the  Greeks  in  their  stand  against  the 
Franks  at  Koundoura,  as  we  saw  above;  even  though  he 
was  defeated  with  considerable  loss,  he  accepted  the  damnosa 
hereditas  of  Nauplia,  Argos,  and  Corinth,  when,  in  1208, 
Sgour6s  at  last  in  despair  leapt  on  horseback  from 
Akrocorinth  and  perished  a  formless  mass  of  broken  bones 
on  the  rocks  below.  Henceforth,  Michael  was  the  sole 
champion  of  Hellenism  in  Europe ;  he  was  styled  "  the  lord 
of  Corinth,"  and  his  brother  Theodore  governed  the  heritage 
of  Sgour6s  in  his  name.  * 

The  Greek  islands  had  been,  for  the  most  part,  allotted  to 
Venice  by  the  partition  treaty,  the  Cyclades  among  them. 

1  Villehardouin,  op,  city  I.,  210,  ch.  clix. ;  Akropolita,  15-16 ;  Nik&as, 
841  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  I.,  13 ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherckes,  II., 
i.,  401-2.  There  is  no  direct  evidence  as  to  Leukas,  except  that  it 
was  ecclesiastically  under  the  Despots'  influence ;  but  its  inclusion  in 
the  Despotat  at  this  period  is  probable.  Cf.  Roman6s,  Tpanavbs  Zrfpfr*, 
297  ;  Blant6s,  'H  Aev/rdt  inrb  rote  Qpdytcovs,  4  ;  Bi/famyA  XpoviKd,  iii.,  270,  276. 

2  Lampros,  'leropla  rrjs  t6A*  wt  A^kwf,  i.,  42 1, «.  1 ;  Henri  de  Valenciennes, 
apud  Buchon,  Recherckes  et  Materiaux,  ii.,  209.  Only  one  MS.  adds  the 
title  le  signour  de  Chorynte, 


THE  CYCLADES  43 

But  the  Venetian  Government,  with  its  usual  commercial 
astuteness,  soon  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  conquest  of 
that  large  group  of  islands  would  too  severely  tax  the 
resources  of  the  state.  It  was  therefore  decided  to  leave  the 
task  of  occupying  them  to  private  citizens,  who  would  plant 
Venetian  colonies  in  the  iEgean,  and  live  on  friendly  terms 
with  the  republic.  There  was  no  lack  of  enterprise  among 
the  Venetians  of  that  generation,  and  it  so  happened  that  at 
that  very  moment  the  Venetian  colony  at  Constantinople 
contained  the  very  man  for  such  an  undertaking.  The  old 
doge  Dandolo  had  taken  with  him  on  the  crusade  his 
nephew,  Marco  Sanudo,  a  bold  warrior  and  a  skilful 
diplomatist,  who  had  signalised  himself  by  negotiating  the 
sale  of  Crete  to  the  republic,  and  was  then  filling  the  post  of 
judge  in  what  we  should  now  call  the  Consular  Court  at 
Constantinople.  On  hearing  the  decision  of  his  government, 
Sanudo  quitted  the  bench,  gathered  round  him  a  band  of 
adventurous  spirits,  to  whom  he  promised  fiefs  in  the  El 
Dorado  of  the  iEgean,  equipped  eight  galleys  at  his  own  cost, 
and  sailed  with  them  to  carve  out  a  duchy  for  himself  in  the 
islands  of  the  Archipelago.  There  was  no  one  to  dispute  his 
claim,  though  L6on  Gabal&s,  the  Greek  archon  of  Rhodes 
and  Karpathos,  styled  himself  "  Lord  of  the  Cyclades,"  and 
even  "  Caesar." l  Seventeen  islands  speedily  submitted,  and 
at  one  spot  alone  did  Sanudo  meet  with  any  real  resistance. 
Naxos  has  always  been  the  pearl  of  the  jEgean :  poets 
placed  there  the  beautiful  myth  of  Ariadne  and  Dionysos ; 
Herodotos  describes  it  as  "excelling  the  other  islands  in 
prosperity  "  ;  even  to-day,  when  so  many  of  the  Cyclades  are 
barren  rocks,  the  orange  and  lemon  groves  of  Naxos  entitle 
it,  even  more  than  Zante,  to  the  proud  name  of  "  flower  of 
the  Levant"  This  was  the  island  which  now  opposed  the 
Venetian  filibuster,  as  centuries  before  it  had  opposed  the 
Persians.  A  body  of  Genoese  pirates  had  occupied  the 
Byzantine  castle  before  Sanudo's  arrival;  but  that  shrewd 
leader,  who  knew  the  value  of  rashness  in  an  emergency, 
burnt  his  galleys,  and  then  bade  his  companions  conquer  or 
die.  The  castle  surrendered  after  a  five  weeks'  siege,  so  that 
by  1207  Sanudo  and  his  comrades  had  conquered  a  duchy, 
1  Akropolita,  49,  92  ;  Nik&as,  842. 


44  THE  FRANK3SH  CONQUEST 

which  lasted  between  three  and  four  centuries.  His 
duchy  included,  besides  Naxos,  where  he  fixed  his  capital, 
the  famous  marble  island  of  Faros;  Antiparos,  with  its 
curious  grotto ;  Kimolos,  celebrated  for  its  fuller's  earth ; 
Melos,  whose  sad  fortunes  had  furnished  Thucydides  with 
one  of  the  most  curious  passages  in  his  history ;  Amorgos, 
the  home  of  Simonides,  Ios  or  Nio,  the  supposed  tomb  of 
Homer :  Kythnos,  Sikinos,  and  Siphnos ;  and  Syra,  destined 
at  a  much  later  date  to  be  the  most  important  of  all  the 
Cyclades.  True  to  his  promise,  Sanudo  divided  some  of  the 
islands  among  his  companions ;  thus  Marino  Dandolo, 
another  nephew  of  the  great  doge,  who  had  captured 
Andros,  held  that  fine  island,  the  second  largest  of  the  group, 
as  a  sub-fief  of  his  cousin's  duchy;  Leonardo  Foscolo 
received  on  similar  terms  the  distant  island  of  Anaphe ;  the 
volcanic  island  of  Santorin,  as  the  classic  Thera  was  called 
in  the  Middle  Ages,  from  the  martyrdom  on  its  rocks  of  one  of 
the  many  St  Irenes  in  the  Greek  calendar,  fell  to  the  share 
of  Jacopo  Barozzi,  and  Astypalaia,  or  Stampalia,  to  that  of 
the  Quirini  with  whose  name  it  is  still  associated  in  that  of  a 
street,  a  bridge,  and  a  palace  at  Venice.  The  brothers 
Andrea  and  Geremia  Ghisi,  both  enterprising  men,  not  only 
acquired  Tenos  and  Mykonos,  but  extended  their  conquests 
to  the  northern  Sporades,  occupying  Skyros,  Skopelos,  and 
Skiathos,  regardless  of  the  fact  that  two  of  these  islands 
Tenos  and  Skyros,  belonged  to  the  Emperor  of  Romania, 
according  to  the  deed  of  partition.  With  the  aid  of  Domenico 
Michieli  and  Pietro  Giustiniani,  they  added  to  their  island 
domain  little  Seriphos,  the  Botany  Bay  of  the  early  Roman 
Empire,  and  Keos,  the  refuge  of  Akomin£tos,  which  a  few 
years  earlier  had  repulsed  the  Italian  tax-gatherers  from 
Eubcea.1  Patmos,  doubtless  by  reason  of  its  religious 
associations,  was  not  only  allowed  to  be  independent,  but  the 
monks  received  many  privileges  from  the  Venetians. 
Lemnos,  which  had  been  included  in  the  imperial  share  at 
the    partition,    became   the    fief    of   the    Navigajosi,    who 

1  A.  Dandolo,  M.  Sanudo,  and  Navagero  apud  Muratori,  op.  cit.y  xii., 
354 ;  xxii.,  545  ;  xxiii.,  986 ;  Enrico  Dandolo,  Cronaca  Veneta^  fol.  45  ; 
Laurentius  dc  Monacis,  Chronieon,  143  ;  Lampros,  M«xed>X  'Ato/cu'drou, 
i.,  389-90- 


EUBCEA  45 

received  from  the  emperor  the  title  of  Grand  Duke,  borne  in 
Byzantine  days  by  the  Imperial  Lord  High  Admiral  The 
remote  island  of  Kythera,  in  later  times  strangely  reckoned 
as  one  of  the  Ionian  group,  was  claimed  by  Marco  Venier, 
on  the  ground  that  the  birthplace  of  Venus  belonged  of  right 
to  a  family  which  boasted  its  descent  from  her,  while  the 
Viari  became  marquises  of  tiny  Cerigotto.1 

The  long  island  of  Euboea,  which  belongs  rather  to  con- 
tinental Greece  than  to  the  Archipelago,  had  various  vicissi- 
tudes. It  had  been  taken  in  1205,  as  we  saw,' by  Jacques 
d'Avesnes,  who  was  too  much  occupied  with  the  siege  of 
Corinth  to  concern  himself  greatly  with  the  island,  and  as 
he  died  without  heirs  a  few  years  later,  he  founded  no 
dynasty  in  Negroponte,  merely  bestowing  lands  there  upon 
the  Templars  for  the  repose  of  his  soul.2  Boniface,  however, 
divided  Euboea  into  three  large  fiefs,  which  were  granted  to 
three  gentlemen  of  Verona — Ravano  dalle  Carceri,  his  relative 
Giberto,  and  Pegoraro  dei  Pegorari.  The  Dalle  Carceri 
family,  long  ago  extinct,  was  at  that  time  influential  at 
Verona.  One  of  the  two  town  councillors  in  1178  was  a 
member  of  the  clan;  and,  of  Ravano's  two  brothers, 
Redondello  was  Podestd,  in  12 10,  and  built  the  old  wooden 
Casa  dei  Mercanti,  as  a  modern  inscription  on  the  later 
building  still  reminds  the  traveller,  while  Henry  was  bishop 
of  Mantua.8  Ravano  himself  had  rendered  signal  service  to 
the  King  of  Salonika  by  assisting  Marco  Sanudo  in  arranging 
the  sale  of  Crete,  while  the  names  of  the  other  two  appear 
as  witnesses  to  the  deed  of  sale.  Ignoring  the  assignment 
of  Oreos  and  Karystos  to  Venice  by  the  treaty  of  partition, 
Boniface  invested  Pegoraro  with  the  north,  Giberto  with  the 
centre,  and  Ravano  with  the  south  of  the  island,  and  the 
three  lords  assumed  the  name  of  terzieri,  terriers,  or  triarchs, 
of  Euboea.  With  the  southern  barony  of  Karystos  seems  to 
have  been  united  the  island  of  iEgina,  likewise  on  paper  a 
Venetian  possession.4    Ere  long,  by  the  return  of  Pegoraro 

1  RomamSs,  op.  tit.,  228. 

*  Ejristolce  Innocentii  III.,  bk.  xiii.,  lett.  146. 

8  Antiche  Cronache  Veronesi,  i.,  388 ;  Panvinius,  Antiquitatum 
Veronensium,  153,  189;  Turresanus,  Elogium  historicarum  nobilium 
Verona  Prapaginunty  76-7  ;  Pontes  Rerum  Austriacarum,  xiii.,  90. 

4  A.  Dandolo  apud  Muratori,  xii.,  334 ;  £.  Dandolo,  Cronaca  Veneta, 


46  THE  FRANKISH  CONQUEST 

to  Italy  and  the  death  of  Giberto,  Ravano  became  sole  lord 
of  Euboea. 

The  republic  adopted  in  the  case  of  Corfu  much  the 
same  plan  as  that  which  she  employed  in  the  Cyclades.  It 
was,  however,  first  necessary  to  dislodge  the  Genoese  pirate, 
Leone  Vetrano,  who  had  made  the  island  his  headquarters 
a  few  years  before  the  Crusade.1  It  is  not  clear  whether  his 
men  were  actually  occupying  the  castle,  or  whether  the 
islanders  had  temporarily  reverted  *  to  the  Byzantine  Empire 
at  the  time  when  the  Crusaders  halted  there  on  their  way  to 
Constantinople.  But  in  either  case  the  hardy  Genoese 
captain,  as  his  compatriots  called  him,  had  no  intention  of 
abandoning  an  island  at  once  so  rich  and  so  splendidly 
situated  for  the  purposes  of  his  profession.  To  the  Venetians, 
on  the  other  hand,  Corfu  was  naturally  a  position  of  import- 
ance, the  first  link  in  the  chain  of  their  newly-acquired  Greek 
possessions;  least  of  all  did  they  desire  it  to  fall  into  the 
hands  of  a  pirate  who  was — what  was  worse — a  Genoese. 
Accordingly,  the  fleet  which  bore  the  first  Latin  patriarch 
to  Constantinople  in  1 205  formally  took  possession  of  Corfti 
in  the  name  of  the  republic,  after  considerable  resistance  on 
the  part  of  the  inhabitants.  A  Venetian  bailie  was  left  in 
the  island,  which  was  placed  at  first  under  the  direct  authority 
of  the  Commune  of  Venice.  But  scarcely  had  the  fleet  sailed 
than  Vetrano  reappeared  upon  the  scene ;  the  Corfiotes 
gladly  gave  him  provisions  and  admitted  his  men,  thereby 
calling  down  upon  themselves  a  second  Venetian  visitation. 
In  1206,  a  large  fleet  under  the  command  of  the  old  doge 
Dandolo's  son  arrived  in  the  harbour ;  the  castle,  in  spite  of 
a  spirited  defence,  was  taken  by  escalade,  and  the  capture  of 
Vetrano  on  the  high  seas  and  his  execution  at  Corfu,  together 
with  some  sixty  of  his  partisans,  was  intended  as  a  salutary 
lesson  to  the  rest  of  the  islanders.  The  castle,  whose  twin 
summits  (Kopv<fx&)  gave  the  island  its  mediaeval  and  modern 
name,  was  fortified  and  a  governor  appointed.  But  the 
republic  realised,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Cyclades,  that  she  had 

foL  44 ;  Magno  apud  Hop^  Chroniques,  179 ;  Hopf;  Karystos  (tr.  Sar- 
dagna),  33  ;  Urkunden  undZusatze  zur  Geschichte  der  Insel  Andros,  225. 

1  Sena,  Sioria  delta  antica  Uguria,  i.,  465. 

2  As  Roman6s  and  Idrom&ios  maintain. 


CORFU  47 

not  the  requisite  strength  for  the  direct  government  of  so 
troublesome  a  possession.  Accordingly,  in  1207,  Corfii, 
together  with  the  islets  belonging  to  it,  was  transferred  to 
ten  Venetian  nobles,  for  themselves  and  their  heirs,  on 
consideration  that  they  maintained  the  defences  and  made 
an  annual  payment  of  "  500  good  gold  pieces  of  the  Emperor 
Manuel."  The  republic  reserved  special  trade  privileges  to 
her  subjects  in  the  colony,  and  great  care  was  taken  to 
protect  the  Greeks,  who  were  to  be  made  to  swear  fealty 
to  her.  The  colonists  were  enjoined  to  exact  from  the 
natives  no  further  dues  than  they  had  been  accustomed  to 
pay  in  Byzantine  times,  and  pledged  themselves  to  respect 
the  existing  rights  of  the  Greek  Church.  This  arrangement, 
it  was  fondly  hoped,  would  secure  the  possession  of  the 
island.1  At  any  rate,  the  fate  of  Vetrano  was  not  without 
its  effect  in  other  parts  of  the  Ionian  group.  Alarmed  at 
his  fellow-pirate's  end  on  the  gallows,  Count  Maio,  or 
Matthew,  Orsini,  who  ruled  over  Cephalonia  and  Zante, 
discovered  that  he  had  qualms  about  the  state  of  his  soul, 
and,  in  1207,  placed  his  territories  under  the  authority  of 
Pope  Innocent  III.,  whose  interest  in  Greek  affairs  strikes 
every  reader  of  his  correspondence.  Two  years  later, 
however,  the  count  thought  it  wiser  to  acknowledge  the 
over  lordship  of  Venice,  which  accordingly  left  him  in 
undisturbed  possession  of  his  islands,  although  they  were 
hers  by  the  letter  of  the  partition  treaty.2 

Lastly,  there  remained  to  be  occupied  the  largest  of  all 
the  Greek  islands,  that  of  Crete,  which  Boniface  had  sold  so 
cheaply  to  the  Venetians.  Even  before  that  transaction,  the 
great  rivals  of  Venice,  the  Genoese,  had  established  a  colony 
there,  so  that  it  was  clear  from  the  outset  that  the  island 
would  be  an  apple  of  discord  between  the  two  commercial 
commonwealths.  The  Venetians  began  their  occupation  by 
landing  a  small  garrison  at  Spinalonga  in  the  east  of  the 

1  Martin  da  Canal,  La  Ckromque  des  Veniciens  in  Archivio  Storicoy 
ItalianOy  viii.,  346,  348,  720 ;  A.  Dandolo  and  Sanudo  apud  Muratori 
xiL,  335  ;  xxiil,  535  ;  E.  Dandolo,  Cronaca  Veneta,  fol.  43 ;  Tafel  und 
Thomas,  Fontes  Rerutn  Austriacarum,  xii.,  569 ;  xiii.,  55-9 ;  Mustoxidi, 
DelU  Cose  Corciresij  vi.-viii. 

2  Epistola  Innocentii  ///.,  vol  ii.,  pp.  16,  73  ;  A.  Dandolo  apud 
Muratori,  xii.,  336 


48  THE  PRANKISH  CONQUEST 

island ;  but,  before  the  rest  of  it  could  be  annexed,  a  Genoese 
citizen,  Enrico  Pescatore,  Count  of  Malta,  and  one  of  the  most 
daring  seamen  of  that  adventurous  age,  set  foot  in  Crete,  at 
the  instigation  of  Genoa,  and  received  the  homage  of  the 
Cretans  and  the  submission  of  the  helpless  and  isolated 
Venetian  garrison.1  A  larger  force  was  then  despatched 
from  Venice,  which  drove  out  the  Maltese  corsair,  and 
appointed  Tiepolo  as  the  first  Venetian  governor,  or  duke, 
as  he  was  styled,  of  Crete.  But  Venice  was  not  yet  to  have 
undisputed  possession  of  her  purchase.  The  Count  of  Malta 
appealed,  as  a  faithful  son  of  the  Church,  to  Innocent  III.; 
Genoa  espoused  his  cause  as  her  own,  and  five  years  elapsed 
before  the  count  was  finally  defeated  and  an  armistice  with 
Genoa  permitted  the  Venetians  in  121 2  to  make  the  first 
comprehensive  attempt  at  colonising  the  island  and  organis- 
ing its  administration.  Thus  early  the  merchants  of  San 
Marco  began  to  learn  the  lesson  that  Crete,  though  it  cost 
little  to  buy,  was  a  most  expensive  possession  to  maintain.2 

1  NikeUs,  843. 

2  Laurentius  de  Monacis,  Chromcony  153.  This  chronicler,  who 
wrote  in  14x3,  and  was  Venetian  Chancellor  of  Crete,  is  the  best  authority 
for  the  island's  history  down  to  1354.  Gerola  {La  Domination*  Genovese 
in  Creta)  gives  the  best  modern  account  of  these  first  years. 


CHAPTER   III 

THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST  (1207-1214) 

Having  thus  described  the  manner  in  which  the  Franks 
occupied  the  various  portions  of  Greece,  let  us  see  how  they 
proceeded  to  organise  their  conquests.  The  usual  tendency 
of  the  desperately  logical  Latin  intellect,  when  brought  face 
to  face  with  a  new  set  of  political  conditions,  is  to  frame  a 
paper  constitution,  absolutely  perfect  in  theory,  and  absolutely 
unworkable  in  practice.  But  the  French  noblemen,  whom 
an  extraordinary  accident  had  converted  into  Spartan  and 
Athenian  law-givers,  resisted  this  temptation,  nor  did  they 
seek  inspiration  from  the  laws  of  Solon  and  Lycurgus.  They 
simply  transplanted  the  feudal  system,  to  which,  as  we  saw,  the 
Greeks  had  not  been  altogether  strangers  under  the  dynasty 
of  the  Comneni ;  and  they  applied  the  legal  principles,  em- 
bodied a  century  earlier  in  the  famous  "  Assizes  of  Jerusalem," 
and  much  more  recently  borrowed  by  Amauri  de  Lusignan 
for  his  kingdom  of  Cyprus,  to  the  new  Frankish  states  in 
Greece.1  We  have,  however,  a  detailed  account  of  the  political 
organisation  of  only  one  of  these  principalities  —  that  of 
Achaia,  the  largest  and  the  most  important  at  this  stage  of 
Frankish  history. 

It  was  not  the  lot  of  Champlitte  to  do  more  than  lay  the 
foundations  of  his  principality.  While  he  was  engaged  in 
this  work  of  organisation,  he  received  the  news  that  his 
eldest  surviving  brother  Louis  had  died  without  heirs — an 
event  which  necessitated  his  return  to  France  to  claim  his 
Burgundian  inheritance.  But  before  he  set  out,  he  appointed 
a  commission,  consisting  of  two  Latin  bishops,  two  bannerets, 
1  X.  r.  M.,  11.  2611-14,  L.  d.  C,  79. 
49  D 


50       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

and  four  or  five  leading  Greeks,  under  the  presidency  of 
Villehardouin,  for  the  purpose  of  dividing  the  Morea  into 
fiefs,  and  of  assigning  these  to  the  members  of  the  conquering 
force  according  to  their  wealth  and  the  number  of  their 
followers.  Champlitte  approved  the  commission's  report, 
and  bestowed  upon  Villehardouin  the  baronies  of  Kalamata 
and  Arkadia  (or  Kyparissia)  as  compensation  for  the  loss  of 
his  original  fief  of  Coron,  now  in  the  hands  of  the  Venetians. 
He  then  appointed  his  nephew  Hugh  as  his  deputy  or  bailie 
in  Achaia,  and  sailed  in  1209  f°r  the  West.  But  on  the 
journey  through  Apulia  he  died,  and,  as  his  nephew  did 
not  long  survive  him,  Villehardouin  carried  on  the  govern- 
ment as  bailie  till  the  next-of-kin  should  arrive  from  France 
to  claim  it1 

Villehardouin's  first  act  was  to  summon  a  parliament  at 
Andravida,  then  the  seat  of  government,  where  the  book,  or 
"  register  "  as  the  chronicler  calls  it,  containing  the  report  of 
the  commission  was  produced.  According  to  this  Achaian 
Doomsday  Book,  twelve  baronies,  whose  number  recalls  the 
twelve  peers  of  Charlemagne,  had  been  created,  their  holders, 
with  the  other  lieges,  forming  a  high  court,  which  not  only 
advised  the  prince  in  political  matters,  but  acted  as  a  judicial 
tribunal  for  the  decision  of  feudal  questions.  In  the  creation 
of  these  twelve  baronies,  due  regard  was  paid  to  the  fact  that 
the  Franks  were  a  military  colony  in  the  midst  of  an  alien 
and  possibly  hostile  population,  spread  over  a  country- 
possessing  remarkable  strategic  positions.  Later  on,  after 
the  distribution  of  the  baronies,  strong  castles  were  erected 
in  each,  upon  some  natural  coign  of  vantage,  from  which  the 
baron  could  overawe  the  surrounding  country.  The  main 
object  of  this  system  may  be  seen  from  the  name  of  the 
famous  Arkadian  fortress  of  Matagrifon 2  ("  Kill-Greek,"  the 
Greeks  being  usually  called  Grifon  by  the  French  chroniclers), 
built  near  the  modern  Demetsana  by  the  baron  of  Akova, 

1  The  Chronicle  of  the  Morea  says  that  Champlitte  appointed 
Villehardouin  as  his  bailie.  But  Innocent  III.,  a  contemporary  extremely 
well  informed  in  Greek  affairs,  specially  mentions  "  Hugo  de  Cham  "  as 
the  bailie.    {Epistola,  bk.  xiii.,  lett.  170). 

f  Or  "Stop-Greek"  from  mater.  The  name  of  Matagrifon  existed 
also  at  Messenia. 


THE  BARONIES  OF  ACHAIA  51 

Gautier  de  Rozieres,  to  protect  the  rich  valley  of  the  Alpheios. 
The  splendid  remains  of  the  castle  of  Karytaina,  the  Greek 
Toledo,  which  dominates  the  gorge  of  that  classic  river, 
which  the  Franks  called  Charbon,  still  mark  the  spot  where 
Hugues  de  Bruyferes  and  his  son  Geoffrey  built  a  stronghold 
out  of  the  ruins  of  the  Hellenic  Brenthe  to  terrify  the 
Slavs  of  Skorti,  the  ancient  Gortys,  and  the  special  impor- 
tance of  these  two  baronies  was  demonstrated  by  the  bestowal 
of  twenty-four  knights'  fees  upon  the  former,  and  of  twenty- 
two  upon  the  latter.  The  castle-crowned  hill  of  Passav&, 
near  Gytheion,  so  called  from  the  French  war-cry  "Passe 
Avant,"  still  reminds  us  how  Jean  de  Neuilly,  hereditary 
marshal  of  Achaia  and  holder  of  four  fees,  once  watched  the 
restless  men  of  Maina;  and,  if  earthquakes  have  left  no 
mediaeval  buildings  at  Vostitza,  the  classic  Aigion,  where 
Hugues  de  Lille  de  Charpigny  received  eight  knights'  fees, 
his  family  name  still  survives  in  the  village  of  Kerpine, 
now  a  station  on  the  funicular  railway  between  Diakopht6 
and  Kalavryta.  At  Kalavryta  itself,  Othon  de  Tournay,  and 
at  Chalandritza,  to  the  south  of  Patras,  Audebert  de  la 
Tr£mouille,  scion  of  a  family  famous  in  the  history  of  France, 
were  established,  with  twelve  and  four  fiefs  respectively. 
Veligosti,  near  Megalopolis,  with  four,  fell  to  the  share  of  the 
Belgian  Matthieu  de  Valaincourt  de  Mons,  and  Nikli,  near 
Tegea,  with  six,  to  that  of  Guillaume  de  Morlay.  Guy  de 
Nivelet  kept  the  Tzikones  of  Leonidi  in  check  and  watched 
the  plain  of  Lakonia  from  his  barony  of  Geraki  with  its  six 
fiefs ;  and  Gritzena,  entrusted  to  a  baron  named  Luke,1  with 
four  fiefs  depending  on  it,  guarded  the  ravines  of  the 
mountainous  region  round  Kalamata.  Patras  became  the 
barony  of  Guillaume  Aleman,  a  member  of  a  Provencal 
family,  whose  name  still  exists  at  Corfu,  and  the  bold  baron 
did  not  scruple  to  build  his  castle  out  of  the  house  and 
church  of  the  Latin  archbishop.  Finally,  the  dozen  was 
completed  by  the  fiefs  of  Kalamata  and  Arkadia,  which  the 
bailie  had  received  from  Champlitte.  In  addition  to  these 
twelve  temporal  peers,  there  were  seven  ecclesiastical  barons, 

1  Dorotheos  of  Monemvasia  (Bi/SXto*  laropiKbv,  464)  alone  gives  his 
surname  as  Tourrrr^Tpowre,  an  obvious  corruption  of  "  de  Charpigny." 


62       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

whose  sees  were  carved  out  on  the  lines  of  the  existing  Greek 
organisation,  and  of  whom  Antelme  of  Clugny,  Latin 
archbishop  of  Patras  and  primate  of  Achaia,  was  the  chief. 
Under  him  were  his  six  suffragans  of  Olena  (whose  bishop 
took  his  title  from  a  small  village  near  the  modern  Pyrgos, 
but  who  resided  at  Andravida),  Modon,  Coron,  Veligosti, 
Amyklai,  and  Lacedaemonia.  The  archbishop  received 
eight  knights'  fees,  the  bishops  four  a-piece,  and  the  same 
number  was  assigned  to  each  of  the  three  great  military 
orders  of  the  Teutonic  Knights,  the  Knights  of  St  John,  and 
the  Templars.  The  headquarters  of  the  Teutonic  Knights 
were  at  Mostenitsa,  near  Kalamata,  while  the  Knights  of  St 
John  were  established  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Modon. 
When,  a  century  later,  the  Templars  were  dissolved,  their 
possessions  in  Achaia  and  Elis  went  to  the  Knights  of  St 
John.  In  Elis,  too,  was  the  domain  of  the  prince,  and  his 
usual  residence,  when  he  was  not  at  Andravida  (or 
Andreville),  was  at  Lacedaemonia,  or  La  Cr^monie,  as  the 
Franks  called  it.  The  knights  and  esquires  who  received 
one  fief  each,  were  too  numerous  for  the  patience  of  the 
chronicler.  The  serfs  living  on  the  baronies  were  assigned, 
like  so  many  chattels,  to  their  new  lords. 

After  the  distribution  of  the  baronies  came  the  assign- 
ment of  military  service.  All  the  vassals  were  liable  to 
render  four  months'  service  in  the  field,  and  to  spend  four 
months  in  garrison  (from  which  the  prelates  and  the  three 
military  orders  were  alone  exempted) ;  and  even  during  the 
remaining  four  months,  which  they  could  pass  at  home,  they 
were  expected  to  hold  themselves  ready  to  obey  the 
summons  of  the  prince,  who  could  fix  what  months  of  the 
year  he  chose  for  the  performance  of  their  military  duties. 
After  the  age  of  sixty  (or,  according  to  a  less  probable 
reading,  forty),  personal  service  was  no  longer  required,  but 
the  vassal  must  send  his  son,  or,  if  he  had  no  son,  someone 
else  in  his  stead.  Those  vassals  who  held  four  fiefs,  the 
bannerets  as  they  were  called,  had  each  to  appear  with  one 
knight  and  twelve  esquires  mustered  beneath  the  folds  of  his 
banner,  while  the  holder  of  more  than  four  was  bound  to 
equip,  for  every  additional  fief  that  he  held,  two  mounted 
esquires  or  one  knight ;  every  knight  or  esquire,  "  sergeants 


LEGAL  TRIBUNALS  53 

of  the  conquest"  as  they  were  called,  must  render  service 
with  his  own  body  for  his  single  fief.  Thus,  the  Franks  were 
on  a  constant  war  footing;  their  whole  organisation  was 
military — a  fact  which  explains  the  ease  with  which  they  held 
down  the  unwarlike  Greeks,  so  many  times  their  superiors  in 
numbers.  This  military  organisation  had,  however,  as  the 
eminent  modern  Greek  historian  Paparreg6poulos  has 
pointed  out,  the  effect  of  making  the  Greeks,  too,  imbibe  in 
course  of  time  something  of  the  spirit  of  their  conquerors. 

Besides  the  twelve  barons  and  the  other  lieges,  the 
ecclesiastical  peers  had  the  right  of  taking  part  in  the 
proceedings  of  the  High  Court,  except  when  it  was  sitting 
to  try  cases  of  murder ;  and  the  bishop  of  Olena,  in  particular, 
as  being  nearest  to  the  capital  of  Andravida,  whither  his 
residence  was  ere  long  transferred,  is  mentioned  by  the 
chronicler  as  being  present  at  its  deliberations.1  According 
to  the  usual  Frankish  system,  there  was  a  second  court  of 
burgesses,  presided  over  by  the  prince's  nominee,  who  bore 
the  title  of  viscount  We  hear  on  several  occasions  of  an 
assembly  of  the  burgesses  in  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea* 
and  towards  the  close  of  the  Burgundian  dynasty  at  Athens, 
the  viscount  is  specially  mentioned.8  Before  this  lower  court 
came  the  legal  business  of  plain  citizens  ;  and,  at  least  in  the 
fourteenth  century,  the  prince  had  two  tribunals,  at  the 
important  towns  of  Glarentza  and  Androusa.  Each  of  the 
great  baronies  seems  also  to  have  had  a  court  of  its  own ; 
we  are  specially  told,  on  one  occasion,  how  "  the  elders "  of 
the  barony  of  Akova  were  summoned,  and  how  they  were 
bidden  to  bring  "  the  minutes "  (ra  irpaxTiKa)  of  their  pro- 
ceedings with  them.4  Round  the  prince  there  grew  up  a 
hierarchy  of  great  officials,  with  high-sounding  titles,  to 
which  the  Greeks  had  no  difficulty  in  fitting  Byzantine 
equivalents.     We  hear  of  the  hereditary  marshal  (irpwroaT- 

1  Canciani,  Barbarorum  Leges  Antiques ^  Hi.,  511,  513.  X.  r.  M.v  U. 
1903-2016,  3145-72 ;  L.  <L  C,  50-6 ;  L.  d.  F.f  28-32.  The  Aragonese 
version  gives  details,  derived  from  a  later  date,  of  the  distribution  of 
lands  to  the  knights,  and  mentions  the  serfs. 

1  LL  3209,  5848,  8632  ;  Z.  d.  C,  297. 

*  L.d.C^  409. 

4  X.  r.  M.f  1L  7682-3. 


54       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

pdropa?) ;  of  the  chancellor  (XoyoOeTw),  who  presided  over  the 
High  Court  when  the  prince  wished  to  argue  a  case  before 
it,  and  who  represented  his  master  as  a  plenipotentiary 
abroad  and  signed  treaties  on  his  behalf;  of  the  chamberlain 
(Trporrofito'Tiapw,  or  Trparroffitmapioi) ;  of  the  great  constable 
(Kovroa-TavXoi) ;  of  the  treasurer  (rpi^ovpUpw) ;  and  of  the 
inspector  of  fortifications  (irpofieoupw  tS>v  Kacrrpwv).  The 
prince  himself  bore  a  sceptre  as  the  insignia  of  his  office, 
when  he  presided  over  the  sessions  of  the  High  Court 

We  learn  from  the  Book  of  the  Customs  of  the  Empire  of 
Romania — a  codification  of  the  Assizes  made  apparently  in 
the  first  quarter  of  the  fourteenth  century  under  Angevin 
auspices  and  still  extant  in  a  Venetian  version  of  a  century 
later — something  about  the  way  in  which  the  feudal  system 
worked  in  the  principality  of  Achaia.  Society  was  there 
composed  of  six  main  elements — the  prince,  the  holders  of 
the  twelve  great  baronies,  or  bers  de  ttrre  in  feudal  parlance ; 
the  greater  and  the  lesser  vassals  (called  respectively  ligii 
and  homines  plani  homagii),  among  whom  were  some 
members  of  the  conquered  race ;  the  freemen ;  and  the  serfs. 
The  prince,  at  his  accession,  had  to  swear  on  the  gospels  to 
observe  all  the  franchises  and  usages  of  the  Empire  of 
Romania,  to  which  the  barons  tenaciously  held,  and  then 
he  received  the  homage  of  the  barons  and  the  lieges,  signified 
by  a  kiss,  and  the  oath  of  his  inferior  subjects.  The  prince 
and  his  twelve  peers  (who,  at  the  time  when  the  Assizes 
were  codified,  consisted  of  the  Dukes  of  Athens  and  of  Naxos, 
the  triarchs  of  Negroponte,  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  the 
Count  of  Cephalonia,  and  the  Moreote  barons  of  Karytaina, 
Patras,  Matagrifon,  and  Kalavryta,  together  with  the  heredi- 
tary marshal  of  the  principality)  alone  possessed  the  power 
of  inflicting  life  and  death ;  but  not  even  the  prince  himself 
could  punish  one  of  his  feudatories  without  the  consent  of 
a  majority  of  the  lieges.  If  he  were  taken  prisoner,  as 
happened  to  the  third  Villehardouin,  he  could  call  upon  his 
vassals  to  become  hostages  in  his  place  until  he  had  raised 
the  amount  of  his  ransom.  No  one,  except  the  twelve  peers, 
was  permitted  to  build  a  castle  in  Achaia  without  his  leave ; 
and  any  vassal  who  quitted  the  principality  and  stayed 
abroad  without  his  consent,  was  liable  to  lose  his  fiet    Leave 


POWERS  OF  THE  PRINCE  55 

of  absence  was,  however,  never  refused,  if  the  vassal  wished 
to  claim  the  succession  to  a  fief  abroad,  to  contract  a  marriage, 
or  to  make  a  pilgrimage  to  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  to  the 
churches  of  St  Peter  and  St  Paul  in  Rome,  or  to  that  of 
St  James  at  Compostella ;  but  in  such  cases  the  absentee 
must  return  within  two  years  and  two  days.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  prince  could  neither  demolish  nor  surrender  a 
frontier  fortress  without  the  consent  of  the  lieges — a  clause 
which  we  shall  find  invoked  by  Guillaume  de  Villehardouin 
in  1262.  It  was  his  bounden  duty  to  provide  for  the  support 
of  a  feudatory  whose  fief  had  been  captured  by  the  enemy ; 
and  his  powers  were  further  restricted  by  the  provision  that 
he  could  arrest  one  of  his  lieges  for  homicide  or  high 
treason  alone.  Nor  could  he  levy  any  taxes  on  the  feudatories, 
the  freemen,  or  their  serfs,  without  the  consent  of  the  lieges, 
feudatories,  and  freemen.  A  liege  could  in  theory,  and  did 
in  practice,  bring  what  we  should  call  a  petition  of  right 
against  the  crown.  In  such  cases,  of  which  we  have  a 
striking  example,  it  was  the  duty  of  the  prince  to  leave  his 
seat  as  president  of  the  High  Court,  and  to  hand  his  sceptre 
to  a  substitute,  in  order  that  he  might  argue  the  case  for  the 
crown  in  person — a  remarkable  proof  of  the  equality  of  the 
sovereign  before  the  feudal  law.  Again  and  again  we  shall 
see  in  the  course  of  this  history  that  a  prince  of  Achaia  was 
not  an  autocrat,  but  merely  primus  inter  pares>  whose  will 
was  limited  by  the  feudal  code  and  by  the  proud  and  powerful 
barons,  its  living  personification.  One  further  provision 
tended  above  all  else  to  weaken  the  central  authority. 
Except  in  the  duchy  of  Naxos,  under  the  Crispo  dynasty, 
the  Salic  law  did  not  obtain  in  the  Latin  states  of  the  Levant, 
and,  by  an  unfortunate  freak  of  nature,  many  of  the  most 
important  baronies,  and  the  principality  itself,  passed  into 
the  hands  of  women.  There  are  few  other  periods  of  history 
in  which  they  have  played  so  prominent  a  part,  and  this 
participation  of  the  weaker  sex  in  the  government  of  a 
purely  military  community,  while  adding  immensely  to  the 
romance  of  the  subject,  had  disastrous  effects  upon  the 
fortunes  of  the  Latin  orient  and  especially  of  Achaia.  Nor 
was  it  the  princely  dignity  alone  which  suffered  by  being 
entrusted  to  a  weak  woman,  whose  sex  and  position  made 


56       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

her  the  object  of  dynastic  and  matrimonial  intrigue,  and 
whose  husband  was  always  a  foreigner  and  therefore  exposed 
to  the  contempt  which  a  proud  aristocracy  usually  feels  foi 
a  prince  consort.  It  happened  on  one  occasion  that  almost 
the  entire  baronage  of  Achaia  was  annihilated  on  the  field  ol 
battle  or  detained  in  the  prisons  of  the  enemy,  and  the  fate 
of  the  principality  was  accordingly  decided  by  the  votes  oi 
its  ladies.  Most  of  the  misfortunes  of  that  warlike  state  may 
be  traced  directly  or  indirectly  to  the  remarkable  lack  ol 
male  heirs  in  most  of  the  great  Frankish  families,  and  to  the 
absence  of  the  Salic  law — a  law  admirably  suited  to  the 
government  of  a  purely  military  community,  surrounded  by 
enemies. 

It  was  vital  to  the  success  of  the  feudal  system  that  the 
feudatories  should  be  persons  well -affected  to  the  prince,  and 
great  care  was  accordingly  taken  to  prevent  fiefs  falling  into 
the  hands  of  strangers.  The  greater  vassals  could  not  sell 
their  fiefs  without  the  prince's  consent ;  but  if  the  liege  were 
a  widow,  she  might  marry  whom  she  pleased,  on  payment  of 
one-third  of  a  year's  income,  provided  that  her  intended 
husband  were  not  an  enemy  of  the  prince.  On  the  death  of 
her  husband,  she  was  entitled  to  a  moiety  of  his  fiefs  and 
castles,  as  well  as  one-half  of  all  the  property  which  he  had 
acquired  during  their  marriage.  When  a  fief  fell  vacant,  the 
successor  must  needs  appear  to  advance  his  claim  within  a 
year  and  a  day  if  he  were  in  Achaia,  within  two  years  and 
two  days  if  he  were  abroad.  Failure  to  put  in  such  an 
appearance  cost  him  his  prospective  fief.  All  freemen 
enjoyed  the  right  of  testamentary  disposition,  and  everyone 
was  allowed  to  sell  his  produce  in,  or  out  of  the  principality. 
But  no  feudatory,  however  eminent,  might  give  his  land  to 
the  church,  to  a  community,  or  to  a  villain,  without  the 
leave  of  the  prince,  who  was  alone  entitled  to  make  such  a 
grant  to  the  ecclesiastical  establishment  This  salutary 
rule,  intended  to  ensure  the  maintenance  of  feudal  land  in 
the  possession  of  those  able  and  liable  to  render  the  full 
feudal  services,  came,  however,  to  be  seriously  infringed  at 
an  early  period  in  the  history  of  Achaia. 

The  lower  ranks  of  this  feudal  society  were  composed 
almost  entirely  of  the  Greeks,  for  on  the  one  hand  the 


THE  SERFS  57 

number  of  French  soldiers  and  camp-followers  who  had 
entered  Achaia  at  the  conquest  was  not  numerous,  and  on 
the  other,  the  "Greek  feudatories,"  of  whom  the  Book  of 
the  Customs  speaks,  must  have  formed  a  small  class,  as 
compared  with  the  vast  mass  of  their  countrymen.  The 
Greek  archons  of  Elis  and  Arkadia,  as  we  saw,  had  made 
special  terms  with  Champlitte,  that  they  should  retain  their 
ancient  privileges,  their  lands,  and  their  serfs;  and  similar 
concessions  were  obtained  by  the  citizens  of  places  which 
surrendered,  such  as  Coron,  Kalamata,  Arkadia,  Nikli,  and 
Lacedaemonia ;  but  the  bulk  of  the  native  population  lived 
and  died  in  a  state  of  serfdom. 

The  position  of  the  serf  was  not  to  be  envied.  He  could 
neither  marry,  nor  give  his  daughter  in  marriage,  without  the 
consent  of  his  lord ;  if  he  died  without  heirs,  his  lord 
succeeded  to  all  his  possessions ;  during  his  lifetime,  he  had 
no  motive  to  be  industrious,  for  his  lord  was  entitled  to  take 
all  his  goods  and  give  them  to  another  serf,  provided  that 
he  was  left  with  just  enough  to  keep  body  and  soul  together. 
Even  his  body  was  regarded  as  a  mere  chattel,  for,  if  a  liege 
killed  his  neighbour's  serf  by  mistake,  he  must  give  the  dead 
man's  master  another  serf  as  compensation,  and  he  could  at 
all  times  give  away  his  own  serfs  to  whomsoever  he  pleased. 
If  a  female  vassal  married  a  serf,  not  only  she,  but  her 
children  also,  descended  into  the  rank  of  serfdom.  There  were 
only  two  ways  in  which  the  serf  could  become  a  freeman  :  by 
the  act  of  the  prince ;  or,  in  the  case  of  a  female  serf,  by 
marrying  a  freeman.  No  serf  might  receive  a  gift  of  feudal 
land  without  the  prince's  leave ;  and,  if  the  serf  were  a  Greek, 
his  evidence  could  not  be  tendered  in  criminal  cases  against 
a  liege.  Still,  even  in  feudal  Achaia,  the  serf  had  some 
rights.  He  could  sell  his  animals,  if  he  chose ;  he  could 
pasture  his  pigs  on  the  acorns  that  covered  the  ground  of  the 
oak-forests,  where,  like  everyone  else,  he  might  cut  firewood 
indiscriminately,  to  the  great  detriment  of  the  country ;  and 
his  lord  could  not  imprison  him  for  more  than  a  single 
night  In  practice,  too,  if  we  may  believe  the  Aragonese 
version  of  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea,  the  conquerors 
did  not  disturb  the  serfs  in  the  possession  of  their  goods. 
But,  save  for  some  few  privileges,  the  serf  was  almost  a  slave! 


m 


58       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

who  worked  for  the  prince,  for  the  prince's  vassals,  or  for  the 
alien  church  of  the  Franks,  in  the  pregnant  words  of  Pope 
Innocent  III.,  "  without  pay  and  without  expenses."1 

Having  thus  established  the  feudal  constitution  of  the 
principality,  Villehardouin  proceeded,  with  the  assistance  of 
the  Greeks,  to  attack  Veligosti  and  Nikli,  which,  though 
already  granted  as  fiefs,  were  still  unconquered.  The  low 
hill  of  Veligosti  was  soon  taken ;  the  high  walls  of  Nikli 
proved  a  more  serious  obstacle ;  but,  when  the  besieger 
vowed  that  he  would  put  the  garrison  to  the  sword,  their 
Greek  relatives  in  his  camp  urged  them  to  surrender  on 
terms.  These  two  places  were  then  handed  over  to  their 
appointed  feudal  lords.  The  large  walled  town  of  Lacedae- 
monia  now  yielded  after  a  five  days'  siege,  and  became  one 
of  Villehardouin's  favourite  residences.  Thence  a  raid  was 
effected  into  the  country  inhabited  by  the  Tzdkones,  and  the 
French  troops  penetrated  as  far  as  the  causeway  which  leads 
to  the  impregnable  fortress  of  Monemvasia.  At  the  request, 
however,  of  the  Lacedaemonian  archons  who  had  lands  in 
that  district,  Villehardouin  recalled  the  raiders,  and  set  about 
the  conquest  of  those  places  which  still  refused  him  homage. 
With  his  usual  tact,  he  called  the  leading  Greeks  to  his 
councils,  and  consulted  with  them  how  he  could  reduce  to 
his  authority  the  strong  Peloponnesian  quadrilateral  of 
Corinth,  Argos,  Nauplia,  and  Monemvasia.  They  pointed 
out  what  the  Franks  had  already  discovered,  that  those 
four  strongholds  were  difficult  to  take  by  force;  but  they 
expressed  their  willingness  to  assist  him,  on  condition  that 
he  swore  in  writing  that  neither  they  nor  their  children  should 
be  forced  to  change  their  faith  and  their  ancient  customs. 
The  French  conqueror  willingly  consented,  for,  like  the 
other  Frankish  rulers  of  Greece,  he  was  not  a  religious 
enthusiast2  It  was  true  that  the  invaders  had  seized  the 
Greek  bishoprics,  that  the  metropolitan  of  Patras  had  dis- 
appeared in  nameless  exile,8  that  a  Latin  prelate  occupied 

1  Epistolcty  bk.  xiii.,  lett  159  ;  Canciani,  Barbarorum  Leges  Antiqtiay 
>».,  493-534 ;  X.  r.  M.,  1L  7587-9,  7669-70,  7876-87,  7880-95 ;  JL  d.  C, 
399i  436  ;  L.  d.  P.,  31-2.  2  X.  r.  M„  11.  2017-97. 

3  Lampros,  Mtxa^X 'A KOfUFdrov,  ii.,  356;  Meliar£kes,  'laropla  toQ  BcwXefov 
ttjs  Nucoiaj,  114. 


TREATY  WITH  VENICE  59 

his  see,  and  that  more  than  a  century  elapses  before  we 
hear  of  another  Greek  metropolitan  of  that  diocese,  and  then 
only  in  name.1  But,  fortunately  for  the  success  of  the 
Frankish  settlement,  these  extremely  shrewd  crusaders  were 
neither  bigots  nor  fanatics.  The  greatest  of  the  popes 
might  desire  the  union  of  the  churches;  but  he  received 
little  assistance  from  the  mundane  barons  who  had  founded 
"  a  new  France  "  in  the  Levant  On  the  contrary,  they  were 
usually  more  disposed  to  oppress  the  Latin  Church  than  to 
help  it  in  the  hopeless  task — hopeless  then  as  now — of  pro- 
selytising among  a  people,  so  wedded,  at  least  to  the  forms 
of  their  own  religion,  as  the  Greeks,  whose  leaders  cared  far 
more  for  their  religious  freedom  than  for  their  political 
independence,  and  were  willing  to  barter  the  latter  for  the 
former.  Thus,  aided  by  the  Greek  archons,  and  seconded 
by  Othon  de  la  Roche  of  Athens,  Villehardouin  proceeded 
to  resume  the  siege  of  Akrocorinth,  now  held  by  Theodore, 
brother  of  the  Despot  of  Epiros.  But  a  summons  to  attend 
the  parliament  which  the  Emperor  Henry  had  convened 
at  Ravenika  in  the  spring  of  1209,  temporarily  interrupted 
the  siege.  The  two  friends,  attended  by  sixty  well-appointed 
knights,  appeared  at  the  gathering ;  Villehardouin  became 
"  the  man  of  the  Emperor,"  and  received  as  the  reward  of 
his  allegiance  the  office  of  Seneschal  of  Romania.2 

His  next  step  was  to  come  to  terms  with  Venice,  which 
he  saw  that  he  could  not  dislodge  from  the  two  Messenian 
stations  of  Modon  and  Coron.  The  republic  had  just  sent 
out  a  new  governor  of  her  Peloponnesian  colony,  and 
Villehardouin,  hastening  back  from  Ravenika,  met  him  in 
the  summer  on  the  island  of  Sapienza  off  Modon.  The  two 
high  contracting  parties  there  executed  a  deed,  by  which 
Villehardouin  relinquished  all  claim  to  Modon  and  Coron, 
whose  territory  was  to  extend  as  far  north  as  the  little 
stream  which  falls  into  the  bay  of  Navarino  exactly  opposite 
the  classic  islet  of  Sphakteria.  The  two  bishoprics  were, 
however,  still  to  remain  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  primate 
of  Achaia.      He  further  did  homage  to  the  republic  for  all 

1  Miklosich  und  M tiller,  op.  at.,  i.,  5,  8. 

2  Henri  de  Valenciennes,  ch.  xxxiii.;  Buchon,  Recherche s  et  MatMaux^ 
i.,  89,  m  2. 


60       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

the  land  which  had  been  assigned  to  her  in  the  treaty  of 
partition  as  far  as  Corinth,  "  without  prejudice,  however,  to 
his  fealty  to  his  lord,  the  Emperor  of  Romania ; "  and  in 
token  thereof,  he  undertook  to  send  three  silken  garments  to 
Venice  every  year,  one  for  the  doge,  the  others  for  the 
church  of  St  Mark.  He  promised  to  conquer  all  that 
portion  of  Lakonia  which  was  not  already  his,  to  hand  over 
one-quarter  thereof  to  the  doge,  and  to  do  homage  for  the 
remaining  three-fourths.  Finally,  he  pledged  himself  to 
grant  to  all  Venetian  citizens  free-trade  throughout  the 
land,  and  a  church,  a  warehouse,  and  a  law-court  of  their 
own  in  every  town,  while  he  himself  and  his  successors  were 
to  become  Venetians,  and  own  a  house  at  Venice.  By  these 
wise  concessions,  he  secured  the  support  of  the  republic  for 
his  scheme  of  making  himself  lord  of  "  Maureson,"  as  the 
deed  quaintly  styles  the  Morea.  It  was  not  long  before  he 
required  it1 

The  news  soon  reached  the  Morea,  that  a  cousin  of 
Champlitte,  Robert  by  name,  was  on  his  way  to  claim  the 
succession.  It  had  been  stipulated  on  the  departure  of 
Champlitte  for  France,  that  any  lawful  claimant  must  appear 
to  put  forward  his  claim  within  the  term  of  a  year  and  a  day, 
otherwise  the  claim  would  lapse.  Villehardouin,  accordingly, 
resolved  to  place  every  obstacle  in  the  way  of  young  Robert's 
arrival.  He  wrote  to  the  doge,  asking  his  assistance,  and 
that  crafty  statesman  managed  to  detain  the  passing  guest 
on  one  excuse  or  another  for  more  than  two  months  at 
Venice.  When  at  last  Robert  put  to  sea,  the  ship's  captain 
received  orders  to  leave  him  on  shore  at  the  Venetian  colony 
of  Corfu,  and  to  apprise  Villehardouin  of  what  had  occurred. 
With  difficulty  Robert  obtained  a  passage  on  board  an 
Apulian  brig  from  Corfu  to  the  port  of  St  Zacharias,  in  the 
Morea,  the  usual  landing-place  from  Europe,  better  known 
by  its  later  name  of  Glarentza.  In  spite  of  the  time  thus 
wasted  on  the  journey,  he  had  not  yet  exceeded  the  term 
appointed,  for  he  had  twelve  days  still  to  spare.  He  at  once 
enquired  where  the  bailie  was,  and,  on  being  informed  that 
he  was  at  Andravida,  sent  a  messenger  thither  to  request 

1  Fontes  Rerum  Austriacarum,  Abt.  ii.,   B.  xiii.,  97-100 ;  Dandolo 
apud  Muratori,  xii.,  336. 


VILLEHARDOUIN  OBTAINS  ACHAIA  61 

that  horses  might  be  sent  for  his  journey.  The  messenger 
found  the  crafty  Villehardouin  absent,  but  the  captain  of  the 
town,  with  the  leading  citizens,  came  down  to  the  coast  in 
person  to  escort  the  claimant  to  his  capital.  There  Robert 
was  told  that  the  bailie  was  at  Vlisiri,  or  La  Glistere,  a  castle 
near  Katakolo.  His  suspicions  were  now  aroused,  and  before 
proceeding  thither,  he  obtained  from  the  captain  of  Andravida 
a  certificate  showing  the  date  of  his  arrival  in  the  country. 
But  Villehardouin,  by  moving  from  one  place  to  another, 
managed  to  avoid  meeting  him  until  the  full  period  had 
elapsed.  Then  at  last  he  awaited  Robert  at  Lacedaemonia, 
where  a  parliament  was  summoned  to  examine  into  the 
claimant's  title.  The  parliament  reported  that  the  term  had 
expired  a  fortnight  before,  and  that  Robert  had  accordingly 
forfeited  his  claim.  The  latter  had  no  course  open  to  him 
but  to  acquiesce  in  this  decision;  his  wounded  pride  pre- 
vented him  from  accepting  his  rival's  flattering  offers,  if  he 
would  remain  in  the  country;  and  he  returned  to  France, 
leaving  Geoffrey,  to  the  great  joy  of  his  subjects,  lord 
(a^cvTJj?)  of  the  Morea.  Thus,  according  to  the  Chronicle 
of  the  Morea}  did  Villehardouin  obtain  the  principality  for 
himself  by  fraud  and  legal  quibbles.  But  behind  these 
quibbles  lay  the  hard  fact  that  the  barons,  who  had  borne 
the  burden  and  heat  of  the  conquest,  were  reluctant  to 
receive  as  their  prince  an  inexperienced  youth  accompanied 
by  a  horde  of  needy  followers.  In  the  beginnings  of  all 
dynasties  a  prince  must  be  able;  and  Geoffrey  possessed 
that  combination  of  courage  and  craft,  which  both  the  bold 
barons  and  the  wily  Greeks  admired.  Moreover,  his  tact 
and  his  fairness  towards  them  had  particularly  endeared  him 
to  the  latter. 

No  attempt  was  made  to  dispute  the  decision  of  the 
Achaian  parliament,  and  the  family  of  Champlitte  hence- 
forth vanishes  from  the  history  of  Greece.  Innocent  III.,2 
who  usually  recognised  accomplished  facts,  hastened  to  style 
Villehardouin  "  Prince  of  Achaia  "  ;  but  the  prince  considered 

i  X.  r.  M„  11.  2096-437  ;  L.  d  C,  59-69 ;  Z.  d.  F.9  34-43.  The 
"Assizes  of  Jerusalem"  confirm  the  account  of  the  Chronicle.  Beugnot, 
Recueil  des  kistoriens  des  Crotsades,  Lois,  ii.,  401. 

2  Epistola,  bk.  xiii.,  lett.  23  ;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  2770-2. 


62       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

himself  unworthy  of  the  title,  so  long  as  he  was  not  master 
of  the  Peleponnesian  quadrilateral.  Accordingly,  with  the 
assistance  of  the  Greek  archons,  whom  his  tolerance  had  won 
to  his  side,  he  now  resumed  the  long-drawn  siege  of  Corinth. 
Othon  de  la  Roche  of  Athens  again  supported  him  ;  and,  in 
1210,  the  citadel  at  last  surrendered,  though  its  defender, 
Theodore  Angelos,  succeeded  in  conveying  the  treasures  of 
the  Corinthian  Church  to  Argos,  while  many  of  the  inhabi- 
tants sought  and  found  a  home  on  the  impregnable  rock  of 
Monemvasia,  which  now  became  a  metropolitan  see  and  a 
place  of  exceptional  importance  as  the  last  refuge  of  Hellenism. 
For  the  other  two  Greek  strongholds  did  not  long  survive 
the  fall  of  Corinth.  Thanks  to  the  maritime  assistance  of 
his  Venetian  friends  at  Coron,  Villehardouin  was  able  to 
reduce  Nauplia,  on  condition  that  the  lower  and  westernmost 
of  the  two  castles  on  Itsh  Kaleh  remained  in  the  hands  of  the 
Greeks — an  arrangement  which  gave  rise  to  the  local  names 
of  "  Greeks'  castle  "  and  "  Franks'  castle,"  still  current  in  the 
seventeenth  century.  Finally,  in  12 12,  the  Larissa  of  Argos 
was  taken,  and  the  Athenian  and  Moreot  rulers,  with  a  dis- 
regard for  ecclesiastical  property  which  scandalised  the  pope,1 
seized  the  treasures  of  the  Corinthian  Church,  which  they 
found  there,  and  divided  its  goods  among  their  followers. 
As  a  still  more  substantial  reward  for  his  aid,  Othon  de  la 
Roche  received  Argos  and  Nauplia  as  fiefs  of  the  principality 
of  Achaia,  and  an  annual  charge  of  400  hyperperi  (£179,  5  s.) 
upon  the  tolls  of  Corinth. 

The  capture  of  Corinth  led  to  the  completion  of  the 
ecclesiastical  organisation  of  the  principality.  That  city  now 
became  the  see  of  a  second  Latin  archbishop,  whose  cathedral 
bore  the  name  of  St  Theodore  the  warrior,  the  patron  of  its 
late  defender,  and  under  whom  Innocent  III.  placed  the 
seven  bishoprics  of  Argos,  DamalcL  (near  the  ancient  Troezen) 
Monemvasia,  "Gilas"  (or  Helos),  "Gimenes"  (or  Zemeno) 
— both  former  Greek  bishoprics,  the  one  in  Lakonia,  the  other 
near  Sikyon — and  the  two  Ionian  dioceses  of  Cephalonia  and 

1  Epistola,  bk.  xiii.,  lett  6,  xv.,  77  ;  Miklosich  und  Miillcr,  ii.,  287  ; 
X.  r.  M.,  2860-81  ;  L.  d  C.j  89-91  ;  C.  d  M.,  436;  Sanudo,  lstoria  del 
Regno  di  Romania,  100 ;  Dor6theos  of  Monemvasia,  471. 


ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CHURCH  63 

Zante.1  But  this  arrangement  was  largely  theoretical,  and 
was  soon  modified.  Monemvasia  was  still,  and  long  remained, 
in  the  hands  of  the  Greeks ;  Helos  was  so  poor  that  a  bishop 
was  never  appointed,  and  in  1223  was  fused  with  the  diocese 
of  Lacedaemonia  ;  Zemen6,  a  year  earlier,  was  amalgamated 
with  Corinth ;  and  at  the  same  time,  Damal&,  which  had 
never  had  a  Latin  bishop  because  it  contained  no  Frankish 
settlers,  was  divided  between  Corinth  and  Argos ;  while 
Cephalonia  and  Zante,  which  had  been  transferred  in  1213  to 
the  nearer  archbishopric  of  Patras,  were  made  into  a  single 
diocese.  In  1222,  also,  Honorius  III.,2  by  the  light  of  the 
experience  which  he  had  then  gained,  reorganised  the 
suffragan  bishoprics  of  Patras,  dividing  the  diocese  of 
Veligosti,  or  Christianopolis,  as  it  was  called  in  ecclesiastical 
parlance,  by  an  adaptation  of  the  classic  name  Megalopolis, 
between  the  Messenian  sees  of  Modon  and  Coron,  and 
amalgamating  Amyklai  with  Lacedaemonia — an  arrangement 
confirmed  by  Innocent  IV.8  Meanwhile,  Lacedaemonia  had 
been  transferred  to  the  jurisdiction  of  Corinth,  and  a  new 
bishopric,  that  of  Maina,  arose  in  the  place  of  Helos,  so  that 
in  the  middle  of  the  century,  when  the  Frank  principality 
was  at  its  zenith,  the  Roman  Church  in  Achaia  consisted  of 
the  archbishopric  of  Patras,  with  its  suffragans  of  Olena, 
Cephalonia,  Coron,  and  Modon  (the  last  exempted,  however, 
by  Alexander  IV.4  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  primate),  and 
of  that  of  Corinth,  with  its  suffragans  of  Argos,  Monemvasia, 
Lacedaemonia,  and  Maina. 

The  organisation  of  the  Church  was  a  fruitful  source  of 
quarrels.  The  Venetians  had  obtained  the  right  to  the 
newly-created  Latin  patriarchate  of  Constantinople,  and  the 
patriarch,  as  the  representative  of  the  pope  in  the  Empire  of 
Romania,  had  the  right  of  conferring  the  pallium  upon 
archbishops.    But  the  primate  of  Achaia,  a  Frenchman,  fretted 

1  Epistola,  bk.  xv.,  lctt  58,  61  ;  Buchon,  Recherehes  htstoriquesy  i., 
pp.  xxxix.,  lxi.,  Ixxxiii.;  Eubel,  Hierarchia  Catholica  Medii  ^£vt\  i.,  188, 
218.  Albericus  Trium  Fontium  (ii.,  558)  says,  however,  that  in  1236 
Argos  was  a  suffragan  bishopric  of  Athens,  to  which  it  belonged  politi- 
cally. The  golden  bull  of  Andr6nikos  II.  in  1293,  mentions  both  Helos 
and  Zemend,  which  Neroutsos  (AeXrfop,  iv.,  95  n.  2)  places  near  Sikyon. 

2  Regesta,  ii.,  50,  163.        3  Regis/res,  i.,  212.        4  Registres,  i.,  188. 


64      THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

at  being  placed  under  the  jurisdiction  of  a  Venetian  patriarch, 
who  had  promised  his  government  to  appoint  none  but 
Venetians  to  archbishoprics.  He  was  not  satisfied  till  his 
assertion  of  independence,  which  Innocent  III.  refused  to 
sanction,  was  at  last  ratified  by  that  great  pope's  successor. 
His  suffragans  had  inherited  from  their  Greek  predecessors 
time-honoured  but  tiresome  quarrels  as  to  the  boundaries  of 
their  dioceses  ;  the  clergy  disputed  with  the  bishops,  the 
Templars  with  the  primate.  Most  of  the  French  canons, 
whom  Champlitte  had  installed  in  the  cathedral  church  of  St 
Andrew  at  Patras,  where  the  relics  of  the  saint  were  then 
preserved,  soon  began  to  experience  the  usual  French 
malady  of  home-sickness,  and  sailed  for  "  Europe."  Many  of 
the  Latin  priests  were  absentees  who  drew  the  incomes, 
without  doing  the  work,  of  their  livings ;  many  more  were 
mere  adventurers  who  tried  to  obtain  benefices  under  false 
pretences.  The  primate  himself  was  suspended  by  Honorius 
III.  for  squandering  the  goods  of  the  Church,  and  Archbishop 
Walter  of  Corinth  sent  back  to  his  monastery  for  misconduct 
by  Innocent  III.  The  correspondence  of  Innocent,  who  took 
the  keenest  interest  in  the  establishment  of  Catholicism  in 
the  realm  of  Romania,  is  full  of  complaints  against  the 
hostile  attitude  of  the  Franks  towards  the  Latin  clergy. 
Nowhere  were  his  complaints  better  grounded  than  in 
Achaia,  and  nowhere  was  the  Catholic  Church  in  so  pitiful 
a  plight  The  primate  was  not  safe  even  in  his  own  palace. 
Aleman,  who,  as  we  saw,  had  received  Patras  as  a  fief,  consider- 
ing the  archiepiscopal  plan  of  fortifying  the  town  against 
pirates  amateurish,  carried  the  archbishop  off  to  prison,  cut 
off  the  nose  of  his  bailie,  and  hastily  converted  his  residence 
and  the  adjacent  church  of  St  Theodore  into  the  present 
castle,  using  the  drums  of  ancient  columns  and  pieces  of 
sculpture  with  all  the  Franks'  scorn  for  archaeology. 
Fragments  of  ecclesiastical  architecture,  and  what  was 
apparently  once  the  archiepiscopal  throne,  may  still  be  seen 
built  into  the  walls.  Villehardouin  himself  was  not  much 
better.  He  neither  paid  tithes  himself,  nor  compelled  his 
Greek  and  Latin  subjects  to  pay  them,  though  he  and  his 
barons  had  sworn  on  the  Holy  Sacrament  to  do  so,  if  they 
returned   safe  from   battle  against  the  Despot  of  Epiros; 


THE  ATHENIAN  COURT  65 

he  forced  the  clergy  to  plead  disputed  cases  before  his 
secular  tribunals,  "  making  no  difference  between  the  priests 
and  the  laity,"  as  the  pope  exclaimed  in  horror;  he  not 
only  curtailed  the  ancient  possessions  of  the  metropolitan 
see  of  Patras,  but  forbade  the  pious  to  grant  it  more,  and,  in 
pursuance  of  his  philhellenic  policy,  he  relieved  the  Greek 
priests  and  monks  from  the  jurisdiction  of  the  archbishop, 
bidding  them  pay  dues  to  him  alone,  while  the  Greek  serfs 
were  not  allowed  to  show  due  obedience  to  the  Latin  Church. 
Moreover,  most  of  the  Greek  bishops  who  had  been  placed 
under  the  archbishop's  jurisdiction,  had  fled  at  the  outset 
from  fear  of  the  conquerors,  and  declined  to  return.  The 
archbishop's  suffragans  told  much  the  same  story,  though 
things  were  better  in  the  Venetian  possessions  in  Messenia. 
Yet  even  there,  the  governor  of  Coron  forbade  the  bishop  to 
enter  his  cathedral  or  to  reside  in  the  castle.  Innocent  III. 
might  well  write  that  "  the  new  plantation  of  Latins,  which 
the  hand  of  God  has  transported  to  the  parts  of  Achaia, 
seems  to  have  less  firm  roots  in  consequence  of  the  recent 
change." l 

Meanwhile,  the  Burgundian  Lord  of  Athens  had  been 
engaged  in  transplanting  the  feudal  system  to  his  classic 
state.  But  there  was  a  considerable  difference  between 
feudal  society  in  Attica  and  in  the  Morea.  While  in  the 
latter  principality  the  prince  was  merely  primus  inter  pares 
among  a  number  of  proud  and  powerful  barons,  at  Athens 
the  "  Great  Lord  "  had,  at  the  most,  one  exalted  noble,  the 
head  of  the  great  house  of  St  Omer,  near  his  throne.  It  is 
obvious  from  the  silence  of  all  the  authorities,  that  the 
Burgundians,  who  settled  with  Othon  de  la  Roche  in  his 
Greek  dominions,  were  men  of  inferior  social  position  to  him- 
self— a  fact  farther  demonstrated  by  the  comparative  lack  in 
Attica  and  Boeotia  of  those  baronial  castles,  so  common  in 
the  Morea.  He  had,  therefore,  less  necessity  for  providing 
important  fiefs  for  personages  of  distinction  than  had  the 
princes  of  Achaia.  Indeed,  it  is  probable  that  in  one  respect 
the  court  of  Athens  under  the  De  la  Roche  resembled  the 

1  Epistola  Innocentii  JJL,  bk.  viii.,  lctt  153 ;  xii.,  143 ;  xiii.,  26,  50, 
51,  56,  143*  161-5,  171-3 ;  xv.,  44,  46,  47,  55  5  Regesta  Honorii  UL,  ii., 
85,  255  ;  Les  Registres  <f Innocent  /K,  Hi.,  61  ;  Eubel,  i.,  218. 

E 


66       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

present  court  of  King  George,  namely,  that  there  was  no  one, 
except  the  members  of  his  own  family,  with  whom  the  ruler 
could  associate  on  equal  terms.  But,  as  in  modern,  so  in 
Frankish  Athens,  the  family  of  the  sovereign  was  soon 
numerous  enough  to  form  a  coterie  of  its  own.  Not  only 
did  Othon  marry,  soon  after  his  arrival  in  Greece,  Isabelle, 
heiress  of  Guy  de  Ray,  in  Franche-Comt6,  by  whom  he  had 
two  sons,  but  the  news  of  their  adventurous  relative's 
astounding  good  fortune  attracted  to  Attica  several  members 
of  his  clan  from  their  homes  in  Burgundy.  They  doubtless 
received  their  share  of  the  good  things  which  had  fallen  to 
Othon  ;  at  any  rate,  we  know  that  one  of  his  nephews,  Guy, 
who  had  undergone  with  him  the  risks  of  the  Crusade, 
divided  with  his  uncle  the  lordship  of  Thebes,  and  that  a 
little  later  the  other  half  was  bestowed  upon  a  niece  named 
Bonne,  who,  after  marrying  young  Demetrios,  King  of 
Salonika,  brought  her  share  of  the  Boeotian  barony  to  her 
second  husband,  Bela  de  St  Omer.  Another  nephew, 
William,  settled  in  Greece,  and  ultimately  became  by  marriage 
Baron  of  Veligosti ;  a  sister  of  Othon  became  the  mother  of 
the  future  Baron  of  Karystos,  Othon  de  Cicon ;  while  a  more 
distant  relative,  Peter,  was  appointed  governor  of  the  Castle 
of  Athens.1  Other  Burgundians  will  have  followed  in  their 
wake;  for  in  the  thirteenth  century  Greece  was  to  the 
younger  sons  of  French  noble  houses  what  the  British 
Colonies  were  fifty  years  ago  to  impecunious  but  energetic 
Englishmen. 

There  was  yet  another  marked  distinction  between  Attica 
and  the  Morea.  Nik6tas  mentions  no  great  local  magnates 
as  settled  at  Athens  or  Thebes  in  the  last  days  of  the 
Byzantine  Empire,  and  those  were  the  most  important  places 
of  the  Frankish  state.  We  hear,  indeed,  of  Theban  archons 
in  1209;  but,  with  that  exception,  during  the  whole  century 
for  which  the  Frankish  sway  existed  over  Athens,  not  a  single 
Greek  of  eminence   is   so  much  as  named  by  any  writer.2 

1  Epistola  Innocentii  Iff.,  bk.  xi.,  lett  244 ;  Guillaume,  Histoirt  des 
Sires  de  Salins,  i.,  67,  83  ;  L.  d.  F.t  44. 

1  The  treaty  between  Ravaoo  dalle  Carceri  and  Venice  and  the  deed 
of  1 2 16  (see  below) specially  mention  "Graeci  Magnates"  in  Negroponte. 
Lampros,  M«xeri)X  'Airofuydrov,  it.,  277, 280.     Michael  Laskaris,  the  Athenian 


BURGUNDIAN  ATHENS  67 

Thus,  whereas  Crete,  Negroponte,  and  the  Morea  still 
retained  old  native  families,  which,  in  the  case  of  Crete, 
furnished  leaders  for  constant  insurrections  against  the 
foreigner,  and  in  that  of  Negroponte  showed  a  tendency  to 
emigrate  to  the  court  of  Nice,  nothing  of  the  kind  occurred 
in  Burgundian  Athens.  It  is  only  at  a  much  later  period 
that  we  hear  of  a  Greek  party  there.  That  the  sway  of 
Othon  was  mild,  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  friends 
of  Michael  Akominitos,  and  even  his  own  nephew,  returned 
from  their  exile  to  Athens,  and  were  quite  content  to  remain 
there  under  the  Latin  sway.1  As  for  the  peasants,  their  lot 
must  have  been  the  same  as  that  of  their  fellows  in  Achaia. 

Othon's  dominions  were  large,  if  measured  by  the  small 
standard  of  classical  Greece.  Burgundian  Athens  embraced 
Attica,  Boeotia,  Megaris,  the  fortresses  of  Argos  and  Nauplia, 
and  the  ancient  Opuntian  Lokris.  The  Marquis  of  Boudonitza 
on  the  north,  the  Lord  of  Salona  on  the  west,  were  the 
neighbours,  and  the  latter,  later  on,  the  vassal,  of  the  Sire  of 
Athens,  his  bulwarks  against  the  expanding  power  of  the 
Greek  Despot  of  Epiros.  Thus  situated,  the  Athenian  state 
had  a  considerable  coast-line  and  at  least  four  ports — the 
Piraeus,  Nauplia,  the  harbour  of  Atalante  opposite  Eubcea, 
and  Livadostro,  or  Rive  d'Ostre,  as  the  Franks  called  it,  on 
the  Gulf  of  Corinth — the  usual  port  of  embarkation  for  the 
West  Yet  the  Burgundian  rulers  of  Athens  made  little 
attempt  to  create  a  navy,  confining  themselves  to  a  little 
amateur  piracy.  The  strictly  professional  pirate  availed 
himself  of  this  lack  of  sea-power  to  ply  his  trade  in  the  early 
Frankish,  as  in  the  late  Byzantine  days;  Latin  corsairs, 
named  Capelletti,  regardless  of  the  fact  that  Attica  was  now 
a  Latin  state,  rendered  its  coast  unsafe,  a  sail  down  the 
Corinthian  Gulf  was  called  "  a  voyage  to  Acheron,"  and  the 
bishop  of  Thermopylae  had  to  move  his  residence  farther 
inland  to  escape  these  sea-robbers.2 

We  are  not  told  where  Othon  resided  ;  but  it  is  probable 
that,  like  his  successor,  he  held  his  court  at  Thebes,  the  most 

patriot  of  the  fourteenth  century,  in  K.  Rhangabes  play,  "The  Duchess  of 
Athens,"  is  unhappily  a  poetic  anachronism. 

1  Lampros,  Mix«^X  *Akohw4tov9  ii.,  267,  301. 

*  Regesta  Honorii  IIF.%  ii.,  167  ;  Miklosich  und  Muller,  Hi.,  61. 


68       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

important  town  of  his  estates.  Both  the  Akropolis  at  Athens, 
the  "  Castle  of  Sathines,"  as  it  came  to  be  called,  and  the 
Kadmeia  at  Thebes,  were  under  the  command  of  a  military 
governor,  and  both  places  were  the  residences  of  Latin  arch- 
bishops. In  the  room  of  Akominitos,  in  the  magnificent 
church  of  Our  Lady  of  Athens,  a  Frenchman,  B£rard,  perhaps 
Othon's  chaplain,  was  installed  as  archbishop,  with  the 
sanction  of  Innocent  III.,  who  took  the  church  and  chapter 
of  Athens  under  his  protection.  "  The  renewal  of  the  divine 
grace,"  wrote  the  enthusiastic  pope  to  B6rard,  "suffers  not 
the  ancient  glory  of  the  city  of  Athens  to  grow  old.  The 
citadel  of  most  famous  Pallas  has  been  humbled  to  become 
the  seat  of  the  most  glorious  Mother  of  God.  Well  may  we 
call  this  city  '  Kirjathsepher/  which,  when  Othniel  had  sub- 
dued to  the  rule  of  Caleb, '  he  gave  him  Achsah,  his  daughter 
to  wife.'"1  Cardinal  Benedict,  the  papal  legate  who  was 
sent  to  arrange  ecclesiastical  affairs  in  -the  East,  fixed  the 
number  of  the  canons,  and  the  pope  granted  the  request  of 
the  archbishop  and  chapter,  that  the  Athenian  Church  should 
be  governed  by  the  customs  of  the  Church  of  Paris.  He 
also  confirmed  the  ancient  jurisdiction  of  the  archbishop, 
derived  from  the  days  of  the  Greek  metropolitans,  over  the 
eleven  sees  of  Negroponte,  Thermopylae,  Daulia,  Avlonari,* 
Oreos,3  Karystos,  Koronea,  Andros,  Megara,  Skyros,  and 
Keos — an  arrangement  which  was  modified  by  his  successor, 
who  merged  the  three  Eubcean  sees  of  Avlonari,  Oreos,  and 
Karystos,  with  that  of  Negroponte,  and  placed  Salona  and 
iEgina  under  Archbishop  Conrad  of  Athens.4 

Innocent  mentions  among  the  possessions  of  the  Church 
of  Athens,  and  confirms    to    its   use,  Phyle,   Menidi,  and 

1  Ejristol<By  bk.  xi.,  lctt.  111-13, 238,  240,  252,  256,  quoting  Judges,  L, 
12-13. 

2  So  Neroutsos  (AcXWor,  tv.,  59)  and  Profc  Bury  {The  Lombards  and 
Venetians  in  Euboia,  11)  interpret  the  papal  adjective  Abelonensem, 
putting  this  see  at  Avlonari,  south  of  Kyme.  A  bishop  of  Avalona  is 
mentioned  in  1343.    (Predelli,  Commemoriait\  ii.,  123,  126.) 

9  The  most  probable  interpretation  of  the  word  Zorxonensem,  as  Oreos 
in  North  Eubcea  is  known  to  have  been  a  Greek  bishopric  Neroutsos 
and  Prof.  Bury  (11.  cc.)  identify  the  place  with  Zarka,  near  Karystos. 

4  M Manges  de  Picolefrancaise  de  Rome,  1895,  p.  74  ;  Regesta  Honoris 
III.,  ii.,  50,  163  ;  Registries  de  Gr/goire  IX '.,  ii.,  40-1,  629. 


THE  ATHENIAN  CHURCH  69 

Marathon;  the  monasteries  of  Kaisarian£  (Sancti  Siriani), 
St  John  (the  Hunter),  St  Nicholas  of  the  Columns  (probably 
near  Cape  Colonna  or  Sunium),  St  Mary  of  Blachernai,  St 
Nicholas  of  Katapersica,  St  Kosmis  and  St  Damian  (whom 
the  Greeks  call  the  "Xyioi  'kvapyvpoi),  St  George  of  the 
Island,1  and  St  Luke.  To  the  Athenian  Church  belonged, 
too,  °  the  markets  of  Negroponte  and  Athens,  and  the  rivers," 
not  very  full  of  water,  it  is  to  be  feared,  "  whence  the  gardens 
are  watered."  The  Church  was  to  enjoy  its  ancient  exemption 
from  all  exactions  of  the  secular  authorities ;  no  man  was  "  to 
lay  rash  hands  upon  it  or  its  possessions,"  no  one  was  "  to 
harass  it  with  vexations  of  any  kind."  Such  was  the 
privileged  position  of  the  Church  of  Athens,  which  Inno- 
cent2 confirmed,  obviously  from  the  documents  of  the  former 
Greek  metropolitan  see,  in  1208.  But  the  theory  was  very 
different  from  the  reality.  Othon  de  la  Roche  was,  indeed, 
at  times  inclined  to  further  the  interests  of  the  Church.  Thus, 
we  find  him  begging  the  pope  to  appoint  a  Catholic  priest 
in  every  castle  and  town  of  his  estates  where  twelve  Latins 
had  fixed  their  abodes,  and  he  was  willing  to  hold  the  import- 
ant Boeotian  fortress  of  Livadia  as  a  fief  of  the  Holy  See, 
and  to  pay  two  silver  marks  a  year  as  rent  for  it.8  But,  when 
it  suited  his  purpose,  he  did  not  hesitate  to  infringe  the 
privileges  of  his  Church.  Soon  after  his  marriage,  possibly 
to  provide  a  place  for  one  of  his  wife's  relatives,  he  compelled 
B£rard  to  give  him  the  appointment  to  the  post  of  ecclesi- 
astical treasurer — an  appointment  which  the  pope  revoked. 
Both  he  and  other  feudal  lords  of  continental  Greece,  like 
Villehardouin  in  the  Morea,  forbade  their  subjects  to  give  or 
bequeath  their  possessions  to  the  Church,  levied  dues  from 
the  clergy,  and  showed  no  desire  either  to  pay  tithes  them- 
selves, or  to  make  the  Greek  and  Latin  population  pay  them. 
At  Thebes  matters  were  worse  than  at  Athens.  Othon  and 
his  nephew  Guy,  the  joint  owners  of  that  city,  seized  the 
greater  part  of  the  archbishop's  revenue  under  the  guise  of 

1  Makronesi,  opposite  Lavrion — the  monastery  mentioned  above  as  a 
lair  of  pirates  in  the  time  of  Akominatos.  Neroutsos,  however  (AfXWov, 
»▼-»  7o),  identifies  it  with  St  George  (Belbina),  off  Sunium,  and  Our  Lady 
of  Blachernai  with  Daphni. 

*  Epistolce,  bk.  xi.,  lett.  256.       3  Muratori,  Antiquitates  Italiaey  v.,  234- 


70       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

land-tax,  so  that  the  Theban  Church  found  its  income  thus 
arbitrarily  reduced  from  900  to  200  kyperperi  (from  £403  to 
£90) ;  later  on,  however,  the  lords  of  Thebes  relented,  and 
contented  themselves  with  an  annual  contribution  of  £72  from 
the  Theban  chapter.  But  out  of  his  income  the  archbishop 
was  requested  by  the  pope  to  assist  his  two  wretchedly  poor 
suffragans  of  Zaratoria  and  Kastoria — places  which  have  been 
identified  with  Zagora  on  Helicon  and  Kastalia.  Instead  of 
doing  so,  the  dean  and  canons  of  Thebes,  assisted  by  the 
captain  of  the  Kadmeia  and  other  laymen,  broke  into  the 
house  of  the  bishop  of  Zaratoria,  and  carried  off  a  man  from 
his  very  arms.  In  short,  the  domestic  quarrels  of  the  Latin 
Church,  whose  best  representatives  did  not  come  to  Greece, 
must  have  been  edifying  to  the  Greeks.  Now  we  find  the 
Theban  archbishop  harassing  and  excommunicating  his 
canons ;  now  it  is  the  canons  of  Athens,  who  are  too  proud 
to  serve  personally  in  the  noblest  of  all  cathedrals — the 
majestic  Parthenon,  where,  later  on,  a  descendant  of  Othon 
himself  was  glad  to  find  a  modest  stall.1 

As  in  the  Morea,  so  in  continental  Greece,  the  military 
orders  and  the  monks  from  the  west  obtained  lands  and 
monasteries.  The  splendid  monastery  of  the  Blessed  Luke 
between  Delphi  and  Livadia,  the  gem  of  all  Byzantine 
foundations  in  Greece,  was  given  to  the  prior  and  chapter  of 
the  Holy  Sepulchre.  The  Knights  of  St  John  held  property 
near  Thebes,  and  seized  the  goods  of  the  Thessalian  bishopric 
of  Gardiki,  and  even  the  episcopal  residence,  heedless  of  its 
inmate's  thunders.  The  Templars  held  "  the  church  of  Sta. 
Lucia,"  outside  Thebes,  Ravenika,  and  the  neighbouring 
town  of  Lamia,  where  they  built  a  castle,  probably  that 
which  still  stands  on  the  hill  there.2  Othon  de  la  Roche  gave 
the  beautiful  Athenian  monastery  of  Daphni,  which  still  bears 
the  marks  of  his  followers'  lances  on  its  splendid  cupola,  to 
the  Cistercians  of  the  Burgundian  Abbey  of  Bellevaux,  to 

1  Neroutsos  in  AeXWo*,  iv.,  59;  Innocent  III.,  Epistolai\k.  xi.,  lett. 
116,  118,  121,  153,  244,  246  ;  xiii.,  15,  16,  110  ;  xiv.,  110;  xv.,  26,  30. 

*  Ibid,,  xiiL,  114,  115,  120,  136,  143,  144  ;  xv.,  69.  I  believe  that  the 
eccUsia  Sancta  Lucia  qua  Fotct  nuncupatur  is  none  other  than  the 
famous  church  of  St  Luke,  outside  Thebes,  containing  his  spurious  tomb. 
The  papal  orthography  is  very  shaky. 


THE  GREEK  CHURCH  71 

which  he  was  devotedly  attached,  and  at  Dalphino,  or  Dal- 
phinet,  as  the  Franks  called  it,  the  last  Athenian  duke  of  his 
house  found  his  grave.  The  Cruciferi,  or  "  Crutched  Friars," 
of  Bologna  had  a  hospice  at  Negroponte.  The  Minorites 
followed  Benedict  of  Arezzo  to  Greece  in  1216,  and  established 
their  monasteries  in  various  parts  of  the  country.  A  century 
later  their  abbey  near  Athens,  probably  "the  Frankish 
monastery"  at  the  foot  of  Pentelikon,  figured  in  the  will  of 
Duke  Walter  of  Brienne,  and  in  1260  their  "province  of 
Romania1'  embraced  the  three  districts  of  Negroponte, 
Thebes,  and  Glarentza,  where  their  church  of  St  Francis  is 
mentioned  in  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea  as  a  place  where  the 
High  Court  of  the  principality  met  At  the  end  of  the 
fourteenth  century  they  had  twelve  monasteries  in  Greece, 
two  of  which  still  survive  under  another  form — the  church  of 
Sta.  Maria  delle  Grazie  at  Zante,  and  the  orthodox  monastery 
of  Sisia  in  Cephalonia,  which  still  bears  the  emblem  of  the 
Franciscans  and  preserves  in  its  name  the  memory  of  Assisi, 
whence  St  Francis  came.1 

The  Greek  Church  had  been  better  treated  than  might 
have  been  expected  from  the  way  in  which  St  Mary's  minster 
on  the  Akropolis  had  been  seized.  It  is  true  that  from  the 
time  of  Akominatos  no  Greek  metropolitan  of  Athens  fixed 
his  residence  in  that  city  till  the  close  of  the  fourteenth 
century,  but  the  titular  metropolitan  resided  at  Con- 
stantinople, after  its  recapture  by  the  Greeks,  and  is  often 
mentioned  in  the  fourteenth  century  as  a  member  of  the 
Holy  Synod.  But  the  Greek  bishop  of  Negroponte,  who 
had  done  obeisance  to  the  Latin  archbishop  of  Athens,  was 
allowed  by  Innocent  III.  to  retain  his  see.2  Akomindtos 
himself  even  ventured  over  once  from  Keos  to  the  scene  of 
his  former  labours,  but  he  hastened  his  return,  "  from  fear  of 
becoming  a  morsel  for  the  teeth  of  the  Italians,"  as  he  calls 
the  Burgundians  of  Athens.8    Yet,  though  he  was  too  honest 

1  Wadding,  Annates  Minorum,  i.,  202  ;  ii.,  206 ;  iv.,  350 ;  Regesta 
Honorii  III.,  i.,  59,  60,  61,  168;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  2659,  75 18 ;  Romands, 
TpariarM  Zdprijn  38,  39  ;  D'Arbois  de  Jubainville,  Voyage  paldographique, 
336  ;  Mcliardkes,  Tcwypafla  toXituc^  tov  pofuw  Kc <f>a\\7jvlas9  pp.  36,  1 78. 

'  Epistola,  bk.  ».,  lett  179  ;  Miklosich  und  Muller,  i.,  453,  456>  459, 

476,  477,  488,  498,  558,  564. 

3  Lampros,  Mix<d>X  'Aico/ui/drov,  ii.,  327. 


72       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

or  too  proud  to  recognise  the  authority  of  the  Frenchman 
who  sat  on  his  metropolitan  throne,  he  recommended  the 
abbot  of  Kaisarian6,  who  had  come  to  terms  with  the 
Franks,  to  render  obedience  to  the  powers  that  be.  Even 
in  his  island  he  was  not  long  free  from  Latin  rule,  for  the 
brothers  Ghisi  and  their  allies  occupied  Keos  soon  after 
his  arrival,  and  suspected  him  of  secret  intrigues  with  the 
Greek  Despot  of  Epiros.  Age  crept  on,  one  after  another  his 
old  friends  died ;  worst  blow  of  all,  his  brother,  Nik6tas, 
the  historian,  died  also,  commemorated  by  the  exile  in  a 
touching  monody,  still  preserved,  which  is,  however,  a  less 
enduring  monument  than  his  own  valuable  history.  A  few 
books,  saved  by  friends  from  the  wreck  of  his  library, 
occasional  presents  from  his  old  admirers  at  Athens,  now 
and  then  a  letter  from  one  of  his  former  flock,  may  have 
cheered  a  little  the  long  days  of  his  solitude.  Above  all,  he 
found  distraction  in  the  theorems  of  Euclid.  More  than 
once  a  message  came  from  the  imperial  court  of  Nice, 
bidding  him  join  the  Greek  patriarch  there,  and  offering 
him  the  vacant  post  of  metropolitan  of  Naxos.  At  another 
time  the  Despot  Theodore  of  Epiros  invited  him  to  his 
court  at  Arta ;  but  he  was  practically  a  political  prisoner  in 
his  cell;  his  strength  was  failing;  he  could  not,  in  that 
uncivilised  spot,  carry  out  the  treatment  prescribed  by  his 
doctor ;  he  could  scarcely  cross  his  own  threshold.  He  had 
but  one  pleasure  left — to  gaze  across  the  sea  at  the  coast  of 
Attica.1  At  last  the  end  came,  and  about  1220  the  grand 
old  ecclesiastic  died,  alone  in  his  humble  cell  of  the  monastery 
of  St  John  the  Baptist,  founded  by  one  of  the  Comneni.  One 
of  his  nephews  pronounced  a  monody  over  him,  which  has 
survived.  The  monastery,  however,  has  disappeared,  but  a 
modern  Greek  geographer  found  that  its  church  had  become 
a  public  school.2  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  pupils  learn 
something  of  the  life  of  the  last  metropolitan  of  Byzantine 
Athens,  a  man  worthy  to  take  his  place  beside  the  patriots 
of  classical  days. 

Meanwhile,   the   Franks  of    Northern    Greece   were   by 

1  Ldmpros,  op,  cit,  L,  345  sqq. ;  ii.,  154,  219,  236,  242-43.  295,  301, 
311,  326,  328 ;  *Apfu>vla9  III.,  273-284. 

2  Meliardkes,  K4m9  225. 


THE  LOMBARD  REBELLION  73 

no  means   unitedly   striving    to   develop    their    newly-won 
dominions.      After    the    death    of   Boniface,    the    relations 
between    the    kingdom    of   Salonika    and    the    empire   of 
Romania,  which    had   been    strained   in    his    lifetime,  had 
become  hostile  in  the  extreme.     The  Count  of  Biandrate 
and  the  Lombard  nobles  of  Salonika  were  resolved  to  shake 
off  the  feudal  tie  which  bound  them  to  the  empire,  and  most 
of  the  great  lords  of  northern  Greece,  the  baron  of  Larissa, 
the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  Ravano  dalle  Carceri  of  Eubcea, 
and  two  brothers  from  Canossa,  who  seem  to  have  owned 
lands  near  the  skdla  of  Oropos,1  joined  their  party.     Their 
attempt  to  secure  the  aid  of  Othon  de  la  Roche  failed,  but 
his  espousal  of  the  emperor's  cause  cost  him  the  temporary 
loss  of  Thebes,  which  Albertino  of  Canossa  attacked,  and 
of  which   that   Italian   rebel  styled   himself  "Lord."     The 
Count  of  Biandrate  now  openly  claimed  in  the  name  of  the 
infant  king  of  Salonika,   or  of   his  half-brother,  William, 
Marquis    of    Montferrat,   all    the   land    from    Durazzo   to 
Megara,  the  Peloponnese,  and  the  suzerainty  over  Epiros. 
The  emperor  replied  by  marching  into  Salonika  to  suppress 
the  revolt     Biandrate  was  imprisoned  in  the  castle  of  Serres, 
which  was    bestowed    upon    his    gaoler,  the    loyal    Count 
Berthold  von  Katzenellenbogen  of  Velestino ;  but  the  other 
Lombard  leaders  withdrew  to  the  castle  of  Larissa,  whither 
Henry  followed  them.     Like  the  Greeks  in  the  war  of  1897, 
they  had  neglected  to  destroy  the  bridge  over  the  Peneios, 
the  pont  de  FArse,  as  the  chronicler  calls  it;  the  imperial 
force  crossed  it,  and  forced  the  adjoining  castle  on  the  old 
Akropolis  to  surrender.     The  kindly,  tactful  emperor  showed 
a   wise  clemency  to  the  rebels,  and  allowed  the  baron  of 
Larissa  to  retain  his  fiefs.    The  Greeks,  whom  Henry  had 
"  treated  as  his  own  people,"  2  everywhere  received  him  with 
enthusiasm  ;  at  Halmyros,  his  next  stopping-place,  they  met 
him  with  the  eikons,  and  wished  him  "  many  years "  of  life 
(iroWa  xpovia).     But  the  rebellion  was  not  yet  quelled.     The 
Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  Albertino  of  Canossa,  and  Ravano 
dalle  Carceri  were  still  up  in  arms,  and  the  triarch  of  Eubcea, 

1  Epistola  lnnoccntii  HLy  ii.,  480,  482,  636  ;  Cairels  apud  Buchon, 
Histoire  des  Conquttes,  449. 

2  Akropolita,  31. 


74       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

who  as  an  island-baron  could  dispose  of  a  flotilla,  tried  to 
capture  a  vessel  from  before  the  emperor's  eyes  in  the 
harbour  of  Halmyros.  Henry's  advisers  prudently  suggested 
negotiations,  with  the  object  of  stopping  the  fratricidal  war. 
Summonses  were  issued  to  a  parliament,  to  be  held  in  May 
1209,  in  the  valley  of  Ravenika,  near  Lamia,  which,  as  we 
saw,  Othon  de  la  Roche  and  Villehardouin  attended,  and  at 
which  the  latter  became  the  emperor's  vassal,  and  received 
as  the  reward  of  his  allegiance  the  office  of  Seneschal  of 
Romania.  But  if  the  ambitious  bailie  of  Achaia  had  good 
reasons  for  supporting  the  emperor,  who  might  be  expected 
in  turn  to  sanction  his  projected  usurpation  of  the  princi- 
pality, the  Lombard  barons,  instead  of  attending  the 
parliament,  remained  defiantly  behind  the  walls  of  the 
Kadmeia  at  Thebes.  Thither  Henry  now  set  out  by  way 
of  Thermopylae,  sleeping  a  night  at  the  rebel  castle  of 
Boudonitza  on  the  way.  The  native  population  bowed 
before  him ;  at  Thebes,  Greek  priests  and  archons  came  out 
to  greet  him  with  such  a  glad  sound  of  drums  and  trumpets 
that  the  ground  shook,  while  the  Latin  archbishop  and 
clergy  escorted  him  to  the  minster  of  Our  Lady,  where  he 
fell  on  his  knees  and  returned  thanks  to  God  for  his  past 
successes.  The  castle  was,  however,  strong,  and  its  defenders 
stubborn,  so  that  it  was  not  till  he  had  ordered  long  scaling 
ladders  to  be  applied  to  the  walls,  that  Ravano  and  Albertino 
asked  for  an  armistice.  Once  again  the  emperor  was 
merciful ;  Thebes,  indeed,  he  restored  to  his  trusty  Othon  de 
la  Roche,  its  legal  owner ;  but  he  ordered  Biandrate  to  be 
released,  and  allowed  the  rebels  to  retain  their  fiefs.  Then 
Henry  was  able  to  proceed  to  Athens,  the  first  emperor  who 
had  visited  the  city  since  Basil,  "  the  Bulgar-slayer,"  nearly 
two  centuries  earlier,  had  come  there  in  triumph.  Like 
Basil  II.,  Henry  ascended  to  the  Akropolis,  and  "  offered  up 
prayers  in  the  minster  of  Athens,1  which  men  call  Our 
Lady,  and  Othon  de  la  Roche,  who  was  lord  thereof— for  to 
him  the  Marquis  (of  Montferrat)  had  given  it,  paid  him 
every  honour  in  his  power."  After  two  days'  stay,  he  set 
out  for  Negroponte,  accompanied  by  the  "Great  Lord"  ;  on 

1  Henri  de  Valenciennes  (ed.  P.  Paris),  ch.  xxxv.    Buchon  in  bis 
two  editions  reads  Thebes  for  Athaines. 


t 


ECCLESIASTICAL  AFFAIRS  75 

the  way  he  was  warned  that  his  arch-enemy,  Biandrate, 
had  preceded  him  thither,  and  was  plotting  to  have  him 
assassinated  in  his  bed.  The  plot,  however,  failed,  owing  to 
the  chivalry  of  the  emperor's  late  foe,  Ravano.  u  The  city  of 
Negroponte,"  quoth  the  triarch,  u  is  mine ;  my  head  shall 
answer  for  your  safety  there."  The  gentleman  of  Verona 
was  as  good  as  his  word ;  he  bitterly  reproached  Biandrate 
with  his  treachery ;  the  emperor  spent  three  days  in 
Negroponte  as  his  guest,  enthusiastically  welcomed  by  the 
Greeks,  who  even  escorted  him  to  the  Latin  church  of  Notre 
Dame,  and  then  returned  safe  and  sound  to  Thebes.  The 
Lombard  rebellion  was  at  an  end.  So  great  was  his  prestige 
at  this  moment,  that  the  crafty  Despot  of  Epiros  did  him 
homage.  The  silvery  eloquence  of  the  emperor's  envoy, 
Conon  de  B6thune,  one  of  the  most  distinguished  poets  of 
the  day,  as  well  as  one  of  the  best  fighters  in  the  crusading 
army,  had  such  an  effect  on  the  Greek  ruler,  that  he  presented 
his  daughter's  hand  and  a  third  of  his  lands  to  the  emperor's 
brother.1 

We  have  seen  how  constant  were  the  conflicts  between 
the  Frankish  barons  and  the  Latin  clergy.  During  his 
progress  through  Thessaly  and  his  visit  to  Eubcea,  the 
emperor  must  have  heard  much  about  the  question,  for  the 
two  Thessalian  archbishops  of  Larissa  and  Neopatras  had 
both  caused  public  scandals — the  one  by  unjust  exactions 
from  his  suffragans  and  the  monasteries  in  his  diocese,  the 
other  by  helping  Sgour6s  to  defend  Corinth  and  by  slaying 
his  fellow-Latins.  Moreover,  in  both  Thessaly  and  Eubcea, 
the  barons  maltreated  the  Church,  occupying  monasteries  and 
churches  and  molesting  the  religious  orders.2  Henry 
accordingly  thought  it  a  favourable  moment  to  come  to  an 
agreement  with  the  Roman  hierarchy,  and  therefore  sum- 
moned a  second  parliament  at  Ravenika  in  May  1210,  for 
the  purpose  of  arranging  ecclesiastical  affairs.  All  the  chief 
feudal  lords  of  Northern  Greece  were  present — Othon  de  la 

1  Henri  de  Valenciennes,  chs.  xviii.,  xxix.-xxxviii.  The  author, 
obviously  an  eye-witness,  was,  according  to  some,  the  emperor  himself. 
Epistola  Itmocentii  111.,  bk.  xiii.,  lett  184. 

*  Ibid.,  bk.  xi.,  lett.  117,  154;  xiii.,  104,  109,  136,  137,  192,  299;  xiv., 
94,98. 


76       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

Roche  and  Ravano  dalle  Carceri ;  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza 
and  Thomas  de  Stromoncourt  of  Salona;  Nicholas  de  St 
Omer  and  Albertino  of  Canossa ;  the  two  great  Thessalian 
barons,  William  of  Larissa  and  Count  Berthold  of  Velestino  ; 
and  Rainer  of  Travaglia,  owner  of  the  spot  where  the 
parliament  met,  to  whom  the  emperor  had  also  transferred 
the  Templars'  castle  of  Lamia.  There  came,  too,  three  out 
of  the  four  archbishops  of  the  north — their  graces  of  Athens, 
Neopatras,  and  Larissa,  with  eight  of  their  suffragans — a 
thoroughly  representative  assembly  of  Church  and  State. 
A  concordat,  subsequently  approved  by  Innocent  III.,  was 
then  drawn  up,  by  the  terms  of  which  all  churches, 
monasteries,  and  other  ecclesiastical  possessions,  "from  the 
boundary  of  the  kingdom  of  Salonika  to  Corinth,"  were 
entrusted,  free  of  all  feudal  services,  to  the  Latin  patriarch 
of  Constantinople,  as  representing  the  pope.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  was  stipulated  that  the  clergy,  whether  Greek  or 
Latin,  should  pay  the  old  Byzantine  akr6stichony  or  land-tax, 
to  the  temporal  authorities ;  and  that,  in  default  of  payment, 
their  goods  might  be  siezed ;  but  the  family  of  a  Greek 
priest  could  not  be  imprisoned,  if  he  failed  to  pay.  His  sons, 
if  unordained,  were,  however,  liable  to  render  feudal  services ; 
but  after  ordination  they  were  to  enjoy  the  same  privilege 
as  the  Roman  clergy.1  The  concordat  of  Raven  ika  was  not, 
however,  signed  by  the  ruler  of  the  Morea,  who  continued  to 
pursue  his  anti-clerical  policy,  seizing  the  goods  of  the 
Archbishop  of  Patras,  and  annulling  all  gifts  to  his  see. 
Even  in  continental  Greece,  to  which  it  specially  applied,  the 
concordat  often  remained  a  dead  letter.  Thus,  both  Othon  de 
la  Roche  and  Villehardouin  were  subsequently  excommuni- 
cated by  their  respective  archbishops  for  appropriating 
church  property,  and  also  placed  under  an  interdict  by  the 
Latin  patriarch  of  Constantinople,  who  laid  claim  to  the 
monasteries  and  ecclesiastical  jurisdiction  in  the  diocese  of 
Thebes.2 

The  Lombard  rebellion  had  a  more  lasting  result  than 
the  summoning  of  the  parliaments  at  Ravenika — the  intro- 

1  Text  in  Honorii  11L%  Opera^  iv.,  414-16,  2lh<\  Epistolct  Innocentii  III., 

n.,  835-7. 

2  Ibid.)  bk.  xvi.,  98. 


VENICE  IN  EUBCEA  77 

duction  of  Venetian  influence  into  the  island  of  Euboea. 
Ravano  dalle  Carceri,  before  he  had  made  his  peace  with 
Henry,  had  been  so  much  alarmed  at  his  isolated  position, 
that  he  had  offered,  through  his  brother,  the  bishop  of 
Mantua,  to  become  the  vassal  of  Venice.  His  offer  gave  the 
Venetians  the  opportunity  of  making  good  their  claims  to 
the  island,  which  the  partition  treaty  had  given  them,  but 
which  they  had  not  yet  advanced.  Ravano  accordingly,  in 
1209,  recognised  the  republic  as  his  suzerain,  promising  to 
send  every  year  2100  gold  hyperperi  G6940,  16s.)  and  a  silken 
garment  woven  with  gold  to  the  doge,  as  well  as  an  altar- 
cloth  for  St  Mark's.  The  Venetians  were  to  have  the  right 
of  trading  wherever  they  wished,  and  a  church  and  a  warehouse 
in  all  the  towns  of  the  island.  With  their  usual  care  for  the 
interests  of  the  natives,  of  which  we  have  already  seen  an 
instance  at  Corfii,  they  made  Ravano  promise  to  keep  the 
Greeks  in  the  same  state  as  they  had  been  in  the  time  of  the 
Emperor  Manuel.  The  republic  of  St  Mark  thus  obtained, 
without  trouble,  most  of  the  practical  advantages  which 
would  have  accrued  from  a  conquest  of  the  island.  A 
Venetian  bailie  was  soon  appointed  to  govern  the  Venetian 
settlements  in  the  island  of  Negroponte,1  and  the  history  of 
Euboea  from  that  date  till  the  Turkish  Conquest  shows  the 
gradual  spread  of  his  authority  over  the  whole  of  it  The 
first  step  in  this  direction  was  taken  after  the  death  of 
Ravano  in  12 16.  The  Venetian  bailie,  acting  on  the  system 
of  divide  et  imperay  then  intervened  between  the  six  claimants 
to  the  island — Ravano's  widow  and  daughter,  two  nephews 
whom  he  had  adopted,  and  the  two  sons  of  Giberto,  the 
former  triarch.  The  bailie  divided  the  island  into  sixths, 
giving  two-sixths  to  each  pair  of  claimants,  with  the  proviso 
that  if  one  hexarch,  or  sestiere,  died,  his  fellow,  and  not  his 
heir,  should  succeed  to  his  share.  This  system  left  the 
bailie  the  real  arbiter  of  the  island.  Though  its  capital 
remained  common  to  all  the  hexarchs,  who  usually 
resided  there  and  had  their  own  judge,  "  the  Podestd,  of  the 

1  Fanies  Rerum  Austriacarum,  Abt.  ii.,  B.  xiii.,  89-96  ;  Laurentius  de 
Monads,  143-4 ;  A.  Dandolo  apud  Muratori,  xii.,  336.  The  first  bailie  is 
mentioned  in  1216,  but  one  may  have  been  appointed  as  early  as  121 1; 
he  is  styled  ain  tota  insula  bajulus." 


78       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

Lombards/1  and  only  the  part  near  the  sea  was  subject  to 
Venetian  jurisdiction,  the  bailie's  authority  became  pre- 
dominant, and  Ravano's  former  palace  was  soon  converted 
into  his  official  residence.  The  hexarchs  and  the  Greek 
magnates  swore  fealty  to  him  as  the  representative  of  the 
republic,  and  the  value  of  his  services  may  be  estimated  from 
the  amount  of  his  salary — at  first  450  gold  hyperperi 
O620 1,  12s.),  and  then,  after  the  capture  of  Constantinople  by 
the  Greeks,  increased,  as  his  position  became  more  important, 
to  1000  hyperperi  (£448) — as  compared  with  the  250  hyperperi 
06 1 12),  paid  to  each  of  the  castellani,  or  captains,  of  Coron  and 
Modon.  Venetian  weights  and  measures  were  introduced 
into  all  the  towns  of  the  island,1  two  Venetian  judges  and 
three  councillors  (afterwards  reduced  to  two,  and  entrusted 
with  levying  the  dues)  had  already  been  appointed,  and  the 
church  of  St  Mark  at  Chalkis,  which  belonged  to  the  church 
of  San  Giorgio  Maggiore  in  Venice,  was  endowed  by  the 
hexarchs,  and  was  subsequently  supported  by  death-duties 
of  2\  per  cent  on  all  the  property  of  deceased  members  of 
the  Venetian  colony.  A  considerable  number  of  Venetian 
settlers  now  arrived,  and  there  also  flocked  to  the  island 
impecunious  "  gentlemen  of  Verona,"  relatives  of  the  feudal 
lords,  so  that  it  soon  contained  quite  a  large  and  fairly 
harmonious  western  society,  for  the  Lombard  character 
harmonised  better  than  that  of  the  warlike  French  with  the 
mercantile  Venetians.  Castles  rose  all  over  the  long  island, 
the  imposing  ruins  of  which  still  remain  to  tell  of  the  days  of 
Lombard  rule.  On  the  way  to  Eretria  the  traveller  passes 
at  the  village  of  Basilik6  a  large,  square  tower,  whose  only 
entrance  is  a  hole  25  feet  from  the  ground  ;  on  a  hill  behind 
the  village  stands  the  large  castle  of  Filla,  while  two  tall 
towers,  close  together  on  another  eminence,  dominate  the 
Lelantian  plain,  no  less  fertile  now  than  in  the  days  of 
Theognis,  and  still  called  Lilanto  in  the  Lombard  times.2 
A  large  mediaeval  castle  still  rises  to  the  right  of  Aliveri, 
and  the  author  has  seen  another  between  Achmetaga  and 
Limne.     We  often   hear   of  La  Cuppa,    near  Avlonari,  of 

1  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Ckroniques%  179-80 ;  Predelli,  Liber  Commmns, 
pp.  34,  97  ;  Bifrons,  fol.  71  ;  Fontes  Rerum  Austriacarunty  xiii.,  175-84. 

2  Ibid.,  xiv.,  132  ;  Sanudo  apud  Hopf,  Chroniqtus,  127. 


VENICE  IN  EUBCEA  79 

Larmena,  near  Styra,  and  of  La  Clisura,  which  commanded 
the  gorge  or  clisura,  between  Chalkis  and  Achmetaga, 
while,  if  little  remains  of  the  once  famous  fortress  of  Oreos 
in  the  north,  Karystos  in  the  south  still  boasts  its  Castel 
Rosso.  From  these  strongholds  the  Lombard  barons  would 
issue  forth  to  scour  the  seas  in  quest  of  rich  booty ;  and,  in 
the  intervals  of  piracy,  met  in  each  others'  palaces  in  the 
common  capital,  where  brilliant  balls  were  often  held.  There, 
too,  besides  Lombards  and  Venetians,  was  the  Jewish  colony, 
which  Benjamin  of  Tudela  had  found  there,  and  which 
naturally  continued  to  exist  under  the  auspices  of  Venice. 
A  large  proportion  of  the  taxation  was  placed  upon  it ;  in 
1355  it  was  confined  in  a  ghetto  on  the  southern  side  of  the 
town,  and  the  public  executioner  was  selected  from  its  ranks. 
It  was,  however,  attracted  to  the  island,  as  to  Thebes,  by  the 
manufacture  of  silk,  from  which  the  Venetian  bailie  was  ex- 
pressly not  debarred.  Otherwise  Venice,  unlike  Great  Britain, 
did  not  wish  her  Levantine  consuls  to  be  men  engaged  in 
business.     Hence  she  was  well  served  and  well  informed. 

In  yet  another  part  of  the  Greek  world  the  Venetians 
succeeded  in  gaining  substantial  advantages  without  the 
expense  of  annexation.  We  have  seen  how  the  crafty 
Despot  of  Epiros  had  done  homage  to  the  Emperor  Henry, 
then  at  the  summit  of  his  good  fortune.  But  that  "most 
potent  traitor,"  as  the  emperor  called  him,  aided  by  Franks 
whom  he  had  taken  into  his  pay,  again  and  again  broke  his 
solemn  vows  to  his  suzerain,  and  in  12 10  recognised  the  over- 
lordship  of  Venice  over  all  his  dominions,  from  Durazzo  to 
"  Nepantum  "  or  Naupaktos,  promising  to  give  the  Venetians 
a  quarter  in  every  town  and  the  right  of  exporting  corn,  to 
protect  their  young  colony  in  Corfu  against  Albanians  or 
Corfiotes,  and  to  pay  to  the  republic  a  tribute  of  42  lbs. 
of  hyperperi  (£2063,  12s.)  every  year.  Thus  the  republic 
became  the  suzerain  of  those  territories  in  Epiros  and 
i£tolia  which  had  been  assigned  to  her  in  the  partition 
treaty,1  while  the   Despot  felt  at  liberty  to  carry  out  his 

1  Innocent  III.,  Epistolct^  bk.  xiii.,  lett.  184.  Pontes  Rerum  Austria- 
carum,  xiii.,  119-23.  This  is,  so  far  as  I  know,  the  earliest  use  of 
u  Nepantum  "—the  transition  form  between  "  Naupaktos  w  and  "  Lepanto." 
In  the  accounts  of  this  treaty  by  A.  Dandolo  (Muratori,  xii.,  336),  and 


80       THE  ORGANISATION  OF  THE  CONQUEST 

ambitious  designs  in  other  directions.  The  fall  of  the  Argive 
fortresses,  which  his  brother  held  for  him  in  the  Peloponnese, 
ended,  however,  any  plans  which  he  might  have  had  for  the 
extension  of  his  rule  to  the  south  of  the  Gulf  of  Corinth ;  but 
he  penetrated  eastward  into  the  territory  of  the  French  Lord 
of  Salona.  With  the  aid  of  the  men  of  Galaxidi,  the  little 
town  which  the  traveller  passes  as  he  steams  into  the  bay  of 
Itea,  and  which  rendered  such  noble  services  to  the  Greek 
cause  in  the  War  of  Independence,  the  Despot  routed  the 
Franks  in  a  pitched  battle  at  Salona,  in  which  Thomas  de 
Stromoncourt  was  slain.  Faithless  to  all  his  engagements, 
the  victor  next  turned  westward,  and,  in  spite  of  his  solemn 
pledges,  conquered  the  fine  island  of  Corfu,  where  the 
Venetian  colony  had  scarcely  taken  root,  and  where  the 
natives  gladly  welcomed  a  ruler  of  their  own  race  and  religion. 
The  local  tradition  ascribes  to  him  the  castle  of  Sant'  Angelo, 
built  to  repel  the  attacks  of  Genoese  pirates,  which  still 
stands,  an  imposing  ruin,  high  above  the  western  shore  of  the 
island,  near  the  monastery  of  Palaiokastrizza.  The  Greek 
clergy  long  afterwards  cited  his  golden  bull  confirming  their 
privileges.  Possessed  of  such  wide  dominions,  he  might  well 
coin  his  own  money.  A  bronze  coin,  attributed  to  him, 
bearing  his  effigy  and  that  of  St  Demetrios  on  one  side,  and 
the  figure  of  the  Archangel  Michael  on  the  other,  has  been 
found  in  Epiros ;  one  of  his  leaden  seals,  also  showing  the 
Archangel  Michael,  was  discovered  in  Corfii.1  But  his  triumph 
was  not  for  long.  He  was  murdered  in  bed  by  a  slave  in 
1214,2  and  it  was  reserved  for  his  brother  Theodore,  an  abler 
general,  and  an  even  more  unscrupulous  statesman,  to 
prosecute  his  policy  of  expansion.  Partisan  hatred  still 
obscures  the  history  of  these  two  reigns.  The  latest  Greek 
historian  of  Epiros  regards  the  first  two  Despots  as  patriots 

Laurentius  de  Monacis  (p.  144)  we  find  "  Neopantum"  and  "  Neopatum." 
The  Livre  de  la  Conquest*  (p.  323)  calls  it  "  Nepant,"  and  it  so  figures 
on  the  coins  of  Philip  of  Taranto. 

1  S&thas,  Xpwucbp  toO  TakafrtSlov,  201  ;  Roman6s,  II epiroC  Aftnrcrdrov  rift 
Rwdpw,  23  ;  Barone,  Notizie  Storiche  di  Re  Carlo  UL  di  Durasso,  61  ; 
Marmora,  Historia  di  Corf&>  210 ;  Buchon,  Recherches  et  AfaUriaux,  iL, 
211,  and  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  403;  Mustoxidi,  Delle  Cose 
Corciresiy  400-1  ;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  373. 

2  Akropolita,  27. 


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SUMMARY  OF  THE  FIRST  DECADE  81 

and  heroes;  the  Latin  authorities,  and  the  Byzantine 
historians,  who  drew  their  inspiration  from  the  rival  Greek 
court  at  Nice,  describe  them  as  monsters  and  barbarians. 
The  truth  probably  lies  between  the  two  extremes. 

We  have  thus  described  the  conquest  and  organisation  of 
Greece  by  the  Franks.  We  have  seen  a  Lombard  kingdom 
established  at  Salonika,  a  Burgundian  nobleman  invested 
with  Athens,  a  French  principality  carved  out  of  the 
Peloponnese.  The  Venetians  have  founded  and  lost  a  colony 
at  Corfu,  occupied  Crete,  sent  forth  a  swarm  of  adventurers 
to  seize  the  Cyclades,  made  themselves  the  real  masters  of 
Euboea,  and  gained  a  footing  at  two  valuable  stations  in 
Messenia.  Over  the  Morea  and  Epiros  they  have  acquired  a 
shadowy  suzerainty,  with  the  practical  advantages  of  free 
trade.  But  the  Greek  flag  still  waves  over  Monemvasia,  and 
the  tribes  of  Leonidi  and  Taygetos  still  own  no  lord.  In  the 
mountains  of  Epiros  and  the  plains  of  Bithynia  two  inde- 
pendent Greek  states  have  arisen  out  of  the  ashes  of 
Byzantium,  to  keep  alive  the  torch  of  Hellenic  freedom.  We 
shall  see  in  the  next  chapter  how  the  ephemeral  Lombard 
kingdom  fell  before  the  vigorous  attack  of  the  Epirote 
Greeks,  how  Thessaly  felt  the  force  of  the  same  strong  arm, 
how  the  Latin  Empire  of  Constantinople  began  to  shake,  as 
the  generation  of  the  bold  crusaders  passed  away  and  the 
power  of  its  rivals  revived,  and  how,  after  reaching  its  zenith, 
the  principality  of  Achaia  received  its  first  shock. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH   RULE  (1214-1262) 

The  new  Despot  of  Epiros  had  not  been  long  on  the  throne, 
when  the  Latin  Empire  of  Romania  received  a  blow,  which 
was  severely  felt  throughout  continental  Greece.  The 
Emperor  Henry  suddenly  died  in  1216,  perhaps  poisoned  by 
the  relentless  Count  of  Biandrate,  still  in  the  prime  of  life,  "  a 
second  Ares"  in  war,  a  friend  to  the  Greeks,  the  ablest 
among  the  Latins  of  Constantinople.  As  he  left  no  heirs, 
Peter  of  Courtenay,  the  husband  of  his  sister  Jolanda, 
succeeded  him  as  emperor,  and  from  that  moment  the 
fortunes  of  the  empire  began  to  decline.  Peter  never  lived  to 
reach  his  capital.  After  receiving  his  crown  from  the  hands 
of  Pope  Honorius  III.  in  the  church  of  S.  Lorenzo,  outside 
the  walls  of  Rome,  he  crossed  over  to  Durazzo  with  the 
intention  of  marching  along  the  classic  Via  Egnatia,  which  so 
many  a  Latin  commander  had  trod,  to  Salonika  and  the  East 
Albania  was  even  then  a  dangerous  country,  and  the  crafty 
ruler  of  Epiros  saw  a  splendid  opportunity  of  destroying  the 
emperor  of  his  natural  enemies,  the  Franks.  The  Epirote 
troops  fell  upon  the  unfortunate  Peter  in  the  defiles  near 
Elbassan;  the  emperor  and  the  papal  legate  who  accom- 
panied him  were  captured ;  and,  while  the  latter  was 
ultimately  released,  the  former  died  in  prison,  perhaps  by  the 
sword.1     His  death,  as  the  historian  Akropolita  says,  was  "  no 

1  There  is  great  difference  of  opinion  among  the  authorities  as  to 
the  death  of  Peter.  The  continuation  of  William  of  Tyre  (Recueil  des 
Historiens  des  Croisades,  ii.,  291-3),  which  gives  the  most  detailed  account, 
says  that  he  was  treacherously  captured  at  a  banquet,  and  died  in  prison ; 
so,  too,  Dandolo  (apud  Muratori,  xii.,  340) ;  the  Chronicle  of  Fossa  Nova 
(ifod.,  vii.,  895-6)  says  that  he  was  imprisoned;   Mousk6s  {Chromgtte 

82 


GREEK  EMPIRE  OF  SALONIKA  83 

slight  aid  to  the  Greek  cause/'  for  both  the  Latin  Empire  and 
the  kingdom  of  Salonika  were  now  in  the  hands  of  women, 
as  regents — the  Empress  Jolanda  and  Margaret,  the  widow  of 
Boniface,  whose  chief  adviser  was  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza.1 
The  victorious  Despot  of  Epiros,  energetic  and  ambitious, 
followed  up  his  success  by  extending  his  dominions  at  the 
expense  of  his  Frankish  and  Bulgarian  neighbours  in  Thessaly 
and  Macedonia ;  soon  Larissa  alone  survived  of  the  Thes- 
salian  baronies,  for  the  doughty  Katzenellenbogen,  who 
might  have  resisted  him,  had  returned  to  his  home  on  the 
Rhine,  and,  in  1222,  Theodore's  career  of  conquest  culminated 
with  the  acquisition  of  Salonika  and  the  extinction  of  that 
ephemeral  Lombard  kingdom.  Thus,  after  only  eighteen 
years  of  existence,  it  fell  ingloriously — the  first  of  the 
creations  of  the  Fourth  Crusade  to  succumb.  For  the 
conqueror  of  a  kingdom  the  title  of  Despot  seemed  too 
humble.  So,  with  a  fine  disregard  for  the  oath  which  he  had 
once  sworn  to  recognise  no  other  emperor  than  him  of  Nice, 
Theodore  had  himself  crowned  at  Salonika,  assumed  the 
imperial  title,  the  purple  mantle,  and  the  red  sandals  of 
Byzantine  royalty,  and  appointed  all  the  great  officials  of  an 
imperial  court.  The  metropolitan  of  Salonika,  faithful  to  the 
oecumenical  patriarch  whose  seat  was  at  Nice,  refused  to 
perform  the  coronation  ceremony ;  but  his  place  was  taken 
by  the  Archbishop  of  Ochrida  and  all  Bulgaria.2  The  result 
was  a  deadly  feud  between  the  rival  Greek  Empires  of  Nice 
and  Salonika,  which  had  the  effect  of  giving  the  Latin  Empire 
of  Constantinople  a  brief  respite.  The  ecclesiastics  of  the  two 
Greek  capitals  espoused  with  all  the  zeal  of  their  profession 
the  quarrel  of  the  respective  sovereigns — for  the  political 
schism  at  once  affected  so  essentially  political  an  institution  as 
the  Greek  Church.  An  emppror  whose  sway  extended  from 
the  Adriatic  to  the  iEgean,  and  from  Macedonia  to  the  Gulf 

rim/e>  1L  23,019-31)  that  he  died  there  ;  Akropolita  (p.  28)  that  he 
"perished  by  the  sword M;  the  Aragonese  version  of  the  Chronicle  of 
the  Morea,  that  he  was  poisoned  in  prison.  Cf.  Meliardkes,  'I<rropla  rw 
BviXcfov  rift  Nurofas,  125  ;   RomanOS,  llcpi  rod  Aea-xordrov  rip  'Hirclpot/,  27. 

1  Raynaldus,  Annates  Ecclesiastic^  i.,  492. 

*  Akropolita,  27-8,  36 ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregoras,  i.,  25-6 ;  Pachymeres, 
L,  82. 


84  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

of  Corinth,  might  consider  himself  the  heir  of  Constantinople 
with  as  much  reason  as  "  the  true  Emperor  of  the  Romans  "  at 
Nice ;  his  clergy,  who  looked  to  him  for  the  advancement  of 
themselves  and  of  the  Greek  idea,  could  easily  meet  the 
Nicene  theologians  with  plausible  arguments  for  ecclesiastical 
autonomy.  One  of  these  apologies  for  Salonika  and  its  ruler 
has  been  preserved  in  the  shape  of  a  verbose  and  long  epistle 
from  George  Barddnes,  metropolitan  of  Corfu,  to  German6s, 
the  oecumenical  patriarch.  The  Corfiote  divine,  who  also 
composed  theological  treatises  against  the  Minorites,  on  the 
use  of  leavened  bread  in  the  Sacrament,  and  on  the 
procession  of  the  Holy  Ghost  from  the  Father  alone,  had 
received  the  epithet  of  Atticus  from  his  literary  skill,  and 
some  tolerable  iambics,  the  sole  relic  of  the  old  cathedral  at 
Corfu,  have  been  ascribed  to  him.1  We  learn  from  his  letter 
that  his  beloved  emperor  "  imitated  the  mildness  of  David," 
and  that  at  his  court  "  learning  lacked  not  arms,  nor  yet  the 
armed  man  learning."  The  metropolitan  had  his  reward 
Theodore,  who  signed  himself  "  King  and  Emperor  of  the 
Romans,"  confirmed  by  a  golden  bull  of  1228,  all  the  privileges 
of  the  church  of  Corfu,  granted  by  Al£xios  I.  and  Manuel  I.2 
Among  the  gifts  of  the  latter  emperor  were  220  serfs,  the 
living  chattels  of  the  church,  such  as  we  saw  in  the  possession 
of  the  Latin  archbishopric  of  Patras,  and  a  number  of 
"  sacred  slaves  "  (ayioSovXoi),  whose  task  it  was  to  till  the  glebe 
and  do  other  work,  and  whose  name  still  survives  in  that  of  a 
Corfiote  village. 

The  capture  of  Salonika  made  a  great  impression  in  the 
west  Pope  Honorius  III.  ordered  the  two  bulwarks  of 
Northern  Greece,  the  castles  of  Salona  and  Boudonitza,  to 
be  put  in  a  thorough  state  of  defence;  bade  the  rulers  of 
Athens  and  Achaia  to  be  of  good  cheer  and  to  attack  the 
conquered  city,  and  endeavoured  to  organise  a  new  crusade 
for  its  recovery.8    The  prelates  and  clergy  generously  sub- 

1  Marmora,  Delia  Historic*  di  Corfi\  198-200;  Mustoxidi,  Delle  Cose 
Corciresi,  423  sqq^  l.-lvi. 

8  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  v.,  14-15  ;  Mustoxidi,  439,  689,  lvi.-lvii.    The 
pillar  containing  the  inscription  is  now  in  the  Magazzino  Archcologico%  on_ 
the  Caelian  at  Rome. 

3  Regesta,  ii.,  164,  207,  286,  304,  333. 


END  OF  THE  KINGDOM  OF  SALONIKA  85 

scribed  money  for  the  defence  of  Boudonitza,  and  Demetrios, 

the  ex-king  of  Salonika,  and  his  half-brother,  the  Marquis 

William    of    Montferrat,  did,   indeed,  head   an    expedition 

against  the  usurper  Theodore,  which   penetrated  as  far  as 

Thessaly.      There  the  marquis  died,  poisoned  it  was  said, 

and  the  feeble  Demetrios  *  then  returned  to  Italy,  where  he 

too  died,  soon  afterwards,  in  1227.     No  further  attempt  was 

made  to  recapture  his  kingdom ;  but  for  another  century  one 

person  after  another  was  pleased  to  style  himself  titular  king 

of  Salonika.      The   Emperor  *  Frederick    II.,  the  marquises 

of  Montferrat,  and  one  of  the  triarchs  of  Euboea  bore  the 

empty  title,  which   passed   by  marriage  with   a  princess  of 

Montferrat  to  the  Greek  Emperor  Andr6nikos  II.,  who  thus 

combined    in    his    own  person   the   real   and   the  nominal 

sovereignty.     Even  then  there  continued  to  be  titular  kings 

of  Salonika  among  the   members  of  the   ducal   House  of 

Burgundy,  which  had  received  the  barren  honour  from  the 

last  Latin  emperor  of  the  East.    Their  shadowy  claim  was 

finally  sold  to  Philip  of  Taranto  in  1320,  after  which  this 

phantom  royalty  vexed  court  heralds  no  more.2 

The  fall  of  the  kingdom  of  Salonika  separated  the  Frank 
states  in  the  south  from  the  Latin  Empire  at  Constantinople, 
and  the  fate  of  the  latter  had  therefore  comparatively  little 
influence  upon  the  much  stronger  dynasties  of  Athens  and 
Achaia.  There  GeofTroy  de  Villehardouin  had  crowned  his 
successful  career  by  marrying  his  elder  son  and  heir  to 
Agnes,  daughter  of  the  Emperor  Peter  of  Courtenay.  Before 
that  ill-fated  monarch  had  started  for  Constantinople  by 
land,  he  had  sent  his  wife  and  daughter  on  by  sea.  On  the 
way,  the  imperial  ladies  put  into  the  port  of  Katakolo,  at 
which  the  traveller  now  lands  for  Olympia,  and  which  owes 
its  name  to  the  great  Byzantine  family  of  KatakaWn.3 
Geoffrey  chanced  to  be  in  the  neighbourhood,  and,  hearing 
of  their  arrival,  hastened  down  to  greet  them,  and  invited 
them  up  to  the   adjoining  "  Mouse   Castle,"  Pontikokastro, 

1  S.  Georgio,  Historia  Montisferratis,  apud  Muratori,  xxiii.,  374,  381, 

8  Ducange,  HisUnre  de  (Empire  de  Constantinople^  i.,  454.5  ;  Buchon, 
Recherches  et  McUeriaux,  i.,  69. 

3  S&has,  Mrq/jxta '  EWtjv  acrjs  'Ioropfaf,  i.,  p.  xxxiii. 


86  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

which  the  Franks  had  appropriately  christened  Beauvoir 
from  the  splendid  view  of  the  sea  and  the  islands  which  it 
commands.  During  their  visit,  at  the  suggestion  of  Geoffrey's 
advisers,  and  by  the  mediation  of  the  Bishop  of  Olena,  a 
marriage  was  arranged  between  young  Geoffrey  and  the 
daughter  of  the  Empress  Jolanda,  to  the  advantage  of  both 
parties,  for  the  empress  saw  that  her  child  would  be  well 
married,  while  in  all  Achaia  there  was  no  daughter  worthy 
of  the  ruler's  son.  One  result  of  this  alliance  was  that,  later 
on,  the  Emperor  Robert,  son  and  successor  of  Peter,  officially 
recognised  his  brother-in-law  as  "  Prince  of  Achaia  " — a  title 
which,  though  applied  by  Innocent  III.,  as  we  saw,  to  both 
Champlitte  and  Geoffrey  I.,  and  used  by  the  latter  in  docu- 
ments, had  not  previously  received  the  imperial  sanction.1 

A  year  later,  in  1218,  Geoffrey  I.  died,  and  great  was  the 
grief  throughout  the  Morea.  "All  mourned,"  we  are  told, 
"rich  and  poor  alike,  as  if  each  were  lamenting  his  own 
father's  death,  so  great  was  his  goodness."2  An  able,  if 
unscrupulous,  statesman,  he  had  shown  great  skill  in  con- 
ciliating the  Greeks,  and  we  may  endorse  the  judgment  of  a 
modern  Greek  historian,  that  he  was  "  perhaps  the  ablest  of 
all  the  Frank  princes  of  the  East" 

The  prosperous  reign  of  his  son  and  successor,  Geoffrey 

1  Recueil  des  Historiens  des  Croisades9  ii.,  291  ;  Albericus  Trium 
Fontium,  ii.,  497.  The  Chronicle  of  the  Morea  twice  tells  the  story  of 
Geoffrey  II.  and  the  daughter  of  the  Emperor  Robert,  who  was  on  her 
way  to  marry  the  King  of  Aragon.  X.  t.  M.f  11.  1185-98,  2472,  sqq . ; 
L.  d.  C.  23,  74-7  ;  L.  d.  F.,  44-6  (which  correctly  makes  the  bride 
Robert's  sister).  Hopf  has  shown  that  this  is  an  anachronism,  for  (1) 
Robert  had  no  daughter ;  (2)  the  King  of  Aragon  was  then  aged  nine. 
The  prologue  of  the  Liber  Consuehidinum  Imperii  Romanice  (Canciani, 
op,  cit.,  Hi.,  499)  copies  and  quotes  the  Chronicle — lo  libro  della  Con- 
quista.  Cf.  also  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  180.  Both  the 
Chronicle  and  the  Book  of  Customs  wrongly  ascribe  to  this  occasion 
the  appointment  of  the  prince  as  Seneschal  of  Romania  (really  made  at 
Raven ika  in  1209),  the  permission  to  coin  money  (really  granted  to 
Guillaume  de  Villehardouin  much  later),  and  the  suzerainty  over  the 
duchy  of  the  Archipelago  (really  conferred  upon  Geoffrey  II.  by  Baldwin 
II.  in  1236).  Geoffrey  I.  styles  himself  "Prince  of  Achaia*1  in  a  docu- 
ment of  12 10.  Ducange,  op.  ci£.f  i,  425;  so,  too,  does  Geoffrey  II.  in 
one  of  12 19  (ibid.,  i.,  426),  *>.,  before  the  date  of  Robert's  accession. 

*  X,  r.  M.,  11.  2461-4  ;  L  d.  G,  73. 


PROSPERITY  OF  ACHAIA  87 

U.,  whom  the  Venetian  historian,  Sanudo  the  elder,  calls, 
-with  technical  accuracy,  u  the  first  Prince  of  Achaia,"  was  of 
££reat  benefit  to  the  principality.    "  He  possessed  a  broad 
domain  and  great  riches;  he  was  wont  to  send  his   most 
^confidential  advisers  from  time  to  time  to  the  courts  of  his 
vassals,  to  see  how  they  lived  and  how  they  treated  their 
subjects.     At  his  own  court  he  constantly  maintained  eighty 
Imights  with  golden  spurs,  to  whom  he  gave  all  that  they 
required  besides  their  pay;   so  knights  came  from  France, 
-from  Burgundy,  and,  above  all,  from  Champagne,  to  follow 
Turn.     Some  came  to  amuse  themselves,  others  to  pay  their 
debts,  others  because  of  crimes  which  they  had  committed 
at  home. " x    The  only  difficulty  which  the  prince  had  to  face 
was  the  unpatriotic  conduct  of  the  Latin  clergy,  who,  in  the 
snug  enjoyment  of  nearly  one-third  of  the  land,  declined  to 
assist  him  in  driving  the  Greeks  out  of  the  still  unconquered 
stronghold  of  Monemvasia.     As  we  saw,  by  the  constitution 
of  the  principality,  the  fiefs  of  the  clergy  depended  upon  the 
performance  of  certain  military  services ;  so  that  when  they 
refused  to  serve,  on  the  ground  that  they  owed  obedience  to 
the  pope  alone,  Geoffrey  was  strictly  within  his  rights  in 
confiscating  their  fiefs.     But,  in  order  to  show  his  own  dis- 
interested patriotism,  he  spent  the  funds  which  thus  accrued 
to  his  exchequer  in  building  a  great  fortress  at  Glarentza, 
in  the  west  of  Elis,  then  the  chief  port  of  the  Morea,  and 
now   recovering  some  of    its    mediaeval    importance.     This 
castle,  the  ruins  of  which  still  stand  out  like  the  boss  of  a 
shield  from  a  round  hill — a  landmark  for  miles  around — took 
three  years  to  construct,  and  was  then  called  Clermont,  or 
Chloumodtsi,  to  which  the  later  name  of  Castel  Tornese  was 
added,  when  it  became  the  mint  for  the  coins  known  as 
toumots,  so  called  because  they  had  been  originally  minted 
at  Tours.2    The  prince  proceeded  calmly  with  his  building, 
regardless  of  interdicts  and  excommunications;  but  when 
the  castle  was  finished,  he  laid  the  whole  matter  before 
the  pope,  who  had  hitherto  taken  the  side  of  the  clergy,  and 
had  described  Geoffrey  as  "more  inhuman  than  Pharaoh" 

1  Apud  Hppf,  Chroniques,  ioo-i  ;  Z.  a\  C,  23,  791 
*  X.  r.  M.t  1L  2631-57  ;  Cronaca  di  Morea.  (version*  itaiiana)  apud 
Hopf.,  op.  city  435.  • 


88  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

in  his  treatment  of  them.  He  pointed  out  that,  if  the  Latin 
priests  would  not  help  him  to  fight  the  Greeks,  they  would 
only  have  themselves  to  blame  if  the  principality,  and  with 
it  their  Church,  fell  under  the  sway  of  those  schismatics. 
Honorius  III.  saw  the  force  of  this  argument ;  the  ecclesiastical 
thunders  ceased,  and  a  concordat  was  drawn  up  in  1223 
between  Church  and  State,  on  the  lines  laid  down  for  Northern 
Greece  at  the  second  parliament  of  Ravenika.  It  was 
arranged  that  all  Achaian  sees  should  have,  free  from  all 
secular  dues  and  jurisdiction,  all  the  estates  which  were  or 
had  been  theirs  from  the  coronation  of  the  Emperor  Atexios 
Moiirtzouphlos,1  that  is  to  say,  all  the  estates  of  the  Greek 
Church  in  the  Peloponnese  on  the  eve  of  the  Latin  Conquest 
The  prince  was  to  keep  the  treasures  and  moveable  property 
of  the  Church,  on  condition  that  he,  his  barons,  and  other 
Greek  and  Latin  subjects,  paid  a  tithe  estimated  at  1000 
hyperperi  G6448)  a  year — a  sum  which  was  apportioned 
between  the  two  archbishoprics  of  Patras  and  Corinth,  and 
the  six  bishoprics  of  Lacedaemonia,  Amyklai,  Coron,  Modon, 
Olena,  and  Argos.  The  concordat  farther  regulated  the 
position  of  the  Greek  priests,  whom  the  prince  had  been 
accused  of  treating  as  his  own  peasants.  The  number  of  the 
country  popes  who  were  allowed  exemption  from  all  secular 
jurisdiction  was  fixed  in  proportion  to  the  size  of  the  village — 
two  in  a  hamlet  of  from  25  to  70  households,  four  in  a 
village  of  from  70  to  125  families,  six  in  places  of  a  still 
larger  population.  Where  the  number  of  households  was 
less  than  25,  that  number  was  made  up  out  of  the  scattered 
dwellings  of  the  neighbourhood.  The  exemption  was 
extended  to  the  wives  and  families  of  the  priests,  provided 
that  their  children  lived  at  home.  All  the  other  country 
popes  were  bound  to  perform  the  usual  services  to  the 
secular  authorities,  but  their  temporal  lord  might  not  lay 
hands  upon  their  sacred  persons,  and  the  clergy  of  the  towns 
were  to  be  accorded  similar  treatment2    This  system  was 

1  So  Prof  L&mpros  interprets  the  A /exit  Bambacoratii  of  the  text. 
'Icropla  r$f  r6\eun  Adtjr&v,  i.,  439,  n. 

*  X.  r.  M.,  1.  2658  sgq. ;  Epistola  InnocenUi  IIL,  ii.,  835-7  ;  HonarU 
III.,  Opera,  iv.,  409-16;  Regesta,  ii.,  158,  159,  161,  163;  Raynaldus, 
Annates  Ecciesiastict\  i.,  501-2. 


GEOFFREY  II.  AIDS  CONSTANTINOPLE         89 

based  upon  a  just  principle.  It  limited  the  number  of  idle 
priests;  while  it  exempted  the  poor  and  fully-occupied 
country  clergy  from  all  services  and  dues.  Henceforth  peace 
usually  reigned  between  the  ecclesiastical  and  civil  authorities 
of  the  Morea.  Ten  years  later,  however,  we  find  Geoffrey 
complaining  to  Gregory  IX.1  that  the  Archbishop  of  Patras, 
to  whom  the  prince  had  entrusted  that  important  castle, 
apparently  on  the  death  of  Walter  Aleman,  had  made  a 
truce  with  the  Greeks,  the  prince's  enemies,  and  had  allowed 
them  to  enter  the  principality — an  incident  which  would 
seem  to  indicate  a  Greek  invasion  from  Epiros,  to  which 
Patras  would  be  naturally  exposed 

But,  when  the  Latin  Empire  was  menaced  by  the  attacks 
of  the  Greek  Emperor  of  Nice  and  the  Bulgarian  Tsar  in  1236, 
both  prince  and  clergy  alike  responded  to  the  papal  appeal, 
urging  them  to  contribute  money  towards  its  maintenance. 
The  tithe  of  all  ecclesiastical  revenues  was  to  be  devoted  to 
the  cause,  while  Geoffrey,  in  whose  land  the  Emperor  Robert,2 
his  brother-in-law,  had  ended  his  wretched  existence  in  1228, 
offered  a  yearly  subsidy  of  22,000  hyperperi  (£9856)  to  his 
successor,  Baldwin  II.,  for  the  defence  of  Constantinople — a 
striking  proof  of  the  excellent  state  of  his  finances.  He  also 
proceeded  to  Constantinople  with  a  considerable  force, 
including  six  vessels,  although  Venice  was  so  jealous  of 
another  Latin  sea-power  arising  in  the  near  East,  that  she  had 
taken  proceedings  against  one  of  her  subjects  who  had  sold 
Mm  a  galley.  With  this  fleet  he  broke  the  Greeks'  line,  and 
entered  the  harbour,  after  destroying  fifteen  of  their  ships.8 

1  Regisires,  i.,  902  ;  ii.,  538. 

%  Recueil  des  Historiensy  ii.,  295  ;  Dandolo  apud  Muratori,  Rerum  It 
Script^  xii.,  343.  Akropolita  (p.  47)  makes  him  die  in  Euboea  ;  the 
Angonese  Chronicle  places  the  death  of  a  Latin  emperor  at  Patras. 
Bochon  {La  dice  Continentale,  244)  thought  that  the  two  tombs  in  the 
crypt  of  Hosios  Loukas  were  those  of  Robert  and  his  father  Peter  of 
Courtenay.  The  tradition  ascribes  them  to  the  Emperor  Roman6s  II.  and 
lus  wife.  The  Hegodmenos  expressed  to  me,  when  I  visited  the  monastery, 
a  disbelief  in  the  latter  theory ;  the  former  is  a  mere  conjecture.  Sir 
Rennell  Rodd  {The  Princes  of  Achaia,  i.,  142)  surmises  that  Robert's  tomb 
is  to  be  found  in  the  monastery  of  Blachernai,  near  Chloumoutsi. 

*  Albericus  Trium  Fontium,  ii.,  558,  who  says  that  he  had  120  ships ; 
Jfooskds,  Chromque  rim/t,  11.  29,238-41,  29,602-9,  31,191-8  ;  Registres  de 
Grlgoire  IX '.,  ii.,  506,  521,  860 ;  Predelli,  Liber  Communis^  p.  128, 


90  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

As  a  reward  for  this  service,  Baldwin  conferred  upon  him 
the  suzerainty  over  the  duchy  of  the  Archipelago,  which  had 
been  a  fief  of  the  Latin  Empire  since  the  time  of  the  Emperor 
Henry,  and  over  the  island  of  Euboea,  which  was  in  reality 
under  the  overlordship  of  Venice,  but  which  the  Latin 
Emperor  might  consider  as  his  to  bestow  in  virtue  of  its 
former  dependence  on  the  extinct  kingdom  of  Salonika. 
The  three  lords  of  Euboea  were  bound  by  this  investiture  to 
supply  a  galley,  or  eight  knights,  to  their  new  suzerain,  who 
also  received  a  grant  of  land  in  their  island  Nor  did  the 
imperial  marks  of  favour  stop  here.  The  prince,  who,  like 
his  sire,  was  Seneschal  of  Romania,  also  became  suzerain  of 
Boudonitza,1  and  received,  as  the  price  of  further  aid,  the 
emperor's  family  fief  of  Courtenay,  which,  however,  Louis  IX, 
of  France  declined  to  permit.  A  second  papal  appeal  found 
him  willing  to  equip  ten  galleys  for  Baldwin's  service,  and  on 
a  false  rumour  of  the  emperor's  death,  he  proceeded  to 
Constantinople  with  ships  and  a  large  retinue  to  act  as 
regent.  Once  again,  in  1244,  Innocent  IV.  urged  him  to 
defend  the  capital  of  the  Latin  Empire,  and  allowed  him  to 
deduct  from  the  annual  revenues  of  the  Peloponnesian  Church 
sufficient  for  the  maintenance  of  100  archers.  He  was  justly 
regarded  as  the  strongest  Frank  prince  of  his  time,  the 
leading  man  in  "  New  France,"  where  the  Empire  of  Romania 
grew  yearly  weaker.  Such  was  his  prestige,  that  the  Despot 
Manuel  of  Epiros  and  the  Count  of  Cephalonia  and  Zante 
voluntarily  became  his  vassals,  and  the  latter  was  henceforth 
reckoned,  like  the  three  barons  of  Eubcea  and  the  Duke  of 
the  Archipelago,  among  the  peers  of  the  principality  of 
Achaia.2  Now  that  the  Venetians  had  lost  Corfu,  the  crafty 
count  had  no  longer  the  same  motive  for  acknowledging  their 
supremacy. 

1  Sanudo  apud  Hopf^  op.  cit%  99-100 ;  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna), 
167.  The  Chronicle  of  the  Moreay  by  an  anachronism,  says  that 
Boniface  of  Montferrat  conferred  upon  Champlitte  the  suzerainty  over 
Eubcea  and  Boudonitza,  and  that  Robert  gave  to  Geoffrey  II.  that  over 
the  Archipelago  (11.  1553-67,  2603-4).  The  last  statement  is  repeated  by 
the  Liber  Consuetudinum  (Canciani,  op.  city  iii.,  499). 

2  Albericus  Trium  Fontium,  ii.,  558 ;  JL  d,  F.,  53-4.  Romanos, 
TpaTiavfa  Zcfyfip,  1 32-4. 


RETIREMENT  OP  OTHON  DE  LA  ROCHE        91 

Although  he  had  resolved  to  be  master  in  his  own  house, 
Geoffrey  II.  was  no  enemy  of  the  Church,  when  it  did  not 
neglect  its  duties  to  the  State.  He  invited  the  Cistercians, 
already  established,  as  we  saw,  at  Athens,  to  send  some  of 
their  order  to  the  Morea,  where  both  they  and  the 
Dominicans  founded  monasteries;  the  Chronicle  tells  us 
that  when  he  felt  himself  dying  he  bade  his  brother,  William 
of  Kalamata,  carry  out  a  vow  which  he  had  himself  omitted 
to  fulfil,  that  of  building  a  church  in  which  his  body  and  that 
of  his  father  could  repose.1  But  we  learn  from  the  corre- 
spondence of  Pope  Gregory  IX.  that  it  was  his  father  who 
founded  the  church  and  hospital  of  St  James  at  Andravida, 
where  in  due  course  the  bones  of  the  three  first  Villehardouin 
rulers  of  Achaia  were  laid.  The  two  accounts  are  not,  how- 
ever, inconsistent,  if  we  suppose  that  Geoffrey  I.  built  no 
more  than  a  modest  chapel,  leaving  it  to  his  sons  to 
erect  a  more  ambitious  memorial  church,  "the  glorious 
minster  of  Monseigneur  St  James,"  as  the  French  Chronicle 
calls  it  Little  now  remains  of  this  famous  mausoleum  of  the 
Villehardouin  family;  like  its  founder,  it  has  passed  into 
history.  But  a  Norman  arch  near  the  little  railway  station 
still  testifies  to  the  past  glories  of  Sta.  Sophia,  the  cathedral 
of  the  Frankish  capital. 

Meanwhile,  the  next  most  important  French  state  in 
Greece,  that  of  Athens,  had  passed  into  the  hands  of  a  new 
ruler,  Othon  de  la  Roche,  like  Berthold  von  Katzenellen- 
bogen  and  several  other  doughty  barons  of  the  Conquest, 
felt,  as  age  crept  on,  that  he  would  like  to  spend  the  evening 
of  his  days  in  his  native  land,  which  he  had  never  forgotten 
in  his  splendid  exile.  Almost  to  the  end  of  his  reign,  we 
find  him  under  the  ban  of  the  Church ;  in  1225,  soon  after  he 
had  made  his  peace  with  the  pope,  he  departed  for  Burgundy 
with  his  wife  and  his  two  sons,  leaving  his  Greek  dominions 
to  his  nephew  Guy,  who  had  already  enjoyed  the  ownership 
of  half  Thebes.2     If  the  Burgundian  noble,  whom  chance  had 


1  X.  t.  M.,  1L  2735-47,  7790-4  ;  Registrei  de  Grdgoire  IX '.,  iL,  770.  I 
owe  the  suggestion  in  the  text  to  Sir  Rennell  Rodd. 

*  Regesta  Honorii  J//.,  ii.,  304  (Feb.  12,  1225)— the  last  allnsion  to 
Othon  in  Greece. 


92  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

made  the  successor  of  Kodros  at  Athens,  of  Agamemnon  at 
Argos,  had  the  least  imagination,  or  had  enjoyed  the  classical 
culture  of  the  Greek  divine  whom  he  had  driven  from  the 
Akropolis,  he  must  have  been  stirred  by  the  thought  that  it 
was  his  lot  to  rule  over  the  most  famous  land  of  the  ancient 
world.  But  classical  allusions  did  not  appeal  to  the  Frank 
conquerors  of  the  thirteenth  century,  who  looked  upon 
Greece  much  as  we  look  upon  Africa.  Cultured  men  there 
were  among  them;  Conon  de  B6thune  was  a  poet  and  an 
orator ;  even  the  first  Geoffroy  de  Villehardouin  wrote  verses 
which  have  been  preserved ;  Elias  Cairels  is  a  poetic 
authority  for  the  Lombard  rebellion ;  but  the  most  inspired 
of  them  all,  the  troubadour  Rambaud  de  Vaqueiras,  though 
rewarded  for  his  songs  by  honours  and  lands  in  Greece, 
sighed  for  the  days  when  he  made  love  to  a  fair  dame  in  the 
Far  West,  when  cantb  pur  Beatrice  in  Monferrato}  Home- 
sickness, the  special  malady  which  prevents  the  French  from 
being  colonists,  seems  to  have  afflicted  many  of  the  founders 
of  "  New  France." 

Othon  passed  the  rest  of  his  life  in  his  beloved  Franche- 
Comt6,  where  he  lived  at  the  most  some  nine  years  more, 
and  where  his  descendants  became  extinct  only  in  the  seven- 
teenth century.  His  sepulchre  is  doubtful ;  but  the  archives 
of  the  Haute-Sadne  contain  his  seal  bearing  the  arms  of  his 
family— azur  equipolU  d  quatre  points  d'ichiquier  (for.  The 
counter-seal,  consisting  of  an  ancient  gem  of  Hellenic 
workmanship,  which  Othon  may  have  picked  up  at  the  sack 
of  Constantinople  or  in  some  shop  at  Thebes,  represents 
three  naked  children  teasing  a  large  dog.  This  is  the  sole 
relic  of  the  Megaskyr?  Guy  I.,  his  successor,  resided  at 
Thebes,  the  most  flourishing  town  in  his  dominions.  Half 
of  that  city  now  passed,  by  the  second  marriage  of  Othon's 
niece,  to  Bela  de  St  Omer,  a  member  of  that  famous  Flemish 
family  whose  name  still  survives,  after  the  lapse  of  centuries, 
in  the  Santameri  tower  at  Thebes  and  in  the  Santameri 
mountains  of  the  Peloponnese.     Thus,  as  the  residence  of 

1  Buchon,  Recherches  et  Afat/naux,  i.,  419-26  ;  Recherches  historiquts, 
ii.,  376;  Histoire  des  ConqutUs,  29,  206,  449;  Giornale  Lxgustico,  v., 

241-71. 

2  Acad&nie  de  Besan^on  (1880),  pp.  140-4  ;  plate  iii. 


ATHENS  UNDER  GUY  I.  93 

two  such  important  and  allied  clans,  the  old  Boeotian  capital 
attained  to  great  celebrity.  The  silk  manufacture  still 
continued  there,  and  the  Jewish  colony  was  tolerated,  for 
we  hear  of  Hebrew  poets  at  Thebes  under  Othon — bards 
whose  verses,  so  a  rival  singer  tells  us,  were  a  mass  of 
barbarisms.  Besides  the  Jews,  there  was  also  a  Genoese 
settlement  there,  which  already  had  its  own  consul.  In 
1240  he  negotiated  a  commercial  treaty  with  Guy,  by  which 
"the  Lord  of  Athens"  granted  Genoese  merchants  freedom 
from  all  taxes,  "except  the  usual  duty  paid  on  all  silk  stuffs 
woven  in  his  land"  He  also  permitted  them  to  have  not 
only  their  own  consul,  but  also  their  own  court  of  justice  for 
all  except  criminal  cases  and  appeals,  which  were  reserved 
for  the  tribunals  of  the  country.  Both  at  Athens  and  Thebes, 
an  open  space  and  consular  buildings  were  assigned  to  them.1 
In  return  for  these  favours,  the  Genoese  were  to  protect  "  the 
Lord  of  Athens,"  his  land,  and  his  subjects.  The  Greeks,  too, 
as  well  as  the  Jews  and  the  Genoese,  enjoyed  the  protection 
of  this  enlightened  ruler.  When  the  Archdeacon  of  Athens 
insisted  on  levying  marriage-fees  in  money,  instead  of  the 
hen  and  the  loaf,  which  the  Athenian  bridegrooms  had  paid 
from  time  immemorial,  he  was  made  to  disgorge.  Every 
traveller  to  Marathon  has  seen  by  the  side  of  the  road,  nearly 
seven  miles  out  of  the  city,  a  Byzantine  column  with  an 
inscription  in  iambics.  The  inscription  tells  us  how  "the 
servant  of  the  Lord,  Neophytos  by  name,"  made  a  road  to 
the  monastery  of  St  John  the  Hunter,  of  which  he  was 
probably  the  abbot  Those  who  have  visited  the  famous 
fort  of  Phyle  may  have  turned  aside  to  rest  at  the  quaint 
little  monastery  of  the  Virgin  of  the  Defile  (Jiavayla  rS>v 
fXcKTTow).  I  was  there  informed  by  the  abbot  that  the 
more  modern  of  the  two  churches  was  founded  in  1242,  that 
is  to  say,  under  the  rule  of  Guy.  These  two  examples  show 
that  the  Greek  monks  were  usually  unmolested  by  the 
Franks  of  Athens  in  his  time.  Once,  indeed,  we  find  him 
begging  the  pope  to  turn  out  the  inmates  of  a  monastery 
near  the  frontier,  suspected  of  betraying  state  secrets  to  his 
enemies.  For  his  capital,  we  are  told,  was  exposed  to 
"frequent  devastations"  by  the  Greeks.  But  Guy  was  no 
1  Liber  Jurium  Reipublica  Genutnsis,  i.,  992-3. 


94  THE  ZENITH  OF  PRANKISH  RULE 

lover  of  adventures,  and  turned  a  deaf  ear  to  the  papal 
appeal,  urging  him  to  join  the  Prince  of  Achaia  and  Count 
Matthew  of  Cephalonia,  in  defending  Constantinople.1 

While  Athens  thus  enjoyed  comparative  peace,  the  new 
Greek  Empire  of  Salonika  had  been  shaken  to  its  founda- 
tions. Theodore  Angelos  was  not  the  man  to  be  content 
with  the  vast  dominions  which  he  had  conquered.  He  was 
now  at  the  zenith  of  his  power  ;  his  Italian  neighbour,  Count 
Matthew  of  Cephalonia,  was  glad  to  purchase  his  friendship 
and  secure  immunity  from  attack  by  marrying  his  sister — the 
first  of  the  matrimonial  unions  between  the  Greeks  of  Epiros 
and  the  Franks.  Even  the  Emperor  Frederick  II.,  the  most 
remarkable  ruler  of  the  Middle  Ages,  did  not  scorn  an 
alliance  with  his  brother  of  Salonika,  brought  about  by  the 
good  offices  of  the  count,  the  brother-in-law  of  one  party, 
the  vassal  of  the  other.  Copper  coins  are  still  extant,  showing 
Theodore  and  St  Demetrios,  the  patron  saint  of  Salonika,1 
supporting  the  imperial  city,  which  might  claim  to  have 
taken  the  place  of  Byzantium  as  the  seat  of  the  Greek 
Empire.  But  ambition  urged  Theodore  to  attack  the  power- 
ful Bulgarian  Tsar,  John  As£n  1 1.,  in  spite  of  the  treaty  of 
peace  which  existed  between  them.  The  tsar  advanced  to 
meet  him,  bearing  aloft  on  his  standard  the  written  oath  of 
the  perjurer,  and  at  Klokotinitza,  on  the  Maritza,  he  routed 
the  Epirote  army,  and  took  his  adversary  prisoner.  The 
Bulgarian,  less  savage  than  his  kind,  treated  his  captive  well, 
till  he  detected  him  plotting  fresh  schemes  of  conquest  To 
unfit  him  for  further  political  adventures,  the  tsar  ordered 
his  eyes  to  be  put  out — the  traditional  punishment  of  the 
Byzantine  Empire.  Profiting  by  Theodore's  misfortunes, 
his  younger  brother,  Manuel,  seized  the  remains  of  his 
empire,  styling  himself  Despot  and  Emperor,  striking  gold 
and  silver  coins  with  the  effigy  of  St  Demetrios,  and  counting 
upon  the  toleration  of  the  Bulgarian  Tsar,  whose  illegitimate 

1  Registres  de  Grtgoire  IX.y  i.,  636;  ii.,  108,  421,  607;  Registres 
d  Innocent  7K,  i.,  112;  Kampouroglos  ;  '\cr9pLa  rGtv  'AflijHo/wp,  ii.,  213-15  ; 
238-9.  He  gives  the  date  of  the  church  as  1204.  The  older  church,  I 
was  told,  was  built  in  742. 

2  Albericus,  ii.,  558  ;  Ricardus  de  S.  Germano,  apud  Muratori,  vii., 
1015  ;  Mionnet,  Description  de  MJdaillcs,  Supp.  III.,  172. 


STATE  OF  NORTHERN  GREECE  95 

daughter  he  had  married  Determined  to  reign  at  any  cost, 
the  new  emperor  first  endeavoured  to  pacify  the  court  and 
Church  of  Nice  by  ecclesiastical  re-union.  He  wrote  to  the 
oecumenical  patriarch,  apologising  for  the  consecration  of 
his  bishops  by  the  Metropolitan  of  Naupaktos,  and  suggesting 
that,  as  pirates  made  the  journey  to  Nice  too  dangerous  for 
the  ecclesiastics  of  Epiros,  the  patriarch  should  either  allow 
the  present  system  to  continue,  or  should  permit  some  Nicene 
divine  to  run  the  risks  of  the  voyage.  Naturally,  the 
patriarch  did  not  see  the  force  of  this  argument ;  u  when,"  he 
said,  "had  piracy  not  existed?  All  this  talk  is  a  mere 
excuse."  Having  thus  failed  to  conciliate  the  patriarch, 
Manuel  promised  submission  to  the  pope,  sending  the  ever- 
useful  metropolitan  Bardines  on  a  mission  to  Rome,  and 
even  took  an  oath  of  homage  to  the  powerful  Prince  of 
Achaia.1  But  meanwhile,  the  heart  of  the  Bulgarian  monarch 
had  been  touched  by  the  beauty  of  blind  Theodore's  daughter. 
She  accepted  his  offer  of  marriage  on  condition  that  he 
released  her  father,  and  the  latter  was  no  sooner  free  than  he 
resumed  his  schemes.  Entering  Salonika  in  disguise,  he 
quickly  won  over  a  considerable  party  by  his  skilful  intrigues ; 
his  friends  aided  him  in  driving  out  his  usurping  brother ; 
and,  though  his  physical  infirmity  prevented  him  from  re- 
occupying  the  throne  himself,  he  was  able  to  exercise  the 
real  power  in  the  name  of  his  son  John,  who  received  the 
nominal  dignity  of  emperor.  The  independent  Greek  Empire 
of  Salonika  was,  however,  not  destined  to  survive  the  attacks 
of  its  stronger  rival  at  Nice,  where  the  powerful  emperor, 
John  Vatdtzes,  was  bent  on  restoring  the  unity  of  the  free 
Greeks  under  his  sceptre.  Thus,  the  exiled  Manuel  not  only 
found  a  welcome  at  his  court,  but  by  his  assistance  was 
enabled  to  invade  Thessaly,  where  he  rapidly  made  himself 
master  of  the  principal  towns,  and  became  the  ally  of  the 
triarchs  of  Euboea  as  well  as  of  the  Prince  of  Achaia.  In 
vain  Theodore  tried  to  keep  the  empire  in  the  family  by 
making  terms  with  his  brother.  Vatdtzes  crossed  over  into 
Macedonia,  and  compelled  the  feeble  Emperor  John,  whom 

1  Akropolita,  44-7  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  28 ;  Albericus,  p.  558. 
Sabatier,  Description  g/n/ra/e  des  monnaies  byzantines,  ii.,  303-4  ;  Mik- 
losich  und  Miiller,  iii.,  59-66  ;  Registres  de  Grdgoire  IX '.,  i.,  491. 


96  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

nature  had  meant  for  a  monk  and  his  father  had  placed  on 
the  throne,  to  abandon  the  coveted  title  of  emperor,  the  red 
sandals,  and  the  ruby-topped  "pyramid"  of  pearls,  and 
resume  the  less  dignified  style  of  Despot.  On  these  terms, 
he  was  allowed  to  keep  his  possessions ;  but,  on  his  death, 
his  brother  and  successor,  Demetrios,  so  greatly  irritated  his 
subjects  by  his  debaucheries  that  they  were  glad  to  welcome 
the  troops  of  Vatitzes.  No  opposition  was  to  be  feared  from 
the  Bulgarians,  for  their  great  tsar  was  dead,  so,  in  1 246,  the 
Emperor  of  Nice  annexed  the  short-lived  Greek  Empire  of 
Salonika  to  his  dominions.  These  rival  and  scattered  Greek 
forces  were  thus  combined,  and  their  fraternal  divisions, 
which  had  given  the  tottering  Latin  Empire  of  Constantinople 
a  respite,  ceased  for  the  present. 

Even  yet,  however,  Hellenism  was  not  united  against 
the  foreign  foe.  The  Despotat  of  Epiros,  thanks  to  the 
energy  of  another  member  of  the  house  of  Angelos,  had 
survived  the  untimely  fall  of  the  less  stable,  but  more 
pretentious,  Empire  of  Salonika.  Ten  years  before  that 
event,  a  bastard  son  of  the  first  Despot,  styling  himself 
"  Michael  1 1.,  Despot  of  Hellas,"  had  made  himself  master 
of  Epiros,  iEtolia,  and  Corfu.  Circumstances  favoured  his 
usurpation,  for  the  Empire  of  Salonika  had  not  recovered 
from  the  blow  which  the  Bulgarians  had  dealt  it,  Theodore 
was  still  a  prisoner,  and  the  Epirotes  saw  that  they  must 
have  a  strong  man  to  rule  over  them.  Michael  II.  won  over 
the  Corfiotes  by  following  the  traditional  policy  of  his  family 
towards  them.  Just  as  Michael  I.  and  Manuel  had 
guaranteed  the  privileges  of  the  metropolitan  church  and 
people  of  the  island,  so  Michael  II.,  by  four  successive  bulls, 
exempted  them  from  practically  all  taxes  and  duties,  relieved 
the  clergy  from  all  forced  labour,  and  granted  the  Ragusan  . 
traders  equal  rights  with  the  islanders.  On  the  death  of  his  - 
uncle,  Manuel,  in  1241,  he  succeeded  to  the  latter's  Thessalian  - 
dominions,  while  old  blind  Theodore,  with  whom  the  love  ofr: 
power  was  still  the  ruling  passion,  managed  to  retain,  eve 
after  the  fall  of  Salonika,  a  small  piece  of  territory  round 
Vodena  in  Macedonia.1 

1  Akropolita,  65-73,   75-6,  85-91  ;   Nikephdros  Gregorys,  i.,  p.   47 
X.  r.   M.,  11.  3061,  3561,  3815;   Mustoxidi,  Delle  Cose  Contresi,  401 


THEODORA  OF  EPIROS  97 

Michael  1 1.  was  at  first  anxious  to  remain  on  good  terms 
with  the  powerful  Emperor  of  Nice.  He  had  married  a 
saintly  woman,  whose  life,1  written  by  a  monk  in  the 
seventeenth  century,  is  one  long  record  of  ill-treatment 
patiently  borne,  of  Christian  forgiveness,  and  of  a  devotion  to 
her  husband,  ill-requited  by  that  passionate  man.  The 
Blessed  Theodora  was  the  daughter  of  John  Petraleiphas,  a 
member  of  a  distinguished  Frankish  family  from  Provence, 
Pierre  d'Aulps  (or  de  Alpibus),  established  even  before  the 
Conquest  in  the  mountainous  region  of  Agrapha.  The 
legend  tells  us  that  her  husband,  tempted  by  the  devil  and 
enchanted  by  the  charms  and  spells  of  a  fair  Greek,  called 
Gangrene,  drove  his  lawful  wife  into  the  wilderness  and 
received  his  paramour  into  the  palace.  Remorse,  or  the 
remonstrances  of  his  councillors,  at  last  prevailed  upon  him 
to  recall  Theodora,  and,  as  a  sign  of  his  repentance,  he 
founded,  at  her  request,  the  monastery  of  the  Saviour  at 
Galaxidi,  on  the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  which,  though  now  ruined  by 
earthquakes,  was  still  inhabited  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
when  it  produced  the  short,  but  interesting  Chronicle  of 
Galaxidi?  which  is  one  of  our  authorities  for  the  history  of 
Frankish  and  Turkish  Greece.  But  Theodora  united  the 
usually  incompatible  qualities  of  a  saint  and  a  diplomatist ; 
she  readily  went  on  a  mission  to  arrange  a  match  between 
her  son  Nikeph6ros  and  the  grand-daughter  of  the  Greek 
Emperor  Vatdtzes.  The  emperor  consented,  and  it  seemed  as 
if  peace  were  firmly  cemented  between  Nice  and  Epiros. 
Indeed,  the  Emperor  Frederick  II.  actually  wrote  to  the 
Despot  in  1250,  begging  him  to  grant  a  free  passage  across 
Epiros  to  the  troops,  which  his  own  son-in-law,  Vatitzes,  was 
sending  him  to  assist  in  his  struggle  against  Pope 
Innocent  IV.3 

Such  was  the  condition  of  Northern  Greece  when,  in  1246, 
Geoffroy  de  Villehardouin  died,4  and  his  brother  William 
Barone,  No  tune  Stork  he  di  Re  Carlo  111.  di  Duraxzoy  61-6 ;  AeXrio*  r$t 
*l<rrofuxi}i  'Eratplas,  ii.,  594-6  ;  Byz.  Zeitsch^  i.,  336. 

1  Job  apud  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  L,  401-6. 

f  PP-  x36>  198-200  ;  AeXWor  rfc  Xpurr.  9Ap%.  'Brcupcfaf,  iii.,  69. 

3  Miklosich  und  M tiller,  iii.,  68-9. 

4  He  is  last  mentioned  as  alive  in  a  letter  of  May  6,  1246.    Heglstns 
<f  Innocent  IV.,  i.,  275. 

G 


98  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

became  Prince  of  Achaia  in  his  stead.  During  his  long  reign 
of  over  thirty  years,  he  is  the  central  figure  in  Greek 
history,  for  he  intervened  in  the  affairs  of  nearly  every  state 
in  Greece,  in  Euboea,  in  Attica,  and  in  Epiros.  The  new 
prince  was  the  first  of  his  race  born  in  the  country — for  his 
birthplace  had  been  the  family  castle  of  Kalamata,  which  had 
been  his  father's  fief,  and  he  spoke  Greek  as  his  native 
tongue.1  In  cleverness  and  energy  he  surpassed  all  his 
subjects  ;  he  was  the  most  adventurous  and  knightly  figure  of 
Frankish  Greece,  combining  at  times  the  chivalrous  spirit  of 
France  with  the  wiles  of  the  Homeric  Odysseus.  He,  too,  has 
been  made  the  hero  of  a  poem,  The  Chronicle  of  the  Moreay 
which  in  jog-tot  "political"  verse  that  is  almost  prose 
extols  the  deeds  of  this  prince  "who  toiled  more  than  all 
who  were  born  in  the  parts  of  Romania."  But  his  reign  was, 
thanks  to  his  love  of  fighting,  an  almost  unbroken  series  of 
wars ;  and  if  he  was  able  for  a  brief  space  to  effect  the 
complete  conquest  of  the  peninsula,  it  was  in  his  days  that 
its  reconquest  by  the  Greeks  began. 

His  first  enterprise  was  the  subjugation  of  Monemvasia, 
the  last  Greek  stronghold,  which  had  defied  his  three  pre- 
decessors, and  which  was  in  uninterrupted  communication 
with  the  Emperor  of  Nice.2  No  one  who  has  seen  that 
picturesque  spot  can  wonder  at  its  continued  independence 
in  the  face  of  such  arms  as  the  Franks  could  bring  against 
it  The  great  rock  of  Monemvasia,  the  Gibraltar  of  Greece, 
stands  out  defiantly  in  the  sea,  and  is  only  accessible  from 
the  land  by  a  narrow  causeway,  the  "single  entrance,"  to 
which  it  owes  its  name.  It  had  long  enjoyed  special 
privileges  from  the  Byzantine  emperors,  and  was  governed 
by  three  local  magnates,  who  styled  themselves  archons — 
Mamonfts,  Daimonoydnnes,  and  Sophian6s.  William  made 
elaborate  preparations  for  the  siege.     He  summoned  to  his 

1  x.  r.  M.t  L  4130. 

*  Ibid.)  11.  2765-9, 2946-7.  All  the  three  families  were  still  living  there 
when  the  Chronicle  was  composed ;  throughout  the  Frankish  period 
we  hear  of  them,  and  the  Mamonacles  are  even  now  extant.  Their  history 
from  1248  to  the  present  day  was  written  by  Meliardkes.  OUoyfrtt*. 
Mafxwva.  'Ioropi/rfj  fieXirrj  rijs  oUoyevelat  Ma/uwa  drb  rift  tfupavlaeun  aMjt  br~ 
rj)  'loroplq.'fjJxpi  ajpepov,  J-ike  many  archontic  families,  they  bore  th« 
imperial!  eagle. 


SURRENDER  OF  MONEMVASIA  99 

aid  the  great  vassals  of  the  principality — Guy  I.  of  Athens, 
who  owed  him  allegiance  for  Argos  and  Nauplia ;  the  three 
barons  of  Euboea  ;  Angelo  Sanudo,  Duke  of  Naxos,  with  the 
other  lords  of  the  Cyclades ;  and  the  veteran  Count  Matteo 
Orsini  of  Cephalonia.1  But  he  saw  that  without  the  naval 
assistance  of  Venice,  which  had  taken  care  that  his  principality 
should  not  become  a  sea-power,  he  could  never  capture  the 
place.  He  accordingly  obtained  the  aid  of  four  Venetian 
galleys,  and  then  proceeded  to  invest  the  great  rock-fortress 
by  land  and  water.  For  three  long  years  or  more  the  garrison 
held  out,  "like  a  nightingale  in  its  cage,"  as  the  chronicler 
quaintly  says — and  the  simile  is  most  appropriate,  for  the 
rock  abounds  with  those  songsters — till  all  supplies  were 
exhausted,  and  they  had  eaten  the  very  cats  and  mice. 
Even  then,  however,  they  only  surrendered  on  condition  that 
they  should  be  excused  from  all  feudal  services,  except  at 
sea,  and  should  even  in  that  case  be  paid.  True  to  the 
conciliatory  policy  of  his  family,  William  wisely  granted  their 
terms,  and  then  the  three  arc/tons  of  Monemvasia  advanced 
along  the  narrow  causeway  to  his  camp,  and  offered  him  the 
keys  of  their  town.  The  conqueror  received  them  with  the 
respect  of  one  brave  man  for  another,  loaded  them  with 
costly  gifts,  and  gave  them  fiefs  in  the  district  of  Vatika,  near 
Cape  Malea.  A  Frankish  garrison  was  installed  in  the 
coveted  fortress,  a  Latin  bishop  at  last  occupied  the  episcopal 
palace  there ;  but  the  traveller  searches  in  vain  among  the 
picturesque  Byzantine  and  Venetian  remains  of  the  rock  for 
the  least  trace  of  the  French  prince's  brief  rule  of  thirteen 
years  over  the  Gibraltar  of  the  Morea.  Local  tradition, 
however,  still  indicates  the  spot  on  the  mainland  where  his 
cavalry  was  left  The  surrender  of  Monemvasia  was 
followed  by  the  submission  not  only  of  Vatika,  but  of  the 
Tzdkones  also,  whose  lands  had  been  ravaged  by  Geoffrey  I., 
but  who,  even  if  they  had  promised  to  obey  him,  had  never 
really  acknowledged  the  Frankish  sway  till  now.2    To  com- 

1  X.  r.  M.,  U.  2891-6;  Romanes,  Tpartapk  Z4/>ftp,  136.  The  French 
rersion  of  the  Chronicle  omits  the  Naxian  and  Cephalonian  con- 
tingents. The  Chronicle  by  an  anachronism,  makes  the  surrender  of 
Coron  and  Modon  to  Venice,  really  surrendered  in  1209,  the  price  of 
the  Venetians  galleys,  11.  2783-5,  2854-9. 

*  lbuLt  1L  2064-72,  2960-5. 


100  THE  ZENITH  OF  PRANKISH  RULE 

plete  the  subjugation  of  the  Morea,  William  built  three 
strong  castles,  specially  intended  to  overawe  the  Slavs  of 
Taygetos  and  the  mountaineers  of  Maina.  Three  miles  from 
Sparta,  on  a  steep  hill  which  is  one  of  the  spurs  of  Taygetos, 
and  was  perhaps  the  site  of  the  "  dove-haunted  Messe  "  of 
Homer,  he  erected  the  fortress  of  Mizithr&,  or  Mistri,  the 
ruins  of  which  are  still  one  of  the  mediaeval  glories  of  the 
Morea,  and  which  played  a  great  part  in  the  history  of  the 
next  two  centuries.  One  wonders,  on  visiting  Villehardouin's 
castle  to-day,  how  the  ancient  Spartans  can  have  neglected 
a  strategic  position  so  incomparably  superior  to  their  open 
village  down  in  the  plain  by  the  Eurotas,  and  even  now, 
when  it  is  abandoned  to  the  tortoises  and  the  sheep,  the  hill 
of  Mistrd.  looks  down,  as  it  were,  with  feudal  pride  upon  the 
brand-new  streets  and  hideous  cathedral  of  the  modern 
Sparta  Scholars  differ  as  to  the  origin  of  its  name,  but 
whether  it  be  of  Slavonic  derivation,1  or  whether  it  be 
Greek,  Mizithr&  stands,  more  than  any  other  spot,  except 
Constantinople,  for  the  preservation  of  mediaeval  Hellenism 
against  the  Franks.  But  the  French  prince  was  not  content 
with  MistrA  alone.  Down  in  the  direction  of  Cape  Matapan, 
he  built  the  castle  of  Old  Maina,  and  on  the  western  side  of 
the  promontory,  near  Kisternes,  he  constructed  yet  a  third 
fortress,  which  the  Greeks  called  Levtro  and  the  French 
Beaufort2  The  immediate  result  of  this  policy  was  the 
submission  of  the  Slavonic  tribe  of  Melings,  who  had  given 
so  much  trouble  to  the  Byzantine  authorities  in  earlier  days, 
but  who  now  saw  that  the  new  forts  confined  them  to  the 
barren  mountains,  where  they  could  not  find  subsistence. 
Accordingly,  they  promised  to  be  the  prince's  vassals,  and  to 

1  Mv&epa  in  modern  Greek  means  a  sort  of  cheese,  but  Hopf  thinks 
the  name  Slavonic.    Cf.  Hatzidakis  in  Bvfarr.  Xpwucd,  ii.,  58. 

2  X.  t.  M.t  11.  2985-3042 ;  L  d.  C,  91-5  ;  L.  d.  F,  48-9.  The  site  of 
Old  Maina  is  placed  by  Finlay  (iv.,  198-9)  and  Sir  Rennell  Rodd  (il, 
277)  near  Cape  Matapan,  which  tallies  with  the  description  in  the  X.  r.  M., 
which  speaks  (1.  3005)  of  a  "  Cape,"  and  with  the  description  of  Nikephoros 
Gregorys  (L,  80).  Leake  (Peloponnesiaca,  142)  thinks  it  is  the  castle  still 
so  called  above  Porto  Quaglio.  Mr  Traquair  informs  me  that  there  is 
no  Frankish  work  now  visible  there.  A  Venetian  document  of  r278 
(Fontes  Rer.  AusL,  xiv.,  232,  234)  mentions  Castrum  de  Belforte  in 
partibus  ScUxvorde. 


THE  COURT  OF  LACED^EMONIA  101 

serve  in  his  army  on  the  same  terms  as  in  the  time  of  the 
Byzantine  emperors,  on  condition  that  they  were  held  exempt 
from  dues  and  other  feudal  service.  The  last  two  castles 
also  shut  in  the  M ainates,  so  that  William's  sway  was  now 
acknowledged  all  over  the  Morea,  save  where  the  lion  banner 
of  St  Mark  floated  over  the  two  Messenian  stations  of  Modon 
and  Coron.  In  their  own  barren  land,  however,  the  Mainates 
continued  to  indulge  in  warfare,  for,  a  few  years  later,  the 
Catholic  bishop  of  Maina  was  allowed  by  Pope  Alexander  IV. 
to  reside  in  Italy,  because  the  prevailing  strife  prevented 
him  from  living  in  his  own  see.1 

The  principality  had  now  reached  its  zenith.  The  barons 
had  built  themselves  castles  all  over  the  country,  whence  they 
took  their  titles,  and  where  they  lived  "  the  fairest  life  that  a 
man  can."  The  prince's  court  at  Lacedaemonia,  which  the 
Franks  called  La  Cr6monie,  and  of  which  an  Englishman, 
William  of  Faversham,  was  then  bishop,  was  considered  as 
the  best  school  of  chivalry  in  the  East,  and  "  more  brilliant 
than  that  of  a  great  king."  The  sons  of  his  great  vassals  and 
of  the  other  Frank  rulers  of  the  Levant  came  there  to  learn 
war  and  manners;  and  personages  like  Marco  II.  Sanudo, 
afterwards  Duke  of  Naxos,  from  whom  our  chief  authority, 
Marino  Sanudo  the  elder,  derived  his  information,  and  Hugh, 
Duke  of  Burgundy,  were  his  honoured  guests.  Never  since 
the  days  of  the  ancient  Spartans  had  such  splendid  warriors 
been  seen  on  the  banks  of  the  Eurotas,  and  Louis  IX.  of 
France,  the  mightiest  Latin  sovereign  of  the  age,  might  well 
wish  that  he  had  the  giant  knights  of  Achaia  to  assist  him  in 
his  crusade  against  the  infidel  From  700  to  1000  of  these 
horsemen  always  attended  the  prince,  and  William  was  able 
to  fit  out  a  fleet  of  about  24  vessels  and  sail  with  400  knights 
to  meet  the  King  of  France  in  Cyprus,  and  to  leave  behind  in 
Rhodes  "  more  than  a  hundred  noble  men  and  good  cavaliers," 
to  assist  the  Genoese  in  defending  that  fine  island,  which  they 
had  recently  captured,  against  the  Empire  of  Nice.  We  are 
told  that  the  Morea  was  at  this  time  the  favourite  resort  of 
the  chivalry  of  France,  and  the  French  soldiers,  who  had  been 
collected  for  the  defence  of  Constantinople  in  1238,  had  been 
content  to  stop  short  in  Achaia  and  remain  there.  But  all 
1  Registres,  i.,  184. 


102  THE  ZENITH  OF  PRANKISH  RULE 

this  brilliance  was  not  merely  on  the  surface.  Trade 
flourished,  and  "merchants"  says  Sanudo,  "went  up  and 
down  without  money,  and  lodged  in  the  houses  of  the 
bailies,  and  on  their  simple  note  of  hand  people  gave  them 
money."1  Commercial  travellers  from  Florence  and  Siena 
visited  Andravida,  and  Urban  IV.  could  write  to  the  bishops 
of  Achaia  to  send  him  some  of  those  silken  garments  for 
which  Greece  was  still  famed.  For  a  prince  so  martial  and  a 
state  so  important,  where  commercial  transactions  were 
constant,  a  local  coinage  had  become  a  necessity.  William 
therefore  availed  himself  of  his  meeting  with  the  King  of 
France  in  Cyprus  to  obtain  the  right  of  coining  money  from 
that  sovereign.  "  Sire,"  said  the  soldierly  prince,  "  you  are  a 
mightier  lord  than  I,  and  can  lead  as  many  men  as  you  like 
where  you  please  without  money;  I  cannot  do  so."  The 
king  thereupon  permitted  him  to  coin  tournois,  such  as 
circulated  in  France.  The  Achaian  mint  was  established  in 
the  castle  of  ChloumoOtsi,  which  thus  obtained  its  Italian 
name  of  Castel  Tornese,  and  ere  long  coins  bearing  the 
princely  title,  the  church  of  St  Martin  of  Tours,  and  the  : 
inscription  De  Clarencid,  were  issued  from  it2  For  more  - 
than  a  century  it  continued  working,  and  many  thousands  ofl 
its  tournois  have  been  found  in  Greece. 

Unfortunately,  William's  ambition,  not  content  with  rulings 
over  a  realm  compared  with  which  that  of  ancient  Sparta-* 
was  small,  soon  plunged  the  country  into  another,  and  this^ 
time  a  fratricidal,  war.  Geoffrey  II.  on  his  deathbed  hadC 
urged  his  brother  to  marry  again,  and  secure  the  succession  in*~ 
the  family;  and  William  had  hastened  to  follow  his  advice- - 
His  second  wife,  Carintana,  was  one  of  the  Dalle  Carceri  oft"  « 
Eubcea,  and  baroness  in  her  own  right  in  the  northern  thircfc 

1  Sanudo  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques  grtio-romanes,  102.  The  historian* 
visited  his  ducal  relative  several  times,  and  probably  wrote  in  1328^ 
making  additions  in  1333,  while  living  in  Constantinople.  Joinville^ 
Vie  de  St  Louis  (ed.  de  Wailly)  53,  151  ;  Akropolita,  94  ;  L.  d.  C,  101 
Registres  dUrbainlV^  i.,  15-16  ;  Mouskes,  Chronique  rimie%  1L  29,602-c^ 
Eubel,  i.,  302. 

8  Sanudo,  loc.  tit;  Schlumberger  (Numismatiquey  312)  thinks,  howeveff^" 
that  some  coins  with  G.  Princeps  Achate  on  them  had  been  struck  befbc^ 
this  date  at  Corinth — a  name  which  appears  on  most  of  them — probab^E- 
by    William.     One  coin,  not    a    tournois,  was  struck    at  "Clarencis»— 
(Supplement,  15). 


WAR  IN  EUB(EA  103 

of  that  island  When  she  died  in  1255,  her  husband  claimed 
her  barony  as  her  heir,  and  actually  had  coins  minted  with 
the  superscription  "  Triarch  of  Negroponte."  Although  the 
Prince  of  Achaia  was  suzerain  of  the  island,  neither  the  other 
triarchs  nor  the  Venetian  bailie  were  desirous  that  so  restless 
a  man  should  become  their  neighbour.  One  of  the  triarchs, 
Guglielmo  da  Verona,  was,  indeed,  the  prince's  kinsman,  for 
he  was  married  to  Villehardouin's  niece;  but  he  could  not 
forget  that,  by  a  former  marriage,  he  was  titular  king  of 
Salonika,  and  therefore  a  great  personage  in  heraldic  lists,  and 
he  was  rich  enough  to  keep  400  knights  at  his  court  Accord- 
ingly, he  and  his  fellow-triarch,  Narzotto  dalle  Carceri,  placed 
his  nephew  Grapella  in  possession  of  the  disputed  barony. 
They  then  concluded  treaties  with  the  Venetian  bailie, 
promising  to  wage  "  lively  war  "  against  the  Prince  of  Achaia,1 
and  to  make  no  peace  with  him  without  the  consent  of  the 
republic,  which,  in  return,  was  to  consult  them  before  ceasing 
hostilities.  The  castle  on  the  bridge  of  Negroponte  was  to 
be  entrusted  to  the  Venetians,  who  were  also  to  receive  a 
strip  of  land  from  St  Mary  of  the  Crutched  Friars  down 
towards  the  castle  and  two  other  strips  in  the  vicinity.  The 
former  pacts  of  1209  and  12 16  were  renewed,  with  the 
exception  that,  instead  of  the  payment  of  700  hyperperi 
from  each  of  the  triarchs,  Venice  should  take  all  the  tolls, 
the  triarchs  being,  however,  exempt  from  paying  them. 
A  further  treaty  localised  the  war  to  the  Empire  of 
Romania. 

The  Prince  of  Achaia  was  not  the  man  to  be  deterred  by 
coalitions.  Using  his  late  wife's  Euboean  barony  as  a  base 
of  operations,  he  summoned  the  two  triarchs,  Narzotto  and 
Guglielmo,  to  appear  before  him,  their  suzerain,  at  Oropos ; 
and,  so  strong  was  the  feudal  tie  which  bound  a  vassal  to 
his  lord,  that  they  obeyed  his  summons,  and  were  at  once 
arrested,  remaining  in  captivity  till  after  the  capture  of  their 
own  captor.  Their  wives,  accompanied  by  many  knights  of 
the  Dalle  Carceri  clan,  now  numerous  in  the  island,  went 
weeping  to  the  Venetian  bailie,  with  dishevelled  hair  and 
clothes  rent,  and  implored  his  aid.     The  bailie,  moved  alike 

1  Ibid,  356  ;  Bury,  The  Lombards  and  Venetians  in  Euboia,  i.,  13-21  ; 
Pontes  Rer.  Austr.y  xiv.,  1-16. 


104  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

by  policy  and  sympathy,  at  the  spectacle  of  the  two  noble 
dames,  consented  ;  but  the  energy  of  the  Achaian  prince  had 
already  secured  the  town  of  Negroponte.  Thrice  the  capital 
changed  hands,  till  finally,  after  a  siege  of  thirteen  months, 
the  Venetians  succeeded  in  re-occupying  it,  and  then  inflicted 
a  crushing  defeat  on  the  famous  cavalry  of  Achaia.  Mean- 
while, in  spite  of  the  wise  warnings  of  Pope  Alexander  IV., 
who  urged  the  prince  to  release  his  prisoners  and  make 
peace  "  lest  the  Greeks  should  become  more  powerful  in  the 
Empire  of  Romania,"  the  war  had  spread  to  the  Morea  and 
continental  Greece.  Guillaume  de  la  Roche,  brother  of  the 
"  Great  Lord  "  of  Athens,  though  by  marriage  he  had  become 
baron  of  Veligosti  and  Damald.  (the  ancient  Troezen),  and 
therefore  a  vassal  of  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  had  actively 
assisted  the  Venetians  at  the  siege  of  Negroponte,  and  they 
had  granted  him  lands  in  their  territory,  and  had  promised  him 
an  annuity  in  case  his  Peloponnesian  barony  was  confiscated 
He  had  set  his  name  as  a  witness  to  the  arrangements 
between  Venice  and  the  triarchs,  and  one  of  those  treaties 
had  actually  been  "  done  at  Thebes,"  in  the  capital  of  his 
brother,  Guy  I.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Prince  of  Achaia 
had  summoned  the  "  Great  Lord "  of  Athens,  his  vassal  for 
Argos  and  Nauplia,  to  assist  him  in  the  conflict  against  the 
Euboean  barons  and  their  Venetian  allies.  It  was  even 
pretended  that  Attica  and  Boeotia,  the  marquisate  of  Bou- 
donitza,  and  the  three  Euboean  baronies,  had  been  placed  by 
Boniface  of  Salonika  under  the  suzerainty  of  the  first  Frank 
ruler  of  Achaia  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest  The  result  of 
such  a  claim,  recorded  by  the  author  of  the  Chronicle  of  the 
Morea,  perhaps  for  the  glorification  of  his  favourite  hero 
William,  perhaps  by  an  anachronism  pardonable  in  one  who 
wrote  in  the  following  century,  would  have  been  to  establish 
the  supreme  authority  of  that  ambitious  prince  over  all  the 
Frankish  states  of  Greece.  But,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
suzerainty  over  the  three  Euboean  baronies  and  Boudonitza 
had  been  given  much  more  recently  to  William's  brother  by 
the  Emperor  Baldwin  II.,  while  the  Sire  of  Athens  owed 
him  allegiance  for  Nauplia  and  Argos  alone.  Although 
Guy  I.  had  married  one  of  William's  nieces,  he  not  only 
refused  to  assist  him,  but  aided  his  enemies,  despatching 


BATTLE  OF  KARYDI  105 

troops  to  Negroponte  and  Corinth,  and  sending  out  his 
galleys  from  Nauplia  to  prey  upon  any  passing  ships,  with- 
out regard  for  the  rights  of  neutrals.  Another  Frank 
potentate,  also  married  to  a  niece  of  William,  Thomas  II. 
de  Stromoncourt,  Lord  of  Salona,  joined  the  Sire  of  Athens 
and  Ubertino  Pallavicini,  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  against 
the  Prince  of  Achaia,  while  Geoffroy  de  Bruyferes,  baron  of 
Karytaina,  "the  best  soldier  in  all  the  realm  of  Romania/9 
who  had  fought  for  his  prince  in  Negroponte,  after  a  struggle 
between  conflicting  ties  of  kinship,  deserted  his  liege  lord 
and  uncle,  William,  for  the  side  of  his  father-in-law,  Guy. 
Thus  a  baron's  league  was  formed  against  the  prince,  whose 
pretensions  were  doubtless  resented  and  feared  by  all  the 
Frank  states  of  Northern  Greece.1  William  was  not,  how- 
ever, without  allies.  The  Genoese,  ever  ready  to  injure 
their  great  commercial  rivals  the  Venetians,  and  grateful 
for  the  assistance  which  the  knights  of  Achaia  had  rendered 
them  in  Rhodes,  manned  his  galleys,  which  darted  out  from 
behind  the  rock  of  Monemvasia  when  the  lion-banner  was 
'seen  out  at  sea;  while  Othon  de  Cicon,  though  a  relative 
of  the  Sire  of  Athens,  held  the  fine  castle  of  Karystos  and 
made  the  difficult  passage  of  the  Doro  Channel  even  still 
more  difficult  for  Venetian  vessels.  William  displayed  his 
restless  activity  in  all  directions.  At  one  moment  he  was 
besieging  the  Venetians  in  Coron ;  at  another,  he  was  nearly 
captured  on  a  rash  raid  into  Attica.  Then  he  resolved  on  a 
regular  invasion  of  the  Athenian  state.  Accordingly,  in 
1258,  he  mustered  all  the  forces  of  the  principality  at  Nikli, 
near  the  classic  Tegea,  crossed  the  isthmus,  and,  forcing  the 
narrow  and  ill-famed  road  which  leads  along  the  rocky  coast 
of  the  Saronic  Gulf  towards  Megara,  the  Kcucri  o-icaXa,  as  it  is 
still  called,  met  Guy's  army  at  the  pass  of  Mount  Karydi, 
*  the  walnut  mountain,"  which  lies  three  hours  from  Megara 
on  the  way  to  Thebes.  There  took  place  the  first  battle 
between  Frankish  Athens  and  Frankish  Sparta ;  the  Sire  of 
Athens  was  routed  ;  and,  leaving  many  of  his  warriors  dead 

1  Sanudo,  103-4 ;  Dandolo  and  Navagero  afiud  Muratori,  xii.,  363 ; 
xxiih,  997-8  ;  Fontes  Rer.Austr.,  xiv.,  29-31  ;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  1553-67,  3185-7  ; 
L  d.  C,  102,  1 10 ;  Muntaner  (ch.  cclxt.)  expressly  says  that  Athens  was 
originally  free  of  all  suzerainty. 


106  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

on  the  field,  took  refuge  with  his  allies  behind  the  ramparts 
of  Thebes.  Thither  William  followed  him,  but  the  prayers 
of  the  archbishop  and  the  arguments  of  his  own  nobles, 
who  pleaded  for  peace  between  relatives  and  old  comrades- 
in-arms,  prevailed  upon  him  to  desist  from  an  assault  upon 
his  enemy's  capital  Guy  thereupon  promised  to  appear 
before  the  High  Court  of  the  barons  of  Achaia  and  to  per- 
form any  penalty  which  it  should  inflict  upon  him  for  having 
borne  arms  against  the  prince. 

The  High  Court  met  at  Nikli,  and  the  Sire  of  Athens 
appeared  before  it,  escorted  by  all  his  chivalry — a  brave 
sight  to  all  beholders.  If  William  had  expected  that  his 
barons  would  humiliate  his  rival,  he  was  disappointed 
They  decided  that  they  were  not  Guy's  peers,  and  therefore 
were  incompetent  to  be  his  judges.  They  accordingly 
proposed  to  refer  the  matter  to  Louis  IX.  of  France,  the 
most  chivalrous  and  saintly  monarch  of  that  age,  and  the 
natural  protector  of  the  French  barons  of  the  East,  many  of 
whom  had  seen  him  in  Cyprus  a  few  years  before.  William, 
a  powerful  prince,  but  still  only  primus  inter  pares  by  feudal  ■ 
law,  felt  bound  to  accept  their  decision,  and,  summoning 
Guy  to  his  presence  and  that  of  his  great  lords,  bade  him  go 
in  person  for  judgment  to  the  King  of  France.  Then  came 
the  turn  of  the  traitor  Geoffroy  de  Bruyferes.  With  a  halter 
round  his  neck,  the  proud  baron  of  Karytaina  came  before 
his  prince.  Moved  by  the  sad  spectacle  of  so  famous  a 
warrior  in  the  guise  of  a  criminal,  his  fellow-barons  flung 
themselves  on  their  knees,  and  implored  William's  mercy  for 
his  erring  vassal  and  kinsman.  The  prince  was  long 
obdurate,  for  Geoffroy  was  his  undoubted  subject,  and  had 
been  guilty  of  the  gravest  of  all  feudal  offences,  that  of  aiding 
the  enemies  of  his  liege  lord.  At  last  he  yielded,  and 
restored  to  the  culprit  his  forfeited  fief,  but  only  for  life, 
unless  he  left  direct  heirs  of  his  body.  Then  the  parliament 
broke  up  with  jousts,  tourneys,  and  tilting  at  the  ring  on  the 
fair  plain  of  Nikli.1 

When  the  spring  came,  Guy  started  for  Paris,  leaving  hist 
brother  Othon  as  his  deputy  at  Thebes,  and  stopping  som^ 

1  Sanudo,  105-6 ;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  3207-370 ;  L.  d.  C,  101-12 ;  L.  d.  F.  -a 


GUY  I.,  DUKE  OF  ATHENS  107 

time  on  the  way  in  his  native  Burgundy  to  see  his  relatives 

and  borrow  money  "  for  the  needs  of  his  land." l     Louis  IX. 

received  him  graciously,  and  also  the  messenger  of  Prince 

William,  who  bore  the  written  statement  of  the  case.     The 

king  referred  the  matter  to  a  parliament  at   Paris,  which 

decided  that  Guy,  being  a  vassal  of  William,  had  been  guilty 

of  a  technical  offence  in  taking  up  arms  against  his  lord,  but 

that  as  he,  in  fact,  had  never  paid  homage  to  the  Prince,  he 

was  not  liable  to  the  forfeiture  of  his  fief.     Moreover,  it  was 

considered  that  his  long  and  costly  journey  to  France  was 

a  quite  sufficient  punishment  for  any  offence  he  might  have 

committed.      The   king  then   told   him   that  he  must    not 

return  empty-handed,  and  asked  what  mark  of  royal  favour 

he  desired.     Guy  replied  that  he  would  prize  above  all  else 

the  title  of  "  Duke  of  Athens,"  for  which,  he  told  the  king, 

there  was  an  ancient    precedent.      Neither    Guy  nor    his 

predecessor  had  ever  borne  it,  but  the  Byzantine  historian, 

Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  writing  in   the  next  century,  tells  a 

fabulous  story,  that  in  the  time  of  Constantine  the  Great  the 

governor    of   the    Peloponnese  had   received  the    rank    of 

u  Prince,"  the  commander  of  Attica  and  Athens,  the  title  of 

u  Grand-Duke,"  and  his  fellow  of  Boeotia  and  Thebes  that  of 

"  First  Lord  "  (Trptfifiucqpioi) ;  this  last  name,  he  adds,  "  has 

now  been  corrupted  by  an  alteration  of  the   first  syllable 

into '  Great  Lord '  (jicyas  Kupios),  while  the  ruler  of  Athens 

has  dropped  his  adjective  and   become  'Duke/  instead   of 

'Grand-Duke.'"2    There  is,  however,  no  trace  of  such  an 

official   at   Athens   in   Byzantine  times;  though   the  Latin 

word  "  Duke "  was  sometimes  used,  even  by  Greek  writers, 

as  the  equivalent  of  their  own  word  "  General "  {a-rparriyoi). 

But  it  is  quite  natural  that  the  Sire  of  Athens,  in  asking  for 

a  title  which  would  put  him  on  a  level  with  the   Duke  of 

Naxos,  should,  after  the  manner  of  the  newly-ennobled  in 

all  ages,  seek  for  some  venerable  precedent  for  it     Louis  IX. 

willingly  conferred  it  upon  him,  and  the  title,  borne  by  his 

successors  for  two  centuries,  has  become  famous  in  literature, 

1  Two  documents  of  his,  dated  1260  (new  style),  printed  by 
Docange,  Histoire  de  F Empire  de  Constantinople^  i.,  436-7. 

*  X.  t.  M.t  1L  3458-61  ;  L,  d.  C,  1 12-17,  Nikephoros  Gregorys,  i.,  p. 
239. 


10*  THE  ZENITH  OF  PRANKISH  RULE 

as  well  as  in  history,  from  its  bestowal,  by  a  pardonable 
anacronism,  upon  Theseus  by  Dante,  Boccaccio,  Chaucer,  and 
Shakespeare,  and  upon  Menelaos  by  the  Catalan  chronicler, 
Ram6n  Muntaner.1  All  of  these  authors,  except  Shakespeare, 
were  the  contemporaries,  one  of  them — Muntaner — the 
friend,  of  Athenian  dukes.  Accordingly,  they  transferred  to 
the  legendary  founder  of  Athens  the  style  of  its  mediaeval 
rulers,  whose  names  were  well  known  in  Italy,  and  thence 
passed  to  England. 

During    Guy's    absence    in    France,    great    events    had 
happened  in   Greece.     The  success  of  William   at   Karydi, 
coupled  with  another  victory  of  his  forces  over  the  Venetians— 
at    Oreos,    in    North    Eubcea,    had    induced   the   doge   to** 
authorise  the    bailie  of  Negroponte  to   make   terms  witfe: 
the  victor.2     But  suddenly,  by  a  turn  of  fortune  and  his  owi — 
rashness,    the    victorious    prince    had     himself    become    ^s 
prisoner  of  war.     Since  the  death  of  his  wife,  CarintanaE 
William  had  been  looking  out  for  a  third  consort,  who  woul^M 
give  him  an  heir,  and  in  1259,  his  choice  fell  upon   Ann?= 
daughter  of  Michael   II.,  the  ambitious  Despot  of  Epiro=i-: 
The  alliance  involved  him  in  the  politics  of  that  trouble^ 
state. 

The  peace  between  the  two  Greek  states  of  Nice  aim  c 
Epiros  had  been  of  short  duration.     Abetted  by  that  restle^ss 
intriguer,  blind  old  Theodore,  Michael  had,   in    125 1,  onf=e 
more    resumed    hostilities.       But    the    rapid    successes     ^>( 
Vatdtzes   in   Macedonia,    and    the    defection     of   his    owrn 
supporters,  convinced    him   that  he  had   better  temporise 
His  enemy  accepted  the  suggestion  that  they  should  come   *t:o 
terms,  and  sent  the  historian  George  Akropolita  as  one    <A 
his  envoys  to  Larissa  to  arrange  conditions  of  peace.     Tf"*e 
historian  returned  to  his  master  with  old  Theodore  in  chains, 
and  the  varied  career  of  that  versatile  and   ambitious  mail 
closed  in  the  dungeons  of  Nice.     But  Michael  II.  was  only 
waiting  for  a  favourable  opportunity  to  renew  the  attack,  and 

1  Dante,  Inferno,  xii.,  16-18  ;  Boccaccio,  Decamerone,  Novel  7,  Day  *  ; 
and  La  Teseide,  i.,  13-14  ;  Chaucer,  Canterbury  Tales,  11.,  862-3 ;  Shake- 
speare,  Midsummer  Nights  Dream ;   Muntaner,  ch.  ccxiv.  (ed.  Lslxv^^ 
Buchon's  translation  is  here  quite  misleading. 

2  Fontes  Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  25-8. 


PRINCE  WILLIAMS  GREEK  MARRIAGE       109 

it  was  not  long  in  coming.  After  the  death  of  Vatdtzes,  in 
1254,  his  son  and  successor,  Theodore  II.  Ldskaris,  had 
invested  the  worthy  Akropolita  with  the  chief  civil  command 
in  his  European  provinces.  The  historian  soon  found  that 
his  post  was  no  sinecure.  The  Despot  of  Epiros  had  been 
further  incensed  by  being  compelled  to  cede  the  valuable 
fortress  of  Durazzo,  on  the  Adriatic,  which  his  predecessors 
had  taken  and  strengthened,  as  the  price  of  his  son's  tardy 
and  long-delayed  marriage  with  the  daughter  of  the  new 
emperor.  He  accordingly  excited  the  Albanians  to  rise, 
and  blockaded  the  historian  in  the  strong  castle  of  Prilap. 
The  treachery  of  the  garrison  opened  the  gates  to  the 
besiegers,  and  the  historian,  in  his  turn,  was  led  off  in  chains 
to  the  prison  of  Arta,  where  he  had  ample  leisure  for  medita- 
ting that  literary  revenge,  which  colours  his  history  of  his 
own  times.  Michael  was  now  master  of  all  the  country  to 
the  west  of  the  river  Vardar,  and  the  death  of  the  Emperor 
Theodore  II.,  in  1258,  and  the  succession  of  a  child  to  the 
throne  of  Nice,  might  well  encourage  his  aspirations  to 
displace  the  tottering  Latin  Empire  of  Romania  and  reign  at 
Byzantium.  An  alliance  between  so  important  a  ruler  and 
the  powerful  Prince  of  Achaia  seemed  to  both  parties  to  have 
much  to  commend  it  William  doubtless  thought  that  a 
Greek  marriage  would  please  his  own  Greek  subjects,  whom 
it  was  the  traditional  policy  of  his  dynasty  to  conciliate ; 
Michael  II.  was  anxious  to  have  the  assistance  of  the  famous 
chivalry  of  Achaia  in  his  coming  struggle  with  the  Nicene 
Empire  for  the  hegemony  of  the  Greek  world.  Determined 
to  make  himself  doubly  sure,  the  Despot,  whose  daughters, 
like  Montenegrin  princesses  in  our  own  day,  were  a 
valuable  political  asset,  had  given  Anna's  lovely  sister, 
Helene,  to  Manfred  the  ill-fated  king  of  the  two  Sicilies, 
who  received  as  her  dowry  several  valuable  places  in  Epiros, 
which  had  once  belonged  to  his  Norman  predecessors,  and  the 
splendid  island  of  Corfu,  which  he  entrusted  to  his 
admiral,  Filippo  Chinardo,  a  Cypriot  Frank  of  distinguished 
bravery.  Indeed,  it  is  probable,  as  a  Byzantine  historian 
suggests,  that  Michael's  two  sons-in-law  were  both  scheming 
to  carve  out  for  themselves  a  vast  domain  in  Northern 
Greece  at  his  expense.      William  may  well  have  aspired  to 


110  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

revive   the  Lombard   kingdom   of  Salonika,  and  rule  from 
Macedonia  to  Matapan. 

It  was  not  long  before  the  wily  Despot  had  to  invoke  the 
aid  of  his  new  allies.    The  real  power  of  the  Nicene  Empire 
was  now  wielded  by  a  strong  man,  Michael  PalaiolcSgos,  scion 
of  a  family  which  is  first  mentioned  about  the  middle  of  the 
eleventh  century,  and  which  was  connected  by  marriage  with 
the  imperial  house  of  Comnenos.    The  great-grandson  of 
Atexios  III.  on  his  mother's  side,  Michael  Palaiol6gos  had 
been  more  than  once  accused  of  aiming  at  the  purple,  and 
his  strong  character  and  great  experience  of  affairs  quite 
overshadowed  the  child  in  whose  name  he  ruled.     He  had 
already  held  command  in  Europe,  like  his  father  before  him,  m 
and  was  therefore  well  acquainted  with  the  character  and  J 
designs  of  his  namesake  of  Epiros.     One  of  his  first  acts  as  s 
regent  was  to  despatch  his  brother  John  with  a  force  against^ 
the  Despot,  while,  by  the  agency  of  a  special  envoy,  he  gave^ 
the  latter  the  option  of  peace  on  very  favourable  terms._« 
But  Michael  of  Epiros,  relying  on  the  two  great  alliancess 
which  he    had    contracted,  replied   with    insolence   to  thes 
proposals  of  Palaiol6gos,  who  had  now  mounted,  as  Michael 
VIII.,  the  imperial   throne  of  Nice.     The  envoy  returnecE: 
to  his  master  after  a  sinister  threat  that  ere  long  the  DespotV 
should  feel  the  force  of  the  imperial  arm.     Embassies  sen*" 
from  Nice  to  the  Sicilian  and  Achaian  courts  proved  equally^ 
futile.       Accordingly  the  emperor  ordered  his  brother  tczz 
march   without  delay  against  the  rival  who  dared  to  rejedT- 
his    offers.       Meanwhile,    Manfred    had    responded    to  his- 
father-in-law's  appeal  by  sending  him  400  German  knightss- 
in  full  armour,  and  William  came  in  person  at  the  head  of  ^0 
force,  mainly  consisting  of  Franks,  but  also  containing  ^5 
contingent  of  Moreot  Greeks.     So  great  was  the  prince'^ 
prestige  after  his  recent  successes,  that  the  troops  of  Euboe^S 
and    of   the    Archipelago,    Count    Richard   of  Cephalonia^- 
Thomas  II.  of  Salona  and  Ubertino  of  Boudonitza,  and  ^^ 
body    of    soldiers    from    Thebes    and    Athens    under    th^^ 
command  of  Guy's  brother  and  deputy  Othon,  did  not  faS-3 
this  time  to  rally  round  the  flag  of  Achaia.     Never  had  th.^ 
prince  commanded  so  fine  an  army,  gathered  from  ever^/ 
quarter  of  Frankish  Greece. 


BATTLE  OF  PELAGONIA  111 

After  spending  some  time  in  plundering,  the  allied  army 

met  the  imperial  forces  on  the  plain  of  Pelagonia,  in  Western 

Macedonia,  in    1259 — a  spot   where,  centuries    before,  the 

Spartan  Brasidas  had  encountered  the  Illyrian  hosts.     The 

imperial  general  had  wisely  hired  foreign  troops  to  contend 

against  the  dreaded  Frankish  chivalry — 300  German  horsemen 

under  the  Duke  of  Carinthia,  1500  mounted  archers  from 

Hungary,  and    600    more  from   Servia,  a    detachment    of 

Bulgarians,  a  large  number  of  Anatolian  warriors  accustomed 

to  fight  against  the  Turks,  500  Turkish  mercenaries,  and  2000 

light  Cuman  bowmen  on  horseback.    Various  devices  were 

adopted  to  exaggerate  the  size  of  his  army,  and  a  scout  was 

sent  privily  to  spread  discord    between   the    Franks    and 

Greeks.     The  lack  of  harmony  between  the  unnatural  allies 

was  increased  by  a  private  quarrel  between  the  Prince  of 

Achaia  and  John,  the  Despot's  bastard,  who  complained  that 

some  of  the  Frank  knights  had  paid  unwarrantable  attentions 

to  his  beautiful  wife,  and  received  for  reply  from  the  prince, 

instead  of  justice,  an  insulting  allusion  to  his  birth.     The 

bastard,  in   revenge,  deserted   to  the  enemy  at  a  critical 

moment ;  the  Despot,  warned  of  his  son's  intended  treachery, 

fled  in  the  night,  and  the  Franks  were  left  alone  to  face  the 

foe.     For  an  instant  even  William's  courage  seems  to  have 

failed    him;    but    the    reproaches  of   that   stalwart    baron, 

Geoffroy  de  Bruyferes,  prevailed  on  him  to  lead  his  diminished 

but  now  homogeneous  army  against  the  heterogeneous  host 

of  Greeks,  Hungarians,  Germans,  Slavs,  and  Turks.     The 

Franks  fought  with  all  the  courage  of  their  race ;  picking  out 

the  Germans  as  their  most  dangerous  enemies,  they  fell  upon 

them  with  lance  and  sword ;  Geoffroy  de  Bruyferes  slew  the 

Duke  of  Carinthia  in  single  combat,  and  the  German  knights 

dropped  before  the  sweep  of  his  blade  "like  grass  upon  a 

meadow."  The  Greek  commander  then  ordered  his  Hungarian 

and  Cuman  bowmen  to  shoot  at  the  horses  of  the  Frankish 

knights     now     inextricably     mingled     with     his     German 

mercenaries,    whose    lives    he    cheerfully    sacrificed.      The 

archers  did  their  work  well;  horseman  after  horseman  fell; 

Geoffroy  de  Bruyferes, "  the  flower  of  the  Achaian  chivalry," 

was  taken  prisoner,  and  the  prince,  while  charging  to  the 

rescue  of  his  nephew,  was  unhorsed.     The  prince  tried  to 


112  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

conceal  himself  under  a  heap  of  straw,  but  was  discovered 
and  identified  by  his  prominent  front  teeth.  Only  the  rank 
and  file  escaped,  and  of  those,  only  some  evaded  the  clutches 
of  the  predatory  Wallachs  of  Thessaly,  who  were  devoted  to 
the  person  of  the  treacherous  bastard,  and  made  their  way 
back  to  the  Morea.  William  and  the  other  principal  prisoners 
were  led  to  the  tent  of  the  Greek  commander,  where  the 
prince's  knowledge  of  the  Greek  tongue,  which  he  spoke  with 
native  fluency,  enabled  him  to  hold  his  own  against  the 
reproaches  of  his  conqueror.  Sending  his  prisoners  to  his 
brother's  court  at  Lampsakos,  the  Greek  general  followed  up 
his  victory  in  Epiros  and  Thessaly.  While  one  detachment 
of  his  army  besieged  Joannina  and  occupied  Arta,  the  two 
chief  towns  of  the  Despotat,  releasing  the  unhappy  Akropolita 
from  prison,  he  marched  with  the  Despot's  bastard  through 
Thessaly  to  Neopatras,  and  thence  to  Thebes.  He  was 
engaged  in  plundering  that  city,  when  the  bastard  again 
turned  traitor  and  fled  to  his  father,  who  had  taken  refuge 
with  his  family  in  the  islands  of  Leukas  and  Cephalonia. 
The  house  of  Angelos  was  popular  in  Epiros,  where  the 
natives  regarded  the  Greeks  of  Nice  as  interlopers,  and  the 
tactless  conduct  of  the  victors  soon  aroused  the  discontent  of 
the  vanquished ;  Arta  declared  for  its  old  Despot,  the  siege 
of  Joannina  was  raised,  and  the  imperial  commander  thought 
it  prudent  to  abandon  Boeotia  and  return  home.1 

The  versatile  Despot  of  Epiros  speedily  recovered  from 
the  results  of  this  campaign.  A  year  after  the  battle  of 
Pelagonia  he  received  a  fresh  contingent  of  troops  from  his 
son-in-law  Manfred,  with  which  his  eldest  son,  Nikeph6ros, 
severely  defeated  the  imperial  general,  Atexios  Strateg6poulos, 
and  took  him  prisoner.  A  brief  truce  followed,  Strateg6poulos 
was  released,  and  was  thus  enabled  to  cover  himself  with 
glory  by  capturing   Constantinople  from  the  Latins  in  the 

1  Akropolita,  95-9,  141-2,  148-53,  156-61,  167-8,  171,  174-84;  Nike- 
ph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  47-9,  71-5  ;  Pachymeres,  i.,  81-6 ;  Sanudo,  106-7 ; 
Miklosich  und  Miiller,  iii.,  240 ;  X.  r.  M.,  1L  3060-137,  3469-419 1  ;  Z.  <L  C, 
96-100,  117-42  ;  L.  d.  F.9  53-63  ;  M.  PalaioWgos,  De  vitd  sud,  6-7.  The 
Chronicle,  though  it  contains  historical  matter,  traces  the  war  to  a  family 
quarrel  between  the  sons  of  Michael  II.,  Nikeph6ros  and  John,  whom 
it  calls  Theodore. 


VlLLEHARlX)UiN  A  PklSONEtt  113 

following    year.     But  the  captor  of  Constantinople,  by  a 
sodden  change  of  fortune  which  astounded  the  Byzantine 
historians    and    led    them    to    compare    him    with    Cyrus, 
Hannibal,  and  Pompey,  again  became  the  captive  of  the 
crafty  Despot,  whom  he  had  a  second   time  attacked,  and 
was  sent  to  the  custody  of  Manfred,  where  he  remained  till 
he  was  exchanged  for  the   King  of  Sicily's  sister,  Anna. 
Three  years  later,  the  emperor's  brother  John,  the  victor  of 
Pelagonia,  once   more  attacked   his  old  enemy  with  such 
success  that  Michael  II.  had  to  invoke  the  diplomatic  aid  of 
his  saintly  wife,  who  went  to  Constantinople  with  her  second 
son  John,  and  left  him  there  as  a  hostage  for  her  husband's 
good  behaviour.     The  expostulations  of  the  patriarch,  who  re- 
buked the  emperor  for  making  war  against  a  fellow-Christian 
■-that  is  to  say,  a  member  of   the   Orthodox   Church — 
combined,  with  the  expense  and  difficulty  of  these  Epirote 
campaigns,  to  bring  about  peace ;  and  the  Despot's  eldest  son, 
Nikeph6ros,  now  a  widower,  received  the  emperor's  niece 
as  a  wife  and  a  pledge  of  union  between  the  two  Greek  states.1 
But,  while  the  battle  of  Pelagonia  had  thus  only  a  passing 
effect  upon  the  fortunes  of  Epiros,  it  was  a  fatal  blow  to  the 
Frankish  principality  of  Achaia.     It  was  the  primary  cause 
of  all  the  subsequent  disasters,  for  the  capture  of  the  prince 
gave  the   astute  Emperor  Michael  the  means  of  gaining  a 
foothold  in  the  Morea,  from  which,  little  by  little,  Byzantine 
nile  was  extended  once  more  over  the  whole  peninsula.     Such 
*as  the   result  of  Villehardouin's   rashness.     Well,   indeed, 
might  the  troubadours  of  France   lament  the  captivity  of 
their  hero,  and  mournfully  prophesy  the  loss  of  Achaia  after 
that  of  Constantinople. 

When  the  prisoners  had  arrived,  the  emperor  summoned 
them  before  him,  and  offered  them  money  for  the  purchase 
of  broad  lands  in  France,  on  condition  that  William  should 
cede  to  him  the  Morea.  The  prince  replied  that  it  was  not 
in  his  power  to  cede  that,  in  which  he  had  only  a  qualified 
share.  He  explained  that  the  land  had  been  conquered  by 
Ins  father  and  his  father's  comrades,  that  the  Prince  of  Achaia 
was  no  absolute  monarch,  but  was  bound  in  all  matters  to 

1  Pachym&es,  i.,  89,  106-7,  I37»  185,  205-7,  214,  242.    Nikephoros 
Gregorys,  i.,  83,  90-2,  98. 

H 


114  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

consult  the  opinion  of  his  peers,  and  to  observe  the  agree- 
ments made  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest  The  emperor, 
irritated  at  this  plain  statement  of  the  principles  of  feudalism, 
ordered  his  Varangian  guards,  among  whom  there  may  have 
been  some  of  our  Anglo-Saxon  forefathers,  to  take  the  prince 
and  his  companions  back  to  their  prison.  For  three  long 
years  they  remained  prisoners,  while  their  captor  dealt  the 
Latin  Empire  of  Romania  its  death-blow,  and  restored  the 
Greek  throne  from  Nice  to  Constantinople.1 

The  capture  of  the  prince  and  so  many  of  his  barons  had 
deprived  the  principality  of  all  its  leading  men.  Accordingly, 
the  princess  and  those  Franks  who  remained,  in  order  to 
prevent  a  threatening  rising  of  the  Greeks,  wrote  to  the  Duke 
of  Athens,2  who  was  still  in  France,  offering  him  the  post  of 
Bailie  of  Achaia.  Rarely  had  the  wheel  of  fortune  turned 
with  such  rapidity ;  the  victor  of  Karydi  was  now  a  prisoner, 
the  vanquished  whom  he  had  haled  before  the  High  Court 
at  Nikli  as  a  rebellious  vassal  was  now  a  Duke  of  Athens 
and  administrator  of  his  conqueror's  estates.  He  had  been 
detained  in  France  owing  to  the  troublesome  complaints  of 
some  French  merchants  and  pilgrims  to  King  Louis,  that 
they  had  been  injured  by  the  Athenian  privateers  which 
issued  from  the  port  of  Nauplia,  and  had  not  received  com- 
pensation from  the  duke.3  Guy  now  settled  this  matter, 
and  started  for  the  Morea.  His  first  act  on  landing  was  to 
order  the  liberation  of  the  two  imprisoned  triarchs  of 
Euboea ;  and  he  commemorated  his  governorship  of  Achaia 
and  his  acquisition  of  the  ducal  title  by  striking  a  coin  at  the 
mint  of  Glarentza — the  earliest  coin  of  an  Athenian  duke 
which  we  possess.4  He  was  engaged  in  administering  the 
country  to  the  general  satisfaction,  when  the  startling  news 
of  the  recapture  of  Constantinople  by  the  Greeks  and  of  the 
flight  of  the  last  Latin  emperor,  Baldwin  II.,  reached  him. 
The  fugitive  first  stopped  at  Negroponte,  where  his  wife  had 
stayed   to  raise  money  from  the  wealthy  citizens  thirteen 

1  X.  t.  M.,  11. 4217-323 ;  L.  d.  C,  141-6. 

*  L.<L  F.,  65,  66  ;  Sanudo,  107.  3  lbuL>  106. 

4  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  337,  340,  who  thinks  that  this  coin  is 
a  forgery.  Buchon,  Atlasy  plate  xxv.  One  of  his  coins  is  in  the  Archaeo- 
logical Museum  at  Venice;  his  previous  currency  bears  the  title  Daminus. 


THE  LAST  LATIN  EMPEROR  AT  ATHENS    115 

years  before,  and  where  the  three  barons  received  him  with 
the  magnificent  honours  due  to  his  exalted  rank.  Thence  he 
proceeded  to  Thebes  and  Athens,  where  he  found  the  duke 
waiting  to  greet  him.  In  the  Castle  of  the  Kadmeia  and  on 
the  ancient  Akropolis,  which,  fifty  years  earlier,  had  welcomed 
another  Latin  emperor  in  his  hour  of  triumph,  there  gathered 
round  their  feudal  chief,  now  a  landless  exile,  the  barons  who 
had  survived  the  fatal  day  of  Pelagonia  and  the  prisons  of 
PalaiokSgos.  The  Duchess  of  Naxos  came  with  her  ladies 
to  offer  presents  to  him,  and  Othon  de  Cicon,  lord  of  Karystos 
and  ^Egina,  who  had  played  so  active  a  part  in  the  Euboean 
war,  and  had  lent  him  5000  hyperperi  (£2240)  in  his  sore 
need.  Baldwin  had  nothing  but  barren  titles  and  a  few 
relics,  the  remnant  of  the  Byzantine  sacristies,  to  bestow. 
But  he  was  generous  of  knighthoods,  and  he  liquidated  his 
debt  to  the  baron  of  Karystos  with  an  arm  of  St  John  the 
Baptist,  which  the  pious  Othon  subsequently  presented  to  the 
Burgundian  Abbey  of  Citeaux.  Thus,  on  the  venerable 
rock  of  Athens  was  played  the  last  pitiful  scene  in  the  brief 
drama  of  the  Latin  Empire  of  Constantinople.  Then 
Baldwin  sailed  from  the  Piraeus  for  Monemvasia;  and, 
leaving  behind  him  not  a  few  of  his  noble  retinue  in  the 
Morea,  set  out  for  Europe,  to  solicit  aid  for  his  lost  cause  and 
to  play  the  sorry  part  of  an  emperor  in  exile.1 

The  "new  Constantine,"  as  Michael  Palaiol6gos  styled 
himself  after  the  recovery  of  Constantinople,  was  now  doubly 
anxious  to  restore  Greek  rule  in  the  Morea  also.  Three 
years  of  confinement  had  somewhat  broken  William's 
Frankish  pride;  some  of  his  fellow-captives  had  died  in 
prison;  and,  as  Michael  VIII.  was  now  more  moderate  in  his 
demands,  a  compromise  was  possible.  The  emperor  desired 
Argos  and  Nauplia  to  be  included  among  the  places  to  be 
ceded  to  him ;  but  his  prisoner  could  plead  that  they  were 
the  fief  of  the  Duke  of  Athens.  William  might,  however, 
conscientiously  agree  to  the  surrender  of  the  three  castles  of 
Monemvasia,  Maina,  and  Mistr&,  which  he  had  either  captured 
or  built  himself,  and  which  were  therefore  his  to  bestow.    The 

1  Sanudo,  115,  172 ;  X.  r.  M„  11.  1301-32 ;  L.  d.  C,  27-31  ;  Ducange, 
Histoire  de  P  Empire  de  Constantinople,  i.,  432  ;  Dandolo  apud  Muratori, 
xii.,  369 ;  Exuvia  Sacra  Constantinopolitana%  ii.,  144-8. 


116  THE  ZENITH  OF  PRANKISH  RULE 

contemporary  Greek  historian,  Pachym^res,  anxious  to 
magnify  the  emperor,  adds  that  the  prince  was  to  become 
Michael's  vassal  for  the  rest  of  the  principality  and  received 
from  his  suzerain  the  title  of  Grand  Seneschal — an  obvious 
attempt  at  explaining,  in  a  way  flattering  to  Greek  vanity, 
the  origin  of  an  office  which  the  Latin  emperors  had  con- 
ferred upon  the  rulers  of  Achaia.  In  return  for  the  three 
castles,  William  and  his  comrades  were  to  be  set  at  liberty, 
and  the  prince  swore  a  most  solemn  oath  over  the  baptismal 
font  of  the  emperor's  infant  son  that  he  would  never  levy  war 
against  Michael  again.  Geoffroy  de  Bruyeres,  who  was  a 
special  favourite  of  the  emperor,  was  released  from  prison  and 
sent  to  arrange  for  the  transference  of  the  castles  to  the 
imperial  authorities.1 

Guy  of  Athens  received  the  message  with  grave  mis- 
givings. He  saw  that  the  three  castles  would  be  a  lever  with 
which  the  emperor  could  shake  the  Frankish  power  in  the 
peninsula,  and  that  Monemvasia  in  particular  would  provide 
him  with  an  admirable  landing-place  for  his  troops.  As  was 
his  duty,  he  convened  the  High  Court  of  the  principality  at 
Nikli,  the  same  spot  where  he  had  himself  stood  to  await  his 
sentence.  But  this  time  it  was  a  ladies'  parliament  which 
met  on  the  plain  to  decide  the  future  of  the  state — for  all  the 
men  of  mark  had  been  slain  at  Pelagonia  or  were  in  prison  at 
Constantinople,  and  their  wives  or  widows  had  to  take  their 
places  at  the  council  Only  two  of  the  stronger  sex  were 
present,  the  Chancellor  of  Achaia,  Leonardo  of  Veroli  in 
Latium,  and  Pierre  de  Vaux,  "the  wisest  head  in  all  the 
principality."  It  was  only  natural  that  with  an  assembly  so 
constituted  sentiment  should  have  had  more  weight  than 
reasons  of  state.  In  vain  the  Duke  of  Athens  argued  in 
scriptural  language,  that  "  it  were  better  that  one  man  should 
die  for  the  people  rather  than  that  the  other  Franks  of  the 
Morea  should  lose  the  fruit  of  their  fathers'  labours  " ;  in  vain, 
to  show  his  disinterestedness,  he  offered  to  take  the  prince's 
place  in  prison  or  pledge  his  own  duchy  to  provide  a  ransom. 
The  men  were,  we  are  told,  unwilling  to  cede  the  castles, 

1  Sanudo,  108  ;  X.  r.  M.t  11.  4324-48  ;  L.  d.  C,  146-7  ;  Pachyme'res,  i., 
88 ;  Nikephoros  Gregoras  I.,  79-80.  Pachymeres  adds  Geraki,  and  the 
Aragonese  version  of  the  Chronicle  (p.  67)  Corinth,  to  the  list  of  castles. 


TREATY  OF  THEBES  117 

justly  surmising  that  this  might  be  the  ruin  of  the  country. 
But  the  conjugal  feelings  of  the  ladies  who  formed  the 
majority  found  a  convenient  legal  excuse  for  the  surrender  of 
the  three  castles  in  the  technical  argument  that  they  were  the 
prince's  to  give  or  to  keep,  and  Guy,  anxious  not  to  lay 
himself  open  in  Greece  and  at  the  French  court  to  the  charge 
of  cherishing  malice  against  his  late  enemy,  finally  yielded. 
The  castles  were  forthwith  surrendered,  and  two  noble  dames, 
Marguerite,  daughter  of  Jean  de  Neuilly,  Marshal  of  Achaia, 
and  the  sister  of  Jean  de  Chauderon,  the  Grand  Constable  of 
the  principality  and  nephew  of  the  prince,  were  sent  as 
hostages  to  Constantinople.1 

As  scon  as  he  was  released,  William  set  out  for 
Negroponte,  where  he  was  received  with  great  honour,  and 
where  the  Duke  of  Athens  met  him  and  escorted  him  to 
Thebes.  There,  in  the  house  of  the  Archbishop  Henry,  a 
treaty  of  peace  between  the  Prince  of  Achaia  of  the  one  part, 
and  Venice  and  the  triarchs  of  the  other  part,  was  concluded. 
The  treaty  of  Thebes  practically  restored  the  status  quo  before 
the  death  of  Carintana,  which  had  been  the  occasion  for  the 
war.  William  recognised  Guglielmo  da  Verona,  Narzotto 
dalle  Carceri,  and  Grapella  as  triarchs,  and  they,  in  turn, 
recognised  him  as  their  suzerain,  and  promised  to  destroy  the 
castle  of  Negroponte  at  their  own  expense,  retaining  its  site 
for  themselves.  Venice  kept  the  strips  of  land  conceded 
to  her  by  the  triarchs  in  1256,  as  well  as  the  right  of  levying 
the  tolls ;  but  the  prince,  as  well  as  the  triarchs  with  their 
Greek  and  Latin  retainers,  and  all  clerics  were  exempted  from 
paying  them,  and  the  house  of  his  agent  at  Negroponte  was 
restored  to  him.  Finally,  the  republic  engaged  to  cancel  all 
fiefs  granted  by  her  bailie  since  the  death  of  Carintana,  and 
received  from  the  prince  the  right  of  free  trade  and  personal 
security  for  all  her  subjects  throughout  his  estates.  Thus,  of 
all  the  parties,  Venice  had  gained  least  by  the  Euboean  war. 
She  had  incurred  great  expense  for  no  special  result,  and  the 
island  had  suffered  from  the  ravages  of  the  soldiers.  The 
Venetian  Government  felt  the  failure  of  its  Eubcean  policy  so 
strongly,  that  it  prohibited  its  bailies  in  Eubcea  from  interfer- 

*  X,  t,  M.,  H.4360-512  ;  Sanudo,  108  ;  L.  d.  C,  148-53;  L.  d  ^.,67-8, 


118  THE  ZENITH  OF  FRANKISH  RULE 

ing  in  questions  of  feudal  rights — a  salutary  provision,  which 
long  remained  in  force.1 

The  combatants  had  good  reason  for  making  up  their 
differences.    They  were  all  alarmed  at  the  restoration  of  the 
Greek  Empire  in  Constantinople,  and  Venice  feared  even 
more  than  the  Greeks  her  ancient  rival  Genoa,  which  had 
just  become  their  ally.     A  year  earlier,  shortly  before  the 
Latin  Empire  fell,  the  Genoese  had  concluded  a  treaty  with 
the  Emperor  Michael  VIII.  at  Nymphaion  in  Lydia,  which  by 
a  stroke  of  the  pen  transferred  from  Venice  to  themselves  the 
monopoly  of  the  Levantine  trade.     The  Ligurian  republic, 
which  had  taken   no   part   in   the  labours  of   the   Fourth 
Crusade,  was  now  granted,  in  return  for  its  pledge  to  make 
war  against  Venice,  free  trade  throughout  the  Greek  empire 
and  in  the  Venetian  islands  of  Crete  and  Negroponte,  which 
the  emperor  hoped  to  conquer.     The  Genoese  received  per- 
mission to  found  colonies  at  Anaea,  Lesbos,  and  in  the  rich 
mastic-island  of  Chios,  which  had  been  captured  from  the  Latin 
Empire  by  Vatdtzes  fourteen  years  earlier ;  they  obtained  the 
city  of  Smyrna,  and  were  assigned   after  the  conquest  of 
Constantinople,  the  suburb  of  Galata  as  their  special  quarterJ^ 
Finally,  the  Black  Sea  was  closed  to  their  enemies.     From 
the  treaty  of  Nymphaion  in  1261  dates  the  growth  of  Geno-s 
as  a  Levantine  power ;  from  that  moment  she  became  a_  -m 
important  factor  in  the  Eastern  question. 

The  Prince  of  Achaia  might  reasonably  imagine  that  Irme 
had  nothing  to  fear  from  the  Genoese,  for  they  had  been  1*.  is 
allies  against  Venice,  and  they  had  expressly  stipulated  ^t 
Nymphaion  that  they  should   not  be  called  upon  to  ma£c^ 
war  upon  him.     But  he  knew  full  well   that  he  would  e*~e 
long  have  to  grapple  with  the  Byzantine  Empire  in  his  oi*rfl 
land.     The  Emperor  Michael  VIII.  attached  much  import- 
ance to  the  new  Byzantine  province  in  the  Morea,  which  not 
only   furnished   him  with  excellent  light  troops,  whom  t*e 
settled  at  Constantinople  and  employed  as  marines  on  Yii* 

1  Fontes  Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  46-55  ;  Sanudo,  108,  in. 

2  Liber  Jurium  Reipublicce  Genuensisy  i.,  1345  sqq. :  a  better  text    >* 
that  given  In  AtH  della  Society  Ltgure,  xxviii.,  791-809 ;  X.  r.  M.,    1*- 
1277-84 ;  Nik.  Gregoras,  i.,  97 ;  Hopf,  Les  Giu$timam%  5 ;  Ducange,    *"» 
438-53- 


BYZANTINE  PROVINCE  IN  THE  MOREA      119 

ships/  but  was  also  a  stepping-stone  towards  the  reconquest 
of  the  whole  peninsula.     An  imperial  viceroy,  called  "  Captain 
(jre^oX??)  of  the  Territory  in  the  Peloponnese  and  its  Castles," 
was  appointed,  at  first   for  an    annual    term ;    a   marshal 
(irpt&TO<rTpaTapf  TrpwroaKkayaTup)  was  instituted,  as  in  the 
Frankish  principality;  and  a  Byzantine  hierarchy  grew  up 
around  the  viceregal   residence  at  Mistr&.2     It  was  there- 
fore  obvious  that  ere  long  war  must  ensue  between  the 
prince  and  the  imperial  viceroy.     From   1262,  the  date  of 
the  cession  of  the  fortresses,  began  the  decline  of  Frankish 
power  in  the  Peloponnese.     Henceforth  the  rivalry  between 
the  Franks  of  the  principality  and  the  Greeks  of  the  adjoin- 
ing   Byzantine   province   led   to  almost  constant  conflicts, 
which  devastated  the  country,  especially  as  mercenaries  were 
usually  employed  on  both  sides,  who,  in  default  of  their  pay, 
pillaged  the  hapless  inhabitants  without  mercy.     Moreover, 
in  the   neighbouring   Byzantine  districts   the   discontented 
Greek  subjects  of  the  Franks  found  support  and  encourage- 
ment ;  the  unity  of  the  Morea  was  destroyed  almost  as  soon 
as  it  had  been  established,  and  by  the  same  wilful  ruler,  and 
the  way   was   thus    ultimately   prepared    for    the    Turkish 
conquest 

In  1263,  a  year  after  the  peace  had  been  signed  in  his 
capital  of  Thebes,  Guy  I.  of  Athens  died.  During  his  long 
reign  he  had  experienced  various  extremes  of  fortune,  and 
had  enjoyed  the  privilege  of  heaping  coals  of  fire  upon  the 
head  of  the  foe  who  had  defeated  him.  He  had  emerged 
from  his  defeat  with  honour,  and  he  was  able  to  leave  to  his 
dder  son  John,  not  only  a  ducal  title,  but  a  state  which  was 
more  prosperous  than  any  other  in  Greece. 

Thus  the  seventh  decade  of  the  thirteenth  century  marks 
the  close  of  an  era  in  the  history  of  the  Latins  in  the  Levant 
The  Latin  Empire  has  fallen ;  a  Greek  emperor  rules  once 
more  on  the  Bosporos,  and  has  gained  a  foothold  in  the 
Morea ;  a  rival  of  his  own  race  faces  him  in  Epiros,  but  he 
has  learned  the  art  of  dividing  the  Latins  against  each  other, 
and  has  found  in  Genoa  a  makeweight  against  Venice. 

1  Pachymlres,  i.,  188,  309. 

*  These  titles  occur  in  the  Mistrd  inscriptions.    Bulletin  d$  Corresf, 
hellMquey  xxiii.,  115,  123. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  GREEK  REVIVAL  (i  262- 1 278) 

It  was  not  to  be  expected  that  either  Villehardouin  or  the 
emperor  would  long  desist — the  one  from  the  reconquest  of 
his  three  lost  castles,  the  other  from  an  extension  of  his 
power.  On  his  return  to  the  Morea,  the  prince  set  out  on  a 
tour  of  inspection,  accompanied  by  a  brilliant  retinue.  From 
the  rock  of  Mistr&  the  imperial  garrison  could  see  the  tall 
Frankish  knights  and  their  gallant  lord  pricking  across  the 
fertile  plain  of  the  Eurotas  to  the  prince's  favourite  residence 
of  Lacedaemonia.  Not  unnaturally,  their  suspicions  were 
aroused,  and  they  regarded  this  brave  display  as  a  hostile 
demonstration  against  themselves.  Without  delay  they 
called  upon  the  warlike  Melings  to  quit  the  gorges  of 
Taygetos  and  rally  round  the  double  eagle  of  Byzantium, 
and  messengers  were  sent  post-haste  to  apprise  the  imperial 
governor  of  Monemvasia  of  what  seemed  to  be  a  breach  of 
the  peace.  Pope  Urban  IV.,  who,  as  a  Frenchman,  felt 
special  interest  in  the  prosperity  of  the  "New  France" 
which  his  countrymen  had  created  oversea,  and  furnished 
William  with  money  for  its  defence,1  salved  any  qualms  of 
conscience  that  the  Prince  of  Achaia  might  have  felt,  by 
telling  him  that  his  solemn  oath  to  the  emperor  had  been 
wrung  from  him  when  he  was  a  prisoner,  and  was  therefore 
not  binding ;  and  the  Franks  might  pretend  that  the  Greek 
garrisons  had  committed  acts  of  pillage  and  received  the 
prince's  discontented  Greek  subjects.  The  news  was  speedily 
communicated  from  Monemvasia  to  the  emperor,  who  sent 
thither  an  army  under  his  brother  Constantine,  assisted  by 
PhilSs  and  Makren6s,  two  high  officials.  He  had  engaged 
for  the  campaign  a  body  of  1500  Turks  and  a  number  of 
1  Les  Registres  dUrbain  IV.y  ii.,  47  ;  Fontes  Rer.  Austr„  xiv.,  57. 

180 


WAR  IN  THE  MOREA  121 

warlike  Greeks  from  Asia  Minor,  and  he  strongly  enjoined 
upon  his  commander  to  win  as  many  allies  as  possible  in  the 
Morea  by  the  gift  of  privileges  under  the  imperial  seal. 
Meanwhile,  a  fleet  was  despatched  under  Philanthropen6s, 
mostly  manned  with  Tzakonians  from  the  Peloponnese  and 
with  the  so-called  Gasmoiiloi,  or  "  bastards,"  the  offspring  of 
mixed  marriages  between  Franks  and  Greek  women,  who 
were  particularly  valuable  soldiers,  because  they  combined 
Greek  caution  with  Latin  courage.1  This  fleet  operated 
against  the  islands  of  the  >Egean,  of  which  the  Prince  of 
Achaia  was  suzerain,  and  the  south  coast  of  the  Morea.  The 
Genoese,  unmindful  of  his  services,  assisted  his  enemies  by 
landing  a  great  number  of  the  imperial  troops  at  Monem- 
vasia,  and  by  joining  in  the  attack  upon  the  islands. 

The  arrival  of  the  imperial  force,  and  the  prompt  seces- 
sion of  the  Melings,  the  Tzakonians,  and  the  restless 
inhabitants  of  the  two  promontories  of  Malea  and  Matapan, 
whose  chiefs  were  easily  won  by  the  promise  of  privileges 
and  the  gift  of  high-sounding  titles,  had  caused  William  to 
summon  his  great  vassals  to  his  aid.  They  seem  to  have 
been  somewhat  slow  in  responding  to  his  appeal,  but  one  of 
them,  his  old  enemy,  Guglielmo  da  Verona,  the  richest  and 
most  powerful  of  the  Eubcean  barons,  rendered  him  such 
great  services,  that  the  prince  was  inclined  to  reward  him 
*ith  the  overlordship  over  his  fellow-triarchs  and  over  the 
Duke  of  Athens.  An  Athenian  contingent  came  to  aid  in 
defending  the  Morea,2  but  the  fine  flower  of  all  the  Achaian 
chivalry,  the  doughty  Geoffroy  de  Bruy&res,  had  been 
ensnared  by  the  charms  of  a  beautiful  woman,  and  had 
gone  with  his  mistress  to  Apulia,  under  the  pretext  of  a 
visit  to  the  famous  shrines  of  St  Nicholas  at  Bari  and  of  St 
Michael,  on  one  of  the  spurs  of  Monte  Gargano.  No  longer 
kept  in  check  by  the  great  castle  of  Karytaina,  in  the  absence 
of  its  master,  the  Slavs  of  Skortd  soon  joined  those  of 
Taygetos  against  the  Franks. 

1  Lis  RegUtresdUrbainIV.,\\.,  ioo,  341.  The  latter  part  of  the  word, 
pm*My  is  Moreot  Greek  for  a  "  bastard  " ;  the  first  part  may  be  the  French 
gars.  See  Prof.  Karolides'  note  to  Paparreg6poulos, 'Lrrop/aroO  "EKkrpwcov 
TMrovttvniyo. 

*  Sanudo,  116.    The  Chroniclt  says  that  it  did  not  come. 


