YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Purchased from the income of the FRANCIS O. MATTHIESSEN, '43 BOOK FUND Constantinople The Story of the old Capital of the Empire by William Holden Hutton. Fellow of S. John Baptist College, Oxford. Illustrated by Sydney Cooper London: J. M. Dent 9§ Co. Aldine House, 29 and 30 Bedford Street Covent Garden, W.C, ^ ? I9°4 This superb successor Of the earth's mistress, as thou vainly speakest, Stands 'midst these ages as, on the wide ocean, The last spared fragment of a spacious land, That in some grand and awful ministration Of mighty nature has engulfed been, Doth lift aloft its dark and rocky cliffs O'er the wild waste around, and sadly frowns In lonely majesty. I was the daughter of Imperial Rome, Crowned by her Empress of the mystic east: Most Holy Wisdom chose me for her home Sealed me Truth's regent, and High Beauty's priest. Lo I when fate struck with hideous flame and sword, Far o'er the new world's life my grace was poured. First Edition, October 1900. Second Edition, July 1904. All rights reserved. PREFACE A WORD of introduction is necessary to explain the nature of this sketch of the history of Constanti nople. It is the holiday-task, very pleasant to him, of a College don, to whom there is no city in the world so impressive and so fascinating as the ancient home of the Caesars of the East. It is not intended to supersede the indispensable Murray. For a city so great, in which there is so much to see, a guide-book full of practical details is absolutely necessary. For this I can refer the reader, with entire confidence, to Murray's Hand-book — and to nothing else. But I think everyone who visits Con stantinople feels the need of some sketch of its long and wonderful history. I have myself often felt the need as I wandered about the city, or spent a long evening, during the cold spring, in the hotel. I have endeavoured, as best I could, to supply what I have myself wanted. I do not pretend to have written a history of the city "from the earliest times to the present day " from the mass of original authorities of which I know something. I have U6ed the works of the best modern writers freely, and I should like here, once for all, to express my obliga tions. I may venture to say that the list of books I here insert will be found useful by anyone who wishes to go further into the history than my little book is able to take him. The ordinary standard books are Professor Bury's edition of Gibbon ; Mr Tozer's edition of Finlay's History of Greece ; Pro- v Preface fessor Bury's History of the Later Empire; Vot Hammer's History of the Turks ; and the VicomtP de la Jonquiere's sketch of the same subject. The authorities, in detail, for the history and topography of the city are admirably summed up in Herr Eugen Oberhummer's contribution to the Pauly-Wissowas Realencyclopadie der classischen Alter- tumsnvissenschajt, band iv., which can be purchased separately as a " Sonder-Abdruck." Among the books which I have found especially useful I must mention first Professor van Millingen's Byzantine Constantinople, The Walls, etc.; the Broken Bits of Byzantium, by Mis Walker and the late Rev. C. G. Curtis, to whose kindness I owe very much, a book which is now very rarely to be met with, and ought certainly to be republished ; Bayet, U Art Byzatitin ; Klaus, Geschichte der Christlichen Kunst ; Lethaby and Swainson, S. Sophia ; Grosvenor, Con stantinople ; Paspates, The Great Palace of Constanti nople. Among histories of particular periods there are none more useful than Pears' Conquest of Con stantinople, and Mijatovich, Conslantine the last Emperor of the Greeks. Among a mass of interesting and im portant articles I should like to note that on Les Debuts du Monachisme a Constantinople, by M. Pargoire in the Revue des questions historiques, Jan. 1899. The texts of the original authorities may be read in the Bonn edition, and some of them, happily, in Pro fessor Bury's admirable collection of Byzantine texts, of which I have found the three volumes already pub lished most useful. I have referred in Chapter VII. to the work of Gyllius, to whom we owe much of our knowledge of the mediaeval city. I have referred to a great number of books of travel, as may be seen ; it is impossible here to particularise them all. Preface The limits of the series have compelled me to con fine myself chiefly to the story of Constantinople as a mediaeval town. Thus I have been reluctantly com pelled to leave out much that I should have liked to say about Skutari, the Bosphorus and its palaces, and the present social life and religious observances, the Dervishes, the " Sweet Waters," and many familiar names. For the same reason, I have dwelt very briefly on much that is of great interest. I would gladly, for instance, have said more about Iconoclasm, and some thing about that great theologian, S. Theodore of the Studium. Practically, I may add that the advice of Murray's Guide is always to be taken ; personally I have found the Hotel Bristol most comfortable in every way, and I have no occasion to commend any other hotel, because I have never felt tempted to leave it. I have myself found a dragoman, except for the first day, unnecessary ; but I can strongly recommend Eustathios Livathinos as a most pleasant companion. Jacob Moses has also much experience. I should add that in my spelling of names I have usually adopted, for simplicity, the common use ; but I fear I have not even been uniform. I owe very much to the kind offices of Lord Currie and of Sir Nicholas O'Conor, Her Majesty's Ambas sadors in T.896 and 1899, and to several members of the Embassy, with a very special debt of gratitude to Mr Fitzmaurice, C.M.G. I can never forget the kindness of the late Canon C. G. Curtis, whose death in 1896 was so great a loss to the British community in Constantinople, to archaeology, and to religion. In several instances photographs taken by my friend, Mr J. W. Milligan, who was in Constantinople in vii Preface 1896, have been of not a little use to my friend, the Rev. Sydney Cooper, to whose illustrations this book will owe very much more than half its interest. W. H. HUTTON. The Great House, Burford, Oion, S. Mart?s Day j 1 900 NOTE TO SECOND EDITION I have to thank many reviewers for the exceedingly kind way in which my book was spoken of when it first appeared. For the new edition I have made some necessary corrections, for which I desire especi ally to thank the Rev. F. E. Brightman. Even now I fear I shall not satisfy my critics in the matter of Turkish orthography ; but I really do not think it much matters that I continue to write " Kapou " with Professor van Millingen rather than " Kapu " with Sir Charles Wilson. In a matter of more importance, the space allotted to the Turkish occupation, I would remind my critics that, as I said in 1900, "the limits of the series have compelled me to confine myself chiefly to the story of Constantinople as a mediaeval town," and the Turkish conquest con veniently ranks as the end of the Middle Age. If I had been writing of modern Constantinople, I should have had many other things to say, but I could not write them in a " Mediaeval Towns " series. Since I wrote, Mr Pears has admirably retold the story of The Destruction of the Greek Empire (1903), and the publication in the Byzantine Texts, edited by Professor Bury, of Ecthesis chronica (Lambros, 1902), has made the curious condition of the city in the years immediately after that event more familiar to students. W. H. H. Burford, July 1904. viii CONTENTS PAGE CHAPTER I The History of the City in ancient and medieval times ....... I CHAPTER II Constantinople under the Turks . . . 154 CHAPTER III The Churches . . . . . .231 CHAPTER IV The Walls ...... 270 CHAPTER V The Mosques, Tiirbehs and Fountains . . 290 CHAPTER VI The Palaces . . . . . .310 CHAPTER VII Antiquities . . . . . .320 ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Interior of S. Sophia . Frontispiece Seraglio Point after Sunset z Therapia ..... 