122  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

Meanwhile,  William  was  waiting  for  his  great  vassals  at 
Corinth,  and  the  imperial  commander,  who  had  so  far  met 
with  no  opposition,  and  had  taken  Lacedaemonia  and  other 
towns,  boasted  to  the  emperor  that  a  third  of  the  Morea  was 
already  his,  and  that  if  he  had  more  men,  he  could  conquer 
the  whole.  Michael  VIII.  sent  him  reinforcements,  and  a 
distinguished  soldier,  Michael  Cantacuzene,  grandfather  of 
the  subsequent  emperor  and  historian,  and  member  of  an 
old  family  which  we  saw  settled  in  Messenia  at  the  time  of 
the  Frankish  Conquest,  also  arrived  in  the  Morea.  The 
imperial  commanders  had  now  6000  cavalry  and  a  large 
force  of  infantry  at  their  disposal ;  they  accordingly  divided 
the  cavalry  into  eighteen  squadrons,  and  ordered  a  march  on 
Andravida,  the  Frankish  capitaL  Leaving  the  mart  of 
Veligosti  a  smoking  ruin,  they  marched  past  Karytaina,  and, 
guided  by  some  of  the  Slavs  of  Skortd,  reached  Prinitsa,  not 
far  from  Olympia,  having  burnt  on  the  way  the  Latin 
monastery  of  Our  Lady  of  Isova,  whose  Gothic  windows 
still  survey  the  valley  of  the  Alpheios,  the  Charbon,  as  the 
Franks  called  it.1  At  Prinitsa  they  were  met  by  a  small  body 
of  312  Franks,  under  the  command  of  Jean  de  Catavas, 
husband  of  the  lady  with  whom  Geoffroy  de  Bruy&res  had 
eloped,  and  a  valiant  but  rheumatic  warrior  whom  the  prince 
had  left  in  charge  during  his  absence  at  Corinth.  Despite 
the  smallness  of  his  forces  and  his  own  physical  infirmity, 
which  prevented  him  from  holding  sword  or  lance,  he 
ordered  the  prince's  standard — the  anchored  cross  of  the 
Villehardouins — to  be  tied  fast  to  his  hand,  and,  reminding 
his  men  that  they  were  Franks  and  their  enemies  men  of 
many  nations,  bade  them  win  fame  which  would  endure  "  so 
long  as  the  ark  remains  on  Ararat"  The  little  band  of 
Franks  seemed  lost  among  the  Greeks,  but  they  cut  down 
their  foes  with  their  swords,  "  as  a  scythe  mows  the  meadow 
grass,"  while  their  leader,  as  he  made  straight  for  the  tent 
of  Constantine  Palaiol6gos,  dressed  all  in  white,  seemed  to 
the  superstitious  Greeks  to  be  none  other  than  St  George, 
guiding  the  Franks  to  victory.  Some  cried  that  this  was  the 
vengeance  of  the  Virgin  for  the  sacrilege  at  Isova,  others 
that  it  was  retribution  for  the  perjury  of  the  emperor,  and 
1  Buchon,  La  Grtee  Continental* y  497. 


FIRST  TURKISH  ALLIANCE  123 

Constantine  was  glad  to  mount  his  swift  Turkish  horse  and 
ride  for  his  life  by  devious  paths  to  MistrA,  leaving  his  men 
to  escape  to  the  woods. 

The  season  of  1263  was  now  far  advanced,  and  it  was 

not  till  the  following  spring  that  Constantine  re-assembled 

his    Slav  and   Tzakonian   allies,  and   marched  again   upon 

Andravida.     Near  the  chapel  of  St  Nicholas  at  Mesisklin, 

a  spot  not  far  from  the  Frankish  capital,  the  two  armies 

met     A  Frank  had  warned  the  Byzantine  general,  that  one 

horseman  of  Achaia  was  worth  twenty  Greeks,  and  that  he 

must  use  artifice  rather  than  force  if  he  wished  to  conquer. 

Despite  this  warning,  Cantacuzene,  who  was  possessed  of 

that  boastful  spirit  which  the  Greeks  usually  regarded  as  a 

peculiarly  Frankish  characteristic,  insisted  upon  showing  off 

his  horsemanship  in  front  of  the  enemy's  line,  and  paid  with 

his  life  for  his  rashness.     At  this  disaster  the  Greeks  retired 

without  giving  battle,  and  the  Prince  of  Achaia  was  persuaded 

to  act   with    prudence    and    refrain    from    pursuing  them. 

Dissensions  now  broke  out  between   Constantine  and  his 

Turkish  mercenaries.     Six  months'  pay  was  already  owing 

to  them,  and  as  he  refused  to  give  it  to  them,  they  offered 

their  services  to  William,  whom  they  believed  to  be  a  man 

of  his  word.     On  the  banks  of  the  river  of  Elis  the  first 

unholy  alliance  was  made  between  a  Frank  ruler  of  Greece 

and  its  future  masters.     Ancelin  de  Toucy,  a  great  noble 

who  had  settled  in  the  Morea  after  the  fall  of  Constantinople,1 

and  who  spoke  Turkish,  acted  as  go-between,  and  William 

gladly  accepted  the  offer  of  the  Turkish  chiefs,  Melik  and 

Salik,  who  were  eager  to  punish  their  late  employers.     The 

Franco-Turkish   forces  accordingly  marched  southwards  in 

the  direction  of  Kalamata,  and  then  ascended  the  beautiful 

pass  of  Makryplagi,  "  the  broad  hillside,"  up  which  the  present 

railway  climbs.      When  Ancelin,  who  was  in  command  of 

the  van,  reached  the  ridge,  the  Greeks  sprang  up  from  their 

ambuscade,  and   fell   upon   him.      Twice  the   Franks  were 

beaten  back,  but  their  commander  bade  them  cease  u  playing 

hide-and-seek  "  with  their  enemies  ; 2  they  stormed  the  ridge ; 

the  Turks,  coming  up  behind,  completed  the  discomfiture  of 

the  Greeks,  and  the  Greek  commanders,  who  had  sought 

1  X.  t.  M.,  11.  1321-4.  2  IHd.f  1.  5395. 


*-!■***' 


\ 


124  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

refuge  in  the  grotto  of  Gardiki — a  place  celebrated  two 
centuries  later  for  two  appalling  massacres — were  discovered 
by  the  Turks,  and  led  prisoners  before  the  prince.  The 
emperor's  brother  had,  fortunately  for  him,  returned  home 
before  the  battle,1  but  his  two  surviving  colleagues,  Makren6s 
and  PhilSs,  and  many  of  their  followers,  were  now  at 
William's  mercy.  The  two  principal  captives  were  sent  to 
the  strong  castle  of  Chloumofitsi,  where  Phil£s  died,  and  his 
fellow-prisoner,  though  subsequently  exchanged,  was  accused 
on  his  return  to  Constantinople  of  collusion  with  William, 
who  was  said  to  have  promised  him,  as  the  reward  of  his 
treachery,  the  hand  of  the  widowed  daughter  of  the  late 
Emperor  Theodore  II.,  Liskaris,  who  was  living  on  her 
Moreot  barony  of  Veligostl2  The  suspicions  of  the  usurper, 
Michael  VIII.,  were  easily  aroused,  and  he  put  out  the  eyes 
of  a  general,  who  might  have  espoused  the  claims  of  the 
dethroned  dynasty. 

The  victory  of  Makryplagi  had  removed  all  fear  of  a 
further  attack  by  the  Greeks,  and  William  was  able  to 
proceed  to  his  beloved  Lacedaemonia,  the  Greek  population 
of  which  had  fled  to  Mistrl  He  supplied  their  places  with 
trusty  Franks,  whom  he  bade  restore  the  deserted  town, 
sent  his  forces  to  ravage  Tzakonia  and  the  country  round 
Monemvasia,  and  ordered  the  Turks  to  plunder  the  Slavs  of 
Skortd,  who,  though  lately  pardoned,  had  again  risen  in  the 
absence  of  the  baron  of  Karytaina.  Soon  after,  Geoffroy  de 
Bruy&res,  stung  by  the  reproaches  of  King  Manfred,  returned 
penitent  to  the  Morea.  He  flung  himself  down  before  the 
prince,  with  his  girdle  round  his  neck,  in  the  church  of  Santa 
Sofia  at  Andravida,  and,  thanks  to  the  good  offices  of  Manfred 
and  the  intercession  of  the  nobles,  he  was  a  second  time 
forgiven.  From  that  time  to  his  death  he  loyally  served  his 
uncle  and  prince. 

The  fighting  was  now  over,  and  the  Turks  asked  per- 
mission to  return  to  their  homes  in  Asia.  In  vain  William 
pressed  their  chief  to  stay ;  but  some  of  his  followers  con- 

1  Pachyme>es,  i.,  207  ;  the  Chronicle^  less  likely  to  be  well-informed, 
represents  him  as  one  of  the  captives. 

*  Her  first  husband  had  been  the  baron.  Pachymeres,  i.,  180 ;  Nike- 
ph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  92. 


DEPOPULATION  OF  THE  MOREA  125 

sented  to  settle  in  the  Morea.  All  who  remained  there 
were  baptised ;  the  prince  knighted  two  of  them,  and  gave 
them  fiefs  and  wives;  one  of  them  seems  to  have  married 
a  noble  damsel,  the  lady  of  Pavlitsa  (near  Bassae);  and, 
when  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea  was  composed,  their 
posterity  was  still  living  at  two  places  in  the  peninsula. 
Thus  a  new  element  was  added  to  the  mixed  population 
of  the  Morea.1  The  land,  indeed,  was  in  danger  of  becoming 
desolate,  owing  to  the  loss  of  life  in  the  war;  Urban  IV. 
received  from  the  prince  and  the  barons  a  gloomy  picture  of 
its  depopulation  ;  and  one  woman,  so  Sanudo  informs  us, 
lost  seven  husbands,  one  after  the  other,  all  of  whom  died 
in  battle. 

Disappointed  of  winning  the  Morea  by  force,  Michael 

VIII.  now  proposed  to  William  that  his  son  and  heir,  the 

future  Emperor  Andr6nikos  II.,  should  marry  the  prince's 

elder  daughter,  Isabelle,  and  that  Andronikos  should  succeed 

as  Prince  of  Achaia.    This  arrangement  would  have  not  only 

re-united  the  Morea  with  the  Greek  Empire,  and  thus  spared 

it    much  bloodshed,  but,  by    welding   Moreot  Greeks  and 

Franks  closely  together,  might  have  so   strengthened   the 

principality  that  it  could  have  offered  a  better  resistance  to 

the  Turks  later  on.     But  the  Frank  barons,  proud  of  their 

nationality,  were  not  willing  to  accept  a   Greek  as   their 

future  sovereign.     In  spite  of  the  prince's  marriage  with  a 

Greek  princess,  the  Frank  nobles  continued  to  select  their 

wives  from  the  best  families  in  France,  and  the  difference 

of  religion  combined  with  the  pride  of  race  to  make  them 

disdainful    of   the    connection    with    Byzantium.      As    the 

historian   Nikeph6ros    Gregorys2    remarked,  they  despised 

marriages  with  Greeks,  even  with  those  of  imperial  blood. 

Isabelle  was  destined  to  make  a  marriage  which  united  the 

principality  to  the  fortunes  of  the  great  house  of  Anjou. 

Charles  of  Anjou,  the  most  ambitious  prince  of  his  time, 
had  now  appeared  upon  the  stage  of  Italian  politics.  Sum- 
moned by  Urban  IV.  to  the  throne  of  the  Two  Sicilies,  he 
routed   Manfred  at  the  historic  battle  of  Benevento ;  and, 

1  X.  r.  M.,  11.  45 13-5921  ;  L.  d.  C,  153-99  ;  L.  d.  F.y  69-84  ;  Sanudo, 
1 16-18,  135  ;  Les  Registres  (PUrbain  IV.y  ii.,  292-4  ;  Pachymdres,  i.,  88, 
205-9  ;  Nikcph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  80.  2  Ibid.%  i.,  237. 


k 


126  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

not  content  with  having  seized  the  Italian  possessions  of  the 
Hohenstaufen,  he  considered  himself  the  heir  of  those  places 
beyond  the  sea  which  Manfred  had  received  as  his  wife's 
dowry  from  the  Despot  of  Epiros.  Though  the  fair  Helene 
of  Epiros  was  now  languishing  with  her  children  in  an 
Italian  dungeon,  Filippo  Chinardo  continued  to  hold  Corfu 
and  the  Epirote  fortresses,  either  for  her  or  for  himself,  a 
few  months  longer.  But  the  treacherous  Despot,  who  had 
first  tried  to  conciliate  the  bold  Frank  by  giving  him  his 
sister-in-law  in  marriage,  together  with  Corfu,  which  he  was 
pleased  to  regard  as  once  more  his  own  to  bestow,  had  him 
assassinated  in  1266,  intending  to  seize  Helene's  former 
dowry  and  re-unite  it  with  his  dominions.  But  Chinardo, 
short  as  his  rule  in  Corfu  had  been,  had  granted  fiefs  there 
to  brave  knights,  such  as  the  brothers  Thomas  and  Gamier 
Aleman,  members  of  a  Provencal  family,  already  settled  at 
Patras,  and  whose  name  is  still  borne  by  one  of  the  Corfiote 
deputies.  Gamier  Aleman  undertook  the  defence  of  the 
island  against  the  Despot,  till  he  was  able  to  invoke  the  aid 
of  his  countryman  and  co-religionist,  Charles  of  Anjou,  who, 
as  a  reward  for  his  services,  named  him  his  vicar  and 
captain-general.  Thus,  in  1267,  the  finest  of  the  Ionian 
islands  became  a  possession  of  the  Angevins  of  Naples, 
under  whom  it  remained  for  more  than  a  century.1 

Charles  was  anxious  to  make  Corfu  and  Epiros  a  stepping- 
stone  to  the  conquest  of  the  rest  of  Greece,  and  desired,  like 
most  conquerors,  to  have  some  legal  claim  to  his  proposed 
conquests.  There  was  at  that  time  in  Italy  the  deposed 
Latin  Emperor  of  Romania,  Baldwin  II.,  who,  after  in  vain 
besieging  the  reluctant  ears  of  western  potentates,  thought 
that  he  had  found  in  the  victor  of  Benevento  the  man  who 
would  assist  him.  The  exiled  emperor  and  the  king  of  the 
Two  Sicilies  met  on  May  27,  1267,  in  the  presence  of  Pope 
Clement  IV.,  in  a  room  of  the  papal  residence  at  Viterbo — 
a  building  recently  restored — and  there  concluded  a  treaty, 
which  gave  the  house  of  Anjou  the  legal  right  to  intervene 
in  the  affairs  of  Greece.  Baldwin  II.  ceded  to  Charles  the 
suzerainty  held  by  himself  and  his  predecessors  over  "  the 

1  Pachym^rcs,  i.,  508.  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  195-201  ; 
II.,  i.,  309-11  ;  Minieri  Riccio,  Alcuni fatti  riguardanti  Carlo  /.,  24. 


TREATY  OF  VITERBO  127 

principality  of  Achaia  and  Morea,  and  all  the  land  which 
William  de  Villehardouin  holds  by  any  title  whatsoever 
from  the  Latin  Empire."  William,  who  was  represented  by 
his  chancellor,  Leonardo  of  Veroli,  one  of  the  witnesses  to 
the  treaty,  was  pledged  to  recognise  Charles  and  his  heirs 
as  his  lords,  and  the  famous  knights  of  Achaia  were  to  form 
part  of  the  2000  horsemen  whom  Charles  promised  to  provide 
for  the  recovery  of  the  Latin  Empire  within  the  space  of  six, 
or,  at  the  most,  seven  years.  Baldwin  also  considered  himself 
entitled  to  bestow  upon  Charles  the  lands  which  had  formed 
the  dowry  of  Helene  of  Epiros,  and  "  which  had  been  held 
by  Manfred  and  Filippo  Chinardo,"  and  transferred  to  him, 
on  paper,  all  the  islands  which  had  belonged  to  the  Latin 
Empire,  except  the  four  most  important.  The  alliance 
between  them  was  to  be  cemented  by  the  marriage  of 
Charles's  daughter  Beatrice  and  Baldwin's  son  Philip,  which 
was  celebrated  six  years  later.  The  other  provisions  of  the 
treaty  are  of  no  importance,  because  the  course  of  Italian 
politics  frustrated  the  hopes  of  the  high  contracting  parties 
that  the  Empire  of  Romania  would  be  restored  by  the  strong 
arm  of  the  Angevin.1 

The  Angevin  connection  could  not  fail  to  please  the  Prince 
of  Achaia.  Charles  of  Anjou  was  a  Frenchman,  and  Achaia 
was  practically  a  French  colony ;  he  was  the  brother  of  the 
saintly  Louis  IX.,  whom  Villehardouin  had  met  in  Cyprus, 
and  to  whose  decision  the  punishment  of  Guy  of  Athens  had 
been  deferred,  and  he  was  King  of  Naples,  and  therefore  a 
powerful  neighbour,  whose  troops  could  reach  Glarentza  from 
Brindisi  in  three  days.  Venice,  too,  ever  an  uncertain  ally, 
had  recently,  for  selfish  reasons,  concluded  an  armistice  with 
the  Greek  emperor,  who  had  thus  a  free  hand  against  the 
Franks  of  Achaia  and  the  Lombards  of  Eubcea.  The  wily 
Palaiol6gos  swore  to  observe  a  "  pure  and  guileless  truce  " 2 
with  the  Venetians,  to  confirm  them  in  their  existing 
possessions  at  Coron  and  Modon,  in  Crete  and  Eubcea, 
while  they  promised  not  to  help  the  Lombards  of  the  latter 

1  Ducange,  Histoire  de  P  Empire  de  Constantinople,  i.,  455-63  ;  Buchon, 
RechercheS)  i.,  30-7  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregoris,  i.,  98,  123. 

*  The  word  used,  dydTy,  mediaeval  Greek  for  a  "truce,"  is  still  the 
technical  expression  in  Maina  for  the  cessation  of  a  blood-feud. 


128  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

island,  but  to  remain  neutral  while  the  Greeks  invaded  it, 
and  to  allow  Michael  to  retain  temporarily  the  Thessalian 
port  of  Halmyros,  so  that  he  might  prevent  the  export  of 
provisions  for  the  use  of  the  islanders.  As  a  further  reward 
for  this  absolutely  selfish  policy,  eminently  characteristic  of 
Venetian  statesmanship  and  worthy  of  modern  German 
diplomacy  in  the  near  East,  the  republic  was  to  receive  that 
valuable  Thessalian  port  and  to  keep  her  quarters  in 
Negroponte  after  the  war  was  over,  while  the  Genoese  were  to 
be  expelled  the  Greek  Empire,  which  was  to  be  thrown  open 
to  Venetian  trade.  Those  iEgean  islands  which  had 
acknowledged  the  suzerainty  of  the  Prince  of  Achaia  during 
the  latter  years  of  the  Latin  Empire,  were  now  to  be  trans- 
ferred to  Michael.  The  armistice,  originally  made  in  1265, 
was  in  1268  confirmed,  with  one  or  two  modifications,  for  the 
term  of  five  years.1  Thus  Venice,  in  order  to  checkmate  her 
Genoese  rivals  and  recover  her  Levantine  trade,  calmly 
sacrificed  the  French  and  the  Lombards. 

Before  the  Prince  of  Achaia  had  received  assistance  from 
his  new  suzerain,  the  latter  summoned  him  to  his  aid  against 
the  luckless  Conradin,  who  had  crossed  the  Alps  to  claim  the 
heritage  of  the  Hohenstaufen.  In  spite  of  the  fact  that 
Manfred's  widow  was  his  wife's  sister,  William  hastened  in 
response  to  the  appeal  of  her  gaoler.  The  feudal  tie  was 
stronger  for  him  than  that  of  sentiment,  and  a  prince  so  fond 
of  fighting  for  fighting's  sake  was  probably  not  sorry  to 
exhibit  his  prowess  before  the  most  successful  sovereign  of 
southern  Europe.  Together  with  his  two  nephews,  the 
redoubtable  Geoffroy  de  Bruy&res  and  Jean  de  Chauderon, 
grand  constable  of  the  principality,  and  other  barons  and 
knights,  400  in  number,  the  fine  flower  of  the  renowned 
Achaian  chivalry,  William  was  present  at  the  fatal  battle  of 
Tagliacozzo 

"  Ove  scnz*  arme  vinsc  il  vecchio  Alardo." 

Indeed,  the  defeat  of  Conradin,  which  Dante  ascribed  to  the 
craft  of  Erard  de  Valeri,  is  by  the  author  of  the  Chronicle  of 

1  Fontts  Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  66-89,  92-100.  Dandolo  and  Navagero 
apud  Muratori,  xii.,  369  ;  xxiii.,  1000. 


VILLEHARDOUIN  AT  TAGLIACOZZO  129 

the  Morea,  attributed  to  the  Prince  of  Achaia.1  According  to 
him,  the  prince  advised  Charles  of  Anjou  to  use  cunning, 
after  the  fashion  of  Greeks  and  Turks,  against  an  enemy 
numerically  his  superior.  The  King  of  Naples  allowed 
himself  to  be  guided  by  William's  unrivalled  experience  of 
Eastern  warfare ;  and  the  latter^  plan  of  alluring  Conradin's 
predatory  Germans  into  the  king's  richly  furnished  camp,  and 
then  closing  in  upon  them  while  they  were  intent  on  plunder, 
proved  to  be  completely  successful.  But  an  unprejudiced 
authority,  the  Florentine  historian  Villani,2  records  how 
"  William  de  Villehardouin,  a  knight  of  great  importance," 
was  with  Charles  and  £rard  on  that  memorable  day,  while 
Clement  IV.  urged  the  appointment  of  so  seasoned  a  soldier 
as  commander  against  the  rebellious  Saracens  of  Lucera. 

After  the  battle,  William  accompanied  his   suzerain  to 

Naples,  whence  he  returned,  laden  with  gifts,  to  the  Morea. 

He  had  now  been  a  quarter  of  a  century  on  the  throne ;  and, 

as  he  had  no  son,  he  was  anxious  that  his  elder  daughter, 

Isabelle,  should  marry  Philip,  the  second  son  of  Charles  of 

Anjou,  and  thus  strengthen  the  connection  which  had  existed 

since  the  treaty  of  Viterbo  between  the  Angevins  of  Naples 

and  the    French    principality  of   Achaia.      The    proposed 

alliance  met  with  the  approval  of  both  the  Neopolitan  court, 

which  saw  that  it  might  favour  its  designs  upon  Greece,  and 

the  leading  men  of  the   Morea,  who   were  glad  that  the 

husband  of  the  young  princess  should  be  of  their  own  race 

and  speech.      But    the    marriage-contract    was    extremely 

favourable  to  the  Angevins,  for  it  stipulated  that  whether  the 

Prince  of  Achaia  left  heirs  or   not,  the  principality  should 

belong  to  the  house  of  Anjou.     William  also  undertook  to 

make  all  the  barons  and  commanders  swear  to  hand  over 

their   castles    peaceably    to    his    successor,    and   to  obtain 

from  the  Princess  Agnes  a  ratification  of  these  conventions. 

Thus  Charles  had  secured  no  mere  phantom  suzerainty,  but 

the  real  possession  of  Achaia  after  the  prince's   death,  and 

thereby  a  convenient  basis  for  the  prosecution  of  his  schemes 

»  X.  r.  M.f  6870-7072  ;  L.  d.  C,  228-33  ;  L.  d.  F.>  88-9.    He  also  con- 
tecs  Tagliacoao  with  Benevento. 

*  Afiud  Muratori,  op.  cit^  xiii.,  249 ;  Del  Giudice,  Codice  Diplomatico, 

n„  14°- 

I 


130  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

against  the  Greek  Empire.  Isabelle  was  still  a  mere  child, 
but  she  was  torn  from  her  home,  a  sacrifice  to  the  raison 
cPttat.  Four  noble  ladies  and  the  son  of  her  old  nurse,  who 
had  probably  been  her  playmate  in  the  castle  of  Kalamata, 
went  with  her ;  and  amidst  the  greater  glories  of  Naples, 
they  must  often  have  talked  of  her  native  land  of  Achaia. 
In  1 27 1  the  wedding  took  place  in  the  beautiful  cathedral  at 
Trani,  and  Isabelle  and  her  husband  went  to  live  in  the 
Castel  delF  Uovo  at  Naples,  the  selfsame  spot  where,  sixty 
years  later,  her  daughter  was  destined  to  die  a  prisoner.1 

Michael  VIII.  had  meanwhile  renewed  his  attempt  to 
conquer  the  Morea.  A  fresh  expedition,  largely  composed 
of  Turkish  and  Cuman  mercenaries,  under  a  commander 
closely  connected  with  the  emperor,  landed  at  Monemvasia, 
and  William  was  obliged  to  invoke  the  aid  of  his  suzerain. 
Charles  sent  him  corn,  money,  and  men,  and  appointed  his 
marshal,  Dreux  de  Beaumont,2  to  take  command  of  them. 
But  the  operations  on  both  sides  were  unimportant.  The 
Greeks  had  learnt  wisdom  from  their  defeats  at  Prinitsa  and 
Makryplagi,  and  abstained  from  giving  battle  in  the  open, 
while  the  Franks  had  not  sufficient  supplies  for  a  prolonged 
blockade  of  Mistrl  Thus,  after  a  punitive  expedition 
against  the  rebellious  Tzakonians,  the  campaign  closed,  and 
the  emperor  was  in  no  hurry  to  renew  it.  The  artful  Michael, 
alarmed  at  the  marriage  of  Baldwin  II.'s  son  with  Charles's 
daughter,  was  at  this  time  endeavouring  to  gain  the  support 
of  the  papacy  and  so  avert  the  danger  of  a  fresh  attack  upon 
Constantinople  by  professing  his  willingness  to  accept  the 
union  of  the  Eastern  and  Western  Churches.  The  Prince  of 
Achaia  was  requested  by  Gregory  X.  to  allow  the  imperial 
delegates  to  pass  through  his  dominions  on  their  way  to 
attend  the  Council  of  Lyons;  but  the  plenipotentiaries,  of 
whom  the  historian  Akropolita  was  one,  were  so  rash  as  to 
make  the  journey  round,  instead  of  across,  the  Peloponnese 

1  Sanudo,  1 18-19;  Minieri  Riccio,  Alcum  Fatti,  122,  140,  141  ;  Delia 
Dominazione  Angioina,  3 ;  //  Regno  di  Carlo  /.,  19,  20 ;  Z.  d.  F., 
91  ;  Muntaner,  ch  cclxii. ;  d'Esclot,  Cronaca,  ch.  lxiv. ;  C.  d.  M.t  438. 

*  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches%  I.,  i.,  221-6 ;  11.,  i.,  326-7,  329.  The 
Chronicle  of  the  Morea  confuses  De  Beaumont  with  Galeran  d'lvry,  who 
was  sent  after  William's  death. 


DIVISION  OF  EPIROS  131 

in  the  month  of  March.  Off  Cape  Malea,  one  of  the  storms 
so  common  at  that  place  and  season,  a.fortuna%  as  the  sailors 
call  it,  got  up ;  one  of  the  two  ships  foundered  with  all  hands, 
and  the  other,  which  contained  Akropolita,  with  difficulty 
managed  to  put  into  the  Venetian  port  of  Modon.  The 
much-suffering  historian  thence  continued  his  journey  to 
Lyons,  and  the  services  which  he  there  rendered  to  the 
cause  of  ecclesiastical  union  were  rewarded,  when  fanaticism 
gained  the  ascendency  after  the  death  of  Michael  VIII., 
with  a  second  term  of  imprisonment,  which  must  have 
reminded  him  of  his  previous  confinement  in  the  dungeons  of 
Epiros.1 

Nowhere  did  the  cause  of  orthodoxy  find  warmer  defenders 
than  in  that  rival  Greek  state.  In  1271,  the  Despot  of 
Epiros,2  Michael  II.,  had  ended  his  long  and  stormy  reign. 
Amidst  all  the  vicissitudes  of  fortune,  he  had  contrived  to 
hold  his  heritage  in  the  mountain  fastnesses  of  his  native 
land  against  the  Greek  Empire  of  Constantinople.  Despite 
the  vagaries  of  his  married  life,  the  builder  of  three 
monasteries  and  churches  was  invested  by  monkish 
chroniclers  with  the  odour  of  sanctity,  and  the  memory  of  his 
pious  wife,  the  Blessed  Theodora,  still  lingers  in  Epiros, 
where  her  religious  foundations  perhaps  compensated  for 
some  of  the  misery  which  her  husband's  restless  ambition 
had  brought  upon  his  country.  After  his  death,  she  became 
a  nun,  and  her  tomb,  with  her  effigy  and  that  of  her  husband, 
is  still  shown  in  the  monastery  of  St  George,  which  she 
founded  at  Arta,  and  which  now  bears  her  name.  Many 
were  the  miraculous  cures  ascribed  to  her  relics,  and  it  was 
not  unnatural  that  one  who  had  healed  a  case  of  cancer 
should  be  beatified  by  a  grateful  Church.8 

The  death  of  Michael  led  to  a  complete  division  of  the 
Despotat  His  eldest  son,  Nikeph6ros  I.,  succeeded  to  Old 
Epiros  and  the  island  of  Leukas.  Corfu,  as  we  saw,  had 
already  passed  into  the  hands  of  the  house  of  Anjou,  and  its 

1  Pacbym&es,  L,  396-7  ;  Les  Registries  de  Gr/goire  X.,  124. 

1  Hopf(afrud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv.,  298)  fixes  his  death  in  127 1, 
fmlay  in  1267. 

9  Bachon,  NouvelUs  Recherche s^  I.,  i.,  398;  II.,  i.,  405-6;  AcXWovrip 
Iprr.  'Apx.  'Braipeiat,  III.,  8l. 


132  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

history  is  henceforth  separate  from  that  of  the  mainland. 
In  Epiros  itself,  the  same  strong  house  had  acquired,  by  the 
treaty  of  Viterbo,  the  former  possessions  of  Manfred ;  and, 
though  Charles  had  not  yet  had  leisure  to  occupy  all  of  them, 
the  Greeks  had  been  unable  to  recover  them  from  Chinardo's 
sons,  while  Joannina  was  held  by  an  imperial  garrison. 
Still,  the  sway  of  Nikeph6ros  extended  over  the  rest  of 
Epiros  and  over  Akarnania  and  jEtolia,  while  the  bastard 
John  I.,  who  had  played  so  treacherous  a  part  at  the  battle  of 
Pelagonia,  was  established  at  Neopatras,  or  La  Patre  as  the 
Franks  called  it,  beneath  the  rocky  walls  of  Mount  Oeta,  and 
thence  ruled  over  a  mixed  population  of  Wallachs  and 
Greeks,  the  successors  of  those  Myrmidons,  whom  Achilles 
had  led  to  the  siege  of  Troy.  His  boundaries  were  Olympos 
on  the  north,  and  Parnassos  on  the  south ;  while  to  the  east 
of  the  latter  mountain  they  ran  down  to  the  Gulf  of  Corinth, 
at  Galaxidi,  and  included  much  of  the  ancient  Lokris  Ozolis ; 
from  the  emperor  he  received  the  title  Sebastokrdtor ;  the 
Franks,  by  a  misunderstanding  of  his  family  name  of  Doukas, 
styled  him  "  Duke  "  of  Neopatras ;  and,  in  that  splendid  and 
healthy  spot  where  the  moderns  seek  the  baths  in  summer,  he 
had  built  a  strong  castle,  the  ruins  of  which  still  attest  his 
sovereignty.1  Married  to  a  daughter  of  Taron£s,  a  Wallach 
chief,  he  had  enlisted  the  sympathies  of  that  race ;  and  his 
opposition  to  the  subjection  of  the  Orthodox  Church  to  the 
pope,  if  it  drew  upon  him  and  his  feebler  but  no  less 
orthodox  brother  the  anathemas  of  the  time-serving 
patriarch  of  Constantinople,  made  him  the  leading 
representative  of  that  fanatical  Hellenism  which  arrogated 
to  itself,  as  it  still  does  to-day,  the  sole  right  to  the  Christian 
name.  Beneath  his  standard,  many  rigidly  orthodox 
families  of  the  imperial  capital  found  shelter,  some  of  whose 
descendants  are  still  living  in  his  old  dominions.  Among 
the  fugitives  there  were  sufficient  ecclesiastics  to  hold  a 
council,  which  excommunicated  the  emperor,  the  pope,  and 
the  oecumenical  patriarch,  with  all  the  combined  bitterness 
of  theologians  and  exiles.  Two  of  the  Thessalian  bishops, 
their  Graces  of  Trikkala  and  Neopatras,  did  indeed  venture 

1  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  lr  109  sgg. ;  Romands,  TpaTiavk  ZApfa,  153, 
297  ;  Sdthas,  T&  Xpovixbv  rw  TaXa^eidiov,  140 ;  X.  r.  M.,  1.  3098. 


THE  DUKE  OF  NEOPATRAS  133 

to  protest  against  this  new  schism  ;  but  the  one  was  put  in 
prison,  and  the  other  was  stripped  of  all  his  garments  except 
his  shirt,  and  then  turned  out  of  doors  on  a  freezing 
December  night1  After  this  there  could  be  no  doubt  of  the 
bastard's  orthodox  zeal. 

His  restless  character  was  well  known  at  Constantinople  ; 
but  the  emperor's  past  experience  of  the  difficulties  which  his 
troops  had  met  in  their  Epirote  campaigns,  and  the  state  of 
his  Asiatic  provinces,  made  it  desirable  that  he  should 
pacify  a  rival  whom  he  would  find  it  hard  to  subdue. 
Accordingly,  he  endeavoured  to  flatter  the  bastard's  vanity 
by  arranging  a  marriage  between  his  own  nephew,  Andr6nikos 
Tarchanei6tes,  and  John's  beautiful  daughter,  and  by 
conferring  upon  the  Duke  of  Neopatras  the  high  dignity  of 
Sebastokrdtor.  But  Tarchanei6tes,  who  had  received  an 
important  command  in  the  Balkans,  believing  himself  to  have 
been  passed  over  in  the  bestowal  of  honours,  threw  up  his 
post  and  fled  to  the  court  of  his  father-in-law,  who  was  not 
sorry  to  have  an  excuse  for  war  with  the  emperor.  The 
shelter  given  to  his  treacherous  official,  and  the  violation  of 
his  territory  by  the  bastard,  forced  the  emperor  to  despatch 
a  large  army,  including  both  Turkish  and  Cuman  auxiliaries, 
against  him  under  the  command  of  his  own  brother  John, 
the  victor  of  Pelagonia,  a  commander  well  acquainted  with  the 
enemy  and  the  enemy's  country.  Many  places  in  Thessaly 
submitted  to  the  imperial  commander,  and  the  bastard 
sought  refuge  behind  the  strong  walls  of  Neopatras,  which  he 
had  recently  fortified.  The  lofty  position,  and  the  artificial 
defences  of  his  capital,  enabled  him  to  defy  the  efforts  of  the 
imperial  engineers.  But  the  size  of  the  garrison  led  the 
bastard  to  fear  that  his  supplies  would  fall  short,  and  he  was 
doubtless  aware  that  the  besiegers  were  using  threats  to 
induce  his  followers  to  betray  him.  Accordingly,  choosing  a 
dark  night,  he  had  himself  lowered  by  a  rope  from  the 
ramparts,  and,  disguised  as  a  groom,  traversed  the  enemy's 
camp,  crying  out  in  the  Greek  of  the  stables  that  he  was 
looking  for  a  horse  which  he  had  lost  Once  out  of  the 
camp,  he  proceeded  by  way  of  Thermopylae  to  Thebes,  the 
1  Pachymercs,  i.,  83  ;  Lcs  Registres  de  Nicholas  ///.,  134-7  ;  Sdthas, 
0fi.  cit,  144. 


134  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

court  of  his  namesake,  John,  Duke  of  Athens,  "  Sir  Yanni," 
as  the  Byzantine  historian  calls  him,  and  implored  his  aid 
against  the  emperor.  As  an  inducement  to  the  Duke,  he 
offered  him  the  hand  of  his  daughter  Helene.  John  of 
Athens  declined  the  proposed  match  for  himself,  pleading 
his  delicate  health  and  his  gouty  disposition,  but  suggested 
his  younger  brother  William  as  a  husband  for  the  lady.  The 
bastard  consented,  but  it  was  agreed  that  the  allies  should 
first  attack  the  enemy.  The  Duke  of  Athens,  at  the  head  of 
from  300  to  500  picked  Athenian  horsemen,  accompanied  the 
fugitive  back  to  some  rising  ground  near  Neopatras,  from 
which  it  was  possible  to  see  the  imperial  army,  estimated  at 
30,000  cavalry.  This  huge  disparity  of  numbers  did  not, 
however,  daunt  the  chivalrous  duke.  In  Greek,  and  in  a 
phrase  borrowed  from  Herodotos,1  which  seems  to  have 
become  proverbial  in  Greece,  he  remarked  to  his  companion 
that  they  were  "  many  people,  but  few  men."  He  then 
addressed  his  Athenian  knights,  and  told  them  that  if  any 
feared  to  face  such  enormous  numerical  odds,  they  were 
free  to  go  home.  Two  alone  availed  themselves  of  his 
permission,  and  then  the  rest  fell  upon  the  imperial  camp. 
The  besiegers  were  completely  taken  by  surprise;  their 
great  host,  composed  of  incoherent  elements  and  various 
races,  was  thrown  into  confusion  by  the  compact  body  of 
Franks ;  one  of  those  panics,  so  common  with  Balkan  armies, 
seized  them  ;  the  cry  was  raised  that  the  Duke  of  Athens,  or 
even  the  terrible  Prince  of  Achaia  was  upon  them,  and  they 
fled  in  disorder,  and  the  bastard  re-entered  his  capital  in 
triumph.  Byzantine  piety  ascribed  the  defeat  to  the 
vengeance  of  Heaven  upon  the  Cuman  auxiliaries,  who  had 
plundered  Thessalian  monasteries,  and  eaten  their  rations  off 
the  holy  eikons ;  a  modern  historian  may  say  that  here,  as  in 
so  many  battles  between  Greeks  and  Franks,  Providence  was 
on  the  side  of  the  small  but  homogeneous  and  well-horsed 
battalions.  For  once,  the  bastard  kept  faith  with  his 
Frankish  ally.  His  daughter  married  William  de  la  Roche, 
and  the  important  town  of  Lamia,  together  with  Gardiki,  the 
ancient  Larissa  Kremaste,  Gravia  on  the  route  from  Lamia 
to  Salona,  and   Siderokastro,  or    Sideroporta,  the   ancient 

1  viL  210. 


BATTLE  OF  DEMETRIAS  135 

Herakleia,  not  far  from  Thermopylae,  were  her  dowry.1 
Thus,  the  influence  of  the  Athenian  duchy  extended  as  far 
north  as  Thessaly. 

The  news  of  the  victory  at  Neopatras  soon  spread  to 
Eubcea,  where  the  Lombard  barons  recognised  in  the  bastard 
a  serviceable  ally  against  the  Greek  emperor,  who  was  his 
and  their  enemy  alike.     Simultaneously  with  the  despatch 
of  his  army  against  the  Duke  of  Neopatras,  Michael  VIII. 
had  sent  a  large  fleet  under  his  admiral,  Philanthropen6s,  to 
prevent  the  Franks  of  the  islands  from  co-operating  with  the 
bastard.     This  fleet  was  now  stationed  off  Demetrias,  in  the 
Gulf  of  Volo,  and  the  Euboean  barons,  excited  by  the  success 
of  the  Franks  on  land,  resolved  to  repeat  it  at  sea.     They 
manned  a  flotilla  of  Euboean  and  Cretan  vessels,  armed  with 
wooden  towers,  which  made  them  resemble  floating  towns, 
and  placed  it  under  the  command  of  the  son  of  the  late 
Venetian  bailie.     The  flower  of  the  Lombard  nobility  took 
part    in   an   enterprise  which,   shortly  before,   would   have 
seemed  as  hopeless  as  "shooting  arrows  against  the  sky." 
But  for  an  accident,  however,  it  would  have  proved  successful 
The  rival  fleets  joined  battle  in  the  beautiful  gulf,  where  the 
navies  of  the  world  could  easily  lie,  and,  despite  the  superior 
numbers  of  the  Greek  ships,  the  besiegers,  from  their  wooden 
towers — for   the  conflict  "resembled  a  siege  rather  than   a 
naval  battle  " — severely  .pressed  their  opponents.     Philanthro- 
pen6s  was  seriously  wounded,  many  of  his  vessels  were  driven 
ashore,  and  his  flagship  was  being  towed  off  by  the  victors, 
when  John  Palaiol6gos  suddenly  arrived  with  the  remnant  of 
his  defeated  army  on  the  scene.     Manning  the  empty  ships 
with   the   best  of  his  soldiers,   he  attacked  the   exhausted 
Lombards  with  such  vigour  that  all  but  two  of  their  ships 
fell  into  his   hands,  one  of  the  triarchs,  Guglielmo   II.   da 
Verona,  who  was  also  in  virtue  of  his  wife,  the  Lady  of 
Passavi,   Marshal   of  Morea,  was   slain,   and   many  of  the 
Euboean  nobles  and  their  Venetian  commander  were  taken 
prisoners.     Guglielmo's  brother,  Giberto,  managed  to  escape 
on  a  light  armed  vessel   to  Chalkis,  which,  thanks  to  the 
energy  of  the  Venetian  bailie  and  colony,  who  abandoned 
their  neutrality  at  the  alarm  of  an  attack,  and  to  the  prompt 
1  L.  d.  C.y  408,  413  ;  Sanudo,  136. 


136  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

despatch  of  reinforcements  by  the   Duke  of  Athens,  was 
saved  from  the  Greeks.1 

The   Emperor's  brother  did   not,  however,  attempt   to 

follow  up  his  victory,  returning  instead  with  his  captives  to 

Constantinople,  and  then  retiring  from  the  public  service  in 

disgust     But  the  Lombards  of  Eubcea  had  now  to  cope  with 

a  more  serious  enemy,  who  had  arisen  in  their  midst,  and 

whom  their  overweening  pride  had  converted  into  a  valuable 

tool  of  Michael   VIII.      Some   time  before    the   battle   of 

Demetrias,  there  was  living  in  Eubcea  a  knight  of  Karystos, 

named   Licario,  whose  ancestors  had  come  from   Vicenza, 

apparently  soon   after  the   Lombard    settlement.2     Licario, 

a  penniless  adventurer  of  great  ambition,  was,  when  we  first 

hear  of  him,  attached  to  the  court  of  Giberto  II.  da  Verona, 

who  succeeded  as  triarch  of  central  Eubcea  after  the  death  of 

Guglielmo  II.  in  the  naval  engagement     In  Giberto's  house 

was  also  residing  Dame  Felisa,  widow  of  the  triarch  Narzotto, 

who  acted  as  guardian  for  her  infant  son.     Felisa  was  still 

charming,  Licario  was  ambitious ;  he  dared  to  avow  his  love, 

was  told  that  it  was  requited,  and  secretly  married  her.     The 

fury  of  her  relatives  at  this  misalliance  knew  no  bounds; 

Licario's  endeavours  to  obtain  the   intervention  of  various 

persons  of  influence  in  the  Franco-Greek  world  on  his  behalf 

failed ;  so  he  returned  to  Karystos  and  established  himself  in 

a   rocky  fastness  of  the   island,  called,  from   its    exposed 

position,  Anemopylae,  or, "  the  gates  of  the  wind."     Taking 

unto  him  other  adventurous  spirits,  in  which  feudal  Eubcea 

was  not  lacking,  he  created  such  a  reign  of  terror  by   his 

frequent  descents  upon  the  surrounding  fields  and  villages, 

that  the  peasants  went  to  live  within  the  walls  of  the  nearest 

town,  and  durst  not  resume  their  agricultural  pursuits  by  day 

without  first  stationing  watchmen  to  tell  them  when  Licario 

was  coming.     But  he  soon  grew  tired  of  plundering  peasants, 

and  still  thirsted  for  revenge  on  the  haughty  barons  who  had 

spurned  him.     He  therefore  entered  into  negotiations  with 

1  Pachyme'res,  i.,  307-9,  322-36 ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregoras,  i.,  109-20 ; 
Sanudo,  120-2  ;  Les  Registres  de  Nicholas  II 7.,  loc.  cit\  M.  Palaiol6gos,  8. 

'  Sanudo,  119 — a  passage  which  effectually  disproves  the  idea  of 
Finlay  (iv.,  141)  that  Licario  was  a  Genoese  of  the  famous  Zaccaria 
family.     The  Byzantine  historians  call  him  Ikarios. 


CAREER  OF  LICARIO  137 

the  emperor ;  and,  finding  his  overtures  welcomed,  proceeded 
to  Constantinople,  where  he  placed  his  services  at  Michael's 
disposal.  He  told  the  emperor  that  he  would  undertake  to 
subdue  the  whole  of  the  island,  if  he  were  given  sufficient 
forces,  and  offered  to  hand  over  his  own  fortress,  so  that  it 
might  serve  as  a  basis  of  attack.  His  plan  was  accepted, 
soldiers  were  put  at  his  disposal,  and  he  carried  on  a  guerrilla 
warfare  against  the  Lombards,  which  inflicted  great  harm 
on  the  island ;  Orebs  was  taken,  and  he  seized  and  fortified 
the  castle  of  La  Cuppa.  The  triarchs  received,  however, 
valuable  assistance  from  their  suzerain,  the  Prince  of  Achaia, 
who  availed  himself  of  a  lull  in  the  war  against  the  Greeks 
in  the  Morea  to  come  over  to  Negroponte  with  as  many  men 
as  he  could  collect,  and  wrested  La  Cuppa  from  its  Greek 
garrison.  A  more  voluble  but  less  useful  ally  was  Dreux 
de  Beaumont,  the  marshal  of  Charles  of  Anjou,  who  accom- 
panied the  prince  with  700  men.  To  judge  from  his  boasts, 
he  was  going  to  drive  the  Greeks  into  the  sea,  but  his 
obstinacy  brought  upon  him  a  signal  rout  under  the  walls  of 
Oreos. 

After  the  defeat  of  the  Lombards'  fleet  off  Demetrias, 
Licario  prosecuted  his  campaign  in  Eubcea  with  still  greater 
success.  Many  of  the  islanders  had  now  flocked  to  his 
standard,  and  he  ventured  to  besiege  the  strong  "  red  castle  " 
of  Karystos,  his  own  birthplace.  Othon  de  Cicon,  the 
Burgundian  baron  of  Castel  Rosso,  held  out  for  long  against 
a  combined  attack  by  land  and  sea,  but  he  was  at  last  com- 
pelled to  surrender,  and  Licario  was  richly  rewarded  by  his 
imperial  master  for  his  capture  of  this  great  prize. 
Michael  VIII.,  like  the  Comneni  before  him,  had  adopted 
the  principles  of  feudalism,  and  he,  accordingly,  invested  his 
faithful  henchman  with  the  whole  island  as  a  fief,  on  condition 
that  he  kept  200  knights  for  the  service  of  his  liege  lord. 
He  also  bestowed  on  him  the  hand  of  a  noble  and  rich 
Greek  lady,  who  took  the  place  of  the  fair  Felisa.  These 
marks  of  favour  spurred  Licario  to  further  efforts ;  the 
important  castles  of  La  Cuppa,  Larmena,  and  La  Clisura 
were  all  taken  and  re-fortified.  Even  beyond  the  shores  of 
Eubcea  his  hand  was  felt.  The  neighbouring  island  of 
Skopelos   was  regarded  as  impregnable  by  its  inhabitants; 


\ 


138  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

even  if  all  the  realm  of  Romania  were  lost — so  they  boasted 
— they  would  escape  in  safety,  and  Filippo  Ghisi,  the  proud 
island  baron,  was  fond  of  applying  to  himself  the  line  of  Ovid, 
"  I  am  too  big  a  man  to  be  harmed  by  fortune."  But  Licario, 
who  knew  that  Skopelos  lacked  water,  invested  it  during  a 
hot  summer,  forced  it  to  capitulate,  and  sent  its  haughty 
lord  in  chains  to  Constantinople.  Far  to  the  south  we  find 
Licario  in  the  Bay  of  Navarino,  "  the  port  of  rushes," *  as  it 
was  called,  and  he  drove  the  Venieri  from  their  island  of 
Cerigo,  the  Viari  from  theirs  of  Cerigotto.  Venice  became 
naturally  alarmed  at  these  successes ;  she  did  not  desire  the 
system  of  triple  government  in  Euboea  to  be  superseded  by 
the  establishment  of  a  strong,  centralised  administration  in  the 
hands  of  an  able  man,  who  might  found  a  dynasty.  So,  when 
she  renewed  her  truce  with  the  emperor  in  1277,  she  expressly 
stipulated  that  she  should  be  allowed  "  to  help  and  defend  the 
island  of  the  Evripos  and  those  in  it  against  your  majesty." 2 
The  emperor  continued  to  make  use  of  his  corresponding 
right  to  levy  war  against  the  island,  and  Licario,  supported 
by  the  Greek  fleet  at  Oreos,  and  by  a  body  of  Catalan 
mercenaries,  who  now  make  their  first  appearance  in  Greek 
history,  resolved  upon  nothing  less  than  an  attack  upon  its 
capital.  Knowing  from  bitter  experience  "  the  supercilious- 
ness of  the  Latins,"  who  were  sure  to  make  the  mistake  of 
despising,  and  rushing  out  to  attack  a  foreign  enemy,  he  laid 
an  ambuscade  for  the  impetuous  garrison,  and  then  appeared 
in  sight  of  the  town.  Duke  John  of  Athens,  the  hero  of 
Neopatras,  was  then  in  Negroponte,  and,  gouty  as  he  was,  he 
mounted  his  horse  and  rode  out  of  the  gate  with  the  triarch 
Giberto  da  Verona  and  their  followers  along  the  road  in  the 
direction  of  Oreos  and  the  north.  The  rival  forces  came  to 
close  quarters  at  Varonda,  the  modern  village  of  Vathondas  ; 
the  Catalan  knife  and  the  generalship  of  Licario  were  too 
much  for  the  impetuous  Franks ;  the  Duke  of  Athens  was 
wounded,  and,  unable  to.  keep  his  gouty  feet  in  the  stirrups, 
fell  to  the  ground  and  was  taken  prisoner  with  Giberto  and 
many  others.    The  town  of  Negroponte  now  seemed  to  lie 

1  Pontes  Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  237. 

2  Ibid.,  xiv.,  133-49 ;  Miklosich  und  Muller,  iii.,  84-96  ;  Dandolo  apud 
Muratori,  xii.,  393. 


LICARKTS  TRIUMPH  139 

at  the  mercy  of  Licario,  but  a  crushing  defeat  of  the  imperial 
forces  on  the   mainland,  and  the  energy  of  the  Venetian 
bailie,  combined  to  save  it    Simultaneously  with  the  despatch 
of  the  Greek  fleet  to  Oreos,  another  army  had  been  sent, 
under  the  two  imperial  generals,  Synaden6s  and  Kavalldrios, 
to  attack  the  redoubtable  bastard  of  Neopatras.    The  bastard 
met  them  on  the  historic  plain  of  Pharsala,  famous  alike  in 
the  struggles  of  Roman  against  Roman  and  of  Greek  against 
Turk.     His  clever  strategy,  and    the    rush  of   his   Italian 
auxiliaries,  decided  the  day ;  one  of  the  Greek  commanders 
was  captured ;  the  other   fled,  only  to  die  of  his  injuries. 
Meanwhile,  at  Negroponte,  Morosini  Rosso,  known  as  "the 
good  bailie  "  for  his  lavish  expenditure  on  the  improvement 
of  the  town,  had  taken  prompt  measures  for  its  defence,  and 
the  news  of  its  danger  had  at  once  been  sent  to  Jacques  de 
la  Roche,  who  governed  Argos  and  Nauplia  for  his  cousin, 
the  Duke  of  Athens.    By  forced  marches,  the  governor  reached 
Negroponte   in   the   incredibly   short   space  of  twenty-four 
hours,  and  the  city  was  saved.     Licario  contented  himself 
with  occupying  the  fine  castle  of  Filla,  and  then  set  out  with 
his  prisoners  in  chains  to  Constantinople.     His  revenge  was 
complete;    his    haughty   brother-in-law,   Giberto,   in   whose 
train  he  had  once  been  a  humble  knight,  was  now  his  prisoner, 
while  he  stood  high  in  the  confidence  of  his  sovereign,  and 
received  the  dignity  of  Great  Constable  of  the  Empire  as  a 
further  mark  of  imperial  favour.     A  Byzantine  historian  has 
depicted   the   final  scene  of  Licario's  triumph  in  dramatic 
language,  worthy  of  the  best  days  of  Hellenic  literature.     He 
shows  us  Giberto  waiting  as  a  prisoner  at  the  door  of  the 
audience-chamber,  while  the  emperor  is  seated  on  his  throne, 
surrounded   by  his   councillors.     Then   Licario  enters,  but 
yesterday  Giberto's  servant,  now  arrayed  in  all  the  splendour 
of  his  official  robes,  and  showing   by  his  haughty  manner 
how  great  a  man  he  had  become.     The  prisoner's  pulse  beats 
faster  and  faster,  the  fellow  is  actually  whispering  into  the 
imperial   ear !     This   was   more  than  Lombard  pride  could 
bear;  Giberto  burst  a  blood-vessel,  and  fell  dead  upon  the 
floor. 

Michael  VIII.  might  well  be  proud  of  his  triumphs.     He 
had  not  only  recovered  the  capital  of  the  empire,  but  had 


i 


140  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

had  the  rulers  of  the  two  strongest  Frankish  states  in  Greece 
in  his  power.  He  did  not,  however,  avail  himself  of  Duke 
John's  captivity  to  extort  territory  from  the  Franks  of 
Athens  as  he  had  done  in  the  similar  case  of  Villehardouin. 
It  might  have  been  expected  that  he  would  have  rounded 
off  the  Byzantine  province  in  the  Morea  by  insisting  on  the 
cession  of  the  Athenian  fief  of  Argos  and  Nauplia  as  the 
price  of  the  duke's  freedom.  On  the  contrary,  he  did  not 
ask  for  a  single  stone  of  the  Athenian  fortresses.  He  even 
thought  of  giving  his  prisoner  his  daughter  in  marriage  and 
so  converting  him  into  an  ally.  John's  state  of  health, 
however,  was  such  that  a  marriage  was  inadvisable,  and  the 
emperor  accordingly  released  him  on  payment  of  30,000  gold 
solidi  (^i344o).1  We  may  be  sure  that  it  was  policy  and 
not  generosity  which  prompted  this  act  of  forbearance. 
Michael  VIII.  knew  that  at  that  moment  Charles  of  Anjou, 
a  man  whose  ambitious  designs  he  dreaded,  was  at  last 
preparing  his  long-expected  expedition  against  the  Greek 
Empire.  Nearer  home  he  had  a  restless  and  victorious  rival 
in  the  person  of  the  Duke  of  Neopatras,  who  was  bound  by 
ties  of  marriage  to  the  ducal  house  of  Athens,  by  ties  of 
friendship  and  commerce  to  the  royal  house  of  Naples.2 
Finally,  in  the  midst  of  his  own  capital,  there  was  a  body  of 
discontented  ecclesiastics,  who  regarded  as  a  schismatic  the 
man  who  had  sent  envoys  to  the  pope  and  had  endeavoured 
to  prevent  the  dismemberment  of  his  empire  by  uniting 
the  churches.  Michael  was  a  cautious  statesman,  and  he 
saw  that  the  policy  adopted  in  1262  would  not  answer 
in  1279.  Duke  John  of  Athens  did  not  long  survive  his 
release  from  captivity;  in  1280  he  died,  and  his  brother 
William,  baron  of  Livadia,  reigned  in  his  stead.8 

Licario  returned  to  his  native  island  after  his  signal 
triumph  over  his  own  and  the  emperor's  enemies  at  Con- 
stantinople, and  took  up  his  abode  in  the  great  castle  of 
Filla,    whose    imposing    ruins    still    look    down    upon    the 

J  Nikephtfros  Gregorys,  i.,  95-7  ;  PachymeVes,  i.,  205,  410-13  ;  Sanudo, 
119-20,  122-7,  136;  Magno,  1 81-2. 

2  Del  Giudice,  La  Famiglia  di  Re  Manfredi,  393-7  ;  Arch,  Stor.  Ital., 
Ser.  III.,  xxii.,  16,  19  ;  xxiii.,  237. 

3  Arch,  Star,  Ital,,  Ser.  IV.,  in.,  162. 


LICARICTS  FURTHER  SUCCESSES  141 

Lelantian  plain.  Outside  the  walls  of  Chalkis  he  was  now 
master  of  the  island,  and  he  maintained  such  a  reign  of 
terror  that  no  one  could  go  in  safety  to  attend  to  the  vine- 
yards in  the  plain,  nor  could  the  priests  "  bless  the  waters " 
of  the  classic  fountain  of  Arethusa  at  Epiphany.1  Beyond 
Euboea,  he  continued  to  make  the  Franks  rue  the  day  when 
he  had  gone  over  to  the  enemy.  Ere  long,  he  succeeded 
Philanthropen6s  as  Byzantine  admiral,  with  the  usual  style 
of  "  Grand  Duke,"  attached  to  that  high  official,  and  in  that 
capacity  ravaged  the  islands  of  Seriphos  and  Siphnos,  which 
he  captured  from  their  Latin  lords,  took  many  castles  on  the 
mainland,  and  made  an  annual  raid  with  the  fleet  upon  the 
dominions  of  Duke  William  of  Athens.  Then  his  name 
disappears  from  history ;  we  know  not  how  he  ended,  nor 
what  became  of  the  children  whom  his  rich  Greek  wife  had 
borne  him.  His  strange  and  romantic  career  strikes  the 
imagination,  and  even  in  that  age  of  adventurers  he  stands 
out  above  his  fellows.  No  renegade  Latin  had  inflicted  so 
much  injury  on  his  fellow-countrymen.  He  had  wrested 
almost  all  Eubcea  from  the  Lombards ;  he  and  his  Byzantine 
allies  had  captured  almost  all  the  iEgean  islands  from  their 
Italian  lords,  and  some  of  them  remained  henceforth  part  of 
the  imperial  dominions.  Even  as  far  east  as  Paphlagonia, 
he  had  won  laurels  by  defeating  the  Turks.2  Another  Latin 
succeeded  him  in  the  post  of  Lord  High  Admiral,  the  pirate 
captain  John  de  lo  Cavo  of  Anaphe,  who  continued,  though 
in  less  dramatic  fashion,  the  destruction  wrought  by  the 
low-born  knight  of  Karystos. 

Meanwhile,  the  long  reign  of  William  de  Villehardouin  in 
the  Morea  had  drawn  to  a  close.  After  1272  the  war 
between  Franks  and  Greeks  in  the  peninsula  languished, 
owing  to  the  negotiations  between  Michael  VIII.  and  the 
papacy,  and  William  and  Dreux  de  Beaumont  were  able,  as 
we  saw,  to  go  over  to  help  the  Lombards  of  Negroponte 
against   Licario.      Three  years   later,  however,  the   Greeks 

1  I  take  this  to  be  the  meaning  of  Sanudo's  phrase,  batizar  la  Croce  al 
Fonte — a  ceremony  I  have  myself  seen  in  Greece.  The  Fonte  is,  of 
course,  the  famous  Arethusa,  which  one  passes  in  going  from  Chalkis  to 
Filla  and  the  Lelantian  plain. 

2  Pachym^res,  i.,  413  ;  Sanudo,  127,  144 ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  98. 


i 


I 


142  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

renewed  hostilities,  and  the  prince  ordered  his  nephew, 
Geoffroy  de  Bruy&res,  to  take  the  Angevin  auxiliaries,  whom 
Charles  had  placed  at  his  disposal  as  his  captain-general,  and 
garrison  the  southern  frontier  of  Skortd.  Geoffroy  accordingly 
proceeded  with  his  men  to  a  place  to  which  the  Slavs  of 
Skortd  had  given,  from  its  numerous  walnut-trees,  the  name 
of  Great  Ardchova,  and  which,  still  known  under  that 
Slavonic  designation,  may  be  found  to  the  left  of  the  road 
between  Tripolitza  and  Sparta.1  There  the  French  soldiers 
contracted  a  fatal  gastric  fever  from  rash  indulgence  in  the 
cold  water,  with  which  the  place  abounded,  and,  though 
their  leader  pluckily  led  the  remnant  of  them  against  the 
Greeks,  he  succumbed  himself  to  the  disease,  thus  ingloriously 
closing  his  varied  career.  In  the  Greek  Chronicle  of  the 
Morea  he  has  found  his  funeral  epitaph :  "  All,  great  and 
small,  mourned  his  loss,  even  the  very  birds,  which  have  no 
speech ;  for  he  was  the  father  of  the  orphan,  the  husband  of 
the  widow,  the  lord  and  defender  of  the  poor."  But  his 
Greek  foes  could  not  refrain  from  rejoicing  at  the  death  of 
"  the  best  knight  of  all  Romania." 2 

The  rest  of  Prince  William's  reign  was  mainly  occupied 
by  feudal  disputes,  which  do  not  always  reflect  very  highly  on 
the  character  of  that  warrior,  who  is  a  finer  figure  leading  his 
knights  to  battle  than  when  relying  on  technicalities  in  the 
High  Court  The  double  desertion  by  Geoffroy  of  his  liege 
lord  had  been  punished,  as  we  saw,  by  the  restriction  of  his 
barony  of  Skortd  to  himself  and  the  heirs  of  his  body,  so 
that,  as  he  left  no  children,  it  escheated,  on  his  death,  to  the 
prince,  who  allowed  Geoffroy's  widow,  Isabelle  de  la  Roche, 
to  retain  one-half  of  it  as  her  portion,  according  to  the  usual 
custom  of  the  country.  Against  this  a  certain  knight,  named 
Pestel,  protested  as  next-of-kin,  and  appealed  from  the  prince 
to  Charles  of  Anjou,  as  suzerain  of  Achaia.  Charles  ordered 
his  vassal  to  invest  Pestel  with  the  barony ;    but  William 

1  The  "  cold  fountain  "  near  this  spot,  and  two  other  passages  of  the 
Chronicle  (L.  d.  C,  379,  385)  favour  this  identification,  though  this 
Arachova  is  rather  far  to  the  south  to  be  included  in  Skortd.  Buchon 
hence  put  it  near  Demetsana.  {La  Grice  Contiruntalc,  492).  The  name 
is  very  common. 

2  X.  r.  M.,  1L  7177-232  ;  L.  d.  C,  236 ;  L  d.  F.9  92. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  BRIENNE  143 

disregarded  his  orders,  and  there  for  the  present  the  matter 
rested.  Isabelle,  on  her  part,  did  not  long  remain  a  widow. 
Two  years  after  her  late  husband's  death,  she  married  Hugh, 
Count  of  Brienne  and  Lecce,  an  old  friend  of  her  father, 
Duke  Guy  I.  of  Athens,  and  member  of  a  family  destined  to 
be  even  more  celebrated  in  the  history  of  Greece,  than  it  had 
been  in  that  of  France,  Italy,  and  the  Holy  Land.  The 
family  came,  like  that  of  Champlitte,  from  Champagne,  where 
it  first  appears  in  the  reign  of  Hugh  Capet  In  the  early 
part  of  the  thirteenth  century  two  brothers  of  this  adven- 
turous house  had  won  fame,  the  one  in  Italy,  the  other  in  the 
East.  Walter,  the  elder,  was  invested  by  Innocent  III.  with 
the  dignity  of  Count  of  Lecce,  near  Brindisi,  while  John,  the 
younger,  became  King  of  Jerusalem  and  Emperor  of  Con- 
stantinople. Walter's  son,  fourth  of  the  name,  was  created 
Count  of  Jaffa  by  the  King  of  Cyprus,  and  died,  after 
excruciating  tortures,  in  the  prisons  of  the  paynim.  His  son, 
Hugh,  who  now  became  connected  with  the  affairs  of  Athens 
and  Achaia,  was  already  well  known  to  the  prince  and  the 
barons  of  the  Morea.  An  hereditary  enemy  of  the  Hohen- 
staufen  in  Southern  Italy,  he  had  fought  against  Manfred  at 
Benevento,  and  had  stood  by  the  side  of  Prince  William  and 
Charles  of  Anjou  at  Tagliacozzo.  The  reward  of  his  services 
was  the  restoration  to  him  of  his  forfeited  possessions  at 
Lecce.  In  1277  his  marriage  with  Isabelle  was  celebrated  at 
Andravida,  in  the  presence  of  the  bride's  brother,  Duke  John 
of  Athens.  Hugh  received  his  wife's  half  of  the  great  barony 
of  Skortd,  and,  after  arranging  its  affairs  and  appointing 
bailies  to  look  after  his  interests,  he  sailed  with  her  to 
Apulia.  Not  long  afterwards,  Isabelle  died,  leaving  a  son, 
who  was  destined  to  be  the  last  French  Duke  of  Athens.1 

Another  feudal  case  caused  the  prince  considerably  more 
trouble  than  that  of  the  barony  of  Skortd.  It  will  be 
remembered  that,  when  he  had  been  released  from  imprison- 
ment at  Constantinople  in  1262,  one  of  the  hostages  sent 
there  on  his  behalf  was  the  Lady  Marguerite,  daughter  of 
Jean  II.  de  Neuilly,  baron  of  Passav&,  and  hereditary 
Marshal  of  Achaia.    While  Marguerite  was  still  a  hostage  at 

1  X.  t.  M.f  11.  7240-60,  237-9  ;  Z.  d.  C,  237-9 ;  Z.  d.  F.y  92  ;  Sanudo, 
117  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches^  I.,  i.,  231-3. 


144  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

Constantinople,  her  uncle  Gautier  II.  de  Rozieres,  baron  of 
Akova  or  31  atagrifon,  as  the  Franks  called  it,  died  without 
heirs  of  his  body.     As  the  Salic  law  did   not   prevail   in 
Prankish  Greece.  Marguerite  was  entitled  to  the  barony  as 
the  next-of-kin ;  but  her  compulsory  absence  from  the  Morea 
prevented  her  from  making  her  claim  within  the  term  of  two 
years  and  two  days,  provided  by  feudal  law  for  claimants 
abroad    The  prince  thereupon  declared  the  barony  forfeited 
to  the  crown,  and,  when  Marguerite  was  at  last  released  and 
claimed  her  inheritance,  he  ungenerously  raised  the  technical 
plea  that  the  time  for  making  such  a  claim  had  expired — a 
piece  of  chicanery  similar  to  that  by  which  his  father  had 
won  the  principality.     In  vain  the  lady  pleaded  that  she  had 
been  absent  on  his  service,  William  ungallantly  stuck  to  the 
letter  of  the  law.     Unprotected  and  helpless,  for  both  her 
husbands  had  been   killed   in  battle— Guibert  de   Cors   at 
Karydit  and  Guglielmo  II.  da  Verona  in  the  sea-fight  off 
Demetrias — she  was  advised  by  her  friends  to  marry  some 
influential  man*  who  would  espouse  her  cause.    The  idea  met 
with  her  approval,  and  her  choice  lighted  upon  Jean  de  St 
Omer,  brother  of  Nicholas  II.,  who  was  hereditary  lord  of 
half  Thebes*  where  he  built  the  magnificent  castle,  of  which 
the  Santameri  tower  is  the  sole  surviving  fragment.      By 
this  marriage  Jean  became  hereditary  Marshal  of  Achaia, 
ami  his  family  thus  extended  its  authority  south  of  the 
Gulf  of  Corinth.    Jean  de  St  Omer  did  not  allow  his  wife's 
claim  to  be  neglected,  and  demanded  to  be  heard  before  the 
court  of  the  principality.    The  prince  convened  the  court  in 
the  church  of  the  Divine  Wisdom  at  Andravida,  and  Jean,  his 
wifc\  ami  his  two  brothers,  Nicholas  and  Othon,  appeared 
before  it    Then  the  lord  of  Thebes  arose,  proud  of  his 
Knea^— 4tor  his  grandmother  had  been  widow  of  Boniface 
ol  Salonika,  and  daughter  of  the  King  of  Hungary,  while  the 
t>uk*  of  Athens  was  his  first  cousin — and  stated  his  sister-in- 
law  V  ease,    The  prince,  nettled  at  his  arrogant  demeanour, 
a*ktd  him  whether  he  demanded  the  barony  of  Akova  for 
h*r  a*  a  right  or  begged  it  as  a  favour,  and  when  the  Theban 
tarott  replied  that  he  asked  no  favour,  but  only  what  was 
jwtty  dwc%  William  summoned  all  the  barons,  prelates,  and 
Y*jwaW  of  the  principality  to  consider  the  question  thoroughly. 


DEATH  OF  PRINCE  WILLIAM  145 

This  second  parliament  was  held  in  the  Minorite  church  of 
St  Francis  at  Glarentza,  and  the  prince,  handing  his  sceptre 
to  the  chancellor,  Leonardo  of  Veroli,  descended  himself  into 
the  arena  to  plead  the  cause  of  the  crown  in  person.  In 
lawyer-like  fashion  he  called  for  the  Book  of  Customs,  and 
cited  the  chapter  relating  to  the  obligation  of  a  vassal  to 
become  a  hostage  for  his  lord.  The  Court  seemed  at  first 
decidedly  in  favour  of  the  claimant,  but  when  the  prince 
again  called  its  attention  to  the  letter  of  the  law,  it  gave  its 
judgment  against  her.  William  thanked  the  Court  for  its 
decision,  but  Jean  de  St  Omer  was  so  much  offended  that  he 
refused  even  to  go  through  that  usual  form. 

Having  thus  obtained  a  confirmation  of  his  legal  position, 
William  could  afford  to  be  generous.  He  called  for  the 
chancellor,  told  him  that  he  had  been  irritated  by  the 
arrogance  of  the  barons  of  St  Omer,  but  that,  now  that  he 
had  gained  the  case,  he  wished  to  give  one-third  of  the 
barony  as  a  favour  to  the  Lady  Marguerite.  Accordingly 
Colinet,  the  Lord  Chamberlain  of  the  principality,  and  the 
elders  of  the  barony,  who  knew  its  boundaries  and  history, 
were  ordered  to  come  with  the  minutes  of  the  baronial 
court,  and  eight  of  the  twenty-four  fiefs  of  Akova  were 
selected  for  her.  A  deed  was  at  once  drawn  up  and  sealed 
by  the  chancellor ;  it  was  placed  under  the  coverlet  of  the 
prince's  bed,  and  Marguerite  was  summoned  to  the  presence 
of  her  lord.  Then  the  chancellor  drew  back  the  coverlet, 
and  disclosed  the  document  The  prince  handed  it  to  her, 
and  invested  her  with  his  glove,  while  the  remaining  two- 
thirds  of  the  barony  were  bestowed  upon  her  namesake, 
the  prince's  younger  daughter,  Marguerite.1 

Not  long  after  this  William  died.  When  he  felt  his  end 
approaching,  he  retired  to  his  beloved  castle  of  Kalamata, 
the  family  fief  of  the  Villehardouins,  where  he  had  been  born. 
To  his  bedside  he  summoned  the  nobles  of  the  principality, 
and  asked  their  counsel  in  making  his  will.  His  wife,  his 
two  daughters,  and  his   subjects,  great  and  small,  he  com- 

1  X.  r.  M.,  11.  7301-752  ;  L.  d.  C,  240-54  ;  JL  d.  F.t  85-7  ;  Liber 
Consuetudinum,  apud  Canciani,  op.  ciL%  III.,  505;  Les  Regisires  de 
Nicholas  III.,  26.  Both  he  and  Clement  IV.  {Regisires,  i.,  10 1)  call  her 
Catharina. 

K 


i 


) 


146  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

mended  to  the  care  of  King  Charles  I.  of  Naples,  and 
appointed  Jean  de  Chauderon,  the  Great  Constable,  Arch- 
bishop Benedict  of  Patras,  and  the  Bishop  of  Modon,  as  his 
executors.  The  first  of  them  was  to  administer  the  affairs  of 
the  principality,  until  Charles  had  had  time  to  appoint  a 
bailie.  He  begged  that  all  his  gifts,  whether  to  Latin  and 
Greek  monasteries,  or  to  private  individuals,  should  be 
respected,  and  directed  that  his  body  should  be  buried  in  the 
memorial  church  of  St  James  at  Andravida,  which  he  had 
built  and  presented  to  the  Templars,  beside  those  of  his 
father  and  brother.  Then  on  1st  May  1278  he  died.  The 
last  of  the  Villehardouin  princes  was  laid  to  rest  as  he  had 
ordered,  and  four  chaplains  were  appointed,  in  accordance 
with  his  wishes,  to  pray  for  the  souls  of  the  three  departed  in 
the  church  of  St  James.  The  outline  of  the  church  can  still 
be  traced,  but  no  archaeologist  has  disturbed  the  long  repose 
of  the  French  rulers  of  the  Morea.     Requiescant  in  pace  ! x 

It  was  a  great  misfortune  for  the  principality  that 
William  left  no  son  to  inherit  it  With  him  the  male  stock 
of  the  Villehardouins  came  to  an  end,  for  the  "  Prince  of  the 
Morea,"  mentioned  by  the  Byzantine  historian  Pachym^res 2 
as  having  become  patriarch  of  Antioch,  and  being  at  one  time 
a  likely  candidate  for  the  oecumenical  throne,  cannot  be 
proved  to  have  been  a  brother  of  Prince  William.  Nor  was 
the  latter's  son-in-law,  Philip  of  Anjou,  alive  at  the  time  of 
his  death.  The  young  prince  had  overstrained  himself  in 
bending  a  crossbow,  and  never  got  over  the  effects  of  the 
injury.  A  year  before  his  father-in-law  he  died,  and  in  the 
beautiful  cathedral  at  Trani,  where,  six  years  earlier,  his 
marriage  had  been  celebrated,  he  found  a  grave.8  Thus  the 
Villehardouin  family  was  now  reduced  to  William's  two 
daughters,    of   whom    Isabelle,  according    to    the    Catalan 

1  X.  r.  M„  11.  7757-8io;  L.  d.  C,  254-6;  L.  d  F.,  92  ;  Buchon,  La 
Grke  ConHnentale^  509-10;  Arch.  Stor.  Ital.,  Sen  IV.,  i.,  436,  which 
fixes  the  true  date  to  1278. 

8  i.,  pp.  402,  437.  The  story  may  have  arisen  from  the  fact  that  there 
was  a  Giufridusy  clericus,  consanguimus  principis  Achate,  who  had  a 
cure  of  souls  at  Olena,  and  whom  Gregory  IX.  ordered  to  be  presented 
to  a  better  living.    (Registres,  ii.,  851.) 

*  Sanudo,  119  ;  Arch.  Stor.  Ital.^  Ser.  III.,  xxvL,  11,  211. 


CHANGE  IN  FEUDAL  ACHAIA  147 

chronicler  Muntaner,1  was  only  fourteen  years  old,  though 
already  a  widow,  and  Marguerite  was  two  years  younger. 
Their  Greek  mother,  Anna  of  Epiros,  or  Agnes  as  the  Franks 
called  her,  who  received  the  castles  of  Kalamata  and 
Chloumotitsi  for  her  life,  soon  afterwards  married  Nicholas  II. 
of  St  Omer,  the  proud  baron  who  had  treated  her  first 
husband  with  such  arrogance.  Henceforth,  in  the  hands  of 
women,  the  principality  naturally  declined.  There  was  no 
strong  man  to  keep  the  unruly  barons  in  check ;  the  bailies 
whom  the  kings  of  Naples  appointed  were  sometimes 
foreigners,  ignorant  of  the  country  and  its  conditions,  and 
after  the  time  of  Villehardouin  only  four  princes  of  Achaia 
ever  resided  in  the  land,  whence  they  took  their  title.  More- 
over, by  this  time  a  change  had  come  over  the  feudal  society 
of  the  Morea.  Of  the  twelve  original  baronies,  two  alone — 
Vostitza  and  Chalandritza — remained  in  the  families  of  the 
old  barons.  Two — Kalavryta  and  probably  Geraki — had 
been  lost  to  the  Greeks  since  the  fatal  re-establishment  of  the 
imperial  power  in  the  peninsula ;  Patras  had  early  passed 
from  the  Aleman  family  to  the  archbishop ;  and,  though  it 
seems  to  have  returned  to  its  secular  lords,  William  Aleman 
had  more  recently  pledged  it  to  the  primate  for  16,000 
kyperperi  (£7168),  and  had  left  the  country;2  the  baron  of 
Gritzena  has  never  been  mentioned  again,  and  had,  therefore, 
probably  died  without  heirs;  the  families  of  Karytaina, 
Akova,  Veligosti,  Passav&,  and  Nikli  were  all  extinct  in  the 
male  line,  and  those  great  baronies  passed  by  marriage  either 
altogether  or  in  part  to  the  houses  of  Brienne,  St  Omer,  De 
la  Roche,  and  De  Villiers.  Of  the  two  Villehardouin  family 
fiefs,  Arkadia  had  been  bestowed  by  the  late  prince  upon 
Vilain  d'Aunoy,  Marshal  of  Romania,  one  of  the  French 
nobles  who  had  emigrated  from  Constantinople  to  the  Morea 
after  the  fall  of  the  Latin  Empire;8  while  Kalamata  was 
temporarily  in  the  hands  of  the  Princess  Agnes,  not  only  a 
woman  but  a  Greek,  and  was  soon  exchanged,  together  with 
Clermont,  the  rest  of  her  widow's  portion,  for  other  lands  in 
less  important  strategic  position*4  Nothing  is  more  remark- 
able in  the  history  of  Frankish  Greece  than  the  rapidity  with 

1  Ch.  cclxii.  *  L.  d.  F.,  88.  3  X.  r.  M.,  11.  1325.7. 

4  Arch.  Star.  Ital.,  Ser.  IV.,  iv.,  176-7. 


I 


148  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

which  the  race  of  the  conquerors  died  out.  Only  two 
generations  had  passed  since  they  first  set  foot  in  the 
Peloponnese,  yet  already  many  of  their  families  were 
extinct  The  almost  ceaseless  wars  of  Prince  William,  and 
the  racial  suicide  which  the  Franks  committed  by  keeping 
themselves  as  far  as  possible  a  caste  apart  from  the  Greeks, 
had  had  the  natural  results,  and  where  they  intermarried 
with  the  natives,  the  children  were  almost  always  more  Greek 
than  French,  serving  on  the  emperor's  ships  and  fighting  the 
emperor's  battles.  One  of  the  few  exceptions  to  this 
tendency  was  where,  for  reasons  of  state,  a  French  prince 
married  a  Greek  princess,  as  in  the  case  of  William  of 
Achaia  and  his  namesake  of  Athens.  But  in  mediaeval 
Greece,  as  in  modern  Europe,  mixed  marriages  between 
sovereigns  bear  no  resemblance  to  those  between  private 
individuals ;  in  almost  every  instance,  the  offspring  of  a  royal 
union  sympathises  with  the  nationality  with  which  his 
interests  are  identified ;  whereas,  the  GasmoAlos,  despised  by 
the  haughty  Franks,  found  a  welcome  and  a  career  in  the 
service  of  the  Greek  Empire. 

No  contemporary  authority  informs  us  what  became  of 
the  Franks  who  had  lands  in  that  part  of  the  Morea  which 
was  reconquered  by  the  Greeks  after  1262.  We  know, 
indeed,  that  one  prominent  man,  Jean  de  Nivelet,  baron  of 
Geraki,  settled  down  at  a  place  near  Vostitza,  to  which  he 
gave  his  family  name.1  No  doubt  some  others  followed  his 
example,  and  it  is  probable  that  several  of  the  smaller 
persons  found  a  new  home  within  the  Venetian  colonies  of 
Modon  and  Coron.  But  those  twin  trading  settlements  were 
circumscribed,  the  conditions  of  life  there  would  scarcely 
appeal  to  the  fighting  chivalry  of  France,  and,  as  the  Frank 
principality  grew  less,  it  must  have  become  harder  for  them 
to  find  even  small  estates,  where  they  could  live  the  life  to 
which  they  had  been  accustomed  down  in  the  south.  To 
return  to  France  was  difficult;  for  two  whole  generations 
spent  in  the  East  must  have  unfitted  them  for  the  West,  just 
as  to-day,  the  Levantine  who  is  happy  at  Smyrna  is  miser- 
able in  London  or  Berlin.  The  only  course  open  to  many  of 
them  was  to  remain  in  the  Byzantine  province,  where  fusion 
1  L.  <L  F.,  137  ;  Schmitt,  The  Chronicle  of  Morea^  liv. 


ABSORPTION  OF  THE  FRANKS  149 

with  the  Greek  race  awaited  them,  and,  as  its  natural 
corollary,  the  adoption  of  the  orthodox  religion  by  themselves 
or  their  children — a  phenomenon  which  meets  us  in  the  case 
of  the  Franks  of  Arkadia  sixty  years  later.  Where  the 
Italian  element  in  Greece  has  been  strong  and  compact,  and 
where  Latin  rule  has  endured,  as  in  the  Ionian  and  iEgean 
islands,  for  many  centuries,  it  has  been  possible  for  the 
descendants  of  the  Venetians  to  keep  their  own  religion,  and 
even  their  own  speech  But  that  has  not  been  the  case  in 
the  Peloponnese,  in  continental  Greece,  or  in  Eubcea.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  Moreot  Franks  were  never  fanatical 
Catholics;  Prince  William  endowed  Greek  monasteries;  his 
brother  appropriated  Catholic  revenues;  the  rank-and-file 
may  therefore  have  thought  that  the  omission  of  the  filioque 
clause  from  the  creed  was  a  small  price  to  pay  for  their 
undisturbed  residence  among  the  Greeks  of  the  Byzantine 
province,  where,  as  time  went  on,  they  became  merged  in 
that  extraordinary  nationality  which  has  assimilated  one 
race  after  another  upon  the  soil  of  Hellas. 

All  over  Frankish  Greece  an  era  seemed  to  have  closed 
with  the  death  of  the  foremost  Frank  ruler  of  his  time. 
Across  the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  Thomas  II.  of  Salona,  who  had 
married  one  of  William's  nieces,  and  had  stood  by  his  side 
on  the  stricken  field  of  Pelagonia,  had  lately  died,  and  his 
son  William  held  the  noble  castle  in  his  stead.1  His  fellow- 
warden  of  the  marches,  Ubertino,  Marquis  of  Boudonitza, 
another  of  the  combatants  of  Pelagonia,  had  been  succeeded 
by  his  sister  Isabella.2  In  Thessaly,  on  the  ruins  of  the 
baronies  which  Boniface  had  distributed  among  his  German 
and  Lombard  followers,3  and  of  which  that  of  Larissa  was 
now  the  sole,  and  perhaps  merely  nominal,  survivor,  there 
had  arisen,  under  the  vigorous  Despots  of  Epiros,  a  Greek 

1  We  know  of  the  existence  of  this  man  from  the  notice  in  the  Angevin 
archives  of  the  marriage  of  his  daughter  Agnes  to  Dreux  de  Beaumont, 
Charles  of  Anjou's  marshal,  in  1275.  (Hopf  aftud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv., 
292).  The  bride's  father  is  there  described  as  "Guglelmo  domino  de 
Salona*"    Sdthas,  T6  Xpovucbv  tov  TaXa^eidlov,  237). 

8  Riccio,  Nuovi  Studii,  11. 

3  A  baroness,  Beatrice  de  Larissa,  is  mentioned  as  late  as  1280  {ibid., 
5)  ;  but  she  had  probably  lost  her  estates,  while  retaining  her  ancestors' 
title,  and  doing  homage  for  her  phantom  barony  to  Princess  Jsabelle. 


150  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

feudal  system,  which  closely  imitated  that  of  the  Franks. 
At  this  time  the  most  important  of  these  Greek  feudal  lords 
was  the  great  family  of  Melissen6s,  which  we  found  connected 
by  marriage  with  the  Epirote  dynasty  at  the  time  of  the 
Frankish  Conquest  The  Melissenof  received  from  Michael  II. 
monastic  lands  in  the  district  of  Halmyros,  recovered  from 
"  the  Greek-eating  Latins."  They  were  a  family  of  conspicu- 
ous piety ;  they  founded  the  monastery  of  Our  Lady  at  the 
picturesque  village  of  Makrinitza,  which  peeps  out  of  one  of 
the  folds  of  Pelion,  "  the  mountain  of  the  defile," x  as  it  is 
called  in  the  Greek  of  the  period,  and  endowed  that  of  St 
John  Baptist  at  Nea  Petra,  near  Demetrias — institutions  which 
both  received  charters  from  the  Emperor  Michael  VIII. ; 
while  two  of  the  Melissenof  renounced  the  pomps  of  the 
world,  left  behind  them  their  splendid  coat-of-arms,  the 
double-eagle,2  the  bees,  and  the  bells,  and  retired  into 
monastic  cells.  Another  local  magnate,  Michael  Gabriel- 
6poulos,  styled  himself  in  1295  "lord  of  Thessaly,"  and  made 
Phanari,  near  Trikkala,  his  headquarters,  promising  the 
citizens  that  he  would  never  introduce  Albanian  colonists 
or  a  Frankish  garrison  there.  Thus,  Thessaly  was  already 
being  prepared,  under  Greek  auspices,  for  the  introduction 
of  the  titnariot,  ox  Turkish  feudal  system,  a  little  more  than 
a  century  later — a  system  of  which  we  may  still  see  the 
traces  in  the  large  estates  which  characterise  that  latest 
addition  to  the  modern  Greek  kingdom.  There,  under 
mediaeval  Greek  rule,  the  system  of  cultivation  by  serfs 
prevailed,  as  in  Corfu  and  the  Morea,  and  a  golden  bull  of 
the  Emperor  Michael  enumerates  the  villains  of  the  monastery 
of  Makrinitza  in  the  same  category  as  its  mills,  both  equally 
its  property.  Thessaly,  like  Thebes,  was  at  this  time  celebrated 
for  its  silk,  and  many  thousand  pounds  of  that  commodity  were 
exported  thence  to  Apulia  by  the  Duke  of  Neopatras. 

Of  the  internal  condition  of  the  Athenian  Duchy  at  this 
period  we  can  glean  but  little.  From  the  fact,  however,  that 
Duke  John  was  able  to  lend  money  for  the  pay  of  the 
Angevin  troops  in  the  Morea,  we  may  assume  that  his 
finances  were  satisfactory,  and  a  Venetian  document  of  1 278 

1  T6  6pot  roG  Apdyyov.     Miklosich  und  Mtiller,  iv.,  331-6,  345-9  ;  v.,  260. 

2  Buchon,  Atlasy  pl?te  xli.,  20. 


"tie- 


^JVrCEIi 


TBER4KLI.4 


^CXHIOOTTO 


I 

J 


CONDITION  OF  ATHENS  151 

mentions  subjects  of  the  republic  who  were  settled  as 
merchants  at  Satines,  as  Athens  now  began  to  be  called  in 
the  vernacular  from  an  amalgamation  of  the  preposition  with 
the  accusative  (e*9  to?  'AOjvai).1  From  a  notice  two  years 
earlier  we  learn  that  at  that  time  the  beautiful  abbey  of 
Daphni  was  the  sole  surviving  possession  of  the  Cistercians 
on  Greek  soil.  The  ecclesiastical  establishment  of  Athens 
had,  indeed,  become  a  comfortable  home  for  those  members 
of  the  ducal  family  who  had  entered  the  Church.  We  hear 
of  two  De  la  Roche  who  were  canons  of  Athens  at  this 
period ;  one  of  them,  Nicholas,  has  left  his  name  as  "  founder  " 
of  some  mediaeval  building  on  one  of  the  pillars  of  the  Stoa 
of  Hadrian;  the  other,  William,  was  made  "procurator  of 
the  Athenian  Church";  but,  despite  the  prayers  of  the 
chapter,  Clement  IV.  declined  to  appoint  as  Archbishop  of 
Athens  one  who  had  "  a  grave  defect  in  the  matter  of  litera- 
ture."2 Obviously  the  influential  canon  was  not  a  reading 
man. 

Great  changes  had  occurred  in  the  Ionian  islands  during 
the  period  covered  by  this  chapter.  While  Leukas  still 
remained  united  to  the  Despotat  of  Epiros,  whose  ruler  was 
now  the  feeble  Nikeph6ros  I.,  Corfu  had  become  a  possession 
of  the  house  of  Anjou,  and  Cerigo  had  passed  into  the  hands 
of  the  great  Monemvasiote  family  of  Daimonoyannes,  with 
whom  it  remained  for  forty  years.  Over  the  three  central 
islands  of  Cephalonia,  Zante,  and  Ithaka,  there  now  ruled  "  the 
most  high  and  mighty  palatine  count,  Richard  Orsini,"  like 
his  father  Matthew,  a  vassal  of  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  and 
consequently  bound  by  the  same  feudal  tie  to  King  Charles 
of  Naples.  In  the  next  chapter  we  shall  have  occasion  to 
mention  this  remarkable  man,  who  was  destined  to  play  a 
conspicuous  part  in  the  history  of  both  Corfu  and  Achaia. 
During  the  present  period  we  find  him  confirming,  in  1264, 
the  possessions  of  the  Catholic  bishopric  of  Cephalonia,  which, 
as  we  saw,  was  united  with  that  of  Zante,  in  a  voluminous 
document  of  much  value  for  the  contemporary  geography  of 

1  Archivio  Storico  Italiano,  Ser.  III.,  vol.  xxii.,  16,  19;  IV.,  i.,  9; 
Font  Rer.  Austr.y  xiv.,  178,  186. 

-  Les  Regis tres  (VUrbain  IV.,  iii.,  426  ;  AeXWw,  ii.,  28  ;  Les  Registres  de 
CUment  /K,  i.,  214,  245  ;  Mart&ne  et  Durand,  Thesaurus,  iv.,  1453. 


152  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

the  diocese.  The  numerous  Italian  names  which  it  contains 
point  to  the  existence  of  a  large  Italian  colony,  the  descend- 
ants of  Margaritone's  men.  It  specially  mentions  the  island 
of  Ithaka  as  part  of  his  dominions,  and  calls  the  ancient 
home  of  Odysseus  by  its  classic  name,  which  also  occurs  in 
a  Venetian  document  of  some  years  later,  where  it  is 
mentioned  as  the  scene  of  piracies.  Horses  and  mules  seem 
to  have  been  as  scarce  in  his  islands  as  in  the  time  of  Homer, 
for  he  had  to  ask  permission  of  King  Charles  to  import 
those  animals  from  the  rolling  plains  of  Apulia  to  his  rocky 
domain.1 

The  three  Venetian  colonies  now  left  in  Greece  proper — 
at  the  town  of  Negroponte  and  the  two  Messenian  stations  of 
Coron  and  Modon — had  naturally  been  affected  by  the 
disturbed  state  of  the  Levant  during  the  hostilities  between 
the  Franks  and  the  Emperor  Michael  VIII.  Since  the  loss 
of  Constantinople,  Negroponte  had  become  far  more  impor- 
tant to  the  republic,  the  salary  of  the  Venetian  bailie  had 
been  raised,  and  money  had  been  spent  freely  on  the  town,  so 
much  so,  indeed,  that  the  Venetian  Sanudo  comments  on  the 
great  expenses  incurred  by  his  fellow-countrymen  in  the  Near 
East,  "  and  especially  for  the  preservation  of  Negroponte." 2 
An  inscription  of  1273  tells  how  the  then  bailie  built  a  chapel 
of  St  Mark — a  proof  of  piety,  or  more  probably  of  the  increase 
of  the  Venetian  colony.3  The  occupation  of  the  whole  island 
outside  the  walls  of  the  capital  must  have  greatly  damaged 
the  traffic  in  corn,  oil,  and  wine,  wax  and  honey,  raw  and 
worked  silk,  which  are  mentioned  as  the  products  of  Euboea 
in  the  thirteenth  century,4  and  the  same  was  the  case  with 
the  wine  and  oil  trade  of  the  two  Messenian  stations,  to 
which,  however,  on  other  grounds,  Venice  naturally  attached 
great  value.  Scarcely  a  man-of-war,  scarcely  a  trading  ship 
on  her  way  to  the  Archipelago,  the  Black  Sea,  or  the  Sea  of 
Azov,  failed  to  be  sighted  by  the  Venetian  watchmen  at 
Coron  and  Modon,  so  appropriately  called  "the  chief  eyes 
of  the  republic,"  and  there  was  money,  too,  to  be  made  by 

1  Miklosich  und  M  tiller,  v.,  16-67;  Font.  Rer.  Austr.,  Abt.  II.,  xiv., 
215  ;  Sanudo,  116 ;  Arch.  Stor.  Jtai.y  Ser.  IV.,  i.,  13. 
*  P.  174.  3  Spon,  Voyage,  ii.,  247. 

4  Fontes  Rer.  Auslr.,  xiii.,  93,  95,  176,  177,  179,  181,  183  ;  xiv.,  15. 


TRADE  OF  THE  MOREA  153 

the  Jewish,  and  not  less  by  the  Christian,  tradesmen  of  the 
two  ports,  out  of  the  pilgrims,  who  put  in  there  on  their  way 
to  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  Whenever,  too,  the  Franks  were 
besieging  a  castle,  it  was  here  that  they  went  for  the  makers 
of  siege-engines.  Coron  was  the  more  important  of  the  two : 
its  cochineal  was  celebrated,  and  when,  about  this  time,  the 
number  of  the  captains  of  these  stations  was  increased  from 
two  to  three,  two  of  the  trio  resided  there,  while  in  critical 
times  a  bailie  was  sent  as  a  consul. 

In  the  other  parts  of  the  Morea,  there  was  a  trade  done 
in  raisins  and  figs,  oil,  honey,  wax,  and  cochineal,  sufficient 
to  attract  the  merchants  of  Florence  and  Pisa,  while  silk  and 
sugar,  small  in  quantity  and  poor  in  quality,  were  also  pro- 
duced ;  but  the  famous  vineyards  of  Monemvasia,  whence  our 
ancestors  got  their  Malmsey,  had  passed  into  the  hands  of 
the  Greeks.  During  the  intermittent  war  with  the  latter, 
the  principality  constantly  suffered  from  lack  of  corn,  which 
had  to  be  imported,  like  horses,  from  Apulia.  In  1268  the 
prince  asked  his  new  suzerain  for  the  loan  of  2000  ounces  of 
gold  (£4800),  in  order  "  to  repair  the  ravages  made  by  war 
on  his  land,"  and  at  the  same  time  his  private  affairs  were  so 
unsatisfactory  that  he  was  forced  to  pledge  valuables  to  the 
amount  of  127  ounces  (or  a  little  over  £300)  at  the  pawn- 
shops of  Barletta,  in  order  to  pay  his  way.  But  at  the  time 
of  his  death,  he  was  able  to  charge  the  annuity  of  £1054, 
which  he  left  to  one  of  his  executors,  upon  the  customs-dues 
of  Glarentza,  the  chief  port  of  Achaia,  and  the  seat  of  a  bank 
which  used  to  lend  money  to  the  Angevin  bailies,  while,  two 
years  later,  the  revenues  of  the  principality  were  required  to 
furnish  an  annual  salary  of  £1200  to  one  of  those  officials. 
A  shrewd  man  and  a  court  favourite,  like  Leonardo  of  Veroli, 
the  Chancellor  of  Achaia,  was  able  to  amass  a  large  fortune, 
and  left  behind  him  houses  and  lands  scattered  over  the 
principality  from  Corinth  to  Kalamata.  What  is  still  more 
interesting  is  the  fact  that  he  had  collected  a  small  library.1 
From  the  inventory  of  his  books  we  gather  that  his  taste 

1  X.  t.  M.,  1.  8430 ;  Z.  d.  C.%  378,  383  ;  Heyd,  Geschkhte  des  Levante- 
handels,  i.,  300 ;  Les  Regis tres  de  Nicholas  III.,  24 ;  Arch.  Stor.  Ital., 
Scr.  III.,  xxii.,  238  ;  IV.,  i v.,  16,  178,  182.  Minieri  Riccio,  Alcunifattiy 
35,  49,  82  ;  Hopf  afiud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv.,  307,  316,  317,  319. 


154  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

lay  chiefly  in  the  direction  of  novels  and  medicine,  for  the 
list  contains  fourteen  romances  and  two  medical  works. 
But  our  curiosity  is  aroused  when  we  hear  that  he  also 
possessed  "a  Greek  book  and  a  *  chronicle/ "  and  that  he 
had  a  work  in  which  he  was  interested  copied  for  him  by 
two  copyists  in  the  royal  library  at  Naples,  and  carefully 
corrected  by  a  French  priest  and  two  Italians.  Obviously 
then,  Franks  of  position  sometimes  spent  the  long  winter 
evenings  in  the  Achaian  castles  with  books  of  history  and 
romance,  and  some  of  them  were  able  to  read  the  language 
of  their  subjects.  One  Archbishop  even  translated  Aristotle. 
There  was,  however,  another  industry  more  lucrative  than 
law  or  agriculture,  which  was  then  thriving  in  most  parts  of 
the  Levant  Piracy  has,  in  almost  every  age,  been  the  curse 
of  the  Greek  seas,  and  it  flourished  luxuriantly  at  this  period.1 
A  document  of  the  year  1278,  which  contains  the  detailed 
report  of  three  Venetian  judges,  appointed  to  estimate  the 
damages  sustained  by  subjects  of  the  republic  in  Greek 
waters  during  recent  years,  throws  a  lurid  light  on  the  state 
of  public  security  in  the  realm  of  Romania.  We  read  of 
corsairs  of  many  nationalities — Genoese  (whose  depredations 
were  so  numerous  as  to  merit  a  special  list  all  to  themselves), 
Venetians,  Lombards,  Pisans,  Sicilians,  Provengals,  Catalans, 
Spaniards,  Greeks,  Slavs,  and  half-castes.  But  Genoa  had 
the  distinction  of  furnishing  most  of  the  captains,  and  Venice 
that  of  supplying  most  of  the  crews.  Perhaps  the  most 
famous  of  these  pirates  was  John  de  lo  Cavo  (or  de  Capite),  a 
native,  and  subsequently  lord,  of  the  island  of  Anaphe,  whose 
professional  headquarters  were  at  Anaea,  on  the  coast  of 
Asia  Minor  opposite  Samos,  whose  favourite  haunt  was  the 
sea  round  Euboea,  and  who  succeeded  Licario  as  imperial 
admiral.  Among  the  many  sufferers  from  his  depredations 
was  the  father  of  the  historian  Sanudo,2  who  lost  valuable 
merchandise  on  two  Venetian  vessels  which  fell  into  this 
corsair's  clutches,  and  for  which  £10,752,  or  one-third  of  the 
value,  was  afterwards  paid  as  compensation  by  the  emperor. 
Another  pirate,  whose  name  became  a  household  word  in 
Greece,  was  Andrea  Gaffore,  a  Genoese,  whom  Sanudo  knew 

1  Fontes  Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  159-281. 

2  lMd.%  337,  35 1  J  Sanudo,  132,  134,  146. 


PIRACY  155 

personally,  and  who,  after  a  long  career  of  plunder,  settled 
down  with  his  pile  as  a  peaceful  citizen  at  Athens,  where  we 
find  him  in  the  early  part  of  the  next  century.  Scarcely  less 
successful  a  sea-robber  was  Roland,  knight  of  Salonika, 
whose  operations  extended  as  far  west  as  Zante.  The  pro- 
fession was  so  lucrative,  and  was  considered  so  respectable, 
that  it  became  hereditary.  The  son  of  John  de  lo  Cavo 
assisted  his  father ;  Gaffore  had  a  brother  in  the  business ; 
the  knightly  Roland  took  his  son-in-law,  Pardo,  presumably 
a  Spaniard,  into  partnership.  Men  of  distinguished  lineage, 
Greeks  and  Franks  alike,  became  corsairs.  The  great 
archontic  families  of  Monemvasia,  the  Daimonoydnnai 
and  the  Mamon£des,  figure  conspicuously  in  the  report  of 
the  Venetian  judges,  and  one  of  the  former,  Paul  Mono- 
ydnnes  (as  his  name  was  written  for  short)  became  the  first 
Greek  lord  of  Cerigo,  after  the  expulsion  of  the  Venier 
dynasty  by  Licario.  Sanudo  specially  speaks  of  the  piracies 
committed  by  the  Lombard  barons  of  Negroponte,  who  found 
the  harvests  of  the  sea  far  more  fruitful  than  those  of  their 
great  island.  Every  year  they  used  to  send  a  fleet  of  ioo 
sail  to  pillage  the  coast  of  Asia  Minor,  and  on  one  occasion 
they  took  booty  to  the  value  of  50,000  hyperperi  (^22,400) 
at  Anaea.1  It  was  therefore  no  wonder  that  old  Guglielmo 
da  Verona  could  afford  to  maintain  400  knights,  that  the 
island  was  famous  for  its  fine  cavalry,  which  greatly  injured 
the  Greeks  on  land,  or  that  Negroponte  could  boast  of  a  rich 
Venetian  banking-house,  that  of  Andrea  Ferro,  which  was 
able  to  finance  the  Franks  of  the  Morea  in  their  war  against 
Michael  VIII.2  The  other  island  barons  followed  the 
example  of  the  Dalle  Carceri  clan  in  Eubcea,  plundering 
Greeks  and  anyone  whom  they  met,  not  sparing  even  the 
pious  pilgrim  on  his  way  to  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  Even  the 
ducal  family  of  De  la  Roche  gave  shelter  to  corsairs  in  the 
beautiful  Gulf  of  Nauplia,  and  thus  brought  down  upon 
themselves,  according  to  the  devout  Sanudo  (mindful  of  his 
father's  stolen  cargo)  the  special  displeasure  of  Providence, 
which  had  similarly  punished  the  Venieri  of  Cerigo  and  the 
Viari  of  Cerigotto.    besides  Anaea  and  Nauplia,  Monemvasia 

1  Sanudo,  120,  127. 

-  Hopf  apud  Ersch  und  Grubcr,  lxxxv.,  293. 


* 


156  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

and  the  islands  of  Skopelos,  Keos,  and  Samothrace,  were 
favourite  lairs  of  the  pirates.  On  one  occasion,  the  Monem- 
vasiotes  looked  calmly  on,  while  a  flagrant  act  of  piracy  was 
being  committed  in  their  harbour,  which,  as  the  port  of 
shipment  for  Malmsey  wine,  attracted  corsairs  who  were 
also  connoisseurs.  After  the  capture  of  Skopelos  and 
Lemnos  by  Licario,  the  inhabitants  of  those  islands  emi- 
grated to  Euboea,  and  turned  pirates,  so  that  it  became  the 
principal  rendezvous  of  the  fraternity  and  a  nest  of  sea- 
robbers.  During  a  war  against  the  Emperor  Andr6nikos  II., 
300  privateers  were  sent  out  from  Negroponte  alone,  and 
Sanudo  had  the  honour  of  knowing  a  Cretan  pirate,  who  used 
to  boast  that  with  his  one  ship  he  had  done  400,000  hyperperi 
worth  of  damage  (£179,200)  to  the  Greek  Empire.  These 
privateers  had,  indeed,  a  regular  fixed  tariff,  which  was 
recognised  as  a  custom  of  the  trade.  The  captain  was 
entitled  to  three  denarii  of  spoil  for  every  two  which  he  had 
spent  on  fitting  out  his  vessel ;  but,  if  he  attacked  the  lair  of 
a  fellow-pirate,  his  gains,  in  consideration  of  the  extra  risk, 
or  perhaps  by  way  of  salve  to  his  professional  conscience, 
were  assessed  at  twice  the  amount  of  his  outlay.  Within  the 
realm  of  Romania  the  privateer  captain  had  also  one-fifth 
of  the  takings,  and  enjoyed  besides  certain  perquisites  as 
dragoman  and  pilot.1  But  great  as  were  the  gains  of  the 
pirates,  they  represented  only  a  part  of  the  damage  done. 
The  misery  and  desolation  which  they  caused  defy  calcula- 
tion, and  were  by  no  means  confined  to  one  race,  or  creed. 
Neutrals,  no  less  than  open  enemies,  were  considered  as  fair 
game  by  these  gentry,  and  the  losses  of  which  the  Venetians 
complained  had  all  been  sustained  during  the  period  when 
Michael  VI 1 1.,  whose  flag  these  privateers  usually  flaunted, 
was  supposed  to  be  cherishing  a  "  pure  and  guileless  truce  " 
with  the  republic 

Private  commerce  was,  under  these  circumstances, 
attended  with  enormous  risks,  especially  among  the  Greek 
islands.  Traffic  between  Andros  and  Euboea  was  specially 
dangerous,  for  to  the  normal  perils  of  that  mill-race,  the 
Doro  channel,  was  added  the  probability  that  John  de  lo 
Cavo    or    Daimonoyannes    would    be    lurking    behind    the 

1  Sanudo,  146. 


PIRACY  157 

Euboean  headland  of  Cape  Mantello,  as  it  was  then  named. 
We  hear  of  a  Venetian  merchant  of  Athens  plundered  as 
he  was  sailing  past  Marathon ;  and  often  a  well-filled 
merchantman  got  no  farther  than  "the  Columns"  of 
Sunium  ;  a  ship  was  seized  even  in  the  port  of  Chalkis 
under  the  eyes  of  the  bailie.  The  passage  from  Eubcea 
across  to  Atalante  was  infested  by  pirate  brigs,  and  cargoes 
of  beans  and  other  articles  of  food,  intended  for  the  consump- 
tion of  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza  and  his  men,  were  taken 
at  the  landing-place.  A  harmless  trader  might  easily  find 
himself  stripped  of  all  but  his  shirt,  or  even  deprived  of  that 
garment,  and  carried  off  to  work  in  the  prisons  of  Rhodes. 
Wherever  there  was  a  good  harbour — in  the  Pagasaean  Gulf, 
in  the  island  of  Ios,  in  Suda  bay,  in  the  extinct  crater  of 
Santorin,  in  the  noble  bay  of  Navarino,  "the  port  of 
rushes,"  as  the  Franks  called  it — there  was  also  a  good  place 
for  the  pirate  captain  and  his  crew.  Maina  had  a  peculiarly 
bad  name  for  piracy  even  then,  and  ships  anchoring  in  Porto 
Quaglio  or  off  CEtylos  often  did  so  at  the  risk  of  their 
cargoes.  The  Gulf  of  Corinth  was  another  risky  place,  and  far 
up  the  west  coast  of  Greece,  the  narrow  channel  of  Corfu  was 
still  a  resort  of  corsairs,  who  carried  off  their  prisoners  to  the 
classic  Butrinto — the  "  tall  city  of  Buthrotum  "  of  the  ^Eneid 
— which  had  been  taken  by  the  Greeks  from  its  Angevin 
commander.  The  point  of  Ithaka  was  another  dangerous 
spot,  the  bishop  of  Cephalonia  was  plundered  by  Dalmatian 
pirates,  and  "Ambracia's  Gulf"  with  its  narrow  entrance 
seemed  to  have  been  specially  constructed  for  the  purpose  of 
incercepting  Corfiote  vessels  on  their  way  to  the  skdla  of 
Arta. 

But  there  were  land-rats  no  less  than  water-rats  which 
disturbed  the  path  of  the  merchant  and  the  priest.  The 
more  or  less  intermittent  Franco-Greek  war  which  had  gone 
on  in  the  Morea  since  the  fatal  cession  of  the  three  castles 
had  completely  changed  the  conditions  of  life  there.  The 
profound  security  which  we  found  existing  in  the  early  days 
of  Prince  William's  reign  had  disappeared.  The  Venetians 
of  Coron  and  Modon,  though  those  places  were  specially 
guaranteed  against  attack  in  the  arrangements  made  by  the 
republic  with   Michael    VIII.,    found   that  their  neutrality 


) 


158  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

availed  them  nothing  when  they  met  a  Greek  captain — half 
officer,  half  bandit — outside  the  narrow  boundaries  of  the 
two  Messenian  colonies.  On  one  occasion,  the  archdeacon 
of  Modon,  while  travelling  in  the  company  of  his  bishop  to 
Glarentza,  was  stopped  at  Krestena,  near  Olympia,  and 
dragged  before  the  emperor's  brother,  Constantine,  then 
commanding  in  the  Byzantine  province.  In  vain  the 
archdeacon  protested  that  he  was  "  a  Venetian  citizen  "  ;  his 
nationality  was  disregarded,  and  he  was  murdered  by  the 
soldiery.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  Venetian  judges 
assessed  the  value  of  a  colonial  archdeacon  at  450  hyperperi 
G6201,  12s).  Nor  was  Constantine  Palaiol6gos's  army  less 
scornful  when  the  local  authorities  of  Coron  sent  him  in 
a  bill  of  damages  for  the  loss  of  a  cargo  of  Cretan 
cheese  and  wine.  Venetian  subjects  languished  in  the 
dungeons  of  Kalavryta  since  the  Greeks  had  dispossessed 
Geoffroy  de  Tournay  of  that  fine  castle,  where  an  imperial 
commandant  now  flew  the  double-headed  eagle  from  the 
keep. 

Three-quarters  of  a  century  of  Frankish  rule  had 
endowed  Greece  with  a  strange,  yet  often  picturesque, 
geographical  nomenclature.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the 
Franks,  not  being  Englishmen,  had  by  this  time  learnt 
at  least  sufficient  Greek  for  all  ordinary  colloquial  purposes, 
though  later  than  this,  French,  and  excellent  French  too, 
was  spoken  at  the  court  of  Thebes.  We  are  expressly  told 
that  Prince  William  of  Achaia  and  Duke  John  of  Athens 
spoke  in  Greek  to  the  Greek  commanders,  the  latter  even 
using,  perhaps  unconsciously,  an  epigrammatic  phrase  of 
Herodotos,  while  Ancelin  de  Toucy,  the  Constable  Chauderon, 
and  Geoffroy  d*  Aunoy  all  spoke  Greek,  and  Leonardo  of  Veroli 
read  it1  But,  all  the  same,  the  Franks,  assisted  by  ignorant 
natives,  had  corrupted  Greek  proper  names  in  a  way  often 
unrecognisable  to  those  who  have  not  read  the  French  and 
Italian  documents  of  the  period.  We  have  already  mentioned 
how  "Athens"  had  become  "Satines,"  "Lemnos"  "Stal- 
imene,"  "Neopatras"  "La  Patre,"  " Lacedaemonia "  "La 
Cr^monie,"  and  "  Euripos  "  "  Negroponte."  But  all  over  the 
Franco-Greek  world  the  same   process  had  been  going  on. 

1  L.  d.  C,  338. 


FRANKISH  NOMENCLATURE  159 

The  island  of  Samothrace  meets  us  frequently  as  "  Sanctus 
Mandrachi  "l  (a  saint  invented  to  account  for  the  name)  ;  "  Ios  " 
and  "  Anaphe,"  by  the  usual  process  of  adding  the  final  letter 
of  the  accusative  of  the  article  to  the  following  noun,  now 
figure  as  "  Nio"  and  "  Nanfio" ;  "  Zetounion  M  (the  Byzantine 
name  for  "Lamia")  is,  in  Frankish  parlance,  "Giton"  or 
"Gipton"  ;  and  Thebes  had  become  "  Estives  "  or  "  Stivas  "  2 
as  early  as  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth  century  ;  Salona  is, 
in  French,  "  La  Sole,"  or  in  Italian,  "  La  Sola,"  which  is  the 
official  designation  on  the  coins  of  its  French  lords. 
"Naupaktos,"  corrupted  into  "  Nepantum  "  as  early  as  1210, 
has  by  1 278  assumed  the  more  modern  form  of  "  Lepanto," 
though  the  other  corruption  long  survived  in  popular  and 
official  use,  for  example,  on  the  coins  of  Philip  of  Taranto. 
The  former  obviously  arose  out  of  the  Greek  accusative 
(«V  top  "E7TOKTOI/),  the  latter  from  the  favourite  Frankish 
method  of  placing  the  French  definite  article  before  a  Greek 
word 3  ("  Le  Pakto  ").  Of  this  practice  "  L'  Arte  "  ("  Arta  "),  and 
d  La  Prevasse  "  ("  Preveza  ")  are  other  examples.  Conversely, 
"  Larissa  "  becomes  "  L* Arse."  "  Monemvasia  "  is  gallicised 
into"  Malevasie,"  and  Italianised  into  "  Malvasia,"  from  which 
the  transition  is  easy  to  the  English  form  "Malmsey." 
"  Livadostro,"  the  port  of  Athens  on  the  Corinthian  Gulf, 
meets  us  as  "Rive  d'  Ostre,"  and  "Sunium"  is  already 
described  as  "  the  pillars  "  ("  Colonne  "),  from  its  noble  temple, 
and  is  yet  further  concealed  under  the  guise  of"  Pellestello"4 
("  many  columns,"  TroXuarrvXov),  while  in  the  French  version  of 
the  Chronicle  of  the  Moreay  "  Kalavryta  "  is  "  La  Grite."  Several 
well-known  classical  names  had  now  vanished :  thus  Ossa 
had  already  received  its  modern  name  of  Kissavos,  and 
Taygetos  that  of  Pentedaktylon.6  Ithaka,  in  common 
parlance,  no  less  than  in  learned  Byzantine  writers,  maintained 

1  E.g.,  Pontes  Rer.  Austr.y  xiv.,  205,  207,  212,  222. 

*  Saewulf  calls  it  "  Stivas  "  in  1 102  (Recueil  de  Voyages^  iv.,  384). 

3  S&has,  Tb  Xpovucdv  tov  TaXafciStov,  16.  Both  6  "Eirairros  and  6  IUktos 
occur  in  the  Chronicle  of  the  Moreay  11.  3489,  3627.  The  earliest  instance 
of  the  form  "Lepanto"  seems  to  be  that  in  a  document  of  1278  {Pontes 
Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  175).  4  Ibid.y  192. 

6  Documents  of  1276  and  1293  apud  Miklosich  und  Muller,  iv.,  427  ; 
v.,  I55-6I. 


160  THE  GREEK  REVIVAL 

the  name  which   had  descended  from  the  days  of  Homer, 
though  it  was  also  called  Val  di  Compare. 

Thus,  if  the  Franks  by  the  end  of  two  generations  had 
acquired  the  language,  and  made  their  mark  upon  the  map 
of  Greece,  the  Greeks  had  re-asserted  themselves,  alike  in 
the  south-east  and  in  the  north.  Already  the  Frankish 
territories  had  greatly  contracted,  already  the  heroic  age  of 
Frankish  Hellas  was  over.  A  new  period  was  about  to 
begin,  when  the  fortunes  of  the  country,  hitherto  directed  by 
vigorous  resident  princes,  were  to  depend  on  the  Eastern 
policy  of  an  Italian  court  and  its  ambitious  monarch. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  ANGEVINS  IN   GREECE  (1278-1307) 

With  the  death  of  Prince  William  of  Achaia,  the  house 
of  Anjou  became  the  dominant  factor  in  Greek  politics. 
Charles  I.,  King  of  Naples  and  Sicily,  was  now,  by  virtue  of 
the  marriage-contract  made  between  his  late  son  Philip  and 
Isabelle  de  Villehardouin,  Prince,  as  well  as  suzerain  of 
Achaia,  and  soon  the  mint  of  Glarentza  issued  coins  with  his 
name,  followed  by  the  princely  title  which  he  now  assumed, 
upon  them.  The  treaty  of  Viterbo,  which  had  given  him  the 
suzerainty  over  Achaia,  had  made  no  mention  of  Athens; 
but  though  there  is  no  direct  authority  for  assuming  that 
Duke  John  of  Athens  acknowledged  Charles  as  his  overlord, 
the  King  of  Naples  addressed  him  as  a  feudatory  of  Achaia, 
and  John's  successor,  Duke  William,  recognised  the  King  of 
Naples  as  his  suzerain,  only  begging  to  be  excused  from 
doing  homage  in  person  at  Naples.  Charles  was  suzerain, 
too,  of  "  the  most  high  and  mighty  Count  Palatine,"  Richard 
of  Cephalonia,  and  in  Corfii  his  captain  and  vicar-general 
governed  the  islanders  for  the  Neapolitan  crown.  Finally,  in 
Epiros,  he  considered  himself,  in  virtue  of  the  treaty  of 
Viterbo,  the  successor  of  Manfred  and  Chinardo,  though  he 
had  as  yet  made  small  progress  towards  the  realisation  of 
his  claims  in  that  difficult  country — the  despair  of  regular 
armies.  Thus,  in  almost  every  part  of  the  Greek  world  the 
restless  Angevin  had  a  base  for  his  long-projected  attack 
upon  Constantinople,  which  the  armistice  between  Venice 
and  the  Greek  Emperor,  the  cunning  intrigues  and  diplomatic 
reconciliation  of  the  latter  with  the  papacy,  and  his  own 
preoccupations  in  Italy,  had  hitherto  prevented. 

Charles  lost  no  time  in  assuming  the  government  of  the 

161  L 


162  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

principality  of  Achaia,  and  sent  thither,  as  his  bailie  and 
vicar-general,    Galeran    d'lvry,    Seneschal    of    Sicily,    who 
remained  in  his  new  post  for  two  years.     His  appointment 
was  notified  to  all  the  great  feudatories  of  Achaia — to  John, 
Duke  of  Athens,  and  his  brother,  William  of  Livadia;  to 
Count  Richard  of  Cephalonia ;  to  the  triarchs  of  Eubcea ;  to 
Isabella,    Marchioness  of    Boudonitza;    to  Chauderon,  the 
Constable,  and  St  Omer,  the  Marshal  of  Achaia ;  and  to  the 
Achaian  barons,   Guy   de    la    Tr&nouille   of  Chalandritza, 
Geoffroy  de  Tournay,  Guy  de  Charpigny  of  Vostitza,  and 
Jacques  de  la  Roche  of  Veligosti.     The  captains  of  Corinth, 
Chloumofttsi,  Beauvoir,  and  Kalamata  were  ordered  to  hand 
over  those  important  castles  to  him,  and  he  was  authorised  to 
receive  the  homage  of  all   the   barons,  knights,  and  other 
feudatories,  "  both  men  and  women,  both  Latin  and  Greek." * 
Accordingly,  upon  his  arrival  at  Glarentza,  he  summoned 
the  prelates,  barons,  and  knights  of  the  principality,  to  hear 
the  commands  of  his  master.     The  assembly  listened  to  the 
royal  message,  which  bade  them  do  homage  to  the  bailie  as 
the  king's  representative,  and  then  Archbishop  Benedict  of 
Patras,  whom  the  other  barons   had  put  forward  as  their 
spokesman,  rose  to  reply.     The  primate  pointed  out   that 
such  a  demand  was  an  infringement  of  the  customs  of  the 
country,  which  had  been  drawn  up  in  writing  and  sworn  to 
by  their  forefathers,  the  conquerors   of  the   Morea.     The 
feudal  constitution  provided,  he  said,  that  a  new  prince  should 
appear  in  person,  and  swear  before  God  and  the  people  with 
his  hand  upon  the  gospels,  to  rule  them  according  to  their 
customs,  and  to  respect  their  franchises,  and  then  all  the 
lieges  were  bound  to  do  him  homage,  sealing  the  compact 
of  mutual  loyalty  with  a  kiss  on  the  mouth.     "  We  would 
rather  die  and  lose  our  heritage/'  added  the  bold  ecclesiastic, 
"  than  be  ousted  from  our  customs."     The  primate's  speech 
was  not  likely  to  please  the  bailie,  but  the  assembly  was 
unanimous  in  support  of  its  leader,  and  it  was  obvious  that 
the  proud  barons,  jealous  of  their  rights,  were  not  going  to 

1  Arch.  Star.  ltaly  Ser.  IV.,  L,  433 ;  ii.,  203 ;  iv.,  11  ;  Riccio,  Nuovi 
Sfudii,  11 ;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  315  ;  Buchon,  AUas%  pL  xxiv., 
5.  There  is  one  of  the  coins  of  Charles  I.  as  "  Prince  of  Achaia"  in  the 
Doge's  Palace  at  Venice,  and  the  title  occurs  in  the  treaty  of  Orvieto. 


THE  ANGEVIN  BAILIES  163 

do  homage  to  a  stranger  who  belonged  to  their  own  class. 
But,  in  the  true  spirit  of  constitutional  monarchy,  they  were 
ready  to  make  some  compromise,  so  that  his  majesty's 
government  might  be  carried  on.  The  question  of  homage 
was  put  aside,  and  the  bailie  and  the  assembled  vassals 
swore  on  the  gospels — he  to  respect  their  customs,  they  to 
be  loyal  to  Charles  I.  and  his  heirs. 

Galeran  d'lvry  does  not  seem  to  have  kept  his  oath,  and 
his  administration  was  unpopular.  He  began  by  removing 
all  the  officials  whom  he  had  found  in  authority,  just  like  a 
modern  Greek  prime  minister,  and  thus  created  a  host  of 
enemies.1  He  was  unsuccessful  in  a  campaign  which  he 
undertook  against  the  Greeks,  who  routed  his  troops  in  the 
defiles  of  Skortd  and  took  many  prisoners.  The  barons  com- 
plained that  the  Angevin  soldiers,  instead  of  defeating  their 
foes,  plundered  friendly  villages,  and  that  the  lands  which 
had  been  taken  from  them,  and  the  late  prince  had  bestowed 
upon  his  Turkish  auxiliaries,  should  be  restored.  In  1280, 
two  of  their  number,  Jean  de  Chauderon  and  Narjaud  de 
R6my,  went  as  a  deputation  to  Naples,  to  complain  of  the 
bailie's  unconstitutional  acts.  Charles  issued  orders  that  the 
old  usages  of  Achaia  should  be  respected,  recalled  Galeran 
d'lvry,  and  appointed  in  his  place  Filippo  de  Lagonessa, 
Marshal  of  Sicily  and  ex-Seneschal  of  Lombardy.2  But  the 
experiment  of  sending  bailies  from  Italy  proved  to  be 
unsuccessful ;  accordingly,  two  years  later,  the  King  of  Naples 
adopted  the  plan  of  choosing  his  vicar-general  from  the  ranks 
of  the  Achaian  barons.  His  choice  fell  upon  Guy  de  la 
Tr^mouille,  lord  of  Chalandritza,  and  head  of  one  of  the  two 
families  which  still  remained  in  undisturbed  possession  of  the 
original  baronies.  But  the  baron  of  Chalandritza,  though  his 
family  had  come  over  at  the  Conquest,  was  not  a  sufficiently 
important  person  to  impose  his  will  upon  his  peers.     His 

1  X.  t.  M.,  11.  7819-939;  L.  d.  C,  256-60;  Angevin  documents  at 
Naples,  quoted  by  Buchon  (Nouve/ies  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  230-1)  and  Hopf 
(apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv.,  316-17).  The  Greek,  French,  and  Italian 
Chronicle  of  the  Morea,  make  Hugues  de  Sully,  who  was  never  in  Achaia, 
the  first  bailie  after  1278,  but  mention  Galeran  d'lvry  as  bailie  in 
William's  later  years. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  223  ;  II.,  i.,  327-8  ;  Arch.  Stor. 
Ital,  Ser.  IV.,  iii.,  12,  164. 


I 


164  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

barony  consisted  of  no  more  than  four  knights'  fees,  and  the 
ruined  castle  of  Tremoul&,  near  Kalavryta,  which  still  pre- 
serves his  name,  is  but  small.  Although  the  chivalry  of 
Achaia  was  still  so  famous,  that  three  of  the  Moreot  barons — 
Jean  de  Chauderon,  Geoffroy  de  Tournay,  and  Jacques  de  la 
Roche  of  Veligosti  and  Damal& — were  included  by  King 
Charles  among  the  hundred  combatants  whom  he  took  with 
him  to  Bordeaux  in  1283,  when  it  was  proposed  to  decide 
the  fate  of  Sicily  by  a  duel  between  the  two  sovereigns  of 
Naples  and  Aragon,  yet  the  bailie  found  it  necessary  to 
employ  Turkish,  and  even  Bulgarian,  mercenaries  against  the 
Greeks.1  Such  was  the  disaffection  in  the  principality,  that 
he  received  orders  not  to  allow  a  single  inhabitant  to  serve 
on  garrison  duty. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  after  three  years  of  office,  Guy  de  la 
Tr^mouille  shared  the  fate  of  his  two  predecessors.  Charles 
I.  of  Naples  had  died  in  1285  ;  and,  as  his  son  and  successor, 
Charles  II.  was  at  the  time  a  prisoner  of  the  house  of 
Aragon,  the  affairs  of  Naples  and  of  Achaia  were  conducted 
by  the  late  king's  nephew,  Count  Robert  of  Artois,  as  regent 
One  of  his  first  acts  was  to  remove  the  bailie  of  Achaia, 
appointing  in  his  place  a  much  more  important  personage — 
William,  Duke  of  Athens,  at  that  time  the  leading  man  in 
Frankish  Greece.  Connected  through  his  wife  with  the 
energetic  Duke  of  Neopatras,  lord  of  Lamia  in  the  north, 
directly  interested,  as  baron  of  Nauplia  and  Argos,  in  the 
welfare  of  the  Morea,  he  was  the  best  possible  selection,  for 
in  him  the  barons  recognised  the  first  among  their  equals. 
The  Duke  of  Athens,  whose  coins  may  still  be  seen  in  the 
Archaeological  Museum  at  Venice,  was  also  possessed  of 
ample  means,  which  he  spent  liberally  for  the  defence  of 
Greece.  Thus,  in  1282,  in  spite  of  the  annual  attacks  of 
Licario  on  his  coast,  he  had  fitted  out  nine  ships  in  Euboea 
to  co-operate  with  the  Angevin  fleet  against  the  imperial 
navy ;  and,  when  bailie  of  the  Morea,  he  built  the  castle  of 
Demdtra,2  in  the  ever-unruly  Skortd,  a  fortress  which  had 

1  Arch.  Star.  ltal.%  Ser.  IV.,  iv.,  354;  v.,  182-3;  x-  T-  M-»  11. 
8100-4,  putting  him,  however,  in  the  wrong  place,  after  Duke  William  of 
Athens  ;  Sanudo,  152  ;  L.  d.  C.f  289,  367. 

8  Riccio,  Delia  Dominazione  Angioina,  1  ;  X.  r.  M.,  11.   7990-8016 ; 


THE  CASTLE  OF  ST  OMER  165 

been  destroyed  by  the  Greeks,  and  the  site  of  which  was 
perhaps  at  Kastri,  to  the  left  of  the  road  between  Tripolitza 
and  Sparta.  With  the  Venetian  republic,  which  had  trade 
interests  at  Athens,  he  was  on  such  good  terms,  that  when, 
in  1284,  it  was  negotiating  an  armistice  with  the  Emperor 
Andr6nikos  II.,  it  expressly  stipulated  that  the  Duke  of 
Athens  should  be  included  in  it — a  stipulation  not,  however, 
insisted  upon  in  the  actual  treaty  of  the  following  year.1 
William  was,  however,  well  able  to  defend  his  land,  and  great 
was  the  regret  when  his  valiant  career  was  cut  short  in  1287, 
after  only  two  years'  office  in  Achaia. 

In  the  Athenian  duchy,  he  was  succeeded  by  his  only 
son,  Guy  II.,  who  was  still  a  minor,  and  for  whom  his  Greek 
mother,  Helene,  daughter  of  the  Duke  of  Neopatras,  acted 
as  regent — the  first  Greek  ruler  of  Athens  for  over  eighty 
years.  In  the  administration  of  the  Morea,  he  was  followed 
by  the  great  Theban  magnate,  Nicholas  II.  de  St  Omer, 
whom  we  have  already  seen  defending  the  claim  of  his 
sister-in-law  to  the  barony  of  Akova.  The  lord  of  half 
Thebes,  like  his  father  before  him,  he  had  built  out  of  the 
vast  wealth  of  his  first  wife,  Princess  Marie  of  Antioch,  the 
noble  castle  of  St  Omer  on  the  Kadmeia,  of  which  only  one 
tower  now  remains,  but  which  was  "the  finest  baronial 
mansion  in  all  Romania."  It  contained  sufficient  rooms  for 
an  emperor  and  his  court,  and  the  walls  were  decorated  with 
frescoes,  illustrating  the  conquest  of  the  Holy  Land  by  the 
Franks,  in  which  the  ancestors  of  the  Theban  baron  had 
played  a  prominent  part  As  his  second  wife  he  had  married 
the  widowed  Princess  of  Achaia,  and  had  thus  come  into 
possession  of  the  lands  in  the  Morea  which  she  received  in 
lieu  of  her  widow's  portion  of  Clermont  and  Kalamata,  while 
his  brother  Jean  had  already  established  himself  and  founded 
a  family  in  the  peninsula.  Nicholas  had  won  the  esteem  of 
Charles  I.,  who  had  sent  him  on  a  mission  to  the  Armenian 
court,  and  he  was  thus  well  known  to  the  Angevins.  Like 
his  immediate  predecessor,  he  spent  money  in  fortifications, 

L.  d.  C,  385  ;  C.  d.  M.y  461  ;  Pachymeres,  i.,  413  ;  Buchon,  Atlas,  pi. 
xxv.,  5  ;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique^  338  ;   Paparregrfpoulos  (v.  153), 
identifies  it  with  Karytaina. 
1  Luna,  fol.  100. 


I 


166  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

building  a  small  fortress  to  protect  his  wife's  village  of 
Maniatochorion  against  attack  from  the  two  neighbouring 
Venetian  colonies  of  Messenia,  and  the  strong  castle  of 
Avarino  on  the  promontory  at  the  north  end  of  the  famous 
bay  of  Navarino,  upon  the  site  where  once  had  stood  the 
palace  of  Nestor,  where  in  classic  days  the  Athenians  had 
entrenched  themselves  at  the  beginning  of  the  Peloponnesian 
war.  But  Nicholas  de  St  Omer  was  not  attracted  to  the 
spot  by  reminiscences  of  Homer  or  Thucydides.  He  was 
anxious  to  erect  a  mansion  for  his  nephew  Nicholas,  and  he 
chose  the  classic  Pylos,  with  the  noble  bay  at  its  foot,  as  a 
commanding  position.  We  often  find  the  place  mentioned 
in  the  thirteenth  century.  The  Franks  called  it  "port  de 
Junch"— the  "harbour  of  rushes" — or  "Zonklon,"  by  a 
corruption  of  that  word ;  but  the  Greeks  described  it  already 
as  "  Avarinos  " — a  name  which  occurs  not  only  in  the  Greek 
Chronicle  of  the  Morea}  but  in  the  earlier  golden  bull  of 
Andr6nikos  II.,  dated  1293.  The  theory,  therefore,  so  con- 
fidently put  forward  by  Hopf,2  that  the  modern  name  of 
Navarino  is  derived  from  the  Navarrese  company  which 
occupied  Zonklon  a  century  later,  falls  to  the  ground.  In 
all  probability,  Avarinos  is  a  reminiscence,  as  Fallmerayer3 
long  ago  suggested,  of  the  barbarous  tribe  of  Avars,  who, 
according  to  a  Byzantine  historian  of  that  period,  "  conquered 
all  Greece  "  in  589,  and  who,  if  we  may  believe  a  correspondent 
of  the  Emperor  Atexios  I.,  "  held  possession  of  the  Pelopon- 
nesos  for  218  years."  Thus,  the  name  "Navarino"  would 
arise,  in  accordance  with  the  usual  Greek  practice,  of  which 
we  had  several  examples  in  the  last  chapter,  out  of  the  final 
letter  of  the  accusative  of  the  article,  «V  top  'Afiapivov,  or 
else,  the  name  of  the  new  settlement  there,  "  Neo- Avarino," 
so  called  to  distinguish  it  from  St  Omer's  castle  of  "  Palaio- 

1  X.  r.  M.,  11.  8056-99,  8105-9  ;  L.  d.  C,  273-6 ;  Buchon,  Recherches 
historiques,  ii.,  498,  501  ;  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  227;  II.,  i.  331  ; 
La  Grlce  Continental,  460. 

2  Apud Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv.,  212,  321  ;  lxxxvi.,  p.  24. 

s  Geschichte  der  Halbinsel  Morea,  i.,  188  ;  Evagrios,  Hist.  Eccles.,  vi., 
10 ;  Leunclavius,  Jus  Graco-Rotnanum,  i.,  278 ;  Leake,  Travels  in  the 
Morea,  I.,  411  ;  Andr6nikos  writes  tit  r^v  IIi/Xov,  rto  KaXot/uxvop  'Apaplvov. 
Cf.  the  author's  article  in  the  English  Hist  Review,  xx.,  307  ;  xxi.,  106  ; 
and  Prof.  Bury  in  Hermathena,  xiii.,  430. 


ST  OMEITS  ADMINISTRATION  167 

Avarino,"  would  easily  be  contracted  into  the  form  which 
the  great  battle  which  secured  the  independence  of  modern 
Greece  has  made  known  to  every  lover  of  Hellas. 

The  administration  of  the    great    Theban    baron    was 
disturbed  by  another  of  those  feudal  claims,  which  had  now 
become  common  since  the  almost  complete   disappearance 
of   the    families    of   the    original    conquerors.     It    will    be 
remembered   that  on   the  death   of  Geoffroy   de  Bruy&res, 
his  barony  of  Skortd  had  been  divided  into  two  halves,  one 
escheating  to  the  crown,  the  other  being  left  in  the  hands  of 
the  widow.     We  saw  how  a  certain  knight,  named  Pestel,  had 
claimed  the  barony,  and  how  Prince  William  had  ignored 
his  claim.     A  new  claimant  now  appeared  in  the  person  of 
another  Geoffroy  de  Bruy&res,  a  cousin  of  the  late  baron, 
who  arrived  from  Champagne  with  elaborate   proofs  of  his 
relationship    and   a    recommendation   from   the   Regent  of 
Naples  to  the  bailie  that  the  High  Court  should  decide  the 
question.     The  Court  met  at  Glarentza,  and  the  bishop  of 
Olena  gave  judgment  in  its  name  against  young  Geoffroy, 
on  the  ground  that  Skortd  would  only  have  descended  to 
him,  if  he  had  been  a  direct  heir  of  its  late  lord,  according  to 
the  decision  of  Prince  William.     Ashamed  to  return  to  France 
empty-handed,  the  claimant  resorted  to  craft  to  obtain  the 
coveted  barony.     He  pretended  to  be  suffering  from  colic, 
which  could  be  best  cured  by  drinking  rain  water,  such  as 
was  to  be  found  in  the  cistern  of  the  small  but  strong  castle 
of  Bucelet,  or  Araklovon,  which  commanded  the  defile  of 
Skortd,  and  which  had  been  held  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest 
by  the  heroic  Doxapatr&s.     He  first  sent  a  trusty  esquire 
to  beg  water  from  the  benevolent  governor,  and  then  obtained 
leave  to  occupy  a  room  in  the  tower,  so  that  he  might  be 
able  to  drink  the  astringent  water  at  his  convenience.     Soon 
he  seemed  to  grow  worse,  and  the   unsuspecting  governor 
permitted  him  to  call  his  esquires  to  his  bedside,  so  that  they 
might  hear  his  last  dying  depositions.     Geoffroy  then  con- 
fided to  them  his  plan.     They  were  to  induce  the  bibulous 
governor  and  his  men  to  drink  deep  with  them  at  a  favourite 
tavern  outside  the  castle  gate,  and  then,  when  their  guests 
had  well  drunk,  they  should  seize  the  keys  from  the  porter 
and  bar  out  the  intoxicated  governor  and  garrison.     The  plan 


168  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

succeeded,  and  Geoffroy,  now  master  of  Bucelet,  released  some 
Greeks  who  were  in  the  castle  dungeon  and  despatched  two 
of  them  by  night  to  the  imperial  commander,  offering  to  sell 
him  the  castle,  of  whose  strategic  value  Geoffroy  was  well 
aware.  He  knew  that  Bucelet  was  the  key  of  Skorti,  and 
he  surmised  that  the  bailie  would  give  him  Karytaina,  rather 
than  that  Bucelet,  and  with  it,  the  whole  of  Arkadia,  should 
fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Greeks.  This  surmise  proved  to 
be  not  far  wrong.  The  Greek  commander,  overjoyed  at  the 
offer,  hastened  towards  Bucelet  with  all  his  troops.  Before, 
however,  he  had  time  to  reach  the  castle,  it  had  been  closely 
invested  by  the  Frankish  soldiers,  hastily  summoned  by  the 
governor  from  their  garrison  duty  at  Great  Ardchova.  Such 
was  the  alarm  caused  in  the  principality,  that  the  bailie 
himself  marched  at  the  head  of  all  his  available  forces  to 
Bucelet.  Ordering  Simon  de  Vidoigne,  the  captain  of 
Skortd,  to  prevent  the  Greek  army  from  crossing  the 
Alpheios  by  the  ford  at  Isova,  he  sent  envoys  to  Geoffroy, 
offering  him  a  free  pardon  if  he  would  surrender  the  castle 
to  him  as  King  Charles  II.'s  vicar-general,  but,  in  the  event 
of  refusal,  threatening  to  pull  it  down  about  his  ears. 
"  Indeed,"  the  messengers  added,  "  Venetian  carpenters  have 
already  been  summoned  from  Coron  to  construct  the  necessary 
engines  of  war."  The  prudent  Geoffroy  now  saw  that  the  time 
had  come  for  a  compromise ;  he  offered  to  give  up  the  castle 
to  the  bailie,  if  the  latter  would  promise  him  some  fief  upon 
which  he  could  settle ;  the  bailie  consented,  and  this  audacious 
piece  of  feudal  blackmail  was  rewarded  by  the  hand  of  a 
wealthy  widow,  Marguerite  de  Cors,  who  brought  him  her 
father's  fief  of  Lisarea  near  Chalandritza,  and  her  husband's 
fief  of  Moraina  in  Skortd.1  As  for  the  castle  of  Bucelet,  it 
was  shortly  afterwards  bestowed  upon  Isabelle  de  Villehardouin 
by  King  Charles  II. 

That  monarch  had  been  released  from  prison  in  1 289,  and 
one  of  his  first  acts  was  to  appoint  a  fresh  bailie  of  the  Morea. 
His  nominee  was  Guy  de  Charpigny,  Lord  of  Vostitza,  head 
of  the  sole  surviving  great  baronial  family  of  the  Conquest — 
for  Guy  de  la  Tr^mouille  had  now  died  without  male  heirs — 

1  X.  r.  M.f  11.  8110-458 ;  L.  d.  C.t  276-87  ;  Z.  d.  F.,  94-8  (with  con- 
siderable variations  in  detail  from  the  other  versions) ;  C.  d.  M%y  462-5. 


FLORENT  tfAVESNES  169 

and  a  man  known  personally  to  the  Neapolitan  court.1  But 
the  Moreot  barons  were  tired  of  this  system  of  government 
by  deputies.  They  had  had  in  eleven  years,  six  bailies 
— two  foreigners,  two  of  their  own  order,  and  two  great 
magnates  from  the  duchy  of  Athens.  The  foreigners  had 
trampled  on  their  privileges,  their  fellow-barons  were  not 
sufficiently  far  above  them  to  secure  their  respect,  and  the 
duchy  of  Athens  was  now  itself  in  the  hands  of  a  child  and 
his  mother.  Meanwhile,  the  war  against  the  imperial  com- 
manders at  MistrA  had  gone  on  more  or  less  continually  ever 
since  the  death  of  William,  for  the  Morea  had  been  involved 
in  the  general  Angevin  plan  of  campaign  against  the 
Byzantine  Empire.  These  facts  had  convinced  the  barons 
that  their  country  could  only  be  saved  by  a  prince  who 
would  reside  among  them.  Two  of  their  number,  Jean  de 
Chauderon,  the  late  prince's  nephew  and  grand  constable  of 
the  principality,  and  Geoffroy  de  Tournay,  formerly  baron  of 
Kalavryta,  were  frequent  visitors  at  the  Neapolitan  court, 
where  they  enjoyed  greater  esteem  than  any  other  nobles  of 
the  Morea.  They  had  both  fought  for  Charles  I.  at  Taglia- 
cozzo,  they  had  both  been  chosen  to  fight  for  him  at 
Bordeaux ;  and  Chauderon  held  the  post  of  admiral  of  the 
kingdom  of  Naples.  Their  advice  was,  therefore,  likely  to 
be  accepted  by  the  king.  During  their  visits  to  Naples  they 
had  made  the  acquaintance  of  a  young  noble  from  Flanders, 
Florent  d'Avesnes,  brother  of  the  Count  of  Hainault,  and 
scion  of  a  family  which  had  greatly  distinguished  itself  in  the 
stormy  history  of  the  near  East  His  great-grandfather  had 
stood  by  the  side  of  Cceur-de-Lion  at  the  siege  of  Acre  ;  his 
grandfather  had  married  the  daughter  of  the  first  Latin 
emperor  of  Constantinople ;  his  great-uncle  had  been  the 
Jacques  d'Avesnes,  who  had  conquered  Euboea  and  been 
wounded  at  the  siege  of  Corinth.  Florent's  father  had  been 
noted  for  his  reckless  extravagance  and  his  amorous 
adventures,  and,  as  he  left  seven  children,  there  was  not 
much  prospect  for  a  younger  son  of  the  family  in  the  old 
home.  Energetic  and  ambitious,  the  young  noble  was  not 
content  to  live  on  the  small  appanage  of  Braine-le-Comte  and 
Hal,  which  his  eldest  brother  had  given  him ;  so,  about  two 
1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  223. 


* 


170  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

years  before  this  date,  he  had  gone  to  seek  his  fortune  at  the 
Neapolitan  court,  where  he  had  received  the  post  of  grand 
constable  of  the  kingdom  of  Sicily,  and  the  captaincy  of 
Corfii.  But  he  was  not  satisfied  with  these  dignities ;  he  had, 
no  doubt,  heard  of  the  discontent  in  the  Morea  with  the 
existing  method  of  government,  and  he  saw  therein  a  means 
of  furthering  his  own  ambition.  Accordingly,  he  approached 
the  two  Achaian  barons  on  the  subject,  and  suggested  that 
they  should  ask  the  king  to  give  him  in  marriage  the  hand  of 
the  widowed  Isabelle  de  Villehardouin,  who  was  still  living 
in  the  Castel  dell*  Uovo,  at  Naples,  like  a  prisoner  of  state, 
and  to  appoint  him  Prince  of  Achaia.  At  the  same  time,  he 
pointed  out,  that  if  he  became  prince,  they  would  remain  the 
masters.  The  scheme  met  with  their  approval ;  they  chose 
a  favourable  moment  for  addressing  the  lame  monarch,  and 
then  frankly  laid  before  him  the  dangers  of  the  present 
situation.  "Your  bailie  and  your  soldiers,"  they  said, 
"tyrannise  over  the  poor,  wrong  the  rich,  seek  their  own 
advantage  and  neglect  the  country.  Unless  you  send  a 
man,"  they  added,  "  who  will  always  stay  there,  and  who,  as 
heir  of  the  Villehardouins,  will  make  it  his  object  to  advance 
the  country's  interests,  you  will — mark  our  words — lose  the 
principality  altogether."  They  then  reminded  King  Charles 
that  his  sister-in-law,  the  late  Prince  William's  daughter, 
"  the  Lady  of  the  Morea,"  as  she  was  called,  was  living  in 
widowhood,  and  prayed  him  to  marry  her  to  some  great 
nobleman,  who  would  govern  Achaia  to  his  Majesty's  benefit. 
Charles  II.  listened  to  their  advice,  realising  that  hitherto 
Achaia  had  been  a  source  of  expense  to  the  crown  of  Naples 
and  was  being  rapidly  ruined.  He  gave  his  consent  to  the 
marriage,  but  only  on  condition  that,  if  Isabelle  survived 
Florent,  neither  she  nor  her  daughter  nor  any  other  female 
descendant  of  hers,  should  marry  without  the  king's  consent. 
If  this  condition  were  not  observed,  the  possession  of  the 
principality  was  at  once  to  revert  to  the  crown  of  Naples. 
This  stipulation,  against  which  the  author  of  The  Chronicle 
of  the  Morea  strongly  protests,  was,  twelve  years  afterwards, 
enforced  against  Isabelle  herself,  and,  a  generation  later, 
against  her  ill-fated  daughter  Matilda. 

Meanwhile,  all  parties  were  delighted  at  the  marriage. 


ISABELLAS  MARRIAGE  171 

The  Lady  of  the  Morea,  still  only  twenty-five  years  old,  must 
have  rejoiced  at  the  prospect  of  leaving  her  gilded  cage  and 
returning  to  her  native  land,  which  she  had  left  as  a  child 
eighteen  years  before.  The  wedding  ceremony  was  performed 
with  much  state  by  the  Archbishop  of  Naples,  in  September 
1289,  and  the  king  invested  Isabelle  and  her  husband 
with  the  principality  of  Achaia.  Then  the  young  couple  set 
out  for  their  principality ;  on  their  arrival  at  Glarentza,  the 
bailie  hastened  to  meet  them,  and  summoned  the  prelates, 
barons,  knights,  esquires,  and  burgesses  to  hear  the  orders  of 
the  king.  In  the  Minorite  church  there,  the  king's  letters 
were  read  aloud,  both  in  Latin  and  in  the  vulgar  tongue,  after 
which,  the  new  prince  took  the  customary  oath  to  observe 
the  customs  of  the  country  and  the  franchises  of  his  vassals, 
and  then  he  received  their  homage  and  the  possession  of  the 
principality  from  the  hands  of  the  bailie.1  In  the  following 
spring,  Charles  II.  ordered  the  title  of  "Prince  of  Achaia," 
which  he  and  his  father  had  used  from  the  death  of  Prince 
William  down  to  1289,2  to  be  removed  from  the  Great  Seal 
of  the  kingdom  of  Naples ;  henceforth  it  figures  in  the  docu- 
ments of  Isabelle  and  Florent,  and  on  the  coins  which  they 
struck  at  Glarentza  to  replace  the  Achaian  currency  of 
Charles  II.  and  his  father.3 

While  the  war  against  the  Greeks  had  been  going  on  all 
these  years  in  the  Morea,  the  house  of  Anjou  had  also 
pressed  its  claims  in  Epiros.  So  long  as  the  Despot 
Michael  II.  lived,  Charles  I.  had,  indeed,  been  unable  to 
make  progress  in  the  Highland  country  beyond  the  Adriatic 
He  had  merely  sent  Jean  de  Cl£ry  to  take  possession  of  the 
Epirote  possessions,  which  the  treaty  of  Viterbo  had  conferred 
upon  him,  and  his  envoy  had  occupied  the  excellent  harbour 
of  Valona,  upon  which  modern  Italy  casts  longing  glances. 

»  X.  r.  M.,  11.  8476-8652  ;  L.  d.  C,  288-97  ;  Buchon,  Recherches  histo- 
riques,  ii.,  498-9;  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  pp.  338-42;  C.  d.  Af.9 
465-6 ;  it  is  not  necessary  to  assume,  with  Buchon,  that  "  the  vulgar 
tongue"  was  Greek;  for  Charles  II.  wrote,  as  usual,  in  Latin;  hence 
"  the  vulgar  tongue  "  would  be  French. 

8  He  is  so  described  in  a  letter  of  that  year  apud  Muratori,  op.  cit^ 
xiv.,  955. 

3  Coins  of  Charles  II.,  Isabelle  and  Florent  in  Buchon,  A tlas%  xxi v., 
6,  7,  8  ;  and  in  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  315. 


I 


172  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

But,  not  many  months  after  the  death  of  Michael  II.,  the 
Albanian  chiefs,  by  reason  of  their  "  devotion  to  the  holy 
Roman  Church,"  recognised  Charles  of  Anjou,  the  champion 
of  the  papacy,  as  their  king,  did  homage  to  his  repre- 
sentatives, and  received  from  him  a  renewal  of  the  privileges 
granted  to  their  forefathers  by  the  Byzantine  emperors. 
Chinardo's  brother  was  then  made  Viceroy  of  Albania, 
Chinardo's  children  were  put  safely  under  lock  and  key  in 
the  prison  of  Trani,  the  treaty  of  Viterbo  was  ratified  by 
Charles's  son-in-law,  Philip  I.  of  Courtenay,  now  titular 
emperor,  at  Foggia  in  1274,  and  the  feeble  Despot  of  Epiros, 
Nikeph6ros  I.,  unable  to  protect  himself  against  the  emperor 
Michael  VIII.,  recognised  Charles  as  his  suzerain,  sent  his 
son  as  a  hostage  to  Glarentza,  and  handed  over  to  the 
Angevins  the  castle  of  Butrinto,  the  classic  Buthrotum,  and 
other  places  once  held  by  Chinardo.  A  vigorous  attempt 
was  now  at  last  made  to  attack  the  emperor  by  land  and 
sea.  A  force  of  3000  men  was  sent  over  to  Epiros,  and 
placed  under  the  command  of  Hugues  de  Sully,  nicknamed 
Le  Rousseau  from  his  red  hair,  a  native  of  Burgundy,  who 
had  accompanied  Charles  to  Naples,  and  had  been  appointed 
in  1278  Captain-General  and  Vicar  of  Albania  and  Corfu. 
Ros  Solum&s  or  Rosonsoul€s,  as  the  Byzantine  historians 
call  him,  was  a  big,  handsome  man,  but  a  most  unfortunate 
commander,  proud,  headstrong,  and  passionate.  His  men, 
among  whom  were  many  Saracens,  shared  his  over-con- 
fidence, and  were  already  partitioning  in  their  own  minds 
the  dominions  of  the  emperor,  as  the  Frank  Crusaders  had 
really  done  three-quarters  of  a  century  earlier.  But  the 
Angevin  expedition,  which  was  to  have  conquered  the 
empire,  got  no  farther  than  Berat,  the  picturesque  Albanian 
stronghold  defended  by  its  river  and  its  rocky  fortress. 
The  emperor  despatched  a  force  to  relieve  the  place,  the 
red-haired  giant  fell  from  his  horse,  and,  lying  helpless  in  his 
heavy  armour,  was  captured  by  the  Greeks,  or  their  Turkish 
auxiliaries.1     On  the  news   of  his  capture,  his  men  fled   in 

1  Buchon,  NouvelUs  Recherche  I.,  i.,  206,  231-2  ;  II.,  i.,  314,  316-19  ; 
L.  d.  C,  257-8  ;  Pachym6res,  i.,  508-19  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  146-8  ; 
Sanudo,  129-30  ;  Ducange,  op.  ctf.t  ii.,  324  ;  Arch.  Stor.  /fa/.y  Ser.  IV.,  ii., 
199,  355  J  iv.,  17. 


TREATY  OF  ORVIETO  173 

panic,  and  the  captives  were  led,  like  prisoners  in  a  Roman 
triumph,  through  the  streets  of  Constantinople,  where  Sully 
languished  for  years  in  the  imperial  dungeons.  Such  was 
the  joy  of  the  emperor,  that  he  commissioned  an  artist  to 
depict  the  victory  of  Berat  upon  the  walls  of  his  palace. 
The  reacquisition  of  Durazzo  completed  the  success  of  his 
arms,  and  the  harbour  of  Valona  and  the  castle  of  Butrinto 
alone  remained  to  the  Angevins  in  Epiros.  At  sea,  the 
Angevin  fleet,  manned  by  Franks  from  the  Morea  and  partly 
led  by  Marco  II.  Sanudo,  Duke  of  Naxos,  did  more  harm 
than  good  to  the  Latin  cause  in  the  Levant,  as  the  duke's 
relative  confesses,  so  that  the  double  attack  upon  the  empire 
had  failed.  Nor  was  the  treaty  for  the  recovery  of  the  realm 
of  Romania,  which  was  concluded  at  Orvieto  in  1281,  thanks 
to  the  efforts  of  Leonardo  of  Veroli,  the  ever-useful  chancellor 
of  Achaia,  between  Charles, "  Prince  of  Achaia,"  his  son-in-law, 
Philip  I.  of  Courtenay,  titular  emperor  of  Romania,  and  the 
Venetian  republic,  any  more  productive  of  results.  The 
treaty  seemed  on  paper  to  be  a  masterpiece  of  statecraft,  for 
it  brought  Venice,  so  long  neutral,  into  line  against  the 
Greeks.  Charles  and  Philip  were  to  provide  some  8000 
horses  and  sufficient  men  to  ride  them  ;  Venice  was  to  equip 
forty  galleys  or  more,  in  order  to  secure  the  command  of  the 
sea;  the  year  1283  was  fixed  for  the  expedition,  in  which  all 
the  three  high  contracting  parties  were  to  take  part  in 
person ;  finally,  there  was  to  be  neither  peace  nor  truce  with 
Michael  VIII.  or  his  heirs.  But  nothing  practical  ever 
came  of  the  treaty  of  Orvieto.  History  can  only  say  of  it, 
that  it  was  one  more  of  the  many  diplomatic  failures  to  solve 
the  Eastern  question.  Charles  did,  indeed,  collect  another 
small  fleet,  of  which  nine  vessels  were  provided  by  Duke 
William  of  Athens,  and  six  by  the  bailie  of  the  Morea, 
Lagonessa,  and  the  Venetians  began  to  make  preparations. 
But  the  French  squadron  fell  foul  of  the  Venetians,  and  the 
Greek  admiral,  John  de  lo  Cavo,  the  terrible  ex-pirate, 
captured  two  rich  Venetian  merchantmen.1  Then,  sud- 
denly the  Angevin  power  in  Sicily  received  a  blow,  which 
in   a  single   night    destroyed    all    the    ambitious    plans   of 

1  Fontes  Rcr.  Austr.^  xiv.,  287-308,  337,  351  ;  Laurentius  dc  Monacis, 
151  ;  Sanudo,  130,  132,  173. 


174  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

Charles  against  the  East     In  1282  took  place  the  Sicilian 
vespers. 

Greek  diplomacy  had  not  been  altogether  unconnected 
with  that  ghastly  tragedy.  Excommunicated  by  the  new 
pope,  Martin  IV.,  a  Frenchman  and  a  creature  of  Charles, 
Michael  VIII.  saw  that  the  farce  of  uniting  the  Eastern  and 
Western  churches  was  played  out.  He  accordingly  entered 
into  negotiations  with  the  deadly  enemy  of  the  house  of 
Anjou,  Peter  III.  of  Aragon,  employing  as  his  inter- 
mediaries his  brother-in-law,  Benedetto  Zaccaria,  member  of 
a  rich  Genoese  family  which  had  been  entrusted  by  the 
emperor  with  the  administration  of  the  rich  alum  mines  of 
Phokaia  in  Asia  Minor ;  a  Lombard,  named  Accardo,  from 
Lodi ;  and  the  celebrated  Giovanni  di  Procida,  who  visited 
Constantinople  in  the  guise  of  a  Franciscan  monk.  The 
emperor  was  to  pay  the  King  of  Aragon  an  annual  subsidy 
of  £26,880  so  long  as  the  war  against  the  Angevins  lasted, 
and  some  portion  of  this  sum  was  provided  by  the  clan  of 
Zaccaria.1  Michael  VIII.  received  full  value  for  his  money; 
for  the  fall  of  the  Angevin  power  in  Sicily  not  only  freed  him 
from  a  dangerous  enemy,  but  also  deprived  the  Frank  states 
in  Greece  of  valuable  support  Not  without  reason  has  it 
been  said  that  the  Sicilian  vespers  sounded  the  knell  of 
French  rule  in  Hellas.2  Their  immediate  result  was  to  stop 
any  attempt  to  carry  out  the  programme  laid  down  at 
Orvieto.  In  Epiros  the  Angevin  commanders  contented 
themselves  with  holding  the  pitiful  remnant  of  the  Neapolitan 
possessions — a  task  rendered  less  difficult  owing  to  the 
feeble  character  of  the  Despot  Nikeph6ros  I.,  the  attacks  made 
upon  him  and  upon  the  emperor  by  the  ever-restless  bastard  of 
Neopatras,  and  by  the  death,  in  the  very  year  of  the  Sicilian 
vespers,  of  the  emperor  himself.  The  last  act  of  Michael 
VIII.  was  to  let  loose  the  Tartars  against  the  crafty  rival  at 

1  Sanudo,  132,  147,  173  ;  Ptolemaeus  Lucensis  apud  Muratori,  op.  cit., 
xi.,  1 186;  Hopf,  Les  Giustiniani,  9 ;  Conspiration  de  Jean  ProcAyta(cd. 
Buchon),  pp.  1-6,  17-18;  Nikephdros  Gregoras  (loc.cit.)  evidently  alludes 
to  this  when  he  says  that  Michael  sent  money  to  "  Frederick  (sic),  King 
of  Sicily,"  to  stop  Charles's  fleet,  confusing  King  Peter  of  Aragon  with  his 
son  Frederick,  who  became  King  of  Sicily  fourteen  years  later. 

2  Pouqueville,  Voyage  dans  la  Grhey  iv.,  90. 


COLLAPSE  OF  THE  LATIN  LEAGUE  175 

Neopatras,  who  had  so  often  been  a  thorn  in  his  side.  The 
death  of  the  titular  emperor  of  Romania  in  the  following 
year  removed  one  of  the  signatories  of  the  treaty  of  Orvieto ; 
another,  the  great  Charles  of  Anjou,  died  in  1285,  leaving  his 
successor  a  prisoner  of  the  Aragonese,  and  in  the  same  year, 
Venice,  the  third  member  of  that  Triple  Alliance,  concluded 
an  armistice  for  ten  years  with  the  new  Emperor  Andr6nikos 
II.  Both  parties  were  given  a  free  hand  in  Negroponte ;  but 
the  emperor  promised  to  respect  the  Venetian  colonies  of 
Crete,  Coron,  and  Modon,  and  to  include  the  Duke  of  Naxos 
and  the  lord  of  Tenos  in  the  treaty,  provided  that  they  swore 
not  to  give  refuge  to  corsairs.  A  year  earlier  Andr6nikos 
had  gained  recognition  in  the  west,  and  practically 
extinguished  the  claims  of  the  house  of  Montferrat  to  the 
phantom  kingdom  of  Salonika  by  his  second  marriage  with 
Irene,  daughter  of  the  Marquis  William  VII.  and  of 
Beatrice  of  Castile,  who  brought  it  to  him  as  her  dowry.1 
Thus  collapsed  the  coalition  for  the  restoration  of  the 
Latin  Empire. 

Freed  from  the  danger  of  attack  from  the  Franks, 
Andr6nikos  II.  resolved  to  secure  himself  against  the 
intrigues  of  his  hereditary  rival,  the  Duke  of  Neopatras. 
The  restless  bastard  had  not  been  sobered  by  advancing 
years,  and  his  eldest  son,  Michael,  had  begun  to  display  all 
the  ambitious  activity  which  had  characterised  his  father  in 
his  prime.  The  emperor  thought  it  wise  to  take  measures 
in  time  against  a  repetition  of  those  movements  in  Thessaly 
which  had  given  so  much  trouble  to  his  father.  In  order  to 
be  quite  sure  of  success,  he  tried  both  force  and  craft,  sending 
an  army  and  a  fleet  of  about  eighty  ships  under  Tarchanei6tes 
and  Atexios  Raoul,  an  official  of  French  descent,  from  whose 
family,  according  to  some  authorities,  the  great  clan  of 
Ralles  derives  its  origin  and  name;  at  the  same  time,  he 
entered  into  negotiations  with  his  cousin  Anna,  the  masculine 
wife  of  Nikeph6ros  I.,  Despot  of  Epiros,  for  entrapping 
young  Michael  by  some  feminine  stratagem.  Anna's  skill 
proved  superior  to  that  of  the  imperial  commanders.     While 

1  Pachym^res,  i.,  524-5,  ii.,  87  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  149,  167, 
168  ;  Fontes  Rer.  Austr.,  xiv.,  322-53  ;  Memorials  Potestatum  Regien- 
sium,  apud  Muratori,  op,  cit,,  viii.,  1 164-5. 


V 


176  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

they  wasted  time  in  restoring  the  fortifications  of  Demetrias, 
near  the  modern  Volo,  until  pestilence  slew  Tarchanei6tes 
and  dispersed  his  followers,  the  cunning  Princess  of  Epiros 
obtained  possession  of  her  nephew  under  the  pretext  of 
marrying  him  to  one  of  her  daughters,  and  then  sent  him  in 
chains  to  Constantinople,  where  he  languished  in  prison  for 
the  rest  of  his  life.  Once,  indeed,  he  managed  to  escape, 
thanks  to  the  aid  of  Henry,  an  Englishman,  presumably  a 
member  of  the  Varangian  guard,  who  had  been  appointed 
his  chief  gaoler.  Hiring  a  fishing-smack,  they  set  sail  in  the 
night  for  Eubcea,  hoping  to  make  their  way  thence  to 
Athens,  where  Michael's  sister,  Helene,  was  then  duchess 
and  regent1  But  one  of  those  sudden  storms  so  common  in 
the  Levant  arose  in  the  Marmara;  their  vessel  was  driven 
ashore  at  Rodosto,  and  they  were  there  recaptured  by  the 
imperial  authorities.  Many  efforts  were  made  to  induce 
Andr6nikos  to  release  his  prisoner,  but  in  vain.  Years  rolled 
on,  and  at  last  Michael,  grown  desperate,  resolved  to  kill  the 
emperor,  even  if  he  perished  himself.  His  prison  was  near 
the  imperial  apartments,  and  he  therefore  determined  to  set 
fire  to  his  cell,  in  hope  that  the  flames  would  reach  the 
emperor's  bedchamber.  Unluckily  for  the  success  of  his 
plan,  Andr6nikos  was  still  awake  when  the  fire  broke  out ; 
orders  were  at  once  given  to  extinguish  the  conflagration, 
and  Michael,  fighting  like  a  tiger,  was  felled  at  the  door 
of  his  cell  by  one  of  the  axes  of  the  bodyguard. 
His  father  had  avenged  him  upon  the  treacherous  Anna 
by  ravaging  the  Despotat  of  Epiros;  and  it  was  to 
save  himself  from  these  attacks  that  the  un warlike  Nike- 
ph6ros  consented  to  become  tributary  to  the  King  of 
Naples.2 

The  founder  of  a  dynasty  is  always  able,  and  his  son 
almost  as  invariably  feeble.  So  it  was  with  Andr6nikos  II. 
Nature  had  intended  him  for  a  professor  of  theology,  to 
which  engrossing  subject  he  devoted  what  time  he  could 
spare  from  the  neglect  of  his  civil  and  military  duties.  In 
order  to  obtain  money  for  the  Orthodox  Church  and  the 
imperial  court,  he  allowed  the  navy  to  rot  in  the  Golden 

1  PachymeVes,  by  a  confusion,  makes  her  ruler  of  Euboea, 
a  Pachymdres,  ii.,  67-77,  201. 


FLORENTS  ADMINISTRATION  17? 

Horn,  after  the  fashion  of  the  present  sultan ;  his  courtiers 
told  him  that  there  was  nothing  more  to  fear  from  the  Latins 
after  the  death  of  Charles  of  Anjou,  so  that  an  efficient  fleet 
was  a  sheer  extravagance.  He  dismissed  the  half-breeds, 
who  were  his  best  sailors,  allowing  some  of  them  to  enter 
the  service  of  the  Franks,  and  thus  permitted  the  pirates 
to  scour  the  seas  unchecked.1  Meanwhile,  the  handwrit- 
ing was  on  the  wall;  the  Turks  were  advancing  in 
Asia  Minor,  yet  the  pedant  on  the  throne  of  the  Caesars 
seemed  to  regard  their  intrusion  as  of  less  moment  to 
the  empire  than  that  of  the  filioque  clause  into  the 
creed. 

Under  these  circumstances,  it  was  no  wonder  that 
Andr6nikos  was  glad  to  suspend,  by  agreement  with  the 
new  Prince  of  Achaia,  the  attempts  which  his  father  had 
made  for  the  reconquest  of  the  Morea.  The  first  act  of 
Florent  was  to  replace  all  the  existing  civil  and  military 
authorities  by  his  own  men,  and  to  redress  the  grievances 
of  the  principality,  which  he  found  utterly  exhausted  by  the 
exactions  of  the  Angevin  officials  and  mercenaries.  He 
endeavoured  to  make  the  foreign  blood-suckers  atone  for 
their  maladministration  by  compelling  them  to  disgorge 
their  ill-gotten  gains,  and  such  was  his  severity  towards 
them  that  he  received  a  significant  hint  from  King  Charles 
to  temper  justice  with  mercy.  As  for  the  future,  he  wisely 
adopted  the  advice  of  such  experienced  men  as  old  Nicholas 
de  St  Omer,  Geoffroy  de  Tournay,  and  Jean  de  Chauderon, 
who  urged  him,  in  accordance  with  the  general  opinion,  to 
make  a  durable  truce  with  the  Greek  Emperor  as  the  only 
way  of  preventing  the  further  decline  of  the  principality. 
He  accordingly  sent  two  envoys  to  the  Byzantine  governor 
(or  K€<pa\?j)  at  MistrS,  suggesting  that  an  armistice  should 
be  concluded.  The  governors  of  the  Byzantine  province 
were,  however,  at  that  period,  appointed  for  no  longer  than 
a  year,  and  the  then  governor's  term  of  office  had  almost 
expired.  He,  however,  at  the  advice  of  the  local  Greek 
magnates,  referred  the  proposal  to  the  emperor,  who  joyfully 
accepted  it,  all  the  more  so  because  he  was  at  the  moment 
harassed  by  the  Turks  in  Asia,  by  the  Despot  of  Epiros, 

1  Pachymdres,  ii.,  69-71  ;  Nikephdros  Gregorys,  i.,  174-6. 

M 


I 


178  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

and  by  the  Bulgarian  Tsar.1  Andr6nikos  sent  to  the  Morea 
a  great  magnate,  Philanthropen6s,  who  belonged  to  one  of 
the  twelve  ancient  Byzantine  families,  and  was  apparently 
the  same  person  as  the  Al^xios  Philanthropen6s  who  was 
grandson  of  the  former  Byzantine  admiral,  and  a  few  years 
later  rebelled  and  proclaimed  himself  emperor.2  The  new 
governor  met  Florent  at  Andravida,  where  the  heads  of  a 
treaty  were  drawn  up  in  writing  between  them.  But  the 
cautious  Fleming  was  still  not  content  with  the  signature  of 
an  annual  official,  of  however  high  rank.  He  pointed  out 
that,  as  he  was  a  prince,  the  emperor's  autograph  should 
accompany  his  own.  Philanthropen6s  agreed;  two  Greek 
archons  and  two  Greek-speaking  French  barons,  Jean  de 
Chauderon  and  Geoffroy  d'Aunoy,  baron  of  Kyparissia, 
accompanied  him  to  Constantinople,  and  Andr6nikos,  glad  to 
be  relieved  of  the  expense  caused  by  the  warfare  in  the 
Morea,  signed  the  treaty  with  the  purple  ink,  and  sealed  it 
with  the  golden  seal  in  their  presence.  For  full  seven  years 
the  principality  enjoyed  repose,  which  was  welcome  to  both 
Greeks  and  Franks  alike.  The  ravages  of  the  Angevin 
officials  and  their  mercenaries  were  repaired ;  "all  grew  rich," 
says  the  chronicler,  "  Franks  and  Greeks,  and  the  land  waxed 
so  fat  and  plenteous  in  all  things,  that  the  people  knew  not 
the  half  of  what  they  possessed."  8 

Unfortunately,  by  a  custom  of  international  law  which 
then  prevailed,  a  truce  between  two  rulers  was  considered  no 
bar  to  the  offer  of  assistance  by  one  of  them  to  the  enemy  of 
the  other.  One  of  the  reasons  which  had  induced  Andronikos 
to  make  peace  in  the  Morea  was,  as  we  saw,  his  difficult 
position  in  Epiros.  The  Despot  Nikeph6ros,  or  rather  his 
wife  Anna,  who  really  inspired  his  policy,  was  at  this  moment 
smarting  under  that  spretce  injuria  fornix  which  had  caused 
so  many  woes  to  the  ancient  Greek  world.  She  had 
rendered   a  great   service    to    the    emperor    by    betraying 

1  "  L'Empereur  de  Jaguora  n  (L.  d.  C,  300).  "  Jaguora  "  is  Zagora,  not 
Angora,  as  Buchon  supposes. 

s  PachymeVes,  ii.,  210-29 ;  Krit6boulos,  the  historian  of  Mohammed 
II.,  seems  to  allude  to  his  appointment  (Miiller,  Fragtnenta  historicorum 
Gracorum%  v.,  104). 

*  X.  r.  M.t  8653-8781  ;  L.  d.  C,  297-300,  472. 


WAR  IN  EPIROS  179 

Michael  of  Neopatras  into  his  hands,  and  she  claimed  her 
reward,  which  was  to  consist  of  a  marriage  between  her  very 
beautiful  daughter,  Thamar,  and  the  emperor's  eldest  son. 
She  added  as  an  inducement,  that  after  her  husband's  death 
she  would  transfer  the  Despotat  to  the  emperor,  regardless  of 
the  claims  of  her  son  Thomas,  a  child  of  feeble  character, 
whom  she  judged  incapable  of  governing  in  troublous  times. 
The  offer  was  a  good  one,  for  it  would  have  ended  the  long 
rivalry  between  Epiros  and  Constantinople  and  have  reunited 
a  large  part  of  the  Byzantine  Empire.  But  the  patriarch 
opposed  a  marriage  between  second  cousins ;  as  a  theologian, 
Andr6nikos  agreed  with  the  patriarch,  as  a  politician  of 
short  views,  he  fancied  that  he  had  found  a  better  match  for 
his  son  in  the  person  of  Catherine  of  Courtenay,  grand- 
daughter of  Baldwin  II.,  whose  claims  as  titular  empress  of 
Constantinople  would  be  extinguished  by  her  marriage  with 
the  real  heir.1  As  a  matter  of  fact,  this  alternative  alliance 
came  to  nothing,  while  the  rejection  of  the  beauteous  Thamar 
determined  her  father  to  wipe  out  this  insult.  The  bastard 
of  Neopatras  also,  if  we  may  believe  the  much  later  Chronicle 
of  Galaxidi?  seized  this  opportunity  of  avenging  the  emperor's 
treatment  of  his  eldest  son,  who  was  at  that  time  a  prisoner 
in  Constantinople ;  "  with  tears  in  his  eyes,"  he  appealed  to 
the  mountaineers  of  Loidoriki  and  the  sailors  of  Galaxidi  to 
come  to  his  aid.  Two  hundred  chosen  men  came  from  either 
place  with  the  intention  to  do  or  die ;  but  in  a  battle  near 
Lamia,  they  were  basely  deserted  by  their  comrades;  the 
Galaxidiotes  perished  to  a  man,  boldly  fighting  sword  in 
hand ;  a  quarter  of  the  contingent  from  Loidoriki  was  left 
on  the  field ;  and  the  bastard,  who  had  witnessed  so  many 
fights,  only  escaped  capture  by  flight.  Nikeph6ros  was  now 
exposed  to  the  full  force  of  the  imperial  army,  which,  44,000 
strong,  crossed  over  from  Thessaly  by  way  of  Metzovo  to 
Joannina,  the  second  most  important  city  of  the  Despotat, 
which  had  been  recovered  from  its  former  imperial  garrison. 
Meanwhile,  the  emperor  had  chartered  sixty  Genoese  galleys 
with  orders  to  enter  the  Ambrakian  Gulf. 

Thus  menaced  by  land  and  sea,  Nikephoros  sought  the 
advice  of  his  chief  men,  who  recommended  him  to  seek  the  aid 
1  Pachym^res,  ii.,  153,  200-2.  *  Pp.  203-4. 


i 


I 


180  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

of  Florent,  who  had  married  his  niece  and  whose  Frankish 
chivalry  was  famous  in  the  whole  Greek  world.  Envoys 
were  accordingly  sent  in  1292  to  the  Achaian  capital  of 
Andravida,  where  the  matter  was  discussed  in  the  church 
of  the  Divine  Wisdom;  the  older  men,  who  remembered 
the  mishaps  which  had .  accrued  to  the  Morea  from  the 
Epirote  campaign  of  Prince  William,  thirty-three  years 
before,  were  opposed  to  a  repetition  of  that  adventure ;  but 
dynastic  reasons  and  the  national  love  of  glory  prevailed, 
and  it  was  agreed,  that  Florent  should  join  his  wife's  uncle 
with  500  picked  warriors,  on  condition  that  the  Despot  gave 
them  their  pay  and  sent  his  only  surviving  son  Thomas  as  a 
hostage  to  the  Morea.  At  the  same  time,  and  on  the  same 
terms,  Nikeph6ros  secured  the  aid  of  Count  Richard  of 
Cephalonia  and  100  of  his  islanders,  sending  him,  as  a  pledge 
of  his  good  faith,  his  daughter  Maria. 

The  three  allies  met  at  Arta,  and  resolved  on  a  march 
upon  Joannina ;  but,  before  they  had  reached  that  place,  the 
imperial  army  had  fled  in  panic,  nor  could  their  chivalrous 
appeals  to  the  honour  of  the  Greek  commander,  whose 
Turkish  and  Cuman  auxiliaries  would  only  obey  their  own 
chiefs,  prevail  upon  him  to  give  them  battle.  After  a  brief 
raid  into  the  emperor's  territory,  they  were  hastily  recalled 
by  the  news  that  the  Genoese  galleys  had  arrived  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Ambrakian  Gulf,  that  the  sailors  had  landed  at 
Preveza,  and  that  they  were  marching  straight  for  Arta.1  The 
Despot  feared  for  his  capital,  for  the  Genoese  were  noted  for 
their  skill  in  sieges,  and  1000  horsemen  were  despatched  in 
hot  haste  to  stop  them.  But  the  flight  of  the  imperial  army, 
which  was  to  have  co-operated  with  them  by  land,  had  dis- 
couraged the  Genoese ;  some  of  their  comrades  were  cut  off 
by  the  cavalry ;  and,  when  Florent  arrived  and  pitched  his 
camp  at  Salagora,  where  the  galleys  were  lying  at  anchor, 
so  as  to  prevent  them  from  landing,  they  sailed  away  to 
Vonitza  on  the  south  of  the  gulf,2  whence  they  ravaged  the 
Despotat  unchecked  as  far  as  the  island  of  Santa  Mavra, 
which  then  formed  part  of  it.  Then  they  returned  to 
Constantinople ;  the  allies  of  the  Despot  dispersed  ;  and  his 

1  Here  ends  the  Italian  version  of  the  Chronicle. 

2  Here  ends  the  Greek  version. 


THE  NAME  OF  SANTA  MAVRA  181 

son  was  released  from  his  detention  at  ChloumoQtsi.  Count 
Richard  of  Cephalonia  did  not,  however,  send  back  his 
hostage,  but  married  her  to  his  eldest  son  John,  a  fine, 
strapping  man,  for  whom  no  lady  of  Romania  was  good 
enough.  Great  was  the  indignation  of  Nikeph6ros,  who 
had  looked  higher  than  the  heir  of  the  county  palatine; 
but  Epiros  had  no  navy,  and  the  count,  safe  in  his  island 
domain,  could  smile  at  his  late  ally's  impotent  wrath,1  which 
was  increased  by  the  count's  refusal  to  carry  out  his  promise 
of  bestowing  the  famous  "island  of  Ithaka,  or  the  fort  of 
Koron6s,"  in  Cephalonia,  upon  his  son.2  Nikeph6ros  had 
acted  more  generously,  for  he  had  grown  fond  of  his  hand- 
some son-in-law,  to  whom  he  seems  to  have  given  the  island 
of  Leukas,  or  Santa  Mavra,  as  it  now  began  to  be  called.8 
The  history  of  Santa  Mavra,  and  the  origin  of  its  name,  are 
somewhat  obscure ;  but  it  appears  to  have  belonged  to  the 
despots  of  Epiros,  in  connection  with  whom  we  have  more 
than  once  had  occasion  to  allude  to  it,  down  to  a  little  before 
the  year  1300,  when  it  is  mentioned,  under  the  names  of 
"Luccate"  and  "  Lettorna,"  in  two  Angevin  documents,  as 
belonging  to  John  of  Cephalonia.  In  one  of  these  documents, 
Charles  II.  of  Naples  gives  John  permission  to  build  a  fort  in 
"  Lettorna,"  and  from  this  fort,  which  is  known  to  have  been 
subsequently  called  "  Santa  Mavra,"  some  scholars  derive  the 
common  name  of  the  island,  while  others  think  that  it  had 
the  name  even  before  the  erection  of  the  fort4  Santa  Mavra 
is  a  popular  saint,  alike  in  Greece  and  Italy,  so  that  her  name 

1  X.  r.  M.,  11.  8782  to  end ;  L.  d.  C,  302-20;  L.  d.  K,  100-3  J  Con- 
tinuator  Caflfari  apud  Pertz,  Monumenta  German*  Histy  xviii.,  338 ; 
Buchon,  Recherches  Ais  tongues,  ii.,  482. 

2  Riccio,  Saggio  di  Codice  Diplomatico,  Supp.,  part  I.,  87.  The  south- 
east corner  of  Cephalonia  is  still  called  Koronof. 

3  This  is  an  inference  from  the  two  facts  that  Leukas  is  not  mentioned 
among  the  dominions  of  Richard  in  the  above-mentioned  inventory  of 
the  bishopric  of  Cephalonia  in  1264,  and  that  it  is  mentioned  as  belong- 
ing to  his  son  John  in  1300  ;  Roman6s,  Tpartavbt  ZApfa,  166,  297. 

4  The  Livre  de  la  Conqueste,  probably  composed  between  1333  and 
1 34 1,  mentions  "Saincte  Maure"  (p.  317)  in  describing  the  events  of 
1292  ;  the  fort  is  so  described  in  an  Angevin  document  of  1343,  in  Walter 
of  Brienne's  will  in  1347,  and  in  a  Venetian  document  of  1355,  where  the 
island  is  still  called  "Lucate" — an  indication  that  the  fort  was  called 
Santa  Mavra  before  the  island.     Roman6s,  op.  ci£,  301-2  ;    Blame's, 


i 


I 


182  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

would  appeal  alike  to  the  Italian  Orsini  and  to  the  native 
Greeks. 

The  Despot  was  able  to  console  himself  for  this  misalliance 
by  a  splendid  match  for  his  other  daughter,  the  beautiful 
Thamar,  whose  slighted  charms  had  been  the  cause  of  the 
late  war.  In  1294  the  Epirote  damsel  was  married  at  Naples 
to  Philip,  second  son  of  King  Charles  II.f  who  was  thus  able 
to  recover  by  a  dynastic  alliance  the  ground  which  his  house 
had  lost  by  the  sword  beyond  the  Adriatic.  The  King  of 
Naples  laid  his  plans  with  much  cunning.  Before  the 
marriage  took  place,  he  conferred  upon  his  son  the  princi- 
pality of  Taranto,  as  being  nearest  to  the  coveted  land  of 
Epiros ;  his  next  step  was  to  make  his  niece,  Catherine  of 
Courtenay,  titular  empress  of  Constantinople,  ratify  the 
treaty  of  Viterbo,  and  pledge  herself  never  to  marry  without 
the  consent  of  the  crown  of  Naples — a  piece  of  diplomacy 
which  he  attempted  to  justify  by  the  most  sickening  and 
transparent  excuses.  He  thus  had  in  his  own  hands  all  the 
claims  to  the  Latin  Empire  of  Romania,  which  still  counted 
for  something  in  diplomatic  circles.  He  then  transferred  all 
these  claims,  and  the  suzerainty  over  the  principality  of 
Achaia,  the  duchy  of  Athens,  the  kingdom  of  Albania,  and 
the  province  of  Wallachia  (or  Thessaly)  to  his  son,  on  whom 
he  also  bestowed  the  island  of  Corfu  with  the  castle  of 
Butrinto  on  the  opposite  coast  of  Epiros  and  its  dependencies 
— the  remnant,  in  fact,  of  the  Angevin  possessions  on  the 
Greek  mainland.  Thus,  in  1294,  Philip  of  Taranto  became 
suzerain  of  all  the  Frankish  states  in  Greece,  which  the  King 
of  Aragon,  the  great  rival  of  the  house  of  Anjou,  promised 
to  respect,  and  actual  owner  of  the  Angevin  dominion  in 
Corfu  and  on  the  Epirote  litoral,  over  which  his  father 
retained  the  overlordship.  A  prince  so  richly  endowed  with 
dignities  and  estates  was  a  desirable  son-in-law ;  nor  was  the 
Despot  moved  to  reject  such  a  marriage  for  his  daughter  on 
the  ground  that  the  King  of  Naples  was  still  keeping  his 
nephews,  the  sons  of  Helene  and  Manfred,  in  the  dungeons 
of  Santa  Maria  del  Monte,  the  fine  castle  which  still  stands 
near  Andria.     He   promised  to  give  Philip,  in  addition  to 

fH  Aev*As  inrb  rods  Qp&yicovt,  p.  25.     Cf.  the  author's  note  in  the  English 
Historical  Review,  xviii.,  513. 


PHILIP  OF  TARANTO  IN  EPIROS  183 

Thamar's  dowry  of  ^"44,800  -  a  year,  the  four  fortresses  of 
Lepanto,  Vonitza,  Angelokastro  and  Vrachori  (the  modern 
Agrinion);  if  his  son  Thomas  died,  Philip  was  to  become 
Despot  of  all  Epiros ;  if  he  lived  to  attain  his  majority,  he  was 
to  hold  the  heritage  of  his  ancestors  as  Philip's  vassal,  and 
cede  the  latter  another  castle  or  a  maritime  province.1  On  the 
other  hand,  Philip  pledged  himself  to  respect  the  religion  of  his 
wife  and  his  future  subjects ;  the  first  of  these  pledges  he  vio- 
lated ;  the  confidence  of  the  Greeks  in  the  second  must  have 
been  shaken  by  the  creation  of  a  Catholic  archbishopric  in  "  the 
royal  castle"  of  Lepanto,  whose  Greek  metropolitan,  hitherto 
the  chief  ecclesiastic  of  the  Despotat,  transferred  his  see  to 
Joannina,  out  of  the  reach  of  "  the  boastful,  haughty,  and 
rapacious  Italians."2  Philip  of  Taranto  was  now,  by  this 
extraordinary  arrangement,  master  of  the  best  positions  in 
iEtolia,  and  had  a  prospect  of  obtaining  the  whole  of  Epiros. 
The  other  branch  of  the  Angeli,  which  ruled  in  Thessaly,  was, 
indeed,  naturally  alarmed  at  this  extension  of  Angevin  sway 
in  Western  Greece,  and  the  two  younger  sons  of  the  old 
Duke  of  Neopatras  made  an  attack  upon  Art  a  and  captured 
Lepanto.  The  King  of  Naples  in  alarm  bade  Florent  of 
Achaia  and  Hugues  de  Brienne,  who  was  now  guardian  of 
the  young  Duke  of  Athens,  defend  Epiros.  But  this  was  a 
merely  temporary  acquisition,  almost  immediately  relin- 
quished ;  in  fact,  the  chief  result  of  these  feuds  between  the 
two  branches  of  the  Angeli  was  to  weaken  both  and  so 
benefit  the  Angevins.  Moreover,  the  Serbs  had  now  occupied 
the  north  of  the  Despotat,  so  that  the  Albanian  Catholic 
population  naturally  preferred  the  rule  of  a  prince  of  their 
own  faith  to  that  of  a  sovereign  who  was  a  member  of  the 
Orthodox  Church.  Philip  himself  was  able  to  pay  but  little 
attention  to  his  transmarine  possessions,  for,  like  his  father 
before  him,  he  was  taken  prisoner  by  the  Aragonese,  at  the 

1  Ducange,  op.  cit.y  ii.,  326-32  ;  Buchon,  Recherches  historigues,  i.,  320-4, 
455  ;  Nouvelles  Recherches^  II.,  i.,  306-8,  315-16,  407-9;  I.,  i.,  198-9  ;  Hopf 
apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv.,  338;  Buchon  identifies  "le  Blecola" 
with  Vrachori ;  PachymeVes,  ii.,  202  ;  Minieri  Riccio,  Delia  Dominazione 
Angioinay  7,  8  ;  Saggio,  Supp.,  part  i.,  56. 

'  Miklosich  und  M  tiller,  i.,  94, 470,  where  the  date  is  erroneously  given 
as  "about  1284."    It  should  be  1307.     Cf.  Regestum  dementis  V.,  ii,,  89* 


i 


} 


184  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

battle  of  Falconaria  in  1299,  and  was  not  released  till  the 
peace  of  Caltabellotta  in  1 302.  But  during  his  captivity  his 
interests  were  well  looked  after,  and  his  father  spared  no 
pains  to  conciliate  the  Epirotes.  Two  years  later,  Charles  II. 
renewed  the  settlement  of  1 294,  and  his  son  was  henceforth 
styled  "  Despot  of  Romania  and  Lord  of  the  Kingdom  of 
Albania" — the  former  of  which  titles  may  be  read  on  the 
coins  which  he  struck  at  his  mint  of  "  Nepant,"  or  Lepanto.1 

The  seven  years'  peace  which  the  Morea  enjoyed  during 
the  reign  of  Florent  was  disturbed  by  several  violent 
incidents.  Soon  after  the  return  of  the  prince  from  Epiros 
he  had  to  pay  a  visit  to  his  suzerain,  the  King  of  Naples,  and 
during  his  absence  in  1292  a  piratical  squadron  under  the 
command  of  Roger  de  Lluria,  the  famous  admiral  of  King 
James  of  Aragon,  made  its  appearance  in  Greek  waters. 
Lluria's  brother-in-law,  Berenguer  d'Entenga,  had  already 
ravaged  Corfu  and  the  coast  of  the  Despotat  of  Epiros,  but 
this  fresh  expedition  was  much  more  destructive.  Lluria 
himself  afterwards  told  Sanudo,  that  he  had  plundered  the 
emperor's  dominions,  because  the  latter  had  failed  to  pay  the 
subsidy  promised  to  King  Peter  of  Aragon  by  Michael  VIII., 
and,  as  the  truce  of  Gaeta,  between  the  houses  of  Anjou  and 
Aragon,  had  barely  expired,  he  did  not  attack  the  Franks  of 
Achaia  till  he  was  attacked  by  them ;  but  he  damaged  both 
Latin  and  Greek  islands  with  piratical  impartiality.  Chios, 
then  a  Byzantine  possession,  yielded  him  sufficient  mastic  to 
fill  two  galleys;  the  Latin  duchy  of  Naxos  afforded  him 
further  booty,  and  then  he  steered  his  course  for  Monemvasia. 
Since  the  re-establishment  of  Byzantine  rule  in  the  south  of 
the  Morea,  thirty  years  before,  Monemvasia  had  greatly 
increased  in  importance.  Michael  VIII.  had  granted  its 
citizens  valuable  fiscal  exemptions ;  his  pious  son  had  con- 
firmed their  privileges  and  possessions,  and  in  1293  gave  the 
metropolitan  the  title  of  "  Exarch  of  all  the  Peloponnesos," 
with  jurisdiction  over  eight  bishoprics,  some,  it  is  true,  still 
in  partibus  infideliunt>  and  confirmed  all  the  rights  and 
property  of  his  diocese,  which  was  raised  to  be  the  tenth  of 
the  empire  and  extended,  at  any  rate  on  paper,  right  across 

1  S&has,  T6  XpwuAv  toG  Ta\a^etStou9  16  ;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique^ 
388  ;  Riccio,  Saggio^  Supp.,  part  i.,  96. 


LLURIA  RAVAGES  GREECE  185 

the  peninsula  to  "Pylos,  which  is  called  Avarinos."  The 
emperor  lauds,  in  this  interesting  and  beautifully  illuminated 
document,  still  preserved  in  the  National  Library  and  (in  a 
copy)  in  the  Christian  Archaeological  Museum  at  Athens,  the 
convenience  and  safe  situation  of  the  town,  the  number  of  its 
inhabitants,  their  affluence  and  their  technical  skill,  their  sea- 
faring qualities,  and  their  devotion  to  his  throne  and  person.1 
Lluria  doubtless  found  abundant  booty  in  such  a  place ;  and 
he  was  able  to  sack  the  lower  town  without  slaughter,  for  the 
archons  and  the  people  took  refuge  in  the  impregnable  citadel 
which  has  defied  so  many  armies,  leaving  their  property  and 
their  metropolitan  in  his  power.  By  the  device  of  hoisting 
the  Venetian  flag  and  pretending  to  be  a  Venetian  merchant, 
he  managed  to  decoy  a  number  of  Mainates  down  to  his 
ships,  whom  he  carried  off  as  slaves.  Hitherto,  he  had  not 
molested  the  Frankish  part  of  the  Morea,  knowing  it  to  be 
under  the  suzerainty  of  Anjou ;  but  while  he  was  watering 
and  reposing  at  Navarino,  a  body  of  Greeks  and  Frankish 
knights  under  Giorgio  Ghisi,  the  captain  of  Kalamata,  and 
Jean  de  Tournay,  "the  finest  and  bravest  gentleman  in  all 
Morea,"  fell  upon  his  men.  A  hand-to-hand  fight  ensued ; 
Lluria  and  Jean  de  Tournay  charged  one  another  with  such 
force  that  their  lances  were  shivered  to  splinters,  and  the 
French  knight  fell  with  all  his  weight  over  the  body  of  his 
adversary.  Lluria's  men  would  have  slain  him,  had  not  their 
leader  bade  them  spare  so  gallant  a  warrior,  in  whom  he 
recognised  the  son  of  an  old  acquaintance  and  whom  he 
would  fain  have  had  for  his  own  son-in-law.  Most  of  the 
Franks  and  Greeks  were  soon  either  dead  or  prisoners,  and  it 
only  remained  for  Lluria  to  assess  and  collect  the  ransom. 
For  this  purpose  it  was  necessary  to  sail  to  Glarentza,  the 
chief  commercial  place  in  Achaia,  where  the  Princess  Isabelle 
was  then  residing.  When  the  red  galley  of  the  Aragonese 
commander  with  Jean  de  Tournay  on  board  hove  in  sight, 
the  Achaian  admiral  saluted  him  in  her  name,  and  beneath 
the  shade  of  a  tower  by  the  sea-shore,  at  a  place  called 
Kalopotami, "  the  fair  river,"  Isabelle  and  her  visitor  met.  The 
good  burgesses  of  Glarentza  were  requested  to  advance  the 

1  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  v.,  154-61  ;   Phrantz6s,  399;    Dorrttheos  of 
Monemvasia,  400  ;  AeXrlov  ttjs  Xpurr.  'Ap\*  'Etcu/d.,  vi.,  m-19. 


d 


I 


186  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

ransom  of  the  captives — £3  5  84  for  Ghisi,  whose  father,  the 
lord  of  Tenos,  was  a  wealthy  man,  as  Lluria  knew  full  well, 
for  he  had  lately  visited  his  island,  and  half  that  sum  for 
Tournay.  The  Aragonese  admiral  was  loud  in  his  praise  of 
the  man  who  had  unhorsed  him  ;  he  gave  him  a  fine  horse  and 
a  suit  of  mail,  as  a  remembrance,  and  released  all  the  other 
prisoners  to  please  him.  Then  he  set  sail  for  Sicily,  laden 
with  treasure  "  enough  to  satisfy  five  armies,"  not  forgetting 
to  plunder  Patras,  Cephalonia,  and  Corfu  on  the  way.  From 
this  expedition  Muntaner  dates  the  lack  of  good  men  able  to 
defend  the  Morea.1 

Not  long  after  Lluria's  expedition  the  Slavs  of  Gianitza, 
near  Kalamata,  surprised,  in  a  period  of  profound  peace,  the 
ancestral  castle  of  the  Villehardouins,  where  Prince  William 
had  been  born  and  died,  and  absolutely  refused  to  give  it  up 
to  Florent  The  latter  appealed  to  the  Byzantine  governor 
at  Mistr&,  but  his  reply  was  that  the  Slavs  had  neither  acted 
by  his  advice,  nor  recognised  his  authority ;  "  they  are 
people,"  he  said,  "  who  do  as  they  like,  and  only  obey  their 
own  chiefs,"  a  fairly  accurate  definition  of  the  manner  in 
which  the  Melings  of  Taygetos  had  always  lived.  Failing  to 
obtain  satisfaction  from  the  emperor's  representative,  Florent 
sent  two  envoys  to  the  emperor,  Jean  de  Chauderon,  the 
grand  constable,  and  Geoffroy  d'Aunoy,  baron  of  Arkadia, 
who  had  both  learnt  the  Greek  language  and  Greek  ways  at 
Constantinople,  where  they  had  already  been  on  an  embassy, 
while  the  latter  had  married  a  relative  of  the  emperor. 
At  first  Andr6nikos  II.  refused  to  see  them,  for  he  was  by 
no  means  anxious  to  order  the  restoration  of  Kalamata. 
But  they  chanced  to  meet  Pierre  de  Surie,  whom  Charles  II. 
had  sent  as  an  emissary  to  Naples  to  discuss  the  proposed 
marriage  of  the  titular  empress  Catherine  of  Courtenay  with 
the  son  of  Andr6nikos.  To  him  they  disclosed  their  business, 
and  he  contrived  that  the  emperor  should  not  only  grant  them 
an  audience,  but  give  them  a  favourable  response.  The 
delighted  envoys  were,  however,  informed  by  the  marshal  of 

1  Le  Uvre  de  la  Conquest*,  pp.  359-77,  which,  however,  confuses  the 
dates  ;  Muntaner,  chs.  cxvL,  cxvii.,  clix. ;  Ldbro  de  los  Fechos,  pp.  107-10. 
Bartholomaeus  de  Neocastro  and  Nicolaus  Specialis  apud  Muratori,  op. 
at.,  xiii.,  1 185  ;  x.,  959  ;  Sanudo,  p.  133. 


RESTITUTION  OF  KALAMATA  187 

the  Byzantine  province  of  Mistr£,  who  was  then  in  Con- 
stantinople, that  the  emperor  had  none  the  less  given  secret 
orders,  of  which  he  would  probably  be  the  bearer,  that  the 
castle  should  not  be  given  up.  This  man,  Sgouro-mailly  by 
name,  was  a  half-caste  from  Messenia,  a  descendant  of  the 
Greek  family  of  Sgour6s  and  the  French  family  of  Mailly, 
and,  unlike  most  of  the  Gasmoil/oi,  had  a  marked  predilection 
for  the  Franks,  though  well  aware  that  the  half-castes  of  the 
Morea  had  a  factitious  importance  at  Constantinople  which 
led  to  valuable  posts.  He  therefore  suggested  that  the 
envoys  should  return  with  him  on  his  swift  galley,  and 
should  at  once  obtain  in  writing  the  imperial  order  for  the 
surrender  of  Kalamata.  They  acted  on  his  advice ;  the  half- 
caste  was  as  good  as  his  word ;  the  castle  was  occupied  by 
his  followers,  and  at  once  restored  to  the  Franks,  to  the  great 
joy  of  Florent.  Sgouro-mailly,  however,  paid  dearly  for  his 
Francophil  feelings.  When  he  returned  to  his  post  at 
MistrA,  he  found  a  secret  order  from  the  emperor,  bidding 
him  on  no  account  surrender  Kalamata.  Regarded  as  a 
traitor  by  the  Greeks,  he  had  to  flee  to  Tzakonia  ;  his  office 
was  taken  from  him,  and  he  died  in  a  humble  straw-loft,  a 
fugitive  and  an  outlaw.  A  century  and  a  half  later  we  find 
his  family  still  mentioned  among  the  Moreot  archons,  and 
the  name  exists  in  the  Peloponnese  to-day.1 

Another  incident  served  to  disturb  the  relations  between 
Franks  and  Greeks,  and  illustrates  the  insolence  of  the 
Flemings,  who  had  followed  their  countryman  into  the 
Morea,  and  had  there  received  baronial  lands,  often  at  the 
cost  of  the  old  Frankish  nobility.  Among  these  newcomers 
were  two  near  relatives  of  Florent,2  Engelbert  and  Walter 
de  Liedekerke,  of  whom  the  former  succeeded  old  Jean  de 
Chauderon,  as  grand  constable,  while  the  latter  was  appointed 
governor  of  the  castle  of  Corinth.  Walter  was  an  extravagant 
man,  who  found  his  emoluments  quite  inadequate  to  his 
expenditure,  and  resorted  to  extortion  in  order  to  maintain 

1  L.  d.  C,  335-59 ;  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  iii.,  290 ;  Adamantiou  (in 
htkrlov,  vi.,  596)  considers  the  name  simply  means  "  curly  locks." 

*  They  are  described  in  the  French  and  Spanish  Chronicles  as  his 
nephews ;  but  we  are  not  told  in  the  genealogy  of  Florent  (Buchon, 
Recherckes  historiques,  i.,  499)  that  he  had  any  sisters. 


188  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

his  establishment  So  profound  was  the  peace  between  Greeks 
and  Franks  at  this  time,  that  many  of  the  emperors  subjects 
from  the  Byzantine  province  had  settled  on  the  fertile  lands 
near  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  which  they  shared  in  common 
with  the  Frankish  vassals  of  the  prince.  Among  these 
settlers  was  a  certain  Ph6tios,  cousin  of  Jacques  le  Chasy, 
or  Zisses,1  "  the  most  gallant  soldier  that  the  emperor  had 
in  all  Morea,"  who  at  that  time  held  the  old  domain  of  the 
Tournay  family  at  Kalavryta,  and  whose  clan,  perhaps  of 
Slavonic  origin,  ruled  over  a  part  of  Tzakonia.  The  serfs, 
who  cultivated  these  lands,  disliked  Ph6tios's  presence  there, 
and  complained  to  Corinth  that  they  could  not  support  the 
burdens  of  two  lords.  Their  complaint  was  carried  to  Walter, 
who  at  once  ordered  the  arrest  of  Ph6tios,  on  the  ground 
that  neither  Franks  nor  Greeks  had  the  right  of  settling  on 
the  common  lands.  When  he  saw  that  his  prisoner  was  a 
rich  man,  he  resolved  to  make  him  pay  a  heavy  blackmail. 
He  thrust  him  into  the  castle  keep,  and  told  him  that  unless 
he  paid  the  damages  for  his  trespass,  assessed  at  more  than 
£4480,  he  would  hang  him.  Ph6tios  at  first  refused  to  pay, 
but  the  governor  ordered  two  of  his  teeth  to  be  extracted — 
a  form  of  argument  so  convincing  that  he  was  glad  to 
compound  with  his  gaoler  for  a  tenth  of  the  original  sum. 
As  soon  as  he  was  free,  he  appealed  to  the  commander  of 
the  Byzantine  province  for  retribution,  and  the  latter  laid 
the  matter  before  Florent,  who,  however,  supported  his 
relative,  adding  that  Ph6tios  had  got  less  than  his  deserts. 
Finding  justice  thus  denied  to  him,  Ph6tios  resolved  to 
take  the  law  into  his  own  hands.  Accordingly  he  lay  in 
wait  for  Liedekerke  at  the  little  harbour  of  St  Nicholas  of 
the  Fig-tree  (the  modern  Xyl6kastro),  on  the  southern 
shore  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  thinking  that  the  governor 
would  probably  land  there  to  take  his  mid-day  meal  by  the 
edge  of  an  abundant  spring.  Presently,  sure  enough,  a 
Frankish  galley  hove  in  sight,  and  from  it  there  stepped 
ashore  a  noble  baron  with  fair  complexion  and  blond  hair, 
the  very  image  of  Walter.  Ph6tios,  certain  of  his  man, 
waited  till  the  baron  was  seated  at  his  repast,  and  then  struck 

1  The  name  Chases  was  that  of  the  Byzantine  official  who  was  stoned 
by  the  Athenians  in  915. 


END  OF  THE  SEVEN  YEARS'  PEACE  189 

him  again  and  again  with  his  sword,  crying  aloud  with 
revengeful  joy,  "  There,  my  lord  Walter,  take  your  money !  " 
The  wounded  man's  attendants  shouted  aloud,  "  Ha !  Ph6ti, 
Ph6ti,  what  are  you  doing?  You  are  killing  the  baron  of 
Vostitza,  by  mistake  for  the  governor  of  Corinth ! "  Horror- 
stricken  at  his  mistake,  for  Guy  de  Charpigny,  the  late  bailie 
of  the  Morea,  was  beloved  by  all,  Ph6tios  threw  away  his 
sword,  lifted  the  wounded  man  tenderly  in  his  arms,  and 
begged  his  forgiveness.  But  it  was  too  late ;  his  innocent 
victim  died  of  his  wounds,  nor  did  Florent,  who  realised 
that  the  fault  lay  with  his  own  relative,  venture  to  seek 
reparation  by  force  from  the  Byzantine  governor.1 

At  last  the  seven  years'  peace,  which  had  so  greatly 
benefited  the  Morea,  came  to  an  end.  At  Vervaina,  between 
Tripolitza  and  Sparta,  there  was  a  beautiful  meadow,  on 
which  an  annual  fair  was  held  in  the  middle  of  June ;  it  was 
a  central  position,  so  that  Greeks  and  Franks  alike  flocked 
thither  to  buy  and  sell;  such  festivals  were  common  in 
Frankish  times  as  in  classic  days,  and  one  of  the  privileges 
which  Andronikos  III.  gave  to  the  Monemvasiotes  was  his 
special  protection  at  all  the  Peloponnesian  fairs.2  Now  it 
chanced  on  this  occasion,  that  a  French  knight,  who  lived 
hard  by,  came  to  words  with  a  Greek  silk-merchant,  and  from 
words  the  arrogant  Frank  proceeded  to  blows.  The  silk- 
merchant  returned  to  his  home  muttering  vengeance,  and 
conceived  the  design  of  capturing  the  castle  of  St  George, 
which,  from  its  commanding  situation  in  front  of  Skorti, 
would  be  a  peculiarly  acceptable  prize  to  the  emperor. 
Having  gained  two  traitors  within  the  castle  walls,  he 
confided  his  plan  to  a  fellow-countryman  from  Skortd,  who 
commanded  a  body  of  Turkish  mercenaries  in  the  imperial 
service ;  a  moonlight  night  was  chosen  for  the  venture,  the 
traitors  did  their  work,  and  next  morning  the  Byzantine 
double-eagle  flew  from  the  castle  keep,  and  the  Turkish 
garrison  mounted  guard  on  the  ramparts.  When  Florent 
heard  the  news  at  his  favourite  residence  of  Andravida,  he 

1  L.  d.  C.y  325-35,  which,  however,  inverts  the  chronological  order  of 
the  last  two  incidents.  The  second  has  been  made  the  subject  of  a 
modern  tragedy,  *wtioj  Zdccnj*,  iJTOt  ret  KaXd/fyvra  iwl  <PpayKOKparLas. 

-  Bull  of  1332,  Phrantzes,  400. 


/ 


190  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

marched  at  once  to  besiege  the  stolen  fortress.  But,  though 
he  swore  that  he  would  stay  there  till  he  retook  it,  though 
he  summoned  an  experienced  Venetian  engineer  from  Coron 
who  did  some  harm  to  the  tower,  though  he  fortified  one 
strong  position  after  another  and  built  another  castle  which 
he  called  Beaufort,  perhaps  identical  with  "  the  Fair  Castle  " 
(Oraiokastro)  in  the  mountains  behind  Astros,  to  command 
the  pass  to  SkortA,  and  though  he  sent  for  soldiers  from 
Apulia  and  obtained  archers  and  spearmen  from  a  powerful 
Slav  chieftain  who  ruled  in  Maina,  the  fine  castle  held  out. 
At  last,  when  winter  came,  Florent  withdrew.  Before  the 
following  spring  of  1297,  he  was  dead.  The  French  chronicler 
mourns  his  loss,  "  for  he  was  upright  and  wise,  and  knew  well 
how  to  govern  his  land  and  his  people."1  If  he  had  the 
faults  of  a  foreigner,  he  was  a  brave  man  who  was  yet  a 
lover  of  peace.  Unfortunately,  like  Prince  William  before 
him,  he  left  no  son,  only  one  daughter,  Mahaut  or  Matilda, 
who  was  a  child  of  three  years  of  age  at  her  father's  death. 
It  seemed  as  if  the  destinies  of  Achaia  were  ever  to  depend 
on  women.  Her  mother,  Isabelle,  continued  to  reign  as 
Princess  of  Achaia,  whose  coinage  bore  her  name,  but  she 
soon  retired  to  her  favourite  castle  of  Nesi  or  L'llle,  as  the 
Franks  translated  it,  situated  in  the  delightful  climate  of  her 
own  Kalamata.  The  administration  of  the  principality  she 
entrusted  to  a  bailie,  Count  Richard  of  Cephalonia,  who  not 
long  after  married  her  widowed  sister,  Marguerite,  and  was 
connected  with  all  the  leaders  of  the  Frankish  world.2  A 
new  chancellor  was  appointed  in  the  person  of  Benjamin 
of    Kalamata,  and    a    Greek    named   Basil6poulos   became 

1  L.  d.  C,  377-86,  472 ;  Buchon,  X.  r.  M.  (ed.  1825),  p.  xlvi. ;  La 
Grcce  Contintntale,  399  sqq.  The  Aragonese  version  of  the  Chronicle 
(pp.  103-6)  narrates  these  last  events  quite  differently.  It  says  that 
the  Byzantine  governor  ordered  the  purchase  of  as  many  horses  as 
possible  from  the  Franks  at  the  most  liberal  rates,  that  he  then  sought 
an  excuse  for  hostilities,  took  Nikli  and  the  castle  of  Chalandritza, 
entirely  destroyed  the  former  town,  and  built  the  castles  of  Palaio- 
Mouchli  (near  the  present  railway  between  Argos  and  Tripolitza)  and 
Cepiana  (the  ancient  Nestdne,  a  little  to  the  north  of  Mouchli)  to 
command  the  plain. 

2  Les  Registres  de  Boniface  VII I ^  ii.,  523.  His  first  wife  had  been  a 
sister  of  Thomas  III.  of  Salona. 


GUY  II.  OF  ATHENS  191 

chamberlain — a  sign  of  the  prominent  position  now  occupied 
by  the  natives. 

Florent  had  left  his  people  at  war  with  the  Byzantine 
province,  and  it  was  therefore  the  first  care  of  his  widow  to 
protect  her  frontier.  This  she  did  by  building  a  new  castle, 
Chastel-neuf  as  it  was  called,  in  the  vale  of  Kalamata, 
through  which  the  present  railway  travels.  By  this  means 
the  people  of  western  Messenia  were  freed  from  the  necessity 
of  paying  dues  to  the  governors  of  the  two  nearest  Greek 
castles,  Mistr&  and  Gardiki — the  fortress  which  the  emperor 
had  built  in  the  pass  of  Makryplagi,  above  the  cave  where  the 
Greek  commanders  had  taken  refuge  after  that  memorable 
battle.1  But  the  barons  thought  that  a  politic  marriage  would 
be  an  even  better  protection  for  their  country  than  strong 
walls.  There  was  some  talk  of  a  union  between  the  widowed 
princess  and  John,  the  son  of  the  emperor.  Andr6nikos  had 
himself  been  suggested  as  a  husband  for  Isabelle  more  than 
thirty  years  earlier,  so  that  there  would  have  been  some 
disproportion  between  the  mature  charms  of  the  Achaian 
princess  and  the  extreme  youth  of  his  son.  This  alliance  fell 
through ;  but  it  was  agreed,  on  the  proposal  of  Nicholas  III. 
de  St  Omer,  the  Grand  Marshal  of  Achaia,  that  a  marriage 
should  be  arranged  between  the  little  princess  Matilda  and 
his  young  cousin,  Guy  II.,  Duke  of  Athens,  who  had  now 
come  of  age,  and  was  regarded  as  "the  best  match  in  all 
Romania."2 

The  seven  years'  minority  of  the  young  Duke  had  been 
an  uneventful  period  in  the  history  of  Athens.  His  Greek 
mother,  Helene  Angela,  had  provided  him  with  a  powerful 
guardian  by  her  second  marriage  with  her  late  husband's 
brother-in-law,  Hugues  de  Brienne,  who  was  now  a  widower, 
and  who  brought  her  half  the  great  barony  of  Karytaipa, 
which  figures  on  her  coins — almost  the  sole  instance  of  a 
baronial  currency  in  the  Morea.8     A  delicate  feudal  question, 

1  X.  r.  M.,  1.  5429  ;  L.  d.  C,  387. 

2  Ibid.)  388-90  ;  PachymeVes,  1 1.,  p.  290. 

3  Schlumberger,  op.  cit.y  325.  The  only  other  instance  is  that  of  a 
baron  of  Damala.  But  Neroutsos  (AeXWov,  iv.,  1 14,  n.  2)  takes  the  inscrip- 
tion on  this  coin  to  mean  "  Lady  of  Gravia,"  the  place  which  was  part 
of  her  dowry. 


t 


192  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

the  same  which  had  led  to  war  between  Athens  and  Achaia 
a  generation  earlier,  alone  disturbed  the  repose  of  the  ducal 
court,  and  threatened  to  renew  that  fratricidal  strife.  The 
Duchess  of  Athens  had  done  homage  to  the  Neapolitan  court, 
but  both  she  and  her  husband  Hugues  flatly  refused  to 
recognise  themselves  as  the  vassals  of  Prince  Florent  of 
Achaia,  on  the  ground  that  there  was  no  feudal  nexus 
between  the  two  Frankish  states.  Both  parties  appealed  to 
their  common  suzerain,  Charles  II.  of  Naples,  who,  after  a 
futile  attempt  to  settle  the  matter  by  arbitration,  finally 
wrote,  in  1294,  that  when  he  had  conferred  Achaia  upon 
Florent  he  had  intended  the  gift  to  include  the  overlordship 
of  Athens.  Accordingly,  he  expressly  renewed  that  grant, 
and  peremptorily  ordered  Guy  II.,  who  had  by  that  time 
come  of  age,  and  his  vassals,  among  whom  Thomas  III.  of 
Salona,  Othon  of  St  Omer,  and  Francesco  da  Verona  are  speci- 
ally mentioned,  to  do  homage  to  the  Prince  of  Achaia.  At  last, 
after  two  years'  further  delay,  the  Duke  of  Athens  obeyed.1 

The  coming  of  age  of  the  last  De  la  Roche  Duke  of 
Athens  has  been  described  by  the  quaint  Catalan  chronicler, 
Ramon  Muntaner.2  The  ceremony  took  place  on  St  John 
Baptist's  day,  1294,  at  Thebes,  whither  the  young  duke  had 
invited  all  the  great  men  of  his  duchy;  he  had  let  it  be 
known,  too,  throughout  the  Greek  Empire  and  the  Despotat 
of  Epiros  and  his  mother's  home  of  Thessaly,  that  whosoever 
came  should  receive  gifts  and  favours  from  his  hand — "  for 
he  was  one  of  the  noblest  men  in  all  Romania  who  was  not 
a  king,  and  eke  one  of  the  richest"  When  all  the  guests 
had  assembled,  mass  was  celebrated  in  the  cathedral  by 
Nicholas,  Archbishop  of  Thebes,  and  then  all  eyes  were  fixed 
upon  the  duke,  to  see  whom  he  would  ask  to  confer  upon 
him  the  order  of  knighthood — a  duty  which  the  King  of 
France  or  the  emperor  himself  would  have  thought  it  a 
pleasure  and  an  honour  to  perform.  What  was  the  surprise 
of  the  brilliant  throng  when  Guy,  instead  of  calling  upon  one 
of  his  great  nobles,  Thomas  III.  of  Salona  or  Othon  of  St 
Omer,  fellow-owner  with  the  duke  himself  of  the  barony  of 

1  L.  d.  C,  269-71  ;  X.  r.  M.,  7979-81,  8018-46;  Buchon,  Nouvelles 
RechercheS)  I.,  i.,  233-5  ;  II.,  i.,  334-8 ;  (Riccio,  Saggioy  Supp.,  pt.  i.,  90 ; 
Sdthas,  T6  Xpoviicbv  rod  Ya\a^€tSiov9  238.  2  Ch.  ccxliv. 


COMING  OF  AGE  OF  GUY  IL  193 

Thebes,  summoned  to  his  side  a  young  knight  of  Euboea, 
Bonifacio  da  Verona,  grandson  of  that  Guglielmo  I.  who  had 
styled  himself  King  of  Salonika  and  had  played  so  large  a 
part  in  the  events  of  his  time.  Bonifacio  was,  however,  a 
poor  man,  the  youngest  of  three  brothers,  whose  sole  posses- 
sion was  a  single  castle,  which  he  had  sold  the  better  to 
equip  himself  and  his  retinue.  Yet  no  one  made  a  braver 
show  than  he  at  the  Athenian  court,  whither  he  had  gone  to 
seek  his  fortune ;  he  always  wore  the  richest  clothes,  and  on 
the  day  of  the  great  ceremony  none  was  more  elegantly 
dressed  than  he  and  his  company,  though  everyone  equipped 
himself  and  the  jongleurs  in  the  fairest  apparel.  He  had 
fully  a  hundred  wax  tapers  ornamented  with  his  arms,  yet 
he  had  borrowed  the  money  for  all  this  outlay,  trusting  to 
the  future  to  pay  it  back.  This  was  the  man  whom  the 
duke  now  bade  approach.  "  Come  here,"  quoth  he,  "  Master 
Boniface,  close  to  my  lord  archbishop,  for  our  will  is  that 
thou  shalt  dub  us  a  knight"  "  Ah,  my  lord,"  replied  Boniface, 
"  what  sayest  thou  !  thou  dost  surely  mock  me."  "  No,  by  our 
troth,"  quoth  the  duke, "  so  do  we  wish  it  to  be."  Then 
Boniface,  seeing  that  the  duke  spake  from  his  heart,  came 
and  stood  near  the  archbishop  at  the  altar,  whereon  lay  the 
arms  of  the  duke,  and  dubbed  him  a  knight  Then  the  duke 
said  aloud,  before  all  the  company,  "  Master  Boniface,  custom 
it  is,  that  those  who  make  men  knights  should  make  them 
presents  too.  Howsobeit,  it  is  our  will  to  do  the  contrary. 
Thou  hast  made  us  a  knight,  wherefore  we  give  thee  from 
this  moment  50,000  sols  of  revenue  for  thee  and  thine  for 
ever,  in  castles  and  in  goodly  places  and  in  freehold,  to  do 
therewith  as  thou  wilt.  We  give  thee  also  to  wife  the 
daughter  of  a  certain  baron  whose  hand  is  ours  to  bestow, 
and  who  is  lady  of  part  of  the  island  and  city  of  Negroponte." 1 
The  duke  was  true  to  his  word;  he  gave  him  his  own 
mother's  dowry  of  Gardiki  in  Thessaly  with  the  classic 
island  of  Salamis,2  thirteen  castles  in  all  on  the  mainland  of 

1  Muntaner  says  "  a  third  part "  ;  but  Agnes  was  not  one  of  the  Urzieri. 

2  So  Hopf  (apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  Ixxxv.,  377)  interprets  "  Seliiirij," 
which  occurs  in  the  Venetian  list  of  Greek  rulers,  drawn  up  in  1311-13, 
where  Boniface  figures  as  dominator  Carts H  et  Gardichie>  Selizirij  et 
Egue  (Hopf,  Chroniques  grico-romanes,  177) ;  Muntaner  (ch.  ccxliil) 
mentions  the  thirteen  castles  ;  L.  d.  C.9  408,  415. 

N 


194  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

the  duchy,  and  the  hand  of  his  cousin,  Agnes  de  Cicon,  lady 
of  iEgina  and  Karystos.  It  was  true  that  the  latter  castle 
was  still  in  the  hands  of  the  Greeks,  but  not  long  afterwards 
Boniface  showed  that  he  had  deserved  his  good  fortune  by 
wresting  it  from  them.  The  Catalan  chronicler,  who  had 
stayed  in  Boniface's  house  at  Negroponte  and  had  there 
heard  the  story  of  his  sudden  rise,  might  well  say  that  this 
was  the  noblest  gift  that  any  prince  made  in  a  single  day  for 
a  long  time.  The  episode  gives  us,  indeed,  some  idea 
of  the  wealth  and  splendour  of  the  Burgundian  dukes  of 
Athens. 

Such  was  the  man  whom  Nicholas  de  St  Omer  pro- 
posed as  a  husband  for  Princess  Isabelle's  little  daughter. 
Guy,  on  his  part,  gladly  accepted  the  idea  of  an  alliance, 
which,  if  he  could  obtain  the  sanction  of  the  King  of 
Naples,  might  one  day,  in  due  course  of  nature,  make 
him  Prince  of  Achaia,  and  thus  end  for  ever  the  vexa- 
tious question  of  homage.  So,  when  the  Achaian  envoys 
arrived,  he  at  once  agreed  to  their  suggestion  that  he 
should  pay  a  visit  to  their  mistress  and  his  suzerain. 
He  sent  for  Thomas  III.  of  Salona,  his  chief  vassal  and 
the  most  honourable  man  in  all  Romania,  and  for  his 
other  barons  and  knights,  and  set  out  in  1299  with  his 
accustomed  splendour  for  Vlisiri  (or  La  Glisi&re,  as  the 
Franks  called  it)  in  Elis,  a  land  of  goodly  mansions,  where 
there  was  ample  accommodation  for  the  princess  and  all  her 
retinue.  There  the  marriage  was  arranged;  Kalamata,  the 
family  fief  of  the  Villehardouins,  became  the  dowry  of  the 
bride ;  the  bishop  of  Olena  performed  the  ceremony ;  and, 
after  some  twenty  days  of  feasting  and  rejoicings,  the  duke 
departed  for  Thebes  with  his  five-year-old  wife.  The  King 
of  Naples,  who  at  first  protested  against  a  marriage  with  this 
mere  child,  contracted  without  his  previous  consent,  subse- 
quently gave  his  approval;  the  qualms  of  Pope  Boniface 
VIII.  at  the  union  of  rather  distant  cousins,  were  pacified  by 
the  gift  of  twenty  silken  garments  from  the  manufactories 
of  Thebes.  Such  dispensations  were  commonly  granted 
to  the  Frankish  lords  of  Greece  at  this  period,  for,  as 
the  pope  said  in  a  similar  case,  their  numbers  had  been 
so    reduced   by  war,    that   they  could  scarcely    find   wives 


PHILIP  OF  SAVOY  195 

of    their     own     social     rank     who     were    not     related     to 
them.1 

Isabelle  herself  did  not  long  remain  a  widow  after  her 
daughter's  marriage.  In  1300,  Boniface  VIII.  held  the  first 
jubilee,  or  anno  santo,  of  the  Roman  Church,  and  among  the 
thousands  who  flocked  to  Rome  on  that  great  occasion  was 
the  Princess  of  Achaia.  Before  she  sailed  from  Glarentza, 
she  appointed  Nicholas  de  St  Omer  bailie  during  her  absence, 
as  it  was  considered  that  Count  Richard  of  Cephalonia,  who 
was  now  her  brother-in-law — for  he  had  recently  married  her 
sister  Marguerite,  the  Lady  of  Akova — toad  grown  too  old  to 
govern  the  country  in  time  of  war.  Isabelle  met  in  Rome, 
not  by  accident — for  negotiations  had  been  going  on  for 
some  time  about  the  matter — Philip  of  Savoy,  son  of  the  late 
Count  Thomas  III.  A  child  at  the  time  of  his  father's  death, 
he  had  been  superseded  in  Savoy  by  his  uncle,  Amedeo  V., 
but  had  received  Piedmont  as  his  share,  and  had  fixed  his 
sub-Alpine  capital  at  Pinerolo,  where  his  remains  still  lie. 
Philip  was  a  valiant  knight,  not  much  over  twenty,  who 
could  help  her  to  defend  her  land  against  the  Greeks  and 
might  even  recover  what  her  father  had  lost ;  the  pope  was 
in  favour  of  the  union,  and  the  protest  of  King  Charles  II.  of 
Naples,  who  appealed  to  the  conditions  laid  down  at  the 
time  of  Isabelle's  second  marriage,  was  induced,  on  the  papal 
intervention,  to  give  his  consent.  At  the  palace  where  he  was 
then  staying,  near  the  Lateran,  he  invested  Philip  of  Savoy 
with  the  principality  of  Achaia,  in  the  name  of  his  own 
imprisoned  son,  Philip  of  Taranto,  to  whom,  as  we  saw,  he 
had  transferred  the  suzerainty  seven  years  before,  and  one  of 
the  witnesses  of  the  deed  was  that  same  Roger  de  Lluria, 
now  in  the  Angevin  service,  who  had  met  Isabelle  at 
Glarentza  under  such  very  different  circumstances.  The 
marriage,  which  took  place  in  Rome  in  1301,  was  a  grand 
affair ;  the  bill  for  the  wedding  breakfast — a  very  extensive 
one — has  been  preserved,  and  the  frugal  Greeks  would  have 
been  surprised  at  the  quantity  of  food  provided  for  their  new 
prince   and   his  guests.     A   few  days   before  the  wedding, 

1  L.  d.  C,  390-3 ;  Sanudo,  136 ;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  7982-4  ;  Les  Registres 
de  Boniface  VI  11.,  i.,  485  ;  ii.,  465  ;  Lamprc^'Er^***  44  ;  Grazie  (1298- 
1304)1  foL  !6. 


196  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

Isabelle  bestowed  the  castle  and  town  of  Corinth  upon  her 
future  husband,  who,  in  his  turn,  promised  to  bring  a  certain 
number  of  soldiers  with  him  to  Greece  for  the  defence  of  the 
land  and  the  prosecution  of  the  war.  The  honeymoon  was 
spent  in  Piedmont,  where  the  prince  had  to  put  his  affairs  in 
order.  Indeed,  it  was  not  till  the  end  of  1302  that  the 
princess  returned  with  him  and  a  body  of  Savoyards  and 
Piedmontese  to  her  native  land.1 

Philip  of  Savoy  swore,  like  his  predecessor,  to  observe  the 
usages  of  the  land,  and  was  greeted,  in  the  name  of  the 
assembled  vassals,  by  the  Archbishop  of  Patras,  who  had 
played  the  most  prominent  part,  alike  when  Charles  I.  had 
sent  his  first  bailie  and  when  Florent  had  been  appointed 
prince.  But  the  new  prince  soon  tried  to  disregard  the 
customs  of  the  country.  He  knew  that  the  King  of  Naples 
really  disliked  his  marriage,  and  the  knowledge  that  Charles 
II.  might  at  any  time  depose  him,  and  would  probably  do  so 
in  the  event  of  his  surviving  Isabelle,  increased  his  natural 
desire  to  make  up  for  his  heavy  expenditure  in  coming,  and 
to  lay  by  for  a  rainy  day.  "  He  had  learned  money-making 
at  home  from  the  tyrants  of  Lombardy,"  it  was  whispered, 
when  he  began  to  practise  a  system  of  regular  extortion. 
As  soon  as  he  had  put  his  Piedmontese  and  Savoyard  officers 
and  soldiers  into  the  castles  of  the  Morea,  he  summoned  his 
chief  confidant,  Guillaume  de  Monbel,  whom  he  had  brought 
with  him  from  Italy,  and  took  counsel  how  he  could  best  fill 
his  coffers.  In  this  enterprise  he  received  assistance  from 
one  of  his  predecessor's  advisers,  Vincent  de  Marays,  a  sly 
old  knight  from  Picardy  and  a  protigi  of  Count  Richard  of 
Cephalonia,  who  had  a  grudge  against  the  chancellor, 
Benjamin  of  Kalamata,  for  having  secured  his  patron's 
dismissal  from  the  post  of  bailie.  Benjamin  was  a  rich  man, 
who  was  a  larger  landowner  than  even  Leonardo  of  Veroli 
had  been,  and  therefore  well  able  to  pay  blackmail.  An 
excuse  for  extortion  was  found  in  the  chancellor's  omission 

1  JL  d.  C,  393-8,  404,  434>  472  ;  x-  r-  M-»  11-  8588-90 ;  Guichenon, 
Histoire  gtntalogique  de .  .  .  Savoye,  II.,  Preuvesy  pp.  102-4;  Buchon, 
Recherches  historiques^  ii.,  379;  Nouvelles  Recherche s>  II.,  i.,  339-43; 
Datta,  Start  a  dei  Principi  di  Savoia,  i.,  pp.  xv.,  33-5  ;  Hopf,  Chroniques 
grdco-romanes,  231-5. 


PHILIPS  EXTORTION  197 

to  send  in  his  accounts  of  public  monies  received  by  him 
during  several  years ;  and  he  was  forthwith  arrested  on  a 
charge  of  malversation.  Benjamin  appealed  in  his  trouble  to 
his  powerful  friend,  Nicholas  III.  de  St  Omer,  whose 
appointment  as  bailie  he  had  obtained,  and  who  was  at  once 
the  most  beloved  and  the  most  dreaded  man  in  Achaia. 
The  haughty  marshal  marched  straight  into  the  chamber 
where  the  prince  was  sitting  with  the  princess  and  his 
Piedmontese  friends,  and  asked  him  point-blank,  why  he  had 
ordered  the  chancellor's  arrest  When  Philip  replied,  that 
Benjamin  owed  him  an  account  of  the  revenues  which  had 
passed  through  his  hands,  St  Omer  rejoined  that  the 
imprisonment  of  a  liege  for  debt  was  against  the  customs  of 
the  country.  "  Hah !  cousin,"  quoth  the  prince,  "  where  did 
you  find  these  customs  of  yours?"  At  that  the  marshal 
drew  a  huge  knife,  and,  holding  it  straight  before  him, 
cried :  "  Behold  our  customs !  by  this  sword  our  forefathers 
conquered  this  land,  and  by  this  sword  we  will  defend  our 
franchises  and  usages  against  those  who  would  break  or 
restrict  them."  The  princess,  fearing  for  her  husband's  life, 
exclaimed  aloud ;  but  St  Omer  reassured  her  by  saying  that 
it  was  not  the  prince  but  his  evil  counsellors  whom  he 
accused.  The  irate  marshal  was  finally  appeased  by  a  soft 
answer ;  the  chancellor  procured  his  release  from  prison  by 
a  payment  of  20,000  hyperperi  of  Glarentza  (£8960)  to  the 
prince.  From  that  moment  the  wily  Benjamin  ingratiated 
himself  with  his  avaricious  master,  whose  passion  for  money 
he  well  knew  how  to  gratify  at  the  same  time  as  his  own 
desire  for  revenge.  At  his  suggestion,  his  enemy  Count 
Richard  of  Cephalonia  was  compelled  to  lend  Philip  20,000 
hyperperi,  for  which  he  received  almost  nothing  in  return. 
But  this  was  not  all  that  the  prince  managed  to  squeeze  out 
of  the  wealthy  family  of  the  Cephalonian  Orsini.  When,  a 
little  later,  old  Count  Richard  was  killed  by  one  of  his  own 
knights,  whom  he  had  struck  on  the  head  with  a  stick  while 
sitting  on  the  Bench  at  Glarentza,  his  son  John  I.  had  to 
purchase  his  investiture  with  his  islands  from  his  suzerain, 
the  Prince  of  Achaia,  by  a  large  present  of  money.  Not 
long  afterwards  he  gave  Philip  a  heavy  bribe  to  decide 
in  his  favour  an  action  brought  against   him   in  the   High 


198  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

Court  of  Achaia  by  his  stepmother,  the  Lady  of  Akova,  for 
restitution  of  her  late  husband's  personal  property,  valued  at 
^44,800.  The  proud  Nicholas  de  St  Omer,  however,  espoused 
the  cause  of  the  lady,  more  from  contempt  and  dislike  for 
the  venal  prince  than  from  a  desire  to  punish  the  violence  of 
his  brother-in-law,  the  new  Count  of  Cephalonia.  Again, 
Philip  had  to  suppress  his  indignation  at  the  insolence  of  the 
greatest  baron  in  the  land,  who  boasted  that  he  had  royal 
blood  in  his  veins,  who  was  cousin  of  the  Duke  of  Athens, 
and  connected  by  feudal  ties  with  the  leading  Achaian 
nobles;  a  compromise  was  made,  by  which  the  Lady  of 
Akova  was  to  receive  one-fifth  of  the  amount  claimed.  From 
other  quarters,  too,  the  Piedmontese  prince  extorted  various 
sums.  Basil6poulos,  the  Greek  who  had  been  appointed 
chamberlain,  made  him  a  compulsory  present  of  £1344; 
the  people  of  Karytaina  contributed  £1792  ;  the  citizens  of 
Andravida,  his  favourite  residence,  £224;  the  burgesses  of 
Glarentza,  £268,  16s. ;  while  the  tolls  of  that  port  were 
charged  with  an  annuity  of  £134, 8s.  to  one  of  his  Piedmontese 
favourites.  These  transactions  give  us  some  idea  of  the 
wealth  of  Greece  at  this  period. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  all  these  "  benevolences,"  the  prince  had 
to  raise  a  loan  from  the  Glarentza  branch  of  the  Florentine 
banking-house  of  Peruzzi,  which  financed  our  own  sovereigns. 
At  last  his  exactions  led  to  a  serious  rising.  The  people  of 
Skorti  had  always  been  the  most  turbulent  element  of  the 
population,  and  their  mountainous  country — the  Switzerland 
of  the  Morea — the  most  jealously  guarded  by  the  Franks. 
Yet,  in  spite  of  the  well-known  characteristics  of  these 
Arkadian  mountaineers,  and  of  the  natural  fortress  which 
they  inhabited,  Philip,  instigated  by  his  evil  genius,  the  old 
knight  from  Picar-dy,  must  needs  impose  an  extraordinary 
tax  upon  the  Arkadian  arc/ions.  He  was  told  that  they 
were  rich,  and  the  large  sum  which  he  had  already  received 
from  the  Arkadian  town  of  Karytaina  doubtless  made  him 
think  that  they  could  well  afford  to  pay  more.  But  the 
natives  of  Gortys,  from  the  Frankish  times  to  those  of  M. 
DelyAnnes,  have  been  sticklers  for  their  constitutional  rights, 
guaranteed  to  them  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest.  Their 
chief  men  met  in  the  house  of  the  two  brothers  Mikron&s,  at 


REVOLT  OF  ARKADIA  199 

the  foot  of  the  mountain,  on  which  stand  the  lonely  ruins 
of  the  noble  temple  of  Bassae,  and  swore,  in  a  spirit  worthy  of 
the  ancient  Greeks,  that  they  would  rather  die  than  pay  a 
single  farthing  of  the  tax.  The  only  man  who  might  have 
prevented  their  rising  was  Nicholas  de  St  Omer ;  but  they 
knew  that  he  was  going  to  Thessaly;  and,  the  moment 
that  he  had  gone,  they  sent  two  spokesmen  to  Mistr&  to 
invite  the  Byzantine  governor's  aid  and  offer  their  land  to 
the  emperor.  Their  mission  aroused  no  suspicion,  for  it 
was  a  common  thing  for  pilgrims  to  visit  the  shrine  of 
St  Nikon  at  Lacedaemonia — the  Armenian  monk,  who,  after 
converting  the  Cretan  apostates  back  to  Christianity,  had 
established  himself  in  the  latter  part  of  the  tenth  century  at 
Sparta,  where  his  memory  is  still  green.  The  governor 
received  their  offer  with  gladness ;  he  assembled  his  troops 
on  the  famous  plain  of  Nikli,  whence  the  traitors  guided  them 
by  a  sure  road  into  Skortd.  Soon  two  Frankish  castles, 
St  Helena  and  Cr&ve-Cceur,  on  either  side  of  Andritsaina, 
were  smoking  ruins.  But  the  Greeks,  as  the  chronicler 
remarks,  were  better  at  a  first  assault  than  at  a  prolonged 
siege.  Florent's  newly-built  castle  of  Beaufort  resisted  their 
attack,  and  when  Philip  approached,  they  speedily  fled  in 
disorder.  The  prince  wisely  abstained  from  carrying  the 
war  into  the  Byzantine  province.  He  bade  the  terrified 
serfs,  who  had  fled  from  Greeks  and  Franks  alike,  return  to 
their  homes ;  enquired  from  them  the  cause  of  the  rebellion ; 
and,  when  he  was  told  that  it  was  the  work  of  a  family  party 
of  archotiSy  contented  himself  with  confiscating  the  lands  and 
goods  of  the  latter.1 

We  saw  that  the  rising  would  not  have  happened  but  for 
the  absence  of  the  marshal  Nicholas  de  St  Omer  in  Thessaly, 
and  it  is  now  necessary  to  describe  the  important  events 
which  had  necessitated  his  presence  there.  In  1296,  both 
Nikeph6ros,  Despot  of  Epiros,  and  the  bastard  John  I.,  Duke 
of  Neopatras,  had  died ;  and,  seven  years  later,  the  latter's 
son  and  successor,  Constantine,  had  followed  his  father  to 
the  grave,  leaving  an  only  son,  John   II.,  who  was  still  a 

1  L.  d.  C,  398-4<>5>  306,  4i3>  422-54,  472  ;  L.  cL  F.9  111-13  J  Ducangc, 
op.  cit.y  ii.,  341-2  ;  Gerland,  JNeue  Quellen,  245  ;  Riccio,  Studii  Storici% 
30  ;  Hopf  apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  Ixxxv.,  352  ;  Datta,  op.  cit^  ii.,  30-1. 


200  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

minor  at  the  time  of  his  death.  In  his  last  will  and  testa- 
ment Constantine  had  appointed  his  nephew  Guy  II.,  Duke 
of  Athens,  guardian  of  the  child  and  regent  of  his  dominions, 
not  only  because  Guy  was  his  nearest  surviving  male  relative, 
but  because  the  Athenian  duchy,  then  the  strongest  of  all 
the  Frankish  states,  could  alone  protect  Thessaly  against  the 
designs  of  the  Emperor  Andr6nikos  II.  on  the  one  side,  and 
of  the  able  and  ambitious  Lady  Anna,  of  Epiros,  who  was 
regent  in  the  name  of  the  young  Despot  Thomas,  on  the 
other.  Guy,  who  had  already  interests  on  the  Thessalian 
frontier,  joyfully  accepted  the  honourable  office,  which 
flattered  his  ambition.  He  summoned  Thomas  of  Salona, 
his  chief  vassal,  Boniface  of  Verona,  his  favourite,  and  others 
from  Euboea,  and  at  Zetouni,  the  modern  Lamia,  which  his 
mother  had  brought  as  part  of  her  dowry  to  the  duchy  of 
Athens,  received  the  homage  of  the  Thessalian  baronage. 
There  he  arranged  for  the  future  government  of  his  ward's 
estates.  The  Greek  nobles  were  to  guard  the  Thessalian 
castles,  while  he  was  to  have  the  revenues,  and  provide  out 
of  them  for  the  administration,  of  the  country ;  as  marshal  of 
Thessaly,  Guy  appointed  a  nobleman  who  was  viscount,  or 
president  of  the  Court  of  the  Burgesses  at  Athens ;  as  his 
bailie  and  representative  in  the  government  of  the  land  the 
duke  chose  Antoine  le  Flamenc,  a  Fleming  who  had  become 
lord  of  Karditza,  on  the  margin  of  the  Copaic  lake,  where  a 
Greek  inscription  on  the  church  of  St  George  still  com- 
memorates him  as  its  "most  pious"  founder,  and  who  is 
described  by  the  chronicler  as  "the  wisest  man  in  all  the 
duchy."  Feudalism,  as  we  saw,  had  already  permeated 
Thessaly  under  the  rule  of  the  Angeli ;  it  was  further 
strengthened  by  the  Frankish  regency;  the  Greek  nobles 
learnt  the  French  language,  and  coins  with  Latin  inscrip- 
tions were  issued  in  the  name  of  the  young  Despot  from  the 
mint  of  Neopatras.1 

The   fears    of   the  late   Despot  were  speedily  fulfilled. 
Scarcely  had   Guy  returned   to  his   favourite   residence  of 

1  Buchon,  Atlas,  plate  xxxix.,  5,  who  ascribes  this  coin  erroneously  to 
Aimone  of  Savoy.  The  inscription  "Angelus  Sab.'  C.  (  =  Sebastocrator, 
or  Sebastocrator  Comnenos)  Delia  Patra,"  refers  to  John  II.  of  Neo- 
patras ;  Schlumberger,  op,  ctt.9  382. 


GUY  II.  IN  THESSALY  201 

Thebes,  when  the  ambitious  Lady  Anna  of  Epiros  seized 
his  ward's  Thessalian  Castle  of  Phanari — a  place  which  still 
rises  like  a  "  watch-tower  "  above  the  great  plain.  The  Duke 
of  Athens,  furious  at  this  audacious  act  of  a  mere  woman, 
summoned  his  vassals  and  friends,  among  them  his  cousin 
Nicholas  de  St  Omer,  to  join  him  in  the  campaign  against 
the  Epirotes.  Philip  of  Savoy,  though  on  good  terms  with 
the  Duke  of  Athens,  who  had  done  him  personal  homage 
for  the  duchy,  the  baronies  of  Argos  and  Nauplia  and  his 
wife's  dowry  of  Kalamata,  refused  to  give  St  Omer  permis- 
sion to  leave  the  Morea.  But  the  marshal  departed,  without 
his  prince's  consent,  at  the  head  of  89  horsemen,  of  whom 
no  less  than  13  were  belted  knights,  and  joined  the  duke 
not  far  from  the  field  of  Domok6,  so  memorable  in  the 
history  of  modern  Greece.  When  he  saw  the  assembled 
host,  of  which  the  duke  begged  him  to  assume  the  command, 
he  was  bound  to  confess  that  never  in  all  Romania  had  he 
seen  a  braver  show.  There  were  more  than  900  Frankish 
horsemen,  all  picked  men ;  more  than  6000  Thessalian  and 
Bulgarian  cavalry,  commanded  by  18  Greek  barons,  and 
fully  30,000  foot-soldiers.  Against  such  a  force  the  Lady 
Anna  felt  that  she  could  do  nothing;  so,  before  it  had 
advanced  far  beyond  Kalabaka,  on  the  way  to  Joannina, 
she  offered  to  restore  the  stolen  castle,  and  pay  a  war 
indemnity  of  £4480.  Her  offer  was  accepted ;  but,  as  it 
seemed  desirable  to  find  work  for  so  fine  an  army,  an 
excuse  was  made  for  an  attack  upon  the  Greek  Empire, 
with  which  Athens  was  then  at  peace.  The  troops  were 
already  well  on  the  way  to  Salonika,  when  the  Empress 
Irene,  who  was  living  there  separated  from  her  husband, 
appealed  to  the  chivalry  of  the  Franks  not  to  make  war  against 
a  weak  woman.  Guy  and  his  barons  were  moved  by  this 
appeal ;  they  returned  to  Thessaly,  and  disbanded  their  forces.1 
The  crafty  Lady  of  Epiros  had  succeeded  in  disarming 
one  enemy ;  but  she  soon  found  herself  attacked  by  another. 
Philip  of  Taranto  had  now  been  liberated  from  prison,  so 
that  his  father  thought  that  the  moment  had  come  to 
demand  the  performance  of  those  exorbitant  conditions,  to 
which  the  late  Despot  of  Epiros  had  consented  at  the  time 
1  L.  d.  C,  405-22  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  233  sqq. 