4 The Hippodrome and Mosque of Ahmed 9 Yeri Batan Serai (Cistern) . . 28 The Imperial Quarter ( Plan ) . 31 The Burnt Column ... 35 S. Sophia and the Ministry of Justice from the Sea . . . 37 The Golden Gate . 42 The Golden Horn from Eyub 53 The Aqueduct of Valens 67 Roumeli Hissar . . 1 39 In the Cemetery at Scutari I 54 The Golden Horn from Per a, after Sunset . 173 Fountain in the Court of Mosque of Valideh facing 186 Interior of Mosque of Ahmed I. 191 Houses in the Phanar . . 207 Street in Galata ... 223 Capitals from S. Sophia . 232 Courtyard of the Church of the Studium . . 234 Plan of SS. Sergius and Bacchus 237 Plan of S. Sophia . . 245 In the Gallery of S. Sophia . 253 Ornament on the Brazen Lintel above the Principal Door of S. Sophia . . . 257 Bronze Door of Southern Entrance to the Narthex, St Sophia facing 258 Illustrations PAGE /Indent Urn in S. Sophia .... 260 Church of the Pantokrator .... 267 Part of the Walls of Theodosius : the Seven Towers in the Background . . • 270 Kadikein (Chalcedon) from Seraglio Point . 272 The Marble Tower at S.W. Corner of the Walls 277 Walls near the Golden Gate : Roman Road in Foreground . . . . .281 Mohammed, the Apostle of God. Embroidery from Curtain over the Door of S. Sophia . 290 Mosque of Mohammed II. from English Embassy 29 1 Mosque of Suleiman from the Golden Horn . 293 Court of the Mosque of Ahmed I. . . . 299 An Entrance to the Mosque of Ahmed . . 30 1 Mural Tiles from the Mosque of Valideh . facing 305 In a Tiirbeh ...... 306 Entrance to the Tiirbeh of Selim II. at S. Sophia 307 Embroidery from Curtain over Entrance to S. Sophia . . . . . .309 Tower of Galata from Bridge . . . 311 Approach to the Old Seraglio . . . . 313 A Corner of the Old Seraglio . . . 315 Scutari Point and Leander's Isle . . . 319 5. Sophia from the Hippodrome. Obelisk in the Foreground . . . . .321 Bas- Relief from Base of the Obelisk in the Hippodrome, showing the Imperial Box during the Performance of a Ballet . facing 324 The Palace of the Porphyrogenitus . . . 331 Sarcophagus from the Royal Mausoleum at Sidon. The Carving is copied from the Frieze of the Parthenon . . facing 336 Sketch Plan of the City . . facing last page TABLE OF EMPERORS Constantiiie I., the Great 306-337 Constantius II. ... 337-361 Julian ...... 361-363 Jovian ..... 363-364 Valens ..... 364-378 Theodosius I., the Great 378-395 Arcadius .... 395-4°8 Theodosius II. . 408-450 Marcian • 450-457 Leo I. . 457-474 Zeno ..... 474-491 Anastasius I. . . . . 491-518 Justin I. 518-5x7 Justinian I., the Great . 527-565 Justin II. . . 565-578 Tiberius II. . 578-582 Maurice .... 582-601 Phocas ..... 602-610 Heraclius .... 610-641 Heraclius Constantinus and Heracleonas 641-642 Constans II. . 642-668 Constantine IV. 668-685 Justinian II. . 685-695 Leontius .... 695-697 Tiberius III. Apsimarus 697-705 Justinian II. (restored) . 705-711 Philippicus .... 711-713 Anastasius II. . 7'3-7I5 Theodosius III. 715-717 Leo III., the Isaurian , 717-740 xiii Table of Emperors Constantine V. Copronymus . 740-775 Leo IV. 775-779 Constantine VI. . , 779-797 Irene 797-802 Nicephorus I. . 802-811 Stauricius . 811 Michael I. Rhangabe . 811-813 Leo V., the Armenian . 813-820 Michael 11., the Amorian 820-829 Theophilus 829-842 Michael III. . 842-867 Basil I., the Macedonian 867-886 Leo VI., the Wise 886-912 Constantine VII. Porphyrogen tus . . 912-958 Co-Em perors — Alexander . 912-913 Romanus I. Lecapenus 919-945 Constantine VIII. and St sphanus, sons of Romanus I., reigned ive weeks . . 944 Romanus II. 958-963 Basil II. Bulgaroktonos 963-1025 Co-Emperors — Nicephorus II. Phocas 963-969 John I. Tzimisces . 969-976 Constantine IX. . 976-1025 Constantine IX. 1025-1028 Romanus III. Argyrus . 1028-1034 Michael IV., the Paphlagoniar 1034-1042 Michael V. 1042 Zoe and Theodora 1042 Constantine X. Monomachus 1042-1054 Theodora (restored) 1054-1056 Michael VI. Stratioticus 1056-1057 Isaac 1. Comnenus 1057-1059 Constantine XI. Ducas 1059-1067 Michael VII. Ducas 1067-1078 Co-Empcroi — Romanus IV. Diogenes • , 1067-1078 xiv Table of Emperors Nicephorus III. Botoniates Alexius I. Comnenus . John II. Comnenus Manuel I. Comnenus . Alexius II. Comnenus . Andronicus I. Comnenus Isaac II. Angelus Alexius III. Angelus Isaac II. (restored) ^ Alexius IV. Angelus / Alexius V. Ducas, Murtzuphlus Latin Emperors Baldwin I. Henry . Peter . Robert . John of Brienne Baldwin II. Nicaan Emperors Theodore I. Lascaris John III. Ducas Theodore II. Ducas John IV. Ducas 1078-1081 1081-1118 1118-1 143 1143-1 180 1 180-1183 1183-1185 1185-1195 1195-12031 203- T 204 . 1204 1204-1205 I205~12l6 I2I7-I2I9I2I9-I228 1228-1237I237-I261 1204-1 222 1222-1254 I254-I259 I 259-I 260 Empire Restored Michael VI [I. Pataeologus . . . 1260- 1282 Andronicus II. Pakeologus . . . 1282-1328 Co-Emperor — Michael IX. .... 1295-1320 Andronicus HI. Palsologus . . . '328-1341 John VI. Pala:ologus . . . . 1341-1391 Co-Emperors— John V. Cantacuzene . . . i342->355 Andronicus IV. Palajologus (usurped throne) .... i376">379 xv Table of Emperors Manuel II. Palxologus . . , John VII. Palaeologus . Constantine XII. Palaologus . . Turkish Sultans Mohammed II., " The Conqueror " Bayezid II., "The Mystic" Selim I., "The Great". Suleiman I., "The Magnificent ' Selim II., "The Sot" Murad III. Mohammed III. Ahmed I. Mustafa 1.1 lal.\ II. j Osman Murad IV. IbrahimMohammed IV Suleiman II. Ahmed II. Mustafa II. Ahmed III. Mahrmid 1. Osman III. Mustafa III. Abdul Hamed Selim III. Mustafa IV. Mahmud II.," Abdul Mejid Abdul Aziz Murad V. Abdul Hamed The Reformer 1391-1425 1425-14481448-1453 1451-1481 1481-15121512-1520 1520-15661566-1574 "574-15951595-16031603-1617 i6i7-(i6i8) 1623 1623-1640 1 640- 1 649 1649-16871687-1691 1691-16951695-17031703-1730 1 730-1 754 I754-i757 '757-'7741774-17891789-1807 1807-18081808-1839 1839-1861 1861-1876 . 1876 . 1876 Constantinople CHAPTER I The History of the City in ancient and mediaeval times i. Byzantium before Constantine. IT is impossible to approach Constantinople without seeing the beauty and the wonder of its site. Whether you pass rapidly down the Bosphorus, be tween banks crowned with towers and houses and mosques, that stretch away hither and thither to dis tant hills, now bleak, now crowned with dark cypress groves ; or up from the Sea of Marmora, watching the dome of S. Sophia that glitters above the closely packed houses, till you turn the point which brings you to the Golden Horn, crowded with shipping and bright with the flags of many nations ; or even if you come over land by the sandy wastes along the shore, looking across the deep blue of the sea to the islands and the snow- crowned mountains of Asia, till you break through the crumbling wall within sight of the Golden Gate, and find yourself at a step deep in the relics of the middle ages ; you cannot fail to wonder at the splendour of the view which meets your eyes. Sea, sunlight, the quaint houses that stand close upon the water's edge, the white palaces, the crowded quays, and the crowning glory of the Eastern domes and the mediseval walls — these are the The Story of Constantinople elements that combine to impress, and the impression is never lost. Often as you may see again the approach to the imperial city, its splendour and dignity and the exquisite beauty of colour and light will exert their old charm, and as you put foot in the New Rome you will feel all the glamour of the days that are gone by. SERAGLIO POINT AFTER SUNSET So of old the Greeks who founded the city dwelt lovingly on the contrast of sea and land here meeting, and hymned the nymphs of wave and spring, the garden by the shore. " Where ocean bathes earth's footstool these sea-bowers Bedeck its solid wavelets : wise was he Who blended shore with deep, with seaweed flowers, And Naiads' rivulets with Nereids' sea." Strictly speaking the peninsula on which the city stands is of the form of a trapezium. It juts out into The Ancient City the sea, beating back as it were the fierce waves of the Bosphorus, and forcing them to turn aside from their straight course and widen into the Sea of Marmora, which