202  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

of  his  daughter's  marriage  with  the  Angevin  prince.  Philip 
had  not  kept  his  part  of  the  bond ;  for  he  had  made  the 
beautiful  Thamar  change  her  religion  and  her  name;  but 
his  father,  none  the  less,  expected  the  precise  fulfilment  of 
the  marriage-contract  by  the  other  side.  He  now  requested 
the  Lady  Anna  to  hand  over  Epiros  to  Philip,  or  else  to 
make  her  son  Thomas  do  homage  to  the  Prince  of  Taranto, 
on  which  condition  he  might  hold  the  Despotat  as  the 
latter's  vassal.  Anna  was  a  woman  of  spirit  and  resource ; 
she  never  forgot  that  she  belonged  by  birth  to  the  imperial 
house,  and,  as  a  patriotic  Greek,  she  preferred  that  her  son's 
dominions,  as  it  seemed  difficult  to  maintain  their  indepen- 
dence, should  belong  to  the  Palaiol6goi  rather  than  to  the 
Angevins.  She  accordingly  made  overtures  to  Andronikos 
II.  for  the  marriage  of  her  son  with  his  granddaughter,  and 
replied  to  the  King  of  Naples  that  Thomas  was  the  vassal  of 
the  emperor  alone.  She  added  that  the  late  Despot  had  no 
power  to  violate  the  laws  of  nature  by  disinheriting  his  son 
in  favour  of  one  of  his  daughters ;  she  must  therefore  decline, 
so  long  as  her  son  lived,  to  surrender  to  Philip  anything 
beyond  what  he  already  held.  Charles  II.  thought  that  it 
would  be  easy  to  conquer  a  woman  and  a  boy  ;  so,  on  receipt 
of  this  answer,  he  summoned  his  son's  vassals,  Philip  of 
Savoy  and  Count  John  I.  of  Cephalonia,  to  his  aid  against 
the  Despoina.  But  the  strong  walls  of  Arta,  and  the  natural 
difficulties  of  the  country,  proved  too  much  for  the  invaders, 
who  soon  abandoned  their  inglorious  campaign.  Anna 
prevented  the  co-operation  of  Philip  of  Savoy  in  a  second 
attack  upon  her  by  a  judicious  bribe  of  £2688,  while  Philip, 
in  order  to  have  a  plausible  excuse  for  declining  his  suzerain's 
summons,  issued  invitations  to  all  the  vassals  of  Achaia  to 
attend  a  general  parliament  on  the  isthmus  of  Corinth  in  the 
following  spring  of  1305. 

On  that  famous  neck  of  land  where  in  classic  days  the 
Isthmian  games  had  been  held,  the  mediaeval  chivalry  of 
Greece  now  assembled  for  a  splendid  tournament.  All  the 
noblest  men  in  the  land  came  in  answer  to  the  summons  of 
the  Prince  of  Achaia.  There  were  Guy  II.  of  Athens  with  a 
brave  body  of  knights,  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  and  the 
three  barons  of  Eubcea,  the  Duke  of  the  Archipelago  and  the 


TOURNAMENT  AT  CORINTH  203 

Count  Palatine  John  I.  of  Cephalonia — the  last  anxious  for 
judgment  of  his  peers  betwixt  his  jealous  sister  and  her 
irascible  husband,  the  Marshal  Nicholas  de  St  Omer,  who 
summoned  his  Theban  vassals  to  his  side.  Messengers  were 
sent  throughout  the  highlands  and  islands  of  Frankish  Greece 
to  proclaim  to  all  and  sundry  how  seven  champions  had 
come  from  beyond  the  seas  and  did  challenge  the  chivalry  of 
Romania  to  joust  with  them.  Never  had  the  fair  land  of 
Hellas  seen  a  braver  sight  than  that  presented  by  the  lists 
at  Corinth  in  the  lovely  month  of  May,  when  the  sky  and 
the  twin  seas  are  at  their  fairest.  More  than  a  thousand 
knights  and  barons  took  part  in  the  tournament,  which  lasted 
for  twenty  days,  while  all  the  fair  ladies  of  Achaia  "  rained 
influence"  on  the  combatants.  There  were  the  seven 
champions,  clad  in  their  armour  of  green  taffetas  covered 
with  scales  of  gold ;  there  was  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  who 
acquitted  himself  right  nobly  in  the  lists,  with  all  his  household. 
Most  impetuous  of  all  was  the  young  Duke  of  Athens,  eager 
to  match  his  skill  in  horsemanship  and  with  the  lance  against 
Master  William  Bouchart,  justly  accounted  one  of  the  best 
jousters  of  the  West.  The  chivalrous  Bouchart  would  fain 
have  spared  his  less  experienced  antagonist.  But  the  duke, 
who  had  cunningly  padded  himself  beneath  his  plate  armour, 
was  determined  to  meet  him  front  to  front;  their  horses 
collided  with  such  force  that  the  iron  spike  of  Bouchart's 
charger  pierced  Guy's  steed  between  the  shoulders,  so  that 
horse  and  rider  rolled  in  the  dust  St  Omer  would  have 
given  much  to  meet  Count  John  in  the  lists ;  but  the  latter, 
fearing  the  marshal's  doughty  arm,  pretended  that  his  horse 
could  not  bear  him  into  the  ring,  nor  could  he  be  shamed 
into  the  combat  even  when  Bouchart  rode  round  and  round 
the  lists  on  the  animal,  crying  aloud  as  he  rode,  "  This  is  the 
horse  which  could  not  go  to  the  jousts ! " l  So  they  kept  high 
revel  on  the  isthmus ;  alas !  it  was  the  last  great  display  of 
the  chivalry  of  "New  France";  six  years  later  many  a 
knight  who  had  ridden  proudly  past  the  fair  dames  of  the 
Morea  lay  a  mangled  corpse  on  the  swampy  plain  of  Bceotia. 
The  tournament  at  Corinth  was  Philip's  final  appearance 
on  the  stage  of  Greek  public  life.  Charles  II.  had  consented 
1  L.  d.  C,  454-^2,  464-701  472  ;  Pachymeres,  II.,  450. 


204  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

with  reluctance  to  his  marriage ;  he  was  now  resolved  that 
the  house  of  Anjou  should  have  the  real  possession,  as  well 
as  the  shadowy  suzerainty,  of  Achaia.  Although  Philip  had 
responded  to  his  previous  summons  to  aid  him  in  Epiros, 
towards  the  end  of  1304  he  had  renewed  his  original  declara- 
tion that  Isabelle,  by  marrying  without  his  consent,  had 
forfeited  the  principality  of  Achaia,  in  accordance  with  the 
terms  laid  down  at  the  time  of  her  former  marriage  with 
Florent  Philip's  refusal  to  assist  his  suzerain  in  a  second 
Epirote  campaign  gave  the  King  of  Naples  a  further  excuse 
for  deposing  the  princess  and  her  husband ;  such  a  refusal 
constituted  a  gross  breach  of  the  feudal  code,  which  justified 
Charles  in  releasing  the  Achaian  barons  from  their  allegiance 
to  their  prince.  The  latter  did  not  await  that  final  blow; 
before  it  was  delivered,  he  had  quitted  the  Morea  for  his 
Italian  dominions,  against  which  the  house  of  Anjou  was 
also  plotting,  leaving  his  old  enemy,  Nicholas  de  St  Omer, 
as  bailie.  If  we  may  believe  the  Aragonese  Chronicle  of  the 
Morea?  Isabelle's  elder  daughter,  Matilda  of  Athens,  claimed 
Achaia  as  her  heritage  from  the  bailie,  who  refused  to  hand  it 
to  her  without  orders  from  Naples.  Her  husband  retaliated 
by  seizing  St  Omer's  half  of  Thebes,  including  the  castle 
which  bore  his  name.  Charles  II.,  however,  bestowed 
the  forfeited  principality  of  Achaia  upon  his  favourite 
son,  Philip  of  Taranto,  who  soon  afterwards  arrived  there 
on  his  way  to  attack  the  Lady  of  Epiros,  and  received 
the  homage  of  the  Achaian  barons.  Thus,  both  the  actual 
possession  and  the  suzerainty  of  the  principality  were  once 
more  in  the  hands  of  the  same  person.  Any  claims  that 
Philip  of  Savoy  and  Isabelle  might  still  entertain  were 
bought  by  the  King  of  Naples  and  his  son,  who,  in  exchange 
for  their  Greek  dominions,  promised  to  give  them,  upon  the 
death  of  the  existing  countess,  the  county  of  Alba,  on  the 
shores  of  the  Fucine  lake,  worth  600  gold  ounces  (£1440)  a 
year,  and  to  pay  them,  during  the  remainder  of  her  life,  an 
annuity  of  that  amount.  To  the  one  child  of  their  marriage, 
little  Marguerite  of  Savoy,  Charles  II.  promised  sufficient 
land  near  Alba  to  yield  a  dowry  of  200  gold  ounces,  or 
^480  a  year,  on  condition  that  she  ceded  the  two  castles  of 
1  Pp.  113,  114,  where  the  chronology  is  obviously  confused. 


DEATH  OF  PRINCESS  ISABELLE  205 

Karytaina  and  Bucelet,  which  her  parents  had  bestowed 
upon  her.  By  way  of  enhancing  the  importance  of  his  gift, 
the  king  raised  Alba  to  the  rank  of  a  principality ;  but  he 
neither  put  Philip  of  Savoy  into  actual  possession  of  it,  nor 
paid  him  the  promised  annuity.  Isabelle  did  not  long 
survive  the  loss  of  her  inheritance.  In  131 1,  disregarding 
these  arrangements  with  the  King  of  Naples,  she  made  a  will, 
leaving  her  elder  daughter,  Matilda,  heiress  of  all  Achaia, 
with  the  exception  of  the  three  castles  of  Karytaina, 
Beauvoir  (above  Katakolo),  and  Beauregard  (also  in  Elis), 
which  were  to  form  the  dowry  of  her  younger  daughter, 
Marguerite.  In  the  same  year,  Isabelle  died  in  Holland — 
the  country  of  her  second  husband.  Philip  of  Savoy  almost 
immediately  remarried ;  and  though  his  and  Isabelle's 
daughter,  Marguerite,  renounced  all  her  claims  to  Greece  on 
her  marriage  in  1324,  his  descendants  by  his  second  marriage 
continued  to  style  themselves  "  Princes  of  Achaia "  till  the 
extinction  of  their  line  a  century  later,  and,  like  their 
ancestor,  issued  coins  with  that  title  engraved  upon  them. 
One  of  these  Piedmontese  princes  even  endeavoured  to  make 
good  his  pretensions,  and  down  to  the  last  century  illegitimate 
descendants  of  Philip  of  Savoy  usurped  the  name  of  Achaia.1 
Princess  Isabelle  of  Achaia  is  one  of  the  most  striking 
figures  in  the  portrait-gallery  of  the  ladies  of  the  Latin 
Orient  Affianced  when  a  mere  child  to  a  foreign  prince 
whom  she  had  never  seen ;  torn  from  her  home  and  sent  to 
live  in  an  Italian  castle,  which  was  to  be  almost  a  prison; 
widowed  at  an  age  when  most  women  are  not  yet  wed; 
separated  for  long  years  from  her  fatherland,  till  at  last  she 
was  allowed  to  return  as  the  wife  of  a  gallant  Flemish 
adventurer ;  widowed  again,  and  then  re-married,  midst  the 
pomp  and  ceremony  of  the  papal  court,  to  a  third  husband, 
only  to  die,  after  all  these  vicissitudes,  still  in  middle  age,  an 
exile  in  a  distant  northern  land — she  was  throughout  her  life 

1  X.  t.  M.,  11.  8588-90;  L.  <L  C,  473  (which  gives  the  wrong  date, 
however),  474  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  339-43  ;  I.,  L,  237  ; 
Atlas,  xxiv.,  9,  12-15;  Guichenon,  Histoire  g£n£alogiquey  I.,  318;  II., 
Prtuves,  pp.  104,  no,  in  ;  Datta,  op.  cit.y  i.,  49-50,  56,  67,  89  ;  ii., 45-50, 
114  ;  Ptolemaeus  Lucensis  apud  Muratori,  op.  cit.t  xi.,  1227,  1232  ;  Mun- 
taner,  ch.  cclxii ;  St  Genois,  Droits  primiHfsy  i.,  338. 


206  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

the  victim  of  dynastic  politics.  A  brave  woman,  every  inch  a 
Villehardouin,  she  did  not  flinch  from  meeting  the  boldest 
corsair  of  that  age  on  the  sea  shore ;  deeply  imbued  with 
piety,  she  founded  the  monastery  of  Sta.  Chiara,  near  Olena. 
We  can  see  her  still,  as  she  rode  through  the  streets  of  Naples 
on  her  "sombre  brown  pillion  of  Douai  cloth,"  which  the 
careful  Angevin  provided  for  his  prisoner  of  state — a  cheap 
price  to  pay  for  keeping  in  his  clutches  the  "  Lady  of  the 
Morea."1 

Philip  of  Taranto  did  not  remain  long  in  his  Peloponnesian 
principality.  As  soon  as  he  had  received  the  homage  of  the 
barons,  who  were  not  sorry  to  be  rid  of  his  extortionate 
namesake,  he  set  out  for  Epiros,  to  substantiate  his  claims 
there.  But,  woman  as  she  was,  the  Lady  Anna  was  too  much 
for  the  Neapolitan  prince ;  an  epidemic  came  to  her  aid,  and 
he  returned  unsuccessful  to  Naples.  As  his  bailie  in  Achaia 
he  appointed  Guy  II.,  Duke  of  Athens,  the  most  important 
of  all  the  contemporary  Frankish  rulers  of  Greece,  whose  wife, 
Matilda,  as  the  elder  daughter  of  Isabelle,  would  naturally 
represent  in  the  eyes  of  the  Moreot  barons  the  princely  house 
of  Villehardouin.2  In  this  way,  perhaps,  he  hoped  to  satisfy 
her  claims.  Two  years  earlier,  when  still  only  twelve,  she 
had  attained  her  majority,  and  the  festival  had  been  cele- 
brated at  Thebes  with  all  the  customary  splendour  of  the 
Athenian  court,  in  the  presence  of  her  widowed  aunt,  the 
Lady  of  Akova,  Nicholas  de  St  Omer,  the  two  archbishops 
of  Athens  and  Thebes,  and  other  high  ecclesiastical  and  civic 
dignitaries. 

It  was,  indeed,  a  time  of  great  prosperity  for  the  Athenian 
duchy,  whose  ruler  was  at  once  Duke  of  Athens,  regent  of 
Thessaly,  and  bailie  of  Achaia.  We  have  already  seen  how 
great  were  the  riches  and  position  of  the  duke,  who  delighted 
in  splendid  apparel,  and  whose  frescoed  Theban  castle  rang 
with  the  songs  of  minstrels.  Nor  was  this  prosperity  merely 
superficial.  Now,  for  the  first  time,  we  find  Attica  supplying 
Venice  with  corn,  which  usually  had  to  be  imported  into  the 
duchy  from   the    south   of  Italy ;   while   the   gift   of  silken 

1  Arch.  Stor.  ItaL,  Ser.  IV.,  iv.,  176 ;  Les  Registres  de  Boniface  VIII, 
ii.,  845  ;  Regestum  dementis  K,  i.,  283. 
-  L.  d.  F.,  117. 


FLOURISHING  CONDITION  OF  ATHENS       207 

garments  to  Boniface  VIII.  is  a  proof  of  the  continued 
manufacture  of  silk  at  Thebes.  No  less  than  three  series  of 
coins  were  required  for  the  commercial  needs  of  the  duchy  in 
his  reign.  Athens,  too,  was  a  religious  centre.  We  find 
Pope  Nicholas  IV.1  granting  indulgences  to  all  who  visited 
"  Santa  Maria  di  Atene  "  on  the  festivals  of  the  Virgin,  of  St 
James  the  Apostle,  and  St  Eligius,  and  on  the  anniversary  of 
its  dedication  as  a  Christian  church.  It  was  now,  too,  that 
the  canon  Nicholas  de  la  Roche  founded  an  ecclesiastical 
building,  perhaps  the  belfry  of  the  ancient  church  of  Great 
St  Mary's,  which  stood  till  a  few  years  ago,  in  the  Stoa  of 
Hadrian,  while  the  great  Byzantine  monastery  of  H6sios 
Louk&s,  near  Delphi,  received  fresh  lustre  from  the  presence 
of  the  dowager  duchess  within  its  walls.  Not  far  away,  on 
an  islet  in  the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  the  persecuted  Eremites  from 
Italy  begged  Thomas  of  Salona  to  give  them  a  refuge,  only 
to  find  that  even  there  the  long  arm  of  the  mundane  pope 
could  reach  them.  Prosperous,  indeed,  must  have  been  the 
region  round  Parnassos,  for  "the  hero"  Thomas  had  his 
private  mint,  which  his  jealous  lord,  the  duke,  tried  to 
prohibit.2  But  the  days  of  the  ducal  family  were  drawing  to 
a  close.  The  splendid  magnificence  of  the  duke  could  not 
conceal  the  incurable  malady  which  was  undermining  his 
health ;  he  had  no  heirs  of  his  body  ;  and,  to  the  north,  there 
lay  that  company  of  wandering  Catalan  warriors,  which  was 
already  a  menace  to  his  dominions. 

A  hundred  years  had  passed  away  since  the  Conquest, 
and  Greece,  in  this  first  decade  of  the  fourteenth  century, 
was  practically  divided  between  the  Duke  of  Athens,  the 
Angevins,  the  Orsini,  the  Greeks,  and  the  Venetians.  The 
house  of  Anjou  had  obtained  possession  of  Achaia  from  the 
family  of  the  conqueror,  had  established  itself  in  the  finest 
of  the  Ionian  islands,  and  had  gained  a  footing  here  and 
there  on  the  coast  of  Epiros.  The  Orsini  had  tightened 
their  hold  over  their  county  palatine  in  the  Ionian  Sea,  but 
neither  Angevins  nor  Orsini  had  absorbed  the  Greeks,  who 

1  Regtstresy  610 ;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  339 ;  Mttanges  his- 
toriques,  iii.,  27  ;  St  Genois,  i.,  336  ;  Capricornus,  fol.  337. 

2  Wadding,  Annates  Minor  urn  t  v.,  324  ;  vi.,  1,  U  ;  S£thas,  T6 
Xpovinbv  tqv  Ya\<ii-€i8lov,  239. 


208  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

were  their  neighbours.  If  Frankish  influence,  personified 
by  the  Duke  of  Athens  and  his  viceroy,  was  predominant  in 
Thessaly,  an  able  and  unscrupulous  woman  still  held  Epiros 
for  the  national  cause,  while  the  pope  plaintively  wrote  that 
"  much  of  Achaia  was  in  Greek  hands,"  and  in  vain  ordered 
a  tithe  to  be  levied  and  paid  to  its  prince  for  the  recovery  of 
what  had  been  lost1  Venice,  however,  had  maintained  and 
strengthened  her  three  colonies  of  Modon,  Coron,  and 
Negroponte.  Lluria  had  spared  the  two  Messenian  stations 
on  his  cruise  round  the  Morea,  because  their  Venetian 
masters  were  at  peace  with  the  house  of  Aragon ;  but  the 
republic,  none  the  less,  constructed  an  arsenal  at  Coron,  and 
restored  the  walls  of  Modon.  Their  trade  naturally  suffered 
when  the  dominions  of  the  republic  were  laid  under  an 
interdict  by  the  pope,  and  after  the  great  earthquake  of 
1304;  but  such  was  their  prosperity  in  1291,  that  it  was 
ordered  that  2000  ounces  should  be  sent  to  Venice  every 
year  out  of  their  surplus  revenues,  and  a  little  later  the 
salaries  of  their  officials  were  raised.  Finding  that  the  wives 
of  the  governors  interfered  in  the  colonial  administration, 
and  that  their  sons  engaged  in  commerce,  the  Home  Govern- 
ment made  a  rule,  that  they  must  leave  their  female  belong- 
ings and  their  grown-up  sons  behind  them  in  Venice. 
Stringent  regulations  were  also  issued  for  the  protection  of 
the  peasants'  property,  and  it  was  the  policy  of  the  republican 
authorities  to  keep  on  good  terms  with  both  their  Greek  and 
Frankish  neighbours;  to  the  latter,  however,  they  did  not 
hesitate  to  lend  the  services  of  the  famous  engineers  of 
Coron  whenever  there  was  a  castle  to  besiege.2 

We  last  saw  the  island  of  Eubcea  almost  entirely  in  the 
hands  of  the  Greeks,  thanks  to  the  energy  of  Licario ;  but 
before  the  close  of  the  century,  the  imperial  garrisons  had 
all  been  driven  out  of  the  island.  The  first  step  was  the 
recovery  of  the  two  castles  of  La  Clisura  and  Argalia,  by 
treachery ;  as  the  island  was  specially  excepted  from  the 
truce  of  1285  between  Venice  and  Andr6nikos  II.,  the 
process   of  reconquest  could   go   on   more  or  less  uninter- 

1  Regestum  dementis  V.%  ii.,  17,  19 ;  iii.,  84. 

2  L.  d.  C,  472  ;  Sanudo,   Vite  de*  Duchiy  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  580  ,• 
Pachym^res,  ii.,  393  ;  Pilosus,  fol.  466. 


THE  VENETIANS  IN  EUBOEA  209 

ruptedly;  till,  finally,  the  quarrels  between  the  Venetians 
and  their  Genoese  rivals  at  Constantinople  led,  in  1296,  to 
the  renewal  of  hostilities  between  the  former  and  the  Greek 
Empire,  and  so  afforded  an  excellent  opportunity  for  recaptur- 
ing the  last  remaining  Byzantine  fortresses  of  Karystos, 
Larmena,  and  Metropyle.  The  credit  for  this  final  blow 
belonged  to  Bonifacio  da  Verona,  who  thus  obtained  posses- 
sion of  the  noble  castle  of  southern  Euboea,  which  had  been 
part  of  his  wife's  dowry ;  henceforth,  in  fact,  as  well  as  in 
name,  the  prime  favourite  of  Duke  Guy  of  Athens  was  baron 
of  Karystos,  and  the  most  important  of  all  the  Lombard 
lords  in  the  island.  But  the  real  influence  over  Euboea  was 
gradually  passing  into  the  hands  of  the  Venetians.  Not 
only  did  the  latter  buy  more  land  round  about  Chalkis,  but 
by  the  usual  ill-luck  which  attended  Frankish  marriages  in 
the  Levant,  the  three  great  baronies  of  Negroponte  were  at 
this  time  almost  entirely  in  the  possession  of  women,  so  that 
the  Venetian  bailie  acquired  a  predominant  position,  which 
was  further  enhanced  by  the  popularity  of  several  of  those 
officials.  The  elder  Sanudo,1  however,  a  Venetian  himself, 
noticed  that  the  Greek  peasants  preferred  the  Genoese  to  the 
Venetians,  hastening  down  to  the  shore  with  provisions  as 
soon  as  a  Genoese  galley  hove  in  sight,  but  by  no  means 
displaying  the  like  alacrity  when  they  descried  the  Venetian 
flag.  And,  as  the  same  author  shrewdly  observed,  "in 
Candia,  Negroponte,  and  other  islands,  and  in  the  princi- 
pality of  the  Morea,  although  those  places  are  subject  to  the 
Frankish  sway  and  obedient  to  the  Roman  Church,  yet 
almost  all  the  inhabitants  are  Greeks,  and  inclined  to  that 
sect,  and  their  hearts  are  turned  towards  things  Greek  ;  and, 
if  they  had  a  chance  of  displaying  their  preference  freely, 
they  would  do  so."  A  bigoted  French  bishop,  like  Gautier 
de  Ray  of  Negroponte,  cousin  of  the  Duke  of  Athens,  could 
still  further  estrange  the  "schismatic"  Greeks  from  the 
Catholic  fold.  One  other  section  of  the  community  in  that 
city — the  Jews — had  no  special  reason  for  loving  the  Venetian 
administration,  for  it  was  upon  them  that  the  burden  of 
taxation  was  more  especially  laid.     Thus,  when  the  salaries 

1  Istoria  del  Regno,   125,  130,  131,  134,  143;  and  Secreta  Fide  Hum 
Cruris,  299-300. 

O 


210  THE  ANGEVINS  IN  GREECE 

of  the  two  Venetian  councillors  were  increased,  as  compensa- 
tion for  their  exclusion  from  trade,  the  difference  was  ordered 
to  be  defrayed  by  the  Jews,  who  had  also,  in  1 304,  to  pay  the 
cost  of  fortifying  with  strong  walls  and  gates  the  hitherto 
open  Venetian  quarter  of  the  city  of  Negroponte.  This 
precaution,  followed  by  an  order  that  henceforth  the  bailie 
and  one  of  the  two  councillors  must  always  reside  within  the 
walls,  was  due  to  an  attempt  by  the  Lombards  to  levy  taxes 
on  a  Venetian  citizen ;  it  was  then  that  Chalkis  assumed  the 
picturesque  appearance  of  a  walled  city,  which,  in  spite  of 
modern  acts  of  Vandalism,  it  still  preserves.  Occasionally, 
however,  a  Jewish  family  was  specially  exempted  from 
taxation,  as  a  reward  for  its  loyalty  to  the  republic.  Thus, 
at  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century,  Eubcea  possessed 
for  Venice  an  importance  second  to  that  of  Crete  alone.  It 
became  the  station  of  a  Venetian  fleet,  and  during  the 
maritime  war  against  Andr6nikos  II.,  which  was  concluded 
by  the  ten  years'  truce  of  1303,  it  was  a  convenient  basis 
whence  privateers  and  armatores  could  swoop  down  upon 
those  islands  of  the  Archipelago  which  Licario  had  wrested 
from  their  Latin  lords.1 

Such  was  the  condition  of  Greece,  when  a  new  race  of 
conquerors  from  the  West  suddenly  appeared  there,  and 
destroyed  in  a  single  day  the  most  magnificent  fabric  which 
the  Franks  had  raised  in  "  New  France." 

1  Prcdelli,  Commemoriali,  i.,  4,  10,  35  ;  Les  Regis tres  de  Boniface 
VIILy  L,  408,  763  ;  Archivio  Veneto,  xx.,  81. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE   CATALAN   GRAND  COMPANY  (1302-I3II) 

The  history  of  Greece  in  the  last  quarter  of  the  thirteenth 
century  was  more  influenced  by  the  long  duel  between  the 
rival  houses  of  Anjou  and  Aragon  for  the  beautiful  island  of 
Sicily  than  by  any  other  cause.  It  was  the  Sicilian  vespers 
and  their  consequences  which  paralysed  the  schemes  of  the 
Angevins  for  the  reconquest  of  the  Latin  Empire  of  the 
East ;  it  was  the  restoration  of  peace  in  Sicily,  after  a  twenty 
years'  struggle,  by  the  peace  of  Caltabellotta  in  1 302,  which 
let  loose  upon  the  Greeks  and  the  Frankish  rulers  of  the 
Levant  the  terrible  Catalan  auxiliaries  of  the  Aragonese 
party,  and  thus  vitally  affected  for  nearly  a  hundred  years  the 
fortunes  of  Hellas.  What  the  Fourth  Crusade  was  to  the 
thirteenth  century,  the  Catalan  expedition  was  to  the 
fourteenth,  only  that  the  rough  mercenaries  from  Barcelona 
showed  less  regard  for  the  Greeks  than  the  motley  band  of 
younger  sons  and  noble  adventurers  and  astute  Venetians, 
who  had  divided  among  themselves  the  fragments  of  the 
Byzantine  Empire  a  hundred  years  before.  The  Catalans, 
like  the  Crusaders,  have  been  very  differently  judged  by 
Eastern  and  Western  writers.  Of  the  four  contemporaries, 
who  have  left  us  accounts  of  their  doings,  the  three  Greeks 
— Pachymdres,  Nikephoros  Gregorys,  and  the  rhetorician 
Theodoulos — depict  them  as  savages,  whose  sole  idea  was 
plunder;  while  their  comrade  and  compatriot,  Ram6n 
Muntaner,  is  rather  proud  than  otherwise  of  their  exploits, 
and  heaps  upon  the  Greeks  the  same  terms  of  opprobrium 
which  we  find  applied  to  them  a  century  earlier  by  the 
apologists  of  the   Fourth   Crusade.      Modern   writers  have 

taken  sides,  according  to  their  nationalities.     To  Stamatiades 

211 


212     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

the  Catalans  are  the  oppressors  of  the  Greeks,  to  Moncada 
and  Rubi6  y  Lluch  they  are  heroes  worthy  to  be  descendants 
of  the  Crusaders.  If  their  career  has  been  very  variously 
judged,  it  has,  at  least,  inspired  two  masterpieces  of  literature 
— the  delightful  Chronicle  of  Muntaner  and  the  majestic 
prose  of  Moncada,  a  work  justly  esteemed  worthy  of  a  place 
in  the  library  of  Spanish  classics.1 

During  the  long  struggle  against  the  Angevins  in  Sicily, 
King  Frederick  II.,  who  now  ruled  that  debatable  island, 
had  thankfully  availed  himself  of  the  stout  hearts  and  stalwart 
arms  of  the  Catalans.  Their  principal  chief  was  one  Roger 
de  Flor,  whose  father,  a  German,  had  been  falconer  of  the 
Emperor  Frederick  II.,  and  whose  mother  was  daughter  of  a 
prominent  citizen  of  Brindisi,  where  Roger,  like  Margaritone 
a  century  earlier,  was  born.  His  father  lost  both  life  and 
property,  fighting  against  Charles  of  Anjou  at  the  battle  of 
Tagliacozzo,  so  that  the  lad  was  early  thrown  on  his  own 
resources.  But  Brindisi  was,  in  that  age,  one  of  the  most 
important  ports  in  the  Mediterranean,  whence  there  was 
constant  communication  with  Greece  and  Syria — just  the 
place,  in  fact,  where  an  adventurous  boy  would  find  an 
opening  for  a  career.  One  winter,  when  Roger  was  eight 
years  old,  the  vessel  of  a  Knight  Templar  lay  in  the  harbour, 
close  to  his  mother's  abode;  the  nimble  youth  was  soon 
free  of  the  ship,  running  about  the  deck  as  if  he  had  been 
bred  to  the  sea.  The  captain  took  a  fancy  to  him,  offered  to 
make  a  man  of  him,  and  when  the  ship  at  last  sailed,  Roger 
sailed  with  it.  He  soon  became  an  experienced  seaman,  and, 
in  due  course  was  admitted  a  brother  of  the  Temple,  being 
ultimately  entrusted  with  the  command  of  the  largest  vessel 
belonging  to  the  Order.     He  was  present  with  this  ship  at 

1  The  contemporary  authorities  for  the  Catalan  expedition  are 
Pachyme>es,  ii.,  393-4<x>,  415-42,  480-518,  521-58,  562  sqq.\  Nike- 
ph6ros  Gregoras,  i.,  218-33,  244"54  >  The6doulos,  llpeapcvriKds  rpbt  rbv 
f}a<n\4a  'Av8p6vucov  and  Tlcpl  tuv  4v  t$  *IraX«y  ical  Tiepa-jjv  £<f>68<p  yeyevrj/xivuv 
afiud  Boissonade,  Anecdota  Grceca,  ii.,  188-228  ;  Muntaner,  ch.  cxciv. 
sqq^  and  Nicolaus  Specialis  apud  Muratori,  x.,  1050.  Of  the  moderns 
the  best  are  Moncada  (died  1635),  Expedition  de  los  Catalanes;  Rubio  y 
Lluch,  La  expedition  y  domination  de  los  Catalanes  en  Oriente;  Stama- 
tiacles,  01  KaraXdm  iv  r%  'A^aroXg;  and  Schlumberger,  Expedition  des 
"  Almugavares  "  ou  routiers  Catalans  en  Orient 


ROGER  DE  FLOR  213 

the  capture  of  Acre  by  the  Egyptians,  and  was  the  means  of 
conveying  many  of  the  fugitives  and  much  treasure  to  a  place 
of  safety.  But  his  large  profits  by  this  voyage  aroused  envy 
and  suspicion ;  the  Grand  Master  of  the  Order  laid  hands 
upon  what  property  of  Roger's  he  could  find,  and  tried  to 
arrest  him ;  but  the  latter  managed  to  escape  to  Genoa, 
where  he  equipped  a  galley  of  his  own.  Renouncing  his 
allegiance  to  the  Temple,  he  now  offered  his  services  to  the 
Angevins,  and,  when  his  offer  was  coldly  received,  to  King 
Frederick  II.,  who  graciously  accepted  them.  Honours  and 
wealth  were  bestowed  upon  him ;  he  became  Vice- Admiral 
of  Sicily,  and  the  most  terrible  corsair  of  the  age. 

The  peace  of  Caltabellotta  closed  the  active  career  of 
Roger  and  his  band  of  Catalans  in  Sicily.  Their  present 
employer  could  no  longer  support  them  from  the  revenues  of 
an  island  exhausted  by  twenty  years  of  civil  war;  they 
could  not  return  to  Spain,  because  they  had  espoused  the 
cause  of  King  Frederick  of  Sicily  against  his  brother,  King 
James  II.  of  Aragon,  nor  had  these  homeless  wanderers  any 
strong  ties  to  bind  them  to  their  native  land  ;  moreover,  the 
pope  either  had  demanded,  or  seemed  likely  to  demand,  the 
surrender  of  their  chief,  the  scourge  of  the  Angevins,  the 
renegade  brother  of  the  Temple.  Frederick  II.  was,  on  his 
part,  naturally  desirous,  like  governments  in  our  own  time, 
to  rid  himself  of  such  dangerous  allies,  now  that  he  had  no 
further  use  for  their  services.  He  had  already  offered  them 
to  Charles  of  Valois,  husband  of  Catherine  of  Courtenay, 
titular  Empress  of  Constantinople,  whose  claims  to  the 
Byzantine  throne  he  had  pledged  himself  to  support.1  As 
this  venture  against  Andr6nikos  II.  was  not  carried  out, 
Roger  bethought  himself  of  offering  his  band  of  followers  to 
the  same  emperor  whom  he  had  been  expected  to  attack. 
Andr6nikos,  then  hard  pressed  by  the  growing  power  of  the 
Turks,  welcomed  Roger's  proposal  as  a  godsend.  He 
accepted  the  latter's  terms,  which  had  been  drawn  up  by 
Muntaner  himself ;  Roger  was  to  obtain  the  title  of  "  Grand 
Duke,"  which  was  equivalent  to  Lord  High  Admiral  in  the 
Byzantine  hierarchy,  with  the  hand  of  the  emperor's  niece, 
Maria;  his  men  were  to  receive  pay  at  double  the  usual 
1  Ducange,  op.  ctf.,  ii.,  335-6 ;  Sanudo,  173. 


214     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

rate,  and  four  months  were  to  be  paid  in  advance,  the  first 
instalment  being  paid  at  Monemvasia.  On  these  conditions, 
Roger  sailed  for  Constantinople  with  thirty-six  ships  and 
6500  men.1  Of  these,  4000  were  the  so-called  almugavari%  or 
"skirmishers,"  the  most  formidable  infantry  of  the  time, 
whose  exploits  led  the  terrified  Pachymdres,  by  a  false,  but 
pardonable  etymology,  to  connect  them  with  the  barbarous 
Avars.  "Would  that  Constantinople,"  cried  the  historian, 
"  had  never  beheld  the  Latin  Roger ! " 

The  name  and  fame  of  the  Catalans  were  already  known 
in  the  harbours  of  the  Levant.  As  early  as  1268,  King 
James  I.  of  Aragon,  of  whose  dominions  Catalufta  formed  a 
part,  had  allowed  the  merchants  of  Barcelona  to  establish 
consuls  in  the  Byzantine  Empire ;  and,  about  1 290,  one  of 
those  officials  is  mentioned  in  a  golden  bull  of  Andr6nikos 
II.,  which  granted  special  privileges  to  merchants  from  Spain. 
Catalan  trade  had  naturally  followed  the  Byzantine  flag  at  a 
time  when  the  Greek  emperors  were  instigating  the  house  of 
Aragon  against  the  hated  Angevins  in  Sicily,  and  the  East 
had  had  a  taste  of  the  Catalans'  quality  as  fighting  men. 
Michael  VIII.  had  on  one  occasion  employed  a  Catalan 
vessel  to  tackle  a  Genoese  corsair,  and  we  saw  Catalan 
mercenaries  assisting  Licario  against  the  Lombards  of  Euboea 
and  ravaging  the  Morea  under  Roger  de  Lluria.  Thus  the 
new  Roger  represented  a  force  whose  value  the  emperor  was 
well  able  to  estimate. 

On  their  way  to  Constantinople,  the  Catalans  plundered 
Corfu,  then  a  possession  of  the  Angevins,  and  put  into 
Monemvasia,  where  the  imperial  authorities  received  them 
well.  When  they  reached  the  capital,  the  emperor  was  as 
good  as  his  word :  the  soldiers  were  given  four  months'  pay 
in  advance,  and  Roger  received  the  hand  of  the  fair  Maria. 
When,  somewhat  later,  another  Catalan  leader,  Berenguer  de 
Entenca,  Lluria's  brother-in-law  and  "  one  of  the  noblest  men 
of  Spain,"  arrived  with  a  fresh  contingent,  Roger  relin- 
quished to  him  the  title  of  Grand  Duke,  and  was  yet  further 
honoured  by  that  of  "Caesar,"  one  of  the  great  Byzantine 
dignities,  whose  latest  holders  had  been  Alexios  Strateg6- 

1  Muntaner,  the  best  authority,  gives  6500  ;  Pachym£res,  8000  ;  Nike- 
ph6ros,  2000. 


THE  CATALANS  AT  GALLIPOLI  215 

poulos,  the  conqueror  of  Constantinople  from  the  Latins, 
and  John  and  Constantine  Palai61ogos,  the  uncles  of  the 
emperor.  The  Catalan  commander  was  the  last  person  who 
ever  bore  the  title. 

The  newcomers  soon  proved  to  be  a  curse  to  the  empire 
which  they  had  been  summoned  to  defend.  If  they  defeated 
the  Turks  in  Asia,  they  quarrelled  with  the  Genoese  in  the 
capital  and  plundered  the  Greeks  everywhere.  When  they 
had  desolated  Asia,  they  crossed  over  into  Europe,  and 
encamped  at  Gallipoli  on  the  Dardanelles,  where  Alfonso 
Fadrique,  a  natural  son  of  King  Frederick  of  Sicily,  joined 
them.  Roger  was  now  killed  at  Adrianople  by  orders  of 
Michael,  the  emperor's  son  and  colleague  ;  but  the  deed  only 
made  the  Catalans  more  desperate,  and  therefore  more  danger- 
ous. Under  Enten^a,  Roger's  successor,  they  entrenched 
themselves  at  Gallipoli,  and  defied  the  emperor;  when 
Enten^a  was  captured  by  a  Genoese  fleet,  they  made 
Berenguer  de  Rocafort,  a  resolute  soldier  of  humble  origin, 
their  leader,  routed  the  imperial  troops  and  wounded  the 
emperor's  son.  Twelve  councillors  were  appointed  to  assist 
Rocafort ;  a  great  seal  was  made  bearing  the  image  of  St 
George  and  the  proud  superscription  "the  army  of  the 
Franks  who  reign  over  the  kingdom  of  Macedonia,"  and  was 
entrusted  to  the  charge  of  Muntaner;  three  banners,  those  of 
Aragon,  of  Sicily,  and  of  St  George,  accompanied  the  host  to 
battle ;  a  fourth,  that  of  St  Peter,  waved  on  the  topmost 
tower  of  Gallipoli.  Their  victories  soon  attracted  a  body  of 
loyal  and  valuable  allies — 3800  Turks  and  Turkish  renegades ; 
ere  long  there  was  scarcely  a  town  in  Thrace  and  Macedonia 
which  they  had  not  sacked.  But  dissensions  broke  out 
among  the  Catalan  leaders.  Enten^a,  who  had  secured  his 
release,  was  murdered  on  his  return  by  Rocafort's  relatives, 
and  that  crafty  chief  persuaded  his  men  to  refuse  to  recognise 
the  authority  of  King  Frederick  of  Sicily,  who  was  desirous 
to  exploit  for  his  own  ends  the  triumphs  of  his  former 
mercenaries,  and  had  accordingly  sent  his  cousin,  the  Infant 
Ferdinand,  son  of  King  James  I.  of  Majorca,  to  take 
command  of  the  company  in  his  name.1  Unable  to  assert  his 
powers  as  King  Frederick's  delegate,  the  Infant  resolved  to 
1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherchts^  II.,  i.,  385-90. 


216     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

return  to  Sicily ;  with  him  went  the  faithful  Muntaner,  while 
the  main  body,  under  Rocafort,  having  exhausted  Thrace  and 
plundered  the  monasteries  of  Mount  Athos,  moved  to 
Kassandreia,  the  ancient  Potidaia,  a  deserted  city  on  the 
narrow  isthmus  which  connects  the  peninsula  of  Kassandra 
with  the  rest  of  Macedonia. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  the  Catalan  expedition  begins  to 
affect  the  history  of  Frankish  Greece.     On  their  way  home, 
the  Infant  and  Muntaner  put   into  the  Thessalian  port  of 
Halmyros,  at  that  time  under  the  regency  of  the  Duke  of 
Athens,  and  set  fire  to  all  that  they  could  find,  in  revenge 
for   the  disappearance  of   some   of  their   men  and   stores. 
After  ravaging  the  island  of  Skopelos,  still  a  Greek  possession, 
they   steered  for  Negroponte,  where  the   Infant  had  been 
hospitably    treated    on    his   outward   voyage.     But   at  this 
moment  there  chanced  to  be  in  the  harbour  eleven  Venetian 
vessels  with  Thibaut  de  Cepoy  on  board — a  French  nobleman, 
agent  of   Charles    of  Valois,  who,  in    1306,  had   renewed 
between  his  master  and  Venice  the  old  arrangement  made 
twenty-five  years  before  at  Orvieto  for  the  recovery  of  the 
Latin  Empire,1  and  who  was  now  manoeuvring  to  win  over 
Rocafort    and    his    Catalans  to   the  service  of  the  titular 
empress  and  her  husband.     Cepoy  feared  that  Ferdinand,  as 
the  representative  of  the   King  of  Sicily,  might  thwart  his 
plan ;  his  Venetian  escort  had  heard  that  Muntaner's  galley 
contained   a  goodly   quantity   of   spoil ;     accordingly,   they 
attacked  the  little  flotilla,  seized  the  chronicler's  property  and 
arrested  the  Infant,  in  spite  of  the  safe  conduct,  which   the 
barons  of  Negroponte  had  given  him.     Ferdinand  and  his 
faithful  retainer  were  lodged  in  the  house  of  Bonifacio  da 
Verona,  whence  the   Infant  was   handed   over   to  Jean  de 
Maisy,    a    well-connected    Frenchman,    who    had    recently 
become,  by  marriage  with  one  of  the  Lombard  heiresses,  the 
next  most   important  baron  of  the  island.      He  was  then 
escorted   to  Thebes,   where   Duke  Guy  of  Athens,  annoyed 
at  the  destruction  of  Halmyros,  and  already  won  over  by 
Cepoy,  shut  him  up  in  the  castle  of  St  Omer.     Muntaner  was 
sent  back  to  Rocafort  at  Kassandreia,  where  he  received  an 
enthusiastic  reception,  and   whence  he  shortly  returned  to 
1  Thomas,  Diflomatarium  V^net0-Levantinumx  I.,  48-53. 


MUNTANER  AT  THEBES  217 

Negroponte,  in  quest  of  his  stolen  property.  All  efforts  to 
recover  it  failed ;  but  half  a  century  later  Venice  paid  back 
to  the  chronicler's  granddaughter  a  tenth  part  of  what  he 
had  lost  at  Negroponte.1  A  poorer  and  a  wiser  man — for  he 
had  learnt  that  it  was  dangerous  to  travel  with  young 
princes — Muntaner  proceeded  to  Thebes,  where  Guy  II., 
then  already  a  prey  to  the  malady  which  carried  him  off  a 
year  later,  received  him  with  courtesy.  He  was  not  the 
first  Catalan  whom  the  duke  had  met;  for,  three  years 
earlier,  Ferdinand  Ximenes,  the  most  respectable  of  all  the 
Catalan  leaders,  had  left  Roger  de  Flor  in  disgust  at  his 
cruelty,  and  had  spent  some  time  at  the  Theban  court,  where 
he  had  been  entertained  with  those  honours  which  the 
lavish  duke  knew  so  well  how  to  bestow.  Muntaner,  in 
response  to  Guy's  polite  attentions,  asked  for  one  favour 
only — that  the  Infant  might  be  well  treated  and  that  he 
might  be  permitted  to  see  him.  The  request  was  granted ;  the 
warm-hearted  Catalan  passed  two  days  in  the  society  of  his 
young  master,  and  when  he  departed,  almost  broken-hearted, 
for  Sicily,  he  left  behind  him  part  of  his  scanty  funds  for 
the  Infant's  use,  and  made  the  cook  swear  on  the  gospels 
that  he  would  not  put  poison  into  the  royal  prisoner's  food. 
The  Infant  was  subsequently  released  and  sent  to  the  King 
of  Naples,  at  the  request  of  Charles  of  Valois  ;  after  more  than 
a  year's  honourable  imprisonment  at  Naples,  he  was  allowed 
to  return  to  Majorca.  We  shall  find  him  later  on  intervening, 
with  fatal  results  to  himself,  in  the  affairs  of  Greece. 

Meanwhile,  the  main  body  of  the  Catalans,  in  their  camp 
at  Kassandreia,  were  treating  Macedonia  as  they  had  treated 
Thrace.  Rocafort,  hopelessly  compromised  with  both  the 
King  of  Sicily  and  the  house  of  Aragon  by  his  refusal  to 
accept  the  authority  of  the  Infant  Ferdinand,  had  thought 
it  prudent  to  take  an  oath  of  fealty  to  Thibaut  de  Cepoy  as 
the  representative  of  Charles  of  Valois,  but,  in  spite  of 
Cepoy's  nominal  leadership,  he  continued  to  be  the  guiding 
spirit  of  the  Company.  His  ambition  aimed  at  nothing  less 
than  a  royal  crown,  and  he  dreamed  of  reviving  for  himself 
that  kingdom  of  Salonika  which  Boniface  of  Montferrat  had 
founded  a  century  before,  and  which  still  lingered  on  as  a 
1  Predelli,  Commemorialix  i.,  87 ;  ii.,  186,  190,  250. 


218     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

titular  dignity  of  the  ducal  house  of  Burgundy.1  He  had  a 
seal  executed,  bearing  the  figure  of  St  Demetrios  and  a 
golden  crown,  while  he  excited  his  men  by  promising  them 
the  plunder  of  Salonika,  a  rich  and  populous  city,  at  that 
moment  a  particularly  splendid  prize,  because  its  walls 
contained  the  two  empresses,  Irene,  wife  of  Andr6nikos  II., 
and  Maria,  consort  of  his  son  and  colleague,  Michael.  Just 
as  Boniface's  conquests  had  included  Attica,  so  Rocafort,  too, 
was  plotting  the  ultimate  dominion  of  the  Athenian  duchy. 
With  this  object  he  sought  the  hand  of  Jeannette  de  Brienne, 
half-sister  of  the  childless  Guy  II.,  which  the  Empress  Irene 
had  already  asked  for  her  son  Theodore.  Guy  had  been  too 
honest  to  accept  her  offer,  which  had  been  coupled  with  the 
proposal  that  he  and  she  should  simultaneously  attack  his 
ward,  young  John  1 1,  of  Thessaly  and  Neopatras,  and  that 
the  latter's  dominions  should  be  given  to  her  son.2  Negotia- 
tions went  on,  however,  for  some  time  between  him  and 
Rocafort;  two  of  his  minstrels  were  sent  as  his  envoys  to 
Kassandreia,3  and'he  seems  to  have  entertained  the  idea  of 
using  the  Catalans  to  conquer  the  Morea  in  the  name  of  his 
wife,  the  natural  heiress  of  the  Villehardouins,4  who,  as  we 
saw,  had  in  vain  demanded  it  as  her  birthright  from  Nicholas 
de  St  Omer,  when  he  had  been  left  as  bailie  after  the 
departure  of  Philip  of  Savoy.  But  Venice,  alarmed  for  her 
colony  at  Negroponte,  worked  against  a  plan  which  would 
have  exposed  that  station  to  a  Catalan  attack,  and  Rocafort, 
whose  arbitrary  acts  had  made  him  unpopular  with  his  men, 
was  arrested  by  the  council  of  the  Catalan  Company,  and 
handed  over  to  Cepoy.  The  latter  was  by  this  time  weary 
of  his  life  with  the  wild  Catalans,  while  his  mission  had  no 
further  object  since  the  death  of  Catherine  of  Courtenay,  the 
titular  empress  of  Constantinople,  at  the  beginning  of  1308, 
and  the  consequent  transference  of  her  claims  to  her  daughter, 
Catherine  of  Valois.  He  therefore  determined  to  quit  the 
Catalan  camp  with  his  prisoner.     One  night,  without  saying 

1  Buchon,  Recherches  et  Mat/riaux,  i.,  68. 

2  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  237  (who,  however,  calls  her,  by  a  con- 
fusion, the  duke's  "daughter") ;  Lettere  di  Collegio,  fol.  6. 

3  As  we  see  from  Cepoy's  accounts  ;  Ducange,  ofi.  a't.t  ii.,  355. 
«  X.  r.  M.,  11.  7275-81  ;  C.  (L  M.,  456. 


DEATH  OF  GUY  II.  219 

good-bye  to  a  single  soul,  he  embarked  on  some  galleys 
which  his  son  had  brought  from  Venice,  and  next  morning 
when  the  Company  awoke,  he  was  well  out  at  sea,  on  the 
way  to  Naples.  There  he  surrendered  Rocafort  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  that  amiable  sovereign,  King  Robert,  who  paid  off 
an  old  grudge  which  he  had  against  the  bold  Catalan  by 
throwing  him  into  the  dungeons  of  Aversa,  where  he  died  of 
hunger.1  Meanwhile,  the  Catalans,  furious  at  the  departure 
of  their  leader,  repented  of  what  they  had  done.  In  their 
rage  they  slew  fourteen  captains  who  had  been  the  ringleaders 
in  the  revolt  against  Rocafort — a  proceeding  which  still 
further  diminished  the  number  of  prominent  men  among 
them.  Until  they  could  find  a  new  chief,  they  elected  a 
committee  of  four,  chosen  in  equal  numbers  from  the  cavalry 
and  infantry,  besides  the  original  Council  of  Twelve. 

Such  was  the  situation  of  the  Catalan  Company,  when 
the  last  of  the  De  la  Roche  dukes  of  Athens  lay  a-dying. 
Muntaner,  as  we  saw,  had  found  him  very  ill,  when  he 
visited  Thebes,  nor  could  the  medical  skill  of  the  patriarch  of 
Alexandria,  who  chanced  to  be  in  Euboea  and  prescribed  for 
the  ailing  duke,  avail  to  save  him.  On  5th  October  1308, 
"the  good  duke,"  Guy  II.,  died.  On  the  following  day,  he 
was  laid  to  rest  in  "  the  mausoleum  of  his  ancestors  "  at  the 
famous  Cistercian  Abbey  of  Daphni  on  the  Sacred  Way, 
where  a  sarcophagus  with  a  cross,  two  snakes,  and  two 
lilies  carved  upon  it,  which  was  perhaps  his  tomb,  may  still 
be  seen  lying  outside  in  the  courtyard.  A  certificate  of  his 
death  and  burial  was  drawn  up  by  Archbishop  Henry  of 
Athens,  the  Abbot  of  Daphni,  the  ex-pirate  Gaffore,  now  a 
peaceful  Athenian  citizen,  and  others,  who  implored,  in  the 
name  of  the  widowed  duchess,  now  left  alone  in  the  world 

1  Hopf  and  Gregorovius  rejected  the  statement  of  Muntaner  (ch. 
ccxxxix.),  that  Cepoy  fled  with  Rocafort  on  the  ground  that  the  last 
section  of  his  financial  accounts,  which  have  been  preserved  and  pub- 
lished by  Ducange  (op.  cit.y  ii.,  352-6),  begins  with  9th  September  1309, 
which  they  therefore  assumed,  without  evidence,  to  be  the  date  of  his 
departure  from  Greece.  But  Cepoy  was  always  accustomed  to  divide  his 
accounts  at  that  date,  because  it  completed  the  period  of  twelve  months 
from  the  time  of  his  departure  from  Paris  in  1306.  The  mention  of  that 
date  therefore  merely  means  that  the  fourth  year  of  his  mission  began 
then.    According  to  Lettere  di  Collegio,  f.  63,  he  was  in  Thessaly  in  1309. 


220     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

at  the  age  of  fifteen,  the  protection  of  her  cousin,  Count 
William  of  Hainault.  Her  husband  had  not,  however,  been 
dead  four  months,  when  she  was  affianced  in  the  Theban 
minster,  the  scene  of  so  many  gorgeous  ceremonies,  to  the 
eldest  son  of  Philip  of  Taranto.  Thither,  for  the  last  time, 
gathered  the  noble  chivalry  of  Athens,  to  witness  this  latest 
sacrifice  to  the  insatiable  ambition  of  the  Angevins.1 

Guy  II.  had  left  no  children,  but  fortunately  the  succession 
to  his  delectable  duchy,  of  which  he  had  appointed  his 
bosom  friend,  Bonifacio  da  Verona,  as  temporary  adminis- 
trator, was  not  seriously  disputed.  Neither  the  French  nor 
the  Argive  branch  of  the  De  la  Roche  family  (the  barons  of 
Veligosti  and  Damal&)  made  any  claim  to  his  inheritance ;  the 
husband  of  his  aunt  Catherine,  Carlo  de  Lagonessa,  seneschal 
of  Sicily  and  son  of  the  former  bailie  of  Achaia,  who  had 
regarded  himself  a  few  years  before  as  his  heir,  and 
Lagonessa's  son,  Giovanni,  had  both  predeceased  him,2  so  that 
there  only  remained  his  two  first  cousins,  Eschive,  Lady  of 
Beyrout,  daughter  of  his  aunt  Alice,  and  Walter,  son  of  his 
aunt  Isabelle  and  Hugues  de  Brienne,  his  stepfather. 
Hugues  de  Brienne  had  left  Greece  for  Apulia  after  his 
stepson  had  come  of  age,  and  had  been  killed  in  battle  in 
1296.  His  son,  Walter,  Count  of  Lecce,  accordingly  came 
forward  as  Guy's  successor.  Dame  Eschive  of  Beyrout 
asserted,  however,  that  she  had  a  prior  claim,  because  her 
mother  was  the  elder  sister  of  Walter's  mother.  As  the 
duchy  of  Athens  was  in  the  Angevin  times  a  vassal  state  of 
the  principality  of  Achaia,  King  Robert  of  Naples,  the  head 
of  the  Angevins,  and  Philip  of  Taranto,  as  Prince  of  Achaia 
and  suzerain  of  Athens,  referred  the  question  in  the  middle 
of  1309  to  the  Achaian  High  Court,  of  which  Philip's  new 
bailie,  Bertino  Visconte,  was  the  president.  The  High 
Court  decided  in  favour  of  Walter,  on  the  ground  that  he 

1  Pachym^res,  II.,  450,  595  ;  Sanudo,  136;  Muntaner,  chs.  ccxxxvii., 
ccxl.,  ccxliv.;  X.  t.  M.t  1L  7263-9,  8046-55  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  I., 
89 ;  St  Genois,  i.,  215,  338 ;  Buchon,  Recherches  historiques,  i.,  473  ;  La 
Grke  Continentale,  131 -3.  M.  Millet,  however,  in  his  monograph  on 
Daphni  (p.  39),  doubts  whether  the  sarcophagus  is  the  tomb  of  Guy,  as 
the  arms  upon  it  were  not  those  of  his  family. 

2  Riccio,  Studii  storiei  sopra  84  Registriy  54. 


X 


WALTER  OF  BRIENxNE,  DUKE  OF  ATHENS    221 

was  a  powerful  and  gallant  man,  while  the  Lady  of  Beyrout 
was  not  only  a  woman  but  a  widow.  When  Eschive  heard 
the  sentence  of  the  Court,  she  knelt  down  at  the  altar  of  the 
church  of  St  Francis  at  Glarentza,  where  the  barons  had  met, 
and  prayed  the  Virgin  that  if  her  judges  and  her  opponent 
had  wrought  injustice,  they  might  die  without  heirs  of  their 
bodies.  Then  she  departed  to  her  own  home,  and  Walter  of 
Brienne  entered  into  the  peaceable  possession  of  his  cousin's 
duchy,  which  Bonifacio  da  Verona,  who  had  acted  as  bailie 
during  the  interregnum,  handed  over  to  him.1 

The  new  Duke  of  Athens  was  a  true  scion  of  the 
adventurous  house  of  Brienne,  who  in  his  thirty  years  of  life 
had  seen  much  of  the  world.  As  a  boy  he  must  have  spent 
some  time  at  the  Theban  court,  when  his  father  was  guardian 
of  Guy  II.  When  barely  of  age,  he  had  been  one  of  the 
"  knights  of  death,"  who  had  gone  to  Sicily  to  support  the 
cause  of  Anjou,  and  he  had  fought  like  the  lion  on  his 
banner  at  Gagliano,  when  he  and  his  comrades  were 
treacherously  led  into  an  ambuscade.  Like  his  suzerain, 
Philip  of  Taranto,  he  had  been  the  prisoner  of  the 
Aragonese,  but  prison  had  not  made  him  cautious,  nor  had 
defeat  taught  him  the  folly  of  despising  the  infantry  of  Spain. 
Thus  the  succession  of  this  brave  but  headstrong  soldier 
destroyed,  instead  of  preserving,  "the  pleasaunce  of  the 
Latins"  in  Frankish  Athens.  Yet  it  is  impossible  not  to 
admire  the  reckless  courage  of  this  most  unstatesmanlike 
ruler.  Those  who  have  seen  the  knightly  figure  of  the  last 
French  Duke  of  Athens  step  on  to  the  stage  in  M.  Rhangab£s's 
gorgeously  mounted  play,  "The  Duchess  of  Athens" — a 
drama  which,  in  spite  of  some  glaring  anachronisms,  has  given 
us  a  living  picture  of  the  brilliant  French  court  of  Thebes 
on  the  eve  of  the  catastrophe — can  feel  all  the  pathos  and 
all  the  pity  of  so  promising  a  career  so  wantonly  sacrificed. 

Meanwhile,  the  Catalans  were  drawing  nearer  to  the 
Athenian  frontier.  The  position  of  the  Company  in  the 
camp  at  Kassandreia  had  grown  more  and  more  precarious. 
In  Macedonia  they  were  threatened  with  starvation  and 
the  combined  attack  of  all  the  neighbouring  peoples.  The 
emperor  had  cut  off  their  retreat  into  Thrace  by  building  a 
1  L.  d.  F.,  1 18-19. 


222     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

long  wall  across  the  pass  of  Christopolis;  while  in  the 
imperial  general  Chandren6s,  if  we  may  believe  the  eulogy 
of  his  relative,  the  rhetorician  The6doulos,  they  had  found 
a  foeman  worthy  of  their  steel,  who  pressed  them  hard  in 
their  station  on  the  peninsula.  Accordingly,  they  resolved 
to  make  a  bold  dash  for  Thessaly,  "  a  land  of  plenty,"  or  find 
an  abiding  settlement  in  one  of  the  Greek  countries  to  the 
south  of  it  The  company  now  numbered  not  less  than 
8000  men,  of  whom  some  5000  were  Catalans,  and  the  rest 
Turks,  1 100  of  the  latter  being  converts  to  Christianity.  On 
the  borders  of  Thessaly,  a  portion  of  the  Turks  left  them,1 
and  the  rest  of  the  company,  after  wintering  at  the  foot  of 
Olympos,  traversed  the  lovely  vale  of  Tempe,  the  route  of 
so  many  an  army,  and  in  the  spring  of  1 309  debouched  into 
the  great  Thessalian  plain.  The  granary  of  Greece  lay  at 
their  mercy,  for  John  II.  of  Neopatras,  its  ruler,  who  had 
been  emancipated  from  his  Athenian  guardian  by  the  death 
of  Guy  II.,  was  young  in  years  and  weak  in  health;  fearing 
a  usurpation  on  the  part  of  one  of  the  feudal  barons  of 
Thessaly,  he  had  recently  married,  or  at  least  betrothed 
himself  to,  Irene,  natural  daughter  of  the  Emperor 
Andronikos  II.2  But,  as  he  had  no  heir,  either  annexa- 
tion or  anarchy  seemed  likely  to  follow  the  demise  of  the 
moribund  duke,  the  last  of  his  race. 

The  rest  of  the  year  was  spent  by  the  Catalans  in  ravaging 
Thessaly,  till  the  inhabitants  invoked  the  aid  of  the  emperor, 
who  not  only  ordered  the  redoubtable  Chandrenos  to  pursue 
the  Catalans,  but  summoned  the  people  of  Loidoriki  and 
Galaxidi,  districts  which  were  included,  as  we  saw,  in  the 
Wallachian  principality  of  the  Angeli,  to  join  his  standard 
against  "the  men  of  Aragon."  Dissensions  hindered  the 
success  of  the  Greeks  till  the  arrival  of  Chandren6s  gave 
unity  of  direction  to  their  forces,  and  in  two  battles,  in  which 
the  stalwart  men  of  Galaxidi  took  a  notable  part,  the  Catalans 

1  Nikephoros  (i.,  248)  makes  all  the  Turks  leave  them  ;  but  Muntaner, 
the  Aragonese  Chronicle,  and  Theodoulos  (ii.,  201)  state  that  the  Turks 
were  present  at  the  battle  of  the  Kephissos. 

1  Nikeph6ros  in  one  place  says  that  in  1309  he  had  been  "lately 
married"  ;  in  another,  that  when  he  died  in  131 8,  he  had  been  "  married 
three  years  "  (i.,  249,  278). 


WALTER  EMPLOYS  THE  CATALANS         223 

were  defeated  with  much  loss.1  The  Company  was  glad  to 
make  peace  with  the  Thessalians  ;  Chandren6s,  having  done 
his  work,  returned  into  Macedonia ;  and  the  Catalan  leaders 
accepted  the  bribes  and  offers  of  the  leading  men  of  Thessaly 
to  give  them  guides,  who  would  conduct  them  into  Boeotia 
and  Achaia,  "  a  luxurious  and  fertile  land,  endued  with  many 
graces,  and  of  all  lands  the  best  to  dwell  in."  Accordingly, 
in  the  spring  of  1310,  they  crossed  the  Phourka  Pass,  suffering 
not  a  little  from  the  nomad  Wallachs  who  frequented  that 
difficult  country,  and  descended  to  Lamia. 

An  energetic  soldier  like  the  new  Duke  of  Athens,  whose 
name  was  famous  in  the  kingdoms  of  the  West,  could 
scarcely  be  expected  to  acquiesce  in  the  practical  establish- 
ment of  a  Byzantine  protectorate  over  thei  dominions  of  his 
predecessor's  ward,  John  II.  of  Neopatras.  From  the  brief 
account  of  Muntaner,  it  would  appear  that  at  this  moment 
a  species  of  triple  alliance  between  the  Greek  rulers  of 
Constantinople,  Neopatras,  and  Arta,  had  been  formed  for 
the  purpose  of  preventing  the  moribund  principality  of  the 
Angeli  from  being  annexed  by  the  duchy  of  Athens. 
Against  the  allies  Duke  Walter  bethought  him  of  employing 
the  venal  arms  of  the  wandering  Catalans.  The  late  Duke 
of  Athens  had  already  negotiated  with  them  when  they 
were  still  at  Kassandreia ;  his  successor  was,  moreover,  per- 
sonally popular  with  them ;  he  had  gained  their  respect 
fighting  against  them  in  the  Sicilian  war,  and  he  spoke  their 
language,  which  he  had  learnt  when  a  child  during  his  im- 
prisonment as  hostage  for  his  father  in  the  Castle  of  Augusta, 
near  Syracuse.  By  means  of  the  good  services  of  Roger 
Deslaur,  a  knight  of  Roussillon,  who  was  in  his  employ,  he 
engaged  them  for  six  months  at  the  high  rate  of  4  ounces 
(£9,  12s.)  for  every  heavily-armed  horseman,  2  ounces 
(£4,  1 6s.)  for  every  light-armed  horseman,  and  1  ounce 
(£2,  8s.)  for  every  foot-soldier — the  same  high  scale  of  pay 
for  which  Roger  de  Flor  had  stipulated  with  Andr6nikos 
II.  eight  years  earlier.     As  soon  as  he  met  them — probably 

1  I  see  no  reason  to  doubt  the  accuracy  of  the  Chronicle  of  Galaxidi 
(p.  205)  here,  because  it  is  exactly  confirmed  by  the  contemporary  account 
of  Theodoulos.  As  Sdthas  points  out  (p.  225),  the  "Andreas"  or 
"  Andrikos  "  of  the  Chronicle  is  Chandrends. 


224     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

at  Lamia x — he  gave  them  two  months'  pay  in  advance.  The 
Catalans  lost  no  time  in  giving  him  value  for  his  money. 
Turning  back  by  the  way  they  had  come,  they  took  Domok6. 
At  the  end  of  a  six  months'  campaign  they  had  captured 
more  than  thirty  castles  for  their  employer,  and  had  once 
more  ravaged  the  fertile  plain  of  Thessaly  so  effectually, 
that  its  exports  of  corn  and  other  products  diminished  after 
this  raid.  His  three  adversaries  were  glad  to  make  peace 
with  him  on  his  own  terms,  and  the  news  of  his  triumph 
penetrated  to  the  papal  court  at  Avignon,  whence  Clement 
V.  wrote  ordering  the  Athenian  revenues  of  the  suppressed 
Order  of  the  Templars  to  be  lent  to  so  "  faithful  a  champion  " 
of  the  true  Church  against  the  "  schismatic  Greeks." 2 

Having  used  the  Company  to  serve  his  purpose,  the  duke 
now  desired,  like  all  its  previous  employers,  to  get  rid  of  it. 
He  picked  out  200  of  the  best  horsemen  and  300  foot 
soldiers  from  its  ranks,  gave  them  their  pay  and  lands,  on 
which  to  settle,  and  then  abruptly  told  the  others  to  be  gone, 
first  giving  up  to  him  the  castles  which  they  had  captured  in 
his  name  and  the  booty  which  they  had  taken.  They 
declined  to  obey  his  orders,  reminded  him  that  he  owed  them 
four  months'  pay,  but  offered  to  do  him  homage  for  the 
conquered  castles,  if  he  would  allow  them  to  remain,  as  they 
had  nowhere  else  to  go.3  Walter  haughtily  replied  that  he 
would  drive  them  out  by  force,  and  made  preparations  during 
the  autumn  and  winter  to  carry  out  his  threat  His 
messengers  went  forth  to  all  parts  of  the  Frankish  world  in 
quest  of  aid  against  the  common  enemy.  All  the  great 
feudatories  of  Greece  rallied  to  his  call.  There  came  Alberto 
Pallavicini,  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  and  by  his  marriage 
with  an  heiress  of  the  Dalle  Carceri,  hexarch  of  Euboea  ; 
Thomas  III.  of  Salona,  that  trusty  vassal  of  the   dukes  of 

1  We  know  from  a  document  quoted  by  Lunzi  {Delia  Condisione 
politica  delle  hole  lonie,  125)  that  Walter  was  before  "la  Gyrona" 
(  =  Gytona,  the  Frankish  form  for  Zetouni,  or  Lamia)  on  June  6,  13 10, 
and  that  is  by  far  the  most  likely  place  for  the  meeting,  being  at  the  end 
of  the  pass  from  Thessaly. 

3  Sanudo,  Secreia  Fidelium  Cruets,  apud  Bongars,  ii.,  68  ;  Regestum 
dementis  K,  v.,  235. 

3  X.  t.  M.,  11.  7282-92  ;  L.  d.  F.t  117  (where  Walter  is  confused  with 
Guy  II.),  119,  120. 


WALTER  ARMS  AGAINST  THE  CATALANS    225 

Athens,  who  had  lately  become  marshal  of  Achaia ;  Boniface 
of  Verona,  the  powerful  Eubcean  baron,  who  owed  everything 
to  the  favour  of  Walter's  predecessor ;  and  two  other  Eubcean 
lords,  George  Ghisi,  owner  of  one  of  the  three  baronies  of 
that  island  and  master  of  Tenos  and  Mykonos,  who  had  been 
captured  by  Roger  de  Lluria  nearly  twenty  years  before,  and 
Jean  de  Maisy,  who  had  received  the  custody  of  the  Infant 
Ferdinand.  The  friendly  Angevins,  for  whose  cause  Walter 
had  fought  in  Sicily,  willingly  allowed  their  vassals  in  the 
Morea  and  their  subjects  in  the  kingdom  of  Naples  to  hasten 
to  the  Athenian  banner,  while  the  Duke  of  Naxos  seems  to 
have  sent  an  island  contingent1  Never  had  such  a  brave 
host  marched  under  the  leadership  of  a  Duke  of  Athens. 
According  to  a  Byzantine  estimate,  Walter's  army  numbered 
6400  horsemen  and  more  than  8000  foot  soldiers ;  according 
to  the  Catalan  Muntaner,  it  consisted  of  700  Frankish 
knights  and  of  24,000  Greek  infantry  from  his  own  duchy ; 
while  the  Aragonese  version  of  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea 
assesses  the  numbers  of  the  assembled  force  at  more  than 
2000  horse  and  4000  foot  With  such  an  army,  the  con- 
temptuous duke  hoped  not  only  to  annihilate  the  Catalans  at 
one  blow,  but  to  extend  his  frontiers  to  the  gates  of 
Constantinople. 

The  situation  of  the  Catalan  Company,  now  composed  of 
3500  horsemen  and  4000  foot  soldiers,  including  many  of 
their  prisoners,  enlisted  because  of  their  skill  as  archers,  was 
now  desperate.  Retreat  would  have  exposed  them  to  a 
fresh  attack  by  the  victorious  Chandren6s;  allies  they  had 
none,  for  Venice  had  returned  an  evasive  answer  to  their 
pacific  overtures  to  her  bailie  at  Chalkis,  and  had  just 
renewed  for  twelve  years  her  truce  with  the  emperor,  which 
contained  a  special  stipulation,  that  no  Venetian  subject, 
under  pain  of  losing  all  his  goods,  should  visit  any  place 
where  the  Catalan  Company  chanced  to  be.2  Nothing 
therefore  lay  before  them  but  the  alternative  of  a  glorious 
death,  or  a  still  more  glorious  victory.  Like  seasoned 
warriors,  they  chose  their  battlefield  well  When  spring 
came,  they  crossed  the  Boeotian  Kephissds,  and  encamped 

1  L.  d.  F.f  120,  confirming  Sauger,  Histoire  nouvelUy  p.  130. 

2  Thomas,  LHplomaiarium  Vctuto-Levantinum,  i.,  82-5. 

P 


226     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

not  far  from  the  right  bank  of  that  sluggish  stream,  which 
ambles  under  the  willows,  like  the  Avon  at  Rugby.  They 
then  proceeded  to  prepare  the  ground,  which  was  to  be  the 
scene  of  their  final  struggle  for  existence.  Nature  seems  to 
have  intended  the  great  plain  of  Bceotia  for  a  battlefield. 
A  few  miles  from  where  the  Catalans  had  taken  their  stand, 
Philip  of  Macedon,  more  than  sixteen  centuries  before,  had 
won  "  that  dishonest  victory  at  Chaironeia,  fatal  to  liberty," 
which  destroyed  the  freedom  of  classic  Greece ;  in  the  time 
of  Sulla,  the  plain  had  thrice  witnessed  the  clash  of  arms 
between  the  Roman  masters  of  Greece  and  the  Pontic  troops 
of  Mithridates.  Now,  after  the  lapse  of  1400  years,  it  was  to 
be  the  spot  where  the  fate  of  Athens  was  to  be  decided. 
But  the  crafty  Catalans  did  not  put  their  trust  in  those  arts 
by  which  the  soldiers  of  Macedon  and  Rome  had  routed 
Greeks  and  Asiatics.  They  knew  that  they  would  have  to 
face  the  most  renowned  chivalry  of  that  day,  knights  who 
had  made  the  names  of  Athens  and  Achaia  famous  all  over 
the  Eastern  world,  descendants  of  those  tall  horsemen,  before 
whose  coats  of  mail  Sgour6s  had  fled  from  Thermopylae  a 
century  before.  The  marshy  soil  of  the  Copaic  basin  was  an 
excellent  defence  against  a  cavalry  charge,  and  the  Catalans 
made  this  natural  advantage  more  efficacious  still  by 
ploughing  up  the  ground  in  front  of  them,  digging  a  trench 
round  it,  and  then  irrigating  the  whole  area  by  means  of 
canals  from  the  river.  The  moisture  aided  the  germs  of 
vegetation,  and  by  the  middle  of  March,  when  the  Frankish 
army  faced  the  Catalans,  the  quagmire  was  concealed  by  an 
ample  covering  of  green  grass. 

On  Wednesday,  10th  March  131 1,  the  Duke  of  Athens 
had  assembled  his  forces  at  Lamia,  where,  as  if  by  a  fore- 
boding of  his  approaching  death,  he  solemnly  made  his  last 
will  and  testament.  The  document,  witnessed  by  Gilles  de  la 
Planche,  bailie  of  Achaia,  and  by  the  two  great  Eubcean 
barons,  Jean  de  Maisy,  the  duke's  kinsman,  and  Bonifacio  da 
Verona,  provided  for  all  the  outstanding  claims  of  his 
predecessor's  widow  on  his  estate,  bequeathed  the  sum  of 
200  hyperperi  (£89,  12s.)  each  to  the  cathedrals  of  Our  Lady 
of  Athens,  Our  Lady  of  Thebes,  and  Our  Lady  of  Negroponte, 
to  the  great  churches  at   Argos  and  Corinth^  and  to  the 


BATTLE  OF  THE  KEPHISSOS  227 

church  at  Daulia,  a  similar  sum  to  the  Athenian  and  Theban 
Minorites,  and  to  the  Theban  Frires  Prdcheurs,  and  half  that 
amount  to  the  church  of  St  George  at  Livadia,  and  to  the 
church  at  Boudonitza.  The  duke  appointed  his  wife,  Jeanne 
deChatillon,  guardian  of  his  two  children,  Walter  and  Isabelle, 
charged  her  to  build  a  church  to  St  Leonard  in  his  Italian 
county  of  Lecce  for  the  repose  of  his  own  and  his  parents' 
souls,  but  expressed  the  desire  to  be  buried  by  the  side  of  the 
last  Duke  of  Athens  in  the  abbey  of  Daphni,  to  which  he  left 
ioo  hyperperi  in  land,  or  iooo  in  cash,  for  celebrating  his 
anniversary.  His  wife,  the  bishop  of  Daulia,  and  others,  were 
to  carry  out  these  dispositions.  Having  thus  made  his  will, 
Walter  set  out  to  attack  his  enemies.1 

Following  the  present  route  from  Lamia  to  Livadia  by 
way  of  Dadf,  Walter  halted,  after  passing  Chaironeia,  near 
the  spot  where  the  present  road  to  Skripou,  the  ancient 
Orchomen6s,  turns  off.  On  the  hill  called  the  Thourion, 
which  is  still  surmounted  by  a  mediaeval  tower,  he  probably 
took  up  his  stand  on  that  fatal  15  th  of  March  to  survey  the 
field.  But,  before  the  battle  began,  the  500  favoured 
Catalans,  whom  he  had  picked  out  from  the  rest,  came  to  him 
and  told  him  that  they  would  rather  die  with  their  brothers 
than  fight  against  them.  The  duke  told  them  that  they  had 
his  permission  to  die  with  the  others,  so  they  departed  and 
added  a  welcome  and  experienced  contingent  to  the  enemies' 
forces.  When  they  had  gone,  Walter,  impatient  for  the  fray, 
placed  himself  at  the  head  of  200  French  knights  with  golden 
spurs  and  many  other  knights  of  the  country  and  the 
infantry,  and  charged,  with  a  shout,  across  the  plain  towards 
the  grassy  expanse,  behind  which  the  Catalans  lay.  Seldom 
had  even  Frankish  Greece  seen  a  braver  sight  than  that  of 
the  martial  duke  and  his  mailed  warriors,  the  flower  of 
Western  chivalry,  with  the  lion  banner  of  Brienne  waving 
above  them.  But  before  the  horses  had  reached  the  centre 
of  the  plain,  they  plunged  all  unsuspecting  into  the  morass. 
Their  heavy  burdens  and  the  impetus  of  their  charge  made 
their  feet  sink  deeper  into  the  yielding  quagmire  ;  the  shouts  of 
"  Aragon !  Aragon  ! "  from  the  Catalans  added  to  their  alarm. 

1  D'Arbois  rde  Jubainville,    Voyage  pal/oqraphique  dans  le  dfyarte- 
ment  de  PAube,  332-340. 


228     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

Some  rolled  over  with  their  armoured  riders  in  the  mud ; 
others,  stuck  fast  in  the  stiff  bog,  stood  still,  like  equestrian 
statues,  powerless  to  move.  The  Catalans  plied  the  helpless 
horsemen  with  showers  of  missiles ;  the  Turks,  who  had 
hitherto  held  aloof  from  the  combat,  for  fear  lest  the  Catalans 
and  the  French  should  join  in  attacking  them,  seeing  that 
the  battle  was  no  mere  feint,  rushed  forward  and  completed 
the  deadly  work.  Still,  despite  their  desperate  situation,  the 
French  fought  bravely,  and  the  struggle  was  keen  to  the 
last.  So  great  was  the  slaughter,  thai,  if  we  may  believe  the 
Catalan  chronicler,  more  than  20,000  foot-soldiers  and  all  the 
700  Frankish  knights  save  two  perished  that  day.  Those  two 
survivors  were  Bonifacio  da  Verona,  who  had  always  been  a 
good  friend  of  the  Company,  and  Roger  Deslaur,  who  had 
been  the  intermediary  between  it  and  the  Duke  of  Athens. 
We  know,  however,  from  other  sources,  that  at  least  two 
other  knights,  Jean  de  Maisy  of  Eubcea  and  the  eldest  son  of 
the  Duke  of  Naxos,  who  was  wounded  there,  both  survived, 
while  the  latter  lived  to  marry  Walter's  half-sister  Jeannette 
and  to  fight  the  Catalans  again.1  Two  other  great  nobles, 
Nicholas  III.  of  St  Omer  and  Antoine  le  Flamenc,  lord  of 
Karditza,  are  known  to  have  been  alive  after  the  battle,  at 
which  the  former  was  apparently  not  present,  while  we  may 
perhaps  assume  that  the  church  of  St  George,  which  the 
Flemish  knight  erected  in  this  very  year  at  his  Copaic  village, 
was  in  pursuance  of  a  vow  made  to  the  saint  before  he  went 
into  action.2  But  the  fatal  day  of  the  Kephiss6s  destroyed 
at  one  blow  the  noble  chivalry  of  Frankish  Greece.  Almost 
all  the  leaders  of  the  land,  almost  all  the  representatives  of 
the  old  conquering  families,  were  left  dead  in  the  Boeotian 
swamp.  The  Duke  of  Athens  fell,  and  his  head,  severed  from 
his  body  by  a  Catalan  knife,  was  borne,  many  years  afterwards, 
on  a  funereal  galley  to  Brindisi,  and  thence  escorted  to 
Lecce,  where  it  was  buried  beneath  a  marble  monument,  in 
the  church  of  Sta.  Croce,  which  his  ill-fated  son  erected  in 

1  Thomas,  Diplomatarium,  i.,  111 ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  i.,  133, 
134,  198,  204. 

*  Mr  D.  Steel,  manager  of  the  Lake  Copais  Company,  has  kindly  had 
a  fresh  copy  of  this  inscription  made  for  me  by  his  Greek  draughtsman. 
The  date  is  "6819,  ninth  indiction," /.*.,  1311,  a  very  significant  one. 


THE  CARNAGE  OF  TttE  KEPHlSSOS         229 

his  Italian  residence,  but  which  was  destroyed,  and  with  it  the 
monument,  when  Lecce  was  fortified  in  the  time  of  Charles  V.1 
There  fell,  too,  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza  and  the  lord  of 
Salona,  those  twin  guardians  of  the  Greek  marches,  whose 
dignities  dated  from  the  Conquest ;  and  brave  George  Ghisi, 
and  many  another  noble  gentleman.  It  was  scarcely  a 
rhetorical  exaggeration,  when  The6doulos  the  rhetorician 
wrote,  that  not  so  much  as  an  army  chaplain  2  was  left  to  tell 
the  tale.  To  him  and  to  the  Greeks  it  seemed  a  glorious 
victory,  which  rid  them  of  the  masters  who  had  ruled  Greece 
for  three  generations,  and  whose  pride  had  been  the  cause  of 
their  fall ;  even  the  Francophil  Chronicle  of  the  Morea  admits 
that  Walter's  death  was  his  own  fault3 

After  the  battle,  the  victors  occupied  the  French  camp, 
and  then  marched  to  the  neighbouring  town  of  Livadia,  one 

1  Galateus,  De  Situ  Iapygiay  92  ;  Delia  Monaca,  Memoria  historica 
delta  Ciltd  di  Brindisi,  470 ;  Summonte,  Storia  delta  Cittd  e  del  Regno 
di  Napoli,  ii.,  248. 

2  Mrfii  *v(Hf>6pov,  a  classical  tag,  "  the  priest  who  carried  the  sacrificial 
fire." 

3  There  are  two  difficulties  about  the  battle — its  date  and  place.  The 
Greek  Chronicle  (11.  7295-300)  gives  "Monday,  March  15,  A.M.,  68 171 
Indict,  vii. "  (or  riii.,  another  MS.)=A.D.,  1309  ;  the  French  version  gives 
the  same  day  and  month  of  13 10  (p.  240),  but  alters  the  year  to  1307  else- 
where (p.  474).  But  in  131 1  the  15th  March  was  a  Monday,  and  that 
date  is  absolutely  fixed  by  Walter's  will  and  by  the  "Necrologium 
Monasterii  S.  Nicolai  et  Cataldi"of  Lecce,  which  I  have  examined  at 
Naples,  and  which  says  "15  Martii  obiit  Gualterius,  dux  Athenarum, 
Brennae  et  Lisii  Comes,  131 1,  Ind.  viiii."  The  four  versions  of  the  Chronicle 
and  Sanudo  all  say  that  the  place  was  Halmyros ;  but  the  well-known 
Thessalian  town  cannot  be  meant,  as  Neroutsos  (AcXWor,  iv.,  130)  and 
Giann6poulos  {wapvaffffSt,  viii.,  76)  believed,  because  nothing  but  the 
Boeotian  plain  suits  the  precise  descriptions  of  Muntaner  and  Nikephoros. 
Halmyros  ("the  salt  place")  is,  however,  a  common  name  in  Greece, 
and  there  may  well  have  been  a  spot  so  called  in  the  Copaic  district 

The  contemporary  authorities  for  the  battle  are : — Nikeph6ros 
Gregorys,  i.,  251-4;  Muntaner,  ch.  ccxl. ;  The6doulos,  ii.,  200-1.  To 
it  refer  X.  r.  M.f  11.  7272-300,  8010 ;  L.  d.  C,  239-40,  268,  474  ;  C.  d.  M., 
456;  L,  d.  F.y  120  ;  Boccaccio,  De  Casibus  Virorum  lllustrium,  p.  265  ; 
Villani  apud  Muratori,  xiii.,  379-80 ;  Sanudo,  J  storia  del  Regno,  125  ; 
Chalkokondyles,  19.  A  poem  by  Pucci,  published  in  Arch.  Star.  ltal.y 
Ser.  III.,  xvi.,  52,  alludes  to  the  fact  of  Walter's  head  being  "cut  off  by 
the  Company."  A  contemporary  table  of  the  rulers  of  Greece  (Hop£ 
Chroniques,  1 77-8)  marks  the  names  of  those  who  died. 


230     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

of  the  strongest  positions  in  the  duchy,  which  had  been  a 
special  appanage  of  the  ducal  family.  But  the  Greek  inhabi- 
tants opened  the  gates  to  "  the  Fortunate  Company  of  the 
Catalans,"  receiving  as  their  reward  the  full  rights  and 
privileges  of  Franks  under  the  Great  Seal  of  St  George.1 
When  the  news  of  the  French  defeat  reached  Thebes,  the 
citizens  fled  with  all  that  they  could  carry  to  Negroponte — 
the  general  refuge  of  the  Latin  inhabitants  of  the  duchy, 
where  a  Venetian  fleet  was  at  that  moment  watching  events. 
But  the  abandoned  city,  the  richest  in  all  the  duchy,  was 
ruthlessly  plundered  by  the  rough  soldiers  of  fortune,  who 
then  hastened  to  Athens.  We  would  fain  believe  the  story 
of  the  Aragonese  Chronicle,  that  the  heroic  widow  of  the 
fallen  duke,  a  daughter  of  a  constable  of  France,  defended 
the  Akropolis,  in  which  she  had  taken  refuge  with  her  little 
son,  until  she  saw  that  there  was  no  hope  of  succour,  and 
then  fled  with  young  Walter  to  Naples,  and  thence  to  her 
old  home  in  France.2  But  Nikeph6ros  expressly  says  that 
the  invaders  surprised  Athens  and  took  it  most  easily, 
together  with  the  possessions,  wives,  and  children  of  the 
vanquished ;  a  very  late  authority  of  more  than  doubtful 
value8  adds  that  they  burnt  the  grove  of  the  nymphs  at 
Kolon6s,  thus  giving  to  the  home  of  Sophokl£s  the  desolate 
appearance  which  it  still  preserves.  As  no  French  leaders 
were  left  to  lead  a  resistance  against  them,  and  the  Greeks 
remained  spectators  of  this  change  of  masters,  they  were  able 
to  parcel  out  among  themselves  all  the  towns  and  castles  of 
the  duchy,  except  its  Argive  appurtenances  beyond  the 
isthmus,  which  the  faithful  family  of  Foucherolles  still  held 
for  the  exiled  dynasty.4  The  widows  of  the  slain  became 
the  wives  of  the  slayers;  each  soldier  received  a  consort 
according  to  his  services,  and  thus  many  a  rough  warrior 
found  himself  the  husband  of  some  noble  dame,  in  whose 
veins  flowed  the  bluest  blood  of  France,  and  "  whose  wash- 
hand  basin,"  in  the  phrase  of  Muntaner,  "  he  was  not  worthy 

1  Lampros,  "Eyypa^a,  337.  2  P.  121. 

3  The  Chronicle  of  Anthimos  (now  ascribed  to  J.  Beniz&os),  quoted 
by  Fallmerayer,  GeschichU  der  Halbinsel  Morea,  ii.,  182. 

4  These  are  doubtless  the  places  to  which  Clement  V.  alludes  as  still 
holding  out  in  1314.    {Regestum,  viii.,  14  ;  ix.,  46.) 


THE  CATALANS  CHOOSE  A  LEADER  231 

to  bear."  No  wonder  that  these  vagabonds  decided  to  end 
their  nine  years'  wandering  and  settle  in  this  delectable 
duchy,  which  a  kindly  providence  had  bestowed  upon  them. 
Their  Turkish  allies,  however,  pined  to  return  to  their  homes 
in  Asia,  although  the  Catalans  offered  to  give  them  three  or 
four  places  in  the  duchy  in  which  to  settle,  and  begged 
them  to  stay.  They  received  as  their  share  the  horses, 
arms,1  and  military  equipment  of  the  fallen  Franks,  and 
departed  on  the  best  of  terms  with  their  Catalan  comrades. 
Both  parties  promised  to  assist  one  another  in  case  of  need ; 
but,  before  the  Catalans  had  had  time  to  perform  their 
promise,  their  Turkish  friends  had  succumbed  to  the  craft 
of  the  emperor  and  his  Genoese  allies  at  the  Dardanelles. 
Those  who  escaped  the  Byzantine  sword,  ended  their  days 
in  the  Genoese  galleys. 

The  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s,  assuredly  one  of  the 
strangest  in  history,  had  left  both  victors  and  vanquished 
without  leaders.  The  Catalans  had  lost  all  their  chiefs  long 
before  the  fight,  the  French  chivalry  lay  in  the  Boeotian 
swamp.  But  the  Company  felt  that  in  its  new  situation  it 
must  have  a  commander  of  acknowledged  rank  and  position. 
As  they  had  no  such  man  among  them,  the  Catalans  offered 
the  command  of  the  Company  to  one  of  their  two  noble 
prisoners,  Bonifacio  da  Verona.  The  famous  Eubcean 
baron  was  the  most  important  Frank  in  the  whole  of 
Northern  Greece ;  he  was  of  high  lineage,  wealthy,  able, 
and  popular  with  the  Catalans;  Muntaner,  as  we  saw,  had 
lodged  in  his  house  at  Chalkis,  and  describes  him  in 
enthusiastic  terms  as  "the  wisest  and  most  courteous 
nobleman  that  was  ever  born."  Wisdom  and  nobility  alike 
disposed  him  to  decline  an  offer  which  would  have  embroiled 
him  with  Venice  and  have  rendered  him  an  object  of  loath- 
ing to  the  whole  Frankish  world.  He  accordingly  absolutely 
refused.  The  Catalans  then  turned  to  his  fellow-captive, 
Roger  Deslaur,  the  knight  of  Roussillon,  who  had  neither 

1  The6doulos  (ii.,  201),  thus  disposing  of  Buchon's  ingenious  theory 
that  the  armour,  found  at  Chalkis  in  1840  and  now  in  the  collection  of 
the  Historical  and  Ethnological  Society  at  Athens,  belonged  to  the  fallen 
of  the  Kephiss6s  and  had  been  transported  by  Bonifacio  to  Chalkis. 
{La  Grhe  Continentale,  134  sqg.). 


\ 


232     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

the  territorial  position,  the  family  ties,  nor  the  scruples  of 
Bonifacio.  He  accepted;  the  Catalans  made  him  their 
leader,  and  gave  him  the  splendid  castle  of  Salona,  together 
with  the  widow  of  its  fallen  lord,  Thomas  III.,  the  last  De 
Stromoncourt 

Thus,  after  a  duration  of  over  a  hundred  years,  fell  at  a 
single  blow  the  French  duchy  of  Athens.  An  artificial 
creation,  imposed  upon  a  foreign  soil,  it  collapsed  as  suddenly 
as  it  had  arisen,  and  it  left  few  traces  behind  it.  We  have 
seen  that  under  the  dominion  of  the  dukes  of  the  house 
of  De  la  Roche,  trade  prospered,  manufactures  flourished,  and 
the  splendours  of  the  Theban  court  impressed  foreigners 
accustomed  to  the  pomps  and  pageants  of  much  greater 
states.  Never  before,  and  never  again,  did  the  ancient  city 
of  the  seven  gates  witness  such  a  brilliant  throng  as  that 
which  made  the  frescoed  walls  of  the  great  castle  of  St  Omer 
ring  with  song  and  revelry ;  never  before,  and  never  again, 
did  the  violet  crown  of  Athens  encircle  so  romantic  a  scene, 
as  when  armoured  knights  and  fair  Burgundian  damsels  rode 
up  to  attend  mass  in  St  Mary's  minster  on  the  Akropolis. 
But  the  French  society,  which  had  made  Attica  the  cynosure 
of  the  Levant,  never  took  firm  root  in  the  land.  The  Greeks 
and  the  Franks  seem  to  have  amalgamated  even  less  in 
Burgundian  Athens  than  elsewhere ;  the  French  were,  after 
three  generations,  still  a  foreign  garrison,  nor  did  they,  as 
was  the  case  in  Norman  England,  form  a  powerful  blend 
with  the  conquered  race.  Fascinating  as  is  the  spectacle 
of  chivalry  enthroned  in  the  home  of  classical  literature,  it 
was  an  unnatural  union,  and,  as  such,  doomed  from  the 
outset  But  in  the  long  history  of  Athens,  not  the  least 
gorgeous  page  is  that  written  by  the  dukes  from  beyond 
the  sea. 

If  it  made  small  mark  on  the  character  of  the  people,  the 
French  dynasty  has,  at  least,  bequeathed  to  us  some  visible 
memorials  of  its  rule.  All  these  rulers,  except  Othon  and 
John,  have  left  coins,  which  may  be  found  in  the  doge's 
palace  and  elsewhere ;  while,  by  way  of  compensation,  as  we 
saw,  a  pious  donation  to  the  abbey  of  Bellevaux  has 
preserved  the  seal  of  the  first  French  ruler  of  Athens.  If 
there  be  one  building  more  than  another  where  we  should 


MEMORIALS  OF  THE  FRENCH  DUKES        233 

expect  to  discover  traces  of  French  influence,  it  is  the  famous 
monastery  of  Daphni,  which  Othon  had  granted  to  the 
Cistercians,  and  where  his  successors  chose  their  graves. 
But,  if  we  except  the  so-called  tomb  of  Guy  II.,  two  rows 
of  Gothic  arcades  alone  recall  this,  the  most  brilliant  period 
in  the  life  of  the  abbey.  Under  the  auspices  of  the  dukes 
from  Franche-Comt6,  the  abbots  of  Daphni  had  played  a 
considerable  part  in  the  ecclesiastical  history  of  Greece. 
Popes  had  used  them  as  intermediaries,  and  their  quinquen- 
nial visits  to  the  mother-abbey  of  Citeaux  must  have  helped 
to  maintain  the  connection  between  France  and  Athens. 
But  after  the  fall  of  the  French  duchy,  the  monastery 
declined;  it  is  but  little  mentioned  in  the  two  succeeding 
centuries;  it  ceased  to  be  the  ducal  burial-place,  and  was 
eclipsed  by  the  greater  glories  of  St  Mary's  minster,  on 
one  of  whose  columns  the  last  known  of  its  abbots  has 
obtained  such  immortality  as  a  meagre  Latin  inscription 
can  confer.1  Another  inscription  on  the  Stoa  of  Hadrian 
commemorates,  as  we  saw,  an  Athenian  canon  of  the  ducal 
family ;  while  Walter  of  Ray,  who  was  bishop  of  Negroponte 
at  the  time  of  the  catastrophe,  found  a  sumptuous  monument 
in  the  French  abbey  of  Beze.2  To  this  period,  too,  has. 
been  ascribed  the  "  Frankish  monastery,"  the  remains  of 
which  long  stood  at  the  foot  of  Pentelikon,  and  which  was 
probably  the  Minorite  establishment  mentioned  in  the  will 
of  the  last  duke.3  A  much  more  striking  foundation — the 
Gorgoep^koos  church — was  attributed  by  the  enthusiastic 
Buchon  to  the  French  ;  but  the  general  opinion  is  that  it  is  a 
Byzantine  structure.  An  imaginative  Greek,  going  one  step 
further,  maintained  that  this  beautiful  little  building  was  the 
chapel  of  the  ducal  palace,  which  he  supposed  to  have  stood 
on  the  site  of  the  present  cathedral.4  But  the  residence  of 
the  French  dynasty  was  at  Thebes,  and  the  commander  of 
the  Akropolis,  who  represented  it  at  Athens,  doubtless  lived 
within  the  castle.     Accordingly,  it  is  in  Boeotia  rather  than 

1  Millet,  Le  Monastere  de  Daphni,  40,  42,  57 ;  Martene  et  Durand, 
Thesaurus,  iv.,  1320,  1422. 

1  Academic  de  Besan$on  (1880),  149-53,  pi.  v. 

3  AeXWoy,  iv.,  82,  136. 

4  Sourmel6s,  Kardaraffts  (rvvoiniK^  36,  n. 


234     THE  CATALAN  GRAND  COMPANY 

in  Attica  that  we  should  expect  to  find  buildings  of  this  first 
Frankish  epoch.  The  stumpy  Santameri  tower  at  Thebes 
still  preserves  the  name  of  its  founder;  a  bridge,  formerly 
of  five,  but  now  of  three,  arches,  which  crosses  the  Melas  some 
two  miles  below  the  village  of  Topolia,  testifies  to  the 
activity  of  the  French  in  that  same  Copaic  district  which 
witnessed  their  fall — a  disaster  perhaps  commemorated  by 
the  little  church  at  Karditza.  Frankish  coats  of  arms  may 
be  seen  on  the  walls  of  the  older  church  at  H6sios  Louk&s, 
one  of  which,  two  snakes  supporting  two  crosses,  bears  some 
resemblance  to  the  device  on  the  tomb  at  DaphnL  It  is, 
indeed,  not  surprising  that  a  monastery  which  was  the  abode 
of  the  prior  and  chapter  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  and  later  on 
the  residence  of  the  dowager  duchess  of  Athens,  should 
contain  Frankish  memorials.1 

Like  the  French  dukes,  their  most  important  vassals,  the 
lords  of  Salona,  have  perpetuated  their  names  by  a  separate 
coinage,  of  which  specimens  minted  by  Thomas  II.  and 
Thomas  III.  from  their  own  mint  have  been  preserved.2 
But  the  splendid  castle  of  Salona,  which  Honorius  III.  had 
helped  to  fortify,  is  the  best  jnemorial  of  that  once  powerful 
French  family,  although  it  is  not  easy  to  determine  how 
much  of  the  present  structure  is  due  to  them,  and  how 
much  to  their  successors.  On  the  other  hand,  neither  the 
Pallavicini  of  Boudonitza  nor  the  branch  of  the  ducal  race 
which  was  established  at  Damal&iin  Argolis  seem  to  have 
left  memories  that  can  be  identified  save  the  ancient  castle 
of  the  marquises.  Both  now  lingered  on  in  the  female  line 
alone — the  usual  lot  of  the  Frankish  nobles  in  Greece.  Such 
was  the  end  of  that  strange  venture  which  had  made  Attica 
and  Boeotia  a  "new  France";  a  few  coins,  a  few  arches,  a 
casual  inscription,  are  all  that  they  have  retained  of  their 
brilliant  Burgundian  dukes. 

1  Buchon,  Ztf  Grhe  Continentale,  246 ;  Atlas,  pi.  xli.,  7,  8,  16  ;  Schultz 
and  Barnsley,  The  Monastery  of  St  Luke,  pi.  14,  D. 

2  Schlumberger,  NumismaHque,  349 ;  Sdthas,  T6  Xpotwcbv  rod  TaXafridlov, 
239. 


k 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE   CATALANS  AND   THEIR   NEIGHBOURS  (131 1-I333) 

The  meteoric  career  of  the  Catalan  Grand  Company  had 
placed  it  in  the  possession  of  the  Athenian  duchy,  but  had 
at  the  same  time  won  for  it  a  host  of  suspicious  or  vindictive 
enemies.  The  house  of  Anjou,  as  represented  by  Philip  of 
Taranto,  Prince  of  Achaia  and  suzerain  of  the  Frankish 
states  of  Greece,  naturally  resented  the  capture  of  Athens 
by  the  enemies  of  his  dynasty ;  the  Venetians  of  Negroponte 
were  justly  alarmed  for  the  safety  of  that  important  colony ; 
the  widow  of  the  fallen  duke  was  seeking  to  recover  the 
duchy  for  her  son ;  the  two  Greek  states  of  Neopatras  and 
Arta  were  ill-disposed  to  the  appearance  of  these  fresh 
intruders;  the  Emperor  though  not  sorry  that  the  Franks 
had  received  such  a  fatal  blow,  had  not  forgotten  the  destruc- 
tion wrought  by  the  Catalans  upon  his  armies  and  his 
lands.  Well  aware  of  their  critical  position  in  a  foreign  land, 
surrounded  by  enemies,  the  victors  of  the  Kephiss6s  re- 
luctantly came  to  the  conclusion,  that,  if  they  wished  to 
maintain  their  acquisitions,  they  must  place  themselves 
under  the  protection  of  some  powerful  sovereign.  Their 
choice  naturally  fell  upon  King  Frederick  II.  of  Sicily,  the 
master  whom  they  had  served  before  they  left  that  island 
for  the  East  ten  years  before,  and  who,  by  sending  the 
Infant  of  Majorca  to  command  them  in  his  name  while  they 
were  still  in  the  Greek  Empire,  had  shown  that  he  had 
not  relinquished  the  idea  of  profiting  by  their  successes. 
Accordingly,  in    13 12,  they   invited   the  King  of  Sicily  to 

286 


236  THE!  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

send  them  one  of  his  children,  to  whom  they  promised  to 
take  the  oath  of  fealty  as  their  lord  and  to  hand  over  the 
command  over  all  their  forces.  Frederick  II.  was  only  too 
pleased  to  accept  an  offer,  which  would  add  fresh  lustre  to 
his  house.  He  told  the  Catalan  envoys,  that  he  would  give 
them  as  their  duke  his  second  son  Manfred;  but,  as  the 
latter  was  at  present  too  young  to  take  personal  charge  of 
the  duchy,  he  would  send  them  a  trusty  knight,  who  would 
receive  their  homage  and  govern  them  in  Manfred's  name. 
For  this  important  post  he  selected  Berenguer  Estafiol,  a 
knight  of  Ampurias,  who  set  out  with  five  galleys  to  take 
possession  of  his  command.  The  Catalans  received  him 
well,  Deslaur  retired  from  his  provisional  leadership  to  his 
lordship  of  Salona  on  the  arrival  of  the  ducal  governor, 
and  we  hear  of  him  no  more.1 

The  archives  of  Palermo  unfortunately  contain  no 
documents  relating  to  the  early  administration  of  Attica 
under  the  Catalan  rule.  But  from  the  fairly  frequent 
allusions  to  Athens  in  the  last  two  decades  of  the  Sicilian 
suzerainty  we  can  form  a  tolerably  complete  idea  of  the 
system  of  government — a  system  which,  with  some  modifica- 
tions, may  be  assumed  to  have  existed  from  the  commence- 
ment. The  two  chief  officials  were  the  vicar-general  and 
the  marshal,  both  appointed  by  the  duke,  the  former  of 
whom  exercised  supreme  political  power  as  his  deputy, 
while  the  latter  was  the  military  head  of  the  state.  The 
vicar-general  was  appointed  during  good  pleasure,  and  took 
the  oath  of  fidelity  on  the  gospels  to  the  duke  or  his 
representative,  repeating  it  before  the  assembled  sindici — 
a  sort  of  parliament — of  all  the  towns  and  cities  of  the 
duchy.  From  his  residence  at  Thebes,  the  capital  of  the 
Catalan  state,  he  could  issue  pardons  in  the  duke's  name  to 
those  accused  of  felony  or  treason  ;  it  was  he  who  exercised 
judicial  authority,  administered  the  finances,  provided  for 
the  defence  of  the  land,  inspected  the  fortresses,  and  often 
appointed  their  commanders.  The  position  of  vicar-general 
was  one  of  considerable  splendour ;  a  major-domo  presided 
over  his  household ;  a  prbcureur  giniral  was  attached  to  his 

1  Muntaner,  ch.  ccxlii.  ;  Libro  de  los  Fechos,  12 1  ;  Sanudo,  Epistolcr, 
apud  Bongars,  Gesta  Dei  per  Francos^  II.,  305. 


V 


ORGANISATION  OF  CATALAN  ATHENS         237 

court  Later  on,  under  the  Aragonese  supremacy,  his 
powers  were  practically  those  of  the  duke  himself.1 

The  marshal  was  always  chosen  from  the  ranks  of  the 
Company,  and  the  dignity  became  hereditary  in  the  family 
of  De  Novelles  till  a  little  before  the  year  1363,  when  the 
hereditary  marshal  had  apparently  been  deprived  of  his 
dignity  for  rebellion  against  his  sovereign.  Roger  de 
Lluria  succeeded  him  as  marshal,  and,  three  years  later, 
combined  the  two  great  offices  in  his  own  person,  holding 
them  both  till  his  death,  after  which  we  hear  of  no  more 
marshals.  The  probable  explanation  of  this  is  not  far  to 
seek.  There  had  probably  been,  as  we  shall  see,  a  conflict 
between  the  vicar  and  the  marshal,  which  proved  that  there 
was  no  room  in  the  narrow  court  of  Thebes  for  two  such 
exalted  officials;  and,  as  Lluria,  when  he  became  vicar- 
general,  was  already  marshal,  such  a  combination  may  have 
seemed  a  happy  solution  of  the  difficulty.2 

Greece  has  ever  been  the  land  of  local  government,  and 
under  the  Sicilian  domination  each  city  and  district  had  its 
own  local  governor,  called  veguer,  castellano,  or  capitdn — 
designations  sometimes  applied  to  the  same  person,  some- 
times distinct,  as  it  was  considered  to  be  an  abuse  when 
more  than  one  of  these  offices  were  concentrated  in  the 
same  hands.  We  are  expressly  told  that  the  "  capitulations  " 
agreed  upon  between  the  Catalans  and  their  duke  limited 
the  duration  of  a  veguer*  s  office  to  three  years,  and  on  one 
occasion  a  " capitdn,  veguer,  and  castellano"  of  Athens  was 
removed  because  his  three  years'  term  was  up.8  But  there 
are  examples  of  the  appointment  of  these  officials  for  life 
or  during  good  pleasure.4  They  were  sometimes  nominated 
by  the  vicar-general,  sometimes  by  the  duke,  and  sometimes 
by  the  local  representatives,  for  example,  by  the  community 
of  Athens,  from  among  the  citizens,  subject  to  confirma- 
tion by  the  duke,  and  they  had  power  to  appoint  a  substitute 

1  L&npros,  "Eyypa^o,  247,  286;  M flanges  historiques,  III.,  53,  54; 
Rosario  Gregorio,  Consideration*,  II.,  574. 

2  Ldmpros,  "Byy/xx^o,  240,  279,  282,  330,  350 ;  Rubi6  y  Lluch,  Los 
Navarros  en  Grecia,  476;  Rosario  Gregorio,  Considerasioni,  II.,  572, 
575.    Cf.  the  author's  article  in  the  English  Hist  Review,  xxii.,  520. 

3  Ldmpros,  "Eyypa^a,  249,  318.  4  Ibid.,  276,  278,  280,  309. 


238  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

in  case  of  absence  on  public  business..  They  were  required, 
before  entering  upon  their  duties,  to  take  an  oath  on  the 
gospels  before  the  vicar-general  and  the  local  community. 
These  duties  included  the  military  command  of  the  town 
and  the  hearing  of  criminal  causes,1  but  a  final  appeal  from 
their  decisions,  as  from  the  civil  and  criminal  jurisdiction  of 
the  vicar-general,  lay  to  the  ducal  tribunal  in  Sicily,  just  as 
our  Colonial  and  Indian  Appeals  go  to  the  Privy  Council  in 
London.  On  one  occasion,  however,  we  find  a  lord  justice 
appointed  during  good  pleasure  to  try  appeals  on  the  spot — 
a  system  which  must  have  saved  much  time  and  expense  to 
the  appellants.2  We  hear  also  of  notaries,  not  infrequently 
Greeks,  appointed  by  the  duke  for  life,  or  even  as  hereditary 
officials,  of  a  constable  of  the  city  of  Thebes,  and  of  a  bailie 
of  the  city  of  Athens,  apparently  a  municipal  officer.3 

The  Catalan  state  enjoyed  a  considerable  measure  of 
representative  institutions,  such  as  the  Catalans  had  for 
some  time  obtained  in  their  native  land  The  principal 
towns  and  villages  were  represented  by  sindici,  and  pos- 
sessed municipalities  with  councils  and  officials  of  their  own. 
These  municipalities  occasionally  combined  to  petition  the 
duke  for  the  redress  of  their  grievances  ;  their  petitions  were 
then  sealed  by  the  "Chancellor  of  the  Society  of  Franks" 
with  the  seal  of  St  George,  which  had  been  that  of  the 
Company  in  its  wandering  days.  On  one  occasion  the 
communities  elected  the  vicar-general,  and  the  dukes 
frequently  wrote  to  them  about  affairs  of  state.  They  did 
not  hesitate  to  send  envoys  requesting  the  recall  of  an 
obnoxious  vicar-general,  they  spoke  perfectly  plainly  to 
their  sovereign,  who  on  one  occasion  complained  of  their 
"morose  answers,"  and  their  petitions  usually,  for  obvious 
reasons,  received  a  favourable  reply.  Later  on,  one  of  their 
principal  demands  was  that  official  posts  should  be  bestowed 
on  residents,  not  on  Sicilians.  Attica  for  the  Catalans  was,  in 
fact,  their  watchword.  They  were  stubborn  folk,  perfectly  con- 
tented to  maintain  the  Sicilian  connection,  so  long  as  they 
could  manage  their  own  affairs  in  their  own  way ;  in  that,  as 
in  much  else,  they  resembled  our  own  self-governing  colonies. 

1  Ldmpros,  "Brw»0*»  266,  277,  309. 

*  JHd^  239,  247,  295.  {  lbid.%  270,  312. 


THE  CHURCH  239 

The  feudal  system  continued,  but  with  far  less  brilliancy 
than  in  the  time  of  the  French.  The  Catalan  con- 
querors were  of  common  origin ;  when  they  had  been 
settled  some  years,  we  find  very  few  knights  among  them, 
and  even  after  seventy  years  of  residence,  the  roll  of  noble 
families  in  the  whole  state  contained  only  some  sixteen 
names.  The  Company  particularly  objected  to  the  feudal 
practice  of  bestowing  important  places,  such  as  Livadia, 
upon  private  individuals,  preferring  that  they  should  be 
administered  by  the  government  officials.  As  a  code  of 
justice,  the  "  Customs  of  Barcelona  "  supplanted  the  "  Assizes 
of  Romania,"  and  Catalan  became  the  official,  as  well  as  the 
ordinary  language.  The  dukes  wrote  in  the  language  of 
Muntaner,  not  merely  to  their  Catalan,  but  also  to  their 
Greek  subjects,  and  we  are  specially  told  that  the  employ- 
ment of  "  the  vulgar  Catalan  dialect "  was  "  according  to  the 
custom  and  usage  of  the  city  of  Athens." 

The  ecclesiastical  organisation  remained  much  the  same 
as  in  the  Burgundian  times.  After  the  annexation  of 
Neopatras,  the  two  duchies  contained  three  archbishoprics — 
Athens,  Thebes,  and  Neopatras — the  first  of  which  had 
thirteen  suffragan  bishoprics,  and  the  last  one,  that  of  Lamia 
or  Zetouni.  Thus  Athens  had  gained  two,  and  Thebes  had 
lost  two,  suffragans  since  the  early  Frankish  days;  but  of  the 
Athenian  bishoprics  only  four — Megara,  Daulia,  Salona,  and 
Boudonitza — were  actually  within  the  confines  of  the  duchy. 

The  church  of  St  Mary  at  Athens,  as  the  Parthenon  was 
called,  had  twelve  canons,  appointed  by  the  duke,  whom  we 
find  confirming  a  Catalan  as  dean  of  the  Athenian  chapter, 
nominating  the  Theban  archbishop,  and  bestowing  vacant 
livings  upon  priests.  Although  in  the  last  years  of  Catalan 
rule  the  clergy  acquired  great  influence,  and  were  selected 
as  envoys  to  the  ducal  court,  the  law  strictly  forbade  them  to 
hold  fiefs — a  very  necessary  provision  in  a  land  won,  and 
held,  by  the  sword.1  The  Knights  of  St  John,  however,  had 
property  in  the  Catalan  state,  and  the  castle  of  Sykaminon, 
near  Oropos,  was  theirs.2 

1  Rubi6  y  Lluch,  472,  481;  Qurita,  Anales,  II.,  377;  L4mpros, 
-Eyflxi^a,  27 1,  285,  306-7. 

i  Ibid.,  233 ;  AeXrlov,  v.,  827  ;  Revue  de  P  Orient  latin,  iii.,  653. 


r 


240  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

Like  the  Franks,  the  Catalans  treated  the  Greeks  as  an 
inferior  race.  They  excluded  them,  as  a  general  rule,  from 
all  civic  right*— the  exclusive  privilege  of  the  Conquistadors, 
as  the  Catalans  styled  themselves — and  thus  an  unhappy 
Hellene  was  legally  debarred  from  acquiring,  selling,  or 
disposing  of  his  property  as  he  chose.  Even  after  his  death, 
someone  else  might  step  in  and  take  his  possessions  from  his 
son,  and  we  hear  of  slavery  existing  at  Athens.  As  a 
general  rule,  too,  intermarriage  of  the  two  races  was 
forbidden,  but  to  these  enactments  there  were  not  a  few 
exceptions.  Greeks,  who  had  deserved  well  of  the  Company 
in  times  of  difficulty,  like  the  people  of  Livadia,  received  the 
full  franchise,  and  might  even  hold  serfs,  besides  being 
permitted  to  marry  their  children  to  members  of  the 
dominant  race.  In  the  later  Catalan  period,  we  find  Greeks 
occupying  posts  of  importance,  such  as  that  of  castellano 
of  Salona,  chancellor  of  Athens,  and  notary  of  Livadia. 
Once,  at  the  very  close  of  Catalan  rule,  Greeks  are  mentioned 
as  sitting  on  the  municipal  council  of  Neopatras.  Persons  of 
such  standing  as  a  count  of  Salona  and  a  marshal  of  the 
duchies  married  Greek  ladies,  and  it  was  provided  in  such 
cases  that  the  Greek  might  keep  the  orthodox  faith ;  only,  if 
the  wife  became  a  Catholic  and  then  reverted,  she  paid  for 
her  double  apostacy  by  the  loss  of  her  property.  A  similar 
penalty  awaited  any  Catalan  who  was  converted  to  the 
orthodox  faith.1  As  for  the  Greek  Church,  it  continued  to 
occupy  the  inferior  position  which  it  had  filled  under  the 
Franks.  Of  the  former  Frankish  nobility  we  naturally  hear 
nothing,  as  it  had  been  annihilated  at  the  battle  of  the 
Kephiss6s.  The  Burgundian  burgesses  are  never  mentioned. 
On  the  other  hand,  we  find  Armenians  residing  at  Thebes 
and  proving  a  source  of  revenue  to  the  ducal  exchequer. 

The  duke  would  naturally  assume  the  crown  lands  of  his 
French  predecessors,  and  this  ducal  domain  included  lands 
and  house  property  at  Athens  and  Thebes.  These  houses 
at  the  capital  were  let,  and  the  rent  was  paid  in  wax  every 
year;  occasionally,  the  crown  was  pleased  to  grant  an 
annuity   out  of  the  proceeds  of  the  "  Theban  wax  tax  "  to 

1  L&npros,  op,  cit,  238,  272,  331,  337-8,  342 ;  Rubi6,  Catalunya  a 
Grecta,  46. 


CATALAN  AGGRESSIONS  241 

some  deserving  Catalan.  We  hear,  too,  of  a  land-tax 
(jus  terragu)  payable  to  the  ducal  court,  to  which  also 
escheated  the  real  and  personal  property  of  converts  to  the 
Greek  faith.1  But,  as  in  the  case  of  the  British  Empire  and 
its  colonies,  the  Sicilian  Dukes  of  Athens  did  not  estimate 
the  value  of  the  connection  by  the  methods  of  an  accountant. 
Upon  them  it  conferred  the  prestige  which  has  in  all  ages 
attached  to  the  great  name  of  Athens,  while  it  also  gave 
them  an  excuse  for  intervention  in  Eastern  politics.  To  the 
Catalans,  on  the  other  hand,  the  protection  of  the  Sicilian 
crown  was  of  great  practical  value.  Having  no  diplomatic 
service  of  their  own,  they  looked  to  the  ducal  diplomatists  to 
explain  away  any  more  than  usually  outrageous  act  of  piracy 
which  they  had  committed  upon  some  Venetian  subject ; 
to  say  soft  things  on  their  behalf  at  the  Vatican ;  to  give 
them,  in  short,  a  status  in  the  community  of  nations.  They 
had  all  the  advantages  of  independence,  without  its  drawbacks ; 
they  lost  nothing  by  having  acknowledged  the  sovereignty 
of  Sicily;  and  both  they  and  their  Sicilian  dukes  seem 
thoroughly  to  have  understood  their  mutual  relations. 

For  four  years,  till  his  death  in  1316,  Estaftol  governed  the 
Catalan  duchy  wisely  and  well.  Under  his  guidance,  the 
Company  maintained  its  martial  spirit,  which  was  the  very 
essence  of  its  existence,  by  expeditions  in  all  directions — 
against  the  imperial  fortresses  on  the  borders  of  Thessaly, 
against  the  Angeli  of  Neopatras  and  of  Arta,  against  the 
island  of  Euboea,  and  in  support  of  the  claims  of  their  old 
comrade,  the  Infant  Ferdinand  of  Majorca,  to  the  principality 
of  Achaia.  We  may  judge  of  the  devastation  wrought  on 
these  forays  from  the  fact  that  Archbishop  Bartholomew  of 
Corinth  was  at  this  time  allowed  by  Clement  V.  to  defer 
payment  of  his  predecessor's  debts  for  three  years,  because  his 
diocese  "  had  been  desolated  and  the  city  of  Corinth  destroyed 
by  the  Catalan  Company,"  while  the  Archbishop  of  Thebes 
and  Walter  of  Ray,  Bishop  of  Negroponte,  could  not  reach 
their  sees.  But  Estaftol  was  a  diplomatist  as  well  as  a 
soldier.  He  managed  to  attack  his  enemies  one  at  a  time ; 
and,  as  soon  as  his  soldiers  had  exhausted  the  resources  of 

1  Limpros,  op.  cit  234,  272,  291,  292,  299,  313,  350 ;  Rubi6  y  Lluch, 
Los  NavarroSy  465. 

Q 


I 


242  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

the  country  which  they  had  invaded,  they  moved  on,  like 
locusts,  to  another.  In  vain  the  pope  ordered  the  Latin 
patriarch  of  Constantinople  to  argue  with  the  Catalan  leaders 
on  the  error  of  their  ways,  and  to  excommunicate  these 
spoilers  of  churches  and  slayers  of  churchmen  in  case  of 
their  continued  disobedience  to  his  voice ;  in  vain  he  bade 
the  Grand  Master  of  the  Knights  of  St  John,  but  recently 
established  in  the  island  of  Rhodes,  to  send  four  galleys  to 
the  aid  of  Walter  of  Foucherolles,  who  held  the  Argive 
fortresses  with  the  title  of  "  Captain  of  the  Duchy "  for  the 
little  duke's  grandfather  and  guardian,  the  Constable  of 
France;  in  vain  he  appealed  to  King  James  II.  of  Aragon 
to  drive  the  Catalans  out  of  Attica,  and  depicted  the  cruelties, 
robberies,  and  murders  which  they  had  perpetrated  on  the 
faithful  children  of  the  Church  in  those  parts.  The  Catalans 
heeded  not  the  patriarchal  admonitions;  the  grand- master 
was  occupied  with  the  affairs  of  his  new  domain ;  while  the 
politic  sovereign,  who  had  no  desire  to  intervene  in  the  affairs 
of  his  brother's  duchy,  replied  that  that  "true  athlete  of 
Christ  and  faithful  boxer  of  the  Church,"  as  the  pope  had 
called  the  late  Duke  Walter,  had  met  with  his  deserts,  and 
that  the  Catalans,  if  they  were  cruel,  were  still  Catholics,  who 
would  prove  a  valuable  bulwark  of  Romanism  against  the 
schismatic  Greeks  of  Byzantium.1 

Upon  Estafiol's  death,  the  Company  elected  one  of  its 
own  members,  a  knight,  William  Thomas,  a  man  of  higher 
rank  than  his  fellows,  as  its  temporary  captain,  until  King 
Frederick  had  had  time  to  send  someone  else  to  rule  over 
them.2  The  king  appointed  his  own  natural  son,  Don 
Alfonso  Fadrique,  or  Frederick,  a  man  of  much  energy  and 
force  of  character,  whom  we  saw  ravaging  the  coasts  and 
islands  of  Greece  some  twelve  years  earlier.  The  "  President 
of  the  fortunate  army  of  Franks  in  the  duchy  of  Athens," 
as  the  new  vicar-general  officially  described  himself,  retained 
the  leadership  of  the  company  for  thirteen  years — a  position 

1  Muntaner,  ch.  ccxlii. ;  (^urita,  Anales>  bk.  vi.,  ch.  xii. ;  Raynaldus, 
op.  cit.9  v.,  22-3;  Regestum  dementis  V.f  vii.,  72-3,  125,  238;  viii.,  14, 
131-2  ;  ix.,  44-7. 

8  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherche s,  II.,  i.,  394-6;  Ldmpros,  "Byypa^a, 
354-6. 


THE  CATALANS  AND  EUBOEA  243 

of  practical  independence,  as  the  nominal  duke,  Manfred, 
died  in  the  year  of  Fadrique's  appointment,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded in  the  title  by  his  younger  brother,  William,  likewise 
a  minor.  Moreover,  he  strengthened  his  hold  upon  Attica, 
and  at  the  same  time  obtained  a  pretext  for  intervening  in 
the  affairs  of  Euboea  by  his  marriage  with  Manilla,  the 
daughter  and  heiress  of  Bonifacio  da  Verona,  "  one  of  the 
fairest  Christians  in  the  world,  the  best  woman  and  the 
wisest  that  ever  was  in  that  land,"  as  Muntaner,  who  had 
seen  her  as  a  child  in  her  father's  house  at  Negroponte, 
enthusiastically  describes  her.  Although  the  fair  Lombard 
had  a  brother,  the  thirteen  castles  in  the  Athenian  duchy 
and  the  other  places  which  Guy  II.  of  Athens  had  once 
bestowed  upon  her  father,  fell  to  her  share.1 

The  Venetians  had  been  alarmed  for  the  safety  of  Euboea 
from  the  moment  when  the  Catalans  had  arrived  in  Greece. 
After  the  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s,  they  increased  the  salaries 
of  their  officials  in  the  island,  and  organised  a  fleet  for  its 
defence.  To  this  fleet  the  Lombard  lords  were  invited  to 
contribute,  and,  with  the  exception  of  Bonifacio,  they  agreed 
to  do  so.  That  powerful  and  ambitious  baron,  who  was  on 
the  best  terms  with  the  Catalans,  refused,  intending,  no  doubt 
with  their  aid,  to  make  himself  master  of  the  island.  The 
marriage  of  his  daughter  with  their  chief  seemed  to  favour 
this  plan. 

Hitherto,  the  Catalans  had  contented  themselves  with 
preventing  the  Catholic  bishop  of  Negroponte  from  returning 
to  his  see — which  can  scarcely  surprise  us,  as  he  was  a  cousin 
of  the  French  dukes  of  Athens — and  with  frequent  plundering 
raids  across  the  narrow  sound,  which  separated  them  from 
the  great  island.  A  more  serious  campaign  began,  however, 
when  Fadrique  and  more  than  2000  men — among  them 
Turkish  mercenaries — marched  across  "the  black  bridge." 
In  Negroponte  these  seasoned  soldiers  of  fortune  found  little 
opposition.  The  baronage  of  the  island,  like  the  Frankish 
aristocracy  in  other  parts  of  Greece,  had  suffered  severely 
at  the  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s,  where  two  of  the  Eubcean 
lords,  George  Ghisi  and  Alberto  Pallavicini,  had  fallen. 
Pallavicini's  successor,  Andrea  Cornaro,  a  member  of  that 

1  Muntaner,  ch.  ccxliii.,  his  last  notice  of  the  Catalans  in  Attica, 


I 


i 


244  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

famous  Venetian  family,  hastened  to  make  his  peace  with 
the  invaders,  who  entered  Chalkis  and  forced  the  Venetian 
bailie  to  do  likewise.  Thus  abandoned  by  their  allies,  the 
other  triarchs  appealed  to  Matilda  of  Hainault,  at  that  time 
Princess  of  Achaia,  as  their  suzerain ;  but  she  was  alone  and 
powerless  to  help  ;  she  had  already  contemplated  ceding  her 
phantom  suzerainty  over  the  island  to  Venice ;  and  she  now 
contented  herself  with  pointing  out  to  the  doge  the  extreme 
danger  which  the  island  ran  of  falling  into  the  hands  of  the 
Catalans.  At  this  moment,  Bonifacio  da  Verona  died — the 
last  survivor  of  the  ancien  regime  of  Frankish  Greece — where- 
upon his  son-in-law  at  once  occupied  the  two  important 
castles  of  Karystos  and  Larmena  as  part  of  Manilla's  dowry. 
But  the  successes  of  the  Company  had  so  greatly  alarmed 
Europe  that  a  coalition  of  the  European  powers  seemed  likely 
to  be  formed  against  it;  the  pope  complained  bitterly 
that  the  Catalans,  "  the  offscourings  of  humanity,"  employed 
infidel  Turks  against  Christians,  and  urged  Venice  to  drive 
them  out ;  the  exiled  family  of  Brienne  was  plotting  to 
regain  its  heritage ;  the  Angevins  protested  against  Fadrique's 
intervention  in  Eubcea.  Under  these  circumstances,  King 
Frederick  of  Sicily  thought  it  prudent  to  order  his  daring 
son  to  desist  from  further  conquests  in  that  island,  and 
Fadrique  obediently  retired  from  Eubcea,  retaining,  however, 
the  two  castles  of  Karystos  and  Larmena.  But  the  Catalans 
had  no  real  reason  for  fearing  the  active  hostility  of  Venice, 
their  nearest  and  most  serious  rival.  The  republic  was 
informed  by  her  agents  that  the  very  subjects  of  the  young 
Duke  Walter  at  Argos  and  Nauplia  were  in  league  with  the 
Company — a  proof  that  the  Catalan  usurpation  was  not 
unpopular  in  Greece.  Her  statesmen,  always  cautious,  were, 
therefore,  still  less  inclined  to  provide  the  money  and  the 
vessels  for  the  restoration  of  the  Brienne  dynasty,  even 
though  the  Duchess  of  Athens,  after  the  fashion  of  kings  in 
exile,  made  liberal  promises  of  commercial  concessions  which 
it  was  not  in  her  power  to  bestow.  On  the  other  hand, 
negotiations  began  between  King  Frederick  and  Venice, 
which  ended  in  1319  in  a  formal  truce,  renewed  two  years 
later,  in  which  the  triarchs  were  included.  This  remarkable 
agreement   provided,   under   a   penalty   of  £2240,  that  the 


PORTO  LEONE  245 

Company  should  fit  out  no  fresh  ships  in  the  Saronic  Gulf 
("  the  sea  of  Athens  ")  or  in  Euboean  waters ;  a  plank  was  to 
be  taken  out  of  the  hull  of  each  of  the  vessels  then  lying  in 
those  stations,  and  their  tackle  was  to  be  carried  up  to  the 
Akropolis  ("the  castle  of  Athens")  and  there  deposited. 
The  Catalan  ships  in  the  Corinthian  Gulf  ("the  sea  of 
Rivadostria,"  or  Livadostro)  might,  however,  remain  as  they 
were.  These  stringent  provisions  were  intended  to  check  the 
growth  of  a  Catalan  navy,  which  had  already  become  a 
menace  to  Venetian  interests  in  the  Levant  It  is  significant 
of  the  revived  importance  of  the  Piraeus,  that  in  a  Genoese 
map  of  this  period  that  harbour,  usually  called  by  the 
Venetians  "the  port  of  Sithines"  (or  Athens),  figures  for 
the  first  time  by  the  name  of  "  Lion,"  the  later  Porto  Leone, 
derived  from  the  colossal  lion,  now  in  front  of  the  Arsenal  at 
Venice,  which  then  stood  there.  It  was  from  there  that  Fad- 
rique  had  been  able  to  send  two  galleys  to  his  Turkish  allies ; 
it  was  from  there  that  his  corsairs  had  preyed  on  Venetian 
commerce,  and  had  wreaked  their  vengeance  on  the  island 
of  Melos,  which  belonged  to  the  duchy  of  Naxos,  for  the 
part  which  the  duke's  son  Nicholas  had  taken  against  the 
Catalans  in  the  marshes  of  the  Kephiss6s  and  in  the  plain 
of  Elis.  Even  as  far  as  Chios  the  Catalan  galleys  had 
penetrated,  and  had  carried  off  from  that  fertile  island  the 
son  of  Martino  Zaccaria,  its  Genoese  lord,  whose  name  had 
long  been  a  terror  to  Latin  pirates. 

Venice  profited  by  the  war  in  Eubcea  to  extend  her 
influence  in  that  island.  When  she  had  got  rid  of  the 
Catalan  danger,  she  informed  the  triarchs  of  her  intention 
of  occupying  the  towns  and  fortresses  as  a  reward  for  her 
trouble  and  expense.  She  was,  indeed,  the  only  power 
which  could  defend  Negroponte  from  the  ever-increasing 
Turkish  peril,  which  menaced  all  the  islands  and  coasts  of 
Greece.  Since  13 14  the  titular  dignity  of  Latin  Patriarch  of 
Constantinople  had  been  united  with  the  see  of  Negroponte ; 
but  the  patriarchal  admonitions  had  no  effect  upon  the 
adventurous  infidels.  The  Archbishop  of  Thebes,  who  went 
on  a  mission  to  Venice  to  seek  aid  against  the  Turks,  wrote 
to  Sanudo  that  they  had  thrice  invaded  Eubcea  in  one  year ; 
the  Venetian  bailie  feared  that,  if  help  were  not  forthcoming, 


i 


„        x     w    *>->  -VND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

•  ~*4*o   -*•"    ^fc**  •  ^ce  of  Ws  successors  was  com- 

^  ~.    xi^siUtui   a?   rfxese  marauders.     There  was 

»  ..  v   .     Jb^ci    -»  J*-*  Cirsfclans  and  Turks  uniting  against 

v   ^    c.     «k    v»  titer   retained  a   fellow-feeling   for  their 

....^v^   *■■*.   *&*•"«  Fjbdrique,  a  few  years  later,  again 

v  tv.tsX.    44   .,k  -uiairs  of  the  island  on  behalf  of  his  wife, 

:v    s.v     Axtv%t>  *u***c  her  brother  to  enjoy  the  castle  of 

...  ..>»*^  x^  ou»i«vv  *  Jgain  on  his  demise,  the  Turks  were 

%,,    ^v.w  .iK*c      ^  »  ;*°  wonder,  therefore,  that  when  the 

w.     c%»<ki   .iww^  5co»«n  Venice  and  the  Company  were 

»..*..<>;    -^    '.^KOv^   :l*    ^S1*  the  Catalans   had  to  promise 

*v*«*v    ^  1sj**x  i»w  their  land  or  service,  and  to  make 

iv .^  .»v*oc*  *1^  those  common  enemies  of  the  Latin 

^   -.<vviic   Turkish  raid  into  Attica,  in  the  course  of 

^s^    ,Ki.,*   o*    it'*  inhabitants  had  been  killed  and  others 

w.v.     !»»^    >su*c*>'    i"    Turkey,   may   have   predisposed   the 

v-.t.«.u>'.»   ;o  jkwy*   thcse  terms-     Alfonso  pledged  himself 

o  *.v*    kv  svtxtlcs  to  be  built  within  his  territory  of  Karystos 

*%w*  x%  ow^'N\t  to  sell  to  the  republic,  and  from  that  time 

k  iiK^v^vvv  ;tw  Venetians  of  Eubcea  no  more.1 

\ls\c**fc^\  b\*vliK;ue  had  found  leisure,  while  he  was  at 
s\inv  *  «Xh  \  o«fc*\  to  extend  the  Company's  authority  over 
<  ;v.*o  oau  ^  Northern  Greece,  where  the  dynasty  of  the 
V »  aS»  Nao  ik**  become  extinct  After  the  death  of  the 
u%  ^)\HNh  Puke  of  Athens  in  the  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s, 
.a  •  '.vvNe  iuIsh  of  Thessaly  had  adopted  the  style  of  "Lord 
.s   oV  'usk»*  o*"  Athens  and  Neopatras  "  (Signore  de  le  tcrre  de 

v v  „  .  \*»av\  in  virtue  of  his  kinship  with  the  house  of 

IV  ■*  Kochc.  But  John  II.,  the  last  of  the  Thessalian 
Vb£\<*»  N^  wonc  °f  *e  enerSy  °f  his  predecessors.  His 
Sv^Utv  ^*\l  never  been  robust,  and  in  1318  he  died  without 
i.\auc*  Unamivk  hi*  rich  dominions  to  be  dismembered.  So 
»*wMi  w^*  the  confusion  which  at  once  ensued,  that  the 
uKVo*»ohUii  of  l-Arissa  could  no  longer  exercise  his  sacred 
iuakikhv*  ui   that  city.     Feudalism,  as  we   saw,   had   been 

\\frWWw  tVwumJfr  T.,  ix.,  82  ;  Raynaldi,  loc.  ciL  ;  Melanges  his- 
tv«^***  Uti  JW-54  l  Thomas,  DipUmatarium,  i.,  1 10-17,  120-2,  214-19  ; 
rlvJvttv  \\mm*m#Mi%  U  163,  176,  189,  191,  195;  II.,  13;  Sanudo, 
\j*.\4m*\  <#**  lUu^ars,  U.,  298,  3i3-'5  J  Giornale  Ugustico  (1888),  p. 
>  fc> ,    <•'«  Jhfa  >*V*>/»)  /Jgmre  di  Storia  Patria,  V.,  Tavo/e,  iv.,  vi.,  vii. 


CATALAN  DUCHY  OF  NEOPATRAS     247 

readily  developed  on  the  congenial  soil  of  Thessaly,  where 
the  Greek  archons  had  copied,  and  copied  for  the  worse,  as 
is  always  the  case  when  the  East  borrows  the  manners  of  the 
West,  the  institutions  of  the  Franks.  One  petty  tyrant  now 
established  himself  at  Trikkala ;  another,  a  member  of  the 
great  family  of  the  Melissenof,  held  sway  over  the  ruins  of 
Delphi,  then  already  known  by  its  modern  name  of  Kastrf, 
keeping  on  good  terms  with  his  Catalan  neighbours  at 
Salona  by  means  of  a  matrimonial  alliance  between  his 
sister  and  the  marshal  of  the  Company.  Several  towns  were 
annexed  by  the  emperor,  who  had  long  coveted  the  lands  of 
his  son-in-law,  and  the  Holy  Synod  threatened  fearful  pains 
and  penalties  upon  the  heads  of  those  Thessalians,  who 
declined  to  submit  to  the  rule  of  Byzantium.  Venice 
obtained  a  share  of  the  spoil  in  the  shape  of  the  port  of 
Pteleon  at  the  entrance  of  the  Pagasaean  Gulf,  which  the 
emperor  voluntarily  allowed  her  to  take,  rather  than  it 
should  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Catalans,  who  subsequently 
agreed  not  to  molest  it  A  Venetian  from  Eubcea  was 
appointed  rector  of  this  station — the  sole  point,  except 
Modon  and  Coron,  which  the  republic  possessed  on  the 
mainland  of  Greece — and  it  remained  in  the  occupation 
of  Venice  down  to  the  capture  of  Eubcea  by  the  Turks. 
But  the  best  part  of  the  country  fell  to  the  share  of  the 
Catalan  Company.  Sanudo  tells  us  how  Fadrique  made 
himself  master  of  one  place  after  another,  of  Loidoriki  and 
Siderokastro,  of  Gardiki  and  Lamia,  of  Domok6  and  Pharsala 
— names  so  well  known  in  the  annals  of  modern  Greece.  At 
Neopatras,  the  seat  of  the  extinct  dynasty,  he  made  his 
second  capital,  styling  himself  Vicar-General  of  the  duchies 
of  Athens  and  Neopatras.  Henceforth  the  Sicilian  dukes  of 
Athens  assumed  the  double  title,  which  may  be  seen  on  their 
coins  and  in  their  documents,  and,  long  after  the  Catalan 
duchy  had  passed  away,  the  kings  of  Aragon  continued  to 
bear  it.  Besides  these  various  competitors  for  the  heritage 
of  the  Angeli,  there  now  appeared  for  the  first  time  in  the 
plain  of  Thessaly  great  masses  of  Albanian  immigrants,  who 
formed  a  new  and  vigorous  element  in  the  population.  They 
ravaged  all  the  open  country;  and,  as  they  brought  their 
wives  with  them,  their   numbers  soon  increased,  and  they 


J 


248  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

began  to  take  the  place  of  the  Wallachs,  who  had  hitherto 
formed  the  bulk  of  the  Thessalian  population,  and  had  given 
the  country  its  name  of  Great  Wallachia.  The  Venetians 
thought  that  this  Albanian  immigration  had  the  great 
advantage  of  keeping  the  Catalans  employed,  so  that  they 
had  less  leisure  to  attack  their  neighbours.  It  was  from 
these  Albanians  that  the  gaps  in  the  population  of  Attica 
and  the  Morea  were  subsequently  replenished.1 

Thessaly  was  now  in  great  part  Catalan  ;  Salona  was  the 
fief  of  the  Company's  former  chief,  Roger  Deslaur ;  so  that 
these  soldiers  of  fortune  were  masters  of  practically  all 
continental  Greece,  except  the  historic  marquisate  of 
Boudonitza  and  the  Despotat  of  Epiros.  After  the  death  of 
the  last  of  the  Pallavicini  marquises  in  the  swamps  of 
the  Kephiss6s,  his  widow  had  married  that  same  Andrea 
Cornaro,  baron  of  Eubcea,  whom  we  have  seen  contending  in 
vain  against  the  claims  of  Fadrique  in  that  island.  Fadrique 
punished  him  by  ravaging  the  marquisate,  without,  however, 
annexing  it  to  Athens.  Indeed,  on  Cornaro's  death,  it 
passed,  by  the  marriage  of  his  stepdaughter,  into  the  hands 
of  a  bitter  enemy  and  former  prisoner  of  the  Catalans,  the 
son  of  Martino  Zaccaria,  the  Genoese  lord  of  Chios.  At  his 
demise,  his  widow  married  in  1335  one  of  the  noble  Venetian 
family  of  Giorgi,  or  Zorzi,  as  it  was  called  in  the  soft  dialect 
of  the  lagoons,  with  which  the  marquisate  remained  till  the 
Turkish  Conquest  The  marquises  had  long  been  peers  and 
vassals  of  the  principality  of  Achaia,  and  as  such  they 
continued  to  be  reckoned  during  the  whole  of  the  fourteenth 
century.  No  proof  exists  that  they  ever  depended  upon  the 
French  duchy  of  Athens ;  but  though  their  sympathies  were 
now  with  Venice,  they  paid  an  annual  tribute  of  four  horses 
to  the  Catalan  vicar-general.2 

The  same  year  which  witnessed  the  extinction  of  the 
Angeli  in   Thessaly  saw,  too,  the  close  of  their  dynasty  in 

1  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  279,  318  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali%  I.,  177  ; 
Sanudo,  Epistola,  afiud  Bongars,  II.,  293;  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  I., 
79  ;  (^urita,  bk.  vi.,  ch.  xii.;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique  de  ? Orient  latin, 
346  ;  Archivio  Veneto,  xx.,  84-5. 

f  Canciani,  III.,  507  ;  Rubi<5  y  Lluch,  482  ;  Qurita,  bk.  x.,  ch.  xxx.  ; 
Hopf,  ChroniqueS)  125,  230,  and  a/tft/ Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv.,  425,  436. 


THE  ORSINI  IN  EPIROS  249 

Epiros.  In  1 318,  the  feeble  Despot  Thomas,  the  last  of  his 
race,  was  murdered  by  his  nephew,  Count  Nicholas  of  Cepha- 
lonia,  who  married  his  widow,  Anna  Palaiologina,  a  grand- 
daughter of  the  Emperor  Andr6nikos  II.  Thus  connected 
with  the  imperial  house,  the  Italian  count  sought  to  establish 
his  authority  over  the  Despotat  of  Epiros  by  drawing  closer 
to  the  Greeks,  whose  religion  he  adopted,  and  in  whose 
language  his  seal  was  engraved.  By  this  means  he  hoped  to 
checkmate  the  plans  of  Philip  of  Taranto,  who  was  still 
meditating  the  conquest  of  the  mainland,  and  to  whom 
he  boldly  refused  the  homage  due  for  his  island  domain. 
But  the  people  of  Joannina,  at  that  time  a  populous 
and  wealthy  city,  where  Jews  could  make  money,  and  where 
Hellenic  sentiments  were  fostered  by  the  fact  that  it  was 
the  seat  of  the  metropolitan,  preferred  the  rule  of  the 
Greek  Emperor,  from  whom  their  Church  received  repeated 
favours,  to  that  of  the  Latin  apostate.  For  a  time  the 
latter  thought  it  worth  while  to  purchase  the  friendship 
of  Byzantium  and  the  title  of  Despot  by  keeping  his  oaths 
not  to  molest  the  Greeks  of  that  city.  But  the  death  of  his  wife 
and  the  growing  weakness  of  the  empire  convinced  him  that 
he  had  nothing  to  hope  or  fear  from  that  quarter.  The  "  Count 
Palatine,  by  the  grace  of  God  Despot  of  Romania,"  as  he 
styled  himself,  accordingly  invited  Venice  to  assist  him  in 
driving  the  imperial  troops  out  of  Epiros,  offering  in  return 
to  hoist  the  lion  banner  on  all  his  castles,  to  do  homage  to 
the  republic  for  all  his  dominions,  and  to  cede  to  it  either 
the  valuable  fisheries  in  the  lake  of  Butrinto  opposite  Corfu, 
or  the  sugar  plantations  of  Parga — the  town  which,  five 
centuries  later,  was  destined  to  obtain  such  romantic  notoriety, 
and  of  which  this  is  perhaps  the  earliest  mention.  But  the 
cautious  Venetians  were  anxious  not  to  endanger  their  com- 
mercial interests  in  the  Greek  Empire,  with  which  they 
continued  to  be  at  peace,  and  they  calmly  reminded  the 
count  that  there  was  no  great  novelty  in  his  offer  to  become 
"  their  man,"  seeing  that  his  ancestor  Maio  had  more  than  a 
century  earlier  recognised  their  suzerainty  over  the  three 
islands  of  Cephalonia,  Zante,  and  Val  di  Compare  (or  Ithaka). 
Nothing  daunted  by  this  politic  answer,  and  encouraged  by 
the  utter  confusion  at  Constantinople  caused  by  the  quarrels 


i 


250  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

of  the  elder  and  the  younger  Andr6nikos,  he  openly  attacked 
the  strong  city  of  Joannina.  But  at  this  point,  in  1323,  his 
career  of  crime  was  cut  short  by  the  hand  of  his  brother, 
Count  John  II.,  who  assassinated  the  assassin  and  received, 
in  his  turn,  the  title  of  Despot  from  Constantinople,  on 
condition  that  he  swore  to  govern  Epiros,  "  not  as  its  sove- 
reign, but  as  the  servant  of  the  emperor."  None  the  less, 
from  his  "castle  of  Arta,"  he  issued  coins,  still  preserved, 
modelled  on  those  of  the  princes  of  Achaia,  to  facilitate  trade 
with  Latin  countries.  Even  in  the  motley  history  of 
Frankish  Greece  we  are  struck  by  the  incongruity  of  an 
Italian  adventurer  minting  French  pieces  on  "Ambracia's 
Gulf."  But  this  vigorous  scion  of  the  Roman  Orsini 
embodied  in  his  person  the  strangest  anomalies.  Like  his 
brother,  the  new  Despot  married  another  Anna  Palaiologina 
and  embraced  the  orthodox  faith,  while  he  sought,  after  the 
usual  manner  of  usurpers,  to  connect  himself  with  the  native 
dynasty  by  assuming  the  three  great  names  of  Angelos, 
Comnenos,  and  Doukas.  As  a  proof  of  his  ostentatious 
piety,  he  restored  the  famous  church  of  Our  Lady  of  Consola- 
tion at  Arta,  where  an  inscription  preserving  his  name  and 
that  of  Anna  may  still  be  seen.  He  was  also  one  of  the  few 
examples  in  the  history  of  Frankish  Greece  of  a  Latin  ruler 
who  patronised  Greek  literature.  By  his  command,  Con- 
stantine  Hermoniak6s  composed  a  paraphrase  of  Homer  in 
octosyllabic  verse.  The  poem,  if  such  we  can  call  it,  has  no 
literary  merit,  but  is  an  incontestable  sign  of  an  interest  in 
culture  even  at  the  court  of  wild  Epiros.  Indeed,  the 
courtly  poet  would  have  us  believe  that  his  master  was 
"a  hero  and  a  scholar,"  and  that  the  Lady  Anna  "ex- 
celled all  women  that  ever  lived  in  beauty,  wisdom,  and 
learning." 1 

South  of  the  isthmus  of  Corinth,  French  influence  was 
still  predominant  despite  Catalan  raids  and  intrigues.     The 

1  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  I.,  283,  536,  544 ;  Cantacuzene,  I.,  13 ; 
L.  d.  F.%  138  ;  Raynaldus,  v.,  95  ;  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  I.,  171  ;  v.,  yy- 
84,  86 ;  Thomas,  Diplomatarium^  146,  161,  168-70,  Archivio  Veneto,  xx., 
93 ;  Lettres  secretes  de  Jean  XXILy  i.,  670 ;  Romanes,  op,  ctt.,  232-4 ; 
Schlumberger,  Numismatique%  374,  Les  Principautis  franques^  80 ; 
AfXrlor  rift  Xpurr.  'Ap%-  'Eraipclas,  iii^  76, 


LOUIS  OF  BURGUNDY,  PRINCE  OF  ACHAIA  251 

faithful  family  of  Foucherolles,1  whom  the  last  Duke  of 
Athens  had  invested  with  lands  at  Nauplia  and  Argos,  still 
held  that  sole  surviving  fragment  of  the  French  duchy  for 
the  exiled  house  of  Brienne,  while  the  principality  of  Achaia, 
though  sorely  tried,  remained,  amid  many  vicissitudes,  under 
the  authority  of  the  Angevins.  At  the  time  of  the  Catalan 
Conquest  of  Athens,  as  we  saw,  it  was  in  the  hands  of  Philip 
of  Taranto,  who  had  left  it  to  be  administered  by  means  of 
bailies.  But  two  years  after  the  fatal  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s, 
the  possession  of  it  was  transferred  to  another  by  means  of 
one  of  those  diplomatic  family  compacts,  so  dear  to  the 
intriguing  house  of  Anjou.  At  that  moment,  one  of  the 
most  eligible  heiresses  of  the  Frankish  world  was  the  titular 
Empress  of  Constantinople,  Catherine  of  Valois,  a  child 
barely  twelve  years  old,  and  to  obtain  her  hand  was  now  the 
main  object  of  Philip  of  Taranto's  policy.  On  his  side,  there 
was  no  obstacle  to  the  match,  for  his  first  wife,  Thamar  of 
Epiros,  with  whom  his  relations  had  become  more  and  more 
strained  after  his  unsuccessful  expedition  against  that 
country,  had  been  accused  of  adultery  a  few  years  earlier  and 
was  now  dead.  The  young  empress  had,  however,  been 
betrothed  already  to  Hugues  V.,  Duke  of  Burgundy  and 
titular  King  of  Salonika,  and  it  was  therefore  necessary  to 
break  off  this  engagement  before  Philip's  plan  could  be 
realised.  The  French  king,  uncle  of  the  girl,  had  no  difficulty 
in  making  the  French  pope,  Clement  V.,  the  subservient  tool 
of  his  designs,  for  the  papacy  was  now  established  at 
Avignon,  and,  as  a  preliminary  move,  the  child-empress  was 
made  to  express  doubts  as  to  the  capacity  of  her  almost 
equally  childish  fiance  to  recover  her  lost  empire.  In  order 
to  compensate  the  house  of  Burgundy  for  the  breach  of  the 
engagement,  it  was  next  arranged  that  Matilda,  the  young 
widow  of  Duke  Guy  II.  of  Athens,  should  marry  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy's  younger  brother  Louis.  Matilda  had  already 
been  betrothed,  soon  after  her  first  husband's  death,  to  the 
eldest  son  of  Philip  of  Taranto ;  but,  of  course,  that  engage- 
ment was  not  allowed  to  stand  in  the  way  of  the  new  family 

1  Raynaldus,  v.,  116  ;  Hopf,  Chroniques,  241  ;  L.  d.  F.,  31  (which, 
by  a  characteristic  anachronism,  places  them  there  in  the  time  of 
Geoffrey  !.)• 


g 


252  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

compact.  Philip  of  Taranto  then  conveyed  to  Matilda  all 
his  rights  to  the  possession  of  Achaia,  on  condition  that  she 
should  transfer  them  before  her  marriage  to  her  future 
husband  Louis ;  it  was  further  provided,  that,  if  he  died 
without  heirs,  she  should  have  nothing  more  than  the  life- 
ownership  of  the  principality,  which,  after  her  death  was  to 
revert  to  the  house  of  Burgundy  in  any  event  At  the  same 
time,  Louis  received  from  his  brother  the  barren  title  of  King 
of  Salonika,  did  homage  to  the  Prince  of  Taranto  for  Achaia, 
of  which  the  latter  expressly  retained  the  suzerainty,  and 
promised  to  assist  him  in  any  attempt  to  recover  the  Latin 
Empire.  The  two  marriages  then  took  place,  in  1313  ;  Philip 
thus  became  titular  Emperor  of  Constantinople,  Louis  of 
Burgundy  Prince  of  Achaia  and  titular  King  of  Salonika,  and 
a  coin  and  a  magnificent  seal  still  preserve  the  memory  of  his 
Achaian  dignity.1  The  person  who  bore  the  loss  of  the 
whole  transaction  was  the  unhappy  Matilda,  who  thus 
became  merely  life-owner  of  a  principality,  which  she,  as  the 
eldest  grandchild  of  Guillaume  de  Villehardouin,  had  not 
unnaturally  considered  as  her  birthright,  and  which  her 
mother  had  bequeathed  to  her,  all  arrangements  with  the 
Angevins  notwithstanding. 

Unfortunately,  Louis  of  Burgundy  delayed  his  departure 
for  Greece,  and  in  his  prolonged  absence  a  claimant  arose  to 
dispute  his  title.  Hitherto,  amid  all  its  trials  under  the 
government  of  women,  foreigners,  and  absentees,  Achaia  had 
been  spared  the  horrors  of  a  contested  succession ;  but  that 
misfortune  was  now  added  to  the  other  miseries  of  the  land. 
Guillaume  de  Villehardouin's  second  daughter,  Marguerite, 
Lady  of  Akova  and  widow  of  Count  Richard  of  Cephalonia, 
was  still  alive,  and,  on  the  death  of  her  elder  sister  in  131 1, 
had  laid  claim  to  the  principality  on  the  ground  of  an  alleged 
will  made  by  her  father.  According  to  the  provisions  of  this 
document,  mentioned  only  by  those  authorities  who  have  a 
natural  bias  for  the  Spanish  side,  the  last  Villehardouin 
prince  had  bequeathed  Achaia  to  his  elder  daughter,  with  the 
provision  that,  if  she  died  without  children,  it  would  pass  to 

1  Buchoa,  Richsrches  tt  MatMaux,  i.,  54-5,  238-48 ;  Atlas,  xxiv.,  10, 
11  ;  xxvi.,  2 ;  Ptolemaeus  Lucensis  apud  Muratori,  xi.,  1232  ;  L.  d.  C, 
29,474;  L.d.F.t  124-7. 


THE  LADY  OF  AKOVA  253 

her  younger  sister.  According  to  the  marriage-contract  of 
Isabelle  in  1271  it  was  not  in  the  power  of  her  father  to 
make  any  such  disposition  ;  and,  even  if  he  had,  his  younger 
daughter  would  still  have  had  no  claim,  because  her  elder  sister's 
daughter,  Matilda,  would  have  been  the  rightful  princess. 
It  was  no  wonder,  then,  that  both  the  court  of  Naples  and 
the  leading  Moreot  barons — the  small  remnant  of  the  Achaian 
chivalry  which  remained  after  the  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s — 
both  rejected  this  unsubstantial  pretext  So  long,  however, 
as  her  chivalrous  protector,  Nicholas  III.  de  St  Omer,  lived, 
Marguerite  was,  at  any  rate,  safe  in  the  possession  of  her  own 
barony.  But,  after  his  death  in  13 13,  she  found  herself 
surrounded  by  personal  enemies,  such  as  her  stepson,  Count 
John  I.  of  Cephalonia,  and  by  Burgundian  partisans,  like 
Nicholas  Mavro,  or  Le  Noir,  baron  of  St  Sauveur,  who  had 
been  appointed  by  the  new  prince  as  his  bailie,  and  who  was 
supported  by  the  bishop  of  Olena.  In  this  dilemma,  she  hit 
upon  the  idea  of  seeking  an  alliance  with  those  Catalans 
whose  exploits  had  amazed  the  whole  Greek  world.  Before 
her  marriage  to  the  late  Count  of  Cephalonia,  she  had  been 
the  wife  of  Isnard  de  Sabran,  son  of  the  Count  of  Ariano,  in 
Apulia,  by  whom  she  had  a  daughter,  Isabelle.  This 
daughter  she  now  married  to  the  Infant  Ferdinand  of 
Majorca,  who  had  played  such  an  adventurous  part  in  the 
history  of  the  Catalan  Company,  whose  name  was  well  known 
in  Greece,  and  who  was  now  at  the  Sicilian  court  The 
marriage  was  one  of  affection  as  well  as  of  convenience. 
The  susceptible  Ferdinand  fell  in  love  at  first  sight  of  a 
damsel  who,  in  the  words  of  his  faithful  henchman  Muntaner, 
was  "  the  most  beautiful  creature  of  fourteen  that  one  could 
see,  the  fairest,  the  rosiest,  the  best,  and  the  wisest,  too,  for 
her  age."  Nor  was  the  King  of  Sicily  averse  from  a  proposal 
which  would  make  the  house  of  Aragon  supreme  in  the 
Morea  as  well  as  at  Athens.  Accordingly,  the  wedding  was 
hurried  on ;  by  way  of  dowry  for  her  daughter,  Marguerite 
ceded  to  Ferdinand  the  barony  of  Akova  and  all  her  claims 
to  Achaia,  now  more  modestly  assessed  at  "  the  fifth  part  of 
the  principality,"  and  the  ceremony  took  place  with  great 
rejoicings  at  Messina.  It  was  not,  however,  to  be  expected 
that  the  Burgundian  party  in  the  Morea  would  acquiesce  in 


4 


254  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

this  arrangement  No  sooner  had  Marguerite  returned, 
leaving  the  newly  married  couple  at  Catania,  than  Nicholas 
Mavro  and  his  confederates  threw  her  into  the  castle  of 
Chloumofitsi.  "Thou  hast  given  thy  daughter  to  the 
Catalans,"  they  scornfully  told  her ;  "  ill  fortune  shall  attend 
thee,  for  thou  shalt  lose  all  thine  own."  Robbed  of  her 
baronial  lands,  the  last  child  of  the  great  Villehardouin  died 
not  long  afterwards,  in  1315,  the  prisoner  of  the  unruly 
nobles.  Two  months  later,  her  daughter  followed  her  to  the 
grave.1 

Before  her  death,  however,  Ferdinand's  young  wife  had 
given  birth  to  a  son,  the  future  James  II.,  last  King  of  Majorca, 
and  to  this  child  she  bequeathed  her  claims  to  Achaia. 
Assigning  to  his  old  comrade  Muntaner  the  delicate  task  of 
conveying  the  baby  to  his  mother,  the  Queen-Dowager  of 
Majorca,  at  Perpignan,  Ferdinand  started  with  a  body  of 
soldiers  to  endeavour  to  make  good  these  claims.  Landing 
near  Glarentza  in  the  summer  of  1315,  he  routed  the  small 
force  which  had  sallied  out  to  attack  him,  entered  the  town, 
and  received  the  homage  of  the  frightened  citizens.  He 
followed  up  this  success  by  capturing  the  castle  of  Beauvoir, 
or  Pontikokastro,  the  ruins  of  which  still  command  the 
peninsula  above  Katakolo,  and  which  Muntaner  calls,  not 
without  reason,  "  one  of  the  most  beautiful  sites  in  the  world." 
All  the  plain  of  Elis  was  his,  and  his  rapid  triumph  induced 
the  three  leaders  of  the  Burgundian  party — Mavro,  Count 
John,  and  the  bishop  of  Olena,  to  recognise  his  authority, 
which  he  endeavoured  to  justify  by  the  publication  of 
the  testaments  of  Prince  William,  the  Lady  of  Akova, 
and  his  own  wife,  as  well  as  by  that  of  his  marriage- 
contract.  He  now  styled  himself  "  Lord  of  the  Morea," 
and  sought  to  consolidate  his  position  by  a  second  mar- 
riage with  Isabelle  d'Ibelin,  cousin  of  the  King  of  Cyprus. 
He  even  found  time  to  mint  money  with  his  name  at 
Glarentza. 

But  Ferdinand's  usurpation  was  of  brief  duration.  Louis 
of  Burgundy  and  his  wife  now  at  last  appeared  to  take 
possession  of  their  principality.     The  Princess  Matilda  would 

1  Muntaner,  chs.  cclxi.-lxv.;  Buchon,  Recherches  historiques^  i.,  439-42, 
452,  475  J  L.  d.  F.,  121-2. 


BATTLE  OF  MANOLADA  255 

seem  to  have  arrived  first  with  a  force  of  Burgundians,  at 
the  harbour  of  Navarino,1  where  Mavro  hastened  to  meet  her 
and  assure  her  of  his  devotion  to  her  cause.  Adherents 
rapidly  joined  the  French  side;  the  Archbishop  of  Patras 
successfully  held  that  city  for  her ;  a  contingent  was  sent  by 
her  vassal,  the  Duke  of  Naxos,  to  assist  her.  But  the  Catalan 
soldiers  of  Ferdinand  inflicted  a  severe  defeat  upon  the 
Franks  and  their  Burgundian  comrades  near  the  site  of  the 
ancient  city  of  Elis,  and  the  princess  was  obliged  to  send  in 
hot  haste  to  summon  her  husband.  Almost  immediately, 
Louis  landed  with  his  Burgundian  troops  from  his  Venetian 
ships  with  the  Count  of  Cephalonia  by  his  side,  and  soon  the 
fortune  of  war  turned.  In  vain  the  usurper  sent  to  the 
Catalans  of  Athens  and  to  his  brother  the  King  of  Majorca 
for  reinforcements ;  before  they  had  had  time  to  arrive,  his 
cause  was  lost.  On  the  advice  of  the  Archbishop  of  Patras, 
Louis  entered  into  negotiations  with  the  Greek  governor  of 
Mistr& ;  and,  with  a  large  contingent  of  Greek  troops  which 
made  his  forces  three  times  more  numerous  than  those  of  his 
rival,  set  out  to  attack  him.  On  5th  July  13 16,  the  two 
armies  met  at  Manolada,  the  beautiful  estate  in  the  plain  of 
Elis,  which  now  belongs  to  the  Greek  crown  prince. 
Ferdinand  took  up  his  position  in  a  forest  of  pines,  but  his 
enemy  set  fire  to  the  resinous  trees,  which  nowhere  burn  so 
easily  as  in  Greece,  and  thus  drove  the  Infant  out  into  the 
open.  The  impetuous  Spaniard  made  straight  for  the 
division  commanded  by  his  mortal  foe,  Count  John  of 
Cephalonia,  and  broke  through  his  line ;  the  son  of  the  Duke 
of  Naxos  was  actually  taken  prisoner ;  but  the  Burgundians 
came  to  the  Count's  rescue ;  in  the  miUe>  the  Infant's  standard- 
bearer  fell,  whereupon  his  followers,  all  save  some  seven,  fled, 
leaving  their  master  almost  alone.  His  few  remaining 
companions  urged  him  in  vain  to  flee  to  Chloumoutsi ;  while 
they  were  arguing  with  him,  the  Burgundians  fell  upon  the 
little  band,  the  Infant  was  surrounded,  and,  in  spite  of  the 
orders  of  Prince  Louis  that  his  life  should  be  spared,  was 
decapitated   on   the   field.      His   head,   gashed   with    many 

1  L.  d.  F.9  128-32,  which  seems  to  me  a  trustworthy  account,  except 
for  a  few  errors  in  the  proper  names  ;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique^ 
318. 


256  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

wounds,  was  handed  over  to  his  implacable  enemy,  Count 
John,  who  next  day  caused  it  to  be  displayed  before  the  gate 
of  Glarentza.  Still  the  sturdy  infantry  of  Catalufta  were  for 
holding  out ;  but  their  captain  pretended  that  he  had  neither 
provisions  nor  pay  to  give  them,  and  counselled  surrender. 
A  commission  of  twelve  was  elected  to  arrange  affairs; 
bribery  was  freely  employed ;  the  Archbishop  of  Lepanto, 
naturally  a  warm  partisan  of  the  French  party,  disseminated 
the  false  news  that  the  kings  of  Majorca,  Aragon,  and  Sicily 
were  dead ;  and  when  the  long-expected  reinforcements  arrived 
from  Majorca,  they  were  told  that  peace  had  been  already 
made.  An  honest  Catalan,  however,  shouted  out  to  them 
not  to  believe  the  traitors,  but  to  land  and  avenge  the 
Infant's  death.  At  this,  they  disembarked  and  hastened  up 
to  Glarentza,  where  their  comrades  insisted  on  the  gates 
being  opened  to  admit  them.  Then  the  commander  of  the 
place  called  in  the  Count  of  Cephalonia,  whose  threats  of 
starvation  gradually  cooled  the  enthusiasm  of  the  garrison. 
The  severed  remains  of  the  ill-fated  Ferdinand  were  trans- 
ported back  on  the  Catalan  galleys,  and  laid  to  rest  at 
Perpignan.  His  best  epitaph  is  that  which  his  faithful  old 
follower  Muntaner  has  enshrined  in  his  delightful  Chronicle: — 
"  He  was  the  best  knight  and  the  bravest  among  all  the 
king's  sons  of  that  day,  and  the  most  upright,  and  the  wisest 
in  all  his  acts."  Thus  ended  one  of  the  most  romantic 
careers  that  even  the  mediaeval  romance  of  Greece  can 
show. 

Louis  of  Burgundy  had  nothing  more  to  fear  from  his 
open  enemies.  The  Catalans  of  Athens  had  turned  back 
when  they  learnt  at  Vostitza,  on  the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  the 
news  of  the  Infant's  defeat  and  death ;  all  the  castles  held 
for  his  rival  had  been  handed  over  to  him,  except  Glarentza, 
which  was  still  occupied  by  the  Catalans  pending  the 
settlement  of  their  affairs.  But  the  victor  did  not  long 
survive  the  fall  of  his  opponent.  Barely  a  month  after  the 
battle  of  Manolada,  before  Glarentza  had  been  evacuated, 
Prince  Louis  died,  poisoned,  as  it  was  suspected,  by  the 
.Count  of  Cephalonia,  one  of  the  darkest  characters  of  that 
age.  The  Burgundians  talked  of  avenging  his  murder  with 
the  aid  of  some   of  the    Infant's   followers;   but   a   natural 


PRINCESS  MATILDA'S  TRAGIC  END  257 

death  a  few  months  later  removed  the  arch-criminal  from 
the  scene  of  his  crimes.1 

Matilda,  barely  twenty-three  years  old,  yet  already  twice 
a  widow,  was  now  left  alone  to  govern  a  country  just 
recovering  from  civil  war,  where  each  unruly  baron  was 
minded  to  do  what  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,  and  where 
anarchy  was  only  tempered  by  Angevin  intrigues.  King 
Robert  of  Naples,  whom  historians  have  called  "the  wise," 
was  an  unscrupulous  diplomatist,  who  saw  in  this  state  of 
things  an  opportunity  for  once  more  securing  the  possession 
of  Achaia  for  a  member  of  his  house.  Besides  Philip  of 
Taranto,  he  had  another  brother,  John,  Count  of  Gravina, 
in  Apulia,  and  he  accordingly  resolved  that  the  young 
widow  should  marry  this  man.  Matilda,  who  had  inherited 
the  spirit  of  her  race,  refused  to  take  the  king's  brother  as 
her  husband,  whereupon  Robert  sent  a  trusty  emissary,  one 
of  the  Spinola  of  Genoa,  to  the  Morea,  to  bring  her  to 
Naples  by  force.  There  she  was  compelled,  in  1318,  to  go 
through  the  form  of  marriage  with  John  of  Gravina,  who  at 
once  took  the  coveted  title  of  Prince  of  Achaia.  Even  the 
king  could  not,  however,  compel  her  to  recognise  his  brother 
as  her  husband,  though  he  induced  her  to  sign  away  her 
birthright  in  case  she  refused  to  do  so.  She  appealed  to 
Venice  for  aid,  while  her  brother-in-law,  Eudes  IV.,  Duke  of 
Burgundy,  who  had  inherited  claims  on  the  principality 
under  his  brother's  will,  also  protested  against  this  arbitrary 
interference  with  his  rights.  But  Venice  did  nothing  on  her 
behalf ;  and  Eudes  was  effectually  silenced  by  the  purchase 
of  his  claims  by  Philip  of  Taranto.  Matilda,  now  absolutely 
helpless  but  still  defiant,  was  dragged  before  Pope  John 
XXII.  at  Avignon,  and  ordered  to  obey.  She  replied  that 
she  was  already  another's,  having  secretly  married  Hugues 
de  la  Palisse,2  a  Burgundian  knight  to  whom  she  was  much 
attached.  This  confession  was  her  ruin,  for  it  gave  the 
King  of  Naples  an  excuse  for  depriving  her  of  her  inherit- 

1  Buchon,  Recherches  historiquesy  i.,  442-50,  475-6,  ii.,  455-9 ;  Mun- 
taner,  chs.  cclxvii.-lxx.,  cclxxx.  ;  L.  d.  F.,  122-4,  127-37 ;  Thomas, 
Diplomatarium^  i.,  112. 

2  Buchon  thinks  that  he  had  long  been  settled  in  Greece.  Perhaps 
La  Palessien  (L.  d.  C.y  466),  in  Cephalonia,  was  his  family  estate. 

R 


258  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

ance.  He  appealed  to  the  clause  in  her  mother's  marriage 
contract,  made  thirty-three  years  before,  which  provided  that 
if  a  daughter  of  Isabelle  married  without  her  suzerain's 
consent,  the  possession  of  Achaia  should  revert  to  the 
crown  of  Naples.  Not  content  with  this,  Robert  got  up  a 
story  that  Palisse  had  conspired  against  his  life,  and  arrested 
the  unhappy  princess  as  his  accomplice.  For  nine  long 
years,  in  spite  of  appeals  on  her  behalf  by  her  cousin,  the 
Count  of  Hainault,  backed  up  by  pecuniary  arguments, 
she  languished  as  a  prisoner  of  state  in  the  island  fortress  of 
Castel  delP  Uovo  at  Naples,  where,  in  happier  days,  her 
mother  Isabelle  had  spent  the  early  years  of  her  married 
life.  Her  royal  gaoler  allowed  her  the  sum  of  three  ounces 
a  month  (£7,  4s.)  for  her  maintenance,  and  when,  at  last,  in 
1 33 1,  death  released  her  from  his  clutches,  he  paid  her  funeral 
expenses,  and  gave  her,  the  lost  scion  of  a  noble  line,  royal 
burial  in  his  family  vault  in  the  cathedral.  No  traces  now 
remain  of  the  marble  monument  which  he  erected  over  his 
unhappy  victim,  the  last  human  sacrifice  to  Angevin  intrigues. 
Thus  closed  the  career  of  the  Villehardouin  family  in  the 
Morea ;  thus  was  the  deceit  of  Geoffrey  I.  visited  upon  the 
head  of  his  unfortunate  descendant  in  the  third  generation.1 

The  Princess  of  Achaia  had  left  neither  children  nor 
testament ;  but  when  her  end  was  near,  she  declared  verbally, 
before  a  number  of  witnesses,  that  she  bequeathed  all  she  had 
to  her  cousin,  King  James  II.  of  Majorca,  the  son  of  her  old 
rival  Ferdinand,  and  the  child  whom  Muntaner  had  prayed 
that  he  might  live  to  serve  in  his  old  age.  Meanwhile,  however, 
her  hated  consort,  John  of  Gravina,  governed  his  principality 
by  means  of  bailies,  who  held  office  for  a  year  or  two  at  the 
most,  and  were  therefore  unable  to  restore  order  and 
prosperity  to  the  land. 

The  emperor,  on  the  other  hand,  had  recently  adopted 
the  sensible  plan  of  appointing  the  imperial  governor  of 
MistrA,    the    "captain    of    the    land    and    castles    in    the 

1  Buchon,  Recherches  historiques,  i.,  450-1  ;  Ducange,  op.  cit.%  ii.,  380- 
2  ;  L.d.  /\,  137-9  ;  \  illani  apud  Muratori,  xiii.,  489,  523  ;  Riccio,  Studii 
storici  sopra  84  Registri  Angioini,  3,  29,  30  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  i., 
189  ;  Sir  R.  Rodd,  The  Princes  of  Achaia,  ii.,  282-7  ;  Lettres  seer}  Us  de 
Jean  XX1L,  i.,  862,  898  ;  Arch.  Veneto^  xx.,  93-4  ;  St  Genois,  i.,  360. 


GROWTH  OF  GREEK  INFLUENCE  259 

Peloponnese,"  as  he  was  officially  styled,1  for  an  indefinite 
period,  so  that  that  official  was  able  to  gain  a  real  acquaint- 
ance with  local  conditions  and  requirements.  Thus, 
Cantacuzene,  son  of  the  man  who  was  killed  in  the  war 
of  1264,  and  father  of  the  future  emperor,  governed  the 
Byzantine  province  for  eight  years,  till  he  was  killed  in 
1 3 16,  and  his  successor,  a  very  able  general,  Andr6nikos 
Palaiol6gos  Asan,  nephew  of  the  emperor  and  son  of  the 
Bulgarian  tsar,  remained  in  office  for  full  six  more.  In  his 
time  the  feeble  Frankish  principality,  which  had  lost  its 
ancient  defenders,  was  still  further  curtailed  by  the  loss  of 
most  of  Arkadia,  the  strongest  strategic  position  in  the 
peninsula.  The  treacherous  and  venal  commanders  of  the 
famous  castles  of  St  George,  Akova,  and  Karytaina,  sold 
them  to  Asan,  who  routed  the  bailie  by  means  of  an 
ambuscade,  and  captured  the  bishop  of  Olena  and  the 
grand  constable,  Bartolomeo  Ghisi,  who  was  at  this  time 
the  leading  man  in  Achaia.  The  result  of  this  campaign 
was  not  only  the  loss  of  two  more  out  of  the  twelve  original 
baronies,  of  which  only  four — Patras,  Veligosti,  Vostitza,  and 
Chalandritza — now  remained  in  the  hands  of  the  Franks, 
but  the  conversion  of  the  Franks  of  Arkadia  to  the  Church 
of  their  conquerors — an  inevitable  movement,  which  the 
pope  in  vain  urged  the  Archbishop  of  Patras  to  check.  We 
can  trace  the  growing  importance  of  the  Byzantine  province 
and  of  the  Greek  Church  in  the  inscriptions  of  MistrA,  which 
begin  at  this  period.  In  the  early  years  of  the  fourteenth 
century  the  builders  were  hard  at  work  there,  restoring  the 
church  of  the  Forty  Martyrs,  and  making  a  well;  in  13 12 
the  metropolitan  church  of  St  Demetrios  was  founded ;  it 
was  then,  too,  that  the  interesting  Afentikd  church  was  built, 
while  it  was  in  these  years  that  the  emperor  showered 
privileges  and  immunities  from  taxation  upon  the  monastery 
of  Our  Lady  of  Brontochion,  whose  widely-scattered  posses- 
sions, ranging  from  Karytaina  to  Passav&,  form  a  measure  of 
Byzantine  influence.  Even  in  the  still  remaining  "Latin 
part "  of  Arkadia  the  abbey  was  promised  lands,  whenever 

1  Golden  bull  of  Andr6nikos  1 1.,  published  by  M.  Millet  in  Bulletin 
de  Carrespondance  htlUnique,  xxiii.,  115.  Cf.  X.  r.  M.,  8694,  8708, 
8716. 


I 


260  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

Providence  should  be  pleased  to  restore  that  region  to  its 
lawful  lord,  the  emperor. 

Thus  reduced  in  numbers  and  crippled  in  resources, 
menaced  by  the  imperial  troops  in  the  interior,  and  harassed 
by  Catalan  and  Turkish  corsairs  on  the  coast,  the  leading 
men  of  the  principality  decided  between  the  painful 
alternatives  of  offering  their  country  to  Venice,  or  to  the 
Catalans  of  Attica,  the  former  for  preference,  so  that  at  least 
they  might  find  a  protection  which  their  absentee  prince 
could  not  give  them.  They  communicated  their  decision  to 
the  Venetian  government,  which  was  too  cautious,  however, 
to  accept  their  offer,  and  continued  to  content  itself  with  the 
two  colonies  in  Messenia.  At  last,  however,  in  1324,  John  of 
Gravina  set  out  for  the  Morea,  and  after  stopping  at 
Cephalonia  and  Zante,  restoring  his  authority  as  suzerain 
over  those  rebellious  islands,  and  deposing  the  Orsini 
dynasty,  received  the  homage  of  the  Achaian  barons  in  the 
customary  manner  at  Glarentza.  But  his  sojourn  in  his 
principality  was  short  and  useless.  An  attempt,  which  he 
and  his  vassal,  Duke  Nicholas  I.  of  Naxos,  made  to  recover 
Karytaina  failed,  and  the  Greeks  continued  to  make  progress, 
in  spite  of  a  defeat  inflicted  on  them  by  the  duke  in  the 
plain  of  Elis  below  the  castle  of  St  Omer.  The  only  lasting 
result  of  his  expedition  was  the  establishment  in  Greece  of 
the  great  Florentine  banking  family  of  the  Acciajuoli,  which 
was  destined  to  wear  the  ducal  coronet  of  Athens.  From 
them  John  of  Gravina  had  borrowed  considerable  funds  for 
his  expenses  in  the  Morea,  and  from  him  they  received  in 
return  the  fiefs  of  La  Mandria  and  La  Lichina,  which  we 
may  identify  with  Lechaina,  near  Andravida.  Numerous 
Neapolitans,  who  had  followed  him,  also  expected  to  be 
rewarded  with  lands  which  had  fallen  vacant  owing  to  the 
almost  complete  disappearance  of  the  old  Frankish  nobility, 
and  thus  there  arose  a  new  race  of  barons,  who  were 
ignorant  of  the  language  and  customs  of  the  people,  while 
they  lacked  also  the  energy  and  courage  of  the  original 
conquerors.1     It  is  significant  of  this   new  order  of  things, 

1  L.  d  C.y  lxxviii.,  476-7  ;  L.  d.  F.,  1407  ;  Millet  in  op.  cif.,  xix.,  269 ; 
xxiii.,  1 1 3- 1 8,  122  ;  Boeckh,  Corp.  Jnscrip.,  8762-4  ;  Raynaldus,  v.,  200-1  ; 
Predelli,  Commemoriali,  i.,  231  ;  M Manges  historiques,  iii.,  54-7  ;  Canta- 


JOHN  OP  GRAVINA  261 

that  one  of  the  bailies  of  this  period,  Nicholas  de  Joinville, 
a  noble  and  upright  man,  who  did  his  best  for  the  land 
entrusted  to  his  charge,  thought  it  necessary  to  add  eight 
fresh  articles,  regulating  the  pay  of  soldiers,  questions  of 
succession,  and  the  system  of  legal  procedure,  to  the  Book 
of  the  Customs  of  the  Empire  of  Romania} 

John  of  Gravina  soon  grew  tired  of  his  Greek 
principality.  In  1326  we  find  him  in  Florence,  four  years 
later  he  was  senator  of  Rome,  while  a  distinguished  Roman, 
Guglielmo  Frangipani,  for  many  years  Archbishop  of  Patras, 
acted  as  his  bailie  in  Achaia — a  post  never  before  entrusted 
to  a  churchman,  and  a  sure  sign  of  the  increasing  power  of 
the  Achaian  primates.  Occupied  exclusively  with  furthering 
Angevin  interests  in  Italy,  John  never  set  foot  in  Greece 
again,  and  in  1333  severed  all  connection  with  it.  Two 
years  earlier,  his  brother  and  suzerain,  Philip  of  Taranto,  had 
died,  and  he  refused  to  do  homage  to  his  nephew  Robert. 
Thanks,  however,  to  the  mediation  of  Niccold  Acciajuoli, 
the  representative  of  the  great  Florentine  Bank  at  Naples, 
and  chamberlain,  some  say  lover,  of  the  widowed  Empress 
Catherine  of  Valois,  the  dispute  between  the  uncle  and  the 
nephew  was  arranged.  John  of  Gravina  transferred  to  the 
empress,  for  her  son  Robert,  the  principality  of  Achaia,  with 
its  dependencies,  in  exchange  for  the  Angevin  possessions  in 
Epiros,  the  kingdom  of  Albania,  and  the  duchy  of  Durazzo, 
as  well  as  the  sum  of  5000  ounces  (£12,500)  in  cash, 
advanced  by  the  serviceable  Acciajuoli.  Thus,  once  again, 
the  suzerainty  and  the  actual  possession  of  Achaia  were 
concentrated  in  the  same  hands,  those  of  the  claimant  to  the 
long  defunct  Latin  Empire.2 

Meanwhile,  young   Walter  of  Brienne,  heir  of  the  last 

cuzene,  i.,  85  ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregoras,  i.,  362 ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles 
Recherches,  II.,  i.,  33.  That  the  Orsini  dynasty  was  deposed  in  the  Ionian 
islands  by  John  of  Gravina  in  1324  is  expressly  stated  by  both  Villani 
and  the  Aragonese  Chronicle,  and  an  Angevin  bailie  figures  there  in 
1337  and  1356. 

1  Canciani,  op.  cit^  iii.,  530 ;  Itinerarium  Symonis  Simeonis,  15. 

2  Ducange,  op.  cit.,\Ly  214-15,  376 ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles Recherchts,  I., 
i.,  54 ;  Riccio,  Studii  storiei,  17,  28.  The  tombs  of  the  two  princes  of 
Achaia — Philip  of  Taranto  and  his  brother  John  of  Gravina — may  still  be 
seen  in  the  church  of  S.  Domenico  at  Naples. 


262  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

Duke  of  Athens,  had  grown  up  to  manhood,  and  thought 
that  the  time  had  come  to  attempt  the  recovery  of  his 
heritage  from  the  Catalans.  As  a  French  noble,  as  Count  of 
Lecce,  and  as  son-in-law  of  Philip  of  Taranto,  the  titular 
emperor  of  Constantinople,  he  had  every  reason  to  expect 
the  warm  support  of  the  house  of  Anjou  in  its  interest,  as 
well  as  his  own.  Philip  saw  that  Walter's  plans  might  be 
made  to  coincide  with  his  own  schemes  for  the  reconquest  of 
the  Latin  Empire,  which  he  had  never  abandoned,  and 
conferred  upon  him  the  title  of  his  Vicar-General  in  Romania. 
Pope  John  XXI L,  like  his  predecessor,  Clement  V.,  was  an 
ardent  worker  in  his  cause,  writing  to  Venice  on  his  behalf 
and  bidding  the  Archbishop  of  Patras  and  Corinth  preach  a 
crusade  against  the  "  schismatics,  sons  of  perdition,  and  pupils 
of  iniquity,"  who  had  occupied  the  ancient  patrimony  of  the 
lawful  Duke  of  Athens  and  afflicted  with  heavy  oppression 
the  ecclesiastics  and  faithful  inhabitants  of  Attica.  But  the 
Venetians,  who  could  have  contributed  more  to  the  success  of 
the  expedition  than  all  the  ecclesiastical  thunders  of  Rome, 
just  at  this  moment  renewed  their  truce  with  the  Catalans  at 
Thebes.     From  that  instant  the  attempt  was  bound  to  fail. 

Walter  was,  like  his  father,  a  rash  general,  though  he  had 
already  won  the  reputation  of  a  wise  administrator  during 
a  brief  term  of  office  as  Angevin  vicar  at  Florence.  When 
he  started  for  Epiros  in  1331,  a  brilliant  company  of  800 
French  knights,  500  picked  Tuscan  men-at-arms,  and  a  body 
of  soldiers  from  his  domain  at  Lecce  accompanied  him.  At 
first  success  smiled  upon  his  plans.  He  captured  the  island 
of  Santa  Mavra,  which  had  belonged  to  the  counts  of 
Cephalonia  since  about  the  year  1300,  and  which  had 
consequently  formed  part  of  the  Despotat  of  Epiros  since 
their  usurpation  of  that  state.  On  the  mainland,  the  fortress 
of  Vonitza,  one  portion  of  the  quadrilateral  which  the 
unhappy  Thamar  had  brought  as  her  dowry  to  Philip  of 
Taranto,  but  which  had  relapsed  from  the  Angevin  rule,  and 
the  city  of  Arta,  fell  into  his  hands.  But  when  he  proceeded 
to  attack  the  Catalans,  he  found  that  he  had  to  deal  with 
cautious  strategists,  who  never  gave  his  fine  cavalry  a  chance 
of  displaying  its  mettle  in  a  pitched  battle.  Their  plan  of 
campaign  was   to   remain   in   their   fortresses,   allowing   his 


DESTRUCTION  OF  ST  OMER  263 

impetuous   followers   to  expend  their  energies  on  the  open 
country.     His  father  and  mother  had  incurred  heavy  debts 
on  behalf  of  their  Greek  dominions,  and  Walter  had  sold  his 
property  and  pawned  his  wife's  dowry  to  raise  funds  for  the 
recovery  of  his  duchy ;  but  he  had  not  calculated  the  cost  of  a 
protracted  expedition,  so  that,  ere  long,  he  found  it  impossible 
to  support  the  expense  of  so  large  a  body  of  men,  especially 
as  the  French  contingent  expected  high  pay  and  generous 
rations.     A  smaller  force,  particularly  if  aided  by  the  Greeks, 
would  have  had   more  chance  of  success;    but   the  native 
Athenians  and  Boeotians  showed  as  little  desire  to  fight  for 
their  lawful  duke  as  they  had  shown  to  avenge  his  father's 
death.       A    correspondent  of   the  contemporary  historian, 
Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  wrote,  indeed,  that  they  were  "  suffering 
extreme    slavery,"    and     had    "exchanged     their    ancient 
happiness  for  boorish  ways."    But    either   their  sufferings 
were  not  sufficient  to  make  them  desire  a  change  of  masters, 
or  their  boorishness  was  such  that  they  did  not  appreciate 
the  advantages  of  French  culture ;  in  any  case,  they  looked 
on   impassively,  while  Walter's  hopes  daily  dwindled  away. 
Early   in  1332,  he   retired  to  the   Morea,  whence,  after  a 
futile  attempt  to  coerce  the  Catalans  by  the  comminations 
of  the  great  Archbishop  Frangipani  of  Patras,  he  took  ship 
for  Italy  never  to  return.1     One  irreparable  loss,  indeed,  was 
inflicted  upon  Greece  in  consequence  of  his  expedition.     In 
order  to  prevent  the  castle  of  St   Omer  at   Thebes  from 
falling  into  his  hands,  and  thus  becoming  a  valuable  base  for 
the  recovery  of  the  duchy,  the  Catalans  destroyed  that  noble 
monument    of   Frankish    rule.      Three    years    after    their 
conquest    of   Athens,    they    had    bestowed     this    splendid 
residence,  together  with  the  phantom  kingdom  of  Salonika, 
upon   Guy  de  la  Tour,  a  noble   French  adventurer  from 
Dauphin^,  who  had  placed  his  sword  at  their  disposal.     More 
recently,   Fadrique  had   granted   the  castle  to   Bartolomeo 
II.  Ghisi,  one  of  the  chief  magnates  of  Greece,  who  was  at 
once  triarch  of  Eubcea,  great  constable  of  Achaia,  and  lord 
of  the  islands  of  Tenos  and  Mykonos,  and  whose  son   had 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  30-3  ;  Raynaldus,  v.,  495,  517  5 
Villani  apud  Muratori,  xiii.,  717;  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  i.,  p.  xciv. ; 
Ldmpros,  "Eyypa^a,  55. 


264  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

married  the  daughter  of  the  Catalan  captain.  Ghisi  seems 
to  have  been  a  man  of  some  literary  and  historic  tastes, 
for  the  original  of  which  the  French  version  of  the  Chronicle 
of  the  Morea  is  an  abridgment  was  found  in  his  Theban  castle. 
The  abridgment  has  fortunately  been  preserved;  but  the 
castle  with  its  historic  frescoes  and  its  memories  of  gorgeous 
ceremonies,  when  the  song  of  the  minstrel  resounded  through 
its  vast  halls  and  all  the  chivalry  of  Frankish  Greece  was 
gathered  there,  has  perished,  all  save  one  short  square  tower, 
which  still  bears  the  once  great  name  of  St  Omer.1 

The  only  other  results  of  Walter's  expedition  were  the 
recognition  of  the  shadowy  Angevin  suzerainty  over  Epiros 
by  the  despot  John  II.,  who,  however,  retained  the  substance 
of  power,  and  struck  coins  at  Arta  bearing  his  name ;  and 
the  retention  of  Vonitza  and  the  island  of  Sta.  Mavra  by  the 
titular  duke  of  Athens.  Later  on,  in  1355,  the  latter  con- 
ferred Vonitza,  "  our  castle  of  Sta.  Mavra  and  our  island  of 
Lucate  "  upon  Graziano  Zorzi,  an  old  comrade-in-arms,  and  a 
member  of  the  great  Venetian  family  which  we  have  already 
seen  established  in  the  marquisate  of  Boudonitza.2  Walter 
himself  still  occasionally  dreamed  of  his  restoration  to 
Athens,  but  soon  found  a  sphere  for  his  activity  in  Italy. 
Summoned  by  the  Florentines  to  command  their  forces,  he 
became  tyrant  of  their  city,  whence  he  was  expelled  amidst 
universal  rejoicings  in  1 343,  and  where  the  traveller  may  now 
see  his  arms  restored  by  the  modern  Italian  authorities  in 
the  audience  chamber  of  the  Bargello.  Thence  he  returned 
to  his  county  of  Lecce,  and  fell,  thirteen  years  later,  fighting 
as  constable  of  France  against  the  English  at  the  battle  of 
Poitiers.  Before  he  left  Lecce,  he  made  his  will,  in  which  he 
mentioned  all  his  possessions  in  Greece — his  city  of  Argos, 
with  its  noble  castle,  the  Larissa ;  the  castles  of  Nauplia, 
Kiveri  and  Thermisi,  Vonitza,  and  Sta.  Mavra,  with  their 
constables  and  men-at-arms.  Something  was  left  to  the 
religious  orders  of  Patras  and  Glarentza,  and  to  the  churches 

1  X.  r.  M.f  11.  8086-92 ;  L.  d  C,  1,  274  ;  Histoire  de  Dauphin/,  II., 
151  ;  Bibliotkique  de  tlicole  des  Chartes,  xxxiii.,  183  ;  Melanges  his- 
torique$%  III.,  27. 

2  Lunzi,  Delia  Condizione  politic^  121  ;  Lampros,  "E77pa0a,  67  \ 
Romanos,  op.  cit.y  302. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  FADRIQUE  265 

and  chapels  of  Nauplia  and  Argos,  while  part  of  the  customs 
dues  of  this  last  city  was  set  aside  to  endow  a  perpetual 
chaplaincy,  whose  holder  was  to  say  a  daily  mass  for  the 
soul  of  the  pious  founder.  As  Walter  left  no  children,  his 
sister  Isabelle,  wife  of  Gautier  d'Enghien,  succeeded  to  his 
estates  and  claims,  and  of  her  sons,  one  styled  himself  Duke 
of  Athens,  and  another  was  lord  of  Argos  and  Nauplia. 
More  fortunate  in  one  respect  than  his  predecessors  who  had 
reigned  in  Greece,  Walter  has  left  us  a  portrait  of  himself. 
Every  visitor  to  the  lower  church  of  St  Francis  at  Assisi — a 
church  traditionally  associated  with  the  family  of  Brienne, 
who  were  terciers  of  the  Order — has  seen  in  the  foreground 
of  Lorenzetti's  "Crucifixion"  the  knightly  figure  of  the 
titular  duke  of  Athens.1 

Thus,  during  the  twenty  years  which  followed  its  conquest 
of  Athens,  the  Catalan  Company  had  strengthened  its  position 
and  extended  its  possessions.  To  Attica  and  Bceotia  it  had 
annexed  the  duchy  of  Neopatras,  including  part  of  Thessaly, 
while  Catalan  lords  held  the  castles  of  Salona  and  Karystos, 
and  the  island  of  iEgina.  It  had  made  terms  with  Venice, 
and  so  could  afford  to  despise  the  schemes  of  the  dethroned 
dynasty  of  Brienne  and  the  ecclesiastical  weapons  of  the 
papacy.  In  the  bastard  son  of  Frederick  II.  of  Sicily  it  had 
found  a  leader,  resolute  in  action,  and  skilful  in  taking 
advantage  of  his  opportunities.  All  the  more  remarkable 
is  the  sudden  and  premature  retirement  of  this  successful 
chief  from  the  leadership  of  the  Company.  At  the  time  of 
Walter  of  Brienne's  invasion,  he  was  no  longer  vicar-general 
— a  post  occupied  by  Nicholas  Lancia — and  in  the  treaty  of 
Thebes  between  the  Company  and  Venice,  he  figures  as 
merely  "Count  of  Malta  and  Gozzo."  Probably,  had  he 
been  at  the  head  of  affairs  at  that  moment,  he  would  have 
saved  his  kinsman's  castle  of  St  Omer  from  destruction.  We 
are  not  told  the  reason  of  his  retirement ;  but,  from  the  fact  that 
he  paid  a  visit  to  Sicily  in  the  following  year,  we  may  perhaps 
infer  that  his  too  successful  career  in  Greece  had  gained  him 

1  D'Arbois  de  Jubainville,  Voyage  pattographique,  341-2 ;  Arch. 
Stor.  Iial.y  Ser.  III.,  xvi.,  48;  Galateus,  De  Situ  lapygia^  92  ;  Hopf, 
Chroniques,  xxix.-xxx.,  who  rightly  identifies  "Chamires"  with  Kiveri 
opposite  Nauplia  and  "Le  Tremis"  with  Thermisi. 


fc 


266  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

enemies  at  the  Sicilian  court,  who  may  have  accused  him  of 
aiming  at  independent  sovereignty,  and  whose  charges  he 
may  have  thought  it  desirable  to  answer  in  person.  Though 
he  did  not  resume  the  leadership  of  the  Company,  he  passed 
the  rest  of  his  life  in  Greece,  where  we  hear  of  him  among 
the  principal  Catalans  in  1335,  and  where  he  died  in  1338, 
leaving  a  numerous  progeny.  His  eldest  son,  Don  Pedro,  was 
already  lord  of  Loidoriki  and  Count  of  Salona,  which  had 
come  into  the  hands  of  his  father,  presumably  on  the  death 
of  Roger  Deslaur  without  heirs.  His  second  son,  Don 
Jaime,  succeeded  his  elder  brother  in  his  estates,  held  for  a 
time  the  island  of  iEgina,  and  became,  later  on,  vicar- 
general  of  the  Company  ;  yet  another  son,  Bonifacio,  inherited 
Karystos  and  Lamia,  and  received  from  Don  Jaime,  with 
certain  reservations,  the  island  of  iEgina,  thereby  reuniting  the 
old  possessions  of  his  namesake  and  grandfather,  Bonifacio  da 
Verona.  One  interesting  part  of  them,  however,  the  sister- 
island  of  Salamis,  seems  to  have  been  subdued  by  the  Greeks, 
for  we  hear  of  it  as  paying  taxes  to  the  Byzantine  governor  of 
Monemvasia.1  Thus,  the  fortunes  of  the  family  continued  to 
be  interwoven  with  those  of  the  Catalan  duchy  till  its  falL 

All  over  Greece,  these  twenty  years  had  wrought  great 
changes.  Alike  in  Thessaly  and  Epiros,  the  Greek  dynasty 
of  the  Angeli  had  come  to  an  end;  and,  while  Byzantine 
officials,  local  magnates,  Albanian  colonists,  and  the  Catalan 
Company  had  divided  the  former  country  between  them,  the 
latter  was  occupied  by  the  palatine  counts  of  Cephalonia, 
who  had  now  been  driven  by  the  Angevins  from  their 
islands.  The  Angevins  were,  therefore,  now  both  possessors 
and  suzerains  of  most  of  the  Ionian  islands  and  of  the 
principality  of  Achaia,  much  reduced,  however,  by  the 
encroachments  of  the  Greek  governors,  and  still  held  the 
strong  fortress  of  Lepanto,  on  the  opposite  shore  of  the 
Corinthian  Gulf.  The  island  of  Sta.  Mavra,  the  castle  of 
Vonitza,  on  the  Gulf  of  Arta,  and  the  towns  of  Nauplia  and 
Argos,  owned  the  sway  of  Walter  of  Brienne,  who  appointed 

1  Thomas,  Diplomatarium,  i.,  127,  214 ;  Bozzo,  Notizie  Storicke 
Siciliane  del  Secolo  XIV.,  607;  Ducange,  op.  cit%  II.,  204;  Rosario 
Gregorio,  II.,  582-3  ;  Rubi6  y  LIuch,  Los  Navarros^77  ;  Hopf,  Karystos, 
588. 


TRADE  OF  ACHAIA  267 

a  "bailie  and  captain-general,"  assisted  by  a  council. 
Venice,  by  her  usual  statecraft,  had  increased  her  hold  upon 
Eubcea,  had  gained  a  footing  at  Pteleon  in  Thessaly,  and 
had  preserved  her  original  colonies  of  Modon  and  Coron, 
in  spite  of  inroads  by  the  Greeks  of  Mistr&,  and  troubles 
with  those  haughty  neighbours,  the  Teutonic  Knights  of 
Mostenitsa.  The  republic  felt  strong  enough,  however,  to 
allow  a  Greek  bishop  to  reside  there,  although  those  patriotic 
and  intriguing  ecclesiastics  were  apt  to  foster  the  national 
instincts  of  their  fellow-countrymen.1  The  lot  of  the  latter 
was  at  this  time  lighter  in  the  Frankish  principality  than 
under  the  Venetian  flag ;  for,  in  spite  of  the  strict  orders 
issued  to  the  colonial  governors  to  treat  the  Greeks  well,  they 
emigrated  in  large  numbers  to  Achaia,  where  taxation 
was  less  oppressive.  Piracy  was  still,  however,  the  great 
curse  of  the  dwellers  on  the  coasts  of  the  Morea  and  in  the 
Greek  islands.  On  one  raid  the  corsairs  carried  off,  and  sold 
as  slaves,  no  less  than  500  persons  from  the  island  of  Culuris, 
or  Salamis,  while  the  Turks  were  an  annual,  and  a  growing 
menace.  Yet  these  depredations  had  not  yet  destroyed  the 
Greek  forests.  Those  who  know  how  bare  most  of  Greece  is 
to-day,  will  learn  with  surprise  that  Sanudo 2  thought  that 
the  timber  required  for  his  cherished  crusade  against  the 
infidels  could  be  obtained  from  Attica,  the  Morea,  and  the 
island  of  Euboea. 

Nor  was  trade  lacking.  Monemvasia,  whence  our  ancestors 
got  their  Malmsey  wine,  under  Byzantine  rule,  continued  to 
be  a  flourishing  port,  whose  merchants  enjoyed  special 
privileges  and  exemptions,  confirmed  by  Andr6nikos  II. 
and  1 1 1.,  and  including  protection  at  all  the  fairs  and  festivals 
of  the  peninsula.  Glarentza,  the  seat  of  a  Venetian  consul, 
and  Patras,  that  of  a  Venetian podestd*  under  the  enlightened 
administration  of  its  great  archbishop,  Guglielmo  Frangipani, 
were  the  chief  commercial  centres  of  the  Frankish  principality. 
The  former  was  a  very  important  mart  for  silk,  raisins,  and 

1  Archivio  Venetoy  xix.,  1 15-16;  Thomas,  op,  cit.y  i.,  105-7. 

2  Secreta  Fidclium  Cruets,  68  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  ii.,  26. 

3  Phrantzgs,  400;  Gerland,  op.  M9  150;  Pegalotti,  Delia  Decima, 
III.,  51,  6o,  106-9,  '45»  202;  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  471,  476; 
Archivio  Veneto^  xiii.,  152. 


268  THE  CATALANS  AND  THEIR  NEIGHBOURS 

valonia,  which  had  commercial  relations  with  Apulia, 
Ancona,  Florence,  and  Venice,  as  well  as  with  Durazzo,  Acre, 
and  Alexandria ;  which,  like  Thebes,  Corinth,  and  Negro- 
ponte,  had  its  own  weights  and  measures,  and  still  possessed 
its  own  mint,  whose  masters  were  paid  salaries  of  300 
hyperperi  a  year.  But  it  had  been  already  remarked  at 
Venice,  that  the  Achaian  currency  had  depreciated  by  nearly 
a  third  since  the  days  of  Prince  William,  so  that  the 
Venetians  had  talked  of  establishing  a  mint  at  Coron  and 
Modon.  They  never,  however,  carried  out  that  project,  and 
the  mint  at  Glarentza  continued  to  produce  coins  till  about 
the  year  1364,  after  which  we  have  no  more  Achaian 
currency.  In  its  place,  the  Venetians  began  to  issue  from 
the  mint  at  Venice,  about  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth 
century,  the  so-called  tornesi  piccioli  or  torneselli,  which 
henceforth  served  as  the  currency  of  their  Greek  colonies, 
and  which  were  modelled  on  the  old  tornesi  of  the  Achaian 
mint.  In  fact,  classic  Hellas  was  at  this  period  a  place  where 
money  was  to  be  made,  an  undeveloped  territory  to  be 
exploited  by  shrewd  men  of  affairs.  In  that  golden  age 
of  Italian  banking,  such  men  were  not  lacking.  Now,  for 
the  first  time,  a  new  influence,  that  of  high  finance,  had  made 
its  appearance  in  Frankish  Greece  in  the  person  of  Niccolo 
Acciajuoli,  whose  house  was  destined  in  another  half  century 
to  put  an  end  to  Catalan  rule  in  Athens  and  assume  the 
ducal  coronet  on  the  Akropolis. 


CHAPTER   IX 

THE   RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI  ( 1333- 1 373) 

The  arrangement  between  John  of  Gravina  and  the  titular 
empress,  Catherine  of  Valois,  had  had  the  advantage  of 
uniting  all  the  Angevin  dominions  in  Greece — the  principality 
of  Achaia,  the  county  of  Cephalonia,  the  castle  of  Lepanto, 
and  the  island  of  Corfii — in  a  single  hand,  and  henceforth  the 
jurisdiction  of  the  Angevin  bailie  and  the  other  chief 
functionaries  of  the  Morea  extended  to  the  adjacent  island  of 
Cephalonia  and  to  the  "  royal  fortress  "  on  the  opposite  coast 
of  the  Corinthian  Gulf.  Fortunately,  too,  although  Robert, 
the  young  Prince  of  Achaia,  for  whom  the  empress  had 
purchased  the  principality,  was  still  a  minor,  his  mother,  who 
exercised  supreme  authority  in  his  name,  and  even  occasion- 
ally used  the  style  of  Princess,1  was  endowed  with  very 
masculine  qualities,  which  she  soon  began  to  display  in  the 
management  of  this  substantial  fragment  of  her  shadowy 
empire.  A  strong  ruler  was,  indeed,  much  needed  in  the 
Morea,  where  the  lax  control  of  the  late  prince  and  the 
confusion  of  the  last  twenty  years  had  increased  the  spirit  of 
independence  among  the  great  barons,  never  at  any  time 
very  tolerant  of  dictation. 

Among  these  feudal  lords,  the  most  important  were  the 
Archbishop  of  Patras  and  the  Genoese  family  of  Zaccaria, 
whom  we  have  already  seen  ruling  the  island  of  Chios,  and 
who  had  lately  acquired  a  footing  in  the  Morea,  to  which 
they  were  destined,  later  on,  to  give  its  last  Frankish  prince. 
Both  of  these  great  personages  considered  themselves 
practically  independent.  Martino  Zaccaria  had  succeeded 
1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches^  I.,  i.,  62  ;  II.,  i.,  103,  108* 

2W 


270  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

the  extinct  family  of  De  la  Roche  as  baron  of  Damal&  in 
Argolis,  where  he  actually  dared  to  issue  coins  of  his  own. 
He  had  succeeded,  too,  the  house  of  Tr6mouille  at 
Chalandritza,  and  though  the  Greek  Emperor  had  lately 
captured  both  him  and  his  rich  island,  his  son  Centurione 
was  in  possession  of  both  his  Peloponnesian  baronies.  The 
Empress  Catherine  was  specially  warned  of  the  designs  which 
this  crafty  Levantine  nourished  against  her  authority  by 
Niccold  di  Bojano,  a  Neapolitan  treasury  official  who  drew  up 
a  report  upon  the  state  of  her  son's  principality.  Centurione, 
he  told  her,  must  be  put  in  his  proper  place,  or  else  neither 
she  nor  her  son  would  ever  obtain  theirs  in  the  Morea.1 
Patras,  too,  under  its  great  archbishop,  Guglielmo  Frangipani, 
was  practically  autonomous,  and  Bertrand  de  Baux,  the 
bailie  whom  the  empress  sent  to  govern  Achaia,  took  the 
opportunity  of  his  death  to  occupy  the  town  and  to  besiege  the 
castle.  Pope  Benedict  XII.2  entered  a  vigorous  protest 
against  this  proceeding,  claiming  that  Patras  was  under  the 
direct  jurisdiction  of  the  archbishop,  as  the  representative  of 
the  Holy  See  to  which  it  belonged.  He  therefore  ordered  the 
bishops  of  Olena  and  Coron  to  lay  the  peninsula  under  an 
interdict.  These  difficulties  convinced  the  empress  that  her 
presence  was  needed  in  the  Morea;  so,  in  1338,  she  set  out 
for  Patras,  accompanied  by  her  trusted  adviser,  Niccol6 
Acciajuoli. 

We  have  already  had  occasion  to  mention  this  remarkable 
man,  whose  house  was  destined,  in  characteristically  modern 
fashion,  to  supplant  the  noble  chivalry  of  Frankish  Greece. 
The  history  of  the  Acciajuoli  bears  a  striking  resemblance  to 
that  of  the  great  financiers  of  our  own  time.  After  they  had 
become  famous,  courtly  biographers  provided  them  with  a 
pedigree  stretching  back  as  far  as  the  sixth  century,  accord- 

1  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  326;  Ducange,  ii.,  265.  This  un- 
dated report  refers  to  Catherine,  not,  as  Ducange  imagined,  to  Marie  de 
Bourbon,  because  Bojano  was  dead  in  1342.  (Buchon,  NouvelUs 
Recherches,  II.,  i.,  in).  The  allusions  to  "the  Count  of  Cephalonia" 
and  his  war  with  "  the  Despot,"  which  Hopf  found  it  hard  to  explain,  are 
easily  explicable.  The  "  Count n  is  John  II.  of  Epiros,  the  "  Despot"  is 
Stephen  Gabriel6poulos,  a  Thessalian  magnate,  to  whom  Cantacuzene 
(*•»  473)  expressly  applies  that  title  ;  the  date  must  be  1333. 

2  Lettres  Communes,  i.,  479  ;  Raynaldus,  vi.,  115-16. 


CAREER  OF  NICCOLO  271 

ing  to  which  the  founder  of  the  family  was  Angelo,  brother 
of  the  Emperor  Justin  II.,  and  one  of  its  members  was 
created  a  baron  of  the  holy  Roman  Empire  by  Frederick 
Barbarossa.1  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Acciajuoli  owed  their 
origin  to  an  enterprising  citizen  of  Brescia,  the  Sheffield  of 
Italy,  who  moved  to  Florence  about  1 160  and  there  established 
a  steel-manufactory,  which  gave  them  their  name.  The 
"  steel-workers  "  made  money,  lent  it  out  at  interest,  and  in 
due  course  became  bankers,  who  played  their  part  in  the 
municipal  life  of  their  adopted  city.  They  were  also 
politicians  of  a  practical  sort,  whose  devotion  to  the  Guelph 
cause  brought  them  into  relation  with  the  Neapolitan 
Angevins,  when  the  Florentines  solicited  the  protection  of 
King  Robert  of  Naples  against  their  Ghibelline  enemies. 
That  sagacious  monarch  rewarded  one  of  the  firm  for  his  skill 
in  transacting  the  royal  business  with  the  dignity  of  chamber- 
lain and  privy  councillor,  and  the  latter  naturally  thought 
that  in  the  management  of  the  Naples  branch  his  son  would 
find  an  excellent  opening.  In  1331,  when  barely  of  age, 
young  Niccol6  Acciajuoli  arrived  there  accompanied  by  a 
single  servant  But  his  skill  in  business,  combined  with  an 
agreeable  presence  and  chivalrous  manners,  won  him  the 
favour,  perhaps  the  affection,  of  the  titular  empress,  Catherine 
of  Valois,  who  was  left  a  widow  in  that  year  with  three  sons 
to  bring  up.  He  assisted  her  with  their  education,  and  it  was 
he  who  arranged,  as  we  saw,  the  exchange  of  the  duchy  of 
Durazzo  for  the  principality  of  Achaia.  The  bank,  of  which 
he  was  the  representative,  was  already  interested  in  Greece, 
which  the  Italian  financiers  of  that  age  regarded  much  as 
their  modern  representatives  in  London  regard  the  colonies. 
Having  succeeded  in  making  his  pupil  Robert  Prince  of 
Achaia,  the  astute  Niccol6  resolved  to  acquire  lands  in  the 
principality  on  his  own  account.  He  accordingly  persuaded 
the  bank  to  transfer  to  him  the  two  estates,  which  it  had 
received  from  John  of  Gravina,  rounded  them  off  by  purchas- 
ing adjacent  land,  and  further  increased  his  holding  by  other 
properties  at  Andravida,  Prinitza,  Kalamata,  and  in  the  island 
of  Cephalonia,  which  the  empress  bestowed  upon  him  as  the 
reward  of  his  services.  He  thus  became  a  vassal  of  the 
1  Fanelli,  Atene  Attica,  290. 


i 


272  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

principality,  taking  care,  however,  to  obtain  from  his 
patroness  the  reduction  of  the  feudal  burdens  attaching  to 
his  lands  and  the  permission  to  dispose  of  them  to  any 
person  capable  of  rendering  the  requisite  military  service. 
Before  his  departure  for  Greece,  he  provided  that,  in  the 
event  of  his  death,  the  revenues  of  these  estates  should  be 
devoted  to  building  that  splendid  Certosa  near  Florence, 
which  is  still  his  chief  monument1 

The  empress  and  her  astute  adviser  must  soon  have  seen 
for  themselves  the  dangers  to  which  Achaia  was  exposed. 
The  Catalans  of  Attica  were  awkward  neighbours,  who 
required  all  the  vigilance  of  the  Knights  of  the  Teutonic  order ; 
the  Greeks  had  encroached  on  the  principality  from  without, 
while  within  they  now  held  many  important  offices  ;  worst  of 
all,  the  Turks,  who  had  made  enormous  progress  in  Asia, 
now  ravaged  the  Greek  coast-line.  The  soundest  and  best 
managed  portion  of  the  principality  was  Patras,  and  the 
empress,  who  resided  there,  accordingly  came  to  the  con- 
clusion that  her  wisest  course,  especially  as  she  needed  papal 
aid  against  the  Turks,  was  to  disavow  her  too  officious  bailie, 
and  recognise  the  authority  of  the  Holy  See  over  that 
temporal  barony.  Henceforth,  the  archbishop  could  truly 
say  that  he  held  the  town  direct  from  the  pope.2 

Catherine  remained  two  years  in  Greece,  during  which 
time  Acciajuoli  spared  neither  his  purse  nor  his  personal 
comfort  in  the  cause  of  the  principality.  At  his  own  expense 
he  built  a  fort  to  defend  the  once  fair  vale  of  Kalamata,  the 
garden  of  Greece,  which  was  then  lying  a  desolate  waste,  and 
his  services  were  further  rewarded  by  the  gift  of  that  barony, 
the  fortress  of  Piada,  near  Epidauros,  and  other  lands.  Thus, 
as  a  large  Peloponnesian  landowner  and  the  representative 
of  his  firm  at  the  Glarentza  branch,  which  then  ranked  in 
their  books  as  of  equal  importance  with  their  London  office, 
the  Florentine  banker  had  a  stake  in  the  country  which  gave 
him  a  direct  interest  in  its  preservation,  and  induced  him,  even 
after  the  departure  of  his  mistress,  to  act  for  a  time  as  her 
bailie  in  Greece.     He  calculated,  indeed,  that,  from  first  to 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherchesy  II.,  i.,  31 -114,  117;  G.  Villani,  M. 
Villani,  and  Palmerius,  Devitd  et  gestis  N.  Acciajoti,  afiud  Muratori,  xiii., 
958,  1205-6  ;  xiv.,  166-7.  *  Gerland,  op.  cit.,  159. 


BYZANTINE  RECONQUEST  OF  EPIROS        273 

last,  his  bank  had  sunk  40,000  ounces  0696,000)  in  the  Morea. 
When  he  returned  to  Italy  in  1341,  Boccaccio,  afterwards  his 
bitter  enemy,  addressed  him  an  enthusiastic  letter  of  welcome, 
in  which  he  compared  him  to  a  second  Ulysses.1 

During  her  stay  at  Patras,  the  empress  had  also 
endeavoured  to  restore  her  influence  in  the  Despotat  of 
Epiros,  where  Lepanto  alone  remained  of  the  former 
Angevin  possessions.  In  1335,  the  Italian  Despot,  John  II., 
had  met  with  the  reward  of  his  crimes  at  the  hand  of  his 
"wise  and  learned"  wife,  who  had  poisoned  him  from  fear 
of  suffering  a  similar  fate  herself.  She  then  assumed  the 
regency  for  her  youthful  son,  Nikeph6ros  II.,  with  the 
acquiescence  of  some,  at  least,  of  her  unruly  subjects.  But 
the  Emperor  Andr6nikos  III.  thought  that  the  moment  had 
now  come  for  reuniting  Epiros  with  the  Byzantine  Empire, 
especially  as  he  had  lately  been  forced  to  expel  the  Epirote 
garrisons  from  Kalabaka,  Trikkala,  and  other  places  in 
Thessaly,  which  they  had  occupied  on  the  death  of  Gabriel6- 
poulos,  the  local  magnate  who  had  ruled  there.  At  the  news 
of  his  approach,  the  regent  herself  advised  submission,  as 
resistance  seemed  hopeless,  so  that  Andr6nikos  was  able  to 
accomplish  without  bloodshed  what  his  predecessors  had  in 
vain  struggled  to  obtain.  No  Greek  emperor  had  visited 
Epiros  since  the  time  of  Manuel  I.,  nearly  two  centuries 
earlier;  but  the  tour  which  Andr6nikos  made  through  the 
cities  of  the  Despotat  was  not  so  much  due  to  curiosity  as 
to  the  desire  to  let  his  new  subjects  see  that  he  wished  to 
understand  their  requirements.  Judicious  grants  of  titles  and 
annuities  to  leading  men  were  intended  to  console  the 
Epirotes  for  the  loss  of  their  independence,  while  the 
regent  was  prudently  ordered  to  leave  the  country.  But 
the  love  of  freedom  had  become  ingrained  in  the  breasts 
of  others  of  the  natives  by  the  experience  of  more  than  a 
century ;  with  their  connivance  and  the  aid  of  his  Frankish 
tutor,  young  Nikeph6ros,  a  boy  with  ambitions  far  above  his 
years,  fled  across  to  the  Empress  Catherine  at  Patras,  and 
asked  her  to  restore  him  to  his  throne.  The  empress  saw 
that  he  might  be  made  the  tool  of  Angevin  interests  in 
Epiros,  and  ordered  one  of  her  Neapolitan  suite  to  conduct 
1  Buchon,  op.  cit.,  I.,  i.,  46  ;  II.,  i.,  114. 

S 


274  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

the  lad  back  to  his  faithful  subjects,  who  had  meanwhile 
expelled  the  Byzantine  viceroy  and  were  clamouring  for 
him.  Andr6nikos,  accompanied  by  the  future  emperor, 
John  Cantacuzene,  now  returned  to  Akarnania,  where  the 
latter's  diplomacy  was  more  successful  than  the  former's 
strategy.  The  most  obstinate  resistance  was  offered  by 
"Thomas's  Castle,"  whither  Nikeph6ros  had  fled,  a  strong 
fortress  on  the  Adriatic,  christened  after  the  last  Greek  Despot, 
which  could  be  easily  provisioned  from  the  sea.  But, 
although  the  Empress  Catherine  sent  a  small  fleet  and 
troops  from  the  Morea  to  assist  her  protfgt,  the  arguments 
of  Cantacuzene  at '  last  induced  the  garrison  to  surrender. 
He  told  them  that  the  Angevins,  in  spite  of  their  frequent 
efforts  to  conquer  their  country,  had  never  succeeded  in 
holding  more  than  a  few  isolated  positions,  like  Lepanto, 
Vonitza,  and  Butrinto,  and  those  only  with  the  consent  of 
the  Despot.  Allies  so  weak,  he  said,  would  be  of  no  avail 
against  the  imperial  forces ;  while,  even  if  they  were,  they 
would  conquer  Epiros  for  themselves  and  not  for  the  Epirotes, 
in  which  case  the  natives  would  be  the  slaves  of  the  Latins. 
"If  you  surrender,"  he  concluded,  "  I  will  give  my  own 
daughter  to  Nikeph6ros,  and  will  treat  him  as  a  son ;  my 
master  will  load  him  with  honours,  of  which  you  too  shall 
have  your  share."  At  this,  the  garrison  opened  the  gates ; 
the  whole  country  once  more  recognised  the  authority  of 
the  emperor,  and  Nikeph6ros,  scarcely  compensated  by  a 
high-sounding  Byzantine  title,  was  led  away  to  Salonika. 

The  specious  arguments  of  Cantacuzene  at  Thomokastron 
had  had  their  effect  upon  the  Moreot  troops,  whom  the 
empress  had  sent  to  aid  in  defending  that  castle.  When 
they  returned  home,  and  found  Catherine  and  her  skilful 
minister  gone,  and  the  Turks  ravaging  their  coasts  unchecked, 
they  reflected  that  in  the  Morea,  too,  the  Angevins  were 
powerless  to  aid.  Impressed  with  the  tact  of  Cantacuzene, 
whose  father  had  been  governor  of  MistrA,  and  who  had 
himself  been  offered  that  post  twenty  years  earlier,  they 
entered  into  negotiations  with  him  in  1341  for  the  cession 
of  the  principality  of  Achaia.  Their  envoys,  the  Bishop  of 
Coron,  and  a  half-caste,  near  Sider6s,  told  the  great  man  that 
he  had  won  their  hearts  by  his  conduct  in  Epiros,  and  begged 


THE  KING  OF  MAJORCA  275 

him  to  come  in  person  and  take  over  their  country.  All  they 
asked  was  to  keep  their  fiefs,  and  to  pay  the  same  taxes  to  the 
emperor  as  they  now  paid  to  their  prince;  on  these  terms 
they  were  ready  to  do  homage  and  receive  an  imperial 
viceroy.  Cantacuzene  was  naturally  flattered  by  this  request, 
not,  as  he  told  them,  the  first  of  the  kind ;  he  promised  to 
visit  the  Morea  in  the  following  spring,  sending  meanwhile 
a  confidential  agent  to  win  over  dissentients  and  to  show 
that  he  was  in  earnest.  But  the  grandiose  scheme  which  he 
had  formed  of  thus  reuniting  the  Byzantine  Empire  from 
Tainaron  to  Constantinople  was  never  accomplished.  The 
great  Servian  tsar,  Stephen  Dushan,  had  now  begun  his 
meteoric  career  of  conquest  at  the  expense  of  the  Greek 
Empire,  while  the  latter  was  soon  distracted  by  the 
intrigues  of  the  rival  emperors,  John  Cantacuzene  and  John 
PalaioWgos.1 

Besides  the  party  of  Cantacuzene,  there  was  still  a  section 
of  the  Franks  which  regarded  King  James  II.  of  Majorca, 
the  grandson  of  the  Lady  of  Akova,  as  the  lawful  Prince  of 
Achaia.  The  King  of  Majorca,  whom  we  last  saw  carried  in 
Muntaner's  arms  as  a  baby  of  a  few  weeks,  had  now  grown 
up  to  manhood,  and  accordingly  the  cause  for  which  his 
father,  Ferdinand  of  Majorca,  had  fallen  more  than  twenty 
years  before  was  revived,  though  the  old  Catalan  chronicler 
was  no  longer  there  to  fight  for  it  A  formal  memoir  was 
drawn  up  and  sent  to  him,  setting  forth  his  rights,  based 
upon  the  alleged  will  of  his  great-grandfather,  Guillaume  de 
Villehardouin,  to  the  effect  that  if  one  of  his  two  daughters 
died  childless,  the  principality  should  go  to  the  other  or  her 
heirs.  Even  so,  James  II.  would  have  had  no  claim,  for 
Isabelle  de  Villehardouin's  daughter  by  her  third  marriage, 
Marguerite  of  Savoy,  was  still  living  ;  but  the  barons  did  not 
consider  her  existence  as  an  obstacle  to  their  plans.  Their 
memorial  informed  the  King  of  Majorca  that  the  island  of 
Negroponte  with  its  two  great  barons,  Pietro  dalle  Carceri 
and  Bartolomeo  Ghisi,  who  then  held  all  the  three  divisions 
of    the   island   between   them ;   the   duchy   of  Naxos,  then 

1  Nikephoros  Gregorys,  i.,  536,  538-9,  544-6,  550-4,  ii.,  596 ;  Canta- 
cuzene, i.,  77,  85-6,  473,  495,  499-5<>4,  5<>9-34,  ii.,  74-7,  80,  82,  83  ;  Mik- 
losich  und  M tiller,  i.,  172-4  ;  Arch,  Stor.  per  le  Prov.  Napol.,  viii.,  225. 


276  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOU 

governed  by  Nicholas  Sanudo ;  and  the  duchy  of  Athens, 
were  all  vassal  states  of  the  principality,  though  in  the  case 
of  the  last  the  feudal  tie  was  ignored  by  the  Catalans,  "our 
bitterest  foes."  The  whole  peninsula,  they  told  him,  was 
divided  between  Prince  Robert  of  Taranto,  a  minor  and  an 
absentee,  for  whom  Bertrand  de  Baux,  now  restored  to 
favour,  was  again  acting  as  vicar;  the  titular  duke  of 
Athens,  Walter  of  Brienne,  who  held  Argos  and  Nauplia 
from  Robert ;  the  Venetians,  independent  masters  of  Modon 
and  Coron  ;  and  the  Greek  Emperor.  The  whole  principality 
contained  more  than  iooo  baronies  and  knights'  fees,  each 
worth  on  an  average  300  pounds  of  Barcelona  a  year ;  after 
deducting  all  expenses  for  garrisoning  the  castles,  this  would 
leave  the  prince  with  a  nett  revenue  of  100,000  florins.  This 
document,  which  gives  a  clear  account  of  the  Morea  as  it  was 
in  1 344,  was  signed  by  Roger,  Archbishop  of  Patras ;  Philippe 
de  Joinville,  baron  of  Vostitza ;  £rard  le  Noir  of  St  Sauveur, 
grandson  of  the  man  who  had  deserted  the  Infant  of  Majorca ; 
Alibert  de  Luc,  perhaps  a  descendant  of  one  of  the  original 
barons  of  the  Conquest,  and  many  others.  James  II.  adopted 
the  title  of  "  Prince  of  Achaia  " — a  style  assumed  with  about 
equal  reason  by  another  James,  son  of  Philip  of  Savoy  by  his 
second  marriage,  and  by  Omarbeg  of  Aidin,  who  had  at  least 
plundered  his  "principality."  But  his  only  act  in  that 
capacity  was  to  confer  upon  Erard  le  Noir  the  hereditary 
dignity  of  Marshal  of  Achaia — an  honour  which  was  perhaps 
deserved,  if  we  may  believe  the  high  praise  bestowed  by  the 
anonymous  chronicler  of  the  Morea  upon  the  benevolence  of 
that  baron,  "  a  true  friend  to  the  poor  man  and  the  orphan." 
In  1349  James  II.  fell,  like  his  father,  in  battle,  fighting 
against  the  Aragonese,  who  had  dispossessed  him  of  his 
kingdom.1 

Meanwhile,  the  growing  Turkish  peril  had  convinced  the 
popes  that  it  was  wise  to  recognise  the  Catalan  occupation 
of  Athens  as  an  accomplished  fact  Three  years  after 
Walter  of  Brienne's  unsuccessful  expedition,  Benedict  XII. 
had  ordered  the  Archbishop  of  Patras  to  excommunicate 
once  more  the  leaders  of  the  Company — William,  Duke  of 

1  Buchon,  Reckerches  historiques,  i.,  452-3  ;  Ducange,  op.  cit.y  ii., 
224-6 ;  Datta,  op.  city  ii.,  166  ;  X.  r.  M.,11.  8468-73. 


THE  PAPACY  RECOGNISES  THE  CATALANS     277 

Athens;  Nicholas  Lancia,  his  vicar-general;  Alfonso 
Fadrique  and  his  two  sons,  Peter  of  Salona  and  James; 
and  many  more.  But  Archbishop  Isnard  of  Thebes,  who 
was  better  acquainted  with  the  local  needs  than  the  pope, 
and  who  saw  the  growing  tendency  of  his  flock  to  join  the 
Orthodox  Church,  not  only  annulled  this  sentence  of 
excommunication  on  his  own  authority,  but  also  celebrated 
mass  before  the  Company  in  the  Theban  minster;  and, 
though  Benedict  at  first  disapproved  of  this  arbitrary  act 
and  ordered  the  renewal  of  the  excommunication,  he  came 
to  see  that  the  Catalans  might  be  useful  as  a  buffer  state 
between  the  Turks  and  the  West,  and  disregarded  the 
ineffectual  protest  of  the  exiled  Duke  of  Athens.  The 
Latin  Patriarch  of  Constantinople  acted  as  intermediary  ; 
on  his  way  to  his  residence  at  Negroponte,  he  stopped  in 
Attica,  where  he  found  the  Catalans  willing  to  return  to  the 
bosom  of  the  Church.  He  communicated  their  prayer  to 
Benedict,  who  replied  that  he  would  hear  it,  if  they  would 
send  envoys  to  Rome.  His  successor,  Clement  VI.,  anxious 
to  form  a  coalition  against  the  Turks,  charged  the  patriarch 
with  the  task  of  making  peace  between  the  Catalans  and 
Walter  of  Brienne,  gave  them  absolution  for  three  years, 
and  invited  Prince  Robert  of  Achaia  and  his  mother,  the 
Empress  Catherine,  to  contribute  galleys  to  the  allied  fleet. 
The  crusade  had  small  results,  but  the  reconciliation  between 
the  Catalans  and  the  papacy  was  complete.  Henceforth, 
those  "sons  of  perdition"  were  regarded  as  respectable 
members  of  Christendom.  Unfortunately,  soon  after  they 
became  respectable,  they  ceased  to  be  formidable.  Occa- 
sionally, the  old  Adam  broke  out,  as  when  Peter  Fadrique 
of  Salona  is  found  plying  the  trade  of  a  pirate  with  the  aid 
of  the  unspeakable  Turk.  But  their  Thessalian  conquests 
were  slipping  away  from  the  luxurious  and  drunken  progeny 
of  the  hardy  warriors  who  had  smitten  the  Franks  at  the 
Kephiss6s,  while  the  Venetians  of  Negroponte  had  no 
longer  cause  to  fear  their  once  dreaded  neighbours.  When 
the  bailie  wanted  money  for  public  purposes  he  borrowed  it 
from  a  Catalan  knight  of  Athens ;  when  a  Catholic  Bishop 
of  Andros  had  to  be  consecrated,  the  Athenian  Archbishop 
came  to  perform   the  ceremony  of   laying    hands   on  his 


278  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

suffragan  in  the  church  of  the  Eubcean  capital — an  arrange- 
ment which  shows  that  the  ecclesiastical  organisation  of 
Athens  had  not  been  disturbed  by  the  Catalan  conquest.1 
And  in  the  war  against  Genoa,  the  Catalans  rendered 
yeoman's  service  to  the  Venetians  at  Oreos. 

Meanwhile,  in  distant  Sicily,  the  shadowy  Dukes  of 
Athens  and  Neopatras  came  and  went  without  ever  seeing 
their  Greek  duchies.  Duke  William  died  in  1338,  and  his 
successors  in  the  title,  John  and  Frederick  of  Randazzo,  the 
picturesque  town  built  on  the  lava  of  Etna,  both  succumbed 
to  the  plague  ten  and  seventeen  years  later — mere  names  in 
the  history  of  Athens,  where  almost  their  only  known  acts 
are  in  connexion  with  the  castle  of  Athens  and  the  church 
of  St  Michael  at  Livadia.  Soon,  however,  after  the  death  of 
the  latter,  in  1355,  his  namesake  and  successor  became  also 
King  of  Sicily  under  the  title  of  Frederick  III.  Thus,  the 
two  Greek  duchies,  which  had  hitherto  been  the  appanage 
of  younger  members  of  the  royal  family,  were  now  united 
with  the  Sicilian  crown.  For  a  moment,  indeed,  in  1357, 
the  new  King  of  Sicily,  hard  pressed  by  enemies  in  his  own 
island,  actually  proposed  to  purchase  the  aid  of  Pedro  IV. 
of  Aragon  by  bestowing  Athens  and  Neopatras  upon  that 
sovereign's  consort  and  his  own  sister,  Eleonora.  But  as  no 
help  was  forthcoming  from  his  brother-in-law,  the  proposal 
fell  through.2 

The  new  duke  found  himself  at  once  called  upon  to 
answer  two  petitions  from  his  distant  subjects.  Shortly 
before  the  death  of  his  namesake  and  predecessor,  a 
deputation  had  arrived  from  Athens  and  Neopatras,  begging 
for  the  removal  of  Ram6n  Bernardi,  the  then  vicar-general 
of  the  duchies,  which  were  declared  by  the  petitioners  to  be 
in  danger,  owing  to  the  lack  of  proper  authority.  They 
suggested  as  suitable  candidates  for  the  post,  Orlando  de 
Aragona,  a  bastard  of  the  house  of  Sicily,  or  one  of  Alfonso 

1  Ducange,  ii.,  204-5,  221  ;  Raynaldus,  vi.,  286,  311  ;  M.  Villani  apud 
Muratori,  xiv.,  371  ;  Hopf,  Die  lnsel  Andros,  51  ;  Lampros,  "Eyy/x^a, 
55-82  ;  Lettres  Closes  de  BenottXll.,  515  ;  de  CL'ment  VL%  i.,  162,  204.    * 

2  Qurita,  II.,  17,  129,  287  ;  Archiv.  Stor.  Siciliano,  vii.,  196  ;  John  and 
Frederick  of  Randazzo  are  mentioned  as  dukes  in  two  documents ; 
Lampros,  "Eyypa^a,  255,  304. 


FREDERICK  III,  DUKE  OF  ATHENS  279 

Fadrique's  sons,  James  and  John.  Frederick  III.  granted 
the  prayer  of  the  petitioners,  and  appointed  James  Fadrique 
vicar-general ;  a  second  petition  prayed  the  duke  to  reward 
his  strenuous  labours  in  defence  of  the  duchies.  What  those 
labours  were  the  document  does  not  specify;  but  we  learn 
from  another  source  that  one  of  his  services  to  his  sovereign 
was  to  crush  a  revolt  of  Ermengol  de  Novelles,  the  hereditary 
marshal.  We  may  surmise  that  the  dualism  between  that 
powerful  noble  and  the  vicar-general  had  now  developed 
into  open  rebellion ;  we  know  that  the  marshal  lost  his 
strong  fortress  of  Siderokastron,  which  James  Fadrique 
added  to  his  own  lands,  and  which  his  royal  master 
confirmed  to  him ;  and  we  may  assume  that  the  De  Novelles 
family  was  further  punished  by  the  loss  of  the  marshal's 
bdton,  which  is  known  to  have  been  held  by  Roger  de  Lluria 
during  the  rest  of  ErmengoPs  lifetime.  On  the  present 
occasion  the  petitioners  begged  that  the  loyal  James  might 
have  assigned  to  him  as  his  reward  the  castles  of  Salona  and 
Loidoriki  with  their  appurtenances,  which  were  his  by  law. 
They  had  belonged  to  his  father,  and  had  descended  from 
him  to  his  eldest .  son  Peter,  on  whose  demise  without 
children,  they  should  have  come  to  James  as  next-of-kin. 
Owing,  however,  as  it  would  appear,  to  the  disturbed  state 
of  the  duchy,  those  great  possessions  had  been  withheld  from 
him.1  All  these  facts  point  to  the  mutual  jealousy  of  the 
great  Catalan  feudatories  of  each  other,  a  jealousy  which  was 
sure  to  break  out  in  civil  war,  whenever  the  vicar-general 
was  weak.  Naturally,  an  hereditary  office-holder  like  the 
marshal,  with  a  large  stake  in  the  country  and  a  powerful 
Greek  connection,  would  be  a  dangerous  rival  to  a  foreigner 
from  Sicily,  the  creature  of  a  distant  sovereign. 

James  Fadrique  did  not  long  retain  the  office  which  the 
envoys  of  the  duchies  had  begged  the  King  of  Sicily  to 
bestow  upon  him.  Possibly,  like  his  father,  he  had  enemies 
at  court,  who  represented  to  his  suspicious  master  that  he 
was  too  powerful  and  too  independent;  at  any  rate,  in  1359, 
Gonsalvo  Ximenes  de  Arenos  had  succeeded  him  as  vicar- 

1  This  disproves  Hopf  s  theory  that  Salona  came  into  the  Fadrique 
family  by  the  marriage  of  Peter  with  an  imaginary  daughter  of  Roger 
Deslaur.     Rosario  Gregorio,  II.,  570-1,  582-3  ;  Rubi6,  Los  Navarros,  476. 


280  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

general.1  In  that  year,  however,  the  post  was  conferred  upon 
a  great  Sicilian  noble,  Matteo  Moncada,  or  Montecateno, 
whose  family  had  come  from  Catalufta  to  Sicily  after  the 
Vespers.  Frederick  added  to  his  vicar's  dignity  by  conferring 
upon  him  the  lordships  of  Argos  and  Corinth  and  the 
marquisate  of  Boudonitza — dignities  which  were  not  his  to 
bestow.  For  Argos  still  belonged  to  Guy  d'Enghien ; 
Corinth  had  lately  been  bestowed  upon  Niccol6  Acciajuoli ; 
while  Boudonitza,  though  threatened  by  the  Catalan  Company, 
was  in  the  possession  of  the  Zorzi — an  outpost  against 
attacks  from  the  north,  where  a  new  power  was  now 
established.2 

The  five  years'  civil  war  between  John  Cantacuzene  and 
John  PalaiolcSgos  and  the  Napoleonic  career  of  Stephen 
Dushan,  the  great  Servian  tsar,  who  for  a  few  years  made 
the  Serbs  the  dominant  race  of  the  Balkan  peninsula,  had 
profoundly  affected  Northern  Greece.  Cantacuzene's  popu- 
larity was  not  confined  to  the  Morea ;  from  Thessaly,  where 
the  Byzantine  Empire  had  latterly  recovered  much  lost 
ground,  but  where  the  Albanians  had  seized  the  moment  of 
the  late  emperor's  death  to  plunder  the  towns,  and  from 
Akarnania,  where  his  recent  exploits  were  remembered,  and 
whither  the  widow  of  the  late  Despot  had  escaped,  came 
invitations  to  assume  the  government  of  those  provinces. 
Cantacuzene  was  unable  to  go  there  in  person  at  so  critical 
a  moment  in  his  career;  but  he  appointed  as  life  governor 
of  Thessaly  his  nephew  John  Angelos,  an  experienced  soldier 
and  a  man  of  affairs,  who  assisted  him  with  the  famed 
Thessalian  cavalry,  completed  the  downfall  of  Catalan  rule 
in  that  region,  and  made  himself  master  of  jEtolia  and 
Akarnania,  taking  the  ambitious  Anna  prisoner.  He  died, 
however,  in  1349,  and  the  great  Servian  tsar,  who  had 
already  extended  his  sway  as  far  as  Joannina,  then  annexed 
the  rest  of  north-west  Greece  and  Thessaly  to  his  vast 
empire,  which  extended  from  Belgrade  to  Arta.  Besides 
styling  himself  "  Tsar  and  Autocrat  of  the  Serbs  and  Greeks, 
the  Bulgarians  and  Albanians,"  Dushan  now  assumed  the 

1  L&npros,  'Erypa^o,  239,  332,  334. 

2  Predelli,  Commemoriali%  II.,  308;  Hopf,  afiud  Ersch  und  Gruber, 
Ixxxv.,  438-9* 


THE  CANTACUZENES  AT  MISTRA  281 

titles  of  "Despot  of  Arta  and  Count  of  Wallachia."  He 
assigned  Akarnania  and  iEtolia  to  his  brother,  Simeon 
Urosh,  who  endeavoured  to  conciliate  native  sympathies  by 
marrying  Thomais,  the  sister  of  the  deposed  Despot  Nike- 
ph6ros  II.,  while  a  Serb  magnate,  named  Preliub,  received 
Joannina  and  Thessaly,  with  the  title  of  Caesar,  and  made 
even  the  Venetians  tremble  in  their  settlement  at  Pteleon.1 

While  Thessaly  and  north-west  Greece  had  thus  passed 
in  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century  under  Servian  rule, 
there  had  been,  by  way  of  compensation,  a  Greek  revival  in 
the  Morea.  In  1348,  the  Emperor  John  Cantacuzene, 
remembering  the  long  connection  of  his  family  with  a  country 
in  which  both  his  father  and  grandfather  had  died,  and  of 
which  he  had  been  himself  offered  the  governorship,  sent  his 
second  son  Manuel  as  governor  to  Mistr&,  not  merely  for  a 
term  of  years,  but  for  life.  Manuel  remained  Despot  of  the 
Byzantine  province  till  his  death  in  1380,  and  his  long  rule  of 
thirty-two  years  contributed  greatly  to  the  prosperity  of  the 
Greek  portion  of  the  peninsula.  Henceforth,  Mistr&  assumed 
more  and  more  importance  as  the  seat  of  a  younger  member 
of  the  imperial  family;  and,  as  the  Turks  drew  closer  to 
Constantinople,  more  and  more  value  was  set  on  the  strongly 
fortified  hill  near  Sparta,  whose  fine  Byzantine  buildings  still 
testify  to  the  piety  and  the  splendour  of  the  Despots,  and 
still  bear  their  quaint  monograms.  The  early  years  of  the 
century,  as  we  saw,  had  witnessed  great  ecclesiastical 
activity  at  Mistrl  Manuel  continued  in  the  footsteps  of 
Andr6nikos  II. ;  he  erected  a  church  of  the  Saviour;  and  a 
poem  addressed  by  him  to  his  father  long  adorned  the 
church  of  the  Divine  Wisdom.2  As  is  usual  where  there  are 
Greeks,  there  was  a  desire  for  books  at  the  new  Sparta,  and 
we  are  therefore  not  surprised  to  find  men  engaged  in 
copying  manuscripts  there.  Later  on,  when  the  Emperor 
John  Cantacuzene  had  abandoned  the  throne  for  the  garb 
of  a   monk,  he   spent  a  year  with  his  son  at  Mistr&,  and 

1  Cantacuzene,  i.,  495;  ii.,  15,  239,  309-22,  355;  iii.,  147,  150, 
i55>  31*;  Nikeph6ros  Gregoras,  ii.,  596,  644,  656-8,  663;  Epiroticay 
210-11.     Predelli,  op.  city  II.,  181. 