the ancients called the Propontis, narrowing again as it forces its way between the near banks of the Hellespont, which rise abrupt and arid from the Euro pean side, and slope gently away in Asia to the foot of Mount Ida. Northwards there is the little bay of the Golden Horn, an arm as it were of the Bosphorus, in to which run the streams which the Turks call the Sweet Waters of Europe. The mouth of the harbour is no more than five hundred yards across. The Greeks of the Empire spanned it by a chain, supported here and there on wooden piles, fragments of which still remain in the Armoury that was once the church of S. Irene. Within is safe anchorage in one of the finest harbours of the world. South of the Golden Horn, on the narrow tongue of land — narrow it seems as seen from the hills of the northern shore — is the city of Constantine and his suc cessors in empire, seated, like the old Rome, on seven hills, and surrounded on three sides by sea, on the fourth by the still splendid, though shattered, mediaeval walls. Northwards are the two towns, now linked together, of Pera and Galata, that look back only to the trading settlements of the Middle Ages. The single spot united, as Gibbon puts it, the pros pects of beauty, of safety, and of wealth : and in a masterly description that great historian has collected the features which made the position, "formed by Nature for the centre and capital of a great monarchy," attractive to the first colonists, and evident to Con stantine as the centre where he could best combine and command the power of the Eastern half of his mighty Empire. " Situated in the forty-first degree of latitude, the 3 The Story of Constantinople imperial city commanded, from her seven hills, the opposite shores of Europe and Asia ; the climate was healthy and temperate, the soil fertile, the harbour secure and capacious, and the approach on the side of the continent was of small extent and easy defence. The Bosphorus and Hellespont may be considered as the two gates of Constantinople, and the prince who possessed those important passages could always shut them against a naval enemy and open them to the THERAP1A fleets of commerce. The preservation of the eastern provinces may, in some degree, be ascribed to the policy of Constantine, as the barbarians of the Euxine, who in the preceding age had poured their armaments into the heart of the Mediterranean, soon desisted from the exercise of piracy, and despaired of forcing this insurmountable barrier. When the gates of the Hellespont and Bosphorus were shut, the capital still enjoyed, within their spacious enclosure, every pro duction which would supply the wants, or gratify the luxury, of its numerous inhabitants. The sea-coast of 4 The Ancient City Thrace and Bithynia, which languish under the weight of the Turkish oppression, still exhibits a rich prospect of vineyards, of gardens, and of plentiful harvests ; and the Propontis has ever been renowned for an inexhaust ible store of the most exquisite fish, that are taken in their stated seasons without skill, and almost without labour. But when the passages of the straits were thrown open for trade, they alternately admitted the natural and artificial riches of the north and south, of the Euxine, and of the Mediterranean. Whatever rude commodities were collected in the forests of Germany and Scythia, as far as the sources of the Tanais and the Borysthenes ; whatsoever was manu factured by the skill of Europe or Asia ; the corn of Egypt, and the gems and spices of the farthest India ; were brought by the varying winds into the port of Constantinople, which for many ages attracted the commerce of the ancient world." There is no wonder that legend should surround the beginnings of the imperial city of the East. Men from Argos and Megara under the navigator Byzas founded it about 657 b.c. But mythology made the founder the son of Neptune the sea god, and said that lo, changed into a heifer, swam across the narrow strait that divides Europe from Asia, and so gave it the name of Bosphorus, which means literally Oxford. The Delphic oracle told men to settle "opposite the land of the blind," for blind were those men of Megara who some years before had chosen Chalcedon on the Asiatic shore instead of the matchless site on which rose the city of Byzantium. The early history can be briefly told. Byzantium was the first of the cities of Europe to fall into the hands of Darius. It was burned to the ground by the Persians, rescued and rebuilt by Pausanias, was threatened by the Ten Thousand on their retreat, and 5 The Story of Constantinople saved by the eloquence of Xenophon. Two years it was besieged by Philip of Macedon, and was saved by the Athenians. When Rome first showed her power in those lands Byzantium was her ally ; but her chequered fortunes ended their first epoch with de struction at the hands of Septimius Severus in 196 a.d. She waited then for a century till her real founder came. Byzantine coins go back as far as the fifth century B.C., and there were in the early Middle Ages many surviving memorials of pre-Christian times ; of these there are now left only the striking Corinthian column standing on a high granite base in the garden of the old Seraglio, which almost certainly commemorates a victory of the Emperor Claudius Gothicus, some parts of the founda tions of the Hippodrome, an inscription in the Doric dialect which formerly stood in the Stadium, and that wonderful serpent column, which only came, it is true, to the city after Constantine rebuilt it, but which was centuries before in the temple of Apollo at Delphi. 2. From Constantine to Justinian. The true history of the city begins with Constantine the Great. It is said that he hesitated at first, like the men of Megara, between Byzantium and Chalcedon, when he came to choose a spot from which to rule the East. But when he chose aright he founded a city which has endured to this day, and which it is inconceiv able should ever be deserted again. The site on which he built is about four miles long, broadening from less than a mile where it fronts the Bosphorus to four miles from where the Marble Tower now stands to the Golden Horn. Seven hills and six valleys diversify the ground. The seven hills as we see them now stretch thus from east to west. First is that irregular elevation ending at Seraglio Point, on which stand the 6 The Ancient City buildings of the old Seraglio, S. Irene, S. Sophia, the great mosque of Sultan Ahmed, and the Hippodrome. Second, and north-west of it, is the hill on which stands the column of Constantine himself, now burned and broken. On the third stands the great tower by the War Office (Seraskierat), the mosques of Bayezid and Suleiman. A valley descends northwards to the Golden Horn ; and across it runs the Aqueduct of Valens, and on the other side is the hill marked by the mosque of Mohammed the Conqueror. The fifth hill stretches from the fourth almost to the Golden Horn, and on it stands the mosque of Selim. The sixth hill, divided from the fifth by a valley ascending from the Golden Horn, has now the ruins of the palace called by the people " the House of Belisarius," and the seventh extends from the south of the Adrianople Gate to the Sea of Marmora. As the old foundation, so the new planning of Constantine has its legend. It is said that he traced the boundary of his city, himself, walking spear in hand and marking the line of the walls ; and when his courtiers asked him how far he could go he answered, as though he saw a sacred vision, " Until He tarries Who now goes before." He ascribed in his laws the founding to the command of God. He did not cover the whole ground of the Seven Hills. It is difficult to trace with certainty the line of the walls, but it would seem probable that they ex tended from what is now the inner bridge across the Golden Horn to a point on the Sea of Marmora about midway between the gate of Daoud Pasha and the Psamatia Gate. This would exclude part of the fifth, sixth, and seventh hills ; but it is improbable