2  Bulletin  de  Corr.  Ml/nioue,  xxiii.,  144  ;  Miklosich  und  Muller,  i.t 
472-4. 


282  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

there,  in  1383,  he  died  and  was  buried.1  He  has  given  us  in 
his  history  a  graphic  picture  of  the  state  of  the  peninsula  at 
the  moment  of  his  son's  appointment  Turkish  raids,  the 
rule  of  the  Franks,  and,  worst  of  all,  the  constant  internecine 
quarrels  of  the  Greeks  had  brought  the  country  to  the  verge 
of  ruin.  The  towns  had  been  divided  by  the  party  strife  of 
their  citizens,  the  villages  had  been  devastated  by  foreign 
foes;  agriculture  was  neglected,  so  that  the  Morea  was 
"  worse  than  the  proverbial  Scythian  desert."  The  imperial 
historian,  no  mean  judge  of  men,  gives  the  Moreot  archons 
much  the  same  character  as  Nik6tas  Choniates  had  given 
them  more  than  a  century  and  a  half  earlier :  "  Neither  good 
nor  evil  fortune,  nor  time,  that  universal  solvent,  can  dissolve 
their  mutual  enmity,  which  not  only  endures  during  their 
lifetime,  but  descends  as  a  heritage  to  their  children.  These 
modern  Spartans  neglect  all  the  laws  of  Lycurgus,  but  obey 
one  of  Solon — that  which  punishes  those  citizens  who  remain 
neutral  in  party  strife !  "  Men  of  this  kind,  like  the  Albanians 
of  to-day,  had  no  appreciation  for  firm  government,  which 
interfered  with  their  time-honoured  custom  of  cutting  one 
another's  throats  in  some  faction  fight.  They  soon  found  a 
leader  in  a  certain  Lampoiidios,  the  cleverest  scoundrel  of 
them  all,  who  had  already  rebelled  against  the  Despot,  but 
had  been  pardoned  and  provided  with  opportunities  of 
rehabilitating  his  ruined  fortunes.  One  of  Manuel's  wise 
measures  was  the  creation  of  a  navy  for  coast  defence  against 
the  small  bands  of  Turks  from  Asia  Minor,  which  constantly 
molested  the  Peloponnesian  coasts.  For  this  purpose,  he 
proposed  to  levy  ship-money  on  the  inhabitants,  and  the 
crafty  Lampoiidios  begged,  and  obtained,  permission  to 
collect  it.  He  went  all  over  the  country,  like  a  born 
demagogue,  reproaching  the  people  with  being  "voluntary 
slaves  "  of  the  Despot,  creatures  unworthy  of  their  ancestors, 
the  heroes  who  had  fought — against  each  other — while  the 
Franks  were  conquering  Greece.  The  taunt  and  the 
threatened  tax  had  their  effect ;  the  people  rose  at  a  given 
signal,  seized  the  chief  officials  of  the  towns  and  villages,  and 

1  So  Hopf  and  Krumbacher,  rejecting  the  version  of  Doukas,  that  he 
died  on  Mt.  Athos,  and  following  the  Chronicle  published  by  Muller  in 
Sitzungsberiehte  der  Wiener  Akademic,  ix.,  393. 


GREEK  REVIVAL  IN  THE  MOREA  283 

marched  on  Mistr£.  But  the  news  that  the  Despot  was 
preparing  to  attack  them  with  the  300  men  of  his  Byzantine 
bodyguard,  and  a  few  Albanian  mercenaries,  who  now  for  the 
first  time  appear  in  the  history  of  the  Morea,  sufficed  to 
cause  a  general  panic.  Manuel  with  his  usual  clemency 
pardoned  the  rebels,  who  for  a  long  time  kept  the  peace. 
But  that  their  behaviour  was  due  to  fear  rather  than 
gratitude  was  demonstrated  when  his  father  fell  and  the 
Emperor  John  Palaiol6gos  sent  Michael  and  Andrew  Asan 
as  governors  to  the  Morea.  The  whole  province,  with  the 
exception  of  one  faithful  city,  went  over  to  the  newcomers, 
but  Manuel  stood  firm,  drove  out  the  Asans  and  secured  his 
recognition  by  the  imperial  government.  Henceforth,  the 
Greeks  acquiesced  in  his  mild  but  firm  rule;  the  local 
magnates  abandoned  politics  for  the  less  exciting  pursuit  of 
agriculture,  and  it  became  the  fashion  to  acquire  large  estates 
and  to  develop  the  country.  Those  who  know  the  Greek 
distaste  for  rural  life  will  realise  how  marvellous  the  influence 
of  Manuel  must  have  beea  The  Cantacuzenes  wisely  based 
their  national  policy  upon  the  support  of  the  national  Church  ; 
thus  the  emperor  in  1348  confirmed  by  a  golden  bull  the 
possessions  of  the  great  monastery  of  Megaspelaion,  a  direct 
dependency,  or  stavrop£gion%  of  the  Patriarchate,  which  his 
predecessors  had  favoured,  and  the  monks  continued  to 
dispose  of  their  serfs  as  they  chose ;  six  years  later,  the 
monastery  was  assigned  by  the  patriarch  as  residence  for  life 
to  the  Greek  metropolitan  of  Patras,  "  Exarch  of  all  Achaia," 
who  since  the  Latin  Conquest  had  been,  of  course,  unable  to 
occupy  his  titular  see.  All  these  things  testified  to  the  great 
Greek  revival  in  the  Morea.  With  his  Frankish  neighbours, 
however,  Manuel  was  usually  on  excellent  terms ;  they,  too, 
learnt  to  respect  his  truthfulness,  for  his  word  was  as  good  as 
his  oath,  and  he  never  broke  his  engagements  with  them. 
Having  been  defeated  by  him  at  the  outset,  they  became  his 
allies,  and  agreed  to  assist  him  both  within  and  without  the 
peninsula  at  their  own  expense.  This  alliance  proved  most 
successful  in  repelling  the  Turks,  who  were  now  a  serious 
danger  to  Franks  and  Greeks  alike. 

The   Ottomans  have  always  made    and   retained   their 
conquests  in  the  Near   East,  thanks  to  the  quarrels  of  the 


2K4  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOIJ 

Christians,  and  it  was  the  internal  disputes  of  the  Catalan 
state  which  now  introduced  them  into  Greece.  In  1361, 
Moncada  had  been  succeeded  as  vicar-general  of  the  duchies 
by  Roger  de  Lluria,  a  relative  and  namesake  of  the  great 
Aragonese  admiral,  who  had  ravaged  the  Morea  seventy 
years  earlier.  The  Lluria  family  had  gained  influence  at 
Thebes,  of  which  city  Roger's  brother  had  recently  been 
governor,  while  Roger  himself  had  received  grants  from  John 
and  Frederick  of  Randazzo,  and  held  the  great  office  of 
marshal  There  was,  however,  a  party  at  the  capital  opposed 
to  this  now  predominant  family,  while  the  new  vicar  found 
himself  simultaneously  involved  in  a  quarrel  with  the 
Venetians  of  Euboea  arising  out  of  a  number  of  petty 
grievances  on  both  sides.  Thus  pressed,  Lluria  resorted  to 
the  traditional  policy  of  the  Catalan  Company  and  called  in 
the  Turks  to  his  aid.  They  had  not  far  to  come,  for 
Mur«Ul  I.  had  now  transferred  the  Turkish  capital  from 
Hnliii  to  Adrianople,  and  they  were  already  casting  longing 
exes  on  !•  recce.  They  readily  responded  to  his  summons, 
and  in  1J0J  Thebes,  the  capital  of  the  Catalan  duchy,  was 
occupied  by  these  dangerous  allies.  The  archbishop  and  an 
influential  deputation  from  various  communities  in  the  duchies 
h**tcucd  to  Sicily  to  lay  their  grievances  before  their  duke. 
Fiedcrick  111.  listened  to  the  tale  of  their  sufferings,  re- 
appointed Moncada  vicar-general,  and  ordered  Lluria  to  obey 
the  Utter1*  orders.  l*ope  Urban  V.,  too,  appealed  to  the 
lell^iouH  sentiments  of  Lluria  and  his  brother,  and  urged  the 
Lombard*  and  Venetians  ofEubcea  and  the  primate  of 
AchaU  to  prevent  the  "profane  multitude  of  infidel  Turks" 
I10111  entering  the  Morea,  as  was  their  intention.  The 
common  danger,  even  more  than  the  papal  admonitions, 
atouMcd  all  those  interested  in  the  peninsula  to  combine  in  its 
detonce.  The  united  efforts  of  Gautier  de  Lor,  the  bailie  of 
Achat*,  the  Krankish  barons,  the  Despot  Manuel,  the  Knights 
ot  St  lohn,  and  a  Venetian  fleet  succeeded  in  burning 
thirty-live  Turkish  galleys  which  were  lying  off  Megara. 
At  this  the  Turks  perforce  abandoned  their  projected 
\maaion,  and  retreated  to  their  ally's  capital  of  Thebes. 
Vh*  loval  union  of  Greeks  and  Latins  had  saved  the 
\l\W*.     This  alone  would  entitle  Manuel  Cantacuzene  to  the 


FURTHER  ACQUISITIONS  OF  NICCOLO  285 

eulogies  which  his  father  and  his  father's  devoted  friend,  the 
litterateur  Dem£trios  Kyd6nes,  bestowed  upon  his  wise 
administration.1 

The  distracted  Frankish  principality,  nominally  subject  to 
an  alien  and  absent  prince,  offered  a  sad  contrast  to  the 
Byzantine  province  under  a  resident  native  governor. 
Prince  Robert,  who  assumed  the  title  of  Emperor  of 
Constantinople  on  the  death  of  the  Empress  Catherine  in 
1 346,  from  that  moment  never  set  foot  in  Achaia ;  indeed,  he 
was  for  several  years  a  prisoner  in  Hungary ;  and  his  main 
interest  in  his  Greek  dominions  was  that  they  enabled  him  to 
present  large  estates  to  his  wife.  He  had  married  in  1347 
Marie  de  Bourbon,  widow  of  Hugues  IV.,  King  of  Cyprus,  and 
to  her  he  assigned  lands  in  Corfu  and  Cephalonia,  the  old 
Villehardouin  family  fief  of  Kalamata,  and  other  places  in 
Achaia,  to  which  she  added  by  purchase  the  baronies  of 
Vostitza  and  Nivelet.  The  frequent  changes  of  the  Angevin 
bailies,  which  are  recorded  in  the  Aragonese  Chronicle  of  the 
Morea  at  this  period,  naturally  weakened  still  further  the 
authority  of  the  absent  prince,  while  real  power  fell  more  and 
more  into  the  hands  of  the  Archbishop  of  Patras  and  the 
family  of  the  Acciajuoli,  who  at  last  became  identical.  After 
his  departure  from  Greece,  Niccol6  Acciajuoli  had  not 
forgotten  to  look  after  his  great  interests  in  that  country. 
We  may  dismiss  the  story  of  a  much  later  Neapolitan 
historian,  that  he  was  sent  by  Queen  Joanna  I.  of  Naples  to 
receive  the  homage  of  the  Athenians,  whom  the  writer 
imagines  to  have  been  brought  under  her  authority  by  two 
enterprising  men  from  Lecce2 — an  obvious  mistake,  due  to 
the  subsequent  rule  of  his  family  there.  But  he  added  to  his 
already  large  possessions  in  Achaia  the  fortress  of  Vourkano, 
at  the  foot  of  classic  Ithome,  the  picturesque  site  of  the 
present  monastery,  and  in  1358  received  from  Prince  Robert 
the    town   and   castle   of  Corinth,    which  was   part  of  the 

1  Cantacuzene,  iii.,  85-90,  358-60 ;  Nikephoros  Gregorys,  iii.,  248, 
Chronkon  Breve^  515;  Kydones  apud  Boissonade,  Anecdota  Nova,  294  ; 
Miklosich  und  Miiller,  i.,  326-30  ;  v.,  19 1-3  ;  Raynaldus,  vii.,  108  ;  Lettres 
secrltes  dUrbain  V.y  163  ;  L.  d.  F.,  151  ;  Rosario  Gregorio,  II.,  572-5  ; 
Predelli,  Commemoriali^  II.,  304. 

-  Summon te,  Hist  di  Napoli,  II.,  601. 


286  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

princely  domain;  two  years  afterwards,  one  of  his  family 
became  through  his  influence  Archbishop  of  Patras,  a 
dignity  subsequently  held  by  two  others  of  this  clan,  and 
estimated  to  be  worth  more  than  16,000  florins  a  year. 

The  bestowal  of  the  great  fortress  of  Corinth  upon  the 
shrewd  Florentine  banker  was  a  marked  tribute  to  his  ability. 
The  dwellers  on  the  shores  of  the  gulf  were  now  a  prey  to 
the  Turkish  corsairs,  against  whom  Robert  in  vain  asked  the 
pope  and  the  Venetians  for  aid.  The  pope  was,  indeed, 
fully  alive  to  the  Turkish  peril,  and  suggested  to  the 
Knights  of  St  John  the  acquisition  of  the  defenceless 
principality ;  when  this  project  failed,  he  begged  Niccolo 
Acciajuoli  to  impress  upon  Robert  the  necessity  of  doing 
something  to  save  Achaia  from  the  infidels.  The  citizens  of 
Corinth  united  their  petitions  to  these  admonitions  of  the 
pope ;  they  told  Robert  that  he  had  left  them  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  the  Turks,  who  daily  afflicted  them,  that  their 
fortresses  had  lost  many  of  their  defenders  by  captivity  and 
famine,  that  their  land  was  a  desert,  and  that  unless  he  could 
provide  some  remedy,  they  must  either  go  into  exile  or  pay 
tribute  to  the  enemy.  Robert  accordingly  bestowed  the 
town  and  castle,  with  all  their  appurtenances,  including 
eight  smaller  castles,  upon  Niccold  Acciajuoli,  who  had  mean- 
while been  created  grand  seneschal  of  Sicily  and  Count  of 
Malta,  as  the  most  likely  man  to  defend  them.  Niccold 
spent  large  sums  in  repairing  the  fortifications  of  Akrocorinth, 
and  obtained  for  his  vassals  from  Robert  the  remission  of  all 
arrears  due  to  the  princely  treasury,  an  order  compelling  all 
his  serfs  who  had  emigrated  owing  to  the  unsettled  state  of 
the  district  to  return,  and  permission  to  render  all  the  feudal 
service,  for  which  he  was  liable  on  account  of  his  other 
Peloponnesian  possessions,  exclusively  in  the  frontier  district 
of  Corinth,  more  exposed  than  the  rest  of  the  peninsula  to 
attacks  from  Catalans  and  Turks.  Unable  to  return  to 
Greece  himself,  he  appointed  his  cousin  Donato  his  repre- 
sentative at  Corinth  and  in  the  rest  of  his  Achaian  fiefs, 
charging  him  to  further  the  welfare  of  his  dependants,  to 
administer  even-handed  justice,  to  protect  the  Church — an 
injunction  sometimes  neglected — and  to  pay  special  regard  to 
the  fortifications.     A   swarm   of  Greeks — "  Greeklings,"  the 


THE  PRINCE  OF  GALILEE  287 

scornful  Boccaccio  calls  them — crowded  the  almost  regal 
audiences  which  he  gave  in  his  Italian  palaces,  and  his  will 
reads  like  an  inventory  of  a  large  part  of  the  Morea.  He 
died  in  1365,  and  lies  in  the  noble  Certosa  which  he  had 
built  near  Florence  to  be  his  mausoleum.1  Few  who  visit 
it  reflect  that  it  was  erected  out  of  the  spoils  of  Greece. 

Upon  the  death  of  the  titular  emperor  Robert  in  1364, 
the  principality  of  Achaia  was  for  the  second  time  exposed 
to  the  evils  of  a  disputed  succession.  Robert  had  left  no 
children;  but  his  stepson,  Hugues  de  Lusignan,  Prince  of 
Galilee,  who  by  the  law  of  primogeniture  should  have  been 
King  of  Cyprus,  finding  himself  deprived  of  the  Cypriote 
throne  by  his  uncle,  conceived  the  idea  of  seeking  compensa- 
tion in  Achaia,  which  was  claimed  by  the  late  prince's 
brother  Philip,  now  titular  emperor  of  Constantinople,  who 
accordingly  styled  himself  also  "  Prince  of  Achaia."  Robert's 
widow,  Marie  de  Bourbon,  favoured  her  son's  enterprise,  and 
her  territorial  influence  in  the  country,  owing  to  purchase  and 
her  late  husband's  gifts,  was  greater  even  than  that  of  Niccold 
Acciajuoli  himself.  We  learn  from  a  list  of  the  Achaian  baronies 
in  1364,  preserved  by  a  lucky  accident,  that  no  less  than 
sixteen  castles  were  her  property,  including  such  strongholds 
as  the  great  fortress  of  Chloumoutsi,  the  old  family  castle  of 
the  Villehardouins  at  Kalamata,  the  two  fortresses  which  the 
famous  house  of  St  Omer  had  built  on  the  bay  of  Navarino 
and  in  the  Santameri  mountains  above  the  plain  of  Elis,  and 
Beauvoir,  or  "  Mouse  Castle,"  whose  ruins  still  command  the 
harbour  of  Katakolo.  But  the  barons  had  appointed  the 
lord  of  Chalandritza,  Centurione  Zaccaria,  bailie  of  the 
principality  on  the  death  of  Robert,  and  had  sent  him  to 
receive  Philip's  oath  as  their  new  prince  at  Taranto.  Thus, 
when  Marie  de  Bourbon  and  her  son  arrived  in  Greece  in 
1366  with  more  than  12,000  troops  from  Cyprus  and 
Provence,  they  found  that  Philip's  bailie  held  all  the 
fortresses  for  his  master,  except  that  of  Navarino,  while 
Angelo  Acciajuoli,  Archbishop   of  Patras   and   an   adopted 

1  Ducange,  ii.,  233,  263-4  ;  L.  d.  F.y  149-52 ;  Buchon,  Nouvcllcs 
Rechcrekesy  I.,  i.,  90,  98-100,  113;  II.,  i.,  143-204;  M.  Villani  apud 
Muratori,  xiv.,  608  ;  Raynaldus,  vi.,  515  ;  Lettres  secretes  dUrbain  K, 
55,  76  ;  Lampros,  "firw><*0<**  106-7,  120-8. 


288  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

son  of  the  great  Niccold,  had  declared  for  Philip  as  lawful 
Prince  of  Achaia.  Confident  in  their  superior  numbers, 
Marie  and  the  Prince  of  Galilee  besieged  the  castle  of 
Patras.  But  the  archbishop,  though  he  had  only  700  horse- 
men, possessed  among  the  canons  of  his  cathedral  one  of  the 
greatest  commanders  of  that  age.  Some  years  before,  a 
young  Venetian,  Carlo  Zeno,  had  received,  as  a  mere  boy,  a 
canon's  stall  at  Patras,  then  already  regarded  as  the  property 
of  the  Holy  See.  It  was  part  of  the  canons'  duty  to  guard 
the  castle,  or  donjon,  as  it  was  called,  of  Patras,  and  this 
uncanonical  work  exactly  suited  Zeno.  The  lad  cared  more 
for  fighting  than  for  theology,  and  the  almost  constant 
warfare  with  Turkish  pirates  at  the  mouth  of  the  Corinthian 
Gulf  gave  him  ample  outlet  for  his  energies.  Wounded  in 
one  of  these  skirmishes,  the  young  canon  had  only  recently 
returned  to  his  stall,  whence  the  archbishop  summoned  him 
to  assume  the  command  of  the  garrison.  Zeno  had  learnt 
all  the  devices  of  Greek  warfare ;  he  waited  till  the  besiegers 
were  scattered  about  the  country,  plundering  the  rich 
environs  of  Patras,  fell  upon  them  with  signal  success,  and 
not  only  defended  Patras  for  six  months,  but  carried  the 
war  to  the  walls  of  Navarino,  where  Marie  and  her  son  had 
taken  refuge,  and  where  the  Emperor  Philip's  bailie  lay  a 
prisoner.  The  commander  of  Navarino  now  summoned  the 
Despot  of  Mistr&  and  Guy  d'Enghien,  the  lord  of  Argos,  to  his 
aid,  the  civil  war  spread,  and  the  Byzantine  and  Argive 
forces  ravaged  the  plain  of  Elis.  Fortunately,  at  this  moment, 
a  peacemaker  appeared  upon  the  scene,  in  the  person  of  the 
chivalrous  Conte  Verde%  Amadeo  VI.  of  Savoy,  who  chanced 
to  put  in  at  Coron  on  his  expedition  to  the  East.  He  there 
received  news  of  the  siege  of  Navarino,  and  hastened  to  the 
aid  of  Marie  de  Bourbon,  who  was  his  wife's  cousin ;  at  the 
sight  of  his  galleys,  the  archbishop's  troops  withdrew  from 
the  attack,  whereon  Amadeo  offered  his  services  as  an 
arbitrator  to  the  two  parties.  Both  Marie  and  the  archbishop 
accepted  his  offer ;  they  met  on  neutral  ground  at  Modon ; 
Marie  relinquished  all  claims  to  Patras,  and  recognised  the 
independence  of  the  archbishop,  who,  in  return,  agreed  to 
make  her  a  money  payment  The  collection  of  this  money 
was  entrusted  to  the  ever-useful  Zeno,  who  adopted  the  usual 


CAREER  OF  CARLO  ZENO        289 

plan  of  inviting  the  citizens  of  Glarentza   to   subscribe   it. 
Glarentza  was  then  not  only  "  the  chief  city  of  Achaia,"  but 
an  important  trade  centre,  though  its  mint  had  now  ceased  to 
issue  the  familiar  Achaian  coinage,  the  last  specimens  of  which, 
bearing  Robert's  name,  may  still  be  seen  in  the  Museo  Correr 
at  Naples.     Boccaccio,  who  laid  a  scene  of  his  novel  Alatiel 
there,  represents  Genoese  merchants  as  trading  with  Glarentza, 
and  we  know  that  it  levied  a  duty  of  from  two  to  three  per  cent, 
on  all  merchandise.    It  could  therefore  have  well  afforded  to  pay 
the  indemnity.     But  a  certain  knight  of  Glarentza  denounced 
Zeno    as    a    traitor    for    having   made  peace  on   what  he 
considered  such   unfavourable  terms;    Zeno  challenged  his 
accuser  to  a  duel,  was  deprived  of  his  canonry  in  consequence, 
and  resigned  the  other  ecclesiastical  benefices  which  he  held 
in   Greece.    The  point  of  honour  was  referred  to  Queen 
Joanna  I.  of  Naples,  who  decided   in   Zeno's  favour;    the 
latter,  as  the   reward   for  his  services,   received  from    the 
Emperor  Philip  the  post  of  bailie  of  Achaia,  where  for  the 
next  three  years  he  remained  to  assist  his  old  patron,  the 
archbishop,  and  his  successor,  "  with  both  hand  and  counsel." 
No  further  hostilities  took  place  between  the  see  of  Patras 
and  the   Prince  of  Galilee,  who  continued   to  occupy  the 
south-west   of  the   peninsula,   whence  his  followers  were   a 
menace  to  the  neighbouring  Venetian  colonies.      But  the 
murder  of  his  uncle,  the  King  of  Cyprus,  in  1369,  led  him  to 
leave  Greece  in  order  to  push  his  pretensions  to  the  throne  of 
that  island;  and,  in  the  following  year,  he  and  his  mother 
signed  an  agreement  with  the  Emperor  Philip,  by  which  they 
relinquished  Achaia,  except  her  widow's  portion  of  Kalamata, 
in  return  for  an  annuity  of  6,000  gulden.     From  that  time 
till  his  death,  nine  years  later,  the  Prince  of  Galilee  troubled 
Greece  no  more ;  but  we  shall  hear  of  his  mother  again  in 
the  tangled  history  of  the  principality,  while  an  Isabelle  de 
Lusignan,  probably  his  daughter,  married  one  of  the  Despots 
of  Mistr«L,  where  her  monogram  has  lately  been  found.     The 
Emperor    Philip,    for    his    part,    did    not    long    enjoy  the 
undisputed  right  to  bear  the  title  of  "  Prince  of  Achaia."     He 
died  in  1373,  without  having  visited  his  Greek  dominions; 
but  in  that  short  time,  his  bailie,  a  Genoese,  had  so  harassed 
the  Archbishop  of  Patras,  that  the  latter,  a  Venetian  citizen, 

T 


290  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

actually  offered  his  town  and  its  territory  to  the  republic  of 
St  Mark.  The  offer  was  not  accepted  then,  but  there  was 
talk  of  removing  all  the  Venetian  trade  from  Glarentza  to 
Patras,  and  thirty-five  years  later  the  administration  of  the 
town  passed  into  the  hands  of  Venice.1 

While  the  Acciajuoli  family  had  played  so  important  a 
part  in  asserting  the  independence  of  the  archbishopric  of 
Patras,  its  members  had  continued  to  extend  their  territorial 
influence  in  other  parts  of  the  peninsula.  By  his  will, 
Niccol6  Acciajuoli  had  divided  his  Greek  possessions  between 
his  eldest  living  son,  Angelo,  and  his  cousin  and  adopted  son, 
also  called  Angelo,  and  afterwards  Archbishop  of  Patras, 
whom  we  have  just  seen  at  war.  To  the  former  he  had 
bequeathed  "  the  most  noble  city  of  Corinth,"  with  all  the 
nine  castles  dependent  upon  it,  as  well  as  all  the  other  lands 
and  castles  of  which  he  was  possessed  in  Greece,  except 
those  which  he  left  to  the  latter.  His  adopted  son's  share 
was  the  castle  of  Vourkano  in  Messenia,  and  all  his  farms, 
rights,  and  vassals  in  the  barony  of  Kalamata.  The  two 
Angelos  were  to  share  the  expense  of  endowing  a  Benedictine 
monastery  in  the  tenement  of  Pethone  in  the  said  barony. 
Anxious  for  the  further  welfare  of  his  house  in  Greece,  the 
astute  testator  left  still  more  property — "  the  lands  which  had 
formerly  belonged  to  Niccol6  Ghisi,  the  great  constable  of 
the  principality  of  Achaia  " — to  his  adopted  son,  on  condition 
that  the  latter  married  Fiorenza  Sanudo,  the  much-sought 
heiress  of  the  duchy  of  the  Archipelago.  After  the  death 
of  Niccol6,  the  Emperor  Philip,  as  Prince  of  Achaia,  duly 
conferred  the  castle  and  town  of  Corinth  afresh  upon  his  son 
Angelo,  and  a  little  later,  as  a  reward  for  his  trouble  and 
expense  in  accompanying  him  to  Hungary,  raised  him  to  the 
dignity  of  a  palatine.  But  this  Angelo  was  too  much 
occupied  with  affairs  in  Italy,  where  he  had  inherited  large 

1  Hopf,  Chroniqtus,  227;  Z.  d.  F.%  152-5;  lac.  Zeno,  Vita  Caroli 
Zeniy  apud  Muratori,  xix.,  212-14 ;  Datta,  Spedizione  in  Oriente  di 
Amadio  VI.y  89-93,  186-9,  205-6;  Guichenon,  op.  cit.,  I.,  416;  Servion, 
Gestes  et  Chroniques  de  la  May  son  de  Savoy e,  II.,  130-2;  Boccaccio, 
Decamertme,  Novel  7,  Day  II.;  Pegalotti,  Delia  Decima,  III.,  107; 
Gerland,  Ntue  Quellen,  41-2  ;  Millet  in  Bulletin  de  Corr.  helUnique{\y&b\ 
453-9. 


■% 


NERIO  ACCIAJUOLI  291 

possessions  from  his  father;  he  had  received  from  Philip 
express  permission  to  nominate  a  deputy-captain  of  Corinth 
in  his  place,  and  as  such  he  selected  Rainerio,  or  Nerio, 
Acciajuoli,  another  cousin  and  adopted  son  of  Niccold. 

Young  Nerio  Acciajuoli,  who  was  destined  to  make 
himself  master  of  Athens  and  rule  over  the  most  famous  city 
in  the  world,  had  already  begun  his  extraordinary  career  in 
Greece.  He,  too,  sought  the  hand  of  the  fair  Fiorenza 
Sanudo — the  Penelope  of  Frankish  Greece — who  was  now 
Duchess  of  the  Archipelago,  and  his  brother  John,  then  Arch- 
bishop of  Patras,  aided  him  in  this  plan  for  bringing  that 
delectable  duchy  into  the  family.  But  Venice  was  resolved 
that  so  great  a  prize  should  fall  to  the  lot  of  none  but  a 
Venetian  nominee,  and  she  succeeded  in  frustrating  Nerio's 
intended  marriage.  Baffled  in  the  iEgean,  he  next  turned 
his  attention  to  the  Peloponnese,  where  he  purchased  from 
Marie  de  Bourbon  the  baronies  of  Vostitza  and  Nivelet. 
Thus,  when  he  became  deputy-captain  of  Corinth  with  its 
dependency  of  Basilicata,  the  ancient  Sikyon,  his  authority 
stretched  along  a  large  part  of  the  southern  shore  of  the 
Corinthian  Gulf,  as  well  as  over  the  isthmus.  Soon  he 
became  real  owner  of  the  Corinthian  group  of  castles,  which 
Angelo  was  glad  to  pawn  to  him  for  a  sum  of  money  paid 
down.  The  loan  was  never  repaid ;  so,  while  Angelo  and  his 
offspring  kept  the  empty  title  of  Palatine  of  Corinth,  Nerio 
remained  in  possession  of  this  valuable  position,  which  served 
him  as  a  base  for  attacking  the  Catalans  of  Attica.  Naturally, 
numbers  of  relatives  and  hangers-on  of  the  Acciajuoli  followed 
their  fortunate  kinsmen  to  Greece,  so  that  a  Florentine 
colonisation  somewhat  replenished  the  diminished  ranks  of  the 
French  settlers  and  the  Neapolitan  adventurers.  The  baron- 
age of  Achaia  was,  indeed,  by  this  time  a  mixture  of  races ; 
of  those  who  figure  in  the  feudal  roll  of  1 364,  the  Acciajuoli 
hailed  from  Florence,  the  Zaccaria  from  Genoa,  Marchesano 
from  Nice;  Janni  Misito  was  apparently  a  Greek;  in  fact, 
£rard  le  Noir  was  almost  the  only  Frenchman  left  among  the 
great  barons,  and  even  his  ancestors  had  not  come  over  at  the 
Conquest.1     The  old  conquering  families  were  extinct 

1  Buchon,  NouvelUs  Recherchesy  II.,  i.,  164,  175,  189-90,  204-14; 
Palmerius  a/fc/^Muratori,  xiii.,  1228,  1230  ;  Gerland,  Neue  Quellen,  141 -5. 


292  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

The  Acciajuoli  were  not  the  only  new  Italian  family  which 
at  this  period  laid  the  foundations  of  a  dynasty  in  Greece. 
Among  the  favourites  of  the  Angevins  were  the  Tocchi,  who 
had  originally  come  from  Benevento,  and  who  were  leading 
personages  at  the  Neapolitan  court.  Flattering  genealogists 
derived  their  name  and  lineage  from  the  Gothic  tribe  of 
Tauci,  which  had  followed  Totila  into  Italy;  but  the  first 
historic  member  of  the  clan  was  Ugolino,  the  grand  seneschal. 
A  Guglielmo  Tocco  had  held  the  post  of  governor  of  Corfu 
for  Philip  I.  of  Taranto  and  his  son,  and  became  connected 
with  one  of  the  reigning  families  of  Greece  by  marrying  the 
sister  of  John  II.  of  Epiros.  His  son  Leonardo  continued  to 
enjoy  the  favour  of  Robert ;  he  was  one  of  the  witnesses 
of  his  marriage-contract,  he  worked  hard  to  secure  his  libera- 
tion from  imprisonment  in  Hungary,  and,  by  marrying  the 
niece  of  Niccolo  Acciajuoli,  secured  the  influence  of  that 
powerful  statesman.  Accordingly,  in  1357,  Prince  Robert 
bestowed  upon  him  the  county  of  Cephalonia,  to  which 
Leonardo  might  perhaps  lay  some  claim  as  first-cousin  of  the 
last  of  the  Orsini.  To  the  islands  of  Cephalonia,  Zante,  and 
Ithaka,  he  added  in  1362  that  of  Santa  Mavra  and  the  fort  of 
Vonitza,  whose  inhabitants  had  grown  tired  of  the  Zorzi 
family,  and  summoned  him  to  their  aid — an  episode  which 
forms  the  subject  of  an  unfinished  drama  by  the  modern  poet 
Valaorites.  If  we  may  believe  another  modern  writer,  he 
promised  to  give  them  a  share  in  the  local  administration,  to 
respect  their  property,  and  to  tolerate  their  religion.  We 
know,  however,  from  a  contemporary  document,  that  he 
showed  his  toleration  by  driving  out  the  orthodox  arch- 
bishop from  the  island.  He  thus  reunited  the  old 
dominions  of  the  Orsini,  and  he  and  his  heirs,  under  the 
style  of "  Duke  of  Leucadia,  Count  of  Cephalonia,  and  Lord 
of  Vonitza,"  not  only  held  their  possessions  for  over  a 
century,  but,  almost  alone  of  the  Frankish  rulers  of 
Greece,  left  representatives  down  to  the  present  generation.1 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  RecAercAes,  I.,  i.,  307,  410;  L.  d.  F.y  151; 
Remondini,  De  Zacynthi  AnHquitaHbus,  139,  142-3  ;  Hopf,  Chroniques, 
182  ;  Ducangc,  ^.  «*/.,  ii.,  264,  and  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  ii.,  263,  give 
the  date  1357  and  his  title ;  Mazella,  DescritHone  del  Regno  di  Napoliy 
643-5  >  Petritz6poulos,  Saggio^  45  ;  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  i.,  493. 


END  OF  THE  ORSINI  IN  EPIROS  293 

It   is  only  in  our  own   time  that  the  family  has   become 
extinct 

It  was  not  to  be  wondered  that  the  Angevins  should 
desire  to  see  the  Ionian  islands  in  the  hands  of  a  strong  man 
whom  they  could  trust,  at  a  moment  when  the  adjacent 
continent,  where  they  still  held  Lepanto,  was  in  flames.  On 
the  death  of  the  great  Servian  tsar,  Dushan,  in  1355,  anarchy 
broke  out  in  his  rapidly  formed  empire,  and  every  petty 
Servian  satrap  declared  his  independence.  At  the  same 
moment,  the  death  of  Preliub,  the  Servian  ruler  of  Thessaly, 
and  the  fall  of  John  Cantacuzene  from  the  Byzantine  throne, 
completed  the  confusion.  Such  an  opportunity  seemed  to 
the  dethroned  Despot  of  Epiros,  Nikeph6ros  Unfavourable 
for  the  recovery  of  his  inheritance.  Since  his  surrender,  he 
had  been  living  as  governor  of  the  Thracian  cities  on  the 
Dardanelles  in  the  enjoyment  of  his  imperial  father-in-law's 
favour  and  confidence.  He  now  marched  into  Thessaly, 
whose  inhabitants  received  him  gladly,  and  then  crossed 
Pindos  into  Akarnania,  whence  he  drove  out  the  Servian 
prince,  Simeon  Urosh,  thus  reviving  in  his  own  person  the 
ancient  glories  of  the  Greek  Despotat  of  Epiros.  But,  from  a 
desire  to  conciliate  Servian  sympathies,  he  was  so  foolish  as 
to  desert  his  devoted  wife,  in  order  to  contract  a  marriage 
with  the  sister-in-law  of  the  late  Servian  tsar.  This  act  both 
offended  and  alarmed  his  Albanian  subjects,  particularly 
devoted  to  the  Cantacuzene  family,  and  then,  as  now, 
suspicious  of  Servian  influence.  The  injured  wife  took  refuge 
with  her  brother  Manuel  at  Mistr&,  while  the  Albanians  rose 
against  her  husband.  Nikeph6ros  summoned  to  his  aid  a 
body  of  Turkish  mercenaries,  who  were  ravaging  Thessaly, 
and  confidently  attacked  his  rebellious  subjects.  Rashness 
had  always  been  his  chief  characteristic,  and  in  the  battle 
which  ensued,  near  the  town  of  Acheloos  in  1358,  it  cost  him 
his  life.  Thus  ended  the  Despotat  of  Epiros,  and  the  lands 
which  had  owned  the  sway  of  the  Greek  Angeli  and  the 
Roman  Orsini,  now  fell  into  Servian  and  Albanian  hands. 
Simeon  Urosh,  who  now  styled  himself  "  Emperor  of  the 
Greeks  and  Serbs,"  established  his  court,  with  all  the  high- 
sounding  titles  of  Byzantium,  at  Trikkala,  where  an 
inscription   still   preserves   his    name,  and   obtained   recog- 


i 


"* 


294  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACClAJUOLI 

nition  of  his  authority,  at  least  in  name,  over  Epiros,  as 
well  as  Thessaly.  Henceforth,  however,  he  devoted  his 
personal  attention  exclusively  to  the  latter,  assigning 
Joannina  to  his  son-in-law,  Thomas  Preliubovich,  in  1367,  and 
iEtolia  and  Akarnania  to  two  Albanian  chiefs,  belonging  to 
the  clans  of  Boua  and  Liosa — a  name  still  to  be  found  in  the 
plain  of  Attica.  Thus,  about  1 362,  all  north-west  Greece  was 
Albanian,  except  where  the  Angevin  flag  still  floated  over 
the  triple  walls  of  Lepanto,  and  that  of  the  Tocchi  over 
Vonitza.1 

The  brief  Servian  domination  over  Thessaly  was  destined 
soon  to  yield  before  the  advance  of  the  all-conquering  Turks. 
But  the  reigns  of  Simeon  Urosh  and  his  son  John,  who 
sought  to  live  as  men  of  peace  in  their  Thessalian  capital  of 
Trikkala,  have  bequeathed  to  modern  Greece  the  strangest 
of  all  her  mediaeval  monuments.  No  one  who  has  visited 
the  famous  monasteries  "in  air,"  the  weirdly  fantastic 
Metiora,  which  crown  the  needle-like  crags  of  the  grim 
valley  of  Kalabaka,  has  satisfactorily  answered  the  question, 
how  the  first  monk  ever  ascended  the  sheer  rocks  on  which 
they  are  built,  rocks  to  which  the  traveller  must  scale  by 
swinging  ladders,  unless  he  prefers  to  be  hauled  up,  fish-like, 
in  a  net  According  to  the  late  Abbot  of  Met^oron,  who 
published  a  history  of  the  twenty-four  monasteries,2  the 
origin  of  this  aerial  monastic  community  may  be  traced  to 
the  end  of  the  tenth  century,  when  a  monk  Andronikos,  or 
Athandsios,  established  himself  there  at  the  time  when  the 
great  Bulgarian  tsar  Samuel  was  ravaging  Thessaly.  The 
same  authority  ascribes  the  foundation  of  the  most  accessible 
of  the  five  still  inhabited  monasteries,  that  of  St  Stephen, 
to  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century,  and  the  monks 
there  related  to  the  present  author  how  the  pious  emperor, 
Andr6nikos  the  elder,  when  forced  to  abdicate,  had  come 
and  settled  for  a  little  time  there,  under  the  name  of 
Ant6nios,  giving  at  his  departure  a  considerable  sum  for 
the  extension  of  the  buildings.  According,  however,  to  a 
fifteenth  century   manuscript,  preserved  in   a   late  copy  at 

1  Cantacuzene,  iii.,  211,  310,  315-19;  Epirotica^  211-16;  Nikeph6ros 
Gregoras,  III.,  249,  557  ;  nopKi<r<rAt,  v.,  191. 
*  TA  MeWwpa. 


THE  MONASTERIES  OF  METEORA  2&5 

Met^ora,1  and  to  a  monkish  biography  recently  published  by 
Professor  Ldmpros,  it  was  the  Abbot  Neilos  of  Doupiane,  near 
the  picturesque  village  of  Kastrdki,  who,  in  1367,  first  built 
four  churches  in  the  caverns,  which  we  see  in  the  rocks  of  that 
wild  and  savage  valley  of  isolated  crags,  while  the  Athanisios 
who  "first  mounted  to  the  flat  top"  of  Met6oron  was  a 
contemporary  of  Simeon  Urosh,  who  had  been  taken  prisoner 
by  the  Catalans  when  a  lad  at  Neopatras.  In  any  case,  the 
monasteries  attained  their  zenith  under  the  Servian  rulers  of 
Thessaly.  John  Urosh,  who  had  been  on  Mount  Athos  as 
a  youth,  retired  from  the  world  to  the  pinnacle  of  Metioron, 
as  the  largest  of  the  monasteries  is  pre-eminently  called, 
leaving  two  deputies  to  govern  his  dominions.  The  humble 
fathers  received  him  with  gladness ;  we  can  easily  imagine 
the  delight  with  which  they  listened  to  his  tales  of  the 
career  of  politics  which  he  had  left,  just  as  their  modern 
successors  love  no  talk  so  much  as  that  of  the  stranger  newly 
arrived  from  a  ministerial  crisis  at  Athens.  By  his  energy 
and  influence  he  was  able  to  increase  the  importance  of  the 
monastery;  in  1388,  he  founded  the  present  church  of  the 
Transfiguration,  as  an  inscription  still  preserved  there  states ; 
while  his  genius  for  organisation  was  displayed  in  a  larger 
sphere  on  behalf  of  his  sister,  the  widowed  Lady  of  Joannina, 
and  in  the  less  exalted  task  of  managing  the  lands  which 
she  bestowed  on  the  monastery,  which  still  reverences  his 
portrait  with  that  of  Athandsios,  its  pious  founder.  After 
presiding  for  seventeen  years  over  the  community  as  "  father 
of  Met^oron,"  he  finally  became  Abbot — a  title  hitherto 
borne  by  no  head  of  the  Met£ora  monasteries,  which  had 
remained  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Abbot  of  Doupiane — 
and  was  consecrated  a  bishop  by  the  metropolitan  of  Larissa, 
when,  in  1393,  the  Turkish  Conquest  of  Thessaly  put  an  end 
to  his  temporal  power.     The  Abbot  of  Metdoron  became 

1  Translated  in  Revue  Archtologique  (1864),  157  sqq.9  N&w  'EXX^o- 
fLvJuwv,  ii.,  61  sqq.  There  is  no  authority  for  the  legend  that  a  much 
greater  man,  the  emperor  John  Cantacuzene,  was  "  King  Joseph,"  and 
arrived  at  Meteora  in  1368.  Not  only  the  MS.  but  the  EpiroHca  mention 
John  Urosh  by  that  title.  Col.  Leake  {Travels  in  Northern  Greece,  iv., 
539)  heard  the  same  tradition  from  the  monks,  and  the  note  to  Codinus, 
p.  286,  cannot  refer  to  Cantacuzene,  who  died  long  before  141 1,  but  to 
him.    A  MS.  now  in  the  National  Library  at  Athens  bears  his  autograph. 


i 


) 


296  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

the  president  of  a  monastic  federation,  of  which  the  other 
monasteries  were  members,  retaining  the  management  of 
their  internal  affairs — a  form  of  government  which  has  now 
ceased.  But  his  admirers  still  called  him  "  King  Joseph  " — 
the  monastic  name  which  he  had  assumed — from  the  re- 
membrance of  his  former  dignity,  and  he  died  in  141 1  in 
his  lonely  cell  far  above  the  intrigues  and  controversies  of 
his  time.  Such  was  the  euthanasia  of  the  last  Christian 
ruler  of  Thessaly. 

Meanwhile,  the  Catalan  duchy  of  Athens,  like  the 
principality  of  Achaia,  had  experienced  the  evils  of  a  weak 
and  absent  sovereign,  and  of  the  consequent  anarchy  which 
ensued.  We  saw  that,  in  1363,  in  response  to  the  Theban 
envoys,  Frederick  III.  of  Sicily  had  re-appointed  Moncada 
as  vicar-general  for  life,  and  had  sent  letters  to  the  community 
of  Thebes  and  to  Roger  de  Lluria,  bidding  them  obey  this 
tried  representative  of  the  duke.  But,  although  entrusted 
by  his  sovereign  with  very  wide  powers,  Moncada  does  not 
seem  to  have  occupied  himself  very  much  with  the  affairs  of 
the  duchy,  nor  even  to  have  revisited  it.  At  any  rate,  early 
in  1365,  he  was  still  only  preparing  to  sail  for  Greece,  where 
one  great  Catalan  magnate  after  another  acted  as  his  deputy. 
First  it  seems  to  have  been  James  Fadrique,  Count  of 
Salona,  the  former  vicar-general,  who  governed  in  his  stead  ; 
then,  after  Fadrique's  death  in  1365,  we  find  Roger  de  Lluria 
once  more  rehabilitated  and  negotiating  as  "marshal  and 
vicar-general"  with  the  Venetians  for  the  renewal  of  the 
treaty  of  peace  between  them  and  the  Company.  It  is 
characteristic  of  Venetian  policy  towards  the  Latin  states  of 
Greece,  that  the  republic  emphatically  rejected  Lluria's 
request  that  the  Company  might  be  allowed  to  fit  out  a  fleet 
at  its  own  expense  against  its  enemies.  He  was  reminded 
that  the  old  clause  prohibiting  the  growth  of  an  Athenian 
navy  was  still  in  force ;  thus  did  Venice  crush  the  efforts  of 
this  mediaeval  Themistoklfts,  as  in  our  own  time  the  Powers 
have  sealed  up  the  Russian  fleet  in  the  Black  Sea. 

A  letter  of  the  governor  of  Livadia  to  Frederick  III.  depicts 
in  dark  colours  the  condition  of  the  duchies  at  this  period. 
Menaced  from  without  by  the  Venetians  of  Euboea  and  the 
Turkish  peril,  the  Catalans  were  divided  among  themselves 


DISSENSIONS  IN  THE  DUCHIES  297 

by  party  strife,  which  paralysed  the  central  authority,  and 
caused  a  general  feeling  of  insecurity.     One  party  wished  to 
place   the  duchies   under  the  aegis  of  Genoa,  the  natural 
enemy  of  Venice,  while  a  rival  to  Lluria  had  arisen  in  the 
person  of  Pedro  de  Pou  (the  Catalan  equivalent  of  de  Puteo\ 
who  held  the  strong  castle  of  Lamia.     This  man  had  long 
exercised  the  chief  judicial  authority  in  the  duchies,  and  acted 
at  this  time  as  their  vicar  during  the  absence  of  Moncada. 
We  may  infer  that  the  absent  vicar-general  had  not  forgotten 
Lluria's  treasonable    alliance    with    the    Turks,  which    his 
master  had  not  dared  to  punish,  and  may  have  found  Pou 
a  more  loyal,  or,  at  any  rate,  a  more  supple  representative. 
Pou  was,  however,  a  grasping  and  ambitious  official,  as  well 
as  an  unjust  judge.     While  he  allowed  cases  to  be  protracted 
for  years,  while   he   seized   a   Greek   serf,  the   property  of 
another  Catalan,  and  sold  him  as  a  slave  to  Majorca,  his 
advice  to   Moncada  was  most  injurious  to  Lluria  and  his 
friends,   whose   castles  he  seized  during  an   Albanian   raid 
and  then  retained.     The  discontent  culminated  in  a  rising 
against  the  tyrant  in  the  summer  of  1366.      Pou,  his  wife, 
and  his  chief  followers  were  slain  ;  Moncada's  men  who  came 
to  avenge  them  were  killed ;  and  Lluria  once  more  acted  as 
vicar-general.     The  victors  sent  an  envoy  to  Sicily  to  justify 
their  conduct  to  their  duke,  who  wisely  granted   them  an 
amnesty,  which  he  had  no  power  to  refuse,  and  ordered  all 
confiscated   property  to   be  restored.      The   experiment  of 
allowing  the  vicar-general,  as  well  as  the  duke,  to  remain  in 
Sicily,  while  the  duchies  were  administered   by  the   vicar- 
general's  vicars,  had  proved  to  be  a  failure  ;  as  a  strong  man 
on  the  spot,  Lluria,  now  the  enemy  of  the  Turks,  was  the 
best  selection ;  after  some  hesitation,  due  to  the  difficulty  of 
solving  the  delicate  situation  created  by  Moncada's  absence 
in  Sicily,  the  natural  desire  not  to  offend  that  powerful  noble, 
and  an  equally  natural  distrust  of  Lluria,  King  Frederick 
came  to  a  decision,  which  was  perhaps  inevitable  under  the 
circumstances.      Moncada  was  removed,  and  in  May  1367, 
Lluria  was  formally  re-appointed   vicar-general  during  his 
sovereign's  good  pleasure,  in  consideration  of  his  "  strenuous 
defence  of  the  duchies  against  the   Parthians  (or  Turks)," 
when   he   had  "shirked   neither  danger  to  his   person   nor 


i 


1 


2&8  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

expense  to  his  pocket"  The  Thebans  must  have  smiled 
when  this  diplomatic  phrase  of  the  ducal  chancery  was 
read  to  them ;  but  it  was  the  age  and  country  of  rapid  changes 
of  policy,  and  Roger  de  Lluria  now  found  it  worth  while  to 
be  loyal.  Honours  were  heaped  upon  him  by  his  grateful,  or 
nervous,  master,  the  privileges  granted  to  him  by  the  last 
two  Dukes  of  Athens  were  confirmed,  and  thenceforth  to 
his  death  he  combined  the  double  qualities  of  marshal  and 
vicar-general  of  the  duchies.1 

The  declining  power  of  the  Catalan  duchies  inspired  the 
heirs  of  Walter  of  Brienne  with  the  idea  of  renewing  the 
attempt  which  he  had  made  so  unsuccessfully  nearly  forty 
years  before.  His  nephew,  Sohier  d'Enghien,  who  had 
borne  the  title  of  Duke  of  Athens,  had  perished  on  the 
scaffold  at  the  hands  of  the  regent  of  Hainault  in  1366  ;  but 
his  brothers,  Guy  of  Argos,  and  the  Counts  of  Lecce  and 
Conversano,  asked  the  Venetian  republic,  of  which  they 
were  honorary  citizens,  to  aid  them  in  the  recovery  of  Athens 
by  permitting  them  to  use  Negroponte  as  their  base.  The 
republic  coldly  replied  that  she  was  at  peace  with  the 
Catalans,  and  must  therefore  decline.  If  we  may  trust  a 
notice  in  the  Aragonese  Chronicle*  the  Count  of  Conversano, 
at  that  time  bailie  of  Achaia,  none  the  less  attacked  Athens 
with  an  army  from  Achaia,  and  temporarily  occupied  the 
whole  city  except  the  Akropolis.  But,  in  any  case,  through 
the  good  offices  of  the  bailie  of  Negroponte,  a  treaty  was 
made  between  the  vicar-general  and  the  lord  of  Argos,  by 
which  the  latter's  only  daughter  was  to  marry  Lluria's  son 
John,  and  Venice  was  to  receive  Megara  as  a  pledge  of  good 
faith.  The  marriage  did  not  take  place,  and  ten  years  later 
we  find  John  de  Lluria  a  prisoner  of  the  Count  of  Conver- 
sano.3 

From    some    mysterious    documents    preserved    in    the 

1  Rosario  Gregorio,  II.,  57-78 ;  Guardione,  Sul  Dominio  dei  Ducati 
di  Atene  e  NeopcOria  22-4 ;  Lampros,  "Eyypa^a,  234-8,  254-61,  283, 
302,  328,  343  (whence  it  is  clear  that  Pou  was  slain  before  August  3, 
1366,  when  Lluria  first  re-appears  as  acting  vicar-general).  Cf.  the 
author's  article  in  the  Eng.  Hist  Review^  xxii.,  519. 

9  P.  155. 

8  Rubi6  y  LIuch,  Los  Navarros,  437,  440 ;  Predelli,  Commetnoruiliy 
III.,  96  ;  St  Genois,  L,  41. 


COLONIAL  SPIRIT  OP  INDEPENDENCE       299 

Vatican  archives,  it  would  appear  that  another  and  much 
more  elaborate  matrimonial  alliance  was  being  projected  at 
this  time  for  the  purpose  of  reconciling  the  claims  of  the 
house  of  Enghien  to  Athens  with  the  ducal  dominion 
exercised  over  it  by  the  King  of  Sicily.  The  idea  was  to 
marry  Gautier  d'Enghien,  now  titular  Duke  of  Athens,  to 
Constance,  daughter  of  John  of  Randazzo  and  first  cousin 
of  King  Frederick.  This  intrigue  occupied  a  number  of 
celestial  minds,  but  without  result  It  proves,  at  least,  the 
tenacity  of  the  claims  put  forward  even  at  this  late  date  by 
the  heirs  of  the  last  French  Duke  of  Athens.1 

The  domestic  quarrels  of  the  Catalans  broke  out  again 
on  the  death  of  Roger  de  Lluria  in  1370,  and  the  mutual 
jealousies  of  the  leading  men  were  increased  by  the  practice 
of  sending  strangers  from  Sicily  to  fill  the  most  important 
posts  in  the  duchies  for  life,  or  during  good  pleasure.  Thus 
at  this  time,  both  the  vicar-general  and  the  captain  of "  the 
castle  of  Athens,"  belonged  to  the  great  Sicilian  family  of 
Peralta,  connected  by  marriage  with  the  royal  house,  but 
newcomers  to  Greece.2  The  Catalans  had  now  been  estab- 
lished for  two  generations  at  Athens,  and  they  felt,  like  most 
colonies  after  that  period,  that  the  mother  country  should 
intervene  as  little  as  possible  in  their  affairs,  and  that  the 
best  places  should  be  held  by  the  colonists.  Being  not  only 
a  colony,  but  a  military  commonwealth,  they  preferred  that 
tenure  of  office  should  be  short,  so  that  those  places  should 
go  round.  Frederick  III.,  docile  as  usual,  granted  both  their 
requests ;  the  captain  of  the  Akropolis  was  removed  because 
he  had  been  three  years — the  old  constitutional  period — in 
office  ;  henceforth  the  community  of  Athens  was  to  elect  its 
own  captain  from  among  the  body  of  Athenian  citizens, 
merely  subject  to  the  duke's  confirmation.  A  similar 
arrangement  was  made  at  Livadia,  whose  governor  had 
received  and  held  all  the  three  offices  of  caste  llano,  veguer, 
and  captain,  as  the  reward  for  his  services  as  a  peacemaker 
during  the  barons'  war,  which  had  begun  after  Lluria's 
demise.     These  offices  were  now  separated,  as.  the  Catalans 

1  Limpros,  "Eyypa^a,  82-8,  and  Eng .  Hist.  Review,  loc.  eit. 
'l  Matteo  de  Peralta  was  appointed  March  31,  1 370  (Lampros,  'Eyypa^a, 
314.     Cf.  Ibid.,  273,  317). 


i 


I 


300  THE  RISE  OP  THE  ACCIAJUOL1 

desired ;  but  so  morose  was  the  reply  of  the  people  of 
Livadia,  when  asked  to  submit  the  names  of  their  new 
officials,  that  the  king  took  the  matter  into  his  own  hands.1 

A  few  lines  about  the  Venetian  colonies  will  complete 
this  sketch  of  Greece  in  the  second  half  of  the  fourteenth 
century.  The  importance  which  the  republic  attached  to 
Modon  and  Coron  may  be  inferred  from  the  minute  regula- 
tions for  their  government,  the  so-called  "Statutes  and 
Capitulations,"  which  begin  with  this  period.  The  two 
Messenian  stations  suffered,  like  the  rest  of  the  world,  from 
the  Black  Death,  so  that  it  was  necessary  to  send  a  fresh 
batch  of  colonists  from  home,  and  the  franchise  was  extended 
to  all  the  inhabitants,  except  the  Jews.  A  curious  regulation 
forbade  the  Venetian  garrison  to  wear  beards,  so  as  to 
distinguish  them  from  the  Greeks.  We  still  hear  complaints 
of  the  maltreatment  of  the  Greek  peasants  there,  and  their 
consequent  emigration  into  the  Frankish  territory ;  but  they 
now  had  influential  spokesmen  in  the  Greek  bishops,  who 
were  permitted  to  reside  in  their  ancient  sees  by  the  side  of 
their  Catholic  colleagues.  One  of  the  latter,  however,  St 
Peter  Thomas,  effected  many  conversions,  and  even  in  that 
age,  when  the  ecclesiastics  wielded  the  greatest  influence  in 
Frankish  Greece,  his  authority  with  the  great  nobles  of 
Achaia  was  exceptional.  Though  usually  more  peaceful  than 
the  neighbouring  states,  the  Venetian  colonies  were  affected 
by  the  war  between  the  republic  and  Genoa,  which  lasted 
from  1350  to  1355.  In  1347  the  Genoese  had  recovered  from 
the  Byzantines  the  rich  mastic  island  of  Chios,  and  entrusted 
its  administration  to  a  chartered  company,  or  maona,  which 
continued  to  manage  it  for  more  than  200  years.  This  step, 
and  the  exclusion  of  their  commerce  from  the  Black  Sea, 
irritated  the  Venetians,  who  sent  a  fleet  to  the  Levant,  which 
made  Negroponte  the  base  of  its  operations.  The  large 
harbour  between  the  classic  bay  of  Aulis,  where  the  Greek 
fleet  had  assembled  before  sailing  for  Troy,  and  the  Skdla 
of  Oropos,  was  the  scene  of  a  Genoese  defeat ;  but  the 
vanquished  retaliated  by  burning  the  Venetian  and  Jewish 
quarters  of  Negroponte  and  hanging  up  the  keys  of  the  town 
before  the  gates  of  Chios.     The  Venetians  now  induced  both 

1  L&npros,  "Eyy/xx^a,  249-52,  3 1 9-2 1. 


WAR  BETWEEN  GENOA  AND  VENICE       301 

John  Cantacuzene  and  Pedro  IV.  of  Aragon,  whose  rule  over 
Sardinia  had  been  undermined  by  Genoese  intrigues,  to  join 
them  in  crushing  the  common  enemy.  The  King  of  Aragon's 
action  naturally  predisposed  the  Catalans  of  Attica  to  take 
the  same  side  as  their  fellow-countrymen  ;  but  Pedro  declined 
to  assist  until  Venice  had  paid  to  Muntaner*s  heirs  the 
compensation  due  for  the  loss  sustained  by  the  Catalan 
chronicler  at  Negroponte  half  a  century  earlier.  The  aid  of  a 
Catalan  force  from  Athens  and  Thebes  enabled  the  Venetians 
to  repel  a  Genoese  attack  on  the  fortress  of  Oreos,  then  a 
strong  place,  though  now  a  mere  ruin;  but  Pteleon,  the 
importance  of  which  had  much  increased  of  late,  was  exposed 
to  the  forays  of  the  invaders,  who  also  landed  in  the  famous 
harbour  of  Navarino,  and  plundered  the  Venetians.  Now 
that  the  Genoese  family  of  Zaccaria  had  become  barons  in 
the  Morea,  it  was  inevitable  that  a  war  between  the  two  rival 
republics  should  involve  hostilities  between  it  and  the 
garrisons  of  the  two  Messenian  colonies.1  So  risky  had 
official  posts  in  Greece  become,  that  Venice  found  it  neces- 
sary to  raise  the  salaries  of  her  governors  of  Modon  and 
Coron,  and  of  her  councillors  at  Negroponte,  in  order  to 
attract  good  men. 

The  damage  done  to  Negroponte  was  soon  repaired,  and 
the  war  served  to  strengthen  the  growing  power  of  Venice 
over  the  island.  Indeed,  Nikeph6ros  Gregorys,  who  himself 
visited  the  island  during  the  war,  remarks  that  "  Eubcea  has 
now  been  subject  to  the  Venetians  for  many  years."  The 
population  had  been  increased  by  many  fugitives  from 
Thessaly  after  the  Catalan  conquest  of  Athens,  and  there, 
too,  all  the  natives  of  the  city,  except  the  Jews,  now 
received  the  Venetian  franchise  after  ten  years'  residence. 
Even  the  Jews,  who  had  had  to  pay  for  fortifying  the  town  of 
Negroponte  more  securely  against  the  Turks,  preferred  to 

1  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  i.,  333 ;  Nikeph6ros  Gregoris,  ii.,  878 ;  in., 
42-4,  46-51  ;  Cantacuzene,  iii.,  209;  Cortusii  and  M.  Villani,  afiud 
Muratori,  xii.,  935-6  ;  xiv.,  82  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  ii.,  204,  206, 
215,  231,  248  ;  Sdthas,  Up^eta,  iv.,  6.  Nikeph6ros  Gregoris  in  the  first 
passage  quoted  gives  "  Oreos  "  as  the  scene  of  the  naval  battle  instead 
of  "  Oropos,"  which  appears  in  the  second.  But  "  Oropos  "  is  obviously 
correct,  as  "  Oreos  "  is  far  too  much  to  the  north. 


i 


302  THE  RISE  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI 

be  under  the  direct  authority  of  the  bailie,  to  whom  they 
now  paid  nearly  ^90,  in  taxes,  instead  of  remaining  "  Jews 
of  the  Lombards/'  to  whom  they  had  paid  only  half  that 
sum.  The  triarchs,  now  reduced  to  two  —  one  a  Ghisi,  the 
other  a  Dalle  Carceri — no  longer  opposed  the  republic, 
though  they  occasionally  complained  that  the  bailie  inter- 
fered with  them  and  even  quashed  the  decisions  of  their 
judge  ;  but  feudal  disputes  were  referred  by  common  consent 
to  the  Latin  patriarch  of  Constantinople,  who,  as  we  saw, 
now,  ex-officio,  held  the  see  of  Negroponte,  and  must,  by  that 
fact,  have  conferred  dignity  upon  the  island.  Upon  the 
triarchs  was  shifted  the  cost  of  fitting  out  the  Euboean  galleys 
— a  burden  subsequently  shared  between  them  and  Venice — 
while  the  bailie  appointed  the  collectors  of  customs.  Two 
of  the  chief  fortresses  of  the  island  passed,  too,  into  Venetian 
hands — Larmena  and  the  "  red  castle  "  of  Karystos.  Venice 
had  long  striven  to  obtain  the  latter  coveted  position,  even 
to-day  a  noble  ruin,  and  then  so  strong  that  it  could  be 
defended  by  some  thirty  men-at-arms  ;  at  last,  in  1365,  after 
many  attempts,  she  bought  the  whole  barony,  serfs  and  all, 
from  Bonifacio  Fadrique,  for  6000  ducats.1 

Thus,  the  chief  results  of  the  forty  years  which  have 
been  described  in  this  chapter,  were  the  revival  of  Greek 
influence  in  the  Peloponnese,  thanks  to  the  statesmanship  of 
the  Cantacuzenes ;  and  the  rise  of  the  Acciajuoli  as  a  force 
in  Greece,  thanks  to  the  shrewdness  of  a  Florentine  banker. 
At  Athens,  the  ultimate  goal  of  the  latter's  family,  the 
Catalans  have  grown  feeble  and  disunited ;  in  Epiros  and 
Thessaly,  Serb  and  Albanian  have  displaced  alike  Frank 
and  Hellene ;  while  the  Turk  is  waiting  his  time  to  supplant 
all  four  Christian  races.  In  the  Ionian  islands  a  new  and 
virile  Italian  dynasty  has  been  founded ;  while  Venice  has 
tightened  her  hold  on  her  Greek  colonies.  Such  is  the 
picture  which  Greece  presents  to  us  in  1373. 

1  Hopf,  Karystos,  602-6  ;  Arch,  Veneto^  xx.,  90. 


1 


CHAPTER  X 

THE   NAVARRESE  COMPANY  ( 1 373- 1 388) 

The  fast  approaching  Turkish  danger  ought  to  have  aroused 
all  the  Latins  of  the  Levant  to  present  a  united  front 
against  the  common  foe,  whom  concerted  action  might  have 
kept  at  a  distance.  But  the  motley  population  of  the 
Balkan  peninsula  had  then,  as  now,  no  common  bond 
which  would  prevent  them  from  sacrificing  the  general 
welfare  to  some  temporary  advantage.  Thus  the  Byzantine 
emperor,  John  V.  Palaiol6gos,  instead  of  joining  the  Serbs 
and  Bulgarians  in  a  league  against  Mur&d  I.,  had  contracted 
a  selfish  alliance  with  the  Sultan,  which  had  not  even  the 
merit  of  saving  him  from  the  ignominy  of  sacrificing  his 
honour  in  Venice  and  the  religion  of  his  ancestors  in  Rome 
for  the  vain  hope  of  aid  from  the  West.  The  new  pope, 
Gregory  XL,  was,  however,  so  much  moved  by  "the  tearful 
exposition"  of  the  Archbishop  of  Neopatras,  who  told  him 
how  the  Turks  had  subdued  and  held  enslaved  the  Greek 
Christians  almost  up  to  the  frontiers  of  the  principality  of 
Achaia  and  the  duchy  of  Athens,  and  threatened  the  very 
existence  of  those  states,  that  he  summoned  the  Christian 
rulers  of  the  East  to  a  congress  to  be  held  at  Thebes  on 
1st  October  1373.  The  papal  invitation  was  addressed  to 
the  real  emperor,  John  V.,  and  to  the  titular  emperor,  Philip 
III.;  to  the  republics  of  Venice  and  Genoa;  to  the  Knights 
of  St  John ;  to  the  kings  of  Cyprus,  Hungary,  and  Sicily ; 
to  the  last  named's  vicar-general  of  the  duchies  of  Athens  and 
Neopatras;  Niccold  III.  dalle  Carceri,  Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago ;  Leonardo  Tocco,  Duke  of  Leucadia ;  Nerio  Accia- 
juoli,  "  Prince  of  Corinth ; "  Francesco  Giorgio,  Marquis  of 
Boudonitza  ;  Francesco  Gattalusio,  "  Prince  of  Mytilene " ; 
and  Ermolao  Minotto,  lord  of  little  Seriphos.     We  can  well 

308 


\ 


304  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

imagine  how  the  ancient  city  of  Thebes  was  enlivened  by 
the  arrival  of  these  more  or  less  eminent  persons,  or  their 
plenipotentiaries,  how  union  against  the  infidel  was  preached 
by  the  Archbishops  of  Neopatras  and  Naxos,  how  their 
excellent  advice  was  loudly  applauded,  and  how  personal 
jealousies  conspired  to  render  abortive  the  resolutions  of  the 
congress,  just  as  they  have  marred  those  of  every  subsequent 
congress  on  the  Eastern  question.  Scarcely  had  the  delegates 
separated,  when  Nerio  Acciajuoli,  the  boldest  and  astutest 
of  them  all,  disregarding  the  pope's  appeal  to  him  as  a 
champion  of  Christendom,  seized  the  excuse  afforded  by 
the  Company's  refusal  to  hand  over  some  of  his  fugitive 
vassals,  to  attack  Megara  and  to  make  himself  master  of 
that  important  position  on  the  way  to  Athens.  It  is 
remarkable  as  a  proof  that  Catalan  rule  was  not  altogether 
unpopular  in  Greece,  that  one  of  its  warmest  defenders  was 
a  Greek  notary,  Dem&rios  Rendi,  who  a  few  years  before 
had  received  the  Catalan  franchise  and  a  grant  of  lands 
from  Frederick  III.,  and  afterwards  rose  to  wealth  and 
importance  at  Athens.  But,  in  all  countries  governed  by 
foreigners,  there  are  always  natives  bound  by  ties  of  interest 
to  the  governing  class.  Nerio  returned  with  some  distin- 
quished  captives  to  Corinth ;  Megara  remained  in  his 
power,  and  its  bishop  was  glad  to  find  a  living  as  priest  of 
the  chapel  of  St  Bartholomew,  which  was  in  the  governor's 
palace  on  the  Akropolis.  So  weak  was  the  once  famous 
Company  that  it  could  not  protect  its  own  territory  from  the 
upstart  Florentine.  Disturbances,  which  broke  out  on  the 
death  of  Matteo  de  Peralta,  the  vicar-general,  in  the  following 
year,  prevented  reprisals ;  in  his  place,  the  various  communi- 
ties of  the  duchies,  without  waiting  for  orders  from  Sicily, 
unanimously  elected  Louis  Fadrique,  Count  of  Salona  and 
grandson  of  the  famous  Alfonso,  an  excellent  appointment — 
for  Fadrique  was  now  the  most  important  member  of  the 
old  colonial  families — which  Frederick  III.  did  not  fail  to 
ratify.1      He    was    wise  to  waive  the   irregularity    of    the 

1  Raynaldus,  vii.,  224  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  218-20; 
Jauna,  Histoire  generate  des  royaumes  de  Chypre,  etc.y  ii.,  882  ;  Rubi6  y 
Lluch,  Los  NavarroSy  464,  465,  474  ;  Lrimpros  '%yypa<f>a9  286,  289-90,  298, 
3°°>  323,  342. 


DISPUTED  SUCCESSION  AT  ATHENS         305 

election,  for   Fadrique    had    restored   order  to    his    Greek 
states. 

The  death  of  that  weak  monarch,  in  1377,  led  to  a 
complete  change  in  the  ducal  dynasty.  Frederick  III., 
dying  without  legitimate  sons,  bequeathed  the  duchies  to 
his  young  daughter  Maria ;  but  the  succession  was  disputed 
by  his  brother-in-law,  King  Pedro  IV.  of  Aragon,  who 
appealed  to  the  principal  of  the  Salic  law  as  laid  down  by 
Frederick  II.  The  prospect  of  having  a  girl  at  their  head 
was  naturally  displeasing  to  the  Catalans  of  Athens  at  a 
moment  when  the  Turkish  danger  was  imminent  It  was 
no  wonder,  then,  that  all  the  three  archbishops — Ballester  of 
Athens,  Simon  of  Thebes,  and  Matthew  of  Neopatras — and 
the  principal  barons  and  knights  at  once  declared  for  Pedro 
IV.  Among  them  were,  first  and  foremost,  the  vicar-general, 
Louis  Fadrique,  Count  of  Salona  and  lord  of  Lamia,  with 
his  cousin,  Don  John  of  Aragon;  the  Count  of  Mitre,  or 
Demetrias,  on  the  Gulf  of  Volo,  who  kept  1500  Albanian 
horsemen  in  his  pay,  and  enjoyed  the  privilege  of  bearing  the 
royal  standard  ;  the  governors  of  the  four  important  military 
positions  of  Athens,  Livadia,  Salona,  and  Neopatras;  the 
two  brothers  Puigpardines,  lords  of  Karditza  and  Atalante ; 
Pedro  de  Ballester,  who  held  the  sordid  village  of  Kapraina, 
which  has  grown  up  on  the  site  of  Chaironeia;  and 
Melissen6  Novelles,  half-Greek,  half-Catalan,  whose  castle 
bore  the  name  of  Estafiol.  There  was,  however,  a  minority 
in  favour  of  Maria  of  Sicily,  the  leader  of  which  was 
Francesco  Giorgio,  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  who  was 
naturally  eager  to  shake  off  his  vassalage  to  the  vicar-general, 
and  who,  as  a  Venetian,  had  no  sympathy  with  the  Catalans. 
With  him  were  Don  Pedro  Fadrique,  lord  of  iEgina,  whose 
rebellion  caused  him  to  forfeit  his  island  to  his  cousin,  the 
vicar-general ;  and  Thomas  de  Pou,  a  son-in-law  of  Roger 
de  Lluria.  The  burgesses,  anxious  for  security,  supported 
the  King  of  Aragon.1 

1  C^urita,  Anales,  II.,  377  ;  Indices>  350-1  ;  Rubio  y  Lluch,  Los 
NavarroS)  265,  266,  436,  440-2,  447-9,  477,  482.  The  latter  shows  from 
the  Aragonese  documents,  that  "  Don  Louis  de  Aragon,  Count  of  Malta," 
whom  (Jurita  quotes  as  a  separate  person,  is  none  other  than  Don  Louis 
Fadrique. 

U 


306  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

The  Aragonese  party,  represented  by  the  vicar-general 
and  the  governor  of  Athens,  sent  two  envoys  to  Pedro  IV.'s 
court,  informing  him  that  the  people  of  the  duchies  awaited 
his  commands,  and  craving  him  to  appoint  someone  as  his 
representative  there.  The  king  replied,  thanking  the  vicar- 
general  and  the  governor  for  their  faithful  services,  and 
requesting  them  to  remain  in  office  until  the  arrival  of  the 
new  vicar-general.  For  that  post  he  selected,  in  1379, 
Philip  Dalmau,  Viscount  of  Rocaberti,  whose  appointment  he 
notified  to  the  authorities  and  communities  of  Thebes, 
Athens,  Livadia,  Neopatras,  and  Siderokastron.  At  the 
same  time,  he  sent  Berenguer  Ballester  of  Thebes,  one 
of  the  envoys,  back  to  the  duchies,  requesting  that  he 
might  return,  together  with  some  other  suitable  person, 
authorised  to  offer  their  homage  to  the  new  "  Duke  of  Athens 
and  Neopatras."1 

At  this  moment,  however,  another  competitor  appeared 
in  the  Catalan  duchies.  The  origin  of  the  Navarrese 
Company,  which  now  attempted  to  repeat  the  exploits  of  the 
Catalan  Company  seventy  years  earlier,  is  still  obscure.  But 
it  seems  probable  that  it  resembled  that  of  its  more  famous 
predecessor.  Employed  by  King  Charles  II.  of  Navarre  in 
his  struggle  with  Charles  V.  of  France,  the  Navarrese 
Company  found  no  further  occupation  at  home  when  the  two 
enemies  made  peace  in  1366,  just  as  the  Catalans  were  no 
longer  able  to  practise  their  profession  in  Sicily  after  the 
peace  between  the  houses  of  Anjou  and  Aragon  in  1302. 
But  Don  Louis,  the  adventurous  brother  of  the  King  of 
Navarre,  had  just  married  the  Duchess  of  Durazzo,  who  had 
inherited  the  claims  of  her  grandfather,  John  of  Gravina,  to 
Albania,  and  when,  in  1368,  the  Albanians  captured  Durazzo, 
and  with  it  the  last  vestige  of  Angevin  rule  over  their  country, 
the  chivalrous  Louis  naturally  set  about  making  preparations 
to  recover  his  wife's  lost  dominions.  A  body  of  800 
Navarrese  and  Gascons,  mostly  men  of  good  family,  had 
accompanied  him  to  Naples,  where  his  wife  resided ;  more 
followed,  and  a  further  force  of  400  was  furnished  him  by  the 
King  of  Navarre,  by  the  latter's  chamberlain,  Mahiot  de 
Coquerel,  whom  we  shall  later  on  find  as  bailie  of  Achaia, 
1  Rubi6  y  Lluch,  Los  Navarros,  444-5 1. 


JACQUES  DE  BAUX  307 

and  others.  But  the  death  of  Don  Louis  in  1376  put  an  end 
to  his  plans  for  the  reconquest  of  Durazzo,1  and  we  hear  no 
more  of  the  Navarrese  Company  till  1380.  In  that  year, 
Jacques  de  Baux,  titular  emperor  of  Constantinople  and 
Prince  of  Achaia,  thought  that  the  moment  had  come  to 
occupy  the  Greek  dominions,  which  should  have  been  his, 
and  that  the  Navarrese  Company  would  be  the  best 
instrument  for  his  purpose. 

Philip  III.  had  died,  like  his  brother,  without  children, 
in  1373,  so  that  his  title  of  Emperor  of  Constantinople  and 
his  principality  of  Achaia  should  have  passed  to  his  nephew, 
Jacques  de  Baux,  son  of  his  sister,  the  widow  of  King 
Edward  Baliol  of  Scotland,  who  had  subsequently  married 
Francois  de  Baux,  Duke  of  Andria,  in  Apulia,  a  member  of  a 
distinguished  Provencal  family,  which  had  followed  the 
fortunes  of  Charles  I.  of  Anjou  to  Naples,  and  had  attained 
to  high  dignities  under  the  Angevin  rule.  The  Baux  were 
already  connected  with  Achaia,  where  Jacques's  grandfather 
had  been  twice  bailie  for  the  Empress  Catherine  of  Valois, 
and  at  first  the  barons  recognised  his  mother  as  their  lawful 
princess.  Indeed,  during  the  civil  war  between  the  Baux 
and  Queen  Joanna  I.  of  Naples,  who  twice  drove  Jacques's 
rebellious  father  from  her  kingdom,  the  son  found  a 
temporary  refuge,  and  perhaps  recognition,  in  Greece.  But 
as  one  of  her  numerous  husbands  had  been  the  son  of  King 
James  II.  of  Majorca,  and  therefore  a  direct  descendant  of  the 
Villehardouins,  Joanna  might  advance  some  sort  of  claim  to 
the  principality,  to  which  he  had  already  been  a  pretender. 
It  seems  probable  that  there  had  always  been  a  party  favour- 
able to  his  pretensions,  for  it  is  remarkable  that  among  the 
envoys  whom  the  barons  sent  in  1 374  to  offer  the  princely 
dignity  to  Queen  Joanna,  was  the  same  £rard  le  Noir,  who 
had  signed  the  similar  document  to  the  King  of  Majorca 
thirty  years  earlier.  The  embassy,  which  was  very  repre- 
sentative— for  it  included  Leonardo  Tocco,  Count  of 
Cephalonia,  and,  as  such,  one  of  the  peers  of  the  principality, 
and  the  two  great  barons,  Centurione  Zaccaria  and  Janni 
Misito — informed  the  queen  that  they  would  accept  her  as 
their  princess  on  condition  that  she  promised  to  maintain 
1  Rubio  y  Lluch,  Los  Navarros,  251,  254,  428,  430-5  ;  Curita,  II.,  377. 


f. 


308  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

their  old  constitution,  or,  in  other  words,  leave  them  alone. 
The  queen  naturally  agreed  to  such  easy  terms,  took  the 
oath  and  the  title  of  princess,  and  sent  a  bailie  to  govern  in 
her  name.  This  official  was,  however,  a  restless  man,  who 
not  only  broke  the  long  peace  between  the  principality  and 
the  Despot  Manuel  of  MistrA,  by  besieging  the  oft-mentioned 
castle  of  Gardiki  in  the  pass  of  Makryplagi,  but  also  irritated 
the  Venetians  by  raising  a  question  as  to  the  boundaries  of 
their  Messenian  colonies.  The  queen  was  willing  to  refer 
this  dispute  to  a  joint  commission,  and  told  her  bailie  to 
treat  the  Venetians  properly;  but  she  had  already  grown 
tired  of  what  had  turned  out  to  be  a  troublesome  possession ; 
so,  when  she  had  taken  a  fourth  husband,  Otto  of  Brunswick, 
in  1 376,  she  conferred  the  principality  upon  him,  and,  in  the 
following  year,  they  pawned  it  to  the  Knights  of  the  Hospital 
of  St  John  of  Jerusalem  for  five  years,  in  consideration  of  an 
annual  payment  of  4000  ducats.1 

The  Knights  of  St  John  were  no  strangers  in  the  Morea. 
Like  the  Templars  and  the  Teutonic  Knights,  they  had 
received  four  fiefs  there  at  the  time  of  the  Conquest,  and  the 
possessions  of  the  Templars  had  passed  to  them  on  the 
dissolution  of  that  order  in  131 2.  On  the  roll  of  1364,  we 
find  two  castles  belonging  to  them ;  a  little  earlier, 
Innocent  VI.  had  suggested  that  they  should  move  from 
Rhodes,  which  had  been  their  headquarters  since  1309,  to 
the  Peloponnese,  and  defend  it  against  the  Turks.  Their 
grand-master  at  this  time  was  Juan  Fernandez  de  Heredia, 
a  noble  and  adventurous  Spaniard,  who  had  won  the  favour 
of  Innocent  VI.,  had  become  "  the  right  arm  of  the  Avignon 
papacy,"  had  fought  against  the  Black  Prince  at  Poitiers, 
and  had  lately  escorted  Gregory  XI.  to  Rome,  when  that 
pontiff,  in  obedience  to  St  Catherine  of  Siena,  ended  the 
"Babylonish  captivity"  and  returned  to  the  widowed  city. 
The  barons,  notably  the  Venetian  Archbishop  of  Patras, 
welcomed  the  advent  of  so  distinguished  a  soldier,  who 
seemed  a  heaven-sent  defender  of  their  threatened  land.  A 
new  and  vigorous  race  of  invaders  had  now  appeared  to 
contest  the  country  with  the  remnant  of  the  Franks.     Since 

1  Ducange,  II.,  292-4;  L.  <L  F.y  155-9  (which  ends  here);  Predelli, 
Commetnoriali,  III.,  129-31  ;  Costanzo,  Start  a  del  Regno  di  Napoliy  1 1.,  21. 


HEREDIA  IN  GREECE  309 

the  collapse  of  the  Despotat  of  Epiros,  and  the  establishment 
of  two  Albanian  chieftains  on  its  ruins,  the  north  of  Achaia 
had  been  menaced  by  an  Albanian  immigration,  as  well  as 
by  Turkish  raids.  The  very  year  after  the  Knights  had 
acquired  the  principality,  one  of  those  chieftains,  Ghin  (or 
John)  Boua  Spata,  who  had  already  seized  the  possessions 
of  the  rival  clan  of  Liosa  at  Arta  upon  the  death  of  its  chief 
by  the  plague,  and  had  thus  united  iEtolia  and  Akarnania 
in  his  own  person,  captured  Lepanto,  and  thus  destroyed  the 
last  vestige  of  Angevin  rule  on  the  continent  of  Greece. 
For  over  eighty  years  the  French  lilies  had  waved  over  the 
triple  fortifications  of  that  celebrated  castle ;  it  had  been  part 
of  the  dowry  which  Philip  of  Taranto  had  received  in  1294 
with  the  unhappy  Thamar ;  now  it  had  gone,  and  an 
Albanian  chieftain  held  one  of  the  keys  of  the  Corinthian 
Gulf.  Heredia  judged  that  this  insult  must  be  avenged  ;  he 
crossed  the  gulf,  and  recaptured  Lepanto.  But  his  imprison- 
ment by  the  Black  Prince  after  the  battle  of  Poitiers  had  not 
taught  him  prudence ;  he  marched  rashly  into  the  heart  of 
the  enemy's  country,  intending  to  take  Arta,  was  defeated 
by  the  Albanians,  and  brought  as  a  prisoner  to  Spata.  The 
chieftain  was  "a  man  of  thought  and  action,  in  all  things 
distinguished,  and  of  striking  beauty " ;  but,  with  all  these 
qualities,  he  lacked  generosity,  and,  without  hesitation,  he 
sold  his  noble  captive  to  the  Turks.  In  spite  of  the  efforts 
of  the  Knights,  assisted  by  the  money  of  the  Archbishop  of 
Patras,  to  retain  the  important  position  of  Lepanto,  it  fell 
again  into  the  possession  of  the  redoubtable  Spata.1  Heredia, 
after  languishing  for  two  years  in  prison,  was  ransomed  in 
1 381,  and  returned  to  the  Morea. 

Meanwhile,  the   lawful  heir  of  that  principality  thought 

1  Epirotica,  221,  223;  Gerland,  Neue  Quellen,  43;  Miklosich  und 
Muller>  ii.,  11  ;  Bosio  (De/F  Istoria  delta  Sacra  Religione  .  .  .  di  S.  Gio. 
Gierosolno.y  II.,  126-9)  gives  a  very  picturesque,  but  mostly  inaccurate, 
account  of  Heredia's  campaign  in  Greece,  making  him  scale  the  walls  of 
Patras  and  slay  the  Turkish  (I)  commander  with  his  own  hand.  Heredia 
then  proceeds  against  Corinth,  but  is  captured  by  the  Turks,  who  obtain 
back  Patras  as  part  of  his  ransom.  It  need  scarcely  be  said,  that  in  1378 
Patras  was  not  Turkish,  nor  had  the  Turks  "  lately  taken  the  Morea." 
Bosio  tells  us,  however,  on  the  authority  of  the  documents  of  the  Order, 
of  Heredia's  captivity  in  Albania,  and  of  his  release  in  1381. 


310  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

that  his  hour  of  triumph  had  come.  His  rival,  Queen  Joanna 
of  Naples,  had  recently  been  deposed  by  Pope  Urban  VI., 
and  in  Greece  circumstances  seemed  peculiarly  favourable 
to  the  claimant's  plans ;  in  Achaia,  the  Knights  of  St  John 
were  growing  tired  of  their  lease;  in  Attica  there  was  a 
disputed  succession.  As  instruments  of  his  policy,  Jacques  de 
Baux  naturally  chose  the  men  of  the  disoccupied  Navarrese 
Company,  who  probably  regarded  him  with  favour  as  the 
husband  of  their  late  leader's  sister-in-law.  For  him,  they 
took  Corfu  from  Queen  Joanna's  officials ;  and  then  directed 
their  steps,  early  in  1 380,  towards  Attica.  There  were  special 
reasons  for  attacking  the  Catalan  duchy.  The  Navarrese  had 
an  old  grudge  against  Pedro  IV.,  who  had  imprisoned  their 
late  beloved  leader ;  Baux,  as  the  uncle  of  Maria  of  Sicily, 
regarded  Pedro  as  an  usurper ;  while  he  was  also  connected 
with  the  family  of  Enghien,  who  were  claimants  to  the  duchy ; 
moreover,  as  Prince  of  Achaia,  he  might  claim  suzerainty 
over  Attica,  as  some  of  his  predecessors  had  done,  while,  as 
titular  emperor,  he  could  cast  the  shadow  of  his  authority 
over  the  whole  Latin  Orient. 

The  Navarrese  Company  was  under  the  command  of 
Mahiot  de  Coquerel  and  Pedro  de  S.  Superan,  surnamed 
Bordo,  either  because  he  had  received  the  freedom  of 
Bordeaux  from  our  Black  Prince,  or,  as  is  more  probable, 
because  he  was  a  "  bastard  "  (port),  like  so  many  other  famous 
commanders  of  the  Middle  Ages.1  These  experienced  person- 
ages found  valuable  auxiliaries  in  the  leaders  of  the  Sicilian 
party.  The  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  whose  castle  com- 
manded the  defile  of  Thermopylae,  allowed  them  to  pass 
beneath  his  walls  and  assisted  their  enterprise ;  Niccol6  III. 
dalle  Carceri,  Duke  of  the  Archipelago  and  lord  of  two  out 
of  the  three  great  baronies  of  Euboea,  was  their  ally,  hoping 
by  means  of  their  swords  to  make  himself  master  of  the 
city  of  Negroponte.  From  the  Morea,  the  Knights  of  St 
John  came  to  pillage  the  distracted  duchy  of  Athens,  where 
they  possessed  a  stronghold,  in  the  castle  of  Sykaminon  ;  and 
it  seems  probable  that  the  Count  of  Conversano  had  made  a 
second  attack  upon  the  lawful  heritage  of  his  house,  for  at 
the  time  of  the  Navarrese  invasion,  John  de  Lluria  of  Thebes 

1  Ducange's  note  to  Cinnamus    392 ;  Rubi6,  oi>.  cit}  309,  n.  2. 


NAVARRESE  CONQUESTS  IN  B(E0T1A         811 

had  been  already  two  years  his  prisoner.  Added  to  these 
misfortunes  were  the  mutual  jealousies  of  that  city  and 
Athens,  which  had  recently  aimed  at  some  form  of  autonomy, 
and  had  chafed  at  being  regarded  as  inferior  to  the  capital  in 
Bceotia.  Finally,  among  the  Greeks  not  a  few  were  dis- 
affected to  the  Catalan  rule.  It  is  no  wonder,  then,  that 
one  place  after  another  fell  rapidly  into  the  hands  of  these 
fresh  adventurers  from  the  West,  fresh  in  both  senses  of  the 
word,  if  we  contrast  them  with  the  degenerate  grandsons  of 
the  Catalans  who  had  conquered  Attica.  The  fine  castle, 
which  still  stands  on  the  hill  above  Livadia,  a  noble  monu- 
ment of  Catalan  rule  in  Greece,  was,  indeed,  bravely  defended 
by  its  veteran  governor  William  de  Almenara  and  James 
Ferrer,  a  Catalan  from  Salona.  The  citizens  were  mostly 
loyal,  for  the  Greeks  of  Livadia  had  received  special  privileges 
at  the  Catalan  Conquest,  and  their  town  had  attained  great 
prominence  under  Catalan  rule.  But  the  treachery  of  a 
Greek  from  Durazzo  opened  the  gates  to  the  enemy,  and 
Almenara  lost  his  life  in  the  vain  effort  to  save  the  betrayed 
citadel.  On  the  other  hand,  two  Greeks,  Dimitre  and  Mitro, 
gallantly  defended  Thebes,  in  the  absence  of  John  de  Lluria, 
and  of  the  three  traitors  who  surrendered  it  to  the  Navarrese, 
two  bore  Spanish  names.  Rather  than  remain  under  these 
new  masters,  many  of  the  terrified  inhabitants  of  both  these 
cities,  Greeks  as  well  as  Catalans,  fled  for  safety  to  the 
Venetian  colony  of  Negroponte,  where  they  remained  for 
months,  wandering  about  the  island  with  their  flocks  and 
herds.  Dimitre  and  Mitro  were  rewarded  for  their  fidelity 
with  the  governorship  of  Salona,  and  that  castle,  as  well 
as  Lamia  and  Siderokastron,  defied  the  assaults  of  the 
Navarrese,  thanks  to  the  efforts  of  the  vicar-general  on 
behalf  of  his  own  possessions,  and  the  invaluable  aid  of  the 
Count  of  Demetrias  and  his  Albanians — not  by  any  means 
the  last  service  rendered  by  that  sturdy  race  to  Greece. 
Like  Salona,  the  Akropolis  of  Athens  offered  a  resolute 
resistance  to  the  enemy.  Galceran  de  Peralta,  the  governor 
of  the  city,  was  unfortunately  taken  prisoner  in  a  sortie, 
together  with  many  others ;  but  Romeo  de  Bellarbe,  the 
commander  of  the  castle,  assisted  by  the  faithful  Greek 
notary,  Dem£trios   Rendi,  whom  we  saw  fighting  manfully 


I 


312  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

at  Megara  six  years  earlier,  baffled  the  machinations  of 
a  little  knot  of  traitors  and  defied  the  soldiers  of  Navarre. 
The  garrison  had  good  reason  to  remember  with  gratitude 
the  wise  policy  of  their  late  duke,  who  had  ordered  that  the 
revenues  of  certain  lands,  originally  intended  for  the  defence 
of  the  castle,  but  bestowed  by  his  predecessors  on  a  Catalan 
favourite,  should  again  be  devoted  to  that  object.  By  the 
20th  May  the  Athenians  could  meet  in  security  under  the 
presidency  of  Romeo  de  Bellarbe  for  the  purpose  of  drawing 
up  a  petition  to  King  Pedro  embodying  their  requests.  As 
a  similar  assembly  was  held  at  Salona  on  the  last  day  of  the 
month,  the  invaders  had  by  that  time  withdrawn  to  Boeotia, 
which  was  still  in  their  power.1 

These  capitulations,  drawn  up  in  the  Catalan  language 
and  still  preserved  in  the  archives  of  Barcelona,  throw  a 
flood  of  light  upon  the  condition  of  the  duchy  in  this,  the 
last  decade  of  its  existence.  They  show  us,  too,  that  the 
leaders  of  the  Aragonese  party,  scarcely  emerged  from  a 
desperate  struggle  for  the  existence  of  the  country,  were 
fully  conscious  of  the  value  of  their  services,  and  desired  to 
have  them  amply  rewarded.  As  is  the  case  with  most 
practical  as  distinct  from  philosophical  politicians,  the 
Athenian  Parliament  of  1380  mainly  occupied  itself  with 
personal  questions.  The  community  of  Athens  prayed  King 
Pedro  to  send  them  a  vicar-general  who  would  restore  the 
country  from  the  power  of  the  invaders,  or,  failing  that,  to 
appoint  Romeo  de  Bellarbe  their  governor  for  life,  on  the 
ground  of  his  intimate  personal  acquaintance  with  their 
affairs  and  the  poverty  and  distress  of  the  people.  They 
begged  him  to  bestow  upon  Romeo  all  the  Athenian 
property  of  three  of  his  majesty's  enemies,  and  to  grant 
to  his  mistress,  a  Greek  slave  from  Megara,  the  full  rights 
and  franchises  of  a  Catalan.  Large  favours  were  asked  for 
another  Greek,  the  notary  Dem^trios  Rendi,  who  had 
already  received  lands  at  Athens  and  the  franchise  from 
Frederick  III.,  and  whose  loyalty  to  Pedro  IV.  had  caused 
him  pecuniary  damage.     The  petitioners  craved  for  him,  for 

1  Rubi6,  op.  cit,  43M0,  443,  455.  463-8,  473,  474,  483,  485  ;  Qurita, 
loc.  cit;  Stefano  Magni  apud  Hopf,  Chroniquesx  183  ;  Ldmpros,  "Eyy/xi^a, 
267-8. 


THE  CAPITULATIONS  OF  ATHENS  313 

his  relative,  Jo&nnes  Rendi,  and  for  their  descendants,  all  the 
rights  and  privileges  enjoyed  by  the  Conquistadors  of  the 
duchies,  and  that  their  property  might  be  free  from  every 
kind  of  tax ;  furthermore,  they  asked  his  majesty  to  bestow 
upon  him  and  his  heirs  for  ever  the  office  of  Chancellor  of 
the  city  of  Athens,  with  an  annual  stipend  of  40  gold  dinars, 
payable  out  of  the  customs  and  dues  thereof.  They 
requested  that  Guerau  de  Rodonella,  one  of  their  envoys, 
Francisco  Pons,  and  Berenguer  Oroniola,  might  be  rewarded 
with  grants  of  traitors'  or  criminals'  lands  and  possessions ; 
that  his  majesty  would  be  pleased  to  provide  for  the  libera- 
tion from  captivity  of  his  loyal  subject  Galcerdn  de  Peralta, 
for  whom  the  Navarrese  demanded  a  higher  ransom  than  the 
Athenians  could  raise ;  and  that  he  would  confer  upon  Pedro 
Valter,  who  had  been  captured  with  Galcerdn,  all  the  notarial 
offices  of  both  duchies  for  life.  The  king  granted  all  these 
petitions,  except  the  last,  remarking  that  one  clerkship  would 
suffice  to  keep  the  worthy  Valter  in  decent  affluence ;  later 
on,  he  showered  yet  further  benefits — lands,  goods,  and  serfs, 
in  both  Athens  and  Thebes — upon  the  ever-useful  Dem6trios 
Rendi.  From  the  time  of  the  Frankish  Conquest  of  Attica 
no  Greek  had  ever  risen  to  such  distinction  as  this 
serviceable  notary,  whose  good  fortune  was  not  even  yet 
exhausted. 

Of  the  sixteen  clauses  which  compose  the  Athenian 
petition,  four  alone  deal  with  questions  of  general  policy. 
The  first  of  these  reflects  that  municipal  jealousy,  or  spirit  of 
local  patriotism — the  terms  are  synonymous — which  has  in 
all  ages  been  characteristic  of  Greece.  It  consisted  of  a 
prayer  that  Athens  might  retain  under  the  new  regime  that 
measure  of  autonomy  which  she  had  recently  obtained  from 
the  central  authorities  at  Thebes.  This  King  Pedro  absolutely 
refused,  asserting  his  intention  of  treating  the  two  duchies  as 
an  indivisible  whole,  governed  by  his  vicar-general,  without 
regard  for  any  special  aspirations  for  home  rule  which  Athens 
might  cherish.  The  second  clause  met  with  an  equally 
decisive  negative.  The  king  declined  to  grant  the  request  of 
the  pious  Athenians,  prompted  no  doubt  by  the  powerful 
ecclesiastics  who  had  supported  the  Aragonese  cause,  that  they 
might  henceforth  be  permitted  to  bequeath  their  property  and 


314  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

serfs  to  the  Catholic  Church  for  the  good  of  their  souls,  and  to 
emancipate  their  villains  whenever  they  chose.  According  to 
the  existing  constitution  of  the  duchies,  this  had  been. strongly 
forbidden,  and  a  special  proviso  had  nullified  any  such 
bequest,  and  ordered  that  all  goods  or  serfs  bequeathed  to 
the  Church  should  be  forfeited  to  the  use  of  the  castle  of 
Athens.  The  king,  as  a  practical  statesman,  pointed  out 
that  the  Catalans  were  only  a  small  garrison  in  Greece,  and 
that  if  Holy  Church  became  possessed  of  their  property, 
there  would  be  no  one  left  to  defend  the  country,  for  the 
clergy  were  neither  liable  to  bear  arms  nor  dependent  upon 
the  royal  jurisdiction.  Besides,  the  existing  law  of  Athens 
was  also  that  of  his  kingdoms  of  Majorca  and  Valencia. 
Finally,  the  petitioners  begged  that  they  might  continue  to 
be  governed  by  the  customs  of  Barcelona,  and  that  they 
might  be  joined  for  ever  to  the  crown  of  Aragon — requests 
which  his  majesty  naturally  granted.  These  capitulations, 
laid  before  him  at  L£rida  by  the  two  Athenian  envoys, 
Boyl,  Bishop  of  Megara,  and  Rodonella,  were  solemnly  signed 
by  the  king  on  1st  September,  whereupon  the  envoys  did 
homage  to  him  as  their  lawful  duke. 

On  the  same  day,  Pedro  IV.  confirmed  the  capitulations 
drawn  up  at  Salona,  and  laid  before  him  by  Bernard 
Ballester,  who  also  represented  the  two  important  com- 
munities of  Thebes  and  Livadia,  which  were  still  in  the 
hands  of  the  Navarrese.  The  petition  of  Salona  is  even  more 
personal  and  egotistical  than  that  of  Athens,  for  it  relates 
entirely  to  Don  Louis  Fadrique.  It  begged  the  king  to 
bestow  upon  him  and  his  heirs  the  dignity  of  Counts  of 
Malta,  to  confirm  to  him  the  castle  of  Siderokastron,  captured 
by  his  father  from  the  rebellious  Marshal  Ermengol  de 
Novelles,  the  island  of  ^Egina,  and  any  castles  which  he  might 
be  able  to  recover  from  the  Navarrese  and  their  allies  before 
the  arrival  of  the  new  vicar-general.  The  king,  conscious  of 
the  Count  of  Salona's  services,  granted  all  these  requests,  and 
received  the  envoy's  homage.  Then  he  again  notified  his 
faithful  subjects  of  his  intention  to  send  Rocaberti  to  govern 
them ;  ordered  the  new  governor  to  allow  the  clergy  of  the 
duchies  and  their  Latin  and  Greek  dependants  the  privileges 
enjoyed  by  the  Church  in  Aragon  and  Catalufta,  and  to  see 


PEDRO  IV:S  PRAISE  OF  THE  AKROPOL1S    315 

that  their  stolen  property  was  restored;  and  granted  the 
bishop  of  Megara  twelve  men-at-arms,  with  four  months'  pay, 
for  the  defence  of  "the  Castle  of  Athens."  Of  that  noble 
rock  the  poetic  monarch — himself  a  troubadour  and  a 
chronicler — wrote  to  his  treasurer  in  eloquent  language  as 
"  the  most  precious  jewel  that  exists  in  the  world,  and  such 
that  all  the  kings  of  Christendom  together  could  in  vain 
imitate."  Thus,  from  the  pen  of  a  King  of  Aragon,  we  have 
the  first  allusion  in  the  whole  range  of  the  history  of  Frankish 
Athens  to  the  classic  beauties  of  the  Akropolis.  The  king 
had  doubtless  heard  from  the  lips  of  the  bishop,  who  was 
chaplain  in  the  governor's  palace,  an  enthusiastic  description 
of  the  ancient  buildings,  then  almost  uninjured,  which  the  latter 
knew  so  well.  While  Pedro  IV.  waxed  enthusiastic  over  the 
classical  glories  of  the  Parthenon,  his  pious  queen,  Sybilla, 
was  keen  to  possess  the  relics  of  the  Virgin  and  other  saints, 
which  it  then  contained,  and  begged  the  archbishop  to  send 
them  to  her.  Yet  this  rare  "jewel,"  so  dear  at  once  to  the 
man  of  taste  and  the  devotee,  could  be  defended  in  that  age 
by  a  mere  handful  of  men.1  When,  more  than  four  centuries 
later,  the  Akropolis  sustained  its  last  siege,  its  garrison 
consisted  of  a  thousand. 

Their  mission  satisfactorily  accomplished,  the  envoys 
departed,  laden  with  marks  of  royal  esteem ;  the  Bishop  of 
Megara  was  specially  favoured,  for  the  king  not  only  granted 
him  the  goods  of  one  of  the  Theban  traitors,  and  ordered  the 
payment  to  him  of  an  annual  stipend  on  account  of  "the 
Chapel  of  St  Bartholomew  in  the  palace  of  the  Castle  of 
Athens,"  but  begged  the  pope  to  appoint  him  Archbishop  of 
Thebes.  Rocaberti,  however,  in  consequence  of  important 
political  events  in  Catalufia  and  Sicily,  delayed  his  departure, 
so  that  he  did  not  arrive  in  the  Piraeus,  with  his  fleet  of  four 
galleys  till  the  autumn  of  1381,  whereupon  Louis  Fadrique 
and  Galcerdn  de  Peralta,  who  had  escaped  from  captivity, 
handed  over  their  offices  to  him.  His  instructions  were  to 
establish  friendly  relations  with  all  the  neighbouring  poten- 
tates, to  grant  a  general  amnesty  in  his  master's  name  to 
all  the  inhabitants  of  the  duchies,  and  to  reward  those  who 

1  Rubi6,    op.    cit,    451-7,    461-71,    474,    476-9,    49©  J    AArlor,    v., 
824-7. 


316  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

had  been  conspicuous  for  their  loyalty  to  the  king.  Royal 
letters  had  already  been  sent  to  "the  Emperor"  Matthew 
Cantacuzene,  who,  in  1380,  had  succeeded  his  brother  Manuel 
.as  Despot  of  MistrA,  commending  the  king's  Athenian 
subjects  to  his  good  offices ;  the  Venetian  bailie  of  Negro- 
ponte  had  been  requested  to  render  aid  against  the  Navarrese 
Company,  and  to  prevent  the  Duke  of  the  Archipelago  and 
the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza  from  molesting  the  king's  Greek 
dominions;  and  similar  appeals  were  made  to  Nerio 
Acciajuoli,  the  lord  of  Corinth ;  to  Maddalena  Buondelmonti, 
widow  of  the  Count  of  Cephalonia  and  regent  for  her  infant 
son ;  to  the  powerful  Archbishop  of  Patras ;  and  to  the 
Grand-master  Heredia,  now  liberated  from  his  captivity,  whose 
Knights  had  hitherto  joined  in  pillaging  the  duchies.  All 
these  persons  regarded  the  Navarrese  as  their  common  foe ; 
of  Heredia  we  are  specially  told  that  he  and  his  Knights  were 
Rocaberti's  most  valuable  support,  while  Queen  Sybilla  of 
Aragon  did  not  hesitate  to  ask  him  to  bestow  the  Athenian 
castle  of  Sykaminon  upon  one  of  her  protfgis.  The  Navarrese 
Company,  faced  by  this  coalition,  withdrew  from  Boeotia  to 
the  Morea,  leaving,  however,  garrisons  behind  them  in 
Livadia  and  Thebes,  the  former  of  which  soon  fell,  while  the 
latter  was  still  in  their  possession  two  years  later,  and  never 
appears  again  in  the  Aragonese  archives.  As  a  reward  for 
what  the  good  people  of  Livadia  had  undergone,  they  received 
from  the  king  a  formal  confirmation  of  all  the  privileges  con- 
ferred upon  them  by  his  predecessors,  including  the  right  to 
be  governed  by  the  usages  of  Barcelona.  At  their  own 
request,  he  established  in  their  town,  where  the  head  of  St 
George  was  preserved,  a  branch  of  the  order  of  that  saint, 
the  insignia  of  which  he  conferred  upon  the  late  vicar-general 
and  other  prominent  men.  But  he  privately  ordered  Roca- 
berti  to  bring  with  him,  when  he  returned  to  Spain,  the  relic 
of  the  popular  Greek  saint1 — an  order,  however,  never 
executed.  He  also  requested  the  vicar-general  to  restore  to 
the  rebel  branch  of  the  Fadrique  clan  all  the  castles  and 
goods  which  they  had  forfeited.  Among  these  was  the 
classic  island  of  jEgina,  which  thus  came  into  the  hands  of 

1  Rubi6,  op.  ciL,    330,  436,    453,  459,   472,   473*  4«2,   486-90,  and 
Catalunya  a  Grecia,  57  ;  C^urita,  Anales,  II.,  378  ;  Indices,  355. 


ALBANIANS  IN  ATTICA  317 

Boniface's  second  son,  John.1  Finally,  in  order  to  fill  up  the 
gaps  in  the  population  of  the  duchy,  caused  by  the  Navarrese 
invasion,  Pedro  told  his  vicar-general  to  grant  exemption 
from  taxes  for  two  years  to  all  Greeks  and  Albanians  who 
would  come  and  settle  there.  This  was  the  beginning  of  that 
Albanian  colonisation  of  Attica  and  Bceotia,  of  which  so 
many  traces  remain,  both  in  the  population  and  in  the 
geographical  nomenclature,  to  the  present  day.2  Numbers 
of  villages  round  Athens  are  still  inhabited  by  Albanians, 
who  speak  Albanian  as  well  as  Greek,  and  such  names  as 
Spata,  Liosia,  and  Liopesi  are  of  Albanian  origin. 

While  the  Catalans  were  thus  replenishing  their  Athenian 
duchy,  their  rivals  and  imitators,  the  Navarrese,  had  carved 
out  for  themselves  a  state  in  the  Morea.  Marching  in  1381 
along  the  south  shore  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  they  found  no 
one  to  contest  their  claims,  for  the  Knights  of  St  John,  weary 
of  their  profitless  lease  of  the  principality,  were  ready  to 
make  terms  with  the  new  arrivals,  and  soon  afterwards 
abandoned  the  country  altogether.  Their  five  years  were 
not  yet  up ;  but,  though  the  land  tax  of  Achaia  yielded  them 
9000  ducats,  their  expenses  had  been  so  heavy  that  they 
asked  the  Queen  of  Naples  to  relieve  them  of  their  bargain. 
But  as  she  was  murdered,  and  her  husband  captured  by 
Charles  of  Durazzo  in  the  following  year,  the  Navarrese 
remained  masters  of  the  principality.  Their  commander 
Mahiot  de  Coquerel  condescended,  indeed,  to  call  himself 
bailie  for  the  titular  emperor  and  Prince  of  Achaia,  Jacques 
de  Baux,  so  long  as  the  latter  lived.  But  when,  in  1383,  the 
last  Latin  Emperor  of  Constantinople  died  at  Taranto  without 
children,  the  Navarrese  became  absolutely  independent  They 
and  not  he — as  the  pompous  inscription  on  his  tomb  in  the 
church  of  St  Cataldo  states — had  "  subjected  by  war  the  cities 
of  Greece," 3  and  they  remained  the  real  masters  of  Achaia, 
although  his  heir,  Louis  of  Anjou,  the  still  living  empress 
and  former  princess,  Marie  de  Bourbon,  and  Charles  of 
Durazzo,  the  new  King  of  Naples,  might  each  claim  to  be  the 
rightful  sovereign.  The  first  two  thought  it  worth  while  to 
transmit  their  unreal  rights  to  their  heirs — Louis  of  Anjou  to 

1  In  spite  of  the  capitulations  of  Salona  in  the  previous  year. 

2  Rubio,  Los  Navarros,  460.  3  Ducange,  op.  cit,  ii.,  296. 


318  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

his  widow,  Marie  of  Brittany ;  the  empress  to  her  nephew, 
Louis  de  Bourbon;  and  a  further  pretender  arose  in  the 
person  of  Amadeo,  grandson  of  Philip  of  Savoy,  the  former 
prince.  Amid  these  conflicting  claims,  Mahiot  de  Coquerel 
was  willing  to  keep  up  the  fiction  that  he  was  the  representa- 
tive of  Charles  III.  of  Naples,  the  strongest  and  nearest  of 
the  claimants ;  but  both  he  and  Pedro,  the  famous  bastard 
of  S.  Superan,  who  succeeded  him  as  vicar  in  1386,  were,  to 
all  practical  purposes,  independent  of  foreign  suzerainty. 
The  Navarrese  treated  the  country  as  a  conquered  land,  just 
as  the  French  had  done,  dividing  the  old  fiefs,  including  most 
of  the  Acciajuoli  estates,  among  themselves,  except  in  one  or 
two  cases,  where  the  barons  came  to  terms  with  them.  The 
Greek  archons  of  Mistr&,  where  Theodore  Palaiol6gos,  son  of 
the  Emperor  John  V.,  was  now  Despot,  sided  with  them,  and 
seized  the  opportunity  to  rebel  against  the  imperial  repre- 
sentative.1 As  for  the  Venetian  governors  of  Modon  and 
Coron,  they  were  glad  to  make  peace  with  these  uncomfortable 
neighbours,  who  drew  nearer  and  nearer  to  their  two  valued 
Messenian  colonies.  When  the  Navarrese  occupied  Navarino 
— a  place  already  long  known  by  that  name — and  the  then 
important  town  of  Androusa,  which  became  their  headquarters, 
it  was  felt  that  an  arrangement  must  be  made.  The  republic 
was  particularly  nervous  about  the  fine  bay  of  Navarino, 
which  she  feared  might  be  purchased  by  her  hated  rival 
Genoa ;  she  accordingly  offered  to  buy  it  from  the  Navarrese. 
Her  offer  was  declined,  but  she  obtained  the  right  of  pre- 
emption to  the  place.  Thus,  this  company  of  adventurers 
from  Navarre  had  established  itself  as  a  recognised  power  in 
the  Peloponnese  by  the  side  of  the  Greeks  of  Mistra  and  the 
two  ancient  colonies  of  Venice. 

All  efforts  to  oust  the  interlopers  failed.  Heredia,  who 
had  never  abandoned  the  idea,  which  appealed  to  his 
romantic  mind,  of  regaining  the  principality  for  the  Knights  of 
St  John,  did,  indeed,  succeed  in  purchasing  Marie  of 
Brittany's  claim.  But  the  rival  claimant,  Amadeo  of  Savoy, 
protested  against  this  sale,  and  induced  the  anti-pope 
Clement  VII.  to  annul  it.  Even  then  Heredia  was  not 
discouraged;  as  late  as  1389  we  find  him  endeavouring  to 

1  Miiller,  Byzantinische  Analekten,  ix.,  393  ;  Chalkokondyles,  52. 


THE  CLAIMANTS  TO  ACHAIA  319 

organise  an  expedition  to  his  beloved  Morea.  But  that  was 
his  last  effort;  he  spent  the  rest  of  his  life  at  Avignon, 
surrounded  by  men  of  letters,  and  devouring  in  his  library 
the  romantic  biographies  of  the  great  conquerors  of  olden 
times.  To  the  last  he  kept  up  his  interest  in  Greece ;  and 
it  was  by  his  command  that  in  1393  was  compiled  the 
Aragonese  version  of  the  Chronicle  of  the  Morea,  which,  in 
spite  of  some  glaring  anachronisms,  contains  much  valuable 
information  about  the  later  period  of  Latin  rule.  Louis  de 
Bourbon  seemed  at  one  time  a  more  formidable  competitor  ; 
he  entered  into  negotiations  with  discontented  survivors  of 
the  old  feudal  nobility,  like  6rard  le  Noir,  the  baron  of 
Arkadia,  and  we  have  it  on  the  authority  of  his  secretary, 
that  "  the  Moreots  were  only  waiting  to  receive  him  as  their 
lord."  But  they  waited  in  vain,  for  the  Bourbon  claimant 
never  came,  but  remained  till  his  death  merely  titular  prince 
of  Achaia — the  last  of  that  historic  race  which  ever  set  up 
its  title  to  rule  over  Greece.  As  for  Amadeo  of  Savoy,  he 
corresponded  with  the  cautious  Despot  Theodore,  and 
endeavoured  to  win  over  Venice  to  his  side.  Finally,  as 
if  there  were  not  claimants  enough,  Pope  Urban  VI.,  "  in  the 
interests  of  peace  and  justice,"  appointed  the  Archbishop  of 
Patras,  whose  see  was  now  independent,  as  vicar-general  of 
the  principality.1 

Besides  the  Navarrese,  the  Greeks,  and  the  Venetian 
colonies,  there  were  two  other  important  factors  in  the 
politics  of  the  Peloponnese — Nerio  Acciajuoli,  who  held 
Corinth  and  its  appurtenances ;  and  the  last  fragment  of  the 
old  Athenian  duchy,  the  castles  of  Nauplia  and  Argos.  There 
a  woman,  Marie  d'Enghien,  the  last  of  her  race,  held  nominal 
sway.  But,  on  her  father's  death,  Venice  had  convinced  the 
two  leading  archons  of  Nauplia,  Kamater6s  and  Kaloeth£s, 
by  judicious  bribery,  that  it  was  for  the  good  of  the  place 
that  she  should  marry  a  Cornaro.  Thus,  the  republic  was 
already  practically  mistress  of  those  coveted  fortresses.2 

By  this  time,  in  Eubcea,  too,  Venice  had  become  absolute 
mistress,  except  in  name.     In  1383,  the  assassination  of  the 

1  Buchon,  Recherche s  et  Matiriaux,  L,  258  ;  Miklosich  und  M tiller, 
iii.,  249;  Gerland,  133. 

2  Predelli,  Contmemoriali%  iii.,  157  ;  Dorotheos  of  Monemvasia,  471. 


320  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

powerful  triarch,  Nicol6  III.  dalle  Carceri,  who  not  only  held 
two-thirds  of  the  island  but  was  also  Duke  of  Naxos,  removed 
her  last  rival — for  he  left  no  legitimate  heirs.  Seven  years 
later,  the  holder  of  the  other  third,  Giorgio  Ghisi,  bequeathed 
his  share  to  the  republic,  which  could  thus  have  easily 
annexed  the  whole  island,  had  she  pleased.  But,  with  its 
usual  shrewdness,  the  Venetian  Government  saw  that  it 
would  be  more  advantageous  to  retain  the  substance  of 
power,  while  allowing  petty  lords  to  have  the  empty 
honour  and  large  expense  of  maintaining  the  castles  of  the 
island.  The  example  of  Karystos  had  served  as  a  warning ; 
that  coveted  barony  yielded  to  the  Venetians  less  than  one- 
third  of  what  Bonifacio  had  obtained  from  it ;  many  of  the 
inhabitants  had  emigrated  to  Attica,  and  an  attempt  to 
colonise  it  with  people  from  Tenedos  failed.  Accordingly, 
it  was  decided  to  let  it  to  three  Venetians,  the  brothers 
Giustiniani,  at  a  very  low  rent.1  The  Greeks  were  among 
the  first  to  benefit  by  this  complete  supremacy  of  Venice, 
for  the  Government,  never  unduly  tender  to  the  Catholic 
Church,  abolished  the  tax  which  the  Orthodox  clergy  had 
been  accustomed  to  pay  to  the  titular  patriarch  of  Constanti- 
nople, who  resided  in  Euboea. 

Freed  from  the  horrors  of  civil  war  and  foreign  invasion, 
the  Catalans  of  Attica  had  no  reason  to  suspect  that  their 
doom  was  impending,  and  that  in  a  few  years  their  dominion 
would  for  ever  pass  away  from  Greek  lands.  Their  absent 
sovereign  with  his  rhapsodies  over  the  Akropolis,  and  his 
vicar-general  at  Athens,  both  acted  as  if  they  regarded  the 
duchies  as  now  firmly  assured  to  the  crown  of  Aragon.  To 
Rocaberti  the  connection  seemed  so  durable  that  he  was 
anxious  to  establish  his  family  in  Greece,  and  to  secure  for 
his  son  the  famous  fief  of  Salona.  Louis  Fadrique,  the  last 
count,  died  in  1382,  after  affiancing  his  sole  heiress,  Maria, 
to  young  Rocaberti,  and  the  King  of  Aragon  wrote  urging 
her  mother  to  hasten  on  the  marriage,  of  which  the  castle  of 
Siderokastron,  granted  to  her  father  for  his  life,  should  be 
the  reward  It  was  naturally  to  his  interest  that  Salona, 
and  Lamia,  which  went  with  it,  should  be  in  strong  hands. 
The  county  had  a  large  population  of  both  Franks  and 
1  Hopf,  Karystos  (tr.  Sardagna),  90. 


DON  PEDRO  DE  PAU  AT  ATHENS     321 

Greeks,  and  its  geographical  position  made  it  a  valuable 
bulwark  against  the  Turks,  now  only  a  single  day's  journey 
from  Neopatras.  But  before  the  wedding  had  been  cele- 
brated, Rocaberti  had  left  Greece.  In  the  late  summer 
of  1382  we  find  him  in  Sicily,  occupied  in  obtaining  posses- 
sion of  the  young  Queen  Maria,  who,  as  the  heiress  of 
Frederick  III.,  should  have  been  Duchess  of  Athens,  and 
whom  Pedro  IV.  was  anxious  to  have  in  his  clutches.  As 
his  deputy  at  Athens,  Rocaberti  left  behind  him  Ram6n  de 
Vilanova,  a  man  of  great  valour  and  prudence,  who  governed 
the  duchies  well.  During  his  time  the  last  of  the  Navarrese 
must  have  left  Boeotia,  and  the  relations  between  the  King 
of  Aragon  and  his  old  enemies,  now  established  in  the  Morea, 
became  so  good,  that  they  assisted  in  repelling  the  frequent 
attacks  made  by  the  Greeks  and  Turks  upon  the  duchy  of 
Athens.  We  are  told  that  Vilanova  was  preparing  to 
recover  what  was  in  the  power  of  these  enemies,  when  the 
domestic  quarrels  between  Pedro  and  his  son  John  compelled 
him,  too,  to  return  to  Spain,  leaving  the  military  command  in 
the  hands  of  Roger  and  Antonio  de  Lluria,  sons  of  the  former 
vicar-general,  and  entrusting  the  command  of  the  castle  and 
city  of  Athens  and  the  other  places  in  the  duchies  to  a  gallant 
soldier,  Don  Pedro  de  Pau.  Rocaberti,  who  had  espoused 
the  cause  of  the  king's  son,  consequently  fell  into  disfavour 
with  Pedro,  who  insisted  upon  his  releasing  his  lieutenant 
Vilanova  from  the  oath  of  fealty  which  the  latter  had  taken 
to  him,  dismissed  him  from  his  post  as  vicar-general,  and 
prevented  the  projected  marriage  between  Rocaberti's  son 
and  the  Countess  of  Salona.  After  a  long  delay,  caused  by 
important  affairs  of  state  at  home,  the  king  appointed,  in 
June  1386,  Bernardo  de  Cornell^  as  his  vicar-general  The 
appointment  was  notified  to  all  the  friendly  potentates  of 
Greece,  among  whom  the  leaders  of  the  Navarrese  Company 
were  now  reckoned.  The  King  of  Aragon  told  them  that  his 
representative  would  co-operate  with  them,  and  would  leave 
for  Greece  with  a  large  force  in  the  following  spring.  But 
before  that  date  the  ceremonious  sovereign  was  dead,  and  most 
of  the  Athenian  duchy  no  longer  owned  the  sway  of  Aragon.1 

1  Rubi6,   Los  Navarros,  460,    479-80 ;  Catalunya  a    Grecia,  44-7 ; 
£urita,  Anales,  ii.,  387  ;  Indices,  360. 

X 


322  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

Nerio  Acciajuoli  had  long  been  watching  attentively 
from  the  rock  of  Corinth,  and  from  the  twin  hills  of  Megara, 
the  rapid  dissolution  of  the  Catalan  rule.  He  saw  a  land 
weakened  by  civil  war  and  foreign  invasion ;  he  knew  that 
the  titular  duke  was  an  absentee,  engrossed  with  more 
important  affairs;  he  found  the  ducal  viceroys  summoned 
away  to  Spain  or  Sicily,  while  the  old  families  of  the  duchy 
were  almost  extinct  He  was  a  man  of  action,  and  he  saw 
that  the  moment  had  come  to  strike.  Like  the  clever 
diplomatist  that  he  was,  he  had  prepared  the  ground  well, 
and  had  established  friendly  relations  with  most  of  his 
neighbours,  Greeks  and  Latins  alike.  He  had  married  his 
elder  daughter,  the  beautiful  Bartolomea,  said  to  be  the 
fairest  woman  of  her  time,  to  Theodore  I.  PalaioUSgos,  the 
Despot  of  Mistr&,  to  whom  he  promised  as  her  dowry  the 
future  possession  of  Corinth,  and  this  alliance  secured  for 
his  schemes  the  approval  of  both  the  Despot  and  his  brother 
Manuel,  at  that  time  Imperial  Viceroy  at  Salonika.  Through 
his  trusty  agent,  the  Bishop  of  Argos,  he  had  gained  the 
acquiescence  of  Pietro  Cornaro,  the  Venetian  consort  of  the 
Lady  of  Argos,  and  had  conveyed  some  inkling  of  his 
schemes  to  his  relatives  in  Italy.  His  own  marriage  with  a 
Saraceno  of  Eubcea  had  connected  him  with  one  of  the 
most  influential  families  of  that  important  island  The 
disturbed  state  of  the  Morea,  where  the  Navarrese  were 
threatening  his  son-in-law,  the  Despot,  provided  him  with  an 
excellent  excuse  for  collecting  an  army,  nominally  for  the 
aid  of  Theodore,  really  for  the  conquest  of  Athens.  A  letter 
of  the  Bishop  of  Argos,  written  early  in  1385,  informs  us  that 
Nerio  was  "gathering  men-at-arms  from  every  possible 
quarter,"  and  that  he  could  put  into  the  field  "  full  70  lances, 
800  Albanian  horsemen,  and  a  very  large  number  of  foot 
soldiers."1  It  only  remained  to  provide  for  an  attack  by  sea 
as  well  as  by  land.  This  was  a  more  difficult  matter,  for  it 
was  against  the  policy  of  Venice  to  allow  the  Latin  lords  of 
the  Levant  to  maintain  navies.  But  Nerio  had  hired  a 
galley  from  the  Venetian  arsenal  at  Candia,  under  the 
plausible  pretext  of  keeping  the  twin  seas  on  either  side  of 

1  Gregorovius,  Brief*  aus  der  "  Corrispondensa   Acciajolj,"  298-9 ; 

Chalkokondyks,  208. 


1 


THE  FLORENTINE  CONQUEST  323 

the  isthmus  free  from  Turkish  corsairs,  whereas,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  he  was  giving  them  shelter  at  Megara.  When  all 
was  ready,  he  easily  found  a  casus  belli. 

The  pride  of  a  noble  dame  was  the  occasion  of  the  fall 
of  Catalan  Athens,  just  as,  two  generations  later,  the  passion 
of  a  beautiful  woman  led  to  the  Turkish  Conquest  Again 
and  again  the  fair  sex  had  played  a  leading  part  in  the 
fortunes  of  Frankish  Greece,  owing  to  the  absence  of  that 
Salic  law  which  might  have  saved  the  country  many  disasters, 
but  which  would  have  robbed  mediaeval  Greek  history  of 
half  its  romance.  The  county  of  Salona  was  the  most 
important  fief  of  the  Catalan  duchy,  and  at  this  time  there 
dwelt  in  the  old  castle  of  the  Stromoncourts  and  the 
Fadriques,  the  widowed  Countess  Helene  and  her  only 
daughter  Maria,  to  whom  Rocaberti's  son  had  been  in  vain 
affianced.  Nerio  now  made  an  offer  for  the  hand  of  the 
young  countess,  the  greatest  heiress  of  Catalan  Athens,  on 
behalf  of  his  brother-in-law,  Pietro  Saraceno  of  Euboea. 
The  dowager  countess,  in  whose  veins  was  the  blood  of  the 
Cantacuzenes — she  was  a  direct  descendant  of  the  famous 
emperor  and  a  cousin  of  the  Despot  of  Mistr& — scornfully 
rejected  the  proposal  of  the  Florentine  tradesman,  and 
affianced  her  daughter  to  Stephen  Doiikas,  a  Servian 
princeling  of  Thessaly.  This  alliance  with  a  Slav  naturally 
aroused  the  indignation  of  both  Greeks  and  Franks  at 
Salona  At  this  critical  moment,  Nerio's  horsemen  invaded 
Salona  and  the  rest  of  the  Catalan  duchy,  while  his  galley 
made  straight  for  the  Piraeus.  The  details  and  precise  date 
of  this  Florentine  Conquest  are  unknown,  but  in  July  1385 
Nerio  was  already  able  to  style  himself  "  Lord  of  Corinth 
and  the  duchy,"1  and  in  January  1387  he  was  signing  a 
patent  in  that  capacity  in  the  city  of  Athens.2  We  now 
know,  however,  that  the  Akropolis  held  out  for  sixteen 
months  longer.  That  noblest  of  all  fortresses  was  com- 
manded by  Don  Pedro  de  Pau,  the  gallant  officer  whom 
Vilanova  had  left  behind  him,  and  whose  name  deserves  to 
be  included  in  the  long  roll  of  heroes  associated  with  the 
sacred  rock.     Down  to  almost  the  close  of  1387  he  managed 

1  Dominator  Choranti  et  Ducamims ;  Misti,  xxxix.,  foL  1 10,  v. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherchesy  II.,  i.,  221. 


324  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

to  keep  up  communications  with  the  Home  Government  In 
March  of  that  year,  his  envoy,  Rodonella,  the  same  man  who 
had  laid  the  Athenian  capitulations  before  Pedro  IV.  seven 
years  before,  appeared  before  Pedro's  son  and  successor, 
John  I.,  at  Barcelona,  to  hear  his  majesty's  pleasure  concerning 
the  duchies,  and  to  do  him  homage.  The  new  duke  had 
already  reappointed  his  friend  Rocaberti  vicar-general,  and 
announced  his  intention  of  sending  him  with  a  fleet  to  "  con- 
found his  enemies."  This  announcement  was  made  to  the 
Captain  of  the  Navarrese  Company,  to  the  Archbishop  of 
Neopatras,  and  to  the  Dowager  Countess  of  Salona.  From 
the  phraseology  of  the  royal  letter  to  the  archbishop,  it  is 
clear  that  much  of  that  duchy  was  no  longer  in  the  possession 
of  the  Catalans,  though  the  castle  had  not  been  taken ;  from 
the  document  addressed  to  the  countess,  we  see  that  Salona 
was  still  hers,  and  that  the  king  was  anxious  to  secure  the 
hand  of  her  much-wooed  daughter  for  the  son  of  his  favourite 
Rocaberti,  although  that  damsel,  the  Helen  of  mediaeval 
Greece,  was  already  affianced  to  another.  At  the  same  time, 
his  majesty  assured  the  sindici  of  Athens  that  he  would 
never  "  forget  so  famous  a  portion  of  our  realm,"  which  he 
hoped  by  God's  grace  to  visit  in  person.  Affairs  of  State  at 
home  prevented,  however,  this  projected  journey,  while 
Rocaberti's  promised  fleet  seems  never  to  have  arrived  at 
the  Piraeus.  On  the  contrary,  in  November  1387  we  find 
him  still  lingering  in  Spain.  Such  was  the  practical 
sympathy  shown  by  the  effusive  kings  of  Aragon  for  their 
distant  dominions. 

Meanwhile,  abandoned  by  his  Government  at  home,  Don 
Pedro  de  Pau  still  held  out— a  lonely  and  pathetic  figure  on 
the  Akropolis.  Circumstances  in  Greece  favoured  his 
defence,  for  the  attention  of  the  besiegers  had  been  distracted 
by  a  raid  of  Turkish  pirates,  which  they  joined  the  Venetian 
bailie  of  Negroponte  in  repulsing.  On  5th  November  1387, 
a  rumour  of  the  brave  commander's  death  reached  Catalufia, 
and  a  successor  was  appointed  in  the  person  of  P.  de  Vilalba, 
who  was  to  hold  the  two  still  unconquered  castles  of  Athens 
and  Neopatras.  Eleven  days  later,  however,  a  second 
messenger  arrived  with  the  news  that  Don  Pedro  was  alive, 
and  Vilalba's  warrant  was  cancelled.     From  that  moment  the 


FALL  OF  THE  AKROPOLIS  325 

Aragonesc  archives  are  silent  as  to  the  fate  of  Athens.1  But  a 
letter,  preserved  in  the  Laurenziana  library  at  Florence, 
laconically  informs  us  that  on  2nd  May  1388,  "Messer  Neri 
had  the  castle  of  Setines."  The  victor  was  unable  at  once 
to  establish  himself  on  the  Akropolis,  for  plague  had  broken 
out  at  Athens,  many  had  died,  and  among  the  victims  had 
been  his  own  valet  Nerio  and  all  his  family  accordingly 
withdrew  to  Thebes  to  reflect  in  safety  over  his  new  position. 
His  triumph  was,  indeed,  complete;  not  only  was  he 
master  of  Athens,  but  a  fortnight  before  the  Akropolis  fell  he 
had  yet  further  strengthened  his  position  in  Greece  by 
bestowing  the  hand  of  his  second  and  favourite  daughter, 
Francesca,  upon  Carlo  Tocco,  the  young  Duke  of  Leucadia 
and  Palatine  Count  of  Cephalonia,  the  most  powerful  Latin 
ruler  of  the  Levant2 

The  Catalan  rule  over  the  duchies  had  thus  ended  for 
ever.  The  sovereigns  of  Aragon  and  Sicily  might  continue 
to  style  themselves  Dukes  of  Athens  and  Neopatras — a  title 
also  borne  by  Queen  Maria  of  Sicily  and  her  husband,8  and 
which  was  included  among  the  dignities  of  the  Spanish  crown 
down  to  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Courtly  Spanish 
poets  might  enumerate  "  thy  great  Athens,  thy  Neopatria," 
among  the  "  good  lands  "  of  a  dead  Aragonese  monarch,  and 
the  rulers  of  Sicily  might  gratify  their  vanity  by  appointing 
a  titular  vicar-general  with  a  pompous  patent  to  rid  the 
land  of  the  "  tyrants "  who  had  occupied  it*  Alfonso  V. 
even  went  so  far  as  to  create  one  of  his  subjects  Duke  of 
Athens,  and  in  1444  actually  demanded  the  restitution  of  his 
two  duchies.6  But,  since  that  memorable  2nd  May  1388,  the 
flag  of  Aragon  has  never  waved  again  from  the  castle  of 
Athens. 

The  Catalan  Grand  Company  disappeared  from  the  face 
of  Attica  as  rapidly  as  rain  from  its  light  soil.     Like  their 

1  Rubio,  Catalunya  a  Grecia,  42-55, 91,  n. ;  Los  A/avarros,  491  ;  C^urita, 
Ana/es,  ii.,  391  ;  Indices,  360,  363,  367  ;  Chalkokondyles,  69,  213 ;  Hopf, 
ChroniqueSy  183  ;  Misti,  xxxviii.,  foL  10;  xL,  fol.  17. 

2  Ldmpros,  "Eyy/xi^a,  119. 

8  La  Lumia,  StorU  Siciliane,  III.,  339,  *.  1. 

4  L&mpros,  'Eyypa^a*  324-7. 

•  Arch.  Stor.  per  le  Prov.  Napoletatu,  xxvii.,  430. 


1 


326  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

Burgundian  predecessors,  these  soldiers  of  fortune  came, 
conquered,  and  disappeared,  without  taking  root  in  the  land. 
Only  two  generations  had  elapsed  since  the  battle  of  the 
Kephiss6s,  and  already  one  family  after  another  had  died  out, 
while  now  and  again  an  old  Catalan  had  returned  to  spend 
the  evening  of  his  life  in  his  old  home,  so  that  King  Pedro 
could  point  to  the  smallness  of  the  Catalan  garrison  in 
Greece.  After  the  fall  of  Athens,  some,  like  the  brothers 
Lluria,  took  ship  for  Sicily;  others,  like  Ballester,  the  last 
Catalan  Archbishop  of  Athens,  returned  to  Barcelona,  while 
others  again  lingered  on  for  a  time,  among  them  the  two 
branches  of  the  Fadrique  family,  the  former  represented  by 
the  Countess  of  Salona  and  her  daughter,  the  latter  by  John, 
the  baron  of  iEgina.  The  masterful  countess,  either  by  her 
courageous  defence  or  her  patrician  airs,  sure  to  impress  the 
Florentine  upstart  whom  she  had  affronted,  held  her  own  for 
nearly  six  years  longer.  In  1390  we  find  King  John  of 
Aragon  again  asking  the  hand  of  her  much-disputed 
daughter  for  a  noble  scion  of  the  Moncada  family.1  The 
final  disappearance  of  the  county  of  Salona  we  shall  see  in 
the  next  chapter.  The  famous  island  of  jEgina  remained 
still  longer  in  Catalan  hands.  From  John  Fadrique  it  passed, 
presumably  by  the  marriage  of  his  daughter,  to  the  family  of 
Caopena,  then  settled  at  Nauplia,  whose  name  undoubtedly 
points  to  a  Catalan  origin,  though  Venetian  genealogists 
make  them  come  from  the  Dalmatian  island  of  Lesina — a 
name  easily  confused  with  "  Legena,"  the  Venetian  form  of 
JEgirn. — and  others  suppose  Cyprus  to  have  been  their 
home.8  At  JEgim.  the  Caopena  held  sway  till  145 1,  and  this 
explains  the  boast  of  a  much  later  Catalan  writer,  that  his 
countrymen  maintained  their  "  ancient  splendour  "  in  Greece 
till  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century.  It  seems  probable 
that,  soon  after  the  Florentine  Conquest,  the  Catalan 
lord  of  iEgina  conveyed  thither  the  head  of  St  George, 
which  King  Pedro  had  wished  to  have  removed  from 
Livadia  to  Spain,  but  which  was  still  preserved  there  in  1 393, 

1  Rubid,  Catalunya  a  Grecia,  54,  61,  63-5  ;  Monumenia  Ord.  Frat 
PradUatontMy  vii.,  71. 

3  Hopf,  Karystos  (tr.  Sardagna),  67,  73.  The  name  of  Cao-Pinna 
is  still  common  in  Sardinia,  where  there  are  many  Catalan  families. 


MEMORIALS  OF  CATALAN  RULE  327 

for  the  Venetians  found  it  at  ;Egina  when  they  became 
possessed  of  the  island,  and  transported  it  thence  to  Venice 
in  1462.1  We  hear  of  a  Catalan  living  at  Modon  in  1418, 
and  of  a  Catalan  corsair  at  Monemvasia  in  1460,  and  in  1609 
a  Catalan  was  Bishop  of  Cerigo.  There  is  still  a  noble 
family  in  Zante  called  Kataliinos,  and  persons  of  the  same 
name  have  been  found  at  Patras,  Kalamata,  and  Aigion 
within  recent  years.  The  island  of  Santorin  possesses  three 
families  of  Spanish  origin — those  of  Da  Corogna2,  De 
Cigalla,  and  Delenda,  the  latter  a  name  common  in  Sardinia 
in  the  form  Deledda.  Thus,  it  happens  that  the  present 
Roman  Catholic  Archbishop  of  Athens,  Mgr.  Delenda,  is  a 
descendant  of  its  Catalan  conquerors. 

Memorials  of  the  Catalan  domination  may  still  be  seen 
in  Greece.  The  fine  castles  of  Salona,  Livadia,  and  Lamia — 
all  important  places  at  that  epoch,  contain  Catalan  work, 
and  the  three  ruined  churches  still  to  be  seen  within  the 
precincts  of  the  first  of  those  fortresses  were  certainly  used, 
if  not  built,  by  the  devout  soldiers  of  Spain  who  resided 
there.  We  know,  too,  that  in  their  time  there  were  churches 
of  St  George,  St  Mary,  and  St  Michael  at  Livadia,  but  we 
are  not  told  that  they  were  of  Catalan  origin.  Probably  the 
row  of  towers  between  Thebes  and  Livadia  dates  from  this 
period,  as  it  was  naturally  most  important  to  keep  up 
communication  between  the  capital  and  the  chief  fortress  of 
the  duchies.  We  are  expressly  told  that  they  fortified  the 
Akropolis,  and  that  the  governor  had  his  residence  and  a 
chapel  dedicated  to  St  Bartholomew  there.  But  of  this 
nothing  now  remains.  The  Christian  Archaeological  Museum 
at  Athens  contains,  however,  one  very  curious  memorial  of 
Catalan  rule — a  fresco  of  the  Virgin  and  Child,  with  two 
armorial  shields  hanging  from  trees,  and  some  mysterious 
letters  in  Gothic  character,  which  came  from  the  church  of 
the  Prophet  Elias,  near  the  gate  of  the  Agori.8  The  Gothic 
inscription  on  the  west  front  of  the   Parthenon  does   not, 

1  Hopf,  Chroniques,  202. 

'  Hopf  (tr.  Sardagna),  in  Archivio  Veneto,  xxxi.,  163,  says,  on  the 
strength  of  a  genealogical  tree  at  Santorin,  that  they  came  from  Cortina. 
But  they  are  heard  of  in  the  Archipelago  in  1307,  before  the  Catalan 
conquest  of  Athens. 

3  AcXrfop  rip  XpurriaviKrji  * XpxatoKoyiKrjt  'Eratpflat,  i.,  65. 


328  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

however,  appear  to  be  Catalan.  It  is  no  wonder  that  the 
Catalans  left  few  great  buildings  behind  them,  when  it  is 
remembered  that  they  lacked  the  stimulus  of  a  ducal  court, 
such  as  had  existed  in  the  time  of  the  Burgundians,  and  that 
they  were  not,  for  the  most  part,  the  younger  sons  of  noble 
houses,  but  a  band  of  soldiers  of  fortune,  who,  by  the  strangest 
of  accidents,  had  become  the  heirs  of  Periklfis  and  Phidias. 
Being  merely  the  representatives  of  the  absent  dukes,  the 
Catalan  vicars-general  coined  no  money,  but  the  kings  of 
Sicily  and  Aragon  bore  the  title  of  "  Duke  of  Athens  and 
Neopatras  "  on  their  coins.1 

Such  a  society  as  this  was  not  likely  to  encourage  culture, 
and  it  is  significant  that  the  Catalan  dialect  has  left  no  mark 
on  the  Greek  language ;  yet  even  in  Catalan  Athens  we  find 
an  Athenian  priest  copying  medical  works,  while  we  know 
that  the  Catholic  bishops  of  Salona  and  Megara  had 
libraries.2  But  professional  men  seem  to  have  been  scarce  in 
the  country,  if  we  may  judge  from  the  fact  that  on  one 
occasion  a  doctor  had  to  be  sent  from  Sicily  to  Thebes.* 
Trade,  on  the  other  hand,  naturally  flourished  between 
Barcelona  and  her  Greek  colony.  The  Venetian  archives 
contain  several  allusions  to  the  commercial  relations  between 
Thebes  and  both  Barcelona  and  Majorca ;  Thebes, "  the  head, 
as  it  were,  and  mistress  "  of  the  cities  of  the  duchies,  had  its  own 
measures,  and  levied  an  octroi  of  2  per  cent,  on  all  merchandise 
that  went  in  or  out  of  its  gates ;  the  contemporary  geographer 
Abulfeda,  mentions  its  gold  and  silver  embroideries,  but  a 
Catalan  traveller  tells  us  that  it  suffered  severely  from  earth- 
quakes. Although  Venice  bound  down  the  Company  to  keep 
no  galleys  in  the  Piraeus,  and  prohibited  the  Catalans  of 
iEgina  from  all  traffic  by  sea,  the  "port  of  Athens"  had 
recovered  some  of  its  importance,  for  we  hear  of  a  harbour- 
master being  appointed,  and  of  ships  from  Spain  being 
anchored  there.4   From  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century 

1  Schlumberger,  Numismatique  de  f  Orient  latin,  345. 

2  Montfaucon,  Pal,  Gracay  70 ;  Rubid,  Los  JVavarros,  458,  475. 
8  L&npros,  "Eyypa^a,  303. 

4  Prcdelli,  Commemoriali,  II.,  22,  139,  141,  310,  325,  331 ;  III,  69; 
Pegalotti,  Delia  Decima,  III.,  51,  108,  109;  Friar  Jordanus,  AfinMUa 
Descripta  (tr.  Yule),  2,  3. 


THE  CHIEF  CATALAN  TOWNS  329 

it  had  borne  the  name  of  Lion,  or  Porto  Leone,  by  which  it 
was  known  down  to  late  Turkish  times,  from  the  great  stone 
lion  which  then  stood  there,  and  which  was  removed  by 
Morosini  to  Venice,  where  it  still  guards  the  entrance  to  the 
arsenal,  waiting  for  the  day  when  all  her  stolen  treasures  shall 
be  restored  to  free  Greece.  Athens,  on  the  other  hand,  had 
sunk  into  insignificance,  as  compared  with  Thebes.  The 
Westphalian  priest,  Ludolph,  who  travelled  in  Greece  between 
1 3 36 and  1 341 , describes  it  as  "  almost  deserted,"  and  he  adds  the 
curious  remark,  which  perhaps  must  not  be  taken  too  literally, 
that  "there  is  not  a  marble  column  nor  any  good  work  of  cut 
stone  in  the  city  of  Genoa  which  has  not  been  brought  thither 
from  Athens,  so  that  the  city  has  been  wholly  built  out  of 
Athens."1  Forty  years  later  the  Catalans  of  Athens  lamented 
to  Pedro  IV.  their  "poverty  and  distress."  Livadia  under 
the  Catalans  obtained  an  importance,  which  it  retained  in 
Turkish  times ;  the  county  of  Salona  was  the  largest  fief  in  the 
country;  and  the  fortress  of  Siderokastron  is  described  as 
"the  key  of  the  duchy  of  Athens."2  Boudonitza,  whose 
Venetian  marquis  was  a  Catalan  vassal ;  Demetrias,  "  the 
boundary  of  Hellas,"  the  last  fragment  of  the  Catalan  posses- 
sions in  Thessaly ;  Lamia,  under  its  name  ;of  Citon ;  the 
Boeotian  Karditza ;  Atalante,  or  La  Calandri ;  Kapraina,  the 
ancient  Chaironeia;  Stiris,  or  Estir,  near  the  monastery  of 
the  Blessed  Luke ;  and  Vitrinitza,  or  La  Veterni^a,  on  the 
Gulf  of  Corinth,  all  figure  in  the  history  of  the  Catalan 
duchies ;  while  their  second  capital,  Neopatras,  or  La  Patria, 
by  furnishing  one  half  of  the  ducal  title,  became  a  household 
word  all  over  the  Spanish  world,  and  a  Spanish  poet  com- 
memorated it  long  after  the  last  Catalan  governor  had  left 
its  walls. 

The  Greeks  long  remembered  with  terror  the  Catalan 
domination  ;  a  Greek  girl  in  a  mediaeval  song,  prayed  that  her 
seducer  might  "fall  into  a  Catalan's  hands,"  and  even  a 
generation  ago  in  Attica,  in  Euboea,  in  Akarnania,  Messenia, 
Lakonia,  and  at  Tripolitza,  the  name  of  "  Catalan  "  was  used 
as  a  term  of  reproach ;  but  the  present  author's  enquiries  in 
Greece  have  not  succeeded  in  tracing  this  curious  survival  to 

1  De  Itinere  Terra  Sancta,  23  ;  Rubi6,  Catalunya,  98. 

2  Guardione,  op.  cit.y  22. 


330  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

the  present  day.  Professor  Polftes,  the  leading  authority  on 
Greek  folklore,  states,  however,  that  in  Mane  a  child  is  some- 
times christened  "  Catalan/1  as  an  omen  of  his  future  strength 
and  courage,  and  that  there  the  name  is  held  in  high  esteem.1 
The  distinguished  Greek  historian,  Professor  Ldmpros,  in  his 
juvenile  drama,  "  The  last  Count  of  Salona,"  and  Koutoubdles 
in  "  John  the  Catalan,  Archon  of  Olympos,"  have  embodied 
in  literature  the  Greek  conception  of  the  Catalans  as  monsters, 
but  there  is  more  of  rhetoric  than  of  history  in  those  produc- 
tions. That  the  Catalans  were  harder  masters  than  the 
French  is  very  probable ;  yet  it  is  remarkable  that  the  Greeks 
did  not  stir  a  finger  to  assist  in  a  French  restoration,  when 
they  had  the  chance.  The  probability  is,  that  the  Catalans 
have  obtained  their  bad  name  from  their  cruelties  before  they 
settled  down  in  Attica,  and  that  they  became  staider  and 
more  tolerant  as  they  became  respectable  ;  towards  the  close, 
as  we  have  seen,  King  Pedro  was  not  only  liberal  towards  the 
Greeks,  but  waxed  as  enthusiastic  as  any  philhellene  over 
the  splendours  of  the  Parthenon.  If,  in  spite  of  his  liberality, 
they  assisted  Nerio,  as  has  been  plausibly  argued,  to  conquer 
Athens,  that  merely  proves  that  they  recognised  in  him  a 
strong  man  on  the  spot,  connected  by  marriage  with  the  chief 
representative  of  Hellenism  in  Greece,  who  would  perhaps 
give  them  that  peace  which  their  absent  duke  could  not 
ensure. 

But  if  the  modern  Greeks  do  not  view  the  Catalans  with 
favour,  the  modern  Catalans  look  back  with  justifiable  pride 
on  the  connection  between  their  countrymen  and  Athens. 
Catalan  divines  have  truly  boasted  that  their  tongue  was  once 
spoken  in  the  precincts  of  the  Parthenon ;  Catalan  poets  and 
dramatists  have  chosen  the  Catalan  Grand  Company  for  their 
theme ;  to  the  labours  of  a  brilliant  Catalan  scholar  we  owe 
the  documents  which  have  thrown  so  much  light  on  this 
period  ;  and  in  the  history  of  Athens,  where  nothing  can 
lack  interest,  these  rough  soldiers  from  the  West  are  also 
entitled  to  a  place. 

About  the  same  time    that  Nerio  Acciajuoli  obtained 

1  Stamatftdes,  01  KaroXdvot,  223 ;  Polftes,  quoted  by  Rubi<5,  La 
EspedicMn,  15-17;  Legrand,  Recueil  de  Chansons  populaires  grtcques, 
p.  xx. 


SERVIAN  TYRANNY  IN  EPIROS  331 

possession  of  Attica,  a  relative  of  his  completed  the  phe- 
nomenal good  fortune  of  the  family  by  becoming  Despot  of 
Epiros.  We  last  saw  all  Akarnania  and  iEtolia  in  the 
possession  of  an  Albanian  chieftain,  Ghin  (or  John)  Boua 
Spata,  while  a  Serb,  Thomas  Preliubovich,  ruled  at  Joannina. 
"  At  first,"  says  the  Chronicle  of  Epiros,  "  he  wore  a  fox's 
skin ;  but  he  soon  threw  it  off,  and  put  on  that  of  a  lion." 
Every  class  and  race  suffered  from  the  persecutions  of  this 
petty  tyrant;  he  first  attacked  the  Greek  Church,  ex- 
pelling the  metropolitan,  and  distributing  the  ecclesiastical 
property  among  his  Servian  followers;  then  it  was  the 
turn  of  the  native  magnates,  whom  he  either  banished,  or 
imprisoned,  then  that  of  the  common  people,  whose  food  he 
taxed  and  whose  savings  he  extorted.  Wine,  corn,  meat, 
and  cheese,  the  fish  of  the  lake,  the  fruit  of  the  orchards,  all 
became  monopolies  of  the  tyrant,  who  compelled  the  peasants 
to  work  for  him  without  pay.  The  Albanians  do  not  usually 
turn  the  left  cheek  to  the  smiter ;  they  called  in  the  aid  of 
their  countryman,  Boua  Spata,  who  more  than  once  besieged 
Joannina,  but  in  vain.  The  Archangel  Michael — so  ran  the 
story — saved  the  threatened  city,  and  its  tyrant,  imitating 
Basil  "the  Bulgar-Slayer,"  was  able  to  style  himself  with 
pride  Thomas  "the  slayer  of  the  Albanians,"  from  the 
number  of  his  victims.  "  All  wickedness  is  small  compared 
with  the  wickedness  of  Thomas" —  such  is  the  constant 
refrain  of  the  tearful  chronicler.  Even  his  Serbs  fled  from 
before  his  face ;  and  thus,  having  forfeited  the  sympathies  of 
all,  he  completed  his  enormities  by  calling  in  the  Turks.  In 
1385,  for  the  first  time,  a  Turkish  force  marched  on  Arta, 
under  the  command  of  Timourtash,  carrying  away  a  number 
of  prisoners.  Boua  Spata,  at  this  crisis,  in  vain  proposed  to 
Preliubovich  an  alliance  against  the  common  enemy ;  but 
vengeance  was  at  hand,  and  before  the  year  was  out,  the 
tyrant  fell  by  the  hands  of  his  own  bodyguard.  The  people 
of  Joannina  joyfully  proclaimed  his  widow,  who  called  her 
brother,  the  famous  Abbot  of  Metdora,  "  King  Joseph,"  to 
her  councils,  and,  on  his  advice  and  that  of  the  leading 
magnates,  resolved  to  marry  a  strong  man  who  could  help 
her  to  reorganise  her  distracted  country  and  protect  it  from 
the  renewed  attacks  of  the  ambitious  Spata.     Such  a  consort 


332  THE  NAVARRESE  COMPANY 

was  found  in  the  person  of  Esau  Buondelmonti,  a  Florentine 
of  noble  family,  connected  with  the  Acciajuoli  and  brother 
of  the  Duchess  of  Leucadia,  in  whose  island  dominions  he 
was  then  residing.  The  elegant  and  quiet  Florentine  pleased 
the  Servian  widow  all  the  more  by  contrast  with  her  first 
husband's  barbarous  ways  ;  indeed,  according  to  one  account, 
Esau  had  already  been  her  paramour,  having  been  captured 
in  battle  by  Preliubovich,  pardoned  at  the  instance  of  his 
wife,  and  then  having  helped  her  to  get  rid  of  the  tyrant 
The  people  received  him  with  intense  relief;  he  restored 
their  confiscated  property,  recalled  the  banished  metropolitan, 
re-endowed  the  Church,  opened  the  doors  of  the  prisons, 
summoned  back  the  exiled  magnates,  and  abolished  the 
hateful  corv/es.  Like  his  predecessor,  he  strove  to  legitimise 
his  rule  with  the  Greeks  by  accepting  the  title  of  Despot  from 
the  imperial  court  at  Constantinople ;  but  he  needed  more 
efficient  aid  against  Spata  and  his  Albanians,  and  had  to 
ask  the  Sultan  Murad  I.  in  person  for  his  protection — to 
such  a  state  of  weakness  were  the  Christian  states  of  the , 
East  now  reduced.  A  Turkish  force  appeared  at  Joannina ; 
Spata,  who  was  besieging  the  town  by  both  land  and  water, 
was  forced  to  withdraw,  and  sorely-tried  Epiros  enjoyed  for 
a  few  years  the  blessings  of  peace.1 

Thus,  in  the  year  1388,  by  an  extraordinary  coincidence, 
Florentines  held  sway  alike  at  Athens,  at  Corinth,  in  Epiros, 
and  in  the  island  county  of  Cephalonia,  where  Esau's  sister, 
the  Duchess  Maddalena,  widow  of  Leonardo  Tocco,  was 
regent  for  her  son  Carlo,2  himself  affianced  to  an  Acciajuoli, 
Another  daughter  of  that  dominant  house  charmed  with 
her  beauty  the  ceremonious  Byzantine  court  of  Mistra.  If 
Florence  was  thus  the  leading  Latin  power  in  Greece,  Venice 
came  near  her ;  for  she  was  firmly  settled  in  Crete,  and  was 
practically  mistress  of  Eubcea  and  of  Argolis,  where  a  noble 
French  dame  still  maintained  the  appearance  of  power  in 
the  last  fragment  of  the  old  French  duchy  of  Athens. 
Venice  held,  too,  her  Messenian  colonies ;  the  possession  of 

1  Epiroticay  216-35;  Chalkokond^les,  211 -12;  Gregorovius,  Brief ey 
304  ;  Verino,  De  lllustratume  Urbis  Florentine,  i.,  120 ;  ii.,  22. 

3  Leonardo  I.  had  died  between  1374  and  1377  ;  Buchon,  Nouvclles 
RecttertheSy  I.,  i.,  309 ;  Hopf,  Chroniques>  183. 


wl1  .  «fla#">£^ 


""^^ 


THE     ARCHIPELAGO 


-*"    *    13$$* 


^TOTBHrflTTO 


GREECE  IN  1388  333 

Pteleon  gave  her  a  post  of  observation  in  Thessaly ;  she  had 
just  acquired  the  island  of  Corfii,  the  key  of  the  Adriatic ; 
and  in  the  Cyclades  the  new  Italian  dynasty  was  more  sus- 
ceptible to  her  influence  than  the  previous  dukes  of  the 
Archipelago  had  been.  The  Navarrese  in  the  principality  of 
Achaia,  and  the  Catalans  at  Salona,  completed  the  Latin 
element.  While  the  Albanian  chieftains  still  held  Arta  and 
Lepanto,  and  the  Servian  dominion  was  fast  waning  in 
Thessaly,  the  Turk  was  surely  approaching.  Already  his 
aid  is  invoked  in  Greek  affairs ;  already  his  shadow  is  over 
the  vale  of  Tempe  and  the  great  Thessalian  plain.  Too 
late  the  Greek  people,  so  long  inarticulate,  was  growing 
conscious  of  its  nationality  and  of  its  power.  The  last 
period  of  Latin  rule  at  Athens  witnessed,  on  the  eve  of  the 
Turkish  Conquest,  the  revival  of  the  Greek  Church  and  the 
national  aristocracy. 


CHAPTER  XI 

FLORENTINE   AND   VENETIAN   ATHENS  (1388-I415) 

THE  history  of  mediaeval  Athens  is  full  of  surprises.  A 
Burgundian  nobleman  founding  a  dynasty  in  the  ancient 
home  of  heroes  and  philosophers;  a  roving  band  of 
mercenaries  from  the  westernmost  peninsula  of  Europe 
destroying  in  a  single  day  the  brilliant  French  civilisation 
of  a  century ;  a  Florentine  upstart,  armed  with  the  modern 
weapons  of  finance,  receiving  the  keys  of  the  Akropolis  from 
a  gallant  and  chivalrous  soldier  of  Spain — such  are  the 
tableaux  which  inaugurate  the  three  epochs  of  her  Frankish 
annals.  But  the  merchant  prince,  whom  a  successful  policy 
of  enlightened  selfishness  had  made  the  founder  of  the 
third  and  last  Latin  dynasty  of  Athens,  was  in  a  much 
more  difficult  position  than  either  of  his  predecessors.  It 
was  true  that  his  dominions,  on  paper  at  any  rate,  were 
almost  as  extended  as  ever  had  been  those  of  the  Bur- 
gundians  and  Catalans  in  their  palmiest  days.  If,  unlike 
the  former,  he  did  not  own  the  Argolid,  he  held  the  stately 
castle  of  Corinth,  the  key  of  the  Morea,  with  its  ring  of 
dependent  fortresses.  Chalkokond^les  tells  us  that  he 
possessed  most  of  Phokis,  the  outlying  parts,  no  doubt,  of 
the  Catalan  county  of  Salona,  and  that  his  northern  frontier 
marched  with  the  confines  of  Thessaly.  The  three  most 
prosperous  cities  of  ancient  Hellas — Athens,  Thebes,  Corinth 
— were  all  his.  But  the  handwriting  was  on  the  wall :  the 
Turk  was  hovering  on  the  Macedonian  border.  Under  these 
circumstances  the  keynote  of  the  new  ruler's  policy  was 
naturally  conciliation  of  the  Greeks.  Now,  for  the  first  time 
since  the  day  when  Michael  Akominitos  had  fled  from  his 
cathedral    on   the   Akropolis  before  the    Burgundian    con- 

884 


THE  GREEK  METROPOLITAN  RESTORED     335 

querors,  a  Greek  metropolitan  was  allowed  to  reside  at 
Athens.1  He  did  not,  indeed,  recover  the  time-honoured 
church  of  Our  Lady  on  that  sacred  rock — for  the  Parthenon 
continued,  as  before,  to  be  the  Catholic  minster  of  the  city — 
but  conducted  his  services  in  what  is  now  the  military 
bakery,  but  which  was  in  Turkish  times  "the  mosque  of 
the  conqueror."  This  venerable  edifice,  now  put  to  such 
base  uses,  was  the  metropolitan  church  of  Athens  during 
the  rest  of  the  Frankish  period.  Opinions  differ  as  to  the 
residence  of  the  metropolitan ;  one  archaeologist  thought 
that  he  had  discovered  fragments  of  the  building  in  the 
Stoa  of  Attalos ;  the  more  probable  view  is  that  it  was  near 
the  church  of  Dionysios  the  Areopagite  under  the  shadow 
of  the  Areopagos,  where  travellers  visited  the  metropolitan 
in  the  seventeenth  century,  until  a  fragment  of  the  rock, 
loosened  by  an  earthquake,  fell  and  destroyed  his  abode.2 
Great  was  the  surprise  of  the  Holy  Synod  at  Constantinople 
when  the  news  arrived  that,  after  nearly  two  centuries,  an 
Athenian  metropolitan  could  live  in  his  see,  instead  of 
remaining,  as  most  of  his  predecessors  had  done,  merely 
a  titular  dignitary,  who  found  occupation  in  attending  the 
meetings  of  that  august  body.  In  the  ecclesiastical  docu- 
ments8 of  the  Catalan  period  we  find  frequent  allusions  to 
the  metropolitans  of  Athens  as  members  of  the  Holy  Synod ; 
and  one  of  the  exiled  hierarchs  died  in  Crete  a  martyr  for 
his  Church ;  but  the  local  business  had  always  been  carried 
on  in  their  absence  by  deputies,  whose  title  was  the  more 
modest  one  of  "first  priest"  (irparroTraTrdg) 4  or  "Exarch."6 
The  degradation  of  the  Athenian  see  to  a  lower  place  in 
the  ecclesiastical  hierarchy  by  Andr6nikos  II.  was  therefore 
justified. 

Throughout  the  Frankish  period  the  Greek  ecclesiastical 
organisation  had  subsisted,  with  a  few  changes;  but  its 
existence  had  been  merely  on  paper,  so  far  as  most  of  the 

1  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  ii.,  165. 

*  Kampotiroglos,  'I<rro/>(a  t&v  'Aerator,  ii,  37,  170,  304 ;  Spon,  Voyage^ 
ii.,  200 ;  Philadelphetis,  'leropla  tQv  'ABnr&r,  L,  178,  273,  278,  279,  312  ; 
ii.,  91. 

8  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  i.,  453,  456,  459,  467,  47 1,  476,  477,  488,  498, 
558,  564. 

4  Ibid.y  ii.,  259.  6  Ldmpros,  Uapvcurvfo,  vi.,  172. 


336       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

Latin  states  of  the  Levant  were  concerned.  The  twelve 
metropolitan  sees,  which  we  found  at  the  time  of  the  Latin 
Conquest,  had  been  increased  to  fifteen  or  sixteen  in  the 
time  of  Andr6nikos  II. ;  but  it  is  significant  that  he  awarded 
all  the  sees  of  Greece  a  lower  place  in  the  hierarchical  scale, 
with  the  notable  exception  of  Monemvasia — a  natural  tribute 
to  the  great  importance  of  that  city  to  the  empire  after  its 
recovery  in  1262.  The  Venetians,  always  more  indifferent 
to  religious  fervour  than  other  Catholics,  had  allowed  the 
Greek  bishops  to  reside  in  their  colonies  of  Coron  and 
Modon.  But  there  was  no  room  found  for  a  Catholic 
archbishop  and  a  Greek  metropolitan  in  the  same  town. 
Hence  the  custom  had  arisen  at  the  oecumenical  patriarchate 
of  tacking  suffragan  bishoprics,  which  had  from  time  im- 
memorial belonged  to  the  "  enslaved  "  metropolitan  sees,  on  to 
other  sees  which  had  been  so  fortunate  as  to  escape  from  the 
clutches  of  the  Franks.  It  had  become  the  practice,  too, 
for  the  bishop  of  a  •'  free "  diocese  to  lay  hands  on  those 
persons  of  an  "  enslaved  "  diocese  who  desired  to  enter  the 
ministry.1  But,  as  the  Greeks  had  gradually  recovered  a 
large  part  of  the  Morea,  two  out  of  its  five  metropolitans — 
those  of  Monemvasia  and  Lacedaemonia — had  been  able  to 
reside  in  their  respective  sees ;  while  a  third,  his  grace  of 
Patras,  though,  of  course,  excluded  from  what  was  pre- 
eminently the  Catholic  city  of  the  peninsula,  had  latterly 
resided,  after  a  long  homeless  existence,  in  the  splendid 
monastery  of  "  the  Great  Cave,"  still  the  richest  institution 
of  the  kind  in  Greece,  which  was  a  special  dependency  (or 
(trravpoTrnyiov)  of  the  patriarchate.  North  of  the  isthmus 
the  occupation  of  Thessaly  by  the  orthodox  Serbs,  after  a 
temporary  attempt  to  form  a  separate  Servian  church,  had 
naturally  involved  the  return  of  the  metropolitan  of  Larissa, 
"  Exarch  of  Second  Thessaly  and  all  Hellas,"  to  that  ancient 
city,  and  the  capture  of  Lepanto  from  the  Angevins  by  the 
Albanians  had  restored  the  metropolitan  of  Naupaktos, 
"Exarch  of  all  iEtolia,"  to  his  old  see  in  1380,  after 
long  exile  at  Arta.*    At  Salona,  thanks,  no  doubt,  to   the 

1  Miklosich  und  M  tiller,  ii.,  139. 

2  Dor6theos  of  Monemvasia,  op.  cit.,  397  ;  Miklosich  und  M  tiller,  i., 
413,  493,  514,  587  ;  ii.,  ",  23,  270. 


BEStfLT  OF  RELIGIOUS  TOLERATION        33? 

influence  of  its  Greek  countess,  we  now  hear  for  the  first 
time  of  a  Greek  bishop,  whose  example,  like  those  of  the 
restored  metropolitans  of  Athens,  inspires  doubts  as  to  the 
wisdom  of  this  tolerant  policy,  from  the  Frankish  point  of 
view.  The  conquerors  had  now,  however,  to  face  this 
dilemma:  either  they  must  continue  to  exclude  the  higher 
Greek  clergy,  in  which  case  they  would  lose  the  sympathies 
of  their  numerous  and  more  and  more  indispensable  Greek 
subjects,  or  they  must  permit  them  to  return,  in  which 
case  the  patriotic  aspirations  of  the  orthodox  hierarchy, 
combined  with  its  intensely  political  character,  would 
certainly  lead  to  conspiracies  against  the  temporal  authori- 
ties, who  were  at  once  aliens  and — worse  still — schismatics. 
This  was  exactly  what  happened.  The  Greek  bishop  at 
Athens  or  Salona,  became  a  political  agent  of  Hellenism, 
a  leader,  or  at  least  a  representative,  of  the  national  party, 
just  as  he  is  to-day  in  Macedonia;  unable  to  secure  the 
triumph  of  Greek  independence,  he  was  ready,  as  is  his 
fellow  in  Macedonia,  to  seek  the  aid  of  the  Turk,  as  a 
preferable  alternative  to  the  rule  of  a  Christian  of  another 
Church,  Thus,  the  restoration  of  the  Greek  metropolitan 
see  of  Athens  was  an  event  of  the  first  importance  to 
Hellenism,  and  the  Holy  Synod  was  able  to  report  with 
pride  that  under  the  tactful  administration  of  Dor6theos, 
"Exarch  of  All  Hellas,  and  president  of  Thebes  and 
Neopatras,"  the  Athenian  Church,  which  had  preserved  the 
orthodox  faith  even  without  its  hierarch,  "seemed  to  have 
recovered  its  ancient  happiness,  such  as  it  had  enjoyed  before 
the  barbarian  conquest"  *  As  for  the  Catholic  hierarchy,  it 
continued  as  before,  only  that,  instead  of  a  Catalan,  a 
Tuscan  was  archbishop  at  both  Athens  and  Corinth. 

But  it  was  not  the  Greek  Church  alone  which  profited  by 
the  change  of  dynasty.  Nerio's  philhellenic  policy — and  it 
was  policy,  not  sentiment,  which  made  this  hard-headed 
Florentine  favour  the  Greeks — was  also  extended  to  the 
laity.  Greek  for  the  first  time  became  the  official  language 
of  the  Government  at  Athens  ;  thirty  years  before,  it  had  been 
employed  by  the  bailie  of  the  titular  duke  at  Nauplia. 
Nerio  and  his  accomplished  daughter,  the  Countess  of 
1  Miklosich  und  M uller,  ii.,  165. 

Y 


338       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

Cephalonia,  used  it  in  their  public  documents ;  the  countess, 
the  most  masterful  woman  of  the  Latin  Orient,  proudly 
signed  herself,  in  the  cinnabar  ink  of  Byzantium,  "  Empress 
of  the  Romans."  This  practice  naturally  necessitated  the 
engagement  of  Greeks  as  secretaries  and  clerks.  Nerio's 
secretary  was  a  certain  Phiomichos,  the  ever-useful 
Demdtrios  Rendi  continued  to  be  notary  of  the  city,  and  as 
his  colleague  we  find  another  Greek,  Nik61aos  Makri.  There 
is  some  evidence  that  Greek  "  elders "  were  allowed  a  share 
in  the  municipal  government,  as  was  the  case  under  the 
Turks.1  Even  Florentines  settled  at  Athens  assumed  the 
Greek  translations  of  their  surnames.  A  member  of  the 
famous  Medici  family  had  emigrated  to  Athens  in  the 
Catalan  days ;  possibly  he  was  one  of  the  Tuscan  men-at- 
arms  who  took  part  in  Walter  of  Brienne's  futile  expedition  ; 
at  any  rate,  a  certain  Pierre  de  Medicis  "  of  Athens  "  held 
the  office  of  bailie  and  captain-general  of  Argos  and  Nauplia 
for  Walter,  when  the  latter  was  tyrant  of  Florence,  and  we 
may  conjecture  that  the  titular  duke  was  glad  to  employ  as 
his  deputy  a  Florentine  and  an  old  follower  who  had 
remained  in  Greece.  This  man's  son  had  now  settled  in 
Athens,  doubtless  attracted  by  the  success  of  his  eminent 
fellow- Florentine.  The  Medici  had  intermarried  with  Greeks, 
and  had  now  become  so  Hellenised  as  to  call  themselves 
Iatr6s,  instead  of  Medici.  A  century  and  a  half  later,  their 
descendants  still  flourished  at  Athens  and  at  Nauplia,  and 
the  family  of  Iatr6poulos  claims  them  as  its  ancestors.2 

Hitherto  the  career  of  Nerio  Acciajuoli  had  been  one  of 
unbroken  success.  His  star  had  guided  him  from  Florence 
to  Akrocorinth,  and  from  Akrocorinth  to  the  Akropolis ;  his 
two  daughters,  one  famed  as  the  most  beautiful,  the  other  as 
the  most  talented  woman  of  her  time,  were  married  to  the 
chief  Greek  and  to  the  leading  Latin  potentate  of  Greece. 
These  two  alliances  seemed  to  afford  him  protection  against 
the  only  serious  foe  whom  he  had  to  fear,  the  vigorous  and 

1  If,  with  Philadelpheiis  (i.,  135),  we  accept  the  Qprjvos,  or  "  Lament  for 
the  Capture  of  Athens,"  as  referring  to  this  period. 

*  Ibid.,  III.,  248,  253  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles Recherches%  I.,  i.,  131  ;  II.,  i., 
220 ;  Gregorovius,  op.  M,  ii.,  227 ;  Ldmpros,  "Ey/pa^a,  407  ;  Sdthas, 
Uni/ieia,  viii.,  370,  451. 


VENICE  BUYS  ARGOS  339 

unscrupulous  leader  of  the  Navarrese  Company.  The  King 
of  Aragon,  in  his  palace  at  Barcelona,  was  far  away ;  but  the 
Navarrese  were  near  at  hand.  They  had  never  shown  much 
love  for  Nerio,  even  when  he  was  only  lord  of  Corinth ;  they 
had  seized  many  of  his  family  estates ;  they  would  be  only 
too  glad,  as  his  confidant,  the  worldly  Bishop  of  Argos,  had 
complained, "  to  do  him  some  great  harm."  They  had  not 
forgotten  their  temporary  occupation  of  the  Athenian  duchy, 
and  they  were  now  on  excellent  terms  with  the  new  King  of 
Aragon,  who  still  regarded  himself  as  its  lawful  duke,  and 
might  at  any  moment  employ  their  swords  and  their  local 
knowledge  against  the  usurper.1  The  most  elementary 
common-sense  suggested  that  he  should  not  place  himself  in 
the  power  of  these  astute  enemies.  But  success  had 
apparently  blinded  the  wily  Florentine  to  the  obvious  dictates 
of  prudence.  He  was  now  destined,  thanks  to  his  ambition 
and  his  rashness,  to  experience  one  of  those  sudden  turns  of 
fortune  so  peculiarly  characteristic  of  Frankish  Greece. 

Nerio  was  naturally  desirous  of  rounding  off  his  dominions 
by  the  acquisition  of  the  castles  of  Nauplia  and  Argos,  which 
had  been  appendages  of  the  French  duchy  of  Athens,  but 
which,  during  the  Catalan  period,  had  remained  loyal  to  the 
family  of  Brienne  and  to  its  heirs,  the  house  of  Enghien. 
It  chanced  that  in  the  very  same  year,  1388,  which  witnessed 
the  fall  of  the  Akropolis,  Marie  d'Enghien,  the  Lady  of 
Argos,  lost  her  Venetian  husband,  Pietro  Cornaro.  Thus 
left  a  young  and  helpless  widow,  and  fearing  an  attack  upon 
her  possessions  by  her  two  ambitious  neighbours,  Nerio  and 
his  son-in-law,  the  Despot  Theodore  of  Mistr£,  whose 
dominions  came  up  as  far  as  Astros,  on  the  Gulf  of  Nauplia, 
the  Lady  of  Argos  transferred  her  Argive  estates  to  Venice, 
in  return  for  a  perpetual  annuity  of  500  gold  ducats  to 
herself  and  her  heirs,  and  a  further  life  annuity  to  herself  of 
200  ducats.  In  the  event  of  her  death  without  heirs,  she 
was  allowed  to  bequeath  the  sum  of  2000  ducats,  payable  out 
of  the  Venetian  treasury,  to  whomsoever  she  pleased.  She  was, 
however,  to  forfeit  all  claim  to  the  above  annuities,  if  she 
married  anyone  except  a  Venetian  noble.  The  ancient 
Larissa  of  Argos,  the  twin  castles  of  Nauplia,  "  the  Frank  " 
1  Rubi6,  Los  Navarros,  480,  492. 


340       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

and  "  the  Greek,"  as  they  were  still  called,  and  the  noble  gulf 
whose  waves  then  washed  their  base,  were  cheap  at  the 
price.1  Thus,  Venice  acquired  the  sole  remaining  dependency 
of  the  old  French  duchy  of  Athens,  which  remained  in  her 
hands  for  over  one  hundred  and  fifty  years.  Thus,  the  most 
shrewdly  practical  and  least  romantic  of  mediaeval  republics 
began  her  long  domination  over  the  ancient  kingdom  of 
Agamemnon.  Thus,  in  the  selfsame  year,  a  Florentine 
banker  became  the  heir  of  Theseus,  a  Venetian  magistrate 
the  heir  of  Atrides. 

Before,  however,  the  Venetian  commissioner,  Malipiero, 
had  had  time  to  take  over  the  Argolid,  the  Despot  Theodore, 
instigated  by  his  father-in-law,  Nerio,  had  seized  Argos  by  a 
coup  de  main.  Nerio  regarded  himself,  and  not  Venice,  as  the 
successor  of  the  De  la  Roche  and  the  Brienne  in  places 
which  had  once  been  theirs,  and  in  which  he  himself  had 
property.  His  plan  was,  however,  only  half  successful,  for 
Malipiero  persuaded  the  people  of  Nauplia  to  admit  him  as 
the  representative  of  the  most  serene  republic.  Already 
incensed  with  Nerio,  whom  she  accused  of  still  harbouring 
Turkish  corsairs  at  Megara  to  the  detriment  of  her  colonies, 
Venice  retorted  by  breaking  off  all  commercial  relations 
between  them  and  the  subjects  of  Nerio  and  his  son-in-law. 
The  Athenians  were  no  longer  allowed  to  export  their  figs 
and  raisins  to  Negroponte,  nor  to  import  their  iron  and 
ploughshares  from  Modon  and  Coron.  At  the  same  time, 
Venetian  diplomacy  made  use  of  the  Navarrese  Company  to 
punish  the  chief  culprit  San  Superan  was  on  good  terms 
with  Venice;  he  had  promised  to  compensate  her  subjects 
for  the  damage  done  by  his  men  at  the  time  of  their 
invasion,  to  favour  her  commerce,  and  to  dispose  of  no 
portion  of  the  principality  to  her  foes.  He  now  willingly 
offered  his  services ;  the  Venetian  Archbishop  of  Patras  did 
the  same.  The  shrewd  Florentine  showed  on  this  occasion 
a  childlike  simplicity,  remarkable  in  one  who  had  lived  so 
many  years  in  the  Levant.  He  accepted  the  invitation  of 
the  Navarrese  commander  to  a  personal  interview  on   the 

1  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  211-15;  Caresinus, 
Sanudo,  and  Navagero  apud  Muratori,  xii.,  482  ;  xxii.,  760,  777  ;  xxiii. 
1072  ;  Gerland,  159 ;  Chronicon  Breve,  516. 


NERIO  PRISONER  OF  THE  NAVARRESE       341 

question  of  Argos,  relying  on  a  safe-conduct  which  he  had 
received.  To  the  men  of  Navarre  the  law  of  nations  was 
mere  waste-paper ;  the  opportunity  of  securing  their  enemy 
was  too  good  to  be  lost  San  Superan  bade  Asan  Zaccaria, 
the  great  constable  of  the  Morea,  arrest  him,  and  on  ioth 
September  1389,  the  order  was  executed.1  At  once  the 
whole  Acciajuoli  clan  set  to  work  to  obtain  the  release  of 
their  distinguished  relative.  His  wife  offered  Theodore  a 
large  sum  to  surrender  Argos.  One  of  his  brothers,  Angelo, 
Cardinal  Archbishop  of  Florence,  sent  a  trusty  emissary  to 
the  Despot,  and  implored  the  intervention  of  the  pope; 
another,  Donato,  a  Florentine  Gonfaloniere,  to  whom  Nerio's 
wife  specially  appealed  for  aid,  persuaded  his  Government  to 
despatch  envoys  to  Venice,  offering  the  most  liberal  terms, 
if  the  republic  would  secure  Nerio's  release.  Donato  was 
ready  to  place  the  cities  of  Athens  and  Thebes  and  part 
of  the  barony  of  Corinth  in  the  hands  of  a  Venetian  com- 
missioner as  a  pledge  of  his  brother's  sincerity,  together  with 
Nerio's  merchandise  in  the  city  of  Corinth  to  the  value  of 
from  12,000  to  15,000  ducats,  so  as  to  defray  any  expenses 
incurred  by  the  republic  in  obtaining  his  release.  He  offered 
to  go  in  person  to  Greece  and  see  that  Argos  was  handed 
over  to  Venice  before  his  brother  was  set  free,  and  appealed 
for  mercy  to  one  who  was  an  honorary  citizen  of  the  republic 
On  the  same  ground,  he  applied  for  aid  to  Genoa,  which  had 
lately  conferred  the  freedom  of  the  city  upon  Nerio's 
daughter,  the  Countess  of  Cephalonia,  and  invoked  the 
assistance  of  Amadeo  of  Savoy.  The  fear  of  Genoese 
intervention,  and  the  news  that  the  Despot  was  preparing  to 
release  his  father-in-law  by  force,  decided  Venice  to  give 
way.  After  nearly  a  year's  imprisonment  near  Vostitza  and 
in  the  inland  castle  of  Listrina  (near  Patras),  Nerio  obtained 
his  release  in  the  latter  half  of  1390  by  sending  his  favourite 
daughter,  the  Countess  of  Cephalonia,  as  a  hostage  to 
Negroponte,  and  by  consigning  the  city  and  castle  of  Megara 
and  the  value  of  his  merchandise  at  Corinth  to  the  Venetians, 
until  they  had  obtained  possession  of  Argos,  which  he 
promised  to  assist  in  securing  for  them,  by  force  if 
necessary.  If  the  Navarrese  had  hoped  to  annex  his 
1  Gregorovius,  Brief e  aus  der  "  Corrispcndenza  Acciajoli?  305-6. 


342       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

dominions  during  his  captivity,  they  were  mistaken,  for  his 
wife  could  point  with  pride  to  the  loyalty  of  both  his  old 
subjects  at  Corinth  and  his  new  subjects  at  Athens  to  their 
imprisoned  lord — a  fact  which  shows  that  his  philhellenic 
policy  had  borne  fruit  But  the  men  of  Navarre,  as  was 
well  known,  were  fond  of  money,  and  they,  too,  were  deter- 
mined to  make  their  captive  pay  dearly  for  his  liberty.  In 
order  to  raise  the  money  for  his  ransom,  he  stripped  the 
silver  plates  off  the  doors  of  the  Parthenon,  seized  the  gold, 
silver,  and  precious  stones  which  the  piety  of  many  genera- 
tions had  given  to  the  ancient  minster  and  to  the  cathedral 
of  Corinth,  and  acquired,  by  lease  or  other  means,  various 
churches,  including  the  Parthenon.  The  Despot  was,  however, 
in  no  hurry  to  surrender  Argos.  It  was  not  till  1394  that 
Venice  at  last  obtained  possession  of  that  coveted  city, 
together  with  the  castles  of  Thermisi  and  Kiveri.  Then,  at 
last,  internal  dissensions  in  his  own  dominions,  where  one 
of  the  hereditary  archons  of  Monemvasia,  a  descendant  of 
the  Mamon&s  who  had  parleyed  with  William  de  Ville- 
hardouin  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  before,  aimed  at 
practical  independence  with  Turkish  aid  or  under  Venetian 
suzerainty,  forced  him  to  yield.  Venice  thereupon  restored 
Megara  to  Nerio,  together  with  a  large  sum  of  his  money 
which  she  had  still  in  hand.  The  administration  of  the 
Argolid  was  then  settled  ;  in  the  days  of  the  titular  dukes  of 
Athens,  Nauplia  and  Argos  had  been  governed  by  a  bailie  or 
captain-general,  assisted  by  a  council ;  each  of  the  two  cities 
now  received  zftodestit,  or  "  captain,"  with  a  couple  of  governors 
under  him,  but  the  two  administrations  were  to  work  in 
common,  as  at  Modon  and  Coron ;  a  deputation  of  Argives 
presented  the  capitulations  of  the  towns  at  Venice,  and 
received  the  ratification  of  their  fiscal  and  feudal  privileges. 
One  of  the  first  acts  of  the  Venetian  authorities  was  to  erect 
a  third  fortress  at  Nauplia,  on  the  north-west  slope  of  Itsh- 
Kaleh,  to  which  they  gave  the  name  of  the  Torrione.  As  at 
that  time  the  site  of  the  present  lower  town  was  covered  by 
the  sea,  the  place  was  extremely  strong. 

1  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  III.,  206,  208,  223,  231  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles 
Recherches%  II.,  i.,  238-53,  254-6;  L&npros,  "Eyypa^a,  114;  Ckronicon 
Brtve,  516 ;  Dordtheos  of  Monemvasia,  472. 


STATE  OF  ACHAIA  IN  1391  348 

Nerio  was  not  the  man  to  forgive  the  Navarrese  the  trick 
which  they  had  played  upon  him,  especially  as  they  had 
seized  most  of  his  family  estates  in  the  Morea  and  insisted  in 
maintaining  the  old  fiction,  that  the  duchy  of  Athens  was  a 
fief  of  Achaia,  and  its  master  merely  "  lord  of  Corinth."  He 
accordingly  entered  into  relations  with  the  pretender  Amadeo 
of  Savoy,  who  had  been  greatly  moved  at  the  news  of  his 
imprisonment,  and  was  at  this  moment  extremely  active. 
Venice  thought  that  the  Savoyard  might  assist  in  capturing 
Argos  for  her,  and  undertook  to  transport  him  and  his  men 
to  the  Morea,  and  to  make  terms  between  him  and  the 
Navarrese  when  he  arrived  there.  The  Navarrese,  on  their 
part,  alarmed  by  the  approaching  Turkish  peril,  offered  to 
recognise  his  claims,  provided  that  he  would  confirm  them 
in  the  possession  of  the  fiefs  which  they  had  won  by  their 
swords,  with  full  right  of  sale  if  any  of  them  wished  to  return 
to  Navarre,  would  permit  them  to  make  certain  gifts  or 
bequests  to  the  famous  Minorite  church  at  Glarentza,  and 
would  pay  20,000  gold  ducats  to  San  Superan.  For  Amadeo's 
guidance,  they  sent  him  a  list  of  the  fiefs  which  existed  in  the 
Morea  in  1391.  From  this  list  we  see  that  the  twelve  peers 
now  consisted  of  the  three  dukes  of  Athens,  the  Archipelago, 
and  Leucadia;  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  the  Count  of 
Cephalonia,  and  the  Countess  of  Salona ;  the  three  triarchs 
of  Negroponte ;  the  barons  of  Arkadia  and  Chalandritza ; 
and  the  Archbishop  of  Patras.  Three  other  ecclesiastical 
barons  are  enumerated — the  bishops  of  Olena,  Modon,  and 
Coron  ;  and  the  two  military  orders  of  the  Teutonic  Knights 
and  those  of  Rhodes.1  Great,  indeed,  had  been  the  changes 
since  the  Achaian  peerage  was  founded  nearly  two  centuries 
before.  Arkadia,  Chalandritza,  and  Patras  were  the  only 
original  baronies  left,  and  they  had  all  passed  away  from 
their  original  holders,  for  the  two  former  now  both  belonged 
to  the  Genoese  Asan  Zaccaria,  great  constable  of  the  princi- 
pality, while  Patras  was  practically  an  independent  fief,  held 
by  the  archbishop,  who  acknowledged  no  overlord  but  the 
pope.  Moreover,  nine  of  the  peers  resided  out  of  the 
peninsula,  whereas,  even  in   the  list  preserved  in  the  Book 

1  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  iii.,  203,  209 ;  Gregorovius,  Briefey  306 ; 
Buchon,  Recherehes  et  MatMaux^  i.,  288-99  J  Hopf,  Chroniquesy  229-30. 


I 


344       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

of  the  Customs  of  ttu  Empire  of  Romania  and  composed 
somewhat  earlier  in  this  same  century,  there  were  only  seven 
absentees.  It  is  especially  noticeable  that  the  Ionian  islands 
furnish  two  baronies,  though  Carlo  I.  Tocco  was  both  Count 
of  Cephalonia  and  Duke  of  Leucadia ;  but  this  is  doubtless 
to  be  explained  by  the  fact  that  on  paper  Amadeo  had 
recently  bestowed  the  former  island,  together  with  little 
Ithaka,  upon  a  Greek  supporter,  one  Ldskaris  Kaloph6ros, 
who  had  thus  succeeded  in  theory  to  the  realm  of  Odysseus.1 
We  notice,  too,  that  the  vicar-general  had  managed  to  secure 
for  himself  the  best  of  both  the  domanial  and  the  baronial 
lands.  Thus  he  held  such  celebrated  places  as  Vostitza, 
captured  from  the  Acciajuoli ;  Glarentza ;  Belveder,  above 
Katakolo;  the  castle  of  St  Omer,  whose  name  is  still 
preserved  by  the  Santameri  mountains;  Androusa,  or 
"  Druse,"  in  Messenia,  now  the  capital  of  the  principality ; 
Kalamata,  the  old  fief  of  the  Villehardouins,  and  many 
smaller  castles — comprising  altogether  about  2770  hearths 
out  of  more  than  4050.  Next  to  him  in  importance  came 
Asan  Zaccaria ;  but  most  of  the  old  castles  were  now  in  the 
hands  of  soldiers  of  the  Company ;  the  strong  position  of 
Navarino,  "  Port  Jonc "  as  it  is  still  called  in  the  document, 
was  entrusted  to  two  of  those  adventurers.  Another  person- 
age, who  figures  largely  in  the  transactions  of  this  period,  was 
Rudolph  Schoppe,  great  preceptor  of  the  Teutonic  Knights, 
who  resided  at  Mostenitsa.  A  century  later,  "the  German 
house"  at  Modon  was  the  usual  stopping-place  of  German 
pilgrims  to  the  Holy  Land.2 

These  negotiations  with  the  Navarrese  did  not  prevent 
Amadeo  from  adopting  a  policy  dear  to  diplomatists  in  our 
own  day — that  of  insuring  his  position  by  making  terms  with 
the  adversary  of  his  allies.  He  sent  envoys  to  Athens,  and 
there  "in  the  chapel  of  the  palace"  on  the  Akropolis,  now 
the  residence  of  "  the  lord  of  Corinth,  of  the  duchy  of  Athens 
and  of  Neopatras,"  as  Nerio  styled  himself,  the  latter  pledged 
himself  to  aid  Amadeo  in  taking  the  Morea  from  the 
Navarrese,  and  to  induce  his  son-in-law,  the  Despot,  to  join 

1  Hopf  apud  Ersch  und  Grubcr,  IxxxvL,  48. 

8  Fabcr,  Evagatorium,  i.,  39,  r6j  ;  Hi.,  33'  \  Archives  d*  ?  Orient 
latin,  H.,  documents,  354, 


THE  TURKS  RAID  GREECE  345 

in  the  attack  upon  them.  As  his  reward,  he  claimed  the 
restitution  of  his  family  property.1  Thus,  insured  against  all 
competitors,  Amadeo  might  have  been  expected  to  act  But 
the  death  of  his  relative,  the  Count  of  Savoy,  made  his 
presence  necessary  at  home ;  he  wisely  preferred  to  preserve 
what  he  possessed  in  Italy  rather  than  make  fresh  acquisitions 
in  Greece,  and  neither  he,  nor  his  brother  and  heir,  Louis, 
did  more  than  call  themselves  by  the  barren  title  of  "  Prince 
of  Achaia,"  which  appears  on  their  coins.8  With  the  death 
of  Louis  in  141 8,  the  legitimate  race  of  the  Savoyard 
pretenders  ceased,  but  as  late  as  the  last  century  a  bastard 
of  Savoy  still  styled  himself  "  of  the  Morea." 

While  the  Latin  rulers  of  Greece  were  thus  intriguing 
against  each  other,  the  Turks  were  threatening  the  existence 
of  them  all.  The  overthrow  of  the  Servian  empire  on  the 
fatal  field  of  Kossovo  in  1389  had  removed  the  last  barrier 
between  Hellas  and  her  future  masters,  and  then,  as  now,  the 
dissensions  of  Greeks  and  Slavs  had  made  them  unable  to 
combine  against  the  Moslem.  In  1387  and  the  following 
year  Turkish  bands  had  appeared  in  the  Morea,  and  in  1391 
the  redoubtable  Evrenosbeg,  "Bren£zes,"  as  the  Byzantine 
historians  call  him,  had  been  invited  by  the  Navarrese  into 
the  Morea,  to  assist  them  in  attacking  the  Despot  of  Mistr&, 
and  had  occupied  his  capital,  the  new  Greek  town  of  Leondari, 
and  the  old  Frankish  castle  of  Akova.8  Next  year  it  was  the 
turn  of  Thessaly,  Boeotia,  and  Attica.  Nerio  thought  that  he 
had  found  a  traitor  in  the  newly  restored  Greek  metropolitan, 
Dor6theos,  whose  theological  rancour  against  the  Latin  Church 
was  a  sufficient  reason  to  make  him  welcome  the  Turkish 
commander.  The  accused  fled,  for  his  life  was  in  danger, 
protesting  his  innocence  and  maintaining  an  active  corre- 
spondence with  his  flock.  Nerio  thereupon  complained  of 
his  conduct  to  the  oecumenical  patriarch,  alleging  that  he 
had  repaired  to  the  Turkish  camp,  and  had  promised  the 
infidels,  in  return  for  their  aid  against  the  Latins,  the 
treasures  of  the  Athenian  Church.  The  Holy  Synod, 
however,  pronounced  the  metropolitan  to  be  innocent,  on 
the    excellent    canonical    ground,  that    the    statements    of 

1  L&npros,  "Eyypo^a,  405-7.  2  Buchon,  Atlas,  xxiv.,  14,  15. 

3  Hopf,  Chromques,  185  ;  Doiikas,  47,  50;  Chromcon  Breve,  516. 


346       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

heretics  and  schismatics  were  not  evidence  against  bishops 
of  the  true  Church,  and  allowed  him  to  retain  his  three 
dioceses  of  Athens,  Thebes,  and  Neopatras.  But  a  century 
later,  when  the  Latins  no  longer  ruled  over  Athens,  we  find 
another  oecumenical  patriarch  accusing  the  worthy  Dor6theos 
of  corruption  for  having  divided  in  two  the  hitherto  united 
sees  of  Daulia  and  Atalante.  Nerio,  however,  cared  nothing 
for  the  decision  of  the  Synod  ;  he  refused  to  permit  Dor6theos 
to  return  to  Athens,  and  strongly  expressed  his  preference — 
on  the  principle  of  divide  et  impera — for  having  two  Greek 
metropolitans  instead  of  one — namely,  one  for  Athens,  and 
the  other  for  Thebes  and  Neopatras.1 

The  Boeotian  raid  of  Evrenosbeg  led  to  nothing  more 
serious  than  the  temporary  loss  of  Livadia,  which  was 
recovered  early  in  1 393  by  Bertranet  Mota,  who  is  described 
as  "one  of  the  chief  captains  of  the  duchy  of  Athens,"2  and 
who  played  an  important  part  in  the  politics  of  those  years — 
now  acting  as  Nerio's  gaoler  in  the  castle  of  Listrina,  now 
fighting  for  him  against  the  Turks  in  Boeotia.  But  in  1393 
Bajazet  I.,  "  the  Thunderbolt,"  resolved  to  annex  permanently 
a  large  part  of  northern  Greece.  He  was  now  arbiter  of  its 
fate,  and  to  his  camp  came  trembling  magnates  to  hear  his 
decisions.  With  the  contemptible  Despot  Theodore  in  his 
train,  he  took  Pharsala  and  Domok6,  whence  the  Servian 
governor,  Stephen  Doiikas  Chlapen,  viceroy  for  "  King 
Joseph"  of  Met^ora,  fled  to  Nauplia,  and  then  proceeded 
southward  to  Lamia.  The  Greek  bishop  betrayed  that 
strong  fortress,  Neopatras  fell,  and  many  other  castles  sur- 
rendered on  terms.  Ecclesiastical  treachery  and  corruption 
sealed  the  fate  of  Salona  amid  tragic  surroundings,  which  a 
modern  Greek  drama  has  endeavoured  to  depict8  The 
dowager-countess  had  allowed  her  paramour,  a  priest,  to 
govern  in  her  name,  and  this  petty  tyrant  had  abused  his 
power  to  wring  money  from  the  shepherds  of  Parnassos  and  to 
debauch  the  damsels  of  Delphi  by  his  demoniacal  incantations 

1  Miklosich  und  M tiller,  II.,  165  ;  Kampotiroglos,  II.,  135-6. 

a  Arch.  Cor.  Arag.,  Reg.  1964,  fol.  72,  v.,  2243,  fol.  123  (kindly  com- 
municated to  me  by  D.  Antonio  Rubi6  y  Lluch) ;  Chalkokond^les,  145, 
213 ;  Epirotica,  242. 

3  Lclmpros,  *0  reXevraiot  K6/irjs  tQv  Zak&vwv, 


FALL  OF  SALONA  347 

in  the  classic  home  of  the  supernatural.  At  last  he  cast  his 
eyes  on  the  fair  daughter  and  full  money-bags  of  the  Greek 
bishop  Serapheim  ;  deprived  of  his  child  and  fearing  for  his 
gold,  the  bishop  roused  his  flock  against  the  monster,  and 
begged  the  sultan  to  occupy  a  land  so  well  adapted  for  his 
majesty's  favourite  pastimes  of  hunting  and  riding  as  is  the 
plain  at  the  foot  of  Parnassos.  The  Turks  accepted  the 
invitation ;  the  priest  shut  himself  up  in  the  noble  castle, 
slew  the  bishop's  daughter,  and  prepared  to  fight.  But  there 
was  treachery  among  the  garrison ;  a  man  of  Salona  murdered 
the  tyrant  and  offered  his  head  to  the  sultan ;  and  the 
dowager-countess  and  her  daughter  in  vain  endeavoured 
to  appease  the  conqueror  with  gifts.  Bajazet  sent  the  young 
countess  to  his  harem ;  her  mother  he  handed  over  to  the 
insults  of  his  soldiery ;  her  land  he  assigned  to  one  of  his 
lieutenants,  Mur&d  Beg.  When  the  latter  showed  signs  of 
independence,  he  was  deposed  and  beheaded  by  his  autocratic 
sovereign.  Ere  long,  another  act  of  blood  completed  the 
grim  tragedy.  The  story  reached  the  people  of  Salona 
that  the  sultan  had  murdered  their  fair  young  countess, 
considering  a  descendant  of  Aragon  and  Byzantium  unworthy 
of  his  embraces.  Such  was  the  end  of  the  famous  fief  of  the 
Stromoncourts,  the  Deslaurs,  and  the  Fadriques.  Thus,  in 
the  early  weeks  of  1 394  a  Turkish  governor  was,  for  the  first 
time,  established  on  the  northern  shore  of  the  Corinthian 
Gulf.1 

1  Nerio's  letter  of  20th  February  1394  (Gregorovius,  Brief ey  307)  fixes 
the  capture  of  Salona  before  that  date.  Thus  the  much  criticised 
chronology  of  Chalkokondyles  (67-9)  is  quite  correct  N.  de  Martoni 
{Revue  de  P  Orient  latin,  III.,  660)  also  alludes  to  it.  Cf  also  Kpovucb¥ 
toO  TaXa&iSlov,  206 ;  Manuel  Palaiol6gos,  Oratio  Funebrisy  apud 
Migne,  Patrologia,  clvi.,  223,  228,  232 ;  PhrantzSs,  57 ;  Miklosich  und 
Miiller,  II.,  270;  Lampros,  "Eyy/wi^a,  89.  The  name  of  the  governor  of 
Domok6,  'EiriK4ppc<ait  has  puzzled  readers  of  Chalkokondyles.  Some  have 
thought  it  a  corruption  of  *iyic4p¥a,  but  a  Greek  historian  would  not 
corrupt  a  well-known  Byzantine  title  ;  Nero&tsos  asserted  that  his  family 
came  from  Cernagora  (Montenegro) ;  others  have  imagined  a  French 
family  of  Charny,  whereas  the  Franks  had  long  been  extinct  in  Thessaly. 
I  believe  it  to  be  a  corruption  of  Chlapen,  as  we  know  that  Stephen 
Doukas  Chlapen  (Orbini,  Regno  degli  Slavic  271)  was  one  of  John 
Urosh's  viceroys.  It  was  he  who  was  engaged  to  the  Countess  of  Salona. 
The  Chronicon  Breve  (517)  mentions  him  at  Nauplia. 


348       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

The  blow  had  fallen  very  near  Athens,  and  Nerio  wrote 
to  his  brother  on  the  fall  of  Salona,  that  the  Great  Turk  was 
expected  to  advance,  and  that  war  was  imminent  The 
Turkish  troops,  however,  once  more  evacuated  his  dominions ; 
Thessaly  became  a  timar,  or  hereditary  fief  of  the  redoubt- 
able Evrenosbeg,  but  the  hour  of  Athens  was  not  yet  come. 
The  statesmanlike  Florentine  now  reaped  the  reward  of  his 
politic  treatment  of  the  Greeks.  When  he  had  heard  that 
the  Turks  were  advancing,  he  had  seized  a  number  of  women 
and  children  as  hostages  for  the  loyalty  of  the  leading  men 
in  the  small  places,  and  had  sent  these  hostages  to  Boeotia. 
When,  none  the  less,  the  Greeks  of  those  villages 
welcomedl  the  Turks,  he  abstained  from  visiting  their  dis- 
loyalty upon  the  hostages.  He  felt  sure  that  when  the 
Turks  retired,  the  Greeks,  if  not  driven  to  desperation, 
would  return  to  their  allegiance,  and  his  surmise  proved 
correct  Again  he  had  found  that  humanity  was  the  best 
policy.1 

Nerio  had  escaped  for  the  moment  by  consenting  to  pay 
tribute  to  the  sultan ;  but  he  hastened  to  implore  the  aid  of 
the  pope  and  of  King  Ladislaus  of  Naples  against  the 
infidels,  who  killed  and  tortured  the  Christians  of  Achaia 
and  Attica.  At  the  same  time,  like  all  usurpers,  he  desired 
to  legitimise  his  position  at  Athens  by  obtaining  formal 
recognition  from  an  established  authority.  His  family's 
fortunes  had  originated  at  the  Neapolitan  court ;  the  king 
still  pretended  that  he  was  the  overlord  of  Achaia,  of  which, 
according  to  the  old  legal  fiction,  Athens  was  a  dependency, 
and  he  had  already  given  Nerio  a  mark  of  his  favour  by 
creating  him  bailie  of  Achaia.  He  now  rewarded  the 
services  of  the  faithful  Florentine  in  having  recovered  the 
duchy  of  Athens  "from  certain  of  the  king's  rivals,"  by 
conferring  upon  him  and  his  posterity  in  January  1394  the 
title  of  duke,  so  long  borne  by  its  former  rulers.  As  Nerio 
had  no  legitimate  sons,  the  king  consented  that  the  title 
should  descend  to  his  brother  Donato  and  the  latter's  heirs. 
Another  of  his  brothers,  Cardinal  Angelo  Acciajuoli,  was 
entrusted  with  the  duty  of  investing  the  new  Duke  of  Athens 
with  a  golden  ring,  and  was  appointed  in  his  stead  bailie  of 
1  LimproSy  "&yy pa<fxi)  114  ;  Raspe,  v.,  fol  16. 


NEMO'S  WILL  349 

Achaia.  But  it  was  expressly  stated  that  the  duke  should 
have  no  other  overlord  than  the  King  of  Naples.  Thus,  the 
old  theory  that  Athens  was  a  vassal  state  of  Achaia  received 
its  deathblow.  The  pope  completed  the  fortunes  of  the 
Acciajuoli  by  nominating  the  Cardinal  Archbishop  of  Patras. 
The  news  that  one  of  their  clan  had  obtained  the  glorious 
title  of  Duke  of  Athens  filled  the  Acciajuoli  with  pride,  such 
was  the  fascination  which  the  name  of  that  city  exercised 
in  Italy.1  Boccaccio,  half  a  century  before,  had  familiarised 
his  countrymen  with  a  title,  which  Walter  of  Brienne,  the 
tyrant  of  Florence,  had  borne  as  of  right,  and  which,  as 
applied  to  Nerio  Acciajuoli,  was  no  empty  flourish  of  the 
heralds'  college. 

The  first  Florentine  Duke  of  Athens  did  not,  however, 
long  survive  the  realisation  of  his  ambition.  On  25th 
September  of  the  same  year  he  died,  laden  with  honours, 
the  ideal  of  a  successful  statesman.  But,  as  he  lay  on  his 
sick-bed  at  Corinth,  the  dying  man  seems  to  have  perceived 
that  he  had  founded  his  fortunes  on  the  sand.  Pope  and 
king  might  give  him  honours  and  promises ;  they  could  not 
render  effective  aid  against  the  Turks.  The  first  Florentine 
Duke  of  Athens  was  also  her  first  ruler  who  paid  tribute  to 
the  sultan.  It  was  under  the  fear  of  this  coming  danger 
that  Nerio  drew  up  his  remarkable  will.2 

In  making  his  final  dispositions,  the  dying  duke's  first 
care  was  for  the  Parthenon,  "  St  Mary  of  Athens,"  in  which 
he  directed  that  his  body  should  be  laid  to  rest.  He  ordered 
that  its  doors  should  once  more  be  plated  with  silver ;  that 
all  the  treasures  of  the  cathedral,  which  he  had  seized  in  his 
hour  of  need,  should  be  bought  up  and  restored  to  it ;  that 
besides  the  canons,  who,  as  we  saw,  were  twelve,  there  should 
always  be  twenty  priests  serving  in  the  great  minster  day 
and  night,  and  saying  masses  for  the  repose  of  his  soul.  For 
the  maintenance  of  these  priests  and  of  the  fabric  of  the 
church,  he  bequeathed  to  it  the  city  of  Athens  with  all  its 
dependencies,  and  all  the  brood-mares  of  his  valuable  stud — 

1  Raynaldus,  vii.,  585  ;  Gerland,  134 ;  Fanelli,  Atene  Attica,  290-1  ; 
Gregorovius,  Brie) fe,  309-10;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches^  II.,  i., 
223-36. 

2  Ibid.,  254-62  ;  Chalkokondyles,  213 ;  Gregorovius,  Briefe^  308. 


350       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

for  the  Acciajuoli  were  good  judges  of  horse-flesh.1  Seldom 
has  a  church  received  such  a  remarkable  endowment;  the 
cathedral  of  Monaco,  built  out  of  the  earnings  of  a  gaming- 
table, is  perhaps  the  closest  parallel  to  the  Parthenon, 
maintained  by  the  profits  of  a  stud-farm.  He  also  restored 
two  sums  of  money  owing  to  it,  ordered  the  restitution  of  the 
treasures  which  he  had  taken  from  the  church  of  Corinth, 
bequeathed  a  splendid  cross  to  the  cathedral  of  Argos  and 
a  sum  of  money  for  a  weekly  mass  there,  and  directed  that 
all  cathedrals  and  other  churches  which  had  come  into  his 
hands  by  lease  or  other  means  should  return  to  their  prelates 
and  patrons  at  the  end  of  the  lease.  He  bequeathed  his 
Argive  property  to  build  a  hospital  for  the  poor  at 
Nauplia,  which,  restored  by  Capo  d'Istria,  is  still  in  use, 
and  placed  both  that  and  the  nunnery  which  he  had 
built  there  under  the  administration  of  his  faithful 
councillor,  the  Bishop  of  Argos.2  Nerio  had  treated  the 
Latin  Church  with  scant  respect  in  his  lifetime ;  he 
had  seized  its  treasures,  and  had  reinstated  its  hated 
rival;  but  he  certainly  made  ample  reparation  on  his 
deathbed. 

Nerio's  wife  had  died  only  three  months  before,  so  that  he 
had  not  to  provide  for  her ;  but  made  his  favourite  daughter, 
the  Duchess  of  Leucadia,  his  principal  heiress.  While  he 
left  his  other  child  nothing  more  than  9,700  ducats  owed  him 
by  her  husband  the  Despot,  he  bequeathed  to  her  sister  the 
castles  of  Megara  and  Sikyon  (or  Basilicata),  all  his  other 
lands  not  specially  left  to  others,  and  a  large  sum  of  money. 
She  was  to  have  Corinth  also,  despite  the  fact  that  it  was  to 
have  belonged  to  the  Despot  after  Nerio's  death,  so  long  as 
the  children  of  Angelo  Acciajuoli,  who  were  its  legal  owners, 
did  not  repay  the  sum  which  their  father  had  borrowed  from 
Nerio.  Besides  these  two  daughters,  Nerio  had  an 
illegitimate  son,  Antonio,  by  Maria  Rendi,  daughter  of  the 
ever-handy  Greek  notary.  To  this  son  he  bequeathed  the 
government  of  Thebes,  the  castle  of  Livadia,  and  all  that  lay 
beyond  it,  for  Livadia,  as  we  saw,  though  it  had  been  annexed 
by   the  Sultan  Bajazet,  had  been  recovered  by  the  Gascon 

1  Sathas,  Mi^/acZb,  i.,  178. 

8  Lamprinfdes,  'H  XovTXfa,  109. 


NERICTS  WILL  DISPUTED  351 

free-lance  Bertranet  for  the  duchy  in  1393.  As  for  his 
mistress,  Nerio  directed  that  she  should  have  her  freedom 
and  retain  all  her  property,  including  perhaps  the  spot 
between  Athens  and  the  Piraeus  which  still  preserves  the 
name  of  her  family — a  provision  all  the  more  curious 
because  Pedro  IV.  had,  as  we  saw,  conferred  the  full 
franchises  and  privileges  of  the  conquerors  upon  her  father 
and  his  family.  To  his  brother  Donato,  who  should  have 
succeeded  him  in  the  title,  the  duke  left  his  Florentine 
property  and  250  ducats;  he  gave  small  legacies  to  his 
servants,  and  ordered  that  his  cattle  should  be  sold  and 
the  proceeds  invested  in  Florence  for  religious  and  charit- 
able purposes.  As  his  executors  he  appointed  the  Duchess 
of  Leucadia,  his  sister  Gismonda  (so  long  as  she  was 
in  Greece),  the  Bishop  of  Argos,  the  governor  of  the 
Akropolis,  and  three  other  persons,  two  of  them  members 
of  the  Acciajuoli  clan.  Finally,  he  recommended  his 
land  to  the  care  of  the  Venetian  republic,  to  which 
his  executors  were  to  have  recourse  in  any  difficulty. 
He  specially  begged  the  republic  to  protect  his  heiress, 
the  Duchess  Francesca,  and  to  see  that  his  dispositions 
concerning  the  cathedral  of  Athens  were  carried  out. 

Donato  Acciajuoli,  Gonfalionere  of  Florence  and  Senator 
of  Rome,  made  no  claim  to  succeed  his  brother  in  the  duchy 
of  Athens,  in  spite  of  the  natural  desire  of  the  family  that 
one  of  their  name  should  continue  to  take  his  title  from  that 
celebrated  city.  He  had  already  had  some  experience  of 
Greece,  where  he  had  acted  as  Niccoli's  representative  thirty 
years  before,  and  he  preferred  his  safe  and  dignified  positions 
in  Italy  to  the  glamour  of  a  ducal  coronet  in  the  East 
But  it  was  obvious  that  a  conflict  would  arise  between 
the  sons-in-law  of  the  late  duke,  for  Nerio  had  practi- 
cally disinherited  his  elder  daughter  in  favour  of  her 
younger  but  abler  sister.  Theodore  Palaiol6gos,  who  con- 
tended that  Corinth  had  always  tbeen  intended  to  be 
his  after  Nerio's  death,  besieged  it  with  a  large  force, 
and  took  all  the  smaller  castles  of  the  Corinthian  barony. 
Nerio's  bastard,  Antonio,  and  Bertranet  Mota,  the  victor 
of  Livadia,  who  had  also  profited  under  Nerio's  will, 
threw  their  powerful  aid  on  Theodore's  side.     On  the  other 


352   FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

hand,  Carlo  Tocco,  Duke  of  Leucadia,  demanded  from    the 
executors  the  places  bequeathed  to  his  wife,  and  invited  the 
Turks  to  assist  him.     Some  40,000  of  those  fatal  auxiliaries 
obeyed  his  call ;    a  sudden   night  attack  upon  the  Despot's 
camp    proved   completely    successful ;   3000  of  Theodore's 
cavalry  were    captured,   and    Theodore    himself   only  just 
escaped.       Carlo  then   signed  a  document,   promising,    on 
receipt  of  Corinth,  to  carry  out  all  the  testamentary  dispositions 
of  his  late  father-in-law.     The  executors,  who  had  no  option 
in  the  matter,  thereupon  handed  over  the  great  fortress  to 
him.     Leaving  his  brother   Leonardo  in  charge  of  Corinth, 
and  another  official  in  command  of  Megara,  he  inveigled  two 
of  the  Florentine  executors  into  visiting  him  in  his  island  of 
Cephalonia  on  their  way  home.     As  soon  as  he  had   them 
safe  in  the  castle  of  St  George,  he  told  them  that  they  should 
never  leave  the  island   alive,  unless  they  restored  him  the 
compromising  document.    They  replied  that  they  had  already 
sent   it   to  Donato,  whereupon  he  compelled  them  to   sign 
another,  stating  that  he  had  carried  out  the  terms  of  Nerio's 
will.     Against  this  act  of  violence  they  protested   at   both 
Florence  and  Venice,  whose  citizenship  and  protection  against 
his  obligations  to  Genoa  he  had  recently  asked.     Well  might 
that   tried   friend   of  the   Acciajuoli   family,  the   Bishop  of 
Argos,  urge  the  Archbishop  of   Patras  to  mediate  between 
the  rival  kinsmen.     For  some  months  longer  the  civil   war 
between   them   rendered   the  isthmus   unsafe   to  travellers. 
An  Italian  notary  has  left  us  a  graphic  picture  of  the  perils  of 
a  journey  at  this  critical  time  from  Athens  to  Corinth,  how 
the  Turks  infested  the  Sacred  Way,  how  all  admission  to  the 
town  of  Megara  was  refused,  for  fear  of  the  Despot's  men,  and 
how   Nerio's  elder  daughter  lay   in  wait  to   intercept   her 
younger  sister  on  her  way  to  take  ship  at  the  port  of  Corinth 
for  Cephalonia.     The  man  of  law  was  not  sorry  to  find  himself 
in   the  castle  of  Corinth   under   Carlo   Tocco's   protection, 
though  the  houses  in  that  city  were  few  and  mean,  and  the 
total  population  did  not  exceed  fifty  families,  or  thirty  fewer 
than  that  of  Megara.     The  place  did  not  boast  a  single  inn, 
there  was  no  bread  to  be  had  for  love  or  money,  but   the 
excellent  figs  of  the  place  and  the  hospitality  of  the  Arch- 
bishop of    Athens,  an   Italian,  like  himself,   consoled    the 


CORINTH  RESTORED  TO  THE  GREEKS       353 

notary  for  his  hardships.     Such  was  life  in  the  duchy  of 
Athens  in  1395.1 

Not  long  afterwards  the  two  sons-in-law  of  Nerio, 
frightened  perhaps  at  the  increasing  audacity  of  the  Turks, 
came  to  terms,  and  Tocco  handed  over  the  great  fortress  of 
Akrocorinth  to  the  Despot  Theodore.  Its  walls  had  struck 
the  Italian  notary  as  poor,  and  the  donjon  as  insignificant  ; 
but  the  natural  position  of  the  citadel  made  it  almost 
impregnable,  and  its  acquisition  by  a  Byzantine  prince  was 
regarded  as  a  national  triumph,  commemorated  by  the 
erection  of  his  statue  over  the  gate.2  Theodore  hastened  to 
ask  the  co-operation  of  Venice  in  repairing  the  Hexamilion, 
or  six-mile  rampart  of  Justinian  across  the  isthmus,  a  part  of 
which  was  still  standing,  while  the  rest  was  in  ruins.  Thus, 
after  the  lapse  of  nearly  two  centuries,  the  isthmus  once 
more  acknowledged  the  Greek  sway.  The  metropolitan  of 
Corinth,  so  long  an  exile,  at  once  returned  to  his  see ;  one  of 
his  first  acts  was  to  demand,  and  obtain,  the  restitution  by 
his  brother  of  Monemvasia  of  the  two  suffragan  bishoprics  of 
Maina  and  Zemen6,  which  had  been  given  to  the  latter's 
predecessor  after  the  Latin  Conquest  of  Corinth.8  Such  ire 
was  common  in  celestial  minds  at  this  critical  period,  when  all 
Greeks  should  have  been  united.  Unhappily,  the  ecclesias- 
tical literature  of  the  fourteenth  century  shows  us  metro- 
politan arrayed  against  metropolitan,  bishops  persecuted  by 
their  superiors,  and  the  Despot  of  Mistr&,  who  should  have 
been  the  recognised  leader  of  Hellenism,  thwarted  by  the 
Greek  hierarchy.4 

While  Nerio's  children  had  thus  been  quarrelling  over 
Corinth,  the  Greeks  of  Athens  had  not  been  idle.  It  was  not 
to  be  expected  that  the  race,  which  had  latterly  recovered  its 
national  consciousness,  and  which  had  ever  remained  deeply 
attached  to  its  religion,  would  quietly  acquiesce  in  the 
extraordinary  arrangement  by  which  the  city  of  Athens  was 
to  be  the  property  of  the   Catholic  cathedral.    Sanudo,  an 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  262-69;  Grcgorovius,  Brie) Sr, 
309-10;  N.  de  Martoni  in  Revue  de  ?  Orient  latin%  III.,  652-3,  656-9; 
Predelli,  Commemoriali,  III.,  218,  236,  238. 

'  lUos  'EW-nvonv/ifjAtv,  II.,  443-4.        3  Miklosich  und  Muller,  ii.,  287-91. 

*  Ibid.,  i.,  216-21  ;  ii.,  9-",  23-5*  135'7,  249-55- 

Z 


354       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

excellent  judge  of  Eastern  politics,  had  truly  said  that  no 
power  on  earth  could  make  the  Orthodox  Greeks  love  the 
Roman  Church,  and  at  Athens  the  professional  jealousy  of 
two  great  ecclesiastics  embittered  the  natives  against  the 
alien  establishment  Despite  the  warning  which  he  had 
received  from  the  treachery  of  Dor6theos,  Nerio  had  felt 
obliged  to  permit  another  Greek  metropolitan,  Makirios,  to 
reside  at  Athens.  This  divine,  thinking  that  the  rule  of  a 
Mussulman  pasha  would  be  preferable  to  that  of  a  Catholic 
archbishop,  summoned  Timourtash,  the  redoubtable  Turkish 
commander,  to  rid  Athens  of  the  filioque  clause,  and  his 
strange  ally  occupied  the  lower  town.  The  Akropolis,  how- 
ever, held  out  under  its  brave  governor,  Matteo  de  Montona, 
one  of  the  late  duke's  executors,  who  sent  a  messenger  to 
the  Venetian  bailie  of  Negroponte  asking  for  his  aid,  and 
offering  to  hand  over  Athens  to  the  republic,  if  the  bailie  would 
promise  that  she  would  respect  the  ancient  franchises, 
privileges,  and  customs  of  the  Athenians.  The  bailie  gave 
the  required  promise,  subject  to  the  approval  of  his  Govern- 
ment ;  he  sent  a  force  which  dispersed  the  Turks,  and  before 
the  end  of  1394,  for  the  first  but  not  the  last  time  in  history, 
the  lion-banner  of  the  Evangelist  waved  from  the  ancient 
castle  of  Athens. 

The  republic  decided,  after  mature  consideration,  to 
accept  the  offer  of  the  Athenian  commander.  No  sentimental 
argument,  no  classical  memories,  weighed  with  the  sternly 
practical  statesmen  of  the  lagoons.  The  romantic  King  of 
Aragon  had  waxed  enthusiastic  over  the  past  glories  of  the 
Akropolis,  and  sixty  years  hence  the  greatest  of  Turkish 
sultans  contemplated  his  conquest  with  admiration.  But 
the  sole  reason  which  decided  the  Venetian  Government  to 
annex  Athens  was  its  proximity  to  the  Venetian  colonies 
and  the  consequent  danger  which  might  ensue  to  them  if  it 
fell  into  Turkish  or  other  hands.  l  Thus,  Venice  took  over 
the  Akropolis  in  1395,  not  because  it  was  a  priceless  monu- 

1  Navagcro  afud  Muratori,  xxiii.,  1075  ;  Predelli,  Comtnemoriali,  III., 

238.    The  text  of  the  Venetian  decision  is  printed  in  the  SitzungsberichU 

der  K.  Bayerischen  Akademie,  1888,  i.,  152-8  ;  Niccolb  de  Martoni,  who 

'  visited  Athens  on  24th  February   1395,  says  that   the  Venetians  had 

"lately  taken  it," — Revue  de  V Orient  latin,  iii.,  647. 


VENICE  ACCEPTS  ATHENS  355 

ment,  but  because  it  was  a  strong  fortress;  she  saved  the 
Athenians,  not,  as  Caesar  had  done,  for  the  sake  of  their 
ancestors,  but  for  that  of  her  own  colonies,  "the  pupil  of 
her  eye."  From  the  financial  standpoint,  indeed,  Athens 
could  not  have  been  a  valuable  asset.  A  city  which  had 
complained  of  its  poverty  to  the  King  of  Aragon,  and  whose 
revenues  Nerio  had  assigned  to  support  the  cathedral  chapter, 
could  not  have  been  great  or  rich,  nor  can  we  well  believe  the 
statement  of  a  much  later  Venetian  historian  that  in  his  short 
reign  he  had  found  time  to  build  "  sumptuous  edifices "  and 
"  spacious  streets." l  The  Venetians  confessed  that  they  did 
not  know  what  its  revenues  and  expenses  were;  on  this 
point  their  governor  was  to  send  them  information  as  soon 
as  possible ;  meanwhile,  as  the  times  were  risky  and  the  city 
would  consequently  require  additional  protection,  involving 
extra  expenditure,  whereas  some  of  Nerio's  famous  brood 
mares  had  been  stolen  and  the  available  revenues  conse- 
quently diminished,  it  was  directed  that  only  eight  priests 
should  for  the  present  serve  "  in  the  church  of  St  Mary  of 
Athens."  Upon  such  accidents  did  the  maintenance  of  the 
Parthenon  depend  in  the  Middle  Ages!  The  Government 
informed  Montana's  envoy,  Leonardo  of  Bologna,  that  its 
officials  would  be  instructed  to  preserve  all  the  ancient  rights, 
liberties,  and  customs  of  "our  faithful  Athenians,"  whose 
capitulations  he  had  presented,  as  they  had  been  presented 
fifteen  years  before  to  Pedro  IV.  Montona  was  to  have  400 
hyperperi  a  year,  and  his  envoy  200,  out  of  the  city  revenues, 
as  their  reward,  but  five  years  later  we  find  the  former 
complaining  that  this  annuity  had  not  been  paid.2  That 
official  Greeks  were  favourable  to  Venice  is  shown  by  the 
fact  that  the  city  notary,  Makri,  was  also  awarded  a  sum 
of  money. 

The  Venetian  Government  next  arranged  for  the  future 
administration  of  its  new  colony.  The  governor  was  styled 
podestd  and  captain,  and  was  appointed  for  two  years  at  an 
annual  salary  of  £70,  out  of  which  he  had  to  keep  a  notary, 
a  Venetian  assistant,  four  servants,  two  grooms,  and  four 
horses.  Four  months  elapsed  before  a  noble  was  found,  in 
the  person  of  Albano  Contarini,  ambitious  of  residing  in 
1  Fanelli,  293.  2  Sdthas,  Mingpcta,  II.,  6. 


356       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

Athens  on  these  terms.  Two  artillery  officers,  or  casteUani, 
were  appointed  at  6  ducats  a  month  each  to  guard  the  castle, 
where  one  was  always  to  be  in  the  daytime  and  both  were  to 
sleep  at  night.  Twenty  men  were  to  be  engaged  at  12 
hyperpeti  a  month  each,  for  the  garrison ;  if  more  men  or 
money  were  wanted,  Contarini  was  to  ask  the  bailie  of 
Negroponte  or  the  casteUani  of  the  two  Messenian  colonies. 
Together  with  two  ecclesiastical  commissioners,  he  was  to 
receive  the  revenues  of  the  Church,  so  that  the  republic  might 
not  be  out  of  pocket ;  later  on  he  also  had  the  appointment 
of  the  casteUani} 

We  are  fortunately  in  a  better  position  than  was  the 
Venetian  Government  to  judge  of  the  contemporary  state 
of  Athens.  At  the  very  time  when  its  fate  was  under 
discussion,  an  Italian  notary,  Niccol6  de  Martoni,  spent  two 
days  in  that  city,  and  his  diary  is  the  first  account  which  any 
traveller  has  left  us  from  personal  observation  of  its  condition 
during  the  Frankish  period.2  "The  city,"  he  says,  "which 
nestles  at  the  foot  of  the  castle  hill,  contains  about  a  thousand 
hearths,"  but  not  a  single  inn,  so  that,  like  the  archaeologist 
in  some  country  towns  of  modern  Greece,  he  had  to  seek 
the  hospitality  of  the  clergy.  He  describes  "  the  great  hall  * 
of  the  castle  (the  Propylaea),  with  its  thirteen  columns,  and 
tells  how  the  churchwardens  personally  conducted  him  over 
"  the  church  of  St  Mary,"  which  had  sixty  columns  without 
and  eighty  within.  On  one  of  the  latter  he  was  shown  the 
cross,  made  by  Dionysios  the  Areopagite  at  the  moment  of 
the  earthquake  which  attended  our  Lord's  passion ;  four 
others,  which  surrounded  the  high  altar,  were  of  jasper,  and 
supported  a  dome,  while  the  doors  came — so  he  was  told — 
from  Troy.  The  pious  Capuan  was  then  taken  to  see  the 
relics  of  the  Athenian  cathedral — the  figure  of  the  Virgin, 
painted  by  St  Luke,  the  head  of  St  Maccarius,  a  bone  of 
St  Denys  of  France,  an  arm  of  St  Justin,  and  a  copy  of  the 
Gospels,  written  by  the  hand  of  St  Elena — relics  which 
Queen  Sybilla  of  Aragon  had  in  vain  begged  the  last 
Catalan  archbishop  to  send  her  fifteen  years  before. 

1  S&thas,  M*i7/*ta,  II.,  3. 

2  The  earlier  fourteenth  century  traveller,  Ludolf  von  Suchem,  who 
mentions  Athens,  did  not  actually  visit  it. 


CONTEMPORARY  ACCOUNT  OF  ATHENS      357 

He  saw,  too,  in  a  cleft  of  the  wall,  the  light  which  never 
fails,  and  outside,  beyond  the  castle  ramparts,  the  two  pillars 
of  the  choragic  monument  of  Thrasyllos,  between  which  there 
used  to  be  "a  certain  idol"  in  an  iron-bound  niche,  gifted 
with  the  strange  power  of  drowning  hostile  ships  as  soon  as 
they  appeared  on  the  horizon— an  allusion  to  the  story  of  the 
Gorgon's  head,  mentioned  by  Pausanias,  which  we  find  in 
later  mediaeval  accounts  of  Athens.  In  the  city  below  he 
noticed  numbers  of  fallen  columns  and  fragments  of  marble  ; 
he  alludes  to  the  Stadion ;  and  he  visited  the  "  house  of 
Hadrian,"  as  the  temple  of  Olympian  Zeus  was  popularly 
called,  from  the  many  inscriptions  in  honour  of  that  emperor 
which  were  to  be  seen  there.  Twenty  of  its  columns  were 
then  standing.  He  completed  his  round  by  a  pilgrimage  to 
the  so-called  "  Study  of  Aristotle,  whence  scholars  drank  to 
obtain  wisdom" — the  aqueduct,  whose  marble  beams,  com- 
memorating the  completion  of  Hadrian's  work  by  Antoninus 
Pius,  were  then  to  be  seen  at  the  foot  of  Lykabettos,  and, 
after  serving  in  Turkish  times  as  the  lintel  of  the  Bouboun- 
istra  gate,  now  lie,  half  buried  by  vegetation,  in  the  palace 
garden.  But  the  fear  of  the  prowling  Turks  was  a  serious 
obstacle  to  the  researches  of  this  amateur  archaeologist.  At 
Port  Raphti,  where  he  landed,  he  had  been  able,  indeed,  to 
admire  the  two  marble  statues,  male  and  female,  one  of  which 
still  remains  and  has  given  the  place  its  name  of  "the  tailor's 
harbour."  The  more  picturesque  mediaeval  legend  was  that 
the  woman,  hotly  pursued  by  the  man,  had  prayed  that  they 
might  be  both  turned  into  stone.  At  Eleusis,  already  called 
Levsina,  he  could  see  in  the  gloaming  the  marble  columns 
and  the  arches  of  the  aqueduct.  But  he  tells  us  that  both 
these  places  were  infested  by  Turks,  so  that  it  was  necessary 
to  travel  by  night.  On  his  way  to  Negroponte,  he  was  only 
saved  from  falling  into  their  hands  by  the  characteristic 
unpunctuality  of  his  muleteers — not  a  horse  was  to  be  had  in 
Athens,  and  mules  then,  as  now,  were  the  sole  means  of 
conveyance  in  the  country  districts.  Even  so,  he  narrowly 
escaped  being  attacked  by  the  Knights  of  St  John,  who 
held  the  castle  of  Sykaminon  and  who  saw  a  Turk  in 
every  traveller,  while  the  Albanians  of  Oropos  were  even 
worse  marauders  than  the  Turks.     Yet  our  traveller  notes 


358       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

that    these    gentry    had    spared     the     fair     olive-grove    of 
Athens.1 

Such  was  the  state  of  affairs  which  confronted  the  first 
Venetian  governor  of  Athens.  He  had,  indeed,  no  easy  task 
before  him.  He  found  Turkish  pirates  infesting  the  coast  of 
Attica,  and  the  land  so  poor  that  he  had  to  ask  his  Govern- 
ment for  a  loan  of  3000  ducats.  The  Metropolitan  Makdrios, 
a  born  intriguer,  who  had  been  plotting  against  the  Despot  in 
the  Morea,  as  well  as  the  Latins  at  Athens,  was  now  in 
prison  at  Venice,  but  found  means  to  continue  his  schemes  in 
favour  of  the  Turks.2  The  Athenian  duchy  was  now  terribly 
exposed  to  their  attacks.  By  the  fall  of  Salona  she  had  lost 
her  western  bulwark :  the  warden  of  her  northern  marches, 
the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  had  managed  to  retain  his  castle 
at  Thermopylae  by  payment  of  a  tribute  and  by  virtue  of  his 
Venetian  citizenship.3  But,  in  1395,  his  marquisate  and  the 
Venetian  station  of  Pteleon,  in  Thessaly,  were  the  sole  re- 
maining Christian  states  of  north-eastern  Greece.  All  else 
was  Turkish,  as  far  south  as  Thebes,  as  far  west  as  Lepanto. 
Even  the  Northern  Sporades  temporarily  succumbed. 

The  Ottoman  advance  was  fortunately,  however,  checked 
for  a  moment  by  the  news  that  Sigismund,  King  of  Hungary, 
had  responded  to  the  appeal  of  the  Emperor  Manuel  II.,  and 
was  marching  on  the  Danube  with  the  chivalry  of  the  West  to 
save  the  Byzantine  Empire.  Bajazet  hastily  retired  from 
Greece  to  meet  this  new  foe,  whom  he  utterly  routed  in  the 
great  battle  of  Nikopolis.  The  defeat  of  this  fresh  crusade 
left  Greece  at  the  mercy  of  the  conqueror.  Marching  himself 
against  Constantinople,  he  despatched  two  trusty  lieutenants, 
Jakub  Pasha  and  Evrenosbeg,  with  an  army  of  50,000  men 
to  continue  his  interrupted  Greek  campaign.  On  crossing 
the  isthmus,  the  forces  divided  :  Jakub  marched  upon  Argos, 
Venice's  recent  acquisition,  which  surrendered,  in  1397, 
without  a  blow,  burnt  the  castle,  and  carried  off  14,000  (some 
say,  even  more  than  30,000)  Argives  into  slavery — a  number 
considerably  superior  to  the  present  population  of  the  town — 

1  Revue  de  P Orient  latin,  III.,  647-56. 

2  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  ii.,  250,  256,  259;  Predelli,  Comtnemoriali^ 
III.,  238. 

3  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  292. 


TURKISH  INVASION  OF  1397  359 

while  Evrenos  harassed  the  Venetian  colonies  in  Messenia. 
After  an  attack  on  Leondari,  the  Turks  recrossed  the 
isthmus,1  and  would  appear  to  have  made  themselves 
masters  of  the  lower  city  of  Athens.  Neither  Venetian 
documents  nor  Byzantine  historians  tell  us  of  this  capture  of 
"the  city  of  the  sages"  in  1397,  of  which  Turkish  writers 
boast2  But  the  Turkish  account  receives  confirmation  from 
a  document  of  1405,  discovered  at  Zante  and  recently 
published,3  which  describes  how  Athenian  families  fled  to 
that  island  before  the  Turks,  and  from  a  passage  in  the 
Chronicle  of  Epiros,  which  states  that  Bajazet  subdued 
Athens.  It  is  possible,  too,  that  the  above  mentioned 
"Lament  for  the  taking  and  captivity  of  Athens"4 — a 
prosaic  poem  in  sixty-nine  verses  of  the  "  political "  metre — 
also  refers  to  this  capture,  though  some  critics  have  supposed 
the  "  captivity  "  to  be  that  which  the  city  suffered  from  Omar 
in  1456,  or  that  the  allusion  is  to  the  visit  of  Mohammed  II. 
two  years  later.  The  writer,  a  priest,  tells  us  how  "the 
Persians,"  as  he  calls  them,  "first  enslaved  the  region  of 
Ligouri6  " —  between  Epidauros  and  Nauplia — "  the  feet  of 
Athens"6 — an  allusion  to  the  days  when  Argolis  was  a 
dependency  of  the  duchy — and  then  came  to  Athens  and 
"  slew  the  priests,  the  elders,  the  wise,  and  all  their  council." 
Above  all,  he  makes  Athens  mourn  the  enslavement  of 
the  husbandmen  of  the  suburb  of  Sepolia,  who  will  no 
longer  be  able  to  till  the  fields  of  Patesia. 

Another  enemy  was  ever  on  the  watch  for  an  opportunity 
to  make  himself  master  of  Athens.  The  bastard  Antonio 
Acciajuoli  was  not  content  with  the  cities  of  Thebes  and 
Livadia,  which  his  father  had  left  him,  but  soon  began  to 
harry  Attica  with  his  horsemen,  and  to  hound  on  the  Turks, 
who  readily  responded  to  his  exhortations.  Successive 
Venetian  governors  depicted  the  pitiful  state  of  the  country 

1  Chalkokondyles,  97;  Chronicon  Brevey  516;  Phrantzes,  62,  83; 
Revue  de  ?  Orient  latin,  viii.,  79. 

*  Hammer,  GeschichU  des  Osmanisehen  Reichs,  L,  252,  613. 

3  By  Philadelpheus,  i.,  139,  and  Kampouroglos,  Mn^ta,  ii.,  153.  Cf. 
Epirotica,  242. 

4  Ibid.%  'I<n-opfa,  L,  117-24;  Philadelpheus,  i.,  134-9. 

6  Professor  Ldmpros  (Nta  'EX^o/w^m**,  ii.,  236)  now  suggests  that 
'\atovpy€ia  ("  olive-yards  ")  should  be  read. 


360       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

and  asked  for  reinforcements;  the  Home  Government  re- 
sponded by  raising  the  garrison  to  fifty-six  men  and  the 
cavalry  to  fifty-five,  and  by  authorising  Vitturi,  who  was 
podestd  in  1 401,  to  spend  200  hyperperi  on  restoring  the  walls 
of  the  Akropolis.  In  order  to  pacify  those  Athenians  who 
were  discontented  with  the  Venetian  rule,  he  was  ordered  to 
issue  a  proclamation  bidding  them  lay  their  complaints  before 
the  commissioners  at  Negroponte  or  Nauplia.  But  these 
measures  were  inadequate  to  save  Athens.  In  the  middle  of 
1402,  the  bad  news  reached  Venice  that  the  lower  city,  thanks 
to  the  treachery  of  its  inhabitants,  naturally  favourable  to  one 
who  was  half  a  Greek,  was  in  the  hands  of  the  bastard,  but 
that  the  Akropolis  still  held  out  The  Senate  ordered  the 
bailie  of  Negroponte  to  proclaim  Antonio  an  u  enemy  of  the 
Christian  faith,"  and  to  offer  a  reward  of  8000  hyperperi  to 
whosoever  should  deliver  him  up  alive,  or  of  5000  to  whoso- 
ever could  prove  that  he  had  killed  him.  It  also  commanded 
him  to  relieve  the  Akropolis,  and,  if  possible,  lay  Thebes, 
the  lair  of  the  enemy,  in  ashes.  At  the  head  of  6000  men, 
the  bailie  set  out  to  perform  the  second  of  these  injunctions. 
The  bastard  had  only  a  tenth  of  that  number  at  his  disposal, 
but  he  placed  them  in  ambush,  we  may  assume  in  the 
Pass  of  Anephorites,  which  the  Venetians  were  bound  to 
traverse,  took  the  enemy  at  the  same  moment  in  front  and 
rear,  and  made  the  bailie  his  prisoner.  Having  nothing 
more  to  fear  from  Venice,  he  returned  to  the  siege  of  the 
Akropolis.1 

The  republic  received  the  news  of  his  victory  with  alarm, 
not  so  much  at  what  might  befall  Athens,  as  at  the  possible 
loss  of  her  far  more  important  colony  of  Negroponte.  Com- 
missioners were  hastily  despatched  to  make  peace  with 
Antonio;  but  the  bastard,  sure  of  being  undisturbed  by 
the  Turks,  calmly  continued  the  siege  of  the  small  Venetian 
garrison  of  the  Akropolis.  Vitturi  and  Montona  held  out 
for  seventeen  months  altogether,  until  they  had  eaten  the 
last  horse  and  had  been  reduced  to  devour  the  plants  which 
grew  on  the  castle  rock.  Then  they  surrendered  and  were 
allowed  to  retire  penniless  to  Negroponte,  which  the 
Venetian  councillors  had  put  into  a  state  of  defence. 
1  S&has,  MnjMfui,  II.,  7,  45,  60,  75,  91,  92  ;  Chalkokonctyles,  213-14. 


ANTONIO  ACCIAJUOLI  AT  ATHENS  361 

Antonio  was  master  of  Athens;  the  half-caste  adventurer 
had  beaten  the  proud  republic1 

Venice  attempted  to  recover  by  diplomacy  what  she  had 
lost  by  arms.  She  possessed  in  the  person  of  Pietro  Zeno, 
lord  of  Andros,  a  diplomatist  of  unrivalled  experience  in  the 
tortuous  politics  of  the  Levant  Zeno's  skill  had  contributed 
to  the  cession  of  Argos ;  it  was  now  hoped  that  he  might  be 
equally  successful  with  Athens.  In  spite  of  the  capture  of 
Bajazet  by  Timur  at  the  battle  of  Angora  in  1402,  and 
the  divided  state  of  the  Turkish  Empire,  both  he  and 
Antonio  knew  that  the  fate  of  Athens  depended  upon 
Suleyman,  the  new  ruler  of  Turkey  in  Europe,  and  to  his 
court  they  both  repaired,  armed  with  those  pecuniary 
arguments  which  are  usually  found  most  convincing  in  all 
dealings  with  Turkish  ministers.  The  diplomatic  duel  was 
lengthy ;  Antonio  was  already  favourably  known  as  a 
suppliant  of  the  late  sultan,  while  Zeno  worked  upon  the 
Turkish  fears  of  the  Mongol  peril,  and  pointed  out  that  the 
Christian  league,  which  had  been  formed  by  the  two 
republics  of  Venice  and  Genoa,  the  Greek  Emperor,  the 
Knights  of  St  John,  and  the  Duke  of  Naxos,  was  not  to  be 
despised  He  also  spent  his  employers'  money  to  good 
purpose,  and  finally  gained  one  of  those  paper  victories,  so 
dear  to  ambassadors  and  so  worthless  to  men  of  action. 
The  sultan  promised  to  Venice  the  restitution  of  Athens 
and  the  grant  of  a  strip  of  territory  five  miles  wide  on  the 
coast  opposite  the  whole  length  of  the  island  of  Euboea ;  he 
ceded  the  Northern  Sporades  to  the  emperor,  ratified  the 
recent  transfer  of  Salona  by  Theodore  Palaiol6gos  to  the 
Knights  of  St  John,  and  consented  not  to  increase  the  tribute 
paid  by  the  Marquis  of  Boudonitza,  although  the  latter  had 
been  caught  conspiring  against  his  Thessalian  governor.2 
But  Suleyman  took  no  steps  to  make  Antonio  carry  out  his 

1  Sithas,  op.  cit.9  I.,  4,  5  ;  II.,  95-103  ;  Jorga,  "Notes  et  Extraits,"  in 
Revue  de  ?  Orient  latin,  iv.,  303. 

*  Jorga,  iv.,  259-62  ;  Thomas  and  Prcdelii,  Diplomatarium,  II.,  290-3  ; 
Lampros,  rEyypa<pa,  392.  This  treaty  bears  no  date ;  it  must  have 
been  not  earlier  than  1404,  the  date  of  Theodore's  grant  of  Salona  to  the 
Knights  of  St  John.  According  to  Chalkokond^les  (174)  and  Doukas  (79) 
the  sultan  also  ceded  Thessaly  as  far  as  Zetouni.  Cf.  Bessarion  (Migne, 
clxi.,  618). 


i 


362       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

part  of  the  treaty,  while  the  latter  had  powerful  friends  in 
Italy — Pope  Innocent  VII.,  Ladislaus  of  Naples,  and  Cardinal 
Angelo  Acciajuoli — working  on  his  behalf.  Accordingly, 
Venice,  nothing  if  not  practical,  reconciled  herself  to  the 
loss  of  a  place  which  it  would  have  been  expensive  to 
recover.  To  save  appearances,  Antonio,  in  1405,  was  per- 
suaded to  become  her  vassal,  holding  "  the  land,  castle,  and 
place  of  Athens,  in  modern  times  called  Sythines,"  on  con- 
dition that  he  sent  every  year  a  silk  pallium  worth  100 
ducats  to  the  church  of  St  Mark.  He  was  to  make  peace 
or  war  at  the  bidding  of  his  suzerain,  to  give  no  shelter  to 
her  foes,  to  join  in  repelling  attacks  on  adjacent  Venetian 
colonies.  He  undertook  to  compensate  Venetian  subjects 
for  their  possessions  seized  during  the  war,  to  pay  the  value 
of  the  munitions  which  he  found  in  the  Akropolis,  and  to 
restore  the  goods  of  the  late  governor  of  Athens  to  his  heirs. 
He  was  also  to  banish  for  ever  the  mischievous  Greek 
metropolitan  Makarios,  who  had  apparently  escaped  from 
his  Venetian  dungeon.  On  these  terms  the  republic  agreed 
to  pardon  the  erring  Antonio  for  all  the  harm  which  he  had 
done  her,  and  to  receive  him  under  her  protection.  He  was, 
however,  in  no  hurry  to  carry  out  his  promises.  He  had  to 
be  sharply  reminded  that  he  had  not  sent  the  pallia,  and 
had  not  evacuated  the  strip  of  territory  opposite  Euboea, 
which  the  sultan  had  ceded  to  Venice,  "  the  continent,"  or 
"Staria"  (Sre/oea),  as  the  Venetians  called  it.  Unless  he 
mended  his  ways,  the  republic  warned  him  that  she  would 
retract  her  promise  to  let  him  retain  Athens.  A  compromise 
was  made,  by  which  he  was  allowed  to  keep  the  fortresses  in 
the  coveted  piece  of  land,  such  as  Sykaminon  and  Oropos,  pro- 
vided that  he  built  no  more.  Nine  years  later,  he  was  still  trying 
in  vain  to  obtain  further  concessions  from  the  Venetians.1 

The  latter  consoled  themselves  for  the  loss  of  Athens  by 
two  fresh  acquisitions  in  Greece.  The  fortress  of  Lepanto — 
one  of  the  most  famous  names  in  the  history  of  Christendom — 
was  still  in  the  possession  of  the  Albanian  family  of  Boua 

1  Predclli,  Commemoriali,  III.,  309;  S&has,  op.  cit.%  I.,  52;  II.,  135, 
184,  183  ;  Jorga,  iv.,  284.  The  "Staria"  was  not  five  miles  of  territory, 
ash  s  been  supposed,  but  tantum  infra  terrain  quantum  capiunt  miliaria 
v.,  tantum  quantum  est  longa  insula  (Jorga,  loc.  at.). 


VENICE  OBTAINS  LEPANTO  363 

Spata,  but  seemed  likely  to  fall  ere  long  into  the  hands  of 
the  Turks,  with  whom  its  lord  was  in  agreement.  Ever  since 
the  Turkish  Conquest  of  Salona  with  its  admirable  harbour 
of  Galaxidi,  corsairs  had  preyed  upon  Venetian  commerce  in 
the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  and  it  was  feared  that  the  Venetian 
island  of  Corfii  would  be  damaged,  if  the  Turks  were  able  to 
convert  Lepanto  into  what  it  became  in  the  seventeenth 
century — a  "little  Algiers."  Rather  than  that  this  should 
happen,  Venice  resolved  to  acquire  the  place.  As  far  back 
as  1390,  a  daring  Venetian  captain  had  hoisted  the  lion- 
banner  on  its  walls ;  but  he  had  not  been  supported  by  the 
Venetian  admiral,  and  had  paid  for  his  premature  act  by  the 
loss  of  his  eyes.  Four  years  later,  the  inhabitants,  alarmed 
by  the  Turks,  had  offered  their  town  to  the  republic,  but  the 
offer  was  cautiously  declined.  At  last,  in  1407,  Venice  made 
up  her  mind  that  the  psychological  moment  had  arrived. 
Two  versions  exist  of  the  way  in  which  she  attained  her 
object.  According  to  the  official  story,  the  then  lord  of 
Lepanto,  Paul  Boua  Spata,  sold  it  for  the  sum  of  1500 
ducats ;  but  a  more  probable  account  informs  us  that  a 
Venetian  detachment  suddenly  landed,  and  that  its  com- 
mander inveigled  the  ingenuous  Albanian  under  promise  of  a 
safe-conduct  to  his  camp,  and  then  threatened  to  cut  off  his 
head,  unless  he  gave  up  the  town.  A  capitano  or  rettore  was 
appointed,  who  was  dependent  on  the  governor  of  Corfii, 
except  during  the  temporary  occupation  of  the  much  nearer 
town  of  Patras.  The  cost  of  keeping  up  the  fortifications, 
which  are  still  one  of  the  most  picturesque  sights  of  the 
beautiful  gulf,  was  defrayed  out  of  the  valuable  fisheries  of 
Anatolikd  For  ninety-two  years  Lepanto  remained  in 
Venetian  hands,  and  its  "  triple  tiara  "  of  walls  was  called  by 
a  Venetian  historian  "  the  strongest  bulwark  of  the  Christian 
peoples." l  But  Venice  was  wise  enough  to  supplement  this 
defence  by  an  annual  tribute  of  100  ducats  to  successive 
sultans.2 

A  year  later,  in  1408,  the  republic  rented  Patras  for  five 

1  Sdthas,  op.  city  I.,  1,  2  ;  II.,  64,  70,  172,  180,  187-9,  23*  ;  HI-,  75  ; 
Nuovo  Archivio  Veneto^  xv.,  284-5  J  Sanudo,  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  837  ; 
Jorga,  iv.,  295. 

2  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  II.,  303,  318,  345,  368. 


364       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

years  from  its  archbishop,  Stephen  Zaccaria,  at  an  annual 
rent  of  iooo  ducats.  The  archbishop  was  harassed  by  the 
Turks,  and  wanted  to  spend  three  years  in  study  at  Padua, 
while  the  Venetians  were  glad  to  acquire  a  place  where  they 
had  so  much  trade.  He  retained  his  spiritual  jurisdiction,  while 
they  appointed  their  own  podest&,  who  decided  all  temporal 
matters  in  the  archbishop's  name,  and  was  assisted,  according 
to  the  custom  of  the  place,  by  a  certain  number  of  citizens. 
The  Venetians  took  over  the  serfs,  received  the  revenues  of 
the  Archbishopric — the  duties  on  wine,  corn,  oil,  silk,  and 
cotton,  which,  though  much  diminished,  still  amounted  to 
some  15,000  ducats,  and  raised  the  tribute  of  500  ducats, 
which  the  city  had  already  been  compelled  to  pay  to  the 
Turks,  and  which  was  remitted  to  the  sultan  by  the  Prince 
of  Achaia  together  with  his  own  contribution.  Both  Patras 
and  Venice  benefited  by  these  arrangements.  The  latter  now 
held  the  two  keys  of  the  gulf  in  her  hands  ;  the  former  experi- 
enced the  good  effects  of  a  practical  administration,  which 
spent  the  balance  of  the  revenues  on  the  defences,  repaired 
the  walls  and  the  palace,  whose  noble  hall  was  adorned  with 
frescoes  of  the  destruction  of  Troy,  and  stationed  an 
"  admiral "  at  the  mouth  of  the  gulf  to  keep  off  corsairs.  The 
numerous  Venetian  mercantile  colony  naturally  felt  safer 
under  the  flag  of  the  republic  than  under  the  crozier  of  a 
spiritual  prince.  Unfortunately,  the  archbishop  desired  to 
return,  and  at  the  end  of  the  five  years'  lease,  he  received 
back  his  dominions.  But  the  fear  of  a  new  foe,  the  Greeks  of 
Mistr&,  soon  drove  him  to  place  Patras,  with  the  seven 
fortresses  dependent  on  it,  once  more  in  the  power  of  the 
republic,  and  in  141 7  a  Venetian  governor  again  took  up  his 
abode  in  the  old  castle  of  the  Franks.  The  pope,  however, 
objected  to  this  alienation  of  ecclesiastical  property ;  Venice 
had  to  restore  it  two  years  later  to  the  feeble  rule  of  the 
archbishop,  with  the  natural  result  that,  a  few  years  after- 
wards, the  Roman  Church  lost  Patras  for  ever.  By  clutching 
at  the  shadow,  she  had  lost  the  substance.1 

1  Gerland,  162-71;  Predelli,  Commemoriali>  iii.,  335  ;  Diplomatarium^ 
II.,  303  ;  Sithas,  op.  cit%  I.,  2,  15,  21-30,  34,  41,  51,  68,  76-89,  91-6,  101, 
106;  II.,  216,  260;  Sanudo  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  839,  917;  N.  dc 
Martoni,  op.  at.,  III.,  661. 


FURTHER  VENETIAN  ACQUISITIONS         365 

Further  Venetian  attempts  at  territorial  expansion  in  the 
Morea  were  not  successful,  the  offer  of  Megara  had  no  attrac- 
tions, as  the  place  was  too  remote,  but  in  Epiros  the  famous 
rock  of  Parga  had,  in  1401,  become  a  dependency  of 
Corfu,1  with  which  it  remained  connected  till  the  memorable 
cession  by  the  British  in  18 19 ;  while  in  1390  the  two  islands  of 
Mykonos  and  Tenos  had  been  bequeathed  to  the  republic. 
The  islanders  petitioned  the  Venetian  Government  not  to 
dispose  of  them, "  seeing  that  no  lordship  under  Heaven  is  so 
just  and  good  as  that  of  Venice,"  whereupon  the  latter  farmed 
them  out,  after  a  public  auction,  to  a  Venetian  citizen,  who 
agreed  to  pay  an  annual  rent  of  1 500  hyperperi  out  of  the  1800 
which  represented  the  insular  revenues,  and  who  was 
dependent  on  the  bailie  of  Negroponte.  With  them  went  the 
classic  island  of  Delos,  "le  Sdiles,"  then  a  favourite  lair  of 
Turkish  pirates,  who  drew  their  water  from  the  sacred  lake, 
of  which  Callimachus  had  sung.2  Of  all  the  Venetian 
acquisitions  in  the  y£gean,  this  was  the  most  durable. 

Thus,  in  the  first  decade  of  the  fifteenth  century,  the 
Venetian  dominions  in  the  Levant  were  increasingly  impor- 
tant— a  fact  fully  recognised  by  the  Home  Government.  The 
documents  of  the  period  are  full  of  provisions  for  the  colonies, 
inspired  by  the  Turkish  peril,  and  of  concessions  to  the 
natives.  Commissioners  are  sent  to  enquire  into  their  con- 
dition, with  power  to  examine  Greeks  as  well  as  Latins ;  in 
Negroponte,  all  the  inhabitants,  except  the  Jews,  whose  taxes 
are  doubled,  are  to  have  privileges,  the  oppressive  hearth-tax 
is  temporarily  removed,  and  the  barons  are  ordered  to  arm 
their  serfs  with  bows  and  arrows,  and  see  that  they  practice 
them.  The  Home  Government  grants  a  humble  petition  of 
the  islanders,  praying  that  their  good  old  customs  may  be 
observed,  pluralities  prevented,  local  offices  made  annual,  and 
limited  to  those  who  have  lived  five  years  in  the  island,  and 
the  serfs  exempted  from  the  duty  of  acting  as  beaters  at 
the  bailie's  hunting-parties.  Still,  the  island  was  not  prosper- 
ous ;  there  was  a  large  deficit  in  the  annual  budget  of  the 
colony;  the  vassals  complained  of  their  poverty,  their 
ineptitude  for  trade,  and  their  struggle  to  live  on  their  rents. 

1  Sathas,  II.,  29,  35,  46. 

2  Predelli,  Commemorialiy  iii.,  278,  354  ;  Sathas,  II.,  163,  168,  178. 


366       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

About  this  time  the  total  population  consisted  of  14,000 
families,  and  the  city  of  Negroponte,  though  much  smaller 
than  it  once  had  been,  could  boast  of  a  fine  church,  a  rich 
Franciscan  monastery ,  and  a  nunnery.  But  what  most  struck 
travellers  was  the  picturesque  castle — now  alas !  no  more — 
in  mid-stream,  approached  by  a  wooden  draw-bridge  on 
either  side.  The  local  legend  made  it  the  abode  of  fairies, 
the  enchanted  fortress  where  the  Lady  of  the  Lake  had  held 
Gauvain  captive.  The  beauty  of  the  Lombard  and 
Venetian  damsels  of  Negroponte,  who  dressed  in  Italian 
fashion,  seemed  to  be  due  to  their  descent  from  these  fairy 
mothers. 

In  order  to  prevent  the  growing  danger  of  the  acquisition 
of  landed  property  in  the  island  by  the  Jews,  the  latter  were 
forbidden  to  purchase  real  estate  beyond  the  Ghetto,  and  the 
Cretan  system  of  letting  land  on  long  leases  of  twenty-nine 
years  was  introduced  so  as  to  give  the  tenants  more  interest 
in  the  soil ;  finally,  any  "  Albanians  or  other  equestrian 
people,"  who  would  emigrate  to  Eubcea,  were  given  full 
freedom  and  grants  of  uncultivated  land,  provided  that  they 
brought,  and  kept,  horses  for  the  defence  of  the  island. 
Albanians,  too,  were  induced  to  settle  at  Argos,  Astros  on 
the  Gulf  of  Nauplia  was  occupied,  and  the  fortifications  of 
Nauplia  were  ordered  to  be  repaired.  So  greatly  did  that 
colony  prosper  under  its  new  rulers,  that  soon  a  considerable 
annual  surplus  was  remitted  out  of  its  revenues  to  the  Cretan 
administration.  In  view  of  the  increasing  peril  of  invasion, 
the  cautious  republic  was  ready  to  give  favourable  con- 
sideration to  the  Despot  Theodore's  plan  of  rebuilding  the 
"six-mile"  rampart  across  the  isthmus,  while  by  treaties 
with  successive  sultans  in  1406  and  141 1  she  secured  that 
her  Greek  colonies  should  not  be  molested.1 

During  the  brief  Venetian  occupation  of  Athens,  the 
Peloponnese  had  been  a  prey  to  those  jealousies  which  had 
distracted  it  at  the  time  of  the  Frankish  Conquest  The 
Despot,  though  he  was  the  brother  of  the  reigning  Emperor 
Manuel  II.,  had  never  succeeded  in  imposing  his  authority 

1  Sdthas,  II.,  27,  30,  56-9,  60-2,  79,  83,  122-4,  224 ;  III.,  1,  2,  74,  9S  J 
Jorga,  iv.,  291,  296  ;  N.  de  Martoni,  loc.  cit;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplo- 
matarium,  ii.,  299,  303. 


ALBANIANS  IN  THE  MOREA  367 

upon  the  proud  and  stubborn  arckons,  whose  ancestry  was 
as  ancient  as  his  own.  If  we  may  believe  the  iambic  poem 
inscribed  on  the  door  of  the  former  church  at  Parori,  near 
Mistr&,  during  the  first  five  years  of  his  reign  they  had 
thwarted  him  in  every  way,  striving  either  to  drive  him  out 
of  the  country  or  to  murder  him,  the  veritable  "  gift  of  God" 
One  of  these  local  magnates,  a  Mamon&s  of  Monemvasia,  a 
descendant  of  the  man  who  had  handed  over  that  great 
fortress  to  Villehardouin,  held  the  office  of  "  Grand  Duke," 
or  Lord  High  Admiral,  and  comported  himself  as  an  inde- 
pendent princelet.  When  Theodore  had  asserted  himself 
and  expelled  him,  Mamon&s  had  not  hesitated  to  submit 
his  hereditary  right  to  tyrannise  over  his  native  city  to  the 
arbitrament  of  the  sultan,  who  ordered  his  restoration. 
Whenever  the  Despot  tried  to  make  his  authority  respected, 
his  rebellious  Greek  subjects  found  allies  in  the  Navarrese, 
and  Theodore  was  thus  forced  in  self-defence  to  look  else- 
where for  support  At  this  time  some  10,000  Albanians  had 
emigrated  from  their  homes  in  Thessaly  and  Akarnania 
before  the  invading  Turks,  and  had  encamped  with  their 
wives  and  children  on  the  isthmus.  Thence  they  sent 
spokesmen  to  the  Despot,  asking  permission  to  settle  in  his 
dominions.  Most  of  his  advisers  opposed  the  idea,  on  the 
ground  that  the  manners  and  customs  of  these  strangers  were 
not  those  of  the  Greeks.  Theodpre  saw,  however,  as  his 
predecessor  Manuel  Cantacuzene  had  done,  that  these 
Highlanders  should  furnish  him  with  splendid  fighting 
material,  with  which  he  might  keep  his  archons  in  order. 
He  admitted  the  Albanians  to  the  peninsula ;  they  occupied 
uninhabited  spots,  planted  trees  in  places  whence  brigandage 
had  driven  the  pacific  natives  ;  while,  when  it  came  to  fight- 
ing against  the  rebels  and  their  Navarrese  allies,  they  and 
their  leader,  Demetrios  Ral,  or  Raoul,  an  ancestor  of  the 
great  family  of  Ralles,  undaunted  by  San  Superan's  mail- 
clad  horsemen,  succeeded  in  capturing  that  proud  warrior 
and  his  brother-in-law,  the  Constable  Zaccaria,  the  former 
captor  of  Nerio.  Nothing  but  the  fear  of  the  Turks  and 
the  good  offices  of  Venice  secured  their  release.1     Imitating 

1  Manuel  Palaiol6gos,  op.  cit%  211  -15,  228-9;  Chronicon  Breve,  516; 
Phrantzes,  57  ;  Bulletin  de  Cdrr.  hellen^  xxiii^  15 1-4. 


368      FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

the  example  of  Nerio,  San  Superan  obtained  in  1396  from 
Ladislaus  of  Naples  the  title  of  hereditary  Prince  of  Achaia, 
to  which  Pope  Boniface  IX.,  without  encroaching  on  the 
rights  of  the  Neapolitan  king,  added  that  of  "standard- 
bearer"  of  the  Church.1  Soon  afterwards,  in  1402,  he  died, 
the  type  of  a  successful  adventurer,  who  had  never  scrupled 
to  use  the  Turks  when  it  suited  his  purpose.  His  widow 
Maria  succeeded  him  as  Princess  of  Achaia  and  regent 
for  his  eldest  child ;  but  the  real  power  was  vested  in 
her  nephew,  Centurione  Zaccaria,  the  ambitious  baron  of 
Kyparissia.2 

The  Despot  Theodore  had  soon  convinced  himself  that 
the  Albanians  alone  would  not  suffice  to  save  his  land  from 
the  Turks.  He  could  not  appeal  for  aid  to  his  brother,  the 
Emperor  Manuel  II.,  for  the  latter  had  gone  to  London  to 
crave  the  help  of  Henry  IV.,  leaving  his  wife  and  children 
in  charge  of  the  Venetians  at  Modon.  Indeed,  it  seemed 
as  if  Theodore  himself  might  have  to  seek  a  refuge  in  some 
Venetian  colony.3  In  this  dilemma,  he  bethought  him  of  the 
Knights  of  St  John,  who  had  previously  held  Achaia,  and 
were  known  to  be  bold  and  experienced  soldiers.  He 
accordingly  went  to  Rhodes  in  1400  and  sold  Mistri, 
Kalavryta,  and  Corinth,  to  the  Knights.  When  the  news 
reached  Greece,  great  was  the  indignation  of  the  natives ; 
even  the  laboured  funeral  oration,  which  the  Emperor  Manuel 
subsequently  delivered  over  his  brother,  fails  to  justify  this 
craven  act  The  panegyrist  strove,  indeed,  to  show  that  his 
brother  had  conferred  a  greater  benefit  upon  Hellenism  by 
ceding  Akrocorinth  than  by  regaining  it  five  years  before ; 
in  vain,  he  quoted  Solomon  in  proof  of  his  brother's  wisdom, 
and  pronounced  the  admirable  maxim — utterly  disregarded 
by  the  Greeks  in  practice — that,  after  all,  it  was  better  to  give 
Corinth  to  one's  fellow-Christians  than  to  let  it  fall  into  the 
hands  of  the  infidels.  This  was  not  the  opinion  of  the  people. 
The  Knights,  indeed,  occupied  Corinth,  where  the  Greek 
party  had  not  had  time  to  take  firm  root,  and  where  they 
strove   to   make   their  rule   popular  by  all  manner  of  con- 

1  Predelli,   Commtmoriali,   III.,  240;   Raynaldi,   viii.,   72;   Riccio, 
Notizie  Storiche,  67. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches^  II.,  i.,  273.  3  Jorga,  iv.,  228. 


THE  KNIGHTS  OF  ST  JOHN  369 

cessions;  but  at  MistrA,  the  capital  and  the  seat  of  the 
metropolitan  of  Lacedaemonia,  the  Greeks  rushed  with  sticks 
and  stones  to  slay  the  envoys  of  the  Order.  The  metro- 
politan intervened  to  save  their  lives,  and  gave  them  three 
days  to  quit  the  district,  whereupon  the  fanatical  people 
entrusted  him  with  the  supreme  temporal  power,  and  refused 
to  receive  back  the  Despot,  until  he  had  repaid  the  purchase- 
money  to  the  Knights  and  vowed  never  to  dream  of  such  a 
monstrous  transaction  again.  He  saw  that  what  he  had 
regarded  as  a  masterpiece  of  diplomacy  had  well-nigh  cost 
him  his  dominions.  Moreover,  the  defeat  and  capture  of  the 
dreaded  Sultan  Bajazet  removed  for  a  time  the  prospects  of  a 
fresh  Turkish  invasion.  Theodore  thought  that  the  Knights, 
having  served  their  turn,  were  no  longer  needed ;  and 
successfully  applied  his  diplomatic  talents  to  the  task  of 
ejecting  them  with  the  least  possible  amount  of  friction. 
A  money  payment,  and  the  cession  of  the  old  county  of 
Salona,  with  the  barony  of  Lamia,  which  Theodore,  as  the 
representative  of  the  last  countess,  had  occupied  on  the  news 
of  the  Turkish  defeat  at  Angora,  but  which  he  was  too  weak 
to  hold,  settled  the  claims  of  the  Knights,  and  both  parties 
separated  on  the  best  of  terms.  In  1404,  Theodore  re-entered 
Corinth,  and  the  Knights  crossed  the  gulf  to  take  possession 
of  Salona.  But  there,  too,  they  found  the  Greeks  fanatically 
opposed  to  "  the  French  priests."  When  they  tried  to  bribe 
the  mountain  folk  to  rise  against  the  Turks,  who  had  re- 
occupied  the  country,  the  crafty  Greeks  took  their  money 
and  then  laughed  at  them,  and  the  monkish  chronicler 
narvely  justifies  his  countrymen's  conduct  towards  the 
Frankish  "Antichrists,"  who  got  no  more  than  they 
deserved  All  that  they  accomplished  was  the  building 
of  a  church  at  Galaxidi,  the  ruins  of  which  still  disguise,  in 
a  corrupted  form,  the  name  of  St  John  of  Jerusalem.  Even 
the  formal  acquiescence  of  the  new  sultan  in  their  occupation 
of  Salona  availed  them  nothing  in  the  face  of  this  Greek 
opposition,  and  the  old  Frankish  barony  was  soon  all 
Turkish  again.1 

1  Phrantzgs,  63 ;  Chalkokond^les,  97,  206 ;  Manuel  Palaiologos,  op. 
eit,  24472  ;  Chronicon  Breve^  517  ;  Xporucbv  roQ  TaXafriSlov,  207-9  ;  Bosio, 
II.,  117;  Thomas,  Diplomatariumy  II.,  290-3. 

2  A 


370       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

Theodore  did  not  long  survive  his  diplomatic  triumph. 
In  1407  he  died,  and,  as  he  left  no  heirs,  the  Emperor 
Manuel  II.  appointed  his  own  second  son,  Theodore  II., 
who  was  still  a  minor,  as  his  brother's  successor.  Over  the 
remains  of  the  late  Despot  the  emperor  delivered,  a  few  years 
later,  a  pompous  funeral  oration,  still  preserved,  in  which  he 
lauded  his  brother  to  the  skies  in  faultless  Greek  and  with 
great  wealth  of  classical  allusion,  attributed  to  his  wise  policy 
in  calling  in  the  Knights  the  revival  of  prosperity  in  the 
peninsula,  and  exclaimed  that  the  Peloponnese  was  his 
brother's  monument — "a  monument,  too,  not  dead,  but 
alive!" 

The  Despot's  last  act  before  his  death  had  been  to 
attempt  what  his  predecessors  had  been  compassing  for  a 
century  and  a  half— the  conquest  of  the  Frankish  principality, 
now  in  the  hands  of  a  new  and  energetic  ruler.  Centurione 
Zaccaria,  son  of  the  former  constable  and  nephew  of  the  last 
prince,  was  not  the  man  to  be  content  with  governing  in  the 
name  of  his  aunt  and  her  infant  children.  He  had  the 
effrontery  to  ask  Venice,  to  whose  care  San  Superan  had 
committed  his  heirs,  for  assistance  in  his  ambitious  design  of 
setting  them  aside,  just  as,  two  centuries  before,  the  first 
Villehardouin,  with  Venetian  aid,  had  deprived  Champlitte's 
successor  of  his  heritage.  Then  he  applied  to  King  Ladislaus 
of  Naples,  who  still  posed  as  overlord  of  Achaia,  and 
obtained  from  him,  in  1404,  the  coveted  title  of  Prince  of 
Achaia.  The  Neapolitan  monarch  salved  his  conscience  for 
thus  depriving  San  Superan's  children  of  their  birthright  by 
pretending  that  they  had  not  notified  their  father's  death 
within  the  time  prescribed  by  the  feudal  law.  Thus,  the 
great  Genoese  family  from  which  Centurione  sprang  had 
reached  the  summit  of  its  ambitions  by  a  quibble  similar  to 
that  by  which  the  first  Villehardouin  had  won  Achaia.  But 
the  handwriting  was  on  the  wall.  He  was  the  last  of  the  long 
series  of  Frankish  Princes  of  Achaia ;  weakened  by  internal 
dissensions,  the  diminished  state  was  destined  to  succumb 
ere  long  to  the  brief  revival  of  Hellenism  at  Mistrl  Mean- 
while, Centurione's  most  pressing  foes  were  those  of  his  own 
race.  One  of  his  most  important  peers,  Carlo  Tocco,  Count 
of  Cephalonia,  at  once  obtained  from  the  King  of  Naples 


FEMALE  RULE  IN  CEPHALONIA  371 

the  abolition  of  the  feudal  tie,  which  had  united  his 
island  county  to  Achaia  for  170  years  —  an  event  com- 
memorated on  the  only  coin  of  his  dynasty,  now  in  the 
British  Museum.  Not  content  with  that,  he  and  his  brother, 
Leonardo  of  Zante,  seized  Glarentza,  from  which  they  were 
finally  dislodged  by  the  united  efforts  of  the  Zaccaria  clan 
and  the  Albanian  troops  of  the  prince.  The  latter,  feeling 
himself  insecure,  begged  his  ancestral  city  of  Genoa  to  look 
upon  him  as  her  son  and  citizen.1 

The  Tocchi  were  at  this  time  among  the  most  ambitious 
and  able  of  the  Latin  dynasties  in  the  Levant.  We  have 
seen  how  Carlo  I.,  Duke  of  Leucadia  and  Palatine  Count  of 
Cephalonia  and  Zante,  had  married  the  favourite  daughter 
of  Nerio  Acciajuoli,  and  had  played  an  active,  if  devious,  part 
in  the  execution  of  his  father-in-law's  will.  His  wife,  the 
Duchess  Francesca,  one  of  the  ablest  and  most  masterful 
women  of  the  Latin  Levant,  in  which  her  sex  had  played  so 
prominent  a  part,  was  the  ruling  spirit  in  his  councils.  To 
her  influence  was  due  the  restoration  of  the  Greek  arch- 
bishopric of  Leukas ;  she  was  sufficiently  Greek  and  sufficiently 
proud  to  sign  her  letters  in  Greek,  and  with  the  cinnabar  ink 
of  Byzantium  :  "  Empress  of  the  Romans  "  ;  and  she  possessed 
all  her  father's  brains,  and  inherited  his  political  ideas.  In 
her  castle  of  Santa  Mavra — the  irregular,  hexagonal  building 
which  is  still  preserved — and  in  her  court  at  the  castle  of  St 
George  in  Cephalonia,  which  served  as  barracks  during  the 
British  occupation,  but  which  now  remains  a  deserted  land- 
mark of  foreign  rule,  she  presided  over  a  bevy  of  fair  ladies. 
Old  Froissart  tells  us,  how  the  Comte  de  Nevers  and  the 
other  French  nobles,  whom  the  sultan  had  taken  prisoners 
at  the  battle  of  Nikopolis,  were  received  there  by  her  with 
splendid  hospitality  on  their  way  home.  The  ladies  were 
exceeding  glad,  he  says,  to  have  such  noble  society,  for 
Venetian  and  Genoese  merchants  were,  as  a  rule,  the  only 
strangers  who  came  to  their  delightful  island.  He  describes 
Cephalonia  as  ruled  by  women,  who  scorned  not,  however, 
to  make  silken  coverings  so  fine  that  there  were  none  like 
them.     Fairies  and  nymphs  inhabited  this  ancient  realm  of 

1  S4thas,  op.  tit.)  II.,  30,  109,  155,  165,  168,  194;  Schlumberger, 
Numismatiquey  391  ;  Riccio,  Notizie  Storicht,  67. 


372       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

Odysseus,  where  a  mediaeval  Penelope  governed  in  the  absence 
of  her  lord.  Events  were  soon  to  extend  his  rule  over  the 
neighbouring  continent,  where  we  last  saw  his  uncle,  Esau 
Buondelmonti,  holding  sway.1 

The  Florentine  ruler  of  Joannina  was  anxious  to  secure 
immunity  for  his  people  from  the  attacks  of  the  great 
Albanian  clan  of  Spata,  which  had  its  capital  at  Arta. 
Accordingly,  on  the  death  of  his  beloved  wife,  he  had 
contracted  a  second  marriage  with  a  daughter  of  old  Ghin 
(or  John)  Boua  Spata,  its  chieftain.  But  this  act  of  policy 
had  the  very  opposite  effect  of  what  had  been  expected,  for 
it  brought  Evrenosbeg  and  a  Turkish  army  upon  Epiros, 
and  made  the  Albanians  more  jealous  than  ever  of  the 
Italian  interloper.  Buondelmonti  proved  a  match  for  the 
Turks  in  that  difficult  country  ;  but  in  his  new  brother-in-law, 
Ghin  Zenevisi,  Lord  of  Argyrokastron,  he  found  a  more 
dangerous  antagonist.  During  an  expedition  to  punish  this 
treacherous  chieftain,  he  was  taken  prisoner,  and  only  released, 
thanks  to  the  good  offices  of  his  influential  Florentine  relatives, 
and  of  the  Venetian  governor  of  Corfu,  on  payment  of  a  large 
ransom.  We  last  hear  of  him  in  1408,  when  he  died  with- 
out offspring,  and,  in  the  ordinary  course,  his  nephew,  Carlo 
Tocco,  should  have  succeeded  him.2  But,  no  sooner  was 
Esau  dead,  than  another  Albanian  chief,  Maurice  Boua 
Sgouros,  who  had  seized  the  succession  of  his  brother  Ghin 
at  Arta,  made  himself  also  master  of  Joannina,  whence  Tocco 
was  unable  to  dislodge  him.  Both  parties  appealed  for  aid 
to  Venice,  which,  after  her  acquisition  of  Lepanto,  was  not 
at  all  desirous  to  see  a  vigorous  Italian  princelet  establish 
himself  on  the  mainland.  Sgour6s,  when  hard  pressed,  called 
in  the  Turks,  which  had  the  effect  of  frightening  all  parties 
into  peace.  But,  though  Tocco  temporarily  relinquished  the 
places  which  he  had  taken  on  the  mainland,  he  did  not 
abandon  his  claim    to  the   old  Despotat  of  Epiros.     The 

1  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  II.,  139;  III.,  253;  Buchon,  Nouvelles 
Recherches,  II.,  i.,  254,  283,  286;  Froissart  (ed.  Buchon),  xiv.,  57,  58; 
Mcliardkcs,  Tctaypa&a  toQ  No/LtoO  Ke^oXXijWat,  34  ;  BlantSs,  'H  Aet/icdj,  58. 

2  A  golden  bull  of  his,  dated  1408,  and  published  by  Roman6s 
(Uepl  toO  Aemror&Tov,  168),  disproves  the  statement  of  the  Epirotica,  that  he 
died  in  1400. 


CARLO  TOCCO  IN  EPIROS  373 

various  races  of  Epiros  seem  to  have  grown  weary  of  the 
Albanian  ascendancy ;  already  another  rival  had  endeavoured 
to  obtain  as  many  diverse  racial  sympathies  as  possible  by 
describing  himself  as  a  "  Serbo-Albano-Boulgaro-Wallach  " — 
a  name  worthy  of  Aristophanes  himself.  Tocco  and  his 
consort  were  doubtless  popular  with  the  Greek  element; 
supported  by  them  and  with  his  own  right  arm,  he  would 
appear  to  have  at  last  vanquished  his  enemy  in  a  battle, 
which  was  fatal  to  the  latter  ;  early  in  14 17,  he  had  already 
made  himself  master  of  "the  land  of  Arta,"  and  in  1418  he 
was  able  to  style  himself  "  Despot  of  the  Romans."  His 
dominions  embraced,  besides  his  islands,  Epiros,  jEtolia, 
and  Akarnania;  he  resided  now  at  Arta,  now  at  Joannina, 
and  now  in  his  insular  castles,  while  the  relatives  of  his  fallen 
rival  emigrated  to  the  Morea,  where  they  and  their  descend- 
ants, later  on,  played  a  prominent  part.  Thus  he  and  his 
masterful  wife  had  established  in  North-west  Greece,  a  com- 
pact dominion,  broken  only  by  the  Venetian  castle  of  Lepanto. 
That,  too,  he  offered  to  buy  ;  but  he  received  the  haughty 
answer,  that  the  republic  had  "never  been  accustomed  to 
sell  her  fortresses,  and  is  quite  capable,  even  if  they  were  not 
remunerative,  of  supporting  their  cost." l 

The  ten  years'  fratricidal  struggle  between  the  four  sons 
of  Bajazet  I.  had  given  Greece  as  a  whole  a  welcome  respite 
from  Turkish  invasions,  and  a  Byzantine  governor  actually 
ruled,  for  the  first  time  for  generations,  in  Lamia.  But  the 
two  surviving  fragments  of  Latin  rule  in  North-east  Greece — 
the  Venetian  marquisate  of  Boudonitza  and  the  Venetian 
station  of  Pteleon  —  were,  from  their  isolated  position, 
peculiarly  exposed  to  attack.  Suleyman,  as  we  saw,  had 
guaranteed  the  independence  of  the  Marquis  Giacomo  on 
continued  payment  of  a  tribute,  which  was  also  claimed  from 
Pteleon  ;  but  the  Turks  none  the  less  became  so  threatening 
that  he  removed  his  vassals  and  cattle  to  the  safer  castle  of 
Karystos  in  Eubcea,  which  his  brother  now  held  from  the 
Venetians.  The  danger  increased  when  Suleyman's  brother, 
Musa,  seized  the  Turkish  throne  in  141a    The  new  sultan's 

1  Epirotica>  235-8  ;  Sithas,  i.,  34 ;  ii.,  114,  234 ;  in.,  64,  174  ;  Hopf, 
Chroniques,  195,  301,  342,  368  ;  Lami,  Delicto:  Eruditorum,  v.,  p.  cxx.  ; 
Jorga,  iv.,  581. 


374       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

victorious  troops  marched  straight,  like  a  new  army  of 
Xerxes,  against  the  historic  fortress  which,  for  two  centuries, 
had  guarded  the  Pass  of  Thermopylae.  The  marquis 
defended  it,  like  a  spcond  Leonidas,  but  he  was  assassi- 
nated by  a  traitor  within  the  walls.  Even  then,  his  sons, 
aided  by  their  uncle,  the  baron  of  Karystos,  held  the 
castle  for  some  months  longer,  in  the  hope  that  Venice  would 
send  aid  to  her  children  in  distress.  Aid  was,  indeed, 
ordered  to  be  sent;  but,  before  it  arrived,  Boudonitza  had 
fallen — surrendered  at  last  by  its  gallant  defenders  on 
condition  that  their  lives  and  property  were  spared.  The 
Turks  violated  their  promise,  robbed  their  prisoners  of  all 
that  they  possessed,  and  incorporated  the  marquisate  with 
the  Pashalik  of  Thessaly.  Young  Niccolo  Zorzi,  the  late 
marquis's  heir,  and  his  uncle,  Niccold  of  Karystos,  were 
dragged  off  as  captives  to  the  sultan's  court  at  Adrianople, 
where  Venice  did  not  forget  them.  In  the  treaty  of  1411, 
between  Musa  and  the  republic,  the  sultan  promised  to 
release  the  young  marquis,  for  love  of  Venice,  seeing  that 
he  was  a  Venetian,  to  vex  him  no  more,  if  he  paid  the 
tribute  agreed  upon,  and  to  allow  his  ships  and  merchandise 
to  enter  the  Turkish  Empire  on  payment  of  a  fixed  duty. 
But  young  Niccol6,  after  what  had  occurred,  felt  insecure  in 
his  ancestral  castle  at  the  northern  gates  of  Greece.  In  141 2 
we  find  him  sending  the  Bishop  of  Thermopylae  to  ask  for 
archers  from  Negroponte  and  the  protection  of  the  Venetian 
admiral,  in  case  the  Turks,  or  their  vassal,  Antonio  of  Athens, 
should  attack  him.1  His  request  was  granted ;  but  his 
marquisate  was  doomed. 

Mohammed  I.  had  indeed  promised  on  his  accession  in 
141 3,  to  be  a  son  to  the  Greek  Emperor  Manuel,  who  had 
helped  him  to  the  throne ;  and  he  had  told  the  envoys  of 
the  Despot  Theodore,  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  and  the  Despot  of 
Joannina,  that  he  wished  to  be  at  peace  with  their  masters.2 
But  he  did  not  spare  the  Venetian  Lord  of  Boudonitza.  His 
fleet  sailed  to  Eubcea,  and,  after  ravaging  the  island,  crossed 
over    to  the  mainland.     On  20th  June  1414  the  castle  fell, 

1  Hopf,  Karystos  (tr.   Sardagna),   55-8,  90;  Thomas  and   Prcdelli, 
Diplomatarium,  ii.,  203  ;  Sdthas,  II.,  155,  210,  270 ;  Jorga,  vi.,  119. 
1  Doukas,  97. 


FALL  OF  BOUDONITZA  375 

its  fortifications  were  destroyed,  numbers  of  the  marquis's 
subjects  were  dragged  off  as  slaves,  and  the  historic  mar- 
quisate  which  had  lasted  over  two  hundred  years,  disappeared 
from  the  face  of  Greece.  Young  Niccoli  fled  to  Venice, 
which  afforded  him  shelter  and  endeavoured  to  recover  for 
him  his  lost  dominions.  When  the  republic,  after  a  brilliant 
victory  over  the  Turkish  fleet,  forced  upon  Mohammed  the 
treaty  of  14 16,  one  of  the  conditions  was  that  the  marquis 
should  be  restored,  if  he  did  homage  and  paid  tribute  to  the 
sultan.  But  his  castle  was  now  in  ruins,  and  he  was  glad 
to  cede  the  vain  honour  of  bearing  the  title  to  his  uncle,  the 
baron  of  Karystos,  receiving  for  himself  the  rectorship  of 
Pteleon,  as  the  reward  of  the  services  of  his  father,  "  killed  by 
the  Turks  in  the  cause  of  Venice."  From  that  time  we  hear 
of  him  no  more ;  but  his  uncle,  Niccold  of  Karystos,  was 
prominent  in  the  diplomatic  negotiations  of  the  period.  He 
went  as  Venetian  ambassador  to  both  the  Emperor  Sigismund 
and  Pope  Martin  V.,  and  it  was  on  an  embassy  to  Mur&d  II. 
at  Adrianople  that  he  died,  it  was  said,  of  poison  administered 
by  the  sultan's  orders.  The  title  of  Marquis  of  Boudonitza 
and  the  barony  of  Karystos  lingered  on  for  two  generations 
in  his  family,  and  at  the  present  day  his  descendants,  the 
Zorzi  of  S.  Giustina  still  exist  in  Venice.  Such  was  the 
tragic  end  of  the  marquisate,  which  Boniface  of  Montferrat 
had  conferred  upon  the  Pallavicini,  and  which  had  passed 
from  them  to  the  family  of  Zorzi.1  A  picturesque  ruin  still 
marks  the  spot  where  the  Italian  marquises  held  their  court. 

With  the  fall  of  Boudonitza,  the  brief  restoration  of 
Byzantine  rule  in  Lamia  passed  away,  and  the  whole  of 
continental  Greece,  from  Olympos  to  Bceotia,  was  Turkish, 
except  where  the  Eubcean  governor  of  Pteleon  kept  the 
Venetian  flag  still  flying.  Despite  the  late  sultan's  promise 
not  to  molest  the  Venetian  colonies,  every  year  the  Turks 

1  Sanudo  ajmd  Muratori,  xxii.,  890,  911,  1043  ;  Navagero,  ibid.,  xxiii., 
1080- 1  ;  Cronaca  di  Amadeo  Valier,  fol.  259  (Cod.  Cicogna,  No.  297)  in 
Museo  Correr  ;  S 4th as,  iii.,  429-31  ;  Jorga,  iv.,  561  ;  v.,  196.  Much  con- 
fusion has  been  caused  by  the  fact  that  both  uncle  and  nephew  had  the 
same  name.  I  have  followed  the  account  given  by  Hopf  in  his  Karystos 
(tr.  Sardagna),  rather  than  that  in  his  history  (lxxxvi.,  73-6),  because  we 
know  (Jorga,  iv.,  546)  that  the  uncle  was  five  years  in  prison. 


376       FLORENTINE  AND  VENETIAN  ATHENS 

descended  in  smaller  or  larger  numbers  upon  Euboea,  and  on 
one  of  these  raids  some  1 500  of  the  islanders  were  carried  off 
into  captivity,  and  the  town  of  Lepso,  the  modern  ^Edepsos, 
where  the  Greeks  go  to  take  the  hot  baths,  was  destroyed. 
So  wretched  was  existence  in  the  island  at  this  time,  that  the 
inhabitants    petitioned    Venice    for    permission   to  become 
tributaries  of  the  Turks.     This  request  the  proud  republic 
refused  ;  but  it  was  obvious,  as  the  petitioners  pointed  out, 
that  Negroponte  was  now,  like  Lepanto,  "  on  the  frontier  of 
all  her  Levantine  possessions,"  and  had  therefore  to  bear  the 
brunt    of  every  Turkish    invasion.     Attica   was  still   more 
exposed   to  these  dreaded  enemies,  and  in    141 5  Antonio 
Acciajuoli  applied  to  Venice  for  munitions  from  Negroponte 
and  leave  to  deposit  his  animals  and  property  there  in  case 
of  attack.     A  year  later  the  Turks  ravaged  his  duchy  and 
forced  him    to  pay  tribute.     Happily  the  great  Venetian 
naval  victory  over  the  Turks  in  1416  checked  for  a  time  the 
Ottoman   advance,  and   the    subsequent    treaty,  which  the 
sultan   made  with  the  victors  three  years  later,  procured  a 
breathing  space  for  the  Latins  of  the  Levant     Mohammed  I. 
even  went  so  far  as  to  threaten  with  condign  punishment, 
Antonio  Acciajuoli,  who  had  maltreated  some  Venetian  sub- 
jects, or  anyone  else  who  should  dare  to  lay  a  finger  on  any 
Venetian  colony.1    Thus,  Greece  enjoyed  a  welcome  respite 
from   the   Turkish   peril.     Had   her  rulers  been  wise,  they 
would   have  availed   themselves  of  it  to  consolidate  their 
forces  against  the  common  enemy,  who  was    so  soon  to 
destroy    their    dominions.     But    when    have    the    Eastern 
Christians  been   united    against    the    Crescent?     Yet    few 
moments  were  more  favourable  than  this,  when  the  Turkish 
ruler  was  pacific,  when  his  Empire  was  just  emerging  from 
a  long  civil  war,   and   when,  by  a  curious   irony  of  fate, 
Hellenism  was  displaying  a  consciousness  of  its  past  and  a 
concern  for  its  future  such  as  it  had  not  shown  since  the 
Frankish  Conquest.     It  was,  alas!   the  last  flicker  of  light 
before  the  long  centuries  of  Turkish  darkness. 

1  Sanudo    apud   Muratori,  xxiL,  896;    S&has,    III.,    1002,    125-7, 
I29*3f)  19°  >  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  318-20. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA  (1415-I441) 

Early  in  the  year  141 5,  the  Emperor  Manuel  II.  paid  a 
memorable  visit  to  the  Peloponnese.  His  object  was  to 
establish  his  son  Theodore,  now  of  age,  in  the  governorship  of 
Mistr&,  to  do  what  was  practicable  for  the  defence  of  a  province 
which  had  attracted  greater  attention  at  the  Byzantine  court 
since  the  rest  of  the  empire  had  been  so  woefully  curtailed  by 
the  Turkish  Conquests,  and  to  pronounce  a  funeral  oration 
over  his  late  brother.  The  Venetians  gave  him  a  state 
reception  when  he  stopped  at  Negroponte  on  his  way.  But 
they  were  so  much  alarmed  at  the  arrival  of  a  ruler,  who 
naturally  personified  the  reviving  idea  of  Hellenism,  that 
they  at  once  dismissed  the  Greek  mercenaries  of  their 
Peloponnesian  colonies.  From  Eubcea  the  emperor  sailed  to 
Kenchreai,  the  port  of  Corinth,  where  he  received  the 
homage  of  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  and  where  he  assembled  the 
people  of  the  peninsula.  He  then  set  them  to  work  to 
rebuild  the  great  rampart  across  the  isthmus  which  his 
brother  had  proposed.  Under  the  imperial  eye  the  workmen 
laboured  so  fast,  that  in  twenty-five  days  a  wall  42  stades  in 
length,  strengthened  by  1 53  towers  and  a  ditch,  and  terminated 
by  a  castle  at  either  end,  stretched  from  sea  to  sea.  The 
emperor  built  on  the  site  of  the  rampart  which  the  Pelopon- 
nesians  had  raised  on  the  approach  of  Xerxes,  which  Valerian 
had  restored  when  he  fortified  Greece  against  the  Goths, 
which  Justinian  had  again  constructed  when  Greece  was 
threatened  by  the  Huns  and  Slavs.  An  inscription  in 
honour  of  Justinian  came  to  light  in  the  course  of  the  work, 
and  it  was  hoped  that  the  wall  of  Manuel  would  prove  as 

877 


378      THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OP  ACHAIA 

durable  as  his.  Remains  of  the  Hexamilion  may  still  be 
seen  between  the  modern  town  of  Corinth  and  the  Canal, 
while  its  name  is  preserved  by  a  hamlet  on  the  line  to 
Argos.  But  the  restoration  of  the  wall  availed  little  against 
the  bravery  of  the  Turks ;  for,  as  Thucydides  had  observed 
centuries  before,  it  is  men  and  not  walls  that  make  a  city. 
If  we  may  believe  a  Byzantine  satirist — and  his  statement  is 
in  keeping  with  their  character — the  Peloponnesian  archons 
showed  so  little  patriotism  and  so  much  jealousy  of  the 
emperor,  that  they  rose  and  threatened  to  destroy  the  ram- 
part when  it  was  barely  finished.  Such  was  their  insubordin- 
ation, that,  when  he  returned  to  Constantinople,  Manuel 
thought  it  prudent  to  take  them  with  him.  Before  he  left,  he 
announced  the  completion  of  the  work  to  the  doge,  who  sent 
his  congratulations,  and  authorised  the  governors  of  the 
Venetian  colonies  in  the  Morea  to  assist  in  its  defence.  But, 
when  asked  to  contribute  to  the  cost  of  maintaining  it,  the 
Venetians  excused  themselves,  on  the  plea  that  they  were 
incurring  heavy  expenses  for  defending  other  parts  of  Greece 
against  the  Turks.  So  unpopular  was  the  tax  imposed  upon 
the  Greeks  for  the  support  of  the  Hexamilion,  that  many 
serfs  fled  into  the  Venetian  colonies  to  escape  it,  and  a  few 
years  later  the  Despot  Theodore  II.  actually  offered  to 
transfer  the  custody  of  the  great  wall  to  the  republic.  But  the 
selfish  Venetians  would  only  consent  to  this,  if  they  also 
received  a  mile  or  two  of  land  inside  it,  and  if  Theodore 
would  pay  half  the  cost  of  defence.  Such  was  the  attitude  of 
the  two  powers  most  vitally  interested  in  the  preservation  of 
the  peninsula  at  a  time  when  union  alone  could  have  saved  it 
from  the  Turks.1 

There  was  at  least  one  man  then  living  in  the  Pelopon- 
nese  who  was  well  aware  that  more  than  ramparts  of  stone 
was  needed  to  secure  the  independence  of  the  peninsula. 
The  Platonic  philosopher,  George  Gemist6s,  or  Ptethon,  as  he 
afterwards  called  himself,  had  been  engaged  for  the  last 
twenty  years  in  teaching  the  doctrines  of  his  master  in  the 

1  Phrantzgs,  96,  107,  108  ;  Chalkokonctyles,  183,  216  ;  Doukas,  102  ; 
M&zaris  aftud  Boissonade,  Anecdote  Gracay  III.,  177  ;  Chronicon  Breve, 
517;  Sathas,  i.,  115;  iii.,  no,  113,  116,  126,  177,  179;  Jorga,  iv.,  547, 
554-5,  558,  Nto  'EWrivonvfinw,  ii.,  451-4,  461-6. 


PLETHON  AT  MlSTRA  379 

picturesque  Byzantine  capital  of  Mistr£.  Even  to-day,  when 
the  Mistr&  of  the  Palaiol6goi  is  a  deserted  town,  the  traveller, 
wandering  among  the  ruins  of  the  palace,  visiting  the  beautiful 
Byzantine  churches,  and  climbing  up  to  the  castle  hill,  may  form 
some  idea  of  the  civilisation  of  the  mediaeval  Sparta.  MistrA 
was  at  this  time  more  than  1 50  years  old ;  and,  as  the  Byzantine 
empire  had  shrunk  to  a  few  islands  and  a  small  tract  of  land 
near  Constantinople,  the  Greek  province  of  the  Peloponnese 
and  its  capital  had  assumed  an  importance  which  they  had 
not  before  possessed.  The  second  son  of  the  emperor  now 
regularly  resided  there,  and  already  there  lay  buried  at  MistrA 
the  ex-Emperor  John  Cantacuzene,  his  sons  Matthew  and 
Manuel,  and  the  Despot  Theodore  I.  To  this  beautiful  spot, 
within  sight  of  the  ancient  Sparta  but  in  a  far  finer  situation, 
Gemist6s  had  moved  from  the  Turkish  capital  of  Adrianople. 
If  we  may  assume  that  "the  philosopher  George,"  to  whom 
the  litterateur  Demetrios  Kyd6nes  addresses  three  or  four 
playful  letters,  is  none  other  than  he,  his  choice  of  abode  seems 
to  have  surprised  the  elegant  Byzantine  world,  which,  like 
modern  French  novelists,  could  conceive  of  no  life  as  worth 
living  except  that  of  the  metropolis.  "  You  thought,"  writes 
Kydones,  "  that  this  mere  shadow  of  the  Peloponnese  was  the 
Islands  of  the  Blessed  ;  to  your  wild  philhellenism  it  seemed 
as  if  the  soil  of  Sparta  were  enough  to  show  you  Lycurgus,  and 
that  you  would  be  his  companion." l  There  was  not  a  little 
truth  in  the  remark,  for  the  economic  schemes  of  Gemist6s 
were  better  fitted  for  Plato's  Republic  than  for  the 
Moreot  society  of  the  fifteenth  century.  But,  in  point  of 
culture,  Mistr&  could  have  compared  favourably  with  some 
modern  seats  of  learning.  No  less  famous  a  man  than 
Bessarion  came-from  distant  Trebizond  to  hear  this  disciple  of 
Plato  expound  the  master's  teaching,  while  in  Hieronymos 
Charitonomos,  whose  funeral  oration  over  P16thon  has  been 
preserved,  Mistr&  produced  one  of  the  earliest  teachers  of 
Greek  in  the  University  of  Paris.2 

1  Boissonade,  Anecdota  Nova,  303.  There  is  no  anachronism  in  the 
assumption,  for  Kyddnes  is  known  to  have  been  alive  as  late  as  1397, 
about  the  time  of  Gemistds's  removal  to  the  Morea.  The  plague  alluded 
to  in  the  letters  may  have  been  that  of  1399. 

2  Platina,  Paneg.  in  laudem  Bessarionis,  2. 


380       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHtAlA 

Gemistos  was  doubtless  emboldened  to  address  his  scheme 
for  the  regeneration  of  the  Peloponnese  to  the  emperor  by 
the  favourable  reception  accorded  to  a  previous  letter,  in 
which  he  had  urged  Manuel  to  pay  a  personal  visit  to  the 
peninsula,  if  he  cared  anything  for  its  safety.1  In  that  letter 
and  in  an  appeal  to  the  Despot  Theodore,  he  foreshadowed 
the  proposals  which  he  embodied  in  a  memorial  to  the 
patient  emperor,  handed  to  him  while  he  was  still  at  the 
isthmus.  He  began  by  proclaiming  the  Hellenism  of 
Greece,  and,  overlooking  the  existence  of  various  other 
races  in  the  Peloponnese,  he  pointed  to  the  speech  and 
education  of  the  people  as  proofs  of  their  Greek  origin.  But 
all  was  not  well  in  this  citadel  of  the  race,  which  neither  its 
strong  natural  defences  nor  the  Isthmian  wall  could  protect 
without  drastic  reforms.  According  to  the  philosopher  of 
Mistr&,  the  radical  defect  in  the  existing  system  of  military 
service  was  that  the  taxpayers  were  summoned  away  from 
their  agricultural  pursuits  to  bear  arms.  So  long  as  campaigns 
were  short  this  did  not  greatly  matter ;  but  the  continual  and 
lengthy  calls  upon  the  people  in  consequence  of  the  frequent 
domestic  wars  and  Turkish  invasions  had  made  them  less 
and  less  inclined  to  respond.  Hence  few  put  in  an  appear- 
ance when  war  was  proclaimed ;  and  even  those  few  were 
badly  armed  and  anxious  to  quit  the  camp  for  their  domestic 
duties.  As  a  consequence,  it  had  been  found  necessary  to 
hire  foreign  mercenaries  for  the  defence  of  the  country — a 
plan  which  increased  the  taxes,  corrupted  the  natives,  and 
was  quite  inadequate  in  an  emergency.  To  remedy  this, 
Gemist6s  suggested  that  justice  demanded  a  division  of  the 
products  of  the  country  into  three  equal  shares  between  the 
three  classes  of  producers,  capitalists,  and  officials,  the  last  of 
which  included  the  soldiers,  the  archons,  and  the  court  The 
first  class,  which  was  by  far  the  most  numerous,  would  keep 
one-third  of  what  it  produced,  would  pay  one-third  to  the 
capitalists,  and  one-third  in  the  form  of  a  tax  to  the  State  for 
the  maintenance  of  the  soldiers  and  officials.  A  peasant 
proprietor  who  owned  his  own  cattle  and  instruments  of  labour, 
would,  of  course,  retain  two-thirds  of  his  produce.     In  districts 

1  Wphi  rbv  BcurtMa,    aptid    M tiller    in   Sitsungsberichte    der    Wiener 
Akademie  (1852),  ix.,  400-2. 


PLETHON^S  PROPOSALS  381 

where  most  of  the  peasants  were  fit  for  military  service,  they 
should  be  grouped  in  pairs,  each  pair  having  property  and 
capital  in  common,  so  that  one  man  would  cultivate  the  soil 
while  the  other  was  performing  military  service,  and  vice  versd. 
The  official  class  should  be  excluded  from  trade  (as  was  the  case 
in  the  Venetian  colonies),  and  exempt  from  payment  of  taxes  in 
consideration  of  its  public  services.  The  peasants,  who  would 
thus  be  the  sole  taxpayers,  and  whom  Gemist6s  calls  in  truly 
Spartan  phraseology  "  Helots,"  should  no  longer  be  expected  to 
undertake  forced  labour  or  to  pay  a  number  of  small  taxes  at 
frequent  intervals  to  an  army  of  tax-collectors.  In  place  of 
those  irksome  imposts,  the  new  Lycurgus  advocated,  centuries 
before  Henry  George,  a  single  tax,  payable,  not  in  cash,  but 
in  kind,  and  amounting  to  one-third  of  all  crops  and  young 
animals.  The  "  Helots,"  no  longer  liable  to  military  service, 
would  thus  be  able  to  support  themselves  and  their  families, 
remunerate  the  capitalist,  and  also  provide  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  official,  non-producing  class.  Gemist6s  would  have 
assigned  one  "  Helot "  for  the  support  of  each  foot-soldier, 
and  two  for  that  of  each  horseman,  while  he  left  it  to  the 
discretion  of  the  sovereign  to  select  as  many  "  Helots"  as  he 
thought  adequate  for  that  of  the  officers  and  of  the  reigning 
house,  suggesting,  however,  three  for  the  former.  One  section 
of  the  unproductive  class — the  clergy — received  scant  favour 
from  this  unorthodox  philosopher,  who  drew  his  inspiration 
from  Plato  rather  than  from  the  Fathers  of  the  Church.  He 
was  willing  to  concede  three  "  Helots  "  apiece  to  the  bishops, 
as  state  officials,  but  to  the  monks,  "  who,  under  the  pretence 
of  philosophic  enquiry,  claim  the  largest  share  of  the  public 
revenues,"  he  refused  even  the  smallest  aid  from  the  funds  of 
the  State.  They  were,  he  said,  "a  swarm  of  drones,"  who 
deserved  no  other  privilege  than  that  of  enjoying  their 
possessions  free  of  taxation.  Or,  at  least,  let  them  hold 
public  offices  without  salary,  as  the  "  ransom  "  which  they 
paid  for  the  retention  of  their  property.  It  is  not  surprising 
that* this  attack  on  their  order  gained  for  Gemist6s  the  bitter 
hatred  of  the  clergy ;  even  after  his  death  they  refused  him 
burial  in  consecrated  ground,  and  it  is  not  at  Mistr&,  but  in 
the  cathedral  of  Rimini  that  we  must  seek  his  remains. 
Not  content  with  having  thus  excited  one  powerful  interest 


382       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

against  him,  the  dauntless  visionary  attacked  another — the 
landed  interest — by  boldly  proposing  the  nationalisation  of  the 
land — a  measure  which,  so  he  believed,  would  make  the 
Peloponnese  blossom  like  the  rose. 

By  these  reforms  Gemist6s  confidently  hoped  to  support 
in  the  least  irksome  manner  a  force  lof  some  6000  native 
soldiers.  But  his  reforming  zeal  was  not  confined  to  the 
question  of  national  defence.  A  strong  patriot,  he  wished  to 
erect  a  high  fiscal  barrier,  a  tariff  Hexamilion,  against  the 
foreigner.  A  land  such  as  ours,  he  told  his  distinguished 
correspondents,  is  essentially  agricultural ;  that  is  our  principal 
occupation ;  we  can  produce  in  the  Peloponnese  all  that  we 
want,  except  iron  and  arms,  and  we  should  be  much  better 
without  foreign  clothes,  seeing  that  the  peninsula  yields  wool, 
flax,  hemp,  and  cotton.  Why  then  import  wool  from  the 
Atlantic  Ocean,  and  have  it  woven  into  garments  beyond  the 
Ionian  Sea  ?  Accordingly,  he  advocated  a  high  export  duty 
of  fifty  per  cent,  on  the  fruits  of  the  earth  and  on  other  useful 
products  of  the  country,  unless  they  were  exchanged  for  iron 
or  arms,  in  which  case  they  should  be  exported  free  of  charge. 
Taxes  and  salaries  being  paid  in  kind,  and  the  export  of 
cotton  being  sufficient,  in  his  opinion,  to  pay  for  the  imports 
of  iron  and  arms,  Gemist6s  saw  no  further  need  for  money. 
The  Peloponnese  was,  at  this  time,  flooded  with  bad  foreign 
coins — for  the  Despots  of  Mistr&,  so  far  as  is  known,  never 
issued  any  currency  of  their  own,  though  Theodore  I.  pledged 
himself  in  1 394  not  to  imitate  the  Venetian  coinage,  while  he 
received  permission  to  copy  other  currencies,  which  looks  as 
if  he  had  contemplated  the  establishment  of  a  mint1  This 
evil  the  philosopher  accordingly  desired  to  remove.  Lastly, 
he  turned  his  attention  to  the  reform  of  the  penal  code. 
Capital  punishment,  formerly  usual,  had  fallen  into  abeyance ; 
while,  in  its  place,  the  judges  inflicted  the  barbarous  penalty 
of  amputation,  or  in  too  many  cases  let  the  criminals  off  scot- 
free.  Gemist6s  deplored  both  this  excessive  cruelty  and  this 
excessive  leniency;  he  thought  it  far  better  to  chain  the 
criminals  in  gangs  and  set  them  to  work  at  the  repair  of  the 
Isthmian  wall. 

1  Predelli,  Commemoriali\  III.,  223;  Schlumberger,  Numismatiquc> 
322. 


THE  SATIRE  OF  MAZARIS  383 

He  concluded  his  scheme  of  reforms,  by  modestly  offering 
his  own  services  to  carry  them  out.  The  offer  was  declined  ; 
the  Emperor  Manuel  was  a  practical  man,  who  knew  that  he 
was  living,  not  in  Plato's  republic,  but  in  the  dregs  of 
Lycurgus.1  The  philosopher  continued,  however,  to  enjoy 
the  favour  of  the  imperial  family.  When  the  Emperor  John  VI. 
visited  the  Morea  in  1428,  he  consulted  him  on  the  Union  of 
the  Eastern  and  Western  Churches,  and  confirmed  the  grant 
of  two  manors,  Phanarion  and  Vrysis,  made  to  Gemist6s  and 
his  two  sons  by  the  Despot  Theodore  II.  It  is  interesting  to 
note  that  one  of  the  conditions  was  the  payment  by  the  lord 
of  the  manor  of  thzfloriatikdn,  or  tax  for  the  maintenance  of 
the  Isthmian  wall.  Gemist6s  showed  his  gratitude  by  a 
florid  funeral  oration,  still  preserved,  over  the  Despot's  Italian 
wife,  Cleopa  Malatesta.2 

About  the  same  time  that  Gemist6s  drew  up  his  scheme  for 
the  regeneration  of  the  Morea,  a  Byzantine  satirist  composed, 
in  the  manner  of  Lucian's  Dialogues  of  the  Dead,  a  bitter 
pamphlet,  in  which  he  gives  us  his  impressions  of  the  Pelo- 
ponnese.  The  satire  may  be  overdrawn,  but  it  is  nearer 
to  life  than  the  idealism  of  the  Platonist.  In  place  of  the 
"  purely  hellenic  "  population  of  Gemist6s,  Mdzaris  tells  us  that 
there  are  in  the  peninsula  seven  races,  "Lacedaemonians, 
Italians,  Peloponnesians,  Slavonians,  Illyrians,  Egyptians, 
and  Jews,  and  among  them  are  not  a  few  half-castes."  These 
are  precisely  the  races  which  we  should  have  expected  to  find 
there.  The  '•  Lacedaemonians,"  as  Mdzaris  himself  explains, 
are  the  Tzdkones,  who  had  "become  barbarians"  in  their 
language,  of  which  he  gives  some  specimens.  The  "  Italians  " 
are  the  Franks  of  all  kinds — French,  Italians,  and  Navarrese  ; 
the  "  Peloponnesians  "  are  the  native  Greeks ;  the  "  Slavonians  " 
are  the  tribes  of  Ezerits  and  Melings  about  Taygetos;  the 
"  Illyrians "  are  the  Albanians  whom  Theodore  I.  had 
admitted  to  the  peninsula  ;  the  "  Egyptians  "  are  the  gypsies, 
whose  name,  like  that  of  the  Jews,  is  still  preserved  in   the 

1  IIf/>i  tQv  iv  neXoTovv^atf  rpay/xdrup.    A6y<H}  &  ical  /3',  apudMignt,  Patro- 
logia  Graca,  clx.,  821-64.     Cf.  Tozer  in  Journal  of  Hellenic  Studies,  vii., 

353. 

2  Miklosich    und   Muller,   iii.,    173-6 ;    Sgur6poulos,    Vera    Historia 
Unionise  §  6,  ch.  x. 


384       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

various  "  Gypht6kastra "  and  "  Ebrai6kastra "  of  Greece. 
Mdzaris  goes  on  to  make  the  shrewd  remark,  true  to-day  of 
all  Eastern  countries  where  the  Oriental  assumes  a  veneer  of 
Western  civilisation,  that  "each  race  imitates  the  worst 
features  of  the  others,"  the  Greeks  assimilating  the  turbulence 
of  the  Franks,  and  the  Franks  the  cunning  of  the  Greeks. 
So  insecure  were  life  and  property,  that  arms  were  worn 
night  and  day — a  practice  obsolete  in  the  time  of  Thucydides. 
Of  the  Moreot  archons  he  gives  much  the  same  account  as  the 
Emperor  Cantacuzene ;  they  are  "  men  who  ever  delight  in 
battles  and  disturbances,  who  are  for  ever  breathing  murder, 
who  are  full  of  deceit  and  craft,  barbarous  and  pig-headed, 
unstable  and  perjured,  faithless  to  both  emperor  and  Despots."1 
Such  men  were  not  likely  to  sink  their  private  differences 
and  rally  round  their  sovereign's  representative  in  a  firm  and 
united  stand  against  the  Turk. 

Manuel's  sojourn  in  the  Peloponnese  seems,  at  least,  to 
have  had  some  effect  in  reducing  to  order  and  civilising  the 
lawless  and  savage  population  of  Maina.  Like  the  Bavarian 
rulers  of  Greece  in  the  nineteenth  century,  the  Byzantine 
sovereign  destroyed  numbers  of  the  towers,  which  were  the 
refuge  of  the  wild  Mainate  chieftains.  It  was  he,  too,  as  two 
Greek  panegyrists  inform  us,  who  stamped  out  their  brutal 
but  very  ancient  custom,  mentioned  by  the  Greek  tragedians, 
of  cutting  off  their  enemies'  fingers  or  toes,  and  dipping  these 
ghastly  trophies  in  the  festive  bumper,  with  which  they 
drank  to  the  health  of  their  friends.  In  a  land  where  stones 
were  so  plentiful  and  imperial  officials  so  rare,  the  towers 
soon  rose  again,  but  this  grim  practice  (Mao-xaXtoTxo?,  as  it 
was  called  by  the  ancients)  is  never  mentioned  again.2 

After  the  departure  of  the  emperor,  the  Morea  enjoyed 
relative  repose,  broken  only  by  occasional  conflicts  between 
the  Greeks  and  Centurione,  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  in  the 
course  of  which  the  Venetian  colonies  suffered  from  the  un- 
controllable Albanians  of  the  Despot,  while  the  old  Frankish 
principality  steadily  dwindled  away  almost  to  nothing  before 

1  'Ertdwda  Mdfr/u  iv  "At&ov,  afiud  Boissonade,  Anecdota  Graca^  iii.,  164, 
168,  174,  177-8. 

8  Isidore  of  Monemvasia  and  Argyr6poulos  in  N^os  'EXAi^o^/tow.  ii., 
181-4. 


VENICE  OCCUPIES  NAVARINO  385 

the  Greek  attack.  The  imperial  family  continued  to  display 
a  strong  personal  interest  in  the  peninsula;  John,  the  heir 
and  associate  of  Manuel  II.,  spent  a  year  there,  during  which 
he  captured  Androusa,  the  capital  of  the  principality ;  and, 
when  he  returned  home,  his  youngest  brother,  Thomas,  was 
sent  there,  attended  by  the  historian  Phrantzfcs,  a  native  of 
Monemvasia,  who  was  destined  to  play  an  active  part  in  the 
last  act  of  Greek  freedom,  and  to  describe  the  events  of  his 
time  for  the  edification  of  posterity.  Nor  were  the  Greeks 
the  only  enemies  of  Centurione  ;  an  Italian  adventurer,  named 
Oliverio,  seized  the  important  port  of  Glarentza,  forced  the 
Prince  of  Achaia  to  bestow  it  upon  him  with  the  hand  of  his 
daughter,  and  then  sold  it  to  Carlo  Tocco,  who  had  long 
desired  that  foothold  in  the  Morea.  Feeling  his  position 
daily  more  insecure,  Centurione  tried  to  dispose  of  the 
principality.  He  first  offered  it  to  his  ancestral  city  of 
Genoa,  much  to  the  alarm  of  her  rival,  Venice,  and  then 
to  the  Knights  of  St  John,  who  declined,  owing  to  the 
Turkish  danger  in  Asia  Minor,  to  interfere  again  in 
its  administration;  he  was  even  quite  willing  to  make 
a  bargain  with  the  republic  of  St  Mark.  The  latter  was 
desirous  of  extending  her  possessions  in  the  peninsula, 
or  of  even  acquiring  the  whole  of  it,  not  from  ambitious 
motives,  as  she  truly  said,  but  from  fear  lest  it  should 
fall  into  the  hands  of  an  enemy  who  might  injure  her 
trade  and  colonies.  Indeed,  the  lack  of  settled  govern- 
ment, and  of  any  proper  police,  practically  ruined  her 
traffic  in  the  Malmsey  wine,  which  it  then  produced. 
In  1417  she  had  garrisoned  Navarino,  just  in  time 
to  prevent  its  occupation  by  the  Genoese ;  in  1423 
she  legalised  her  position  there  by  purchase,  and  she 
rounded  off  her  Messenian  colonies  by  the  acquisition 
of  several  other  important  castles.  These  greatly 
strengthened  her  position  in  the  south  of  Messenia; 
communication  by  land  between  Modon  and  Coron  was 
now  secured  by  the  fortress  of  Grisi,  which  was  of 
great  value  when  the  sea  was  beset  by  Turkish  ships. 
New  regulations  were  drawn  up  for  this  enlarged  strip 
of  Venetian  territory.  In  1439,  we  are  told,  it  included 
seven    castles,  three    of   which,  including    Navarino,    were 

2  B 


£ 


386       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

placed  under  the  jurisdiction  of  Modon,  and  the  other 
four  under  that  of  Coron;  in  each  of  these  seven  strong- 
holds a  Latin  governor,  chosen  from  among  the  Venetians 
of  the  two  colonial  capitals,  held  office  for  two  years, 
and  at  the  end  of  his  term,  a  councillor  of  the  colony 
went  and  heard  any  charges  which  the  people  might  have 
against  him. 

Not  satisfied  with  these  piecemeal  acquisitions,  the 
republic,  in  1422,  sent  a  commissioner  to  examine  thoroughly 
and  report  upon  the  defences,  the  revenues  and  expenditure 
of  the  Morea,  and  to  sound  the  Despot  Theodore,  the  Prince 
of  Achaia,  and  Carlo  Tocco,  with  a  view  to  obtaining  all,  or 
most,  of  the  Greek  Despotat ;  the  whole  of  the  principality 
of  Achaia,  either  at  once,  or  on  the  death  of  Centurione ;  and 
the  valuable  mart  of  Glarentza.  The  commissioner  presented 
a  thorough  and  satisfactory  report  to  his  Government ;  the 
Morea,  he  wrote,  yields  more  than  Crete  ;  it  comprises  more 
than  150  castles,  its  circumference  is  700  miles;  its  soil 
contains  deposits  of  gold,  silver,  and  lead,  and  it  exports  silk, 
honey,  wax,  grain,  poultry,  and  raisins.  It  is  curious  to 
compare  this  statement  with  that  of  Gemist6s.  The  philo- 
sopher had  made  no  mention  of  the  silk  industry,  which  still 
flourished,  while  the  commissioner  omitted  the  cotton,  which 
figured  so  largely  in  the  schemes  of  Ptethon,  and  to  which 
there  is  frequent  allusion  in  the  Venetian  documents.  The 
large  amount  of  merchandise  which  Nerio  Acciajuoli  had 
stored  at  Corinth,  the  great  value  of  the  Venetian  wares 
which  we  find  at  Patras,  and  the  existence  of  a  considerable 
Jewish  colony  there,  confirm  the  commercial  importance  of 
the  country.  Even  in  the  midst  of  war's  alarms,  a  wealthy 
Venetian  merchant,  settled  at  Patras,  had  customers  on  both 
sides  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  and  that  city  was  the  home  of 
several  well-to-do  families,  whose  standard  of  living  would 
have  incurred  the  censure  of  the  philosopher.  In  spite,  then, 
of  all  it  had  undergone,  the  constant  civil  wars,  the  Turkish 
depredations,  the  eight  plagues  of  the  last  two  generations, 
and  at  least  one  great  earthquake,  the  Peloponnese  would 
seem  to  have  been  well  worth  acquiring.  Had  Venice 
annexed  it,  she  might  perhaps  have  saved  it,  or  at  least  post- 
poned its  fall.     But  the  negotiations  came  to  nothing,  and 


THE  TURKS  INVADE  THE  MOREA  387 

the  republic  contented  herself  with  urging  united  action 
against  the  Turks.1 

The  warning  was  indeed  needed.  The  warlike  Murad  II. 
was  now  Sultan,  and  in  1423,  when  the  negotiations  were 
barely  over,  the  great  Turkish  commander,  Turakhan,  in- 
vaded the  Morea  with  an  army  of  25,000  men.  Accompanied 
by  the  sultan's  frightened  vassal,  Antonio  Acciajuoli  of 
Athens,  Turakhan  made  short  work  of  the  vaunted  Hexa- 
milion,  whose  defenders  fled  as  soon  as  they  saw  him  approach, 
and  marched  upon  Mistra,  Gardiki,  in  the  pass  of  Makryplagi, 
and  the  town  of  Leondari.  In  one  difficult  defile  the  Greeks 
fell  upon  him,  defeated  him  with  much  loss,  and  recovered 
most  of  the  rich  booty  which  he  had  taken.  But  this  check 
proved  to  be  only  temporary.  Tocco's  representatives  at 
Glarentza  purchased  their  own  safety  by  betraying  to  the 
Turks  the  pass  of  Kissamo,  which  exposed  the  Venetian 
colonies  to  attack.  A  string  of  1260  Venetian  subjects  and 
some  6000  Greeks  followed  the  homeward  march  of  the 
Turkish  commander.  But  the  Albanian  colonists  were 
resolved  that  he  should  not  leave  the  Morea  without  feeling 
the  weight  of  their  arms.  They  gathered  at  Davia,  near 
Tripolitza,  under  a  general  of  their  own  race,  and  prepared 
to  attack.  They  paid  dearly  for  their  daring,  many  were 
slain,  about  800  were  captured  and  massacred,  and  towers  of 
Albanian  skulls,  such  as  that  which  still  stands  near  Nish, 
marked  the  site  of  the  battle.  The  emperor  was  obliged  to 
purchase  peace  by  promising  that  the  Morea  should  pay  an 
annual  tribute  of  100,000  hyperperi,  and  that  the  walls  of  the 
Hexamilion  should  be  left  in  ruins.  Even  this  sharp  lesson 
did  not  teach  the  princelings  of  the  Morea  wisdom  ;  scarcely 
had  the  Turks  withdrawn,  than  Theodore  attacked  Centurione 
and  made  him  his  prisoner.2 

A  more  attractive  and  more  energetic  figure  now  appeared 

1  PhrantzSs,  109,  no,  138  ;  Chalkokonctyles,  241  ;  Sanudo,  in  op.  cit., 
xxii.,  916, 943  J  Sdthas,  i.,  52-60,  64, 65, 68-70, 74,  75, 92,  104,  106-8,  115-19  ; 
iii.,  185,  207,  449-5°;  Jor&a,  iv-»  5**2,  n.  3,  607,  615  ;  Gcrland,  171,  211- 
16  ;  Chronic  on  Breve,  518  ;  Journal  of  Hellen.  Studies,  xxvii.,  300-1. 

2  Chalkokondyles,  238-9;  Chronicon  Breve,  518;  Phrantzgs,  117; 
Sanudo,  in  op.  cit.,  xxii.,  970,  975,  978  ;  Buchon,  NouveUes  Recherches,  IT., 
i.,  272  ;  Sdthas,  iii.,  268  ;  Jorga,  v.,  136,  145. 


388       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

among  the  Greeks  of  the  Morea — that  of  the  man  who  was 
destined  to  die  on  the  walls  of  Constantinople,  the  last  Emperor 
Constantine.  The  Despot  Theodore  was  subject  to  fits 
of  depression  ;  he  did  not  get  on  with  his  Italian  wife ;  and 
then  the  intrigues  of  MistrS.  seemed  to  him  vanity,  and  the 
life  of  a  monk  preferable  to  that  of  a  ruler.  In  one  of  these 
moods,  he  announced  his  intention  of  entering  a  monastery, 
and  of  handing  over  the  government  to  his  active  brother, 
Constantine.  The  Emperor  John  VI.,  who  now  sat  on  the 
throne,  agreed  to  this  plan,  and,  in  1427,  set  out  for  the  Morea 
with  his  brother  Constantine  and  the  faithful  PhrantzSs,  in  order 
to  install  the  new  Despot.  But,  when  the  imperial  party  arrived, 
they  found  that  Theodore,  like  several  other  sovereigns  in 
love  with  the  charms  of  private  life  in  theory,  but  in  practice 
wedded  to  the  delights  of  power,  had  changed  his  mind.  The 
local  magnates,  he  told  them,  would  not  permit  the  abdication 
of  their  beloved  Despot  It  therefore  became  necessary  to 
provide  Constantine,  who  had  hitherto  been  content  with 
some  towns  on  the  Black  Sea,  with  an  appanage  somewhere 
else,  and  this  led  to  the  reconquest  of  the  Frankish  Morea. 

The  plan  of  campaign  was  skilfully  laid.  First,  an  attack 
was  made  upon  Glarentza  and  the  other  possessions  of  Carlo 
Tocco  in  the  peninsula.  Some  of  these  surrendered,  and  a 
politic  marriage  between  Constantine  and  Carlo's  niece 
Theodora  (daughter  of  Leonardo  of  Zante)  brought  him 
Glarentza  as  her  dowry.  The  historian  Phrantzfcs  took  over 
the  town  on  his  behalf,  and  Constantine  fixed  his  residence 
in  the  historic  castle  of  Chloumofitsi,  which  Geoffroy  II.  de 
Villehardouin  had  built  two  centuries  before.  Patras  was 
his  next  objective,  and  the  papacy  now  realised  too  late  its 
folly  in  compelling  the  Venetians  to  restore  it  to  the  much 
weaker  government  of  the  Church.  On  the  death  of  the 
late  archbishop,  Venice  had  in  vain  appealed  to  Martin  V. 
to  appoint  one  of  her  citizens  to  the  vacant  see;  but  the 
pope  thought  that  he  would  better  secure  the  town  against 
Greek  attacks  by  sending  as  archbishop,  Pandulph  Mala- 
testa  of  Pesaro,  whose  sister  Cleopa  was  wife  of  the  Despot 
Theodore.  But  this  connection  failed  to  save  the  place. 
The  first  attack  of  the  three  brothers  was,  indeed,  only 
partially    successful,    for    their    quarrels    prevented    united 


CONSTANTINE  AT  PATRAS  389 

action,  and  the  citizens  were  thus  able  to  purchase  a  brief 
respite  by  an  annual  tribute  of  500  pieces  of  gold  to  Con- 
stantine.  In  1429,  however,  Constantine  and  the  faithful 
Phrantzfts  made  a  second  attempt  to  obtain  possession  of 
Patras.  The  offer  of  some  of  the  local  priests  and  leading 
citizens  to  hand  over  the  town  was  considered  unpractical, 
so,  on  Palm  Sunday,  the  Greek  forces,  with  myrtle  boughs  in 
their  hands,  began  the  attack.  On  the  Saturday  before 
Easter,  a  sudden  sortie  was  made  from  the  Jews'  gate  ;  it 
was  repulsed,  but  as  Phrantzes  and  his  master  ventured  too 
near  the  walls,  Constantine's  horse  was  shot  under  him  by  a 
well-aimed  arrow.  The  future  emperor  fell  to  the  ground, 
and  would  have  been  killed  by  the  enemy,  had  it  not  been 
for  the  devotion  of  his  companion,  who  kept  them  at  bay 
until  Constantine  had  had  time  to  disentangle  himself 
from  his  charger  and  escape  on  foot.  Phrantzes  and  his 
favourite  steed  were  both  wounded,  and  the  historian  was 
taken  prisoner  and  chained  in  a  disused  granary,  where  for 
forty  days  he  had  ample  leisure  for  meditating,  amidst  ants, 
weevils,  and  mice,  on  the  rewards  of  loyalty.  When  his  name- 
day  arrived,  the  pious  Phrantz&s  prayed  to  his  patron  saint 
St  George  to  deliver  him  ;  his  prayer  was  heard,  his  chains 
were  removed,  and  he  was  able  to  correspond  with  Constantine. 
At  his  suggestion,  a  conference  was  held  between  the  besiegers 
and  the  besieged,  at  which  the  latter  consented,  on  condition 
that  Constantine  would  retire  to  Glarentza,  to  surrender  the 
town,  if  their  archbishop,  who  had  gone  to  seek  aid  of  the 
pope,  did  not  return  from  Italy  by  the  end  of  May.  Phrantzfcs 
was  released  more  dead  than  alive,  but  his  master's  expres- 
sions of  gratitude  and  a  present  of  fine  clothes  and  money 
consoled  him  for  his  forty  days'  imprisonment.  Constantine 
had,  however,  almost  immediate  occasion  to  demand  from 
him  a  further  proof  of  devotion.  Scarcely  had  he  reached 
Glarentza  than  he  received  a  haughty  message  from  the 
sultan,  forbidding  him  to  besiege  Patras,  as  it  paid  tribute 
to  the  Turks.  Constantine  was  a  man  of  action,  and  he  at 
once  resolved  to  take  the  town  first  and  then  make  diplomatic 
excuses  afterwards.  Accordingly,  as  soon  as  the  time  agreed 
upon  had  expired  and  there  was  no  sign  of  the  archbishop, 
he  returned  to  Patras,  and  there  in  the  church  of  its  patron 


fc 


390       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAlA 

saint,  St  Andrew,  received  the  keys  of  the  town.  His  entry 
was  a  veritable  holiday;  flowers  rained  on  him  from  the 
windows ;  it  was  roses,  roses  all  the  way,  when,  for  the  first 
time  for  225  years  a  Greek  conqueror  trod  the  streets  of  the 
archiepiscopal  city.  Only  the  old  feudal  castle  and  the 
archbishop's  palace  near  it  held  out,  in  the  hope  that 
Pandulph  would  return.  Next  day  the  citizens  swore  fealty 
to  the  Despot  in  the  church  of  St  Nicholas,  an  historic 
building  unhappily  destroyed  by  an  explosion  less  than  a 
century  ago ;  *  and,  at  their  request,  Phrantz&s,  their  late 
prisoner,  was  appointed  their  governor. 

Before,  however,  he  took  up  his  duties,  he  was  sent  to 
explain  away  as  best  he  could  to  the  sultan  the  annexation 
of  Patras.  At  Lepanto,  on  the  way,  he  fell  in  with  two 
Turkish  envoys  and  the  Archbishop  of  Patras,  who  had 
heard  of  the  loss  of  his  see,  and  had  put  in  with  one  of  the 
Catalan  galleys  furnished  him  by  the  pope,  at  the  Venetian 
station  on  the  north  coast  of  the  gulf.  Phrantzes  and  the 
archbishop  tried  hard  to  pump  one  another  without  success ; 
but  in  the  evening  the  artful  historian,  at  the  imminent  risk 
of  getting  drunk  himself,  as  he  sadly  confesses,  made  the 
Turks  intoxicated  and  then  opened  their  letters.  Arrived 
at  the  sultan's  court,  he  received  peremptory  orders  to  bid 
his  master  restore  Patras  to  its  rightful  lord  ;  but  Phrantzds 
knew  his  Turks;  he  made  friends  with  the  sultan's  Prime 
Minister,  pacified  Turakhan  on  his  way  back,  and  was  able 
to  assure  his  sovereign  that  the  Turks  would  not  molest  him. 
Pandulph  in  despair  offered  Patras  to  Venice ;  but,  as  it  was 
no  longer  his  to  offer,  the  cautious  republic  declined.  Still 
the  fine  old  castle  held  out,  till,  in  May  1430,  hunger  forced 
the  garrison  to  yield.  The  Catalan  galleys  of  the  pope 
proved  useless  to  Pandulph,  for,  though  they  captured 
Glarentza,  their  captain  at  once  sold  it  back  to  Constantine. 
The  latter  ordered  the  destruction  of  that  famous  town,  from 
fear  lest  it  should  be  occupied  again  by  an  enemy.  The 
churches  and  monasteries,  where  once  the  High  Court  of 
Achaia  had  met,  were  dismantled,  the  monks,  the  archons, 
and  the  poor  became  homeless  exiles,  and  from  the  ruin  of 
Glarentza  a  Greek  poet  traced  the  beginning  of  the  future 
1  Gerland,  117,  n.  1. 


END  OF  FRANKISH  ACHAIA  391 

emperor's  ill-fortune.  Meanwhile,  however,  the  goddess 
smiled  on  him.  The  last  Latin  Archbishop  of  Patras, 
baffled  in  his  hopes,  retired  to  his  native  Pesaro,  where  his 
remains  lie;  his  name  is,  however,  still  preserved  in  two 
inscriptions,  which  now  serve  as  doorposts  of  the  inner 
entrance  of  the  castle  which  his  men  had  so  manfully 
defended.  But  to  the  Greeks  the  capture  of  Patras  will  be 
ever  associated  with  the  name  of  the  last  Emperor  of 
Constantinople,  whose  exploits  in  the  Morea  well  deserved 
the  encomium  composed  by  a  Byzantine  rhetorician  of 
that  day.1 

Nearly  all  the  Peloponnese  was  now  in  the  hands  of  the 
three  brothers,  Theodore,  Constantine,  and  Thomas.  Besides 
Glarentza  and  Patras,  which  he  had  won  for  himself,  Con- 
stantine had  received  from  Theodore  the  old  barony  of 
Vostitza,  which  adjoined  that  of  Patras,  and  in  the  far  south 
of  the  peninsula,  on  the  west  of  Taygetos,  the  strong  castle 
of  Leuktron,  the  creation  of  the  last  Villehardouin  prince, 
together  with  a  large  strip  of  Maina.  Theodore  had  also 
transferred  to  him  the  administration  of  the  great  possessions 
of  the  Melissen6s  family  during  the  minority  of  the  present 
representative,  and  these  included  the  richest  part  of  Messenia, 
with  such  places  as  Androusa,  Kalamata,  Nesi,  Ithome,  and 
the  Lakonian  Mantineia,  the  ancient  Abia,  where  another 
brother,  Andr6nikos,  had  taken  up  his  abode  after  he  had 
sold  Salonika  to  the  Venetians.  Meanwhile,  Thomas  had 
not  been  idle.  He  had  obtained  Kalavryta  from  his  brother 
Theodore,  and  at  the  time  of  the  surrender  of  Patras  was 
besieging  Centurione  in  the  castle  of  Chalandritza.  In 
September  1429,  the  Prince  of  Achaia  was  reduced  to  make 
terms  with  his  assailant ;  he  gave  his  elder  daughter  Catarina 
in  marriage  to  Thomas  ;  and,  passing  over  his  bastard  son, 
conferred  upon  her  the  remains  of  the  Frankish  principality 
as  her  dowry,  reserving  for  himself  nothing  except  the  family 
barony  of  Kyparissia  and  the  title  of  prince.  The  wedding 
took  place  at  MistrA  in  January  1430,  and  Thomas  received 

1  Boeck,  Corpus  Inscriptionum  Gracarum,  No.  8776  ;  AeXrfw,  i.,  523  ; 
Phrantzes,  122-39,  144-58  ;  Qprivot  rrfi  KtovararrwovrdXeut,  1L  52-62  ;  Chalko- 
kondyles,  206,  239-42  ;  Sdthas,  i.,  160-2,  191  ;  Ckronicon  Ariminensey  apud 
Muratori,  xv.,  939  ;  Dokian6s  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  251. 


V 


392      THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

from  his  imperial  brother  the  title  of  Despot  Two  years 
later  the  last  Prince  of  Achaia  died,  when  Thomas,  fearing 
the  intrigues  of  his  widow,  kept  her  in  prison  for  the  rest  of 
her  life.  Centurione's  son,  Giovanni  Asan,  seems  to  have 
sought  refuge  in  Venetian  territory,  where  we  shall  find  him 
a  quarter  of  a  century  later.  At  the  same  time,  the 
Greeks  annexed  the  ancient  fiefs  of  the  Teutonic  Knights 
at  Mostenitsa;  and  to  complete  the  symmetry  of  the 
peninsula,  an  exchange  was  effected  between  Thomas 
and  Constantine,  the  former,  as  the  heir  of  Centurione, 
taking  Glarentza,  and  the  latter  Kalavryta.  Thus,  in 
1432,  after  the  lapse  of  two  hundred  and  twenty-seven 
years,  the  whole  peninsula  was  Greek,  save  where  the 
Venetian  flag  waved  over  the  colonies  of  Modon  and  Coron, 
with  their  seven  dependent  castles,  and  the  territory  of 
Nauplia  and  Argos.  Never  since  the  old  Byzantine  days 
had  there  been  such  uniformity. 

The  rule  of  the  Franks  in  Achaia  had  latterly  been  simply 
an  element  of  discord  ;  but  in  its  earliest  stage  it  had  wrought 
no  little  good  to  the  land  and  people.  A  fair-minded  modern 
Greek  historian  has  contended  that  his  countrymen  owe  the 
warlike  spirit,  which  they  showed  after  the  Turkish  Conquest 
down  to  the  time  when  they  at  last  regained  their  freedom, 
to  the  example  of  the  splendid  Frankish  chivalry,  which  had 
taught  Greek  fingers  to  war  and  Greek  hands  to  fight 
Certainly,  there  is  a  great  contrast  between  the  feeble 
resistance  offered  by  the  Peloponnesians  to  the  Franks  in  the 
thirteenth  century  and  their  constant  insurrections  against 
the  Turks.  Only,  we  must  not  forget  in  this  comparison  the 
fact  that  the  Albanians — that  nation  of  fighters — were  not 
represented  in  the  Morea  at  the  time  when  the  Franks 
arrived.  But  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  during  a  large 
portion  of  the  reigns  of  the  Villehardouin  princes,  the  penin- 
sula experienced  all  the  advantages  of  strong  and  vigorous 
personal  rule.  Trade  flourished,  the  alien  Church  was  kept 
in  its  place,  the  Greeks  had  at  least  as  much  liberty  as  their 
own  emperors  and  their  own  local  tyrants  had  allowed  them. 
We  may,  indeed,  distinguish  three  periods  in  the  history  of 
Frankish  Achaia.  The  golden  age  terminated  with  the 
cession    of   the    four    castles    in    1262,  which    led   to  the 


SUMMARY  OF  FRANKISH  RULE  393 

reintroduction  of  Byzantine  influence  and  the  consequent 
duel  between  Hellenism  and  the  Franks,  of  which  the  Morea 
was  the  theatre  for  the  next  one  hundred  and  seventy  years. 
The  second  period  lasted  down  to  the  year  131 1,  the  fatal  date 
of  the  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s,  which  profoundly  affected  the 
fortunes  of  all  Frankish  Greece.  During  this  half  century 
there  were  short  periods  of  peace  and  plenty,  as  in  the  reign 
of  Florent  of  Hainault,  but  the  country  had  become  depopu- 
lated by  the  long  wars  of  its  soldierly  Prince  William,  and 
after  his  death  without  a  male  heir,  the  Angevin  connection, 
with  its  evils  of  absenteeism  and  dynastic  intrigue,  sorely  tried 
this  fairest  portion  of  "  new  France."  The  barons,  always  the 
peers  of  the  prince,  aimed  at  being  the  masters  of  the  Angevin 
bailies,  and  would  tolerate  no  interference  with  their  right  to 
liberty,  which  was  often  merely  a  euphemism  for  liberty  to  riot. 
Meanwhile,  foreigners — Flemings,  Neapolitans,  and  Savoy- 
ards— ignorant  of  the  manners  and  language  of  the  country, 
took  the  place  of  the  old  French  families,  which  by  some 
inscrutable  law  of  population  had  become  extinct,  or  else 
survived  in  the  female  line  alone  after  two  or  three  genera- 
tions. During  the  third  period  these  evils  were  aggravated, 
and  others  were  added.  The  disputed  succession  to  the 
throne  more  than  once  afflicted  the  land  with  the  curse  of 
civil  war,  while  the  Byzantine  governor  first  ceased  to  be  a 
merely  annual  official,  and  then  became  an  important  member 
of  the  imperial  family.  MistrS.  waxed  as  Constantinople 
waned,  until  at  last,  two  centuries  too  late,  the  Morea  once 
again  became  a  Greek  state.  We  have  compared  the 
Frankish  Conquest  of  Achaia  with  the  Norman  Conquest  of 
England ;  but  the  similarity  unfortunately  ceased  with  the 
conquest  The  Morea  had  her  Wars  of  the  Roses  before  the 
two  races,  the  conquerors  and  the  conquered,  had  been 
thoroughly  amalgamated ;  she  lacked  the  long  line  of  able 
sovereigns,  and  above  all,  the  sturdy  burghers,  who  contributed 
so  much  to  the  stability  of  our  national  institutions,  while  in 
Greece  the  Roman  Church,  except  in  Corfii  and  the  Cyclades, 
remained  to  the  last  that  of  a  small  minority,  whereas  in 
England  it  was  that  of  the  people  even  before  the  conquest. 
Where  the  two  nationalities  were  united  in  marriage,  the  half- 
castes  who  were  the  offspring  of  these  unions,  usually  sided 


k 


394       THfe  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHA1A 

with  the  Greeks,  manned  the  imperial  ships,  fought  in  the 
imperial  armies,  and  held  office  in  the  imperial  administra- 
tion. Now  and  again  self-interest  led  a  Gasmule  to  identify 
himself  with  the  Franks ;  but  in  most  cases  the  legal  maxim 
held  good— partus  sequitur  matrent. 

For  us,  however,  after  the  lapse  of  nearly  five  centuries, 
the  brilliant  French  chivalry  of  Achaia  still  lingers  on  in 
many  a  ruined  keep,  in  many  a  mouldering  castle,  in  the 
Norman  arch  of  Andravida,  in  the  great  fortresses  of 
Karytaina  and  ChloumoOtsi,  in  the  splendid  isolation  of 
Passav<L  Elis  still  preserves  in  the  names  of  her  prosperous 
little  towns,  and  in  the  trappings  of  her  horses,  the  memory 
of  the  bright  days  when  gentle  knights  pricked  over  the 
plain  that  leads  to  Olympia  or  rested  for  shelter  from  the 
noon-day  sun  beneath  the  oaks  of  Manolada ;  when  many  a 
pleasaunce  studded  the  smiling  country  round  Vlisiri ;  when 
monks  from  far-off  Assisi  chanted  their  vespers  in  the 
Minorite  church  of  rich  Glarentza. 

At  the  same  time  when  the  Frankish  rule  in  Achaia 
ended,  the  Turks  made  further  conquests  in  Northern  Greece. 
In  1423,  Andr6nikos  Palaiol6gos,  who  governed  Salonika, 
afflicted  by  elephantiasis  and  harassed  by  the  Turks,  had 
sold  that  great  city,  the  second  of  the  empire,  to  Venice, 
which  was  also  anxious  to  accept  the  offer  of  the  Greek 
captain  of  Lamia  to  transfer  the  port  of  Stylida  and  the 
village  of  Avlaki,  half-way  between  Stylida  and  Lamia,  to 
the  strongest  of  the  Christian  powers  interested  in  the 
Levant,  as  the  best  means  of  saving  the  latter  place, 
temporarily  regained  from  the  sultan.1  The  republic 
thought  sufficiently  highly  of  her  new  purchase  to  bestow 
the  title  of  duke  upon  the  chief  official  whom  she  sent 
there,  and  to  pay  an  annual  tribute  for  it  to  Mur&d  II. 
But  her  occupation  of  Salonika  was  very  short  and  by 
no  means  beneficial  either  to  Venice  or  to  her  colony  in 
Euboea.  Lamia  and  its  territory  soon  fell  again  into 
Turkish  hands,  and  the  unhappy  Euboeans  complained  that 
they  were  more  harried  than  ever  by  those  invaders, 
who  carried   off  so  many  captives  that  the  island  was  in 

1  Sdthas,  i.,  140,  149  ;  iii.,  250,  where  "Zeffali  Zitoni"  is  a  corruption 
of  KC<pa\ii  7*rfTOVPlov. 


DfiATtt  0$  CARLO  TOCCO  395 

danger  of  becoming  depopulated.  This  so  greatly  alarmed 
the  Home  Government,  that  the  bailie  received  instructions  to 
inspect  and  repair,  by  means  of  the  forced  labour  of  the 
serfs,  all  the  fortresses  of  Euboea,  and  to  restrict  the  sale  of 
wine  to  those  strongholds  so  as  to  induce  people  to  inhabit 
them.  In  consideration  of  the  pressing  danger,  his  salary 
was  increased,  but  all  other  expenses  in  the  island  were 
reduced,  and  the  Duke  of  the  Archipelago  was  reminded 
that  it  had  always  been  the  custom  of  his  predecessors  to 
light  signal  fires,  warning  the  colonists  of  Euboea  when  a 
Turkish  fleet  was  approaching.  In  1430,  Salonika  fell  finally 
before  the  Ottoman  arms,  and  then  the  Venetians  of  Euboea 
feared  that  their  turn  would  come.  More  than  5000  of  the 
islanders  were  in  captivity,  and  stores  and  200  men  were 
sorely  needed  to  defend  the  eleven  castles  of  the  island. 
Venice  hastened  to  save  her  colony  by  concluding  peace 
with  Mur&d  II.1- 

On  the  opposite  side  of  Greece,  however,  the  Latins  were 
not  so  fortunate  as  to  escape.  In  1429,  Carlo  I.  Tocco  had 
ended  in  his  capital  of  Joannina  his  long  and  successful 
reign.  "  In  military  and  administrative  ability  he  was,"  as 
Chalkokondyles  says,  "  inferior  to  none  of  his  contemporaries," 
and  under  him  the  dynasty  of  the  palatine  Counts  of 
Cephalonia  had  reached  its  zenith.  Having  no  legitimate 
heirs,  he  left  the  island  of  Sta.  Mavra  and  the  strong  fort  of 
Vonitza  on  the  Ambrakian  Gulf  to  his  widow,  the  able  and 
masculine  Duchess  Francesca,  divided  Akarnania  among  his 
five  bastards,  and  bequeathed  the  rest  of  his  continental  and 
insular  dominions  to  his  nephew,  Carlo  II.  Such  an  arrange- 
ment was  sure  to  lead  to  civil  war;  the  Albanians  hated 
the  Italian  rule,  which  had  weighed  heavily  upon  them ;  the 
bastards,  after  the  fashion  of  this  degraded  period,  appealed 
with  their  approval  to  the  sultan,  and  Memnon,  the  ablest 
and  most  unscrupulous  of  the  five,  was  particularly  impor- 
tunate in  imploring  Murid  II.  to  restore  him  to  his  heritage. 
Carlo  II.  in  vain  invoked  the  good  offices  of  his  brother-in- 
law,  Constantine,  and  the  latter  despatched  his  handy  man, 
Phrantzds,  whose  decision  all  the  parties  swore  to  accept 

1  Sdthas,  in.,  306,  349,  372,  388-91  ;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diploma- 
farium,  ii.,  345. 


396       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAlA 

Phrantzes  met,  however,  with  his  usual  ill-fortune.  Off  the 
small  islands  near  Sta.  Mavra,  once  the  abode  of  the  Homeric 
Taphians,  "  lovers  of  the  oar,"  a  Catalan  galley,  in  the  pay  of 
the  Duchess  Francesca,  captured  the  historian  and  sold  him 
and  his  suite  at  Glarentza  for  a  ransom  such  as  no  archaeo- 
logist would  now  fetch.  Meanwhile,  the  fall  of  Salonika  had 
left  the  sultan  free  to  respond  to  the  bastard's  appeal.  Two 
previous  attempts  to  enter  Epiros  had  been  checked  by  the 
natives  in  the  difficult  passes  of  Pindos.  But  a  Turkish 
army  under  Sinan  Pasha  now  appeared  under  the  walls  of 
Joannina,  preceded  by  a  letter  from  the  sultan,  calling  upon 
the  inhabitants  to  surrender,  promising  not  to  deprive  them 
of  their  city,  and  bidding  them  decide  ere  it  was  too  late  for 
repentance.  Sinan  Pasha  reiterated  the  orders  and  promises 
of  his  master,  who  had  sent  him,  he  told  them,  "  to  take  the 
duke's  lands  and  castles,"  and  threatened  to  treat  any  place 
which  resisted  as  he  had  treated  Salonika.  "  The  Franks," 
he  pointed  out  to  the  Greeks  and  Albanians,  "are  merely 
seeking  to  ruin  you,  as  they  ruined  the  Thessalonians ; 
whereas  I  will  allow  the  metropolitan  to  have  all  his 
ecclesiastical  rights,  and  the  archons  to  keep  all  their  fiefs." 
These  arguments  convinced  the  inhabitants  that  further 
resistance  was  useless;  Carlo  II.  was  allowed  to  retain  the 
rest  of  Epiros,  Akarnania,  and  his  islands,  on  payment  of  an 
annual  tribute;  the  archons  purchased  the  continuance  of 
their  privileges  by  the  usual  capitation-tax.  On  9th  October 
1430,  Joannina  surrendered,  and  has  ever  since  belonged  to 
the  Turkish  Empire.  A  small  Turkish  colony  settled  there, 
and  soon  a  new  version  of  the  Rape  of  the  Sabine  women 
provided  them  with  Christian  wives.  Carlo  did  not  feel 
secure  against  the  invasion  of  his  reduced  dominions, 
especially  as  his  cousin,  Memnon,  continued  to  haunt  the 
sultan's  court  and  grovel  before  his  patron  "  like  a  respectful 
servant."  We  accordingly  find  him  asking  Venice  for 
protection,  as  otherwise  he  "  will  be  forced  to  come  to  some 
arrangement  with  the  Genoese,  the  Catalans,  or  the  Turks." 
A  similar  appeal  was  made  by  the  dowager  duchess,  from 
whose  island  the  Turks  carried  off  500  souls.  The  Venetians 
were  anxious  that  the  Ionian  islands,  which  carried  on  a 
large  trade  with  their  possessions,  should  not  be  lost ;  they 


PROSPERITY  OF  ATHENS  397 

therefore  urged  the  duchess  to  defend  her  own,  as  "so 
masculine  a  lady  "  well  could,  and  told  Carlo  that  they  would 
treat  him  as  a  Venetian  citizen,  and  elect  him  a  noble  of  the 
Grand  Council.  This  did  not,  however,  prevent  Memnon 
and  his  brother  Ercole  from  conspiring  with  his  continental 
subjects  against  him,  until  he  purchased  peace  by  allowing 
them  to  retain  what  they  had  occupied.  The  "  Despot,"  or 
"  Lord  of  Arta,"  as  he  styled  himself,  thenceforward  remained 
for  many  years  on  good  terms  with  both  them  and  the  sultaa1 
Meanwhile,  under  the  statesmanlike  rule  of  Antonio 
Acciajuoli,  the  duchy  of  Athens  had  been  spared  the 
vicissitudes  of  the  other  Latin  states  in  the  Levant.  While 
all  around  him  principalities  and  powers  were  shaken  to 
their  foundations ;  while  that  ancient  warden  of  the  northern 
march  of  Athens,  the  marquisate  of  Boudonitza,  was  swept 
away  for  ever;  while  Turkish  armies  invaded  the  Morea, 
and  annexed  the  Albanian  capital  to  the  sultan's  empire; 
while  the  principality  of  Achaia  disappeared  from  the  map 
in  the  throes  of  a  tardy  Greek  revival ;  the  statesmanlike 
ruler  of  Athens  skilfully  guided  the  policy  of  his  duchy.  At 
times  even  his  experienced  diplomacy  failed  to  avert  the 
horrors  of  a  Turkish  raid ;  we  saw  how  the  Turks  had 
ravaged  his  land  in  141 6,  how  Mohammed  I.  had  threatened 
to  chastise  him  for  injuring  some  Venetian  subjects,  how,  in 
1423,  Turakhan  had  forced  him,  as  a  vassal  of  the  sultan,  to 
join  in  the  invasion  of  the  Morea.  The  historian  Doukas 2 
even  represents  him  as  helping  the  Turks  against  Salonika. 
But,  as  a  rule,  the  dreaded  Mussulmans  spared  this  half- 
Oriental,  who  was  a  past-master  in  the  art  of  managing  the 
sultan's  ministers.  From  the  former  rulers  of  Athens,  the 
Catalans  and  the  Venetians,  he  had  nothing  to  fear.  Once, 
indeed,  he  received  news  that  Alfonso  V.  of  Aragon  and 
Sicily,  who  never  forgot  to  sign  himself  "  Duke  of  Athens 

1  Chalkokondyles,  236-8  ;  PhrantzSs,  154,  155,  157 ;  Spandugino  (ed. 
lSSl\  25"8;  Epirotica,  242-6,  254;  Jorga,  vi.,  75,  82;  Miklosich  und 
Muller,  L,  191  ;  Hi.,  282  ;  Slthas,  iii.,  416  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches^ 
II.,  i.,  350-2  ;  Brocquiere,   Voyage  doutrenur  in  Af /moires  de  Plnstitut, 

v.,  587. 

2  P.  197,  where  he  is  called  Inert**  9vP&*-  He  styles  himself  either 
"Duca"  (Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherchesy  II.,  i.,  273)  or  more  usually 

afiOtrrrii  'ABtjpQv  Qrjp&v  kclI  t&v  itfji  (ibid.,  289,  290,  296). 


398       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

and  Neopatras,"  had  invested  a  Catalan  named  Thomas 
Beraldo  with  the  Athenian  duchy,  and  intended  to  put  him 
in  possession  of  it  So  great  was  Antonio's  alarm  that  he 
asked  the  Venetian  Government  to  order  its  bailie  in 
Negroponte  to  protect  him.  But  Venice  reassured  him 
with  the  shrewd  remark  that  theiCatalans  usually  made  much 
ado  about  nothing,1  and  nothing  further  was  heard  about 
the  matter.  On  her  part  the  republic  was  friendly  to  the 
man  who  had  supplanted  her,  when  once  she  had  come  to 
an  understanding  with  him.  She  twice  gave  Antonio  per- 
mission, in  case  of  danger,  to  send  the  valuable  Acciajuoli 
stud — for,  like  his  father,  he  was  a  good  judge  of  horse-flesh 
— to  the  island  of  Euboea ;  and  she  ordered  her  bailie  to 
"  observe  the  ancient  commercial  treaties  between  the  duchy 
and  the  island,  which  he  would  find  in  writing  in  the 
chancery  of  Negroponte."  When  he  complained  that  a 
number  of  Albanian  families  had  emigrated  from  his  duchy 
to  Euboea,  they  were  sent  back  with  all  the  more  readiness 
because  they  were  useless.  At  his  request  the  Euboean 
peasants  were  at  last  allowed  to  cultivate  the  five-mile  territory 
which  the  Venetians  still  held  as  a  strategic  position  on  the 
mainland  opposite  the  island.  But  when  he  asked  permission 
to  construct  two  galleys,  he  received  a  flat  negative,  even 
though  he  offered  to  join  the  republic  against  the  Turks. 
Nor  was  he  more  fortunate  in  his  protest  against  the  arrange- 
ment by  which  Venice  secured  to  herself  the  future  possession 
of  jEgina.  That  classic  island  had  passed,  as  we  saw,  about  the 
end  of  the  fourteenth  century,  from  the  family  of  Fadrique  to 
that  of  Caopena.  But,  in  1425,  Alioto  Caopena,  at  that  time 
its  ruler,  placed  himself  under  the  protection  of  the  republic 
in  order  to  escape  the  danger  of  a  Turkish  raid.  The  island 
must  then  have  been  fruitful,  for  one  of  the  conditions  under 
which  Venice  accorded  him  her  protection  was  that  he  should 
supply  corn  for  her  colonies.  While  he  retained  his 
independence,  he  agreed  to  hoist  the  banner  of  the 
Evangelist,  whenever  desired,  and  it  was  stipulated  that, 
if  his  family  became  extinct,  -/Egina  should  become  Venetian. 
Against  this  treaty  Antonio  of  Athens,  one  of  whose  adopted 
daughters  had  married  the  future  lord  of  jEgina,  Antonello 

1  Jorge,  v.,  122. 


FLORENCE  AND  ATHENS  399 

Caopena,  in  vain  protested.  To  the  Florentine  Duke  of 
Athens,  jEgina,  as  a  Venetian  colony,  might  well  seem,  as 
it  had  seemed  to  Aristotle,  the  "  eyesore  of  the  Piraeus."  But 
a  quarter  of  a  century  later,  a  Venetian  colony  it  was.1 

With  another  Italian  commonwealth,  his  family's  old 
home  of  Florence,  Antonio  maintained  the  closest  relations. 
In  1422,  a  Florentine  ambassador  arrived  in  Athens  with 
instructions  to  confer  the  freedom  of  his  city  upon  the 
Athenian  ruler,  and  to  inform  him  that  Florence,  having 
now  become  a  maritime  power  (by  the  destruction  of  Pisa 
and  the  purchase  of  Leghorn),  intended  to  embark  in  the 
Levant  trade,  and  asked  from  him  as  favourable  treatment 
as  the  Venetians  and  Genoese  merchants  received  in  his 
dominions.  The  ambassador  was  directed  to  make  a  similar 
request  of  Carlo  I.  Tocco,  on  the  ground  that  his  mother, 
Maddalena  Buondelmonti,  was  a  Florentine.  Antonio  gladly 
made  all  Florentine  ships  free  of  his  harbours,  and  halved  the 
usual  customs  dues  in  favour  of  all  Florentine  merchants 
throughout  his  dominions.  Any  rights  which  he  might 
thereafter  grant  to  Venetians,  Catalans,  or  Genoese,  were 
to  be  theirs  also.2 

Visitors  from  Tuscany,  when  they  landed  at  Riva  d'Ostia 
on  the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  must,  indeed,  have  felt  themselves  in 
the  land  of  a  friendly  prince,  though  the  court  on  the 
Akropolis  presented  a  curious  mixture  of  the  Greek  and 
the  Florentine  elements.  Half  a  Greek  himself,  Antonio 
chose  both  his  wives  from  that  race — the  first  the  beautiful 
daughter  of  a  Greek  priest,  to  whom  he  had  lost  his  heart 
in  the  mazes  of  a  wedding-dance  at  Thebes,  and  whom, 
though  she  had  a  husband  already,  he  made  his  mistress,  and 
subsequently  his  wife;  the  second  was  Maria  Melissen6,  a 
daughter  of  the  great  Messenian  family,  who  brought  him 
Astros,  Leonidi,  and  other  places  in  Kynouria,  the  land  of 
the  Tzdkones,  as  her  dowry.  As  he  had  no  children,  he 
adopted  the  two  daughters  of  Protimo,  a  nobleman  of  Eubcea, 
whom   he  married  to   Niccol6  Giorgio,  the  titular  marquis 

1  S4thas,  i.,  178,  179;  iii.,  6,  225,  281,  287,  319,  420;  Chalkokondyles, 
215-16.  The  best  account  of  the  mediaeval  history  of  JEgina.  is  in  Baron 
Sardagna's  version  of  Hopfs  Karystos^  pp.  66-72. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  kecherches,  II.,  i.,  287-90. 


400       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

of  Boudonitza  and  baron  of  Karystos,  and  to  Antoncllo 
Caopena  of  iEgina.  The  latter  was  a  great  favourite  at  the 
Athenian  court,  as  he  was  useful  to  his  father-in-law.1  The 
succession  to  the  duchy  being  thus  open,  members  of  the 
Acciajuoli  clan,  sons  of  Antonio's  uncle  Donato,  whom  King 
Ladislaus  of  Naples  had  appointed  Nerio's  heir  in  1394,  and 
who  was  now  dead,  came  to  Athens  to  pay  their  respects  to 
their  prosperous  relative.  Of  these  cousins,  Franco  settled 
in  Greece  at  the  castle  of  Sykaminon,  near  Oropos,  which 
had  belonged  to  the  Knights  of  St  John,  and  acted  as 
Antonio's  ambassador  during  negotiations  with  Venice; 
Nerio  twice  visited  the  Athenian  court,  and  was  long  the 
guest  of  his  cousin,  the  Duchess  of  Leucadia ;  Antonio  was 
made  bishop  of  her  other  island  of  Cephalonia,  and  Giovanni 
archbishop  of  Thebes,  where  another  Acciajuoli  had  been  his 
predecessor.  Towards  the  close  of  Antonio's  long  reign  a 
second  generation  of  this  family  had  grown  up  to  manhood  in 
Greece.  Foremost  among  these  younger  cousins  were 
Franco's  sons,  Nerio  and  Antonio,  both  destined  to  be  dukes 
of  Athens  ;  their  sister,  Laudamia,  Lady  of  Sykaminon,  and 
her  husband,  a  member  of  the  great  Florentine  family  of 
Pitti ;  two  other  grandchildren  of  Donato,  Niccol6  Machiavelli 
and  Angelo  Acciajuoli,  both  spent  some  time  in  Greece, 
where  the  latter,  a  devoted  adherent  of  Cosimo  de'  Medici, 
was  banished  when  his  chief  was  exiled  by  Albizzi  from 
Florence.  A  branch  of  the  Medici,  as  we  saw,  was  already 
established  at  Athens.  Thus,  with  such  names  as  Acciajuoli, 
Medici,  Pitti,  and  Machiavelli  at  the  Athenian  court,  Attica 
had,  indeed,  become  a  Florentine  colony.2 

Antonio  and  his  Florentine  relatives  must  have  led  a 
merry  life  in  their  delectable  duchy.  In  the  family  corre- 
spondence we  find  allusions  to  hawking  and  partridge 
shooting,  and  the  ducal  stable  provided  good  mounts  for 
the  young  Italians,  who  scoured  the  plains  of  Attica  and 
Bceotia  in  quest  of  game.  The  cultured  Florentines  were 
delighted  with  Athens  and  the  Akropolis.  '•  You  have  never 
seen,"  wrote  Niccold  Machiavelli  to  one  of  his  cousins,  "a 

1  Chalkokonctyles,  loc.  cit. ;  Phrantzgs,  159. 

2  Buchon,  op.  city  269-86,  294 ;  Predelli,   Commemoriali,  iii.,  509 ; 
Mai,  SpiciUgium  Romanum,  L,  460;  Sstthas,  III.,  100. 


THE  ACCIAJUOLI  ON  THE  AKftOPOLlS      401 

fairer  land  nor  yet  a  fairer  fortress  than  this " — a  sentiment 
which  recalls  the  rhapsody  of  Pedro  IV.  over  the  castle  of 
Athens.  It  was  there,  in  the  venerable  Propylaea,  that 
Antonio  fixed  his  ducal  residence.  In  the  closing  years 
of  the  Catalan  rule  there  had  been,  as  we  saw,  a  palace 
and  an  adjoining  chapel  of  St  Bartholomew  on  the  Akropolis  ; 
but  under  both  the  Burgundians  and  the  Catalans,  Thebes  had 
been  the  usual  residence  of  the  head  of  the  state.  The 
Acciajuoli,  however,  made  Athens  their  capital  and  the 
Propylaea  their  home.  No  great  alterations  were  required 
to  convert  the  classic  work  of  Mnesikl£s  into  a  Florentine 
palace.  All  that  the  Acciajuoli  seem  to  have  done  was  to 
cut  the  two  vestibules  in  two,  so  as  to  make  four  rooms,  to 
fill  up  the  spaces  between  the  pillars  by  walls  (which  were 
seen  by  Dodwell,  Leake,  and  other  travellers  of  the  early 
part  of  the  last  century,  and  which  were  only  removed  in 
2835),  and  to  add  a  second  story,  of  which  the  joist-sockets 
are  still  visible,  to  both  that  building  and  to  the  Pinakoth6ke, 
which  either  then,  or  in  Turkish  times,  was  crowned  with 
battlements.1  It  has  been  conjectured  from  a  passage  in 
an  anonymous  account  of  the  antiquities  of  Athens,2  com- 
posed probably  in  1458,  that  the  ducal  chancery,  whence 
the  Acciajuoli  issued  their  Greek  documents,  was  in  this 
latter  edifice.  Here,  too,  was  the  chapel  of  St  Bartholomew, 
to  which  Pedro  TV.  alluded,  and  in  which  Nerio  I.  signed  a 
treaty  with  the  envoys  of  Amadeo  of  Savoy.  The  vaulted 
arches  of  this  chapel  and  the  central  column  which  supported 
them  were  still  to  be  seen  in  1837.  To  the  Florentine 
dukes,  too,  is  usually  ascribed  the  construction  of  the  square 
"  Frankish  tower,"  which  was  pulled  down  in  1874  by  an  act 
of  vandalism  unworthy  of  any  people  imbued  with  a  sense  of 
the  continuity  of  history.  This  tower,  85  feet  high,  28J 
feet  long  by  25  J  feet  broad,  and  sf  feet  thick  at  the  base, 
was   built  of  large  stones  from  the  quarries  of  Pentelikon 

1  Burnouf,  La  ville  et  PAcropole  dAttenes,  80.  Cf.  his  plan  of  the 
Akropolis  under  the  Franks,  pi.  vi. ;  Stuart  and  Revett,  Antiquities  of 
Athens,  II.,  ch.  v.,  pi.  I. 

2  TA  Star  pa  ko.1  SiSaffKoKgui  rGtv  'AdrjvQv,  apud  Laborde,  AtAenes  aux 
xv.y  xvi.y  et  xvii.  Sihlesy  i.,  20 ;  Wachsmuth,  Die  Stadt  Athen,  i.,  738. 
But  Professor  Lampros,  in  a  note  to  his  translation  of  Gregorovius 
("•>  359)  n'  2)»  thinks  that  KayiccXKapla  means  a  portico. 

2  C 


402       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

and  the  Piraeus,  all  taken  by  the  mediaeval  architects  from 
the  classical  buildings  of  the  Akropolis.  High  up,  on  the 
north  side  of  the  tower,  was  a  little  square  turret  projecting 
from  the  wall,  and  on  the  top  beacon-fires  could  be  kindled 
which  would  be  visible  from  Akrocorinth.  Placed  opposite 
the  graceful  temple  of  Nike  Apteros,  it  commanded  the 
sea-coast  and  the  plain  and  mountains  of  Attica,  save  where 
the  cathedral  of  Our  Lady  shut  out  a  part  of  Hymettos.  A 
wooden  staircase,  fastened  into  the  walls,  such  as  one  sees  in 
some  of  the  Venetian  catnpanili,  enabled  the  Florentine 
watchman  to  ascend  to  the  top,  and  sweep  land  and  sea 
for  Turkish  horsemen  or  rakish-looking  galleys.  Such 
towers  may  still  be  seen  near  Moulki  in  Boeotia  and  in 
the  island  of  Eubcea.  In  addition  to  these  erections  on  the 
Akropolis,  some  archaeologists  have  regarded  the  Acciajuoli 
as  the  authors  of  the  marble  steps  which  lead  up  to  the 
Propylaea,  more  usually  ascribed  to  the  Romans,1  and  others 
have  believed  that  it  was  they  who  first  surrounded  the 
famous  Klepsydra  with  bastions,  so  as  to  provide  the 
Akropolis  with  water;2  in  that  case,  Odysseus  was  merely 
following  their  example  when  he  fortified  the  well  in  1822. 

Nor  did  they  limit  their  activity  as  builders  to  the  castle 
rock  alone.  To  the  Florentine,  if  not  to  the  Burgundian 
period,  is  now  assigned  the  so-called  wall  of  Valerian,8  of 
which  the  remains  are  still  visible  in  an  Athenian  backyard, 
with  sheds  and  hutches  under  it  The  anonymous  writer 
above  mentioned  alhides  to  "the  splendid  abode  of  the 
polemarch  " — a  name  supposed  to  be  his  way  of  expressing 
the  title  of  the  Frankish  governor  of  the  town — in  the  Stoa 
of  Hadrian,  where  frescoes,  still  quite  fresh,  are  even  now 
visible.  The  same  author  says  that  the  dukes  possessed  a 
beautiful  villa  at  the  spring  of  Kallirrhoe,  where  they  used  to 
bathe,  and  that  close  by  they  were  wont  to  pray  in  a  church 

1  Burnouf,  75,  76,  85,  87  ;  Leake,  Topography  of  Athens^  i.,  73  ;  Finlay, 
iv.,  170  (who  thought  the  tower  earlier  than  the  Acciajuoli) ;  Buchon, 
La  Grke  Continentale>  67,  127  (who  considered  it  to  have  been  the  ducal 
prison). 

2  Pittakys,  LAncienne  Attenes,  155  ;  Curtius  in  Archdologischc 
Zeitung  for  1854,  p.  203. 

3  Wachsmuth,  1.,  724.  Both  Cyriacus  of  Ancona  and  the  anonymous 
visitor  of  1466  speak  of  the  "new  walls"  of  Athens. 


LITERATURE  AT  ATHENS  403 

which  had  in  pagan  times  been  "a  temple  of  Hera,"  or,  more 
correctly,  of  Triptolemos.  In  this  church,  called  St  Mary's 
on  the  Rock,  the  Marquis  de  Nointel  had  mass  recited  when 
he  visited  Athens  in  1674.  His  companion,  Cornelio  Magni, 
also  alludes  in  his  "  Description  of  Athens,"  to  a  church  on 
the  bridge  over  the  Ilissos,  then  "all  in  ruins  but  still 
displaying  the  traces  of  the  Acciajuoli  arms,"  while  he  found 
the  lion  rampant  of  Brescia,  the  emblem  of  the  ducal  family, 
which  visitors  to  the  famous  Certosa  know  so  well,  still 
guarding  —  auspicium  melioris  &vi — the  entrance  of  the 
Turkish  bazaar.1  A  few  years  later,  a  chapel  called  H agios 
FrAnkos  is  mentioned  by  the  Venetian  writer,  Coronelli,2  as 
"having  been  built  by  the  Acciajuoli";  on  the  other  hand, 
the  statement  of  the  Florentine  biographer,  Ubaldini,3  that 
Antonio  erected  the  lion  of  the  Piraeus,  which  gave  the  har- 
bour its  mediaeval  name  of  Porto  Leone,  is  incorrect,  for  we  saw 
that  it  was  already  so  called  a  century  earlier.  But  enough  has 
been  said  to  justify  both  his  remark  and  that  of  the  Athenian 
historian,  Chalkokond^les,  that  Antonio's  long  pacific  and 
economic  administration  enabled  him  to  beautify  the  city. 

Of  literary  culture  there  are  some  few  traces  in  Florentine 
Athens.  It  was  in  Antonio's  reign  that  Athens  gave  birth 
to  her  last  historian,  Laonikos  Chalkokond^les,  the  Herodotos 
of  mediaeval  Greece,  who  told  the  story  of  the  new  Persian 
invasion,  and  to  his  brother  Dem^trios,  who  did  so  much  to 
diffuse  Greek  learning  in  Italy.  Another  of  Antonio's 
subjects,  Ant6nios  the  Logothete,  is  known  to  scholars  as  a 
copyist  of  manuscripts  at  Siena ;  and  it  is  obvious  that  the 
two  Italian  courts  of  Athens  and  Joannina  were  regarded  as 
places  where  there  was  an  opening  for  professional  men, 
for  we  find  a  young  Italian  writing  from  Arezzo  to  Nerio,  in 
order  to  obtain,  through  the  latter's  influence  with  Carlo  I. 
Tocco  and  Antonio,  a  chair  of  jurisprudence,  logic,  natural  or 
moral  philosophy,  or  medicine,  at  either  of  their  courts — he 
did  not  mind  which.*     Even  a  Greekling  of  Juvenal's  time 

1  Laborde,  i.,  18,  19  ;  Stuart  (I.,  ch.  ii.,  pi.  1)  gives  a  picture  of  the 
llavcryia  arty  TUrpa,  which  was  destroyed  by  Hadji  Ali  in  1778  ;  Magni, 
RelasionC)  14,  49,  and  Viaggi^  466,  491  ;  it  is  marked  in  his  plan. 

2  Tavola,  36.  *  Originc  del  la  fatniglia  degli  Acciajuoli \  176. 

4  Montfaucon,  Palcrographia  Gracu^  76,  79,  94  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles 
Re  c  here  he  s i  II.,  i.,  276. 


404       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

could  have  scarcely  offered  to  teach  such  a  variety  of  subjects. 
Unfortunately,  we  are  not  told  whether  the  versatile  candi- 
date's modest  offer  was  accepted 

Thus,  for  a  long  period,  the  Athenian  duchy  enjoyed 
peace  and  prosperity,  broken  only  by  the  pestilence  which 
visited  it  in  1423,  driving  Antonio  to  seek  safety  at  Megara.1 
Yet,  if  we  may  judge  from  the  complaints  which  he  made 
about  the  emigration  of  a  few  hundred  Albanians  from  his 
dominions,  it  would  seem  that  the  land  had  become  depopu- 
lated, and  that  there  was  a  lack  of  men  to  till  the  soiL  A 
similar  phenomenon  is  observable  in  the  Greece  of  to-day, 
where  even  the  most  fertile  districts  are  being  rapidly 
denuded  of  their  male  inhabitants.  But  the  modern  Greeks 
have  not  the  twin  institutions  on  which  mediaeval  society 
rested — serfdom  and  slavery.  Both  continued  to  exist  under 
the  AcciajuolL  Antonio  granted,  and  his  successor  con- 
firmed, the  Frankish  privileges  to  a  Greek,  from  which  we 
learn  that  those  who  did  not  enjoy  the  franchise  were  still 
liable  to  furnish  baskets,  new  wine,  oil,  and  other  articles; 
while  the  Duchess  Francesca  of  Leucadia  made  a  present  of 
a  young  female  slave  to  her  cousin  Nerio,  with  full  power  to 
sell  or  dispose  of  her  as  he  pleased.  Yet  there  continued  to 
be  a  growth  of  Greek  influence  at  Athens,  as  was  natural 
under  a  dynasty  which  was  now  half  hellenised.  The  notary 
and  chancellor  of  the  city  continued  to  be  a  Greek  ;  the 
public  documents  were  drawn  up  in  the  Pinakoth£ke  in  that 
language ;  and  a  Greek  archon  was  now  destined  to  play  a 
leading  part  in  Athenian  politics.2 

When,  in  1435,  after  a  long  reign  of  thirty-two  years,  the 
longest  of  any  Athenian  ruler  till  the  time  of  King  George, 
Antonio  was  one  summer  morning  found  dead  in  his  bed, 
the  victim  of  an  apoplectic  stroke,  two  parties,  an  Italian  and 
a  Greek,  arose  to  dispute  the  succession.  The  Italian  candi- 
date, young  Nerio,  eldest  son  of  Franco  Acciajuoli,  baron  of 
Sykaminon,  whom  the  late  duke  had  adopted  as  his  heir, 
occupied  the  city.  But  the  Duchess  Maria  Melissen£  and 
her  kinsman,  Chalkokond^les,  father  of  the  historian  and  the 
leading  man  of  Athens,  held  the  castle.     Well  aware,  how- 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Reckerchcs^  II.,  i.,  272,  279,  280. 

2  lbid.y  285,  290,  296-7. 


THE  NATIONAL  PARTY  AT  ATHENS  405 

ever,  that  the  sultan  was  the  real  master  of  the  situation,  the 
Greek  archon  set  out  for  the  Turkish  court  with  a  large  sum 
of  money  to  obtain  Mur&d  II.'s  consent  to  this  act  of  usurpa- 
tion. The  sultan  scornfully  rejected  the  30,000  gold  pieces 
which  the  Athenian  archon  offered  him,  cast  him  into  prison, 
and  demanded  the  surrender  of  the  duchy,  at  the  same  time 
sending  an  army  under  the  redoubtable  Turakhan  to  occupy 
Thebea  Chalkokond^les  managed  to  escape  to  Con- 
stantinople, whence  he  took  ship  for  the  Morea ;  but  on  the 
way,  falling  in  with  some  vessels  belonging  to  the  Frankish 
party  at  Athens,  he  was  seized  and  sent  back  as  a  prisoner  to 
the  sultan,  who  pardoned  him.  This  futile  attempt  was  not, 
however,  the  only  effort  of  the  Greeks  to  make  themselves 
masters  of  Athens.  Even  before  the  death  of  the  duke, 
Constantine  Palaiol6gos  had  sent  his  trusty  emissary 
Phrantz£s  on  a  mission  to  the  Athenian  court,  and  the 
duchess  now  requested  him  to  return  with  a  large  force  of 
soldiers  and  a  formal  document  setting  out  the  agreement 
made  between  her  and  his  master.  This  arrangement  was, 
that  Constantine  should  take  the  duchy  of  Athens,  and  that 
she  should  receive  in  exchange  lands  in  Lakonia  near  her 
own  family  possessions.  This  diplomatic  scheme,  which 
would  have  united  nearly  all  Greece  under  the  Palaiol6goi, 
was  frustrated,  as  the  other  had  been.  Turakhan  had 
already  invested,  and  soon  took,  Thebes,  while  the  Frankish 
party  at  Athens,  which  included  the  other  leading  Greeks 
hostile  to  Chalkokond^les,  had  at  once  seized  the  opportunity 
of  his  absence  to  decoy  the  duchess  out  of  the  Akropolis,  and 
to  proclaim  Nerio.  Peace  was  secured  by  the  marriage  of 
the  new  duke  with  the  dowager  duchess,  and  by  the  banish- 
ment of  the  family  of  Chalkokond^les.  Venice,  which  might 
have  interposed  as  the  late  duke's  suzerain,  instructed  her 
bailie  at  Negroponte,  whither  many  Athenian  serfs  had  fled, 
not  to  interfere  with  the  occupation  of  Athens  by  either  of  the 
two  parties,  or  even  by  the  Turks.  At  the  same  time,  he  was 
to  suggest  diplomatically  to  Nerio  that  he  should  offer  to 
recognise  the  Venetian  suzerainty.1     The  only  interest  which 

1  Chalkokondyles,  320-2  ;  Phrantz6s,  158-60  ;  Sdthas,  i.,  199;  iii.,  427 
(which  proves,  by  the  phrase,  ex  matrimomo  secuto,  that  Maria  actually 
married  Nerio). 


406       THE  GREEK  RECONQUEST  OF  ACHAIA 

the  republic  had  in  endeavouring  to  recover  the  city  was  to 
prevent  its  falling  into  dangerous  hands.  As  for  the  Turks, 
although  Phrantzes  betook  himself  to  Turakhan's  head- 
quarters at  Thebes,  and  was  assured  that  the  Turkish  com- 
mander would  have  granted  his  request,  had  he  known  a 
little  earlier,  they  did  not  molest  the  new  duke.  The 
Turkish  policy  has  always  been  to  govern  by  dividing  the 
Christian  races  of  the  Near  East ;  and  the  Sultan  was  well 
content  to  allow  a  Florentine  princeling  to  retain  the 
phantom  of  power  so  long  as  he  paid  his  tribute  with 
regularity. 

The  weak  and  effeminate  Nerio  II.  was  exactly  suited  for 
the  part  of  a  Turkish  puppet.  But,  like  many  feeble  rulers, 
the  "  Lord  of  Athens  and  Thebes,"  as  he  officially  styled 
himself,  seems  to  have  made  himself  unpopular  by  his 
arrogance,  and  a  few  years  after  his  accession  he  was 
deprived  of  his  throne  by  an  intrigue  of  his  brother,  Antonio 
II.  He  then  retired  to  Florence,  the  home  of  his  family, 
where  he  had  property,  to  play  the  part  of  a  prince  in  exile, 
if  exile  it  could  be  called.  There  he  must  have  been  living 
at  the  time  of  the  famous  council,  an  echo  of  whose  decisions 
we  hear  in  distant  Athens,  where  a  Greek  priest,  of  rather 
more  learning  than  most  of  his  cloth,  wrote  to  the  oecu- 
menical patriarch  on  the  proper  form  of  public  prayer  for  the 
pope.  A  bailie — so  we  learn  from  one  of  his  letters l — was 
then  administering  the  duchy  pending  Nerio's  return,  for 
Antonio  had  died  in  1441,  his  infant  son,  Franco,  was  absent 
at  the  Turkish  court,  and  his  subjects  had  recalled  their 
former  lord  to  the  Akropolis,  preferring  the  rule  of  a  grown- 
up man,  however  feeble,  to  that  of  a  child,  who  was  enjoying 
so  dubious  an  education.  Presenting  his  Florentine  pro- 
perty to  Tommaso  Pitti,  his  man  of  business,  to  whom  he 
owed  money,  Nerio  returned  to  his  palace  on  the  Akropolis, 
where  we  shall  presently  find  him  entertaining  the  first 
archaeologist  who  had  visited  Athens  for  centuries. 

1  Chalkokond^les,  322;  Buchon,  Nowelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  298- 
302 ;  Ubaldini,  op.  cit.,  177  ;  Gaddi,  Elogiographus,  90-4  ;  and  Corol- 
larium  Poeticum,  33  ;  Nfo  'EMi^o^/aw*,  i.,  43*56- 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST  (144I-I460) 

The  Frankish  principality  of  Achaia  being  now  extinct,  it 
might  have  been  expected  that  common-sense  and  the 
common  danger  from  the  Turks  would  have  convinced  the 
Greeks  that  union  and  disinterested  endeavours  were  needed 
to  consolidate  and  defend  against  the  Turks  what  had  been 
so  slowly  and  laboriously  won  back  from  the  Latins.  But 
that  nota  inter  fratres  inimicitiay  which  Tacitus  had  remarked 
as  a  characteristic  of  human  nature  in  his  time,  was 
intensified  in  the  case  of  the  four  surviving  brothers  of  the 
Emperor  John  VI. — Theodore,  Constantine,  Thomas  and 
Dem£trios.  The  Peloponnese,  as  we  saw,  was  now  divided 
amongst  the  three  former,  while  the  fourth  had  not  yet 
obtained  an  appanage  in  the  peninsula.  Unhappily,  the 
prospect  of  the  imperial  succession  was  an  apple  of  discord 
among  them,  and  the  Byzantine  court  became  a  hot-bed  of 
fraternal  intrigues,  which  were  naturally  continued  in  the 
residences  of  the  three  Despots  in  the  Morea.  The  emperor, 
who  wished  Constantine  to  succeed  him,  was  desirous  of 
keeping  the  trio  in  Greece ;  while  Constantine  and  Thomas 
wanted  to  have  the  peninsula  to  themselves,  and  the  former 
did  not  hesitate  to  seek  the  consent  of  the  sultan  to  this 
scheme  through  the  mediation  of  the  ever-useful  Phrantzfts, 
his  unfailing  emissary  in  all  dubious,  or  diplomatic,  trans- 
actions. Civil  war  accordingly  broke  out  between  Theodore 
and  his  two  brothers,  which  it  required  all  the  efforts  of  two 
imperial  embassies  to  assuage.  It  was  agreed  that  Con- 
stantine should  go  to  live  in  Constantinople,  leaving  the 
Morea  to  Theodore  and  Thomas,  and  there  he  remained  as 
regent  for  the  emperor,  while  the  latter,  accompanied  by 

407 


408  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

Dem&rios  and  the  oecumenical  patriarch,  set  out  to  achieve 
the  union  of  the  Eastern  and  Western  churches  at  the  councils 
of  Ferrara  and  Florence.  On  his  journey  to  Italy,  the 
emperor  landed  at  Kenchreai,  traversed  Greece  on  horseback, 
preached  the  blessings  of  brotherly  love  to  the  two  Despots, 
and  ordered  the  philosopher  Gemist6s  to  accompany  him  to 
the  council.  Then  he  took  ship  at  the  Venetian  harbour  of 
Navarino.  The  insecurity  of  the  Greek  seas  at  that  period 
may  be  judged  from  the  fact  that  the  emperor  and  his  ship- 
load of  learned  theologians  ran  imminent  risk  of  being 
captured  by  a  Catalan  corsair  who  was  lurking  behind  the 
island  of  Gaidaronisi,  near  Sunium.1  Their  sufferings  and 
labour  were  in  vain ;  and  on  their  return  journey,  wherever 
they  stopped  in  Greece,  at  Corfu,  Modon,  and  Chalkis,  the 
Greek  clergy  indignantly  remonstrated  with  them  on  the 
concessions  which  they  had  made.  The  Greeks  of  Corfu, 
who  had  no  bishop  of  their  own,  bitterly  remarked  that  the 
Latin  archbishop  would  now  press  his  claim  to  ordain  their 
priests ;  those  of  Chalkis,  where  the  returning  theologians 
took  part  in  a  service  in  a  Catholic  church,  declared  that 
henceforth  they  could  no  longer  exclude  the  Latin  clergy 
from  performing  mass  in  the  Greek  churches. 

During  the  six  years  between  1437  and  1443,  during 
which  Constantine  was  mainly  absent  at  Constantinople, 
the  Morea  enjoyed  the  blessing  of  having  practically  no 
history.  We  find  Thomas  administering  justice  and  confirm- 
ing sales  of  property  at  Patras,  and  Theodore  ratifying  the 
ancient  privileges  of  the  inhabitants  of  Monemvasia.  All  the 
Despot's  subjects,  whether  freemen  or  serfs,  were  permitted  to 
enter  or  leave  that  important  city  without  let  or  hindrance, 
except  only  the  dangerous  denizens  of  Tzakonia  and  Vatika, 
whose  character  had  not  altered  in  two  hundred  years.  The 
citizens,  their  beasts,  and  their  ships,  were  exempt  from 
forced  labour ;  and,  at  their  special  request,  the  Despot  con- 
firmed the  local  custom,  by  which  all  the  property  of  a 
Monemvasiote  who  died  without  relatives  was  devoted  to  the 
repair  of  the  castle ;  while,  if  he  had  only  distant  relatives, 
one-third  of  his  estate  was  reserved  for  that  purpose.     This 

1  Phrantzgs,  161 -3 ;  Doukas,  214 ;  Jorga,  vi.,  389,  393  ;  Sgur6poulos, 
Vera  Historic*  Umonis}  §  4,  chs,  iv.,  vi, ;  §  n,  chs,  vi.-viii. 


STATE  OF  THE  MOREA  409 

system  of  death-duties  (to  afiictrriKiov,  as  it  was  called)  was 
continued  by  Theodore's  successor,  Dem&rios,  by  whom 
Monemvasia  was  described  as  "  one  of  the  most  useful  cities 
under  my  rule."  The  prosperity  of  Patras,  on  the  other 
hand,  must  have  suffered  by  the  transference  of  the  Venetian 
trade  to  Lepanto,  previously  only  a  cattle-market,  which,  in 
consequence,  began  to  pay  its  expenses.1  To  the-  eye, 
however,  of  a  literary  observer,  the  Humanist,  Francescus 
Philelphus,2  there  was  "  nothing  in  the  Peloponnese  worthy 
of  praise  except  George  Gemist6s,"  or  Pl£thon,  as  he  now 
called  himself,  who  had  returned  from  Florence,  and  was 
holding  a  judicial  post  at  Mistr&.  "  The  Palaiol6goi  princes 
themselves,"  added  the  critic,  "  are  oppressed  by  poverty,  and 
even  their  own  subjects  ridicule  and  plunder  them.  The 
language  is  depraved,  the  customs  are  more  barbarous  than 
the  barbarians."  Yet  it  is  to  these  barbarians  that  we  owe 
those  beautiful  Byzantine  churches,  the  Pantanassa  and  the 
Peribleptos,  at  MistrA. 

In  1443  a  fresh  distribution  of  the  Moreot  Governments 
took  place.  In  view  of  the  succession  to  the  throne  of  all  the 
Caesars,  both  Constantine  and  Theodore  were  anxious  to 
obtain  the  city  of  Selymbria,  on  the  Sea  of  Marmara,  which 
was  close  to  the  capital.  Finally,  an  arrangement  was  made 
by  which  Theodore  received  Selymbria,  where  he  died  of  the 
plague  five  years  later,  and  ceded  his  province  in  the  Morea 
to  Constantine.  An  inscription  in  the  chapel  of  Our  Lady 
of  Brontochion,  at  Mistr&,  still  commemorates  Theodore's 
temporary  aspirations  for  the  peace  of  the  cloister,  and  a 
feeble  monody  has  been  preserved  in  remembrance  of  this 
feeble  ruler.8 

Thus,  Constantine  now  held  the  larger  portion  of  the 
peninsula,  including  Patras,  Corinth,  and  Mistr&,  in  each  of 
which  he  was  represented  by  a  governor,  in  the  case  of 
Mistral  the  faithful  Phrantzes,  whose  jurisdiction  included  not 
only  the  capital,  but  the  village  of  Jewish  Trype,  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Langada  Gorge,  Sklavochorio  (the  ancient  Amyklai), 
and  several  other  villages  in  the  neighbourhood     PhrantzGs 

1  Miklosich  und   Muller,  iii.,  258 ;    v.,   170-4  :  Gerland,   218,  222  ; 
S4thas,  iii.,  413,  458. 

J  Epistola,  bk.  v.,  fol.  lvii,  3  Bys.  Zeitschrifr  ix.,  641. 


410  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

received  on  his  appointment  strict  injunctions  to  abolish  a 
number  of  offices  and  to  establish  one-man  rule  at  Mistr£,  while 
a  single  minister  in  attendance  (called  kclOoXikos  /meo-afar)  was 
attached  to  the  person  of  the  sovereign  wherever  he  went.    Con- 
stantine's  first  act  after  his  arrival  was  to  rebuild  the  Isthmian 
wall,  which  Turakhan  had  destroyed  a  second  time  during 
a  raid  into  the  Peloponnese  in  143 1 ;  the  next  was  to  renew, 
this  time  by  force  of  arms,  the  attempt  which  he  had  made  by 
diplomacy  nine  years  before,  to  recover  the  Athenian  duchy 
for  himself  and  the  cause  of  Hellenism,  which  he  personified. 
The  moment  seemed  singularly  favourable,  for  a  weak  man 
held  sway  at  Athens,  and  the  Turks,  hard  pressed  by  the 
Hungarians    and    Poles,    whom    Pope    Eugenius   IV.    had 
marshalled  against  them,  defied  by  Skanderbeg  in  Albania, 
defeated   by  John   Hunyady  at   Nish,    threatened    by   the 
appearance  of  a  Venetian  fleet  in  the  iEgean,  were  unable  to 
protect   their   Athenian   vassal.      He,    therefore,    cheerfully 
responded  to  the  appeal  of  the  papal  envoys,  marched  into 
Bceotia  early  in  1444,  occupied  Thebes,  ravaged  the  country 
to  the  gates   of  Livadia   and  as  far  north  as  Lamia  and 
Agrapha,  and  compelled  Nerio  II.  to  pledge  himself  to  pay 
tribute.     The  Wallachs  of  Pindos  now  descended  upon  the 
Turks  of  the  great  Thessalian  plain,  and  received  from  the 
victorious    Constantine     a    governor    whose    seat    was     at 
Phanari ;  one  of  the  Albanian  clans  in  Phthiotis,  to  which 
the    sultan    had    granted   autonomy,   joined   his  standard ; 
300    Burgundian    auxiliaries    arrived    to    swell    his   forces, 
and  he  was  so  flushed  with  success  that  he  did  not  scruple  to 
arouse  the  wrath  of  Venice  by  seizing  the  port  of  Vitrinitza, 
on  the  Gulf  of  Corinth,  which  had  been  ceded  by  the  Turks 
to  the  governor  of  Lepanto.     Thus,  for  a  moment,  almost  all 
the   Morea  and    the    greater    part    of   continental   Greece 
acknowledged  the  sway  or  the  suzerainty  of  a  Greek  prince. 
Never,  since  the  time  of  the  Frankish  Conquest,  had  the 
Hellenic  cause  been   so  successful     The  news  spread   to 
Italy ;    Cardinal  Bessarion   hastened   to  congratulate  Con- 
stantine on  the  fortification  of  the  isthmus,  and  urged  him  to 
transfer  his  capital  from  MistrA  to  Corinth.     At  the  same 
time,  he  bade  him  become  the  Lycurgus  of  the  new  Sparta — 
lightening   taxation,  checking  extravagance    in    dress  and 


ALFONSO  V.  CLAIMS  ATHENS  411 

servants  by  strict  sumptuary  laws,  preventing  the  export  of 
corn,  building  a  navy  from  the  wood  of  the  Peloponnesian 
forests,  and  searching  for  iron  in  the  folds  of  Taygetos.  Above 
all,  the  cardinal  advised  him  to  send  a  few  young  Spartans  to 
learn  letters  and  arts  in  Italy  and  so  qualify  as  literary  and 
technical  instructors  of  their  fellow-countrymen.  While  the 
patriot  churchman  dreamed  of  a  revival  of  ancient  Hellas  by 
the  genius  of  Constantine,  the  court  of  Naples  heard  that  he 
had  actually  occupied  Athens ;  and  Alfonso  V.  of  Aragon, 
who  had  never  forgotten  that  he  was  still  titular  duke  of 
Athens  and  Neopatras,  wrote  at  once  demanding  the 
restitution  of  the  two  duchies  to  himself,  and  sent  the 
Marquis  of  Gerace  to  receive  them  from  the  conqueror's 
hands.  But,  before  the  letter  was  despatched,  the  fate  of 
Greece  had  been  decided  on  the  shores  of  the  Black  Sea. 
The  perjury  of  the  Christians,  who  had  broken  their  solemn 
oaths  to  keep  peace  with  the  sultan,  had  been  punished  by 
their  crushing  defeat  at  Varna  in  November  1444.  Venice 
made  peace  to  save  her  colonies ;  the  rest  of  Greece  lay  at 
the  mercy  of  the  victor.1 

Nerio  II.  was  the  first  sufferer  for  his  compulsory  alliance 
with  the  Greek  Despot  Omar,  the  son  of  Turakhan, 
governor  of  Thessaly,  ravaged  Boeotia  and  Attica,  as  a 
punishment  for  his  weakness.  Nerio  now  saw  that  his  only 
hope  lay  in  obsequiousness  to  the  Turks,  whose  star  was 
again  in  the  ascendant,  and  sent  an  envoy  to  the  sultan, 
expressing  his  willingness  to  pay  the  same  tribute  as  before. 
On  these  conditions  he  purchased  safety  from  the  Turks,  but 
at  the  same  time  called  down  upon  himself  the  vengeance  of 
Constantine,  who  marched  against  Athens,  and  endeavoured 
to  take  it  Nerio  now  called  upon  the  sultan  to  protect  him ; 
his  appeal  was  supported  by  Turakhan,  whose  Thessalian 
province  had  suffered  from  Constantine's  recent  successes ; 
and  Mur&d,  true  to  the  traditional  Turkish  policy  of  support- 

1  Chalkokondyles,  283,  305,  306,  318,  319  (where  for  Qartplou  I  read 
Qapaplov);  Phrantzes,  157, 193-6,200-1;  Chromcon Breve%  518,  5i9;Do6kas, 
223  ;  Magno  apud  Hopfi  Chroniques^  195  ;  Sathas,  i.,  208  ;  Jorga,  viii.,  6  ; 
Alfonso  V.'s  letter  in  ArckMo  Storico  per  le  Prov.  Napoletane^  xxvii., 
430-1  ;  Cyriacus  of  Ancona  in  Fabricius,  Biblioteca  Latina  media  et 
infimcc  /Etatis,  vi.,  addenda,  p.  12  ;  N6» 'EKKipopriipWi  III.,  15-27  ;  iv.,  23. 


\ 


412  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

ing  the  weaker  of  two  rival  Christian  nationalities,  accord- 
ingly sent  an  ultimatum  to  Constantine,  demanding  the 
evacuation  of  the  Turkish  territory  which  he  had  occupied. 
As  Constantine  refused,  the  sultan  resolved  to  chastise  the 
bold  Greek  who  dared  to  disobey  him. 

In  1446  all  Mur&d's  preparations  were  made,  and  he  set 
out  from  Macedonia  to  invade  Greece,  with  a  commissariat 
so  splendidly  organised  as  to  call  forth  the  enthusiastic 
praise  of  the  Athenian  historian.  North  of  the  isthmus  he 
met  with  no  opposition,  for  Constantine,  with  his  brother 
Thomas  and  the  whole  force  of  the  Peloponnese,  amounting 
to  60,000  men,  had  retired  behind  the  newly  restored 
walls  of  the  Hexamilion.  At  Thebes  an  Athenian  con- 
tingent joined  the  sultan  under  Nerio,  who  had  thus  the 
petty  satisfaction  of  assisting  his  present  against  his  late 
master.  After  encamping  for  a  few  days  at  a  place  called 
Mingiai  to  prepare  his  cannon  and  fascines,  Mur£d  drew  up 
his  forces  in  front  of  the  Isthmian  wall.  A  spy,  who  was 
despatched  from  the  Greek  headquarters,  came  back  with  an 
alarming  report  of  the  strength  of  the  Turkish  army,  which 
stretched  from  sea  to  sea,  and  implored  the  Despot  to  send 
an  embassy  to  the  sultan  with  all  speed,  and  so  avert,  if 
possible,  the  evils  which  his  rashness  had  brought  upon  the 
Peloponnese.  Constantine  ordered  the  spy  to  be  thrown 
into  prison  for  his  frankness,  and  rejected  his  advice.  He 
had,  indeed,  sent  Chalkokond^les,  father  of  the  historian, 
as  an  envoy  to  the  sultan,  but  his  instructions  were  to  claim 
the  isthmus  and  the  Turkish  possessions  recently  captured  in 
continental  Greece — a  claim  which,  as  the  historian  admits, 
was  excessive,  and  so  irritated  Mur&d  that  he  threw  the 
ambassador  into  prison.  When,  however,  the  sultan  came 
to  examine  the  imposing  walls  of  the  Hexamilion,  he 
remonstrated  with  old  Turakhan  for  having  advised  him  to 
attack  such  apparently  impregnable  lines  so  late  in  the  season 
— for  it  was  now  27th  November.  But  the  veteran,  who  knew 
his  Greeks  and  had  already  twice  taken  the  Isthmian  wall, 
maintained  that  its  defenders  would  not  resist  an  attack,  but 
would  flee  at  the  news  of  his  arrival  at  the  isthmus.  In  this 
expectation  the  sultan  waited  several  days  before  ordering 
the  attack  ;  but,  as  Constantine  showed  no  sign  of  surrender, 


MURAD  II.  STORMS  THE  ISTHMIAN  WALL    413 

he  ordered  his  cannon  to  open  fire  on  the  wall.  On  the 
evening  of  the  fourth  day,  the  fires  in  front  of  the  Turkish 
tents,  and  the  strains  of  the  martial  hymns  which  rose  from 
the  Turkish  camp,  warned  the  Greeks  that,  according  to  their 
custom,  the  besiegers  would  begin  the  assault  on  the  next 
day  but  one.  On  the  following  evening  the  sutlers  dragged 
the  siege  engines  into  position,  and  at  dawn  next  day,  ioth 
December,  the  band  sounded  the  signal  for  the  attack. 
While  some  endeavoured  to  undermine  the  wall,  and  others 
placed  scaling  ladders  against  it,  the  Turkish  artillery 
prevented  the  defenders  from  exposing  themselves  over  the 
battlements.  The  honours  of  the  day  rested  with  a  young 
Servian  janissary,  who  was  the  first  to  scale  the  wall  right  in 
the  centre  under  the  eyes  of  the  sultan — a  sad  but  characteristic 
example  of  the  manner  in  which  the  Turks  in  all  ages  have 
used  the  Slavs  against  the  Greeks  and  the  Greeks  against 
the  Slavs.  Others  followed  him,  the  Greeks  were  driven 
down  from  that  point  of  the  battlements,  a  panic  seized  them, 
and  they  fled  in  disorder,  followed  by  the  troops  near  them. 
The  two  Despots  in  vain  endeavoured  to  rally  their  panic- 
stricken  men ;  then,  finding  their  efforts  useless,  and  suspect- 
ing the  Albanians  of  treachery,  they  fled  also;  while  the 
Turkish  soldiers  poured  over  the  fatal  battlement,  through  a 
breach  in  the  wall,  and  finally  through  the  gates.  Some  fell 
upon  the  ample  plunder  which  they  found  in  the  Greek  camp, 
others  slew  or  captured  the  fleeing  Greeks;  the  whole 
isthmus,  laments  a  Greek  poet,  was  strewn  "  with  gold-winged 
arrows,  jewelled  swords,  and  the  heads  and  hands  and  bodies 
of  men."  The  sultan  stained  his  laurels  by  two  hideous  acts 
of  cruelty.  Three  hundred  Greeks,  who  had  fled  to  Mount 
Oneion,  above  Kenchreai,  he  induced  to  surrender,  and  then 
butchered  in  cold  blood ;  six  hundred  of  his  soldiers'  captives 
he  purchased,  in  order  to  sacrifice  them  as  an  acceptable 
offering  to  the  Manes  of  his  father. 

The  two  Despots  retreated  into  the  far  south  of  the 
peninsula,  for  they  knew  that  the  citadel  of  Akrocorinth  had 
neither  provisions  nor  munitions  sufficient  to  resist  a  long 
siege;  they  had  staked  and  lost  their  all  at  the  isthmus, 
and  they  had  to  face  a  revolt  headed  by  a  Greek  arclion,  who 
proclaimed    Centurione's    bastard   son,  Giovanni    Asan,   as 


414  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

legitimate  Prince  of  Achaia.  If  hard  pressed  by  the  Turks, 
they  were  resolved  to  quit  the  country.  Meanwhile,  leaving  old 
Turakhan,  who  knew  the  Peloponnese  well,  to  pursue  them, 
the  sultan  marched  along  the  south  shore  of  the  Corinthian 
Gulf  with  such  rapidity  that,  on  the  same  day  on  which  he 
captured  the  isthmus,  he  surprised  Basilicata,  the  ancient 
Sikyon,  whose  entire  male  population  had  gone  to  defend 
the  Hexamilion,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  who  had  taken 
refuge  with  the  women  and  children  in  the  Akropolis.  This 
small  garrison  soon  surrendered ;  the  sultan  set  fire  to  the 
town,  and  then  continued  his  march  to  the  wealthy  city  of 
Vostitza,  which  met  with  a  like  fate  at  his  hands.  When  he 
reached  Patras,  he  found  that  all  the  inhabitants,  except 
some  4000  who  had  occupied  the  castle  and  the  palace,  had  fled 
across  the  gulf  to  the  Venetian  colony  of  Lepanto,  which  had 
secured  immunity  by  continuing  to  pay  him  tribute.  The 
occupants  of  the  palace  surrendered,  and  were  enslaved ;  but 
the  people  in  the  splendid  old  castle,  even  though  a  breach 
was  made  in  the  walls,  hurled  blazing  resin  and  pitch  on 
to  the  heads  of  the  janissaries,  and  so  maintained  their 
position.  The  sultan  had  to  content  himself  with  burning 
and  destroying  the  town,  whose  wealth  had  made  it  the 
"  purse  "  of  Constantine,  and  with  ravaging  the  country  as  far 
as  Glarentza.  Meanwhile,  Turakhan  had  returned  from  his 
raid ;  and,  as  the  season  was  far  advanced  and  the  Despots 
were  willing  to  make  peace  on  his  terms,  and  pay  him  a 
tribute,  Murad  withdrew  to  Thebes,  leaving  the  Hexamilion  a 
heap  of  ruins,  and  taking  more  than  60,000  captives  with 
him.  On  his  approach,  the  terrified  Thebans  abandoned 
their  homes,  only  to  fall  into  the  clutches  of  the  Turkish  army 
at  the  isthmus.  The  news  of  the  fall  of  the  Hexamilion  had 
been  at  once  followed  by  the  submission  of  all  Constantine's 
recent  conquests  in  continental  Greece;  and  the  Bey  of 
Salona  swore  on  the  Koran  that  no  harm  should  befall  the 
revolted  people  of  Loidoriki  and  Galaxidi,  if  they  would 
return  to  their  allegiance.1 

On  the  death  of  his  brother,  the  Emperor  John,  in  1448, 

1  Chalkokondyles,  320,  322,  341-50,  408  ;  Doukas,  223  ;  Chronkon 
Breve  >  519,  520;  Phrantzes,  202,  203  ;  Magno  and  "AvOot  apud  Hopf, 
Chroniquts,  194,  267  ;  Qprjpos  ttjs  Kwy<rravrivovx6\ew^  U.  67-90  ;  XprnnKb*  rod 


CONSTANTINE  CROWNED  AT  MISTRA        415 

Constantine  succeeded,  in  spite  of  the  intrigues  of  his  younger 
brother  Dem^trios,  to  the  imperial  title.  It  is  a  picturesque 
fact,  which  the  Greeks  should  not  forget  when  they  raise 
their  contemplated  monument  to  him,  that  the  last  emperor 
of  Constantinople  was  crowned  at  MistrA,  where  his  first  wife, 
Theodora  Tocco,  like  Cleopa  Malatesta,  the  wife  of  his 
brother  Theodore,  lay  buried  in  the  Zoodotou  monastery. 
After  the  coronation  on  6th  January  1449,  the  new  emperor 
sailed  on  board  a  Catalan  ship  for  the  imperial  capital,  where 
he  met  his  two  surviving  brothers.  Thomas  he  confirmed  in 
the  dignity  of  a  Despot,  upon  Dem6trios  he  bestowed  his 
previous  government,  with  the  exception  of  Patras,  which 
was  added  to  that  of  Thomas.  Before  the  two  Despots  left 
for  the  Morea,  they  solemnly  swore,  in  the  presence  of  their 
aged  mother,  their  brother  the  emperor,  and  all  the  leading 
members  of  the  Senate,  to  live  in  unity  and  brotherly  love.1 

Shortly  after  the  accession  of  Constantine  to  the  imperial 
throne,  his  great  adversary,  Murad  II.,  rounded  off  his  Greek 
conquests  by  annexing  practically  all  that  remained  of  the 
former  Despotat  of  Epiros.  For  many  years  Carlo  II.  Tocco 
had  remained  at  peace  with  his  cousins  and  with  the  Turks. 
When  the  antiquary,  Cyriacus  of  Ancona,  visited  the  "  King 
of  the  Epirotes,"  as  he  styles  him,  in  1435  and  1436,  the  latter 
gave  him  a  letter  of  introduction,  which  ensured  him  a 
warm  welcome  at  a  marriage  festivity  in  the  family  of  the 
Despot's  cousin  Turnus.  In  1444,  however,  when  the  fortunes 
of  the  sultan  seemed  to  be  waning,  and  his  brother-in-law, 
the  Despot  Constantine,  made  his  brilliant  but  short-lived  con- 
quests in  nothern  Greece,  Carlo  also  threw  off  the  Turkish 
suzerainty.  In  this  bold  step  he  was  advised  and  assisted  by 
his  father-in-law,  Giovanni,  the  above-mentioned  Marquis 
of  Gerace,  a  member  of  the  great  Sicilian  family  of 
Ventimiglia.  Landing  with  a  small  body  of  cavalry, 
the  marquis  routed  with  great  loss  a  large  army  of 
Turks  which  was  besieging  his  son-in-law.  On  his  return 
home,  however,  shortly  afterwards,  Carlo  was  captured  by 
treachery  or  a  Turkish  stratagem,  and  reduced  to  his  former 

Va\a%€i8lov,  209,  210;  Jorga,  viii.,  33,  34;  Thomas,  Diplomatarium,  ii., 
368  ;  Cyriacus  of  Ancona  apud  Tozzetti,  Relazioni  di  Alcuni  Viaggi%  v., 
442.  l  Phrantz&s,  204-6. 


416  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

state  of  vassalage.  Unfortunately,  he  died  on  30th  September 
14489  before  his  eldest  son,  Leonardo  III.,  had  reached  man- 
hood, so  that  there  was  no  one  strong  enough  to  protect  his 
continental  dominions.  The  four  governors,  whom  the  late 
Despot  had  appointed  guardians  of  his  children,  thought  that 
the  only  way  to  save  their  threatened  heritage  was  to  invoke 
the  protection  of  Venice ;  Zante  hoisted  the  banner  of  St 
Mark;  the  captain  of  Sta.  Mavra  offered  his  island  to  the 
republic;  while  others  of  the  islanders  sent  to  Alfonso  V. 
of  Naples,  mindful  of  the  connection  between  the  ducal 
family  and  the  Neapolitan  crown.  But  while  Venice  was 
negotiating,  the  sultan  acted.  On  24th  March  1449,  the 
Turks  took  Arta,  and  annexed  all  the  continental  dominions 
of  the  house  of  Tocco,  except  the  three  points  of  Vonitza, 
Varnazza,  and  Angelokastro,  which  thenceforth,  under  the 
name  of  Karl-ili,  or  "  Charles's  country,"  formed  a  part  of  the 
Turkish  Empire,  still  preserving  in  its  Turkish  name  the 
memory  of  Carlo  Tocco. 

Venice  was  now  more  than  ever  anxious  to  prevent  the 
loss  of  the  island  county  of  Cephalonia  or  its  occupation  by 
another  Christian  power,  such  as  the  King  of  Naples.  She 
really  wanted  absolute  possession  of  the  central  Ionian  group, 
such  as  she  had  long  enjoyed  in  Corfu,  and  she  actually 
ordered  Vettore  Cappello,  her  admiral,  afterwards  famous  as 
the  captor  of  Athens,  and  whose  effigy  still  adorns  the  portal 
of  Sant*  Aponal  at  Venice,  to  take  steps  for  the  annexation 
of  Zante.  Pensions,  it  was  thought,  would  reconcile  any  of 
the  chief  inhabitants  who  now  enjoyed  offices — and  such 
were  numerous  under  the  Tocchi — to  the  change  of  ruler. 
But  it  soon  became  evident  that  neither  the  "  Despot  of 
Arta,"  as  Leonardo  III.  still  styled  himself,  nor  his  brothers 
wished  to  surrender  their  heritage.  Another  proposal,  that 
Venice  should  occupy  the  islands  during  his  minority,  was 
rejected,  and  ultimately  the  negotiations  terminated  by  the 
republic,  with  the  advice  of  "  the  Councils  of  Cephalonia  and 
Zante,"  taking  him,  his  brothers,  and  successors  under  her 
protection.  Henceforth  Leonardo  III.  was  included  in 
Venetian  treaties,  though  the  kings  of  Naples  continued 
to  regard  him  as  their  vassal.1 

1  /Eneas  Sylvius,  Europe  406 ;  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Chroniqucs^  196  ; 


CYRIACUS  OF  ANCONA  417 

While  the  Italian  rule  in  continental  Greece  was  thus 
drawing  to  a  close,  an  antiquary,  for  the  first  time  since  the 
Conquest,  visited  the  country.  This  mediaeval  Pausanias, 
Cyriacus  of  Ancona,  has  left  us,  together  with  numerous 
ancient  inscriptions  and  not  a  few  sketches  of  classical  monu- 
ments, some  brief  notes  on  the  distinguished  personages 
whom  he  met  in  the  course  of  his  extended  travels.  A 
merchant  by  profession,  like  Schliemann,  whom  in  some 
respects  he  resembled,  he  taught  himself  Greek,  and  was 
consumed  by  a  burning  enthusiasm  for  the  memorials  of 
classic  Hellas.  As  his  notes  often  contain  no  indication  of 
the  year  in  which  they  were  written,  an  exact  chronology  of 
his  Greek  journeyings  is  extremely  difficult  ;  but  he  seems  to 
have  first  visited  the  Levant  in  141 2,  and  we  find  him  reading 
daily  the  Greek,  Latin,  and  mediaeval  historians  to  Mohammed 
II.  during,  or  immediately  after,  the  siege  of  Constantinople,1 
that  is  to  say,  in  1452  or  1453.  His  preserved  fragments 
refer,  however,  mainly  to  three  Greek  journeys,  the  first  of 
which  extended  from  the  end  of  1435  to  about  the  middle  of 
1436,  the  second  took  place  in  1437,  and  the  third  and  longest 
lasted  from  1443  to  1449,  when  the  Genoese  Government 
describes  him,  in  a  letter  of  recommendation,  as  "  now  return- 
ing west,"  after  "  having  visited  Epiros,  iEtolia,  Akarnania, 
the  Morea,  Achaia,  Athens,  Phokis,  Boeotia,  Crete,  and  the 
Cyclades." 2 

The  worthy  antiquary,  on  the  first  of  these  journeys, 
arrived  in  Greek  waters  towards  the  end  of  December  143$. 
The  plague  then  raging  at  Corfii  prevented  him  from  touching 
at  that  island,  where,  during  one  of  his  previous  voyages, 
he  had  acquired  some  Greek  manuscripts.8  He  accordingly 
spent  Christmas  at  the  Corfiote  dependency  of  Butrinto,  on 
the  opposite  coast,  and  thence  proceeded  to  Arta,  where 
Carlo  II.  Tocco  received  him  most  hospitably.  "The  King 
of  the  Epirotes,"  as  Cyriacus  calls  him,  gave  the  traveller  every 

Navagero  apud  Muratori,  xxiii.,  1 1 13 ;  Epirotica^  254 ;  Sansovino, 
Del?  Origine  dei  Turchi,  154 ;  Jorga,  vii.,  424  ;  viii.,  45,  54,  55  ;  Predelli, 
Commemoriali,  v.,  37,  204 ;  The  Chronicles  of  Rabbi  Joseph^  283. 

1  Zorzi  Dolfin,  Cronaca  de/P  Assedio  di  Constantinopoli%  apud  De 
Rossi,  Inscriptiones  Christiana  Urbis  Roma,  II.,  i.,  374. 

2  Jorga,  viii.,  55. 

3  Kyriaci  Anconitani  1  titter arium  (ed.  Mehus),  29,  3a 

2  D 


418  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

facility  for  seeing  the  sights  of  his  dominions.  His  majesty's 
secretary,  Giorgio  Ragnarolo  of  Pesaro,  assisted  his  fellow- 
countryman  ;  and,  thus  supported,  the  antiquary  was  able 
to  visit  Rogus,  where  he  found  "the  head  of  the  Virgin's 
mother,  the  body  of  St  Luke,  and  the  foot  of  St  John 
Chrysostom  " ;  the  ruins  of  the  old  Roman  colony  of  Niko- 
polis,  founded  to  commemorate  the  victory  of  Actium ;  and 
the  remains  of  Dodona.  He  then  travelled  southward  through 
Akarnania  and  iEtolia,  stopping  at  Vonitza,  so  important  in 
the  mediaeval  history  of  the  country,  gazing  across  at  Ithaka 
from  the  coast  of  the  mainland,  and  finally  arriving  at  the 
ancient  Kalydon,  whence  he  set  out  for  Patras.  Before, 
however,  he  had  left  "  the  Royal  city  of  Akarnania,"  he  had 
prudently  submitted,  in  a  letter  still  preserved,1  the  manuscript 
account  of  his  journey  in  Epiros  to  the  "  King  of  the  Epirotes," 
in  case  any  of  his  observations  should  fail  to  please  the  royal 
eye !  From  Patras  he  crossed  over  to  the  Venetian  colony 
of  Lepanto,  and  ere  long  we  find  him  at  Kirrha,  the  ancient 
port  of  Delphi,  then  called  "  Ancona  "  (from  the  "  elbow  "  of 
land  on  which  it  stood),  or  "the  Five  Saints"  (from  some 
church  of  that  name).  At  Salona  he  mentions  the  church  of 
the  Transfiguration,  but  he  has  little  or  no  regard  for  what  is 
post-classical.  He  scornfully  remarks,  in  the  narrow  spirit  of 
the  archaeologist  for  whom  contemporary  Greece  has  no 
interest,  that  Delphi  "is  called  Castri  by  the  foolish  Greek 
populace,  which  is  quite  ignorant  where  it  was";  but  he 
inspected  with  keen  interest  the  ruined  walls,  the  remains  of 
the  round  temple  of  Apollo,  the  amphitheatre,  and  the 
hippodrome,  wandered  among  the  broken  statues  which 
covered  the  ground,  and  admired  the  large  and  richly  orna- 
mented tombs.  Thence  he  proceeded  to  Livadia  by  way  of 
the  noble  Byzantine  monastery  of  H6sios  Louk&s,  where  the 
monks  showed  him  a  very  ancient  collection  of  sacred  books. 
At  Livadia  he  noted  a  large  temple  of  Hera  in  the  ruined 
city;  and,  after  a  digression  to  Orchomenos,  arrived  at 
Thebes,  which,  though  no  longer  the  capital  of  the  duchy, 
was  still  the  occasional  residence  of  the  Duke  of  Athens,  for 
our  traveller  specially  mentions  the  "  royal  court "  there. 
A  brief  visit  to  Chalkis  and  Eretria  concluded  this  part  of  his 
1  Published  in  Studi  e  documents  di  Staria  e  di  LHrittoy  xv.,  337. 


CYRIACUS  AT  ATHENS  419 

tour,  and  on  7th  April  1436  he  reached  Athens,  where  he 
stayed  for  fifteen  days,  the  guest  of  a  certain  Antonelli 
Balduini.  On  this  occasion  he  does  not  seem  to  have  been 
presented  to  Nerio  1 1.,  nor  does  he  tell  us  much  about  the  con- 
temporary state  of  the  city  at  the  beginning  of  the  new  reign. 
His  days  are  entirely  devoted  to  visiting  the  antiquities,  to 
making  sketches,  and  to  copying  the  inscriptions  which  he 
finds  on  the  monuments.  Many  of  them  relate  to  the 
Emperor  Hadrian — the  great  philhellene,  who,  as  the  inscrip- 
tion on  his  arch  reminded  the  traveller,  founded  a  new  Athens, 
which  began  where  that  of  Theseus  ended.  He  noted  down 
the  emperor's  celebrated  edict  at  the  gate  of  Athena 
Archegetis  regulating  the  oil-trade ;  he  transcribed  the 
inscription  commemorating  the  completion  by  Antoninus 
Pius  of  Hadrian's  aqueduct,1  which,  like  the  Capuan  notary 
forty  years  earlier,  he  was  informed  by  the  local  ciceroni 
to  have  been  "  Aristotle's  Study " ;  he,  too,  alludes  to 
the  statue  of  the  Gorgon  on  the  south  of  the  Akro- 
polis;  he,  too,  describes  the  temple  of  Olympian  Zeus, 
of  which  he  counted  one  more  column  than  his  prede- 
cessor had  done,  as  the  "house,"  or  "palace  of  Hadrian." 
Similarly,  he  mistook  the  choragic  monument  of  Lysi- 
krates  for  the  marble  seats  of  a  theatre.  The  perfect 
"  temple  of  Mars,"  as  he  calls  the  Theseion,  "  with  its  thirty 
columns,"  and  "  the  fifty-eight  columns  and  noble  sculptures 
on  the  pediments,  frieze,  and  metopes  of  the  Parthenon" 
naturally  aroused  his  admiration.  But,  unlike  the  pious 
notary,  he  tells  us  nothing  of  its  condition  as  the  cathedral 
of  Athens,  beyond  two  casual  allusions  to  the  recent  restora- 
tion of  a  pillar,  and  to  an  inscribed  ancient  marble  urn  inside, 
which  may  perhaps  have  served  either  as  a  font  or  for  holy 
water.  He  alludes,  however,  to  the  church  of  St  Dionysios 
under  the  Areopagos.  His  general  impression  of  Athens  is 
striking.  "  Everywhere,"  he  writes,  "  I  saw  vast  walls 
decayed  with  age,  and  inside  and  outside  the  city  in- 
credible marble  buildings,  houses,  and  temples,  all  kinds 
of  sculptures  executed  with  marvellous  skill,  and  huge 
columns — but    all    these    things    a    mass  of   great    ruins." 

1  Tozzetti,  Relasioni  di  Ahuni  Viaggi  fatti  in  Toscana  (2nd  cd.),  v., 
414-16. 


\ 


420  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

Down  at  the  Piraeus  the  antiquary  could  trace  the  huge 
foundations  of  the  ancient  walls,  part  of  two  round  towers 
was  still  standing,  and  the  entrance  of  the  harbour  was 
guarded  by  the  huge  marble  lion,  now  in  front  of  the 
arsenal  at  Venice.     Phaleron,  or  Porto  Vecchio,  he  ignores. 

Of  contemporary  Athens  he  gives  us  the  barest  glimpses. 
He  tells  us  that  it  possessed  a  "  north  "  and  a  "  west  gate,"  as 
well  as  "  the  gate  of  the  new  city,"  and  that  of  the  castle — 
the  same  number  which  the  Jesuit  Father  Simon  enumerates 
more  than  two  centuries  later  ;  that  it  had  "  new  walls " — a 
statement,  corroborated  by  that  of  another  traveller  thirty 
years  afterwards,  which  might  indicate  the  so-called  wall  of 
Valerian  as  the  work  of  the  Acciajuoli ;  and  that  the  Theseion 
lay  outside  the  town.  Of  the  inhabitants  he  says  nothing ; 
as  living  Greeks,  they  had  for  him  no  interest ;  was  he  not  an 
archaeologist  ? 

After  a  day  at  Eleusis,  where,  like  the  Capuan,  he  noted 
the  ruins  of  an  aqueduct,  Cyriacus  journeyed  by  way  of 
Megara  to  the  isthmus,  still  strewn  with  the  walls  erected  by 
Manuel  II.  and  destroyed  by  the  Turks  five  and  thirteen  years 
earlier.  Rapidly  visiting  Corinth  and  the  amphitheatre  and 
brick  baths  of  Sikyon,  he  made  an  excursion  up  to  Kalavryta, 
where  he  met  a  kindred  soul,  one  George  Cantacuzene,  a 
scholar  learned  in  Greek  literature  who  possessed  a  large 
library,  from  which  he  lent  the  wandering  archaeologist  an 
Herodotos  and  several  other  books — an  interesting  proof  of 
the  existence  of  culture  in  the  Morea  at  this  period.  On  the 
way  down  the  valley,  the  traveller  stopped  to  see  the  image 
of  the  Virgin,  attributed  to  St  Luke  and  still  preserved  in  the 
monastery  of  Megaspelaion,  and  thence  returned  by  way  of 
Patras,  at  the  beginning  of  May,  to  the  dominions  of  his 
friend,  the  "  King  of  the  Epirotes,"  who  gave  him  the  above- 
mentioned  letter  of  introduction  to  his  cousin  Turnus.  The 
Tocchi  were  interested  in  literary  matters;  Orlando,  the 
brother  of  Turnus,  is  known  to  have  employed  a  Greek  priest 
to  copy  manuscripts  of  Origen  and  Chrysostom  for  him,  and 
Turnus  heartily  welcomed  Cyriacus  at  his  daughter's  wedding 
at  Orionatium  in  the  middle  of  May.  Two  days  later  his 
guest  crossed  over  to  Corfii,  saw  part  of  the  old  walls  and  the 
remains  of  the  ancient  city  of  Palaiopolis,  and  then  returned 


CYRIACUS  AT  MISTRA  421 

with  his  sketches  and  a  goodly  collection  of  inscriptions  to 
his  native  land.1 

But  the  love  of  travel  did  not  allow  him  much  repose. 
In  July  of  the  following  year  he  is  sketching  the  walls  of 
Kythera  and  admiring  those  of  Epidauros  Limera,  near 
Monemvasia.  In  August  he  is  at  Zante,  "the  island  of 
Epiros"  as  he  calls  it,  in  allusion  to  its  union  with  the 
continental  dominions  of  the  Tocchi,  and  it  was  probably 
there  that  he  received  a  letter  of  introduction  to  Carlo  II.'s 
ambitious  cousin,  the  bastard  Memnon,  who  seems  at  this 
time  to  have  been  governor  of  Charpigny  in  the  Morea,  the 
old  feudal  castle  of  Hugues  de  Lille.  He  gives  us  a  pretty 
picture  of  his  meeting  with  Memnon  "  at  the  clear  springs  of 
the  Alpheios,"  where  the  bastard  was  surrounded  by  his 
huntsmen,  some  bearing  a  straight-horned  stag,  others  a  huge 
she-bear,  and  others  again  a  haul  of  fish  fresh  from  the  river. 
Memnon  not  only  gave  him  a  warm  welcome,  but  presented 
him  with  the  skin  of  the  bear,  and  escorted  him  to  Mistr&, 
where  he  arrived  a  week  later.  There  he  visited  Theodore 
II.,  then  the  reigning  Despot,  examined  the  statues,  the 
columns,  and  the  marble  stage  of  the  gymnasia  on  the  site 
of  classic  Sparta,  and  speculated  on  the  origin  of  the  name  of 
its  mediaeval  successor,  which  he  believes  to  have  been  due  to 
the  cheese-like  shape  of  the  hill  of  Mistrl2  Of  the  beautiful 
Byzantine  churches  of  the  Moreot  capital  he  is  as  silently 
disdainful  as  any  classical  archaeologist  of  our  own  day.  Yet 
this  very  period  was  the  golden  age  of  architecture  at  Mistr<L 
The  Florentine  arcades  (due,  no  doubt,  to  the  influence  of  the 
Despots'  Italian  wives)  and  the  Peribleptos  church  belong  to 
the  first  half  of  the  fifteenth  century  ;  only  a  few  years  before 
Cyriacus's  visit,  Jodnnes  Frangopoulos,  the  marshal  of  the 
Morea,  had  presented  the  charming  Pantanassa  as  "  a  small 
thank-offering  "  to  the  Virgin.3 

In  1443  Cyriacus  returned  once  more  to  Greece  with  letters 
for  the  two  Despots  of  the  Morea,  and,  apparently  in  February 
1444,  he  revisited  Athens.4     An  extremely  interesting  letter, 

1  Epigrammata  reperta  per  lllyricumy  iii.-v.,  ix.-xix.,  xxviii.,   xxxi., 
xxxii.,  xxxv.  ;   Itinerariumy  62,  64-70 ;  Montfaucon,  Palaographiay  79,  80. 
-  Epigrammatay  xxxvii.,  xl. ;  Itinerarium,  72. 
n  Bull.  Corr.  HelLy  xxiii.,  134-7. 
4  The  year  of  this  visit  to  Athens  must  have  been  1444,  and  not  1447, 


422  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

which  he  wrote  from  Chios  on  29th  March  of  that  year, 
describes  his  second  impressions  of  the  place.  After  mention- 
ing the  Tower  of  the  Winds,  the  "  Temple  of  ^Eolus,"  as  he 
calls  it,  he  goes  on  to  say  how,  accompanied  by  the  duke's 
cousin  and  namesake,  he  went  to  pay  his  respects  to  "  Nerio 
Acciajuoli  of  Florence,  then  Prince  of  Athens,"  whom  he 
"  found  on  the  Akropolis,  the  lofty  castle  of  the  city."  Again, 
however,  the  archaeological  overpowered  the  human  interest ; 
of  the  living  ruler  he  tells  us  nothing ;  his  attention,  as  he 
says,  was  rather  attracted  by  the  Propylaea,  in  which  was  the 
ducal  residence.  He  describes  in  enthusiastic  language  the 
splendours  of  the  architecture — the  marvellous  portico  of 
four  polished  marble  columns,  with  ten  marble  slabs  above, 
and  the  court  itself,  where  two  rows  of  six  huge  columns 
three  feet  in  diameter  supported  the  marble  ceiling,  and 
where  the  walls  on  either  side,  composed  of  polished  pieces 
of  marble  all  of  equal  size,  were  approached  by  a  single  large 
and  splendid  entrance.  After  sketching  the  building,  he 
hastened  on  with  even  greater  eagerness  to  reinspect  the 
Parthenon ;  again  he  enumerates  its  fifty-eight  columns, 
twelve  on  each  front  and  seventeen  on  each  side ;  he  alludes 
to  the  battle  of  the  Centaurs  and  the  Lapithae  sculptured  on 
the  metopes,  to  the  sculptures  of  the  pediments,  and  to  the 
frieze  of  the  cella,  which  he  supposed  to  represent  the 
victories  of  Athens  in  the  time  of  Perikl&s.  During  the  next 
five  years  he  continued  his  journey  in  the  Levant ;  he  had 
an  audience  of  Mur£d  1 1,  at  Adrianople  before  the  disastrous 
battle  of  Varna,  and  describes  a  hunting  party  near  Con- 
stantinople, at  which  the  Emperor  John  VI.  and  the  ex- 
Despot  Theodore  II.,  who  had  then,  left  the  Morea,  were 
present.  At  the  Dardanelles  he  spoke  with  some  of  the 
Greek  captives,  whom  Mur&d  II.  had  carried  off  from  the 
Peloponnese.  In  his  repeated  visits  to  the  islands  of  the 
Archipelago,  he  received  assistance  from  the  Latin  rulers, 
themselves  in  some  cases  men  of  culture,  interested  in  the 

as  assumed  by  Gregorovius  and  others,  because  the  letter  from  Chios 
is  dated  :  Kyriaceo  die,  tv.  Kal.  Ap.  Now,  29th  March  fell  on  a  Sunday  in 
1444,  and  we  know  from  another  letter  of  Cyriacus  to  the  Emperor  John 
VI.,  written  before  June  1444,  that  he  left  Chalkis  for  Chios  on  v.  Kal, 
Mart  of  that  year  (Fabricius,  loc.  cit),  Mommsen  is  wrong  in  making 
Kyriaceo  die  mean  Wednesday,  which  will  not  fit  other  dates. 


PROOFS  OF  LATIN  CULTURE  423 

classic  treasures  of  their  diminutive  dominions.  Thus, 
Crusino  I.  Sommaripa  of  Paros  took  a  pride  in  showing  him 
some  marble  statues,  which  he  had  had  excavated,  and 
allowed  him  to  send  a  marble  head  and  leg  to  his  friend, 
Andriolo  Giustiniani-Banca  of  Chios,  a  connoisseur  of  art  and 
a  writer  of  Italian  verse,  to  whom  many  of  his  letters  are 
addressed.1  So  deeply  was  Cyriacus  moved  by  Crusino's 
culture  and  kindness,  that  he  too  burst  out  into  an  Italian 
poem,  of  which  happily  only  one  line  has  been  published. 
Dorino  I.  Gattilusio  of  Lesbos  aided  him  in  his  investigation 
of  that  island,  nor  was  Francesco  Nani,  the  Venetian  governor 
of  Tenos  and  Mykonos,  any  more  backward  in  paying  him 
attention,  escorting  him  to  Delos  and  back  in  his  state  galley 
with  fourteen  rowers.2  In  another  Venetian  island,  that 
of  Crete,  Cyriacus  attended  a  shooting  match,  held  at  Canea, 
in  which  the  archers  were  dressed  as  heroes  of  different 
nations  and  the  winner  received  a  eulogy  from  the  pen  of 
the  archaeologist.  Early  in  1448,  he  revisited  Mistri ;  on  the 
road,  the  site  of  Sparta  with  its  ruins  inspired  him  with  an 
Italian  sonnet,  in  which  he  contrasted  the  classic  city  of 
heroes  with  the  mediaeval  capital  over  which  Constantine 
Palaiol6gos  then  ruled.  At  least,  however,  the  Spartans  of 
the  fifteenth  century  had  not  lost  their  physique,  for  a  tall 
youth  of  immense  strength  carried  the  worthy  antiquary 
across  a  stream  under  his  arm,  and  then  broke  an  iron  rod  to 
show  his  power.  The  poem,  too,  though  not  flattering  to 
Mistra,  was  translated  into  Greek,  and  this  rendering,  still 
extant,  has  been  attributed  8  to  Gemistos  Pl&hon.  There  is 
nothing  improbable  in  this  meeting  of  the  archaeologist  and 
the  philosopher,  who  may  have  already  made  one  another's 
acquaintance  at  Florence,  for  in  1450,  just  before  his  death, 
the  latter  composed  a  complimentary  letter  to  the  Despot 
Demdtrios  on  his  reconciliation  with  his  brother,4  and  wrote  a 
funeral  oration  on  the  death  of  their  mother,  the  dowager 
empress.  While  at  Mistr&,  Cyriacus  seems  to  have  been 
the  guest  of  Constantine,  for  we  find  him  writing,  on  4th 

1  Hopf,  Les  Giustimamy  149. 

2  Bulletino  delF  Istituto  for  1861,  pp.  183,  187. 

3  By  Professor  Ldmpros,  nopwMro-fo,  vii. 

4  Still  in  MS.     Cf.  Migne,  Patrologia  Graca^  clx.,  802. 


424  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

February  1448,  at  the  latter's  court,  an  account  of  the  Roman 
calendar  in  Greek,  which  he  dedicated  to  the  Despot1 
From  Mistr&  he  made  excursions  to  Coron,  where  the 
Venetian  officials,  aided  by  a  Cretan  scholar,  one  of  the 
Calergi,  showed  him  the  antiquities,  and  to  Vitylo,  where 
Constantine's  governor,  John  Palaiol6gos,  entertained  him 
and  showed  him  the  ancient  materials,  of  which  the  castle 
was  constructed.  The  last  stage  of  this  long  journey  was 
another  visit  to  Epiros,  in  October  1448.  Cyriacus  found 
his  old  host,  Carlo  II.,  just  dead,  and  Leonardo  III.  reigning 
in  his  stead.  Here  the  antiquary  revisited  his  old  haunts  of 
Dodona  and  Rogus,  and  composed  three  Italian  sonnets  for 
the  repose  of  Carlo's  soul.2  The  results  of  his  long  archaeo- 
logical investigations  he  embodied  in  three  large  volumes,  of 
which  only  fragments  have  come  down  to  us.  His  original 
drawing  of  the  west  front  of  the  Parthenon3  and  those  of 
other  Athenian  monuments  have  been  preserved  in  a 
manuscript  formerly  belonging  to  the  Duke  of  Hamilton, 
but  now  in  the  Berlin  Museum,  and  are  the  earliest  extant 
reproductions  of  those  buildings.  Sketches  of  the  same  front 
of  the  Parthenon,  of  the  Tower  of  the  Winds,  of  the 
Monument  of  Phil6pappos,  showing  the  king  in  a  four-horse 
chariot,  of  "  a  round  temple  of  Apollo  at  Athens "  (perhaps 
that  of  Augustus),  and  of  the  noble  lion  of  "the  port  of 
Athens"  facing  the  two  round  towers,  may  be  seen  in  the 
Barberini  manuscript  of  1465,  now  at  the  Vatican,4  which 
contains  the  diagrams  of  San  Gallo.  As  that  eminent 
architect  took  the  explanatory  text  almost  verbatim  from 
Cyriacus,  he  has  been  assumed  to  have  copied  the  latter's 
drawings,  and  this  is  all  the  more  probable  because  the 
sketch  of  "  the  temple  of  Apollo "  was  drawn  and  given  to 

1  Printed  in  Revue  des  ktudes  grccgucs  for  1896,  p.  228.  The  year  is 
fixed  because  it  was  written  on  Sunday,  4th  February,  and  because  we 
know  that  Bollani,  whom  Cyriacus  mentions  as  Castellan  of  Coron,  had 
been  elected  in  April  1447. 

2  Colucci,  Belle  Antichitci  Piceney  xv.,  1 10  ;  Tozzetti,  v.,  66-9,  422-3, 
437,  439-42,  449,  46o. 

3  Reproduced  in  Jahrbuch  der  K.  Preussischen  Kunstsammlungcn, 
iv.,  81. 

4  No.  4424,  folios  28,  29,  32  ;  Laborde  (i.,  32)  has  reproduced  folio  28. 
Cf.  De  Rossi,  op.  ci/.,  II.,  i.,  363. 


QUARRELS  OF  THE  DESPOTS  425 

its  owner,  as  is  expressly  stated,  by  "  a  Greek  in  Ancona,"  the 
residence  of  the  antiquary.  Copies  of  the  traveller's  sketches 
of  the  Cyclades  exist  in  a  manuscript  at  Munich,1  whereas 
we  have  not  a  trace  of  his  contemporary,  Francesco  Squarcione 
of  Padua,  who  is  said  to  have  "  travelled  all  over  Greece."  2 

The  fall  of  Greek  rule  in  the  Morea  was  now  fast  ap- 
proaching, hastened  by  the  fraternal  quarrels  of  the  two 
Despots,  Thomas  and  Demdtrios.  Neither  their  solemn 
oaths  at  Constantinople,  nor  the  imminent  Turkish  peril 
prevailed  over  their  mutual  selfishness  and  ambition.  The 
only  point  on  which  they  were  unanimous  was  their  desire 
to  extend  their  dominions  at  the  cost  of  the  Venetian  colonies, 
especially  Nauplia  and  Argos,  which  complained  loudly  to 
the  mother-country  for  protection,  and  demanded  a  copy  of 
the  privileges  granted  it  after  its  capture  by  the  Turks  in 
1397.3  Thomas  managed  to  obtain  a  start  of  his  brother, 
and,  reaching  the  Morea  first,  seduced  the  subjects  of 
Demdtrios  from  their  allegiance.  The  latter,  destitute  of 
national  feeling,  sent  his  brother-in-law,  Matthew  Asan,  to 
call  in  the  aid  of  the  Turks,  and  thus  compelled  Thomas  to 
come  to  terms  and  submit  their  dispute  to  the  arbitration  of 
their  brother,  the  emperor.  As  the  two  Despots,  however, 
still  continued  to  quarrel,  Mohammed  II.  ordered  old 
Turakhan  to  assist  Dem^trios,  and  at  the  same  time,  in 
view  of  the  future  conquest  of  the  peninsula,  to  destroy  all 
that  remained  of  the  Hexamilion.  Thomas  then  made  peace 
with  his  brother,  surrendering  to  him  Kalamata  in  exchange 
for  the  Arkadian  district  of  Skorta,  which  he  had  taken.  So 
great  was  the  joy  of  the  old  philosopher  and  patriot  Pldthon, 
that  he  took  up  his  pen  for  the  last  time  to  congratulate 
Demetrios  on  this  reconciliation.  Then  he  died,  full  of 
years,  fortunate  in  escaping  the  disgrace  of  seeing  the 
country  a  Turkish  province.  "  Sparta,"  cried  his  friend  Hier- 
onymos  Charit6nymos  in  his  funeral  oration,  "  is  no  longer 
famous  ;  we  lovers  of  learning  shall  soon  be  scattered  to  the  ends 
of  the  world  " — a  prophecy  only  too  true,  and  too  soon  fulfilled.4 

1  Cod.  Lat.,  716  ;  cf.  Bullctino  del?  Istituto,  loc.  cit. 
-  Scardeonius,  De  Antiquit.  Urbis  Patavii^  370. 

3  Sitthas,  MviwA€ta,  i.,  212-13  ;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium, 
ii.,  381  ;  Jorga,  viii.,  69,  70, 79, 95.         4  Migne,  Patrologia  Gracat  clx.,  807. 


426  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

In  October  1452,  when  Mohammed  II.  was  ready  for  the 
attack  on  Constantinople,  he  sent  Turakhan  back  to  the 
Morea  to  keep  the  two  Despots  busy  there  with  their  own 
defence,  so  that  they  might  not  send  assistance  to  their 
imperial  brother.  Accompanied  by  his  two  sons,  Achmet 
and  Omar  (the  future  conqueror  of  Athens),  and  at  the 
head  of  the  European  army  of  the  Turkish  Empire,  the  old 
commander  again  arrived  at  the  isthmus.  The  walls  had 
been  repaired,  and  the  resistance  offered  by  their  defenders 
was  such  that  the  capture  of  the  rampart  cost  many  lives. 
When  the  Greeks  fled,  Turakhan  marched  through  the  centre 
of  the  peninsula  by  way  of  Tegea  and  Mantineia  as  far  as 
Ithome  and  the  Messenian  Gulf,  plundering  and  taking 
prisoners  as  he  went  Neokastron,  presumably  the  "  Chastel- 
Neuf"  mentioned  in  the  feudal  list  of  1364,  fell  before  him  ; 
but  Siderokastron  in  Arkadia  justified  its  name  and  defied  all 
his  efforts.  Nor  was  that  the  only  Turkish  reverse.  As 
Achmet  was  retiring  through  the  Pass  of  Dervenaki,  between 
Mycenae  and  Corinth,  that  death-trap  of  Turkish  armies,  where 
370  years  later  another  Ottoman  force  met  a  similar  fate,  he 
was  surprised  by  Matthew  Asan,  brother-in-law  of  Dem&rios, 
defeated  and  taken  as  a  captive  to  Mistrl  The  victory  was 
the  last  ray  of  dawn  before  the  darkness  of  centuries.  King 
Alfonso  of  Naples,  who  had  long  been  intriguing  with  Deme- 
trios,  sent  his  congratulations,  and  talked  of  invading  Turkey  ; 
but  the  Turks  had  achieved  their  object,  and  the  besieged  of 
Constantinople  applied  in  vain  to  the  Despots  for  corn  and 
soldiers.1 

The  news  that  the  city  was  taken,  and  the  emperor  slain, 
fell  like  a  thunderbolt  upon  his  wretched  brothers,  who 
naturally  expected  that  they  would  be  the  next  victims. 
Their  first  impulse,  and  that  of  their  leading  archons,  was 
to  rush  down  to  the  nearest  port  and  take  ship  for  Italy — 
an  act  of  cowardice  which  had  the  worst  effect  upon  their 
already  discontented  Albanian  subjects.  But  as,  one  after 
another,  important  Greeks  arrived  from  Constantinople — 
men   like  Cardinal   Isidore,  who  had   played   a   prominent 

1  Chalkokonctyles,  374,  375,  378,  381,  382  ;  Phrantz£s,  235,  236 ; 
Krit6boulos,  i.,  19  ;  Archivio  Storico  per  le  Prov.  Napoletane,  xxvii., 
612,  823. 


ALBANIAN  RISING  IN  THE  MOREA  427 

part  at  the  Council  of  Florence  and  had  been  taken  prisoner 
by  the  Turks,  and  Phrantzfis,  whose  loyalty  to  his  master  had 
exposed  him  to  a  similar  fate — the  two  Despots  plucked  up 
sufficient  courage  to  remain,  and  sent  envoys  to  the  sultan's 
court  at  Adrianople,  in  the  hope  that  the  conqueror  would 
leave  them  the  shadow  of  sovereignty  so  long  as  they  paid 
the  annual  tribute  of  10,000  or  12,000  ducats  which  he 
imposed  upon  them.1  Some  of  the  Greek  nobles  wished, 
indeed,  to  proclaim  Dem^trios  emperor,  but  this  was  too 
much  for  the  fraternal  jealousy  of  Thomas,  and  the  idea 
was  dropped.  Meanwhile,  the  smouldering  discontent  of 
the  Albanians,  ill-treated  by  the  Greek  officials  and  fired 
by  the  great  exploits  of  their  countryman,  Skanderbeg,  in 
Albania,  had  burst  out  into  one  of  those  rare  efforts  for 
independence  which  that  strange  race  has  occasionally 
shown.  Some  30,000  of  these  nomads  rose  against  the 
Despots,  at  the  instigation  of  one  of  their  native  chieftains, 
Peter  Boua,  nicknamed  "  the  lame,"  a  member  of  the  family 
which  had  once  held  Arta  and  Lepanto.  Various  dissatisfied 
Greek  arc/ions  joined  the  movement,  for  the  greedy  Byzantine 
officials  who  held  the  chief  posts  at  the  petty  courts  of  Patras 
and  Mistr&  were  extremely  unpopular  with  the  natives  of  the 
peninsula.  Among  these  Greek  rebels  the  most  prominent 
was  Manuel  Cantacuzene,  who  was  lord  of  all  Braccio  di 
Maina,  and  could  not  forget  that  his  ancestors  were  of 
imperial  lineage  and  had  once  ruled  at  Mistra.  .Thomas 
had  in  vain  tried  to  arrest  him,  as  a  dangerous  pretender ; 
he  was  now  proclaimed  Despot  by  the  Albanians,  whose 
national  vanity  he  flattered  by  taking  the  Albanian  name 
of  "  Ghin,M  and  calling  his  wife  "  Cuchia." 

In  the  pitiable  condition  of  Greece  at  that  time  it  was 
obvious  to  both  parties  that  they  could  only  obtain,  or  retain, 
the  government  of  the  Morea  by  foreign  aid.  Accordingly, 
they  both  applied  to  the  only  two  foreign  Powers  which  were 
strong  enough  to  assist  them — Venice  and  the  sultan.  The 
republic  was  at  first  not  disinclined  to  listen  to  the  proposals 

1  Phrantz^s,  309  ;  Doiikas,  314  (who  puts  the  tribute  at  10,000  ducats); 
Chalkokondyles,  399,  400,  416  (who  puts  it  at  12,000  gold  pieces) ;  Krit6- 
boulos  (I.,  74;  III.,  1)  estimates  it  at  6000  gold  pieces;  Cambini, 
Rabbi  Joseph,  and  ^Eneas  Sylvius  (cf.  infra)  at  17,00a 


428  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

of  the  Albanians  to  submit  to  Venetian  rule.  Venice  had 
been  constantly  harassed  by  the  Despots,  and  on  one  occasion 
had  plainly  told  the  Emperor  Manuel  II.  that  the  members 
of  his  family  were  u  worse  neighbours  than  the  Turks  " ;  l  in 
this  very  year  of  the  rebellion,  Dem^trios  had  been  molesting 
the  Venetian  colonies.  The  first  impulse  of  the  Venetian 
Government  was,  therefore,  to  instruct  its  officials  in  the 
Morea  to  encourage  the  insurgents  until  it  had  had  time 
to  decide  upon  its  policy.  More  cautious  counsels,  however, 
prevailed — for  Venice  did  not  want  to  embroil  herself  with 
the  sultan — and  it  was  proposed  that  Vettore  Cappello  should 
proceed  to  the  Morea,  to  urge  the  desirability  of  unity  on 
the  contending  parties,  and  to  negotiate  for  the  peaceful 
acquisition  of  such  maritime  places  as  Glarentza,  Patras, 
Corinth,  and  Vostitza,  but  only  in  the  event  of  a  possible 
Genoese  or  Catalan  occupation  of  the  peninsula.  He  was 
to  protest,  and  the  protest  was  perfectly  genuine,  that  the 
republic  did  not  seek  these  territorial  acquisitions  from 
motives  of  ambition,  but  simply  in  order  to  save  the  country. 
The  news  that  a  Genoese  fleet  was  hovering  off  the  Morea 
and  that  the  Albanians  were  negotiating  with  that  rival 
republic,  naturally  alarmed  the  statesmen  of  the  lagoons.2 

The  sultan  acted,  however,  while  the  Venetians  debated. 
He  saw  that  a  strong  Albanian  principality  in  the  Morea 
would  be  less  to  his  interest  than  the  maintenance  of  the  two 
weak  Byzantine  states  of  Patras  and  Mistr&.  He  therefore 
resolved  to  aid  the  Despots  in  suppressing  the  revolt,  without, 
however,  utterly  annihilating  the  revolted  ;  he  chose,  in  other 
words,  that  policy  of  making  one  Christian  race  balance 
another,  so  skilfully  followed  by  his  successor  in  Macedonia 
at  the  present  day.  Omar,  son  of  old  Turakhan,  was  de- 
spatched to  carry  out  these  instructions  ;  he  inflicted  a  slight 
defeat  on  the  Albanians,  and  obtained  from  the  grateful 
Demetrios  the  release  of  his  brother  Achmet  as  his  reward. 
Another  pretender,  however,  now  appeared  on  the  scene,  in 
the  person  of  Centurione's  son,  Giovanni  Asan.  The  so- 
called  "  Prince  of  Achaia "  had  been  imprisoned  with  his 
eldest  son  since  his  ineffectual  rising  in  1446  in  the  castle  of 

1  Jorga,  iv.,  596. 

2  Srithas,  i.,  215-27  ;  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques^  199. 


CENTURIONE  ESCAPES  429 

Chloumofitsi,  and  it  had  been  rumoured  that  Thomas  had 
allowed  these  dangerous  representatives  of  the  old  dynasty 
to  die  of  hunger.  They  were,  however,  still  alive,  and  had 
eagerly  listened  to  the  plans  of  a  fellow-prisoner,  a  Greek 
agitator  of  obscure  origin,  named  LoukAnes,  who  had 
received  preferment  from  Theodore  II.,  but  had  strongly 
opposed  the  influence  of  Byzantine  officialdom  in  his  own, 
and  his  countrymen's  interest  These  prisoners  of  state  now 
persuaded  their  gaoler  to  release  them,  whereupon  they  threw 
the  weight,  Centurione  of  his  name,  Louk£nes  of  his  ability, 
on  the  side  of  the  insurgents.  There  must  still  have  been 
many  Franks  who  regarded  the  only  son  of  the  last  Frankish 
ruler  of  Achaia  as  their  legitimate  sovereign,  and  even 
Venice  and  Alfonso  of  Naples  thought  it  desirable  to  con- 
gratulate "Prince  Centurione"  on  his  release,  and  to  give 
him  and  his  wife  their  coveted  title.  Phrantzfcs,  who  knew 
Peloponnesian  politics  well,  and  who  had  just  entered  the 
service  of  the  Despot  Thomas,  considered  his  escape  so 
serious  that  he  interrupted  a  mission  to  the  Servian  court 
as  soon  as  he  heard  the  news,  and  Matthew  Asan,  the 
brother-in-law  of  Dem^trios,  was  despatched  to  the  sultan 
to  ask  for  further  assistance.  This  time  Mohammed  II. 
sent  old  Turakhan  himself  to  the  aid  of  the  Despots,  whose 
two  capitals  of  MistrA  and  Patras  were  besieged  by  the 
insurgents.  Turakhan,  with  his  two  sons  and  a  large  force, 
arrived  in  October  1454,  and  told  the  two  Despots,  who  had 
in  the  meanwhile  compelled  the  enemy  to  raise  the  siege  of 
those  towns,  that  the  presence  of  one  or  other  of  them  with 
his  troops  was  essential  to  the  success  of  his  plans.  First, 
accompanied  by  Dem&rios,  he  attacked  the  Albanians  at  a 
place  called  Borbotia,  which  they  strongly  fortified,  but  from 
which  they  fled  by  night,  leaving  about  10,000  men  and 
women  prisoners  of  the  allies.  Next  it  was  the  turn  of 
Thomas,  who  took  part  with  the  Turkish  commander  in  the 
capture  of  Ithome  and  Aetos — a  place  which  had  recently 
hoisted  the  flag  of  Centurione,  and  which  added  another 
1000  to  the  ranks  of  the  captives.  At  this  the  rest  of  the 
Albanians  submitted,  on  condition  that  they  should  keep  the 
lands  which  they  had  taken  and  the  cattle  which  they  had 
plundered — an   arrangement  which   well  suited  the  sultan's 


430  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

policy  of  playing  off  the  two  races  against  one  another.  The 
pseudo-despot,  Cantacuzene,  disappeared,  till  four  years  later 
he  returned  as  the  decoy  of  the  sultan,  while  Centurione 
found  a  refuge  among  the  Venetians  at  Modon,  where  he 
remained  for  some  two  years.  It  was  then  thought  desirable 
to  confirm  his  devotion  to  Venice  by  the  grant  of  a  small 
pension,  lest  he  should  lend  his  name  to  some  Turkish  or  other 
enterprise  for  the  conquest  of  the  Morea  ;  especially  as,  early 
in  1456,  we  find  him  a  pensioner  of  King  Alfonso  at  Naples ; 
accordingly,  in  1457,  the  republic  granted  him  an  annuity,  on 
condition  that  he  continued  to  reside  at  Modon,  or  "  wherever 
else  he  could  be  most  useful "  to  her.  Seven  years  later  he 
settled,  like  his  enemy  Thomas,  in  Rome,  and  thenceforth 
drew  a  monthly  pittance  from  Paul  II.  till  1469,  when  he  died, 
the  last  of  his  famous  race  to  claim  the  title  of  "  Prince  of 
Achaia." l  As  for  the  Albanian  chief,  Peter  Boua,  he  was 
confirmed  by  the  Turks  in  his  privileges,  and,  nine  years  later, 
headed  another  rising  of  his  countrymen.  Having  thus  re- 
stored the  authority  of  the  two  Despots,  old  Turakhan  gave 
them,  before  he  departed,  the  excellent  advice  to  live  as 
brothers,  to  reward  their  loyal  subjects,  and  to  repress  at  once  the 
germs  of  sedition.  Needless  to  say,  his  advice  was  not  taken.2 
The  sultan  was  now  the  real  master  of  the  Morea.  The 
two  Despots  were  his  tributaries,  and  the  Greek  archons, 
degenerate  scions  of  old  Moreot  families  such  as  those  of 
Sophian6s  and  Sgouromallaios,  hesitated  as  little  as  Albanian 
chiefs  like  Peter  Boua  or  Manuel  Raoul  to  acknowledge  him 
as  their  sovereign  on  condition  that  he  took  none  of  their 
property  and  spared  their  children  from  the  blood-tax.  Two 
of  them  even  offered  to  hand  over  to  Venice  Mouchli, 
between  Argos  and  the  modern  Tripolitza,  and  the  three 
castles  of  Damal&,  Ligouri6,  and  Phanari  in  Argolis — an  offer 
which  the  Venetian  Government  found  very  tempting,  as 
the  three  Argive  castles  were  near  the  sea-coast  Meanwhile 
both  Thomas  and  Dem&rios  went  on  intriguing  as  before. 

1  S£thas,  i.,  229  ;  Seer  eta,  xx.,  f.  133  ;  Liber  Depositarii  S.  Cruciate, 
ff.  123-48,  81-87. 

*  Chalkokondyles,  406-14 ;  Phrantzgs,  383-5  ;  Cambini  apud  Sanso- 
vino,  op.  city  152  ;  Spandugino  (ed.  1 551),  41-2  ;  iEneas  Sylvius,  Europa, 
405  ;  "AvSot  apud  Hopf,  Chromques%  267  ;  Archivio  Storico  per  le  Prov. 
Napoletane,  xxvii.,  834-5  ;  xxviii.,  193,  203. 


THE  TURKISH  TRIBUTE  IN  ARREARS        431 

Both  had  tried  to  negotiate  a  matrimonial  alliance  between 
their  children  and  the  family  of  Alfonso  V.  of  Aragon  and 
Naples,  who  sent  an  envoy  to  examine  the  Isthmian  wall, 
and  report  on  the  defences  of  the  country,  while  Thomas 
invoked  the  aid  of  Venice  to  prevent  his  brother  from 
thus  re-introducing  Spanish  influence  into  the  Morea  to  the 
detriment  of  both  the  republic  and  himself.  While  Dem6trios 
appointed  the  scholar  Argyr6poulos  as  his  envoy,  and  told 
him  to  seek  the  aid  of  the  pope  and  of  Charles  VII.  of 
France,  Thomas  sent  the  serviceable  PhrantzSs  to  smooth 
over  his  disputes  with  the  Venetians,  and  obtained  a  safe 
conduct  for  himself  and  his  family  for  the  Venetian  colonies 
and  the  loan  of  both  a  Venetian  and  a  Neapolitan  galley,  on 
which  he  could  flee  in  case  of  need.  Nevertheless,  the  two 
brothers  might,  perhaps,  have  preserved  the  shadow  of 
authority  for  the  rest  of  their  lives,  had  they  abstained  from 
any  act  which  could  offend  their  all-powerful  suzerain,  the 
sultan.  But  the  old  intriguer  Loukines  could  not  rest  from 
attempting  to  stir  up  Byzantine  officials  and  native  Pelopon- 
nesians  alike  to  revolt ;  and,  in  spite  of  the  wise  refusal  of 
Matthew  Asan,  the  governor  of  Corinth,  who  knew  his  Turks 
only  too  well,  to  join  in  these  schemes,  the  tribute  to  the 
sultan  was  allowed  to  fall  into  arrears.  So  long  as  there  was 
any  danger  from  the  Albanians,  the  Despots  had  been  willing 
enough  to  pay  what  their  deliverer  asked  as  the  price  of  his 
assistance.  But  after  the  revolt  had  been  suppressed,  they 
omitted  to  remit  their  annual  ransom.  Their  excuse  was  that 
neither  their  Albanian  nor  Greek  subjects  would  pay  their 
respective  quota  unless  the  land  of  the  peninsula  were 
divided  in  equal  portions.  The  Turkish  view,  however,  was 
that  the  Despots  received  the  amount  regularly,  but  spent  it 
on  themselves.1 

The  sultan  sent  frequent  embassies  to  demand  payment, 
and  at  the  same  time  to  report  on  the  state  of  the  country 
He  was  afraid  that  the  constant  quarrels  of  the  Despots  would 
end  in  a  Venetian  or  Aragonese  occupation  of  the  Morea, 
which  he  thought  would  make  a  good  base  for  his  projected 

1  Miklosich  und  Muller,  III.,  290;  Sdthas,  i.,  230-32;  PhrantzSs, 
385;  Chalkokondyles,  413-14 ;  Kritoboulos,  III.,  1;  Archivio  Storico 
per  le  Prov.  Napoletane,  xxviii.,  200. 


432  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

attack  upon  Italy  and  which  he  had  no  wish  to  see  in  the 
hands  of  a  strong  Western  power.  When,  therefore,  some  three 
years'  tribute  was  in  arrears,  he  despatched  an  ultimatum  to  the 
Despots,  giving  them  the  alternative  of  peace  with  payment,  or 
the  loss  of  their  dominions.  Emboldened  by  the  appearance 
of  the  fleet  sent  out  by  Pope  Calixtus  III.  to  the  ^Egean, 
Thomas,  the  more  energetic  of  the  two  brothers,  refused  to 
pay ;  this  refusal  led  to  his  own  and  his  brother's  ruin. 

In  the  spring  of  1458,  at  the  head  of  an  army  of  80,000 
cavalry  and  a  large  body  of  infantry,  Mohammed  II.  arrived 
in  Thessaly,  where  he  halted  to  rest  his  men  and  to  give  the 
Despots  a  last  chance  of  payment  It  was  currently  reported 
at  the  time,  that  had  they  done  so,  the  sultan,  who  had  other 
pressing  business  on  hand,  would  have  abandoned  his  expedi- 
tion at  that  eleventh  hour.  But  when  no  envoy  arrived 
from  the  Morea,  he  ordered  his  army  to  advance  through 
Thermopylae  into  Bceotia,  and  encamped  on  the  classic  Held 
of  Plataea  at  the  river  Asopos,  till  his  scouts  had  examined 
the  mountain  passes  leading  to  the  isthmus.  While  he  was 
there,  messengers  arrived  from  Thomas,  begging  for  peace 
and  bringing  a  part  of  the  tribute,  4500  gold  pieces.  But  it 
was  too  late;  the  sultan  took  the  money,  and  told  the 
trembling  emissaries  that  he  would  make  peace  when  he  was 
in  the  Peloponnese.  Then,  as  his  scouts  reported  the  passes  to 
be  unoccupied,  he  proceeded  to  the  isthmus,  where  he  arrived 
on  15th  May.  He  met  with  no  resistance  at  the  Hexamilion  ; 
but  a  short  experience  of  the  natural  and  artificial  fortifica- 
tions of  Akrocorinth  convinced  him  that  it  could  only  be 
taken  by  surrender  or  starvation.  There  is  only  one  approach 
to  the  citadel,  and  the  steepness  of  the  ground  would  not 
permit  him  to  plant  his  batteries  near  enough  to  the  walls  to 
have  any  effect  upon  them;  while,  even  if  he  could  have 
succeeded  in  battering  down  the  triple  line  of  walls,  an 
assault  would  have  been  most  difficult  Accordingly,  he  left 
half  his  forces  under  the  command  of  Mahmoud  Pasha,  a 
Greek  renegade  and  the  first  Christian  who  ever  occupied  the 
post  of  Grand  Vizier,  to  invest  the  place,  and  proceeded  to 
reduce  the  neighbouring  fortresses  by  force  or  threats.  He 
then  marched  into  the  interior  of  the  peninsula,  devastating 
and  destroying  as  he  went.     At  Nemea  he  turned  westward, 


MOHAMMED  II.  IN  THE  MOREA  433 

and  besieged  Tarsos,  a  place  to  the  north  of  Lake  Pheneos, 
which  surrendered  and  furnished  some  300  youths  to  the 
janissaries.  But  Doxies,  the  Albanian  chieftain  of  the 
district,  occupied  a  very  strong  position  on  a  high  hill  with 
a  band  of  Greeks  and  Albanians,  and  prepared  to  defy  the 
great  sultan.  Unfortunately  the  besiegers  cut  off  the  water 
supply,  and  thus  compelled  the  heroic  defenders,  who  had 
been  constrained  to  bake  their  bread  with  the  blood  of  their 
slaughtered  cattle,  to  sue  for  peace.  Mohammed  treacher- 
ously seized  this  unguarded  moment  to  attack  the  place, 
which  thus  fell  into  his  hands.  The  ancient  feudal  castle 
of  Akova  was  taken  by  storm ;  the  fortress  of  Roupele,  in 
which  a  number  of  Albanians  and  Greeks  had  taken  refuge 
with  their  families,  after  two  days'  desperate  fighting,  during 
which  the  Turkish  losses  were  such  that  the  sultan  ordered  a 
retreat,  surrendered  just  as  he  was  departing.  Mohammed 
sent  the  inhabitants  to  colonise  Constantinople,  with  the 
exception  of  some  twenty  Albanians  who  had  surrendered  at 
Tarsos  and  had  broken  their  parole  not  to  fight  against  him 
again.  As  an  awful  example  he  ordered  their  ankles  and 
wrists  to  be  broken — an  act  of  cruelty  commemorated  by 
the  Turkish  name  for  the  place — "  Tokmak  Hissari,"  or  "  the 
castle  of  ankles."  Thence  he  marched  into  the  territory  of 
Mantineia,  accompanied  by  Ghin  Cantacuzene,  the  leader 
of  the  Albanian  insurrection  of  1453,  whom  he  had  summoned 
to  join  him,  thinking  that  his  influence  with  the  Albanians 
would  be  useful.  The  ex-Despot  was  sent  to  try  his  persuasive 
powers  on  the  people  of  Pazanike ;  but  his  mission  only  made 
them  more  obstinate;  his  Turkish  companions  accused  him 
of  treachery,  and  he  was  driven  from  the  sultan's  camp. 
Alarmed  for  his  safety,  he  fled  to  Hungary,  where  he  died. 

Finding  that  the  enemy  had  occupied  a  strongly  fortified 
position,  Mohammed  encamped  near  Tegea,  and  held  a 
council  of  war.  The  two  Despots  had  meanwhile  fled  to 
the  sea-coast — Thomas  with  his  family  to  the  Lakonian 
Mantineia,  Demetrios  to  Monemvasia.  The  sultan's  ardent 
desire  was  to  see  and  capture  that  famous  fortress,  "the 
strongest  of  all  cities  that  we  know,"  as  Chalkokondyles 
justly  called  it.  But  his  advisers  represented  to  him  the 
difficult   nature    of   the   country   which    he   would   have   to 

2  E 


434  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

traverse,  so  he  prudently  decided  instead  to  attack  Dem£trios 
Asan  in  Palaio-Mouchli,  then  one  of  the  most  important 
places  in  the  peninsula.  Here  again,  the  sultan  cut  off  the 
water  supply,  and  after  three  days,  Asan  surrendered  on 
favourable  terms,  receiving  the  town  of  Loidoriki  as  a  fief  for 
his  son.  The  sultan  now  marched  across  country  by 
a  difficult  route  to  Patras,  the  abandoned  capital  of  Thomas, 
whose  citizens  he  found  fled  to  Lepanto  and  other  Venetian 
colonies,  except  the  garrison  of  the  castle.  The  latter  made 
no  resistance,  their  lives  were  spared,  and  the  conqueror  was 
so  struck  with  the  fertility  and  situation  of  the  town  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  that  he  offered  freedom, 
immunity  from  taxation  for  several  years,  and  the  restitution 
of  their  property  to  all  the  inhabitants  who  would  come  back. 
After  garrisoning  the  castle,  he  despatched  a  portion  of  his 
forces  to  overrun  Elis  and  Messenia,  and  then  returned  along 
the  coast  of  the  gulf  to  Corinth,  occupying  Vostitza  on  the  way. 
Although  it  was  now  July,  he  found  Akrocorinth  still 
untaken,  for  Matthew  Asan,  who  had  been  absent  at 
Nauplia,  had  succeeded  in  entering  the  fortress  by  night 
with  seventy  men  and  partially  revictualling  it.  As  Asan 
boldly  refused  to  surrender,  and  there  was  no  longer  pro- 
vender for  the  beasts  of  burden  in  the  Turkish  camp, 
Mohammed  resolved  to  bombard  the  entrance  with  stone 
balls  made  from  the  ruins  of  the  ancient  city  of  Corinth. 
At  last  a  breach  was  made  in  the  outermost  of  the  three 
walls ;  but  when,  after  a  hand-to-hand  fight,  the  Turks 
assailed  the  second  rampart,  they  were  greeted  with  such 
volleys  of  large  stones  that  they  had  to  retire  with  heavy 
loss.  So  powerful,  however,  for  that  period  was  the  Turkish 
artillery,  that  a  stone  ball  weighing  nearly  900  lbs.  and  fired 
at  a  range  of  about  a  mile  and  a  half  destroyed  the  bakery 
of  the  citadel  and  the  arsenal.  At  this  juncture,  the  Turkish 
detachment  which  had  been  sent  to  plunder  Elis  and 
Messenia  arrived  at  Corinth  with  some  15,000  head  of 
cattle,  so  that  the  besiegers  had  ample  supplies  for  a  long 
blockade,  while  the  small  stock  of  provisions  which  Asan 
had  brought  with  him  was  now  all  but  exhausted.  The 
Greeks  complained  to  their  metropolitan,  who  treacherously 
informed  Mohammed   of  the  state   of  affairs.     The   sultan 


OMAR  GOVERNOB  IN  THE  MOREA  435 

then  again  called  upon  Asan  to  surrender,  and  the  latter, 
seeing  that  the  majority  was  opposed  to  further  resistance, 
went  forth  under  a  flag  of  truce,  together  with  Loukines, 
who  had  been  in  command  during  his  absence,  and  made 
terms  with  the  sultan.  On  6th  August,  Corinth,  "the 
star  castle,"  as  the  Turks  called  it,  surrendered ;  the  inhabitants 
were  left  unmolested,  but  ordered  to  pay  tribute ;  while  the 
conqueror  demanded  from  the  Despots  an  annual  tribute  of 
3000  gold  pieces  and  the  cession  of  the  city  and  district  of 
Patras,  Vostitza,  Kalavryta,  and  all  the  country  which  he 
had  traversed  with  his  army — about  one-third  of  the  whole 
peninsula — and  threatened  a  renewal  of  hostilities  in  case 
of  refusal.  Asan  proceeded  to  Trype  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Langada  Gorge  where  the  two  Despots  were  waiting,  and 
laid  these  hard  terms  before  them.  But,  hard  as  they  were, 
there  seemed  to  be  no  option  but  to  accept  them.  True, 
the  patriotic  Phrantz£s  sneered  at  the  men  who  had  sur- 
rendered the  key  of  the  Morea  and  complained  that  Thomas 
had  given  away  valuable  cities  "  as  if  they  were  of  no  more 
account  than  the  vegetables  in  his  garden."  Mohammed 
left  a  garrison  of  400  picked  men  of  his  own  bodyguard  in 
Corinth,  thoroughly  provisioned  all  the  fortresses  which 
seemed  to  be  in  good  condition,  destroyed  the  others  and 
sent  their  inhabitants  to  Constantinople,  where  he  settled 
the  skilled  workmen  in  the  city  and  the  peasants  in  the 
surburban  villages.  Then,  appointing  Omar,  son  of  Turak- 
han,  governor  of  the  new  Turkish  province  in  the  Morea, 
he  set  out  in  the  beginning  of  the  autumn  of  1458  for 
Athens,  the  city  which  that  warrior  had  captured.1 

The  end  of  the  Italian  rule  at  Athens  had  been  marked 
by  a  domestic  tragedy  which  might  have  attracted  the 
dramatic  genius  of  her  great  classic  writers.  In  1451 — the 
same  year  that  had  witnessed  the  death  of  Mur&d  II. — died 
Nerio  II.  We  catch  a  last  characteristic  glimpse  of  him  in 
the  middle  of  that  year,  when  the   Venetian   envoy  to  the 

1  Kritoboulos,  III.,  1-9;  Doiikas,  339-40;  Historia  Politica,  31; 
Chronicon  Breve,  520  ;  Chalkokond)  les,  442-52  ;  Phrantzes,  387-8  ;  "Arias 
apudWo^ChroniqueSy  267-8;  Cambini,  152;  /Eneas  Sylvius,  Europa, 
405  ;  Magno  apud  Hopf,  op,  cit,%  200.  The  amount  of  the  tribute  given  by 
Kritoboulos  seems  more  probable  than  the  500  pieces  of  Chalkokondyles. 


436  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

new  sultan  was  directed  to  ask  that  potentate  to  urge  upon 
his  vassal,  "  the  lord  of  Sithines  and  Stives,"  the  necessity  of 
settling  the  pecuniary  claims  of  two  Venetians.1  After  the 
death  of  his  first  wife,  Maria  Melissen£,  Nerio,  like  his  brother 
Antonio,  had  married  one  of  the  daughters  of  Niccol6  Zorzi 
or  Giorgio  of  Karystos,  titular  marquis  of  Boudonitza. 
The  Duchess  Chiara — such  was  the  name  of  this  pas- 
sionate Venetian  beauty — bore  him  a  son,  Francesco, 
who  was  unfortunately  still  a  minor  at  the  time  of  his 
father's  death.  The  child's  mother  possessed  herself  of  the 
regency  and  persuaded  the  Porte,  by  the  usual  methods,  to 
sanction  her  usurpation.  Soon  afterwards,  however,  there 
visited  Athens  on  some  commercial  errand  a  young  Vene- 
tian noble,  Bartolomeo  Contarini,  whose  father  had  been 
governor  of  the  Venetian  colony  of  Nauplia.  The  duchess 
fell  in  love  with  her  charming  visitor,  and  bade  him  aspire 
to  her  hand  and  land.  Contarini  replied  that,  alas !  he  had 
left  a  wife  behind  him  in  his  palace  on  the  lagoons.  To  the 
Lady  of  the  Akropolis,  a  figure  who  might  have  stepped 
from  a  play  of  ^Eschylus,  the  Venetian  wife  was  no  obstacle. 
It  was  the  age  of  great  crimes.  Contarini  realised  that  Athens 
was  worth  a  murder,  poisoned  his  spouse,  and  returned  to 
enjoy  the  embraces  and  the  authority  of  the  duchess. 

But  the  Athenians  soon  grew  tired  of  this  Venetian 
domination.  They  complained  to  Mohammed  II.;  the 
great  sultan  demanded  explanations ;  and  Contarini  was 
forced  to  appear  with  his  stepson,  whose  guardian  he 
pretended  to  be,  at  the  Turkish  court.  There  he  found  a 
dangerous  rival  in  the  person  of  Franco  Acciajuoli,  only  son 
of  the  late  Duke  Antonio  II.  and  cousin  of  Francesco,  a 
special  favourite  of  Mohammed  and  a  willing  candidate  for 
the  Athenian  throne,  who  had  only  been  awaiting  a  favour- 
able moment  to  return.  When  the  sultan  heard  the  tragic 
story  of  Chiara's  passion,  he  ordered  the  deposition  of  both 
herself  and  her  husband,  and  bade  the  willing  Athenians 
accept  Franco  as  their  lord.  Young  Francesco  was  never 
heard  of  again ;  but  the  tragedy  was  not  yet  over.  Franco 
had  no  sooner  assumed  the  government  of  Athens,  than  he 
ordered  the  arrest  of  his  aunt  Chiara,  threw  her   into   the 

1  Jorga,  viii.,  78. 


CAPTURE  OF  ATHENS  437 

dungeons  of  Megara,  and  there  had  her  mysteriously 
murdered.  A  picturesque  legend,1  current  three  centuries 
later  at  Athens,  makes  Franco  throttle  her  with  his  own 
hands,  in  a  still  more  romantic  spot — the  monastery  of 
Daphni,  the  mausoleum  of  the  French  dukes — as  she  knelt 
invoking  the  aid  of  the  Virgin,  whereupon  he  cut  off  her 
head  with  his  sword.  So  deep  was  the  impression  which 
her  fate  made  upon  the  popular  imagination. 

The  legend  goes  on  to  tell  how  her  husband,  "the 
Admiral/'  had  come  with  many  ships  to  the  Piraeus  to 
rescue  her,  but  arrived  too  late.  Unable  to  save,  he  resolved 
to  avenge  her,  and  laid  the  grim  facts  before  the  sultan. 
Mohammed  1 1.,  indignant  at  the  conduct  of  his  prottg£y  but 
not  sorry,  perhaps,  of  a  pretext  for  destroying  the  remnants 
of  Frankish  rule  at  Athens,  ordered  Omar,  son  of  Turakhan, 
the  governor  of  Thessaly,  to  march  against  the  city.  The 
lower  town  offered  no  resistance,  for  its  modern  walls  had 
but  a  narrow  circumference,  and  its  population  and  resources 
were  scanty.  Nature  herself  seemed  to  fight  against  the 
Athenians.  On  29th  May,  the  third  anniversary  of  the 
capture  of  Constantinople,  a  comet  appeared  in  the  sky ; 
a  dire  famine  followed,  so  that  the  people  were  reduced  to 
eat  roots  and  grass.  On  4th  June  1456,  the  town  fell  into 
the  hands  of  the  Turks.2  But  the  Akropolis,  which  was 
reputed  impregnable,  long  held  out.  In  vain  the  constable 
of  Athens  and  some  of  the  citizens  offered  the  castle  to 
Venice  through  one  of  the  Zorzi  family;  the  republic 
ordered  the  bailie  of  Negroponte  to  keep  the  offer  open, 
but  took  no  steps  to  save  the  most  famous  fortress  of 
Christendom ;  in  vain  he  summoned  one  Latin  prince  after 
another  to  his  aid.  From  the  presence  of  an  Athenian  ambas- 
sador at  the  Neapolitan  court,8  we  may  infer  that  Alfonso  V. 
of  Aragon,  the  titular  "  Duke  of  Athens,"  was  among  their 

1  Kampouroglos,  MrijueTa,  III.,  141. 

2  A  contemporary  note  in  MS.,  No.  103  of  the  Liturgical  Section  of 
the  National  Library  at  Athens,  quoted  by  Kampouroglos,  Mi^/ucia,  II., 
153,  fixes  the  date  at  "May  4,  1456,  Friday,"  but  in  that  year /tun  4,  not 
May  4,  was  a  Friday,  which  agrees  with  the  date  of  June  1456  given  by 
Phrantz£s,  the  Chromcon  Breve>  the  His toria  Patriarchica,  and  in  Nerozzo 
Pitti's  petition  of  1458  in  the  Florentine  Archives  (Balie,  xxix.,  f.  67.) 

3  Archivio  Storico per  If  Prwincie  NapoUtane^  xxviii.,  203. 


438  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

number.  Dem£trios  Asan,  lord  of  Palaio-Mouchli,  who  was 
Franco's  father-in-law,  was  also  endeavouring  to  dispose  of 
his  city  to  Venice  at  this  time,  so  that  he  could  not  help 
his  kinsman ;  and  the  papal  fleet,  which  was  despatched  to 
the  iEgean,  did  not  even  put  into  the  Piraeus.  Meanwhile, 
Omar,  after  a  vain  attempt  to  seduce  the  garrison  from  its 
allegiance,  reminded  Franco  that  sooner  or  later  he  must 
restore  Athens  to  the  sultan  who  gave  it  "Now,  there- 
fore," added  the  Turkish  commander,  "  if  thou  wilt  surrender 
the  Akropolis,  His  Majesty  offers  thee  the  land  of  Bceotia, 
with  the  city  of  Thebes,  and  will  allow  thee  to  take  away 
the  wealth  of  the  Akropolis  and  thine  own  property." 
Franco  only  waited  till  Mohammed  had  confirmed  the  offer 
of  his  subordinate,  and  then  quitted  the  castle  of  Athens, 
with  his  wife  and  his  three  sons,  for  ever.  At  the  same  time, 
his  uncle,  Nerozzo  Pitti,  was  deprived  by  the  Turks  of  his 
Athenian  property,  his  castle  of  Sykaminon,  and  his  island  of 
Panaia,  or  Canaia,  the  ancient  Pyrrha,  opposite  the  mouth  of 
the  Maliac  Gulf,  and  retired  penniless  to  a  Theban  castle, 
with  his  wife  and  eleven  children.  As  compensation  for  these 
losses,  the  Florentine  Government  allowed  him  to  sell  his  house 
in  Florence,  which  was  all  that  he  had  left ;  many  others,  like 
him,  were  ruined  and  exiled.  The  last  Latin  Archbishop  of 
Athens,  Niccol6  Protimo  of  Euboea,  quitted  the  Akropolis  with 
the  duke ;  he  was  assigned  the  possessions  of  the  Latin  Patri- 
archate in  his  native  island ;  in  146 1  he  was  consoled  for  the  loss 
of  his  see  by  the  archbishopric  of  Lepanto,  which  he  held  to  his 
death  in  1483,  and  even  then  the  popes  continued  to  confer  the 
phantom  title  of  Archbishop  of  Athens  on  absentees.1  It  was 
not  till  1875  that  a  Catholic  archbishop  again  resided  at  Athens. 
Such  was  the  state  of  affairs  when  Mohammed  II.,  having 
punished  the  Despots  of  the  Morea,  arrived  at  Athens  in  the 
early  autumn  of  1458.  His  biographer,  the  Greek  Krit6boulos, 
who  became  governor  of  his  native  island  of  Imbros  under 
the  Turkish  dispensation,  tells  us  that  this  cultured  sultan, 

1  Chalkokondyles,  453-5  ;  Phrantzds,  385  ;  The  Chronicles  of  Rabbi 
Joseph,  281 ;  Historia  Politica,  25 ;  Historia  Patriarchies  97, 124;  Chronicon 
Breve,  520;  S&has,  i.,  230 ;  v.,  6;  vi.,  165;  Sansovino,  153;  /Eneas  Sylvius, 
Europa,  405;  Baphius,  De  Felicitate  Urbis  Florentia^  38;  Pagnini,  Delia 
Decima,  ii.,  251;  Ubaldini,  177-8;  Reg.  Vat  491,  f.  304;  Eubel,  ii.,  40. 


MOHAMMED  II.  AT  ATHENS  439 

who  knew  Greek,  and  whom  he  audaciously  describes  as  "  a 
philhellene,"  was  filled  with  desire  to  behold  "  the  mother  of 
the  philosophers,"  as  a  Turkish  historian  calls  Athens. 
Mohammed  had  heard  and  read  much  about  the  wisdom  and 
marvellous  works  of  the  ancient  Athenians  ;  we  may  surmise 
that  Cyriacus  of  Ancona  had  told  him  of  the  Athenian 
monuments  when  he  was  employed  as  a  reader  to  His 
Majesty  at  the  siege  of  Constantinople.  He  longed  to  visit 
the  places  where  the  heroes  and  sages  of  classic  Athens 
had  walked  and  talked,  and  at  the  same  time  to  examine 
with  a  statesman's  eye  the  position  of  the  city  and  the 
condition  of  its  harbours.  When  he  arrived  at  the  gates, 
if  we  may  believe  a  much  later  tradition,  the  abbot  of 
Kaisarian£  handed  to  him  the  keys  of  the  city — in  return 
for  which  he  ordered  that  the  famous  Byzantine  monastery 
at  the  foot  of  Hymettos,  which  had  enjoyed  complete  fiscal 
exemption  under  the  Latins,  should  never  pay  more  than  one 
sequin  to  the  Turkish  governor.1  There  is  nothing  improbable 
in  the  tradition,  for  the  abbot  was  probably  the  most  important 
Greek  ecclesiastic  left  at  Athens,  the  Metropolitan  Isidore,  a 
friend  of  Phrantz&s,  having  fled  to  the  Venetian  island  of  Tenos, 
where  his  tomb  was  discovered  near  the  foundations  of  the 
famous  E vangelistria  church  some  sixty  years  ago.2  The  sultan 
spent  four  days  in  admiring  the  monuments  and  in  visiting  the 
harbours  of  this  new  possession, "  of  all  the  cities  in  his  Empire 
the  dearest  to  him,"  as  the  Athenian  Chalkokond^les  proudly 
says.  But  of  all  that  he  saw,  he  admired  most  the  Akropolis, 
whose  ancient  and  recent  buildings  he  examined  "  with  the 
eyes  of  a  scholar,  a  philhellene,  and  a  great  sovereign."  Like 
Pedro  IV.  of  Aragon  before  him,  he  was  proud  to  possess  such 
a  jewel,  and  in  his  enthusiasm  he  exclaimed:  "How  much, 
indeed,  do  We  not  owe  to  Omar,  the  son  of  Turakhan ! " 

The  conquered  Athenians  once  again  were  saved  by 
their  ancestors.  Like  his  Roman  prototype,  Mohammed  II. 
treated  them  humanely,  though  he  carried  off  many  of  their 
women  and  children  to  his  seraglio,  he  granted  all  their 
petitions,  and  gave  them  many  and  various  privileges.  The 
contemporary  historians  do  not  tell  us  of  what  these  privileges 

1  Spon,  Voyage^  ii.,  155,  172.     Cf.  Kampoiiroglos,  *I<rropia,  II.,  21-3. 
55  Idem..  Mn7M«a,  II.,  18 ;  Phrantzgs,  203. 


440  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

consisted ;  but  there  were  Athenians  in  the  seventeenth 
century  who  could  show  patents  of  fiscal  exemption,  granted 
to  their  ancestors  by  the  conqueror.  It  is  not  improbable 
that  the  local  Greek  authorities,  the  so-called  Stj/uLoyepoin-es, 
or  "  elders  of  the  people,"  of  whom  we  found  a  trace  under 
the  rule  of  the  Acciajuoli,  and  who  are  often  mentioned  in 
the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  were  recognised  by 
Mohammed.  It  is  probable,  too,  that  the  same  statesmanlike 
sovereign,  who  converted  the  oecumenical  patriarch  into  a 
useful  instrument  of  his  far-sighted  policy,  favoured  the 
re-establishment  of  the  Orthodox  Church  in  the  position  of 
the  leading  Christian  denomination  at  Athens.  At  any  rate, 
while  the  Uniate  Archbishop  shared  the  fate  of  his  Catholic 
colleague,  we  find  a  metropolitan  of  Athens  resident  there  a 
generation  after  the  Turkish  Conquest,  and  another  is  men- 
tioned 1  as  taking  part  in  ecclesiastical  business  at  Constan- 
tinople in  1465.  But,  if  the  last  Latin  Archbishop  of  Athens 
was  turned  out  of  his  noble  cathedral  as  soon  as  the  Turks 
became  masters  of  the  Akropolis,  the  Parthenon  was  not 
for  long  restored  to  the  Greek  Church.  It  has,  indeed,  been 
assumed  from  the  practice  of  the  Turks  at  Constantinople 
and  elsewhere,  that  the  most  important  church  of  Athens 
was  immediately  devoted  to  the  worship  of  Allah.  But  two 
writers  subsequent  to  the  capture  of  Athens,  the  anonymous 
author  of  1458  and  the  anonymous  author  of  1466,  both 
distinctly  allude  to  the  Parthenon  as  still  a  church.2  Possibly 
it  may  have  been  part  of  the  wise  policy  of  Mohammed  to 
conciliate  the  Greeks  and  further  estrange  them  from  the 
Latins  by  allowing  them  to  resume,  for  a  time  at  least,  the 
use  of  their  noble  cathedral.  However  that  may  be,  ere  long 
it  was  converted  into  a  mosque,  called  in  the  early  part  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  the  Ismazdi,  or  "  house  of  prayer," 
and  soon  from  the  tapering  minaret,  which  rose  above  it, 
the  muezzin  summoned  the  faithful  to  worship.  A  like  fate 
befell  the  church  which  had  served  as  the  orthodox  cathedral 
during  the   Frankish  domination.      This  church,   now   the 

1  Kampouroglos,  M^/ielo,  i.,  358  ;  ii.,  226 ;  'ItrropJa,  ii.,  147-8 ;  Reg. 
Vat.,  469,  f.  392  ;  479,  f  H. 

2  "  t.  nel  detto  castello  una  chiessia  che  gia  fu  tempio  "  ;  Mitteilungtn 
des  k.  dcutsch,  Arch%  Institute  (Athen\  xxiv,,  73. 


ATHENS  AT  THE  CONQUEST  441 

military  bakery,  received  in  honour  of  the  sultan's  visit,  the 
name  of  Fethijeh  Jamisi,  or  "  mosque  of  the  conqueror,"  and 
still  preserves  the  traces  of  the  purpose  to  which  it  was  put 
In  its  place  the  orthodox  adopted  as  their  "  Katholik6n," 
or  metropolitan  church,  that  of  St  Pantele£mon,  which  stood 
in  the  square  where  the  public  auctions  are  now  held.1  It 
was  a  tradition  in  the  seventeenth  century  that  Mohammed  II. 
had  also  ordered,  as  a  mark  of  his  special  favour  for  Athens, 
that  the  city  should  not  be  made  the  capital  of  a  sandjak, 
or  province,  so  as  to  spare  it  the  usual  exactions  of  the 
provincial  governor's  retinue.2  But  in  1462  there  is  mention 
of  a  subassi  of  Athens,3  and  it  has  therefore  been  assumed  by 
modern  Greek  historians,  that  from  the  time  of  the  Conquest 
down  to  about  16 10  or  1621,  the  city  was  governed  by  that 
official,  who,  after  the  capture  of  Negroponte  in  1470,  was 
the  subordinate  of  the  pasha  of  that  province.  His  konak  was 
at  the  Stoa  of  Hadrian,  while  the  disdar-agay  or  commander 
of  the  garrison,  occupied  a  part  of  the  palace  of  the  Acciajuoli 
in  the  Propylaea,  and  the  Erechtheion  served  as  his  harem. 

The  anonymous  treatise  on  "  The  Theatres  and  Schools 
of  Athens,"  which  was  probably  composed  by  some  Greek 
at  this  moment,  perhaps  to  serve  as  a  vade  mecum  for  the 
sultan,  whose  eager  enquiries  about  the  meaning  and  history 
of  the  monuments  it  may  have  endeavoured  to  satisfy,  gives 
us  an  interesting,  if  unscientific,  idea  of  Athens  as  she  was 
after  two  and  a  half  centuries  of  Frankish  rule.4  The  visitor 
could  glean  from  this  curious  guide-book,  apparently  the 
work  of  a  local  antiquary,  the  popular  names  bestowed  by 
the  natives  upon  the  classical  monuments.  Thus,  the 
choragic  monument  of  Lysikrates  was  then,  as  in  the  time 
of  Michael  Akomindtos,  "the  lantern  of  Demosthenes,"  a 
name  still  current  in  1672 ;  the  Tower  of  the  Winds  was 

1  Kampouroglos,'I<rr<y>Ja,  ii.,  37, 275, 304;  Philadelpheus,  i.,  178, 273, 312. 

2  La  Guilletiere,  Athknes  Ancienm  et  Nouvelle,  157,  160. 

3  Sanudo  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  1172  ;  Malipiero,  Annali  in  Archivio 
Storico  Italiano,v\\.y  12  ;  A  <ro6ft™*y*  is  also  mentioned  in  1506  ;  Kampou- 
roglos  (ii.,  77-83),  however,  thinks  that  down  to  1470  Athens  was  the  seat 
of  a  pasha,  but  he  adduces  no  other  authorities  than  modern  historians, 
such  as  Hammer  and  Daru.     Cf.  Philadelpheus,  i.,  287-8. 

4  The  date  of  1458  or  1460  exactly  fits  the  allusion  to  "the  duke"  in 
the  past  tense,  and  to  the  Parthenon  as  a  Christian  church. 