that they were left entirely unprotected or completely excluded from the city of Constantine. By the sixth at any- rate already stood the Blachernae, later to be the 7 The Story of Constantinople famous palace of the Byzantine emperors. Sycae, across the Golden Horn, was the name of what is now Galata. It was at one time the quarter where the Galatian mercenaries dwelt, and quite early in history it had another division named Pera, or "across the water." The seaward walls remained as they had been in old Byzantium, and they were repaired, and brought forward to the point whence the new land walls started. Of the remains of Constantine's time there are none that are not half destroyed or wholly altered, but the Church of S. Irene still recalls the days of its first founder, and the serpent column from Delphi still stands in the Hippodrome where he placed it. The divisions of Constantine's city are not easy to recover. For municipal government it had, like Rome, fourteen regions, two of which were outside the walls, those (xiii.) of Sycae and (xiv.) of Blachernae. From the Golden gate, which was not far from the Marmora end of the land walls (the name Isa Kapou Mesjidi still recalls the Holy Name of Jesus which it bore), a road led to the Augusteum. The Forum of Constantine stood outside where the old Byzantine walls had been, and west of the Hippodrome. The Hippodrome extended south-west from the Forum of the Augusteum. North-east at some distance stood the Church of S. Irene. The Augusteum which, as Mr Bury says, we may trans late place imperiale, had the Church of S. Sophia, begun probably by Constantius, on the north ; on die east the Senate house, and some buildings of the Palace ; on the south the great Palace itself, built eastwards of the Hippodrome and commanding the magnificent view over the Marmora islands to the shores of Asia and the snows of Olympus. Of the splendour of the city of Constantine many The Ancient City hints of description remain. Constantinople was enriched, says one writer, by the spoils of all other cities : Rome and Athens, Sicily and Antioch, were robbed of treasures. Of all these treasures the most wonderful, almost if not quite alone, survives. For eight hundred years it had already stood in the Sanctuary of Delphi, the serpent column with its triple head, inscribed with the names of the Greek city states which had triumphed on the field of Platasa. Through all the changes of the sixteen centuries since Constantine lived the column has still remained where he set it. Its heads are now broken off, and one may be seen in the museum ; but parts of the inscrip tion on the coils might still be traced fifteen years ago when rubbings were taken. The name of the Tenians, whose trireme brought the news to the Greeks of the Persian approach, may still be seen. " For this service," says Herodotus, " the Tenians were inscribed in Delphi, on the tripod, among those who had overthrown the barbarian." Thus for nearly two thousand four hundred years this memorial has endured. Of all the wonders of the city of Con stantine there is none like it. From Constantine to Justinian the history of the city may be rapidly traversed, for no great builder came between them to rival their work. It was on May n, 330 a.d., that the city of Constantine was dedicated and received the name of New or Second Rome. Throned in the Hippodrome, ever after to be the centre of Byzantine life, Constantine gave thanks to God for the birth of this fair city, the daughter (so wrote S. Augustine), as it were, of Rome herself. Grandeur, riches, dignity, he could give to his new city : but before he died it was plain that he could not bequeath to her a legacy of peace. The early history of Constantinople is largely con- The Story of Constantinople cerned with the defence of the true Christian faith, handed down from the Apostles, against the errors of Arius. The Council of Nicxa (Isnik) in 325, sum moned by Constantine at a place not more than a day s journey from Constantinople, defined the being of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity as ' OpoovsHtv, of one essence (substance), with that of the Father, but centuries passed before the false teaching was overcome. It was natural that at Constantinople, the seat of imperial government, the strife should be con centrated ; that there the Arian leaders should meet the great S. Athanasius of Alexandria in keenest attack. It was there that Constantine gave his order to the aged bishop Alexander that Arius should be admitted to communion. There the bishop lay in prayer before the altar in the apse of S. Irene, be seeching God to spare him the profanation. There that very day Arius met his awfully sudden death. Under the sons of Constantine the imperial city witnessed scenes of disturbance and persecution. As soon as Constantius freed himself from the danger of civil war, he threw himself warmly into the support of Arianism, and "devoted the leisure of his winter quarters," says Gibbon, " to the amusement or toils of controversy ; the sword of the magistrate, and even of the tyrant, was unsheathed to enforce the reasons of the theologian " ; and he refers to the happy passages in which Ammianus Marcellinus records the results of his disastrous activity, in language which loses nothing in Gibbon's English. " The Christian religion, which in itself is plain and simple, he confounded by the dotage of superstition. Instead of reconciling the parties by the weight of his authority, he cherished and propagated by verbal dis putes the differences which his vain curiosity had excited. The highways were covered with troops The Ancient City of bishops, galloping from every side to the assem blies which they call synods ; and, while they laboured to reduce the whole body to their own particular opinions, the public establishment of the posts was almost ruined by their hasty and repeated journeys." The " opinions " indeed were far from original to Constantius, but his support of Arianism rendered the position of the Church in the imperial city dangerous and uncertain. Five times was the bishop Paul banished from the city. The Catholics rose in tumult, and the streets of Constantinople saw for the first time what they have often since witnessed, a massacre in which not even the churches preserved those who fled to them for refuge. Another fatal precedent had already been set when Constantine died, by the murder of many princes of his house. One of the few sur vivors ascended the throne in 361, on the death of the last of Constantine's sons. This new Emperor was Julian, whom later ages have named the Apostate. Julian had been baptized and had " followed the way of the Christians " till he was twenty. He had even, it seems, taken minor orders as a reader. But he was greatly attracted by the old Greek ideals, and had not patience to study the Christian religion perfectly. As Emperor he set himself seriously to revive Paganism, which had received its death-blow from Constantine. The pagan Emperor was above all things a pedant and a doctrinaire. It is impossible to study his life or his writings without a sense of his extraordinary self- conceit. He was moral in life, sound and excellent even to weariness in his platitudinarian sentiments ; but he was obstinate, and blind, and abnormally self- conscious, as men of his mould always are. He was so convinced that he was right that he was utterly blind to the good deeds of Christians and deaf to their arguments, even from the clearest thinkers. We see '3 The Story of Constantinople in him not a trace of intellectual progress, even on his own lines ; we find him throughout intensely super stitious and fond of dabbling in occult arts. As a student, he somewhat hastily accepted certain con clusions, and found himself a marked man in conse quence. From that moment he clung to his philosophy with the tenacity of a limited mind ; and we may be quite sure the story is legendary that such a man admitted on his deathbed the triumph of a religious system which he had combated