442  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

supposed  to  be  "  the  school  of  Sokrates,"  just  as  the  caverns 
at  the  foot  of  the  hill  of  Phil6pappos  are  still  known  as  the 
philosopher's  prison;  the  gate  of  Athena  Archegetis  was 
transformed  in  common  parlance  into  "the  palace  of 
Themistokl£s " ;  the  Odeion  of  Perikl£s,  restored  in  Roman 
times,  was  shown  to  visitors  as  "  the  school  of  Aristophanes," 
and  that  of  Herodes  Atticus  as  "  the  palaces  of  Kleonides 
and  Miltiades."  Near  "the  lantern  of  Demosthenes"  the 
natives  pointed  out  to  the  curious  stranger  the  spots  where 
once  had  stood  the  houses  of  Thucydides,  Solon,  and 
Alkmaion.  "The  school  of  Aristotle"  was  placed  among 
the  ruins  of  the  theatre  of  Dionysios,  and  above  it  our 
author  mentions  the  sun-dial  and  the  two  pillars  of  the 
choragic  monument  of  Thrasyllos,  and  repeats  the  story  that 
a  Gorgon's  head  was  formerly  to  be  seen  in  an  ironbound 
niche  between  them — all  of  which  statements  are  confirmed 
by  the  similar  *  Description  of  Attica,"  probably  composed 
about  the  year  1628.1  Another  "  school,"  that  of  Sophokles, 
was  supposed  to  have  occupied  a  site  to  the  west  of  the 
Akropolis,  while  outside  the  city  the  anonymous  author 
alludes  to  the  Academy,  which  he  supposes  to  have  been  at 
Basilik£,  on  the  left  as  one  goes  down  to  Phaleron,  and  not 
at  Kathemia,  near  Kolokynthou ;  to  the  Eleatic  school  at 
Ambelokepoi ;  to  the  Platonic  at  Patesia  (or  "  Paradeisia "), 
and  to  those  of  a  certain  Polyzelos  and  Di6doros,on  Hymettos, 
whose  name  the  Italians  had  corrupted  to  "  Monte  Matto,"  or 
"  the  Mad  Mountain."  Wild  as  these  statements  are,  they  yet 
contain  important  topographical  facts.  They  prove  that  the 
ancient  deme  of  Alopeke  had  already  received  its  modern 
designation  of  Ambelokepoi ;  that  Patesia,  whose  name  has 
been  erroneously  derived  from  the  fact  of  the  "  P&dish&h  " 
having  pitched  his  headquarters  there,  was  still  known  by  its 
picturesque  name  of  "  Paradeisia  " ;  and  that  the  old  tradition 
that  two  of  the  monasteries  on  Hymettos — probably  Kaisari- 
an6  and  Ast6ri — had  once  been  schools  of  philosophers,  which 
seems  to  have  actually  been  the  case  at  the  close  of  the  fourth 
century,2  was  still  preserved.     For  the  anonymous  writer,  as 

»  Tl€pl  rijf  ArriKTft  apud  Philadelphctis,  i.,  189. 

a  SourmelSs,  Kafd<rra<m  (twohtik^  43  «.,  46,  47  ;  Syndsiosa^WMigne, 
Jxvi.,  1523. 


THE  LOCAL  LEGENDS  443 

for  Cyriacus,  the  Olympieion  was  the  ruins  of  a  palace,  and, 
like  the  traveller  from  Ancona,  he  mentions  three  gates  of 
the  city.  On  the  Akropolis  he  mistook  the  temple  of  Nike 
Apteros  for  "  a  small  school  of  musicians,  founded  by 
Pythagoras " ;  he  mentions  the  Propylaea  as  the  ducal 
palace,  with  the  former  chancery  adjoining  it ;  and  he 
elaborately  describes  the  "  Church  of  the  Mother  of  God," 
the  foundation  of  which  he  attributes  to  ApolkSs  and  Eul6gios, 
both  patriarchs  of  Alexandria  in  the  sixth  century.  Allusion 
has  already  been  made  to  his  mention  of  the  ducal  villa  of 
the  Acciajuoli  at  the  spring  of  Kallirrhoe,  and  to  the  neigh- 
bouring chapel,  where  they  were  wont  to  pray.  This 
chapel  had  now  been  converted  by  "  the  pious "  Greeks  into 
an  orthodox  church  of  St  Mary's  on  the  Rock.  Perhaps 
the  most  curious  tradition  preserved  in  this  pamphlet  is  the 
incident  taken  from  the  apocryphal  "Acts  of  St  Philip." 
The  apostle  —  such  was  the  legend  —  had  spent  two 
years  at  Athens,  whither  the  scribe  of  the  Chief  Priest l  of 
Jerusalem  followed  him  to  controvert  what  he  said.  At  last, 
the  apostolic  patience  failed,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  Athenian 
Agor£  the  saint  caused  the  earth  to  open  and  swallow  up 
his  irreverent  adversary.  A  church  of  St  Philip  was 
founded  to  commemorate  the  event,  and  this  church, 
completely  restored  in  our  own  generation,  still  preserves, 
together  with  the  quarter  to  which  it  has  given  its 
name,  the  quaint  mediaeval  legend  of  the  apostle  and  the 
scribe.  Thus,  at  the  close  of  the  Frankish  domination,  the 
ciceroni  of  Athens  had  identified  their  city  with  some  of  the 
most  famous  names,  alike  of  pagan  and  of  Christian  story. 

On  the  fifth  day  after  his  arrival,  the  heir  of  these  great 
men  left  Athens  for  Bceotia,  examining  with  his  usual  minute 
care  all  the  places  of  interest,  and  obtaining  information  about 
them.  From  Thebes — the  abode  of  his  vassal  Franco — he 
sent  a  message  to  the  terrified  bailie  of  Negroponte  that  he 
proposed  to  visit  that  city  on  the  following  day.  When  he 
reached  the  summit  of  the  Pass  of  Anephorites,  he  paused  for 
a  quarter  of  an  hour,  as  many  a  traveller  has  done  since,  to 
admire  the  magnificent  situation  of  the  great  island  spread 

1  Laborde,  i.,  17-20  ;  Kampoiiroglos,  'laropla  ii.,  299  ;  Nerofltsos  \r\ 
AfXriV,  III.,  75. 


444  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

out  like  a  map  at  his  feet — the  narrow  channel  of  the  Euripos, 
with  its  oft-changing  tide,  more  like  a  river  than  an  arm  of 
the  sea,  the  picturesque  fortress,  which  then  stood  in  mid- 
stream, and  the  bridge  which  connected  the  city  of  Negro- 
ponte  with  the  continent  The  islanders,  alarmed  at  the 
force  of  a  thousand  cavalry  which  accompanied  him,  thought 
that  their  last  hour  had  come;  they  picked  up  sufficient 
courage,  however,  to  go  out  to  meet  him  with  rich  gifts  in 
their  hands ;  the  sultan  received  them  affably,  rode  across  the 
bridge,  and  spied  out  for  himself  the  possibilities  of  capturing 
the  place.  The  information  which  he  then  gleaned  was  put 
to  good  use  when,  twelve  years  later,  he  besieged  the  city. 
Then,  the  same  day,  2nd  September,  he  returned  to  Thebes, 
whence  he  departed  on  the  morrow  for  Macedonia.1  His 
trembling  vassal  must  have  heaved  a  sigh  of  relief  when  this 
terrible  visitor  was  gone. 

Scarcely,  however,  had  he  left  Greece  than  disturbances 
again  broke  out  in  the  Morea.  In  October,  the  sultan  had 
sent  one  of  his  officials  to  complete  the  formalities  of  the 
recent  peace,  to  receive  the  oaths  of  the  two  Despots,  and  to 
demand  from  Dem^trios  the  hand  of  his  only  child,  Helene, 
and  from  Thomas  the  cession  of  the  castles  which  he  had  not 
yet  transferred  to  the  sultan's  commissioner.  Thomas 
complied  with  this  demand ;  Dem6trios  sent  Matthew  Asan 
to  ask  Mohammed  for  the  islands  of  Lemnos  and  Imbros  in 
return  for  his  daughter  and  his  principality.  According  to 
another  account,  Asan  was  instructed  to  ask  the  sultan  for 
aid  against  Thomas,  who  seemed  to  be  constitutionally 
incapable  of  learning  by  experience,  and  who,  early  in  1459, 
committed  the  double  mistake  of  attacking  his  brother  and 
revolting  against  his  suzerain. 

The  crafty  and  ambitious  officials  who  infested  the  two 
petty  courts  of  the  Morea,  among  them  the  veteran  intriguer, 
Loukines,  "  the  curse  of  the  Peloponnesians,"  as  Phrantz£s 
calls  him,  fanned  the  smouldering  embers  of  fraternal  hatred  ; 
some  of  the  Albanian  chiefs,  impatient  of  Turkish  rule  and 
anxious  to  imitate  the  deeds  of  their  great  countryman, 
Skanderbeg,  joined  with  these  Greek  counsellors  in  inciting 

1  Krit6boulos,  III.,  9  ;  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  200  ;  Chalko- 
kondyles,  547. 


CIVIL  WAR  IN  THE  MOREA  445 

Thomas  to  "  eat  his  oaths,  as  if  they  were  vegetables."  The 
connivance  of  Omar,  the  Turkish  governor,  was  suspected, 
and  the  sultan  suspended  him  from  both  his  Peloponnesian 
and  Thessalian  commands,  and  despatched  Hamsa  Zenevisi, 
"  the  carrier  of  falcons,"  a  renegade  Albanian,  to  succeed  him 
in  the  Morea.  Hamsa's  first  act  was  to  arrest  Omar  and  the 
latter's  father-in-law  Ahmed  ;  his  next  to  relieve  the  Turkish 
garrison  of  Patras,  which  was  besieged  by  Thomas's  men. 
The  successes  of  the  latter  at  the  expense  of  the  Turks  were 
confined  to  the  capture  of  Kalavryta,  for  Corinth  and  the 
other  places  which  Loukdnes  had  promised  to  win  by  treachery 
remained  true  to  the  sultan.  Demetrios,  however,  lost  one 
strong  place  after  another — Karytaina  and  St  George  in 
Arkadia,  Bordonia  and  Kastritza,  near  Sparta,  Kalamata, 
Zarnata,  Leuktron,  and  most  of  Maina ;  but  the  commanders 
of  some  of  these  castles,  instead  of  taking  the  oath  to  his 
rival,  simply  proclaimed  their  own  independence,  thus  y^t 
further  weakening  the  unhappy  country,  while  the  Albanians, 
bent  on  plunder,  increased  the  confusion  by  changing  sides 
"  thrice  a  week,"  and  deserting  now  Thomas,  now  Dem&rios, 
as  it  suited  their  purpose.  Thomas,  however,  continued  to 
hold  his  own ;  he  forestalled  his  less  active  brother  in  an 
attempt  to  capture  the  important  town  of  Leondari,  and  the 
latter  withdrew  to  his  capital  of  Mistri.  But  the  Turkish 
troops  now  arrived  at  Leondari  from  Patras,  easily  threw  into 
confusion  the  forces  of  Thomas,  who  was  more  skilled  at 
palace  intrigues  than  at  strategy,  and  blockaded  the  Despot 
in  the  town,  where  fever  and  famine  soon  made  their  appear- 
ance. Hampered,  however,  by  the  number  of  his  captives, 
the  Turkish  commander  raised  the  siege,  and,  leaving  one  of 
his  lieutenants  to  support  his  ally  Demetrios  at  Mistr&, 
repaired  to  the  sultan  to  ask  for  reinforcements.  Thus, 
Thomas  was  free  to  resume  the  offensive  against  the  Turkish 
garrisons.  A  gleam  of  common  sense  or  a  pang  of  conscience 
prompted  him  to  desist,  at  least  for  a  little,  from  attacking 
his  brother ;  in  the  church  at  Kastritza  he  met  Demetrios ; 
the  Metropolitan  of  Lacedaemonia,  clad  in  his  episcopal  cope, 
the  symbol  of  justice,  celebrated  the  Holy  Eucharist  with  all 
the  impressive  rites  of  the  Orthodox  Church ;  and  when,  in 
the  noble  language  of  the  liturgy  of  St  Chrysostom,  he  bade 


446  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

the  people  "  draw  nigh  in  the  fear  of  God,  and  with  faith  and 
love/1  the  two  brothers  approached  together,  and  swore  on  the 
Holy  Sacrament  to  keep  the  peace. 

But  even  the  most  solemn  oaths  had  long  ceased  to  bind 
the  consciences  of  the  two  Palaiol6goi.  They  were  soon 
engaged  in  a  fresh  fratricidal  war,  the  one  relying  on  Turkish 
aid,  the  other  on  a  body  of  300  Italian  foot  soldiers  sent 
by  Bianca  Visconti,  Duchess  of  Milan,  and  by  Pius  II.,  who 
wrote  to  the  rulers  of  Europe  that  "  almost  all  the  Morea  had 
risen  against  the  Turks,"  and  pointed  out  that  the  peninsula 
was  the  bulwark  of  Christendom  against  the  infidels.1  The 
sultan  ordered  Zagan  Pasha,  a  Christian  renegade  of  marked 
ability,  whom  he  had  promoted  to  be  governor  of  the  provinces 
of  Thessaly  and  the  Morea,  to  attack  Thomas.  Zagan  entered 
the  peninsula  in  March  1460,  raised  the  siege  of  Achaia,  near 
Patras,  which  the  Despot  was  bombarding,  and  compelled  him 
to  retreat  to  the  south  of  Messenia.  Finding  his  military 
operations  unsuccessful  and  his  Italian  mercenaries  dispersed, 
Thomas  now  begged  for  peace,  which  Mohammed,  anxious 
to  chastise  the  Turkoman  chief,  Usun  Has&n,  in  Asia,  was 
willing  to  grant,  on  condition  that  the  Despot  restored  any 
Turkish  forts  which  he  had  taken,  that  he  withdrew  his 
troops  from  any  which  they  were  besieging,  that  he 
agreed  to  pay  at  once  a  tribute  of  3000  gold  pieces,  and 
promised  to  appear  in  person  before  the  Turkish  envoy  at 
Corinth  within  twenty  days'  time.  Thomas  was  prepared  to 
accept  these  terms,  but,  as  his  subjects  declined  to  contribute 
the  money,  he  was  unable  to  pay.  This  final  breach  of  his 
engagements  so  infuriated  Mohammed,  that  he  postponed  his 
intended  expedition  into  Asia,  and  set  out  in  May  1460 
to  make  short  work  with  both  Despots.  He  waited  three 
days  at  Corinth  for  the  arrival  of  Dem£trios ;  but  the  latter, 
who  had  been  blockaded  with  his  family  by  his  brother  in 
Monemvasia,  sent  his  brother-in-law,  Matthew  Asan,  in  his 
stead  with  valuable  presents  to  pacify  the  sultan,  to  whom 
he  had  omitted  to  send  his  daughter  Helene,  as  stipulated. 
Mohammed,  however,  was  not  to  be  pacified ;  he  ordered 
Asan  under  arrest,  and,  instead  of  entering  the  territory  of 
Thomas,  his  open  enemy,  he  despatched  Mahmoud  Pasha 
1  Raynaldus,  x.,  198  ;  Pit.  J  I.  Commentarii  (ed.  161 4),  61-2. 


PALL  OF  MISTRA  447 

with  all  speed  to  MistrA,  whither   Dem&rios  had   gone   in 
consequence  of  the  hostilities  which  his  brother  was  carrying 
on  from  Kalamata.      Demdtrios,  on  finding  his  capital  sur- 
rounded by  the  Turks,  resolved  to  shut  himself  up  in  the 
fine  old  castle;   but  when  he  learnt  that  his  brother-in-law 
was  a  prisoner,  he  agreed  to  obey  the  summons  to  surrender, 
if  he  received  a  written  guarantee  by  the  hand  of  the  latter. 
Mahmoud  at  once  released  Asan  and  sent  him,  as  desired, 
together  with  Hamsa   Zenevisi,  in   whom   the  Despot  had 
confidence,  to  accept   his  surrender.     One   Greek   historian 
suggests   that    the    whole    affair    was    a    comedy  carefully 
arranged  beforehand,  and  that  Demdtrios  was  not  sorry  of  an 
excuse  for  getting   rid   of  his   irksome  sovereignty   in   the 
Morea  in  return  for  compensation  elsewhere.     But,  however 
that   may  be,    Mohammed,  who  arrived   on    the    morrow, 
received  him  with  the  honour  due  to  a  descendant  of  emperors, 
rose  from  his  seat  as  the  trembling  Despot  entered  his  tent, 
offered  him  his  right  hand,  gave  him  a  place  at  his  side,  and 
endeavoured  to  reassure  his  fears  by  splendid  gifts  and  still 
more  splendid  promises.     But  none  the  less  he  treated  him 
as  a  prisoner,  he  gave  him  clearly  to  understand  that  Greek 
rule  at  Mistrci  was  now  at  an  end,   and   appointed    Hamsa 
Zenevisi  governor  of  that  famous  city,  which  had  for  all  but 
two  hundred  years  been  the  capital  of  the  Byzantine  province. 
At  the  same  time,  the  sultan  reiterated  his  claim  to  the  hand 
of  the  Despot's  daughter,  who,  with  her   mother,  was  still 
sheltering  at  Monemvasia.     Is&,  son  of  the  Pasha  of  Uskub, 
and  Matthew  Asan,  were  accordingly  sent  to  demand   the 
surrender   of  the   city    and    of   the   two    princesses.      The 
Monemvasiotes  handed  over  the  imperial  ladies  to  the  envoys 
of  the  sultan  and  the  Despot ;  but,  relying  on  their  immense 
natural  defences,  animated  by  the  sturdy  spirit  of  indepen- 
dence which  had  so  long  distinguished  them,  and  inspired  by 
the  example  of  their  governor,  Manuel  Palaiologos,  they  bade 
them  tell  Mohammed  not  to  lay  sacrilegious  hands  on  a  city 
which   God   had   meant    to    be    invincible.     The   sultan   is 
reported  to  have  admired  their  courage  and  wisely  refrained 
from  attacking  the  impregnable  fastness  of  mediaeval  Hellenism. 
On  30th  May,  he  placed  the  daughter  of  Demdtrios  in  his 
seraglio,  and  despatched  her  with  her  mother,  under  charge 


448  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

of  an  eunuch,  to  Boeotia,  whither  Dem£trios  himself  was 
shortly  sent  to  join  them.  Meanwhile  he  accompanied  his 
captor.  At  this  the  governor  of  Monemvasia  transferred 
his  allegiance  to  Thomas ;  but  the  latter,  himself  a  fugitive 
and  soon  an  exile,  was  incapable  of  maintaining  his  sovereignty. 
A  passing  Catalan  corsair,  one  Lope  de  Baldaja,  was  then 
invited  to  occupy  the  place  ;  but  the  liberty-loving  inhabitants 
soon  drove  out  the  petty  tyrant  whom  they  had  summoned  to 
their  aid ;  and,  with  the  consent  of  Thomas,  placed  their  city 
under  the  protection  of  his  patron,  the  pope.  Pius  1 1,  gladly 
appointed  both  spiritual  and  temporal  governors  of  the  rock 
which  had  so  long  been  the  stronghold  of  orthodoxy.1 

Having  thus  wiped  the  province  of  Demdtrios  from  the 
map,  the  sultan  turned  his  arms  against  Thomas.  Bordonia 
was  abandoned  at  his  approach  by  its  cowardly  archons ;  but 
the  strong  fortress  of  Kastritza,  built  on  a  sheer  rock,  and 
approached  by  a  single  entrance,  and  that  fortified  by  a 
triple  wall,  for  a  time  defied  the  assault  of  the  janissaries. 
Urged  on  by  promises  of  plunder,  they  returned  to  the 
attack,  drove  the  garrison  back  into  the  Akropolis,  and 
forced  them  from  sheer  exhaustion  and  lack  of  water  to 
surrender  on  terms.  In  flagrant  violation  of  this  solemn 
convention,  Mohammed  beheaded  or  impaled  all  the  male 
survivors,  to  the  number  of  300,  ordered  the  local  chief, 
Proinokokk&s,  to  be  flayed  alive,  enslaved  the  women  and 
children,  and  levelled  the  castle  with  the  ground.  Leondari  he 
found  deserted  by  its  inhabitants,  who  had  taken  refuge  in 
the  almost  impregnable  stronghold  of  Gardiki.  After  in  vain 
offering  them  terms,  he  ordered  his  men  to  attack  the  place, 
which  resisted  for  no  more  than  a  single  day,  for  the  heat 
was  intense  and  the  crowd  of  fugitives  was  so  great  that  both 
water  and  provisions  ran  short.  Here,  again,  Mohammed 
violated  his  oath  to  spare  the  lives  of  those  who  surrendered  ; 
he  collected  the  men,  women,  and  children  together  in  a 
small  plain  to  the  number  of  6000,  bound  them  hand  and 
foot,  and  then  ordered  them  to  be  massacred  in  cold  blood. 
The  chief  men  of  the  place,  who  belonged  to  the  family  of 
Bochdles,  escaped  the  general  fate,  thanks  to  the  intercession 
of  the  Beglerbeg  Mahmoud,  who  was  connected  with  them 
1  PiL  II.  Cotnmentariiy  103-4;  Raynaldus,  x.,  241-2;  Magno,  op.  cit.>  203-4. 


FLIGHT  OF  THOMAS  449 

by  marriage,  and  made  their  way  to  Naples.  The  surrender 
of  Gardiki  was  promptly  followed  by  that  of  the  castle  of 
St  George,  whose  governor,  Kork6deilos  Klad^s,  lived  to  head 
an  insurrection  against  the  Turks  some  years  later.  One 
place  after  another  now  opened  its  gates  to  the  invaders — 
Kyparissia,  till  lately  the  residence  of  the  Despot  Thomas ; 
Karytaina ;  Androusa  and  Ithome ;  from  the  first  of  these 
cities  and  its  fertile  neighbourhood,  the  garden  of  Greece,  no 
less  than  10,000  people  were  dragged  off  to  Constantinople. 
Meanwhile,  Thomas  had  made  no  attempt  to  defend  his 
dominions.  On  the  news  of  the  sultan's  advent  at  Mistr&, 
he  had  shut  himself  up  in  the  sea-coast  town  of  Mantineia 
on  the  Messenian  Gulf,  whence  he  could  easily  escape  in 
case  of  need.  Seeing  that  all  was  lost,  and  that  Venetian 
territory  alone  remained  safe,  he  now  set  out  for  Navarino. 
But  Mohammed  began  to  inspect  the  Messenian  colonies  of 
Venice,  as  he  had  inspected  Negroponte  ;  as  he  drew  nearer, 
the  Venetian  authorities  urged  Thomas  not  to  involve  them 
in  diplomatic  difficulties  by  remaining  defiantly  in  their 
station  of  Navarino,  and  offered  him  two  ships  on  which  to 
make  his  escape.  The  terrified  Despot  thereupon  fled  to 
Marathos,  and  on  the  same  day  that  the  sultan  came  in 
sight  of  Navarino,  set  sail  with  his  wife  and  family  and  with 
some  of  his  nobles  from  the  neighbouring  harbour  of  Porto 
Longo  for  Corfii.  There  he  arrived  on  28th  July,  where, 
five  days  later,  the  faithful  Phrantzfis  joined  him.  Neither 
ever  saw  the  Morea  again. 

The  Venetians  had  good  cause  to  fear  that  the  anger  of 
the  sultan  would  now  fall  upon  their  colony.  They  were,  it 
is  true,  at  peace  with  Mohammed,  but  he  had  just  shown 
his  disregard  of  international  law  by  killing  some  of  the 
people  of  Modon  who  had  come  out  to  him  with  a  flag  of 
truce,  and  by  annexing  some  Venetian  villages  on  the  ground 
that  they  had  belonged  to  the  Greeks  and  were  therefore 
his.  The  authorities  of  Navarino  accordingly  hastened  to 
renew  the  treaty  with  the  conqueror  and  endeavoured  to 
mollify  him  by  the  offer  of  hospitality — an  offer  which  did 
not  restrain  his  horsemen  from  making  an  incursion  into  the 
town  and  slaying  a  number  of  Albanians  from  the  surround- 
ing districts.     Then  the  sultan  marched  away  to  the  North, 

2  F 


I 


450  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

accompanied  by  Matthew  Asan,  while  Dem6trios,  for  whom 
Mohammed  had  no  further  use,  was  sent  to  join  his  family 
in  Boeotia.  Meanwhile,  Zagan  Pasha  had  been  busily 
occupied  in  the  west  of  the  peninsula.  Chloumoiitsi  fell ; 
and  Santameri,  the  famous  castle  of  Nicholas  III.  de  St 
Omer,  which  was  held  by  some  Albanians,  and  in  which 
most  of  the  neighbours  had  deposited  all  their  valuables, 
surrendered  on  terms.  Next  day,  however,  the  Illyrian 
apostate  broke  the  convention,  slew  many  of  the  inhabitants, 
and  enslaved  the  rest — an  act  of  treachery  which  was  also  a 
political  blunder,  for  it  inspired  the  other  garrisons,  which 
still  held  out,  with  the  courage  of  despair.  Zagan  might 
plead  that  he  was  only  imitating  his  master,  for  Mohammed 
had  ordered  the  flaying  of  his  old  Albanian  opponent  Doxas, 
or  Doxies,  now  captain  of  Kalavryta,  who  had  played  fast 
and  loose  with  both  Greeks  and  Turks.  But  the  sultan  saw 
his  officer's  mistake,  and  at  once  tried  to  undo  it  by 
depriving  Zagan  of  his  command,  and  by  ordering  the 
release  of  the  captives  of  Santameri.  This  politic  act  had 
the  desired  result ;  most  of  the  forts  round  Patras  hastened 
to  surrender ;  and  when  the  sultan  arrived  there  almost  the 
only  place  which  still  held  out  was  Salmenikon,  a  very 
strong  mountain  fortress  between  Patras  and  Vostitza 
defended  by  Graitzas  Palaiol6gos,  who  if  not  a  genuine  son 
of  the  imperial  race,  proved  himself  far  worthier  of  the  name 
than  the  two  miserable  Despots.  This  courageous  soldier 
paid  no  heed  to  the  sultan's  summons  to  capitulate ;  in  vain 
the  Turkish  gunners  bombarded  the  place,  in  vain  the 
janissaries  marched  to  the  assault.  After  a  seven  days' 
siege,  the  enemy,  however,  cut  off  the  water  supply,  and 
the  lower  town,  crowded  with  Greek  and  Albanian  fugitives, 
then  surrendered;  some  6000  captives  swelled  the  train  of 
the  conqueror,  who  set  aside  the  promising  boys  for  his 
corps  of  janissaries,  and  distributed  the  others  among  his 
captains.  Still  Palaiol6gos  held  the  Akropolis  of  the  town, 
and  declined  to  yield  unless  the  sultan  would  move  a 
stage  away  from  it  Mohammed  agreed,  and  marched 
down  to  Vostitza,  leaving  Hamsa  Zenevisi,  whom  he  had 
appointed  in  Zagan's  room,  to  take  over  the  place.  But, 
after  the  lesson  of  Santameri,  the  Greek  commander  had 


ANNEXATION  OF  THE  MOREA  451 

little  confidence  in  Turkish  oaths;  he  therefore  resolved  to 
make  a  preliminary  trial  of  Hamsa's  sincerity,  and  sent  out 
a  detachment  of  the  garrison  laden  with  baggage,  to  see 
whether  the  Turks  would  allow  them  a  free  passage.  The 
temptation  to  attack  and  plunder  them  proved  too  strong 
for  the  Pasha;  he  broke  his  sovereign's  pledge,  with  the 
result  that  Palaiol6gos  refused  to  surrender.  The  angry 
sultan  now  re-appointed  Zagan  governor  of  Thessaly  and 
the  Morea,  but  Salmenikon  still  held  out.  At  last,  in  1461, 
after  a  year's  siege,  the  gallant  commander  capitulated,  and 
made  his  way,  with  all  the  honours  of  war,  into  Venetian 
territory  at  Lepanto.  Such  was  the  admiration  which  he 
inspired  in  his  opponents,  that  the  Grand  Vizier  Mahmoud 
was  heard  to  exclaim :  "  I  found  many  slaves  in  the  Morea, 
but  this  was  the  only  man."  The  Venetian  senate  received 
with  gladness  so  courageous  a  soldier,  and  appointed  him 
commander  of  all  the  light  horse  of  the  republic  It  is  from 
him  that  the  Athenian  Palaiol6goi,  of  whom  we  hear  a 
century  later,  were  perhaps  descended. 

From  Vostitza  the  sultan  set  out  to  Corinth,  by  way  of 
Lake  Pheneos  and  Phlious.  Treacherous  to  the  last,  he 
issued  a  proclamation  granting  a  full  pardon  to  all  who 
would  lay  down  their  arms  and  provide  his  soldiers  with 
provisions,  and  then  seized  those  who  trusted  him.  Phlious 
he  thought  it  necessary  to  overrun,  because  the  Albanians 
had  collected  all  their  belongings  there,  and  had  been 
followed  by  many  kindred  spirits,  who  were  ready  to  revolt  at 
a  signal  from  them.  Then,  leaving  Zagan  behind  him  to 
make  a  tour  of  the  conquered  Morea  and  to  re-organise  a 
government,  Mohammed  recrossed  the  isthmus  in  the  late 
summer  of  1460.  His  campaign  had  been  a  complete 
success.  He  had  finally  destroyed  the  last  vestiges  of  Greek 
rule  in  the  peninsula,  and  had  annexed  the  whole  of  it  to  the 
Turkish  Empire,  save  where  the  Venetian  banner  still  waved 
over  the  colonies  of  Nauplia,  Argos,  and  Thermisi,  Coron, 
Modon,  and  Navarino,  and  where  Monemvasia  acknowledged 
the  sway  of  the  pope.  His  Greek  biographer  tells  us  that 
nearly  250  forts  had  fallen  before  him,  and  he  had  carried  off 
thousands  of  the  inhabitants,  including  many  of  the  men  of 
wealth,  to  Constantinople — the  adults  to  repopulate  his  capital, 


452  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

the  boys  to  serve  in  the  corps  of  janissaries.  The  rest  of  the 
leading  men  fled  to  the  Venetian  colonies,  and  thus  the  country, 
deprived  of  its  natural  leaders,  lay  at  the  feet  of  the  conqueror.1 
The  fate  of  the  Palaiol6goi  deserves  the  notice  which 
mankind  usually  bestows  upon  sovereigns  in  exile. 
Dem£trios  received  from  Mohammed  the  islands  of  Imbros 
and  Lemnos,  which  his  friend,  the  historian  Krit6boulos,  had 
been  the  means  of  securing  for  the  Turks,  together  with  a 
portion  of  Thasos  and  Samothrace,  and  the  valuable  mart 
and  salt-mines  of  iEnos.  These  possessions,  which  had 
belonged  to  the  great  Genoese  family  of  Gattilusio,  brought 
in  600,000  aspers  a  year,  in  addition  to  which  Dem£trios 
received  an  annuity  of  300,000  more  from  the  mint  at 
Adrianople.  He  was  thus  able  to  spend  his  time  in  riotous 
living  and  hunting  till  he  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  incur  the 
sultan's  anger.  If  we  may  believe  the  story  of  Phrantz£s, 
a  bitter  enemy  of  Matthew  Asan,  that  individual,  who  had 
accompanied  his  brother-in-law  to  ;Enos,  was  accused  of 
embezzling  money  from  the  salt-works  by  the  sultan,  who 
not  only  threatened  him  with  impalement,  but  suspected 
Dem£trios  of  being  his  accomplice,  and  deprived  him  of  all 
his  allowance,  except  just  sufficient  to  keep  body  and  soul 
together.  A  later  writer,  however,  considers  Dem£trios  to 
have  been  the  culprit,  and  says  that  he  was  only  saved  from 
execution  by  the  intervention  of  Mahmoud  Pasha.  One  day, 
however,  when  Mohammed  was  hunting,  he  met  the  poor 
exile  on  foot,  and  was  so  deeply  moved  at  the  sight  that  he 
gave  him  a  sum  of  50,000  aspers  from  the  proceeds  of  the  corn- 
tax,  much  less  than  what  he  had  enjoyed,  but  still  enough  to 
live  on.  In  1470  the  Despot  ended  his  pitiable  career  as  a  monk, 
David  by  name,  at  Adrianople,  and  as  his  daughter  never 
married  Mohammed  after  all — for  the  sultan  feared  that  she 
might  poison  him — this  branch  of  the  family  became  extinct* 

1  Chalkokondyles,  455-9*  470-85  ;  Phrantzds,  388-97,  405-9 ;  Doukas, 
340;  Chronkon  Breve,  521;  Krit6boulos,  iii.,  14,  15,  19-24;  Hisioria 
Politico,  32-3;  Magno,  op.  cit,  201,  203,  204  ;  Sansovino,  op.  cit.,  152, 
156  ;  Krit6boulos,  the  apologist  of  Mohammed,  makes  no  mention  of  the 
sultan's  acts  of  perfidy.  For  the  Athenian  Palaiol6goi,  cf.  Kampou- 
roglos,  Mi^iicta,  i.,  89  ;  iii.,  251-6. 

2  Krit6boulos,  iii.,  14,  15,  24  ;  Phrantzds,  413-14,  427-9,  447  ;  Chalko- 
kondylcs, 469,  483,  494 ;  Spandugino,  43-4  ;  Hisioria  Politico,  35-6. 


THOMAS  IN  ROME  453 

The  sultan  was  naturally  anxious  to  get  Thomas  as  well 
as  Dem£trios  into  his  clutches,  in  order  to  prevent  him 
intriguing  with  the  Western  Powers  against  the  Turkish 
Empire.  He  therefore  sent  an  agent  to  Corfii  with  a  request 
that  the  Despot  would  depute  one  of  his  archons  to  treat  of 
peace  and  to  arrange  for  an  appanage,  on  which  Thomas 
could  live.  But  when  the  Despot's  emissary  arrived  at  the 
sultan's  headquarters  with  a  proposal  to  exchange  Monem- 
vasia  for  another  sea-coast  place,  the  latter  flung  him  into 
prison,  and  only  released  him  in  order  that  he  might  convey 
to  his  master  Mohammed's  command  that  either  Thomas 
or  one  of  his  sons  should  appear  in  person.  Meanwhile, 
Thomas  had  despatched  George  Raoul  to  seek  the  aid  of 
Pope  Pius  II.,  and  on  16th  November,  1460,  set  out  for 
Ancona,  accompanied  by  most  of  his  magnates,  and  bearing 
the  head  of  St  Andrew,  which  had  so  long  been  preserved 
at  Patras.  The  relic  was  a  valuable  asset,  for  many  princes 
offered  large  sums  for  it,  and  its  possessor  had  no  difficulty 
in  disposing  of  it  to  the  pope  in  return  for  an  annuity.  The 
precious  relic  was  deposited  for  safety  in  the  castle  of  Narni, 
while  Thomas  proceeded  to  Rome,  where  Pius  II.  bestowed 
on  him  the  Golden  Rose,  the  symbol  of  virtue,  a  lodging  in 
the  Santo  Spirito  Hospital,  and  an  allowance  of  300  gold 
pieces  a  month,  to  which  the  cardinals  added  200  more — a 
sum  which  his  followers  considered  barely  enough  for  his 
maintenance,  and  certainly  not  enough  for  theirs.  Venice, 
indeed,  contributed  a  sum  of  500  ducats  to  his  treasury,  and 
concluded  a  treaty  with  him  against  the  Turks,  but  there 
were  no  practical  results  of  this  alliance.  Meanwhile,  on 
1 2th  April,  1462,  the  day  after  Palm  Sunday,  Pius  II. 
received  the  head  of  St  Andrew  at  the  Ponte  Milvio,  on  the 
spot  where  the  little  chapel  of  that  Apostle  with  its  com- 
memorative inscription  now  stands.  Cardinal  Bessarion 
handed  the  case  containing  it  to  the  pope,  who  bade  the  sacred 
skull  welcome  among  its  relatives,  the  Romans, "  the  nephews 
of  St  Peter" — a  ceremony  depicted  on  the  tomb  of  the 
Pontiff  in  Sant'  Andrea  della  Valle.  Shortly  afterwards, 
the  Despot's  wife,  who  had  remained  with  her  family  at  Corfii, 
died  and  was  buried  in  the  church  of  SS.  Jason  and 
Sosipater,  whereupon  Thomas  summoned  his  two  sons  and. 


* 


454  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

his  daughter  Zoe  to  join  him.  But  before  they  arrived,  he  died, 
on  1 2th  May  1465,  and  was  buried  in  the  crypt  of  St  Peter's ; 
but  so  completely  has  this  scion  of  an  imperial  race  been  for- 
gotten that  no  one  knows  his  grave ;  yet  every  visitor  to  Rome 
unconsciously  gazes  on  his  features,  for  on  account  of  his  tall 
and  handsome  appearance  he  served  as  a  model  for  the  statue 
of  St  Paul,  which  still  stands  at  the  steps  of  St  Peter's.1 

The  family  of  Palaiol6gos  was  now  represented  by  his 
two  sons  and  his  two  daughters.  The  elder  daughter,  Helene, 
widow  of  the  last  Despot  of  Servia,  resided  at  the  court  of  her 
son-in-law,  Leonardo  III.,  at  Sta.  Mavra,  and  a  local  legend, 
devoid  of  historical  accuracy,  ascribes  to  her  the  erection  of 
the  church  whence  the  town  received  its  name,  in  gratitude 
for  the  deliverance  of  herself  and  her  daughter  from  ship- 
wreck on  3rd  May,  the  day  of  Sta.  Mavra.2  There  she  died 
as  the  nun  Hypomon6  in  1474,  leaving  two  other  daughters, 
one  of  whom  died  childless,  while  the  third  married  the  son 
of  the  Albanian  hero,  Skanderbeg,  in  whose  descendants,  and 
in  those  of  the  Tocchi,  there  thus  flowed  the  blood  of  the 
Palaiol6goi.  Thomas's  younger  daughter,  Zoe,  or  Sophia,  was 
married  first  to  a  Caracciolo,  and  then  to  the  Grand  Duke 
Ivan  III.  of  Russia,  to  whom  she  brought  a  dowry  of  6000 
gold  pieces,  provided  by  Pope  Sixtus  IV. — an  event  com- 
memorated by  one  of  the  paintings  in  the  Santo  Spirito 
Hospital  With  her  daughter,  the  wife  of  Alexander  Jagellon 
of  Poland,  the  female  line  came  to  an  end.  The  two  sons 
do  not  seem  to  have  profited  much  by  the  strict  injunctions 
which  Bessarion  had  laid  down  for  their  education.  The 
elder,  Andrew,  who  bore  the  empty  title  of  Despot,  which  we 
find  on  his  seals,8  and  continued  to  draw  his  father's  allowance 
from  the  pope,  fell  into  dissolute  habits,  and  married  a  woman, 
named  Catherine,  off  the  streets  of  Rome,  by  whom  he  had  no 
children.  In  such  company,  and  with  scarcely  a  rag  to  clothe 
his  limbs,  he  aroused  the  pity  or  contempt  of  the  Romans.  His 
annuity  was  reduced ;  he  had  to  take  a  back  place  at  papal 

1  Phrantzgs,  409-13,  415  ;  Chalkokondyles,  485  ;  Pit.  II.  Commentariiy 
130,  192  sqq. ;  Spandugino,  42-3  ;  Eroli,  Miscellanea  Storica  JVarnese,  i., 
70 ;  Ciacconius,  Vita  Pontificum,  II.,  1076 ;  Fortini,  Solenne  Ricevimento 
della  Testa  di  S*.  Andrea  Apostolo.  a  Petritz6poulos,  op.  ciL>  48. 

3  *Sios  'EXKrjvotivjuup,  I.,  426  ;  Gottlob,  A  us  dcr  Camera  Apostolica,  292. 


END  OF  THE  PALAIOLOGOI  455 

ceremonies.  Once  he  was  seized  with  the  idea  of  recovering  the 
Morea  with  Neopolitan  aid,  and  induced  Sixtus  IV.  to  give  him 
2000  gold  pieces  for  the  purpose ;  but  in  1494  he  ceded  all  his 
rights  to  Charles  VIII.  of  France,  and  in  his  last  will  and 
testament  in  1 502,  he  left  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  of  Castille  his 
heirs.  In  that  year  he  died  in  Rome  in  such  great  misery  that 
his  widow  had  to  beg  his  funeral  expenses  from  the  pope.1  His 
younger  brother,  Manuel,  a  man  of  more  spirit,  preferred  the 
risk  of  death  at  the  hands  of  the  sultan  to  the  prospect  of  starv- 
ing at  the  papal  court.  But  to  his  surprise  Mohammed  gave 
him  an  establishment  and  a  daily  sum  for  its  maintenance.2  He 
remained  a  Christian,  as  did  his  elder  son,  who  died  young ; 
but  his  second  son,  Andrew,  became  a  Mussulman  and  is  last 
heard  of  as  Mohammed  Pasha  in  the  reign  of  Suleyman  the 
Magnificent  Though  the  family  of  the  Despots  of  the  Morea 
would  thus  appear  to  have  been  long  extinct,  a  Cornish 
antiquary  announced  in  1815  that  the  church  of  Landulph 
contained  a  monument  to  one  of  Thomas's  descendants. 
But  this  claim  is  genealogically  unsound,  for  there  is  no 
historical  proof  of  the  existence  of  the  supposed  third  son  of 
the  Despot,  mentioned  in  the  brass  plate  at  Landulph.3  But 
after  all,  the  world  has  not  lost  much  by  the  extinction  of  the 
race,  which,  if  it  vainly  tried  to  save  Constantinople  by  an  act 
of  heroism,  foolishly  lost  the  Morea  by  its  dissensions. 

The  faithful  retainers  of  the  Palaiol6goi,  disgusted  at  the 
prospects  offered  them  in  Rome,  scattered  all  over  Europe. 
Many  followed  the  Grand  Duchess  Sophia  to  Russia,  where 
they  became  absorbed  in  the  Muscovite  nobility  ;  some  went 
to  France ;  others  to  Venice  or  Palermo ;  others  again,  like 
Nicholas  Melissen6s,  the  fianci  of  Phrantzds's  daughter,  to 
Crete.  The  historian  had  declined  to  accompany  his  master 
to  Rome ;  he  remained  in  Corfu,  moving  from  one  village  to 
another,  till  he  finally  settled  down  in  the  monastery  of  SS. 
Jason  and  Sosipater.  A  visit  to  the  Despot  Andrew  in  Rome 
at  the  time  of  his  sister's  first  engagement,  and  a  summons 
from  the  widowed  Princess  of  Servia  to  the  court  of  Leonardo 

1  Phrantzgs,  424-5,  450 ;  J.  Volaterranus,  Diarium  Romanum,  apud 
Muratori,  xxiii.,  157  ;  Af/tnoires  de  PAcaddmie  des  Inscriptions,  xvii.,  572  ; 
^urita,  A  nates,  v.,  210.  2  Historia  Politico,  34  ;  Spandugino,  43. 

3  Archccologia,  xviii.,  83  sqq. 


1 


456  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

Tocco  at  Sta.  Mavra,  broke  the  monotony  of  his  life.  At 
last,  the  busy  diplomatist,  his  career  closed,  became  a  monk, 
under  the  name  of  Greg6rios,  and  in  his  silent  cell  occupied 
himself  with  composing,  at  the  request  of  some  noble 
Corfiotes,  the  story  of  his  troublous  times,1  till  at  last  he  was 
laid  to  rest  by  the  side  of  his  master's  consort  in  the  quiet 
church  at  Kastrddes.  Phrantzfis  did  not  write  without  anger 
or  bias ;  but  he  has  given  us  a  living  picture  of  the  leading 
actors  in  the  tragic  drama  in  which  he  too  had  played  a  part 
And  to-day,  beside  the  tomb  of  mediaeval  Greece's  last 
contemporary  historian,  the  friend  of  the  young  Greek 
kingdom  may  meditate  on  the  causes  which  for  nearly  four 
centuries  placed  the  Greeks  beneath  the  sway  of  the  Turks. 
The  fall  of  the  two  Greek  principalities  in  the  Morea 
was  closely  followed  by  the  destruction  of  the  fragments  that 
remained  of  the  duchy  of  Athens.  On  his  way  back  from 
the  peninsula  in  1460,  Mohammed  II.  revisited  Athens  and 
reinspected  the  old  city  and  the  harbours.  Unfortunately, 
the  janissaries  stationed  on  the  Akropolis  told  him  that  some 
Athenians  had  conspired  to  restore  Franco.  The  sultan  not 
only  arrested  ten  of  the  richest  citizens  and  took  them  away 
to  Constantinople,  but  resolved  to  rid  himself  of  his  former 
favourite.  Franco,  as  the  man  of  the  Turk,  was  at  the 
moment  serving  with  his  Boeotian  cavalry  in  Mohammed's 
camp,  and  received  orders  from  his  suzerain  to  join  in  the 
attack  which  was  about  to  be  made  on  Leonardo  III.  Tocco 
in  western  Greece.  The  "  Lord  of  Thebes "  so  strongly 
objected  to  being  compelled  to  fight  against  his  fellow- 
Christians,  that,  though  he  received  as  large  revenues  from 
Thebes  and  Livadia  as  he  had  ever  had  from  Athens,  he  had 
written  to  Francesco  Sforza  of  Milan  offering  his  services  as 
a  condottiere  for  the  sum  of  10,000  ducats  a  year.2  He  was 
forced,  however,  to  obey  the  sultan's  orders,  and,  after 
defeating  Tocco,  repaired  to  the  headquarters  of  Zagan,  the 
governor  of  the  Morea.  Zagan  had  meanwhile  been  told  by 
Mohammed  to  kill  him.  The  Pasha  invited  him  to  his  tent, 
and  detained  him  in  conversation  till  nightfall ;  then,  as  the 
unsuspecting  Franco  was  on  his  way  back  to  his  own  tent, 
1  Phrantz^s,  411,  424,  425,  429,  43°,  453- 

*   Xtot  'EXXl/KO/il'^Wir,   j.,  2l6-l8. 


END  OF  THE  ACCIAJUOLI  457 

the  Pasha's  guards  strangled  him.  Such  was  the  sorry 
ending  of  the  last  "  Lord  of  Thebes."  Thereupon,  Moham- 
med annexed  Thebes  and  all  Boeotia,  and  thus  obliterated 
the  last  trace  of  the  Frankish  duchy  of  Athens  from  the  map. 
Franco's  three  sons,  Matteo,  Jacopo,  and  Gabriele,  with  their 
mother,  were  taken  to  Constantinople  and  enrolled  in  the 
corps  of  janissaries,  where  one  of  them  afterwards  showed 
military  and  administrative  ability  of  so  high  an  order  as  to 
win  the  favour  of  his  sovereign.  Their  mother,  a  daughter  of 
Dem&rios  Asan  of  Mouchli,  and  famed  for  her  beauty, 
became  the  cause  of  a  terrible  tragedy,  which  convulsed  alike 
court  and  church.  George  Amoiroiitses,  the  former  minister 
and  betrayer  of  the  last  Emperor  of  Trebizond,  fell  desperately 
in  love  with  the  fair  widow,  to  whom  he  addressed  impas- 
sioned verses,  and  swore,  though  he  had  a  wife  still  living,  to 
marry  her  or  die.  The  oecumenical  patriarch  forbade  the 
bans,  and  lost  his  beard  and  his  office  rather  than  yield  to 
the  sultan.  But  swift  retribution  fell  upon  the  bigamist,  for 
he  dropped  down  dead,  a  dice-box  in  his  hand.1 

Though  the  Acciajuoli  dynasty  had  thus  fallen  for  ever, 
members  of  that  great  family  still  remained  in  Greece.  An 
Acciajuoli  was  made  civil  governor  of  the  old  Venetian  colony 
of  Coron,  in  Messenia,  when  the  Spaniards  captured  it  from 
the  Turks  in  1532.  When  they  abandoned  it,  he  accom- 
panied them,  but  was  captured  by  an  Algerine  pirate,  who  sold 
him  as  a  slave  to  a  Greek.  Eventually  he  was  re-sold  to  a 
Spaniard,  only  to  die  in  poverty  at  Naples,  where  his  race  had 
first  risen  to  eminence,  and  where  it  became  extinct.2  At  the 
beginning  of  the  last  century  the  French  traveller,  Pouque- 
ville,8  was  shown  at  Athens  a  donkey-driver  named  Neri, 
in  whose  veins  flowed  the  blood  of  the  Florentine  dukes ; 
and  the  modern  historian  of  Christian  Athens,  Nerofltsos,  used 
to  contend  that  his  family  was  descended  from  Nerozzo  Pitti, 
lord  of  Sykaminon  and  uncle  of  the  last  duke  of  Athens.4     In 

1  Chalkokondyles,  483-  4  ;  Historia  Patriarchies  97-100 ;  Spandugino, 
44;  Ubaldini,  178-9,  AeXWo*  rfjs  fR0vo\oyunji  'Brcu/rfaf,  II.,  281-2  ;  The 
Chronicles  of  Rabbi  Joseph^  281-2. 

2  Lilta,  viii.,  Tab.  4. 

-  Voyage  dans  la  Grke,  iv.,  90. 

4  Kampouroglos,  Mrwuia,  i.,  289-92  ;  'laropia,  ii.,  45. 


458  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

Florence  the  family  became  extinct  only  so  recently  as  1834; 
and  the  Certosa  and  the  Lung*  Arno  Acciajuoli  still  preserve 
its  memory  there.  In  the  Florence  gallery,  too,  are  two 
coloured  portraits  of  the  dukes  of  Athens,  which  would  seem 
to  be  those  of  Nerio  I.  and  the  bastard  Antonio  I.  In  that 
case,  the  Florentine  dukes  of  Athens  are  the  only  Frankish 
rulers  of  Greece,  except  the  palatine  counts  of  Cephalonia, 
whose  likeness  has  been  preserved  to  posterity. 

Thus  ended  the  strange  connection  between  Florence  and 
Athens.  A  titular  duke  of  Athens  had  become  tyrant  of  the 
Florentines,  a  Florentine  merchant  had  become  Duke  of 
Athens ;  but  the  age  when  French  and  Italian  adventurers 
could  find  an  El  Dorado  on  the  poetic  soil  of  Greece  was 
over. 

The  Turkish  conquest  of  continental  Greece  was  com- 
pleted by  the  campaign  against  Leonardo  III.  Tocco,in  which 
the  unhappy  Franco  had  been  forced  to  take  part  For 
several  years,  in  spite  of  an  occasional  dispute  with  his 
Venetian  protectors,  the  Duke  of  Leucadia  had  enjoyed 
peace  in  his  islands,  while  the  three  points  which  he  still  held 
on  the  mainland  remained  unmolested  by  his  Turkish  neigh- 
bours. But  he  was  so  patriotic  or  so  impolitic  as  to  second 
Skanderbeg  in  his  rising  against  the  Turks,  and  this  brought 
down  upon  him  the  vengeance  of  the  sultan.  According  to 
one  account,  he  was  taken  prisoner  at  Corinth,  whence  he 
escaped  by  the  aid  of  a  corsair  to  Sta.  Mavra ;  but  he  lost  the 
last  of  his  continental  possessions,  except  the  strong  fortress 
of  Vonitza  on  the  Ambrakian  Gulf.  When,  three  years  later, 
he  heard  that  Venice  was  preparing  to  recover  the  Morea 
from  the  Turks,  he  begged  the  aid  of  the  republic,  whose 
honorary  citizen  he  was,  in  reconquering  the  old  Despotat  of 
Arta,  where  he  still  possessed  many  adherents.  This  scheme, 
however,  came  to  nothing.1 

To  complete  the  picture  of  continental  Greece  as  she  was 
at  the  date  of  the  Turkish  Conquest,  it  remains  to  describe 
the  condition  of  the  Venetian  colonies.  North  of  the 
isthmus,  Lepanto,  for  which  the  republic  continued  to  pay  an 
annual  tribute  of  100  gold  ducats  to  the  sultan,  had  increased 

1  Magno,  201  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali^  v.,  131  ;  Lunzi,  Delia  Con- 
dizioncy  178-81. 


i 


STATE  OF  EUBGEA  459 

in  population  owing  to  the  immigration  of  fugitives  from  the 
Despotat  of  Arta  and  from  the  Morea.  These  immigrants, 
mostly  Albanians,  had  their  own  chief,  and  obtained  exemp- 
tion from  obnoxious  corvies  on  their  boats  and  beasts  of 
burden.  But  an  earthquake  and  the  cost  of  repairing  the 
fortifications  unfortunately  made  it  necessary  to  reduce  the 
garrison  and  thus  diminished  Venetian  influence  in  Epiros.1 
Both  Lepanto  and  Pteleon,  the  Venetian  station  at  the 
entrance  of  the  Gulf  of  Volo,  were  now  surrounded  by  the 
Turkish  empire,  so  that  their  position  was  naturally  precarious. 
It  had  been  decided  that  the  garrison  of  Pteleon  should  be 
Italian,  and  that  a  citizen  of  Eubcea  who  knew  Greek  and 
was  acquainted  with  Thessaly  should  be  its  rector,  and,  as 
we  saw,  the  post  was  held  for  seven  years  by  Niccold  Zorzi, 
son  of  the  last  Marquis  of  Boudonitza ;  but  after  his  time,  the 
old  system  of  appointing  a  governor  direct  from  Venice  was 
adopted.2  The  five-mile  frontage  on  the  mainland  opposite 
Euboea  is  mentioned  as  still  belonging  to  Venice  in  1439, 
but  its  cultivation  was  of  doubtful  advantage  to  the  islanders, 
because,  though  corn  could  now  be  exported  in  large  quantities, 
their  peasants  were  constantly  surprised  while  at  work  by 
the  Turks. 

Of  the  great  island  itself  the  republic  had  been  practically 
absolute  mistress  ever  since  the  disappearance  of  the  Dalle 
Carceri  and  Ghisi  families  towards  the  end  of  the  last 
century.  When  the  three  great  baronies  then  became 
vacant,  the  Venetian  bailie  disposed  of  them  as  seemed 
most  to  the  interest  of  his  Government,  bestowing  the  third 
of  the  Ghisi  upon  a  number  of  small  holders,  and  the  two- 
thirds  of  the  Dalle  Carceri  upon  Januli  d'Anoe,  whose  family 
retained  its  share  till  the  Turkish  Conquest,  and  upon  Maria 
Sanudo,  whose  share  descended  to  the  Sommaripa  of  Paros. 
But  all  these  feudal  lords,  like  the  Zorzi  of  Karystos,  were  the 
creatures  of  the  republic,  and  the  real  governor  of  the  island 
was  the  Venetian  bailie.  All  the  fortresses  in  D'Anoe's 
barony,  for  example,  were  garrisoned  by  Venetian  troops; 
it  was  to  Venice  that  his  vassals  appealed  for  justice,  and 
every  four  months  the  baron  himself  was  bound  to  present 

1  Sdthas,  i.,  213 ;  v.,  2-5  ;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatariutn,  ii., 
345,  3S3.  -  Sathas,  iii.,  223,  43<>>  452,  455- 


460  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

himself  at  Negroponte  with  two  good  horses  and  an  esquire.1 
Next  to  the  republic,  the  most  important  person  in  the 
colony  was  the  titular  patriarch  of  Constantinople — a  dignity 
still  connected  with  the  see  of  Negroponte.  In  1426,  we  are 
told  that  he  owned  a  quarter  of  the  island  and  that  he  had 
many  serfs,  but  that  he  shirked  his  share  of  the  public 
burdens.*  After  the  peace  of  1430  between  Venice  and  the 
sultan,  the  island  enjoyed  a  brief  revival  of  prosperity,  and 
the  lamentations  of  the  colonists  were  less  loud.  A  pro- 
tective measure  to  encourage  the  local  wine  trade  proved 
most  beneficial,  and  the  famous  plain  of  Lilanto,  which  a 
special  official,  the  potamarch,  was  bound  to  keep  irrigated, 
was  then  called  "  the  life  of  this  island,  the  eye  and  garden 
of  Negroponte,"  as  it  still  is.8  Care,  too,  was  taken  to 
humour  the  Jews,  who  were  the  chief  merchants  and  who 
bore  the  chief  burden  of  taxation,  and  their  ghetto  at  the 
capital  was  enlarged.  Originally,  they  had  lived  outside 
the  city ;  but  they  had  entered  the  walls  for  greater  security ; 
in  1355  the  ghetto  had  been  assigned  to  them,  and  finally, 
in  1440,  their  numbers  had  so  much  increased  that  its 
boundaries  were  extended,  with  the  proviso  that  if  they 
dwelt  beyond  a  certain  tower  they  would  forfeit  their  houses 
and  be  banished  for  ever.  Orders,  too,  were  given  that  the 
ghettos  at  Karystos  and  Oreos  were  to  be  repaired,  that  the 
law  should  be  equal  for  them  and  the  Christians,  and  that  the 
public  hangman  should  no  longer  be  chosen  from  among 
them.4  But  there  were  signs  that  the  island  was  declining. 
The  harbours  of  Negroponte  and  Karystos  became  choked 
with  sand;  the  walls  needed  repair;  the  plague  made  such 
havoc,  that  the  vassals  of  Karystos  were  reduced  to  between 
two  and  three  thousand;  Catalan  corsairs  still  infested  the 
coasts ;  the  Albanian  immigrants  were  becoming  restive ; 
and  the  Turks,  after  a  long  interval,  resumed  their  operations, 
so  that  the  captain  of  the  bridge  was  ordered  to  pass  the 
night  there.  Then  came  the  alarming  news  of  the  destruc- 
tion of  Christian  rule  in  Constantinople  and  on  the  mainland, 
and  the  scare  of  Mohammed  II.'s  visit  Taxes  were  hastily 
remitted  to  pacify  the  islanders,  and  the  Home  Government 

1  Sithas,  i.,  197-8  ;  iiiM  316-18.  2  Ibid.,  Hi.,  312. 

3  /&</.,  Hi.,  361,  452-7.  4  /£&£,  Hi.,  279,  464. 


CODIFICATION  OF  THE  LAW  461 

became  seriously  alarmed  about  the  island, "  on  the  posses- 
sion of  which  depends  the  maintenance  of  our  sea-power," 
as  they  wrote  to  the  bailie. 

It  is  to  the  closing  years  of  Venetian  rule  in  Negroponte 
that  we  owe  the  copy  of  the  Book  of  the  Customs  of  the  Empire 
of  Romania,  to  which  allusion  was  made  in  the  third  chapter. 
In  1 42 1  a  commission  of  twelve  citizens  was  ordered  to  be 
elected  for  the  purpose  of  drawing  up  in  a  single  volume  the 
laws  and  customs  prevalent  in  the  Latin  Orient  The  work 
was  not  finished  till  thirty  years  later,  when  the  last  Latin 
Archbishop  of  Athens,  Niccold  Protimo,  himself  a  native  of 
the  island,  was  entrusted  with  the  collation  of  the  completed 
copy  sent  from  Negroponte  with  that  preserved  in  the 
chancery  at  Venice.  It  was  then  found  that  the  Euboean 
code  contained  147  more  articles  than  the  Venetian,  and  of 
these  only  37  were  approved.  The  code,  as  we  have  it, 
consists  of  219  articles  with  8  extra  articles  added  by 
Nicholas  de  Joinville,  bailie  of  Achaia  more  than  a  century 
earlier,  and  is  written  in  the  Venetian  dialect1 

South  of  the  isthmus,  the  two  groups  of  Venetian  colonies 
in  Argolis  and  in  Messenia  had  suffered  considerably,  as  we 
saw,  from  the  disturbed  state  of  the  peninsula,  now  from 
the  Despots  and  now  from  the  Turks.  The  population  of 
Nauplia  had  been  increased  by  a  settlement  of  Albanians, 
and  a  band  of  gypsies  had  been  encamped  there  as  far  back 
as  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century  under  a  chief,  or 
drungarius,  to  whom  special  privileges  were  granted.  But 
the  local  aristocracy  claimed  the  exclusive  right  to  hold 
the  various  offices,  as  of  yore,  and  complained  of  the 
condition  of  the  walls  and  the  riotous  behaviour  of  the 
light  horsemen  in  the  suite  of  the  governor.2  At  Modon 
and  Coron  the  treatment  of  the  serfs  was  the  most  important 
question  at  this  period;  they  complained  that  they  had  to 
provide  straw  and  grass  for  the  horses  of  the  governor,  and 
to  lend  their  own  animals  for  his  hunting-parties ;  and  they 
were  subject  to  a  corvie%  or  parapiasmo,  as  it  was  called,  of 
two  days  a  month ;  but  they  seem  to  have  prospered  under 

1  Sathas,  iii.,  225 ;   Magno,  198 ;   Canciani,  Leges  Barbarorum%  iii, 

497. 

8  Sathas,  iii.,  192,  443  ;  iv.,  187-91 ;  Hop^  Geschichte%  lxxxvL,  113. 


462  THE  TURKISH  CONQUEST 

Venetian  rule,  for  there  were  rich  peasants  among  them  who 
were  willing  to  pay  a  large  sum  for  enfranchisement.  The 
Greek  bishop  was  now  allowed  to  live  in  the  town  of  Coron, 
instead  of  some  miles  outside,  and  twice  a  year  the  Greek 
priests  and  monks  paid  a  tax  to  the  republic  Emigration, 
however,  was  such  an  evil,  that  the  taxes  were  lowered  in 
order  to  encourage  people  to  live  in  the  colony.1 

While,  all  ground,  principalities  were  falling,  Venice  had, 
at  this  eleventh  hour,  added  to  her  Greek  colonies.  In  145 1, 
the  classic  island  of  iEgina,  which  she  had  long  coveted, 
became  hers.  It  had  been  arranged,  twenty-six  years  before, 
as  we  saw,  that,  when  the  Caopena  family  became  extinct, 
the  republic  should  take  their  inheritance.  In  145 1, 
Antonello  Caopena,  son-in-law  of  the  Duke  Antonio  I.  of 
Athens,  died  without  heirs,  after  having  bequeathed  the 
island  to  Venice.  The  islanders  welcomed  Venetian  rule  ; 
the  claims  of  Antonello's  uncle  Arn4,  who  had  lands  in 
Argolis,  where  a  mountain  still  bears  his  name,  were  satisfied 
by  a  pension,  and  a  Venetian  governor,  or  rettore,  was 
appointed,  who  was  dependent  on  the  authorities  of  Nauplia. 
After  Arab's  death,  his  son  Alioto  renewed  his  claim  to  the 
island,  but  was  told  that  the  republic  was  firmly  resolved  to 
keep  it.  He  and  his  family  were  pensioned,  and  one  of 
them  loyally  aided  in  the  defence  of  JEgina.  against  the 
Turks  in  1537,  was  captured  with  his  family,  and  died  in  a 
Turkish  dungeon.  Venice,  however,  ransomed  his  wife  and 
children,  who  came  and  settled  as  poor  and  simple  citizens 
on  the  lagoons.  There  they  remained  till,  in  1648,  the  last 
of  the  race  died,  as  priest  of  S.  Giovanni  in  Bragora.  Such 
was  the  end  of  the  Catalan  lords  of  JEgina..2 

Two  years  after  the  annexation  of  ^Egina,  the  Venetian 
admiral  occupied  the  Northern  Sporades — Skyros,  Skiathos, 
and  Skopelos — the  original  fief  of  the  Ghisi,  which  had 
belonged  to  the  Byzantine  Empire  for  nearly  two  centuries. 
Now  that  that  empire  had  fallen,  the  islanders  were  ab- 
solutely defenceless    against    the   attacks  of  pirates.     One 

1  S&has,  iii.,  343,  421,  459 »  »v->  29  ;  v.,  94  ;  Jorga,  vl,  379  ;  viii.,  95. 

3  Magno,  197  ;  Mar,  iv.,  f.  80, 83  ;  Hopf,  Karystos  (tr.  Sardagna),  71  sqq. 
The  mountain  peak  of  Arna  is  near  Epidauros,  where  Arna's  lands  lay 
(Meliar*kes,  *A^yoX«,  65). 


VENICE  ACQUIRES  THE  NORTHERN  SPORADES  463 

party  preferred  the  mild  rule  of  the  Gattilusii  of  Lesbos, 
another  that  of  the  maona,  or  Genoese  Company,  which  ruled 
over  Chios,  but  the  majority  favoured  a  Venetian  protectorate, 
of  which  their  neighbours  in  Eubcea  had  had  so  long  an 
experience.  Accordingly,  they  offered  their  island  home  to 
the  Venetian  admiral,  on  condition  that  he  would  confirm 
their  ancient  privileges  and  preserve  their  episcopal  see.  At 
first  he  hestitated,  for  three  of  the  four  castles  of  Skyros 
were  now  in  ruins,  and  such  an  acquisition  seemed  therefore 
to  be  more  of  an  expense  than  a  profit  to  his  Government. 
An  embassy  sent  by  the  natives  to  the  Genoese  forced  him, 
however,  to  consent,  for  he  knew  that  Venice  would  not 
tolerate  her  great  rival  so  near  her  most  important  colony. 
Two  Venetian  rectors,  dependent  on  the  bailie  of  Negroponte, 
were  sent  to  govern  the  islands,  the  republic  granted  their 
privileges  and  heard  their  petitions,  and  they  remained  in 
her  possession  till  1538.1 

Finally,  as  we  saw,  two  of  the  Cyclades,  Tenos  and 
Mykonos,  had  been  under  Venetian  authority  since  the 
extinction  of  the  Ghisi  family  in  1390,  and  had  been  farmed 
out  to  a  Venetian  citizen,  who  was  dependent  on  Negroponte. 
But  the  islands  were  so  poor  and  so  thinly  inhabited,  that 
the  rent  was  reduced.  Turkish  depredations  were  frequent, 
and  the  islanders  complained  to  the  Senate,  to  which  they 
were  faithful  even  when  misgoverned.  In  1430  a  governor 
was  accordingly  sent  direct  from  Venice,  the  two  islands 
were  declared  independent  of  Eubcea,  and  the  privileges  of 
the  people  were  confirmed.  Still,  the  most  ample  franchises 
could  not  keep  off  Catalan  and  Turkish  corsairs.2  Thus,  in 
1460,  the  dull  uniformity  of  Turkish  rule  spread  over  the 
land,  save  where  the  dukes  of  the  Archipelago  and  the 
Venetian  colonies  still  remained  the  sole  guardians  of 
Western  culture,  the  only  rays  of  light  in  the  once  brilliant 
Latin  Orient. 

1  Magno,  198-9;    Navagero  apud  Muratori,  xxiii.,   11 16;    Chalko- 
kondyles,  431  ;  Sdthas,  v.,  45. 

8  Sdthas,  iii.,  144,  181,  414  ;  iv.,  236. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

THE  VENETIAN   COLONIES  (1462-I540) 

AFTER  the  fall  of  the  duchy  of  Athens  and  the  principality 
of  Achaia,  the  only  Latin  possessions  left  on  the  mainland 
of  Greece  were  the  papal  city  of  Monemvasia,  the  fortress  of 
Vonitza  on  the  Ambrakian  Gulf,  and  the  Venetian  colonies, 
composed  of  four  distant  and  isolated  groups — the  Messentan 
stations  of  Coron  and  Modon  with  its  dependency,  Navarino ; 
the  castles  of  Argos  and  Nauplia,  to  which  the  island  of  iEgina 
was  subordinate,  and  the  frontier  fortresses  of  Lepanto  and 
Pteleon.  It  only  remains,  then,  to  complete  the  history  of 
Frankish  rule  on  the  Greek  continent  by  describing  the 
fortunes  of  these  lingering  offshoots  of  Italy  down  to  the 
capture  of  the  last  of  them  by  the  Turks  in  1540.  With 
them,  for  the  sake  of  clearness,  we  may  include  the  fate  of 
the  Venetian  island  of  Negroponte  and  that  of  the  insular 
domain  of  the  Tocchi  in  the  palatine  county  of  Cephalonia. 

However '  little  the  Venetians  might  desire  it,  a  war 
between  the  republic  and  the  sultan  was  clearly  inevitable ; 
they  were  convinced  that  the  great  conqueror  intended  to 
round  off  his  Greek  territories  by  the  acquisition  of  their 
remaining  colonies  upon  Greek  soil,  and  they  wisely  availed 
themselves  of  the  short  breathing-space  afforded  by  the 
sultan's  attack  upon  the  empire  of  Trebizond  to  put  their 
fortifications  in  order.  An  inscription  on  the  ruins  of  Coron 
still  commemorates  the  repair  of  that  outpost,1  while  ;Egina 
obtained  money  for  her  defences  by  the  unwilling  sacrifice 
of  her  cherished  relic,  the  head  of  St  George,  which  had 
been  carried  thither  from  Livadia  by  the  Catalans  after  their 

1  Rispcsta  di  Jacopo  Grandt\  144  ;  Buchon,  La  Grhc  Continentale, 
454  (the  latter  gives  the  date  wrong) ;  Sdthas,  i.,  237-8. 


T^\F 


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TURKISH  WAR  OF  1463  465 

expulsion  from  the  Athenian  duchy.  The  kings  of  Aragon 
had  not  abandoned  the  hope  of  obtaining  possession  of  the 
coveted  head.  Alfonso  V.  had  sent  an  emissary  to  carry  it 
off;  but  a  great  storm  prevented  his  design,  and  the  relic 
was  restored  to  the  church  of  St  George,  in  the  lofty  town 
of  what  is  now  Palaiochora.  In  1462,  however,  the  Venetian 
Senate  ordered  the  relic  to  be  removed  to  S.  Giorgio 
Maggiore  at  Venice,  and  this  time,  to  the  dismay  of  the 
Greeks,  the  saint  wrought  no  miracle  to  prevent  this  act  of 
sacrilege.  On  12th  November,  it  was  transported  from 
iEgina  by  Vettore  Cappello,  the  famous  Venetian  commander, 
and  placed  in  S.  Giorgio,  and  the  monastery  and  the  Senate 
tried  to  soothe  the  feelings  of  the  ^Eginetans  by  giving  100 
ducats  apiece  towards  fortifying  the  island.1 

The  Turks  soon  found  an  excuse  for  hostilities.  An 
Albanian  slave,  the  property  of  the  governor  of  Athens,  had 
run  away  with  some  of  his  master's  property,  and  had  sought 
refuge  in  the  house  of  Valaresso,  one  of  the  councillors  of 
Modon.  The  Venetian  authorities  of  that  colony  refused  to 
give  him  up,  whereupon,  in  November  1462,  Omar,  son  of 
Turakhan,  the  captor  of  Athens,  marched  upon  Lepanto,  and 
almost  took  that  important  fortress;  while  Is&,  who  had 
succeeded  Zagan  in  the  governorship  of  the  Morea,  occupied 
Argos  without  a  blow,  owing  to  the  treachery  of  a  Greek 
priest,  and  Turkish  bands  ravaged  the  country  round  Modon. 
The  war-party  in  Venice  then  persuaded  the  Government  to 
fight,  and  in  1463  a  war  began,  which  lasted,  more  or  less 
continuously,  till  1479.  Bertoldo  d'Este  was  appointed 
commander-in-chief  of  the  Venetian  land  forces,  and  ordered 
to  proceed  to  Nauplia  and  co-operate  with  the  fleet  under 
Loredano;  while  the  heroic  Albanian  leader,  Skanderbeg, 
was  provided  with  subsidies,  in  order  that  he  might  create  a 
diversion  among  the  mountains  of  his  native  land.  D'Este 
recruited  his  forces  by  opening  the  Cretan  gaols  and  convert- 
ing the  prisoners  into  soldiers.  At  the  same  time  he  issued 
a  proclamation,  calling  upon  the  Greeks  to  rise  and  regain 
their  freedom  with  his  assistance.  The  long  rule  of  the 
Franks  had  had  the  effect  of  making  them  far  more  warlike 

1  Magno,  tf/WHopf,  Chroniques,  202;  Cornelius,  Ecclesia  Venete,  viii , 
1 73"93>  27°-i  ;  Malipiero,  Anna/i,  in  Archivio  Storico  ltaliano,  vii.,  12. 

2   G 


466  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

than  they  had  been  at  the  time  of  the  Latin  Conquest ;  and, 
provided  that  they  were  sure  of  foreign  aid,  they  were  ready 
to  rise  against  the  Turks.  The  Spartans  took  up  arms 
under  the  leadership  of  Michael  Rdlles,  a  primate  belonging 
to  a  distinguished  Lacedaemonian  family  of  Norman  or 
Albanian  origin.  The  Arkadians  found  a  chief  in  Peter 
Boua — the  same  Albanian  who  had  headed  a  rising  against 
the  Greeks  nine  years  earlier,  and  the  Mainates,  as  ever, 
showed  a  spirit  of  independence.  Monemvasia,  weary,  as  was 
to  be  expected,  of  papal  rule,  begged  the  protection  of  a 
state  which  of  all  Catholic  communities  was  notoriously  the 
least  bigoted ;  the  pope  was  far  off,  the  papal  governor  was 
helpless ;  and  ere  long  a  Venetian  podesta%  paid  out  of  the 
treasury  of  the  Venetian  islands  of  Lemnos  or  Crete,  was 
sent  out  to  the  great  fortress.1 

At  first,  fortune  smiled  on  the  Venetian  arms.  Argos 
was  speedily  retaken;  its  castle,  the  famous  Larissa,  soon 
hoisted  the  lion-banner  of  St  Mark ;  another  old  Frankish 
town,  that  of  Vostitza,  drove  out  the  Turks ;  and  D'Este  was 
able  to  send  home  a  long  list  of  fortresses  which  had  joyfully 
opened  their  gates  to  his  men.  Among  them  it  is  interesting 
to  notice  such  familiar  Frankish  names  as  Karytaina, 
Santameri,  and  Geraki,  which  now  reappears  after  a  long 
silence.  Several  strong  positions,  however,  remained  in 
Turkish  hands,  chief  among  them  Akrocorinth,  whose  fate 
was  certain  to  determine  that  of  the  rest.  Accordingly, 
D'Este  and  Loredano  set  to  work  to  besiege  it  But  first,  in 
order  to  encourage  the  Greeks,  they  rebuilt  the  famous  wall 
across  the  isthmus,  which  had  been  destroyed  by  Murid  II. 
The  two  commanders  put  the  first  stone  in  its  place,  and  their 
example  filled  their  men  with  such  zeal  that  in  fifteen  days  the 
restored  Hexamilion,  12  feet  high  and  flanked  with  136  towers, 
stretched  from  sea  to  sea.  A  religious  ceremony  celebrated  the 
completion  of  the  work  ;  an  altar  was  erected  in  the  middle  of 
the  wall ;  mass  was  performed ;  and  the  flag  of  the  Evangelist 
was  hoisted  over  the  ramparts.     Such  an  achievement  was 

1  The  acquisition  of  Monemvasia  was,  according  to  Phrantzgs  and 
Magno,  in  1464  ;  but  Malatesta's  secretary  puts  it  in  1463.  The  Venetian 
document  (Regina,  fol.  52)  appointing  its  podestd.  is  dated  17th  Sep- 
tember 1464. 


MALATESTA  IN  GREECE  467 

thought  worthy  of  a  picture  on  the  ceiling  of  the  Doge's  Palace. 
Unfortunately  the  work  had  been  too  hastily  done ;  the  wall  was 
too  low,  and  the  stones  had  no  mortar  to  keep  them  together. 

The  success  of  the  Venetians  was  now  checked.  D'Este, 
uncautiously  removing  his  helmet  in  the  heat  of  an  attack  on 
Akrocorinth,  was  struck  by  a  stone,  and  died  of  the  wound. 
The  same  day  the  news  arrived  that  Mahmoud  Pasha,  the 
grand  vizier,  with  the  victorious  army  which  had  just  ended 
for  ever  the  ancient  kingdom  of  Bosnia,  was  marching  to  the 
assault  of  the  Isthmian  wall.  Its  defenders,  without  a  general, 
decimated  by  dysentery,  and  alarmed  at  the  great  numerical 
superiority  of  the  enemy,  abandoned  the  Hexamilion  without 
striking  a  blow,  and  retreated  to  Nauplia.  The  Turks  once 
more  destroyed  the  rampart  across  the  isthmus,  reoccupied 
Argos,  levelled  that  city  with  the  ground,  and  sent  its  inhabi- 
tants to  Constantinople,  where  they  received  lands  and  houses 
from  the  sultan  at  the  Peribleptos  monastery.  A  much 
worse  fate  was  reserved  for  the  loyal  subjects  of  Venice  in 
Messenia,  many  of  whom  were  sawn  asunder  by  the  orders  of 
Mohammed  II.  Finding  that  their  Venetian  allies  were 
unable  to  defend  them,  the  Spartans  retired  to  the  fastnesses 
of  Taygetos,  whence  the  Turks  in  vain  endeavoured  to  lure 
them  by  promises  of  amnesty.1 

Venice  was  not,  however,  discouraged  by  the  failure  of 
her  arms.  Sigismondo  Malatesta,  the  husband  of  Isotta  and 
the  builder  of  the  cathedral  in  his  native  town  of  Rimini,  was 
appointed  as  D'Este's  successor ;  but  that  most  famous  scion 
of  his  family  gained  little  glory  from  his  Peloponnesian 
campaign.  He  succeeded,  indeed,  in  taking  two  of  the  three 
rings  of  walls  which  compose  the  old  Byzantine  capital  of 
Mistra ;  but  the  splendid  castle  resisted  his  assaults,  discord 
broke  out  in  his  camp,  and  he  hurriedly  returned  home  to 
defend  his  interests  there  against  the  pope,  with  no  other 
prize  than  the  bones  of  the  philosopher  Gemist6s  Pl£thon, 

1  Phrantz£s,  414-15;  Chalkokondyles,  545,  555-64;  Chronicon  breve, 
521  ;  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  202-3;  "Avdot,  ibid.,  268  ;  Sanudo 
and  Navagero  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  1 172-3  ;  xxiii.,  1121-3  \  Lettera  dun 
Scgrctario,  apud  Sathas,  vi.,  95.7  ;  Dam,  Histoire  de  Venise,  ii.,  443-6 ; 
Kritoboulos,  bk.  iv.,  ch.  16  ;  v.,  1,  2  ;  Ldmpros,  'Eyypatfa  134-5  ;  Regina, 
fol.  52,  56  (in/.  H.  S.  xxvii.,  241). 


468  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

whose  neo-Platonic  doctrines  he  had  embraced,  and  whose 
remains  he  laid  in  the  cathedral  at  Rimini,  where  the  tombs 
of  the  Spartan  sage  and  the  Italian  lord  may  still  be  seen.1 

Venice  now  sent  one  of  her  most  distinguished  sons  to 
the  front  Vettore  Cappello  had  had  a  large  experience  of 
Greek  affairs,  and  the  news  of  his  appointment  to  the 
command  of  the  fleet  in  the  Levant  inspired  the  troops  with 
fresh  hopes.  Nor  did  his  first  achievements  belie  their 
expectations.  Directing  his  course  to  the  north  of  the 
^Egean,  he  completed  the  conquest,  begun  by  his  prede- 
cessors, of  the  group  of  islands  which  had  once  belonged  to 
the  Gattilusii,  and  then  cast  anchor  at  the  Piraeus  in  the 
summer  of  1466.  For  a  brief  moment  Athens  figured  again 
in  the  pages  of  history.  Cappello  marched  upon  the  city 
before  dawn  on  12th  July,  and  captured  the  whole  of  the 
lower  town.  The  sack  yielded  his  men  a  large  booty,  but  he 
spared  the  lives  of  the  Greek  inhabitants,  and  contented 
himself  with  firing  the  Turkish  ships  in  the  harbour.  As  the 
Akropolis  was  strongly  fortified  and  well  provisioned,  he 
made  no  attempt  to  besiege  it,  and  sailed  away  to  Patras. 

If  this  second  Venetian  capture  of  Athens  had  no  practical 
results,  it  has  at  least  afforded  us  a  last  glimpse  of  the  city, 
for  to  this  moment  we  may  ascribe  the  anonymous  descrip- 
tion, written  by  a  Venetian,  which  was  published  a  few  years 
ago.2  The  author  tells  us  that  almost  all  the  rock  on  which 
the  castle  stood  was  then  surrounded  with  houses ;  he  alludes 
to  the  great  strength  of  the  Akropolis,  and  distinguishes 
between  the  "modern  walls"  of  the  city  and  the  ancient 
circumvallation,  which  was  "larger  than  that  of  Padua."  The 
west  portal  of  the  Stoa  of  Hadrian  then  served  as  the  gate  of 
the  town ;  the  Tower  of  the  Winds,  later  on  a  tekkeh  of 
Dervishes,  was  then  a  Greek  church ;  and  near  the  Stadion 
there  dwelt  the  fraticelli  delta  mala  opinione — an  heretical 
sect,  which,  rooted  out  of  Western  Europe,  had  thus  found  a 
refuge  under  the  tolerant  rule  of  the  Turks.  Of  the  other 
ancient  monuments,  the  cultured  visitor  describes  the  Temple 
of  Olympian  Zeus,  which  then  had  one  column  less  than  in 

1  Sanudo  and  Navagero  in  op.  cit.>  xxii.,  1179-82  ;  xxiii.,  1123  ;  Mali- 
piero,  32-6  ;  Sdthas,  i.,  242-57  ;  vi.,  87, 92-4,  98  ;  Sansovino,  f.  194. 
8  MitUilungen  des  k.  deutschen  Arch.  Institute  (Athen\  xxiv.,  72-88. 


ATHENS  IN  1466  469 

the  time  of  his  predecessor,  Cyriacus ;  the  arch  and  aqueduct 
of  Hadrian,  the  latter  still  locally  known  as  "Aristotle's 
Study "  ;  the  choragic  monument  of  Lysikrates,  the  monu- 
ment of  Phil6pappos,  the  west  wing  of  which  had  partially 
collapsed  since  the  visit  of  the  antiquary  of  Ancona ;  the 
Theseion,  or  "  temple  of  the  Gods  " ;  the  Roman  market-place 
with  the  gate  of  Athena  Archegetis  and  the  pillar  of  Hadrian 
inscribed  with  the  regulations  for  the  oil  trade.  He  also 
mentions  a  Roman  tomb  to  the  north  of  the  Olympieion, 
which  has  escaped  the  notice  of  other  travellers.  As  the 
Turks  were  in  possession  of  the  Akropolis,  he  was,  as  he 
says,1  "  unable  to  approach  "  sufficiently  near  to  examine  the 
monument  of  Thrasyllos,  and  could  only  descry  the  west  front 
of  the  Parthenon,  which  was  still  a  church.  That,  and  the 
"  ancient  palace "  of  the  Acciajuoli  in  the  Propylaea,  are  the 
only  buildings  which  he  could  see  clearly  from  below,  and 
which  he  therefore  mentions  as  standing  there.  Down  at  the 
Piraeus  he  admired  the  famous  lion,  from  whose  mouth — so 
he  was  told — water  used  to  flow ;  and  on  the  Sacred  Way,  he 
waxes  enthusiastic  over  the  marbles  and  mosaics  of  Daphni, 
"the  most  beautiful  I  have  ever  seen."  From  this  time 
forth,  Athens  disappeared  from  the  ken  of  Europe  for  more 
than  a  century.  A  German  traveller  who  passed  by  it  in 
1483  speaks  of  "the  faint  and  almost  obliterated  vestiges  of 
Athens/'  which  he  did  not  deem  worthy  of  a  visit ;  and  seven 
severe  plagues  and  the  tribute  of  Christian  children  decimated 
the  scanty  population.2 

Disasters  now  again  befell  the  Venetian  arms.  Barbarigo, 
the  governor  of  the  Morea,  weary  of  a  year  of  inaction, 
resolved,  against  the  better  advice  of  Rdlles,  to  undertake 
the  siege  of  Patras,  and  allowed  himself  to  be  enticed  into 
an   ambush   by  the   Turks   under  the    redoubtable    Omar. 

1  Mitteilungcn  des  k  deutschen  Arch.  Institute  (Athen\  xxiv.,  76. 
This  passage  fixes  the  date  at  1466,  for  the  Akropolis  was  then  inacces- 
sible. The  only  other  historical  indication  in  the  narrative  is  the  allusion 
to  D'Este's  death  before  Corinth  in  1463.  The  omission  of  all  mention  of 
the  Turks  also  points  to  a  moment  when  the  city  was  in  Venetian  hands. 

2  The  authorities  for  the  capture  of  Athens  are  : — Sabellico,  Dec.  III., 
Lib.  8  ;  Secreta,  xxii.,  fol.  186  ;  Magno,  204  ;  Phrantz6s,  425  ;  Sanudo  and 
Navagero  (xxii.,  1 183 ;  xxiii.,  1 125);  Malatesta's  secretary  (Sdthas,  vi., 
99) ;  Malipiero,  37. 


470  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

Both  the  Venetian  and  the  Moreot  chieftains  were  impaled 
by  the  brutal  conqueror;  Cappello's  efforts  to  take  Patras 
failed ;  the  land  forces  retreated  to  Kalamata,  where,  beneath 
the  old  castle  of  William  de  Villehardouin,  they  sustained  a 
fresh  defeat;  and  the  admiral  withdrew  to  Negroponte, 
where  he  died  of  a  broken  heart.  For  five  months  he  had 
never  been  seen  to  smile.  His  kneeling  figure,  the  hat, 
— his  coat-of-arms — and  an  inscription  commemorating  his 
deeds  at  sea  and  his  death  in  Euboea,  adorn  the  portal  of 
the  church  of  S.  Aponal  in  Venice.1 

For  the  next  three  years  a  desultory  struggle  was  waged 
in  the  Morea,  with  results  unfavourable  to  the  republic 
The  death  of  Pius  II.  at  Ancona  had  prevented  the  crusade 
which  his  zeal  and  the  tireless  eloquence  of  Bessarion  had 
organised  ;  his  successor,  Paul  II.,  though  a  Venetian,  lacked 
enthusiasm ;  and  the  selfish  policy,  for  which  Venice  was 
distinguished,  had  prevented  the  other  Italian  states  from 
rallying  to  her  aid  against  the  Turks.  Skanderbeg  alone  of 
her  allies  remained  in  arms,  and  with  his  death,  in  1468,  she 
would  gladly  have  come  to  terms  with  the  sultan  on  the 
basis  of  uti  possidetis.  Of  the  122  castles  of  the  Morea, 
only  26  were  now  in  Venetian  hands ;  more  than  40  castles 
lay  in  ruins ;  over  50  flew  the  Turkish  flag,  among  them 
the  old  Frankish  stronghold  of  Geraki.  Still  Venice  retained 
all  her  old  colonies  except  Argos ;  her  rectors  held  sway 
over  Maina  and  Lemnos;  her  podesttt  governed  the  sheer 
rock  of  Monemvasia;  the  Greeks  of  Mitylene  had  gone  to 
cultivate  the  waste  lands  of  her  cherished  Negroponte.2 

Mohammed  II.  had  long  coveted  that  splendid  island, 
and  the  moment  had  now  arrived  for  the  realisation  of  his 
cherished  plan.  So  well-informed  a  Government  as  that  of 
Venice  could  not  be  in  any  doubt  of  what  was  intended,  nor 
was  it  forgotten  that  the  sultan  had  once  already  inspected 
Negroponte.  From  all  sides,  from  Cyprus,  Rhodes,  and 
Cephalonia,  from  Naples  and  from  Burgundy,  the  republic 
sought  aid  in  the  defence  of  her  prized  possession ;  but  of 
all  these  allies,  one  alone,  the  Count  of  Cephalonia,  sent  a 

1  Foregoing  authorities  and  Sansovino,  f.  203 ;  Sdthas,  i.,  258 ;  vil, 
7,  8,  15,  26\  48  ;  Krittfboulos,  v.,  13  ;  Chalkokondyles,  558. 
*  Magno,  205-6. 


SIEGE  OF  NEGROPONTE  471 

galley  to  join  the  Venetian  fleet.     "  The  princes  of  Christen- 
dom," it  was  said,  "  looked  on  as  if  in  a  theatre." 

Early  in  June  1470,  the  Turkish  fleet  of  300  sail,  with 
60,000  or  70,000  men  on  board,  issued  from  the  Dardanelles ; 
and,  after  taking  Imbros,  and  making  a  futile  attempt  to 
capture  the  strong  castles  of  Lemnos  and  Skyros,  traversed 
the  Doro  channel  at  the  south  end  of  Eubcea,  and  proceeded 
up  to  Negroponte.  On  the  way,  the  Turkish  admiral 
occupied  the  castle  of  Styra  and  the  great  square  tower, 
which  still  stands  in  the  village  of  Basilik6,  near  Chalkis,  and 
on  15th  June  cast  anchor  in  the  bay  of  Burchio,  the  modern 
Bourkos;  there  his  men  disembarked  and  planted  their 
tents  on  the  shore  of  Millemoza,  as  the  inmost  recess  of 
that  bay  was  called,  within  a  short  distance  of  the  land  walls 
of  the  city.  The  next  two  days  were  occupied  in  skirmishes, 
but  on  the  18th  the  ardour  of  the  garrison  was  checked  by 
the  spectacle  of  a  long  line  of  Turkish  troops  descending 
through  the  pass  of  Anephorites  along  the  road  from 
Thebes,1  headed  by  the  great  sultan  himself.  For  two 
hours  Mohammed  II.  stood  at  the  head  of  the  bridge  over 
the  Euripos  and  carefully  examined  the  enchanted  castle, 
which  stood  in  the  middle  of  the  stream  till  a  wanton  and 
useless  act  of  Vandalism  in  our  own  time  removed  it.  Then, 
judging  that  mode  of  entry  into  the  city  impracticable — for 
the  stream  is  a  mill-race  and  the  drawbridge  was  up — he 
moved  to  the  Punta,  or  Bocca  di  S.  Marco,  as  the  narrow 
entrance  of  the  small  bay  to  the  south  of  the  Euripos  was 
then  called,  and  ordered  a  bridge  of  boats  to  be  constructed 
across  to  the  island.  Over  this,  at  the  Ave  Maria,  a  third 
of  the  army  passed ;  next  morning  the  sultan,  his  son,  and 
the  bulk  of  the  army  followed.  Mohammed  established  his 
headquarters  at  Sta.  Chiara,  half  a  mile  from  the  city,  and 
his  lines  extended  past  the  Nun's  Mountain,  as  the  eminence 
of  Veli  Baba  behind  Chalkis  was  then  called  from  a  convent 
of  the  Virgin  which  stood  there,  past  the  suburb  of  S. 
Francesco  and  as  far  as  the  fountain  of  Arethusa,  on  the 
road  to  Eretria.  On  the  mainland  of  Bceotia,  at  the  Forks,  as 
the  present  fort  of  Kara  Baba  was  then  described,  a  battery 

1  "Struez"  is  no  doubt  meant  for  "  Stives n — the  natural  way  for  the 
sultan  to  come. 


472  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

was  placed,  so  that  the  city  was  completely  invested  except 
on  the  north.  On  that  side,  however,  the  sultan  constructed 
a  second  bridge  of  boats,  which  were  dragged  over  land 
from  the  bay  of  Burchio  to  the  Atalante  channel. 

The  condition  of  the  place,  as  its  defenders  well  knew, 
was  not  satisfactory.  The  walls  had  been,  indeed,  repaired 
forty  years  before ;  and  on  every  battlement  of  the  sea-wall 
the  lion  of  the  Evangelist  bade  defiance  to  the  infidels ;  a 
moat  washed  the  walls  on  the  land  side,  so  that  it  was  com- 
pletely surrounded  by  water ;  but  the  republic  had  strangely 
omitted  to  fortify  the  two  heights  which  commanded  the 
town,  that  of  the  Forks  and  that  of  the  Nun's  Mountain, 
trusting  to  her  fleet  to  save  Negroponte  in  her  hour  of  need. 
Unfortunately,  the  fleet  was  under  the  command  of  Niccoli 
da  Canale,  a  better  lawyer  than  seaman,  who,  instead  of  giving 
battle  to  the  Turkish  armada,  had  dallied  off  the  island  of 
Skiathos,  and  then  sailed  away  to  Candia,  to  the  great 
surprise  of  the  Cretan  authorities. 

At  the  time  of  the  siege,  the  bailie  was  Paolo  Erizzo,  who 
had  actually  completed  his  two  years'  term  of  office,  but  who 
had  remained  on  at  his  post  in  the  hope  that  his  presence 
might  be  of  use.  For  a  similar  reason,  Giovanni  Bondumier, 
the  ex-provveditore—iox  in  view  of  the  Turkish  peril,  a  prov- 
veditore  as  well  as  a  bailie  had  latterly  been  sent  to  Negroponte 
— was  still  in  the  city,  though  his  successor,  Alvise  Calbo,  had 
actually  arrived.  These  men  were  the  soul  of  the  defence 
of  Negroponte,  and  were  bravely  supported  by  the  numerous 
Venetian  colony.  The  city  contained  2500  souls,  besides 
fugitives,  and  the  garrison  had  recently  been  strengthened 
by  700  men  from  Candia  and  a  force  of  500  foot  soldiers 
under  the  leadership  of  a  Dalmatian  named  Tommaso,  who 
was  in  charge  of  all  the  engines  of  war.  Against  them  was 
the  vast  host  of  the  Turks,  variously  estimated  at  120,000 
and  300,000  men,  exclusive  of  the  naval  forces. 

On  25th  June,  when  he  had  made  all  his  preparations, 
the  sultan,  through  an  Italian  interpreter,  summoned  the 
bailie  to  surrender,  saying  that  he  was  resolved  to  have  the 
city,  but  that,  if  the  bailie  would  yield  at  once,  he  would 
exempt  the  inhabitants  from  all  taxes  for  ten  years,  would 
give  to  every  noble  who  had  a  house  two,  and  would  allow 


SIEGE  OF  NEGROPONTE  473 

the  bailie  and  the proweditore  to  live  in  comfort  at  Negroponte, 
or  else  would  assign  them  a  liberal  allowance  at  Con- 
stantinople. To  this  the  bailie  ordered  his  aide-de-camp 
to  reply,  that  Venice  had  made  Negroponte  her  own,  that 
ten  or  twelve  days  at  the  most  would  decide  her  fate,  and 
that,  with  God's  help,  he  would  burn  the  sultan's  fleet  and 
root  up  his  tents,  so  that  he  would  not  know  where  to  hide 
his  diminished  head.  At  this  bold  reply  all  the  men  on  the 
wall  shouted  aloud,  and  the  interpreter  was  bidden  go  tell 
his  master  to  eat  swine's  flesh,  and  then  try  to  storm  the  moat. 
This  insult  was  faithfully  reported  to  Mohammed,  who  from 
that  moment  resolved  that  the  garrison  should  have  no  mercy. 

The  same  evening  the  bombardment  began.  The 
sultan  had  twenty-one  (according  to  another  account,  forty- 
two),  powerful  pieces  of  artillery,  which  he  had  placed  in 
commanding  positions,  both  on  the  island  and  at  Kara 
Baba,  and  which  kept  up  a  continuous  fire  day  and  night. 
None  of  the  120  huge  stones  which  they  fired  failed  to  fall 
into  the  doomed  city,  and  to  this  day  they  may  be  seen  piled 
up  in  one  of  the  squares  of  the  town,  a  memento  of  the 
great  siege.  Meanwhile,  a  first  assault  was  made  upon  the 
walls.  The  Turks  threw  fascines  into  the  moat;  but  the 
defenders  succeeded  in  setting  fire  to  them,  and  the  besiegers 
were  forced  to  retreat  with  heavy  loss.  On  30th  June  a 
second  assault  was  made  with  still  more  disastrous  results, 
but  the  day  witnessed  two  serious  catastrophes  for  the 
Christians.  The  Turkish  cavalry  scoured  the  island  as  far 
north  as  Oreos,  killing  every  one  above  the  age  of  fifteen ; 
the  castle  of  La  Cuppa  was  betrayed,  and  the  3000  Greeks, 
who  had  fled  there  for  safety,  were  butchered  in  cold  blood 
before  the  walls  of  Negroponte.  The  same  fate  overtook 
the  crew  of  a  vessel,  laden  with  troops  and  munitions  of 
war,  which  unwittingly  fell  into  the  midst  of  the  Turkish 
fleet  in  the  bay  of  Burchio. 

There  was  a  traitor,  however,  in  the  capital  as  well  as 
at  La  Cuppa.  A  Dalmatian  named  Luca,  from  the  island 
of  Curzola,  was  found  missing,  and  the  story  of  an  old  Greek 
woman,  who  was  intimate  with  the  mistress  of  the  Dalmatian 
captain,  Tommaso,  aroused  the  suspicion  of  the  bailie.  The 
missing   man's  brother  was  arrested,  and,  under  threat  of 


fc 


474  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

torture,  confessed  that  Luca  had  been  sent  by  Tommaso's 
orders.  The  latter's  trumpeter,  he  added,  could  tell  the 
reason.  The  trumpeter,  confronted  with  the  bailie,  at  once 
made  a  complete  disclosure  of  the  plot  "  We  are  all  foes  of 
Christendom,"  he  said,  and  then  went  on  to  accuse  a  certain 
Albanian,  employed  in  the  governor's  palace,  of  having  been 
in  Turkish  pay  for  the  last  seven  years.  This  man's  house 
was  searched,  and  three  arrows  with  compromising  inscrip- 
tions were  discovered  there.  The  first,  in  Greek,  ran  as 
follows  :  M  I  am  thy  servant ;  what  I  have  promised  is  ready  " ; 
the  other  two,  in  Turkish,  came  from  the  sultan's  camp,  and 
bade  the  traitor  perform  his  promise,  for  the  sultan  had 
come  at  his  words,  and  could  tarry  no  longer.  The  news 
that  the  plot  was  out  soon  reached  the  arch-traitor,  Tommaso. 
The  Dalmatian  resolved  to  brave  it  out;  he  mounted  his 
horse,  and,  at  the  head  of  a  hundred  of  his  men,  rode 
towards  the  piazza,  vowing  that  he  would  cut  off  the  nose 
of  the  fellow  who  had  arrested  his  friends.  But  the  bailie 
had  meanwhile  made  his  preparations ;  the  square  was  lined 
with  troops,  and  in  the  centre  Erizzo  himself  was  walking 
calmly  up  and  down  with  a  number  of  Venetian  nobles,  as 
if  nothing  had  happened.  On  seeing  the  traitor,  the  bailie 
asked  him  why  he  had  come  with  such  a  retinue,  thus  leaving 
the  walls  unguarded.  Disarmed  by  Erizzo's  innocent  air, 
Tommaso  dismissed  his  men,  and  followed  the  bailie  into  the 
latter's  palace,  to  discuss  some  question  of  repairs  to  the 
ramparts.  But  scarcely  had  he  crossed  the  threshold  than 
Alvise  Dolfin  stabbed  him  in  the  neck.  Fifty  swords  flashed 
through  his  body,  as  many  of  his  company  were  put  to  death, 
and  their  captain  with  his  secretary  and  trumpeter  hung  by 
one  foot  from  the  pillars  of  the  bailie's  palace.  Their  corpses 
were  then  taken  down,  quartered,  and  fired  from  the  guns 
into  the  Turkish  camp.  So  savage  was  the  vengeance  which 
the  Venetians  took  upon  the  Dalmatian's  men,  that  the 
bailie  lamented  the  loss  of  so  many  marksmen. 

The  sultan,  ignorant  of  the  traitor's  death,  made  a  third 
assault  on  the  land  walls  at  the  Burchio  ravelin,  which 
Tommaso  had  promised  to  surrender.  To  keep  up  the 
deception,  the  Venetians  hoisted  the  Turkish  flag — the 
signal  agreed  upon— over  the  tower  of  the  Temple,  and  the 


SIEGE  OF  NEGROPONTE  475 

Turks,  rushing  on  "  like  pigs,"  went  to  the  slaughter,  instead 
of  to  the  sack  of  the  city.  Moreover,  the  able-bodied  lads  of 
the  town  now  took  the  place  of  the  executed  marksmen  on 
the  walls,  and  they  made  such  excellent  practice  that  the 
sultan  sent  to  ask  who  they  might  be.  He  was  told  that 
they  were  reinforcements  from  Nauplia,  who  had  crossed 
the  Euripos  despite  the  vigilance  of  his  guards  at  the  bridge, 
a  fable  which  cost  those  unhappy  men  their  heads.  For  three 
more  days  and  nights  the  sultan  continued  to  bombard  and 
demand  the  surrender  of  the  city,  and  on  the  morning  of 
nth  July  prepared  to  make  a  more  vigorous  assault  than 
ever  on  the  damaged  line  of  wall  between  the  tower  of  the 
Temple  and  the  Porta  di  Cristo,  the  chief  land-gate,  while 
his  fleet  directed  its  attack  against  the  ruined  ramparts  of 
the  ghetto.  Suddenly,  however,  Canale's  fleet  of  71  sail 
was  seen  coming  down  the  Atalante  channel.  In  a  moment, 
the  situation  was  changed.  The  sultan  expected  the 
Venetian  admiral  to  break  the  northern  bridge  of  boats,  fire 
the  other  and  shut  him  up  in  the  island.  According  to  one 
account,  he  shed  tears  of  rage;  according  to  another,  he 
actually  mounted  his  horse  to  recross  the  bridge,  and  was  only 
held  back  by  his  most  trusted  pasha.  Modern  expert  opinion 
agrees  with  the  sultan ;  had  Canale  done  his  duty,  he  could 
have  saved  Negroponte  and  ruined  the  great  conqueror. 

But  the  legal  mind,  and  perhaps  the  paternal  affection, 
of  the  Venetian  admiral — for  his  son  was  on  board — 
hesitated  till  it  was  too  late.  In  vain  two  Cretan  gentlemen 
begged  permission  to  charge  with  their  galley  against  the 
bridge  of  boats.  The  commander  replied  that  he  must  wait 
till  all  his  vessels  had  come  up.  Corruption  was  rife  in  the 
fleet;  no  one  stirred;  the  tide  in  the  Euripos  turned;  and, 
Canale  quietly  cast  anchor  in  the  bay  of  Politika,  six  miles 
up  channel.  Meanwhile,  the  great  man  of  action  who 
commanded  the  besiegers  acted.  He  lined  both  the  Boeotian 
and  the  Euboean  shore  with  soldiers  to  prevent  Canale  from 
landing ;  he  posted  marksmen  on  the  northern  bridge  to 
repulse  an  attack,  and  offered  the  whole  booty  of  the  city  to 
his  men.  Early  on  the  morning  of  the  next  day,  seeing  that 
Canale  was  still  inactive,  he  made  his  final  assault  upon  the 
town.      He  had  previously  filled  the  moat  with  casks,  dead 


¥ 


47C  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

bodies  and  fascines,  so  that  the  heap  of  material  thrown 
into  them  overtopped  the  broken  walls.  Over  this  improvised 
road,  which  emitted  a  fearful  stench,  the  Turks  rushed  to  the 
attack.  The  garrison,  weary  and  worn,  raised  black  flags  of 
distress  as  a  signal  to  Canale,  but  in  vain ;  still,  though 
abandoned  by  the  fleet,  it  gallantly  held  its  ground  till  two 
hours  after  daybreak,  when  the  besiegers  carried  the  Burchio 
ravelin ;  a  few  moments  later  all  the  walls  were  in  the 
possession  of  the  enemy.  Even  then  the  fighting  continued 
in  the  narrow  streets,  which  were  barricaded  with  beams, 
casks,  and  chains,  while  the  women  hurled  boiling  water, 
quick-lime,  and  pitchers  on  the  heads  of  the  Turks.  Forcing 
their  way,  foot  by  foot,  the  invaders  at  last,  at  mid-day, 
gained  the  square.  There  Calbo,  the  provveditore%  fell,  sword 
in  hand  ;  his  predecessor,  Bondumier,  was  butchered  in  the 
house  of  Paolo  Andreozzo,  who  himself  survived  to  write  the 
story  of  the  siege.  The  bailie  and  a  number  of  gentle  ladies 
and  children  found  refuge  in  the  castle  in  the  Euripos,  and 
pulled  up  the  drawbridge,  hoping  that  the  fleet  would  even 
now  come  to  their  rescue.  Canale  did,  indeed,  make  a  show 
of  attacking  the  bridge  of  boats,  but  when  he  saw  the 
Turkish  flag  waving  over  the  city,  he  turned  and  left  the 
poor  wretches  in  the  castle  of  the  Euripos  to  their  fate. 

That  fate  was,  indeed,  terrible.  Mohammed  had  vowed 
to  avenge  the  insults  levelled  at  him  from  the  walls,  and  he 
kept  his  vow.  But  the  castle  was  strong,  and  his  emissaries, 
Mahmoud  Pasha,  the  Turkish  admiral,  and  the  Italian 
interpreter,  found  it  necessary  to  promise  the  lives,  but 
not  the  liberty,  of  the  inmates.  The  sultan  was  furious  at 
being  thus  baulked  of  his  prey.  He  issued  instant  orders 
that  every  living  soul,  down  to  the  very  children  at  the 
breast,  should  be  cut  in  pieces  on  the  bridge.  For  Erizzo 
he  reserved  an  even  worse  fate.  Sarcastically  remarking 
that  he  had  promised  to  spare  the  bailie's  neck,  but  not  his 
body,  he  ordered  him  to  be  placed  on  two  planks  and  sawn 
asunder — a  fiendish  act  commemorated  by  one  of  the 
paintings  on  the  ceiling  of  the  Doge's  Palace.1  According 
to  one  account,  which  has  been  eagerly  accepted  by  a  host 

1  So  Cicogna  and  Litta  ;  the  present  official  view  is  that  Alban  d*  Armer 
(cf.  infr.)  is  the  person  represented 


CARNAGE  AT  NEGROPONTE  477 

of  Venetian  dramatists,  but  for  which  there  is  little  historical 
evidence,  Erizzo's  only  daughter,  Anna,  refusing  to  yield 
to  the  desires  of  her  father's  murderer,  was  killed  before 
the  sultan's  eyes.  In  his  thirst  for  blood,  the  conqueror 
rode  through  the  streets  to  see  if  the  cupidity  of  his 
janissaries  had  spared  the  lives  of  his  victims,  and  massacred 
all  he  could  find  before  the  church  of  the  Holy  Apostles,  on 
the  shore  of  the  bay  of  Burchio,  at  his  own  headquarters, 
and  at  San  Giovanni  Bocca  d'Oro ;  to  make  assurance  doubly 
sure,  he  ordered  his  galleys  to  be  searched,  and  issued  a 
proclamation  that  any  of  his  men  who  was  guilty  of  con- 
cealing a  Frank  should  be  beheaded.  His  special  vengeance 
fell  upon  the  lads  who  had  made  such  excellent  practice  from 
the  walls.  One  of  the  fairest  cities  in  Greece  was  converted  into 
a  charnel-house ;  the  heads  of  the  slain  were  heaped  up  in  the 
Piazza  di  S.  Francesco,  in  front  of  the  official  residence  of  the 
Latin  patriarch ;  the  Euripos  ran  red  with  the  blood  of  the 
corpses  thrown  into  it  It  was  calculated  that  77,000  (other 
estimates  give  25,000  or  30,000)  Turks  and  6,000  Christians 
had  perished  in  the  siege.  It  was  said  that  every  male  in 
Negroponte  over  the  age  of  eight  years  was  cut  in  pieces. 

The  rest  of  the  great  island  now  surrendered.  Historic 
castles,  like  Karystos,  the  fief  of  the  Zorzi ;  iEdepsos,  the 
property  of  the  Sommaripa  of  Paros ;  Oreos,  the  third  of 
the  three  original  baronies,  then  a  Venetian  stronghold,  all 
yielded.  Pteleon,  with  its  dependency  of  Gardiki,  succumbed 
three  days  after  the  fall  of  Negroponte,  despite  the  heroic 
efforts  of  its  rector  to  save  the  last  outpost  of  Christendom 
in  northern  Greece.  Its  site  was  left  desolate;  its  inhabit- 
ants were  sent  to  swell  the  Christian  population  of  Con- 
stantinople. Thither  the  sultan  himself  set  out,  after 
presenting  the  fallen  city  of  Negroponte  to  his  son  and 
leaving  a  garrison  behind  him,  while  his  fleet,  laden  with 
booty  and  captive  women  and  children,  set  sail  for  the 
Dardanelles.  Once  again,  the  irresolute  Canale  allowed 
it  to  pursue  its  way  unmolested,  "  courteously  escorting  it," 
as  the  Turkish  admiral  sarcastically  said,  "alike  on  its 
outward  and  its  homeward  voyage." 

When  the  news  of  the  fall  of  Negroponte  reached  Venice, 
great  was  the  lamentation.     Many  nobles  fell  ill  of  grief  and 


478  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

shame — grief  a*  the  death  of  their  relatives  and  friends  who 
had  been  engaged  in  trade  there,  shame  at  "the  worst 
tidings  ever  received  by  the  State."  Their  indignation 
demanded  a  scapegoat,  and  in  the  person  of  their  incom- 
petent admiral  one  was  ready  to  hand.  Pietro  Mocenigo 
was  appointed  to  take  his  place,  with  orders  to  send  Canale 
home  in  irons.  That  pitiful  officer,  conscious  of  his 
approaching  disgrace,  made  a  half-hearted  attempt  to 
recover  the  lost  city.  With  94  sail  he  cast  anchor  in 
the  bay  of  Aulis,  where  once  the  Greek  fleet  had 
waited  on  the  way  to  Troy.  A  blunder  in  strategy  cost 
him  the  lives  of  some  of  his  most  valuable  men ;  and, 
before  he  had  had  time  to  repair  it,  Mocenigo  arrived. 
Canale  hastened  to  meet  him  and  to  yield  him  the  honour 
of  recapturing  the  city.  Mocenigo  sarcastically  bade  him 
keep  for  himself  the  credit  of  the  undertaking ;  and,  when 
Canale  declined,  ordered  his  arrest  Placed  on  his  trial  at 
Venice,  the  miserable  man  was  banished  to  Porto  Gruaro, 
where  he  died;  his  successor  abandoned  all  hope  of 
regaining  Negroponte,  and  since  1470  the  island  has  owned 
no  master  save  the  Turk  and  the  Greek.1 

The  Lombard  and  Venetian  families,  so  long  settled 
there,  have  left  no  descendants  in  Eubcea.  One  doctor  in 
the  island  still  bears  the  name  of  Venezian6s ;  but  of  the 
offspring  of  the  three  barons  and  of  the  Venetian  merchants, 
who  had  once  enlivened  the  shores  of  the  Euripos  with  their 
festivities  or  enriched  them  with  their  trade,  not  a  trace 
remains  there.  Hard,  indeed,  was  the  lot  of  most  survivors 
of  the  siege.     Many  had  lost  all  that  they  possessed,  and 

1  The  authorities  for  the  siege  of  Negroponte,  which  I  have  used  are : 
— Rizzardo,  La  Presa  di  Negroponte;  Jacopo  dalla  Castellana,  Perdita 
di  Negroponte  (both  eye-witnesses) ;  the  two  poems,  //  Pianto  di  Negro- 
ponte,  and  La  Persa  di  Nigroponte  (the  last  three  in  Archivio  Storico 
JtalianOy  Appendice,  ix.,  403-40);  Continuatio  Chronici  Bononiensis, 
Sanudo,  and  Navagero  (Muratori,  xviii.,  779-80 ;  xxii.,  1 190- 1 ;  xxiil, 
1 1 28-9);  Malipiero  in  Archivio  Storico  Italiano,  vii.,  48-55  ;  the  Latin 
treatise  De  Nigroponti  Captione  in  the  Basle  (1556)  ed.  of  Chalkokondyles 
(pp.  330-2),  of  which  there  is  an  Italian  version  in  Sansovino  (pp.  322-3) ; 
Magno,  207;  Sabellico,  Dec.  III.,  Lib.  8;  Phrantzes,  448;  Historia 
Politico,  44;  Chronicon  breve^  521-2.  The  best  modern  account  is 
Admiral  Fincati's  able  article  in  Archivio  Veneto,  xxxii.,  267-307. 


i 


FATE  OF  THE  SURVIVORS  479 

noble  ladies,  who  had  lived  as  local  magnates  in  Euboea  on 
estates  which  had  belonged  to  their  ancestors  for  centuries, 
were  compelled  to  subsist  on  charity  as  pensioners  of  the 
Venetian  Government  in  the  convent  of  St  Philip  and  St 
James.  Twenty-seven  of  these  ladies,  "most  unhappy  of 
mortal  women,"  appeared  before  the  doge  and  begged  for 
bread.  Twenty  years  later  they  received  the  house  of  a 
pious  lady,  which  became  the  monastery  of  the  Holy 
Sepulchre,  as  their  abode.  One  high-born  dame  of  the 
great  family  of  Sommaripa  was  carried  off  into  slavery  with 
her  daughter,  and  recovered  by  the  Venetians  at  Smyrna, 
when  they  took  that  city.  The  Government,  indeed,  ordered 
that  Canale  should  be  made  to  refund  the  amount  of  his 
salary  during  the  time  that  he  had  been  admiral,  and  that 
this  sum  should  be  devoted  to  ransoming  the  prisoners. 
One  of  them  used  his  eyes  to  such  good  purpose  during 
his  imprisonment  at  the  Dardanelles,  that  he  set  fire  to  the 
naval  arsenal  of  the  Turks  at  Gallipoli.  Special  grants  were 
made  to  the  children  of  Alvise  Calbo  and  Bondumier,  and 
the  last  baron  of  Karystos  was  appointed  governor  of 
Lepanto;  but  most  of  the  refugees  ended  their  days  in 
poverty.1  The  Latin  patriarch  of  Constantinople,  who  for 
more  than  a  century  and  a  half  had  held  the  see  of  Negro- 
ponte,  and  whose  possessions  in  the  island  had  been  so  great, 
had  already  ceased  to  reside  there ;  but  the  Catholic  bishoprics 
of  Eubcea  now  ended  their  career.  For  the  second  time, 
Archbishop  Protimo  of  Athens,  who  had  been  living  in  the 
island,  found  himself  an  exile,  and  wrote  pitifully  to  the  pope 
that  he  must  either  beg  or  starve.2  Thus  closed  the  long  Lom- 
bard and  Venetian  history  of  Negroponte — a  history  which  is 
still  commemorated,  despite  modern  Vandalism,  by  the  winged 
lions  on  the  walls,  which  Erizzo  so  bravely  defended,  and  by 
the  fine  escutcheons  in  the  little  museum  at  Chalkis. 

Despite  the  heavy  blow  which  she  had  received,  Venice 
manfully  continued  the  struggle  against  the  great  sultan. 
Further    losses    were    incurred    in    the     Morea;     Vostitza 

1  Cornelius,  Ecclesioe  Venete,  xi.,  272-9,  293-6 ;  Magno,  208 ;  Nava- 
gero,  xxiii.,  11 30,  1146;  Malipiero,  67;  Cippico,  P.  Mocemgi  Gesta 
(ed.  1656),  350 ;  Wadding,  Annates,  xxv.,  195. 

2  Mas  Latrie  in  Revue  de  ?  Orient  latin,  1 1 1.,  445 ;  Reg.  Lat.,  722,  f.  291^ 


\ 


480  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

surrendered ;  Belveder,  or  Pontikokastro,  above  the  harbour 
of  Katakolo,  followed  its  example,  and  the  Turks  set  fire  to 
its  deserted  walls,  and  left  it  the  ruin  which  it  still  remains. 
The  Venetians  themselves  burnt  the  old  castle  of  Kalamata, 
the  birthplace  of  William  of  Achaia,  rather  than  that  it 
should  fall  into  Turkish  hands  ;  thousands  of  Greeks  from 
the  ancient  episcopal  see  of  Olena  and  two  other  places  in 
Elis,  upon  which  the  republic  had  bestowed  special  privileges, 
emigrated  to  Zante,  where  the  Tocchi  were  better  able  than 
the  republic  to  protect  them.  Nauplia  was  almost  driven  to 
yield  from  lack  of  food,  but  was  relieved  in  time.  As  the  sea 
still  washed  the  base  of  the  rock,  and  at  that  time  not  a  single 
house  stood  in  what  is  now  the  lower  town,  it  had  nothing  to 
fear  from  an  assault1  The  war  dragged  on  for  some  nine 
years  more,  despite  efforts  to  make  peace,  which  were  bound 
to  fail,  because  the  republic  asked  for  the  restitution  of 
Negroponte.  The  operations  were,  however,  for  the  most 
part  outside  of  Greece.  Pope  Sixtus  IV.  succeeded  in 
inducing  the  kings  of  Naples  and  Cyprus  and  the  grand 
master  of  the  Knights  of  Rhodes  to  join  Venice  in  a  holy 
league  ;  the  Shah  of  Persia  was  incited  to  attack  the  Turks  in 
Asia  and  claim  the  fallen  empire  of  Trebizond  ;  the  Grand 
Duke  Ivan  III.  of  Russia  offered  to  invade  Constantinople, 
as  son-in-law  of  Thomas  Palaiol6gos,  and  therefore  heir  of 
Byzantium.  For  a  time  the  fortunes  of  war  turned ; 
Mocenigo  bombarded  Smyrna ;  Loredano  saved  Lepanto. 
The  Turks  were  naturally  eager  to  capture  this  last  Venetian 
fortress  of  northern  Greece,  and  its  neglected  walls  and 
dwindling  population  seemed  to  favour  the  enterprise  But, 
though  in  1477  a  large  army  besieged  it  for  three  months, 
and  the  Turkish  artillery  battered  down  a  large  part  of  the 
ramparts,  the  bravery  of  Antonio  Zorzi,  its  rector,  and  the 
prompt  arrival  of  Loredano's  fleet  forced  the  Turks  to  retire 
with  no  other  success  than  the  capture  of  the  outlying  forts 
of  the  colony.2     But  the  republic  had  had  enough  of  fighting. 

1  Malipiero,  59,  65;  Sanudo,  xxii.,  1192;  Navagero,  xxiii.,  1129; 
Magno,  203  ;  Sdthas,  i.,  269 ;  v.,  27-9;  Dor6theos  of  Monemvasia,  Bt0X£<w 
%l(rropiKbvy  473. 

3  Malipiero,  106,  114;  Sanudo,  1207;  Navagero,  1 146-7;  Sabellico, 
Dec.  III.,  bk.  10 ;  "Av0ot}  268  ;  Sdthas,  vii.,  17. 


PEACE  OF  1479  481 

The  King  of  Naples,  who  had  designs  upon  Cyprus  which 
clashed  with  her  own,  had  not  only  broken  up  the  league 
against  the  sultan,  but  had  even  made  an  alliance  with  him — 
the  first  instance  of  those  unnatural,  but  by  no  means 
uncommon,  unions.  The  Turks  were  pressing  hard  the 
Venetian  possessions  in  Albania,  and  Skutari  was  doomed. 
So,  after  sixteen  years  of  warfare,  peace  was  concluded  in 
1479.  Venice  restored  to  the  sultan  all  the  castles  in  the 
Morea  taken  during  the  war  and  the  island  of  Lemnos,  on 
condition  that  the  garrisons  were  granted  an  amnesty  and 
allowed  to  depart  if  they  so  desired.  Thus,  after  the  peace 
of  1479,  Venice  still  retained  the  fortress  and  territory  of 
Lepanto  north  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  and  the  colonies  of 
Nauplia,  Monemvasia,  Coron,  Modon,  and  Navarino  in  the 
Morea.  A  boundary  commission  was  appointed  to  delimitate 
their  frontiers ;  after  much  discussion,  the  "  impregnable " 
fortress  of  Thermisi,  on  the  coast  opposite  Hydra,  with  its 
valuable  salt-pans,  the  adjacent  Kastri,  and  the  ruined  fortress 
of  Kiveri,  opposite  Nauplia,  were  included  in  the  territory  of 
the  latter,  and  Monemvasia  was  allowed  to  retain  Vatika. 
iEgina  remained  subject  to  the  governor  of  Nauplia. 
The  Ionian  islands  of  Corfu,  Paxo,  and  Cerigo,  with  their 
dependencies  ;  the  northern  Sporades ;  two  of  the  Cyclades — 
Tenos  and  Mykonos;  and  Crete,  completed  the  diminished 
dominions  of  the  republic  in  the  Levant1 

While  Venice  had  thus  lost  Negroponte  and  Argos  by 
the  war,  the  long  struggle  had  been  even  more  disastrous  to 
the  Greeks.  The  Venetians,  whose  navy  was  far  superior  to 
that  of  the  Turks,  gained  most  of  their  successes  at  the 
expense,  not  of  the  sultan  but  of  his  Greek  subjects,  just  as, 
in  the  Greco-Turkish  war  of  1897,  a  bombardment  of  Smyrna 
or  Salonika  would  have  mainly  injured  the  Hellenic  popula- 
tion of  those  two  great  Turkish  towns.  The  Turks,  likewise, 
carried  off  numbers  of  Greeks  from  the  places  which  they 
captured,  and  thus  the  unhappy  natives  were  the  chief 
sufferers  from  the  victories  of  their  friends  or  the  successes  of 
their  enemies.     Yet  the  war  had  shown  that  the  Hellenic  race 

1  Miklosich  und  Mullcr,  Acta  et  Diplomat^  III.,  293-309;  Predelli, 
Commemoriali,  v.,  228-30,  238-9  ;  S£tbas,  vi.,  121,  126,  142,  214,  219-20; 
Navagero,  11 66 

2  H 


482  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

could  produce  splendid  fighters,  and  the  name  of  Maroiila, 
the  heroine  of  Lemnos,  might  well  rank  with  the  ancient 
Spartans  or  the  modern  women  of  Soull  At  a  critical 
moment  during  the  siege  of  that  island,  the  girl  seized  the 
sword  and  shield  of  her  dying  father  and  charged  the  Turks 
at  the  head  of  the  wavering  garrison.  As  a  reward  for  her 
services,  she  was  allowed  to  choose  a  husband  from  among 
the  noblest  officers  of  the  Venetian  army,  while  the  republic 
provided  the  marriage  portion.1  It  was  then,  too,  that  the 
Venetians  first  employed  the  Greeks  and  Albanians  of  the 
Morea  as  light  horsemen  against  the  Turks.  Thus  arose  the 
famous  corps  of  stradioti^  who  in  the  sixteenth  century 
demonstrated  all  over  Europe  even  as  far  as  Scotland,  that 
Greek  valour  was  not  extinct  According  to  the  learned 
Greek  historian,  whose  researches  have  thrown  a  flood  of 
light  upon  their  organisation  and  exploits,  their  name  is  not 
derived  from  the  Greek  word  a-rpaTiarrai  ("  soldiers "),  but 
from  the  Italian  straday  because  they  were  "  always  on  the 
road,"  and  had  no  fixed  abodes.  They  were  mainly  recruited 
from  Lakonia ;  but  the  most  valiant  were  the  men  of 
Nauplia  and  Thermisi.  Among  their  leaders  we  find  many 
historic  names,  such  as  those  of  Boua  and  Palaiol6gos,  whose 
bearers  were  descendants  or  relatives  of  the  men  who  had 
fought  the  good  fight  for  the  liberty  of  the  Peloponnese.  But 
they  had  their  weaknesses  as  well  as  their  good  qualities,  and 
their  inordinate  vanity  was  the  favourite  theme  of  Venetian 
comedians,  just  as  Plautus  had  satirised  the  boastfulness  of 
the  Miles  Gloriosus  for  the  amusement  of  the  ancient  Romans. 
A  Venetian  historian  said  that  they  were  "  fonder  of  booty  than 
of  battle,"  and  Tasso  has  blamed  their  rapacity  in  the  line  : 

"  II  leggier  Greco  alle  rapine  intento  ;n 
but  other  poets  have  sung  of  their  triumphs.  Indeed,  there 
were  bards  in  the  ranks  of  the  "  wanderers  "  themselves,  and 
a  whole  literature  of  their  poems  has  been  published,  mostly 
written  in  a  peculiar  dialect  resembling  that  now  spoken  in 
Calabria,  where  many  Greek  songs  are  still  sung  by  the 
descendants  of  the  numerous  Epirote  families  settled  there 
after  the  Turkish  Conquest — the  third  time  that  Magna 
Graecia  had  received  a  large  Greek  population.  One  of  their 
1  SabeUico,  Dec  HI.,  bk.  10. 


THE  STRADIOTI  483 

number,  Marullus,  of  whom  it  was  said  that  he  "  first  united 
Apollo  to  Mars,"  wrote  Latin  alcaics  and  sapphics,  which, 
if  not  exactly  Horatian,  are,  at  any  rate,  as  good  as  the 
ordinary  product  of  the  sixth-form  intellect  Another,  Theo- 
dore Spandounis,  or  Spandugino,  more  usefully  employed  his 
pen  in  the  composition  of  a  work  on  the  Origin  of  the 
Ottoman  Emperors,  with  the  patriotic  object  of  arousing  the 
sympathy  of  sixteenth  century  statesmen  for  the  deliverance 
of  Greece.  The  stradioti,  were,  however,  mightier  with  the 
javelin  and  the  mace — their  characteristic  weapons — than 
with  the  pen.  The  long  javelin,  which  they  carried  on 
horseback,  was  a  particularly  formidable  weapon.  Shod  at 
both  ends  with  a  sharp  iron  point,  it  could  be  used  either  way 
with  equally  deadly  effect ;  and  if  it  failed,  the  agile  horseman 
could  seize  the  mace  which  hung  at  his  saddle  bow,  and 
bring  it  down  on  the  skull  of  an  opponent1  Unfortunately, 
the  blow  was  rarely  struck  for  Greece,  and  the  skull  was 
usually  that  of  a  Christian,  against  whom  the  stradioti  had 
no  personal  or  national  quarrel. 

The  base  ingratitude  of  Venice  sacrificed  by  the  peace  of 
1479  one  of  the  last  independent  Latin  rulers  of  Greece. 
Leonardo  III.  Tocco  had  still  preserved  his  islands  of 
Cephalonia,  Zante,  Sta.  Mavra,  and  Ithaka,  with  the  solitary 
fortress  of  Vonitza  on  the  Ambrakian  Gulf.  During  the  war 
he  had  acted  as  an  intermediary  between  the  two  combatants, 
had  sent  a  galley  under  his  brother  to  the  relief  of  Negro- 
ponte,  and  had  been  included  in  the  alliance  between  the 
republic  and  the  King  of  Naples  against  the  Turks  in  147 1. 
During  this  sixteen  years'  struggle,  his  islands  had  been  the 
refuge  of  many  thousands  from  the  mainland.  No  less  than 
15,000  had  fled  to  Sta.  Mavra,  and  10,000  Greeks  and 
Albanians  had  emigrated  from  the  west  of  the  Morea  to 
Zante,  where  they  made  unfruitful  lands  blossom  like  the  rose, 
and  where  they  formed  an  almost  independent  community 
under  a  Venetian  official,  called  by  the  name  of  consul, 
much  as  did  the  Albanian  colonies  of  Sicily  in  later  times. 

1  The  locus  classicus  for  all  that  concerns  them  are  volumes  vii.,  viiL, 
and  ix.  of  Sdthas's  Mvij/tcSa  'EXAi^i*^  'laroptdt,  which  contain  documents 
relating  to  them  from  1464  to  1570,  and  some  of  their  literary  produc- 
tions.    Cf.  ibid.,  iv.,  pp.  lix.  and  417,  and  Cippico,  P.  Mocetiigi  Gesta,  343. 


484  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

Thus,  while  the  continent  was  being  devastated  with  fire  and 
sword,  the  islands  flourished.    When  PhrantzSs    visited  the 
court  of  Sta.  Mavra,  where  the  duke  resided,  he  found  all  well 
there  and  Leonardo  his  own  master — for  he  had  put  to  death 
the  four  governors  whom  his  predecessor  had  appointed  over 
him.     £urita  tells  us  that  at  the  time  of  the  Turkish  Conquest 
Cephalonia  was  most  fertile:  in  its  two  large  harbours  big 
vessels  could  lie ;  and  it  contained  more  than  6000   houses, 
with  a  population  of  40,000  souls.     Zante,  at  the  same  time, 
had  25,000  inhabitants,  and   the  Spanish  historian  remarks 
that  Leonardo's  state  brought  him  in  more  than  1 2,000  ducats  a 
year,  and  was  large  enough  to  entitle  it  to  the  rank   of  a 
kingdom.        The    administration   of   the    islands   was    well 
organised  ;  in  Zante  and  in  Cephalonia  there  was   a    vice- 
regent,  or  captain,  who    represented   the  duke,    and    who 
exercised  judicial  powers,  and  we  hear  of  financial  officials  of 
the  ducal  court  named  ficurrpoixaa'aapoi,  of  procurators,  and  of 
treasurers.     The  Catholics  of  Zante  had  their  cathedral  of 
the  Redeemer  in  the  castle,   not   far  from   the   Franciscan 
monastery ;  in  the  Catholic  monastery  of  the  Prophet  Elias 
were  the  tomb  and  escutcheon  of  Carlo  I.      It  was  at  this 
period  that  the  church  of  St  Nicholas  on  Mount  Skopos  was 
founded,  and   that   Leonardo   made  various  grants  to   the 
Latin  bishopric  of  Cephalonia  and  Zante,  and  directed  the 
bishop  to  reside  in  the  latter,  and  more  Italian,  island.     But 
he  did  not  limit  his  favours  to  the  Catholics ;  he  saw  that  the 
Greeks,  if  harshly  treated,  might  "prefer  the  mufti's  turban 
to  the  cardinal's  hat,"  and  he  therefore  revived  in  1452,  the 
ancient  orthodox  bishopric  of  Cephalonia,  which  had  been  a 
"  widowed  see  "  since  the  early  days  of  the  Orsini,  and  gave 
the  bishop  jurisdiction  over  both  Zante  and   Ithaka.       He 
was  to  be  elected  from  each  of  the  two  larger  islands  in  turn, 
and  was  to  be,  as  of  old,  a  suffragan  of  the  Metropolitan  of 
Corinth.     With  his  sanction,  too,  a  noble  lady  named  Kleopa 
endowed   the  convent  of  St  John   Baptist  in  Zante.1     But 
though    he    made    these  concessions,  and   though  he   was 
sufficiently  Hellenised  as  to  use  Greek  in  his  documents,  he  is 
said  to  have  been  regarded  by  the   islanders   as   a   tyrant 
Their  disaffection  naturally  facilitated  the  Turkish  Conquest 

1  Chidtes,  'leropucb  '  AxofHrrinoviOpaTa,  ii.,  532-3,  628. 


PLIGHT  OF  LEONARDO  TOCCO  485 

Leonardo  III.  had  married,  in  1463,  Militza,  the  grand- 
daughter of  Thomas  Palaiol6gos;  but,  after  her  death,  he 
sought  to  contract  a  politic  alliance  which  would  ensure 
him  that  protection  which  Venice  seemed  unable  or  unwilling 
to  afford  him.  In  1477  he  therefore  wedded  a  Neapolitan 
lady  of  high  degree,  who  was  niece  of  King  Ferdinand  I. 
But  the  effect  of  this  stroke  of  policy  was  the  very  opposite 
of  what  he  had  expected.  Venice  had  no  desire  to  see  the 
old  Neapolitan  influence  re-established  in  the  Ionian  islands, 
and  had  disregarded  Ferdinand's  protest  that  the  Tocchi 
were  his  vassals.  Accordingly,  she  revenged  herself  for  this 
rapprochement  with  Naples  by  leaving  Leonardo  out  of  the 
treaty  of  peace.     This  act  of  omission  cost  him  his  sceptre. 

Leonardo  was  bound  by  treaty,  not  only  to  pay  an  annual 
tribute  of  4000  ducats  to  the  sultan,  but  to  make  a  present 
of  500  more  every  time  that  a  Turkish  Sandjakbeg  or 
provincial  governor  came  to  Joannina  or  Arta.  It  chanced 
at  this  moment  that  one  of  these  personages  arrived,  who 
was  not  yet  sixteen  years  of  age,  and  who  had  been  degraded 
from  the  superior  rank  of  pasha.  The  Duke  of  Leucadia 
treated  this  juvenile  official,  who  chanced  to  be  a  relative  of 
his  own,  with  scant  consideration,  sending  him  a  gift  of  fruit, 
instead  of  money.  The  young  governor's  pride  was  injured, 
and  he  lodged  a  complaint  at  Constantinople,  that  during 
the  late  war  Leonardo  had  harboured  Venetian  light  cavalry 
in  Zante,  at  the  same  time  recalling  the  fact  that  he  had  not 
been  included  in  the  recent  peace.  Mohammed  was  only 
too  glad  of  an  opportunity  to  round  off  his  conquests  by 
the  annexation  of  almost  the  last  Christian  state  in  Greece, 
which  would  serve  as  a  base  for  his  intended  attack  on  Italy. 
He  therefore  ordered  Ahmed  Pasha  of  Valona  to  attack 
Leonardo  with  twenty-nine  ships.  The  duke  did  not  await 
the  Turkish  invasion.  He  knew  that  the  Venetians  would 
not,  and  the  Neapolitans  could  not,  help  him,  and  that  his 
own  subjects  detested  him.  So,  long  before  the  pasha 
appeared,  he  collected  all  his  portable  valuables,  hired  a 
Venetian  merchantman,  and  fled  from  Sta.  Mavra  to  the 
strongest  of  his  castles,  Fort  St  George,  in  Cephalonia.  But 
he  did  not  trust  the  garrison  ;  the  Turks  who  were  approach- 
ing got  sight  of  his  treasure-ship,  so  he  hastily  embarked  on 


486  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

board  another  Venetian  vessel  that  lay  in  the  harbour  with 
his  wife,  his  son   Carlo,  and  his  two  brothers  for  Taranto, 
whence   he  proceeded   to   Naples.     Ahmed,  saluted   by  the 
Venetian  admiral  as  he  sailed  down  the  channel  of   Corfu, 
easily  captured  Vonitza,  the  last  vestige  of  the  old  Despotat 
of  Epiros,  and  the  islands  of  Santa  Mavra,  Cephalonia,  and 
Ithaka,  cutting  to  pieces  all  the  ducal  officials,  burning  the 
castle  of  Cephalonia,  and  carrying  off  most  of  the  peasants 
to  Constantinople ;  there  the  sultan  separated  the  husbands 
from  their  wives,  and  mated  both  sexes  with  Ethiopians,  in 
order  that  they  might  produce  a  race  of  grey  slaves.     The 
pasha  then  proceeded  to  attack  Zante,  but  here  he  was  met 
by  the  Venetian  admiral,  who  protested  that  the  island  was 
inhabited  by  a  colony  of  Venetian  subjects  from  the  Morea — 
the  recent  immigrants — who  had  hoisted  the  lion-banner  of 
St  Mark,  and  who  were  protected  by  500  light  horse  under 
the  redoubtable   Peter   Boua.     The   matter  was  referred  to 
Constantinople — and,  meanwhile,  the    Albanian    condottierc 
twice  defeated  the  treacherous  invaders — but  with,  no  other 
result  than  that  those  islanders  who  chose  were  allowed  to 
leave — a  permission  of  which  some  thousands  availed  them- 
selves.    Then  the  pasha  ravaged  "  the  flower  of  the  Levant " 
with   fire   and   sword,  and   destroyed   most  of  its  churches 
and  all  its  habitations.     Thus,  in  1479,  after  an  existence  of 
well-nigh  three  centuries,  the  county  palatine  of  Cephalonia, 
the  picturesque  realm  of  many  a  mediaeval  Odysseus,  dis- 
appeared in  the  dull  monotony  of  the  Turkish  Empire.     In 
Zante,  in  Ithaka,  and  in  Cephalonia,  the  Turkish  sway  was 
of  very  brief  duration  ;  nor  was  it  unpopular  with  the  Greeks, 
who  seem  to  have  preferred  the  Turkish  officials  to  their  own 
bishop ;  but  in  Sta.  Mavra,  with  one  scanty  interval,  it  lasted 
for  over  two  centuries.     The  Turks  converted  the  church  of 
the  saint  into  a  mosque ;  the  island  was  governed  by  a  bey, 
who,  after  the  capture  of  Lepanto,  in  1499,  depended  on  the 
pasha  of  that  place;  and  Ottoman  families  immigrated  to 
take  the  place  of  those  unhappy  Leucadians,  whom  Ahmed 
Pasha  had  sold  as  slaves  for  no  more  than  ten  soldi  apiece.1 

1  Miklosich  und  Muller,  v.,  69-72,  260;  Lunzi,  180-98;  Remondini, 
op,  cit,  146  ;  Serra,  Storia  di  Zante,  and  Magno  apud  Hopf,  Chrottiques, 
344-5,  208  ;  Sansovino,  197;  Sdthas,  i.,  269-71  ;  vi.,  17,  21,  215,  and  in 


RECOVERY  OF  CEPHALONIA  487 

Leonardo  Ill.^&nd  his  family  had  meanwhile  met  with  a 
friendly  reception  from  King  Ferdinand  I.  of  Naples,  who 
bestowed  on  him  an  annuity  of  500  florins  and  the  lands  of 
Briatico  and  Calimera  in  Calabria ;  in  1480  he  arrived  with 
his  son  and  his  brothers  in  Rome  to  beg  an  annuity  from 
Sixtus   IV.,  who  gave  him  1000  gold  pieces  and  promised 
him  2000  a  year — an  event  still  commemorated  by  one  of 
the  paintings  in  the  Santo  Spirito  Hospital.     After  a  short 
stay  in  Rome,  he  returned  to  Naples  and  proceeded  to  plan 
the  recapture  of  his  dominions.    The  Tocchi  were  an  enter- 
prising family,  not  likely  to  abandon  the  idea  of  reigning  in 
Greece  at  the  first  rebuff.     The  Roman  diarist  Volaterranus 
tells  us  that  he  once  heard  a  bastard  son  of  Leonardo,  a 
daring  young  fellow  of  two-and-twenty,  say:  "Though  we 
have  lost  our  rings,  we  have  still  got  our  fingers  entire,"  and 
this  youth  is  mentioned  as  being  at  Zante  in  1481.     In  the 
same  year  his  father  Leonardo  and  a  Neapolitan  fleet  in  vain 
summoned  the  Turkish  subassi  of  Cephalonia  and  Zante  to 
surrender ; x  but  Leonardo's  brother  Antonio  and  a  band  of 
Catalan   mercenaries  about  the  same  time  easily  recovered 
the  two  islands — for  the  garrison  of  the  former  was  weak,  and 
that  of  the  latter  had  fled  in  alarm  at  his  approach.     But 
Antonio's  success  aroused  the  jealousy  of  Venice,  which  had 
no  desire  to  see  the  islands  in  the  possession  of  the  King  of 
Naples  or  his  vassals.     The  governor  of  Modon  in    1482 
dislodged   Antonio  and   his  Catalans  from    Zante,  but  he 
managed  to  retain  Cephalonia  till  the  following  year.     His 
exactions,  however,  irritated  the    natives ;    his  connivance 
with  corsairs,  who  made  the  island  their  rendezvous,  alarmed 
the  Venetians;  and,  in  1483,  after  a  futile  attempt  to  buy 
him  out,  the  republic,  aided  by  many  of  the  islanders,  pre- 
pared to  attack  him.     Thereupon,  the  garrison  of  the  castle 
slew  him,  and  opened  their  gates  to  the  Venetian  commander, 
who  then  without  opposition  made  himself  master  of  the  whole 
island  and  appointed  its  first  Venetian  governor.     But,  while 

B<rr£a  of  1 885,  No.  506  ;  (Jurita,  vol.  v.,  bk.  iv.,  ch.  xxx. ;  Phrantzes,  429 
(where  the  corrupt  word  fjumrrpaXduujv  refers  to  the  /tacrr/jo/Aoererdpot,  officials 
well  known  in  the  Ionian  islands) ;  Predelli,  Cotnmemoriali,  v.,  203,  212  ; 
Sabellico,  loe.  tit  ;  Feyerabend,  Reyssbuch,  ff.  351,  372. 

1  Siithas,  i.,  279  ;  vi.,  228,  230  ;  Faber,  Evagatorium,  iii.,  345-6. 


488  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

Leonardo  III.  asked  for  the  restitution  of  tiie  two  islands  from 
the  sultan,  the  latter  demanded  them  for  himself.     Venice  in 
vain  strove  to  retain  Cephalonia,  which  in  1485  she  had  to 
cede  to  Bajazet  II.,  till  it  finally  passed  into  her  hands  in  150a 
But  she  succeeded  in  keeping  Zante,  on  condition  of  paying  an 
annual  tribute  of  500  ducats,  and  the  "  flower  of  the  Levant " 
thenceforth  remained  Venetian  down  to  the  fall  of  the  republic1 
The  Tocchi   made  no  further    efforts  to  recover   their 
island  domain,  for  the  kings  of  Naples  were  now  threatened 
by  France,  and  had  no  wish  to  irritate  the  sultan   into  a 
second  attack  upon  Otranto.     Leonardo  III.,  after  going  as 
Neapolitan  ambassador  to  Spain,  where  he  was  welcomed 
with  royal  honours,  received  the  Apulian  town  of  Monopoli, 
the  home  of  the  first  palatine  count  of  Cephalonia,   from 
Charles  VIII.  of  France  in  1495,  when  the  latter  invaded 
Naples,  and  perished  beneath  the  ruins  of  his  house  in  Rome, 
under  the   pontificate   of   Alexander   VI.     His  eldest  son, 
Carlo,  whom  Ferdinand  I.  had  promised  to  treat  as  his  own 
child,  and  who  received  both  Neapolitan  and  papal  pensions, 
after  fighting  in  the  armies  of  the  Emperor  Maximilian  I., 
died  at  his  house  in  the  Via  S.  Marco,  in  Rome,  under  Leo 
X.      Leonardo's  two  sons  by  his  second  marriage  naturally 
received  favours  from  the  Spanish  dynasty,  alike  at  Naples 
and    in    Spain    itself.    One   of   them,   Ferdinand,  or    Don 
Ferrante,  obtained  the  Lombard  castle  of  Refrancore  from 
Maximilian  I.,  acted  as  Spanish  ambassador  to  the  court  of 
Henry  VII.  of  England  in  1506  in  the  affair  of  the  Duke  of 
Suffolk,  and  tried  to  keep  the  peace  between  Francis  I.  and 
the  Emperor  Charles  V.  in  1535 — an  event  commemorated 
on  his  tomb  in  Madrid.     Carlo's  descendants  claimed  to  be 
treated  as  princes  of  the  blood,  on  the  ground  that  they 
represented    both    the    Byzantine    and    Servian  dynasties. 
They  continued  to  style  themselves  Despots  of  Arta  until, 
in  the  seventeenth  century,  they  substituted  for  this   title 
that    of   Prince  of   Achaia,2  perhaps  on   the  ground   that 

1  J.  Volaterranus  and  Navagero  apud  Muratori,  xxiii.,  102-3  (=part 
III.,  12-13,  in  new  edition),  1180-1,  1189  5  Lunzi,  199-219  ;  Sithas,  i.,  315  ; 
vi.»  334i  336>  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  v.,  248,  317;  Miklosich  und 
Miiller,  Acta  el  Diploma tay  III.,  332. 

2  Curita,  vol.  iv.,  bk.  xx.,  ch.  lxxiii. ;  vol.  v.,  bk.  v.,  ch.  xxvi ;  Serra 


•\ 


FATE  OF  THE  TOCCHI  489 

Thomas  Palaiologos,  whose  representatives  they  were  by  the 
female  line,  had  married  the  heiress  of  the  last  Frankish 
Prince  of  Achaia.  At  Naples  they  built  a  palace  in  the  present 
Corso  Vittorio  Emanuele,  now  known  as  the  Palazzo  Troise, 
but  formerly  called  by  the  people  the  Palazzo  del  Santo  Piede, 
from  the  foot  of  St  Anna,  which  Leonardo  III.  had  brought 
with  him  from  Greece,  and  which  was  there  preserved.  The 
family  has  only  recently  become  extinct,  but  a  room  of  the 
palace  still  contains  a  collection  of  the  portraits  of  the  former 
palatine  counts  of  Cephalonia,  while  the  family  titles  and 
the  sacred  foot  have  passed  to  Carlo  Capece  Galeotta,  Duke 
of  Regina,  the  head  of  the  Neapolitan  Legitimists.2  But  it 
has  never  been  suggested  that  the  Albanian  question  should 
be  solved  by  the  restoration  of  this  estimable  nobleman  to 
the  seat  once  occupied  by  the  family  at  Joannina. 

In  their  islands  the  Tocchi  have  left  but  few  memorials 
behind  them.  Their  arms,  three  blue  waves  on  a  silver  shield, 
surmounted  by  a  head  of  Pegasus,  can  no  longer  be  seen  on 
the  castle  walls  and  on  the  bells  of  the  Panagia  Anaphonetria 
church  at  Zante,8  while  one  coin  alone  still  commemorates 
their  sovereignty  in  the  Ionian  Sea. 

The  twenty  years'  peace  between  Venice  and  the  Turks, 
which  followed  the  conclusion  of  this  war,  was  by  no  means 
a  period  of  repose  for  the  Greeks.  Scarcely  had  the  late 
war  ended  than  a  national  insurrection  broke  out  in  Maina 
under  the  auspices  of  a  guerilla  leader,  Korkodeilos  Klad&s, 
the  prototype  of  the  chieftains  who  played  so  great  a  part 
in  the  War  of  Independence  more  than  three  centuries  later. 
Klad&s  had  been  one  of  the  last  of  the  Peloponnesian 
warriors  to  submit  to  Mohammed  II.  at  the  time  of  the 
Conquest,  and  the  conqueror  had  thought  it  politic  to  bestow 
upon  him  the  rich  plain  of  Helos,  near  Sparta,  as  a  military 
fief.4  Helos,  according  to  one  theory,  had  in  old  times 
given  to  the  Helots  their  name ;   but  Klad&s  had  more  of 

apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  345  ;  Mazzella,  Descrittione  del  Regno  di  Napoliy 
643-8  ;  Sansovino,  197  ;  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  I.,  i.,  325-35  ;  II., 
i.,  354-6 ;  Gottlob,  op,  cit.t  293.    The  tomb  was  destroyed  two  centuries  ago. 

*  De  la  Ville,  in  Napoli  Nobilissima  for  1900,  pp.  180-1. 

J  K.  Mazarakes  of  Zante  has  kindly  examined  for  me  both  the  bells 
and  the  escutcheon  on  the  castle.  Both  are  Venetian,  the  latter  that  of 
Donato  da  Leze,  governor  1504-6.  4  Phrantzds,  407. 


I 


490  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

the  Spartan  than  of  the  Helot  in  his  composition.  The 
Venetians,  recognising  his  abilities  during  the  war,  had 
appointed  him  captain  of  the  Greeks  in  their  service,  the 
so-called  stradioti}  But  the  Venetian  politicians  soon 
found,  as  many  governments  have  discovered  since,  that 
a  dashing  leader  of  irregulars,  however  useful  in  time  of 
war,  is  apt  to  be  an  embarrassment  in  time  of  peace.  Kladis 
did  not  acquiesce  in  the  cession  of  the  region  known  as 
"  the  arm  of  Maina "  {Brazzo  di  Maina)  to  the  Turks.  He 
escaped  from  Coron  to  Maina  and  raised  the  standard 
of  revolt,  round  which  several  thousand  outlaws  and 
irregulars  speedily  gathered.  The  Venetian  authorities, 
afraid  lest  Mohammed  should  suspect  them  of  having 
instigated  the  movement,  at  once  arrested  the  family  of 
Klad&s,  and  bade  the  Mainates  hand  over  the  rebel  chief 
to  the  Turkish  governor  of  the  Morea.  In  order  to  secure 
the  performance  of  this  command,  they  put  a  heavy  price 
upon  the  head  of  their  former  captain.  But  the  Mainates 
showed  no  desire  to  sell  their  leader,  who  signally  routed  a 
Turkish  force  which  was  despatched  against  him.  Dis- 
sensions, however,  broke  out  between  him  and  another 
insurgent  captain  of  stradioti,  Theodore  Boua,  and  a  fresh 
Turkish  army  succeeded  in  penetrating  into  parts  of  Maina 
which  no  Mussulman  foot  had  as  yet  ever  trodden.  But 
Klad&s,  though  at  bay,  was  not  taken.  Some  Neapolitan 
galleys  chanced  to  be  lying  off  the  coast,  and  the  outlawed 
chieftain,  after  a  last  gallant  and  successful  attack  upon  the 
Turks,  escaped  on  board  and  sailed  to  Naples,  where  he 
received  a  warm  welcome  from  the  king,  who  was  anxiously 
expecting  the  descent  of  the  Turkish  fleet  upon  the  Adriatic 
coast  of  his  kingdom.  Klad&s  figures  no  more  in  the 
history  of  Greece;  but  we  find  him  fighting  by  the  side 
of  Skanderbeg's  son  for  the  Neapolitan  cause  in  Kpiros, 
and  King  Ferdinand  I.  thought  so  highly  of  his  services 
that  he  granted  him,  and  bade  his  son  continue,  a  yearly 
allowance  out  of  the  treasury.2 

A  fresh  insurrection  broke  out  in  1489 ;  but  a  far  more 

1  S&has,  Mrntun,  vii.,  20. 

2  Ibid.,  i.,  271,  273.9  J  vi.,  147-50,  154-6,  158,  168,  171,  180,  200,221, 
222,  226-9  :  'BMf1'***  'AvMora,  I.,  £i;'-£0'  ;  TovptcoKparovfUvri  'EXXdt ,  36-45. 


SCHEMES  OP  CHARLES  VIII  491 

imposing  movement  now  occupied  the  attention  of  Europe. 
Andrew  Palaiol6gos,  the  elder  son  of  the  last  Despot  of  the 
Morea,  and  nephew  of  the  last  Emperor  of  Constantinople, 
after  endeavouring  to  persuade  the  Neapolitan  court  to  aid 
him  in  the  reconquest  of  his  father's  province,  found  a  readier 
hearing  from  the  ambitious  King  of  France,  Charles  VIII. 
In  1494,  a  solemn  meeting  took  place  between  him  and  the 
king's  representative,  Cardinal  York,  in  the  church  of  San 
Pietro  in  Montorio,  at  Rome,  where  the  former  transferred  all 
his  imperial  rights  and  claims  to  the  most  Christian  king,  on 
consideration  of  an  annual  payment  of  4300  gold  ducats  and 
a  grant  of  lands  yielding  a  further  annual  income  of  5000 
gold  ducats,  the  cardinal  also  pledging  King  Charles  to 
restore  Palaiol6gos  to  the  Despotat  of  the  Morea,  for  which 
the  Despot  should  yield  "  a  fair,  white  steed "  on  St  Louis' 
Day  to  the  king,  in  token  of  homage.1  In  the  same  year 
Charles  VIII.  set  out  on  his  famous  expedition  to  Naples, 
preceded  by  a  grandiose  proclamation,  announcing  his 
intentions  against  the  Turks,  and  heralded  by  the  verses 
of  a  courtly  poet  who  foretold  that  he  would  "  pass  beyond 
the  sea,  then  enter  Greece,  and  by  his  prowess  be  acclaimed 
King  of  the  Greeks."  The  news  of  his  plans  spread  across 
the  Adriatic,  and  Thessaly  and  Epiros  awaited  the  advent  of 
the  conqueror  of  Naples.  The  Turks  quitted  the  coasts  in 
alarm,  and  the  sultan  prepared  to  retire  bag  and  baggage 
into  Asia.2  In  Monemvasia  a  plot  was  organised  with  the 
connivance  of  Andrew  PalaioUSgos,  whose  name  was  still 
popular  there,  for  delivering  that  strong  Venetian  fortress 
to  his  French  ally.s  But  the  triumphs  of  the  French  king 
had  excited  the  jealousy  of  Europe ;  Venice  arrested  one  of 
his  principal  agents,  and  forbade  all  ships  to  sail  from  the 
Venetian  ports  for  Greece ;  and  Charles  retreated  to  France, 
leaving  the  unhappy  Greeks  to  pay  the  penalty  of  their 
credulity  with  their  lives.  Such  has  been  the  usual  result 
of  foreign  intervention  in  the  affairs  of  Greece.  Quicquid 
delirant  regesy  plectuntur  Achivi. 

1  Memoires  de  VAcademie  des  Inscriptions,  xvii.,  539. 

2  "  Pour  se  sauver  dela  en  Asie  avec  tout  son  train  n — the  first  use  of 
Mr  Gladstone's  classic  phrase.     Ibid.,  xvii.,  567. 

{  Sanudo,  Diarii,  i.,  703. 


492  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

These  recent  services  of  Venice  to  the  sultan  did  not  for 
long  retard  his  designs  upon  her  possessions  in  the  Levant 
Excited  by  her  Italian  enemies,  of  whom  Lodovico  il  Moro 
of  Milan  was  the  worst,  he  began  a  fresh  Turco- Venetian 
war  in  1499.  Lepanto,  her  last  scrap  of  territory  in 
continental  Greece,  was  the  objective  of  both  his  land  and 
his  sea  forces.  The  population  of  the  Venetian  colony  on 
the  Corinthian  Gulf  had  considerably  increased,  owing  to 
the  immigration  of  people  from  Zante,  when  the  Turks  had 
taken  that  island  ;  and,  though  many  had  doubtless  returned, 
now  that  "the  flower  of  the  Levant"  was  in  the  hands  of 
Venice,  there  were  nearly  7000  persons  in  the  town  shortly 
before  it  fell.  The  Lepantines  had,  however,  received  little 
attention  from  the  Home  Government,  though  their  envoys 
occasionally  journeyed  with  petitions  to  the  metropolis.  For 
thirty  years  no  Venetian  commissioner  had  been  sent  to  hold 
an  enquiry  into  the  administration  of  this  outlandish  place; 
and  when,  at  the  eleventh  hour,  in  the  very  year  of  its 
capture,  one  of  those  officials  at  last  arrived,  he  found  that 
the  poor  had  been  much  oppressed  by  the  nobles  and 
citizens,  who  formed  a  class  apart  from  the  people,  and 
had  established  a  council  of  thirty  for  the  management  of 
public  affairs.  The  colony,  as  delimitated  after  the  last  war, 
contained,  besides  Lepanto  itself,  four  other  castles,  all  in  bad 
repair,  and  so  carelessly  guarded  that  the  garrison  of  one  of 
them  was  represented  by  one  old  woman !  Something  had, 
however,  been  done  for  the  fortifications  of  the  town.  The 
late  rector  had  died  of  his  exertions  on  the  defences,  and 
Sanudo  has  preserved  a  contemporary  plan  of  the  place,  with 
its  triple  ring  of  walls  and  the  castle  at  the  summit,  which 
gave  it  then,  as  now,  the  appearance  of  the  papal  tiara.  Such 
was  the  condition  of  the  city,  which  a  Venetian  historian  has 
called  "  the  strongest  bulwark  of  the  Christian  peoples." * 

The  fate  of  Lepanto  was  decided,  however,  not  by  land, 
but  by  sea.  The  Venetian  fleet,  which  should  have  pre- 
vented the  Turkish  admiral  from  entering  the  Gulf  of 
Corinth,  was  commanded  by  Antonio  Grimani,  a  man  who 

1  Sdthas,  hivrjfieia,  v.,  7-12  ;  vi.,  21S-19  ;  Sanudo,  Diarii,  ii.,  165,  292-4, 
534,  790  ;  Cappelletti,  Storia  delta  R.  di  Vertezia,  vi.,  365  ;  Lamansky, 
Secrets  de  PEtat  de  Vemsey  593. 


\ 


LOSS  OF  LEPANTO  493 

owed  his  position  to  his  wealth  and  his  connections  rather 
than  to  his  skill  as  a  seaman.  He  now  repeated  the 
timorous  tactics  which,  twenty-nine  years  before,  had  cost 
the  republic  Negroponte.  He  allowed  the  Turkish  fleet  to 
creep  up  the  west  coast  of  the  Morea  beneath  the  walls  of 
the  Venetian  castle  of  Navarino,  or  Zonchio,  as  the  Venetians 
still  called  it.  When  the  Turkish  admiral  moved  thence  to 
the  islet  of  Prodano,  a  battle  became  inevitable.  But  in  this 
conflict,  which  has  taken  its  name  from  Zonchio,  the  Venetian 
commander,  blinded  by  jealousy  of  his  much  abler  colleague, 
Loredano,  took  the  part  of  a  spectator.  In  vain  Loredano 
and  Alban  d'Armer,  another  Venetian  captain,  boarded  the 
biggest  of  the  Turkish  vessels.  The  intrepid  Turk  set  fire  to 
his  ship  ;  the  flames  spread  to  theirs  also  ;  all  three  perished, 
and  the  island  of  Sapienza  long  preserved  the  name  of  Borrak 
Reis,  the  author  of  this  heroic  suicide.  According  to  a  less  pro- 
bable story,  Armer  escaped  the  fire,  only  to  be  sawn  asunder 
by  the  Turks.  At  that  time  the  French  were  the  allies  of 
Venice ;  but  not  even  the  arrival  of  a  French  fleet  could  stir 
the  dilatory  Venetian  admiral  into  activity.  After  three 
futile  engagements,  the  Turkish  galleys  entered  the  Gulf 
of  Corinth,  and  the  fate  of  Lepanto  was  sealed.  The 
garrison  had  already  repelled  seven  attacks,  and  when  the 
vessels  were  first  sighted,  the  bells  were  rung  in  a  joyful 
peal,  for  they  thought  that  it  was  Grimani,  coming  to  their 
relief.  The  fatal  truth  turned  their  rejoicing  to  despair; 
next  day,  the  Albanians  in  the  town  sent  seven  envoys  to 
treat  with  the  Turks.  These  emissaries  returned,  clad  in 
cloth  of  gold,  and  laden  with  promises  of  fiscal  exemption 
for  ten  years,  and  with  the  guarantee  that  the  lives  and 
property  of  all  the  inhabitants  should  be  spared.  Thereupon 
the  city  surrendered,  and  on  the  next  day,  29th  August,  the 
castle  hauled  down  the  lion-banner,  which  for  ninety-two 
years  had  floated  over  Lepanto.  The  Turkish  soldiers  were 
forbidden  to  sack  the  town ;  a  careful  inventory  was  made  of 
everything  that  it  contained;  and  the  patriotic  Archbishop 
Saracco,  who  had  stayed  to  comfort  the  besieged,  was  allowed 
to  go  free  and  tell  the  sad  tale  at  Venice.1    Great  was  the 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  ii.,  1235, 12904,  1323,  1339-40;  Hi.,  11-14  ;  Malipiero, 
Annali,    174-80;    Haji    Kalifeh,    The  History  of  the   Maritime    Wars^ 


1 


494  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

indignation  of  the  Venetians  when  the  news  arrived.  Public 
opinion  at  once  recognised  that  Grimani,  and  not  Moro,  the 
governor  of  Lepanto,  was  responsible  for  its  loss.  Street- 
boys  went  about  singing  doggerel  verses  against  "Antonio 
Grimani,  the  ruin  of  the  Christians";  the  Government 
ordered  his  arrest ;  his  enemies  demanded  his  head.  Mean- 
while, the  wretched  man,  after  a  feeble  attempt  to  take 
Cephalonia,  had  retired  to  Corfii,  whence  he  was  brought 
as  a  prisoner  to  Venice  and  put  upon  his  trial.  Family 
influence  was  used  to  the  utmost  to  procure  his  acquittal; 
the  proceedings  were  protracted  until  public  indignation 
had  somewhat  cooled ;  and  in  the  end  his  punishment 
was  banishment  to  the  island  of  Cherso  in  the  Quarnara1 
Twenty-one  years  later  the  man  who  had  lost  Lepanto 
became  Doge  of  Venice.  A  smaller  culprit,  the  commander 
of  the  castle,  found  to  have  taken  a  bribe,  was  hanged 
between  the  red  columns  of  the  Doge's  Palace — a  striking 
example  of  Juvenal's  saying,  that  one  scoundrel  obtains  the 
gallows,  another  the  diadem.2 

The  sultan  now  held  the  key  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  and 
he  at  once  gave  orders  to  secure  the  entrance  by  the  erection 
of  two  forts  on  either  shore,  at  Rhion  and  Antirrhion,  where 
little  more  than  a  mile  of  sea,  the  so-called  "little  Dar- 
danelles," separates  Roumeli  from  the  Morea.  In  three 
months'  time  these  forts  were  finished,  and,  though  damaged 
by  tjie  fortunes  of  war,  have  ever  since  remained — a 
picturesque  memorial  of  Bajazet  II.8  But  he  was  not 
satisfied  with  this  conquest ;  when  Venice  sued  for  peace, 
he  demanded  nothing  less  than  the  cession  of  Nauplia  and 
her  two  Messenian  colonies ;  and  when  she  refused,  he  resolved 
to  take  them  by  force.  In  the  following  year,  1500,  he 
entered  the  Morea  at  the  head  of  a  large  army,  and  ordered 

19-21  ;  Chronicon  Venttutn,  apud  Muratori,  xxiv.,  1 13-14,  117;  Bembo, 
Rerum  Venetarum  Historia  (ed.  1 551),  ff.  100-4;  Sansovino,  f.  200; 
Historia  Politico,  56.  The  best  modern  account  is  Admiral  Fincati's 
La  deplorabile  Battaglia  Novate  del  Zonchio  in  the  Rivista  MaritHma 
for  1883,  pp.  185-213. 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii>  iii.,  5,  66,  172-4  ;  Malipiero,  Annali,  182. 

2  Bembo,  f.  153  ;  Sanudo,  Diarii,  vl,  85. 

3  Sanudo,  Diarii,  iii.,  30, 40,  54  ;  Chronicon  Venetum,  xxiv.,  128  ;   Haji 
Kalifeh,  Cronologia  historica,  137. 


BAJAZET  II.  ATTACKS  MODON  495 

an  attack  upon  Nauplia.  Though  Palamidi  was  still  un- 
fortified, the  place  was  defended  by  four  castles — the  two  old 
"  fortresses  of  the  Franks  and  the  Greeks,"  as  they  were  still 
called,  the  Venetian  Torrione,  and  the  Castel  dello  Scoglio, 
on  the  islet  of  St  Theodore,  the  modern  Bourtzi ; l  the  popula- 
tion of  the  colony  had  increased  since  the  Turkish  Conquest 
of  the  Morea,  for  seven  years*  residence  conferred  local 
citizenship;  and  the  stradiotiy  if  at  times  a  source  of 
anxiety  to  the  governor  and  a  cause  of  friction  with  the 
Turks  of  Argos,  were  first-class  fighting  men.  Accordingly, 
the  Turkish  cavalry  were  defeated,  nor  was  an  attack  on 
the  strong  castle  of  Navarino  more  successful.  Bajazet 
therefore  decided  to  concentrate  his  efforts  on  Modon,  the 
Port  Said  of  Frankish  Greece,  the  important  half-way  house 
between  Venice  and  the  Holy  Land,  at  which  every  traveller 
stopped  on  his  way  to  the  East  A  pilgrim  who  visited  it 
in  1484  was  struck  by  its  thick  walls,  its  deep  ditches,  and 
its  strong  towers ;  ten  years  later  it  was  being  further  fortified. 
The  cathedral  of  St  John,  though  a  mean  structure,  contained 
the  venerated  remains  of  St  Leo,  and  the  head  of  St 
Athanasius ;  the  "  German  House  "  of  the  Teutonic  Knights 
is  mentioned  by  every  visitor.  The  Venetian  Government 
found,  indeed,  that  the  budget  of  the  colony  always  showed 
a  deficit ;  but  Modon  was  none  the  less  a  flourishing  place, 
where  a  number  of  Jewish  silk-workers  found  employment. 
It  possessed  a  fine  artificial  harbour,  and  an  enthusiastic 
traveller  of  this  period  exclaims  that  you  can  find  vessels 
there  "  for  every  part  of  the  world,  for  Modon  is,  as  it  were, 
half  way  to  every  land  and  sea."  It  boasted  a  busy  market 
in  the  suburb,  where  a  colony  of  gypsies  had  settled,  and 
where  the  Turks  of  the  country  made  their  fortunes  by 
selling  pigs  to  the  Giaours,  whom  it  was  worth  their  while, 
therefore,  not  to  harass.  No  less  than  5000  of  these  animals 
were  exported  to  Venice,  and  much  of  the  wine  which  passed 
for  Malmsey  in  the  West  really  came  from  Crete  or  Modon 
— for  the  Turks  who  now  owned  the  vineyards  round 
Monemvasia  had  ceased  to  plant  vines.  "  The  mere  thought 
of  the  muscat  of  Modon  delights  me,"  writes  worthy  Father 

1  Sanudo,   Diarit,  iii.,   838,  900;   Dordtheos  of  Monemvasia,  472; 
Lamprinfdes,    H  NaurXJo,  13 1-2. 


496  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

Faber,  while  as  for  oranges,  they  were  dirt  cheap.  Such 
was  the  condition  of  the  ancient  Venetian  colony  on  the 
eve  of  its  capture.1 

Cabriel,  the  governor,  had  made  preparations  for  the 
Turkish  siege.  Immediately  after  the  fall  of  Lepanto,  he 
had  written  home  for  supplies,  and  the  republic  had  at 
once  ordered  the  despatch  of  men,  munitions,  and  money 
for  the  defence  of  a  place  which  was  so  very  dear  to  her 
heart  Many  small  houses  outside  the  town  were  burned, 
so  as  not  to  give  cover  to  the  enemy,  and  a  dam  was  built 
across  the  mouth  of  the  harbour,  so  that  only  a  single  ship 
could  enter  at  a  time.  Most  of  the  women  were  sent  to 
Crete,  and  the  garrison  of  7000  men  was  in  excellent  spirits. 
For  a  month  Bajazet  in  vain  besieged  the  town  by  land 
and  sea,  while  500  cannon  played  upon  its  walls.  The 
sultan  was  on  the  point  of  abandoning  the  siege,  when  an 
unfortunate  act  on  the  part  of  the  garrison  delivered  the 
place  into  his  hands.  Four  Venetian  and  Corfiote  galleys 
suddenly  appeared  with  supplies  at  the  mouth  of  the 
harbour;  the  delighted  inhabitants  rushed  down  to  the 
beach  to  greet  their  deliverers ;  the  walls  were  temporarily 
deserted;  and  the  janissaries  seized  this  opportunity  of 
entering  at  the  tower  of  the  governor's  palace,  where  their 
continuous  cannonade  had  destroyed  the  fortifications.  The 
people  rushed  back  to  the  defence  of  the  town,  but  it  was 
too  late:  in  despair,  they  set  fire  to  their  own  homes,  and 
more  than  half  the  city  was  laid  in  ashes.  The  sultan 
showed  no  mercy  to  those  who  had  so  bravely  withstood 
his  armies  for  a  month ;  the  Catholic  bishop  was  slain  as 
he  was  addressing  his  flock ;  all  the  males  of  twelve  years 
and  upwards  were  beheaded ;  but  the  governor  was  spared 
to  serve  as  a  decoy-duck  elsewhere.  The  rest  of  the  women 
and  children  fled  in  panic  to  the  Turkish  fleet,  and  were 
sold  as  slaves  to  every  quarter  of  the  Mussulman  world 
Thus,  on  Sunday,  9th  August  1 500,  Modon  fell,  after  having 
belonged  to  Venice  for  nearly  300  years.  Delighted  with  his 
prize,  Bajazet  promoted  the  janissary  who  had  first  mounted 

1  Faber,  Evagatoriiim,  i„  39,  165  ;  iii.,  314,  331,  333,  337,  338,  343; 
Feyerabend,  Reyssbuchy  ff,  37,  55,  125,  182-3,  351  ;  Casola,  Viaggio,  37-8; 
Sdthas,  i.,  295. 


LOSS  OF  MODON  AND  COfcON  49? 

the  walls  to  be  a  sandjak,  or  provincial  governor,  and  on 
the  first  Friday  after  the  capture,  when  the  fire  was  at  last 
spent,  rode  to  the  desecrated  cathedral,  there  to  offer  up 
his  thanksgivings  to  the  God  of  battles,  to  whom,  as  he 
confessed  when  he  gazed  at  the  deep  moat,  he  owed  the 
conquest  of  this  strong  city.  No  time  was  lost  in  repairing 
the  walls,  and  every  village  in  the  Morea  was  ordered  to 
send  five  families  to  repopulate  Modon.1 

The  fall  of  Modon  brought  with  it  the  loss  of  Navarino 
and  Coron.  Contarini,  the  commander  of  Navarino,  as  soon 
as  he  was  convinced  that  Modon  had  really  been  taken,  sur- 
rendered that  strong  fortress — an  act  of  cowardice  which 
cost  him  his  head.  The  punishment  was  not  undeserved, 
for  the  place  had  provisions  for  three  years,  and  3000  men 
to  defend  it  The  authorities  of  Coron  wished  to  hold  out ; 
but  they  were  overruled  by  the  terrified  inhabitants,  who 
were  promised  favourable  conditions  if  they  yielded,  and 
death  if  they  resisted.  Their  lives  were  indeed  spared,  but 
they  were  driven  into  exile,  and  the  revenues  of  both  Coron 
and  Modon  were  thenceforth  dedicated  to  Mecca.  At  Coron, 
too,  the  sultan  prayed  in  what  had  so  long  been  the  Catholic 
church  to  Allah,  and  then  set  out  to  besiege  Nauplia,  taking 
with  him  the  governor  of  Modon  as  a  proof  that  that  colony 
had  succumbed.  Cabriel,  however,  escaped,  and  another 
Venetian  from  Coron,  who  had  held  office  at  Nauplia,  fled 
on  horseback  into  that  city  and  urged  the  citizens,  whom 
he  had  been  sent  to  convince  of  the  folly  of  resistance,  to 
resist  to  the  last.  A  brave  messenger  from  Monemvasia,  at 
the  risk  of  impalement,  which  had  befallen  two  of  his  com- 
rades, stripped  off  his  clothes  and  swam  across  the  harbour 
with  letters  announcing  the  speedy  arrival  of  the  Venetian 
fleet  The  mettle  of  the  garrison  and  the  strength  of  the  forti- 
fications caused  Bajazet  to  desist  from  the  difficult  enterprise 
and  retire,  content  with  the  capture  of  Vatika,  to  Adrianople. 

The  Venetian  colony  in  the  Argolid  was  saved,  but 
great  was  the  grief  of  the  metropolis  when  the  news  of 
Modon's  loss  arrived.     The  Council  of  Ten  burst  into  tears 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  in.,  574,  602,  620,  637,  688-94,  717-18,  733  ;  S£thas, 
i.,  316-18  ;  Sansovino,  f.  201  ;  Bembo,  ff.  1 10-14  ;  Historia  Politic  a,  56-8  ; 
Chronicon  breve,  522  ;  Haji  Kalifeh,  The  Maritime  Wars,  21-3. 

2  I 


1 


498  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

when  the  sad  tidings  were  announced  to  them,  and  the 
whole  city  was  overcome  with  sorrow.  Nor  was  this 
remarkable;  for  Modon,  as  the  republic  informed  the 
Princes  of  Europe,  had  been  "the  receptacle  and  special 
nest  of  all  our  galleys,  ships,  and  vessels  on  their  way  to  the 
Levant"  Together  with  Coron,  it  had  been  the  earliest 
acquisition  of  the  republic  on  the  mainland  of  Greece,  and 
the  Venetian  archives  contain  a  whole  literature  concerning 
the  administration  of  these  two  Messenian  colonies.  The 
dependent  castle  of  Navarino  was,  indeed,  almost  immedi- 
ately recaptured  by  a  clever  ruse,  but  retaken  by  Kemal 
Reis  in  the  following  year ;  and  both  Modon  and  Coron, 
thirty  years  later,  succumbed  for  an  instant  to  Christian 
fleets.  But  the  flag  of  the  Evangelist  never  waved  again 
from  their  towers  till  the  day  when  Morosini,  imitating 
Bajazet  II.,  went  in  state  to  attend  a  thanksgiving  service 
in  the  consecrated  mosque  of  Modon.  Zante  took  its  place 
as  a  port  of  call,  while  the  survivors  found  a  home  in  the 
newly-won  Venetian  island  of  Cephalonia.1 

The  republic  had  several  times  attempted  to  recover  that 
island,  which  she  had  been  forced  to  surrender  in  1485. 
Thanks  to  the  efforts  of  Pope  Alexander  VI.,  King  Ferdinand 
of  Spain  was  induced  to  send  his  famous  captain,  Gonzalo 
de  C6rdoba,  to  her  aid.  The  Spanish  and  Venetian  fleets, 
the  latter  under  Pesaro,  were  designed  for  the  recovery  of 
Modon ;  but,  as  timber  was  required  for  the  necessary  siege 
engines,  they  sailed  to  Cephalonia,  an  island  now  singularly 
barren  but  then  covered  with  forests,  which  have  given  its 
name  to  the  Black  Mountain.  To  provide  useful  employment 
for  the  soldiers  while  the  timber  was  being  cut,  the  two 
commanders  resolved  to  attack  the  fortress  of  St  George, 
which  had  been  the  favourite  residence  of  the  Tocchi,  and 
was  still  the  capital  of  the  island.  The  castle  stands  upon  a 
steep  and  high  mountain,  and  was  defended  by  300  mea 
But  the  besiegers  erected  a  rampart  high  enough  to  enable 
them  to  command  the  position ;  a  friendly  Greek  kept  them 
supplied  with  provisions,  and  on  24th  December  1500  the 

1  Sanudo,  Diarit,  Hi.,  688, 7 19, 77 1,8 11,  833,  901-2;  iv.,328;  Bembo, 
ff.  115,  117,  123 ;  Sansovino,  f.  201  ;  S4thas,  i.,  318 ;  vii.,  67  ;  DonStheos 
of  Monemvasia,  loc.  tit. 


CEPHALONIA  AND  STA.  MAVRA  499 

capital  of  Cephalonia  fell.  An  inscription  was  immured  over 
the  main  entrance  to  commemorate  an  event  which  placed 
the  island  for  well-nigh  three  centuries  under  Venetian  rule,1 
and  the  loyal  Cephalonian  and  his  descendants  were  rewarded 
with  perpetual  exemption  from  all  dues. 

Another  of  the  Ionian  islands,  that  of  Sta.  Mavra,  now 
passed,  but  only  temporarily,  into  the  possession  of  the 
republic  The  Spanish  captain  had  sailed  back  to  Sicily 
after  the  capture  of  Cephalonia,  and  Pesaro  had  contented 
himself  for  the  moment  with  burning  the  Turkish  arsenal  at 
Preveza ;  but  in  the  following  summer,  aided  by  a  papal 
fleet  under  the  command  of  his  namesake,  the  Bishop  of 
Paphos,  he  attacked  the  sole  Ionian  island  which  was  still 
Turkish.  Sta.  Mavra  had  recently  received  a  considerable 
number  of  Jewish  refugees  from  Spain,  who  were  always 
welcomed  by  the  Turks,2  and  it  was  a  lair  of  corsairs  who 
preyed  on  the  shipping  of  the  Venetian  islands.  Leonardo 
Tocco  had  strengthened  the  old  fortifications,  which  were 
defended  by  a  considerable  Turkish  garrison.  But  the  papal 
commander  occupied  the  shallows  which  separated  the  town 
from  the  mainland,  and  the  Venetian  admiral  bombarded  the 
castle  with  such  vigour  that,  after  six  days,  the  Turks  con- 
sidered the  desirability  of  surrendering.  While  they  were 
deliberating,  the  besiegers  entered,  and  thus,  on  30th  August 
1502,  Sta.  Mavra  fell.  At  first  sight  it  seemed  to  be  a 
valuable  prize ;  a  large  sum  of  money  belonging  to  the 
sultan  was  found  in  the  treasury,  a  number  of  captive 
Mussulmans  became  slaves,  and  strategically  it  was  "  a  beam 
in  the  Turk's  eye,"  "the  key  of  Corfu,  Cephalonia,  and 
Zante."  But  its  loss  so  infuriated  Bajazet  II.  that  he  refused 
to  make  the  peace  which  Venice  was  anxious  to  obtain,  unless 
it  were  restored  to  him,  and  a  party  in  the  island  was 
intriguing  with  the  Turks,  with  whom  the  natives  had 
intermarried.  The  republic  reluctantly  consented  to  sur- 
render a  place  which  she  had  begun  to  fortify,  and  a  year 
and   a   day   after   its   capture   the   first    Venetian   governor 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  iii.,  1274,  1639  (who  gives  the  date,  which  was 
wrongly  copied  by  Hammer,  ii.,  611).  Cf,  Bembo,  fF.  1 15-17  ;  Sansovino, 
f.  201  ;  Lunzi,  Delia  Condiziom,  222-7  ;  Sdthas,  v.,  155-6. 

1  Risposta  di  Jacopo  Grandt\  22. 


I 


500  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

handed  over  Sta.  Mavra  to  the  Turks.  Nearly  two  centuries 
were  to  elapse  before  the  lion-banner  again  flew  from  the  old 
castle  of  the  palatine  counts.1 

The  results  of  the  war  had  been  disastrous  to  Venice ; 
the  tomb  of  her  victorious  admiral,  in  the  church  of  the 
Frari  still  magniloquently  records  his  Greek  triumphs,  and 
portrays  the  two  captured  Ionian  castles ;  but  her  sole  gain 
was  Cephalonia;  and  the  peace  of  1502-3  left  her  nothing 
but  Nauplia  and  Monemvasia,  with  their  respective  appurten- 
ances, in  the  Morea.  She  failed  to  retain  Maina,  which  the 
son  of  Klad&s  had  won  for  her;2  and  against  the  sack  of 
Megara  by  the  men  of  Nauplia  she  had  to  set  the  temporary 
capture  of  the  castle  of  iEgina  by  the  redoubtable  Kemal 
Reis  and  the  carrying  off  of  2000  yEginetans — a  foretaste 
of  what  that  fair  island  was  to  suffer  a  generation  later.3 

For  more  than  thirty  years  Greece  ceased  to  be  the 
battlefield  between  Venice'  and  the  sultans,  for  both  parties 
were  occupied  elsewhere ;  the  treaty  of  1 502-3  was  renewed 4 
in  1 5 13  and  1521,  and  the  Venetian  colonies  were  thus  able 
to  enjoy  a  long  period  of  repose  before  their  final  catastrophe. 
From  the  petitions  of  those  communities  and  the  reports  of 
their  governors  we  are  able  to  form  a  clear  idea  of  their 
condition  during  this  last  generation  of  Venetian  rule. 
Peace  did  not  bring  them  plenty,  for  both  Nauplia  and 
Monemvasia  bitterly  complained  that  the  restriction  of  their 
respective  territories  after  the  last  war  had  deprived  them  of 
the  lands  which  they  had  been  wont  to  sow.  All  their 
supplies  of  corn  had  now  to  be  imported  from  the  Turkish 
possessions,  and  it  was  thus  in  the  power  of  the  Turks  to 
starve  them  out  by  simply  closing  the  frontier,  while  corsairs 
rendered  dangerous  all  traffic  by  sea,  and  many  a  fisherman 
of  Nauplia  was  carried  off  and  put  up  for  ransom  at  the  old 
Frankish  castle  of  Damal&,  now  included  within  the  Turkish 
boundary.6    The  total  population  of  the  town  of  Nauplia  was 

1  Sanudo,  Dtarit,  iv.,  313,  315,  394,  645,  667,  781;  v.  46-7,  85; 
Bembo,  f.  141  ;  San  so  vino,  f.  202;  Prcdclli,  Commctnoriali,  vi.,  65-6; 
Miklosich  und  Miiller,  iii.,  344-54. 

8  Ibid.)  iii.,  17,  730 ;  Sdthas,  v.,  152. 

3  /&</.,  iv.,  83,  604  ;  Bembo,  f.  114. 

4  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  iii.,  360 ;  Predelli,  op.  cit.^  vi.,  131. 

*  S&has,  iv.,  197,  220,  230  ;  vi.,  247-8,  254  •  Sanudo,  Diarii,  xxix.,  482. 


STATE  OF  NAUPLIA  501 

nearly  10,000,  while  the  whole  colony,  which  comprised  the 
castles  of  Thermisi  and  Kastri,  contained  13,299  souls.1  In 
1 5 19,  its  government  was  reformed;  the  system  of  having 
two  rectors  was  found  to  lead  to  frequent  quarrels ;  and  the 
republic  thenceforth  sent  out  a  single  official  styled  "bailie 
and  captain,"  assisted  by  two  councillors,  who  performed  the 
duties  of  catnerlengo  by  turns.  The  bailie's  authority 
extended  over  the  rector  of  jEgina,  whereas  Kastri  had  been 
granted  to  two  families,  the  PalaiokSgoi  and  the  Alberti, 
whose  administration  was  the  cause  of  much  discontent2 
Early  in  the  sixteenth  century  a  democratic  wave  passed  over 
the  colony.  Society  at  Nauplia  was  divided  into  three  classes 
— nobles,  citizens,  and  plebeians ;  and  it  had  been  the  ancient 
usage  that  the  nobles  alone  should  hold  the  much-coveted 
local  offices,  such  as  that  of  judge  of  the  inferior  court  and 
inspector  of  weights  and  measures.  The  populace  now 
demanded  its  share  of  these  good  things,  and  the  Home 
Government  ordered  that  one  at  least  of  the  three  inspectors 
should  be  a  man  of  the  people.  The  democracy  managed, 
too,  to  make  its  influence  felt  on  the  Municipal  Council  of 
Thirty,  which  met  with  closed  doors,  to  the  no  slight  scandal 
of  the  governor,  who  complained  to  Venice  of  such  irregular 
proceedings.  In  order  to  spare  the  pockets  of  the  community, 
it  was  ordered  that  appeals  from  his  decision  should  lie  to 
Crete,  instead  of  Venice.  Economically,  the  colony  paid  its 
way,  though  for  twenty  years  the  inhabitants  were  granted 
exemption  from  local  dues  as  the  reward  of  their  fortitude  in 
the  late  war ;  an  octroi  duty  on  all  foreign  animals,  a  tax  on 
donkeys,  and  a  duty  on  the  salt-pans  of  Thermisi,  were  the 
chief  imposts;  but  a  serious  drain  on  the  budget  was  the 
bakshish  paid  to  the  Turkish  governor  of  the  Morea  and  to 
the  voivode  who  was  stationed  at  the  frontier.8  The  fortifica- 
tions, too,  were  allowed  to  fall  into  disrepair,  and  were 
inadequately  guarded.  The  low  sea-wall  had  never  been 
completed ;  the  hill  of  Palamidi  was  still  unenclosed  ;  the 
"castle  of  the  Greeks"  on  Itsh  Kaleh  was  unguarded  and 
almost  in  ruins ;  and  it  was  difficult  to  get  men  to  garrison  the 

1  Report  of  1 531,  Sdthas,  vi.,  249. 

-  Ibid.,  iv.,  220  ;  vi.,  246,  254  ;  Sanudo,  Diarii^  xxvii.,  315,  338,  358. 

a  Sdthas,  iv.,  195,  198,  200,  203,  215,  219,  223 ;  vi.t  245-6,  252. 


502  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

island    fortress  where   the  executioner  now   resides.      Tie 
peasant-soldiers  of  Nauplia  used  sometimes   to    leave  the 
"  castle  of  the  Franks  "  with  only  half  a  dozen  men  in  it,  while 
they  went  out  to  earn  their  living,  for  they  were  badly  paid ; 
and  racial  jealousies  divided  the  stradioti%  Greeks  refusing  to 
serve  under  Albanians,  and  Albanians  under  any  chief  who 
was  not  of  their  own  clan.     The  fact  that   both    races  had 
their    own    "chief    priest,"  or  protopapds,  would    not  tend 
towards  greater   union,  while  the  presence  of  a    Catholic 
bishop — for  Nauplia  now  figured  as  an  episcopal  see — must 
have  increased  the  causes  of  discord.     Worst  of  all,  the  Turks 
were  always  in  and  out  of  the  town,  and  knew  perfectly  well 
all  the  weak  points  of  a   strategic   position,   which    a   high 
Venetian  officer  had  declared  to  be  "most   important   not 
only  to  Venice  but  to  all  Christendom." 1 

^Egina  had  always  been  exposed  to  the  raids  of  corsairs, 
and  was  cursed  with  oppressive  governors  during  these  last 
thirty  years  of  Venetian  rule.  The  island  was  remote  and 
lonely ;  Venetian  nobles  were  as  little  anxious  to  go  there  as 
are  modern  Italian  officials  to  go  to  Sardinia ;  and  we  may 
thus  explain  the  high  proportion  of  bad  rulers  at  this  period 
of  its  history.  Three  rectors  of  ^Egina  were  severely  punished 
for  their  acts  of  injustice,  and  we  have  a  graphic  account  of 
the  reception  given  by  the  suffering  ^Eginetans  to  the  captain 
of  Nauplia,  who  came  to  hold  an  enquiry  into  the  administra- 
tion of  one  of  these  delinquents.  We  are  told  how  all  the 
people  came  out  on  to  the  square  of  Palaiochora  with  loud 
shouts  of  "  Justice !  Justice !  Marco !  Marco ! "  ;  how  they 
had  given  a  sack  full  of  documents,  setting  forth  their 
privileges,  to  the  rector,  and  how  he  had  returned  the  precious 
papers  all  mice-eaten  and  in  pieces;  how  he  had  spurned 
their  ancient  right  to  elect  an  islander  to  keep  one  key  of 
the  money-chest ;  and  how  they  threatened  to  leave  the 
island  in  a  body  with  the  commissioner,  unless  he  avenged 
their  wrongs.  A  Latin  inscription  over  the  door  of  the 
Latin  church  of  St  George  at  Palaiochora,  the  arms  of  the 
visiting  councillor  of  Nauplia,  and  a  jug  below,  still  record 
the  last  of  these  enquiries,  in  1533.     The  inscription  has  a 

1  S4thas,  vi.,  244-5,  250-1  J  Sanudo,  Diarti,  vii.,  654 ;  xi.,  138 ;  xxvl, 
457,  476 ;  xL,  338 ;  J-amansky,  6o8f 


STATE  OF  MONEMVASIA  503 

pathetic  interest,  for  it  is  the  last  memorial  of  mediaeval 
jEgina.  Four  years  later  the  mountain  capital  was  a  smoking 
mass  of  houses  and  ruined  churches.1 

Monemvasia  had  suffered  a  long  blockade  during  the 
last  war ;  she  had  lost  her  outlying  castles  of  Rampano  and 
Vatika,  her  famous  vineyards  and  her  cornfields  were  in 
Turkish  hands.  But  she  remained  what  she  had  been  for 
centuries — an  impregnable  fortress,  the  Gibraltar  of  Greece. 
The  Venetians  renewed  the  system,  which  had  prevailed 
under  the  Despots  of  the  Morea,  of  devoting  one  of  the  local 
imposts  to  the  repair  of  the  walls ;  the  Venetian  podestd  seems 
to  have  been  a  popular  official ;  and  the  republic  had  wisely 
confirmed  the  special  privileges  granted  by  the  Byzantine 
emperors  to  the  church  and  community  of  this  favoured  city. 
Both  a  Greek  metropolitan  and  a  Latin  archbishop  continued 
to  take  their  titles  from  Monemvasia,  and  the  most  famous 
of  these  prelates  was  the  eminent  scholar,  Marcus  Mousotiros. 
In  1524,  however,  despite  the  thunders  of  the  oecumenical 
patriarch,  the  Greek  and  the  Italian  arranged  between  them- 
selves that  the  former  should  retain  the  see  of  Monemvasia 
and  that  the  latter  should  take  a  Cretan  diocese.2  The 
connection  between  the  great  island  and  this  rocky  peninsula 
was  now  close.  The  Greek  priests  of  Crete,  who  had 
formerly  gone  to  Modon  or  Coron  for  consecration,  after  the 
loss  of  those  colonies  came  to  Monemvasia;  the  Cretan 
exchequer  contributed  to  the  expenses  of  the  latter,  and 
judicial  appeals  from  the  podestd  of  Malmsey  lay  to  the 
colonial  authorities  at  Candia,  instead  of  being  remitted  to 
Venice  ;  for,  as  a  Monemvasiote  deputation  once  plaintively 
said,  the  expenses  of  the  long  journey  had  been  defrayed  by 
pawning  the  chalices  of  the  churches.  Even  now  Monemvasia 
is  remote  from  the  world ;  in  those  Venetian  days  she  was 

1  Sdthas,  v.,  39-40;  Sanudo,  Diariiy  vii.,  258  ;  xvi.,  651,  655-7 ;  xvii., 
79-80;  xviii.,  98;  xix.,  343;  xx.,  150,  182;  xxiL,  468,  529;  xxiv.,  49; 
xxxii.,  402  ;  lviii.,  556.  The  inscription  has,  I  think,  never  been  published. 
I  copied  it  on  the  spot.  "Tempore  syndicatus  clariss.  domini  Antonii 
Barbaro  Dignissimi  Consiliarii  Nauplii  Romanie  Die  Prima  Aprilis 
MDXXXlii."  The  jug,  not  a  Venetian  emblem,  was  perhaps  added  by 
Barbarossa,  the  jug- maker's  son. 

2  Nto  'BXX^oM^Mwr,  III.,  56;  Sanudo,  Diarii,  vii.,  714;  xxiii.,  536; 
xxiv.,  669  ;  xxv.,  64  ;  xxix.,  402  ;  xxxi.,  227  ;  xxxv.,  363  ;  xliv.,  475  ;  lv.,  296. 


504  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

seldom  visited,  not  only  because  of  her  situation,  but  because 
of  the  fear  which  ships'  captains  had  of  her  inhabitants.1 

The  long  peace  was  interrupted  in  1531  by  a  sudden 
descent  upon  Modon  by  the  Knights  of  St  John.  Driven 
from  Rhodes  by  the  Turks  eight  years  earlier,  the  Knights 
had  not  abandoned  the  idea  of  settling  in  the  Levant,  and 
the  Venetian  island  of  Cephalonia,2  and  the  Turkish  fortress 
of  Modon  were  alternately  suggested  as  suitable  places  of 
abode.  Even  when  Malta  had  been  granted  to  them  by  the 
Emperor  Charles  V.,  they  continued  to  plan  the  capture  of 
the  former  Venetian  station  in  Messenia,  which  in  their  hands 
would  have  become  an  outpost  of  Christendom.  Two  Greeks, 
who  had  formerly  been  servants  of  the  Order  in  Rhodes,  but 
who  now  held  posts  at  the  harbour  of  Modon,  entered  into 
the  plot ;  a  flotilla  was  equipped  under  the  command  of  Fra 
Bernardo  Salviati,  prior  of  Rome  and  nephew  of  Pope 
Clement  VII. ;  and  two  schooners  were  laden  with  planks  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  conceal  a  number  of  armed  men  below. 
One  of  these  innocent-looking  vessels  was  entrusted  to 
Ydnni  Skanddles,  a  Greek  from  Zante  and  son  of  the  friendly 
customs'  official  at  Modon ;  and  its  Greek  crew  was  disguised 
as  janissaries.  While  the  rest  of  the  squadron  remained 
behind  the  island  of  Sapienza,  the  schooners  went  on  in 
advance  to  Modon.  The  two  confederates  kept  their  word ; 
the  harmless  merchants  and  the  false  janissaries  were  allowed 
to  land,  and  the  latter  spent  the  night  in  the  tower  on  the 
mole,  of  which  Skanddles's  father  was  governor,  pledging  the 
garrison  in  the  excellent  local  vintage.  To  secure  or  slay  the 
sleepy  and  drunken  Mussulmans  was  easy ;  the  tower  was 
captured  ;  the  soldiers  landed  from  the  two  schooners ;  and 
the  town  was  soon  entirely  in  their  possession,  except  the 
former  palace  of  the  Venetian  governor  above  the  land  gate, 
whither  the  rest  of  the  garrison  had  hastened.  The  Knights 
were,  however,  slow  in  arriving  from  Sapienza  to  complete 
the  capture  ;  so  that,  before  their  cannon  had  made  the  least 
impression  on  the  palace,  a  large  Turkish  force  was  reported 
to  be  approaching.     Accordingly,  after  sacking  the  place,  they 

1  Sanudo,  Dtarii,  xi.,  349  ;  xxxiii.,  366  ;  S£thas,  iv.,  224, 227, 229,  234  ; 
Lamansky,  059  ;  Feyerabend,  Reyssbueh,  f.  112. 
*  S£thas,  vi.,  278, 


DORIA  RECAFrURES  CORON  505 

sailed  away  with  1600  captives.  Their  adventure,  reported 
to  the  pope,  it  is  interesting  to  note,  by  one  of  the  Acciajuoli, 
was  welcomed  in  Rome,  but  caused  much  annoyance  to 
Venice,  anxious  not  to  provoke  the  anger  of  the  sultan,  who 
might  hold  her  responsible  for  the  acts  of  her  Ionian  subjects. 
Accordingly,  as  a  measure  of  precaution,  Skanddles  was 
banished  from  Zante.1 

In  the  following  year  the  Greek  coasts  were  exposed  to 
a  much  more  serious  visitation.  War  broke  out  between 
Charles  V.  and  the  sultan,  and  the  former,  more  anxious  to 
damage  the  Turks  than  to  benefit  the  Greeks,  the  exploits 
of  whose  ancestors  left  him  cold,  despatched  the  famous 
Genoese  admiral,  Andrea  Doria,  to  the  Levant  Doria 
gained  a  series  of  rapid  successes.  The  allied  imperial, 
papal,  and  Maltese  squadron,  with  the  aid  of  the  Greek 
inhabitants,  speedily  captured  Coron ; 2  a  Te  Deum  of  triumph 
was  sung  in  the  reconsecrated  cathedral,  and  at  the  moment 
of  the  elevation  of  the  Host  the  standards  of  the  three 
confederates  were  run  up  on  the  walls.  Mendoza,  a  Spaniard 
and  a  Knight  of  Malta,  was  left  behind  with  a  garrison  of  his 
countrymen,  Acciajuoli  was  appointed  civil  governor,  and 
Doria  sailed  away  to  Patras,  whose  garrison  capitulated  and 
whose  inhabitants  he  pillaged.  He  completed  his  cruise  by 
an  attack  on  the  two  castles  which  Bajazet  II.  had  built  on 
either  side  of  the  entrance  to  the  Gulf  of  Corinth ;  the  castle 
of  the  Morea  surrendered ;  but  the  garrison  of  the  other  fired 
the  powder-magazine  and  perished  beneath  the  ruins  of  the 
fortress. 

Nothing  but  harm  accrued  to  the  Greeks  from  Doria's 
expedition,  and  they  had,  indeed,  good  reason  to  pray  for 
deliverance  from  their  deliverers.  Deluded  by  his  promises 
and  elated  at  his  victories,  they  rose  and  slaughtered  their 
Turkish  masters,  who  retaliated  upon  them  as  soon  as 
the  Genoese  admiral  had  set  sail.  Charles  V.  soon  realised 
that  he  could   not  permanently  keep  an  isolated  station  in 

1  Sanudo,  Diarit,  liv.,  603-8  ;  lv.,  9-13,  25,  49,  85  ;  Spandugino  apud 
Sdthas,  ix.,  1934;  Bosio,  III.,  75-6,  103-7  ;  Codice  Diploma Hco  Gerosoli- 
mitano,  II.,  204. 

2  There  is  a  curious  painting  of  this  event  in  the  Archivioat  Siena,  on 
one  of  the  covers  of  the  old  Treasury  registers,  or  tavoletUs. 


506  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

Messenia,  far  from  his  own  dominions  and  exposed  to 
continual  Turkish  attacks.  So,  after  once  relieving  the 
beleaguered  garrison,  he  endeavoured  to  transfer  to  Venice 
or  to  the  Knights  of  Malta  the  responsibility  of  its  defence* 
The  former,  with  characteristic  prudence,  declined  to  accept 
her  former  colony,  just  as  she  had  refused  the  offer  of  the 
castles  formerly  dependent  upon  Monemvasia.  The  latter 
knew  that  they  could  never  maintain  it  without  Venetian  aid, 
and  they  knew,  too,  that  the  selfish  republic  would  never 
tolerate  the  intrusion  of  another  Christian  power  in  the 
Morea,  and  had  refused  to  co-operate  in  the  capture  or  support 
of  Coron.  Meanwhile,  the  Turks  were  keeping  up  a  con- 
tinuous blockade,  and  hunger  and  plague  were  reducing  the 
strength  of  the  garrison.  At  last,  in  1534,  the  emperor 
resolved  to  abandon  it  and  remove  its  inhabitants  to  his  own 
dominions.  This  compulsory  emigration  of  the  people, 
mostly  Albanians — for  the  Greeks  had  been  transferred  to 
Cephalonia  thirty  years  before — recalls  the  cession  of  Parga 
by  Great  Britain  three  centuries  later.  They  sought  refuge 
in  the  churches,  and  implored  the  Divine  Providence  to  avert 
from  them  the  miseries  of  exile ;  but  they  found  that  they 
must  either  submit  to  the  Turk  or  obey  the  commands  of 
the  emperor.  Many  died  of  plague  on  the  voyage  to  Sicily, 
while  the  survivors  were  attacked  by  the  terrified  population 
of  Messina  on  landing,  and  driven  into  the  lazzaretto  like 
pariahs.  So  wretched  was  their  condition,  that  the  emperor 
granted  to  those  of  them  who  took  up  their  abode  in  Naples 
a  yearly  allowance  and  valuable  fiscal  exemptions,  as  well  as 
the  possession  of  the  Greek  church  of  SS.  Peter  and  Paul, 
which  had  been  founded  at  Naples  by  one  of  the  Palaiol6goi 
more  than  twenty  years  earlier.  In  return,  they  entered  his 
service  as  stradioti>  and  displayed  in  other  lands  a  valour 
which  might,  under  better  auspices,  have  saved  their  beloved 
home  from  the  Turk.  Others  settled  in  Calabria  and  the 
Basilicata,  others  again  in  Sicily,  and  an  Albanian  monk  at 
the  Greek  monastery  of  Grotta  Ferrata,  near  Rome,  told  the 
author  that  most  of  the  Albanians  from  his  part  of  Sicily 
were  the  descendants  of  these  exiles  from  Coron.  One  Greek, 
who  had  specially  distinguished  himself  in  the  siege  and 
defence  of  the  place,  received   from  the  emperor  the  barren 


DEVASTATION  OF  .EGINA  507 

honour  of  knighthood,  and  a  grant  of  the  villages  of  Leondari 
and  St  George  of  Skortd,  "  whensoever  it  should  please  God 
to  drive  out  the  Turks." * 

In  1537,  Suleyman  the  Magnificent  declared  war  upon 
Venice,  and  the  Turkish  fleet,  under  Khaireddin  Barbarossa, 
after  a  vain  attempt  to  take  Corfu,  and  after  ravaging  the 
Ionian  islands,  in  October  fell  upon  jEgina,  then  well  inhabited. 
No  considerations  of  sentiment  stayed  the  hands  of  the  red- 
bearded  pirate.  His  men  scaled  the  high  rock  in  the  interior 
of  the  island,  which  resembles  the  Akropolis  of  Athens,  and 
on  which,  from  fear  of  corsairs,  the  mediaeval  capital  was 
built  On  the  fourth  day,  Palaiochora  fell ;  the  town  was 
destroyed ;  but  the  Latin  church,  which  we  saw  mentioned 
four  years  earlier,  was  spared ;  the  grown-up  men  were 
butchered,  and  the  governor  with  one  of  the  Caopena,  who 
had  come  to  the  rescue  of  his  ancestors'  island,  and  more 
than  6000  women  and  children  were  carried  off  as  slaves.  So 
thoroughly  did  the  Turks  accomplish  their  hideous  work,  that 
when  Baron  de  Blancard  touched  at  iEgina  with  a  French 
fleet  soon  afterwards,  he  found  not  a  single  soul  on  the 
island.2  Few  now  set  foot  in  the  abandoned  streets  of  this 
town  of  churches,  where  the  scanty  inhabitants  of  the 
scattered  hamlets  still  worship,  save  when,  once  a  year,  the 
pious  islanders  assemble  round  the  marvellous  spring  in  the 
church  of  Our  Lady  to  keep  the  festival  in  honour  of  the 
Virgin's  birth.  From  below,  the  mountain  side  seems  covered 
with  buildings,  and  the  castle  stands  out  from  the  flat  summit 
of  the  rock,  just  as  if  the  Venetian  sentinels  were  still  on  the 
watch   for  pirates  in   the  Saronic  Gulf  below.     Remains   of 

1  Guazzo,  Historic ,  ff.  124,  128-30;  P.  Jovius,  Histories  sui  temporis, 
ii.,  ff.  1 16-18,  126-8  ;  Bosio,  III.,  1 14-16,  125-7,  132  ;  Sanudo,  Diarii,  lvii., 
94-5,182,  227,  668,  678;  Paruta,  Historia  Venetian*,  i.,  328,  333,  339; 
Mustoxidi/EXXi/i'OAH'^Atw*',  147-9  ;  Duplessis,  In  Difesa  dei  Nazionali  Greet 
per  la  Chiesa  di  rito  Greco  .  .  .  di  Napoli.  I  could  not  find  in  the 
Greek  Church  at  Naples  the  tombs  mentioned  by  Mustoxidi ;  but  there 
is  one  of  a  stradioto,  who  died  in  1607. 

-  Paruta,  i.,  381 ;  Maurocenus,  Historia  Veneta^  182;  A.  Cornaro,  Historia 
di  Candia,  II.,  f.  92  ;  Charriere,  Negotiations  de  la  France  dans  le  Levant, 
i.,  372  ;  Haji  Kalifeh,  The  Maritime  IVars,  58 ;  S£thas,  ix.,  199 ;  Hopf, 
Karystos  (tr.  Sardagna),  72  ;  Dor6theos  of  Monemvasia,  437.  Cf,  my 
article  on  Palaiochora  in  the  Morning  Post  of  23rd  December  1904. 


508  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

frescoes  still  cover  the  crumbling  walls  of  the  old  Venetian 
chapel  within  the  castle  walls,  where  the  last  Venetian 
governor,  warned  that  Barbarossa's  pennant  had  been 
sighted,  flung  himself  down  on  his  knees  and  prayed  the 
preoccupied  saints  to  save  this  outpost  of  the  republic  from 
the  enemy.  No  site  in  Greece  is  more  lovely,  none  more 
mediaeval.  Palaiochora  belongs  to  a  world  very  different 
from  ours ;  it  tells  us  of  what  life — and  death — must  have 
been  like  in  the  last  years  of  Venetian  rule  in  the  small 
Greek  islands. 

Meanwhile,  the  Turks,  acting  under  orders  from  Kassim 
Pasha,  were  striving  to  capture  the  last  two  Venetian  colonies 
in  the  Morea.  The  operations  before  Nauplia  began  on  14th 
September,  and  it  was  soon  obvious  that  the  Greek  and 
Albanian  stradioti  intended  to  make  a  desperate  defence. 
Two  successful  sorties  as  far  as  Argos  adorned  the  walls  of 
Nauplia  with  many  a  Turkish  head,  and  even  when  Kassim 
himself  arrived,  his  men  made  little  impression  on  the  stout 
hearts  of  the  garrison.  At  the  two  outlying  fortresses  of 
Kastri  and  Thermisi  he  was  more  successful ;  the  defenders 
of  Kastri  preferred  slavery  to  being  burned  alive  inside  the 
castle,  and  the  four  Palaiol6goi,  whose  fief  it  was,  were 
beheaded  at  Argos.  Upon  this  Thermisi  surrendered ;  but 
neither  of  these  disasters  diminished  the  heroic  courage  of 
the  men  of  Nauplia.  Fresh  supplies  were  thrown  into  the 
town,  but  the  lack  of  water  began  to  be  severely  felt — for 
the  cisterns  were  running  dry — and  a  party  which  sallied 
forth  to  fetch  water  from  the  wells  near  Mount  Elias,  was 
surprised  by  the  Turks,  and  Vettore  Busichio,  the  bold 
captain  of  the  light  Albanian  horse,  was  mortally  wounded. 
Kassim  now  occupied  the  hill  of  Palamidi,  which  the 
Venetians  had  neglected  to  fortify,  and  which  commanded 
the  town,  and  moved  his  headquarters  from  Argos  to  Tiryns, 
and  thence  to  the  church  of  St  Friday,  only  a  thousand  paces 
from  Nauplia.  But,  in  spite  of  the  heavy  missiles  discharged 
from  the  heights  of  Palamidi,  where  the  convict  prison  now 
stands,  by  a  big  Turkish  gun,  which  the  besieged  nicknamed 
"bone-breaker"  with  a  humour  worthy  of  Ladysmith,  the 
place  held  out,  and  further  reinforcements  arrived.  Kassim 
next  dug  trenches  close  up  to  the  edge  of  the  moat ;  but  the 


PEACE  OF  1540  509 

men  whom  he  placed  there  fell  victims  to  a  bold  night  attack. 
At  last,  when  the  siege  had  lasted  fourteen  months,  he  retired 
with  the  bulk  of  his  army  to  Argos,  leaving  a  small  garrison 
on  Palamidi,  which  was  speedily  captured  by  the  Venetians 
and  its  newly-erected  bastions  destroyed.  Desultory  skir- 
mishes went  on  during  the  spring  of  1539,  but  Nauplia,  like 
Monemvasia,  proved  too  strong  for  the  Turks  to  take.1 

Venice  was  no  longer  alone  in  her  struggle  against  the 
sultan,  for  Pope  Paul  III.  had  at  last  succeeded  in  forming 
a  league  between  the  Emperor  Charles  V.,  the  republic,  and 
himself.  The  fleet  of  the  three  allies  assembled  at  Corfti, 
and  sailed  to  Preveza,  where  Barbarossa  had  taken  up  his 
position.  There,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Ambrakian  Gulf,  where, 
sixteen  centuries  before,  the  fate  of  the  Roman  world  had 
been  decided,  the  hostile  navies  met.  Unfortunately,  the 
command  of  the  imperial  vessels  had  been  entrusted  to 
Andrea  Doria,  who  showed,  as  was  natural  in  a  Genoese, 
little  enthusiasm  in  the  cause  of  Venice.  Owing  to  his 
timorous  tactics,  the  victory  rested  with  Barbarossa,  and  the 
rapprochement  between  Charles  V.  and  the  French  monarch 
broke  up  the  league.  Venice  had  no  option  but  to  make 
such  terms  with  the  sultan  as  she  could  obtain.  Humiliating, 
indeed,  was  the  peace  of  1540;  Venice  ceded  Nauplia  and 
Monemvasia — her  two  last  possessions  in  the  Morea;2  and 
Admiral  Mocenigo  was  sent  to  break  as  best  he  could  to  her 
loyal  subjects  the  sad  news  that  the  republic  for  whom  they 
had  fought  so  well  and  had  endured  so  many  privations  had 
abandoned  their  homes  to  the  Turk.  The  Venetian  envoy, 
if  we  may  believe  the  speech  which  Paruta  puts  into  his 
mouth,  repeated  to  the  weeping  people  the  ancient  adage, 
ubi  bene,  ibi  patria,  and  pointed  out  to  them  that  they  would 
be  better  off  in  a  new  abode  less  exposed  than  their  native 
cities  had  been  to  the  Turkish  peril.  In  November  a 
Venetian  fleet  arrived  in  the  beautiful  bay  of  Nauplia  and 
off  the  sacred  rock  of  Monemvasia,  to  remove  the  soldiers, 
the  artillery,  and  all  the  inhabitants  who  wished  to  live 
under  Venetian  rule.    Then  the  banner  of  the   Evangelist 

1  Guazzo,  ff.  205-8 ;  Dordtheos  of  Monemvasia,  437-8 ;  Paruta,  i., 
379-8o,  391-2,  412,  439. 

2  Predelli,  Comtnemoriali,  vi.,  236,  238. 


I 


510  THE  VENETIAN  COLONIES 

was  lowered,  the  keys  of  the  two  last  Venetian  fortresses  in 
the  Morea  were  handed  to  Kassim  Pasha,  and  the  receipts  for 
their  transfer  were  sent  to  Venice.1 

The  inhabitants  of  the  two  cities  had  been  loyal  to 
Venice — for  not  only  had  the  stradioti  fought  like  heroes, 
but  no  less  heroic  had  been  the  conduct  of  the  7000 
Nauplians  who  had  died  of  hunger  and  enteric  rather  than 
surrender — and  Venice  was  loyal  to  them.  The  first  idea  of 
transporting  the  Monemvasiotes  to  the  rocky  island  of 
Cerigo  was  abandoned,  in  deference  to  the  eloquent  protests 
of  the  metropolitan,  and  lands  were  assigned  to  the  exiles 
in  the  more  fertile  colonies  of  the  republic.  A  commission 
of  five  nobles  was  appointed  to  consider  the  claims  and 
provide  for  the  settlement  of  the  stradioti  from  Nauplia  and 
Monemvasia,  and  this  commission  sat  for  several  years,  for 
the  claimants  were  numerous,  and  not  all  genuine.2  Some, 
like  the  ancient  Monemvasiote  family  of  Daimonoydnnes, 
former  lords  of  Cerigo,  received  lands  in  Crete,8  where  the 
last  "  chief  priest "  of  Nauplia  and  some  of  the  Athenian  De' 
Medici,  who  had  so  long  been  settled  there,  also  found  a 
home;  one  of  the  latter  clan  returned  to  the  land  of  his 
ancestors,  and  was  glad  to  accept  a  small  post  at  Verona.4 
The  Caopena,  whose  father,  captured  at  ^Egina,  perished  in  a 
Turkish  dungeon,  settled  at  Venice,  where  a  century  later  the 
family  became  extinct6  Others  were  removed  to  Corfu,  where 
they  formed  an  integral  part  of  the  Corfiote  population,  and 
where  the  name  of  the  stradioti  is  still  preserved  in  a  locality 
of  the  island  ;  while  others  again  were  transplanted  to  Cepha- 
lonia,  Cyprus,  or  Dalmatia.  Not  a  few  of  them  were  soon, 
however,  smitten  with  homesickness;  they  sold  their  new 
lands,  and  returned  to  be  Turkish  subjects  at  Nauplia  and 
Monemvasia.6 

Thus  fell  the  last  Latin  colonies  in  the  Morea,  For 
nearly  a  century  and  a  half  the  Lion  of  St  Mark  did  not  own 

1  Paruta,  i.,  451-3. 

3  Lami,  Delicia  Eruditorum,  xv.,  203;  Sathas,  riii.,  310-13,   320-1, 
335,  344,  377-8,  441-3. 

s  Ibid^  342,  413,  450,  454  ;  Sansovino,  Cronologia  del  Mondo,  f.  185. 

4  Sathas,  viii.,  370,  451,  455- 

*  Ibid,  434,  457.  6  Ibid,  396. 


VENICE  DISAPPEARS  FROM  THE  MOREA     511 

a  single  inch  of  soil  on  the  mainland  of  Greece,  where  since 
the  early  years  of  the  thirteenth  century  he  had  constantly 
retained  a  foothold.  But  the  Venetian  fortifications  of 
Nauplia,  with  here  and  there  a  winged  lion  or  a  dated  tablet, 
remained  to  remind  the  rayah  of  the  Venetian  days ;  and 
the  pictures  and  churches  of  Monemvasia,  the  encircling 
walls,  the  quaint  Italian  chimneys,  and  the  well-head  up  in 
the  castle,  which  bears  the  date  of  15 14,  the  arms  of  the 
republic  and  of  her  last  podestd,  Antonio  Garzoni,  and  the 
initials  and  escutcheon  of  Sebastiano  Renier,  who  had  also 
her  representative,  still  speak  to  us  of  this  first  Venetian 
occupation.1 

With  the  disappearance  of  the  Venetian  flag  from  the 
mainland,  the  Greeks  lost  the  refuge  which  they  had  been 
accustomed  to  find  since  the  Turkish  Conquest  in  the 
Venetian  settlements.  Most  of  their  leaders  had,  like 
Michael  Rilles,  found  a  shelter  beneath  the  banner  of  St 
Mark,  and  it  was  there  that  the  klephts,  who  afterwards 
played  so  great  a  part  in  the  liberation  of  Hellas,  first 
organised  their  raids.  That  the  Greeks  at  that  period, 
whatever  might  have  been  the  case  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
preferred  Venetian  to  Turkish  rule,  seems  obvious  from  the 
alacrity  with  which  they  flew  to  arms  at  the  bidding  of  their 
Latin  allies.  Up  to  1 540  the  republic  was  always  at  hand  to 
suggest,  if  not  to  urge,  the  possibilities  of  a  successful  rising, 
and  the  Venetian  settlements  maintained  the  Western 
standard  of  culture  in  the  midst  of  the  general  stagnation 
which  fell  upon  Turkish  Greece.  At  the  same  time,  the 
flight  of  the  winged  lion  from  the  Morea  meant  for  that 
sorely-tried  land  a  respite  from  the  almost  constant  turmoils, 
to  which  it  had  been  exposed  since  the  removal  of  Guillaume 
de  Villehardouin's  strong  hand  first  plunged  the  peninsula 
into  anarchy.  Under  the  Turks  there  was  at  last  a  dull 
uniformity,  which  was  not  without  the  advantage  that  it 
consolidated  the  various  elements  of  the  nation. 

1  /.  U.  S^  xxvii.,  240. 


CHAPTER  XV 

corfO  (1214-1485) 

We  have  described  in  the  previous  chapters  the  rise  and  fall 
of  the  various  states  of  continental  Greece,  whose  history 
occupied  the  period  between  the  Latin  and  the  Turkish 
Conquests.  We  must  now  turn  to  the  two  principal  island 
possessions  of  the  Franks,  omitting,  for  the  sake  of  clearness, 
those  minor  places  in  the  ;Egean  whose  fortunes  do  not 
affect  the  main  narrative.  These  two  insular  states  are  the 
duchy  of  Naxos,  and  the  colony  of  Corfu.  In  the  history 
of  both,  Venetian  enterprise  played  a  conspicuous  part 
Both  survived,  though  for  different  periods  of  time,  the 
establishment  of  Turkish  rule  on  the  mainland,  and  Corfu, 
the  most  important  of  the  Ionian  islands,  was  practically 
never  subjected  to  the  Mussulman  yoke.  But  in  other 
respects  the  careers  of  the  two  exhibit  widely  different 
results  of  Latin  rule  in  the  Levant 

The  island  of  Corfu,  the  loveliest  spot  in  all  Greece,  has 
had  a  history  separate,  down  to  very  recent  times,  from  the 
rest  of  the  country.  Even  the  other  Ionian  islands,  except 
the  little  island  of  Paxo,  lie  far  away  from  the  ancient  home 
of  the  Phaeacians.  For  well-nigh  three  centuries  its  history 
was  quite  distinct  from  theirs,  and  it  was  not  till  after  the 
Turkish  Conquest  of  the  mainland  of  Greece,  that  they  were 
all  united  under  the  Venetian  banner,  which  waved  over 
them  until  the  downfall  of  the  republic  in  1797. 

We  saw  in  the  second  and  third  chapters  how,  after  two 

Venetian  attempts  to  colonise  Corfu,  the  island  was  captured 

by  Michael  I.,  Despot  of  Epiros,  about  the  year  12 14,  with 

whose  continental  dominions  it  remained  united  for  half-a- 
6is 


THE  ANGELI  AND  THE  CHURCH  513 

century.  We  saw,  too,  how  one  Despot  after  another  ratified 
and  extended  the  privileges  of  the  Corfiote  Church,  which 
they  wisely  recognised  as  the  bulwark  of  their  rule  over  the 
islanders,  and  which  furnished  them,  from  the  pen  of  the 
metropolitan,  George  Bardines,  with  plausible  arguments 
against  the  theologians  of  the  Nicene  Empire.  Under  the 
sway  of  the  bastard  Michael  II.,  the  island  was  specially 
favoured.  An  usurper,  he  was  bound  to  conciliate  his 
subjects,  and  we  accordingly  find  him  lavishing  one  privi- 
lege after  another  upon  the  fortunate  Corfiotes.  At  the  end 
of  1236,  immediately  after  he  had  made  himself  master  of  the 
island,  he  not  only  confirmed  their  former  rights,  but  made 
them  and  their  villains  practically  exempt  from  taxation  and 
customs  duties;1  ten  years  later,  by  two  successive  golden 
bulls,  he  freed  the  thirty-two  priests  of  the  town  of  Corfu, 
who  formed  a  religious  corporation,  from  all  forced  labour,2 
and  bestowed  similar  privileges  upon  the  thirty-three  country 
popes,  who  were  consequently  described  as  the  "  freemen  "  (or 
AevOepiarrai),  forming  a  regular  caste,  into  which  none  but 
members  of  their  own  families  could  enter.8  From  the 
scanty  notices  of  the  period  when  Corfu  belonged  to  the 
Despotat  of  Epiros  which  have  come  down  to  us,  it  is  clear 
that  this  was  the  zenith  of  the  orthodox  church  in  the  island. 
Long  after  the  times  of  the  Despots,  the  Corfiote  clergy  were 
wont  to  produce  their  charters  when  they  sought  for  redress 
from  their  Angevin  or  Venetian  rulers,  and  the  institution  of 
the  thirty-two  town  priests  still  existed  in  the  middle  of  the 
fifteenth  century,4  when  it  was  regarded  as  the  mainstay  of 
orthodoxy  in  the  island.  These  privileged  priests  never 
forgot  their  benefactors,  and  the  wise  ecclesiastical  policy 
of  the  Despots  of  Epiros  saved  the  Greek  Church  through 
centuries  of  Roman  Catholic  predominance. 

Of  the  civil  administration  of  the  Despots  in  the  island  we 
know  scarcely  anything,  beyond  the  fact  that  in  their  time  it 
was  divided  into  ten  "  decarchies  " 5 —  possibly  a  continuation 

1  Barone,  Notizie  Storiche  di  Re  Carlo  111.  di  Durasgo,  61-4. 

2  Ibid,,  65-6  ;  S£thas,  Mn^fa,  I.,  48-9. 

3  Romanos  in  AeXWov  Trfa'Iffr.  xal'Edv.  "Rraiplat,  II.,  594-6. 

4  Phrantz6s,  412  ;  Lamansky,  Secrets  de  ?£tat  de  Vem'se,  050. 
ft  AeXWov,  II.,  594. 

2  K 


1 


514  CORFU 

of  the  Venetian  system  of  colonisation  by  ten  nobles,  possibly 
a  survival  of  the  old  Roman  decuriones,  or  local  landowners. 
It  is  interesting  to  notice  that  among  the  names  of  these 
"  decarchies "  which  have  come  down  to  us,  one  at  least,  in 
the  slightly  corrupted  form  of  "  Bistoni,"  preserves  that  of  the 
classic  mountain  of  Istone,  the  modern  Santi  Deka,  which 
figures  in  Thucydides*  account  of  the  Corcyraean  sedition. 
The  oldest  historian  of  Corfu  may  be  exaggerating  when 
he  says  that  the  Despots  of  Epiros  "  adorned  the  city  with 
most  noble  buildings"  j1  but  tradition  and  probability  are  with 
him  when  he  ascribes  to  them  the  castle  of  Sant'  Angelo  on  the 
west  coast,  whose  ruins,  in  a  superb  situation  above  the  blue 
Ionian  sea,  still  preserve  the  name  of  that  adventurous  race. 
Michael  1 1.,  as  we  saw,  considered  it  necessary  to  secure 
the  alliance  of  King  Manfred  in  his  struggle  for  the  leadership 
of  the  Greeks.  Accordingly,  in  1259,  he  married  his  beautiful 
daughter  Helene  to  the  sovereign  of  the  Two  Sicilies,  to 
whom  she  brought  as  her  dowry  Corfu,  the  fortresses  of 
Butrinto,  Suboto,  and  Valona,  and  one  or  two  other  places 
on  the  mainland.  It  was  not  the  first  time  that  the  island 
had  been  a  Sicilian  possession,  for  more  than  once  in  the 
course  of  the  twelfth  century  the  Normans  of  Sicily  had 
temporarily  occupied  it  Unable,  however,  to  govern  it  in 
person,  Manfred  entrusted  the  island,  together  with  his 
possessions  in  Epiros,  to  his  admiral,  Filippo  Chinardo, 
who,  as  a  Frank  from  Cyprus,  had  had  experience  of 
managing  Greeks,  and  who  endeavoured  to  win  over  the 
Corfiotes  by  exempting  them  from  the  duty  of  repairing 
the  Sicilian  fleet.  Even  after  Manfred  had  fallen  at  the 
battle  of  Benevento  and  his  widow  and  children  were 
prisoners  of  Charles  of  Anjou,  Chinardo  maintained  his 
position  in  Corfu  and  the  Epirote  fortresses  for  a  few  more 
months.  The  crafty  Despot  of  Epiros  gave  him  the  hand  of 
his  sister-in-law,  and  recognised  him  as  lord  of  the  island  by 
regarding  it  as  her  dowry,  now  that  his  daughter,  its  rightful 
owner,  was  in  prison.  Chinardo  felt  himself  secure  enough 
to  bestow  Corfiote  fiefs  upon  his  lieutenants,2  thus  extending 

1  Marmora,  Delia  Historia  di  Corfil%  210. 

8  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherchcs^   II.,   i.,  309-10;   Del  Giudice,  La 
famiglia  di  Re  Mattfredi,  428 


CHARLES  I.,  "KING  OF  CORFU"  515 

the  feudal  system  which  had  been  founded  under  the  Greeks 
and  which  so  long  prevailed  in  Corffr.  But  there  was  a  Greek 
party  in  the  island  which  was  in  communication  with  the 
Despot,  and  the  latter  had  no  difficulty  in  procuring  his 
assassination.  Michael  II.  did  not,  however,  reap  the  profit 
of  his  crime.  One  of  Chinardo's  newly  created  barons, 
Gamier  Aleman,  a  member  of  the  Provencal  family  which 
we  saw  installed  at  Patras,  had  the  strongest  motives  of 
personal  interest  to  keep  out  the  Greeks.  He  naturally 
turned  for  aid  to  his  fellow-countryman  and  fellow-Catholic, 
Charles  of  Anjou,  who  regarded  himself  as  the  representative 
of  the  conquered  Manfred  in  all  the  latter's  possessions.  On 
hearing  of  Chinardo's  murder,  Charles  had,  in  January  1267, 
appointed  the  murdered  man's  son  captain  of  Corfii.  But 
Aleman's  position  and  services  called  for  this  reward,  and 
the  office  of  captain  and  vicar-general  was  transferred  to 
him  by  the  cautious  king.1  The  treaty  of  Viterbo,  two 
months  later,  formally  recognised  Charles's  rights  over  the 
lands  "which  had  been  held  by  Manfred  and  Filippo 
Chinardo."  Thus,  in  1267,  began  the  Angevin  domination 
over  Corfu. 

For  the  next  few  years,  however,  Charles  of  Anjou  was 
too  much  occupied  with  Italian  politics  to  devote  his  personal 
attention  to  that  grand  scheme  for  the  conquest  of  the 
Eastern  Empire,  which  had  been  conceived  at  Viterbo,  and 
towards  which  he,  like  Bonaparte  five  centuries  later, 
considered  the  occupation  of  Corfu  to  be  the  first  step.  He 
added  indeed  the  style  of  "King  of  Corfu"  to  his  other 
titles,  and  deputed  Prince  William  of  Achaia  to  make 
arrangements  for  its  custody ;  but  he  thought  it  expedient 
to  allow  Aleman  to  remain  in  undisturbed  and  practically 
independent  possession  of  the  island  and  its  castles,  excusing 
him  from  rendering  any  account  of  his  administration,  and 
pardoning  any  offence  which  he  might  have  committed 
against  the  king's  orders.  It  is  clear  that  the  diplomatic 
monarch  was  anxious  not  to  offend  the  proud  Proven9al 
baron,  to  whom  he  owed  the  island ;  it  is  clear,  too,  that  he 
desired  to  conciliate  the  Greek  party  among  the  Corfiotes; 

1  Minieri  Riccio,  Alcunifattt\  21,  24,  37  ;  Del  Giudice,  Codice  Diplo- 
viaticO)  I.,  278,  298. 


516  CORFU 

one  of  his  first  acts  was  to  recall  all  the  natives  who  had  fled  the 
island,  except  those  implicated  in  Chinardo's  assassination ; 
another  was  to  guarantee  to  all  the  citizens  the  security  of 
their  lives  and  the  enjoyment  of  their  property  according  to 
the  usages  and  customs  of  the  island1 

Just  as  the  death  of  the  Despot  Michael  II.  gave  Charles 
the  opportunity  of  carrying  out  his  long-deferred  plans  in 
Epiros,  so  that  of  Gamier  Aleman  in  1272  made  him  for  the 
first  time  the  real  master  of  Corfu.  Aleman's  son  was 
satisfied  with  a  money  payment  and  with  confirmation  of  his 
family  fiefs  in  the  island,  and  Giordano  di  San  Felice,  the  new 
vicar-general  and  captain  of  Corfu,  took  possession  in 
Charles's  name  of  the  three  fortresses  of  Castel  Vecchio,  Castel 
Nuovo  (as  the  two  summits  of  the  present  Fortezza  Vecchia 
were  then  called),  and  Sant*  Angelo.  Under  his  jurisdiction 
were  the  castles  of  Suboto  and  Butrinto,  "  the  key  of  Corfu," 
as  the  Venetians  called  the  latter,  which  had  once  belonged 
to  Manfred  and  Chinardo,  which  had  been  retaken  by  the 
Greeks,  but  which,  in  1279,  was  restored  to  Manfred's 
conqueror  by  the  feeble  Despot  Nikephoros  I.2 

The  Angevin  rule,  as  might  have  been  anticipated  from 
its  origin,  was  especially  intolerant  of  the  orthodox  faith. 
Charles  owed  his  crown  to  the  pope,  and  was  anxious  to 
repay  the  obligation  by  propagating  Catholicism  among  his 
orthodox  subjects.  The  Venetians,  as  we  saw,  had  enjoined 
tolerance  of  the  Greek  Church  during  their  brief  period  of 
domination ;  the  Despots  of  Epiros  had  made  it  a  privileged 
body ;  now  for  the  first  time  the  islanders  learnt  what 
religious  persecution  meant  The  metropolitan  of  Corfu, 
whose  dignity  dated  from  the  tenth  century,  and  who  had 
played  so  conspicuous  a  part  in  the  disputes  between  Epiros 
and  Nice,  was  deposed,  and  in  his  place  a  less  dignified 
ecclesiastic,  called  "chief  priest"  (jieyas  TrparroTrcnras)  was 
substituted.     This  personage  was  elected  by  the  thirty-two 

1  Del  Giudicc,  La  famiglia  di  Re  Manfredi,  403-4  ;  Codice  Diplo- 
matico,  i.,  307  ;  ii.,  35  ;  Mustoxidi,  Cose  Corciresi,  pp.  lvii.,  442  ;  Buchon, 
op.  tit,  406. 

8  Ibid.,  397,  405-7,  409-12,  4H-I6 ;  Buchon,  op.  tit.,  309,  407  ; 
Riccio,  //  Regno  di  Carlo  /.,  58,  60,  87,  107  ;  Saggio  di  Codice 
Diplomatico,  i.,  99,  175,  180 ;  the  history  of  Butrinto  has  been  summarised 
by  Roman 6s  in  the  \t\riw%  III.,  554  et  sqq. 


THE  ANGEVINS  AND  THE  CHURCH  517 

priests  of  "the  sacred  band"  and  by  the  same  number  of 
local  nobles,  while  eight  similar  ecclesiastics  were  appointed 
for  the  benefit  of  the  Greeks  throughout  the  island.  The 
title  of  "  Archbishop  of  Corfu "  was  usurped  by  Antonio,  a 
Latin  priest,  and  the  principal  churches,  including  the 
cathedral,  which  was  then  in  the  fortress,  were  seized  by  the 
Catholic  clergy;  the  residence  of  the  metropolitan  had 
already  been  pulled  down  by  Chinardo.  It  was  not  till  the 
Russians  landed  in  Corfu  a  hundred  years  ago  that  the  Greek 
Church  recovered  its  high  position  in  the  island,  though  the 
successors  of  Charles  showed  their  willingness  to  grant 
favours  to  the  Greek  clergy.1 

Towards  another  religion,  that  of  the  Jews,  the  Angevins 
were  sufficiently  tolerant  to  induce  that  race  to  settle  for 
the  first  time  in  any  numbers  in  the  island,  where  a  ghetto 
and  its  vicar  are  mentioned  in  1365  ;  but  the  injunctions  of 
successive  sovereigns,  bidding  the  Corfiotes  treat  them  well, 
would  seem  to  show  that  this  protection  was  seldom 
efficacious  against  the  prejudices  of  the  natives,  prejudices 
not  quite  extinct  in  our  own  day.  That  these  Jews  came 
from  the  Levant  rather  than  from  Italy  seems  proved  by 
the  curious  fact  that  the  Greek  is  the  older  of  the  two 
Corfiote  synagogues,  and  that  the  earliest  known  example 
of  vulgar  Greek  prose  is  a  translation  of  the  Book  of  Jonah 
for  the  use  of  the  synagogue  in  Corfu.2 

The  military  and  civil  administration  was  placed,  as  was 
natural,  in  the  hands  of  Italians  or  Provencals.  At  the 
head  of  the  government  was  the  captain,  or  vicar-general, 
usually  directly  dependent  upon  the  king,  but  at  times 
specially  placed  under  the  supreme  authority  of  the  royal 
representative  in  Albania.  A  magister  massarius,  or 
treasurer  (so  called  because  one  of  his  duties  was  to  look 
after  the  material  of  war  and  other  instruments  of  the 
massa,  or  public  "  estate ")  was  the  second  Angevin  official, 
and  in  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century  the  two  offices 
were  united  in  the  same  person.     A  third  official  was  styled 

1  Marmora,  216;  Mustoxidi,  410;  Del  Giudice,  op.  city  425,  434; 
Lcs  Registres  de  Grigaire  A".,  208. 

2  Romanos,  'H  'E/Jpatir?)  Koivdriji  rrji  Kcp*tfpaf,  4,  5;  AeXrlov  rrjs  'I<rr.  'Er.t 
ii.,  605. 


518  CORFU 

inquisitor.1  The  High  Court  of  Justice,  or  Curia  Regis, 
was  composed  of  the  captain,  a  legal  assessor,  and  a  notary, 
all  foreigners  and  all  appointed  by  the  sovereign,  together 
with  two  or  three  Corfiote  judges,  who  from  their  tenure  of 
office  were  styled  judices  annuales.  This  court,  which  sat  to 
try  all  civil  and  criminal  cases,  met  in  the  loggia  adjoining, 
or  in  a  palace  "  above  the  iron  gate,"  an  important  entrance, 
the  custody  of  which  was  entrusted  to  a  special  officer.- 
The  official  language  of  the  court  was  Latin,  but  we  find  the 
captain  signing  his  name  in  French,  and  there  was  a  public 
notary  for  the  Greek  tongue,  in  which  contracts  between  a 
Greek  and  a  foreigner  were  drawn  up.3  One  of  the  first 
acts  of  the  Latin  rulers  was  to  introduce  the  feudal  usages 
and  customs  of  the  Empire  of  Romania.4 

The  island,  under  the  Angevins,  was  divided  into  four 
bailiwicks,  each  administered  by  a  bailie,  and  called  re- 
spectively the  Circle,  the  Mountain,  the  Centre,  and 
Levkimme  after  the  White  Cape  at  the  South.  The  old 
decarchies,  however,  continued  to  exist,  as  in  the  days  of 
the  Despots.  The  land  belonged  partly  to  the  royal  domain, 
and  partly  to  the  barons,  to  whom  it  had  been  granted  by 
the  sovereign.6  One  of  Charles's  chief  instructions  was  to 
draw  up  a  complete  list  of  the  Corfiote  fiefs,  distinguishing 
those  created  by  Manfred  and  Chinardo  from  those  of  Greek 
origin.8  This  list  has  been  lost ;  but,  if  we  may  believe  the 
historian  Marmora,7  there  were  twenty-four  at  the  time  of 
the  Angevin  occupation.  These  fiefs  passed  into  the  posses- 
sion of  Provencal  or  Italian  families  like  that  of  Goth  (or 
Hugot),  which  had  accompanied  Charles  to  Naples,  or  those 
of  Altavilla,  S.  Ippolito,  and  Caracciolo.  This  great 
Neapolitan  clan  left  its  name  long  imprinted  on  the  land 
which  was  once   its   property.     Even    the    little    group    of 

1  Marmora,  loc.  cit.\  Del  Giudice,  op.  cit.y  423 ;  Romands,  Ay/Aorta 
Upases. 

8  AcXrlof,  ii.,  603,  606  ;  Del  Giudice,  Codice  Diplomatic  i.,  308 ; 
Barone,  24,  26 ;  Roman 6s,  Atjfuxrla  llpa^it,  7. 

8  Barone,  25  ;  Roman6s,  TparuLpto  Zripfrf,  311-13. 

4  Del  Giudice,  La  FamigHa  di  Re  Manfredi,  41a 

*  Barone,  22-4  ;  Aekrlov,  ii.,  605. 

6  Del  Giudice,  La  Famiglia,  428. 

7  P.  283. 


ANGEVIN  ADMINISTRATION  519 

the  Othonian  islands  formed  one  of  the  fiefs  in  the  gift  of 
the  sovereign  of  Corfii.1 

The  Latin  barons  formed  a  council  which  met  in  the 
arcades  near  "the  iron  gate,"  and  which  elected  the  above- 
mentioned  "  annual  judges,"  four  officials,  named  sindici,  who 
were  the  representatives  of  the  community,  and  two  others, 
bearing  the  ancient  Byzantine  title  of  catapan>  who  looked 
after  the  food  supplies.  As  time  went  on,  baronies  were 
conferred  on  Greeks  who  had  rendered  services  to  the 
sovereign,  such  as  the  family  of  Kavdsilas  from  Epiros ;  and, 
towards  the  close  of  the  Angevin  period,  we  find  the  com- 
munity, or  at  least  the  principal  persons  composing  it, 
summoned  by  the  sound  of  the  bell  for  the  discussion  of 
public  affairs.  One  prince  after  another,  as  the  Corfiotes 
confessed,  conferred  privileges  upon  them.2 

The  island  was,  indeed,  valuable  to  the  Angevins  for 
other  reasons  than  its  strategic  position.  Charles  I.  found 
it  well  suited  for  horse-breeding ;  it  possessed  valuable  salt- 
pans ;  it  produced  plenty  of  wine ;  and  its  olive-trees,  though 
not  what  they  afterwards  became  in  the  Venetian  times, 
are  already  mentioned  in  the  fourteenth  century.  The 
fisheries  of  Butrinto  were  a  source  of  revenue,  and  there 
was  sufficient  trade  to  attract  a  Venetian,  as  well  as  a 
Jewish  colony,  to  the  island.8  Moreover,  the  Corfiotes, 
descendants  of  the  sea-faring  Phaeacians,  were  bound  to 
furnish  crews  for  the  Angevin  fleet 

The  Sicilian  Vespers  and  the  consequent  struggle  between 
the  houses  of  Aragon  and  Anjou  entailed  the  vengeance  of 
the  former  party  upon  the  unhappy  Corfiotes,  who  had  the 
misfortune  to  be  subjects  of  the  latter.  Roger  de  Lluria 
twice  ravaged  the  island,  burning  and  destroying  the  castle ; 
Berenguer  d'Enten^a  and  Berenguer  Villaraut  both  raided 
this  beautiful  spot;  and,  on  its  way  to  Constantinople,  the 
Catalan  Grand  Company  did  not  fail  to  plunder  it4  Nor 
were    the   Aragonese    fleets    the  only  evils  of   which    the 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches^  II.,  i.,  409 ;  Barone,  20,  23,  25. 
8  Marmora,  221 ;  Mustoxidi,  lx.,  lxvii. ;  Buchon,  op.  cit.y  I.,  i.,  410. 

3  Barone,  25,  29 ;  Predelli,  Commemoria/t,  iL,  21. 

4  Muntaner,  chs.  cxvi.,  cxvii.,  clix.  ;  N.  Special  is  apud  Muratori,  x., 
960  ;  Predelli,  Commetnoriali,  i.,  31. 


\ 


520  CORFU 

islanders  complained.  The  captains  at  this  period  were 
absentees — men  of  great  name  and  lineage,  like  Hugh  of 
Brienne,  baron  of  Karytaina ;  Count  Richard  of  Cephalonia ; 
and  Florent  d'Avesnes,  Prince  of  Achaia;  who  had  more 
important  interests  elsewhere,  and  whose  deputies  oppressed 
the  people.  Charles  II.  of  Naples,  who  was  now  their 
sovereign,  showed,  however,  that  he  wished  them  well.  In 
1294,  he  confirmed1  the  golden  bull  which  the  Despot 
Michael  II.  had  issued  in  1236;  in  the  same  year  he 
bestowed  the  island,  together  with  the  castle  of  Butrinto 
and  its  dependencies,  upon  his  fourth  son,  Philip  of  Taranto, 
on  the  occasion  of  his  marriage  with  the  fair  Thamar  of 
Epiros,  reserving  to  himself  the  overlordship  as  a  matter  of 
form.  Thus  the  Prince  of  Taranto  repeated  the  diplomatic 
marriage  of  Manfred  under  more  favourable  auspices. 
Holding  Corfu,  with  its  dependencies  and  the  dowry  of 
Thamar  on  the  mainland,  he  seemed  to  occupy  a  stronger 
position  than  any  previous  Latin  ruler  of  the  island.  So  far  as 
high-sounding  titles  went,  there  was  soon  no  personage  in  the 
Latin  Orient  so  magnificent  as  the  new  "  Lord  of  Corfu,"  as  he 
styled  himself  on  his  coins,  who  was  also  titular  Emperor  of 
Constantinople,  Prince  of  Achaia,  and  Despot  of  Romania.2 

His  long  reign  of  nearly  forty  years  over  the  island  was, 
if  we  may  believe  the  indiscriminate  panegyric  of  Marmora,  a 
second  golden  age,  during  which  a  well-beloved  prince 
governed  a  devoted  people.  He  strengthened  the  Catholic 
element,  and  at  the  same  time  encouraged  agriculture  by 
conferring  upon  the  archbishop  the  waste  and  uncultivated 
lands  of  the  island  for  the  support  of  the  established  church.5 
He  issued  orders  for  the  protection  of  the  Jews,  whose  Sab- 
bath services  were  disturbed,  whose  possessions  were  liable  to 
seizure,  and  whose  services  were  enlisted  as  galley-slaves,  or 
worse  still,  as  public  executioners,  a  duty  all  the  more  repug- 
nant because  the  gallows  were  erected  in  the  Jewish  cemetery.4 

1  Barone,  60. 

1  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches%  II.,  i.,  407  ;  Riccio,  Saggio  di  Codice, 
supp.,  part  I.,  79  J  Schlumberger,  Numismatique,  389  ;  Supplements  11. 