all his life. Julian was brought up probably in Constantinople. As Emperor he did not a little to increase the pride and beauty of the city. Especially interesting to him were the constitutional rules which Constantine had set up in imitation of the old Rome, and he paid notable respect to the office of the Consul, and enlarged the powers of the Senate. Art and science he endeavoured to foster by endowments for teaching in the schools of the city, and in this he was followed by his successors. Julian died a disappointed man in 363, and his suc cessors inclined to the Catholic party ; but still Arianism was strong, and its strength was felt not least in Constantinople. Jovian proclaimed toleration, Valentinian followed him, Valens professed Arianism. While religions contended, the material prosperity of the city continued to grow. In 378, when the Goths drew near to besiege the imperial city, they turned back, it is said, at the sight of its increased size. Al ready people of every kindred and tongue poured into the great mart for commerce and pleasure. At length, says Sozomen, it far surpassed Rome both in population and riches, and Eunapius thus describes its importance in his day : — " Constantinople, formerly called Byzantium, allowed the ancient Athenians a liberty of importing corn in great quantities ; but now not all the ships of burden from Egypt, Asia, Syria, Phoenicia, and many "4 The Ancient City other nations can import a quantity sufficient for the support of those people whom Constantine, by un peopling other cities, has transported thither." Already there began the custom, which has lasted so many centuries, of building houses on wooden piles thrust out into die sea. As the incursion of the barbarians became more dangerous many took refuge in the capital ; and yearly the churches grew in importance, and the monasteries attracted more religious. "There were many structures which Constantine had only commenced ; and the completion of the fortifications of the city had been left to Constantius ; Julian found it necessary to construct a second harbour on the side of the sea of Marmora ; 1 Valens was obliged to improve the waterworks of the city by the erection of the fine aqueduct which spans the valley between the fourth and fifth hills. And how large a number of hands such work required appears from the fact that when the aqueduct was repaired, in the ninth century, 6000 labourers were brought from the provinces to Constantinople for the purpose." 2 But while the magnificent aqueduct of Valens (364-378) still towers over the city, as one views it from the heights of Pera, no other great building was added till the reign of Theodosius the Great (378-395), which marks the triumph of Catholic Christianity and the great increase in the splendour of the patriarchal and imperial abode. A contem porary, Gregory of Nyssa, quaintly describes the re sults of the theological interests which now surrounded the throne. Not only did great preachers fill the churches with attentive crowds, but the poor took up the tale. "The city is full of mechanics and 1 This was close to where is now the Kutchuk Aya Sofia (church of S. Sergius and S. Bacchus). 2 Van Millingen, "Walls of Constantinople,'' p. 41.'S The Story of Constantinople slaves who are all of them profound theologians, and preach in the shops and in the streets. If you desire a man to change a piece of money for you he informs you wherein the Son differs from the Father ; if you ask the price of a loaf you are told by way of reply that the Son is inferior to the Father ; and if you enquire whether the bath is ready, the answer is that the Son was made out of nothing." This was in the time of the Arian triumph. It was the work of great preachers, as well as of the ortho dox Emperor, to recover the Church from the blows she had received in the house of her friends. The three great saints of the Eastern Church in the fourth century were in different ways associated with Constantinople. S. Basil of Csesarea in Cappadocia, (brother of S. Gregory of Nyssa) was a fellow- student of the Emperor Julian, and died in 379. He knew very little directly of the seat of empire ; he probably only twice passed through it ; but his writings, full in every page of lucid order and perspi cuous exposition, did much to vindicate the position which the orthodox in Constantinople were struggling to retain. Probably it was before his death that the great preacher, S. Gregory of Nazianzus, was plead ing in the imperial city, and vindicated by his great oration the worship of the Holy Trinity. The site of his first preaching was commemorated by the building of the Church of Anastasia, a name given to denote the rising again of the Catholic faith of Nicaea. The sixteenth century mosque of Mehmed Pacha, south west of the Hippodrome, preserves the position of the church, which was destroyed in 1458. At first the mission of S. Gregory was conducted amid scenes of the greatest disturbance and at great danger to his own life. His church was profaned, he himself was stoned. But when Theodosius entered the city in 16 The Ancient City triumph he gave to S. Gregory the great church of the Twelve Apostles, and himself sought to seat him upon the episcopal throne. Humble, and weakened by suffering, it was with reluctance that the saint entered upon the heritage of the church ; but he records that when he entered the sanctuary the light that burst forth on the chill November day cheered him to give thanks before all the people for the benefits which the Blessed Trinity had bestowed. After a month of reluctance he was at length in stalled as bishop. In May 381 the second General Council of the Church was assembled by the order of the Emperor Theodosius at Constantinople. It reasserted the creed of Nicaea, emphasised the Catholic teaching of the Divinity of the Holy Ghost, and con demned the heresy of Apollinaris. Its claim to be ecumenical rests on its unanimous acceptance of " all the nations and all the churches of the Christian world." By this council the precedence of the bishop of Con stantinople in the Church was assigned as next after that of the Roman bishop, "because it is the new Rome." S. Gregory, attacked by critics for his acceptance of the see, which he had so reluctantly received, withdrew to Nazianzus. " The title of a saint had been added to his name, but the tendencies of his heart, and the elegance of his genius, reflect a more pleasing lustre on the memory of Gregory of Nazianzen," says Gibbon in his inimitable way. The consecration of his successor, a senator named Nectarius, who when elected had not yet been baptised, is described by the same classic as "whimsical," but it served to bring peace to the Church of Constantinople. The conquests of Theo dosius confirmed the security of the imperial throne, and under the rule of the orthodox Emperor the Church in the East regained her peace. By his order all churches were given up to the orthodox, and his b 17 The Story of Constantinople edict condemned all those who taught heretical doc trines, and " who, though possessing a sound faith, form congregations separate from the canonical bishops." Under Theodosius the security of life and property in the imperial city tended to a great increase of wealth and population ; and with that to a consider able extension of the area occupied. " Should the zeal of the Emperor to adorn the city continue," said the orator Themistius, " a wider circuit will be required, and the question will arise whether the city added to Constantinople by Theodosius is not more splendid than the city which Constantine added to Byzantium." " No longer is the vacant ground in the city more extensive than that occupied by buildings ; nor are we cultivating more territory within our walls than we in habit ; the beauty of the city is not as heretofore scattered over it in patches, but covers the whole area like a robe woven to the very fringe. The city gleams with gold and porphyry. It has a [new] Forum, named after the Emperor ; it owns baths, porticos, gymnasia ; and its former extremity is now its centre. Were Constantine to see the capital he founded, he would behold a glorious and splendid scene, not a bare and empty void ; he would find it fair, not with appar ent but with real beauty." l The beginning of the fifth century witnessed the great extension of the city which the orator so grandi loquently describes in anticipation. Anthemius, who ruled during the earlier part of the minority of Theo dosius II., built the great wall, a mile or in parts a mile and a half to the west of Constantine's wall, which still extends from the Sea of Marmora to the so-called " palace of Belisarius." It was within the city now rapidly growing, that the greatest preacher of the early 'Themistius, Oratio xviii., quoted by Van Millingen, p 42. 18 The Ancient City Church, began at the end of the fourth century to exer cise his marvellous influence over the crowds that thronged the great church of the capital. Arcadius, the son and successor of Theodosius I., having heard of the splendid eloquence of John, a preacher of Antioch, whom men came to call Chrysostom (the golden-mouthed), nominated him to the throne of Constantinople on the death of Nectarius in 397. He set an example, which the clergy sadly needed, of simplicity and asceticism ; he was not only a re former but an organiser of missions, and above all a preacher of righteousness. The Emperor and Empress, Arcadius and Eudocia, were among his most ardent admirers. He owed his nomination to the imperial minister Eutropius ; yet he denounced his vices at the height of his power, and when he fell preserved him in sanctuary from the rage of the people. But the Empress and the courtiers soon grew restless under his searching exposure of vice and worldliness. He was a severe disciplinarian : bishops were ready to turn against him, and the ladies of the court were determined to avenge themselves on their censor. When he de nounced the Empress almost openly as Jezebel, it was clear that peace could not long be maintained even in appearance. Charges of heresy, complicated by his charitable succour of some Eastern monks whom the bishop of Alexandria had ill-treated and banished, led to his condemnation by a council of his enemies at Chalcedon, across the Bosphorus. When the citizens heard this they surrounded the palace of their beloved bishop and kept watch all night lest he should be seized, but he gave himself up and was banished to Hieron (now Anadoli Kavak) at the mouth of the Black Sea on the Asiatic side. The people assembled round the imperial palace with threats ; an earthquake shook the resolution of the Empress, and Chrysostom was brought •9 The Story of Constantinople back in triumph to his throne. His position seemed stronger than ever. Always ready to believe the best, he accepted the Empress's assurance of friendship and repaid it with courtierlike expressions of respect. But it was soon apparent that the friendship could not be con tinued without a sacrifice of principle. Eudocia envied, it would seem, the divine honours of the pagan emperors ; and the dedication of her statue in September 403 was made the occasion of blasphemous and licentious revelry. From the ambo of the great church S. John Chrysostom denounced the wickedness of the festival, while the sound of the disturbance could be heard as he spoke. Men declared that he compared the Empress to Herodias — " Again Herodias dances : again she demands the head of John on a charger." The Empress demanded the punishment of the bold preacher. Intrigues won over the Emperor, time serving bishops brought up ingenious distortions of Church rules through which Chrysostom could be punished. It was pretended that he was not legally bishop, and at last the timid Emperor gave the order to arrest him, an act which was accomplished, in a scene of brutal disorder and violence, in the great church itself on Easter Eve 404, when the sacrament of baptism wa6 being ministered to three thousand catechumens. Two months later he was sent into banishment, and his adherents underwent a bitter persecution. They appealed to the churches of the West for aid : Chrysos tom himself wrote to Rome, Milan, and Aquileia. But the Emperor was not to be moved. In his banishment at Cucusus, on the borders of Cilicia and Armenia, the Saint exercised as wide an influence as on his throne. Constant letters to Constantinople cheered the loyal clergy, comforted penitents, aroused faint hearts to devoted service of God. But his suffer- 20 The Ancient City ings in exile were at length made tatal by the brutality with which he was hurried from place to place, and he gave up his soul on September 14, 407, a martyr to his zeal for righteousness. Thirty years afterwards in 438 his body was translated to the city where his memory was still cherished. It came in triumphal procession down the Bosphorus followed by crowds of boats, and was laid in a tomb by the altar in the Church of the Holy Apostles ; the Emperor, Theo dosius II., praying for the pardon of God on the sins of his parents. Thus briefly the tale of Chrysostom may be told. It is characteristic of the struggles through which the Church of Constantinople had to pass during the years of unchecked imperial power, when it was dependent on the arbitrary authority of a sovereign who might be weak and led by evil counsellors, or wicked and re sentful of any criticism of his deeds, but who had always at his command a body of brutal soldiery, often pagan and retaining of the old Roman tradition only the implicit obedience to the commands of their ruler. The name of S. John Chrysostom, loved and honoured by the people in his life, has remained the chief glory of the Church of Constantinople. It is said that his tomb was rifled by the Crusaders in 1204, and his head is shown among the relics of the Cathedral of Pisa ; but in countless ways his memory is still pre served by the Church which he ruled. At the Cathedral Church of the Patriarchate in the Phanar they point to-day to a pulpit and a throne (of much later date) as his ; and the ancient liturgy of the East, used from time immemorial in the Church of Constantinople, has been given his name, as that of the most famous of the holy prelates who used it. The troubles of the Church, which centred round the persecution and martyrdom of S. Chrysostom, were 21 The Story of Constantinople followed by at least outward peace in religious matters. The chief clergy of Constantinople became the mere officers of the Court. But the dangers of the times, when again and again the barbarian was at the gates, turned men's minds to the repair of the fortifications and the completion of their circuit around the now greatly extended city. The work of Anthemius, regent during part of the minority of Theodosius II., was eulogised by Chrysostom himself. The office of Praetorian Praefect of the East which he held, was honoured, said the great preacher, by his holding it. He restored the defences of the Empire after the weakness of Arcadius, " and to crown the system of defence he made Constantinople a mighty citadel. The enlargement and refortification of the city was thus part of a comprehensive and far seeing plan to equip the Roman State in the East for the impending desperate struggle with barbarism ; and of all the services which Anthemius rendered, the most valuable and enduring was the addition he made to the military importance of the capital. The bounds he assigned to the city fixed, substantially, her permanent dimensions, and behind the bulwarks he raised — im proved and often repaired indeed by his successors — Constantinople acted her great part in the history of the world." x The two greatest interests of Constantinople have always been the military and the ecclesiastical. The Eastern churches have always looked, and look to day, on the New Rome as the centre of true religion and sound learning. The theology of the Councils is the theology of the great Church of Constantinople and its patriarchs ; and in the days of its bitterest persecution, in the times when the infidel has ruled, the strongest sentiment of the Greek people, who feel 1 Van Millingen, pp. 44, 45. 