8  M.  Mustoxidi,  'Icrropturd  'AvdXerra,  98. 

4  A.  Mustoxidi,  Cose  Corciresi,  445  ;  'EXAi^o/HnJ/iciw,  486  (more  accurate 
than  Buchon,  op.  cit.y  I.,  i.,  408). 


CORFIOTfe  PRIVILEGES  521 

But  there  are  some  dark  shadows  on  the  picture,  which 
the  courtly  artist  has  omitted  So  ardent  a  Catholic 
as  the  Prince  of  Taranto  could  scarcely  be  expected 
to  tolerate  the  Greek  Church,  which  represented  a  national 
as  well  as  a  religious  force,  especially  as  the  Greek  emperor 
had  recently  bestowed  upon  the  new  metropolitan  of  Joannina 
the  offensive  title  of  a  Exarch  of  Corfii."  There  was,  too, 
the  alarm  of  Greek  invasions  from  the  mainland  opposite. 
At  one  moment  we  find  the  Despot  Thomas  of  Epiros 
scheming  with  the  Greek  emperor's  admiral  to  make  a 
descent  from  Valona  on  Corfu ;  at  another  it  is  Count  John 
II.  of  Cephalonia  who  threatens  the  fortunate  island;  or, 
again,  it  is  the  imperial  fleet  which  blockades  the  harbour. 
Philip's  governors,  too,  oppressed  even  the  Catholic  Church ; 
and  the  prince,  always  an  absentee  and  for  some  years  a 
prisoner,  was  not  able  to  keep  a  tight  hand  upon  them. 
Still,  in  the  Venetian  times,  the  Corfiote  nobles  looked  back 
on  the  good  Prince  of  Taranto  as  the  founder  of  many  of 
the  privileges  which  they  enjoyed,  and  he  confirmed  and 
strengthened  the  feudal  system  by  grants  of  new  baronies  to 
his  friends.1  Among  these  was  Guglielmo  Tocco,  who,  as 
his  governor  in  Corfii,  laid  the  foundations  of  that  remarkable 
family's  fortunes  in  the  Ionian  islands.2 

Philip's  son,  Robert,  was  a  minor  at  the  time  of  his 
father's  death,  and  his  mother,  the  titular  Empress  Catherine 
of  Valois,  exercised  authority  in  her  own  and  his  name  in 
Corfu,  as  well  as  in  Achaia.  Robert  followed  his  father's 
policy  of  protecting  the  Corfiote  Jews,  and  of  rewarding  his 
faithful  adherents,  both  Greek  and  Italian,  by  the  bestowal 
of  feudal  lands.  He  confirmed  the  local  privileges,  especially 
those  of  the  thirty-three  country  priests,  granted  a  century 
before  by  the  Despot  Michael  II.,  and  released  them  from 
the  exactions  of  the  magister  massarius  and  from  the  obliga- 
tion, which  lay  upon  all  the  Corfiotes,  of  making  a  present 
to  the  prince  whenever  they  appeared  in  his  presence.  The 
fertile  island  enabled  him,  too,  to  make  provision  for  his 
wife,  Marie  de  Bourbon,  in  the  event  of  her  widowhood,  and 
during  the  struggle  which  arose  between  the  widow  and  her 

1  Thomas,  Dipiomatarium,  135,  161. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherchesy  I.,  i.,  41a 


522  CORFU 

brother-in-law,  Philip  II.  of  Taranto,  she  had  sufficient 
authority  in  Corffo  to  repeat  her  late  husband's  orders  on 
behalf  of  the  Hebrew  colony.1  But,  from  the  death  of  his 
brother  in  1364,  Philip  II.  exercised  the  rights  of  sovereignty 
over  the  island.  He,  too,  strove  to  protect  the  Jews,  ratified 
the  franchises  so  long  enjoyed  by  the  village  popes,  and 
ordered  his  officials  not  to  interfere  in  the  affairs  of  the 
Greek  clergy,  the  punishment  of  whom  he  allowed  the 
protopapddes  of  the  city  of  Corfu  to  determine,  as  had  been 
their  immemorial  custom.  In  this  tolerant  policy  he  was 
guided  by  Roman6poulos,  the  archbishop,  who,  though  a 
Greek  by  race  and  a  Catholic  by  religion,  had  neither  the 
Chauvinism  of  a  naturalised  foreigner  nor  the  bigotry  of  a 
convert.2  According  to  some  authorities,  it  was  during  this 
reign  that  the  fief  of  the  gypsies,  of  which  we  shall  hear  more 
in  the  Venetian  period,  was  first  created.  At  any  rate,  the 
gypsies,  of  whom  we  have  seen  traces  in  other  parts  of 
Greece,  where  the  various  Tv<f>T6Ka<rrpa  still  preserve  their 
name,  seem  to  have  crossed  over  to  Corfu  from  the  mainland 
during  the  Angevin  domination.  These  may  have  been  the 
oft-mentioned  "men  from  Vagenetia"  in  Epiros,  who  first 
found  refuge  at  the  courts  of  the  Corfiote  barons  in  the 
reigns  of  Charles  II.  and  of  Philip  I.  of  Taranto.  Catherine 
of  Valois  and  her  son  Robert  made  these  serfs,  whose  name 
still  lingers  in  Corfu,  a  source  of  revenue,  by  imposing  a  poll- 
tax  upon  them,  to  be  paid  by  their  feudal  lord  when  they 
entered  the  island  and  his  service;  and  Philip  II.'s  second 
wife,  Elizabeth  of  Hungary,  to  whom  he  granted  Corfii  on 
his  marriage  in  1371,  tried  to  seize  them  all  and  make  them 
serfs  of  the  princely  domain.  Against  this  high-handed  act 
the  barons  successfully  protested.8 

Both   Elizabeth4  and   her  husband   died   in  November 
1 373i  and  his  young  nephew,  Jacques  de  Baux,  became  the 

1  Mustoxidi,  op.  cit,  447-9,  Ixi. ;  Romanos  in  AcXHof,  ii.,  601  ;  and 
'E/3patr?)  Kotvbrijs,  5. 

2  AeXr/of,  587  ;  Marmora,  223  ;  Miklosich  und  Miiller,  v.,  67  ;  Buchon, 
op.  cit%  I.,  i.,  413. 

3  Mustoxidi,  op.  at.f  449;  Hopf,  op.  ctt.t  lxxxvi.,  33,  186;  Barone, 
25  ;  Roman6s,  Aruiwrta  Kepicvpaiirfi  IIpa£ts ;  Albanas,  Tie  pi  rwtev  Ktpxpa 
WrXwv,    13,  29. 

4  CrassuUo,  De  Rebus  Tarentinis  in  Raccolta  di  Varic  Cronache,  v.,  1. 


JACQUES  DE  BAUX  523 

heir  of  all  his  titles  and  dominions.  The  Corfiote  barons, 
however,  were  as  little  inclined  as  their  fellows  in  the  Morea, 
to  accept  his  sway.  During  the  civil  war,  which  raged 
between  the  Baux  and  Queen  Joanna  I.  of  Naples,  Jacques 
found  a  temporary  refuge  in  his  Greek  estates ;  but  the 
Ionians,  headed  by  Guglielmo  and  Riccardo  d'Altavilla 
proclaimed  the  Queen  of  Naples  as  Lady  of  Corfu,  the 
suzerainty  over  which  had  been  preserved,  as  we  saw,  ninety 
years  before,  to  the  Neapolitan  Crown.  Joanna  retained 
possession  of  the  island  for  seven  years;  she  pacified  the 
Greeks  by  renewing  the  privileges  of  the  thirty-two  city 
priests,  granted  by  the  Despot  Michael  II.,  and  confirmed  by 
her  predecessors;  she  guaranteed  to  the  citizens  their  old 
customs  and  the  franchises  bestowed  upon  them  by  a  long 
line  of  Angevin  princes ;  she  extended  her  protection  to  the 
Jews ;  she  encouraged  the  immigration  of  the  "  men  from 
Vagenetia  " ;  and  ordered  her  officials  to  see  that  the  Venetian 
merchants,  so  long  established  there,  enjoyed  their  time- 
honoured  rights  undisturbed.1  But,  in  1380,  Jacques  de 
Baux  thought  that  the  moment  was  favourable  for  the 
assertion  of  his  claims  in  Greece.  The  Navarrese  Company 
was  despatched  thither  to  do  his  work,  and  its  first  achieve- 
ment on  Greek  soil  was  the  capture  of  Corfu.  The  last 
titular  emperor  of  Constantinople  did  his  best  to  win 
adherents  in  the  island.  Almost  his  sole  act  was  to  purchase 
the  support  of  the  powerful  baron,  Adamo  di  Sant*  Ippolito, 
by  the  grant  of  the  island  of  Paxo,  which  had  belonged  to 
Filippo  Malerba  of  Verona,  a  recent  captain  of  Corfii — one 
of  the  few  allusions  to  the  smallest  of  the  Seven  Islands 
during  the  Angevin  period.2  But  the  distracted  politics  of 
the  time  made  the  baron  of  Paxo  soon  forget  his  benefactor. 
Charles  III.  of  Durazzo  descended  upon  Naples,  and  robbed 
Joanna  of  her  crown  and  life.  Corfu,  too  weak  to  stand 
alone,  was  divided  into  three  factions — that  of  the  usurper ; 
that  of  Joanna's  heir,  Louis  of  Anjou,  one  of  whose  officials 
was  pleased  to  style  himself  "  Marquis  of  Corfu  " ;  and  that 
of  Jacques  de  Baux,  whose  Navarrese  garrisons  must  have 

1  S£thas,  op.  cit.y  i.,  47  ;  in.,  31  ;  Barone,  22,  24,  26,  65  ;  Lunzi,  79-82  ; 
Predelli,  Commemariali^  iii.,  130. 

-  [Archduke  Salvator,]  Paxos  und  AnHpaxosy  9-13. 


524  CORFU 

been  detested  alike  by  Greeks  and  Italians.  Sant'  Ippolito 
and  Riccardo  d'Altavilla  saw  that  it  was  their  interest  to 
worship  the  rising  sun.  They  succeeded,  not  without  con- 
siderable labour  and  expense,  in  driving  the  Navarrese 
veterans  out  of  the  castles  of  Corfu  and  Butrinto  ;  most  of 
the  barons  joined  them;  and,  in  1382,  Charles  III.  was  lord 
of  the  island.  The  usurper  showed  the  usual  "  kindness  of 
kings  upon  their  coronation  day " ;  he  rewarded  the  services 
of  the  two  most  conspicuous  traitors,  graciously  received  a 
deputation  of  Italians  and  Greeks,  renewed  the  ancient 
privileges  of  the  city  and  its  thirty-two  Greek  priests,  en- 
deavoured to  repair  the  ravages  which  the  recent  struggle 
had  made  in  its  finances,  assured  the  Jews  of  his  royal  pro- 
tection, and  confirmed  important  feudal  lords,  such  as  the 
Caracciolo,  in  their  fiefs.1  To  those  who  remember  Corfu  in 
the  days  of  the  British  protectorate,  when  the  island  of  Vido 
in  the  harbour  was  defended  by  those  strong  fortifications 
which  we  subsequently  blew  up,  it  may  be  of  interest  to 
recall  that  it  formed  one  of  his  feudal  grants.  It  was  then 
known  as  the  island  of  Santo  Stefano 2 — a  name  derived  from 
the  old  church,  which  our  engineers  sacrificed  in  1 837.  At 
the  time  of  the  siege  of  1537  it  was  called  Malipiero,  but 
later  in  the  sixteenth  century  it  received  from  its  then  owner 
the  name  of  Vido,  changed  by  the  French,  during  their  brief 
occupation,  into  He  de  la  Paix. 

There  was,  however,  another  Power,  which  had  long 
coveted  Corfu,  and  had  been  closely  following  the  various 
revolutions  in  the  ownership  of  the  island.  Venice  had 
never  forgotten  that  the  key  of  the  Adriatic  had  once  been 
hers;  during  the  Angevin  period  she  had  made  successive 
attempts  to  obtain  it — in  13 14  and  1351  by  purchase,  in  1355 
by  a  coup  de  fnain.  More  recently,  negotiations  had  been 
opened  with  Jacques  de  Baux  for  the  mortgage,  lease,  or 
purchase  of  the  island;  but  these  negotiations  also  fell 
through.  Meanwhile,  the  Venetian  consul,  after  the  fashion 
of  Levantine  consuls  in  our  own  day,  was  busy  preparing 
public  opinion  in  Corffc  for  a  Venetian  occupation.  There 
was  a  party   among   the   Corfiotes,  which   could   not    help 

1  Mustoxidi,  452-3  ;  Barone,  18,  20,  22,  23,  24-6,  29. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  i.,  409-11. 


VENICE  OCCUPIES  CORFU  525 

contrasting  the  unbroken  continuity  of  Venetian  administra- 
tion with  the  continual  civil  wars  of  Naples.  Money  was 
freely  spent  and  promises  as  freely  made  to  wavering  nobles, 
who  may  have  been  frightened  by  the  execution  of  one  of 
their  order  for  high  treason,  but  who,  when  death  had 
removed  both  Jacques  de  Baux  and  Charles  III.,  found 
themselves  without  a  sovereign  lord.  Their  allegiance  to  the 
throne  of  Naples  at  this  moment  received  a  further  shock 
from  the  discovery  that  the  baron,  who  held  the  city  and 
castle  for  the  late  king,  was  an  impostor  who  had  forged  his 
patent  While  the  Neapolitan  party  advocated  loyalty  to 
Ladislaus,  Charles's  little  son  and  successor,  some  thought  of 
Genoa,  others  of  Venice,  and  others  again  actually  offered 
their  country  to  Francesco  da  Carrara,  Signor  of  Padua,  who 
at  once  sent  Scrovigno,  a  trustworthy  servant  of  his  own  and 
of  the  late  king,  to  occupy  the  place.  That  Corfu  should  fall 
into  the  hands  of  her  bitterest  foe  was  more  than  Venice 
could  stand ;  a  recent  incident  had  made  it  unnecessary  to 
spare  the  susceptibilities  of  the  Neapolitan  court  any  longer. 
Miani,  the  Captain  of  the  Gulf,  chanced  to  be  in  Corfiote 
waters  at  the  time ;  he  landed  and  explained  to  a  meeting  of 
the  citizens  that  his  government  was  both  willing  and  able 
to  protect  them,  that  Genoa,  the  only  other  maritime  power, 
would  treat  them  like  slaves,  while  Padua  had  no  navy. 
These  arguments  proved  effective ;  the  town  was  peaceably 
surrendered ;  and  Scrovigno  shut  himself  up  in  one  of  the 
two  forts  of  the  sea-girt  castle.  But  siege  materials  were 
despatched  from  Venice,  the  castle  was  besieged,  and 
Scrovigno  was  glad  to  escape  by  night  on  a  Genoese  galley. 
Miani  then  summoned  the  garrison  to  surrender ;  once  again, 
after  the  lapse  of  170  years,  the  lion  banner  was  hoisted  over 
Corfu ;  thenceforth  it  floated  there  for  more  than  four 
centuries.  A  few  places,  however,  held  out  some  time  longer 
for  the  King  of  Naples — the  second  of  the  city  forts,  the 
lofty  castle  of  Sant*  Angelo  on  the  west  coast,  the  recently 
constructed  castle  of  Cassopo  at  the  north  of  the  island,  and 
that  of  Butrinto  on  the  opposite  main.  These  strongholds 
were,  however,  all  surrendered  or  taken  ;  that  of  Cassopo  was 
destroyed  for  fear  lest  it  should  fall  into  the  hands  of  the 
Genoese;     strange    legends    grew    up    around     its    ruined 


I 


526  CORFU 

ramparts  ;  and  a  hundred  years  later,  travellers  were  told  that 
it  had  been  deserted  because  a  fiery  dragon  had  poisoned 
the  inhabitants  with  his  breath.1  As  for  Butrinto,  its 
governor,  Riccardo  d'Altavilla,  who  had  received  his  post 
from  Charles  III.,  capitulated  as  soon  as  he  had  secured  his 
reward  from  the  Venetian  commander.3  Malipiero  arrived 
from  Venice  as  rector  and  provveditore  of  Corfu. 

On  28th  May,  1386,  a  meeting  of  the  commune  or  "  of  the 
larger  and  saner  part  of  it,"  was  summoned  by  the  sound  of 
the  bell  to  elect  a  deputation  which  should  do  homage  and 
present  the  petition  of  the  commune  to  the  Venetian  govern- 
ment All  the  three  races  of  Corfu — Italians,  Greeks,  and 
jews — were  represented  among  the  six  Corfiote  envoys,  and 
the  fact  that  the  name  of  "  David,  son  of  Simon,"  figures 
beside  that  of  the  proud  Altavilla,  shows  the  influence  of  the 
Hebrew  element  in  the  island.  The  deputation  was  instructed 
to  beg  that  the  new  masters  of  Corfu  would  observe  all  the 
privileges  granted  to  the  community  by  the  Angevins  ;  that 
the  republic  would  never  dispose  of  the  island  ;  that  all  fiefs 
should  be  confirmed,  and  that  the  barons  and  Holy  Church 
might  continue  to  exercise  the  right  of  dragging  their 
recalcitrant  serfs  before  the  captain,  who  would  keep  them  in 
prison  till  their  lords  should  have  obtained  satisfaction ;  that 
the  captain  should  administer  justice,  in  civil  and  criminal 
matters  alike,  with  the  assistance  of  the  "annual  judges," 
according  to  the  ancient  custom  ;  that,  whereas  the  commune 
had  resigned  to  the  new  rector  the  time-honoured  Corfiote 
privilege  of  exemption  from  all  taxes  and  tolls,  in  considera- 
tion of  the  prosperity  of  the  town,  an  annual  salary  should  be 
paid  to  a  doctor,  the  walls  should  be  repaired,  and  a  loggia 
erected  for  the  honour  of  the  republic  and  the  island ;  and 
that  all  the  provisional  arrangements  made  between  Miani 
and  the  community  should  be  ratified.  A  second  meeting, 
held  on  9th  June,  proclaimed  the  formal  acceptance  of 
Venetian  rule,  because  the  island  was  deprived  of  its  lawful 

1  Feyerabend,  Reyssbuch,  36,  54,  185  ;  Revue  de  V Orient  latin^  I., 
231  ;  IIL,  666. 

2  Lunzi,  85-105  ;  Mustoxidi,  455,  lviii.,  lxiv. ;  Marmora,  231  ;  Sanudo 
and  Navagcro  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  760-1  ;  xxiii.,  1070- 1  ;  Thomas  and 
Predclli,  Diplotnatarium,  ii.,  185  ;  Arch,  Veneto^  xvii.,  252. 


THE  VENETIAN  CHARTER  527 

protector,  "coveted  by  its  jealous  neighbours,  and  almost 
besieged  by  Arabs  and  Turks";  and  conferred  the  post  of 
captain  and  magister  massarius  upon  Miani,  as  a  token  of 
gratitude  for  his  peaceful  occupation  of  the  city.1 

The  six  envoys  met  with  a  warm  reception  from  the 
Venetian  aristocracy  and  a  handsomely  furnished  palace  was 
placed  at  their  disposal.  On  8th  January,  1387,  they 
obtained  an  audience  of  the  doge,  whom  one  of  their  number 
addressed,  so  it  is  said,  in  the  florid  style  of  the  Levant  He 
spoke  of  their  past  history — how  Corcyra  had  been  ruled  by 
Roman  and  Greek  emperors,  by  Despots  and  kings,  and 
expressed  the  hope  that  the  Venetian  lion,  the  king  of  beasts, 
would  scorn  to  tyrannise  over  his  subjects,  but  would  be 
content  with  their  homage  and  leave  them  their  ancient 
liberties.  The  doge  was  graciously  pleased  to  accept  the 
one  and  confirm  the  other,  with  a  few  alterations  and  addi- 
tions. Thus,  it  was  provided  that  justice  should  be  adminis- 
tered by  the  Venetian  governor  and  the  "annual  judges," 
according  to  the  customs  of  Venice,  to  which  an  appeal 
would  lie;  but  no  Corfiote  was  to  be  tried  outside  the 
island,  except  on  appeal.  A  Greek  notary  was  to  be  elected, 
according  to  usage,  to  draw  up  citations  on  the  Greeks,  and 
two  officers  of  the  court  were  to  be  appointed  to  serve  them. 
A  clause  was  inserted,  owing  perhaps  to  the  experience  of 
Crete,  ordering  the  island  barons  to  perform  their  feudal 
service  with  good  and  sufficient  war-horses;  another 
prohibited  the  Venetian  officials  from  forcing  the  Corfiotes 
to  sell  them  food  or  to  fish  for  them  ;  while  a  third  directed 
that  the  measure  for  the  sale  of  new  wine  should  be 
stamped  by  the  authorities  in  October,  or  oftener,  but 
that  the  customary  fee  should  be  only  paid  once  a  year. 
Finally,  the  offices  of  catapan  and  syndic  were  to  be  retained, 
and  no  one  except  the  governor  was  to  interfere  with 
them.2 

Great  was  the  joy  of  the  Corfiotes  at  the  return  of  their 
envoys  with  the  charter  of  the  island ;  nor  had  they  reason  to 

1  Mustoxidi,  lx.-lxiii. ;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  op,  at.,  ii.,  199-204  ; 
Sanudo,  op.  at.,  xxii.,  751. 

2  Marmora,  238;  Mustoxidi,  lxi v. -lxviii.;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  op.  tit, 
ii.,  204-9. 


528  CORFU 

repent  their  change  of  masters.  The  Venetian  bailie,  as  the 
governor  was  called  by  the  express  desire  of  the  islanders, 
reduced  the  chaos  of  the  last  few  years  to  order.  During  the 
general  confusion  of  the  interregnum,  various  persons  had 
appropriated  public  property,  which  they  were  now  compelled 
to  restore.  Such  was  the  popularity  of  the  new  government, 
that  the  municipality  granted  it  the  proceeds  of  the  two  per 
cent,  customs  duty,  which  had  lately  been  imposed,  in  order 
to  hasten  the  restoration  of  the  walls.1 

Venice  was,  however,  anxious  to  legalise  her  position  as 
mistress  of  the  island.  The  Queen-regent  of  Naples 
complained  of  the  annexation;  Ladislaus,  when  he  came 
of  age,  demanded,  and  attempted  to  exercise,  his  rights,  but 
hinted  that  he  did  not  mind  coming  to  terms.  The  negotia- 
tions were  protracted  till  1402,  when  Ladislaus  finally  sold 
the  island  with  all  its  dependencies  to  the  republic  for  30,000 
gold  ducats.2  Thus  ended  the  rule  of  the  Neapolitan  princes 
over  the  fairest  of  Greek  islands,  and  with  it  their  last 
connection  with  Greece.  In  its  early  days  it  was,  on  the 
whole,  easy,  though  its  ecclesiastical  policy  was  unfair  to  the 
church  of  the  majority.  Later  on,  when  it  was  weak  at  home 
it  was  ineffective  at  Corfii.  Every  revolution  at  Naples  had 
an  echo  in  the  island,  with  the  worst  effect  upon  the  morality 
of  its  public  men.  It  became  the  highest  form  of  statesman- 
ship to  go  over  to  the  winning  side,  in  the  certainty  of 
obtaining  a  fief  or  an  office  as  the  reward  of  disloyalty.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  insecure  title  of  these  successive  rulers 
made  them  peculiarly  ready  to  respect  the  ancient  privileges 
of  the  islanders.  Indeed,  it  is  probable  that,  in  the  Angevin 
days,  when  the  sovereign  was  always  an  absentee,  Corfu  was 
a  paradise  for  the  barons  and  an  inferno  for  their  serfs.  The 
chief  result  of  the  Neapolitan  domination  was  to  strengthen 
the  feudal  system  and  so  to  confirm  that  spirit  of  aristocracy 
which  still  characterises  the  Ionian  islands. 

Modern  Corfu  contains  scarcely  a  trace  of  its  Angevin 
rulers.  The  church  of  Santo  Stefano  has  vanished,  Cassopo 
is  a  heap  of  ruins,  and  one  coin  alone  preserves  the  name  of 

1  Marmora,  249  ;    Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches,  II.,  L,  423. 

2  Mustoxidi,  lxviii.  to  end;  Lunzi,  117- 18;  Thomas  and  Predelli, 
op.  cif.,  ii.,  263-89. 


VENETIAN  ADMINISTRATION  529 

the  princes  of  Taranto,1  from  which  a  recently  extinct 
Corfiote  family  boasted  its  descent.  The  Angevin  barony  of 
De  Martina,  once  held  by  the  Tocchi,  which  till  lately  sur- 
vived in  the  topography  of  the  island,  has  now  changed  its 
name.2  But  the  pilgrimage  church  on  the  summit  of  Panto- 
krdtor  dates  from  this  period. 

The  administration  of  Corfu  during  the  Venetian  period 
was  modelled  on  that  which  had  long  prevailed  in  the  older 
colonies  of  the  republic.  For  the  first  twenty-four  years,  the 
government  was  entrusted  to  a  single  Venetian  official, 
styled  "  bailie  and  captain,"  who  was  elected  by  the  Home 
Government  and  held  office  for  two  years.  But,  in  1410,  it 
was  decided  that  two  councillors  should  be  sent  from  Venice 
to  assist  him  in  the  exercise  of  civil  and  criminal  jurisdiction 
and  to  perform  the  duty  of  chamberlain.  Each  of  the 
councillors  was  to  receive  300  gold  ducats  a  year,  and  two 
towers  of  the  city  were  assigned  as  their  abodes.  They  and 
the  bailie  were  ordered  to  sit  in  court  five  days  a  week,  and 
the  "annual  judges,"  whose  numbers  were  now  increased  to 
three,  one  Latin  and  two  Greeks,  continued  to  act  as  their 
assessors.  The  peasants,  however,  soon  found  that  the 
presence  of  the  two  councillors  tended  to  protract  litigation 
and  led  to  their  having  to  supply  two  more  officials  with 
fodder  for  their  horses.  They  accordingly  petitioned  for  a 
return  to  the  former  system  of  one-man  rule,  which  is  really 
more  beneficial  to  the  poor  in  southern  countries  than  more 
democratic  arrangements.  Their  prayers  were,  however, 
rejected,  and  the  island  continued  to  provide  posts  for  the 
two  councillors.  We  are  specially  told,  that,  though  the 
Venetian  officials  were  forbidden  to  engage  in  trade,  these 
appointments  were  considered  as  the  plums  of  the  colonial 
service.  So,  in  the  British  days,  the  pleasant  island  of  the 
Phaeacians  was  regarded  as  the  best  of  our  foreign  stations.8 

The  power  of  the  bailie  was  further  limited  by  the  institu- 

1  That  which  bears  the  inscription  of  Johs  Despotus  Curfou  Civis, 
which  Buchon  ascribed  to  John  of  Gravina,  who  was  never  lord  of  Corfu, 
has  been  described  by  Schlumberger  (op.  ci£,  389)  as  a  forgery.  Could  it 
refer  to  Count  John  II.  of  Cephalonia,  who  styled  himself  "Despot," 
and  threatened  Corfu  ? 

2  AeXrlov,  II.,  597,  n.  2  ;  Gerakdres,  Ke/>*vpai*cal  ZeXtfe*,  53. 

3  Sdthas,  op.  ciLy  ii.,  249  ;  iii.,  88,  247  ;  Marmora,  256. 

2  L 


fc 


530  CORFU 

tion  of  a  third  office,  that  of  the  praweditore,  who  was  in 
command  of  the  garrison  and  resided  in  the  fortress,  and 
who  also  decided  those  moot  points  of  feudal  law  which  were 
of  frequent  occurrence  in  a  community  such  as  Corfu.  He 
was,  moreover,  judge  in  disputes  between  the  citizens  and  the 
garrison,  and  his  authority  extended  over  the  island  barony 
of  Paxo,  which  was  treated  by  the  Venetians  as  by  their 
predecessors,  as  an  integral  part,  of  its  larger  neighbour.  It 
continued  to  belong  to  the  great  baronial  family  of  Sant' 
Ippolito,  which  in  1423  fortified  it  against  the  Turkish 
corsairs,  who  were  wont  to  carry  off  the  defenceless  serfs. 
When  that  clan  became  extinct,  it  passed  to  the  other  great 
Neapolitan  house  of  Altavilla,  and  thence  to  the  republic.  In 
1 5 1 3,  however,  it  was  sold,  together  with  the  taxes  which  it 
paid,  to  the  family  of  Avrdmes,  which  treated  the  inhabitants 
so  badly  that  many  of  them  fled  to  Turkish  territory.  In 
consequence  of  this,  it  was  restored  to  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
proweditore,  who  was  locally  represented  by  a  leading  native. 
As  time  went  on,  that  important  official  assumed  also  the  title 
of"  captain,"  which  had  originally  been  borne  by  the  bailie,  and 
his  delegate  in  Paxo  was  accordingly  styled  "  captain  "  also.1 

In  the  sixteenth  century  the  appointment  of  the  great 
naval  authority  of  provveditore  generate  del  Levante^  whose 
headquarters  were  Corfu,  completely  overshadowed  that  of 
all  the  other  Venetian  officials  in  the  Ionian  islands.  His 
arrival  for  his  three  years'  term  of  government  was  regulated 
by  an  elaborate  code  of  etiquette,  still  preserved  in  a  special 
volume  in  the  Corfiote  archives ;  the  Jews  had  to  provide  the 
carpets  for  the  streets,  along  which  the  great  man  would 
pass;  the  heads  of  both  the  Latin  and  the  Greek  Church 
greeted  him  with  all  the  splendid  rites  of  their  respective 
establishments ;  a  noble  Corfiote  pronounced  a  panegyric 
upon  him  in  the  church  of  St  Spiridion,  before  whose  remains 
his  excellency  would  kneel  in  prayer  ere  returning  to  his 
palace,  where  obsequious  Hebrews,  laden  with  flowers,  bent 
low  as  he  crossed  the  threshold.  Strict  orders  were  issued 
to  these  officials  that  they  should  respect  the  rights  of  the 
natives,  and  spies,  known  as  "  inquisitors  over  the  affairs  of 

1  S4thas,  Hi.,  249,  422;  v.,  235;  Lunzi,  252,  348;  Paxos  und  AnH- 
paxos,  13-14;  Buondelmonti,  55. 


THE  TWO  COUNCILS  531 

the  Levant,"  were  sent  from  time  to  time  to  the  islands  for 
the  purpose  of  checking  the  Venetian  administration  and  of 
ascertaining  the  grievances  of  the  governed,  who  had,  as 
under  the  Angevins,  the  often-exercised  privilege  of  sending 
special  missions  to  lay  their  complaints  before  the  Home 
Government  We  can  see  from  the  Venetian  archives  what 
Ionian  historians  unanimously  assert  to  have  been  the  case, 
that  redress  was  almost  invariably  granted,  though  the 
abuses  of  which  the  natives  complained  were  apt  to  grow 
up  again.1 

A  large  share  in  the  local  administration  was  granted  to 
the  inhabitants,  or  rather  to  the  aristocracy.  At  the  time  of 
the  transfer  of  the  island  to  Venice,  the  General  Assembly 
consisted  of  the  principal  citizens,  Greeks  as  well  as  Italians ; 
but,  as  time  went  on,  strange  elements,  Albanians  and 
Cephalonians,  crept  into  this  body,  so  that,  in  1440,  it  was 
ordered  that  the  bailie,  with  the  advice  of  the  "  good  citizens," 
should  choose  some  seventy  prominent  persons  as  a  council 
for  the  term  of  one  year ;  half  a  century  later,  this  body 
was  increased  to  150 — a  total  preserved  till  the  last  years 
of  Venetian  rule.  ,  There  were  henceforth  two  councils — the 
General  Assembly  and  the  Council  of  150.  The  former 
became  an  oligarchy,  composed  exclusively  of  Greek  and 
Italian  nobles,  together  with  a  few  foreigners  who  had 
resided  ten  years  or  married  into  a  Corfiote  family.  But 
when  the  numbers  of  the  nobility  were  much  diminished 
by  the  first  great  Turkish  siege  in  1537,  new  families  were 
added  to  the  list  from  the  burgher  class,  the  qualification 
for  noble  strangers  was  subsequently  reduced  to  five  years, 
and  Marmora  gives  the  names  of  1 12  noble  families  inscribed 
in  the  "  Golden  Book "  of  the  Corfiote  aristocracy  when  he 
wrote  his  history  in  1672.  The  "Golden  Book"  was  burned 
as  the  symbol  of  hated  class  distinction  in  the  first  enthusiasm 
for  liberty,  equality,  and  fraternity,  after  the  French  repub- 
licans took  possession  of  Corfu.  As  all  the  nobles  were 
debarred  from  engaging  in  trade,  it  may  readily  be  imagined 
that  a  premium  was  put  upon  place-hunting.  Very  early 
in  the  Venetian  period  we  hear  of  the  number  of  Greek 
lawyers — then,  as  now,  the  plague  of  Greece.      It  only  re- 

1  Lunzi,  253-65. 


532  CORFU 

mained  to  discourage  agriculture  by  compelling  the  nobles 
to  reside  in  the  city  if  they  wished  to  take  part  in  the 
Assembly,  and  the  corruption  of  Corfiote  society  was  com- 
plete. To  these  arrangements  we  may  trace  the  neglect  of 
country  life  and  the  consequent  distress  of  the  island  in  the 
present  day. 

The  General  Assembly  met  every  year  at  the  end  of 
October  to  elect  the  Council  of  150  from  among  its  own 
members.  At  first  it  seems  to  have  held  its  sitting  in  "  the 
hall  above  the  Chancery " ;  but,  after  that  building  was 
destroyed  by  the  Turks  at  the  time  of  the  first  siege,  it  was 
convened  in  a  quaint  house,  decorated  with  pictures  of 
Nausikaa  welcoming  Odysseus  and  of  other  scenes  from 
the  early  history  of  Corcyra,  and  situated  on  the  esplanade 
between  the  Fortezza  Vecchia  and  the  town.  This  interest- 
ing memorial  of  Venetian  rule  has  long  since  been  swept 
away.1 

It  was  the  policy  of  the  Venetian  Government  to  leave 
the  Corfiotes  all  the  minor  offices,  and  it  was  the  desire  of 
the  islanders  that  these  offices  should  be  annual,  so  that  they 
might  be  enjoyed  by  as  many  people   as  possible.     Thus, 
the  Council  of  150  elected  the  three  "annual  judges,"  who, 
besides  sitting  as  assessors  of  the  bailie  and  the  two  council- 
lors in  the  High  Court,  formed  a  petty  tribunal  of  their  own 
for  the  trial  of  cases  where  the  sum  at  issue  was  small.     It 
elected  the  four  syndics,  two  Greeks  and  two  Latins  during 
the  period  of  which  we  are  treating,  who  were  required  to 
be  at  least  thirty-eight  years  of  age   and   who  were    the 
representatives  of  all  classes  of  the  community,  collectively 
and  individually,  bringing  their  grievances  before  the  Vene- 
tian authorities,  and  also  regulating  prices  in  the  market — a 
function  which  bordered  on  that  of  the  still  existent  catapans. 
It  chose,  too,  the  clerk  of  the  Court,  two  taxing  masters,  who 
regulated  the  scale  of  law  costs ;  the  giustizieri>  or  officials 
who  stamped  the  weights  and  measures;   and   the  person 
entrusted  with  the  census,  which  was  supposed  to  be  made 
once  during  each  bailie's  term  of  office.2     In  1470,  it  obtained 
the  privilege  of  electing  the  captain  of  the  war  galleys  fitted 

1  Lunzi,  274  ;  Marmora,  312-13  ;  Sathas,  ii.,  159  ;  iii.,  467  ;  v.,  226,  249. 

2  Buchon,  Nouvelles  Recherches>  II.,  i.,  425. 


THE  CONTINENTAL  DEPENDENCIES  533 

out  at  Corfu,  a  wise  concession  of  the  Venetian  Government, 
which  found,  on  the  great  day  of  Lepanto,  that  its  Corfiote 
captains  were  worthy  descendants  of  the  seafaring  Phaeacians. 
Venice  was  unwilling,  however,  to  relinquish  to  the  natives 
the  posts  of  constable  of  the  island,  captain  of  "the  iron 
gate,"  dragoman,  and  salt  commissioner ;  but  the  command 
of  the  castle  of  Sant*  Angelo,  which  included  some  petty 
judicial  authority,  passed  in  time  into  the  hands  of  the 
Council.  Later  on,  too,  the  Council  elected  a  species  of 
cabinet,  called  the  Conclave  and  composed  of  the  three 
"annual  judges,"  the  four  syndics,  and  five  other  officials, 
whose  number  was  fixed  in  the  seventeenth  century,  and 
whose  meetings  were  held  with  closed  doors.1 

The  dependencies  of  the  colony  on  the  mainland  likewise 
furnished  posts,  some  of  which  were  in  the  gift  of  the  Council, 
and  all  were  held  by  Corfiote  nobles,  usually  for  a  year. 
Butrinto  was  the  most  important  of  these  stations,  both 
strategically  and  economically,  for  it  was  not  only  "the 
guardian  and  right  eye"  of  Corfu,  but  yielded  from  its 
fisheries,  once  the  property  of  Cicero's  friend,  Atticus,  1300 
ducats  a  year.2  More  interesting,  however,  from  Byron's 
noble  lines  and  from  its  dramatic  history  in  the  early  days 
of  the  British  protectorate,  when  official  ignorance  of 
geography  abandoned  it  to  the  Turks,  was  "Parga's  shore" 
— an  outpost  boldly  occupied  on  his  own  responsibility  by 
the  Venetian  bailie  of  Corfu  in  1401,  and  accepted,  after 
some  hesitation,  by  the  republic.  This  hesitation  was  not 
unwarranted,  for,  despite  its  poetic  name,  the  practical 
Venetians  found  that  the  place,  whose  sugar  had  proved  so 
remunerative  to  Count  Nicholas  of  Cephalonia  a  century 
before,  now  cost  more  than  it  was  worth,  and  accordingly 
several  times  urged  the  inhabitants  to  emigrate  over  the 
narrow  channel  to  the  islet  of  Antipaxo,  where  they  enjoyed 
the  right  of  tilling  the  land,  or  even  to  Corfu,  where  unculti- 
vated ground  was  always  at  their  disposal.  But  then,  as  in 
1 8 19,  the  Pargians  showed  a  touching,  if  inconvenient, 
attachment  to  their  ancient  home,  which  was  well  situated 

1  S£thas,  L,    1 12-14,  221;    ii.,   151,  213,  221;  v.,  224,  251;    Lunzi, 
279-87,  299-302  ;  Marmora,  9,  270,  314. 
-  Sdthas,  v.,  250. 


\ 


534  CORFU 

for   purposes    of    piracy,   and    they   combined    devotion    to 
Venice,  from   whom    they   had   obtained    excellent     terms, 
with  the  lucrative  traffic  of  selling  the  weapons  sent   for  their 
defence  to  the  neighbouring   Turks.     The  governorship  of 
Parga,  at  first  bestowed   on   a  Corfiote  noble   for    life    and 
then  placed  at  the  disposition  of  the  Council,   was,   at  the 
petition  of  the  Pargians,  in  151 1,  taken  from  that  body  and 
transferred  to  the  Venetian  authorities  of  Corfu :  but  it  was 
ultimately   restored   to  the   Council.     The   post   could    not, 
however,  have  been  either  lucrative  or  easy ;  for  out  of  his 
exiguous  salary  the  governor  had  to  provide  each   Pargian 
family  with  five  measures  of  salt  a  year,  and  each  priest  and 
local   magnate  with    a    dinner   on   Christmas  eve     and    at 
Epiphany,  while  a  local  council  of  thirty-two  managed  most 
of  the  affairs  of  this  small  community,  and   a  irparroTrairag 
looked  after  its  spiritual  welfare.1     All  the  inhabitants  were 
soldiers,  and  many  of  them  pirates,  and  they  were  known  to 
imprison  a  Venetian  governor,  just  as  the  Albanians  of  to- 
day besiege  a  Turkish  Vali,  till  they  could  get  redress.     At 
the  same  time  as  Parga,  Corfii    acquired    the    castles    of 
Saiada  and   Phanari,  which   with   La  Bastia,   Suboto,    and 
Strovili  made  up  the  continental  dependencies  of  the  island 
in  the  fifteenth  century.     For  a  brief  period  Lepanto  was 
placed   under  the  jurisdiction   of  Corfu.2     Under   Venetian 
protection,  too,  were  the  monks  who  inhabited  the  ancient 
home  of  the  harpies,  the  Strivali  islands,  where  Theodore 
Ldskaris  and    Irene    had    long    ago    established    a    Greek 
monastery   of   the   Redeemer.     Thither    in    the    thirteenth 
century  the  Benedictines  had  gone,  and  on  one  occasion  we 
find    the    pope    appointing   the    prior    of   "Our    Lady   of 
Stropharia."     When,  however,  the  Greeks  recovered  Achaia, 
the    Emperor    John    VI.    restored    the    monastery   of    the 
Redeemer.     Every    passing    ship    reverently    greeted    and 
gave  alms  to  the  monks,  whose  exploits  against  the  Turks 
who  had   dared   to  set  foot  on   their  wind-swept  solitude 

1  Sathas,  ii.,  45-6, 232  ;  iii.,  32,  466  ;  v.,  256, 328-30  ;  Marmora,  253, 282, 
285  ;  Thomas,  Diplomatarium,  i.,  170;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  i.,  217  ; 
Jorga  in  Revue  de  tOrient  latin,  vi.,  378  ;  P.  A.  S.,  'H  Ild/rya,  75-7  ;  u. 
Foscolo,  Prose  Poliiiche^  447-52. 

2  Sathas,  iii.,  32  ;  v.,  246,  336. 


THE  GREEK  CHURCH  535 

enhanced  the  prestige  of  their  sacred  habit  among  pilgrims 
on  their  way  to  the  Holy  Land.1 

The  ecclesiastical   policy  of  the   Venetians  was  always 
less  bigoted  than  that  of  other  Catholic  powers ;  and  while, 
as  Catholics,  they  continued  to  give  precedence  to  their 
own  Church,  which  in  Corffc  became  a  perquisite  of  the  great 
Venetian  families,  they  never  forgot  that  the  interests  of 
the  republic  were  of  more   importance  than  those   of  the 
papacy.     Accordingly,  they  studiously   prevented    any  en7 
croachments  on  the  part  of  either  the  oecumenical  patriarch 
or  the  pope,  fearing  the  political  influence  of  the  one  and 
the  theological  fanaticism  of  the  other.     The  externals  of 
the   Angevin  ecclesiastical  system   were  therefore  retained 
as  being  well  adapted  to  this  cautious  policy.     The  head  of 
the  Orthodox  church  was  still  called  "  chief  priest "   Oueya? 
irpwTOTraTras),  while  the  title  of  archbishop  was  reserved  for 
the  aristocratic  Venetian  who  was  the  head  of  the  Catholic 
clergy.     The  "chief  priest"   was   elected   by  thirty  chosen 
members   of   the   General    Assembly  and   by  the  "sacred 
band"    of    the    thirty-two    city    priests,    whose    numbers, 
however,   in   the    later   Venetian    period,  were   really   only 
twenty.     His  term  of  office  was  five  years,  at  the  end  of 
which  time,  if  not  re-elected,  he  sank  into  the  ranks  of  the 
ordinary  clergy,  from  whom  he  was  then  only  distinguished 
by  his  crimson  sash.     Merit  had,  as  a  rule,  less  to  do  with 
his  election  than  his  relationship  to  a  noble  family  and  the 
amount  of  the  pecuniary  arguments  which   he  applied  to 
the  pockets  of  the  electors,   and   for   which    he    recouped 
himself  by  his  gains  while  in  office.     In  each  of  the  four 
bailiwicks   into   which   Corfii   was  still  divided,  and  in  the 
island  of  Paxo,  then,  as  now,  a  part  of  the  Corfiote  diocese, 
there  was  a  irporroiraira^  under  his  jurisdiction,  while  he  was 
dependent  upon  no  other  ecclesiastical  authority  than  the 
oecumenical   patriarch,  with   whom,  however,  he   was    only 
allowed  to  correspond  through  the  medium  of  the  Venetian 
bailie  at   Constantinople.     He  had  his   retinue  of  officials 

1  Les  Registres  de  Boniface  VIIL%  ii.,  540 ;  Revue  de  V Orient  latin,  L, 
232 ;  iv.,  508,  563 ;  Feycrabend,  Reyssbuch%  ff.  125,  233 ;  Faber,  Evaga- 
torium,  i.,  164 ;  Buochenbach,  Orientalische  Reyss,  34 ;  Chi6tes,  *l<rro/>tff& 
*Avoftrrifi.ovt6paTa,  ii.,  535  ;  Pure  has  His  Pilgrimes,  vii.,  546. 


536  CORFU 

with  high-sounding  Byzantine  titles;  he  enjoyed  consider- 
able honours;  and  from  his  decision  in  ecclesiastical  cases 
there  was  no  appeal.  Two  liberal  popes,  Leo  X.  and  Paul 
III.,  expressly  forbade  any  interference  with  the  religious 
services  of  the  Greeks  on  the  part  of  the  Latin  archbishop, 
and  the  doges  more  than  once  upheld  the  ancient  charter  of 
the  city  priests  and  the  privileges  of  "  the  decarchy  "  of  the 
thirty-three  rural  popes.  At  the  same  time,  measures  were 
taken  to  prevent  the  increase  in  the  number  of  Greek  priests, 
monks,  and  churches,  which  gave  the  Venetians  cause  for 
alarm,  because  they  were  well  aware  that  to  the  Greeks 
politics  and  religion  are  inseparable.  This  was  especially 
the  case,  when  numbers  of  fugitive  priests  sought  refuge  in 
the  island  after  the  capture  of  Constantinople  and  the 
Morea.  But,  in  spite  of  all  regulations,  the  Orthodox 
church  kept  alive  the  national  feeling  in  the  island.  Mixed 
marriages  were  allowed ;  and,  as  the  children  usually  became 
Orthodox,  it  is  not  surprising  to  learn  that  twenty  years 
before  the  close  of  the  Venetian  occupation  there  were  only 
two  noble  Latin  families  which  still  adhered  to  the  Catholic 
faith. 

It  was  a  natural  result  of  the  Venetian  policy  that  there 
was  less    bitterness    in   Corfu   than   in   most  other    places 
between  the  adherents  of  the  two  religions.     The  Catholics 
took  part  in  the  religious  processions  of  the  Orthodox  ;  the 
college  of  thirty-two  priests  on  the   eve   of  Christmas   and 
Epiphany  delivered  an  eulogy  of  Venetian  rule  at  the  bailie's 
palace,  whereupon   two  condemned  prisoners  were  released 
to  them,  after  the  fashion  of  Barabbas.     When  the  body  of 
St  Spiridion    was    carried   round   the  town,  the   Venetian 
authorities  and  many  of  the  garrison  paid  their  respects  to 
the  sacred  relics ;  twenty-one  guns  were  fired  from  the  Old 
Fortress,  and  the  ships  in  the  harbour  saluted.     The  Orthodox 
clergy  reciprocated  these  attentions  by  meeting  the  Catholics 
in  the  church  of  St  Arsenios,  the  tenth  century  bishop  who 
had  been  the  first  metropolitan  of  Corfu,  where  the  discordant 
chanting  of  Greeks  and  Latins  represented  their  theological 
concord,  and  by  praying  for  the  pope  and  the  Latin  arch- 
bishop at  the  annual  banquet  in  the  tatter's  palace.     They 
were  ready,  also,  to  excommunicate  refractory  villages  at  the 


THE  JEWS  537 

bidding  of  the  Government,  and  this  practice,  which  filled  the 
superstitious  peasants  with  terror,  was  one  of  the  greatest 
social  abuses  of  Corfu.  It  is  not  quite  extinct  in  Greece  even 
now.1 

The  position  of  the  Corfiote  Jews,  though  far  less  favour- 
able than  that  of  the  Orthodox,  was  much  better  than  that  of  the 
Hebrew  colonies  in  other  parts  of  the  Venetian  dominions. 
In  the  very  first  days  of  the  Venetian  occupation  an  order 
was  issued  to  the  officials  of  the  republic,  bidding  them  to 
behave  well  to  the  Jewish  community  and  to  put  no  heavier 
burdens  upon  them  than  upon  the  rest  of  the  islanders.  Many 
of  the  Venetian  governors  found  it  convenient  to  borrow  not 
only  money,  but  furniture,  plate,  and  liveries  from  them. 
That  they  increased  in  numbers — owing  to  the  Jewish  immigra- 
tion from  Spain  and  Portugal  in  1492  and  from  Naples, 
Apulia,  and  Calabria  half  a  century  later — may  be  inferred 
from  Marmora's  statement  that  in  1665  there  were  about  500 
Jewish  houses  in  Corfu  ;  and  the  historian,  who  shared  to  the 
full  the  dislike  of  the  Hebrew  which  has  always  characterised 
the  Greeks  and  has  been  always  cordially  reciprocated, 
natvely  remarks  that  the  Corfiote  Jews  would  be  rich  if  they 
were  let  alone.2  They  paid  none  of  the  usual  taxes  levied  on 
Jewish  banks  at  Venice;  and  when,  by  the  decree  of  1572, 
they  were  banished  from  Venetian  territory,  a  special  exemp- 
tion was  granted  to  the  Jews  of  Corfu.  They  were  allowed  to 
practice  there  as  advocates,  with  permission  to  defend  Chris- 
tians no  less  than  members  of  their  own  race.  They  had 
their  own  council,  and  elected  their  own  officials,  representing 
the  Greek  and  the  "Apulian"  or  "Spanish"  synagogues — 
for  from  1540  there  were  two — who  managed  the  internal 
affairs  of  the  ghetto.8  Outside  its  limits  they  were  allowed 
to  own  real  property  worth  no  more  than  4000  ducats 
between  them — indeed,  public  opinion  would  have  left  them 
no  land  but  their  graves — and  they  were  expressly  forbidden 
to  have  serfs,  or  to  take  land  or  villas  on  lease,  with  the 
exception  of  one  house  for  the  personal  use  of  the  lessee. 
But  the  effect  of  this  enactment  was  nullified  by  means  of 

1  S£thas,  i.,  46-51  ;  ii.,  143,  150,  193  ;  iii.,  33,  431  ;  Lunzi,  chs.  xi.  and 
xii.;  Lamansky,  050  ;  Misti,  xii.,  f.  54  ;  Marmora,  319-22. 

-  P.  430.  3  Roman6s,  'Rppairij  Kowfop,  8. 


I 


538  CORFU 

mortgages  ;  and  if  a  Jew  wanted  to  invest  money  in  houses 
he  had    no    difficulty    in    finding  a   Christian    who   would 
purchase  or  rent  them  with  borrowed  Jewish  capital.     Nor 
was  it  easy  to  confine  the  growing  Jewish  colony  within  its 
separate  quarter.     When  the  old  ghetto,  "  the  mount  of  the 
Jews,"1  was  pulled  down  in    1524  to  make  room    for  the 
fortifications,  orders  were  given  to  choose  a  new  site;  but 
sixty  years  later  we  find  a  Venetian  report  complaining  that 
they  were  living  among  the   Christians  and   even    in   the 
castle.     Later  plans  of  the  city  show  us,  however,  the  ghetto 
marked  in  the  same  place  and  called  by  the  same  name  as 
the  still  surviving  Hebratkdr    At  the  same  time,  the  Jews 
had  to  submit  to  some  degrading   restrictions   of  costume. 
They  were  compelled  to  wear  a  yellow  mark  on  the  breast,  as 
a  badge  of  servitude,  and   a   Venetian   ordinance    naively 
remarks  that  this  was  "  a  substitute  for  the  custom  of  stoning, 
which  does  so  much  injury  to  the  houses."     True,  a  money 
payment  to  the  treasury  secured  a   dispensation    from    the 
necessity  of  wearing  these  stigmas ;   but  it  is  obvious  from 
the  complaints  of  their  envoys   that   the  Jews   were   badly 
treated   by  the  natives,  who   refused   them    access   to   the 
principal  well  and  harried  them  while  they  were  doing  their 
marketing.     Absurd    tales,  too,  were  current   about   them. 
The  old  fable  that  Judas  Iscariot  was  a  native  of  the  island, 
was  still  told  to  travellers,  who  were  shown  a  lineal  descendant 
of  the  arch-traitor.     They  were  expected  to  offer  a  copy  of 
the  law  of  Moses  to  a  new  Latin  archbishop,  who  sometimes 
delighted  the  other   Corfiotes  by   lecturing  them    on    their 
shortcomings.      Finally,  they  were  forbidden  to  indulge   in 
public   processions — an   injunction   perhaps  quite    as    much 
in  their  own  interest  as  in  that  of  the  public  peace.8 

The  feudal  system  continued  to  form  the  basis  of  Corfiote 
society,  and  became  the  bulwark  of  Venetian  rule.  The  new 
masters  of  the  island  confirmed  the  Angevin  barons  in  their 
fiefs,  but  created  few  more,  so  that  towards  the  end  of  the 
Venetian    period    the    original    twenty-four    baronies    had 

1  SAthas,  iii.,  46  ;  Roman6s,  op.  at.,  9  ;  Marmora,  286. 

2  Marmora,  364-5. 

3  lbid.y  255-6,  286,  370,  430,  437;  Sdthas,  ii.,  150-3,  206;  v.,  261; 
Buochenbach,  Oricntalische  Reyss,  27  ;  Lunzi,  455-61. 


THE  GYPSIES  539 

dwindled  to  from  twelve  to  fifteen,  among  them  two  still 
bearing  the  names  of  the  extinct  clans  of  Altavilla  and  Sant' 
Ippolito,  one  or  two  held  by  old  Greek  families,  and  the  rest 
by  Venetian  aristocrats  long  settled  in  the  island.  For  as 
the  "  Customs  of  Romania  "  continued  to  prevail,  it  followed 
that  the  Salic  law  did  not  obtain  in  Corfu  ;  accordingly,  there, 
as  elsewhere,  many  baronies  passed  into  the  hands  of  women, 
who  usually  found  husbands  in  the  Venetian  aristocracy. 
In  theory  each  baron  had  to  keep  at  least  one  good  horse 
and  a  certain  number  of  retainers  for  the  defence  of  the 
island,  and  to  present  himself  with  them  for  review  in  the 
castle  on  the  1st  of  May.  We  have  an  account  of  the  brave 
show  made  by  the  barons,  then  fourteen  in  number,  in  1515; 
but  in  practice  this  chivalrous  custom  was  usually  allowed 
to  lapse.  A  less  picturesque  but  far  more  efficacious  body  was 
the  armed  band  of  the  peasants,  the  so-called  cernide,  which 
guarded  the  coast  and  at  times  furnished  the  republic  with 
some  of  her  best  seamen.  In  this  body  all  between  the  ages 
of  twenty  and  sixty-five  were  bound  to  serve.  A  clause  in 
the  charter  of  Parga  specially  stipulated  that  the  natives  of 
that  rock-fortress  should  only  be  liable  for  service  in  defence 
of  their  own  home.1 

By  far  the  most  interesting  of  the  fiefs  was  that  of  the 
'kQlyyavoi  or  gypsies,  who  were  about  a  hundred  in  number 
and  were  subject  to  the  exclusive  jurisdiction  of  the  baron 
upon  whom  their  fief  had  been  bestowed — "an  office,"  as 
Marmora  says,  "  of  not  a  little  gain  and  of  very  great  honour." 
Their  feudal  lord  could  inflict  on  them  any  punishment  short 
of  death — a  privilege  denied  to  all  his  peers ;  they  were  his 
men  and  not  those  of  the  Government,  which  could  not  compel 
them  to  serve  in  the  galleys  or  render  the  usual  feudal  services 
of  the  other  peasants.  They  had  their  own  military  com- 
mander, similar  to  the  drungarius  of  the  gypsies  at  Nauplia, 
and  every  May-day  they  marched,  under  his  leadership,  to 
the  sounds  of  drums  and  fifes,  bearing  aloft  their  baron's 
banner,  and  carrying  a  May-pole  decked  with  flowers,  to  the 
square  in  front  of  the  house  where  the  great  man  lived. 
There  they  set  up  their  pole  and  sang  a  curious  song  in  honour 
of  their  lord,  who  provided  them  with  refreshment  and  on  the 

1  S&has,  i.,  267-9  >  Lunzi,  452-4,  467  et  sqq. ;  Marmora,  259,  283-4, 


540  CORFU 

morrow  received  from  them  their  dues.  Originally  granted 
to  the  family  of  Abitabuli,  whose  name  perhaps  came  from 
the  habitaada,  or  encampments  of  these  vagrants,  and  then 
held  by  the  house  of  Goth,  the  fief  of  the  gypsies  was  con- 
ferred in  1 540,  after  the  great  siege  of  Corfu,  upon  Ant6nios 
Eparchos,  a  versatile  genius,  at  once  poet,  Hellenist,  and 
soldier,  as  compensation  for  his  losses  and  as  the  reward  of 
his  talents.  By  a  curious  anomaly  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
gypsy  baron  extended  over  the  peasants  of  the  continental 
dependencies  of  Corfii.  It  is  therefore  possible  that  the  serfs 
called  vaginitis  whom  we  found  under  the  Angevins,  and  who 
emigrated  from  the  mainland,  and  paid  a  registration  fee  on 
their  arrival,  were  gypsies.1 

The  Corfiote  serfs  were  of  three  classes,  those  of  the  re- 
public— for  Venice  had  domain  lands  in  the  island,  which  were 
usually  let  to  the  highest  bidder  on  a  twenty-nine  years*  lease 
— those  of  the  Latin  Church,  and  those  of  the  barons.  The 
Corfiote  peasants,  though  they  sometimes  amassed  sufficient 
money  to  enfranchise  themselves,  and  though  Venice  often  lent 
a  ready  ear  to  their  grievances,  were  worse  off  under  the  feudal 
system  than  their  fellows  on  the  mainland  under  Turkish 
rule.  They  had  no  political  rights  whatever;  they  were 
summed  up  in  the  capitulations  at  the  time  of  the  Venetian 
occupation,  together  with  "the  other  movable  and  immovable 
goods  "  of  their  lords ;  and  it  is  no  wonder  that  they  some- 
times ran  away  to  escape  the  tyranny  of  a  hard  master.  The 
peasants  on  the  domain  lands  had  a  lighter  lot  than  the  other 
two  classes ;  though  all  except  the  priests  were  liable  to 
forced  labour,  they  could  obtain  exemption  on  payment  of  a 
very  small  sum.  Their  chief  grievances  were  that  they  were 
compelled  to  labour  on  Government  works  in  the  town  at 
times  when  they  wanted  to  be  sowing  their  corn  or  gathering 
their  grapes ;  that  they  had  to  cut  firewood  for  the  bailie,  and 
to  provide  oil  even  in  years  when  the  olives  did  not  bear. 
Occasionally  we  hear  of  a  peasants'  insurrection  against 
their  oppressors,  and  Marmora  remarks  in  his  time  that  "  the 
peasants  are  never  contented  ;  they  rise  against  their  lords  on 
the  smallest  provocation."    Yet,  until  the  last  century  of  her 

1  Lunzi,  464-6 ;  Srfthas,  iii.,  31,  38-40 ;  the  words  of  the  gypsy  song 
are  quoted  in  the  *08^y6s  r^t  Ke/>«V>at  (ed.  1902), 


EDUCATION  541 

rule,  Venice  had  little  trouble  with  the  inhabitants.  She  kept 
the  nobles  in  good  humour  by  granting  them  political  privi- 
leges, titles,  and  the  entrance  to  her  navy ;  and,  so  long  as  the 
Turk  was  a  danger,  she  was  compelled,  from  motives  of  pru- 
dence, to  pay  a  due  regard  to  their  wishes.  Moreover,  by  an 
almost  complete  neglect  of  education,  the  republic  was  able 
to  prevent  the  growth  of  an  intellectual  proletariat,  such  as  in 
the  British  times  furnished  an  ample  supply  of  political 
agitators.1 

During  the  four  centuries  of  her  rule,  Venice  did  practi- 
cally nothing  for  the  mental  development  of  the  Corfiotes. 
No  public  schools  were  founded;  for,  as  Count  Viaro 
Capodistrias  informed  the  British  Parliament  much  later,  the 
Venetian  Senate  never  allowed  such  institutions  to  be  estab- 
lished in  the  Ionian  islands.2  When  the  Catholic  archbishop 
wanted  an  excuse  for  remaining  in  Venice,  he  pleaded  that  he 
could  not  study  theology  at  Corfu.  The  administration  was 
content  to  pay  a  few  teachers  of  Greek  and  Italian ;  and  to 
grant  the  Ionian  youths  the  special  privilege  of  taking  a  degree 
at  the  University  of  Padua  without  examination.  Moreover, 
the  Corfiote  student  after  his  return  soon  forgot  what  he  had 
learned,  retaining  only  the  varnish  of  culture.  There  were 
exceptions,  however,  to  this  low  standard.  When  Cyriacus  of 
Ancona  visited  Greece,  he  was  able  to  purchase  Greek  manu- 
scripts at  Corfu.  Others  were  copied  by  the  exiles  who  fled 
there  after  the  conquest  of  the  Morea.  In  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury there  was  quite  a  number  of  Corfiote  writers — poets  like 
Eparchos  and  Trib61es,  the  traveller  Noiikios,  the  theologian 
Kartdnos  ;  but  they  mostly  wrote  abroad.  It  was  a  Corfiote 
who  founded  at  Venice,  in  1621,  the  Greek  school,  called 
Flangineion,  after  the  name  of  its  founder,  Flangfnes,  which 
did  so  much  for  the  improvement  of  Greek  education,  and 
which  still  exists  by  the  side  of  S.  Giorgio  dei  Greci.  But 
even  in  the  latest  Venetian  period  there  were  few  facilities  for 
obtaining  knowledge  in  Corfu.  No  wonder  that  the  Corfiotes 
were  easier  to  manage  in  those  days  than  in  the  more 
enlightened  British  times,  when  newspapers  abounded  and 

1  Sathas,  ii.,  169  ;  iii.,  77,  85,  89,  290,  422. 

2  Remarks  respectfully  committed  to  the  Consideration  of  the  British 
Parliament,  64. 


I 


542  CORFU 

some  of  the  best  pens  in  Southern  Europe  were  ready  to 
lampoon  the  British  Protectorate.1 

The  long  Venetian  domination  exercised  a  natural  in- 
fluence on  the  language,  especially  in  the  town.  At  the  time 
of  the  annexation,  the  islanders  had  stipulated,  as  we  saw, 
that  a  Greek  notary  should  be  appointed,  as  under  the 
Angevins,  for  serving  writs  in  Greek  on  the  Greeks,  and  a 
Greek  interpreter  formed  part  of  the  Venetian  administration. 
From  1524  dates  the  appointment  of  the  first  Greek  teacher. 
That  Greek  continued  to  be  used  in  private  documents,  while 
Venetian  or  Latin  was  the  official  language,  is  clear  from  the 
will  of  one  of  the  barons,  which  has  been  preserved,  and 
which  is  drawn  up  in  Greek,  though  the  testator  was  of 
Frankish  origin.  But  at  the  time  of  the  battle  of  Lepanto, 
when  Venice  was  particularly  anxious  to  conciliate  her 
Greek  subjects,  the  bailie  issued  a  Greek  translation  of  his 
proclamations  for  the  special  benefit  of  the  country  folk.2  It 
was  among  them,  of  course,  that  the  language  of  Hellas  held 
its  firmest  roots,  and  even  to-day  it  is  almost  the  only  tongue 
understood  in  the  country-districts  of  Corfu,  while  Italian  is 
readily  spoken  in  the  town.  In  the  Venetian  times,  the 
dialect  of  the  rulers  was  the  conversational  medium  of  good 
society,  and  the  young  Corfiote,  fresh  from  his  easily  won 
laurels  at  Padua,  looked  down  with  contempt  upon  the 
noblest  and  most  enduring  of  all  languages,  which  had 
become  solely  the  speech  of  the  despised  peasants.  Still, 
nature  will  out,  and  Greek  idioms  occasionally  penetrated 
the  Venetian  dialect  of  Corfu.  But  it  was  only  towards  the 
close  of  the  Venetian  domination  that  Greek  became  fashion- 
able. Two  Corfiotes,  Eug£nios  Boiilgaris  and  Nikephoros 
Theotokes  were  the  pioneers  of  modern  Greek,  and  in  one 
of  Goldoni's  comedies  we  are  told  that  the  street-boys  of 
Corfu  sang  ditties  in  that  language.3 

The  Venetian  flag  naturally  attracted  a  far  larger  amount 
of  shipping  to  the  island,  which  served  as  a  half-way  house 

1  Sdthas,  ii.,  245  ;  v.,  269  ;  Marmora,  433  ;  Kyriaci  Ancomtani  Itine- 
rarium,  29  ;  Veloudes,  'H  iv  Bever/p  'EXXipruc^  drroixla  (ed.  2),  1 16. 

3  RomaiuSs,  Vpanavbi  Zwpfri,  57,  59,  314-20.     Gcrakires,  op.  ciL,  «i*'. 

3  Romanos,^.  «/.,  29-30  ;  Goldoni,  Lafamiglia  del?  Antiquario^  Act 
II.,  Scene  10. 


FISCAL  SYSTEM  543 

for  galleys  between  Venice  and  Crete,  and  a  traveller,  who 
visited  it  in  1480,  says  that  the  harbour  "was  never  empty." 
But  these  visits  of  the  fleet  led  to  many  fatal  brawls,  while 
Ionian    commerce    was  hampered   by   the  selfish    colonial 
policy  then  prevalent  in  Europe,  which  aimed  at  concentrat- 
ing   all    colonial    trade    in  the   metropolis,  through  which 
Corfiote  exports  had  to  pass.     This  naturally  led  to  a  vast 
amount  of  smuggling,  even  now  rampant  in  Greece.    Among 
the  exports  we  read  of  valonea,  cotton,  all  sorts  of  fruit,  and 
salt,  which  was    sent  to    the  other    Venetian  colonies   in 
Dalmatia  and  Albania ;  a  considerable  amount  of  wine  was 
produced;    and   the  oil-trade,   now  the  staple  industry  of 
Corfu,  was  so  greatly  fostered  by  a  grant  of  twelve  gold  pieces 
for  every  plantation  of  100  olive  trees,  that  in  the  last  half 
century  of  the  Venetian  rule  there  were  nearly  2,000,000  of 
these  trees  in  the  island     Even  the  now  bare  islet  of  Vido, 
which  the  French  made  a  solitude  and  called  it  lie  de  la 
Paix,  was,  in  Marmora's  time,  so  thickly  planted  with  olives, 
that  it  "  looked  like  a  forest  swimming  in  the  waves."     Yet 
Corfu  then,  as  now,  presented  the  paradox  of  great  fertility 
combined  with  great  poverty.     When  the  corn  raised  on  the 
mainland  was  exported  abroad,  instead  of  being  kept  for  the 
consumption  of  the  colony,  the  Corfiotes  were  in  despair,  for 
their   island   did  not  produce   nearly  enough  grain  for  the 
whole  year ;  hence  its  export  was  more  than  once  forbidden 
by  the  paternal  administration,  and  public  granaries  in  which 
officials  were  ordered  to  deposit  a   part  of  their  pay,  were 
established  to  mitigate  the  severe  famines.     The  taxes  con- 
sisted of  a  tithe  of  the  oil,  the  crops,  and  the  agricultural 
produce ;  a  money  payment  on  the  wine  sold  ;  a  "  chimney- 
tax  "  on  each  house  ;  and  export  duties  of  1 5  per  cent  on 
oil,  9  per  cent  on   salt,  and  4  per  cent  on  other  articles. 
There  were  also  import  duties  of  6  per  cent  on  Venetian, 
and   of   8   per  cent,   on   foreign,  goods.     The  salt-pans  of 
Levkimme  formed  a  Government  monopoly,  and  the  importa- 
tion of   foreign    salt  was  punished    by  banishment.     The 
fisheries  of  Butrinto  were  let,  as  we  saw,  to  a  Corfiote,  and 
yielded  1300  ducats  a  year.1     Corfiote  merchants  received 

1  Sathas,  i.,  1 12-14;  ".,  126,  131,  140,  307;  iii.,  33,  90,  200,  302,  356, 
359>  47o ;  v.,  224,  227,  228 ;   Marmora,  10,  257,  258 ;  Lunzi,  ch.  xv. ; 


fc 


544  CORFU 

the  same  treatment  in  Venice  as  those  of  Candia  and  the 
other  Greek  colonies,  and  the  bezzoni  and  tornesi  of  the 
Venetian  mint  did  duty  in  Corfu.1 

It  is  to  Venice  that  Corfu,  almost  more  than  any  other 
place  in  Greece,  owes  its  present  appearance.  The  streets, 
the  fortifications,  the  houses  are  all  Venetian  rather  than 
Greek ;  indeed,  in  some  respects,  the  traveller  just  landed 
there  can  scarcely  fancy  that  he  has  set  foot  on  Greek  soil, 
for  neither  forty-three  years  of  union  with  Greece,  nor  fifty 
years  of  British  protection,  nor  yet  the  brief  interregnum  of 
French  and  Russian  rule,  have  succeeded  in  removing  the 
mark  of  Venice.  The  lion  of  St  Mark  still  watches  over  the 
walls  ;  from  his  mouth  the  water  still  flows  at  the  fountain  of 
Karddki,  where  Venetian  ships  used  to  fill  their  tanks ;  the 
castles  still  retain  their  Venetian  names,  a  Corfiote  village  on 
the  slopes  of  Pantokrdtor  is  still  called  Enetfa.  The  whole 
fabric  of  modern  Corfiote  society,  the  conditions  of  land 
tenure,  and  the  habits  of  the  people  are  still  largely  based 
upon  the  Venetian  polity.  The  titles,  which  the  Xonians 
almost  alone  of  Greeks  still  use,  are  relics  of  the  days  when 
the  shrewd  statesmen  of  the  mercantile  republic,  like  our 
modern  Prime  Ministers,  closed  the  mouths  of  obstreperous 
subjects  or  rewarded  loyal  services  by  the  bestowal  of  honorary 
distinctions.  Many  of  the  most  ardently  Greek  opponents  of 
the  British  Protectorate  bore  aggressively  Italian  names,  and 
among  the  modern  Corfiote  Members  of  Parliament  there  are 
some  whose  Italian  origin  is  scarcely  concealed  by  the  classical 
terminations  of  the  Greek  declensions. 

If  we  would  figure  to  ourselves  what  Corfu  was  like 
during  the  first  1 50  years  of  the  Venetian  domination,  that 
is  to  say,  up  to  the  period  of  the  first  great  Turkish  siege,  we 
must  remember  that  the  town,  despite  the  resolutions  of  the 
Venetian  Government,  remained  unwalled,  and  that  its  sole 
defences  were,  as  in  Angevin  times,  the  two  fortified  peaks 
of  what  is  now  known  as  the  Fortezza  Vecchia,  then  distin- 
guished as  the  "  old  "  and  "  new  castles  "  (the  latter  built  by 
Charles    I.  of   Anjou),  whose  commanders  changed    every 

Jervis,  History  of  the  Island  of  Corfd,  125  ;  Botta,  Storia  Naturale  deli 
/sola  di  Corfd,  61  ;  Faber,  Evagatorium,  iii.,  351. 
1  Archivio  Veneto^  xvii.,  88  ;  xviii.,  1 14. 


APPEARANCE  OF  THE  TOWN  545 

sixteen  months.  Familiar  landmarks  were  the  two  towers, 
in  which  the  councillors  resided,  the  "  tower  of  the  iron  gate," 
the  church  of  St  Nicholas,  and  that  of  the  Holy  Apostles.1 
In  1394,  a  Corfiote  baron  of  Neapolitan  origin,  Pietro  Capece, 
built  the  Catholic  convent  and  church  of  the  Annunziata,  the 
oldest  of  all  the  extant  Latin  churches  in  the  town,  which  he 
subsequently  placed  under  the  care  of  the  bailie,  and  which 
contains  many  tombs  and  inscriptions,  mostly  relating  to 
Corfiotes  who  fell  in  the  Turkish  wars.  Another  church, 
that  of  St  Michael,  attributed  by  some  to  the  Despots  of 
Epiros  whose  name  it  bore,  is  said  by  Marmora  to  haye  been 
perhaps  founded  on  the  day  when  the  islanders  resolved  to 
accept  the  sway  of  Venice.  But  the  most  famous  shrine  in 
the  island  was  that  of  Our  Lady  of  Cassopo,  to  which  home- 
ward-bound mariners  were  wont  to  pay  their  respects,  and 
which  rose  on  the  site  of  the  altar  of  Zeus,  before  which  Nero 
had  inaugurated  his  artistic  tour  of  the  Greek  provinces. 
Around  it  there  had  grown  up  a  much-frequented  market, 
which  was  free  from  all  dues.2  Owing  to  the  number  of 
poor  and  infirm  pilgrims  who  passed  through  the  island  to 
and  from  the  Holy  Land,  a  hospice  was  provided  for  their 
accommodation  ;  but  towards  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century 
their  usual  abode  was  the  cloister  of  the  Bare-footed  Friars. 
Upon  travellers  from  the  north,  the  town  did  not  at  that 
time  make  a  favourable  impression.  The  streets  were 
"  narrow,  dark,  and  smelly,"  the  place  swarmed  with  "  abject 
persons,"  and  the  pious  pilgrim  was  offended  by  the  contrast 
between  the  meanness  of  the  archiepiscopal  residence  and 
the  numbers  of  the  Jews.3  Yet  at  the  time  of  the  siege  we 
hear  of  the  "  beautiful  and  splendid  houses "  of  the  suburbs 
and  of  the  splendid  Avrdme  Palace  by  the  sea-shore — a 
mansion  adorned  with  fine  marble  statues,  and  standing  in  a 
lovely  garden.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  visitors  were 
shown  the  rock  which  Pliny  the  elder  had  long  ago  identified 

1  Sdthas,  ii.,  10,  81,  85,  87,  116,  117  ;  iii.,  46. 

-  Marmora,  232,  251  ;  S&has,  ii.,  141  ;  iii.,  30,  85,  263,  460 ;  Buondel- 
monti,  54,  55,  and  his  plan  of  the  island  ;  Burncy  MS  213,  f.  23. 

3  Feyerabcnd,  Reyssbuch,  ff.  36,  351  ;  Casola,  Viaggio^  34-5  ;  Sdthas, 
iii.,  57  ;  Jovius,  Historia  sui  temporis^  ii.,  f.  186 ;  Guazzo,  Historic^ 
f.  203. 

2  M 


I 


546  CORFU 

with  "  the  ship  of  Ulysses." x  Another  spot  associated  with 
classical  Corfti,  the  ancient  Hyllaean  harbour,  now  received 
its  modern  name  of  Chaliki6poulo  from  the  family  of  that 
name  to  which  it  belonged.2 

The  Turkish  peril  had  not  become  acute  at  the  time  of 
the  Venetian  occupation.  The  neighbours  of  the  new 
Venetian  colony  were  either  Italian  princelets,  like  the 
Tocchi,  who  ruled  over  the  other  Ionian  islands,  and  like 
Esau  Buondelmonti,  the  Despot  of  Joannina,  or  else  Albanian 
chieftains  who  had  established  themselves  at  various  points 
in  Epiros  after  the  break-up  of  the  Greek  Despotat.  It  was 
the  policy  of  the  republic  to  play  off  the  Italians  against  the 
Arnauts  and  the  Arnauts  against  the  Italians.  Thus,  when 
Esau  was  captured  by  the  Albanians,  the  bailie  of  Corfii 
intervened  to  obtain  his  release  and  entertained  him  in 
the  castle;  while,  on  his  death,  the  Corfiotes  assisted  the 
Albanians  to  occupy  Joannina,  rather  than  that  it  should 
fall  into  the  hands  of  his  ambitious  nephew,  Carlo  Tocco, 
who  was  a  vassal  of  the  King  of  Naples  to  boot  The  tatter's 
aggressive  and  successful  policy  in  iEtolia  and  Akarnania  led 
to  occasional  friction  with  Venice,  but  never  endangered  the 
safety  of  Corfii. 

It  was  otherwise,  however,  with  the  Genoese.  These 
commercial  rivals  of  Venice  did  not  abandon  all  hope  of 
obtaining  so  desirable  a  possession  until  some  time  after 
the  establishment  of  the  Venetian  protectorate.  Twice, 
in  1403  and  again  in  1432,  they  attacked  Corfii,  but  on 
both  occasions  without  success.  The  first  time,  under  the 
leadership  of  Marshal  Boucicaut,  they  tried  to  capture  the 
impregnable  castle  of  Sant'  Angelo,  which  was  courageously 
defended  by  a  Corfiote  noble,  and  were  routed  by  the  island 
militia  with  great  slaughter  near  the  village  of  Doukades. 
The  second  attempt  was  more  serious.  The  invaders 
effected  a  landing,  and  had  already  ravaged  the  fertile 
island  and  burned  the  borgo  and  suburbs  of  the  capital, 
when  on  the  seventh  day  a  sudden  sally  of  the  townsfolk 
and  the  garrison  checked  their  further  advance.  Many  of 
the  Genoese  were  taken  prisoners,  while  those  who  succeeded 

1  Faber,  op.  ett.,  iii.,  347. 

3  Romanos,  Vpana»6%  Zcfytfip,  316  ;  S&has,  v.,  318. 


ARRIVAL  OF  GREEK  EXILES  547 

in  escaping  to  their  vessels  were  pursued  and  severely 
handled  by  the  Venetian  fleet.  The  further  attempts  of 
Genoese  privateers  to  waylay  merchantmen  on  their  passage 
between  Corfu  and  Venice  were  frustrated,  and  soon  the 
islanders  had  nothing  more  to  fear  from  these  Christian 
enemies  of  their  protectors.  The  raid  had  proved  what 
Venetian  statesmen  had  once  doubted — the  fidelity  of  the 
Greeks ;  but  the  loss  of  life  and  property  which  it  had 
caused,  and  which  was  intensified  by  visitations  of  the 
plague,  led  the  Government  to  grant  five  years'  exemption 
from  all  services  and  dues  to  all  who  would  settle  in  the 
island1 

Meanwhile,  however,  the  Turks  had  been  rapidly  gaining 
ground  on  the  mainland  opposite.  The  first  serious  alarm 
arose  when  they  captured  the  harbour  of  Valona,  one  of 
the  keys  of  the  Adriatic,  from  Regina  Balsha,  the  lady  of 
the  place.2  In  1430  Joannina  fell,  and  in  the  following  year 
the  Turks  made  their  first  attack  upon  Corfu ;  but  the 
repulse  with  which  they  met  discouraged  them  from  renew- 
ing the  attempt  for  more  than  a  century.  Henceforth, 
however,  especially  after  the  disappearance  of  the  Tocchi 
from  the  continent,  the  continental  dependencies  of  Corfii 
were  constantly  exposed  to  the  danger  of  Turkish  or 
Albanian  attack.  The  people  of  Parga,  in  particular, 
suffered  terribly  for  their  devotion  to  Venice;  their  homes 
were  captured,  their  wives  and  children  carried  off,  and  it 
required  a  vigorous  effort  by  the  Corfiotes  to  recover  the 
rocky  fortress,  which  was  now  their  outpost  against  the 
Turk.3 

After  the  fall  of  Constantinople  and  the  subsequent 
collapse  of  the  Christian  states  of  Greece,  Corfu  became 
the  refuge  of  many  distinguished  exiles.  From  the  imperial 
city  came  the  famous  family  of  the  Theot6kai,  which  has 
given  so  many  leading  men  to  the  island  of  its  adoption.4 
From  the  Morea  fled  the   last  Despot  Thomas  Palaiol6gos 

1  Marmora,  253-7  ;  Chalkokondyles,  265  ;  Sanudoa/WMuratori,  xxii., 
1030 ;  Sathas,  III.,  433,  445,  466,  472  ;  Kyriaci  Anconitam  Itinerariumy 
29,  30.  2  Sdthas,  III.,  159,  181. 

3  Kalligas,  MeX^reu,  653  ;  P.  A.  S.,  *H  Udpya,  80-1  ;  Marmora,  260-1  ; 
Sdthas,  v.,  328.  4  Roman6s,  Vpartavk  Zwpfyt,  99. 


I 


548  CORFU 

with  his  wife  and  family,  the  historian  Phrantz£s,  and  the 
ancestor  of  the  Corfiote  historian  Marmora.  Phrantzds 
wrote  the  story  of  his  troubled  times  at  the  instance  of 
some  noble  Corfiotes  in  the  repose  of  the  Phaeacian  island, 
and  his  remains,  with  those  of  his  master's  consort,  the 
Despoina  Caterina,  sleep  in  the  church  of  SS.  Jason  and 
Sosipater.  So  great  was  the  influx  of  Greek  priests  that 
Venice  became  seriously  alarmed  lest  they  should  undermine 
the  loyalty  of  her  Corfiote  subjects,  and  issued  an  order 
that  the  ancient  "college  of  32"  should  hold  no  more 
meetings,  and  that  all  popes  settled  in  the  island  during 
the  last  ten  years  should  leave  it.  But  the  need  of  humour- 
ing the  Greeks  in  view  of  her  own  struggle  with  the  Turks 
induced  her  to  pursue  her  usual  tolerant  policy.1 

The  religious  enthusiasm  of  the  Greeks  increased  all  the 
more,  because  at  that  time  Corfu  became  the  shrine  of  her 
famous  saint,  Spiridion,  a  Cypriote  bishop  who  took  a 
prominent  part  at  the  council  of  Nice,  and  whose  remains 
had  been  transferred  to  Constantinople.  A  priest,  named 
Kalochair6tes,  brought  the  holy  man's  body  and  that  of  St 
Theodora,  the  consort  of  the  Iconoclast  Emperor  The6philos, 
to  Corfu  in  1456,  and  upon  his  death  his  two  eldest  sons 
became  proprietors  of  the  male  saint's  remains,  and  his 
youngest  son  received  those  of  the  female,  which  he 
bestowed  on  the  community.  The  body  of  St  Spiridion 
ultimately  passed  to  the  distinguished  family  of  Boiilgaris, 
to  which  it  still  belongs,  and  is  preserved  in  the  church  of 
the  saint,  just  as  that  of  St  Theodora  reposes  in  the 
cathedral.  Four  times  a  year  the  body  of  St  Spiridion  is 
carried  in  procession,  in  commemoration  of  his  alleged 
services  in  having  twice  delivered  the  island  from  plague, 
once  from  famine,  and  once  from  the  Turks.  His  name  is 
the  most  wide-spread  in  Corfu,  and  the  number  of  boys 
called  "Spiro"  is  legion.2 

During  the  operations  against  the  Turks  at  this  period 
the  Corfiotes  distinguished   themselves  by  their  active  co- 

1  Lamansky,  047,  049,  050 ;  Marmora,  267. 

2  Brokines,  IIe/>i  rdv  i-njaiw  TeXovfUrwr  iv  KeptcOpq,  Xiravtiwv  too  0.  \ei\jd*m> 
roQ'Aylov  Zrvpttwot  (English  tr.  by  Mrs  Dawes);  Marmora,  261-7,287; 
Sdthas,  v.,  260. 


CORFIOTE  LOYALTY  549 

operation  with  their  protectors.  We  find  them  fighting  twice 
at  Parga  and  twice  at  Butrinto;  during  the  long  Turco- 
Venetian  war,  which  broke  out  in  1463,  we  hear  of  their 
prowess  at  the  isthmus  of  Corinth,  beneath  the  walls  of 
Patras,  and  behind  the  ramparts  of  Lepanto ;  it  was  a  Corfiote 
who  temporarily  gained  for  the  republic  the  castle  of  Strovili 
on  the  mainland,  and  even  in  her  purely  Italian  wars  the 
islanders  assisted  The  privilege  of  electing  the  captain  of 
the  Corfiote  war-galleys  was  the  reward  of  this  loyalty. 
Meanwhile,  headed  by  their  archbishop,  they  worked  on 
their  own  fortifications,  and,  regardless  of  archaeology,  found 
in  their  ancient  city,  Palaiopolis,  a  handy  quarry.  It  seems, 
indeed,  as  if  the  words  of  Marmora1  were  then  no  mere 
servile  phrase:  "Corfu  was  ever  studying  the  means  of 
keeping  herself  a  loyal  subject  of  the  Venetians." 

1  Sdthas,  v.,  222,  224,  246,  336-9 ;  vi.,  219 ;  vii.,  11  ;  Marmora,  268-70, 
324-5,  333  ;  P.  A.  S.,  'H  U&pya,  81-4  ;  Malipicro,  Annali,  89,  no. 


I 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  IONIAN   ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE  (1485-1540) 

The  sequel  of  the  long  war  which  ended  in  1479,  fatal  as 
it  was  to  the  ancient  domination  of  the  Italian  counts  of 
Cephalonia  over  the  four  Ionian  islands  which  had  so  long 
formed  a  separate  Latin  state,  enabled  Venice  to  increase 
her  possessions  in  the  Ionian  Sea.  We  saw  in  a  previous 
chapter  how  in  1482  and  the  following  year,  she  drove 
Antonio  Tocco  out  of  Zante,  and  Cephalonia,  when  he  had 
recovered  them  from  the  Turks,  and  how  she  was  forced  to 
cede  the  latter  of  her  conquests  to  Bajazet  II.,  but  managed 
to  keep  permanent  possession  of  "  the  flower  of  the  Levant," 
on  payment  of  an  annual  tribute  of  500  ducats,  which 
continued  from  1485  down  to  its  abolition  by  the  treaty 
of  Carlovitz  in  1699,  and  formed  a  heavy  burden  on  the 
revenues  of  the  island. 

The  first  care  of  the  Venetians  was  to  repopulate  their 
new  possession,  which  had  not  recovered  during  the  brief 
restoration  of  the  Tocchi  from  the  emigration  and  devasta- 
tion caused  by  the  Turkish  Conquest  The  authorities  of 
the  Venetian  colonies  on  the  mainland  were  ordered  to  offer 
lands  to  settlers  in  the  island ;  especially  to  stradioti  from 
Modon,  Coron,  Nauplia,  and  Lepanto,  who  would  serve  as 
a  protection;  numbers  of  those  light  horsemen  accepted, 
on  condition  that  they  should  be  free  from  tithes  and  from 
all  compulsory  feudal  service  for  four  years;  and  thus  the 

republic  soon  had  at  her  disposal  a  seasoned  body  of  men 

at  once  colonists  and  cavalry — for  they  had  to  keep  their 
own  horses — under  the  command  of  Theodore  Palaiol6gos, 
perhaps  a  son  of  the  defender  of  Salmenikon,  who   had 

650 


REPOFULATION  OF  ZANTE  551 

already  acted  as  an  agent  of  the  republic  in  sounding  the 
opinions  of  the  people  of  Cephalonia.  In  comparatively  few 
years'  time,  the  stradioti  of  Zante  numbered  1 500  families ; 
and,  though  they  were  liable  to  serve  outside  the  island,  they 
had  a  strong  motive  for  settling  there,  in  that  they  could 
bequeath  their  lands.  The  loss  of  Lepanto,  Modon,  and 
Coron  naturally  increased  the  tide  of  immigration  to  Zante  ; 
the  Knights  of  Rhodes  received  lands  there;  in  1528,  despite 
plague  and  earthquakes,  the  population  had  reached  17,255 
souls,  and  among  them  were  some  of  the  most  illustrious 
Greek  families  of  Crete,  Constantinople,  and  the  Morea. 
The  island  replaced  Modon  as  the  port  of  call  on  the  way  to 
the  East ;  a  flourishing  town  grew  up  at  the  water's  edge, 
where  the  modern  capital  stands ;  and  successive  governors 
noted  with  alarm  the  steady  depopulation  of  the  old 
mediaeval  city  on  the  castle  hill,  where  the  civil  and 
ecclesiastical  authorities  lived,  and  strove  by  fiscal  privileges 
to  prevent  the  human  current  from  flowing  downwards.1 

The  new  colony  was  at  first  ordered  to  be  governed  by 
the  laws  of  Lepanto,  but  the  administration  of  Zante  was 
later  assimilated  to  that  of  Corfu.  Down  to  1545  it  was 
entrusted  to  a  single  proweditore,  who  was  at  first  a 
subordinate  of  the  governor  of  Modon ;  but,  in  that  year, 
at  the  request  of  the  community,  two  councillors  were 
appointed  in  Venice  to  accompany  him,  and  to  hold  office 
for  the  term  of  two  years,  like  himself.  These  councillors 
took  it  in  turns  to  act  as  treasurer,  a  month  at  a  time,  and, 
together  with  the  proweditore%  they  administered  justice,  an 
appeal  lying  from  their  decisions  to  Corfti.  A  secretary  com- 
pleted the  resident  Venetian  official  hierarchy.2  There  was, 
however,  a  much  greater  personage,  the  proweditore  generate 
del  Levantey  an  official  first  appointed  in  1500,  after  the  loss 
of  Modon,  whose  commission  included  the  supervision  of 
all  the  Venetian  colonies,  but  more  especially  Zante,  in 
consequence  of  its  increased  importance.     Every  year  it  was 

1  S&has,  v.,  75-6,  81-3,  91,  96 ;  vi.,  253-63 ;  vii.,  43  J  Lun«>  203-4 » 
Rcmondini,  De  Zackyntki  Antiq^  147  ;  Chromcon  breve,  522  ;  Mustoxidi, 
EXX^roM^M^v,  299-300 ;  Bembo,  £  15;  Chidtts,  ^tTopurtk'ATOfunifAovrtpaTa^ 
ii.,  305-11,633. 

2  S£thas,  v.,  100,  103 ;  vi.f  269 ;  vii.,  45. 


* 


552        THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

his  duty  to  visit  the  various  islands ;  on  his  arrival  the 
powers  of  the  local  governor  lapsed,  and  those  who  had 
grievances  hastened  to  lay  them  before  him.  The  day  of 
his  arrival  was  a  public  holiday ;  the  Greek  and  Latin  clergy 
walked  in  procession  to  his  palace ;  the  Catholic  bishop  and 
the  Greek  "  chief  priest  "  offered  him  respectively  the  cross  and 
the  Gospels  to  kiss ;  then  they  all  proceeded  in  state  to  the 
Catholic  cathedral,  where  the  rival  heads  of  the  two  churches 
sat  side  by  side  ;  the  protopap&s  wished  the  republic  and  her 
representative  many  years  ;  the  bishop  celebrated  mass ;  and 
a  banquet  to  the  magistrates  and  the  nobles  ended  the  day.1 
In  Zante,  as  in  Corfii,  there  was  a  General  Council, 
composed  of  all  the  nobles,  which  met  once  a  year  to  elect  a 
smaller  council,  whose  numbers,  limited;  to  ioo  down  to  1545, 
were  finally  fixed  at  1 50.  The  organisation  of  the  latter  was 
deliberately  borrowed  from  the  similar  body  at  Corfu ;  and, 
like  it,  the  Zantiote  Council  of  1 50  had  the  right  of  conferring 
the  local  offices,  which  were  few,  unimportant,  and  highly 
coveted.  This  body  also  elected  the  three  annual  judges, 
and  the  captains  of  any  galleys  that  were  fitted  out  at  Zante. 
The  community  had  the  right  of  sending  deputations  for 
the  redress  of  grievances  at  its  own  expense  to  Venice,  or  to 
the  provveditore  generale,  whose  headquarters  were  Corfu. 
Society  in  Zante  was  formed  on  aristocratic  lines;  the 
islanders  were  divided  into  three  classes — the  people,  the 
burghers,  and  the  nobles ;  and  the  feudal  system,  introduced 
by  the  Latin  counts,  had  split  up  the  island  into  twelve  fiefs. 
The  noble  families  were  for  long  unlimited  in  number;  in 
1542,  however,  it  was  ordained  that  no  newcomers,  except 
those  who  had  emigrated  from  Nauplia  and  Monemvasia 
(then  recently  lost),  could  form  part  of  the  General  Council 
unless  they  had  resided  for  five  years;  and  the  total  was 
finally  fixed  at  ninety-three,  the  place  of  an  extinct  family 
being  filled  by  the  ennoblement  of  a  family  of  burghers. 
There  was  no  distinction,  as  at  Corfu,  between  Latin  and 
Greek  nobles;  the  population  of  Zante  was  a  mixture  of 
races — Italians,  Greeks  from  many  parts  of  the  Morea,  and 
Jews,  who  had  a  ghetto  walled  in  and  guarded — and  it  was 
to  this  truly  Levantine  characteristic  that  Venetian  governors 
1  S£thas,  i.,  319-20 ;  Lunzi,  314-16, 


CATHOLICISM  IN  ZANTE  553 

attributed  the  difficulty  of  keeping  order.  Homicide  was 
common,  and  the  Mainate  emigrants  took  the  blood-feud 
with  them  to  Zante.1 

The  Catholic  Church  required  re-establishment,  for  the 
Turks  had  destroyed  the  Franciscan  monastery  and  the  old 
cathedral  in  the  castle,  and  the  only  Catholic  place  of  worship 
left  in  the  early  years  of  the  sixteenth  century  was  a  small 
chapel,  which  served  as  a  barn.  Under  these  circumstances, 
it  was  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  the  Catholics  had  become 
converts  to  the  Greek  Church.  The  island  now,  however, 
became  again  the  seat  of  a  Catholic  bishop.  From  the  time 
when  Honorius  III.2  had  added  the  see  of  Zante  to  that  of 
Cephalonia,  its  holder  had  hitherto  always  styled  himself 
"  Bishop  of  Cephalonia  and  Zante,"  and  had  resided  down  to 
the  time  of  Leonardo  III.  Tocco  in  the  former  and  more 
important  island.  When,  however,  the  last  of  the  Palatine 
counts  restored  the  Greek  bishopric  of  Cephalonia  and 
Zante,  he  ordered  that  the  next  Catholic  bishop,  Giovanni 
Ongaro,  while  retaining  the  double  title,  should  reside  in 
Zante,  where  the  number  of  Italians  was  larger  than  in  the 
more  purely  Greek  island,  and  thither,  after  the  Venetian 
Conquest,  the  exiled  Latin  prelate  returned.  When,  in 
1488,  he  was  laid  to  rest  in  the  duo  mo  y  his  successor  altered 
his  title,  styling  himself  as  His  Grace  "of  Zante  and 
Cephalonia,"  the  change  in  the  order  of  the  islands  being 
doubtless  due  to  the  fact  that  Cephalonia  was  still  in  the 
power  of  the  Turks.  Even  after  it  too  became  Venetian, 
Zante  continued  to  be  the  residence  of  the  Catholic  bishop 
and  to  give  him  his  first  title,  as  is  still  the  case.  For  long, 
however,  the  Catholic  prelates  were  absentees ;  one  of  the 
Medici  of  Nauplia  held  the  see  for  many  years  without 
visiting  his  flock;  the  number  of  Catholics  naturally 
dwindled ;  and  the  Cephalonians  complained  that  their 
children  were  left  unconfirmed  and  the  Latin  churches 
allowed  to  fall  into  ruin.  In  Zante,  however,  the  Venetians 
founded  the  still  existent  Catholic  cathedral  of  S.  Marco, 
which  replaced  the  old  minster  of  the  Redeemer  up  in  the 

1  S&has,  v.,  100,  112 ;  vi.,  257,  275  ;  Hopf  apud  Ersch  und  Gruber, 
lxxxvi.,  186  ;  Lunzi,  ch.  viii.;  Mercati,  Saggio  Storico  Statistico  di  Zante, 
33-  2  R'gtsta,  II.,  5a 


\ 


554       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

castle ;  the  monastery  of  Santa  Maria  delle  Grazie ;  and 
S.  Antonio  ai  Lazzaretti,  besides  restoring  the  old  cathedral 
in  the  time  of  Sixtus  V.,  whose  arms  were  placed  in  the 
church,  and  the  ancient  Franciscan  monastery,  afterwards 
converted  into  barracks.1 

The  Greek  bishop  of  Cephalonia,  whom  Leonardo  III.  had 
appointed,  was  still  living  at  a  very  advanced  age  when  the 
Venetians  occupied  Zante,  and  his  successors,  like  their 
Latin  rivals,  included  both  islands  in  their  titles,  and  claimed 
to  exercise  authority  over  both.  Hence  disputes  arose 
between  them  and  the  protopap&s  of  Zante,  an  official 
elected  by  the  Council  of  1 50  for  the  term  of  five  years, 
who  was  the  real  head  of  the  Greek  Church  in  the  latter 
island.  These  disputes  were  further  accentuated  by  the 
attempt  of  the  metropolitan  of  Corinth  to  interfere  in  the 
affairs  of  a  see,  which  was  held  by  one  of  his  suffragans. 
This  interference  was  stopped  by  the  Venetians,  who  forbade 
Greek  priests  to  go  to  the  mainland  for  consecration.  A 
further  grievance  of  the  Orthodox  Zantiotes  was  that  the 
Cephalonian  clergy  always  elected  a  native  of  that  island  to 
the  episcopal,  or  archiepiscopal  throne,  as  it  became  in  1632, 
while  they  had  no  voice  in  the  election ;  it  was  accordingly 
at  last  decided  that  a  Zantiote  must  be  chosen  on  every 
third  vacancy.2  The  incident  was  typical  of  the  jealousy 
between  the  islanders ;  and  it  is  characteristic  of  Greek  life, 
that  when,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  the  Cephalonians  claimed 
precedence  over  Zante,  they  quoted  to  the  Venetians  in 
support  of  their  claim  the  fact  that  in  the  Homeric  catalogue 
the  people  of  Zakynthos  are  only  cited  as  the  subjects  of 
Odysseus!8  Some  of  the  Catholic  bishops  of  Zante,  like 
Medici,  contravened  the  privileges  of  the  Orthodox,  ordering 
Catholic  priests  to  perform  services  and  baptisms  in  Greek 
churches.4  But  against  this  the  republic,  true  to  her  principles 
of  toleration,  promptly  protested.  Venetian  policy  in  these 
islands  was  to  pay  respect  to  the  Orthodox  hierarchy,  and 
at  the  banquet  in   honour  of  the  pravveditore  generate   at 

1  S£thas,  v.,  79-80,  95,  1 80-1  ;  Lunzi,  ch.  xiii. ;  Chi6tes,  II.,  298,  492, 
497,  506,  5I5>  532-4  J  vi.,  98-103  ;  Mcrcati,  31. 

*  S4thas,  v.,  80,  108,  109,  136,  140,  188 ;  Chiotcs,  II.,  520,  527 ; 
Miklosich  und  Miillcr,  v.,  74-6.        s  Sdthas,  iv.,  p.  iv.        4  Ibid.y  v.,  167. 


COLONISATION  OF  CEPHALONIA  555 

Cephalonia,  the  Orthodox  bishop  sat  at  his  right  hand  and 
ate  from  a  plate  of  gold. 

When,  in  1500,  Cephalonia  also  became  a  Venetian 
possession,  it  was  treated  in  the  same  way  as  Zante.  The 
island  needed  cultivation ;  for  the  Venetian  Government 
during  its  previous  brief  occupation  between  1483  and  1485 
had  ordered  that  it  should  be  made  to  appear  as  desolate  as 
possible,  in  order  that  the  sultan  might  not  think  it  worth 
while  to  insist  upon  its  evacuation.  The  Turkish  domination 
and  the  various  attempts  of  the  Venetians  to  recapture  the 
island  had  naturally  prevented  its  improvement,  so  that  the 
first  act  of  the  latter,  when  they  recovered  it,  was  to  plant 
there  a  military  colony  of  stradioti  from  Modon  and  Navarino, 
with  other  survivors  of  those  fallen  towns,  confiscating  a  part 
of  five  feudal  baronies  for  the  purpose.  So  greatly  did 
Cephalonia  increase  in  population,  that,  in  1548,  despite  the 
great  Turkish  raid  of  ten  years  earlier,  it  contained  15,304 
souls,  while  the  policy  of  fining  all  who  left  their  lands 
untilled  increased  its  fertility.  But  at  this  period  there  was 
only  one  fortified  town  in  the  island,  the  castle  of  St  George, 
which  the  Venetians  restored — for  Assos  was  built  later — and 
the  inhabitants  lived  for  the  most  part  in  scattered  hamlets, 
which  afforded  a  temptation  to  foreign  and  native  thieves. 
Its  government  during  the  previous  Venetian  occupation  had 
been  modelled  on  that  of  Lepanto ;  it  was  now  assimilated  to 
that  of  Zante.  But  the  character  of  the  two  islands,  though 
separated  by  only  a  narrow  channel,  was  widely  different 
Cephalonia,  owing  to  its  purer  Hellenic  population,  was 
actuated  by  the  democratic  sentiments  engrained  in  the 
Greek  race,  despite  the  existence  of  six  baronies,  a  relic  of 
the  feudal  system.  The  meetings  of  the  Cephalonian 
Council  were  noted  for  their  turbulence  and  irregularity,  of 
which  the  Venetian  governors  often  complained.  The 
request  for  a  "  Council  of  primates  "  had  been  granted  in  1 506 
on  condition  that  every  councillor  should  reside  not  more 
than  a  mile  from  the  capital ;  but  in  1 548  we  are  told  that 
"  there  was  neither  means  nor  place  of  meeting."  Tumultuous 
gatherings,  at  which  even  peasants  took  part,  were  held  in  the 
street,  and  we  hear  of  800  or  900  persons  electing  the  captains 
of  the  galleys,  the  three  annual  judges,  and  the  other  local 


I 


556       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

officials.  Hence,  while  Corfiote  nobles  temporarily  resident 
in  Zante  and  Zantiote  nobles  in  Corfu  were  allowed  to  take 
part  in  the  General  Council  of  their  hosts,  both  islands  scorn- 
fully refused  the  privilege  to  Cephalonians.  After  half  a 
century  of  Venetian  rule,  a  governor  sums  up  the  condition  of 
the  island  in  a  sentence :  "  The  inhabitants  are  poor  and  idle ; 
civilisation  and  municipal  laws  there  are  none."  Yet  the 
natives,  like  true  Greeks,  had  even  then  a  yearning  for 
education.  "There  is  not  a  single  schoolmaster  in  all 
Cephalonia,"  they  pathetically  wrote  to  Venice,  and  they 
begged  that  a  portion  of  the  fines  paid  by  criminals  might  be 
set  aside  to  provide  a  teacher's  salary.  Their  petition  was 
granted,  and  at  Zante  the  abbot  of  the  Anaphonetria  monas- 
tery was  obliged  to  pay  1 50  ducats  to  the  community  every 
year  as  the  pay  of  a  schoolmaster.  Otherwise  a  single 
Italian  master  in  either  island  represented  the  most  cautious 
republic's  total  contribution  to  public  education.1 

Under  the  jurisdiction   of  Cephalonia  was  the   ancient 
home  of  Odysseus.     After  its  devastation  by  Ahmed  Pasha 
in  1479,  Ithaka  remained  deserted  and  unclaimed  till    1 503, 
though  it  is  mentioned  several   times  during  the  previous 
war  as  a  station  of  the  Venetian  fleet.2    But  in  that  year  a 
party  of  Venetian  subjects  landed  on  the  island  with  their 
oxen,  and  began  to  cultivate  it.     The  governor  of  Cephalonia, 
afraid  of  remonstrances  from  the  sultan,  advised  caution,  and 
reported  the  matter  home.8    Thereupon,  in   1504,  an    order 
was  issued  from  Venice  for  repopulating  "an  island  named 
Val  di  Compare  situated   opposite  Cephalonia,  at   present 
uninhabited,  but  reported  to  have  been  formerly  fertile  and 
fruitful. "     Accordingly,  lands  were  offered   to  settlers  free 
from  all  taxes  for  five  years,  at  the  end  of  which  time  the 
colonists   were  to  pay  to  the   treasury  of  Cephalonia   the 
same  dues  as  the  inhabitants  of  that  island.     The  offer  of 
the  Senate  seems  to  have  been  successful ;  among  those  who 
accepted  it  were  the  families  of  Boua  Grfvas,  Pe talis,  and 
Karavfas,   which   last    in    modern    times   produced  a    local 

1  Sdthas,  v.,  150-5,  163,  175,  179,  186-7,  200  ;  vi.,  279,  281,  285  ;  vii., 
86,  120 ;  Lunzi,  205,  216,  227-31,  318-23,  472  ;  Chi6tes,  iii.,  75. 

2  Sanudo,  ZHarii,  iii.,  444,  488,  498,  500, 

3  Jbid.,  v„  883. 


ITHAKA  557 

historian  of  Ithaka.  In  1545,  the  tithe  of  Ithaka — 82  bushels 
of  wheat — figures  in  the  budget  of  Cephalonia,  and  three 
years  later  the  retiring  governor  of  the  latter  island  reported 
that  "under  the  jurisdiction  of  Cephalonia  there  is  another 
island  named  Thiachi,  very  mountainous  and  barren,  in 
which  there  are  different  harbours  and  especially  a  harbour 
called  Vathi  or  Val  de  Compare;  in  the  which  island  are 
hamlets,  in  three  places,  inhabited  by  about  sixty  families, 
who  are  in  great  fear  of  corsairs,  because  they  have  no 
fortress  in  which  to  take  refuge."  These  three  hamlets  are 
doubtless  those  of  Palaiochora,  Anoe,  and  Exoe,  which  are 
regarded  as  the  oldest  in  the  island.  In  1563,  Ithaka  is 
described  as  "very  well  populated,  for  many  Cephalonians 
go  to  live  there,"  and  we  obtain  a  glimpse  of  its  internal 
government.  In  1504  a  Venetian  governor  had  been 
appointed,  and  a  certain  Pugliese  had  subsequently  been 
made  "captain"  of  Ithaka  for  life.  On  his  death,  in  1563, 
Venice  allowed  the  Cephalonian  council  to  elect  one  of  its 
members  every  year  to  fill  his  place  "without  any  cost  to 
the  republic,"  on  condition  that  he  recognised  in  all  things 
the  superior  authority  of  the  proweditore,  who  paid  it  an 
annual  visit.  Ithakan  interests  were  represented  by  two 
"  elders  of  the  people  "  (SvHxoyipovres),  who  acted  as  assessors 
to  the  "captain,"  and  the  natives,  after  several  complaints 
to  Venice  against  his  extortion  and  interference  in  their 
local  affairs,  at  last  secured  the  abolition  of  this  office,  so 
that  thenceforth  the  two  "elders"  ruled  alone.  Every 
year  the  principal  men  of  the  island  met  to  elect  the  local 
officials.  Small  as  it  is,  Ithaka  boasted  of  one  feudal  barony, 
held  by  the  family  of  Galdtes — the  only  Ithakan  family 
which  enjoyed  the  privileges  of  nobility  in  the  Venetian 
period.  It  had  first  received  exemptions  from  Leonardo 
III.  Tocco,  and  it  is  still  extant  in  the  island.1 

At  first  both  Zante  and  Cephalonia  were  a  drag  on  the 
Venetian  exchequer,  for  both  required  development,  and  the 
former  was  saddled  with  the  Turkish  tribute.  But  the 
introduction  of  the  currant  in  the  first  half  of  the  sixteenth 

1  Sdthas,  v.,  157,  202  ;  vi.,  284,  285  ;  Karavfas,  'laropla  rfc  rfaov'ie&Mit, 
69  ;  Lunzi,  348-50  (Greek  ed.,  pp.  83-5) ;  Meliardkes,  TfwypattAa  tov  vofioO 
KetpaWrivlas,  150,  191  ;  Chi6tes,  II.,  228. 


1 


558       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

century l  enormously  increased  the  revenues  of  Zante.  The 
wholesale  conversion  of  corn-fields  into  currant  plots  caused, 
however,  such  alarm  that  the  local  authorities  applied  to 
Venice  for  leave  to  root  up  the  currant  bushes.  The 
republic  replied  by  allowing  the  currants  to  remain,  but  at 
the  same  time  levied  a  duty  (the  "  new  tax,"  as  it  was  called) 
upon  them,  the  proceeds  of  which  were  devoted  to  the 
purchase  and  storage  of  bread  stuffs.2  The  two  islands 
were  also  useful  to  the  fleet,  which  bought  its  wine  at 
Zante,  and  obtained  its  masts  and  spars  from  the  forest  on 
the  Black  Mountain,  which  the  republic  reserved  for  her 
exclusive  use.8  She  took  over  at  the  outset  all  the  salt- 
pans, fisheries,  mills,  and  other  appurtenances  of  the  Palatine 
counts,4  and  farmed  out  the  taxes  in  the  usual  manner. 
They  chiefly  consisted  of  a  tithe  on  the  produce,  from  which 
the  stradioti  were  exempt,  and  which  was  assessed  by  assessors 
named  scontri^  annually  elected  by  the  governor  and 
Council ;  of  a  house-duty,  or  livello ;  of  a  duty  on  all  wine 
sold ;  and  of  the  so-called  preda>  a  tax  on  flocks  and  herds. 
Out  of  the  corn  paid  as  tithe  by  the  Zantiotes  sufficient  was 
ordered  to  be  sent  to  Venice  every  year  to  defray  the 
amount  of  the  Turkish  tribute  on  that  island.6  Thus,  a 
century  later,  it  came  to  be  said  that,  if  Corfu  was  useful 
to  the  republic  as  a  strategic  position,  the  other  two  islands 
were  valuable  from  their  revenues.  Nor  were  the  Cepha- 
lonians  and  Zantiotes,  if  we  may  believe  the  reports  of  their 
Venetian  governors,  otherwise  than  loyal  to  the  republic 
They  knew  that  they  had  no  alternative  but  Turkish 
government,  and  they  saw,  too,  from  their  vicinity  to  the 
Morea,  that  their  fellow-Greeks  there  were  worse  off  than 
themselves.  The  peasants  might  not  like  the  obligation  to 
serve  in  the  armed  force  or  man  the  galleys  of  the  islands, 
which  the  nobles  were  so  proud  to  command.  But  they 
knew  that  the  blood-tax,  the  7ra£6o/xa£a>/xa,  of  the  Turks  was 
harder    than    these    milder    forms    of   conscription.        The 

1  It  is  spoken  of  as  "recent"  in   1541  (Sdthas,  vi.,  268)  ;  in   1552 
Zantiote  currants  were  sent  to  England  (Feyerabend,  Reyssbuch,  f.  376). 

2  Lunzi,  433*4- 

3  Sdthas,  v.,  97,  170,  177  ;  vi.,  278.  4  /£*</.,  v.,  156. 
6  Ibid.,  v.,  77t  88,  94,  161  ;  vi.,  266-7,  272,  284. 


SIEGE  OF  CORFU  559 

Zantiote  peasants  hated  their  own  aristocracy;  the  Cepha- 
lonians  often  quarrelled  among  themselves ;  but  neither 
island  ever  rose  against  the  republic  which  secured  them 
the  almost  uninterrupted  blessings  of  peace. 

The  Turco- Venetian  war  of  1499- 1502,  which  gave  Cepha- 
lonia  to  Venice,  scarcely  affected  the  sister-islands.  Zante  was 
reassured  by  the  coolness  of  a  stradioto  at  the  moment  of 
a  scare  of  invasion.  Corfu,  which  Bajazet  II.  had  threatened 
ten  years  earlier,  prepared  for  an  attack,  and  the  houses  of 
the  suburb  were  sacrificed  to  the  defences  of  the  city.1  But 
the  colony  sustained  no  loss  save  the  temporary  capture  of 
Butrinto ;  while  a  Corfiote  captain,  one  of  the  ancient  family 
of  Goth,  greatly  distinguished  himself  by  running  the 
blockade  of  Modon,  receiving  in  return  for  his  services  the 
jurisdiction  over  the  fief  of  the  gypsies.2  For  a  whole 
generation  the  Ionian  islands  enjoyed,  like  the  other 
Venetian  colonies,  the  long  peace. 

At  last,  however,  after  rather  more  than  a  century  of 
almost  complete  freedom  from  attack,  Corfu  was  destined 
to  undergo  the  first  of  the  two  great  Turkish  sieges,  which 
were  the  principal  events  in  her  annals  during  the  Venetian 
occupation.  In  1537  war  broke  out  between  the  republic 
and  Suleyman  the  Magnificent,  at  that  time  engaged  in 
an  attack  upon  the  Neapolitan  dominions  of  Charles  V. 
During  the  transport  of  troops  and  material  of  war  across 
the  channel  of  Otranto,  the  Turkish  and  Venetian  fleets 
came  into  hostile  collision,  and  though  Venice  was  ready 
to  make  amends  for  the  mistakes  of  her  officials,  the  sultan 
resolved  to  punish  them  for  the  insults  to  his  flag.  He  was  at 
Valona,  on  the  coast  of  Epiros,  at  the  time ;  and,  removing 
his  camp  to  Butrinto,8  whose  commander  surrendered  at  his 
approach,  he  gave  orders  for  the  invasion  of  Corfu. 

The  island  was  not  taken  unawares.    The  presence  of  the 

1  Sdthas,  vi.,  237-9 ;  vii.,  66 ;  Malipiero,  169 ;  Chromcon  Venctum, 
apud  Muratori,  xxiv.,  150. 

8  Marmora,  277  ;  but  Lunzi  says  that  the  fief  had  been  granted  to  his 
family  a  generation  earlier. 

3  So  Paruta  and  the  Duke  of  Naxos ;  and  the  position  of  Butrinto 
makes  this  more  probable  than  La  Bastia  or  Paramythia,  the  alternative 
sites  for  his  camp. 


560       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

sultan  in  Epiros  and  the  naval  operations  of  Andrea  Doria  to 
the  north  and  south  of  Corfu  had  put  the  authorities  on  their 
guard,  and  Admiral  Girolamo  Pesaro  with  a  large  fleet, 
which  was  joined  by  a  contingent  of  five  Ionian  galleys,  had 
been  despatched  to  Corfiote  waters.  The  town  still  relied  for 
its  protection  upon  the  two  fortified  peaks  of  what  is  now 
called  the  Fortezza  Vecchia,  defended  by  a  garrison  of  some 
2000  Italians  and  the  same  number  of  Corfiotes,  under  the 
command  of  Naldo,  an  officer  who  had  distinguished  himself 
in  the  Italian  wars,  while  four  galleys,  with  their  crews  on 
board,  lay  behind  the  breakwater  below  the  fortress.  The 
place  was  well  supplied  with  guns  and  ammunition  ;  it 
contained  provisions  for  three  years ;  and  its  defences  were 
strengthened  by  the  destruction  of  3,000  houses  in  the 
suburbs,  which  might  have  served  as  cover  to  the  enemy. 

The    Turks,  under    the    command   of  the    redoubtable 
Khaireddin  Barbarossa,  the  most  celebrated  captain  in  the 
service  of  the  sultan,  landed  at  Govino,  where  the  much  later 
Venetian   arsenal   now  stands,  towards  the  end  of  August, 
destroyed  the  village  of  Potam6,  and   marched    upon   the 
capital     On   the  29th  another  force  of  25,000  men  crossed 
over  to  join  him,  these  operations  being  facilitated    by    the 
fact  that  Pesaro  had  sailed  up  the  Adriatic  without  engaging 
the  Turkish  fleet.     The  mart,  as   it  was  called,    which   lay 
outside  the  city  walls,  was  speedily  taken,  and  its  remaining 
inhabitants  found  the  gates  shut  against  them  and  were  forced 
to  crouch  under  the  castle  ramparts  on  the  rocky  promontory 
of  S.  Sidero  or  behind  the  breakwater.    The  Corfiote  traveller, 
Noukios,  an  eyewitness  of  the  siege,  has  left  a  graphic  account 
of  the  sufferings  of  these  poor  wretches,  huddled  together  on 
a   narrow  ledge  of  rock,  without  food  or  shelter,  and    ex- 
posed  to  the  stones  of  the  garrison  and  to  the  full  force  of  one 
of  those  terrific  storms  of  rain  not  uncommon  in  Corfu  at  that 
season.     Those  who  could  afford  to  bribe  the  soldiers  on  the 
walls  were  pulled  up  by  means  of  ropes,  while  the  rest  were  left 
to  die  of  cold  or  hunger.     When  it  seemed  that  the  siege  was 
likely  to  last,  the  Venetian  governor,  in  order  to  economise 
food  and  space,  turned  out  of  the  fortress  the  old  men,  women, 
and  children,  who  went  to  the  Turkish  lines  to  beg  for  bread 
The  Turkish  commander,  hoping  to  work  on  the  feelings  of 


SIEGE  OF  CORFU  561 

the  garrison,  refused  ;  so  the  miserable  creatures,  repudiated 
alike  by  the  besieged  and  the  besiegers,  wandered  about 
distractedly  between  the  two  armies,  striving  to  regain 
admission  to  the  fortress  by  showing  their  ancient  wounds 
gained  in  the  Venetian  service;  and,  at  last,  when  their 
efforts  proved  unavailing,  lying  down  in  the  ditches  to  die. 
Meanwhile,  for  three  days  and  nights  the  suburbs  were 
blazing,  and  the  Turks  were  ravaging  the  fair  island  with 
fire  and  sword.  The  castle  of  Sant*  Angelo  on  the  west 
coast  alone  resisted  their  attacks.  More  than  3000  refugees 
from  the  countryside  had  congregated  within  its  walls,  and 
four  times  did  its  brave  Corfiote  garrison  repulse  the  enemy. 
Barbarossa,  whose  headquarters  were  at  the  Avrdme  Palace 
on  the  sea-shore,  now  began  the  bombardment  of  the  fortified 
peninsula,  which  contained  the  mediaeval  city  of  Corfu.  He 
planted  a  cannon  on  the  islet  of  Vido,  then  called  Malipiero, 
the  pleasaunce  of  a  nobleman,  and  noted  for  its  abundance  of 
game.  But  the  gunners  made  such  bad  practice  that  in  three 
days  they  only  hit  the  mark  five  times,  while  the  rest  of  their 
shots  flew  over  the  fortress  into  the  sea  on  the  other  side. 
Nor  was  Barbarossa  more  fortunate  in  an  attempt  to  bombard 
the  city  from  his  own  galley ;  a  well-aimed  shot  struck  the 
vessel ;  and,  when  he  retired  in  the  direction  of  the  fountain 
of  Karddki,  where  ships  were  accustomed  to  water,  and  began 
a  cannonade  of  the  place  from  that  side  where  the  walls  were 
lower,  the  great  distance  caused  most  of  his  projectiles  to  fall 
short  of  the  mark.  At  this,  Ayas  Pasha,  the  grand  vizier, 
resolved  to  see  for  himself  the  prospects  of  taking  the  city ; 
he  therefore  ventured  out  one  dark  and  rainy  night  to  inspect 
the  moat  and  the  walls.  What  he  saw  convinced  him  that 
Corfu  could  only  be  captured  after  a  long  siege,  whereas  the 
month  of  September  had  now  begun  and  sickness  had  broken 
out  among  the  half-starved  Turks.  He  therefore  advised  the 
sultan  to  abandon  the  attempt  Suleyman  first  resolved 
to  try  the  effect  of  persuasion  upon  the  garrison ;  he 
therefore  sent  a  Corfiote  prisoner  to  frighten  the  Venetian 
authorities  into  surrender.  The  bailie,  Simeone  Leone,  and 
the  proweditore,  Luigi  da  Riva,  dismissed  the  sultan's  envoy 
without  a  reply,  and  a  brisk  cannonade  from  the  castle 
batteries  proved  an  effective  answer  to  fresh  demonstrations 

2  N 


k 


562       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

of  hostility.  Suleyman  accordingly  made  a  virtue  of  necessity ; 
the  grand  vizier  sent  for  the  Venetian  representative  at 
Constantinople,  who  was  at  the  sultan's  headquarters,  and 
offered  to  raise  the  siege,  if  the  republic  would  compensate 
his  master  for  his  losses ;  but,  before  any  reply  could  arrive 
from  Venice,  the  siege  had  been  already  raised.  After  firing 
all  the  houses  that  remained  standing  in  the  suburbs,  the 
Turks  were  ordered  to  embark ;  their  fleet  made  one  more 
demonstration;  but  on  nth  September,  after  a  stay  of  only 
thirteen  days  in  the  island,  they  recrossed  the  channel  to 
Epiros.  But  in  that  short  time  they  had  wrought  enormous 
damage.  The  Corfiote  traveller  tells  us  that  they  had 
destroyed  "  all  the  works  of  men's  hands "  throughout  the 
island,  and  that  they  slew  or  carried  off  all  the  animals  they 
could  find ;  sparing  only  the  trees  and  vines  owing  to  the 
suddenness  of  their  departure.  The  Duke  of  Naxos  wrote  to 
the  pope,  that  two  large  cities  might  have  been  built  out  of 
the  houses  and  churches  which  they  had  destroyed  ;  the 
privileges  and  letters-patent  of  the  islanders  had  perished  in 
the  flames  or  had  been  used  as  ammunition,  and  a  Corfiote  peti- 
tion states  that  they  carried  away  more  than  20,000  captives. 
The  population  was  so  greatly  reduced  by  this  wholesale 
deportation,  that  the  nobles  had  to  be  recruited  from  the 
burgesses,  and  nearly  forty  years  afterwards  the  whole  island 
contained  only  some  17,500  inhabitants,  or  less  than  one- 
fifth  of  the  estimated  population  in  classical  times.  Among 
these  captives  was  a  young  girl,  Kale  Kartdnou,  whom  (and 
not  a  Baffo  of  Paros)  the  Corfiote  historians  believe  to  have 
been  the  mother  of  Mur&d  III.1 

Great  was  the  joy  in  Venice  at  the  news  that  the  invaders 
had  abandoned  Corfu,  and  public  thanksgivings  were  offered 
up  for  the  preservation  of  the  island,  even  in  the  desolate 
condition  in  which  the  Turks  had  left  it.  Planks  were  sent 
to  rebuild  the  suburb;  the  Italian  mercenaries  who  had 
maltreated  the  inhabitants  during  the  siege  were  hanged; 
and  a  noble  Venetian  was  beheaded.     The  Greeks  had  made 

1  Noukios,  'Ato^/au^,  7-14;  Paruta,  I.,  372-9;  Maurocenus,  176-81; 
Marmora,  301-12,  327  ;  Haji  Kalifeh,  The  History  of  the  Maritime  Wart, 
57-8  ;  Guazzo,  ff.  199,  201-4 ;  Jovius,  ii.  ff.  186-8  ;  Buchon,  Recherches, 
ii.,  466-7  ;  M,  Mustoxidi  'Iaro/w**  Kctf  QiXoXoyiied.  'A^dXeirra,  83-97,  193. 


FORTIFICATION  OF  CORFU  563 

immense  sacrifices  in  their  determination  never  to  yield — 
they  could  not  have  fought  better,  it  was  said,  had  they  been 
fighting  for  the  national  cause — and  they  had  their  reward. 
The  new  bailie,  Tiepolo,  contented  everyone,  we  are  told, 
by  his  wise  provisions ;  he  restored  order  out  of  chaos,  and 
did  his  best  to  promote  peace  with  the  Turks ;  while  the 
republic  bestowed  upon  Eparchos,  the  distinguished  Corfiote 
scholar  and  envoy,  the  vacant  fief  of  the  gypsies,  as  compensa- 
tion for  his  losses  and  as  the  reward  of  his  services.  But 
the  chief  result  of  the  siege  was  the  tardy  but  systematic 
fortification  of  the  town  of  Corfu,  at  the  repeated  request 
of  the  Corfiote  Council,  which  sent  several  embassies  to 
Venice  on  the  subject.  More  than  2000  houses  were  pulled 
down  in  the  suburb  of  San  Rocco  to  make  room  for  the  walls, 
for  which  the  old  city  of  Palaiopolis  once  more  provided 
materials,  and  Venice  spent  a  large  sum  on  the  erection 
of  new  bastions.  Some  parts  of  the  Fortezza  Vecchia  date 
from  this  period ;  what  is  now  called  the  Fortezza  Nuova 
was  built  between  1577  and  1588,  when  the  new  works  were 
completed.  The  traveller  Buochenbach,  who  visited  the 
island  in  1 579,  gives  the  inscriptions  placed  on  two  of  the 
new  bastions ;  we  have  two  plans  showing  the  fortifications 
of  the  citadel  and  of  the  town  about  this  time ;  and  visitors 
to  Venice  will  remember  the  models  of  Corfu  in  the  arsenal 
and  on  the  outside  of  Sta.  Maria  Zobenigo.1 

The  other  Ionian  islands  suffered  in  less  degree  at  the 
hands  of  the  Turks.  They  ravaged  Paxo,  carried  off  over 
13,000  souls  from  Cephalonia,  descended  upon  Zante,  and 
burnt  Parga,  whose  inhabitants  long  wandered  homeless 
about  the  mountains  of  Epiros,  until  Venice  at  last  restored 
their  beloved  abode.2  They  laid  in  ashes  the  monastery  of 
the  Redeemer  on  one  of  the  Strivali  islands,  the  Strophades 
of  the  ancients — a  building  already  once  before  destroyed  by 
the   Turks — despite   the    prowess  of   those  very   muscular 

1  Sdthas,  v.,  269;  Lamansky,  611;  Guazzo,  f.  208;  Miklosich  und 
Miillcr,  iii.,  364-6 ;  M.  Mustoxidi,  op.  cit^  52,  193 ;  Buochenbach, 
Orientalische  Reyssy  24 ;  Marmora  (364-5)  and  Jervis  {History  of  the 
Island  of  Corf %  126)  give  the  two  plans. 

2  Paruta,  i.,  379 ;  P.  A.  S.  H  Ildpya,  86 ;  Sdthas,  v.,  98,  289 ;  viii., 
331  ;  Guazzo,  f.  242  ;  Maurocenus,  181. 


\ 


564        THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

Christians,  the  monks,  whose  martyrdom  was  commemorated 
by  a  Zantiote  poet1  Finally,  the  devastation  of  the  Venetian 
islands  was  completed  by  a  raid  upon  the  southernmost  of 
them  all,  Cerigo. 

This  seems  the  most  appropriate  place  to  describe  the 
vicissitudes  of  Kythera,  or  Cerigo,  which,  though  neither 
geographically  nor  any  longer  politically  one  of  the  Ionian 
group,  was  so  reckoned  during  the  British  occupation  and 
during  the  last  eighty  years  of  Venetian  rule.  The  history 
of  the  fabled  home  of  Venus  was  absolutely  different  from 
that  of  the  other  Greek  islands,  in  some  respects  resembling 
that  of  the  Cyclades,  in  others  that  of  the  Ionian  islands, 
just  as  it  is  placed  half-way  between  the  two.  At  the  time 
of  the  Conquest,  in  1 207,  it  was  occupied,  as  we  saw,  by  the 
Venetian  family  of  Venier,  self-styled  descendants  of  the 
goddess  of  love,  who  took  the  title  of  Marquis  of  Cerigo, 
because  they  guarded  the  southern  marches  of  Greece,  while 
the  same  style  was  adopted  by  their  fellows,  the  Viari,  who 
held  sway  over  the  islet  of  Cerigotto,  famous  in  our  own 
time  for  the  discovery  of  the  bronze  statue  of  "  the  youth  of 
Antikythera." 2  When,  however,  the  Greeks  recovered 
Monemvasia,  the  position  of  the  two  marquises  became 
dangerous.  It  would  appear  from  a  confused  passage  of 
the  Italian  memoir  on  the  island,  that  the  natives  of  Cerigo, 
impatient  at  the  treatment  which  they  received  from  their 
Latin  lord,  sent  a  deputation  to  invoke  the  aid  of  the  Greek 
governor  of  the  new  Byzantine  province.3  At  any  rate, 
Licario's  famous  cruise  among  the  Latin  islands  proved 
fatal  to  the  rule  of  both  the  Venetian  marquises.  A 
governor  was  sent  to  Cerigo  from  Monemvasia;  but  ere 
long  the  island  was  conferred  by  Michael  Palaiol6gos  upon 
Paul  Monoydnnes,  one  of  the  three  great  Monemvasiote 
archonsy  who  is  described  in  a  Venetian  document  as  being, 
in  1275,  "the  vassal  of  the  Emperor  and  captain  of  Cerigo." 
Monoyannes  fortified  the  island,  where  his  tomb  was 
discovered  during  the  British  protectorate,  and  it  remained 
in  the  possession  of  his  family  till  1309,  when  intermarriage 

1  Sdthas,  M*i7/ie?a,  v.,  78-9,  102  ;  TwpoKparov/tirri  'BXXdr,  122. 

2  Chi  las,  Chronicotty  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  346. 

3  Antique  Memoric  di  Cerigo^  apud  Sdthas,  vi„  301. 


CERIGO  AND  THE  VENIERI  565 

between  the  children  of  its  Greek  and  Latin  lords  restored 
Cerigo,  with  the  approval  of  Venice,  to  the  Venieri.1 

The  island  now  received  a  strict  feudal  organisation, 
which  long  continued  to  affect  its  topography  and  its  land 
tenure.  It  was  divided  up  into  twenty-four  carati,  or  shares, 
six  of  which  were  owned  by  each  of  the  four  brothers  Venier, 
while  the  fertile  plain  and  the  castle  of  Kapsali  were  held  in 
common.  In  order  to  increase  the  population,  the  brothers 
invited  Cretans  to  settle  there,  granting  them  exemption 
,  from  all  services  and  dues  for  ever.  The  rest  of  the  islanders 
were  simple  serfs,  whom  the  brothers  divided  among  them 
like  so  much  live  stock ;  these  pdroikoi,  as  they  were  called, 
ran  with  the  land ;  they  could  not  marry  without  the  consent 
of  their  lords;  they  could  not  engage  in  any  except  the 
smallest  trade;  they  could  not  quit  the  island  without 
leaving  a  pledge  of  their  return ;  in  short,  they  were  at 
the  beck  and  call  of  their  masters,  or  worse,  of  their  masters' 
agents,  for  the  marquises  usually  preferred  residence  in 
Crete  to  their  ancestral  castle  of  Kapsali,  where  one  of  the 
clan  held  the  command  for  the  others.2 

Such  was  the  state  of  Cerigo  down  to  1 363,  the  year  of 
the  great  Cretan  rebellion.  In  that  rising  the  Venier  family 
took  a  very  prominent  part;  Tito  Venier  was  one  of  the 
ringleaders,  and  both  he  and  two  other  members  of  his 
family  paid  for  their  disloyalty  with  their  heads.  A 
Venetian  fleet  arrived  off  Cerigo,  and  young  Piero  Venier, 
who  held  the  castle,  had  no  option  but  to  surrender.  The 
republic  took  possession  of  the  island,  and  for  thirty  years  it 
formed  a  Venetian  colony,  governed  by  a  castellano,  sent 
every  two  years  from  Crete. 

The  Venieri  did  not,  however,  abandon  the  hope  of 
recovering  their  confiscated  marquisate;  they  had  influence 
at  Venice;  they  had  not  all  been  disloyal  to  the  mother 
country;  and,  accordingly,  in  1393,  a  portion  of  the  island 
was  restored  to  them.  Henceforth,  eleven  out  of  the  twenty- 
four  shares  were  held  by  Venice,  and  the  remaining  by  the 

1  Sanudo,  lstoria  del  Regno,  apud  Hopf,  Chroniqucs,  127  ;  Pontes 
Rerum  Austricarum,  xiv.,  181  ;  Hopf,  apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxxv., 
310  ;  Sansovino,  Cronologia  del  Mondo,  185  ;  Arch.  Veneto,  xx.,  92. 

2  Sathas,  vi.,  302-3  ;  Stai,  Raccolta  di  antiche  autoritd,  45. 


\ 


566       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

Venieri —  an  arrangement  which  we  find  in  force  two 
centuries  later — but  the  republic  continued  to  appoint  the 
governor.  In  fact,  the  system  adopted  resembled  the 
administration  of  Tenos  in  the  sixteenth  century.  The 
Venieri  were  never  disturbed  again  in  the  possession  of  their 
thirteen  shares;  down  to  the  fall  of  the  republic  in  1797 
they  remained  "  partners,"  or  compartecipi>  of  Venice ;  and 
their  name  is  still  borne  by  humble  inhabitants  of  Cerigo.1 

The  organisation  of  this  distant  colony  by  the  republic 
resembled  that  of  Corfu.  In  1502  the  governor  received  the 
higher  rank  of  proweditore,  the  first  of  whom  was  specially 
sent  out  to  strengthen  the  fortifications  of  the  castle,  above 
whose  gate  may  still  be  read  the  date  of  1 503,  when  the  old 
fortress  was  enlarged.2  This  official,  who  exercised  judicial, 
executive,  and  military  powers,  was  dependent  on  the 
Government  of  Crete,  so  long  as  that  great  island  remained 
Venetian ;  during  the  brief  Venetian  occupation  of  the 
Morea  in  the  eighteenth  century,  he  took  his  orders  from 
there ;  and,  finally,  after  the  peace  of  Passarovitz,  he  became 
the  subordinate  of  the  provveditore  generate  del  Levante  at 
Corfu.  Appeals  lay  from  him  to  those  officials,  and  from 
them  to  the  Home  Government.  In  1573,  on  the  petition 
of  the  principal  inhabitants,  a  Council  of  thirty  was  estab- 
lished, whose  members  formed  a  close  oligarchy,  and  a 
"  Golden  Book  "  was  started,  in  which  the  names  of  the  nobles 
and  their  sons  were  registered.  This  body,  which  existed 
down  to  1797,  had  the  exclusive  right  of  electing  the  local 
authorities  from  its  own  ranks,  including  two  councillors,  who 
acted  as  assessors  of  the  governor,  and  three  judges  of  petty 
sessions,  who  had  jurisdiction  in  small  cases.  The  Council 
also  had  the  privilege  of  electing  envoys,  or  sindaciy  who  were 
commissioned  to  lay  any  complaints  which  the  islanders  had 
against  the  Venetian  governor  or  his  subordinates  before  the 
authorities  at  Venice.  But  the  local  historian  informs  us 
that  Venice  always  upheld  her  own  officials.3  To  her  the 
island,  from  its  geographical  position,  was  of  much  im- 
portance after  she  lost  her  last  stations  in  the  Morea.      Cerigo 

1  Sdthas,  vi.,  303-5  ;  Chilas,  347,  35°  J  Relazioni  degli  Ambasciatori 
Ventti,  Ser.  III.,  iii.,  13 ;  Stai,  Raccolta,  46. 

2  Sathas,  vi.,  306 ;  Stai,  48.  3  Stai,  50-1. 


BARBAROSSA  RAIDS  CERIGO  567 

was  then  her  only  port  of  call  between  Zante  and  Crete ;  it 
was  also  an  excellent  post  of  observation  where  news  could 
be  easily  obtained  from  the  Morea  and  ships  sighted  at  a 
huge  distance.  From  March  to  October,  the  dangerous 
months,  a  guard  was  always  mounted  on  Cape  St  George, 
beacon-fires  were  lighted  at  night,  and  the  Cretan  Govern- 
ment was  kept  advised  of  the  approach  of  a  Turkish  fleet ;  in 
short,  Cerigo  was  "  an  eye  of  Crete " ;  but,  after  the  loss  of 
that  island,  it  too  lost  its  importance,  and  after  the  peace  of 
Passarovitz  it  was  practically  useless.1 

To  the  inhabitants,  however,  the  situation  of  the  island 
was  a  doubtful  advantage,  for  it  exposed  them  to  the  attacks 
of  corsairs  and  Turks.  True,  it  was  defended  by  three  castles, 
in  which  Venice  kept  a  small  garrison,  paid  by  the  Cretan 
Government.  But,  in  1537,  it  suffered  terribly  from 
Barbarossa's  raid.  From  the  castle  of  San  Dimitri,  at 
that  time  the  chief  place  of  the  island,  7000  souls  were 
carried  off  without  the  least  resistance,  and  the  other  towns 
were  sacked  and  destroyed.  This  raid  made  a  profound 
impression  on  the  islanders,  and  "Barbarossa's  sack  of 
Palaiochora "  was  long  spoken  of  as  the  blackest  day  in 
the  annals  of  Cerigo.  The  survivors  either  fled  to  the 
thickets,  or  else  escaped  to  the  Morea,  whence  it  was  difficult 
to  entice  them  back.  Hence  the  land  went  out  of  cultivation  ; 
the  population  sank  in  1545  to  1850,  and  the  Venetian  part 
of  the  island  yielded  less  than  a  quarter  of  the  corn  which  it 
produced  before  the  war.  Such  was  the  distress  that,  in 
1562,  all  the  inhabitants  desired  to  emigrate  into  Turkish 
territory.  Their  misery  was,  indeed,  due  to  domestic 
tyranny,  as  well  as  to  foreign  invasion.  The  Venieri  let 
their  portion  of  Cerigo  to  local  personages,  who  farmed  the 
taxes,  and  their  share  of  the  island  came  to  be  called  the 
Commessaria  from  being  managed  by  these  commessi,  or 
agents,  who  ground  down  the  peasants  with  every  kind  of 
exaction.  It  was  impossible  to  induce  their  victims  to  bring 
their  woes  before  the  Venetian  governor,  because  as  the 
peasants  shrewdly  remarked,  "our  rectors  come  and  go, 
while  our  tyrants  live  permanently  here."  In  vain,  both 
Venice  and  the  Venieri  tried  to  lure  the  peasants  back  by 
1  Sdthas,  vi.,  286,  289,  290  ;  Lam  an  sky,  660  et  sqq. 


\ 


568       THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS  UNDER  VENICE 

exemptions  for  five  years  from  the  terzarie,  or  third  of  the 
produce,  which  was  the  chief  revenue  of  the  island.  A 
Venetian  governor  declared  that  he  had  never  heard  of  a 
single  fugitive  who  had  returned.  Hence  the  Venetian 
commissioner  who  visited  Cerigo  in  1563  reported  that  all 
the  revenues  of  the  republic's  portion,  amounting  to  an 
average  of  500  ducats,  were  eaten  up  by  the  officials'  salaries 
and  the  costs  of  the  swift  vessels  which  carried  news  to 
Crete.1 

The  Venieri  and  the  Venetians  treated  the  Greek  Church 
with  leniency.  The  famous  golden  bull  of  Andr6nikos  II., 
issued  in  1293  during  the  brief  sway  of  the  Greeks  over  the 
island,  mentions  the  bishopric  of  Kythera  as  already  exist- 
ing, and  names  its  bishop  as  first  among  the  suffragans  of 
the  metropolitan  of  Monemvasia.  We  hear,  indeed,  of  a 
TrparroTcaTras  instead  of  a  bishop  in  the  second  half  of  the  four- 
teenth century ;  but  later  on  the  chief  ecclesiastic  of  the  island 
had  the  episcopal  title,  and  enjoyed  the  exclusive  right  of 
ordaining  the  Cretan  priests.  The  best  known  of  the  series, 
Maximus  Margoiinios,  who  was  appointed  towards  the  close 
of  the  sixteenth  century,  won  fame  as  a  Greek  scholar,  a 
theologian,  a  letter  writer,  and  a  lyric  poet  It  is  only  in 
our  own  time  that  the  exigencies  of  local  politics  threatened 
for  a  moment  this  ancient  see.2  And  down  to  our  own  day 
the  Kytherians,  whether  at  home  or  at  Athens,  celebrate 
every  7th  October  (n.s.)  the  festival  of  their  patron  saint, 
Our  Lady  of  the  myrtle  bough,  whose  image  borne  by  the 
waves  to  the  island  and  found  in  a  myrtle  tree  represents  the 
Christian  version  of  Aphrodite  rising  from  the  sea. 

The  peace  of  1540,  which  restricted  the  possessions  of 
Venice  in  the  Levant  to  Crete  and  Cyprus — the  latter  soon 
to  go — the  solitary  outpost  of  Tenos  in  the  iEgean,  and  six 
out  of  the  seven  Ionian  islands  with  their  dependencies  of 
Parga8and  Butrinto  on  the  mainland,  greatly  increased  the 

1  Sdthas,  v.,  53-fo  ;  vi.,  287,  288,  292,  306,  307 ;  Stai,  54  ;  Cornaro, 
MS.  "Historia  di  Candia,"  II.,  fol.  92  ;  Lamansky,  loc.  at. 

2  Stai,  49-50;  Chilas,  348;  Lami,  Dclicice  Erudttorum,  ii.,  292-318; 
ix.,  1 -6 1  ;  Horatio  F.  Brown,  The  Venetian  Printing  Press^  135  ;  Sithas, 
v.,  66-75  ;  AcMop  rijs  Xptar.  'Apx-  Br»»  vi.,  1 1 5. 

3  Predelli,  Commemoria/t]  vi.,  236. 


IMPORTANCE  OF  THE  IONIAN  ISLANDS      569 

importance  of  this  last  group  to  the  republic.  We  saw  how 
the  stradioti  from  her  lost  colonies  in  the  Morea  found  a  home 
in  Corfu ;  and,  were  we  to  continue  the  story  of  the  Ionians 
under  Venetian  rule,  we  should  find  that  they  came  at  last  to 
represent  all  that  was  left  of  her  once  splendid  colonial 
empire  in  Greece.  But  the  history  of  the  Ionian  islands 
down  to  the  fall  of  the  republic  in  1797  is  beyond  the  scope 
of  the  present  work. 


CHAPTER    XVII 

THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO  (1207-I463) 

To  complete  the  history  of  Frankish  Greece  it  only  remains 
to  describe  the  most  romantic  and  also  the  most  durable  of 
all  the  creations  of  the  Fourth  Crusade — the  island  duchy  of  the 
Archipelago.  Italian  rule  over  the  classic  home  of  lyric  poetry 
which  the  noble  verses  of  Byron  have  immortalised,  estab- 
lished by  the  swords  of  a  handful  of  aristocratic  freebooters, 
not  only  survived  by  more  than  a  century  the  Latin  states  of 
the  mainland,  but  continued  to  exist  in  isolated  fragments 
down  to  the  seventeenth  and  even  to  the  eighteenth  century. 
We  saw  in  the  second  chapter  how,  in  1 207,  the  Venetian 
Marco  Sanudo  and  his  comrades  made  themselves  masters 
of  the  isles  of  Greece,  and  how  the  bold  adventurer  fixed  his 
residence  at  Naxos.  The  Byzantine  capital  had  been  in  the 
south,  where  the  ruins  of  the  castle  of  Apaliri  still  mark  the 
site.  The  conqueror  founded  the  present  city.  There,  on  the 
hill  above  the  sea,  where  the  arches  and  tortuous  lanes  of  the 
upper  town  still  recall  the  picturesque  rock-villages  of  the 
Italian  Riviera,  he  built  a  strong  castle,  flanked  with  twelve 
large  towers,  and  a  great  square  donjon  in  the  middle,  a  frag- 
ment of  which  stands  to-day,  a  monument,  like  the  tower  at 
Paros,  of  Italian  rule  in  the  Archipelago.  There,  too,  he 
erected  a  Catholic  cathedral,  on  which,  in  spite  of  its  restora- 
tion in  the  seventeenth  century,  his  arms  may  still  be  seen ; 
while  below,  the  remains  of  a  massive  mole  tell  of  his  efforts 
to  shelter  the  port  which  the  little  island  of  Palati  protects  on 
the  other  side.  It  was  he,  too,  according  to  one  authority, 
who  made  boat-houses  for  a  small  fleet  of  galleys,1  so  neces- 
sary to  the  lord  of  an  insular  realm. 

1  Lichtle,  MS.  ("Description  de  Naxie"),  however,  assigns  them  to  the 
Knights  of  Rhodes.     Cf.  Bys.  Zeit^  xi.,  496-8. 

670 


DUKE  MARCO  I.  571 

Sanudo,  though  a  Venetian  citizen  and  descended,  so 
flattering  genealogists  afterwards  pretended,  from  the  historian 
Livy,  had  no  intention  of  acknowledging  the  suzerainty  of 
the  republic  and  of  becoming  a  mere  republican  governor, 
although  the  deed  of  partition  had  assigned  Andros  and  most 
of  the  other  Cyclades  to  the  Venetians.  He  did  homage  to 
the  Latin  Emperor  Henry,  the  over-lord  of  the  Frankish 
states  in  the  Levant,  who  invested  him  with  his  islands  "  on 
a  freer  tenure  than  any  baron  who  was  then  in  all  the 
empire  of  Romania," 1  and  erected  them  into  a  duchy,  then 
known  by  its  old  Byzantine  name  of  "the  Dodekdnesos" 
(or  "the  Twelve  Islands"),  but  soon  called  the  "duchy  of 
Naxos,"  or,  "  of  the  Archipelago  " — the  form  into  which  the 
Latins  corrupted  the  Greek  term  "  Aigaion  P£lagos."  Duke 
Marco  I.  remained  true  to  his  sovereign ;  one  account 
represents  him  as  being  at  the  emperor's  side  when  he  died 
at  Salonika.2  Towards  his  mother  country,  however,  he  was 
not  so  loyaL  When,  in  1212,  the  Cretans,  under  the  leader- 
ship of  the  Hagiostephanitai,  rose  against  Venice,  Tiepolo, 
then  Duke  of  Candia,  summoned  Marco  Sanudo  to  his  aid, 
stimulating  his  patriotism  by  the  promise  of  30  knights'  fees 
in  the  colony.  According  to  another  account,  Sanudo  had 
already  been  promised  broad  lands  in  Crete  as  the  reward  of 
his  services  at  the  time  of  the  sale  of  the  island  to  Venice. 
At  any  rate,  he  came  with  a  large  body  of  men,  speedily 
stamped  out  the  rebellion,  and  claimed  his  reward.  When 
Tiepolo  delayed  to  carry  out  his  part  of  the  bargain,  the 
Duke  of  Naxos  listened  willingly  to  the  treacherous  sugges- 
tion of  a  Cretan  archon,  named  Skordili,  that  he  should  seize 
the  island  with  the  assistance  of  the  Greeks.  The  idea 
appealed  to  his  ambition,  and  his  soldiers,  discontented  at 
the  scarcity  of  bread  in  the  market,  were  glad  of  an  excuse 
for  war  ;  the  Greeks  fraternised  with  them ;  the  town  of  Candia 
was  soon  theirs ;  the  Venetian  duke,  disguised  as  a  woman, 
was  let  down  from  the  wall,  and  escaped  to  the  neighbouring 
castle  of  Temenos,  which  the  Byzantine  conqueror  Nikephoros 
Phok&s  had  founded   250  years   before  on   the  double  hill 

1  Pacta  Ferrartce,  published  by  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  167  ; 
Zabarella,  Tito  Livio  Padovano,  56,  78;  Sauger,  Histoire  nouvclle, 
13-14.  2  Ibid^  23,  27-8. 


\ 


572         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

which  is  so  prominent  a  landmark  to  the  mariner.  Mara 
leaving  his  relative  Stefano  in  charge  of  the  town,  then  set  ou 
with  his  army  of  Greeks  and  Italians  to  conquer  the  other  fort 
of  the  island.  But  his  career  of  conquest  was  checked  by  th» 
arrival  of  Venetian  reinforcements  at  the  port  of  Fair  Havens 
whereupon  Tiepolo  sallied  forth  from  his  stronghold,  occupiet 
and  fortified  a  commanding  position  at  Upper  Sivriti,  th< 
modern  Amari,  while  Marco  was  compelled  to  hide  in  a  cave 
waiting  for  help  from  his  island  duchy.  Then  Tiepolo  by  « 
brilliant  coup  de  main  recovered  Candia  without  bloodshed 
and  put  the  commander  in  chains.  Though  the  castle  o 
Belvedere  in  the  south  and  all  the  district  from  Mylopotama 
as  far  west  as  cape  Spada  was  still  his,  Marco  saw  thai 
further  resistance  was  useless ;  but  he  made,  as  might  have 
been  expected  from  so  clever  a  diplomatist,  most  favourable 
terms  for  himself.  On  condition  that  he  surrendered  the 
seven  castles  which  he  held,  he  was  to  receive  2500  hyperptri 
to  take  from  the  land  which  was  still  his  3000  bushels  of  com 
and  2000  of  oats,  while  twenty  Greek  archons  who  had  been 
compromised  in  the  rebellion  were  allowed  to  leave  the  island 
with  all  their  property.  Sanudo  promised  never  to  set  foot 
in  Crete  again,  unless  the  Duke  of  Candia  summoned  him  to 
his  aid,  and  in  121 3  he  returned  to  Naxos.  But  the  failure  of 
this  attempt  to  make  himself  "  King  of  Crete  "  did  not  in  the 
least  damp  his  ardour.  He  fitted  out  eight  galleys,  descended 
upon  the  coast  of  Asia  Minor,  and  captured  Smyrna  ;  but  the 
fleet  of  Theodore  Ldskaris,  the  Emperor  of  Nice,  nearly  four 
times  larger  than  his  own,  defeated  and  captured  him.  He 
was  forced  to  restore  his  conquests,  but  his  valour  and  beauty 
appealed  so  strongly  to  the  emperor,  that  he  not  only  liber- 
ated his  prisoner,  but  bestowed  upon  him  the  hand  of  his 
sister.1 

Thus  allied  by  marriage  with  an  Orthodox  sovereign,  the 
first  Duke  of  Naxos,  who,  as  a  Venetian,  was  not  likely  tc 
be  a  bigot,  naturally  showed  a  wise  spirit  of  tolerance  foi 

1  L.  de  Monacis,  154-5  ;  A.  Dandolo  and  Sanudo  apud  Muratori,  xii. 
338 ;  xxii.,  545  ;  E.  Dandolo,  Cronaca  Veneta,  foL  44-5  ;  Cornelius 
Creta  Sacra,  ii.,  241-9;  Tafel  und  Thomas,  ii.,  159-66.  Cf.  Gerola 
Monumenti  Vcneti  nelV  isola  di  Creta,  i.,  105,  181,  191,  195,  219,  237,265 
284,  285. 


THE  CHURCH  573 

the  religion  of  his  Greek  subjects.  Provided  that  their 
Church  was  not  molested,  they  had  little  objection  to  being 
governed  by  an  Italian ;  so,  when  they  saw  that  he  had  no 
intention  of  banishing  their  metropolitan — a  position  twice 
offered  to  the  exiled  Michael  Akominatos  of  Athens  by  the 
patriarch  of  Nice1 — or  of  taxing  their  monasteries,  his  rule 
became  popular  in  the  Borgo  and  adjacent  "  Neochorio,"  or 
new  town,  where  the  Greeks  clustered  at  the  foot  of  the 
castle  hill.  Many  Catholics,  however,  doubtless  flocked  to  the 
Cyclades  to  make  their  fortunes  in  the  delectable  duchy  which 
he  had  founded,  and  a  Catholic  archbishopric  was  therefore 
established  for  their  welfare  at  Naxos,  with  four  suffragans 
at  Melos,  Santorin,  Tenos,  and  Suda,  as  Syra  was  called  in 
the  Middle  Ages,  while  the  bishop  of  Andros  was  placed,  as 
we  saw,  beneath  the  see  of  Athens.2  Such  was  the  begin- 
ning of  the  Latin  Church  in  the  Archipelago,  which  has 
proved  the  most  durable  of  all  the  Frankish  institutions  in 
the  Levant;  for  even  to-day  Catholics  are  numerous  there 
and  a  Catholic  archbishop  still  resides  in  the  town  of  Naxos. 
About  the  year  1227  the  creator  of  the  new  state  closed  his 
successful  career,  the  career  of  a  typical  Venetian  adventurer, 
brave,  hard-headed,  selfish,  and  unscrupulous ;  in  short,  just 
the  sort  of  man  to  found  a  dynasty  in  an  age  when  a  weak 
empire  had  been  dismembered  and  in  a  part  of  the  world 
where  cleverness  counts  for  more  than  heroic  simplicity  of 
character. 

His  son  and  successor,  Angelo,  though  the  child  of  a 
Greek  mother,  rendered  loyal  service  to  the  decaying  Latin 
Empire,  doing  homage  successively  to  Robert,  John  of 
Brienne,  and  Baldwin  II.,  and  distinguishing  himself — it  is 
said — by  his  vigour  in  the  defence  of  Constantinople  against 
the  Greeks  of  Nice  and  their  Bulgarian  allies  in  1236,  when 
his  large  contingent  of  ships  did  great  execution,  and  he 
led  the  vanguard  with  Geoffrey  II.  of  Achaia.8  This 
incident  had  a  profound  effect  upon  the  external  relations 
of  the  duchy ;  for,  as  we  saw  in  a  previous  chapter,  it  was 
out  of  gratitude  to  the  Prince  of  Achaia  that  the  Emperor 

1  L&npros,  Mtxa^X  Atcofjupdrov,  \\.y  154-5. 

2  Les  Regis  tre s  d*  Innocent  IV.,  iii.,  196,  207,  239,  328;  Les  Registres 
de  GrSgoire  IX.,  i.,  613  ;  Sauger,  11-13.  3  ^<*>  40-4- 


574         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Baldwin  II.  conferred  upon  the  latter  the  suzerainty  over 
the  Archipelago.  Angelo  received  from  the  emperor  a 
leaden  bull  setting  forth  this  new  feudal  bond,  by  which 
the  dukes  of  Naxos  became  vassals  and  peers  of  the 
principality  of  Achaia,  and  which,  though  occasionally 
disputed  by  Venice,  was  still  in  force  at  the  close  of  the 
fourteenth  century.1  In  virtue  of  this  arrangement,  Angelo 
and  the  other  lords  of  the  Cyclades  were  summoned  by  their 
suzerain,  Prince  William  of  Achaia,  to  assist  him  at  the 
siege  of  Monemvasia  in  1247,  and  to  aid  him  in  his  ill- 
starred  campaign,  which  ended  with  the  battle  of  Pelagonia 
in  1259.  Both  Angelo  and  the  Grand-Duke  of  Lemnos 
were  invited  by  Venice  to  join  in  maintaining  the  crumbling 
fabric  of  the  Latin  Empire  in  1260;  and,  in  the  following 
year,  when  the  fugitive  Emperor  Baldwin  II.  landed  at 
Negroponte  and  proceeded  to  Thebes,  the  Duchess  of 
Naxos,  a  French  dame  of  high  degree  who  had  been 
married  in  his  palace  at  Constantinople  in  happier  days, 
met  him  with  grand  presents.  The  penniless  emperor  had 
nothing  substantial  to  give  her  in  return ;  but  he  knighted 
her  son  Marco,  the  future  duke,  who  had  studied  in  the 
best  school  of  chivalry,  the  court  of  William  of  Achaia, 
and  bestowed  upon  her  husband  the  empty  title  of  "  King."1 
By  his  assistance  to  the  Latin  Empire,  Angelo  had,  however, 
incurred  the  wrath  of  Vataitzes,  the  Emperor  of  Nice,  who 
had  revenged  himself  by  capturing  from  him  the  island  of 
Amorgos  and  bestowing  it  upon  Geremia  Ghisi,  chief  of  a 
Venetian  family  related  to  the  Sanudi,  which  already  held 
all  or  part  of  no  less  than  eight  islands,  and  was  therefore 
second  to  the  ducal  dynasty  alone.  Sprung  originally  from 
Aquileia,  the  Ghisi  were  more  loyal  to  Venice  than  their 
independent  cousins,  and  every  St  Mark's  day  the  offering 
of  a  large  wax-candle  in  the  great  church  signified  that  they 
remained  true  sons  of  the  republic.8  Angelo  behaved 
towards  the  Venetians  much  as  his  father  had  done.  When 
a  fresh  rebellion  broke  out  against  their  rule  in  Crete  in 
1229,  he  obeyed  the  summons  of  the  Duke  of  Candia,  and 

1  Sanudo  apud  Hopf,  Chroniques,  124. 

8  Ibid,,  100,  102,  115,  172;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  2891-6;  L.  d.  C,   119,  145; 
Z.  d,  F.f  52,  56,  61.  3  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxvi.,  336. 


THE  CASTLE  OF  ANDROS  575 

built,  at  his  request,  the  castle  of  Suda.  But  when  the 
Cretans  implored  the  aid  of  Vatdtzes,  and  a  Nicene  fleet  of 
thirty-three  sail  arrived  off  the  island,  Angelo  abandoned 
the  Venetian  cause  and  returned  to  his  duchy,  bribed,  it 
was  said,  by  the  money  of  the  Greek  emperor.1  He  ended 
his  long  reign  in  1262  "beloved  by  his  people,"  if  we  may 
believe  a  late  panegyrist,  and  "worthy,"  according  to  the 
same  authority,  "  of  the  Empire  of  the  East." 

Nearly  half  a  century  had  now  elapsed  since  the  founda- 
tion of  the  duchy,  and  the  Latin  rule  seemed  to  be  well- 
established.  A  Venetian  document2  of  this  period  informs 
us  that  all  the  islands  possessed  fortresses,  of  which  the 
picturesque  ruins  of  the  castle  of  Andros  may  be  taken  as  a 
specimen.  Situated  on  a  rock  at  the  mouth  of  the  harbour, 
and  approached  by  a  stone  bridge  of  a  single  span,  which  has 
defied  the  tremendous  storms  of  seven  centuries,  and  by 
three  steps,  it  bore  over  the  entrance  a  statue  of  Mercury.3 
The  statue  has  disappeared ;  but  the  castle  of  green  stone, 
the  work  of  Marino  Dandolo,  its  first  Venetian  lord,  still 
remains,  though  the  sea  has  eaten  away  its  face  till  it  is  as 
jagged  as  the  teeth  of  a  saw,  and  a  vaulted  roof  inside  one 
of  the  blocks  of  masonry  may  have  been  the  baronial 
chapel.  Sometimes,  as  in  the  case  of  the  tower  at  Paros, 
the  petty  lords  of  the  islands  built  their  residences  out  of 
the  marble  fragments  of  some  classical  monument,  and  thus 
destroyed  what  had  hitherto  escaped  destruction.  But 
though  each  island  baron  needed  one  or  more  castles  for 
his  own  abode  or  for  the  protection  of  his  subjects  against 
corsairs,  he  did  not  always  reside  there  himself  While  the 
dukes  habitually  lived  in  their  picturesque  duchy,  not  a  few 
of  their  vassals,  who  had  property  or  official  posts  in  Crete, 
Negroponte,  or  in  some  other  Venetian  colony,  preferred  the 
more  brilliant  and  amusing  society  of  those  places  to  the 
solitary  splendour  of  a  grim  baronial  castle  on  some  rock 

1  L.  de  Monads,  156;  A.  Dandolo  apud  Muratori,  xii.,  346;  Cor- 
nelius, Creta  Sacra,  ii.,  263  ;  who  all  ascribe  this  incident,  by  an  anach- 
ronism, to  Marco  Sanudo. 

2  Hopf,  ChroniqueSy  175-6. 

3  Bartolomeo  dalli  Sonetti,  Periplus,  21  ;  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sar- 
dagna),    161. 


I 


576         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

in  the  ^Egean  which  the  ancient  Romans,  whose  descendants 
they  boasted  themselves  to  be,  had  regarded  as  a  dismal 
exile  for  traitors  rather  than  an  agreeable  pleasaunce.  Thus, 
Marino  Dandolo  of  Andros,  one  of  the  pleasantest  and  most 
fertile  of  the  Cyclades,  an  island  of  streams  and  lemon- 
groves  and  ferns,  usually  governed  it  from  his  palace  in 
Venice,  and  the  Barozzi  of  Santorin  spent  less  time  in  their 
castle  of  Skar6s  than  on  their  Cretan  estates.  Besides,  as 
time  went  on,  the  baronies  of  the  Archipelago  became  a  school 
for  the  governors  and  diplomatists  whom  the  republic  of  St 
Mark  required  in  the  Levant,  and  it  was  thence  that  she 
often  selected  her  bailies  of  Negroponte  and  her  captains 
of  Modon  and  Coron. 

Already,  in  the  mouths  of  Venetian  colonists  and  sailors, 
the  nomenclature  of  the  Cyclades  had  been  strangely  distorted 
Delos  had  become  "  Sdili "  ;  Syra  was  "  Lasudha  "  ;  Patmos  is 
scarcely  recognisable  under  "Sanctus  Joannes  de  Palmasa"; 
"  Serfenti  "  and  "  Sifantd  "  were  the  corruptions  of  "  Seriphos" 
and  Siphnos  "  ;  "  Fermene  "  had  taken  the  place  of  Thermia, 
or  Kythnos.  Already,  too,  in  the  above-mentioned  Venetian 
document,  the  name l  "  Arcipelago  "  is  used  for  the  <A£gean 
— Egeopelagus,  as  it  figures  in  the  Latin  titles  of  the  later 
dukes. 

The  rule  of  the  Latins  over  the  Cyclades  received,  how- 
ever, a  severe  shock  during  the  reign  of  Marco  1 1.,  the  third 
duke.  The  Greek  cause  was  now  everywhere  in  the 
ascendant,  for  not  only  had  the  Latin  Empire  fallen,  but  the 
Byzantine  double-eagle  now  waved  over  the  south-east  of 
the  Morea,  whence  Tzdkones  and  half-castes  flocked  to  man 
the  navy  of  Michael  VIII.,  whose  admiral,  PhilanthropencSs, 
was  despatched  against  the  iEgean  islands.  The  native 
population  of  the  Cyclades  was  naturally  excited  by  these 
successes  of  its  race,  and  the  island  of  Melos,  the  nearest  to 
the  great  Greek  stronghold  of  Monemvasia  and  situated  on 
the  main  route  between  that  place  and  Constantinople,  was 
specially  affected  by  the  national  movement.  A  Greek 
monk  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  the  insurgents,  who 
seized  the  castle  and  drove  out  the  Latins.     But  Marco  IL 

1  It  also  occurs  in  the  treaty  of  1268  ;  {Fontes  Rerum  Aus/riacarum, 
part  ii.,  xiv.,  96). 


1 


LICARIO'S  CRUISE  57? 

possessed  all  the  vigour  of  his  family.  He  assembled  a 
fleet  of  sixteen  galleys,  and,  with  the  aid  of  some  French 
adventurers  from  Constantinople,  carried  the  fortress  of 
Melos  in  less  than  a  couple  of  hours,  but  wisely  pardoned 
the  rebels,  with  the  exception  of  the  ringleaders.  The  monk, 
however,  he  thought  it  necessary  to  punish,  as  an  example 
to  the  others.  He  therefore  had  him  bound  hand  and  foot, 
and  then  thrown  into  the  sea.  This  combination  of  clemency 
and  cruelty  had  the  desired  effect1  But  a  far  more 
dangerous  antagonist  now  appeared  in  the  Archipelago. 
We  have  already  described  the  career  of  Licario — the 
Italian  of  Eubcea,  who  was  driven  by  the  aristocratic  pride 
of  the  Lombard  lords  into  the  service  of  the  Greek  emperor, 
and  who  inflicted  such  immense  damage  upon  his  own 
countrymen.  We  saw  how  he  took  Skopelos,  an  island 
supposed  to  be  impregnable,  from  the  Ghisi;  but  this  was 
only  one  of  his  exploits  in  the  Archipelago.  The  rest  of 
the  Northern  Sporades — Skyros,  Skiathos,  and  Chiliodromia 
— were  now  all  recovered  for  the  Byzantine  Empire;  and 
Lemnbs,  the  fief  of  the  Navigajosi,  shared  their  fate.  The 
island  was  strongly  fortified,  and  the  principal  castle  was 
held  by  Paolo  Navigajoso,  who  still  bore  the  proud  title  of 
Grand  Duke,  or  Lord  High  Admiral,  of  the  fallen  Latin 
Empire,  with  a  garrison  of  700  men.  So  desperate  was  his 
resistance,  that  the  Greek  emperor  offered  him  60,000  gold 
hyperperi  for  his  castle — an  offer  disdainfully  refused  by  that 
brave  and  wealthy  noble.  Even  after  Paolo's  death,  the 
Grand  Duchess,  a  sister  of  Duke  Marco  II.  of  Naxos,  still 
held  out;  till,  when  the  siege  had  lasted  three  years,  she 
departed  with  all  the  corn  in  the  granaries,  the  lead  off  the 
palace  roof,  and  the  clothing  and  money  in  the  castle. 
Thenceforth  Lemnos,  like  the  Northern  Sporades,  remained 
in  Greek  hands  till  the  fall  of  Constantinople.  Ten  other 
islands  were  at  the  same  time  lost  for  twenty  years  or  more, 
and  their  Latin  lords  were  expelled.  The  Ghisi  were  driven 
from  Amorgos,  Seriphos,  and  Keos;  the  Barozzi  fled  from 
Santorin ;  the  Duke  of  Naxos  was  deprived  of  Ios,  Siphnos, 
Sikinos,  and  Polykandros ;  the  Quirini,  who  vaunted  that  they 
were  of  even  nobler  origin  than  the  Sanudi,  belonging  to  the 

1  Sauger,  78-80. 

2  O 


578         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

same  family  as  the  Roman  Emperor  Galba,  were  ousted  from 
Astypalaia ;  and  the  terrible  corsair  Giovanni  de  lo  Cavo 
freed  his  native  island  of  Anaphe  from  the  Foscoli.  Two 
dynasties  alone — the  Sanudi  and  their  vassals  the  Ghisi, 
remained  in  the  whole  Archipelago  ;  and  both  were  thankful 
to  be  included  by  the  Venetians  in  the  treaties  of  peace 
which  the  republic  concluded  with  the  Byzantine  Empire  in 
1277  and  1285,  on  condition  that  they  harboured  no  corsairs. 
In  her  earlier  treaty  of  1265  the  republic  had  abandoned 
"  all  the  islands  which  had  been  under  the  suzerainty  of  the 
Latin  Empire  or  of  the  principality  of  Achaia  "  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  Michael  VIII. ;  she  now  attached  more  import- 
ance to  their  preservation,  and  did  not  forget  that  their 
rulers  were  of  Venetian  origin  and  might  further  Venetian 
aims  against  her  great  commercial  rivals,  the  Genoese.  The 
latter  had  obtained  from  the  Greek  emperor  by  the  treaty  of 
Nymphaion1  in  1261  the  right  to  establish  commercial 
factories  at  Lesbos  and  Chios — the  commencement  of  the 
famous  connection  between  Genoa  and  the  rich  mastic  island.* 
The  growing  desire  of  Venice  to  acquire  direct  authority 
over  the  duchy  was  now  shown  by  her  attempt  to  claim  the 
suzerainty  over  it — a  claim  repudiated  strongly  and  success- 
fully by  Duke  Marco  II.  An  excuse  for  the  Venetian  pre- 
tensions was  afforded  by  the  affairs  of  Andros.  On  the  death 
of  Marino  Dandolo,  the  first  baron  of  that  island,  without 
direct  heirs,  Duke  Angelo,  in  strict  accordance  with  the 
feudal  code  of  Romania,  had  left  half  of  the  barony  to  the 
widow  and  had  invested  Geremia  Ghisi  with  the  other  half. 
But  Ghisi  was  a  powerful  man  without  scruples — in  fact,  the 
greatest  filibuster  in  all  the  Archipelago ;  he  made  himself 
master  of  the  whole  island,  and  hoisted  his  pennant  over  the 
castle.  The  widow,  in  her  despair,  sought  the  aid  of  the 
gallant  Jacopo  Quirini  of  Astypalaia,  an  influential  Venetian 
in  whom  she  found  both  a  second  husband  and  a  warm 
advocate.  Quirini  appealed  to  Venice,  which  peremptorily 
ordered  Ghisi  to  surrender  the  island  to  a  plenipotentiary  of 

1  Sanudo  and  Magno,  apud  Hopf,  Chromques,  123-5,  *27,  132,  181-2; 
N.  Gregorys,  i.,  98  ;  Pachym^res,  i.,  204-5,  2°9  J  Pontes  Rerum  Austria- 
carutny  part  ii.,  xiv.,  68-9,  80,  138,  326,  344  ;  Zabarella,  //  Galda. 

2  Hopf,  Les  Giustiniani)  5,  6. 


MARCO  II.  REPUDIATES  VENICE  579 

the   republic.     But  Ghisi,  too,  had  friends  at  court;  for  his 
daughter  was  married  to  a  son  of  the  doge ;  so  matters  were 
delayed  in  the  usual  dilatory  style  of  Italian  justice,  till  at 
last  both  Ghisi  and  the  Lady  of  Andros  were  both  dead 
Upon  this,  Marco  II.,  who  was  now  Duke  of  Naxos,  assumed 
possession  of  the  whole  island,  as  no  claimant  had  made  his 
appearance.     Two  days,  however,  before  the  period  of  two 
years  and  two  days  allowed  by  the  feudal  code  had  expired, 
there  landed  at  Naxos  Niccolo  Quirini,  son  of  the  Lady  of 
Andros  by  her  second  marriage,  and  demanded  his  mother's 
share.     The  duke  might  have  imitated  Geoffrey  I.  of  Achaia, 
and  have  dodged  the  claimant  among  the  bays  of  his  islands 
for  a  couple  of  days,  till  the  full  term  was  expired.     But  he 
was  sufficiently  conscientious  not  to  avail  himself  of  this 
quibble,  and  expressed  his  readiness  to  abide  by  the  decision 
of  the  feudal  court  of  Achaia,  of  which  state  he  was  the 
vassal.     This  did  not  satisfy  the  claimant,  who,  like  his  father, 
appealed  to  Venice,  hoping  that  she  would  support  the  cause 
of  one  who  had  been  her  representative  in  the  Holy  Land. 
After  a  further  long  delay,  Marco  II.  was  at  last  cited  in 
1282  to  appear  before  the  doge.     To  this  summons  the  duke 
replied  in  a  very  able  state  paper,  in  which  he  pointed  out 
by  irrefragable  historical  evidence  that  Venice  was  not  his 
suzerain,  and  had  therefore  no  jurisdiction  over  him.     It  was 
true  that  the  deed  of  partition,  upon  which  the  Venetians 
based   their  claim,  had    assigned   Andros   to  the   republic. 
But  his  grandfather  had  conquered  it  and  the  rest  of  the 
duchy  at  his  own  cost ;  he  had  been  invested  with  his  island 
domain  by  the  Emperor   Henry,  and  that  sovereign's  suc- 
cessor, Baldwin  II.,  had  transferred  the  suzerainty  over  the 
duchy  to  the  Prince  of  Achaia.     In  1267,  by  the  treaty  of 
Viterbo,  Baldwin   II.   had  ceded   the   suzerainty  over  that 
principality  and   all   its  dependencies,  of  which  the  duchy 
was  one,  to  Charles  of  Anjou,  and  had  expressly  bestowed 
upon  that  monarch  "  all  the  islands  belonging  to  the  Latin 
Empire,"  except  four  outside  the  limits  of  the  Cyclades. 
Accordingly,  on  the  death  of  Prince  William  of  Achaia  in 
1278,  Marco  II.  had  done  homage  to  King  Charles,  who  was 
his  legal  suzerain,  and  had  commanded  three  galleys  in  the 
fleet  which  that  sovereign  despatched  to  attack  the  Greek 


fc 


580         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Empire.  It  was,  therefore,  to  the  feudal  court  of  the  latter, 
and  not  to  Venice,  that  an  appeal  from  the  ducal  court  should 
be  referred.  At  the  same  time,  he  gave  Venice  a  significant 
hint  not  to  cross  the  path  of  so  mighty  a  sovereign  as  the 
King  of  Naples,  then  at  the  height  of  his  power.  The 
republic  thereupon  dropped  the  matter;  Marco  was  wise 
enough  to  pacify  Quirini,  who  enjoyed  great  influence  at 
Venice— it  was  he  who  built  the  still  existing  Palazzo 
Quirini-Stampalia  in  that  city — by  a  money  payment ;  no 
more  was  heard  of  a  case  which  had  lasted  over  half  a 
century ;  the  Sanudi  retained  possession  of  Andros  as  long 
as  their  dynasty  existed,  and  they  added  its  name  to  the 
ducal  title,  styling  themselves  "  Lords  of  the  duchy  of  Naxos 
and  Andros,"  and  residing  at  times  in  Marino  Dandolo's 
wave-beat  castle.1 

The  campaign  of  Licario  in  the  Archipelago  had  another 
effect,  more  disastrous  even  than  the  loss  of  the  islands. 
Piracy  has  in  all  ages  been  the  curse  of  the  iEgean,  and  at 
this  time  the  corsairs  of  every  nation  infested  that  beautiful 
sea.  Skopelos  and  Keos,  the  volcanic  bay  of  Santorin,  and 
the  fine  harbour  of  Ios,  were  favourite  lairs  of  the  pirates ; 
they  infested  the  terrible  Doro  channel  between  Andros  and 
Eubcea,  and  robbed  one  of  the  island  barons  in  the  haven  of 
Melos.  The  Greek  governors,  who  were  appointed  to 
administer  the  conquered  islands,  connived  at  the  doings  of 
the  corsairs,  who  might  even  fly  the  imperial  flag  and  style 
themselves  "  Lord  High  Admiral,"  like  Giovanni  de  lo  Cavo 
of  Anaphe,  while  the  reduction  of  the  imperial  navy  by 
Andr6nikos  II.  converted  swarms  of  half-breed  sailors  into 
pirates.  The  exploits  of  these  men  have  already  been 
described,  and  the  terrible  devastation  which  they  wrought 
on  the  smaller  and  more  defenceless  islands  may  easily  be 
imagined.  Sometimes  the  more  remote  consequences  of 
their  raids  were  worse  than  the  raids  themselves.  Thus,  in 
1286,  on  one  of  these  expeditions,  some  corsairs  carried  off  a 
valuable  ass  belonging  to  one  of  the  Ghisi,  and  sold  it  to 
Duke  Marco  II.'s  son  William,  who  was  baron  of  Syra.      The 

1  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  36-52,  161-70 ;  Veneto-ByzanHniseke 
Analekten,  462-4  ;  Ducange,  Histoire  de  r  Empire,  i.,  455-63  ;  Buchoo, 
Recherches  el  Materiaux,  i.,  32,  33  ;  Sanudo,  130. 


WAR  OF  THE  ASS  581 

purchaser  was  under  no  illusions  as  to  the  ownership  of  the 
ass,  for  it  was  marked  with  its  master's  initials,  but  was 
perfectly  aware  that  he  was  buying  stolen  goods.  Seeing 
this,  Ghisi  invaded  Syra,  and  laid  siege  to  the  castle.  But  the 
fate  of  the  ass  had  aroused  wide  sympathies,  and  was  agita- 
ting all  the  small  world  of  the  Archipelago.  Just  at  this 
moment  it  chanced  that  the  admiral  of  Charles  II.  of  Naples, 
who  was  now  the  suzerain  of  the  Sanudi,  had  put  into  Melos 
for  provisions.  Feudal  law  compelled  him  to  assist  the  son  of 
his  master's  vassal ;  the  prayers  of  the  fair  chdtelaine  of 
Melos,  Donna  Cassandra  Sanudo,  conquered  any  hesitation 
that  he  might  have  felt ;  so  he  set  sail  for  Syra,  and  with  the 
aid  of  the  ducal  troops,  forced  Ghisi  to  raise  the  siege.  The 
great  ass  case  was  then  submitted  to  the  decision  of  the 
Venetian  bailie  in  Euboea,  who  reconciled  the  two  great 
families  of  the  Archipelago  and  restored  the  peace  of  the 
duchy,  but  only  after  "more  than  30,000  heavy  soldi"  had 
been  expended  for  the  sake  of  the  animal,  which  had  probably 
died  in  the  interval1 

A  fresh  disaster  fell  upon  the  Archipelago  in  1292,  when 
the  Aragonese  admiral,  Roger  de  Lluria,  arrived  on  his 
punitive  expedition  against  the  Greek  Empire.  Latin  or 
Greek  was  all  the  same  to  this  licensed  freebooter,  when 
plunder  was  to  be  had.  Andros,  Tenos,  Mykonos,  and 
Therm  ia  were  all  ravaged  by  his  sailors,  who  thus  gave 
Greece  a  foretaste  of  Catalan  cruelty.2  Yet,  if  we  may  credit 
a  later  historian,  even  at  this  very  period,  Naxos  was  a 
flourishing  island.  We  are  told  that  the  fertile  plain  of 
Drymalia  then  "  contained  twelve  large  villages,  a  number  of 
country  houses,  and  more  than  10,000  inhabitants  " — a  total 
doubtless  partly  due  to  the  immigration  of  the  population  of 
Amorgos  half  a  century  earlier.  Yet  towards  his  orthodox 
subjects  Marco  II.  was  by  no  means  so  conciliatory  as  his 
two  predecessors.  There  was  in  the  island  an  altar  dedicated 
to  a  portly  man  of  God,  St  Pachys,  or  "the  fat,"  who  was 
believed  by  the  superstitious  Naxiotes  to  possess  the  power  of 
making  their  children  stout,  and  consequently  comely, 
according  to  Levantine  ideas.  Fond  mothers  accordingly 
flocked  to  his  altar  with  their  skinny  offspring,  and  pushed 
1  Sanudo  apud  Hopf,  Chroniquesy  1 13-14.        *  Muntaner,  ch.  cxvil 


1 


582         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

their  children's  bodies  several  times  through  a  perforated 
stone  still  preserved  as  a  curiosity  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
and  similar  to  those  which  have  been  found  in  Cyprus  and 
Ireland.  If  Marco  II.  had  been  a  wise  statesman,  he  would 
have  allowed  the  Naxiote  matrons  to  offer  up  prayers  to  the 
"  fat "  saint  as  long  as  they  pleased.  But  he  was  either  too 
bigoted,  or  too  sceptical,  to  tolerate  this  harmless  exercise, 
which  savoured  of  paganism  and  had  doubtless  originated  in 
classical  times.  He  smashed  the  altar,  and  thereby  so  greatly 
excited  the  Greeks,  that  he  had  to  build  a  fortress  to  keep 
them  in  order.  The  double  walls  and  the  round  tower  of  this 
stronghold,  Castel  d'Alto,  or  Apanokastro,  as  it  was  called, 
still  stand  on  a  mountain  commanding  the  plain  of  Drymalia 
— a  warning  to  those  who  would  interfere  with  the  beliefs  of 
the  people.1 

Towards  the  end  of  his  long  reign,  Marco  II.  had  the 
satisfaction  of  seeing  the  recovery  of  several  of  the  lost 
islands.  During  the  seven  years  war  between  Venice  and 
Andr6nikos  II.,  supported  by  the  Genoese,  which  began  in 
1296,  the  republic  of  St  Mark  repeated*  the  tactics  of  ninety 
years  earlier,  and  let  loose  a  new  swarm  of  privateers  upon 
the  Archipelago.  The  bailie  of  Negroponte  was  ordered  to 
fit  out  vessels  to  prey  upon  the  Greeks,  and  as  that  official 
happened  to  be  one  of  the  Barozzi,  the  dethroned  barons  of 
Santorin,  he  naturally  carried  out  his  orders  with  the  utmost 
zeal.  Other  dispossessed  island  lords  joined  in  this  filibus- 
tering expedition,  the  Ghisi,  the  Michieli,  and  the  Giustiniani, 
while  a  new  and  bourgeois  family  from  Venice,  the  Schiavi, 
recaptured  the  island  of  Ios  for  the  Duke  of  Naxos  and 
received  it  as  a  fief  from  his  hands.  The  patrician  exiles 
were  equally  successful ;  the  Barozzi  recovered  Santorin  and 
Therasia,  the  Ghisi  and  their  fellows  Amorgos,  Keos,  and 
Seriphos,  and  these  five  islands  were  specially  confirmed  to 
the  conquerors  in  the  treaty  which  Venice  concluded  with 
the  Greek  emperor  in  1 303.  But  the  feudal  relations  of  these 
barons  no  longer  remained  on  the  old  footing.  It  was  under 
Venetian  auspices  and  by  Venetian  diplomacy  that  they  had 
regained  and  retained  their  lost  islands,  and  it  was  thence- 

1  Sauger,  65-8  ;  Buchon,  Les  Cyclades  in  Revue  de  Ptm's  for  1843,  vol* 
xvi.,  350 ;  xvii.,  269, 


DISUNION  IN  THE  DUCHY  583 

forth  Venice,  and  not  the  Duke  of  Naxos,  whom  they 
regarded  as  their  suzerain.  Such  an  attitude  of  independence 
naturally  provoked  ill-feeling  and  led  to  disputes  between 
him  and  them,  and  thus  destroyed  the  unity  of  the  Latin 
duchy.  Moreover,  the  long  war,  successful  though  it  had 
been,  had  added  yet  another  scourge  to  the  Archipelago,  and 
all  the  islanders  were  not  so  fortunate  as  those  of  Keos,  who 
received  compensation  from  the  Genoese  republic  for  the 
damage  inflicted  by  its  subjects  upon  that  most  convenient 
maritime  station,  where  galleys  could  obtain  provisions  on 
their  way  to  the  East1  But  the  Catalans  were  less  scrupulous 
than  the  Genoese ;  their  leader,  Roger  de  Flor,  ravaged  Keos 
in  1303,  carried  off  many  of  the  islanders,  and  inflicted 
damage,  against  which  remonstrances  were  idle.2 

Marco  II.  seems  to  have  died  in  that  year,  and  was  buried 
in  the  church  of  St  Catherine  in  the  plain  outside  the  town  of 
Naxos,  which  served  as  the  ducal  chapel,  and  in  which  his 
tomb  was  afterwards  found,  marked  by  an  inscription  and 
the  arms  of  his  family.8  William  I.,  his  eldest  son,  the  hero 
of  the  famous  War  of  the  Ass,  followed  him  as  fourth  duke, 
and  endeavoured  to  compel  the  reinstated  barons  of  the 
other  islands  to  return  to  their  old  allegiance  to  the  duchy. 
As  might  be  inferred  from  his  former  exploit,  he  was  not 
likely  to  be  hampered  by  scruples.  Accordingly,  when 
Jacopo  Barozzi,  lord  of  Santorin,  was  traversing  the  Archi- 
pelago, he  had  him  seized  by  corsairs  and  flung  him  into  the 
dungeons  of  Naxos.  This  was,  however,  more  than  Venice 
could  stand,  for  the  kidnapped  baron  had  been  her  bailie  at 
Negroponte  and  her  governor  in  Crete.  An  ultimatum  was, 
therefore,  sent  to  the  duke,  bidding  him  send  his  captive  to 
Negroponte  within  a  week,  under  pain  of  being  treated  as 
an  outlaw.  This  message  had  the  desired  effect ;  the  duke 
let  his  prisoner  go,  and  men  saw  that  the  name  of  Venice 

1  Hopf,  Veneto-Byz.  Analekten,  502  ;  Navagero  apud  Muratori,  xxiii., 
1009,  1011  ;  Thomas,  Diplomatariutn>  i.,  15,  18 ;  Sanudo,  in  op.  tit,  131  ; 
Predelli,  Commemoriali,  i.,  36,  where  the  Michieli  and  Giustiniani  write 
in  1303,  that  essi  avevano  riconosciuto  la  sovramfd  feudale  di  Venezia 
sopra  quei  luoghi.    George  I.  Ghisi  even  issued  coins. 

2  Thomas,  Diplomatarium^  i.,  138,  149. 

3  Buchon  in  Revue  de  Parts,  xvi.,  348 ;  William  U  is  first  mentioned 
in  a  document  of  1303,  alluded  to  below. 


1 


584        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

was  more  powerful  than  that  of  Sanudo  in  the  ^Egean.  But 
William  was  not  easily  baffled.  He  despatched  his  faithful 
vassal  and  admiral,  Domenico  Schiavo  of  Ios,  against  the 
Ghisi's  island  of  Amorgos  in  an  unguarded  moment  and 
reunited  it  with  his  duchy.1  Thanks,  too,  to  the  feeble 
policy  of  Andr6nikos  II.,  the  Greeks  continued  to  lose  the 
ground  which  they  had  acquired  under  the  energetic  rule  of 
his  predecessor.  In  1307  a  whole  batch  of  islands  was 
recovered  by  the  Latins.  John,  or  Januli  I.  da  Corogna, 
whose  name  indicates  that  his  family  had  come  originally 
from  Corufla,  and  who  belonged  to  the  Knights  of  St  John, 
seized  Siphnos,  threw  off  his  allegiance  to  his  Order,  and 
declared  himself  a  free  and  independent  sovereign,  in  spite  of 
the  protests  of  the  Sanudi,  who  still  considered  the  island 
theirs.  At  the  same  time,  his  namesake,  Januli  Gozzadini,  a 
member  of  that  ancient  and  only  just  extinct  family  of 
Bologna,  a  branch  of  which  had  been  settled  in  Greece  for 
the  past  half  century,  recaptured  the  distant  island  of  Anaphe, 
or  Namfio,  of  which  he  became  the  petty  sovereign.  Thus, 
exactly  a  century  after  the  Latin  Conquest,  two  new  Latin 
families,  one  Spanish,  one  Italian,  established  themselves  in 
the  Archipelago.  The  Gozzadini  still  ruled  there  in  the 
seventeenth  century,  while  the  ruined  "  chancery "  of  the 
castle  of  Siphnos  still  bears  a  Latin  inscription  of  Januli  II. 
da  Corogna,  dated  1374,  and  the  family  still  flourishes  in 
Santorin.2  Finally,  in  13 10,  the  Quirini,  aided  by  another 
Venetian  family,  the  Grimani,  recovered  their  lost  island  of 
Stampalia,  for  which  they  did  homage  to  Venice  and  which 
was  too  remote  from  Naxos  to  be  molested  by  the  jealous 
duke.8  Thus,  Greek  rule  had  once  more  been  eliminated 
from  the  islands,  but  the  place  of  the  Byzantine  governors 
had  been  taken  by  Venetian  vassals  or  independent  lords. 

Outside  the  frontiers  of  the  duchy  the  Latin  cause  in 
the  Levant  was  at  this  time  strengthened  by  two  important 

1  Hopf,  Veneto-Byzantinische  Analckteny  388,  454. 

*  Ibid.,  466,  and  apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxviii.,  306,  307  ;  lxxvi.,  415, 
416 ;  Buchon,  Recherches  historiques>  ii.,  475-6 ;  Tournefort,  Voyage  du 
Levant  i.,  68.  He,  Ross  (Retsen,  i.,  1,  43),  ano^Hopf  misread  the  date, 
which  Mr  Wace  has  copied  for  me  on  the  spot. 

3  Piacenza,  LE$eo  Redivivo}  241  ;  Zabarella,  //  Galba,  82. 


THE  KNIGHTS  AT  DELOS  585 

conquests.  In  1304,  Benedetto  Zaccaria,  the  rich  Genoese 
who  already  owned  the  valuable  alum  mines  of  Phokaia  and 
had  married  a  sister  of  the  late  Emperor  Michael  VIII., 
occupied  the  island  of  Chios,  nominally  as  a  vassal  of  the 
Greek  Empire,  really  as  an  independent  prince.  Five  years 
later,  the  Knights  of  St  John,  in  quest  of  a  new  home,  now 
that  they  had  been  driven  from  the  Holy  Land,  conquered 
Rhodes  from  the  Turkish  corsairs,  who  had  made  themselves 
its  masters.  We  are  specially  told  by  the  elder  Sanudo  that 
the  Duke  of  Naxos  sent  his  dashing  son  Nicholas  with  a 
fleet  of  galleys  to  assist  them  in  this  conquest.  It  was  perhaps 
at  the  duke's  suggestion  that  they  occupied  the  classic  island 
of  Delos,  where  the  Emperor  Cantacuzene  describes  them  as 
settled  twenty  years  later,  and  where  the  remains  of  their 
castle  have  been  traced  by  some  archaeologists  on  the  top 
of  Mount  Kynthos,  by  others  on  Rheneia.1  The  duke  was 
naturally  pleased  to  see  the  warrior  Knights  established  at 
Rhodes,  and  the  Zaccaria  at  Chios,  for  they  were  likely  to 
defend  the  Archipelago  against  the  Turkish  pirates  from  the 
coast  of  Asia  Minor,  who  had  now  begun  to  make  their 
appearance.  In  13 18  we  find  them  ravaging  the  rich  island 
of  Santorin,  and  already  some  of  the  Cyclades  had  been 
almost  depopulated  by  their  raids.2  Yet  Marin  Sanudo 
wrote  in  1321  that  Melos  could  provide  mill-stones  and  the 
other  Cyclades  plenty  of  large  and  small  cattle,  as  well  as  wood 
and  straw  for  his  projected  crusade.8 

Both  William  Sanudo  and  his  eldest  son  Nicholas  were 
adventurous  men,  leading  figures  in  the  critical  period  which 
saw  the  establishment  of  the  Catalans  in  the  duchy  of 
Athens.  William  was  one  of  those  invited  to  the  grand 
tournament  on  the  isthmus  of  Corinth  in  1305;  and,  as  we 
saw  in  a  former  chapter,  his  heir,  who  was  married  to  the 
half-sister  of  Walter  of  Brienne,  commanded  a  Naxian 
contingent  at  the  great  battle  of  the  Kephiss6s,  where  he 
received  two  wounds  in  the  face  and  hand,  and  was  among 

1  Cantacuzene,  i.,  380,  476-78,  485  ;  Journal  of  Hellenic  Studies,  i., 
38;  Revue  de  Paris,  xvi.,  339. 

8  Hopf,  Les  Giustiniani)  14 ;  Sanudo,  Ep.,  vii.,  apud  Kunstmann, 
810  ;  Pachym&es,  ii.,  344 ;  Thomas,  Diplomatarium,  i.,  107,  108,  110. 

3  Secreta  Fide  Hum  Cruris,  67, 


I 


586         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

the  few  Latin  nobles  who  were  taken  alive,  while  ; 
magnate  of  the  Archipelago,  George  Ghisi  of  Ten 
among  the  slain.  Undeterred  by  this  experience  of  < 
warfare,  he  went  to  the  aid  of  his  father's  suzerain,  1 
Matilda  of  Achaia,  in  1316,  when  that  principality  was  i 
by  the  Infant  of  Majorca,  and  at  the  battle  in  Elis 
again  taken  prisoner.  In  revenge  for  these  two 
hostility  against  the  Company,  Alfonso  Fadrique  < 
the  island  of  Melos,  and  carried  off  about  700  captive 
when  the  Venetians  remonstrated  with  King  Fredei 
of  Sicily  at  this  invasion,  the  latter  replied  with 
correctness,  that  in  feudal  law  the  Duke  of  the  Arch 
held  his  islands  as  a  fief  of  the  Princess  of  Achaia, 
"  the  republic  had  no  jurisdiction  "  in  any  of  them. 
Nicholas,  who  succeeded  his  father  in  1323,  cor 
scrupulously  faithful  to  this  feudal  tie,  and  we  fin 
assisting  John  of  Gravina,  his  suzerain,  in  his  cai 
against  the  Greeks  of  the  Morea.  Together  they  att< 
in  vain  to  capture  the  strong  castle  of  Karytaina,  anc 
the  Prince  of  Achaia  returned  to  Italy,  the  warlike 
of  the  Archipelago  was  left  behind  as  commander- i 
of  all  his  forces.  In  that  capacity  he  routed  the  Greel 
great  loss  in  the  plain  of  Elis  below  the  castle  of  St 
not  far  from  the  place  where  he  had  once  been 
prisoner.1  Old  Marin  Sanudo  was  horrified  at 
proceedings ;  he  pleaded  his  kinsman's  youth  as  an 
for  what  he  had  done,  and  promised  to  persuade  hin 
a  good  servant  of  the  Greek  emperor,  as  his  father  ha 
before  him,  and  at  the  same  time  to  give  him  som 
advice  for  the  preservation  of  his  duchy. 

So  restless  a  personality  could  not  be  expec 
acquiesce  in  the  continued  independence  of  the 
vassals  of  the  duchy.  Like  his  father,  but  with 
success,  Nicholas  attacked  the  Barozzi  of  Santori 
Therasia,  in  spite  of  their  appeals  to  Venice  and  thei 
sounding  title  of"  Lord  High  Admiral "  of  the  paper  ] 
of  Romania,  extracted  a  reluctant  pledge  of  homage, 
1335  wrested  their  two  valuable  islands  from  thei 
1  L.d.C,  271,  465  ;  X.  r.  M.,  11.  8032-5  ;  C.dAf^  461  ;  Z.  < 
99,  I2<^  144-6;  Predelli,  Commetnoriali,  i.,  in- 12. 


POWER  OF  DUKE  NICHOLAS  I.  587 

united  them  with  his  own  possessions.  The  Barozzi  never 
regained  the  barony  of  their  forefathers,  which  remained 
united  with  the  duchy  for  over  a  century;  they  retired  to 
Crete,  and  thence  emigrated,  after  the  Turkish  conquest  of 
that  island,  to  Naxos,  where  the  author  has  seen  their  tombs 
and  where  they  were  still  extant  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  The  Sanudi  did  not  neglect  their  new  acquisition ; 
they  encouraged  cotton-planting  on  the  volcanic  soil  of 
Santorin,  they  strengthened  the  fortifications;  and,  for  the 
greater  security  of  the  island,  Nicholas,  in  1336,  conferred 
the  fortress  of "  La  Ponta,"  or  Akrotiri,  as  it  is  now  called, 
upon  the  Gozzadini,  who  had  recently  established  themselves 
with  his  consent  in  the  island  of  Kythnos,  or  Thermia,  which 
formed  a  portion  of  the  duchy.  So  strong  was  this  castle,  as 
its  ruins  still  testify,  that  it  remained  in  the  hands  of  the 
Gozzadini  long  after  the  Turkish  Conquest.  It  was  not  till 
16 1 7  that  it  at  last  succumbed  to  the  crescent.1  As  the 
plebeian  Schiavi,  of  Ios,  had  been  induced  to  resign  it  to  their 
lord,  the  duchy  was  now  more  important  than  it  had  been 
since  the  early  days  of  Marco  II.,  and  for  the  first  time  had 
a  currency  of  its  own.  The  duke  now  had  in  his  immediate 
possession  the  richest  and  largest  islands — Naxos,  Andros, 
(where  he  sometimes  resided),  Paros  and  Antiparos,  Melos 
and  Kimolos,  Santorin,  Syra,  and  Ios,  while  the  Gozzadini 
of  Thermia  and  the  Schiavi  and  Grimani,  upon  whom  the 
late  duke  had  bestowed  the  island  of  Amorgos  (the  latter 
a  Venetian  family  engaged  in  the  alum  trade),  were  his 
vassals.  His  hereditary  rivals,  the  Ghisi,  however,  still  held 
Tenos  and  Mykonos  under  Venetian  suzerainty ;  the  Quirini 
and  Grimani  looked  to  the  republic  to  protect  their  island  of 
Stampalia ;  newcomers,  like  the  Premarini 2  of  Keos  and  the 
Bragadini  of  Seriphos,  were  Venetian  by  race,  and  as  much 
bound  to  their  old  home  as  the  Giustiniani  and  Michieli,  who 
divided  those  islands  with  them ;  the  Knights  of  Rhodes  had 

1  Hopf,  AnalekUn,  391-8,  505,  515-16.  The  Gozzadini  had  taken 
Thermia  from  the  Castelli  (a  family  from  Treviso,  connected  with,  and 
attracted  to  Greece  by,  the  Catalans  of  Attica),  on  whom  Nicholas 
Sanudo  had  conferred  it  about  thirteen  years  earlier.  Like  the  Schiavi, 
they  were  one  of  the  two  or  three  middle-class  families  which  became 
barons  in  the  Cyclades,  and  their  sway  was  even  shorter. 

?  /#</.,  443.    A  coin  of  one  other  Duke,  John  I.,  is  in  the  Museo  Correr% 


\ 


588         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

a  garrison  at  Delos ;  while  at  Anaphe  the  Gozzadini,  and  at 
Siphnos  the  Da  Corogna,  asserted  their  independence,  alike 
of  Venice  and  of  the  duke. 

At  such  a  critical  period,  when  the  Turks  were  rapidly 
advancing,  it  was  most  important  that  the  minor  luminaries 
of  the  Archipelago  should  rally  round  the  duke.  The 
historian,  Sanudo  the  elder,  considered  that  his  ambitious 
relative  ought  to  sink  his  ancient  feud  with  the  Ghisi  and 
unite  with  them  in  keeping  up  one  galley,  while  the  Genoese 
barons  of  Chios  should  maintain  another,  against  the  common 
foe  of  Christendom.  "The  Turks,"  he  wrote  in  1326, 
"specially  infest  these  islands,  which  are  appurtenances  of 
the  principality  of  the  Morea"  (that  is  to  say,  the  duchy 
of  Naxos);  "and  if  help  be  not  forthcoming,  they  will  be 
lost  Indeed,  if  it  were  not  for  the  Zaccaria  of  Chios,  and 
Nicholas  Sanudo  of  Naxos,  and  the  Holy  House  of  the 
Hospital,  who  have  hitherto  defended  and  still  defend  them, 
those  islands  could  not  exist  Nor  do  I  believe,"  concludes 
the  pious  Venetian,  "  that  they  will  continue  to  exist,  without 
the  help  of  God  and  the  pope." x  Two  years  earlier  the  Turks 
had  ravaged  Naxos  during  the  absence  of  the  duke  in  Achaia; 
two  years  later  the  Venetian  bailie  of  Negroponte  wrote  that 
the  whole  Archipelago  threatened  to  fall  into  the  hands  of 
these  corsairs,  who  had  dragged  away  from  the  islands  some 
15,000  men  in  a  series  of  raids;  on  one  of  these  terrible 
visitations,  no  less  than  380  Turkish  vessels  with  40,000 
hands  on  board  plied  their  deadly  trade  in  the  fair  -^Egean, 
and  carried  off  more  than  10,000  souls.  But  even  these 
severe  lessons  failed  to  make  any  permanent  impression 
on  the  jealous  Latins  of  the  Levant  At  one  moment  we 
find  Nicholas  Sanudo  joining  Ghisi  and  the  Knights  of 
Rhodes  in  a  league  against  the  Turks;  at  another  we 
hear  that  he  has  attacked  Mykonos  in  his  colleague's 
absence,  and  carried  off  his  wife.  He  even  sends  six 
vessels  and  100  horsemen  to  assist  the  Greek  Emperor 
Andr6nikos  III.  in  capturing  Chios  from  the  bold  Genoese, 
Martino  Zaccaria,  titular  "  King  of  Asia  Minor,"  in  the 
heraldry  of   the  phantom   Latin   Empire,  who   had    killed 

1  Sanudo,  Secreta  Fidelium  Crucis%  2,  30,  294,  300,  302  ;  Villani  apud 
Muratori,  xiii.,  723 ;  Arch.  Veneio^  xx.,  86-9. 


TURKISH  RAIDS  589 

or  captured  no  fewer  than  io,ooo  Turks  in  his  fifteen  years' 
tenure  of  that  island,  and  he  showed  his  friendship  to  the 
emperor  by  appearing  in  person  to  pay  his  respects,  and 
to  offer  him  gifts.  His  relative,  Marin,  explains  that  he 
had  been  compelled  to  act  thus  by  the  apathy  of  those  from 
whom  he  had  a  right  to  expect  aid  in  recovering  and  pre- 
serving his  dominions — an  excuse  usually  made  for  unnatural 
alliances  in  the  Near  East  to-day.  Yet  the  duke  was  quite 
ready  to  join  the  Knights  of  Rhodes  and  Cattaneo,  the  lord 
Phokaia,  in  attacking  the  Greek  island  of  Lesbos  when 
opportunity  offered.  On  this  occasion,  however,  Nicholas 
was  well  served  by  Cattaneo,  who  prevented  his  allies  from 
plundering  and  dividing  the  island  between  .  themselves. 
The  result  of  these  animosities  among  the  Christians  was 
seen  in  1341,  the  last  year  of  the  duke's  reign,  when 
Omarbeg  of  Aidin,  the  same  satrap  who  was  pleased  to 
style  himself  "  Prince  of  Achaia,"  or  Morbassan,  ravaged 
the  islands  of  the  Archipelago  with  a  large  fleet,  and  forced 
them  for  the  first  time  to  pay  an  annual  tribute.1 

Nicholas's  brother  and  successor,  John  L,  took  an  active 
part  in  all  the  stirring  events  of  a  period  which  saw  the 
Turks  cross  over  into  Europe  and  the  Genoese  establish 
themselves  in  the  iEgean.  He  contributed  a  galley  to  the 
allied  fleet,  which,  under  the  auspices  of  Pope  Clement  VI., 
attacked  and  took  Smyrna  in  1343.  In  the  following  year, 
a  body  of  Turks,  led  by  a  Genoese  pirate,  occupied  the  lower 
town  of  Naxos,  plundered  the  island,  and  carried  off  6000  of 
his  subjects  into  slavery.  Two  years  later,  the  "  Black  Death  " 
traversed  the  Archipelago  in  its  course  across  Europe,  and. 
animals  as  well  as  human  beings  perished  in  its  embrace. 
His  fidelity  to  Venice,  which  had  assisted  him  with  arms 
against  the  Turks,  involved  him  in  the  great  war  between 
the  Venetian  and  Genoese  republics,  of  which  the  Levant 
was  the  theatre  in  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century.  So 
zealous  was  he  to  aid  his  old  home,  that  he  at  once  joined  his 
flotilla  to  the  Venetian  fleet,  and  was  about  to  proceed  in 
person  to  Venice  to  offer  his  aid,  when  the  Genoese  squadron 
of  fifteen  galleys  appeared   off  his  capital.    The  town  of 

1  N.  Gregorys,  i.,  438,  523-7,  597 ;  Cantacuzene,  i.,  385  ;  Secreta 
Fidclium  Cruets,  315  ;  Buondelmonti,  Liber  lnsularum,  ch.  xviii. 


\ 


590         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Naxos  surrendered,  and,  in  1354,  the  duke  was  taken  away 
as  a  captive  to  Genoa.  Keos  was  ravaged ;  Melos  and  other 
islands  fell  a  prey  to  the  Genoese ;  but  at  the  peace  of  1335 
the  duke  was  released,  and  they  were  restored  to  him.1  The 
critical  circumstances  of  the  time  taught  him  the  wisdom  of 
securing  unity  in  his  island  domain ;  he,  therefore,  pacified 
the  Ghisi  by  conferring  upon  them  the  island  of  Amorgos, 
which  his  father  had  taken  from  them,  as  a  fief  of  his  duchy, 
and  bought  off  any  claims  of  the  Barozzi  to  Santorin  by  a 
money  payment  The  Ghisi  did  not,  however,  long  retain 
the  island  of  fair  women ;  the  baron  of  Amorgos  was  so  rash 
as  to  take  part  in  the  great  insurrection  of  the  Venetian 
colonists  of  Crete  against  the  mother  country  in  1 363 ;  he 
atoned  for  this  act  of  treason  on  the  scaffold,  and  Venice 
took  possession  of  his  island.  But  the  Cyclades  were  no 
longer  desirable  acquisitions,  for  there  was  a  complete  dearth 
of  labour  to  cultivate  the  land.  We  are  told  at  this  time  that 
the  serfs  had  fled  from  Anaphe,  Amorgos,  and  Stampalia  to 
Crete,  because  they  did  not  think  it  worth  while  to  sow,  in 
order  that  Turks  and  Catalans  might  reap.  The  one  excep- 
tion to  this  general  state  of  desolation  was  the  island  of  Seriphos, 
a  rugged  rock,  possessed,  however,  of  mineral  wealth,  which 
is  still  exploited.  A  large  share  of  this  island  had  passed  to 
Ermolao  Minotto,  a  Venetian  noble,  who  worked  the  iron 
mines  and  made  it  one  of  the  richest  spots  in  the  Archipelago. 
The  serfs  had  saved  enough  money  to  purchase  their  enfran- 
chisement, and  the  importance  of  the  place  may  be  judged 
from  the  fact  that  Gregory  XI.  included  Minotto  among  the 
dignitaries  whom  he  summoned  to  the  congress  at  Thebes 

in  I373.2 

John  I.  of  Naxos  died3  in  1361,  leaving  an  only  daughter, 
Fiorenza,  an  extremely  eligible  young  widow,  for  she  was 
not  only  Duchess  of  the  Archipelago,  but  had  been  married 
to  one  of  the  great  Dalle  Carceri  clan,  who  owned  two  of 
the  three  big  baronies  of  Eubcea,  and  by  whom   she  had 

1  Lichtle,  Histoire  de  Naxie;  N.  Gregorys,  ii.,  797 ;  L.  de  Monads, 
222  ;  Romanin,  Storia  documentata  di  Venezia,  iii.,  194. 

2  Ersch  und  Graber,  lxvi.,  338,  343  ;  Hopf,  AnalekUn,  438. 

3  Predelli,  Comtnemoriali,  II.,  327,  whence  Count  Mas  Latrie  {La 
Dues  de  PArchipel,  8)  infers  that  he  was  already  dead. 


FIORENZA'S  WOOING  591 

had  one  son,  still  a  mere  child.  It  was  the  first  time  that 
this  romantic  duchy  had  been  governed  by  a  woman,  and 
needless  to  say,  there  was  no  lack  of  competitors  for  the 
hand  of  the  fair  Fiorenza.  Over  her  second  marriage  there 
now  raged  a  diplomatic  battle,  which  was  waged  by  Venice 
with  all  the  unscrupulousness  shown  by  that  astute  republic 
whenever  its  supremacy  was  at  stake.  The  first  of  this 
mediaeval  Penelope's  suitors  was  a  Genoese,  the  most 
important  of  the  merchant  adventurers,  or  maonesi,  who 
held  the  rich  island  of  Chios  much  as  modern  chartered 
companies  have  held  parts  of  Africa  under  the  suzerainty 
of  the  Home  Government  Venice  had  viewed  with  alarm 
the  recent  establishment  of  Genoese  influence  at  Chios  and 
Lesbos,  and  she  was  resolved  that  no  Genoese  citizen  should 
be  installed  at  Naxos  and  in  Eubcea  as  Fiorenza's  consort 
The  lady  was  therefore  solemnly  warned  not  to  bestow 
her  hand  upon  an  enemy  of  the  republic,  when  so  many 
eligible  husbands  could  be  found  at  Venice  or  in  the 
Venetian  colonies  of  Crete  and  Eubcea.  At  the  same  time, 
the  bailie  of  Negroponte  was  instructed  to  hinder  the 
Genoese  marriage  by  fair  means  or  foul.  The  beauteous 
Fiorenza's  mother  meekly  replied  that  her  daughter  had 
never  dreamt  of  marrying  anyone  unacceptable  to  the  most 
serene  republic;  but  soon  afterwards  the  young  widow 
showed  a  desire  to  accept  the  suit  of  Nerio  Acciajuoli, 
the  future  Duke  of  Athens,  whose  family  had  long  had  her 
in  view  as  a  desirable  match  for  one  of  its  members.  This 
alliance  the  republic  vetoed  with  the  same  emphasis  as  the 
former;  but  the  Acciajuoli  had  much  influence  at  the 
Neapolitan  court,  and  Nerio  was  therefore  able  to  obtain 
the  consent  of  Robert  of  Taranto,  who,  as  Prince  of  Achaia, 
was  suzerain  of  the  duchy.  To  his  letter  requesting  Venice 
not  to  interfere  with  the  matrimonial  arrangements  of  his 
vassal,  the  Venetians  replied  that  Fiorenza  was  also  a 
daughter  of  the  republic,  that  her  ancestors  had  won  the 
duchy  under  its  auspices,  had  been  protected  by  its  fleets, 
and  owed  the  continued  existence  of  their  dominions  to  its 
diplomacy.  Simultaneous  orders  were  sent  to  the  com- 
mander of  the  Venetian  fleet  in  Greek  waters  to  oppose, 
by  force  if  necessary,  the  landing  of  Nerio  in  the  Cyclades. 


k 


592         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

The  Venetian  agents  in  the  Levant  had,  however,  no  need 
of  further  instructions.  They  knew  what  was  expected  of 
them,  and  were  confident  that  their  action,  if  successful, 
would  not  be  disowned.  Fiorenza  was  kidnapped,  placed 
on  board  a  Venetian  galley,  and  quietly  conveyed  to  Crete. 
There  she  was  treated  with  every  mark  of  respect,  but  was 
at*  the  same  time  plainly  informed  that,  if  she  ever  wished 
to  see  her  beloved  Naxos  again,  she  must  marry  her  cousin 
Nicholas  Sanudo  "  Spezzabanda,"  the  candidate  of  the 
republic  and  son  of  a  large  proprietor  in  Euboea.  The 
daring  of  this  young  man,  which  had  gained  him  his 
nickname,  "the  disperser  of  a  host,"  may  have  impressed 
the  susceptible  duchess  no  less  than  the  difficulties  of  her 
position.  At  any  rate,  she  consented  to  marry  him ;  the 
republic  expressed  its  complete  satisfaction,  and  pledged 
itself  to  protect  the  duchy  against  all  its  enemies.  "  Spezza- 
banda"  showed  his  gratitude  to  his  Venetian  patrons  by 
going  with  a  flotilla  to  assist  in  suppressing  the  great 
Cretan  insurrection  of  this  period,  and  loyally  administered, 
with  the  title  of  duke,1  the  dominions  of  his  wife  till  her 
death  in  1371.  As  his  stepson  was  still  not  of  age,  he 
continued  to  govern  the  duchy  in  his  name,  as  avogiert  or 
tutor.  It  was  to  his  influence  in  this  capacity  that  we  may 
attribute  the  grant  of  Andros,  the  second  island  of  the 
Archipelago,  as  a  fief  to  his  little  daughter  Maria  Sanudo— 
an  act  which  weakened  the  state  at  a  moment  when  it 
needed  a  centralised  administration.2  Andros  had  been  an 
immediate  possession  of  the  dukes  for  over  a  century;  it 
never  again  enjoyed  personal  union  with  Naxos. 

When  young  Niccol6  dalle  Carceri  came  of  age,  he  proved 
to  be  the  worst  ruler  who  had  ever  reigned  over  the 
Archipelago.  Hitherto,  the  dukes  had  had  no  interests 
outside  their  duchy,  and  had  always  resided  in  it,  either  at 
Naxos  or  at  Andros.  But  their  successor  was,  unfortunately, 
a  great  baron  in  Euboea  as  well,  and  lived  most  of  his  time 
in  the  latter  island,  for  which  he  cared  more  than  for  his 
ducal  throne.     Leaving  one  of  the  Gozzadini  of  Anaphe  to 

1  All  the  documents  are  given  by  Gerland,  op.  cit,  138-49.     C/.  also 
Buchon,  Nouvelles  RecherchtSy  II.,  i.,  175. 

2  Magno,  182  ;  Sdthas,  i.,  204. 


MURDER  OF  NICCOLO  DALLE  CARCERI        593 

act  as  regent  for  him  at  Naxos,  he  schemed  to  extend  his 
possessions  in  Eubcea,  and  in   1380,  while   Venice   was  at 
war  with   Genoa,  he   plotted   the   capture    of   the  city  of 
Negroponte  with  the  assistance  of  the  Navarrese  Company, 
which  had  then  entered  Attica.     While  this  act  of  treachery 
irritated  Venice,  which  had  helped  him  with  a  galley  against 
the  Turks,  he  aroused  the  strongest  resentment  among  his 
subjects  by  his  extortion,  and  they  found  a  ready  leader  in 
an  Italian  who  had  recently  become  connected  by  marriage 
with  the   Sanudo  family.    This  man,  Francesco   Crispo — a 
name  which  suggested   to  biographers  of  the  late   Italian 
Prime  Minister   a   possible   relationship — belonged,  like  the 
Dalle  Carceri,  to  a   Lombard   family  from   Verona,  which 
had  settled  in  Negroponte,  where  Francesco,  or  Franguli,  as 
the  Greeks  called  him,  held  the  barony  of  Astrogidis.     A 
few  years  before  he  had   married  the  daughter  of  Marco 
Sanudo,  brother  of  Duke  John  I.  and  baron  of  Melos,  which 
would    seem    to   have    prospered    greatly  under    his    rule. 
Crispo  had   succeeded   his   father-in-law   as  baron  of   that 
island,  but  aimed  at  being  something  more  than  a  vassal 
of  the  young  Duke  of  Naxos.     He  sounded  the  discontented 
in   several   of  the   islands,  and   set  out  for    Naxos,  where 
Niccold  chanced  to  be.     According  to  one  story,  the  duke 
met  his  fate  in  his  capital ;  according  to  another,  a  ducal 
hunting-party  in  the  interior  of  the  island  gave  Crispo  an 
opportunity  for  carrying  out  his  plan.    The  merry  band  of 
huntsmen    set    out    for    the    lovely    valley  of   Melanes,  a 
paradise  of  oranges  and   lemons,  where  the    duke  had  a 
villa,  still  called  ApIientikS, "  the  lord's  domain."     After  the 
luncheon,    they    proceeded    to    a    spot    where    game    was 
plentiful,   Crispo  leading    the   way  with   the    duke's    most 
trusty  friends,  so  that  his  unsuspecting  host  was  left  with 
his    own    minions.     Suddenly,   on    the    mountain-side    the 
duke's  companions    fell    upon   him ;    in    vain    he  tried  to 
defend  himself;  a  sword-cut  laid  him  dead  on  the  ground. 
The    murderers,    carefully    instructed    by    their    employer, 
hastened   after    him,   and    told    how    the  duke    had    been 
attacked  by  a  body  of  strange  horsemen,  who  had  either 
killed  or  carried  him  off— which  of  the  two  they  had  not 
stopped  to  enquire.    Crispo  feigned  amazement  and  indig- 

2  P 


594         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

nation  at  his  kinsman's  fate ;  he  was  for  returning  at  once 
to  the  scene  of  the  murder,  but  allowed  himself  to  be 
dissuaded  by  his  partisans,  who  begged  him  not  to  expose 
his  life  also  to  an  ambuscade.  Two  horsemen,  sent  back  to 
investigate,  reported  that  they  had  found  the  duke  lying 
in  his  blood;  one  of  Crispo's  intimates  urged  him  to  seize 
the  fortresses  of  the  island  at  once,  in  order  to  prevent  the 
designs  of  the  mysterious  assailants  of  the  unfortunate 
Niccol6.  Crispo  at  once  occupied  the  ducal  castle  of  Naxos; 
and  the  Naxiotes,  glad  to  be  freed  from  their  tyrant, 
unanimously  accepted  him  as  their  duke,  for,  in  virtue  of 
his  wife,  he  was  the  next-of-kin  to  the  late  ruler,  with  the 
exception  of  Niccol6's  two  step-sisters.  Thus,  in  1383,  a  new 
dynasty  arose  in  the  Archipelago,  which  lasted  for  nearly  two 
hundred  years.  The  Sanudi  disappeared  from  Naxos;  but 
illegitimate  descendants  of  the  Dalle  Carceri  lingered  on 
there  as  late  as  the  seventeenth  century,  and  their  arms  still 
adorn  the  pavement  before  the  door  of  the  Greek  cathedral.1 
Even  in  our  own  time,  the  assassination  of  a  sovereign  has 
not  prevented  Christian  Europe  from  recognising  his  successor, 
and  the  Venetians  were  avowedly  politicians  first  and 
Christians  afterwards.  They  had  no  reason  to  love  the 
murdered  duke,  who  had  plotted  against  them,  while  his 
assassin  was  a  man  of  energy,  who  could  defend  the  duchy 
against  the  Turks,  and,  being  an  usurper,  would  be  more 
amenable  to  Venetian  influence  than  the  legitimate  dynasty. 
Like  his  modern  imitator,  Francesco  Crispo  found  a  high 
ecclesiastic  to  act  as  his  apologist ;  the  bishop  of  Melos  went 
as  his  envoy  to  obtain  the  consent  of  Venice  to  his  usurpation, 
and  to  prepare  the  way  for  a  visit  from  himsel£  Everyone 
wrote  in  his  favour — the  Latin  nobles  of  the  Archipelago 
and  the  Duke  of  Candia  alike ;  of  all  the  barons  of  the 
Cyclades,  Januli  Gozzadini,  the  late  duke's  viceroy,  alone  had 
the  chivalry  to  protest  against  him.  By  a  clever  stroke  of 
diplomacy,  the  usurper  won  the  bailie  of  Negroponte  to  his 
cause  by  depriving  Maria  Sanudo,  the  late  duke's  half-sister, 

1  Magno,  182-3;  Rubi6,  Los  Navarros,  436 ;  Sauger,  185-92  ;  Lichtle; 
Buchon,  in  Revue  de  Paris,  xvii.,  269  ;  Byz.  Zeitsckrift,  xvi.,  259  ;  Revue 
deP  Orient  latin,  iii.,  581.  The  family  arms  given  by  Turresanus  are, 
however,  quite  different. 


FRANCESCO  CRISPCTS  USURPATION  595 

of  her  island  of  Andros,  and  bestowing  it,  combined  with  Syra, 
upon  the  bailie's  son,  Pietro  Zeno,  together  with  the  hand  of 
one  of  his  own  daughters.  A  proposed  matrimonial  alliance 
between  one  of  his  sons  and  a  daughter  of  the  doge,  gained 
over  the  chief  magistrate.  Two  voices  alone  were  raised 
against  him — those  of  Maria  Sanudo  and  of  the  late  duke's 
widow.  The  latter,  who  had  trumped  Crispo's  cards  by 
herself  marrying  a  son  of  the  doge,  was  ultimately  pacified  by 
a  widow's  portion  near  the  hot  baths  of  iEdepsos  in  Euboea  ; 
the  former,  whom  Crispo  hypocritically  pretended  to  "  treat  as 
his  own  child,"  received  as  compensation  the  marble  island  of 
Paros,  on  condition  that  she  married  Gasparo  di  Sommaripa, 
a  member  of  a  family  which  still  flourishes  in  the  Archipelago. 
Originally  descended  from  the  Marquis  de  Sommerive,  in 
Languedoc,  they  had  emigrated  to  Verona,  whence,  like  the 
Dalle  Carceri  and  the  Crispi,  they  had  come  to  seek  their 
fortune  in  Greece.  Various  motives  seem  to  have  operated 
with  Crispo  in  the  choice  of  the  man.  The  Sommaripa  may 
very  likely  have  been  connected  with  the  Dalle  Carceri,  in 
which  case  he  would  think  it  desirable  to  pacify  a  dangerous 
rival ;  or  else  he  may  have  considered  that  a  man  who  had 
hitherto  held  no  position  in  the  feudal  world  of  Greece, 
would  feel  gratitude  to  his  benefactor ;  a  third  reason,  we  are 
expressly  told,  was  to  neutralise  the  claims  of  Maria  Sanudo 
by  marrying  her  to  one  who  was  regarded  in  the  exclusive 
circles  of  the  Archipelago  as  a  parvenu.  In  this,  however,  he 
was  disappointed;  she  did  not  abandon  her  claim,  and, 
though  her  husband  appealed  in  vain  to  his  relative,  Giovanni 
Galeazzo  Visconti  of  Milan,  after  a  long  and  wearisome 
litigation  their  son  regained,  half  a  century  later,  his  mother's 
island  of  Andros.1 

The  Venetians  had  every  reason  to  be  content  with  the 
usurpation  of  Francesco  Crispo.  It  gave  them  a  free  hand  in 
Euboea,  for  he  prudently  made  no  claim  to  succeed  the  late 
duke  in  the  two  great  baronies  of  that  island,   which  thus 

1  Magno,  183-5;  Sanudo  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  779,  783;  Lichtlc ; 
Sauger,  325  et  sqg. ;  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  78 ;  Codice  CicognOy 
2532,  §  34.  The  first  of  these  reasons  seems  to  have  been  the  tradition  in 
Naxos,  for  Sauger  makes  Crispo  anxious  to  discredit  Sommaripa  by 
accusing  him  of  the  late  duke's  murder. 


596         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

passed  under  Venetian  influence;  it  made  the  Archipelago 
much  more  dependent  upon  the  good  will  of  the  republic, 
which  henceforth  took  a  keener  interest  in  its  preservation. 
In  the  person  of  Pietro  Zeno,  the  new  baron  of  Andros,  she 
found  the  most  useful  diplomatist  of  the  age,  a  man  perfectly 
familiar  with  every  phase  of  the  Eastern  question,  whom  she 
employed  in  all  her  delicate  negotiations  in  the  Levant 
Moreover,  in  1390,  the  Ghisi  family,  the  second  most 
important  dynasty  in  the  Cyclades,  came  to  an  end  in  Tenos 
and  Mykonos,  and  those  islands,  with  Delos,  passed  by  will 
into  her  hands.  There  are  still  Ghisi  in  Greece — the 
author  has  met  them  at  Athens — proud  of  their  genealogical 
trees,  conscious  of  their  aristocratic  past ;  but  they  never  held 
sway  again  in  their  ancestral  islands.  Thus,  Venice  became 
paramount  in  the  Archipelago ;  in  the  very  year  of  Crispo's 
usurpation,  Jacques  de  Baux,  the  last  Angevin  Prince  of 
Achaia  had  died,  so  that  the  new  duke  had  nothing  to  hope 
for  from  the  old  feudal  overlords  of  the  duchy.  Venice,  on 
the  other  hand,  assisted  him  with  vessels  against  the 
privateers  of  the  Sultan  Bajazet,  and  included  him  in  her 
treaties  with  that  sovereign  and  other  Levantine  powers, 
only  protesting  when  he  himself  indulged  in  piratical  expedi- 
tions as  far  as  the  Syrian  coasts.  There  can  be  no  doubt 
that  the  Greeks  preferred  the  rule  of  Venice  in  the  Archi- 
pelago to  that  of  the  petty  barons.  When  Tenos  and 
Mykonos  became  Venetian,  the  islanders  implored  the 
republic  not  to  dispose  of  them,  and  declared  that  they  would 
emigrate  into  some  other  Venetian  colony  rather  than 
remain  in  their  own  island,  if  it  were  bought  by  Pietro  Zeno 
of  Andros.1  "No  lordship  under  heaven,"  they  protested, 
"  is  as  just  and  good  as  that  of  Venice,"  and  this  was  not 
altogether  an  exaggeration,  as  an  incident  which  occurred 
at  that  time  in  the  Archipelago  showed. 

In  the  flourishing  island  of  Seriphos,  the  wise  rule  of 
Ermolao  Minotto  had  been  followed  by  the  grinding  tryanny 
of  a  perfect  fiend  in  human  shape,  a  Venetian  noble,  Niccol6 
Adoldo.  Fortunately  for  the  Seriphians,  their  lord  was 
usually  an  absentee,  preferring  the  delights  of  Venice  to 
residence  in  the  island,  which  the  ancient  Greeks  and 
1  Predelli,  Commemoriali^  iii.,  278. 


TYRANNY  IN  SERIPHOS  597 

Romans  alike  had  regarded  as  the  abomination  of  desolation, 
and  which  the  fifteenth  century  traveller,  Bartolomeo  dalli 
Sonetti,  calls  Serfeno  de  la  calamitate.  But  from  time  to  time 
Adoldo  descended  upon  Seriphos  for  the  purpose  of  wringing 
more  money  from  his  unhappy  subjects.  On  one  of  these  occa- 
sions, he  landed  with  a  band  of  Cretan  mercenaries — the  worst 
species  of  cut-throats  —  invited  various  leading  Seriphians 
to  dinner  in  his  castle,  and  then  had  them  arrested.  The 
most  awful  tortures  failed  to  make  them  disclose  the  spot 
where  they  had  concealed  their  money,  whereupon  the 
baffled  tyrant  hurled  them  from  the  castle  battlements  to 
death  on  the  stones  below.  Seriphos  was  a  remote  island 
*n  1 393 — it  is  not  very  accessible  now — but  in  course  of  time 
the  news  of  this  massacre  reached  Venice,  for  the  Venetian 
families  of  Michieli  and  Giustiniani  had  also  shares  of 
Seriphos,  and  Adoldo  had  encroached  upon  their  rights. 
He  was  accordingly  put  on  his  trial  for  cruelty  and  murder, 
sentenced  to  two  years'  confinement  "  in  the  lower  prisons," 
and  forbidden  ever  to  revisit  his  island,  his  share  of  which 
was  sequestered  by  the  republic  Thus,  the  islanders  had  an 
object-lesson  in  the  vengeance  which  Venice  meted  out  to 
tyrants  who  happened  to  be  her  citizens.  As  for  Adoldo,  he 
died  at  a  ripe  old  age  in  the  odour  of  sanctity ;  his  remains 
were  interred  in  the  church  of  S.  Simeone  Piccolo,  which  he 
endowed,  and  a  splendid  tomb  was  erected  over  his  unworthy 
ashes.1 

Francesco  Crispo  died  in  1 397,  leaving  a  large  family  of 
sons,  and  the  necessity  of  providing  for  them  led  to  the 
further  sub-division  of  the  duchy  into  baronial  fiefs.  Thus, 
while  his  eldest  son,  Giacomo  I.,  succeeded  him  as  Duke  of 
Naxos,  another  of  his  children  received  Melos  and  Kimolos, 
a  third  Anaphe,  a  fourth  Syra,  and  a  fifth  Ios.  Giacomo, 
though  he  gained  the  epithet  of  "  the  Pacific,"  was  none 
the  less  ready  to  join  the  other  Christian  powers  of  the 
Levant  in  defending  their  common  interests  against  the 
Turks,  whose  great  defeat  by  the  Mongols  at  Angora  had 
given  the  Archipelago  a  merely  temporary  respite  from 
attack.  Thus,  he  was  a  member  of  the  Christian  League, 
on  whose  behalf  his  brother-in-law  and  vassal,  Pietro  Zeno 
1  Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxvi.,  344. 


\ 


598         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

of  Andros,  concluded  the  very  advantageous  treaty  of  1403 
with  the  new  Sultan  Suleyman.1  A  year  later  he  even  visited 
England  to  invoke  the  aid  of  Henry  IV.  Our  enterprising 
sovereign  was  not  able  to  assist  him,  though  he  had  at  one 
time  intended  to  lead  an  army  "  as  far  as  to  the  sepulchre  of 
Christ " ;  but,  when  Henry  Beaufort,  bishop  of  Winchester, 
made  a  pilgrimage  to  Palestine  in  141 8,  he  was  conveyed 
back  to  Venice  on  one  of  Pietro  Zeno's  galleys — the  only 
connection,  so  far  as  we  have  been  able  to  discover,  between 
England  and  the  duchy.2  The  duke  was  ready,  too,  to  join 
his  galley  to  those  of  the  Venetian  colonies  in  a  campaign 
against  the  Turks  on  the  coast  of  Asia  Minor,  and  Venice 
not  only  described  him  as  her  "  good  and  dear  friend,"  but 
used  her  friendly  offices  with  the  sultans  Musa  and 
Mohammed  I.,  and  with  Elias  Bey,  the  ruler  of  Caria,  to 
preserve  the  Archipelago  from  depredations,  besides  allowing 
her  protigi  to  buy  arms  from  her  arsenal  and  to  export 
cypress  wood  from  Crete  for  the  fortification  of  his  islands, 
None  the  less,  however,  did  the  duchy  suffer  from  the  raids 
of  the  inevitable  Turks,  which,  as  Zeno  told  the  Venetian 
Government,  were  of  daily  occurrence.  In  1416,  the  tactless 
omission  of  the  duke  to  salute  Mohammed  I.  at  Smyrna 
brought  a  large  Turkish  fleet  down  upon  the  Cyclades,  which 
carried  off  many  of  the  inhabitants  of  Andros,  Melos,  and 
Paros,  and  did  a  vast  amount  of  damage.  Venice  avenged 
this  attack  upon  one  who,  in  the  words  of  the  Byzantine 
historian,  "  had  long  been  her  vassal  and  flown  her  flag,"  by 
the  naval  victory  of  Gallipoli,3  but  the  injury  inflicted  on  the 
islands  was  so  great,  that  some  of  them  were  almost  depopu- 
lated. The  Florentine  priest  Buondelmonti,  who  spent  four 
years  at  this  time, "  in  fear  and  great  anxiety,"  travelling  among 
the  Cyclades,  of  which  he  has  left  us  one  of  the  earliest  accounts 
composed  by  any  writer  during  the  Frankish  domination, 
depicts  life  in  the  Archipelago  in  gloomy  colours.  At  both 
Naxos  and  Siphnos  there  was  such  a  lack  of  men,  that  many 
women  were   unable   to   find   husbands ;   in   fact    the   small 

1  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Dipiomatariumy  ii.,  290-3. 
3  Sdthas,    ii.,    125  ;    Sanudo    apud   Muratori,    xxii.,    923 ;    Antonio 
Morosini,  Chronique,  ii.,  164. 

3  Doukas,  109 ;  S£thas,  ii.,  174 ;  iii.,  92-3,  112. 


LIFE  IN  THE  CYCLADES  599 

and  wretched  population  of  the  latter  island,  still  the  absolute 
property  of  the  Da  Corogna,  who  had  a  tower  there  in  a  lovely 
garden,  was  mainly  composed  of  females,  who  were  zealous 
Catholics,  though  they  did  not  understand  a  word  of  the  Latin 
language,  in  which  their  services  were  held.  At  Seriphos, 
so  rich  forty  years  earlier,  the  cultured  Florentine  found 
"  nothing  but  calamity  "  ;  the  people  passed  their  lives  "  like 
brutes,"  and  were  in  constant  fear,  day  and  night,  lest  they 
should  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Infidels,  though  Venice  had 
the  island  included  in  her  treaties  with  the  Turks,  like  so 
many  others  of  the  Cyclades.1  Syra,  destined  in  modern 
times  to  be  the  most  flourishing  of  all  the  islands,  was  then 
"  comparatively  of  no  account " ;  the  islanders  fed  on  carobs 
and  goats'  flesh,  and  led  a  life  of  continual  anxiety,  though 
a  strong  sense  of  clannishness  bound  them  to  their  poverty- 
stricken  home.  The  people  of  Paros  were  in  the  same  plight, 
the  principal  town  of  Paroikia  had  few  citizens,  while  pirates 
frequented  the  big  bay  of  Naoussa.  Antiparos  and  Sikinos 
were  abandoned  to  eagles  and  wild  asses,  and  most  of  the 
islets  were  deserted.  Compared  with  the  other  islands, 
Andros  had  suffered  least,  owing  no  doubt  to  the  energetic 
personality  of  Zeno,  the  "  Duke  of  Andros,"  as  he  was  some- 
times called,2  and  the  vigour  of  Januli  della  Grammatica,  his 
henchman.  But  even  Zeno  found  it  politic  to  harbour  the 
dreaded  foes  of  Christendom  in  his  island,  just  as  the  duke  of 
Naxos  gave  shelter  to  corsairs  from  Catalufia  and  Biscay.8 
The  one  place  in  the  iEgean  which  the  Mussulmans  never 
molested  was  the  monastery  of  Patmos,  whose  monks  were  on 
the  best  of  terms  with  them.  In  order  to  repair  the  ravages 
made  by  the  Turkish  raids,  several  of  the  island  barons  took 
steps  at  this  time  to  repopulate  their  desolate  possessions. 
Thus,  Marco  Crispo  colonised  Ios  with  Albanians  from  the 
Morea,  and  strengthened  the  defences  of  the  place  by  building 
a  castle  and  a  town  at  its  foot,  the  remains  of  which  may  still 
be  seen.4    To  this  castle  the  peasants  used  to  climb  up  every 

1  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  295,  320. 

2  Sanudo,  xxii.,  896. 

3  Sdthas,  ii.,  255  ;  iii.,  158  ;  Revue  de  I *  Orient latin,  iv.,  319. 

4  Sauger,  214-15;  Tournefort,  i.,  95-6;   Pasch  von  Krienen,  Breve 
Dcscrizione^  31. 


1 


600         THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

evening  from  their  plots  of  land  in  the  rich  plain  below,  nor 
did  they  dare  to  open  the  gates  in  the  morning  and   sally 
forth,  till  the  old  women  whom  they  had  sent  out  as  spies 
before  dawn,  reported  that  the  coast  was  clear  and  no  pirate 
craft  was  careening  in  the  fine  harbour.     In  141 3   Giovanni 
Quirini   of  Stampalia,  who  was  also  administering    Tenos 
and  Mykonos  for  the   Venetians,  proceeded   to  repopulate 
his  own  island,  which  had  never  recovered  from  the  great 
raid  of  Omarbeg  Morbassan   seventy  years  before,  at  the 
expense  of  the    two   Venetian   colonies  committed    to   his 
charge.     This  wholesale  emigration  of  Teniotes  to  Stampalia 
attracted    great    notice    throughout   the    Archipelago.     An 
inscription,  together  with  a  stone  escutcheon  quartering  the 
three  lilies  of  the  Quirini,  and  his  wife's  nine  counters,  in  the 
chapel  of  the  castle   at   Stampalia  which  he  restored,  still 
reminds  us  that  the  "  Count  of  Tenos,"  as  he  styled  himself, 
began  the  importation  of  the  colonists  on  30th  March  1413, 
the  feast  of  the  translation  of  his  patron  saint,  S.   Quirinus, 
and  almost  every  successive  traveller  in  the  Cyclades  alludes 
to  it.     But  Venice  naturally  objected  to  the  depopulation  of 
her  two  islands  ;  Quirini  was  ordered  to  return  thither  with  all 
the  people  whom  he  had  transported,  and  not  to  move  more 
than  twenty-five  miles  from  his  office.1     Similarly,  the  Goz- 
zadini  repopulated  the  town  of  Thermia,  which  the  Turks  had 
taken  by  treachery,  and  it  was  probably  at  this  period  that 
the  Albanians  crossed  over  from  Euboea  to  settle  in  the  north 
of  Andros — the  only  island  of  the  Cyclades  which  still  retains 
an  Albanian  population.      Under  these  circumstances,  the 
mineral  resources  of  the  islands,  except  the   Parian  marble 
quarries,  could  not  be  exploited.    The  gold  found  in  some  parts 
of  Naxos  was  left  unworked,  and  the  emery  mines  of  that 
island,  which  Buondelmonti  mentions,  and  which  are  now  so 
profitable  to  the  Greek  Government,  do  not  seem  to   have 
been  a  source  of  revenue  to  the  duke,  who  was  obliged  to  raise 
money  for  the  payment  of  his  liabilities  by  the  sale  of  horses 
and  mules  at  Candia,  just  as,  even  then,  the  cattle  of  Tenos 
were  highly  esteemed.2     Buondelmonti  mentions  the  sulphur 

1  Buchon,  Atlas,  xlii.,  2,  3  ;  Sdthas,  iii.,  4  ;  Buondelmonti,  ch.  xviii. ; 
Bartolomeo  dalli  Sonetti,  12  ;  Boschini,  L 'Archipelago,  20  ;  BmS.A.y  xiin 
152.  *  -  Sathas,  ii.,  129,  130,  279 ;  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  177. 


THE  SALIC  LAW  601 

springs  and  the  millstones  of  Melos,  and  alludes  to  an 
unsuccessful  experiment  made  by  Duke  Giacomo  to  plumb 
the  unfathomable  depths  of  the  crater  which  forms  the 
harbour  of  Santorin.1 

Giacomo  I.  died  of  a  flux  at  Ferrara  in  141 8  on  his  way 
to  meet  Pope  Martin  V.  at  Mantua.8  He  had  played  a 
considerable  part  in  the  Levantine  politics  of  his  time ;  he 
had  been  instrumental  in  arranging  the  retrocession  of 
Corinth  to  the  Greeks  by  the  Knights  of  St  John ; 8  his 
possession  of  his  father's  usurped  throne  was  little  disturbed 
by  the  continual  appeals  for  pecuniary  compensation,  which 
the  widow  of  the  last  legitimate  duke  made  against  him  at 
Venice,  and  to  which  he  opposed  the  usual  dilatory  tactics 
of  Italy,  supported  by  the  normal  impecuniosity  of  the 
Levant.  By  his  will  he  appointed  his  brother  John  as  his 
successor,  thus  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  duchy 
setting  aside  the  usual  custom  of  the  Empire  of  Romania, 
according  to  which  one  of  his  daughters  should  have  suc- 
ceeded him.  It  might  have  been  well  for  the  rest  of  Greece, 
had  this  frank  recognition  of  the  advantages  of  the  Salic 
lav/  in  troublous  times  been  generally  accepted ;  certainly 
the  history  of  the  Frankish  states  would  have  been  more 
pacific,  if  less  picturesque.  At  any  rate,  Giacomo  I.  thus 
set  a  precedent,  which  was  subsequently  followed ;  no  woman 
sat  again  on  the  sea-girt  throne  of  the  Archipelago. 

The  Venetian  Government,  long  anxious  to  obtain  a 
hold  over  the  duchy,  thought  that  the  time  had  come  for  a 
decisive  step.  It  was  accordingly  proposed  to  occupy  the 
late  Duke's  dominions  in  the  name  of  his  widow  and  her 
mother,  and  to  confirm  all  his  brothers  in  their  respective 
fiefs,  on  condition  that  they  paid  the  same  homage  as  before. 
In  that  case,  the  republic  would  be  willing  to  put  the  castle 
of  Naxos  into  thorough  repair.  A  Venetian  ambassador 
was  to  convey  these  proposals  to  Niccol6  Crispo  of  Syra, 
who  was  acting  as  regent  in  the  absence  of  the  late  duke. 
But  more  prudent  counsels  prevailed.  Niccol6,  it  was 
pointed  out,  was  not  only  an  adversary  of  Venetian  rule,  but 
had  a  Genoese  wife — Recording  to  another  account  she  was  a 

1  Buondelmonti,  chs.  xviii.-xx.,  xxiv.-vi.,  xxviii.-xxx.,  xxxii.-iv.,  xxxvii., 
xl.,  xlix.,  lxxix.  3  Sdthas,  i.,  96.  3  Bosio,  pt.  ii.,  121. 