22 The Ancient City that the city is still truly their own, is that of loyalty to the unalterable faith and the immemorial liturgies of the holy Orthodox Church preserved by the suc cessors of S. Chrysostom. But while the intense intellectual keenness of the East and the chivalrous conservatism of the ancient Greek families preserves undisputed the dominion of religion, and the thronged churches witness to a devotion which is perhaps more conspicuous than in any city which lives on to our day from the centuries of the Middle Ages, the great city of Constantine can never cease to be the home of a military power, where military science is cultivated and the soldier's life is the most prominent before the eyes of the people. Even at the lowest point of the Empire, the great city of the Cassars was always a military stronghold of the first class. The streets have never ceased to be thronged with soldiers, and the military pageants of to-day look back for their origin and their necessity to the days of Constantine and Theodosius and Anthemius the wall-builder. It is said that to-day the city is more completely defended than any other in Europe. More than sixteen centuries ago it was the strength of the walls of Anthemius and the size of the army and the fleet that he gathered that turned back the army of Attila. Just as the whole city was concerned in the doings of the Church, its buildings, its festivals, its councils, so were all the citizens bound to take part in its military defence. The walls, like the churches, belonged to all. Strict laws, from which no one was exempt, and the power of levying special taxes besides the due proportion of the city land-tax, made every man liable to contribute. Characteristically the Hippodrome had its share in directing the work. The two factions of the Circus, the blues and the greens, were charged with the direction ; and it is said that 2 3 The Story of Constantinople in 447 they furnished no less than sixteen thousand labourers for the work. The reign of Theodosius II. was the great age of the construction of defences. The walls of Anthemius were built in 413 ; in 439 the sea walls were ex tended to include the part of the city now enclosed. In 447, an earthquake, always the greatest enemy of the fortifications and responsible even now for more destruction than any other force, overthrew much of what had been so lately built, with fifty-seven towers. Attila was almost at the gates, and was dictating an ignominious treaty of peace. But, as an inscription which may be read to-day on the gate now called Yeni-Mevlevi Haneh Kapoussi tells — ¦ " In sixty days, by order of the sceptre loving Emperor, Konstantinos the Eparch added wall to wall." A Latin inscription makes the same record almost in the words of the contemporary chronicler Marcellinus Comes — " Theodosii jussis gemino nee mense peracto Constantinus ovans haec moenia firma locavit Tarn cito quam stabilem Pallas vix conderet arcem." This addition was a new wall, in front of that of Anthemius, with 192 towers, and a moat without, forming tiers of defence. It was this magnificent series of bulwarks which, in the words of the historian of the walls, " so long as ordinary courage survived and the modes of ancient warfare were not superseded, made Constantinople impregnable, and behind which civilisa tion defied the assaults of barbarism for a thousand years." * Theodosius II. reigned till 450. The later part of his reign was disturbed by the Nestorian controversy, in 1 Van Millingen, p. 46. The Ancient City which the bishop of Constantinople himself involved the Church. The denial by this prelate of the title Theo- tokos (Mother of God) to the Blessed Virgin Mary was no obscure attack upon the reality of the Incarna tion as the Church had always received it ; and the people of the city as well as the clergy received the new teaching with disgust. Eastern and Western bishops united against the heresy, and in 431 the third General Council of the Church at Ephesus condemned it and its author, and again defined the Catholic faith. The party of Nestorius was not sup pressed, though he was himself deposed, and in the sixth century it became the great agent of Christian missions in the East. Hardly was this false teaching rejected before a new heresy arose. Eutyches, a monk of Constantinople, denied the existence of two natures in Christ, and after a dispute which shook the Church for twenty years his teaching was at last condemned by the fourth General Council, which met at Chalcedon, just across the Bosphorus. The Council also emphasised the importance of the position now held by the New Rome by enacting that it should be " magnified in ecclesias tical matters even like the elder imperial Rome, as being next to it." This rule was accepted by the Emperor Marcian, and the power it gave to consecrate the metropolitans of Thrace, Asia, and Pontus was supported by the State as a badge of supremacy. The emperors who followed Marcian were all more or less concerned in the theological strife which the opinions of Eutyches had raised. The Monophysites, as the party which rejected the decisions of Chalcedon came to be called, was constantly rising into power in the Court. The imperial crown was worn in turn by four adventurers, who deposed prelates and attempted to reconcile parties at their will. In 482 the Emperor Zeno, with the 2S The Story of Constantinople advice of the patriarch Acacius, put forth the Henoticon (form of union), which was intended to reconcile the Monophysites to the Catholic Church. The con troversy was far from stilled by this inept document ; and when in 484, Felix, the pope of Rome, with other Western bishops, wrote to the patriarch Acacius, de claring him deposed from his office, and separated from the communion of the faithful, a schism was caused in Constantinople itself. While the majority of the clergy and people treated the Roman decree with contempt, some of the monks, and especially the Akoimetai (an order which kept up perpetual worship by suc cession of worshippers, and thus received the name of "sleepless"), refused communion with their own patriarch. The Henoticon had divided the Church. The patriarchates of Antioch and Alexandria were Monophysite ; Jerusalem and Constantinople were orthodox. The reign of Anastasius, the son-in-law of Leo, whose wife was the widow of his predecessor Zeno, was regarded by the orthodox as an era of persecu tion. Himself a man of piety and virtue, he was greeted by the people in the Circus on his accession with the cry, " Reign as you have lived ! " He added to the defences of the city a great wall stretching from the Marmora to the Euxine, some thirty-five miles from Constantinople ; but he unhappily turned to theology, and widened the gulf which the Henoticon had made between the Emperors and the Church. In November 512, the streets again ran with blood shed by the people for the cause of religious truth. Amid these years stained by crime and folly, the imperial city was again and again in danger from external as well as internal foes. At the beginning of the reign of Anastasius the Isaurians who had been driven from the city rebelled, and for *6 The A?icient City five years there was war, ended only when, in 498, Isaurian captives were led in triumph through the streets. Eleven years before, Theodoric the Goth had stood before the gates, but turned back from the massive strength which he could not overthrow. He was now ruler of Italy. And even in the East, Huns, Romans and Goths again and again threatened the capital. Anastasius dabbled in theology to the end, made overtures to Pope Hormisdas which came to nothing, and died at the age of eighty-eight, re gretted by none. He was succeeded by an illiterate but honest Thracian soldier, Justin. Orthodox and straightfor ward, he was welcomed by the people as a saviour and a second Constantine. Under his rule peace was