602        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Princess  of  Trebizond — while  his  brother  John,  the  late 
duke's  heir,  was  fond  of  Venice.  He  was  in  the  habit  of 
residing  there  for  months  at  a  time ;  he  was  at  that  moment 
staying  with  his  sister-in-law  at  the  convent  of  S.  Maria 
delle  Vergini,  now  used  as  a  magazine;  and  he  chose  his 
wife,  not  from  Genoa  or  Trebizond,  but  from  among  the 
daughters  of  the  republic1  It  was  therefore  decided  to 
recognise  him  as  duke,  provided  that  he  took  an  oath  of 
obedience  to  Venice  and  acknowledged  his  duchy  to  be  a 
Venetian  dependency.  A  Venetian  galley  was  accordingly 
made  ready  to  conduct  him  either  to  his  capital  or  to  his 
own  island  of  Melos.  He  had  the  sense  to  meet  any  possible 
opposition  from  his  brothers  by  increasing  their  already 
considerable  appanages,  bestowing  Santorin,  which  had  been 
united  with  Naxos  for  over  eighty  years,  upon  Niccolo  of 
Syra,  and  Therasia  upon  Marco  of  Ios — an  arrangement 
which,  though  doubtless  inevitable,  tended  to  weaken  the 
unity  of  the  State.  But  where  there  was  a  large  ducal 
family,  subdivision  was  the  only  alternative  to  civil  war/ 
On  the  other  hand,  the  new  duke  acted  with  a  complete  lack 
of  chivalry  towards  his  sister-in-law  and  her  mother,  Maria 
Sanudo,  reducing  them  to  penury  and  exile  by  depriving 
them  of  their  islands  of  Paros  and  Antiparos,  valuable  pos- 
sessions which  each  furnished  thirty  sailors  to  the  ducal  galleys, 
and  restoring  them  to  the  unfortunate  ladies  only  after  strong 
and  repeated  remonstrances  from  Venice,  backed  by  force.8 

John  II.,  though  he  had  succeeded  to  the  duchy  with  the 
full  approval  of  Venice,  found  that,  in  that  time  of  stress, 
she  was  not  always  able  to  protect  her  distant  nominee. 
Occasionally  she  would  give  him  a  galley  for  his  defence 
against  the  Turks;  and  in  her  treaties  with  Mohammed  I. 
and  Mur&d  II.  in  1419  and  1430,  she  inserted  a  clause  to  the 
effect  that  he  and  his  brothers  should  be  included  in  the 
terms  of  peace,  treated  as  Venetians,  and  exempted  from 

1  Sanudo  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  923 ;  Antonio  Morosini,  loc.  ciL ; 
Cicogna,  Iscrizioni  Veneziane,  v.,  92,  629  (whose  quotation  from  the 
chronide  of  the  convent  obviously  refers  to  this  duke);  Sdthas,  i.,  96-101; 
Sansovino,  Cronologia  del  Afondo,  f.  184. 

2  Sauger,  213. 

3  Sdthas,  i.,  124,  129-33  J  "i-i  220,  223-4,  283  ;  Revue  de  ?  Orient 
latin,  v.,  137. 


1 


THE  CRISPI  AND  GENOA  603 

tribute  and  other  molestation.  Indeed,  in  a  schedule  of  the 
former  treaty,  the  sultan  expressly  stated  that  he  reckoned 
"  Santorin,  Anaphe,  Therasia,  Astypalaia,  Thermia,  Amorgos, 
Ios,  Paros,  Naxos,  Syra,  Melos,  Siphnos,  Keos,  Seriphos, 
Tenos,  Mykonos,  and  Andros "  as  all  Venetian.  But,  in 
1426,  the  proud  republic  frankly  confessed  that  she  could 
not  help  him,  and  was  content  that  he  and  Zeno  of  Andros 
should  make  the  best  terms  they  could  with  the  Turks,  so  as 
to  save  their  islands,  provided  only  that  they  neither  received 
nor  victualled  Turkish  ships,  nor  in  any  way  aided  those 
foes  of  Christendom.  The  duke,  however,  not  only  agreed  to 
pay  tribute  and  to  open  his  ports  to  the  Turks,  but  inflicted 
an  even  greater  injury  on  Venetian  interests  by  omitting 
from  that  time  to  light  the  usual  signal  fires  to  warn  the 
bailie  of  Negroponte  of  the  approach  of  an  Ottoman  fleet1 
His  connection  with  Venice  proved,  at  times,  to  be  an  actual 
source  of  danger  to  himself;  for,  when  the  Venetians  ravaged 
the  Genoese  colony  of  Chios  in  143 1,  the  Genoese  admiral, 
Spinola,  took  revenge  by  seizing  Naxos  and  Andros,  and  all 
the  diplomacy  of  the  Crispi  was  required  to  prevent  their 
islands  from  becoming  Genoese  possessions.  Great  was  the 
disgust  of  Venice  when  she  heard  that  her  "  dear  friends  "  had 
made  a  treaty  with,  and  paid  blackmail  to,  her  deadliest  rival ; 
none  the  less,  they  continued  for  some  years  to  be  adherents 
of  Genoa.2  But  then,  as  now,  the  small  states  of  the  Levant 
could  retort  with  some  truth  that,  if  their  natural  protectors 
in  Europe  neglected  them,  they  must  fend  for  themselves. 
John  II.  would  seem  to  have  died3  in  1433,  leaving  an 

1  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  318-19,  345  ;  Predelli, 
Commemoriali,  iv.,  164  ;  Sdthas,  i.,  179  ;  iii.,  304,  372  ;  Revue  de  V Orient 
latin,  v.,  320,  n.  3. 

2  Ibid.,  vi.,  124,  130;  Foglietta,  Historia  Genuensium  (ed.  1585),  p. 
208  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali,  iv.,  208. 

3  Not  in  1437,  as  Hopf  and  Count  Mas  Latrie  assume  from  the 
Venetian  document  of  that  year  addressed  to  him  and  printed  in 
Sardagna's  translation  of  Hopfs  Andros,  p.  171,  where,  as  Jorga  has 
pointed  out  {Revue  de  ?  Orient  latin,  vi.,  383  nJ),  "  Johanni n  must  be  a 
mistake  for  "  Jacopo,"  who  is  obviously  "  the  duke  n  alluded  to  in  another 
Venetian  document,  issued  the  same  day,  as  having  "  made  a  marriage- 
contract  with  the  daughter  of  the  late  lord  of  Andros."  A  document  from 
the  ducal  chancery  at  Naxos,  dated  26th  December,  1433,  speaks  of  John 
as  dead  {Byzantinische  Zeitschrift,  xiii.,  143).     Cf.  Magno  186. 


604        THE  DUCHY  OP  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

only  son,  Giacomo  II.,  still  a  minor,  under  the  guardianship 
of  a  masterful  woman,  the  dowager  Duchess  Franceses; 
while  the  child's  three  uncles,  Niccol6  of  Syra  and  Santorin, 
Marco  of  Ios,  and  William  of  Anaphe,  were  appointed  their 
brother's  executors,  and  the  first  of  the  trio  regent  of  the 
duchy.  Giacomo  II.'s  reign  was  chiefly  remarkable  for  the 
final  settlement  of  the  claims  of  the  Sommaripa  family  to  the 
island  of  Andros.  Maria  Sanudo  had  never  abandoned  her 
rights  to  that  valuable  island,  which  the  first  of  the  Crispi 
dukes  had  bestowed,  as  we  saw,  upon  Pietro  Zeno.  That 
famous  diplomatist,  so  long  the  leading  figure  of  the  Latin 
Orient,  who,  if  his  lot  had  been  cast  on  a  bigger  stage,  might 
have  left  a  great  name  in  history,  had  died  in  1427  ;  and,  as 
his  son  and  successor,  Andrea,  was  delicate,  and  had  an  only 
daughter,  Venice  early  made  preparations  to  occupy  Andros 
on  his  death,  lest  it  should  fall  into  undesirable  hands,  and 
decided  that  his  daughter  should  be  under  the  tutelage  of  the 
republic  till  her  marriage.  News  of  these  plans,  however, 
leaked  out;  and,  when  Andrea  really  died  in  1437,  the 
Venetian  bailie  of  Negroponte,  who  had  been  ordered  to 
seize  the  island  in  the  name  of  the  republic,  found  himself 
forestalled  and  his  envoy  refused  admittance  by  the  young 
duke's  uncles,  who  had  imprisoned  the  late  baron's  widow  in 
the  old  castle  at  Andros  and  forced  her  to  sign  a  document, 
promising  the  hand  of  her  little  daughter,  still  a  mere  child, 
to  their  nephew  within  the  next  five  years,  together  with 
Andros  as  her  dowry.  The  Venetian  Government  was 
naturally  indignant  at  this  frustration  of  its  long-cherished 
scheme  by  the  petty  lords  of  the  Archipelago ;  a  Venetian 
noble,  Francesco  Quirini,  was  sent  to  Naxos ;  backed  by  a 
Cretan  galley,  and  the  threat  that  the  duke  would  be  treated 
as  the  enemy  of  the  republic,  he  obtained  the  cession  of  the 
island  to  himself,  as  Venetian  governor,  pending  the  decision 
of  the  question.  For  three  years  he  and  his  successor 
administered  Andros  in  the  name  of  the  republic,  which 
protested  that  she  merely  wanted  to  assert  her  jurisdiction  in 
the  Archipelago,  while  all  the  claimants  were  being  heard 
at  Venice.  Finally,  in  1440,  the  Venetian  court  decided  that 
the  lawful  baron  of  Andros  was  Maria  Sanudo's  son,  Crusino 
I.  Sommaripa,  lord  of  Paros  and  triarch  of  Euboea ;  Crusino 


CULTURE  IN  THE  CYCLADES  605 

agreed  to  pay  indemnities  to  the  members  of  the  Zeno  family, 
and  thus,  after  more  than  half  a  century,  Andros  returned 
to  its  legal  possessor.1 

Installed  in  this  valuable  island,  which  it  retained  till 
the  Turkish  Conquest,  the  Sommaripa  clan  now  occupied 
the  position  formerly  held  by  the  Ghisi — that  of  the  second 
most  important  family  in  the  duchy.  Crusino  was,  moreover, 
a  man  of  culture  as  well  as  a  man  of  affairs.  He  had  exca- 
vated marble  statues  at  Paros,  and  was  delighted  to  show 
them  to  Cyriacus  of  Ancona,  who  visited  him  more  than  once 
and  inspected  the  quarries  of  that  island,  whence  marble  was 
still  exported.  The  antiquary  found  a  ship  laden  with  a 
cargo  of  the  polished  Parian  stone  lying  in  the  harbour 
ready  to  sail  for  Chios,  whose  rich  Genoese  colonists  had 
ordered  the  material  for  their  villas,  and  Crusino  allowed  him 
to  send  the  head  and  leg  of  an  ancient  statue  to  one  of  his 
friends  there.  When,  therefore,  archaeologists  blame  the 
Latin  rulers  of  the  Cyclades  for  destroying  classical  temples 
in  order  to  build  their  own  castles  out  of  the  marble  frag- 
ments— an  example  of  which  may  be  seen  at  Paros  itself— it 
is  well  to  remember  that  some  of  them,  like  Crusino,  did 
something  for  archaeology — more,  perhaps,  than  archaeologists 
have  ever  done  for  the  remains  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
Cyriacus  himself  mentions  that  he  saw  at  Mykonos  marble 
fragments  of  statues,  which  had  been  brought  from  Delos.2 
Buondelmonti,  a  quarter  of  a  century  earlier,  had  noticed 
more  than  a  thousand  scattered  on  the  ground  of  the  sacred 
island,  whence  he  had  in  vain  tried  to  raise  the  colossal  statue 
of  Apollo.8 

The  installation  of  the  Sommaripa  at  Andros  was  not 
the  only  dynastic  change  in  the  Archipelago  at  this  period 
Crusino's  son-in-law,  a  Loredano,  received  from  him  the 
island  of  Antiparos,  and  thus  a  fresh  great  Venetian  family 
obtained  a  footing  in  the  Cyclades.  This  infusion  of  new 
blood  was  of  great  benefit  to  the  island,  which  had  long  been 

1  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  171-9 ;  Revue  de  ?  Orient  latin,  vi.f 
379>  383>  388;  Sdthas,  i.f  199-208;  Magno,  185-93;  Predelli,  Com* 
memoriali,  iv.,  224. 

2  Tozzetti,  Relation*  aH  alcuni  viaggi,  v.,  423  ;  BulleHno  del?  lstitnto 
(1861),  187.  3  Ibid.,  181 ;  Buondelmonti,  ch.  xxxii. 


606        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

uninhabited  :  for  the  energetic  Venetian  repopulated  it  with 
new  colonists,  and  built  and  resided  in  the  castle,  whose 
gateway,  now  fallen,  still  preserved,  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  his  coat  of  arms.1  At  the  same  time,  another 
Venetian  coloniser,  Giovanni  Quirini  of  Stampalia,  acquired 
the  whole  of  Amorgos,  and  this  increased  stake  in  the 
Levant  might  perhaps  warrant  the  title  of  "Count,* 
which  he  and  all  his  descendants  bore.2  A  third  Venetian 
family,  the  Michieli,  now  owned  all  Seriphos,  and  set  up 
their  arms  with  the  date  of  1434  over  the  castle  gate.  Even 
non-Venetian  dynasties,  such  as  the  Gozzadini  of  Thermia 
and  Keos,  and  the  Spanish  Da  Corogna  of  Keos  and  Siphnos, 
were  glad  to  be  regarded  as  Venetians,  whenever  the  republic 
concluded  a  treaty  of  peace  with  the  Turks,  although  Januli 
da  Corogna  proudly  asserted  that  he  owned  allegiance  to  no 
man  for  his  rock  of  Siphnos,8  over  which  the  Dukes  of  Naxos 
still  claimed  a  shadowy  suzerainty,  and  of  which  their  vassals, 
the  Grimani,  long  pretended  to  be  the  rightful  lords.4 

The  fourteen  years'  reign  of  Duke  Giacomo  II.  was  a 
period  of  peace  for  the  Archipelago.  The  energies  of  the 
Turks  were  temporarily  diverted  to  Hungary,  and  their 
crushing  defeat  by  John  Hunyady  at  Nish  emboldened  the 
Venetians  to  send  a  fleet  to  the  ^Egean  under  Luigi  Loredano, 
father  of  the  new  baron  of  Antiparos.  In  these  circumstances, 
we  are  not  surprised  to  find  the  islands  of  Andros  and  Naxos, 
which  had  just  strengthened  its  flotilla,  contributing  galleys 
to  the  Venetian  squadron  ;  but  the  overthrow  of  the  perjured 
Christian  host  in  the  great  battle  of  Varna  led  Venice  to 
make  peace  with  the  sultan  in  1446,  including  the  Naxian 
duchy  in  the  provisions  of  the  treaty.6  The  following  year  the 
duke  died,2  leaving  his  wife  enceinte  with  a  son,  who  was 

1  Magno,  194  ;  Pasch  von  Krienen,  128  ;  Sauger,  346. 

2  Magno,  195  ;  Predelli,  Commemoriali^  iv.,  299  ;  Zabarella,  //  Galba> 
82  ;  Hopf,  Analekten,  524-6. 

3  "  Esse  liberum  dominium  insule  Siphani,"  in  a  document  of  1434,  apud 
Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxviii.,  307.  4  Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  185. 

6  Sathas,  i.,  208 ;  Thomas,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  368 ;  Predelli,  Com- 
memorial^  iv.,  296. 

6  The  doge  of  Genoa  wrote  to  him  in  1447  (Giorrude  Ligusticoy  iiL, 
315) — the  last  allusion  to  him  ;  Magno  (p.  196)  says  he  died  "  in  1450  or 
thereabouts." 


GROWING  VENETIAN  INFLUENCE  607 

born  six  weeks  after  his  father's  death,  and  received  the  name 
of  Gian  Giacomo.  The  two  strongest  members  of  the 
family,  Niccol6  of  Syra  and  Santorin  and  William  of  Anaphe, 
the  same  who  had  acted  as  regents  of  the  late  duke,  once 
more  assumed  the  government  with  the  assent  of  Venice,  and 
imprisoned  the  child's  grandmother,  the  dowager  Duchess 
Francesca,  who  had  exercised  great  influence  during  the  late 
reign,  and  who  claimed  the  regency.  Niccol6  soon  died,  and 
we  then  find  the  Duchess  Francesca,  the  archbishop,  and  the 
citizens  of  Naxos,  electing  his  son  Francesco  in  his  place,  and 
begging  the  Venetian  Government  to  ratify  their  choice — an 
interesting  fact,  which  shows  that  the  people  had  a  voice  in 
the  selection  of  a  regent,  and  that  the  duchy  was  more  than 
ever  dependent  upon  Venice.  The  republic  accordingly 
again  included  the  two  regents  in  the  treaties  of  peace  which 
she  made  with  Alfonso  I.  of  Naples  and  Mohammed  II.  in 
1450  and  145 1 — the  last  agreement  which  she  concluded  with 
the  Turks  before  Constantinople  fell. 

In  1452  the  little  duke  died,1  and  a  disputed  succession 
at  once  ensued  Had  females  been  allowed  to  succeed,  the 
next-of-kin  was  the  boy  duke's  aunt,  Adriana,  wife  of 
Domenico  Sommaripa,  son  of  the  baron  of  Andros,  and 
it  had  been  stipulated  in  her  marriage-contract,  that  if  her 
brother  Giacomo  II.  died  without  heirs,  she  should  succeed 
him.  But  there  was  already  a  precedent  in  the  Crispo 
dynasty  for  the  exclusion  of  women,  and  this  afforded  a 
pretext  to  the  two  regents,  old  William  Crispo  of  Anaphe, 
the  late  duke's  great-uncle,  and  Francesco  of  Santorin,  his 
cousin,  for  claiming  the  duchy  as  the  nearest  agnates.  At 
first,  the  Venetian  Government,  by  a  decree  of  March  1452, 
excluded  both  these  rival  candidates,  and  it  might  have  been 
possible  for  the  Sommaripa  family,  had  they  taken  the  trouble 
to  canvass  at  once  in  person  at  Venice,  to  secure  the  succes- 
sion.2 But  William  Crispo,  though  he  was  old,  was  ambitious ; 
he  had  twice  acted  as  regent  of  the  duchy,  and  was  in  no 
mood  to  end  his  days  in  the  castle  which  he  had  built  on  his 
island  of  Anaphe,  the  most  remote  of  all  the  Cyclades.     He 

1  Magno,  196-98 ;  Thomas  and  Predelli,  Diplomatarium,  ii.,  383-4 ; 
Predelli,  Commemoriali,  v.,  56,  65  ;  Revue  de  P  Orient  latin,  viii.,  42,  76. 
8  Sauger,  214,  226,  343,  348  ;  Lichtlc. 


fc 


608        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

came  to  terms  with  his  nephew  Francesco,  which  seemed  to 
be  favourable  to  both  of  them.     He  was  to  be  duke  for  the 
rest  of  his  life ;  and,  as  he  had  only  one  legitimate  child,  and 
that  a  daughter,  the  duchy  was  to  pass  at  his  death  to  his 
nephew,  his  daughter  was  to  inherit  distant  Anaphe,  while 
lands  and  female  serfs  in   Naxos  were  the   portion   of  his 
bastard  Giacomo.1    Civil  war  was,  above  all  else,  to  be  avoided, 
for  by  this  time  the  Turks  were  masters  of  Constantinople, 
and  a  scare  of  Turkish  and   Catalan  corsairs    had   lately 
frightened  the  islanders,  who  fled   in   numbers  at  the  bad 
news  from  the  great  city.     Accordingly,  before    the   end  of 
1453,  William  II.  was  proclaimed  duke:  and  though  Venice 
cited  him  to  appear  before  the  senate  to  answer  the  plaint  of 
the  Sommaripa,  she  at  last  wisely  acquiesced  in  the  succes- 
sion of  so  experienced  a  man,  who  was  ready  to  place  his 
naval  resources  at  her  disposal,  and  allowed  his  chancellor  to 
accompany  her  fleet2    The  domineering  dowager,  Francesca, 
who  had  so  long  exercised  influence  in  the   affairs   of  the 
duchy,  had  now  retired  to  her  native  lagoons,  so  that  there 
was  no  one  at  the  ducal  court  to  dispute  his  supremacy.     The 
memory  of  the  Duchess  Francesca  is,  however,  still  preserved 
at  Naxos  by  the  little  church  of  S.  Antonio  on  the  shore, 
part  of  the  monastery  which  she  had  built,  and  which  she 
bestowed  on  the  Knights  of  St  John  in  1452,  in  order  that 
she  might  obtain  the  jubilee  indulgence  of  the  anno  santo, 
which  Pope  Nicholas  V.  had  proclaimed   two   years  before. 
From  that  time  Naxos  became  one  of  the  bailiwicks  of  the 
Order,  paying  no  less  than  51,000  florins  a  year  to  the  grand- 
master at  Rhodes.     The  arms  of  the  Knights  still  adorn  the 
little  church;  on  the  right  of  the  altar  are  the  tomb  and 
escutcheon  of  Giovanni  Crispo,  who  was  commander  of  the 
Order ;  and  hard  by  are  the  remains  of  the  arsenal,  where 
they  kept  some  half-dozen  galleys.8     It  was,  indeed,  the  era 
of   pious  foundations  in   Naxos.     This  was  not   the  only 

1  Sauger,  227  ;  Byzantinische  Zeitschrifc  xiii.,  1 50.  This  deed,  dated 
9th  November  1453,  is  his  first  known  act  as  duke. 

2  Predelli,  Commemorudi,  v.,  92  ;  Magno,  200 ;  Chalkokondyles,  4001 

3  Magno,  199-200;  Bosio,  II.,  239;  Sauger,  220;  Lichtle  ;  Buchoo 
in  Revue  de  Paris,  xvi.,  343  ;  At/as,  xl.,  33.  The  church  wa*  built 
before  1440,  for  in  that  year  Niccol6  Gozzadini  of  Thermia  left  it  a  legacy 
(Ersch  und  Gruber,  lxxvi.,  419).    There  are  no  arms  at  St  Elias  now. 


ERUFflON  OF  SANTORIN  609 

church  built  by  the  Duchess  Francesca,  and  the  piety  of 
her  son,  Duke  Jacopo  II.  and  his  wife  is  said  to  have  been 
recorded  by  their  armorial  bearings  on  the  church  of  St  Elias. 

During  the  reign  of  Duke  William  II.  occurred  one  of 
those  tremendous  phenomena  which  have  conferred  world- 
wide notoriety  upon  an  island  of  the  Cyclades.  For  more 
than  seven  centuries,  ever  since  the  year  726,  the  volcano  of 
Santorin  had  been  silent,  though  the  lava  rocks  and  the 
strong  wine  may  have  reminded  the  islanders  of  its  origin. 
But,  in  1457,  the  sea  murmured  as  if  in  agony,  the  rocks  of 
Old  Kaym^ne, "  the  Burnt  Island,"  which  had  arisen  in  the 
harbour  200  years  before  Christ,  were  cleft  asunder  with  a 
groan,  and  a  fresh  mass  of  rock,  black  as  a  coal,  was  thrown 
up  from  the  deep  to  fill  the  gap.  The  "birth  of  this 
memorable  monster,"  the  third  accretion  to  the  islet,  was 
commemorated  in  a  set  of  detestable  Latin  hexameters 
inscribed  on  a  slab  of  marble  at  the  castle  of  Skar6s  and 
addressed  to  Francesco  Crispo,  "  true  descendant  of  heroes," 
who  was  at  that  time  baron  of  Santorin  and  who  was  soon 
to  be  Duke  of  Naxos,  and  two  centuries  later  the  offspring 
of  this  upheaval  could  be  clearly  distinguished  by  its  burning 
sand  from  the  older  portions  of  the  "burnt"  rock.1  For 
more  than  a  hundred  years  no  further  eruption  disturbed 
the  "magnanimous"  rulers  of  Santorin. 

But  the  political  cataclysms  of  the  time  were  more  serious 
than  those  of  nature.  It  was  reserved  for  old  William  of 
Naxos  to  witness  the  disappearance  of  one  Christian  state 
after  another  before  the  advancing  Moslem.  In  the  year  of 
his  accession  the  Byzantine  Empire  had  fallen ;  in  his  reign 
fell,  too,  the  Byzantine  principality  in  the  Morea,  the 
Florentine  duchy  of  Athens,  and,  still  nearer  home,  the 
island  state  which  the  Genoese  Gattilusii  had  ruled  for 
over  a  century  in  Lesbos.  Of  all  these  calamities,  the  fall  of 
the  Gattilusii  must  have  affected  him  most,  for  his  family  was 
connected  with  them  by  ties  of  matrimony,  and  when  Dorino 
Gattilusio  was  driven  by  the  Turks  from  iEnos,  he  settled 
in  exile  at  Naxos,  and  married  the  grand-niece  of  the  duke.2 

1  P&gues,  Histoire  de  Santoriny  138  ;  Casola,  Viaggio  a  Gerusalemme, 
96  ;  Bartolomeo  dalli  Sonetti,  5. 

2  Krit6boulos,  ii.,  16. 

2  Q 


610        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

It  was  now,  too,  that  the  islands  of  Skyros,  Skopelos, 
and  Skiathos  offered  themselves  to  the  Venetians.  More 
clearly  even  than  their  fellows  of  the  Northern  Sporades, 
the  islanders  of  the  Cyclades  saw  that  Venice  was  now  their 
only  possible  protection  against  the  Turk — for  what  would 
the  2000  horsemen  of  the  duchy  avail  against  the  hosts 
of  Islam  ?  On  her  side,  Venice  did  not  forget  "  the  Duke 
of  Naxos,  his  nobles  and  their  men,  with  their  places  and 
all  that  they  have,"  in  the  treaty  which  she  made  with 
Mohammed  II.  in  1454,  and  which  specially  exempted  them 
from  u  tribute  or  any  other  service,"  and  gave  them  the  status 
of  Venetians,1  with  the  right  to  hoist  the  lion  banner  of  St 
Mark  from  their  castles.  Yet  the  duchy  was  only  saved  by 
one  of  those  sudden  storms  so  common  in  the  ^Egean  from 
an  attack  by  a  large  Turkish  fleet  under  Junis  Beg  in  the 
very  next  year — an  attack  justified  in  the  eyes  of  the  irate 
sultan  by  the  hospitality  and  shelter  which  pirates  had 
received  in  the  harbours  of  Naxos,  Paros,  and  Rheneia. 
Warned  by  the  fate  of  the  Lesbians,  and  by  a  fresh  Turkish 
raid,  the  duke  thought  it  advisable  to  ensure  his  possessions 
by  paying  tribute  to  the  all-powerful  Mohammed.2  He  felt 
himself  terribly  isolated  from  the  rest  of  Christendom  since 
the  Turkish  conquest  of  the  Greek  continent ;  he  must  have 
realised  that  sooner  or  later  a  similar  fate  awaited  his  own 
dominions,  and  that  the  highest  form  of  practical  statesman- 
ship was  to  supplement  the  paper  safeguards  of  Turco- 
Venetian  treaties  by  the  more  durable  cash  nexus  with  the 
sultan. 

1  Sanudo  apud  Muratori,  xxii.,  1 155. 

2  Krit6boulos,  ii.,  3  ;  iii.,  10 ;  Doukas,  331,  340. 


"I 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO  (1463-1566) 

WILLIAM  II.  died  in  1463,  and,  in  virtue  of  the  arrangement 
made  at  his  accession,  his  nephew,  Francesco  II.  of  Santorin, 
succeeded  him.  But  the  new  duke  did  not  long  enjoy  this 
coveted  dignity ;  afflicted  with  a  serious  malady,  he  went  to 
seek  the  advice  of  a  doctor  at  the  Venetian  colony  of  Coron, 
and  died  there  the  same  year.  His  son,  Giacomo  III.,  was 
proclaimed  duke  by  the  people,  under  the  regency  of  the 
late  duke's  widow,1  though  it  seemed  doubtful  at  first  whether 
the  lad's  uncle,  Antonio  of  Syra,  would  not  usurp  the  throne.2 
Coinciding  as  it  did  with  the  long  Turco- Venetian  war,  which 
lasted  from  1463  to  1479,  the  reign  of  Giacomo  III.  could  not 
fail  to  be  affected  by  the  further  disasters  befalling  the 
Venetian  possessions  in  the  Levant  In  1468  four  Turkish 
vessels  attacked  Andros ;  Giovanni  Sommaripa,  baron  of  thfe 
island,  lost  his  life  in  defending  his  home ;  and  the  invaders 
withdrew,  after  ravaging  the  place,  with  numerous  prisoners 
and  booty  to  the  value  of  15,000  ducats.  Two  years  later, 
after  the  crowning  disaster  of  the  war — the  capture  of 
Negroponte— the  Turkish  fleet  landed  at  Andros  again  on 
its  way  home,  and  carried  off  so  many  captives  that  the 
population  was  reduced  to  2000  souls.  Despite  the  reassuring 
visits  of  Venetian  fleets,  almost  all  the  islands  suffered  in 
greater  or  less  degree  from  Turkish  raids  at  this  terrible 
period.  Paros  retained  no  more  than  3000  inhabitants; 
Antiparos,  repopulated  a  generation  before   by  Loredano, 

1  The    doge  wrote    to    her    in    1464  as   Gubernatrici   Egeopelagi% 
Cornelius,  Ecclesia  Veneta^  viii.,  272. 
1  Magno,  204-5. 

611 


1 


612        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

was  reduced  to  barely  a  hundred  persons ;  despite  the 
previous  efforts  of  Giovanni  Quirini  to  colonise  Stampalia, 
the  carelessness  of  his  son,  an  absentee,  allowed  the  colony 
to  dwindle  down  to  400,  while  the  rich  island  of  Santorin, 
though  now  a  direct  possession  of  the  Duke  of  Naxos, 
nourished  only  300  inhabitants,  and  yielded  the  duke  no 
more  than  500  ducats.  Still  smaller  was  the  population  of 
Keos  and  Seriphos,  while  the  two  Venetian  islands  of  Tenos 
and  Mykonos  had  long  complained  of  the  devastation  wrought 
by  the  Turks — to  which  must  be  added  the  drain  of  men 
enlisted  in  the  Archipelago  for  service  in  the  Venetian  navy, 
which  put  in  there  on  the  way  to  attack  Smyrna  in  1472. 
Delos,  which  the  Venetian  admiral,  Mocenigo,  visited  at 
this  time,  was  quite  deserted  ;  but  the  remains  of  the  temple 
and  the  theatre,  the  colossus  of  Apollo,  the  mass  of  pillars 
and  statues,  and  the  cisterns  full  of  water  are  described  by 
his  biographer.1  Naxos  was  visited  by  the  Turkish  fleet 
in  its  turn  in  1477,  and  two  years  later  the  Naxian  diocese, 
which  had  for  some  time  been  very  poor,  is  described  as  being 
largely  in  the  occupation  of  the  Turks.2  Happily,  the  peace 
of  1479  ;at  last  terminated  the  long  contest  between  Venice 
and  the  sultan ;  the  Duke  of  Naxos  and  his  subjects  were 
treated  as  Venetians,  and  three  years  later  the  new  sultan, 
Bajazet  1 1.,  repeated  his  predecessor's  compact8 

The  restoration  of  peace  was  naturally  a  subject  of 
rejoicing  to  the  sorely  tried  Archipelago,  and  the  marriage 
of  his  daughter  at  the  Carnival  of  1480  gave  the  duke  an 
opportunity  of  giving  vent  to  his  own  and  his  people's 
feelings.  He  had  chosen  as  his  son-in-law,  Domenico  Pisani, 
son  of  the  Duke  of  Candia  and  member  of  a  very  distin- 
guished Venetian  family,  and  he  bestowed  upon  him,  as 
his  daughter's  dowry,  his  own  native  island  of  Santorin,  on 
condition  that  Pisani  should  restore  it  in  the  event  of  a  son 
being  born  to  the  ducal  donor.  Never  had  there  been  such 
splendid  festivities  in  the  history  of  the  duchy.     The  castle 

1  Magno,  205,  207  ;  Rizzardo,  Lapresa  di  Negroponte,  24  ;  Sdthas,  L, 
244  ;  Predelli,  Commemorialiy  v.,  230 ;  Cippico,  P.  Mocenigi  Gesta^  341, 
344.  *  Eubel,  ii.,  221. 

8  Predelli,  op.  ett.y  v.,  228,  241  ;  Miklosich  und  M tiller,  iii.,  295,  314; 
Malipiero,  Artna/i,  121. 


THE  IDYLL  OP  SANTORIN  613 

at  Melos,  where  Giacomo  III.  was  then  residing,  rang  with  the 
mirth  of  the  wedding  guests ;  and  the  merriment  was 
renewed  when  the  young  couple  landed  with  the  duke  in 
their  new  domain.  Giacomo,  we  are  told,  "danced  every 
day,  leaping  for  joy  and  singing,"  while  the  islanders 
shouted  Viva  Pisani!  in  honour  of  their  baron.  In  the  old 
castle  of  the  Barozzi  at  Skar6s,  the  chief  of  the  five  fortresses 
of  the  volcanic  island,  whose  ruins  still  look  down  on  the 
bottomless  harbour  far  below,  Pisani  knelt  down  with  bis 
wife  before  their  lord  the  duke,  and  received  from  his  hands 
the  keys  of  the  castle,  the  rod  which  betokened  their  feudal 
rights,  and  the  scroll,  drawn  up  by  the  chancellor,  which  set 
out  the  conditions  of  their  investiture.  Then,  in  the  tower 
of  the  lower  castle,  the  vassals  were  ushered  in  to  do  homage 
to  their  new  lord,  foremost  among  them  the  two  great 
families  of  Santorin,  the  Gozzadini  and  the  Argyroi,  or 
D'Argenta,  Latinised  Greek  archonsy  who  boasted  their 
descent  from  one  of  the  Byzantine  emperors,  but  did  not 
scorn  to  hold  the  castle  of  S.  Niccol6  from  the  lord  of  Santorin. 
When  the  ceremony  was  over,  the  flag  of  the  Pisani  was  run 
up  on  the  upper  castle;  the  new  dynasty  was  officially 
recognised  in  the  motley  heraldry  of  the  Archipelago.  Then 
the  duke  returned  to  his  residence  at  Melos,  and  the  new 
lord  of  Santorin  set  out  to  survey  his  island  domain,  too 
long  neglected  by  its  absentee  ruler.  Pisani  showed  all  the 
energy  of  a  king  upon  his  coronation  day.  He  planted  vines 
and  olives,  sowed  cotton,  and  consulted  how  he  could  best 
benefit  the  traders  of  the  community.  A  new  era  seemed  to 
have  opened  for  the  depopulated  island  ;  wherever  the  baron 
went,  the  church  bells  rang  a  merry  peal  to  greet  him  ; 
whenever  he  lay  down  to  rest,  the  governors  of  the  castles 
laid  the  keys  in  his  chamber.  Anxious  for  the  spiritual 
welfare  of  his  subjects,  he  appointed  a  new  bishop  ;  desirous 
to  secure  them  against  attack,  he  placed  his  island  under 
Venetian  protection,  hoisted  the  banner  of  the  republic  beside 
his  own,  and  journeyed  with  his  wife  to  Venice  to  obtain  con- 
firmation of  his  possession.  Naturally,  Venice  granted  the 
request  of  so  desirable  and  so  well-connected  a  ruler. 

But  the  idyll  of  Santorin  did  not  last  long.     While  Pisani 
was  still  in  Venice,  his  father-in-law  died.    Giacomo  III.  had 


I 


614         THE  DUCHYr  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

left  no  son,  so  that,  by  virtue  of  the  marriage-contract,  Pisani 
was  entitled  to  retain  his  island ;  indeed,  had  not  the  Salic 
law  been  adopted,  as  we  saw,  in  the  Crispo  dynasty,  his  wife 
would  have  succeeded  as  Duchess  of  the  Archipelago.  But 
the  late  duke's  brother,  John  III.,  not  content  with  succeeding 
to  the  duchy,  landed  in  Santorin,  occupied  Skar6s,  pulled 
down  the  Pisani  flag,  and  hoisted  the  lozenges  and  two 
crosses  of  the  Crispi.  Pisani's  father  complained  at  Venice 
of  this  act  of  violence,  and  the  Venetian  Government  ordered 
the  admiral  of  the  fleet  to  compel  restitution  of  the  island. 
But  when  his  emissaries  arrived  at  Santorin,  they  found  that 
John  III.  had  strengthened  the  defences  of  Skaros,  and  were 
compelled  to  retire  ignominiously  under  a  heavy  shower  of 
stones.  This  was  more  than  the  Venetian  authorities  could 
endure.  They  ordered  the  erring  duke,  in  a  most  peremptory 
letter,  to  appear  at  Venice  to  answer  the  charges  against  him. 
His  reply  was  to  instruct  his  brother-in-law,  then  in  Venice, 
to  act  on  his  behalf.  The  whole  question  was  then 
investigated,  and  as  important  points  of  feudal  law  were 
involved,  the  judges  ordered  a  clerk  to  make  a  fresh  copy 
of  the  Book  of  the  Customs  of  the  Empire  of  Romania^  and 
to  draw  up  a  genealogical  tree  of  the  Dukes  of  Naxos — the 
oldest  pedigree  of  the  Sanudi  and  Crispi,  with  which  we  are 
acquainted.  After  opposite  opinions  had  been  expressed  by 
the  Court,  a  compromise  was  at  last  agreed  upon,  that  the 
duke  should  keep  Santorin  on  payment  of  compensation  to 
Pisani  and  his  heirs.  John  III.,  having  obtained  what  he 
wanted,  now  humbly  replied  that  he  "  was  ready  to  live  or 
die  for  Venice  " ;  while  the  Pisani  family  ere  long  had  the 
doubtful  satisfaction  of  reigning  over  three  of  the  smaller 
islands  of  the  Archipelago.1 

The  peace  concluded  between  Venice  and  the  Turk  did 
not  ensure  the  security  of  the  Levant  During  Mohammed 
II.'s  operations  against  Rhodes,  the  ^Egean  was  beset  with 
Turkish  pirates,  who  were  a  continual  dread  to  the  more 
or  less  pious  pilgrims  on  their  way  to  the  Holy  Land,  and 

1  Magno,  209;  Sdthas,  vi.,  225,  233;  Hopf,  AnalekUn,  404-13,  517; 
Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  185  ;  Prcdelli,  op.  cit.%  v.,  305  ;  Feyerabend, 
Reyssbuch,  f.  371  ;  Canciani,  Barbarorum  Leges%  iii.,  485.  The  author 
published  the  genealogical  tree  in  Byz.  Zeitsckrifc  xvi.,  258. 


VENETIAN  INTERVENTION  615 

it  was  no  uncommon  thing  to  find  the  hold  of  a  Turkish 
corsair  filled  with  prisoners  dragged  away  from  their  homes 
in  the  Cyclades.1  Bajazet  II.,  the  new  sultan,  in  spite  of 
his  pledge  to  Venice  that  the  duchy  should  not  be  asked 
for  tribute,  demanded  arrears  of  payment,  and  complained 
that  the  Duke  of  Naxos  and  the  baron  of  Paros  harboured 
pirates  who  preyed  upon  the  Turkish  dominions.  He 
followed  this  complaint  by  preparing  a  small  fleet  to  drive 
the  latter  offender  from  the  marble  island.  The  republic 
ordered  her  admiral  to  protect  him,  and  the  Archbishop  of 
Paros  and  Naxos  took  the  opportunity  of  his  presence  in 
the  Archipelago  to  suggest  that  the  offer  of  an  annuity 
might  induce  the  rulers  of  those  islands  to  make  over  all 
their  rights  to  Venice.  Neither  the  duke  nor  Sommaripa 
were,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  willing  to  abdicate,  though  the 
latter  was  glad  to  fly  the  Venetian  flag  beside  his  own. 
But  the  tyrannical  conduct  of  John  III.  soon  brought 
about  a  Venetian  occupation.  That  headstrong  ruler 
exasperated  his  subjects  by  his  exactions  to  such  a  pitch, 
that,  led  by  a  Greek  veteran,  they  besieged  him  and  the 
nobles  in  the  castle,  whence  he  was  only  rescued  by  the 
timely  arrival  of  a  fleet  belonging  to  the  Knights  of  Rhodes. 
Even  this  lesson  did  not  make  him  mend  his  ways.  The 
execution  of  the  rebel  leader  rekindled  the  enmity  of  the 
people  against  the  duke,  and,  when  he  died,  in  1494,  many 
of  his  subjects  wagged  their  heads  and  spoke  of  poison. 

Though  he  had  left  two  children,  a  son  and  a  daughter, 
both  were  minors  and  both  illegitimate,  so  that  the  moment 
was  favourable  for  Venetian  intervention.  It  was  perhaps 
not  a  mere  chance  that  the  Venetian  admiral  with  six 
galleys  was  in  the  harbour,  and  his  appearance  inspired  the 
popular  party  to  advocate  annexation  to  the  republic  The 
chief  men,  however,  favoured  the  claims  of  the  children's 
mother;  and  the  most  energetic  member  of  the  Crispo 
family,  Giacomo,  bastard  of  the  old  Duke  William  II., 
assumed  the  title  of  Governor  of  Naxos  on  their  behalf 
and  issued  official  documents  in  that  style.  Meanwhile, 
however,  the  people,  accompanied  by  their  wives  holding 
their  children  in  their  arms,  approached  the  Venetian 
1  Bartolomeo  dalli  Sonetti,  36 ;  Faber,  Evagatorium,  i.,  37. 


616        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

admiral  with  cries  of  "we  want  to  be  governed  by  Venice! 
we  submit  to  her!"  The  admiral,  who  had  probably 
suggested  this  demonstration,  received  them  well,  appointed 
a  Venetian  governor  of  Naxos,  and  despatched  officers  to 
occupy  and  administer  the  other  islands  which  had  belonged 
to  the  late  duke — Santorin,  Syra,  Nio,  and  Melos.  At  the 
same  time,  an  envoy  of  the  Naxian  people  was  sent  to 
Venice  to  announce  the  news,  followed  by  their  archbishop 
and  a  formal  embassy.  It  was  then  proposed  in  the  senate 
that  the  republic  should  accept  the  duchy,  after  making  due 
provision  for  the  late  duke's  widow  and  children,  in  order 
to  relieve  the  people  from  tyranny,  and  to  prevent  the 
islands  from  becoming  a  nest  of  corsairs  and  a  part  of  the 
growing  Turkish  Empire.  It  was,  however,  decided  that 
the  administration  of  the  island  revenues  should  be  left  to 
the  ducal  family;  but  that  a  Venetian  governor  should  be 
appointed  for  a  term  of  two  years  with  residence  at  Naxos 
and  a  salary  of  500  ducats  payable  out  of  those  funds; 
Naxian  citizens  were  to  be  sent  to  govern  the  dependent 
islands.  As  first  Venetian  governor  of  Naxos,  Pietro 
Contarini  was  elected.  Thus,  in  1494,  Venice  at  last 
became  mistress  of  the  duchy  of  the  Archipelago.1 

The  acquisition  was  not  perhaps  of  great  economic  value. 
We  are  told  that  of  the  five  islands  which  the  late  duke  had 
held  under  his  immediate  sway,  Santorin  and  Nio  contained 
800  souls,  and  Syra  half  that  number.  Both  Nio  and  Melos 
had  fine  and  frequented  ports,  but  the  fortifications  of  the 
latter  harbour  were  in  ruins,  and  the  Milanese  canon  Casola, 
who  put  into  Nio  just  before  the  duke's  death,  likened  the 
mountain  castle  of  the  Crispi  there  to  "  a  pigstye,"  where 
the  inhabitants  were  crowded  together  for  fear  of  pirates, 
but  where  the  food  was  good  and  the  women  beautiful. 
Melos  and  Naxos  were  the  most  flourishing  of  the  Cyclades; 
the  former  was  rich  in  saltpetre,  pumice,  and  mill-stones  ;  and 
its  hot  baths,  which  had  proved  fatal,  so  it  was  said,  to  old 
Duke  William  II.,  were  second  only  to  those  of  Thermia, 
which  the  enthusiastic  Venetian  mariner,  Bartolomeo  "  dalli 

1  Magno,  209 ;  Srithas,  vi.,  241  ;  Navagero,  xxiii.,  1203  ;  Bembo, 
Historia  Veneta  (ed.  1809),  i.,  73,  101-2  ;  Casola,  Viaggio^  96 ;  Archives 
de  P  Orient  latin,  i.,  614. 


i 


STATE  OP  THE  ISLANDS  IN  1494  617 

Sonetti,"  as  he  called  himself,  declared  to  be  superior  to  the 
baths  of  Padua.  Of  the  other  Cyclades,  where  Venetian 
influence  was  now  predominant,  though  the  island  barons 
were  nominally  independent  of  her,  the  two  most  prosperous 
were  those  of  the  Sommaripa — Paros  and  Andros.  The 
German  pilgrim,  Father  Faber,  who  was  in  the  Archipelago 
eleven  years  earlier,  tells  us  that  Parian  marble  was  exported 
to  Venice,  and  that  the  island  produced  another  stone,  better 
even  than  marble.1  The  lord  of  Andros,  who  was  recognised 
by  Venice  as  quite  independent  of  the  duchy  of  Naxos, 
seems  even  to  have  styled  himself  "Duke"  of  his  own 
island,2  as  Pietro  Zeno,  a  much  more  important  man,  had 
done.  All  the  other  islands,  except  three  and  part  of  a 
fourth,  now  belonged  to  Venetian  families — Amorgos  and 
Stampalia  to  the  Quirini ;  Seriphos  to  the  Michieli ;  Anti- 
paros  to  the  Loredani ;  part  of  Keos,  whose  harbour  could 
hold  a  great  fleet,  to  the  Premarini.  The  daughter  of  old 
William  Crispo,  Fiorenza,  still  held  her  isle  of  Anaphe ;  and 
the  Gozzadini  ruled  over  Siphnos,  Thermia,  and  part  of  Keos. 
Seeing  that  Venice  was  absolute  mistress  of  Tenos  and 
Mykonos,  as  well  as  of  the  Northern  Sporades,  and  had 
acquired  Cyprus  five  years  before,  she  still  possessed  a  con- 
siderable stake  in  the  Levant,  despite  the  loss  of  Negroponte. 
The  Cyclades  were  all  fortified,  as  we  can  see  from  the 
plans  of  each  island,  which  the  Venetian  mariner,  Bartolomeo 
dalli  Sonnetti,  has  inserted  in  his  quaint  metrical  account  of 
his .  many  voyages  among  them.8  Santorin  and  Keos 
boasted  five  castles  apiece;  Paros  four  (among  them  the 
strong  fortress  of  Kephalos,  which  Niccol6  Sommaripa  had 
recently  erected  as  his  residence  on  a  high  rock  above  the 
sea);    Naxos  and   Amorgos  three  each;   Melos   two;   and 

1  S£thas,  vi.,  24 1 ;  Casola,  39, 96 ;  Faber,  Evagatorium^  iii.,  299, 301 , 3 1 9-2 1 . 

2Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  135,  185. 

3  The  author's  surname  is  unknown,  but  he  dedicated  his  book  to 
Mocenigo,  the  doge  who  held  office  from  1478-85.  The  only  historical 
allusions  in  it  are  to  Fiorenza,  Lady  of  Melos  (fl.  1376) ;  to  the  recolonisa- 
tion  of  Astypalaia  by  Quirini  in  1413 ;  to  the  eruption  of  Santorin  in 
1457  ;  to  the  dismantling  of  Tenedos  in  1384;  and  (perhaps)  to  the  loss  of 
Negroponte.  Much  of  the  book  is  not  original,  being  merely  copied 
from  Buondelmonti ;  hence  it  must  be  used  with  caution  ;  but  the  plans 
are  very  accurate,  as  I  have  found  from  personal  observation. 


i 


618        THE  DUCHY  OP  THE  ARCHIPEJ^AGO 

Syra  and  most  of  the  other  islands  one.  Such  was  the 
condition  of  the  Archipelago  when  the  first  Venetian 
governor  landed  at  Naxos. 

The  Venetian  administration,  brief  as  it  was,  seems  to 
have  been  beneficial  to  the  islands.  For  a  moment  corsaiis 
were  wiped  from  the  sea,  and  the  frequent  presence  of  a 
Venetian  fleet  in  one  or  other  of  the  harbours  gave  the 
inhabitants  a  sense  of  security.  "They  look  upon  onr 
admiral,"  so  runs  a  Venetian  report,  "  as  the  Messiah."  But 
these  benefits  were  only  temporary.  The  pirates  returned  to 
their  favourite  hunting-ground  as  soon  as  the  Venetian 
admiral  had  sailed,  and  two  of  them  in  particular,  Paolo  de 
Campo  of  Catania,  half-corsair  half-hermit,  and  his  rival, 
Black  Hassan  by  name,  did  much  damage.  Moreover,  the 
renewal  of  hostilities  between  the  sultan  and  the  republic 
in  1499  alarmed  the  islanders.  The  Venetian  governor  of 
Naxos  wrote  that  he  had  no  powder ;  a  Venetian  ambassador, 
who  paid  a  passing  visit,  reported  that  the  fortifications  were 
weak,  and  suggested  that  the  governor  should  be  recalled 
and  his  salary  devoted  to  strengthening  them.  This  policy 
received  powerful  support  at  home  from  the  Loredano  family, 
one  of  whose  daughters,  "  a  lady  of  wisdom  and  great  talent," 
had  married  Francesco,  the  son  of  the  late  Duke  of  Naxos; 
accordingly,  as  the  latter  was  now  of  age,  the  senate  decided, 
in  October  1 500,  to  restore  the  duchy  to  him,  on  condition 
that  he  promised  not  to  take  his  father  as  his  model.  And 
thus,  in  an  evil  hour,  a  youth  who  turned  out  to  be  a 
homicidal  maniac,  took  the  place  of  Venice.1 

The  change  was  in  every  way  unfortunate  for  the  people 
of  the  Cyclades.  The  continuance  of  the  Turco- Venetian 
war  exposed  Naxos  to  two  attacks  in  successive  years,  in  the 
course  of  which  the  lower  town  was  taken  and  sacked,  and 
many  Naxians  carried  off  as  prisoners.  So  savage  were  the 
feelings  of  revenge  which  such  deeds  caused,  that  a  celebrated 
Turkish  corsair,  driven  ashore  at  Melos,  was  slowly  roasted 
for  three  hours  by  the  infuriated  people.  The  peace  of  1503, 
as  usual,  included  the  Archipelago,  but  the  petty  lords  of  the 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  i.,  204,  463,  739,  744,  815  ;  ii.,  130,  630,  662-3,  7°*  J 
Hi.,  23,  85,  971  ;  Bembo,  i.,  324  (f.  115,  Latin  ed.) ;  E.  A.  C,  Cenmstorid 
intorno  Paolo  de  Campo. 


THE  MAD  DUKE  619 

iEgean  were  at  this  time  often  more  oppressive  to  their 
subjects  than  the  Turks  themselves.  The  Sommaripa  of 
Paros  were  at  war  with  the  Sommaripa  of  Andros;  the 
hapless  Andrians  wrote  in  Greek  to  Venice  complaining  that 
many  of  their  fellow-countrymen  had  been  borne  off  to  the 
marble  island,  while  their  own  "Duke"  Francesco  was  so 
cruel  a  tyrant  that  they  actually  thought  of  calling  in  the 
Turks.  Rather  than  allow  such  a  calamity  to  happen,  the 
republic  removed  the  oppressor  to  Venice,  and  for  seven 
years,  from  1507  to  1514,  Andros  was  ruled  by  Venetian 
governors  and  the  lion  banner  floated  over  the  wave-beat 
castle  of  her  feudal  lords.1  Meanwhile,  the  capital  of  the 
Archipelago,  the  fairest  isle  of  the  iEgean,  had  been  the 
scene  of  one  of  the  most  ghastly  tragedies  in  the  history  of 
the  duchy.  Francesco  III.  had  for  long  been  ailing,  but  it 
was  not  till  1 509,  when  he  was  engaged  with  the  ducal  galley 
in  the  Venetian  service  at  Trieste,  that  we  first  hear  of  his 
madness.  So  violent  was  his  conduct,  that  his  men  vowed 
they  would  rather  serve  the  Turk,  and  the  duke  was  put  in 
custody  at  San  Michele  di  Murano,2  the  present  cemetery 
island.  Thence,  however,  in  accordance  with  a  practice  still 
common  in  Italy,  he  was  released,  and  thus  given  the  oppor- 
tunity of  committing  an  atrocious  crime.  On  15th  August 
1510,  he  managed,  "by  songs,  kisses,  and  caresses,"  to  entice 
his  wife  to  his  couch  with  the  object  of  murdering  her.  For 
the  moment,  the  duchess  succeeded  in  escaping  from  the 
maniac's  sword  by  fleeing,  just  as  she  was,  in  her  nightdress, 
to  the  house  of  her  aunt,  the  Lady  of  Nio,  Lucrezia  Loredano. 
Thither,  however,  on  the  night  of  the  17th,  her  husband 
pursued  her,  burst  open  the  doors  and  forced  his  way  up- 
stairs, where  he  found  the  Lady  of  Nio  in  bed  Meanwhile, 
on  hearing  the  noise,  the  terrified  duchess  had  hidden  under 
a  wash-tub ;  but  a  slave  betrayed  her  hiding-place ;  the  duke 
struck  her  over  the  head  with  his  sword ;  and,  in  a  frenzied 
attempt  to  ward  off  the  blow,  she  seized  the  blade  with  both 
hands,  and  fell  fainting  on  the  floor  at  his  feet  Even  then 
the  wretch's  fury  was  not  appeased;  he  gave  the  prostrate 

1  Sanudo,  Diariiy  iv.,  40,  178,  205,  310 ;  v.,  1007  ;  vii.,  159,  683,  717  ; 
Relazioni  degli  Ambasciatori  VeneHy  Series  III.,  iii.,  14,  15. 
8  Sanudo,  Diarii,  viii.,  328,  337,  355*  3^6- 


620        THE  DUCHY  OP  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

woman  a  thrust  in  the  stomach,  and  then  left  her  to  die. 
Meanwhile,  the  whole  town  was  on  its  feet ;  the  duke  fled  to 
his  garden,  and  was  thence  induced  by  the  people  to  return 
to  his  palace,  where  he  vainly  endeavoured  to  prove  that  his 
wife's  wounds  were  the  result  of  playing  with  a  knife.  A 
meeting  was  now  held,  at  which  it  was  decided  to  depose  the 
murderer,  to  proclaim  his  son  Giovanni,  then  not  more  than 
eleven  years  of  age,  and  to  elect  as  governor  of  the  duchy 
Giacomo  Gozzadini,  baron  of  Keos,  who  resided  in  Naxos 
and  had  already  held  that  office  once  before.  The  news  of 
his  deposition  reached  Francesco  as  he  sat  at  meat  in  the 
palace  with  his  son ;  so  great  was  his  fury  that  he  seized  a 
knife  to  slay  his  heir,  and  had  not  the  palace  barber  caught 
his  arm,  a  second  murder  would  have  been  committed 
Fortunately,  the  lad  escaped  by  leaping  from  the  balcony; 
the  people  rushed  into  the  palace,  and  after  a  fierce  struggle, 
in  which  the  duke  was  wounded,  he  was  seized,  and  sent  off 
to  Santorin  in  safe  custody.1 

The  Naxiotes  lost  no  time  in  reporting  what  had  occurred 
to  the  nearest  Venetian  authorities,  and  the  question  was 
brought  before  the  Republican  Government.  The  latter 
decided  to  send  out  Antonio  Loredano,  the  brother  of  the 
murdered  duchess,  as  governor  of  Naxos,  with  a  salary  of 
400  ducats  a  year,  payable  out  of  the  ducal  revenues,  and  to 
remove  the  maniac  to  Candia.  There,  in  151 1,  on  the 
anniversary  of  his  crime,  he  died  of  fever.  For  four  and  a 
half  years  Loredano  remained  in  office,  and  thus  for  the  second 
time  Naxos  enjoyed  a  brief  Venetian  protectorate.2  As 
Andros  was  also  under  the  administration  of  the  republic, 
pending  the  settlement  of  the  various  claims  to  that  island, 
the  shadow  of  the  winged  lion  had  fallen  over  the  whole 
Archipelago.  Nor  were  the  Venetian  governors  by  any 
means  to  be  pitied,  for  life  was  taken  easily  in  the  iEgean 
when  there  was  no  fear  of  plague  and  when  there  was  a 
temporary  lull  in  the  raids  of  corsairs.  We  have  an  interest- 
ing account  of  the  amusements  organised  for  one  of  the 
Venetian  ambassadors  who  stopped  in  the  islands  at  this 
period.     "  Naxos  and  Paros,"  we  are  told,  "  are  places  of  much 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  xi.,  393-4,  705. 

3  Ibid.,  xii.,  22,  175,  503  J  xx.,  354,  356,  376. 


GAIETY  OF  THE  ISLANDERS  621 

diversion,  whose  lords  honoured  his  Excellency  with  festivities 
and  balls,  at  which  there  was  no  lack  of  polished  and  gracious 
ladies."  The  rector  of  Skyros  reported  that  his  island  would 
be  most  productive,  if  only  the  Greeks  could  be  induced  to 
cultivate  it  assiduously.  But  there  were  only  two  working- 
days  in  the  week;  day  after  day  the  people  were  keeping 
some  festival,  gazing  with  awe  at  the  famous  miracle-working 
eikons  in  the  church  of  St  George,  which  even  Turks  thought 
fit  to  propitiate  with  offerings,  or  dancing  the  picturesque 
country  dances  that  have  now  all  but  gone.  "  So  passes  our 
life,"  the  rector,  evidently  a  serious  man,  sadly  wrote.  Under 
these  circumstances,  it  is  no  wonder  that  no  revenues  were 
ever  seen  at  Venice  from  the  Venetian  islands  of  the  ./Egean.1 
The  Venetian  administration  of  Naxos  ceased  when  the 
young  Duke  Giovanni  IV.  came  of  age,2  and  as  Alberto 
Sommaripa  had  at  last  been  recognised  as  rightful  lord  of 
Andros  and  clad  in  scarlet  at  Venice  in  token  of  his  succession,8 
the  Cyclades  were  once  more  left  to  the  government  of  the 
local  dynasties.  The  reign  of  Giovanni  IV.  was  the  longest 
of  any  Duke  of  the  Archipelago,  and,  with  one  exception,  the 
most  unfortunate.  He  had  not  been  long  on  the  throne, 
when  he  was  surprised  while  hunting,  by  a  Turkish  corsair, 
and  carried  off  as  a  prize.  Venice  at  once  ordered  her 
admiral  in  Greek  waters  to  ransom  her  protigt,  and  the 
Venetian  ambassador  at  Constantinople  spoke  so  strongly 
on  the  subject,  that  the  sultan  promised  to  issue  a  letter 
"  marked  with  the  corsair's  head."  The  duke's  imprisonment 
was  brief,  but  his  capture,  as  he  plaintively  said,  had  so  bad 
an  effect  on  his  finances  that  he  could  not  pay  his  liabilities.4 
Possibly  he  was  not  sorry  of  an  excuse  for  shirking  them,  as 
a  Venetian  commissioner  found  his  revenues  to  be  3000 
ducats  and  his  expenditure  1300.  "The  young  duke,"  wrote 
this  authority,  "  is  surrounded  by  evil  counsellors  ;  his  island 
is  weak,  his  castle  strong,  but  badly  armed."  Sanudo,  who 
met  him  in  Venice,  describes  him  as  "  a  very  inexperienced 

1  Sanudo,  Diariiy  xvii.,  35  ;  xviii.,  359-60 ;  xxvi.,  457. 
9  From  Sanudo,  Diarii,  ii.,  701,  and  xxvi.,  457,  it  seems  that  he  was 
born  in  1499  ;  he  is  first  mentioned  as  duke  in  May  14 17. 
3  IHd.%  xviii.,  358,  361. 
1  Ibid.,  xxiv.,  467,  471,  596,  645  ;  xxv.,  158,  185. 


622        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

youth,"  but  none  the  less  the  proud  republic  treated  him  with 
the  utmost  consideration.  Not  only  did  she  include  u  Naxos 
and  the  islands  appertaining  to  it "  in  her  treaty  with  Selim  L 
in  1517,  but  she  bestowed  many  marks  of  honour  upon  the 
ducal  visitor,  which  show  how  high  was  the  social  status  of 
the  ruler  of  the  Archipelago.  Four  nobles  in  scarlet  and 
many  more  in  black  were  sent  by  the  doge  to  escort  him 
from  the  house  where  he  was  staying,  six  trumpeters  and  the 
men  of  the  ducal  galley  preceded  him,  and  when  he  appeared 
clad  in  crimson  velvet  with  a  gold  chain  round  his  neck,  the 
doge  embraced  him  and  bade  him  be  seated  at  his  side.1 

Like  most  of  his  race,  however,  Giovanni    IV.   did  not 
scruple  to  defy  the  republic  when  it  suited  his  purpose.     Soon 
after  his  accession,  the  Sommaripa  dynasty  became  extinct  in 
Paros,  by  the  death  of  the  last  baron  without  issue.     Several 
claimants  at  once  arose ;  for  Paros,  though  its  revenues  were 
then  small,  was  one  of  the  most  important  islands.     Of  these 
claimants  the  most  active  was  the  young  Duke  of  Naxos,  who 
captured  the  castles  of  Kephalos  and  Paroikia,  and  installed 
his  own  officials  in  both  of  those  fortresses.     Meanwhile,  the 
Venetian   Government,  in   its  capacity  of  the   late    baron's 
residuary  legatee,  and  in  virtue  of  the  general  powers  of  arbitra- 
tion which  it  had   long  claimed   in   such   cases,  ordered  a 
commissioner  to  occupy   Paros   in   its    name,   pending  the 
decision   of  the  dispute.      The   Naxian   garrison,    however, 
forcibly  repulsed  his  overtures,  and  it  was  necessary  to  make 
a  naval  demonstration  before  the  duke  was  brought  to  reason. 
The  question  was  then  submitted  to  a  committee  of  experts 
in  Venice,  and  the   senate  decided  in   favour   of   Fiorenza 
Venier,  who,  as  sister  of  the  late  baron,  was  the  legal  heiress, 
according  to  the  statutes  of  the  Empire  of  Romania,  and  who, 
as  widow  of  a  Venetian  noble,  was  the  most  desirable  candi- 
date.    Thus,  in   1520,  the  marble  island,  like  the    island  of 
Venus,  passed  to  the  Venieri.     But  they  had  little  time  to 
leave  any  mark  upon  their  new  domain,  for  their  dynasty  too 
became  extinct  at  Paros  eleven  years  later,  when  a  fresh 
dispute  arose  as  to  the  succession.    On  this  occasion,  the 
Duke  of  Naxos,  now  grown  wiser,  did  not  interpose ;    a 
Venetian  commissioner  was  sent  to  govern  the  island  in  the 
1  Sanudo,  Diarii>  xxv.,  416 ;  xxvL,  457  ;  xxxiv.,  245,  246,  250,  26a 


FALL  OF  RHODES  623 

interim,  and  in  1535  the  republic  decided  in  favour  of  another 
woman — Cecilia,  sister  of  the  last  baron  and  wife  of  a  brave 
Venetian,  Bernardo  Sagredo,  whose  heroic  defence  of  the 
island  against  the  Turks  is  one  of  the  last  and  brightest  pages 
in  the  history  of  the  Archipelago.1 

The  accession  of  Suleyman  the  Magnificent  renewed  and 
increased  the  dangers  to  which  the  petty  lords  of  the  iEgean, 
as  the  advanced  guard  of  Christendom,  were  peculiarly 
exposed  Any  advantages  which  they  might  gain  from  his 
treaty  with  Venice  were  more  than  balanced  by  his  capture 
of  Rhodes — a  feat  of  arms  facilitated  by  the  indifference  of 
the  most  serene  republic  But  the  Duke  of  Naxos  was  not 
indifferent  to  the  fate  of  the  warrior  Knights,  a  branch  of 
whose  Order  existed  in  his  capital,  and  who  had  held  for  the 
last  forty  years  the  neighbouring  island  of  Nikaria.  He 
prayed  God  to  help  them  in  this,  their  hour  of  need,  and 
incurred  the  censure  of  Venice  and  the  risk  of  a  Turkish  attack 
by  furnishing  them  with  provisions.  It  seems,  indeed,  to 
have  been  thought  that  after  the  fall  of  Rhodes  they  would 
ask  his  permission  to  make  Naxos  their  headquarters.  Such 
an  act  of  generosity  would,  however,  have  been  fatal  to  the 
duchy ;  for  either  the  newcomers  would  have  made  themselves 
its  masters,  or  the  sultan  would  have  annexed  it  without 
delay,  rather  than  allow  so  central  a  position  to  fall  into  the 
possession  of  his  deadly  foes.  The  popes  had,  however,  long 
ago  transferred  Lindos  and  two  Asian  bishoprics  to  the 
metropolitan  see  of  the  Archipelago  at  Naxos,  and  now 
endowed  the  archbishop  with  the  goods  of  the  Order  there.2 

During  the  next  ten  years  we  hear  little  of  the  duchy ; 
Venice  was  at  peace  with  the  great  sultan,  so  that  her 
protigt  was  able  to  leave  his  island  state  for  the  purpose  of 
paying  a  vow  at  Loreto  and  Rome,  undisturbed  except  by 
the  visit  of  some  dangerous  Turkish  corsair.  His  weakness 
was,  however,  clearly  displayed  in  1532,  when  Kurtoglu,  one 
of  the  worst  of  those  sea-robbers,  suddenly  appeared  at 
Naxos  with  twelve  sail,  and  was  only  bought  off  by  a  gift  of 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  xxv.,  259,  264,  281,  282,  421,  422 ;  xxvi.,  24,  160, 
161  ;  xxvii.,  482;  xxix.,  52,  55,  57,  64,  68,  507 ;  Sauger,  344. 

2  laid.,  xxxi.,  59 ;  xxxiii.,  362,  375  ;  Sauger,  286 ;  Lichtlc,  op.  cit ; 
Reg.  Av.,  clxvii.,  f.  441. 


624        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

money  and  refreshments.  Both  the  Venetian  governor  of 
Paros  and  the  petty  seigneur  of  Sifanto  had  to  pay  black- 
mail to  this  ruffian,  who  levied  30  ducats  from  the  exiguous 
finances  of  the  latter  island.  "  It  would  make  the  very  stones 
weep,"  wrote  the  Venetian  rector  of  Mykonos,  "  to  see  the 
ruin"  which  another  of  these  pirates  caused.1  Meanwhile, 
the  nephew  of  a  famous  corsair  compiled  a  Turkish  account 
of  the  Cyclades  to  facilitate  their  conquest 

The  long-threatening  storm  at  last  burst  over  "  the  isles 
of  Greece."  In  1536  France  and  the  sultan  made  an  unholy 
alliance  for  the  purpose  of  driving  Venice  from  the  Levant, 
and  in  the  following  year  the  war  broke  out,  which  was 
destined  to  deprive  the  republic  of  her  last  possessions  in 
the  Morea.2  The  Turkish  attack  upon  Corfu  failed,  as  we 
saw ;  but  a  fleet  of  seventy  galleys  and  thirty  smaller  vessels 
appeared  in  the  jEgean  under  the  command  of  Khaireddin 
Barbarossa,  the  terrible  corsair,  himself  an  islander  from 
Lesbos,8  who  had  risen  to  be  the  Turkish  admiraL  His  first 
attacks  were  directed  against  the  two  Venetian  islands  of 
Cerigo  and  ./Egina,  whose  terrible  sufferings  at  his  hands 
have  been  described  in  previous  chapters.  From  ,/Egina  the 
red-bearded  commander  sailed  to  the  Cyclades,  where  one 
petty  Venetian  dynasty  after  another  fell  before  him.  The 
castle  of  Seriphos,  where  the  Michieli  had  lorded  it  for  over 
a  century,  could  not  save  their  diminutive  barony  from 
annexation ;  the  group  of  three  islands,  Nio,  Namfio,  and 
Antiparos,  which  had  passed  by  marriage  or  inheritance  a 
few  years  before  from  the  ducal  family  to  the  Pisani,5  now 
became  Turkish ;  the  Quirini  lost  their  possessions  of 
Stampalia  and  Amorgos,  whose  inhabitants  fled  to  Crete. 
These  six  islands  never  again  owned  the  Latin  sway. 
Abandoned  by  Venice  in  the  shameful  treaty  of  1 540,  their 
Venetian  lords  in  vain  attempted  to  recover  them  by  negotia- 
tions with  the  Porte.  The  Pisani  pleaded  for  the  restitution 
of  little  Namfio,  but  the  Venetian  bailie  at  Constantinople 

1  Sanudo,  Diarii,  xxjl,  450 ;  lvi.,  882 ;  Mitteilungen  (Atfun\  xxvii, 

417-3°- 

2  Haji  Kalifeh,  History  of  the  Maritime  Wars  of  the  Turk*,  28. 

3  Hopf,  Analckten,  419 ;   Sanudo,    Diarii,  lvii.,   472 ;    Patch   voa 
Kriencn,  31. 


BARBAROSSAS  CONQUESTS  625 

replied  that  all  the  inhabitants  had  been  removed,  and  that 
the  islet  had  been  left  a  mere  barren  rock.  The  Quirini 
were  willing  to  acquiesce  in  the  loss  of  Amorgos,  if  they 
could  but  retain  Stampalia,  the  island  whose  name  they  had 
incorporated  with  their  own.  But  there,  again,  the  sultan  was 
inexorable.1  The  escutcheon  of  the  Michieli  over  the  castle 
gate  at  Seriphos  alone  preserves  the  memory  of  their  rule 
there ;  but  the  connection  of  the  Quirini  with  Stampalia 
survives  in  their  arms  and  superscription  in  that  island,  and  in 
the  name  of  the  square,  street,  bridge,  and  palace  in  Venice, 
where  they  long  resided,  and  where  the  last  of  their  race  only 
recently  died.  But  few  who  enter  the  library,  into  which 
the  Palazzo  Quirini-Stampalia  has  now  been  converted, 
realise  the  historic  meaning  of  its  double  name.2 

Having  thus  made  an  easy  conquest  of  the  smaller 
islands,  Barbarossa  appeared  at  Paros,  and  ordered  it  to 
surrender.  But  Bernardo  Sagredo,  the  baron  of  the  marble 
island,  was  resolved  not  to  relinquish  his  newly-won 
possession  without  a  struggle.  Abandoning  the  fortress 
of  Agousa  to  the  enemy,  he  shut  himself  up  with  the  small 
forces  at  his  command  in  the  strong  castle  of  Kephalos, 
where,  with  the  aid  of  a  Florentine  outlaw,  he  not  only  held 
out  for  several  days,  but  made  effective  sorties  against  the 
besiegers.  Want  of  powder,  however,  forced  him  to  yield ; 
his  wife,  Cecilia  Venier,  was  allowed  to  withdraw  to  Venice, 
and  Sagredo  himself  was  soon  released  from  captivity,  thanks 
to  the  gratitude  of  a  Ragusan  sailor  who  had  once  rowed 
in  a  galley  under  his  command.  The  Parians,  some  6000  in 
number,  were  treated  as  the  other  islanders  had  been ;  the 
old  men  were  butchered,  the  young  men  were  sent  to  serve 
at  the  oar ;  the  women  were  ordered  to  dance  on  the  shore, 
so  that  the  conqueror  might  choose  the  most  pleasing  for  his 
lieutenants;  the  boys  were  enrolled  in  the  corps  of  the 
janissaries.8    Though  Sagredo  tried  to  recover  his  lost  island 

1  A.  Maurocenus,  Historia  Veneta  (ed.  1623),  182  ;  Paruta,  Historia 
Venetiana  (ed.  1703),  382  ;  Predelli,  CommemoriaIi\  vi.,  236,  238 ;  Hopf, 
op.  cit.t  417,  476  ;   La  Vidade  Barbaroxa  in  Arch,  Stor.  Sicily  xi.,  105-9. 

8  Pasch  von  Krienen,  1 10. 

3  Maurocenus,/^:.  cit. ;  Paruta,  loc.  cit;  Buchon,  Recherches%  ii.,  468  ; 
Hopf,  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna),  148-50;  Pasch  von  Krienen,  119;  A 
Cornaro,  "  Historia  di  Candia,"  ff.  93,  94. 

2  K 


■\ 


626        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

by  the  offer  of  tribute,  it  was  abandoned  to  the  sultan  by 
the  treaty  of  1 540.  But  the  latter  would  seem  to  have  given 
it  to  the  Duke  of  Naxos,  among  whose  possessions  we  find 
it  included  some  twenty  years  later,  while  at  the  same  time, 
a  Greek  named  Eraclfdes  Basilik6s,  one  of  those  adventurers 
so  common  in  the  Levant,  who  boasted  that  he  was  descended 
from  the  rulers  of  Moldavia,  was  pleased  to  style  himself 
Margrave  Palatine  of  Paros ! * 

From  Paros  the  Turkish  fleet  sailed  across  to  the  capital 
of  the  Cyclades.  We  have  from  the  pen  of  the  duke  himself 
a  graphic  account  of  this  dreaded  visitation.  As  soon  as  the 
fatal  galleys  were  sighted,  the  inhabitants  fled  from  all  parts 
of  the  island  to  take  refuge  in  the  city,  leaving  in  their  haste 
their  heavy  goods  and  chattels  behind  them.  The  Turks  had 
no  sooner  landed  than  they  forced  their  way  into  the  tower 
near  the  sea  and  the  adjoining  houses,  and,  in  their  rage  at 
finding  no  one  there,  destroyed  all  those  buildings  and  broke 
open  the  cellars,  where  corn,  wine,  and  oil  were  stored. 
Meanwhile,  a  Christian  emissary  of  the  Turkish  commander 
sought  an  audience  of  the  reluctant  duke  in  his  palace  in  the 
upper  town.  "  If,"  he  said,  "  you  will  voluntarily  submit 
yourself  and  your  islands  to  the  emperor,  already  master 
of  Asia  and  ere  long  of  all  Europe  too,  you  may  easily 
obtain  his  favour.  If  not,  then  I  bid  you  expect  his  hatred 
and  indignation."  The  envoy  continued  in  the  same  strain: 
"If  you  surrender,  all  your  possessions  shall  be  saved; 
but  if  you  refuse,  we  will  send  you,  your  wife  and  children, 
your  fellow-countrymen  and  subjects,  to  destruction  to- 
gether. We  have  a  powerful  fleet,  a  vigorous  and  vic- 
torious soldiery,  and  an  admirable  siege  equipment.  Take 
warning  and  counsel,  then,  from  the  ^Eginetans,  the 
Parians,  and  the  other  lords  of  the  Cyclades.  You 
are  fortunate  to  be  able,  if  you  choose  wisely,  to  profit 
by  the  misfortunes  of  your  neighbours."  The  duke  begged 
the  envoy  to  withdraw,  while  he  took  counsel  with  his 
advisers.  The  trembling  council  hastily  met,  and,  as  the 
ducal  resources  were  inadequate  to  the  task  of  resisting  and 
there  was  no  hope  of  help  from  Western  Christendom,  it  was 
decided  to  accept  the  Turkish  terms,  rather  than  expose  the 
1  Gratiani,  De  Joantu  Heraclide  Dcspota,  6. 


THE  DUKE^S  APPEAL  TO  CHRISTENDOM      627 

duke  and  his  subjects  to  the  certainty  of  death  or  slavery. 
Accordingly,  on  nth  November,  Giovanni  IV.  surrendered, 
promising  to  pay  an  annual  tribute  of  5000  ducats,1  and 
paying  the  first  year  in  advance,  in  order  to  mollify  his 
threatening  adversary.  The  sum,  he  plaintively  says,  was 
beyond  the  means  of  a  poor  duke  and  an  exiguous  state,  but 
the  loss  of  the  money  was  a  lesser  evil  than  the  loss  of  his 
dominions.  Yet,  with  all  these  concessions,  he  could  not 
prevent  the  Turks  from  ravaging  "the  Queen  of  the 
Cyclades "  and  carrying  off  more  than  25,000  ducats'  worth 
of  booty,  and  he  already  foresaw  that,  unless  Christendom 
would  unite  against  the  Turk,  in  a  few  years'  time  he  would 
share  the  same  fate  which  had,  eighty  years  before,  befallen 
the  last  Greek  emperor  of  Constantinople. 

With  the  forlorn  hope  of  making  Christendom  forget  its 
quarrels  and   combine  against  the  common  foe,  the  duke 
addressed   his  memorable  letter  to  "Pope   Paul  III.;  the 
Emperor  Charles   V. ;    Ferdinand,   King   of   the   Romans ; 
Francois  I.  of  France;  and  the  other  Christian  kings  and 
princes."     In   this   curious  document  he  bade  them  "apply 
their  ears  and  lift  up  their  eyes,  and  attend  with  their  minds, 
while  their  own   interests  were   still   safe,"   lest   they,  too, 
should  suffer  the  fate  of  the  writer.     He  reminded  them  of 
the  wealth  and  strength  of  the  magnificent  sultan,  which, 
even  if  united  by  some  miracle,  they  would  find  it  hard  to 
resist.     He    pointed    out    that    Suleyman's    policy  was    to 
separate  them,  so  as  the  easier  to  destroy  one  while  cajoling 
another,  and  that  by  this  means  ere  long  the  whole  earth 
would  be  the  sheep-fold  of  Mahomet.     He  emphasised  these 
admirable  truisms,  which  might  have  been  addressed  to  the 
Concert  of  Europe  at  any  time  during  the  last  thirty  years, 
by  a  well-worn   tag   from   his  ancestor   Sallust — Sallustius 
Crispus  "the  author  of   our   race" — and  urged   his  corre- 
spondents to  wake  up  and  invade  the  Turkish  Empire  while 
the  sultan's  attention  was   distracted  by  the  Persian  war.2 
But  neither  his  platitudes  nor  his  allusion  to  his  distinguished 

1  In  1553  and  1554  the  tribute  for  the  Cyclades  was  6000  ducats; 
Rclazioni degli  Ambasciatori  Veneti,  Series  III.,  i.,  39,  150. 

*  Buchon,  Recherches,  ii.,  464-72 ;  Charriere,  Negotiations  de  la 
France  dans  le  Levant^  i.,  373. 


628        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

ancestry,  which  he  might  have  had  some  difficulty  in  proving, 
availed  the  unfortunate  duke  with  the  selfish  powers  of 
Europe. 

Meanwhile,  Barbarossa  went  on  with  his  career  of 
conquest ;  Mykonos,  so  sorely  tried  sixteen  years  before,  now 
succumbed,  never  to  become  Venetian  again,  though  the 
rector  of  Tenos  might  still  pretend  to  jurisdiction  over  the 
sister  island  and  for  half  a  century  longer  bear  its  name  in 
his  commission.  Many  of  the  inhabitants  were  carried  off; 
the  rest  fled  to  Tenos.  The  people  of  the  latter  island, 
despite  their  devotion  to  Venice,  yielded  at  once  to  the 
summons  of  the  terrible  admiral;  at  the  suggestion  of  a 
treacherous  Melian,  who,  as  a  subject  of  the  Duke  of  Naxos, 
was  no  friend  of  the  Venetians,  they  handed  Dolfino,  the 
rector,  to  Barbarossa.  They  soon  repented  their  precipitate 
surrender,  sent  to  Crete  for  aid,  and  once  more  hoisted  the 
lion  banner.  So  ashamed  were  the  Teniotes  of  their  dis- 
loyalty, that  later  travellers  were  told  that  their  ancestors 
had  merely  thought  for  a  moment  of  surrender,  and  that  they 
had  not  only  routed  the  forces  of  Barbarossa,  but  had  thrown 
down  from  the  battlements  of  the  castle  the  officer  whom  he 
had  sent  to  arrange  the  terms  of  the  expected  capitulation.1 
Keos,  then  divided  between  the  Premarini  and  the  Gozzadini, 
was  captured,  but  bestowed  by  the  sultan  on  the  duke  in 
the  following  year.2  Crusino  Sommaripa  lost  Andros,  but 
managed  to  regain  possession  of  his  island,  thanks  to  the 
intervention  of  the  French  ambassador  at  Constantinople,  to 
whom  he  doubtless  emphasised  his  own  French  descent  It 
was  arranged  that  he  should  pay  an  annual  tribute  of  35,000 
aspers  to  the  Bey  of  Negroponte,  and  a  firman  of  the  sultan 
specially  allowed  the  Andrians  to  defend  themselves  against 
the  violence  of  the  janissaries.3  The  other  islands  received 
similar  capitulations.4 

In  1538,  Barbarossa  made  a  second  cruise  in  the  iEgean 

1  Cornaro,  op.  tit.,  ff.  94,  95,  99  J  Maurocenus,  loc.  cit.:  Tournefort, 
Voyage  du  Levant,  i.,  139.  Cf.  the  author's  artide  on  Mykonos  in  die 
English  Historical  Review,  xxii.,  307. 

2  Haji  Kalifeh,  op.  tit,  58  ;  Mar.,  xxvi.,  f.  48  (mistranslated  by  Hqtf 
Analekten,  451.) 

3  Sauger,  349-5 1  ;  P&gues,  Histoire  de  Santorin,  609. 

4  Sanudo,  Diarii,  lv.,  458-9,  472-6. 


CAPTURE  OF  THE  NORTHERN  SPORADES     629 

with  a  fleet  of  120  sail,  received  the  tribute  due  from  the 
Duke  of  Naxos,  and  put  an  end  for  ever  to  the  rule  of 
Venice  in  the  Northern  Sporades.  Though  at  times 
oppressed  by  their  Venetian  rectors,  the  Greeks  of  those 
islands  had  often  sought  and  found  justice  from  the  Home 
Government.  Only  a  few  years  before  their  capture  by  the 
Turks,  they  had  taken  the  opportunity  of  the  visit  of  a 
Venetian  commissioner  to  complain  of  the  tyranny  of  their 
rectors.  Sanudo  has  left  us  a  picturesque  account  of  the 
scene — how  the  people  of  Skyros,  men  and  women  alike, 
came  down  to  the  shore,  crying  "  Mercy,  mercy  upon  us ! " 
how  the  commissioner  bade  the  town-crier  summon  all  who 
had  any  grievance  against  the  rector  to  appear  before  him, 
and  how  they  told  him  the  piteous  tale  of  their  woes. 
Their  rector,  said  their  spokesman,  the  Greek  bishop,  had 
u  cornered  "  all  the  corn  of  the  island,  and  had  prevented  the 
importation  of  more  by  asking  the  neighbouring  Turkish 
governors  to  send  none  to  Skyros.  Then,  despite  the 
express  clause  in  their  capitulations  forbidding  the  rector  to 
engage  in  trade,  he  had  sold  them  his  whole  stock  at  his  own 
price,  and  allowed  no  one  to  bake  bread  except  from  his 
corn,  so  that  many  had  fled  to  Turkey.  Similarly,  the  people 
of  Skiathos  had  complained  that  there  was  such  insecurity 
that  they  must  perforce  remain  shut  up  in  the  castle  "  like 
a  bird  in  its  cage."  In  both  these  cases  the  rector  was 
removed,  and  Venetian  justice  was  amply  vindicated;  it 
might  therefore  have  been  expected  that  the  natives  would 
have  fought  to  the  last  for  their  masters.  But  their  treachery 
caused  the  loss  of  both  these  islands.  The  people  of  Skyros 
at  once  handed  over  Cornaro,  their  rector,  with  his  court  and 
some  Italian  artillerymen  sent  from  Candia,  and  offered  to 
pay  2000  ducats  tribute  to  the  Turk.  Memmo,  the  rector  of 
Skiathos,  knew  that  the  lofty  castle  possessed  great  natural 
strength ;  he  therefore  resolved  to  hold  out,  and,  as  his 
garrison  was  small,  armed  the  natives,  on  whom  he  thought 
he  could  rely.  Unhappily,  an  arrow  wounded  him  at  the 
first  attack ;  as  he  lay  wounded  in  his  litter,  the  traitors  in 
the  castle  fell  upon  him  and  slew  him ;  whereupon  they  let 
down  ropes  from  the  rocks  and  drew  the  Turks  up  into  the 
citadel.     Barbarossa  was  so  indignant  at  the  murder  of  his 


630        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

brave  opponent,  that  he  ordered  the  instant  beheadal  of  the 
men  who  had  betrayed  their  commander,  and  carried  off 
the  rest  of  the  inhabitants  into  slavery.  When  Baron 
Blancard,  the  French  admiral,  passed  soon  afterwards,  he 
found  Skiathos  and  Skopelos  both  deserted.1 

Like  the  islands  of  the  dispossessed  barons  of  the 
Archipelago,  the  Northern  Sporades  and  the  much  older 
Venetian  colony  of  Mykonos  were  retained  by  the  sultan  at 
the  peace  of  1 540,  despite  the  efforts  of  the  Venetian  plenipo- 
tentiary. Five  years  later  we  find  Venice  still  in  vain  trying 
to  obtain  the  restitution  of  little  Mykonos.2  Only  the  non- 
Venetian  dynasties  of  the  jEgean — the  Crispi,  the  Sommaripa, 
and  the  Gozzadini — survived  the  two  fatal  visits  of  the  red- 
bearded  admiral.  Even  the  lord  of  little  Siphnos  was  glad  to 
pay  tribute,  "not  wishing  to  appear  either  wiser  or  more 
foolish  than  his  neighbours."  3  They  well  knew,  however,  that 
they  only  existed  on  sufferance.  Venice  could  no  longer 
afford  them  protection,  nor  had  she  the  same  interests  as 
before  in  a  sea  where  Tenos  was  now  her  sole  possession. 

Her  shameful  neglect  of  even  so  important  an  outpost  as 
Tenos  was  shown  from  the  fact  that  no  sindici  visited  the 
island  to  redress  the  grievances  of  the  Greeks  for  over  thirty 
years.  It  is  to  the  visit  of  one  of  these  officials  in  1563  that 
we  owe  a  most  interesting  account  of  the  state  of  the  Cyclades 
on  the  eve  of  the  Turkish  Conquest  "  Tenos,"  he  wrote,  "  is 
the  richest  and  most  populous  of  all  the  iEgean  islands,  with 
the  exception  of  Chios ;  the  fortress  is  almost  impregnable, 
though  the  garrison  consists  of  but  twelve  foot  soldiers ;  the 
population  is  9000,  a  good  part  of  whom  speak  Italian  and 
are  Catholics.  Such  is  their  civilisation,  that  this  remote 
island  scarcely  differs  at  all  from  Venetia ;  while  the  corsairs 
are  a  constant  menace  to  the  other  islands,  they  rarely 
venture  to  molest  Tenos,  defended  as  it  is  by  2000  able- 
bodied  men.  Among  themselves  the  Teniotes  are  peaceable ; 
the  oldest  inhabitant  cannot  remember  a  murder ;  the  rectors 

1  Maurocenus,  196 ;  Paruta,  409 ;  Charrifcre,  loc.  cit.j  Cornaro,  loc. 
cit.j  Haji  Khalifeh,  59-61. 

8  Predelli,  Commemoriali^  vi.,  236,  238 ;  Lamansky,  Secrets  de  PAtat 
de  Vemse,  58  ;  Ssithas,  viii.,  451. 

3  Cornaro,  op.  cit.9  f.  100. 


TENOS  IN  1563  631 

find  them  excellent  and  most  obedient  subjects,  and  fines 
are  accustomed  to  be  paid  in  silk,  the  staple  of  the  island. 
Yet  some  of  those  officials  in  the  past  have  made  too  much 
out  of  the  islanders,  who  have  one  special  grievance  against 
them.  Tenos,  it  should  be  remembered,  consists  of  two 
halves — one  half  directly  administered  by  the  republic,  the 
other  originally  let  by  the  senate  to  the  Loredano  family  and 
disposed  of  by  them  to  some  citizens  of  the  island  called 
Scutoni,  or  Scutari.  According  to  the  Venetian  regulations, 
the  produce  of  the  former  half,  consisting  of  corn  and  wine, 
should  be  sold  every  year  by  auction  to  the  highest  bidder ; 
and  out  of  the  proceeds,  which  should  average  800  ducats, 
the  salaries  of  the  rector  and  the  other  officials  should  be 
paid.  Latterly,  however,  in  distinct  violation  of  the  capitula- 
tions, which  prohibit  direct  or  indirect  trading  by  the  rectors, 
those  officials  have  bought  up  all  the  corn  at  low  prices,  as  no 
one  dared  to  bid  against  them,  especially  as  the  governors 
of  Tenos  have  more  power  than  those  of  any  other  Venetian 
colony,  and  are  less  liable,  from  their  distance  from  Venice 
or  even  Crete,  to  be  called  to  account.  This  abuse  is  doubly 
bad :  for  not  only  are  the  natives  compelled  to  buy  corn  from 
the  rector  on  his  own  terms,  as  the  island  does  not  produce 
sufficient  other  grain  for  their  nourishment,  but  the  castle  is 
often  left  without  provisions.  Two  remedies  are  suggested  : 
the  increase  of  the  rector's  present  miserable  salary  of  seven 
ducats  a  month,  which  forces  him  to  make  money  in  this 
way ;  and  the  substitution  of  a  cash  payment  by  the  people, 
instead  of  this  zemoro%  or  tithe  in  kind,  which  they  would 
much  prefer.  For  humanitarian,  strategic,  and  political 
reasons  alike,  the  republic  should  hold  this  island  dear.  For 
it  is  the  sole  refuge  in  the  Archipelago  for  fugitive  slaves, 
whose  surrender  the  other  islanders  dare  not  refuse,  and  it  is 
the  first  point  whence  a  Turkish  fleet  can  be  spied,  and  thus 
Candia  can  be  warned  in  time.  Above  all,  it  is  a  living 
memorial  of  Venetian  rule,  which  keeps  ever  before  the  eyes 
of  the  other  islanders  the  blessings  of  your  sway.  Moreover, 
if  the  Teniotes  were  discontented,  you  could  not  retain 
them  for  a  moment,  nor  are  there  wanting  incentives  to 
disaffection  among  them.  Their  neighbour,  the  Duke  of 
ffaxos,  naturally  an  ambitious  man,  anxious  to  increase  his 


\ 


632        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

state  by  hook  or  by  crook  at  the  expense  of  his  neighbours, 
covets  Tenos,  and  lavishes  favours  on  its  inhabitants, 
whenever  they  come  to  Naxos  or  any  of  his  other  islands, 
trying  to  persuade  them  that  they  would  be  better  off  under 
his  rule.  His  argument  is  an  appeal  to  their  material  interests. 
" '  As  my  subjects/  he  tells  them,  c  you  would  be  Turkish 
tributaries,  and  in  that  capacity  you  would  be  able  to  purchase 
corn  in  Turkey  and  could  more  easily  recover  any  of  your 
friends  who  have  been  captured  by  Turkish  corsairs.'  On 
the  other  hand,"  added  the  commissioner,  u  I  have  found  in 
the  other  islands,  formerly  under  Venetian  protection,  in- 
credible affection  for,  and  devotion  to,  your  rule.  Never  have 
those  people  forgotten  that  happy  time." 

It  was  the  Venetian  policy  to  allow  the  Teniotes  a  large 
measure  of  local  government,  and  the  local  offices  were  held 
on  short  tenures,  so  that  as  many  as  possible  might  participate 
in  them.  Every  25th  of  April  the  rector  summoned  the 
council,  composed  of  all  the  citizens  of  the  capital,  or  Castello, 
and  submitted  to  them  the  names  of  four  different  families, 
from  one  of  which  they  elected  an  official,  called  the  "  bailie" 
Local  judges,  annually  elected,  tried  small  cases,  with  an 
appeal  to  the  rector,  instead  of  to  Crete,  as  the  journey 
thither  was  both  expensive  and  unsafe.  The  republic  wisely 
allowed  the  old  code  to  continue  in  force — the  Assizes  of 
Romania  and  the  statutes  of  Casa  Ghisi,  by  which  Tenos  had 
been  governed  for  nearly  two  centuries  before  her  time.  She 
had  confirmed  the  privileges,  alike  of  the  Byzantine  emperors 
and  of  the  Latin  barons,  and  her  rector  every  two  years 
named  the  headmen,  or  primates  (protogeri)  of  the  villages. 
Once  a  year,  on  May-day,  he  kept  up  the  ancient  custom  of 
receiving  the  homage  of  the  feudatories  at  the  mountain  of 
S.  Veneranda ;  four  times  a  year  it  was  their  duty  to  practice 
the  cross-bow  for  the  defence  of  the  island.  All  the  summer 
long,  watch  was  kept  day  and  night  at  the  coast  (the  so-called 
merovigli  and  nichtovigli),  and  relays  of  peasants,  called 
roccariy  or  "  men  of  the  fortress,"  had  to  guard  the  castle  at 
night  Beacon-fires  were  lighted  as  soon  as  a  suspicious  sail 
was  sighted;  rewards  were  offered  for  every  corsair's  head 
that  was  brought  to  the  rector;  Turkish  captains  were 
propitiated  by  presents  of  live  stock ;  and  finally  five  so-called 


THE  DUKE'S  SPLENDID  MISERY  633 

"  centurions  "  were  elected  by  the  council  to  form  a  trainband 
of  ioo  men  each,  as  in  the  Ionian  islands.  Such  was 
existence  in  the  one  Venetian  island  of  the  iEgean  at  the 
time  of  the  Turkish  conquest  of  the  other  Cyclades. 

The  writer  above  mentioned  then  proceeds  to  describe 
the  condition  of  the  duchy.  "  The  islands  of  Zia,  Siphnos, 
and  Andros,"  he  told  his  Government,  "  have  their  own  lords 
(the  Sommaripa  and  the  Gozzadini),  but  are  tributaries  of  the 
sultan ;  the  other  sixteen  islands  are  under  the  duke,  but  of 
these,  only  five — Naxos,  Santorin,  Melos,  Syra,  and  Paros — 
are  inhabited.  The  Duke  of  Naxos,  a  man  of  nearly  seventy, 
is,  in  point  of  dignity,  the  Premier  Duke  of  Christendom ;  but, 
despite  his  title,  he  is  duke  more  in  name  than  in  fact ;  for 
in  all  things  the  Grand  Turk  and  his  ministers  are  practically 
supreme.  Every  year,  when  the  Turkish  captains  arrive,  the 
duke's  subjects  bring  their  complaints  against  him  before 
them,  so  that  he  dare  not  punish  his  own  dependents  for 
their  crimes,  nor  even  for  their  offences  against  his  own 
person.  He  dresses  and  lives  like  a  pauper,  without  the 
least  pomp  or  princely  expenditure ;  for,  though  he  raises  from 
9000  to  10,000  ducats  a  year  out  of  his  islands,  he  has  to  pay 
4000  ducats  as  tribute  to  the  sultan,  and  his  sole  thought  is 
how  he  can  save  money  with  which  to  bribe  the  Turkish 
captains  and  ministers.  Under  these  circumstances,  his 
administration  is  rather  the  shadow  of  a  principality  than  a 
government"  * 

The  Venetian  commissioner's  report  is  fully  confirmed 
from  what  we  know  of  the  duke  from  other  sources. 
Scarcely  had  the  peace  of  1540  been  concluded  than  he, 
who  had  so  eloquently  preached  to  the  Great  Powers  the 
need  of  union,  exemplified  the  insincerity  of  such  maxims 
by  benefiting  his  own  relatives  at  the  expense  of  his 
Christian  neighbours.  The  Turks  acquiesced,  and  the 
Venetians  in  vain  protested,  when  he  kept  the  Premarini 
out  of  their  part  of  Zia,  and  bestowed  it,  together  with  the 
devastated  island  of  Mykonos,  which  Venice  had  been  forced 
to  abandon  to  the  sultan,  upon  his  daughter  on  her  marriage 

1  Lamansky,  op.  tit,  651-60,  08-10;  S&has,  iv.,  236-311.  Cf.  Count 
Albrecht  zu  L6wenstein  (who  visited  Melos  in  1562),  apud  Feyerabend, 
Reyssbuch,  foL  205. 


• 


634        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

with  Gian  Francesco  Sommaripa,  the  last  Latin  lord  of 
Andros,  while  allowing  the  Gozzadini,  who  were  his  wife's 
relatives  and  the  traditional  friends  of  his  dynasty,  to  retain 
their  share  of  Zia.1  The  duke  might  go  on  distributing  fiefs 
to  his  friends — we  have  several  documents  bearing  his  name, 
and  one  bearing  his  ducal  seal2 — he  might  appoint  his 
relatives  governors  of  his  subordinate  islands ;  but  he  was 
under  no  illusions  as  to  the  security  of  his  tenure.  Ever}' 
year  the  disaffection  of  his  Greek  subjects,  who  at  this  time 
formed  nineteenth-twentieths  of  the  population  of  Naxos,5 
increased;  they  saw  that  their  Latin  masters  were  them- 
selves the  slaves  of  the  Turks,  and  when  a  Western  nation 
has  lost  its  prestige,  how  can  it  hope  to  govern  an  oriental 
people?  Moreover,  in  order  to  raise  funds  for  his  tribute 
to  the  sultan  and  for  bribing  the  Turkish  officials,  the  duke 
was  forced  .to  squeeze  more  money  than  before  out  of  his 
subjects.  The  latter,  as  in  the  other  Latin  states  of  the 
Levant,  found  leaders  in  the  Orthodox  clergy.  In  1559, 
the  duke  was  forced  to  banish  the  Orthodox  metropolitan  of 
Paronaxia  for  sedition.  This  divine,  dabbling  in  politics 
after  the  fashion  of  his  kind,  had  conspired  with  a  certain 
Mamusso  of  Candia  to  stir  up  a  revolt  among  his  flock. 
"It  was  disgraceful,"  he  said, "  that  so  many  valiant  Greeks 
should  allow  their  religion  to  be  insulted  and  their  country 
to  be  governed  by  a  mere  handful  of  Franks."4  Such  an 
incident,  to  which  there  had  been  no  parallel  in  the  history 
of  the  duchy  since  the  days  of  Marco  II.,  was  ominous  of 
the  future.  Worse  still,  the  oecumenical  patriarch  asked  the 
grand  vizier  to  oust  the  Catholic  hierarchy,  whose  scandal- 
ous conduct  and  great  unpopularity  were  admitted  by  the 
duke  in  two  letters  to  Rome.  "  I  have  decided/'  he  told 
the  Vatican,  "  to  have  no  more  friars  or  foreigners  as  arch- 
bishops: local  people  alone  are  popular."  It  was  obvious 
that  at  any  moment  the  natives  might  call  in  the  Turks  to 

1  Hopf,  Analekteit,  451  ;  Sauger,  296,  352  (whose  account,  more 
trustworthy  as  be  approaches  his  own  time,  here  tallies  with  the  fact, 
unknown  to  Hopf,  that  Mykonos  was  no  longer  Venetian). 

2  Buchon,  Recherchesy  ii.,  463,  473 ;  Atias%  xlii.,  14  ;  Byzantinischi 
ZeitschriftyiC\\\,%  154-6. 

3  Lichtle. 

4  Lamansky,  064  ;  Vat.  Arch.,  Arm.  xi.,  Caps,  iv.,  183. 


FALL  OF  THE  DUCHY  635 

put  an  end  to  the  tyranny  of  the  small  foreign  garrison, 
which  still  preserved  its  titles  and  dignities  without  the 
power  to  make  them  respected. 

Giovanni  IV.,  happy  in  the  opportunity  of  his  death, 
was  spared  the  humiliation  of  witnessing  the  fall  of  his 
dynasty.  He  ended  his  long  reign — the  longest  of  any 
Duke  of  the  Archipelago — in  1564,  and  his  second  son, 
Giacomo  IV.,  the  last  Christian  ruler  of  the  duchy,  reigned 
in  his  stead l — for  his  elder  son,  Francesco,  who  had  shared 
his  father's  throne  and  had  therefore  acquired  some  ex- 
perience of  government,  had  unfortunately  predeceased  him. 
The  new  duke  recognised  that  he  was  a  mere  puppet  of 
the  Turks;  in  a  letter,  written  in  1565,  he  plaintively  says : 
"We  are  now  tributaries  of  the  great  emperor,  Sultan 
Suleyman,  and  we  are  in  evil  plight,  because  of  the 
difficulties  of  the  times ;  for  now  necessity  reigns  with 
embarrassment  and  pain  for  her  ministers ;  and,  like 
plenipotentiaries  or  commissioners  of  others,  we  husband 
our  opportunities  as  fate  doth  ordain."2  But,  though  he 
saw  the  weakness  of  his  position,  he  acted  as  if  it  were 
impregnable.  He  and  the  nobles  of  his  petty  court  thought 
of  nothing  but  their  pleasures  and  of  how  to  gratify  them. 
The  debauchery  of  the  castle  of  Naxos  utterly  scandalised 
the  temperate  Greeks;  the  heir  apparent  was  a  notorious 
evil  liver;  and  the  climax  was  reached  when  the  Latin 
clergy  lived  in  open  concubinage  and  a  Catholic  ecclesiastic 
publicly  accompanied  the  body  of  his  mistress  to  the  grave 
and  received  the  condolences  of  his  friends  on  his  loss. 
These  shocks  to  their  morality,  combined  with  fiscal  oppres- 
sion, at  last  made  the  Greeks  desire  a  change  of  master, 
such  as  the  people  of  Chios  had  just  experienced.  They 
sent  two  of  their  number  to  the  sultan,  begging  him  to  send 
them  some  person  fitter  to  govern  them,  much  as  the 
Samians  constantly  do  at  the  present  day.  The  duke  now 
realised  his  peril;  he  collected  12,000  ducats  and  sailed  for 
Constantinople  to  counteract  their  efforts  by  the  most 
convincing  of  arguments.  But  he  was  too  late;  on  his 
arrival,  he  was  at  once  stripped  of  all  his  possessions  and 

1  We  have  a  document  of  Giacomo  IV.,  dated  10th  December  1564, 
Byzant.  Zeitschrift%  xiii.,  157.  2  Ibid.,  138. 


i 


636        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

thrown  into  prison  like  a  common  malefactor,  where  he 
remained  for  five  or  six  months.  Meanwhile,  another 
Christian  renegade,  Piall  Pasha,  who  had  driven  the  Genoese 
from  Chios,  returned  from  the  Adriatic,  and  occupied  Naxos 
without  opposition.  The  Greeks  of  Andros,  who  had  learnt 
to  despise  their  feeble  lord,  seeing  how  successful  their 
fellows  in  Naxos  had  been  in  getting  rid  of  their  duke, 
conspired  against  the  life  of  Sommaripa.  Deserted  by  most 
of  the  Latins  of  the  island,  who,  instead  of  rallying  round 
him,  fled  from  the  persecution  of  the  Greeks,  he  saved  his 
life,  but  lost  his  islands  of  Andros  and  Zia,  by  flight  to  his 
wife's  native  Naxos.  At  the  same  time,  the  last  remaining 
Latin  dynasty,  that  of  the  Gozzadini,  was  wiped  from  the 
map.1  Thus,  after  having  lasted  for  359  years,  the  Latin  duchy 
of  the  Archipelago  ceased  to  exist  Tenos  alone  survived  the 
wave  of  Turkish  conquest  which  swept  over  the  ^Egean. 

The  Naxiotes  and  Andrians  soon  found  that  they  had 
exchanged  the  rule  of  King  Log  for  that  of  King  Stork 
The  new  sultan,  Selim  II.,  bestowed  the  oldest  and  most 
picturesque  of  all  the  Latin  states  of  the  Levant  upon  his 
favourite,  Joseph  Nasi,  a  Jewish  adventurer,  who  thus,  after 
many  vicissitudes,  rose  from  the  prosaic  counting-house  to 
the  romantic  island-throne  of  the  Sanudi  and  the  CrispL 
Nasi  belonged  to  a  family  of  Portuguese  Jews,  who  had 
outwardly  embraced  Christianity  in  order  to  escape  persecu- 
tion, and  had  assumed  the  aggressively  Portuguese  name 
of  Miquez,  the  better  to  conceal  their  Hebrew  origin.  Like 
other  members  of  his  family,  Jo&o  Miquez,  as  he  was  then 
pleased  to  call  himself,  went  to  seek  his  fortune  at  Antwerp, 
where  his  aunt,  a  rich  widow,  admitted  him  to  the  manage- 
ment of  her  affairs.  He  there  won  the  favour  of  the  regent 
of  the  Low  Countries,  Maria,  sister  of  the  Emperor  Charles 
V.,  and  the  love  of  his  fair  cousin,  with  whom  he  eloped. 
His  aunt  sanctioned  the  marriage,  and  the  whole  household 
migrated  for  greater  security  to  Italy.  We  next  hear  of 
Miquez  founding  a  bank  at  Lyons,  and  becoming  the 
creditor  of  the  French  crown  to  a  large  amount.  Thence, 
armed    with    a    letter    of   introduction    from    the    French 

1  Sauger,  299-301,  354-5  ;  Luccari,  Copioso  ristretto  degii  Annali  £ 
RausO)  148  ;  Conti,  Historie  dfsuoi  tempiy  i.,  475. 


THE  JEWISH  DUKE  637 

ambassador  in  Rome,  he  made  his  way  to  Constantinople, 
where  Jews  were  well  received,  and  where  his  real  fortunes 
began.  There  was  no  longer  need  for  disguising  himself  as 
a  Christian ;  he  returned  to  the  faith  and  name  of  his  Jewish 
forefathers ;  and,  as  Joseph  Nasi,  gained  the  intimacy  of  the 
future  sultan,  Selim  II.,  thanks  to  one  of  his  co-religionists, 
a  Jewish  doctor  named  Daout,  and  retained  it  by  pandering 
to  the  vices  of  that  bibulous  and  gluttonous  ruler,  to  whom 
he  presented  choice  wines  and  dainties  for  his  table.1  But 
Nasi,  like  the  Jewish  magnates  of  our  own  time,  was  anxious 
to  benefit  his  race  as  well  as  himself.  He  had  long  cherished 
the  idea  of  founding  a  Jewish  state,  and  thus,  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  anticipated  the  Zionist  movement  He 
had  in  vain  asked  Venice  to  give  him  an  island  for  the 
new  Zion;  from  Suleyman  the  Magnificent  he  obtained 
permission  to  rebuild  the  town  of  Tiberias.  Startled  French 
diplomatists,  upon  whom  he  kept  pressing  his  claims  for 
payment,  reported  that  he  intended  to  make  himself  "  King 
of  the  Jews";  fulsome  Jewish  authors  dedicated  to  him 
their  works;  the  whole  downtrodden  race  regarded  him  as 
its  head.  Such  was  the  man  upon  whom  Selim  II.  now 
solemnly  conferred  Naxos,  Andros,  and  the  other  islands  of 
the  Archipelago,  with  the  historic  title  of  duke.2 

When  the  islanders  heard  that  a  Jew  was  to  be  their  new 
master,  they  hastened  to  repair  the  mistake  which  they  had 
committed.  The  Greeks  do  not  love  the  Catholics,  but  they 
love  the  Jews  even  less,  and  the  latter  fully  reciprocate  their 
feelings.  The  subjects  of  the  dispossessed  duke  begged  the 
sultan  to  release  Giacomo  IV.  and  restore  him  to  his  now 
faithful  people.  Selim  set  the  prisoner  free,  but  refused  to 
replace  him  on  the  ducal  throne.  Finding  that  arguments 
were  useless  against  the  all-powerful  Jew,  Crispo,  accompanied 
by  his  family  and  by  his  sister,  the  Lady  of  Andros,  fled  to  the 

1  Le  Relazioni  degli  Ambasciatori  veneti%  Series  III.,  i.,  343  ;  ii.,  66, 
67,  91. 

2  Charriere,  Negotiations  de  la  France,  ii.,  403,  707,  708,  735-7,  773*5  ; 
iii.,  80,  84  ;  Strada,  De  bello  Belgico,  i.,  171  -2  ;  Reports  of  Venetian  and 
Imperial  Ambassadors,  apud  Hammer,  Geschichte  des  osm.  Reiches,  iii., 
564-5  ;  Sereno,  Commentari  della  Guerra  di  Cipro,  7  ;  Contarini,  Historia 
delle  cose  successe,  2  ;  Carmoly,  Don  Joseph  Nassy  (a  work  to  be  used  with 
caution) ;   Levy,  Don  Joseph  Nasi;  Romanin,  vi.,  317, 1*.  2. 


•\ 


638        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Morea,  whence  he  proceeded  to  Rome  to  seek  aid  of  Pope 
Pius  V.,  while  his  wife  found  a  refuge  in  the  republic  of 
Ragusa.  From  Rome  the  duke  went  to  beg  alms  of  Venice; 
and  the  Venetian  Government,  moved  by  the  spectacle  of 
his  poverty,  assisted  him,  as  the  pope  had  done,  and  thus 
enabled  him  to  live  in  a  manner  more  suitable  to  the 
"  Premier  Duke  of  Christendom."  * 

The  Jewish  Duke  of  Naxos  never  once  visited  his  duchy 
during  the   thirteen  years  for  which   it   belonged   to  him 
Possibly  he  did   not   dare,  certainly  he   did    not   desire,  to 
quit  the  court  of  Constantinople,  where  he   was  the  boon 
companion  of  Selim   the  Sot,  for  the  splendid    isolation  of 
the  Crispi's  feudal  castle  at  Naxos  or  for  the  island  fortress 
of  the  Sommaripa  at  Andros.     Moreover,  he  was  engaged 
in  larger  enterprises — seizing  the  French  ships  at  Alexandria, 
hounding  the  Turks  against  Otranto,  scheming  for  the  con- 
quest of  Cyprus.     At  the  same  time,  he  was  anxious  to  make 
as  much  out  of  the  Cyclades  as  possible — for  his  tribute  to 
the  sultan  from  the  islands  was  14,000  ducats  and  his  personal 
expenses   enormous  —  and   he  therefore  sent   there  as  his 
deputy  a  man   in  whom   he  had  the  fullest  confidence,  Dr 
Francesco  Coronello,  a  lawyer  by  profession,  a  Christian  by 
name,  but  a  Spanish  Jew  by  race,  whose  father,  Salamon,  had 
been  governor  of  Segovia,  but  was  at  this  time  "  the  right 
eye"  of  Nasi  at  Constantinople,  constantly  consulted  by  the 
great  financier,  and  together  with  his  son  Francesco — so  it 
was  said  in  the  Cyclades — responsible  for  the  deposition  of 
the  Crispi  and  the  Sommaripa.2    The  Jesuit  historian  of  the 
duchy,  moved  by  the  fact  that  a  Coronello  was  in  his  time 
French  consul  at  Naxos,3  has  depicted  Francesco  Coronello 
as  a  beloved  and  respected  ruler ;  and  such  was  the  official 
Turkish  view.4     But  the  contemporary  opinion    of  him,  as 
held  at   least   in   the  Venetian  island  of  Tenos,   was  very 
different.     The  Teniotes   had   special  reasons  for    disliking 
the    change    of   government   in   the   neighbouring   islands 

1  Luccari,  lac.  cit. ;  Conti,  lac.  cit. ;  Sauger,  303. 

2  Gerlach,  Tagebuchy  426  ;  Lamansky,  Secrets,  82. 

3  Sauger,  302. 

4  As  expressed  in  the  capitulations  of  1580  and  1640 ;  P&gues,  Histoin 
de  Santorin,  609,  614. 


TENOS  THREATENED  639 

The  lords  of  Andros  and  Naxos,  even  when  Turkish 
tributaries,  had  not  ceased  to  be  Christians,  and  had  always 
secretly  warned  their  co-religionists  of  any  coming  attack. 
The  Jewish  duke's  lieutenant,  on  the  other  hand,  allowed 
neither  news  nor  food  to  reach  Tenos  or  Crete  from  his 
islands,  and  sent  back  all  runaway  slaves  to  their  masters 
at  Constantinople.  At  a  time  of  peace,  this  "  mortal  enemy 
of  Venice"  seized  a  Cretan  brig,  laden  with  money  and 
powder  for  the  garrison  of  Tenos,  taking  the  cargo  and 
enslaving  the  crew.  In  order  to  hound  on  the  sultan  against 
the  republic,  he  sent  him  a  specimen  of  the  bread  which 
the  Venetians  of  Crete  were  obliged  to  eat  in  their  dire 
extremity.  Being  in  the  adjacent  island  of  Andros  in  1 570, 
he  discovered  that  Tenos  also  had  no  provisions.  According 
to  a  story  current  at  the  time,  he  had  sent  Selim  a  picture  of 
a  lovely  garden,  in  the  midst  of  which  was  one  very  fruitful 
tree.  ,c  The  garden,"  the  sultan  was  told,  "  is  the  Cyclades, 
and  is  all  your  majesty's,  save  this  one  tree,  which  is  Tenos."1 
Sure  of  the  sultan's  approval,  he  therefore  urged  Piall  Pasha, 
who  was  then  at  Athens,  to  complete  his  conquest  of  the 
Cyclades  by  capturing  the  Venetian  island.  "Tenos,"  he 
told  the  Turkish  admiral,  "  is  the  refuge  of  all  the  fugitive 
slaves  and  of  all  the  Christian  vassals ;  unless  you  take  it, 
the  other  islands  will  never  be  quiet"  Piall  responded  to 
this  appeal;  he  landed  with  Coronello  at  Tenos  with  8000 
men ;  but  though  he  did  great  damage,  the  courage  of 
Girolamo  Paruta,  the  Venetian  rector,  saved  the  last 
Venetian  possession  in  the  iEgean.  Soon  afterwards, 
Coronello  himself  fell  into  the  hands  of  his  enemies.  During 
a  visit  to  Syra,  even  then  a  flourishing  island  with  more  than 
3000  inhabitants,  he  was  seized  in  the  night  by  the  leading 
men,  and  handed  over  to  the  commander  of  three  Cretan 
vessels,  then  lying  in  the  harbour.  When  the  Teniotes 
heard  that  their  arch  foe,  "the  heart  and  soul  of  Joao 
Miquez,"  had  been  captured,  they  offered  the  ships'  captain 
500  sequins  to  put  him  ashore  on  Tenos  and  let  them 
execute  him  with  cruel  tortures.  Coronello,  however,  bid 
a  higher  sum,  if  the  captain  would  take  him  to  Canea 
instead,  and  he  was  accordingly  put  in  prison  there,  pending 
1  Buocbenbach,  Orientalische  Reyss,  39. 


640        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

the  decision  of  the  Home  Government  Meanwhile,  the 
Turkish  authorities  despatched  a  commissioner  to  punish 
the  people  of  Syra,  but  the  latter  protested  that  it  was  not 
they  but  the  ships'  captain  who  had  kidnapped  Coroneilo, 
and  convinced  the  commissioner  of  their  truthfulness  by  a 
bribe.1 

The  fatal  war  had  now  broken  out  which  was  to  cost 
Venice  the  possession  of  Cyprus,  and  the  republic,  suspecting 
that  Nasi  had  been  responsible  for  the  recent  conflagration 
in  her  arsenal,  and  knowing  that  he  had  been  largely 
instrumental  in  hounding  on  Selim  II.  against  that  island, 
whose  arms  he  had  had  painted  in  his  house,  and  whose 
king  he  aspired  to  be,2  naturally  bethought  herself  of  the 
exiled  Duke  of  Naxos.  A  Venetian  fleet  entered  the 
Archipelago ;  the  moment  was  propitious,  for  Nasi's  lieuten- 
ant was  a  prisoner  at  Canea;  and  thus,  in  1571,  with  the 
aid  of  the  provveditore  Canale,  Giacomo  IV.  was  restored 
to  the  ducal  throne,  and  Niccol6  Gozzadini  recovered  his 
island  of  Siphnos.8  He  does  not  seem,  however,  to  have 
returned  to  Naxos,  which  was  temporarily  placed  under  the 
administration  of  a  certain  Angelo  u  Giudizzi,"  perhaps  one 
of  the  Gozzadini  family.4  But  he  exercised  his  authority 
by  nominating  a  new  Archbishop.  The  duke  showed  his 
gratitude  to  the  republic  by  following  her  fleet  at  the  great 
battle  of  Lepanto  with  a  force  of  500  men.6 

Meanwhile,  the  Teniotes  had  sent  a  secret  envoy  to 
Venice,  imploring  the  republic  not  to  let  loose  so  dangerous 
a  man  as  Coroneilo.  The  senate  accordingly  ordered  the 
Cretan  authorities  to  enquire  into  the  truth  of  the  allegations 
against  him ;  if  they  proved  to  be  true,  then  to  put  him  to 
death  secretly  and  give  out  that  he  had  died  of  an  illness ; 
if  there  was  any  doubt  about  the  charges,  to  send  him  to  the 
prison  at  Candia  for  greater  security.6    The  sequel    of  this 

1  Lamansky,  Secrets,  80-3 ;  Contarini,  op.  tit,  5  ;  Hammer,  op.  at, 
Hi.,  576. 

2  Contarini,  op.  cit.t  2 ;  Charri&re,  op.  cit.f  Hi.,  88 ;  Relazioni  degU 
Ambasciatori  veneti,  Appendice,  391. 

3  Crescenzi,  Corona  delta  nobilta  d Italia,  H.,  159. 

4  Lichtle  ;  Hopf  apud  Ersch  und  Gruber,  Ixxvi.,  422,  n. 

6  Prcdelli,  Comtnemoriali,  vi.,  327  ;  Thcincr,  Annates  Ecclesiastic^  L, 
473.  6  Lamansky,  loc.  cit. 


NASFS  ADMINISTRATION  641 

incident  is  unknown ;  but  Coronello  managed  to  regain  his 
freedom  and  his  former  position  in  Naxos,  which  was  re- 
covered by  the  Turks  under  Mehmet  Pasha  almost  as  soon 
as  it  had  been  won  by  Canale.  At  any  rate,  in  1572  we  find 
Giacomo  IV.  begging  the  republic  to  order  its  fleet  to  aid 
him  in  recapturing  his  dominions,1  and  presenting  them  in 
advance  to  his  benefactress  Venice.  Like  other  people,  he 
was  inspired  with  hope  by  the  recent  victory  of  Lepanto,  in 
which  he  had  borne  a  part ;  but  his  hopes  were  disappointed 
in  the  humiliating  peace  which  the  Venetians  concluded  with 
the  sultan  in  1573. 

On  the  death  of  Selim  II.  in  the  following  year,  the 
influence  of  his  favourite  Nasi  was  expected  to  wane, 
especially  as  the  grand-vizier  loathed  him,  and  the  chances 
of  the  deposed  duke  accordingly  seemed  brighter.  The 
mother  of  the  new  sultan  (Mur&d  III.),  a  Baffo,  was  a  native 
of  Paros,  and  he  therefore  hoped  that  her  influence  with  her 
son  would  be  exerted  in  his  favour.  Accordingly,  in  1575, 
he  set  out  for  Constantinople  by  way  of  Ragusa  and 
Philippopolis,  where  the  Ragusan  historian  Luccari 2  invited 
him  to  dinner  and  learnt  from  him  much  about  the  past 
glories  of  the  Crispi.  But  his  mission  failed,  and  in  the 
following  year  he  died  of  a  broken  heart  at  Pera,  and  was 
buried  in  the  Latin  church  there.  Nasi,  whose  influence, 
though  diminished  since  the  accession  of  Mur&d  III.,  was 
still  sufficient  to  enable  him  to  retain  the  duchy  of  Naxos 
and  the  duty  on  wine,  continued  to  govern  the  islands  from 
his  mansion  at  Belvedere,  near  Constantinople,  through  the 
faithful  Coronello,  whose  authority  was  such  that  he  is  said 
to  have  styled  himself  officially  "Duke  of  the  Archipelago."3 
Nasi  maintained  the  ancient  customs  and  laws  of  the  Latins  ; 
his  other  officials  were  all  Christians ;  and  he  tried  to  win 
over  some  of  the  old  families,  like  the  Sirigo  and  the 
D'Argenta,  or  Argyroi  of  Santorin,  by  giving  them  places 
under  his  lieutenant-governor  and  by  confirming  them  in 
their  ancient  fiefs.  Coronello  even  succeeded  in  legitimising 
his  own  position  to  a  certain  extent  by  marrying  one  of  his 

1  Haji  Kalifeh,  Cronologia  Historica  (tr.  Carli),  150;  Predelli,  Com- 
memorial^  loc*  tit  *  P.  148. 

3  Relazioni  dtgli  Ambasciatori,  Series  III.,  ii.,  166;  Lichtle. 

2  S 


\ 


642        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

sons  to  a  member  of  the  old  ducal  family.1  But  his  admini- 
stration was  as  little  able  as  that  of  the  Crispi  to  protect  the 
lives  and  property  of  his  master's  subjects  from  corsairs.  In 
1 577,  the  D* Argenta,  who  had  been  barons  of  the  castle  of 
St  Nicholas  in  Santorin  for  generations,  were  attacked  by  ten 
Turkish  galleys  and  carried  off  to  Syria.  They  managed  to 
obtain  their  freedom,  but  not  to  regain  their  ancestral  castle; 
for  four  weary  years  they  wandered  about  Europe,  seeking 
the  aid  of  princes  and  men  of  renown,  till  at  last,  armed  with 
a  letter  from  Gregory  XIII.,  they  knocked  one  day  at  the 
hospitable  door  of  honest  Martin  Kraus,  Professor  of  Classics 
at  Tiibingen.  Kraus  was  interested  in  the  new  Greece  as 
well  as  in  the  old ;  he  collected  money  for  his  two  visitors, 
and  at  the  same  time  material  from  them  for  his  Turcogradcu 
One  of  them  described  for  him  the  present  condition  of  the 
Archipelago — how  Santorin  still  had  five  castles,  Paros  two, 
and  Melos,  Nio,  Seriphos,  Siphnos,  Andros,  Mykonos, 
Amorgos,  Anaphe,  and  Astypalaia  one  apiece ;  how  all  these 
islands  still  possessed  towns  or  villages ;  and  how  two  of 
them,  Paros  and  Melos,  were  episcopal  sees.  He  told  him 
how  Tenos  still  kept  aloft  the  Venetian  flag ;  and  he  might 
have  added  that  the  Teniotes  were  intensely  loyal  to  the 
republic,  which  gave  them  a  large  share  in  the  government 
Since  the  severe  lesson  which  Coronello  had  received,  he 
does  not  seem  to  have  molested  them  again.  They  now 
received  news  and  food  from  Syra  with  the  more  or  less  open 
connivance  of  Nasi's  Christian  officials;  they  continued  to 
harbour  fugitive  slaves — a  practice  at  which  the  Venetian 
rector  wisely  winked,  and  their  only  grievance  was  that  the 
republic  had  issued  an  ordinance  confiscating  their  property 
if  they  were  absent  for  more  than  six  months — a  penalty 
which  affected  many  breadwinners.2 

Duke  Nasi  of  Naxos  died  of  stone  in  August  1579,  ^d, 
as  he  left  no  heirs,  his  dynasty  died  with  him.  The  Jewish 
poets,  whom  he  had  so  liberally  encouraged,  lamented  him 
as  "  the  sceptre  of  Israel,  the  standard-bearer  of  the  dispersed 

1  Pegues,  op.  city  614  ;  Curtius,  Naxosy  46 ;  Sauger,  302  ;  NYa  ITar&pa, 
vi.,  572  ;  ix.,  436. 

2  Crusius,  Turcogracia,  206;  Foscarini's  Report  of  1577,  apud 
Lamansky,  Secrets,  641. 


ANNEXATION  OF  THE  CYCLADES  643 

Jews,  the  noble  duke,  the  sublime  lord."  His  widow,  the 
Duchess  Reina,  continued  to  live  at  her  husband's  mansion 
near  Constantinople  for  many  years  longer,  publishing  at  her 
own  cost  the  works  of  Hebrew  scholars  and  poets ;  while  of 
his  mother-in-law,  Gracia,  we  have  two  memorials,  in  the 
shape  of  the  Jewish  Academy  which  she  founded  at  Con- 
stantinople, and  in  the  bronze  medallion  of  herself  now  in 
the  national  library  in  Paris.  Of  Francesco  Coronello  we 
hear  no  more  ;  but  his  family  became  thoroughly  naturalised 
at  Naxos,  and  is  not  yet  extinct  in  Greece. 

Thus  ended  the  brief  Jewish  sway  over  the  "  Isles  of 
Greece  " — not  the  least  curious  of  the  many  strange  accidents 
of  Levantine  history,  where  the  most  unlikely  nations  are 
found  in  the  least  expected  situations.  The  experiment  was 
bound  to  be  a  failure.  A  Jew  was  the  last  person  calculated 
to  make  a  popular  ruler  of  a  Greek  state  ;  an  absentee,  whose 
expenses,  owing  to  his  mode  of  life  and  the  exigencies  of 
bakshish,  were  so  huge  that  three  years  after  he  became  duke 
he  was  described  as  "  overwhelmed  with  debts,"  and  that  he 
did  not  leave  90,000  ducats  behind  him  when  he  died,  was 
sure  to  wring  the  uttermost  farthing  out  of  his  alien  subjects. 
If  the  last  Crispo  had  chastised  them  with  whips,  we  may  be 
sure  that  Nasi  had  chastised  them  with  scorpions.  The 
official  view,  as  expressed  in  the  capitulations  of  1580,  was 
that  they  had  lived  unmolested  and  unoppressed ;  but  their 
desire  for  the  reinstatement  of  their  old  masters,  already  once 
manifested,  and  again  demonstrated  on  the  death  of  the 
Jewish  duke,  proves  the  unpopularity  of  his  rule. 

No  sooner  was  the  news  known,  than  several  inhabitants 
of  the  Cyclades  who  were  at  Constantinople  went  to  the 
Porte  and  begged  for  the  restoration  of  their  former  lords  of 
Naxos  and  Andros,  whose  children  had  retired  to  Venice. 
The  French  ambassador  reported  that  the  grand-vizier — a 
bitter  enemy  of  Nasi — had  expressed  himself  as  favourable 
to  the  revival  of  these  two  ancient  dynasties,  but  nothing  came 
of  the  plan.1  It  was  decided  to  annex  the  islands  to  the 
Turkish  Empire,  and  a  sandjakbeg  and  a  cadi  were  sent  to 
govern  them.2     In  1580,  a  deputation  of  Christians  from  the 

1  Charriere,  op.  tit.,  iii.,  71,  809,  931  ;  Cannoly,  op.  tit,  10-14;  Mas 
Latric,  Us  Dues  de  PArchipel,  15.  *  P&gues,  609,  614. 


644        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

islands,  including  a  Sommaripa  of  Andros,  appeared  at  the 
Porte,  and  obtained  from  Mur&d  III.  extremely  favourable 
capitulations.  Their  capitation  tax  was  to  be  kept  at  its 
old  figure;  their  churches  were  to  be  free,  and  could  be 
repaired  at  their  own  pleasure;  all  their  ancient  laws  and 
customs  were  to  remain  in  full  force ;  they  were  entitled  to 
retain  their  local  dress;  and,  as  of  old,  silk,  wine,  and 
provisions  were  exempt  from  duty  in  their  islands.  These 
capitulations  were  confirmed  by  Ibrahim  sixty  years  later, 
and  formed  the  charter  of  the  Cyclades  under  Turkish  rule. 

But,  though  the  duchy  of  the  Archipelago  had  passed 
away  for  ever,  one  petty  but  ancient  Latin  dynasty  still 
lingered  on  in  the  Cyclades  for  well-nigh  forty  years  longer. 
The  Gozzadini  had  been  restored  to  Sifanto,  as  we  saw,  in 
1 57 1,  and  in  their  palace  in  that  insignificant  island,  and  in 
their  time-honoured  castle  of  Akrotiri  in  Santorin,  they 
continued  to  reside.  We  are  not  told  how  they  managed  to 
survive  the  Turkish  wave,  which  had  swept  all  else  away; 
perhaps  their  insignificance  saved  them — perhaps  their  greater 
subservience  to  the  sultan — possibly  the  fact  that  they  sprang 
from  Bologna  and  not  from  Venice.  At  any  rate,  they,  who 
had  boasted  their  independence  of  the  duchy,  still  existed, 
though  tributaries  of  the  Turkish  Empire.  In  1607  Angelo 
Gozzadini  sent  his  sons  to  be  educated  at  the  Collegio  Greco 
in  Rome,  and  on  that  occasion  Pope  Paul  V.  issued  an  appeal 
on  his  behalf  to  all  Christendom,  with  special  reference  to  the 
forthcoming  cruise  of  the  Venetian  fleet  in  the  ALgean.  "  I 
have  heard,"  wrote  the  pope, "  that  my  beloved  son,  Angeletto 
Gozzadini  of  the  noble  Bolognese  family  rules  the  seven 
islands  of  Sifanto,  Thermia,  Kimolos,  Polinos,  Pholegandros, 
Gyaros,  and  Sikinos,  truly  adhering  to  the  Catholic  faith. 
All  Christians  who  arrive  in  his  islands  should  therefore  treat 
him  well."  In  the  following  year,  the  Venetian  squadron  found 
a  hospitable  reception  from  him  in  his  island  domain,  and  he 
professed  himself  a  loyal  vassal  of  the  republic ;  but,  in  1617, 
his  diminutive  state  was  swallowed  up  in  the  Turkish  Empire, 
at  a  moment  when  feeling  ran  high  against  the  Catholics  of 
the  Archipelago.  Angelo  took  refuge  in  Rome,  where 
Cardinal  Gozzadini  was  then  influential ;  but  in  his  old  age 
he  returned  to  Naxos,  where  his  forbears  had  lived  so  long. 


MEMORIAL  OF  THE  LATINS  645 

His  two  sons,  one  of  whom  fought  for  Venice  in  the  Candian 
war,  in  vain  hoped  for  the  restoration  of  their  seven  islands, 
but  they  died,  like  so  many  dispossessed  princes,  in  exile  in 
Rome.1  The  family  has  only  just  become  extinct  at  Bologna ; 
Tournefort  *  found  three  of  its  members  residing  at  Sifanto, 
and  it  still  exists  in  the  Cyclades,  where  for  310  years  it 
had  held  sway.  During  that  long  period,  as  was  natural,  the 
proud  nobles  from  Bologna  erected  monuments  of  their  rule, 
some  of  which  still  survive.  Their  ruined  castle  at  Sifanto 
is  still  called  "  the  palace  "  (seraglio\  and  inside,  on  a  marble 
pillar,  could  till  lately  be  seen  their  arms,  with  the  date  1465 
and  the  initials  of  Niccoli  Gozzadini,  the  first  of  the  family 
who  ruled  there.  One  of  the  two  towers  of  the  island  long 
bore  their  name,  while  their  escutcheon  still  ornaments  the  old 
convent,  now  turned  into  a  school;  their  name  recurred  in 
inscriptions  on  two  of  the  now  ruined  churches  at  Zia,  and 
their  arms  used  to  be  seen  on  that  of  Palaiochora  at  Melos 
recently  restored.3  Those  from  "  the  palace  "  are  now  in  Syra. 
Owing  to  its  longer  duration  and  to  the  essentially 
aristocratic  character  of  its  constitution,  the  duchy  of  the 
Archipelago  has  bequeathed  to  us  more  heraldic  memorials 
than  the  other  Frankish  states.  While  coats  of  arms  are 
rarely  found  in  the  castles  of  feudal  Achaia,  with  the  notable 
exception  of  Geraki,  there  is  scarcely  an  island  in  the 
Cyclades  which  has  not  preserved  some  emblem  of  its  former 
lords.  Two  hundred  years  ago  the  arms  of  the  Sommaripa 
covered  the  walls  of  Andros  ;  and  the  author  has  seen  on  a 
tower  in  that  picturesque  town  a  splendid  escutcheon — two 
heraldic  monkeys  supporting  a  shield  containing  two  fleurs- 
de-lys,  while  the  sun  is  represented  on  the  stone  below. 
Allusion  has  already  been  made  to  the  heraldry  of  Naxos, 
the  big  church  in  the  castle  at  Melos  still  bears  the  escutcheon 
and  inscription  of  the  Crispi,  while  two  crowned  lions  ram- 
pant   with   outstretched    paws — perhaps    the  arms    of  the 

1  Hopf,  Gozzadini,  apud  Ersch  und  G ruber,  lxxvi.,  423  ;  Veneto- 
Byzantinische  Analekten,  398,  516 ;  Cod.  Cicogna,  2532,  §  34. 

2  i.,  68. 

3  Pasch  von  Krienen,  1 14 ;  Piacenza,  286 ;  Bucbon,  At/as,  xl.,  26 ; 
2Wa  navSityxx,  ix.,  196  ;  Hopf,  loc.  tit.  (who  emends  MCCCC.  into  MCCCCLXV. 
because  the  Gozzadini  were  not  lords  of  Siphnos  before  1464). 


646        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Michieli — may  be  seen  on  two  slabs  in  the  floor  of  the 
church  in  the  ancient  monastery  of  Our  Lady  at  Amorgos.1 
Even  when  they  have  preserved  nothing  else,  the  descendants 
of  the  island  barons  have  cherished  these  marks  of  nobility. 

But  an  agency  more  powerful  than  stone  inscriptions  has 
kept  alive  the  Latin  influence,  and  has  kept  together  the 
old  Latin  families  in  the  Cyclades.  In  the  very  year  that 
Naxos  was  finally  annexed  to  Turkey,  Pope  Gregory  XIII. 
confirmed  the  metropolitan  jurisdiction  of  the  Archbishop  of 
Naxos  over  his  suffragans,  who  in  Sauger's  time,  a  century 
later,  were  five  in  number;  and  among  the  bishops  we  find 
scions  of  the  former  *  dynasties ;  others  of  the  old  Italian 
families  went  over  to  the  Greek  Church,  but  numbers  of  them 
remained  true  to  the  faith  of  their  ancestors;  and  at  the 
present  day  the  Catholics  of  the  Cyclades  are  in  many  cases 
descendants  of  the  Latin  conquerors.  In  the  present  Greek 
parliament  there  are  such  names  as  Crispi ;  and  the  present 
Catholic  Archbishop  of  Athens  is  a  Delenda  of  Santorin. 

Of  the  feudal  society  in  the  Cyclades  it  is  possible  to  form 
some  idea  from  the  letters  of  the  dukes  which  have  come 
down  to  us.  There,  as  in  the  rest  of  Frankish  Greece,  the 
Assizes  of  Romania  were  the  feudal  code,  modified  by  the 
special  usages  of  Naxos,  of  which  one  clause  in  Italian  has 
been  preserved  in  the  British  Museum.2  The  duke,  as  the 
head  of  the  social  firmament  was,  as  we  have  seen,  a  personage 
of  much  importance,  not  only  in  his  own  scattered  realm,  but 
in  Achaia,  of  which  he  was  a  peer,  at  the  Vatican,  where  he 
insisted  on  his  right  of  nominating  bishops,  and  at  Venice, 
where  he  was  regarded  as  the  premier  duke  of  Christendom. 

The  republic  treated  him  with  much  the  same  attention, 
and  for  much  the  same  reason,  which  the  British  Government 
shows  to  Indian  princes  on  a  visit  to  London.  Nominally 
independent,  he  was  really  a  Venetian  vassal,  and  as  such 
might  at  any  time  be  useful  to  Venetian  interests  in  the 
East  In  his  own  immediate  circle  of  islands — those  which 
were  under  his  direct  government — he  was  more  autocratic 
than  the  Prince  of  Achaia,  and  the  long  history  of  both  the 
Sanudo  and   the    Crispo    dynasties   is  not  broken   by  the 

1  Lettere  edificanti^  vii.,  153  ;  AcXtIov,  i.,  599. 

2  Archives  de  P  Orient  latin^  613-14  ;  Byz.  Zeitschrifc  xiii.,  147, 15a 


i 


THE  DUCAL  GOVERNMENT  647 

appearance  of  those  pretenders  who  were  so  common  in 
the  more  important  principality.  It  was  only  in  the 
smaller  islands  that  disputed  successions  sometimes 
arose,  and  then  they  were  usually  settled  by  Venetian 
intervention.  More  fortunate,  too,  than  their  brethren  of 
the  mainland,  both  the  Sanudi  and  the  Crispi  produced  an 
abundant  stock  of  males  to  inherit  their  throne.  Once  only 
did  the  ducal  dignity  devolve  upon  a  woman,  and  in  the 
second  dynasty,  as  we  saw,  the  Assizes  of  Romania  were  so 
far  modified  as  to  exclude  females  from  the  ducal  succession. 
Hence,  with  one  or  two  rare  exceptions,  dynastic  intrigues 
were  avoided. 

The  duke  in  so  peculiarly  scattered  a  domain  could  not 
personally  administer  the  affairs  of  all  the  islands  which 
were  directly  subject  to  him,  and  in  these  he  was  represented 
by  governors.  In  the  ducal  letters  we  read  of  such  officials 
as  "lieutenants,"  "bailies,"  and  "ducal  factors" — an  office 
found  also  under  the  Jewish  dispensation  at  Santorin — while 
there  was  a  " captain"  of  the  castle  of  Naxos.  Another 
important  post,  conferred  for  a  long  term  of  years  and  extant 
also  in  Turkish  times,  was  that  of  apanochinigarix  of  the 
island  and  city  of  Naxos — an  official  perhaps  originally  the 
"chief  huntsman"  of  the  ducal  household,  but  later  on  a 
civil  authority.  Legal  documents  were  usually  counter- 
signed by  the  chancellor,  and  the  usual  language  of  the 
ducal  chancery  was  the  Venetian  dialect,  varied  by  Latin. 
There  is,  however,  an  example  of  a  Naxian  deed  drawn  up 
in  a  Greek  copy. 

In  a  state  where  the  Latins  had  dwelt  so  long,  there  was 
naturally  a  large  number  of  half-castes,  called  vastnuli  in  the 
language  of  the  islands.  These  half-breeds  were  neither 
wholly  free,  nor  wholly  slaves ;  they  could  acquire  property, 
but  they  could  not  bequeath  it  to  their  heirs,  and  at  their 
death  all  they  had  was  their  lord's ;  they  and  their  animals 
were  liable  to  forced  service  by  land  and  sea;  and,  if 
enfranchised,  they  had  to  purchase  their  freedom  anew  from 
their  lord's  successor.  As  for  the  serfs,  though  they  could 
acquire  a  peculium  of  their  own,  it  was  ever  at  their  lord's 
disposal,  and  a  female  serf  with  her  children  yet  unborn  was 
1  Byzantimsche  Zeitsckrifc  xiii.,  156. 


648        THE  DUCHY  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

transferred  from  one  master  to  another  like  so  much  personal 
property.  Yet,  if  these  serfs  were  exclusively  Greek,  the 
dukes,  with  rare  exceptions,  treated  the  Orthodox  Church  with 
respect.  There  can,  however,  have  been  no  love  lost  between 
the  Greek  serf,  chained  to  the  oar  of  the  baronial  galley,  or 
labouring  in  the  fields  of  his  feudal  lord,  and  the  proud  nobles, 
who  traced  their  descent  from  the  great  families  of  Venice  or 
Bologna,  and  who  sat  as  of  right  in  "  the  higher  and  lower 
court "  of  the  duchy.1 

Taxes  and  dues,  however,  do  not,  as  a  rule,  appear  to 
have  been  excessive.  An  orange  at  Christmas,  or  a  fowl,  was 
the  usual  equivalent  of  our  peppercorn  rent — a  formal 
recognition  of  feudal  ownership.  Tithes  and  thirtieths 
were  paid  by  the  islanders;  the  Byzantine  land-tax,  or 
akrdstichon,  had  survived;  and  there  was  the  turcoteli*  the 
equivalent  of  our  Danegeld,  the  blackmail  levied  by  the 
Turkish  corsairs  on  the  duke,  and  extracted  by  him  in  turn 
from  his  subjects.  Yet,  as  we  saw,  when  the  islands  became 
a  Hebrew  possession,  the  natives  might  well  have  exclaimed 
in  the  language  of  their  former  dukes — quando  si  stava  peggio, 
si  stava  meglio. 

The  Italian  society  of  the  Cyclades  was  by  no  means 
uncultured  in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries.  We  saw 
how  Crusino  Sommaripa  made  excavations  at  Paros,  and 
how  he  received  the  travelling  antiquary  from  Ancona 
Giacomo  I.  Crispo,  whose  lovely  park  was  a  proof  of  his 
taste,  made  scientific  experiments  in  the  crater  of  Santorin, 
and  Buondelmonti  was  able  to  buy  a  manuscript  at  Andros.5 
At  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century,  the  old  baronial  castles 
of  the  islands  rang  with  the  sound  of  merriment ;  balls  were 
of  constant  occurrence;  and,  as  the  Turkish  peril  drew 
nearer  and  nearer,  the  motto  of  the  dukes  seems  to  have 
been  :  "  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  die." 

The  duchy  of  the  Archipelago  has  passed  away  for  ever 
— unsung,  unlamented.  The  stern  classicist  regards  the 
Italian  dukes  as  mere  interlopers  on  the  old  Hellenic  soil ;  he 
would  pull  down  their  towers  as  ruthlessly  as  a  Sanudo  or 

1  Buchon,  Recherches  historiques,  ii.,  463. 

2  Byzantinische  Zeitschrift%  xiii.,  152. 

3  /£*</.,  xi,,  499 ;  Buondelmonti  (ed,  Legrand),  25. 


ROMANCE  OF  FRANKISH  GREECE  649 

a  Crispo  pulled  down  his  temples,  and  a  Venetian  lion, 
winged  and.  evangelised,  is  of  less  value  in  his  eyes  than  a 
Periklean  potsherd.  But  the  romance,  the  poetic  haze  of 
Greece  was  in  her  middle  age,  rather  than  in  her  classic 
youth;  and,  as  we  voyage  among  those  dream  islands 
over  a  sea  of  brightest  blue,  we  seem  to  see  the  galley 
of  some  mediaeval  duke  shoot  out  from  the  harbour  in 
quest  of  spoil 


TABLE  OF  FRANKISH  RULERS 


PRINCES  OF  ACHAIA 


A.D. 


Guillaume  de  Champlitte    . 

. 

. 

1205 

Geoffroy  I.  de  Villehardouin 

. 

Bailie 

1209;  prince  1210 

Geoffroy  II.  de  Villehardouin 

.               . 

. 

1218 

Guillaume  de  Villehardouin 

. 

. 

1246 

Charles  I.  of  Anjou  . 

. 

. 

1278 

Charles  II.  of  Anjou 

. 

. 

1285 

Isabelle  de  Villehardouin    . 

,               , 

. 

1289 

With  Florent  of  Hainault 

. 

. 

1289 

With  Philip  of  Savoy 

• 

. 

1301 

Philip  I.  ofTaranto. 

• 

1307 

Matilda  of  Hainault 

.               . 

. 

1313 

With  Louis  of  Burgundy 

. 

. 

1313 

John  of  Gravina 

• 

. 

1318 

Catherine  of  Valois) 
Robert   of  TarantoJ 

• 

• 

*333 

Robert  of  Taranto   . 

m 

. 

1346 

Marie  de  Bourbon  . 

• 

. 

1364 

Philip  II.  ofTaranto 

. 

. 

1370 

Joanna  I.  of  Naples. 

• 

.            . 

1374 

Otto  of  Brunswick  . 

• 

. 

1376 

[Knights  of  St  John- 

-1377-81] 

Jacques  de  Baux 

' 

•            • 

1381 

Mahiot  de  Coquerel,  vicar  . 

, 

.        1383 

Bordo  de  S.  Superan 

. 

Vicar 

1386 ;  prince  1396 

Maria  Zaccaria 

. 

. 

1402 

Centurione  Zaccaria 

• 

• 

.   1404-32 

DUKES  OF  Al 

'HENS 

Othon  de  la  Roche,  Megaskyr 

. 

.           . 

1205 

Guy  I. 

. 

Megaskyr  1225  ;  duke  1260 

John  I. 

1263 

William 

, 

.            . 

1280 

661 

652 


TABLE  OF  FRANKISH  RULERS 


AJL 

Guy  II. 

.          12$; 

Walter  of  Briennc   . 

. 

•          W 

Roger  Deslaur,  chief  of  the  Catalan  Company 

I3II 

Manfred 

13" 

William 

.          I3U 

John  of  Randazzo    . 

•          133* 

Frederick  of  Randazzo 

134* 

Frederick  III.  of  Sicily 

1355 

Pedro  IV.  of  Aragon 

.          13" 

John  I.  of  Aragon    . 

.          I# 

Nerio  Acciajuoli 

Lord  of  Athens  1388  ; 
[  Venice— 1 394-1402] 

duke  1394 

Antonio  I.    . 

1402 

Nerio  II.      . 

.       143$ 

Antonio  II.  . 

M39 

Nerio  II.  (restored). 

1441 

Francesco     . 

1451 

Franco 

•     1455-6 ;  "  Lord  of  Thebes  "  1456-60 

DESPOTS  OF  EPIROS 

Michael  I.  Angelos . 

IIO» 

Theodore 

1214 

Manuel 

"3D 

Michael  II.  . 

.           Itf 

Nikeph6ros  I. 

1271 

Thomas 

1296 

Nicholas  Orsini 

I318 

John  II.  Orsini 

13*3 

Nikeph6ros  II. 

•     I335-58 

[Byzant 

ine— 1336-49;  Serb— 1349-56] 

Simeon  Urosh 

•           •           «           .            . 

I35S 

Thomas  Preliubovich 

.           •            .           •            . 

1367 

Maria  Angelina 

. 

1385 

Esau  Buondelmonti 

..... 

I386-I40S 

[Albanians — 1408-18  ;  then  united  with  Cephalonia] 

DUKES  OF  NEOPATRAS 

John  I.  Angelos 

•           .           .           .            • 

1271 

Constantine  • 

.           *           .           .            « 

1295 

John  II.        . 

.     I303-I5 

I 


[United  with  Athens] 

PALATINE  COUNTS  OF  CEPHALONIA 
Matteo  Orsini  .  •  .  .  .  .1194 

Richard        .......         Before  1264 


TABLE  OF  FRANKISH  RULERS 

John  I 

Nicholas      ....... 

John  II 

[Angevins  (united  with  Achaia)— 1324-57] 
Leonardo  I.  Tocco  ...... 

Carlo  I.         ......  . 

Carlo  II 

Leonardo  III.  ...... 

Antonio        ....... 

DUKES  OF  THE  ARCHIPELAGO 

Marco  I.  Sanudo 
Angelo 
Marco  II. 
Guglielmo  I. 
Niccol6  I.     . 
Giovanni  I.  . 
Fiorenza 

With  Niccolfc  II.  Sanudo 
Niccol6  III.  dalle  Carceri 


Francesco  I.  Crispo 
Giacomo  I.   . 
Giovanni  II. 
Giacomo  II. 
Gian  Giacomo 
Guglielmo  II. 
Francesco  II. 
Giacomo  III. 
Giovanni  III. 

Francesco  III. 

Giovanni  IV. 
Giacomo  IV. 

Joseph  Nasi . 


653 

A.D. 
I303 
1317 
1323 


"Spezzabanda" 


[Venice— 1494. 
[Venice— 151 1 


1500] 
17] 


Despots  of  Epiros  . 
Manfred  of  Sicily  . 
Chinardo 

Charles  I.  of  Anjou  . 
Charles  II.  of  Anjou 
Philip  I.  ofTaranto 
Catherine  of  Valois^ 
Robert  of  Taranto] 


LORDS  OF  CORFU 
[Venice — 1206-14] 


1357 
Before  1377 

1429 
.  1448-79 
.  1481-3 


1207 
c.  1227 
1262 
1303 
1323 
i34i 
1 361 
1364 
1371 

1383 
1397 
1418 

1433 
1447 
1453 
1463 

1463 
1480 

1500 

1517 
1564-6 

1566-79 


1214-59 
1259-66 
1266 
1267 
1285 
1294 

1331 


654 


TABLE  OF  PRANKISH  RULERS 


A.D 

Robert  of  Taranto    .            .            .            .            .              .             .1346 

Marie  de  Bourbon   . 

.           1364 

Philip  II.  of  Taranto 

1364 

Joanna  I.  of  Naples 

1375 

Jacques  de  Baux 

1380 

Charles  III.  of  Naples 

.     1382-86 

[Venice— 1 386-1797] 

VENETIAN  COLONIES 

Modon  ^ 

Coron  J 

1 206-1 3OO 

Argos 

1 388-1463 

Nauplia 

I388-1S40 

Monemvasia 

1464-1540 

Lepanto 

.     MO7-99 

Negroponte  . 

1 209- 1470 

Pteleon 

1 323-M70 

jEgina 

1451-1537 

Tenos 

I39O-I7I) 

Mykonos 

I39O-I537 

Northern  Sporades 

I453-I338 

Corfu 

1206-12 14  ;  1386-1797 

Cephalonia  . 

'483-5;  I5«>-I797 

Zante 

1482-1797 

Cerigo 

I303-I797 

Sta.  Mavra  . 

.       1502-3 

Athens 

1394-1402 

Patras 

1408-13;  I4I7-I9 

Naxos 

1494-1500;  1511-17 

Andros 

M37-40;  1507-14 

Paros 

1518-20;  1531-36 

J  of  Amorgos 

1 370-1446 

Maina 

.     I467-79 

Vostitza 

1470 

I 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I.  Contemporary  Documents. 
(a)  Venetian; 
Tafel  trad  Thomas  :  "  Urkunden  ziir  alteren  Handels-und  Staatsgeschichte 
der  Republik  Venedig  (1204- 1300) n  in  Fontes  Rerum  Austriacarum, 
Part  II.,  vols,  xii.,  xiii.,  and  xiv. 
Thomas  and  Predelli :  Diplomatarium  Veneto-Levantinum  (1300-1454), 

2  vols. 
Giomo :   u  Le  Rubriche  dei  Libri   Misti  perduti,"  in  Archivio    Veneto, 

xvii.,  et  sqq. 
Predelli :  /  Libri  Commemoriali,  6  vols.;  //  Liber  Communis, 
Jorga:  "Notes  et  Extraits  pour  servir  a  l'histoire  des  Croisades,  au 

XV*  Steele,"  in  Revue  de  VOrieni  latin,  vols,  iv.-viii. 
Sithas :  Mrqtula  'EX\t)vuct)s  'Ivroplas  (Afonumenta  Hellenica  Historia),  9 

vols. 
Lamansky :  Secrets  de  ?£tat  de  Venise. 
Relazioni degli  Ambasciatori  Venett\  Serie  III.  and  Appendice. 
(^Neapolitan: 
Del  Giudice :  Codice  Diplomatico  di  Carlo  /.  e  II.  di  Angid  (1265-8),  2 
vols.  (Napoli :  1863-9). 
La  Famiglia  di  Re  Manfredi,  2nd  ed.  (Napoli :  1896). 
Minieri  Riccio :  Saggio  di  Codice  Diplomatico >  2  vols.,  with  supplement 
(Napoli:  1878-83). 
Alcunifatti  riguardanti  Carlo  /.  di  Angid,  dal  1252  al  127a 
//  regno  di  Carlo  I.  di  Angid  negli  anni  1271  e  1272. 
//  regno  di  Carlo  I.  a* Angid,  dal  2  Gennaio  1273  al  31  Dicembre  1283. 
In  Archivio  Storico  Italiano,  Serie  III.,  vol.  xxii. — Serie  IV., 
vol.  v. 
II  regno  di  Carlo  I  d  Angid,  dal  4  Gennaio  1284  al  7  Gennaio  1285  ; 
Ibid,  Serie  IV.,  vol.  vii.    Genealogia  di  Carlo  II.  a* Angid,  in 
Archivio  Storico  per  le  Provincie  Napoletane,  vols,  vii.,  viii. 
Delia  dominazione  Angioina  nel  reame  di  Sicilia. 
Nuovi  studii  riguardanti  la  dominazione  Angioina  nel  regno  di  Sicilia. 
Studii  storici/atti  sopra  84  Registri  Angioini. 
Notizie  storiche  tratte  da  62  Registri  Angioini. 
Studi  storici  suifascicoli  Angioini. 
Barone  :  Notizie  storiche  di  Re  Carlo  III.  di  Durazso. 

06ft 


656  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

(c)  Papal: 

Epistolarum  Innocentii  Iff.,  libri  XVI.  (ed.  1682). 

Honorii  111.  Opera,  4  vols.  (ed.  Horoy,  1879-80). 

Regesta  Honorii  III.  (ed.  Pressutti,  1895). 

Les  Rcgistres  de  Gre'goire  IX.  (ed.  Auvray,  1896- 1906). 

Les  Regis tres  a* Innocent  IV.  (ed.  Berger,  1884-97). 

Les  Registres d *  Alexandre  IV.  (ed.  Bourel  de  la  Ronciere). 

Les  Registres  dUrbain  IV.  (ed.  Guiraud). 

Les  Registres  de  Clement  IV.  (ed.  Jordan). 

Les  Registres  de  Gr/goire  X.  el  de  Jean  XXL  (ed.  Guiraud). 

Les  Registres  de  Nicolas  HI.  (ed.  Gay). 

Les  Registres  de  Martin  IV.  (ed.  £cole  francaise  de  Rome). 

Les  Registres  dHonorius  IV.  (ed.  Prou). 

Les  Registres  de  Nicolas  IV.  (ed.  Langlois). 

Les  Registres  de  Boniface  VIII.  (ed.  Digard). 

Les  Registres  de  Benott  XL  (ed.  Grandjean). 

Regestum  Clementis  V.  (ed.  Benedictine  Order). 

Lettres  secretes  el  curiales  de  Jean  XX  11.  (ed.  Coulon). 

Lettres  communes  de  Jean  XXII.  (ed.  Mollat). 

Lettres  communes  de  Benott  XII.  (ed.  Vidal). 

Lettres  closes,  palentes,  et  curiales  de  Benott  XII.  (ed.  Daumet). 

Lettres  closes,  patentes,  et  curiales  de  Clement  VI.  (ed.  D£prez). 

Lettres  secretes  et  curiales  dUrbain  V.  (ed.  Lecacheux). 

(d)  Miscellaneous : 

Miklosich  und  Miiller :  Acta  et  Diplomata  Graca  Medii  jEw,  6  vols. 

Exuvice  Sacra  Constantinopolitana  (ed.  1877),  2  vols. 

Lam  pros  :  "Eyypa^a  &pa<pcp6fi€va  els  rf}r  fi€<raiu¥LK^w  'loropta*  twv  •  AQrfvwy.    (The 

third  volume  of  his  Greek  translation  of  Gregorovius,  Gesckkkk 

der  Stadt  Athen  im  Mittelalter). 
Ross    und    Schmeller :  "  Urkunden  zur  Geschichte  Griechenlands  im 

Mittelalter/1  in  Abhandlungen  der  philos.-philoL   Classe  der  K. 

Bayer.  Afcademie,  B.  II. 
Alti  delta  Societd  Ligure  di  Storia  patria. 
Liber  Jurium  Reipublica  Genuensis. 
Docutnenti  suite  relazioni  toscane  colP  Oriente. 
Guardione  :  Sul  Dominio  dei  Ducati  di  Atene  e  Neopatria. 
Milanges  historiques,  vol.  iii. 

Charriere  :  Negociations  de  la  France  dans  le  Levant,  vols,  i.-iii. 
Archives  de  V Orient  latin. 

II.  Contemporary  Authors. 
(a)  Greek: 
Mixa^X  'AicofXLV&Tov  too  Xwvi&tov  tA  autffitva  (ed.  Lampros). 
Nik^tas  Choniates  (ed.  Bonn). 
Akropolita  (ed.  Bonn). 
Michael  Palaiol6gos,  De  vitd  sud. 
Pachymcres  (ed.  Bonn). 


k 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  657 

Nikephoros  Gregorys  (ed.  Bonn). 

J.  Cantacuzene  (cd.  Bonn). 

Laonikos  Chalkokondyles  (ed.  Bonn). 

Phrantzds  (ed.  Bonn). 

Doukas  (ed.  Bonn). 

Chronicon  breve  (ed.  Bonn). 

Epirotica  (ed.  Bonn). 

Krit6boulos  apud  M tiller :  Fragmenta  historicorum  Gracorum,  vol.  v. 

Manuel  Palaiologos  apud  Migne :  Patrologia  Graca. 

G.  Gemist6s  Plethon  apud  Migne :  Patrologia  Graca. 

Bessarion  apud  Migne  :  Patrologia  Graca. 

Theodoulos  Rhdtor  apud  Boissonade  :  Anecdota  Gracay  vol.  ii. 

Mazaris  apud  Boissonade :  Anecdota  Graca,  vol.  iii. 

Kyd6nes  apud  Boissonade :  Anecdota  Nova, 

Bprjvos  rrjt  Kwv<rrarrtvovir6\c<ot  apud  Wagner :  Mediaval  Texts. 

T6  Xpoiwcdr  rod  Mo^wj  (ed.  Schmitt).    Cited  as  X.  r.  M. 

Dorotheos  of  Monemvasia :  Btp\loy'I<TTopiic6v  (ed.  1814). 

(b)  Miscellaneous : 

Le  Ldvre  de  la  Conqueste.    (Forming  vol.  i.  of  Buchon,   Recherches 

historiques).    Cited  as  L,  a\  C. 
Cronaca  di  Aforea,  apud  Hopfj  Chroniques  gr/co-romanes.     Cited  as 

CdM. 
Ubro  de  los  Fechos  et  Conquistas  del  Principado  de  la  Morca.     (The 

Aragonese  version  of  the  above).    Cited  as  L.  d  F. 
Benedict  of  Peterborough :  Gesta  Regis  Ricardi,  in  Rolls'  Series. 
Matthew  Paris :  Chronica  Majora,  and  Historia  Afinor,  in  Rolls'  Series. 
Muratori :  Rerum  Italicarum  Scriptores. 
Pertz :  Monumenta  Germanics  his  tori ca. 
Historia patria  Monumenta.    (Torino,  1854-7). 
Martin  da  Canal :  "  La  Chronique  des  Veniciens,"  in  Archivio  Storico 

Italiano,  vol  viii. 
Laurentius  de  Monacis :  Chronicon. 
Enrico  Dandolo :.  "Cronaca  Veneta."    (MS.  in  Venice). 
Amadeo  Valier :  "  Cronaca."    (MS.  in  Venice). 
A.  Cornaro :  "  Historia  di  Candia."    (MS.  in  Venice). 
Antonio  Morosini :  Chronique. 
Sabellico  :  Historia  Rerum  Venetarum  (ed.  1556). 
Bembo :  Rerum  Venetarum  historia  (ed.  155 1). 
Guazzo:  Historie. 
P.  Jovius :  Historia  sui  temporis. 
Cippico :  P.  Mocenigi  Gesta. 
Paruta :  Historia  Venetiana  (ed.  1703). 
A.  Maurocenus :  Historia  Veneta  (ed.  1623). 
Sanudo:  DiariL 
Conti :  Historie  de*  suoi  tempi. 
Contarini :  Historia  delle  cose  successe  (ed.  1 572). 
Foglietta  :  Historia  Genuensium  (ed.  1585). 

2  T 


658  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Albericus  Trium  Fontium  ;  Chrotdcon  (ed.  1698X 

Philippe  Mousk£s :  Ckronique  rimie,  vol  ii.  (Bruxelles,  1838). 

"  Chronique  de  Geoffroy  de  Villehardouin  "  and  "  Continuation  par  Henri 

dc  Valenciennes,"  in  Buchon,  Recherches  et  Mattriaux,  voL  il; 

and  also  editions  by  Bouchet  and  P.  Paris. 
Muntaner :  "  Cronaca,"  in  Cronache  Catalane  (tr.  Moise)  ;  and  also  edited 

by  Lanz  (1844). 
The  Chronicles  of  Rabbi  Joseph  Ben  Joshua  (tr.  Bialloblotzky). 
Luccari :  Copioso  ristretto  degli  annali  di  Rausa. 
Gerlach :  Tagebuch. 
jEneas  Sylvius  :  Europa. 
Pius  1 1. :  Commentarii. 
Rizzardo  :  La  Presa  di  Negroponte. 

"  De  Nigropontis  Captione,"  in  Basle  ed.  of  Chalkokondyles. 
Pegalotti:  Delia  Decima. 

Barbarorum  Leges  Antiqua  (ed.  P.  Canciani,  1785). 
The  Itinerary  of Benjamin  of  Tudela  (tr.  Asher,  1840). 
G/ographie  dEdrisi  (tr.  Jaubert). 
Itinerarium  Symonis  Simeonis  (ed.  Nasmith,  1778). 
Friar  Jordanus :  Mirabilia  Descripta  (tr.  Yule). 
Ludolph  von  Suchem  :  De  Itinere  Terra  Sancte. 
Nicolaus  de  Marthono :   "  Liber  Peregrinationis  ad   Loca  Sancta,"  in 

Revue  de  V  Orient  latin,  vol.  iii. 
Faber:  Evagatorium. 
Casola  :  Viaggio  a  Gerusalemme. 
Feyerabend :  Reyssbuch  des  Heyligen  Lands  (ed.  1584). 
Breuning  von  und  zu  Buochenbach  :  Orientalisehe  Reyss. 
Kyriaci  Anconitani  Itinerarium  (ed.  Mehus). 
Epigrammata  reperta  per  lllyricum. 
Tozzetti :  Relazioni  di  a/cum  viaggifatti  in  Toscana. 
Fabricius  :  Biblioteca  latina  media  et  infima  AZtatis,  vol  vi. 
Colucci :  Delle  Antic  hi td  picene. 

Brocquiere  :  "  Voyage  d,Outremer,w  in  Memoires  de  P  Institute 
Tu)v  &Tody)fjuu>v  ' Av&povUov  rov  Nowrfou  (ed.  M.  A.  Mustoxidif  1 865). 
Buondelmonti :  Liber  insularum  Archipelagi  (ed.  Sinner,  1824;  anded 

Legrand,  1897). 
Bartolomeo  dalli  Sonnetti :  Peripius. 
Crusius :  Turcogracia. 
Bongars :  Gesta  Dei  per  Francos,  2  vols.    (The  second  contains  Sanudo : 

Secreta  Fidelium  Crucis). 
Beugnot :  Recueil  des  historians  des  Croisades. 
Sgur6poulos  :   Vera  historia  Unionis. 
Sansovino  :  Historia  universale  del?  Origine  et  Imperio  dei  TurckL 

Cronologia  del  Mondo. 
Spandugino  .*  /  Commentari  ,  ,  .  delP  Origine  de*  Principi  Turchi  (ed 

'550, 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  659 


III.  Later  Writers. 

Ducange  :  Histoire  de  VEmpire  de  Constantinople,  2  vols.  (ed.  Buchon). 
Buchon  :  Recherches  et  Matiriaux,  2  vols. 
Recherches  historiques  sur  la  Principaute4 francaise  de  Morde,  2  vols. 
Nauvelles  Recherches  historiques  sur  la  PrincipauU  franc case  de  Mor/e, 

2  vols. 
Histoire  des  Conquites. 
Atlas  des  Nouvelles  Recherches  historiques. 
La  Grece  Continentale  et  la  Morie. 

"  Les  Cyclades,"  in  Revue  de  Paris  for  1843,  vo^s*  x"i->  xv>m  and  xv»- 
Hopf :  "Geschichte  Griechenlands  vom  Beginn  des  Mittelalters  bis  auf 
unsere  Zeit,"  in  Ersch  und  ember's  Allgemeine  Encyklopadie,  vols. 
lxxxv.  and  lxxxvi. 
"Ghisi.M    Ibid,  vol  lxvi. 

"  Giustiniani."     Ibid.,  vol.   Ixviii.     Also  in   French,  Les  Giustiniani 
(tr.  Vlasto)  and  Italian, "  Di  Alcune  dinastie  latine  nella  Grecia" 
(tr.  Sardagna),  in  Archivio  Veneto,  vol  xxxi. 
"  Gozzadini,"  in  Ersch  und  Gmbe^s  Allgemeine  Encyklopadie,  voL  lxxvi. 
Chroniques  gr/co-romanes. 

"  Geschichtlicher  Ueberblick  iiber  die  Schicksale  von   Karystos,"  in 

Sitzungsberichte  der  Wiener  Akademie  (1853),  B.  XI.    Also,  with 

additions,  in  Italian,  Dissertazione  documentata  sulla  storia  di 

Karystos  (tr.  Sardagna). 

"  Geschichte  der  Insel  Andros  und  ihrer  Beherrscher,w  in  Sitzungsberichte 

der  Wiener  Akademie  (1855),  B.  XVI. 
"  Urkunden  und  Zusatze  zur  Geschichte  der  Insel  Andros."    Ibid.  (1856), 
B.  XXI.    Also,  in  Italian,  Dissertazione  documentata  sulla  storia 
dell*  Isola  di  Andros  (tr.  Sardagna). 
"  Veneto-Byzantinische    Analekten,"    in    Sitzungsberichte   der    Wiener 

Akademie  (1859),  B.  XXXII. 
Emerson  :  The  History  of  Modern  Greece. 
Finlay  :  A  History  of  Greece,  vols.  Hi.,  iv.,  v.  (ed.  Tozer,  1877). 
Hertzberg :  Geschichte    Griechenlands   seit  dem  Absterben  des  antiken 

Lebens  bis  zur  Gegenwart,  Bde.  II.  and  III. 
Gregorovius :  Geschichte  der  Stadt  A  then  im  Mittelalter.    Also,  trans- 
lated, with  many  additions,  into  Greek,  by  Lampros,  as  'loropla  riji 
t6\c<os  'AOtivQv  K*rk  rout  fUrovs  aluvat. 
"Briefe  aus  der  '  Corrispondenza  Acciajoli,,M  in  Sitzungsberichte  der 
philos.philoL  undhistor.  Classe  der  K.  Bayer.  Akademie  (1890), 
B.  II. 
Fallmerayer :  Geschichte  der  Halbinsel  More  a  wakrend  des  Mittelalters. 
Diane  de  Guldencrone :  L* Achate  f/odale. 
Sir    Rennell    Rodd:     The  Princes  of  Achaia  and  the  Chronicles  of 

Morea. 
Mas  Latrie,  Count:     "Les    princes  de    Mor6e,w  and   "Les  dues  de 
rArcRipel,"  in  the  Venetian  Miscellanea,  vols.  ii.  and  iv. 


"\ 


660  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Paparreg6poulos: 'laropla Tov,E\Krjvuco0*E6ifovst  4th  ed.  by  P.  Karolfdes,  1903. 
Sourmele's  :  Kardaraau  trvvovru^i  ri}t  rdXews  Hov  *A.dr)v£>v. 
Kampouroglos,  D.  G.  :  'Iflropfa  rwv ' AtfiyyaW,  3  vols.  (1889-96). 

M^/tna  rijt 'Iarop/oi  Tu}v'A.drjyaiu)y%  3  vols.  (2nd  e<L,   1 89 1 -2). 
Philadelpheus  :  'lffropla  t&v  'Adrjvuv  Art  TovpKOKparlai,  2  vols.  (1902). 
Konstantinfdes  :   'Itrropla  rdav  'A^wv  drd  Xpiarov  ycyvfyrcws  M^U*  ™"  frw* 

1 82 1  (2nd  ed.,  1894). 
Hammer :  Gesckichte  des  osmanischen  Retches.,  Bde.  I.  and  II. 
Heyd  :  Z*  Colonic  Commerciali  degli  Italiani  in  Orienle. 

Gesckichte  des  Levantehandels. 
Dam :  Histoire  de  Venise. 
Romanin  :  Sioria  documentata  di  Venezia. 
Cicogna  :  Iscrizioni  Veneziane,  vol  v. 
Cornelius  :  Ecclesia  Veneta,  vol.  viii. 
Schlumberger :  Les  Principaut/s  francs  du  Levant 

Numistnatique  de  P  Orient  latin,  with  Supplement 

Expedition  des  "  Almugavares"  ou  routiers  Catalans  en  Orient 
Moncada :    "  Expedition  de  los  Catalanes  y  Aragones  contre  Turcos  y 

Griegos,"  in  Biblioteca  de  A  u tores  Espaiioles,  vol.  xxi. 
Rubi6  y  Lluch  :  La  Expedicion  y  Domination  de  los  Catalanes  en  Orienk. 

Los  Navarros  en  Grecia. 

Catalunya  a  Grecia. 
Stamat&des  :  01  KaraXdvoi  iv  rj  * AraroXp. 
(^urita  :  Anales  de  la  Corona  de  Aragon. 
Rosario  Gregorio  :  Considerazioni  scpra  la  storia  di  Sicilia. 
Bozzo  :  Notizie  Storiche  Siciliane  del  Secolo  XIV. 

Guichenon  :  Histoire  g/n/alogique  de  la  royale  maison  de  Savoy e  (1670). 
Datta :  Storia  dei  Principi  di  Savoia  del  ramo  dAcaja  (Torino,  1832). 

Spedizione  in  Oriente  di  Amadeo  VI. 
Servian  :  Gestez  et  Chroniques  de  la  May  son  de  Savoye. 
Litta  :  Lefamiglie  celebri  italiane. 
Muratori :  Antiquitates  Italia. 
Mazella :  Descrittione  del  Regno  di  Napoli. 
Panvinius :  Antiquitatum  Veronensium. 
Turresanus :    "  Elogium  historicarum    nobilium  Veronae   propaginmn.9 

(MS.  at  Verona). 
St  Genois  :  Droits  PrimiUfs  des  antiennes  terres  .  .  .  de  Haynaut. 
Lami :  Delicice  Eruditorum.    (Vol.  v.  contains  many  documents  about 

Corinth.) 
Mai :  Spicilegium  Romanum. 

Bosio  :  DeW  Istoria  delta  Sacra  Religione  .  .  .  di  S.  Gio.  Gierosol  "•• 
Martene  et  Durand :  Thesaurus. 
Wadding :  Annates  Minorum. 
Raynaldus :  Annates  Ecclesiastici  (ed.  1747). 
Le  Quien  :  Oriens  Christianus,  voL  ii. 
Eubel :  Hierarchia  Catholica  Medii  /£vi(i  198-1503). 
Gerland :  Neue    Quellen  zur  Gesckichte  des  lateinischen  Erzbisthtms 
Patras  (1905). 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  661 

Schultz-Gora  :  Le  Epistole  del  Trovatore  Rambaldo  di  Vaqueiras, 

Laborde :  Athenes  auxXV*,X  VI*,  et  X  VII*  Sihles. 

A.  Mommsen :  Athena  Christiana. 

Lttmpros  :  At  'ABrjvat  irepl  tA  rfKrj  tov  6to8eK&TOv  atwvos. 

Fanelli :  Atene  Attica. 

Magni :  Relatione  delta  citld  di  Atene. 

Viaggi  e  di  more  per  la  Turchia. 
Spon  et  Wheler,    Voyage  dltalie  de  Dalmatic,  de  Grece  et  du  Levant, 

3  vols.  (Lyon,  1678). 
Guillaume  :  Histoire  gifn/alogique  des  Sires  de  Salins. 
D  Arbois  de  Jubainville  :   Voyage  palcdgraphique  dans  le  dfyartement  de 

PAube. 
Ubaldini :  Origine  delta  famiglia  Acciajuoli. 
Gaddi :  Elogiographus. 

Corollarium  Poeticum. 
Pouqueville  :   Voyage  dans  la  Grtee. 
Millet :  Le  Monastcre  de  Daphni. 
Schultz  and  Barnsley  :  The  Monastery  of  St  Luke. 
Polykarpos  :  Td  MeWwpa  (1882). 
Srtthas  :  Xpovucbv  'Av£k6otov  TaXafriUlov. 

TovpKOKparovfjUvrj  'EXXds. 
Lamprinfdes :  'H  'SavrXla. 
Marmora  :  Historia  di  Corfh. 
A.  Mustoxidi :  Delle  Cose  Corciresi. 

Illustrazioni  Corciresi. 
M.  A.  Mustoxidi :  'IflropurA  koX  4»i\oXo7uc4  'AvdXtKra. 
Lunzi :  Uepl  rrjt  ToXiTiKrp  Karaardaem  -rijs  'Eirrav^ijov  iwl  'EverQv.     Also  in  an 

enlarged   Italian  version :  Delia  Condizione  politica  dclle  hole 

Ionie  sotto  il  dominio  Veneto. 
Idromenos  :  ZvvoimK^lcTOpla  tt}s  Kcpictipas. 
Jervis  :  History  of  the  Island  of  Corfh. 
Botta  :  Storia  Naturale  delP  J  sola  di  Corfil. 
Saint- Sauveur  :   Voyage  historique,  littdraire  et  pittoresque  dans  les  isles 

et  possessions  ci-devant  vinitiennes  du  Levant,  4  vols. 
Albdnas  :   Hepl  tQ>v  iv  Kepxvpq,  rlrXtav  cvycvclas. 
Brokfnes  :   Ucpl  ru>v  irrplws  TcXovnivwv  iv  Kepicvp^  Xiravtuov  tov  $.  Xei^dvov  rod 

'Aylov  Zrvpl&wvos.    (Eng.  tr.  by  Mrs  Dawes). 
Roman6s  :  Vpanavos  Zi&pfr*  av$4mjs  Aevtcddos. 
*H  'EjSpatK^  Kowbrin  rrji  Ktpfcvpat. 
ArjuocLa  KeptcvpaXirti  llpa£tt. 

U€pl  TOV  AC0TOT&TOV  TTfS  'H*elpOV. 

Arabantin6s  :  Xpovoypa</>La  -n)*  'HrWpov. 

Meliarflkes  :  'l<rropla  tov  BaviXelov  tt}*  XtKcUas  icai  tov  AefTordrov  rrjs  Uxtlpov. 

Tctaypafla  toXitiki}  tov  vojiov  KecpaXXrivLas. 

Tctaypa<f>la  toXltikt)  tov  vofiov  'ApyoXlSoi  ical  KopivBLat. 

"Avdpot,  Kiias. 

'A/xopy6s>  KlpuaXos.     In  AcXHov  rijs'Iar.  icai'EBv.  'Er.,  vols.  i.  and  vi. 

OUcyivcM  Ma/uwa. 


662  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Risposta  di  Jacopo  Grand*  .  .  .  intorno  S.  Maura. 

Petritz6poulos  :  Saggio  Storico  sulP  eld  di  Leucadia  (1824). 

Stamat&OS  :  *iA 0X071*0!  3iarpi/3oi  irepl  Acvxdtot  (1851). 

Blant&S  :  'H  Aei/K&f  faro  rods  Qpdytcov*  (1902). 

Remondini :  De  Zacynthi  Antiquitatibus. 

Serra :  "  S  tori  a  di  Zante."    (MS.  in  author's  possession). 

Chi6tes :  'ImopiKik'ATOfipqfioyrfiMTa'E'WTarljaov. 

Mercati :  Saggio  Storico  Statistico  di  Zante. 

Karavfas  :  'loropla  ttjs  rfyrov'ld&Kyt. 

Stai :    Raccolta  di  antiche  autorita  .  .  .  riguardanti  PIsola  di  CiUra 

(Pisa,  1847). 
P.  A.  S.  :  'H  Udpya. 

Perrhaib6s  :  'l<rropla  rod  Zovkiov  ml  Udpyas. 
Foscolo  :  "  Narrazione  delle  fortune  e  della  cessione  di  Parga,"  in  Prose 

Politiche. 
Bury  :  "The  Lombards  and  Venetians  in  Euboia,"  in  Journal  of  Hellenic 

Studies,  vols,  vii.-ix. 
Historia  del  Regno  di  Negroponte  (1695). 
Piacenza :  IJEgeo  Redivivo. 
Boschini:  U  Archipelago. 
Porcacchi :  Le  hole  piii  famose  al  Monde. 
Tournefort:  Voyage  du  Levant. 

Pasch  von  Krienen  :  Breve  Descrizione  delP  Archipelago. 
Sauger :  Histoire  nouvelle  des  anciens  Dues  de  PArchipel  (ecL  1699). 
Lichtle  :  "  Description  de  Naxie.M    (MS.  copy  in  Berlin). 
Zabarella  :  Tito  Livio  Padovano. 

II  Galba. 
Curtius :  Naxos. 
Carmoly  :  Don  Joseph  Nassy. 
Levy  :  Don  Joseph  Nasi. 

Lettere  Edijfkanti  senile  dalle  missions'  straniere^  vol.  vii. 
Pegues  :  Histoire  de  Santorin. 
E.  A.  C. :  Cenni  Storici  intorno  Paolo  de  Campo. 
Dugit :  "  Naxos  et  les  £tablissements  latins  de  PArchipey  in  Bulletin  de 

rAcaddmie  Delphinaley  vol.  x. 
Haji   Kalifeh :    The  history  of  the  Maritime   Wars  of  the   Turks  (tr. 

Mitchell). 
Cronologia  his  tor  tea  (tr.  Carli). 

IV.    Periodicals. 
Archivio  Storico  Italiano. 
Archivio  Veneto  and  Nuovo  Archivio  Veneto. 
Archivio  Storico  per  le  Provincie  Napoletane. 
Giornale  Ligustico. 
Napoli  Nobilissima. 
Bulletino  delP  Istituto. 
Revue  de  V  Orient  latin. 
Bulletin  de  Correspondance  he  I  Unique. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  663 

Revue  des  Etudes  grecques. 

Revue  Arch/blogique. 

BidlioMque  de  FEcole  des  Char  Us. 

Melanges  de  F  Jtcole  francaise  de  Rome. 

Academie  de  Besancon. 

Byzantitiische  Zeitschrift. 

Mitteilungen  des  k.  deutsch.  Arch.  Instituts  (Athen). 

The  English  Historical  Review. 

Journal  of  Hellenic  Studies. 

AcXrlop  rijt  'laropurijt  *<U  'ESvoXoyiKrji  'Eraipias.     Cited  as  AfXi-lor. 

AeXrlov  rip  Xpumariirifl  'Apx<uo\oyucrjt  'Rraipclas. 

Uapya<T<r6s. 

'Apfxovla. 

yta  Tlaydutpa. 

Bi/farrtvA  Xpovitcd. 


■  I  I .  !       ! 


it 


$ 


t-, 


m 


M 


m 
I 


INDEX 


{Except  where  expressly  stated,  the  Greek  names  of  places  are  used,  the  Prankish 
equivalents  being  put  in  brackets  after  themfy 


Acciajuoli,  family  of,  26o\  285,  457-8, 
SOS- 
Angelo  (Archbishop  of  Patras),  287- 

9* 

Angelo  (son  of  Niccolo),  290-1. 
Angelo    (Cardinal     Archbishop     of 

Patras),  341,  348. 
Antonio  I.  (Duke  of  Athens),  3$o-i ; 

takes  Athens,  560-2,  376,  387, 

397-404. 
Antonio  II.  (Duke  of  Athens),  400, 

406. 
Bartolomea,  3*2,  3$o. 
Donato,  286,  341,  348,  351. 
Francesca  (Countess  of  Cephafonia), 

3*5,  338,  34*,  350-I,  371,  395-7, 

4^4 
Francesco  (Duke  of  Athens),  436. 
Franco  (Duke  of  Athens),  406, 436-8, 

456-7. 
Giovanni  (Archbishop  of  Patras),  291. 
Nerio  I.  (Duke  of  Athene),  291,  303-4, 

316,319.3**//*?.,  59». 
Nerio  1 1.  (Duke  of  Athens),  400, 404-6, 

410-12,  422,  435-6. 
Nkcolo,  261,  270  et  sqq. 

Achaia,  town  of,  446. 

Acheloos,  29,  293. 

Adoldo,  Niccolo,  596-7. 

jEdepsos,  375»  477,  595- 

jEgiaius,  2a 

,£gina,  1,  8,  9,  ».  ***  *9,  45,  "5,  »94 ; 
belongs  to  Fadrique  family,  266, 
305,  316 ;  passes  to  the  Caopena, 
3*6,  398-9;  Venetian,  461,  464-5, 
481,  500-3  ;  Turkish,  507-8. 

Akominitos,  Michael  (Metropolitan  of 
Athens),  6-9,  1 1  et  sqq.,  31-2,  34* 
67,  71-*,  573. 

Akova  (Matagrifon),  50,  53,  144-5,  *47, 
*53,  *59,  345,  433- 

Akropotita,  108-9,  112, 130-1. 

666 


Albanians,  2^7,  283,  *93-4,  809,  3", 
317;  settle  in  Morea,  366-7,  383-4, 
387  ;  revolt  in  Morea,  427-30,  433, 
451,  546 ;  »  Cydadet,  599-6oa 
Aleman,  Gamier  (of  Corfu),  126, 515-16. 
GuHlautoe  1.  (of  Patras),  51,  64. 
Guillaume  II.  (of  Patras),  147* 
Thomas  (of  Corf  a),  126. 
Alfonso  V.  of  Afagon  and  I.  of  Naples, 

3*5,  397, 4",  416, 4*6, 4*9-31, 437, 
465,  607. 
Altavilla,  family  of,  518,  523-4, 526,  530; 

539. 
Amadeo  VI.  of  Savoy  (Conte    Verde), 

288. 
Amadeo  of  Savoy  (claimant  of  Achaia), 

318-19,  341,  343-5- 
Amorgos,  13,  25,  44,  577,  582,  584,  590, 

603,  606,  617,  624-5,  64*,  646. 
Anaphe  (Namfio),  44,  578,   580,  584, 
588,  590    592,  597,  603-4,  607-8, 
617,  624,  642. 
Anatoliko,  29,  363. 

Andravida  (Andreville),  23,  37-8,  50, 
52-3,  91,  1**,  1*4,  144,  146,  180, 
271. 
Andros,  25,  29, 44,  *77,  575-6,  57*-8i, 
587,  59*,  595-600,  603-6,  610,  617; 
Venetian,  619-21,  628,  633-4; 
Turkish,  636-7,  642-3,  648. 
Androusa  (Druse),  53,  318 ;  capital  of 

Achaia,  344,  385,  391,  449- 
Angelokastro,  183,  416. 
Angelos,  -a,  Alezios  III.,  5,  21, 28-9, 32. 
Alexios  IV.,  29. 
Anna  (Despoina  of  Eptros),  175,  178, 

200-2,  206. 
Constantine   (Duke    of   Neopatras), 

199-200. 
Dem&rios  (Despot  of  Salonika),  96. 
Helene    (Regent   of  Athens),    165, 
1 91-2. 

2  T  2 


666 


INDEX 


Angelos,  Isaac  II.,  3,  7  «•,  23,  27,  3©. 
John  (Emperor  of  Salonika),  95. 
John  I.  (Duke  of  Neopatras),  132-5, 

150,  X7S»  199- 
John  II.  (Duke  of  Neopatras),  199, 

218,  222-3,  246. 
Manuel  (Despot  of  Epiros),  90,  94-6. 
Michael  I.  (Despot  of  Epiros),  30,  38, 


41,  75,  79-*0*  512. 
iiael  II.  (Despo 


Michael  II.  (Despot  of  Epiros),  96, 

io»  etsqq.,  131,  5IJ-I5. 
Nikephoros   I.  (Despot  of   Epiros), 
131,  151,  I7«i  174-6.  I7«  */«., 
199- 
Thamar,  179, 182-3,  251. 
Theodore  (Despot  of  Epiros),  42,  59, 
62,    72,    80,    82;    Emperor    of 
Salonika,  83-4,  94-6,  108. 
Thomas  (Despot  of  Epiros),  179-80, 
200-2,  249,  521. 
Anjou,  Charles  I.  of,  125, 128-9;  Prince 
of  Achaia,   161,   173;    "King  of 
Corfu,"  515-19,  C44,  579-80. 
Anjou,  Charles  II.  of  (Prince  of  Achaia), 
164,  170,  182-4,  19a.  195.  202-4, 
520,  522,  58i. 
Anoe,  Januli  d'  (triarch  of  Euboea),  459. 
Antelme  (Archbishop  of  Patrasl  52. 
Antiparos,  44,  587, 602,  605-6,611, 617, 

624. 
Antipaxo,  533,  602. 
Antirrhion,  494. 
Ap6kaukos,  12. 
Arfchova,  Great,  142,  168. 
Araklovon  (Bucelet),  38, 167-8,  20$. 
Arethusa,  fountain  of,  141. 
Argos,  5,  xi,  23,42,62  244,  251,  264-6, 
280 ;  Venetian,  339-42,  350 ;  Turk- 
ish, 358,  425.  465-7,  S08-9. 
Argyroi  (D'Argenta),  613,  641-2. 
Arkadia,  castle  of.    See  Kyparissia. 
Arkadia  (Mesarea),  24,  38,  40,  259. 
Armer,  Alban  d\  476  *.,  493. 
Arta,  II,  29,  41,  131,  250,  262,  280-1, 

309,  372-3,  416. 
Asan,  Andrew,  283. 
Andronikos  Palaiolbgos,  259. 
Dem&rios,  434,  438.  457. 
Matthew,    425-6,    429,    431,    434-5. 

446-7,  449,  452. 
Michael,  283. 
"  Assizes  of  Jerusalem,"  49. 
Astros,  339,  366,  399 
Astypalaia  (Stampalia),  44,  578,   584, 
587.    590 ;  recolonised,  600,  603, 
606,  612,  617,  624,642. 
Atalante  (La  Calandri),  67,  305,  329. 
Athens,  5-9,   II  et  sqq.y  28,  31-2  ;   be- 
stowed on  Othon  de  la  Roche,  34-5, 
65  et  sqq+;  Baldwin  II.   at,  115, 
150-1;    Catalan,  230,  298-9,   311 


//  sqq.;  Florentine  conquest  of, 
323-5,  329;  Venetian  colony, 
353-62 ;  Florentine  buildings  at, 
401-3,  411  ;  Cyriacus  at,  419-22; 
Turkish  conquest  of,  437-8;  Mo- 
hammed II.  at,  438-43;  secood 
visit,  456 ;  taken  bv  Cappello,  468. 
Monuments  of,  15-18,  357,  419, 422, 

441-3,468-9.  , 
Aunoy,  Geoffroy  d*  (baron  of  Kypar- 
issia),  178, 186. 
VUain  d'  (baron  of  Kyparissia),  147. 
Avesnes,  Florent  d'  (Prince  of  Achaia), 
169-71,  177-8, 180,  183  et  sqq^  52a 
Jacques  d\  28,  31,  35-*,  45- 
Avrames,  family  of,  530,  545,  561. 

Bajazbt  I.,  346,  358,  369,  596. 

Bajawt  II.,  488, 494-9,  $$0,  559,  61$. 
Baldwin  I.,  27-8,  34,  4a 

Baldwin,  II.,  86  *.,   1 14-15,   126-7, 

573-4,  579. 
Ballester,     Antonio     (Archbishop    of 
Athens),  305,  326. 
Berenguer,  306. 
Barbarossa,  Khaireddin,  507,  509,  560-1, 

567  ;  in  Cyciades,  624-30. 
Bardanes,  George,  12,  19,  84,  95,  513. 
Barozzi,  family  of  (lords  of  Santorin), 
^     44,  576-7,  582-3,  586-7,  590. 
Basingstoke,  John  of,  20. 
Baux,  Bertrand  de  (bailie  of  Achaia), 
270,  276. 
Jacques  de  (Prince  of  Achaia),  307, 
310,  317,  523-5,  596. 
Beaufort,  Henry  (bishop  of  Winchester), 

598. 
Beaumont,   Dreuz  de,   130,    137,   141, 

149  *•  1. 
Bellarbe,  Romeo  de,  311- 12. 
Benjamin  of  Kalamata,  190,  196. 

fienjamin  of  Tudela,  2  et  sqq^  15,  21. 
Bernardi,  Rambn,  278. 
Bessarion,  Cardinal,  379,  410,  453-4. 
Biandrate,Oberto,  Count  of.  41, 73-4, 82. 
Bochiles,  family  of,  448. 
Boniface  of  Montferrat  (King  of  Salon- 
ika), 27  et  sqq^  40-I,  45* 
Bordonia,  445,  448. 
fioua,  clan  of,  294,  363. 
Ghin  Spata,  309,  331,  37*. 
Maurice  Sgouros,  372. 
Paul,  363. 

Peter,  427,  430,  466,  486. 
Theodore,  490, 
Boudonitsa,  marquisate  of,   33,  74,  84, 
90,  104,  227,  234,  280,  35*  ;  Turk- 
ish,   373-5.      See  also    Pallavicini 
and  Zorzi. 
Boyl,  bishop  of  Megara,  314-15. 
Bragadini,  the  (of  Seriphos),  587. 


INDEX 


667 


Branis,  9,  29. 

Brienne,   Hugh,  Count  of   (baron    of 
Karytaina),   143,  183,  191-2,  220, 
5«a 
Isabelle,  227. 
Jeanne.    See  Chatillon. 
Jeannette,  21 8,  228. 
John  (Latin  Emperor),  $73. 
Walter  (Duke  of  Athens),  220  et  sqq. 
Walter  (titular  Duke  of  Athens),  227, 
230,  261-5. 
Bruyeres,  Geoffrey  I.  de  (baron  of  Kary- 
taina), 51,  105-6,  in,   116,   121, 
124,  142. 
Geoffiroy  II.  de,  167-8. 
Hugues  de,  51. 
Buondelmonti,  Esau,  332,  372,  546. 

Maddalcna,  316. 
Butrinto,  25,  157,  172-3,  249,417,  514, 
516,  519-20,  524-6,  543,  549,  559, 
568. 

Cafparo,  6. 

Canale,  Niccolb  da,  472  et  sqq, 
Canossa,  Albertino  of,  73,  76. 
Cantacuzene,  family  of,  9,  29,  259. 
Helene  (Countess  of  Salona),  323*4, 

326,  343,  346-7. 
John  (Emperor),  274-5,  280-1. 
Manuel  (Despot  of  Mistra),   281-4, 

308. 
Manuel  ("Ghin  "),  427,  433. 
Matthew  (Despot  of  Mistra),  316. 
Michael,  122-3. 
Caopena,  the   (lords  of  y£gina),   326, 

398-400,  462,  510. 
Cappello,  Vettore,  416,  428,  465  ;  takes 

Athens,  468,  470. 
Caracciolo,  family  of,  518,  524. 
Cassopo,  525,  528,  545. 
CasteUi,  the  (lords  of  Thermia),  587  *.  1. 
Catalans,  138,  211  et  sqq.;  at  Monem- 

vasia,  448 ;  in  i£gina,  462,  583. 
Catavas,  Jean  de,  122. 
Catherine  of  Valois  (titular  Empress), 
218,   251,   261,   269  //    sqq.,  285, 
521-2. 
Cattaneo  (lord  of  Phokaia),  589. 
Cephalonia,  2,  5,  8,  29-30,  63, 151,  249  ; 
Angevin,  260 ;  bestowed  on  Leon- 
ardo I.  Tocco,  292,  352,  371,  416  ; 
Turkish,    483-6;    Venetian,   487; 
Turkish,    488 ;    Venetian,    498-9, 
504,  553-9. 
Cepoy,  Thibaut  de,  216-19. 
Ccrigo  (Kythera),   45,  138,   151,  155, 

564-8. 
Cerigotto  (Antikythera),  45,  138,  if 5. 
Chalandritza,  51,  147,  259,  287,   343, 

39-. 
Chalkis  (Negropontc),  5,7,  14,  22,  75, 


104,  114,  138,  152,  209-10,  300-2, 

366, 408 ;  Mohammed  1 1,  at,  443-4 ; 

siege  of,  470-9. 
Chalkokond^les,  Laonikos  (historian), 

403. 
Father  of,  404-5,  412. 
Chamiretos,  Leon,  9. 
Champlitte,  Guillaume  de,  28,  30,  37  et 

W->  49-50. 

Hugues  de  (bailie  of  Achaia),  5a 
Robert  de,  60. 
Chandrenos,  222-3. 
Charles    III.    of   Durazzo    (King    of 

Naplesl  317,  523-6. 
Charpigny,  Hugues  de  Lille  de  (baron 
of  Vostitza),  51. 
Guy    de   Lille   de,   162;    bailie   of 
Achaia,  168,  1 89. 
Ch£tillon,     Jeanne     de    (Duchess    of 

Athens),  227,  23a 
Chauderon,  Jean  de,  117,  146,  162-4, 

169,  178,  186. 
Chinardo,  Filippo,  109,  126-7,  514-16. 
Chios,  245,  248,  603,  605. 
Chloumoutsi    (Clermont,   Castel   Tor- 
nese),  87,  102,  124,  147,  254,  287  ; 
residence  of  Constantine,  388, 429  ; 
Turkish,  45a 
Chozobi6tissa,  monastery  of,  12. 
Church,  Greek,  11-14,  47,  58,  65,  71-2, 
83,  87-8,  240,  334-7,  345-6,  353, 
440,  484,  503,  5-3,  516-17,  521-4, 
535-6,  5S2-5,  568,  573,  581,  634. 
Latin,  52,  59,  62  //  sqq.,  67  //  sqq., 
75-*,  88,  151,  239.  277,  3i4i438, 
440,    484,   503,    516-17,    520-1, 
535-6,    552-5,    573,    612,    623, 
634-5,  646. 
Cicon,  Othon  de,  66,  105, 115,  137. 
Cistercians,  70,  151,  233. 
Coinage,  102-3,  114,  162  ».,  164,  171, 
191,  200,  207,  232,  234,  2  co,  252, 
254,  264,  268,  270,  328,  382,  544. 
Comncnbs,  dynasty  of,  9, 12. 
Alezios  I.,  5,  13,  84. 
Alezios  II.,  14. 
Andronikos  I.,  14. 
Manuel  I.,  5,  25,  28,  30,  84. 
Contarini,  Bartolomeo,  436-7. 
Coquerel,  Mahiot  de  (vicar  of  Achaia), 

306,  317-18. 
Corfu,  2,  5,  8,  11,  25,  29-30;  Venetian, 
46,  80,  84,  96,  109,  126,  161,  182, 
184,  186,  214,  285,408,417,  420, 
453,  455-6,  510,  512  //  sqq.;  siege 
of,  559-63. 
Corinth,  5,  10-11,  14-15,  22,  36,  42; 
capture  of,  62,  187,  196 ;  tourna- 
ment at,  202-3,  280,  285-6,  290-1, 
322,  341,  352 ;  Greek,  353,  368-9, 
432  ;  Turkish,  434-5,  467. 


668 


INDEX 


Cornaro,  Pietro(of  Argos),  319, 323,339. 
Cornell*,  Bernard*  de,  321. 
Coron,  24,  38-9,  59»  i5*-3,  157-*,  *<*» 
288,  300-1,336,  340,  3*5-*»  461-a, 
464, 490 ;  Turkish,  497-8 ;  Spanish, 
505-6. 
Coronello,  Francesco,  638-43. 
Cotirtenay,  Catherine  of  (titular  Em- 
press), 179, 182,  214,  218. 
Peter  of  (Emperor),  82,  85-6. 
Crete,  29,  47-8,  565,  568,  571-*,  574-5- 
Crispo,  Antonio,  611. 
Fiorenza,  617. 
Francesca,  604,  607-9. 
Francesoo  I.   (Duke  of  the   Archi- 

pelagoY  S93-7- 
Fraace«co  II.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago}, 607,  609,  611. 
Francesco  III.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 618-20. 
Giacomo  I.  (Duke  of  the  Archipelago), 

597-6oi,  648. 
Giacomo    II.  (Duke    of   the  Archi- 
pelago), 604-6,  609. 
Giacomo   III.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 61 1-3. 
Giacomo  IV.  (Duke   of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 635-41. 
Giacomo  (bastard),  615. 
Gian  Giacomo  ( Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 606-7. 
Giovanni   II.   (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 601-3. 
Giovanni  III.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 614.15. 
Giovanni   IV.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 562,  620-35. 
Guglielmo  II.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 604,  607-11,  616. 
Marco,  599,  602,  604. 
Niccolb,  601-2,  604,  607. 
Crissa,  5. 

Crudferi  ("Crutched  Friars"),  7i|  103. 
Culture,  19-21,  153,  250,  281,  379.  403, 

417,  420,  423,  541-2,  556,  648. 
Currant  trade,  5J7-8. 
Customs  of  the  Empire  of  Romania,  54, 
261,  461,  518,  539, 614,  632, 646-7. 
Cyriacus  of  Ancona,  415,  417-25,  541, 
605. 

Da  Corogna,  family  of,  327,  584,  588, 

599,  606. 
Dalle  Carceri,   Bonifacio    da    Verona, 
193-4,  2oo,  209,  216,  220-1,  225-6, 
228,  231,  243-4. 
Felisa,  136. 
Giberto    I.   da    Verona    (triarcb    of 

Euboea),  45. 
Giberto  II.  (triarch),  135*6,  138-9. 
Grapella  (triarch),  103,  117. 


Dalle  Carceri,  Guglielmo  I.  da  Venom 
(triarch),  103,  117,  mi, 155. 
Guglielmo  II.  (triarch),  135-6, 144. 
Narzotto  (triarch),  103,  117,  136. 
Niccol6  III*  (triarch  and  Duke  of  the 
Archipelago),  303, 310, 3*0, 592-4. 
Ravano  (triarch),  28,  31,  45,  73,  77, 
103. 
Damatt,  63, 270,  430,  500. 
Dandolo,  Marino  (of  Andros),  44, 575-6, 

578. 
Daphni,  monastery  of,  19,  70,  151, 219, 

227,  233,  437. 
De  la  Roche,  Isabelle,  142-3. 
Jacques  (of  Veligosti),  139,  162,  164. 
Jean  (Duke  of  Athens),  134,  13840, 

150,  1 61-2. 
Guillaume  (Duke  of  Athens),  104, 134, 
140-I,   161-2  ;   bailie  of  Achtia, 
164,  173. 
Guy  I.  (Duke  of  Athens),  66,  91s, 


Guy 


99,  104  */ jyy.,  107,  1 14-17, 119. 

II.  (Duke  of  Athens),  165, 191-4. 

200-4;  bailie  of  Achaia,  206-7, 

216-20. 
Othon  (Megastyr),  28,  31,  34-6,  41, 

59,  62,  65,  69,  73-6,  91-a. 
Delenda,  family  of,  327,  646. 
Delia  Grammatica,  599. 
Delo  Cavo,  John,  141,  154,  156,  173, 

578,  580. 
Delos  (Sdiles),  365, 4*3,  576,  585,  5«i 

<o6,  605, 612. 
Delphi  (KastrQ,  247,  418. 
Demitra,  164. 
Demetrias,  28 ;  battle  of,  133,  17$,  305, 

3",  329 
Demetrioa  (King  of  Salonika),  41, 66, 85. 
De  Novelles  (hereditary  marshals  of 

Athens),  237,  279,  30S- 
Dervenaki,  426. 

Deslaur,  Roger,  223,  228,  231,  236,266. 
Domokd,  5,  28,  33,  201,  224,  247,  346. 
Doria,  Andrea,  505,  509,  560. 
Doxapatres,  38. 
Doocas  (or  Doxies),  433,  450. 
Dushan,  Stephen,  280-1,  293. 

Edrisi,  15,  21. 

Eleuais,  18,  357,  42a 

Enghien,  family  of,  265,  280,  298-9. 

Gautier  d'  (titular  Duke  of  Athens), 
299. 

Guy  d'  (of  Argos),  298. 

Marie  d}  (of  Argosl  319,  339, 
Entenca,  Berenguer  6?,  184,  214-15, 519. 
Eparchos,  Ant6nios,  540-1,  563. 
Eremites,  207. 
Erizzo,  Paolo,  472  //  sgq. 
Eschive  (Lady  of  Beyrout),  2  20-1  % 
Estafloi,  Berenguer,  236,  241. 


INDEX 


669 


Este,  Bertoldo  d',  465-7. 
Eubtta(Negroponte),  1,  5,  13,  21-2, 29, 

34-5.  4S>  &7 !  Venetian  colony  in, 

77-9.  90;  war  in,   102-4,  136-41. 

20&-10,  216,  243-6,  301-2,  3^9-20, 

365-6,    376,  394-5*  39«.  459-6i; 

Turkish  conquest  of,  470-9,  595. 
Eudaimonoyannes       (Daimonoyannes, 

Monoyannes),    family  of,  10,  98, 

151,  155-6.  5io,  564. 
Euphrosyne  (Empress),  9-10,  28. 
Euthymios,  12. 
Evrenosbeg,  345.  347.  358-9.  37*. 

Fadrique,  Alfonso  (vicar-general    of 

Athens),  242  et  sqq.,  263, 265-6, 586. 

Bonifacio  (baron  of  Karystos),  266, 

302. 
James    (Count    of    Salona,    vicar- 
general),  266,  277,  279,  296. 
John  (of  i£gina),  305,  317,  326. 
Louis    (Count    of     Salona,    vicar- 

general),  304-5.  314-15.  320. 
Maria   (Countess    of   Salona),   320, 

3*3-4.  326,  347. 
Pedro  I.  (Count  of  Salona),  266,  277, 

279. 
Pedro  II.  (of  'Egina),  305. 
Ferdinand  of  Majorca,  Infant,  215-17, 

253  etsqq. 
Filla,  castle  of,  78,  138,  14a 
Flor,  Roger  de,  212-15,  $83. 
Foscolo,  family  of,  44,  578. 
Foucherolles,  family  of,  230,  242,  251. 
Frangipani,  Guglielmo  (Archbishop  of 

Patras),  261-3,  267,  2 69- 7 a 
Prankish  nomenclature,  158-60. 
Frederick  II.  of  Sicily,  212  et  sqq^  235-6, 

242,244. 
Frederick    III.    of   Sicily    (Duke    of 
Athens),  278,  284,  290-300,  304-5. 

Gabalas,  Leon,  43. 
Gabrielbpoulos,  Michael,  15a 
Galaxidi,  34,  80,  97.  »79,  222,  369.  414- 
Galeran  d'lvry  (bailie  of  Achaia),  162-3. 
Galilee,  Prince  of,  287-9. 
Gardiki    (Larissa  KremastO,  15,    79, 

134.193,247,477. 
Gardiki  (in  Morea),  124,  191,  308,  387, 

44«. 
CasmoAIoi  (vasmuli),  121,  1 48,  1 87,  647. 
Gattilusii  (of  Lesbos),  303,  423,  452, 

468,609. 
Gemistos   (Ple'thon),    George,  378-83, 

408-9,  423,  425,  467. 
Genoese,  2,  46-8,  118,  180,  300-1,  578, 

582-3,  589-91,  603. 
Georgians,  20-1. 
Gerace,  Marquis  of,  411,  415. 


Geraki,    51,    147-8 ;     Venetian,    465 ; 

Turkish,  47a 
Ghisi,  family  of,  574,  577,  580-2,  584, 
587-8,  59A  596.  633. 
Andrea  (of  Tenos),  44. 
Bartolomeo   (of   Tenos),   259,  263, 

275. 
Filippo  (of  Skopelos),  138. 
Geremia  (of  Tenos),  44,  574,  578-9. 
Giorgio  I.  (of  Tenos),  185-6,  225, 

229,  583  «.  1,  586. 
Giorgio  III.  (of  Tenos),  32a 
Giorgio.    See  Zorzi. 
Giustiniani,  the,  44,  582,  587,  597. 
Glarentza,  53,  87,  145.  153.  162,  171, 
185,   198,   254.  256,    267-8,  272, 
281,  289,  344.  371.  385.  388,  390. 
39a. 
Goth,  family  of,  518,  540. 
Gozzadini,  the,  584,  587-8,   592,  594, 
600,  606,  608  n.  3,  613,  617,  620, 
628,  630,  633-4.  636,  640,  644-5. 
Gravia,  33,  134. 
Grimani,  the,  492-4,  587,  606. 
Gritzena,  51,  147. 
Gyaros,  14,  644. 

Gypsies,  383,  461 ;  (fief  of  the),  522, 
539-40. 

Halmyros,  5,  21,  28,  32,  73-4,  128, 

216. 
Helos,  489. 

Henry  IV.  (of  England),  598. 
Henry  (Latin  Emperor),  41,  59,  73  et 

fi  82,  571,  579. 
Heredia,  308-9,  316,  318. 
Hexamilion,  the,  353,  366,  377-8,  383, 

387,  4«-i3,  4*5-6.  432,  466-7. 
Holy  Sepulchre,  Order  of  the,  70. 
Honorius  HI.,  63,  84,  88,  553. 
Hymettos  (Monte  Matto),  18,  442. 

Innocent  III.,  39,  47-8,  61-2, 64-5. 
Ios  (Nio),  44,  577.  580,  582,  584,  587. 

597.   599.  603-4;    Venetian,  616, 

619 ;  Turkish,  624,  642. 
Irene,  Princess,  10,  29. 
Isova,  monastery  of,  122. 
Ithaka  (Val  di  Compare),  2,  5,  8, 151-2, 

157,  181,    249,    292,  344,  483-6, 

556-7. 
Ithome,  426,  429,  449. 

James  II.  of  Majorca,  254,  258,  275-6. 
Jews,  4-5,  23-4.  79.  93.  209-10,  301, 

365-6.  383,  386,  495,  517,  520-4, 

526,  530,  537-8,  545,  552;  Jew, 

Duke  of  Nazos,  636-49. 
Joanna  I.  of  Naples,  28$,  289 ;  Princess 

of   Achaia,  307-8,  317 ;    Lady  of 

Corfu,  523. 


670 


INDEX 


I 


Joannina,  41,  131,  179,  249-50,  2 80- 1, 

331,      372-3;       Turkish,       396, 

546-7. 
John  I.  of  Aragoo  (Duke  of  Athens), 

3*4,  3^6. 
John  of  Gravina  (Prince  of  Achaia), 

257-61,  586. 
John  the  Hunter,  monastery  of  St.,  19, 

69,  93. 
Joinville,  Nicholas  de  (bailie  of  Achaia), 

261,  461. 
Jolanda  (Empress),  83. 


KAISARIAN&,  monastery  of,  13,  19,  69, 

72,  439,  442. 
Kalabaka,  273. 
Kalamata,  24,  38,  50-1,  T45»  T47,  186, 

271-2,  285,  287,  289-90,  344i  39*, 

425,  4*5.  45o,  470,  480. 
Kalavryta  (La  Gritc),  29,  51,  147,  158, 

368,  391-2,  420,  435. 
Kapraina  (Chaironeia),  305. 
Karditza  (in  Bceotia),  200,  228,  234, 

305. 
Karydi,  battle  of,  105. 
Karystos  (Castel  Rosso),  14,  29,  45, 

105,  137,  194,  209,  244,  246,  266, 

302,  320,  459-60,  477. 
Karytaina,  51,  147,  191,  205,  259,  445. 

466,  586. 
Kastri  (near  Nauplia),  481,  501,  508. 
Kastritza,  445,  448. 
Katakolo,  38. 
Katzenellenbogen,    Berthold    von    (of 

Velestino),  31-2,  73,  76,  83. 
Keos(Zia),  25,  34,  44,  156,  577,  5*0, 

582-3,  5«7,  590,  603,  606, 612, 617, 

620,  628,  633-4,  636,  645. 
Kephalos,  castle  of,  617,  622,  625. 
Kephissos,  battle  of  the,  225  tt  sqq. 
Kerpine  (Charpigny),  51,  421. 
Kimolos,  44,  587,  597,  644. 
Kirrha  (Ancona),  418. 
Kiveri,  264,  265  «.,  342,  481. 
Kladas,  Korkodeilos,  449,  489-90. 
Knights  of  St  John  (Rhodes),  52,  70, 

239,  242,  286,  303  ;  lease  Achaia, 

308-10,  317,   343,   357  J   purchase 

Corinth,    368-9,    385,    5<H,    55** 

584-5,     587-9,     601,     608,     615, 

623. 
Koundoura,  battle  of,  38. 
Koupharis,    George  (Metropolitan    of 

Corfu),  12. 
Kydones,  Demetrios,  285,  379. 
Kyparissia  (Arkadia),  23,  38,  50-1,  343, 

391,449.  ^ 
Kythera.    See  Cerigo. 
Kythnos  (Thermia,  Fermene),  44,  576, 

581,  587, 600,  603,  606,  616-7,  644. 


LA  BasTIA,  534. 

Lacedsemonia  (La  Cremonie),  n,  24, 
29.  38,  52,  58,  61, 124. 

La  Clisura,  castle  of,  79,  U7,  208. 

La  Cuppa,  castle  of,  78,  137,  473- 

u  Ladies*  Parliament,"  the,  116. 

Ladislaus  of  Naples,  348,  525,  528. 

Lagonessa,  Carlo  de,  220. 
Filippo  de  (bailie  of  Achaia),  163, 173* 
Giovanni  de,  220. 

Lamia  (Zetounion,  Citon),  5,  33,  79, 
134,  179,  200,  223-4*  *26,  239, 
247,266,297,  3",  327,  329,  346, 
369;  Byzantine,  373,  375  ;  Turkish, 
394,  4io. 

Lampoudios,  282. 

Lancia,  Nicholas  (vicar-general  of 
Athens),  265,  277. 

Larissa  (Larsa),  5,  11,  21,  28,  32,  73, 
149,  336. 
Beatrice  de,  149  w.  3. 
Guglielmo  de,  32,  76. 

Larmena,  castle  of,  79,  137,  209,  244, 
246,  302. 

Le  Plamenc,  Antoine  (baron  of  Kar- 
ditza), 200,  228. 

Lelantian  plain  (Lilanto),  21,  78,  460. 

Lemnos  (Stalimene),  29,  44  ;  assigned 
to  Demesne*  Palaiologos,  452, 466, 
470-1,  481-2,  577. 

Le  Noir  (Mavro),  Erard  III.,  276,  291, 

307,  319. 
Nicholas,  253  etsqa. 
Leonardo    of    Veroli     (chancellor    of 

Achaia),  116,  127,  145,  153,  173- 
Leondari,  345»  387,  445,  44*,  5©7. 
Leonidi,  399. 
Lepanto  (Naupaktos,  Nepantum),  5,  9, 

11-12,  41,    79,   183-4,    309,   336; 

Venetian,  363,  4©9-io,   434,  438, 

458-9, 465  ;  siege  of,  480  ;  Turkish, 

492-4,  534. 
Lesbos,  578,  589. 
Leukas  (Sta.  Mavra),  11,  29,  42,  112, 

131,  151,  181,  262,  264  ;  annexed 

by  Leonardo  L   Tocco,  292,  371, 

395, 4i6, 454, 458  ;  Turkish,  483-6 ; 

Venetian,  499 ;  Turkish,  50a 
Leuktron  (Levtro,  Beaufort),  100,  391, 

445. 
Licario,  136-41,  5*4,  5$7- 
Liedekerke,  Walter  de,  187-8. 
Ligourio,  359,  430. 
Liosa,  clan  of,  294,  309 
Listrina,  castle  of,  341. 
Livadia,  69,  227,  229,  240, 299.300, 311, 

316,  327,  346,  350,  410,  418,  456. 
Lhradostro  (Rived'Ostre,  Rivat  d'Ostia\ 

67,  399 
Lluria,  Antonio  de,  321,  326. 
John  de,  298,  31a 


INDEX 


671 


Lluria,  Roger  de  (Aragonese  admiral), 
184-6,  19s,  208,  519,  581. 
Roger  de  (vicar-general  of  Athens), 

284,  296-9. 
Roger  de  (his  son),  321,  326. 
Loidoriki,    179,   222,    247,    266,    414, 

434- 
Loredano,  family  of,  605-6,  611,  617-20, 

631. 
Louis  of  Burgundy  (Prince  of  Achaia), 

251-6. 
Loukanes,  429,  431,  444-5. 
Luke,      Blessed      (Hosios      Loukfis), 

monastery  of  the,  70,  89  n,  2,  207, 

234,  418. 
Lusignan,    Hugues   de.     See  Galilee, 

Prince  of. 
Isabelle  de,  289. 

M  AGISTER     MASSARIUS    (/M<TTpoiM<r- 

irdpot),  484,  486  «.,  517,  521,  527. 
Maina,  castle  of,  100,  115. 
Maina,     district     of,    24,    384,    427 ; 

Venetian,  470,  489-90,  50a 
Maisy,  Jean  de  (of  Eubcea),  216,  225-6, 

228. 
Makren6s,  120,  124. 
Makronesi,  8, 
Makryplagi,  battle  of,  123. 
Malatesta,  Cleopa,  383,  41 5. 
Pandulph    (Archbishop    of    Patras), 

388-91. 
Sigismondo,  467. 
MamonSs,  family  of,  10,  98,  155,  342, 

365. 
Manfred  (Duke  of  Athens),  236,  243. 
Manfred    (King  df    Sicily),    109-10, 

112-13,  514-16. 
Manolada,  battle  of,  255. 
Mantineia  (Lakonian),  391,  433,  449. 
Marathon,  18,  69,  157. 
Marathos,  449. 

Margaret  (ex-Empress),  27,  83. 
Marguerite  of  Savoy,  204-5,  *75* 
Maria  (Duchess  of  Athens),  305,  321, 

325. 
Marie  de  Bourbon  (Princess  of  Achaia), 

285,  287-8,  291,  3i7>  521. 
Matilda  of  Hainault,  190 ;  Duchess  of 

Athens,  191,  204,  206  ;  Princess  of 

Achaia,  244,  251  et  sqq. 
Mazaris,  283-4. 

Medici,  family  of,  338,  510,  553-4. 
Megara,  28,  239,  284,   298,  304,  323, 

340-2,350,352,437,500. 
Megaspelaion,  monastery  of,  283,  336, 

420. 
Meletios,  12-13. 
Melings,  tribe  of,  38-9,  120. 
Melissene*,  Maria  (Duchess  of  Athens), 

399.  4<>4-$- 


Melissenbs,  family  of,  41,  150,  247,  391, 

w  ,  399,  455- 

Melos,44,245,  573,  576-7,580-1,  585-*, 

590,    593-4,    597-*,    601-3,    613; 

Venetian,  616-18,  633,  642,  645. 
Meteora,  monasteries  of,  294-6. 
Michieli,  the,  44,  582,  587,  597,  606, 

617,  624-5,  646. 
Minorites,  71,  227,  233,  343. 
Minotto,  Ermolao  (of  Seriphos),  303, 

590,  596. 
Misito,  Janni,  291,  307. 
Mistrfi,  100,  115,  119,  259,  281,  289, 

*93,  345,  368-9,  379,  4©9,  41 5, 
421,  423,  425,  445  ;  Turkish,  447  ; 
besieged  by  Malatesta,  467. 

Mocenigo,  Pietro,  478,  48a 

Modon  (Methone),  5,  24,  29,  36,  38-9, 
59.  152-3,  157-8,  208,  288,  300-1, 
336,  340,  385-6,  408,  449,  461-2, 
465  ;  Turkish,  495-8,  504. 

Mohammed  I.,  374,  598,  602. 

Mohammed  II.,  425  et  sqq.,  470  //  sqq., 
607,  610,  614. 

Moncada,  Matteo  (vicar  -  general  of 
Athens),  280,  284,  296-7. 

Monemvasia,  9,  11  *.,  14,  23,  39,  58, 
62-3 :  capture  of,  98-9 ;  ceded  to 
Greeks,  115,  120,  153,  155,  184, 
214,  266-7,  336,  342,  367,  408-9, 
433,  447J  Papal,  448,  453  J 
Venetian,  466,  481,  491,  5©3  J 
Turkish,  509-11,  564,  568. 

Montesquiou  ( Penteskouphia  ),  castle 
of,  36 

Montona,  Matteo  de  (governor  of  the 
Akropoiis),  354-5,  360 

Morea,  name  of,  37  *. 

Morlay,  Guillaume  de  (baron  of  Nikli), 

51 
Mostenitsa,  52,  344,  391. 
Mota,  Bertranet,  346,  351. 
Mouchli  (Palaio-),  430,  434. 
Muntaner,  Ramdn,  213,  215-17,  254. 
Muradll.,  387,  394-5,  405,  411-15,422, 

467,  602. 
Mykonos,  44  ;  Venetian,  365,  463,  581, 

587-8,  596,  600,  603,  605,  612,617, 

624  ;     Turkish,     628,    630,     633, 

642. 

Nasi,  Joseph  (Duke  of  Naxos),  636-42. 

Naupaktos.     See  Lepanto. 

Nauplia  (Napoli  di  Romania),  5,  7,  10, 
2  3,  36-7,  40,  42  ;  joined  to  Athens, 
62,  244,  251,  264-6  ;  Venetian,  339, 
342,  350,  4*5,  461,  480, 495.  500-2, 
508-11. 

Navarino  (Zonklon,  Port  Jonc),  138, 
157,  166,  255,  287-8,  301,  318,  344, 
385,  408,  449,  493,  495,  497-8. 


672 


INDEX 


I 


Navarrese  Company,  the,  306  el  sqq., 

339<"ffeS*3t  593- 
Navigajosi,  the  (of  Lemnos),  44,  577. 
Naxos,  II,  2$.  29,  43-4,  57©  el  sqq. 
Negroponte,  City  of.    See  Chalkis. 

Island  of.    See  Eubcea. 
Neopatras  (La  Patre,  La  Patria),  11-12, 

28,  132-4,  239,  *47,  329,346. 
Neuilly,  Jean  I.  de  (baron  of  Passava),  51  • 

Jean  II.  de  (baron  of  Passavfi),  117, 
143. 

Marguerite  de  (of  Passava),  1 17,143-5. 
Nikaria  (Ikaria),  623. 
Nikli,  24,  38,  $x,  58,  105-6,  147,  199. 
Nivelet,  barony  of,  285,  291. 

Guy  de  fbaron  of  Geraki),  51. 

Jean  de  (baron  of  Geraki),  148. 
Noukios,  541,  560,  562. 

Olina,  Bishop  of,  52-3,  86,  343. 
Omar,  son  of  Turakhan,  411,  426,  428  ; 
governor  of   Morea,    435 ;    takes 
Athens,  437-9.  445.  4^5,  4^9- 
Omarbeg    (Morbassan,     "Prince     of 

Achaia*'),  276,  589,  600. 
Oreos,  29,  45,  137-9,  278,   301,  460, 

473,  477. 
Oropos,  73,  103,  300,  357,  362. 
Orsini,  John    I.    (Palatine    Count    of 
CephaloniaJ,  181, 197,  202-3,  253-7. 
John  II.  (Palatine  Count  of  Cepha- 

lonia),  250,  26j,  273,  5«. 
Matthew,  or  Maio  (Palatine  Count  of 
Cephalonia),  2,  30,  47, 90, 94, 99. 
Nicholas  (Palatine  Count  of  Cepha- 

Ionia),  249,  533. 
Nikeph6ros  II.  (Despot  of  Epiros), 

273-4,  293. 
Richard  (Palatine  Count  of  Cepha- 
lonia),  no,   151,    161-2,   180-1, 
190,  195-7,  52a 
Othoiiian  Islands,  519. 
Otto  of  Brunswick  (Prince  of  Achaia), 
308,  317. 

Palaiol6gos,  Andrew,  454-5,  491. 
Andronikos  II.  (Emperor),  125,  165, 

175-8,  184,  335-6,  580,  582. 
Andronikos    III.    (Emperor),    189, 

273-4,  588. 
Constantine  (Emperor),  388-92,  405, 

407  //  sqq, ;  crowned  at  Mistrfi, 

415,  423-4. 
Demetrios  (Despot),  407-9,  415,  423 

425-35,  444-52. 
Graitzas,  450-1. 
John  VI.  (Emperor),  383,  385,  388, 

407-8,  414,  422,  534. 
Manuel  II.  (Emoeror),  358,  366,  368, 

370 ;  visits  Morea,  377-84- 
Manuel(governorofMonemvasia),447. 


Palaiologos,  Manuel  (son  of  Thomas), 

455. 
Theodore  I.  (Despot  of  MistrS),  318- 

19,  322,  339-42,  351-3,  366-70. 
Theodore  II.  (Despot  of  Mistri),  370, 
378,    383,    386-8,    391,    407-9, 
421-2. 
Thomas    (Despot  of    Mistra),   385, 
391-2, 407  "  sqq.,  425-35, 444-54, 
547. 
Pallavicini,  Alberto  (Marquis  of  Bou- 
donitza),  224?  229. 
Guido  (Marquis  of  Boudonitza),  31, 

33,  73,  76,  83. 
Isabella  (Marchioness  of  Boudonitza), 

r49,  162. 
Ubertino  (Marquis   of  Boudonitza), 
105,  no,  149. 
Panaia  (Canaia),  438. 
Paralimni,  13. 
Parga,  249 ;  Venetian,  365,  533-4,  539, 

547,  549,  563,  568. 
Paros,  44,  570,  575,  587,  598-600,  602-5, 
610. 1 1 ,  614, 620 ;  Venetian,  622-4  ; 
Turkish,  625-6  ;  restored  to  Naxos, 
626,  633,  642. 
Parthenon,  the  ("  Our  Lady  of  Athens," 
Sta.  Maria  di  Atene),  7,  9,  12-13, 
16-17,   34,  68,   74,  207,  226,  239, 
315,  327.  335,  342,  349-50,  355-6, 
419,  422,  424 ;  becomes  mosque, 
440 ;  still  a  church,  443,  469. 
Passavi,  barony  of,  51,  135,  143,  147, 

259. 
Patesia,  359,  442. 
Patmos,  44,  576,  599- 
Patras,  5,  II,  23,  29,  37,  147,  186,  259, 
261,  267,  270,  272,  289-90;  Vene- 
tian, 363-4  ;  Greek,  38&-90,  408-9, 
414-15,  429 ;  Turkish,  434-5,  445, 
469-70. 
Pau,  Don  Pedro  de    (commander   of 

Athens),  321,  323-4* 
Paxo,  523,  530,  535,  563. 
Pasanike,  433. 

Pediadites  (Metropolitan  of  Corfu),  12. 
Pedro  IV.  of  At  agon  (Duke  of  Athens), 

Sox,  305"  W- 
Pegoraro     dei    Pegorari     (triarch    of 

Euboea),  45. 
Pelagonia,  battle  of,  in,  574. 
Peralta,    Galceran    de    (governor    of 

Athens),  299,  311,  313,  315. 
Peralta,  Matteo    de   (vicar-general  of 

Athens),  299  n.  2,  304. 
Pesaro,  Benedetto,  498,  500. 
Pescatore  Enrico  (Cou  1  of  Malta),  48. 
Petraleiphas,  family  of,  o,  97. 
Phaleron  (Porto  Vecchio),  420. 
Phanari(in  Thessaly),  150,  201,  41a 
Pharsala,  28,  33,  139,  247,  346. 


INDEX 


673 


Philanthropen6s  (Greek  admiral),  1 21, 

576. 
Philanthropenbs,  Alexios  (governor  of 

Mistrfi),  178. 
Philes,  120,  124. 
Philip  of  Savoy  (Prince  of  Achaia),  195 

et  sgg. 
Phlious,  451. 

Pholegandros  (Polykandros),  577,  644. 
Phrantzfcs,   385,   388-90,  395-6,  4<>5A 

409,  427,  429,  431,   435  ;   dies  at 

Corfu,  455-6,  484,  548. 
Piada,  272. 
Piall  Pasha,  636,  639. 
Piracy,  8-9,  67,  154-7,  580,  614-15,  618. 
Piraeus  (Porto  Leone),  14,  23,  245,  328, 

403,  420,  469- 
Pisani,  the,  612-14,  624. 
Pitti,  Laudamia  (of  Sykaminon),  40a 
Pitti,  Nerozzo  (of  Sykaminon),  438, 457. 
Pius  II.,  446,  448,  453,  470. 
Polinos,  644. 
Pontikokastro  (Beauvoir,  Belvedcr),  38, 

85,  205,  254,  287,  344  I  burnt,  480. 
Port  Raphti,  357. 
Pou,  Pedro  de,  297. 
Prtetor  (protoprcetor\  6-8,  1 6. 
Preliub  (lord  of  Joannina),  281,  293. 
Preliubovich,  Thomas  (Despot  of  Joan- 
nina), 294,  331. 
Premarini,  the,  587,  617,  628,  633. 
Preveza  (La  Prevasse),  159,  180,  509. 
Prinitsa,  battle  of,  122. 
Protimo  Niccolb  (Archbishop  of  Athens), 

438,461,479. 
Pteleon  (Fitileos),   21,  247,  281,  301, 

358,  375.  459,  477. 

QuiRINI,  the  (of  Stampalia),  44,  577- 
80,  584,  587,  600,  604,  606,  612, 
617,  624-5. 

Rallks,  Michael,  466,  469-70. 
Rambaud  de  Vaqueiras,  31,  40,  92. 
Randazzo,     Frederick     of    (Duke    of 

Athens),  278,  284. 
Randazzo,  John  of  (Duke  of  Athens), 

278,  284. 
Ravenika,  5,28, 59;  (parliaments  of),  74-6. 
Ray,  Gautierdc  (bishop  of  Negroponte), 

209,  233,  241,  243. 
Rendi,  Dem&rios,  304,  3"-i3*  338. 
Rendi,  Maria,  350. 
Rheneia,  585,  610. 
Rhion,  494. 

Robert  (Latin  Emperor),  86,  89,  573. 
Robert  the  Wise  (King  of  Naples),  220, 

257-8. 
Rocaberti,  Philip  Dalmau,  Viscount  of 

(vicar-general    of    Athens),    306, 

314-16,  320-1,  324. 


Rocafort,  Berenguer  de,  215-19. 

Roupele,  433. 

Rozieres,    Gautier     I.    de    (baron    of 

Akova),  51. 
Rozieres,    Gautier    II.    de    (baron    of 

Akova),  144. 

SagmaTaS,  monastery  of,  13. 

Sagredo,  Bernardo  (of  Paros),  623,  625. 

Saiada,  534* 

Salamis  (Culuris),  8,  18,  29, 193,  266-7. 

Salmenikon,  450-1. 

Salona  (La  Sole,  La  Sola),  33-4,  84 ; 

Catalan,  232,  234,  239,  266,  279, 

311-12,  314,323-4,  327,  336:  fall 

of,  346-7,  360 ;  ceded  to  Knights 

of  St  John,  369,  418. 
Salonika  (Greek  Empire  of),  83,  94-6. 
(Latin  kingdom  of),  28,  30,  41,  83-5, 
103,  251-2. 
S.  Angelo  (Corfu),  castle  of,  80,  514, 

5i6,  525.  533,  546,  561. 
St  George,  castle  of  (Arkadia),  189, 259, 

445,  449,  507 ;  (Cephalonia),  371, 

555- 
S.  Ippolito,  family  of,  518,  523-4,  530, 

539* 
St  Omer,  Bela  de  (baron  of  Thebes), 
66,  92. 
(Santameri),  castle   of  (m   Morea), 

260,  287,  344,  450,  466,  586. 
(Santameri),  castle  of  (at  Thebes), 
165, 216-17, 234 ;  destroyed,  263. 
Jacques  de  (of  Gravia),  31,  33. 
Jean  de  (marshal  of  AchaiaJ,  144-5, 

162. 
Nicholas  I.  (of  Gravia),  31,  33,  76. 
Nicholas  II.  (baron  of  Thebes),  144, 

147,  165. 
Nicholas   III.  (marshal  of  Achaia), 
191,   195,   197,  199-201,  203-4, 
206,  228,  253. 
Othon  (of  Thebes),  144,  192. 
St  Spiridion,  548. 

S.  Superan,   Pedro  (Bordo)  de,  310 ; 
vicar  of  Achaia,  318,  340-1,  343-4  ; 
prince,  367-8. 
Santorin,  44,  573,  576-7,   580,   582-3, 
585-7,    590,  602-4,  607  ;  eruption 
of,  609,  611-14  ;  Venetian,  616-17, 
633,  642,  644,  648. 
Sanudo,  Angelo  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 99,  573-5. 
Fiorenza    (Duchess    of   the    Archi- 
pelago), 290-1,  590-2. 
Giovanni    I.    (Duke  of   the    Archi- 
pelago), 589-90. 
Guglielmo  I.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 225,  255,  580,  583-6. 
Marco  I.  (Duke  of  the  Archipelago), 
43-4,  570-3. 


674 


INDEX 


Sanudo,  Marco  II.  (Duke  of  the  Archi- 
pelago), 101,  173,  574,  576-83. 
Maria  (triarchy  Lady  of  Andros),  459, 

592,  594-5.  60a,  604. 
Niccolb  I.  (Duke  of  the  Archipelago), 

228,  255,  260,  585-9, 

Niccol6  II.,  "  Spezzabanda"  (Duke  of 
the  Archipelago),  592. 
Schiavi,  the  (of  Ios),  582,  584,  587. 
Senacherim,  41. 
Serbs  (in  Thessaly  and  Epiros),  280-1, 

293-6,  331. 
Seriphos  (Serfent6v  Serfeno),  44,  141, 

576-7,  582,  587,  590,  596-7,  599, 

603,  606,  612,  617,  624.-5,  642. 
Sgouro-mailly  (Sgouromallatos),  family 

of,  187,  43a 
Sgour6s,  L6on  (archon  of  Nauplia),  7, 10, 

22,  31-3,  35-6,  42.    See  also  Boua. 
Siderokastron    (Herakleia),   134,  247, 

279,  306,311,  320,329. 
(in  Arkadia),  426. 
Sikinos,  44,  577,  599,  644. 
Sikyon  (Basilicata),  291,  350,  414,  42a 
Silk  trade,  5,  21-2,  79,  102,  150,  152, 

189,  194,  207,  495,  631. 
Siphnos  (Sifanto),  44,  141,  576-7,  584, 

588,  598,  603,  606,  617,  624,  630, 

633,  640,  642,  644-5. 
Skaros,  castle  of,  576,  609,  613-14. 
Skiathos,    44 ;    Venetian,    462-3,   577, 

610 ;  Turkish,  629-30. 
Skopelos,  44, 137-8, 156,  216  ;  Venetian, 

462-3,   577,    580,    610;    Turkish, 

629-30. 
Skorta    (Gortys),    51,    142-3,   189-90, 

198-9,  425. 
Skyros,  29,  44;  Venetian,  462-3,  471, 

577,  610,  621  ;  Turkish,  629-30. 
Slavery,  404. 
Slavs,  3-4,  51,  383. 
Sommaripa,  family  of,  459,  595,  604-5, 

607,  611,  615,    617,  619,    621-2, 

628,  630,  633-4,  636,  644-5. 
Crusino  I.  (of  Paros),  423,  604-5. 
Sophianbs,  family  of,  10,  98,  43a 
Spandugino,  Theodore,  483. 
Sporades,    Northern,    358,    361.      See 

Skiathos,  Skopelos,  Skyros. 
Stampalia.    See  Astypalaia. 
Stradioti,  482-3,   490,    495,    502,   506, 

508,  510,  550-1,  555,  558-9. 
Stromoncourt,  Guillaume  de  (baron  of 

Salona),  149. 
Thomas   I.  de   (baron    of   Salona), 

31,  33.  76,  8a 
Thomas   II.  de  (baron  of  Salona), 

34  *•  1,  105,110,  149,234. 
Thomas  III.  de  (baron  of  Salona), 
34  «.  1,  192,  194,  200,  207,  224, 

229,  232,  234. 


Strophades  Islands  (St rival!),  534,  563. 

Strovili,  534,  549. 

Stryphn6s,  Michael,  9,  14,  16. 

Stylida,  394- 

Styra,  79,  471. 

Suboto,  514,  516,  534. 

Suleyman  the  Magnificent,  507,  559, 
561-2,  623  //  syq. 

Sully,  Hugues  de,  172. 

Sumum,  29. 

Sybilla  (Queen  of  Aragon),  515-16. 

Sykaminon,  castle  of,  239,  310,  316, 
357,  362,  400,  438,  457. 

Syra  (Suda),  44,  573,  576,  580-1,  587, 
595,  597, 599, 602-4, 607,61 1 :  Vene- 
tian, 616,  618,  633,  639-40,  642. 

Taranto,  Philip  I.  of,   182-4,  201-2; 
Prince  of  Achaia,  204,  206  ;  titular 
Emperor  as  Philip  II.,  251-2,257, 
261  ;  "lord of  Corfu,"  520-2. 
Philip  II.  of  (Prince  of  Achaia.  and 
titular  Emperor  as  Philip  III.), 
287-9,  291,  303,  522. 
Robert  of  (Prince  of  Achaia),  261, 
269  et   sqg, ;   titular    Emperor, 
285-7,  292,  521-2,  591. 
Tarsos,  433. 

Taxes,  6-8,  76,  240-1,    380-3,  408-9. 
^     543, 648. 

Templars,  45,  52,  64,  70,  146. 
Tenos,  29,  44,  365,  439,  463,  568,  573, 
581,  586-7,  596,  600,  603,  612,617. 
Teutonic  Knights,  52,  267,  343-4,  391, 

^     495. 

Thebes  (Estives),  5,  11,  14-15,  21,  32, 
34,  66;  capital,  67-8,  73-4,  104, 
115,  117,  204,  220,  230,  240,  284; 
congress  of,  303,  3".  3i6,  35°, 
405-6 ;  taken  by  Constantine,  410, 
414,  438,  443-4,  456. 

Theotokai,  family  of,  547. 

Therasia,  582,  $86,  603-4. 

Thermisi,  castle  of,  264,  265  «.,  342, 
481-2,  501,  508. 

Thermopylae,  32-3. 

Thomokastron,  274. 

Tocco,  family  of,  292,  420,  480,  488-9, 

529. 
Antonio,  487,  55a 
Carlo  I.  (Palatine  Count  of  Cepba- 

Ionia),  325,  352-3,  370-3,  385-81 

395- 
Carlo  II.  (Palatine  Count  of  Cepha- 

lonia),  395-7,  415-18,  420,  424. 
Guglielmo  (governor  of  Corfu),  292, 

521. 
Leonardo    I.    (Palatine     Count    of 

Cepbalonia),  292,  307,  332  a,  2. 
Leonardo  II.  (of  Zante),  352,  371. 


INDEX 


675 


Tocco,  Leonardo  III.  f  Palatine  Count 
of  Cephalonia),  416,  424,  454,  456, 
458,  470,  483-9,  499,  553-4.  557- 
Theodora,  388,  415. 
Toucy,  Ancelin  de,  123. 
Tournay,  Geoffroy  de,  162,  164,  169. 
Jean  dc,  185. 

Othon  de  (baron  of  Kalavryta),  51. 
Tremouillei  Audebert  de  la  (baron  of 
Chalandritza),  51. 
Guy  de  la  (baron  of  Chalandritza), 
162  ;  bailie  of  Achaia,  163-4. 
Tremoulfi,  castle  of,  164. 
Trikkala,  5,  273  ;  Servian  capital,  293. 
Turakhan,    387,    405-6,    410-12,    414, 

425-6,  429-30, 
TzaTiones,  4,  39,  Sh  58,  99,  i«i  130, 
383,  408,  576. 

UROSH,  John  (••  Father  of  Meteoron"), 
294-6,  331. 
Simeon  (" Emperor"),  281,  293  4. 

Vaginiti,  522-3,  54a 

Valaincourt,    de    Mons,    Matthieu    de 

(baron  of  Veligosti),  51. 
Varnazza,  416. 
Vatika,  408,  481,  497. 
Velestino,  28,  32. 

Veligosti,  24,  38,  51,  58,  124,  147,  259. 
Venier,  family  of  (in  Cerigol  45,  138, 

155.  564-8  I  (^  Parosj,  622. 
Vessena,  28. 

Vetrano,  Leone,  2,  6,  30,  46. 
Viari,   the    (of  Cerigotto),   44-5,   138, 

1$$. 
Vido  (S.  Stefano,  Malipicro),  524,  528, 

543,  561. 
Vilanova,  Rambn  de,  321. 
Villehardouin,   Geoffroy  I.  de    (bailie 

and  Prince  of  Achaia),  36  et  sqq. 

50,  58  //  sqq.,  76,  86-8,  97. 
Geoffroy  II.  de  (Prince  of  Achaia), 

87-9,  573. 
Guillaume  de  (Prince  of  Achaia),  97 

tt    sqq.,     1 09- 1 1  ;     a     prisoner, 

1 1 2-14  ;  at   Tagliacozzo,  1 28-9, 

iai-6,  574. 
Isabelle  de  (Princess  of  Achaia),  125, 

129-30,    146,    170-1,   185,    190, 

195  etsqq.,  205. 
Marguerite  de  (Lady  of  Akova),  145, 

147,  190,  195,  198,  206,  252-4. 


Viterbo,  Treaty  of,  126-7,  579. 
Vitrinitza  (La  Veternica),  329.  41a 
Vlisiri  (La  Glisiere),  61. 
Vonitza,  180,  183,  262,  264,  292,  395, 

4X6,  458. 
Vostitza  (Aigion),  51,  147-8,  259.  285, 

291,  344,  391,  4H,  434-5,  4*5, 479- 
Vourkano,  285,  29a 

WALLACHS,  2-3,  248. 

William  of  Aragon  (Duke  of  Athens), 

243.  276,  278. 
Women,  influence  of,  55-6. 

ZACCARIA,  Asan  (great  constable),  341, 
343-4,  367. 
Benedetto  (of  Chios),  174,  585. 
Centurione,    270,     287,    307,    368; 
Prince  of  Achaia,  370,  374,  377, 

384-7,  391-2. 
Giovanni    Asan    (titular    Prince    of 

Achaia),  392,  413,  428-30. 
Martino  (of  Chios  and  Damala),  245, 

248,  269,  588. 
Zagan  Pasha,  446,  450-1,  456,  465. 
Zante,  2,  5,  29-30,  63,  151,  249,  260; 

bestowed  on  Leonardo  I.  Tocco, 

292,  416,  480 ;  Turkish,  483-6 ; 

Venetian,  487-8,  492,  498,  550-9, 

563. 
Zarnata,  445. 
Zenevisi,  Ghin,  372. 

Hamsa,  445,  447,  450-1. 
Zeno,  Andrea  (of  Andros),  604. 

Carlo  (canon  of  Patras),  288-9. 

Pietro  (of  Andros),  361,  595-9,  603-4. 
Zetounion.    See  Lamia. 
Zorzi,  family  of,    33,   248,    292,   437, 

459.      , 

Antonio  (of  Karystos,  governor  of 
Lepanto),  479-80. 

Chiara  (Duchess  of  Athens),  436-7. 

Francesco  (Marquis  of  Boudonitza), 
303,  305.  3io,  316. 

Giacomo  (Marquis  of  Boudonitza), 
36l,  373. 

NiccolO  (titular  Marquis  of  Boudo- 
nitza, governor  of  Pteleon), 
374-5,  459. 

Niccol6  (titular  Marquis  of  Boudo- 
nitza, baron  of  Karystos),  374-5, 
399,  436. 


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