made with the orthodox West, and the Church again had rest. With the death of Justin, 527, we reach the second great epoch of the history of the imperial city. Constantinople before the days of Justinian, when Theodoric, about 461, was sent as a hostage to the Imperial Court, et quia puerulus elegans erat meru'i: gratiam imperialem habere, was the most glorious city of Europe. Jordanes, the historian of the Goths, tells how he marvelled at the wondrous sight. " Lo ! now I behold," said he, " what I have often heard, but have never believed, the glory of so great a city ! " Then turning his eyes this way and that, beholding the situation of the city and the concourse of ships, how he marvels at the long perspective of lofty walls. Then he sees the multitude of various nations like the stream flowing forth from one fountain which has been fed by many springs ; then he beholds the soldiers in ordered ranks. " A god," said he, " without doubt a god upon earth is the Emperor of this realm, and whoso lifts his hand against him, that man's blood be on his 27 The Story of Constantinople own head." Thus the barbarian may well have spoken when he had his first sight of the majesty of the Empire and its civilization in its Eastern home. Within a few years there was a great change. Earthquakes, rebellions, fires, compelled the rebuild ing of a great part of Constantinople, and Justinian the Great, lawyer, theologian and organiser of victory, left monuments as enduring in architecture as in the TERI BATAN SERAI (CISTERN) other spheres of his activity. With the exception of the churches of S. John of the Studium and S. Irene, and the walls of Theodosius, there are to-day no great works of the Christian period, save a very few of the later Emperors, remaining in Constantinople except those which ¦ Justinian built. His architects created the Byzantine style which reached its magnificent completion in S. Sophia. The finest of the cisterns which astonish the traveller to-day are the work of his age ; and as we walk by the splendid walls that 28 The Ancient City extend from the Marmora to the Golden Horn, it is along his triumphal way diat we tread. The first book of the " Aedificia " of Procopius, written to com memorate his achievements in building, is even now a handbook in little to the glories of Constantinople. Leaving to our description of the city the still stand ing work of the great Emperor, we must here shortly sketch the reign which was for nine centuries the most glorious memory of the Eastern Empire. Born in 482 or 483, Justinian was the_ son of a Dardanian peasant, and was born at Scupi (Uskiip), "at the crossing-point of great natural routes across the western part of the Illyrian peninsula." When his uncle Justin raised himself to the throne in 518 he was sent for and trained to succeed to, if not already to exercise, supreme power. So long as Justin lived Justinian was his chief adviser. When Vitalian, the orthodox Goth, whose troops in the neighbourhood of the city seemed to threaten the new dynasty, was murdered in the palace, it was Justinian, for whose concern in the crime no valid evidence has been produced, who rose to the highest place in military as well as civil affairs. In 523 he married the beautiful Theodora, whose earlier life has been covered with shame by historians whose veracity is open at least to suspicion. She is described by the bitter Procopius as everything that is vile ; it is probably true that her youth was disreputable ; but it is certain that she made the noblest atonement for the past by the charity and piety of her later life and by the courage and wisdom which were of profit even to the Empire.1 Of her beauty there is no doubt. Small, pale as marble, but with brilliant eyes, the bitterest of 1 The very interesting little book of M. Antonin Debidour, LImpcratrice Theodora (1885), should be read by all who are attracted by the wonderful career of this ex traordinary Empress. 29 The Story of Constantinople her enemies describes her ; and when he uses the language of compliment he declares of the statue erected in her honour by the baths of Arcadius that " the face is beautiful but falls short of the beauty of the Empress, since it is utterly impossible for any mere human workmen to express her loveliness." Four years after the marriage, which was one of unbroken affection till the Empress died in 548, Justinian was associated with his uncle on the imperial throne. On April 1, 527, he became sole Emperor, and he reigned till 565. Constantinople under Justinian became again the centre of Christian Europe. But before his power was fully established it was threatened by the gravest of the great insurrections with which the populace showed its independence and its fickle levity. The sedition arose in the Circus, and it was long the fashion to believe that Constantinople was ruled entirely under the sway of the factions of the Hippodrome. A more critical investigation has shown that the demes (5rj/j,cii) or parties were organised bodies intimately connected with the court and the municipality. The demes had two parts, military under democrats, and civil, or political, under demarchs. The heads of each faction were officers of the court and the army, and the demes were fully organised for military purposes. Not only were they, as we have seen, intrusted with the building of the wall, but they provided, under the Emperor Maurice, troops for the guarding of the long walls ; and Justinian himself, at the end of his reign, Used them in a similar way. It was to the demes, one writer seems to show, that Justin owed his throne. But while their military and political importance is now fully recognised, we are still without an explanation of how they became connected with the parties and colours of the Circus. 30 The Ancient City However that may be, we find in the reign of Jus tinian two large Circus parties, the Blues and the Greens, with whom were merged as sub-divisions the Reds and the Whites, who organised the races and had so much liberty allowed them by the laws, that they were able to defy emperors and set public order at defiance. But the madness of their riot was not without a method. To the demes or factions were allowed Tilt inFCRIAL QUARTER privileges which seemed the last relics of the ancient freedom of the Greek cities. " In the sixth century," says Professor Bury, " the outbreaks of the demes re present a last struggle for municipal independence, on which it is the policy of imperial absolutism to encroach. The power of the demarchs had to give way to the control of the praefects of the city." On January 13, 532, there began an insurrection called ever after the "Nika" (conquer), from the 31 The Story of Constantinople watchwords of the insurgents, which threatened the imperial throne, and went nigh to destroy the whole city. The praefect of the city led to execution some criminals belonging to both parties, three days before. The Greens, during the celebration of public games in the Hippodrome on Sunday, January 1 1 , appealed to the Emperor against Calapodius, the imperial minister, and the most extraordinary dialogue occurred. " Be silent, Jews, Samaritans and Manichaeans," cried Jus tinian's mandator, uttering imperial commands, but they renewed their complaints, and finally passed into insults, calling the Emperor tyrant and murderer. Justinian determined to show his indifference to the mob by the execution that night of criminals of both factions. Two were rescued, and the two factions determined to procure their pardon, and on the 1 8th, when the great games took place, they appealed to Justinian, but in vain. The two demes then declared themselves united, and having no answer from the praefect whose house they surrounded, they set fire to the praetorium, and then in the night spread the fire over the imperial quarter. The portico of the Palace, the Baths of Xeuxippus, the Senate-house, and the wooden church of S. Sophia were set on fire. Next morning they marched to the Palace and demanded the dismissal of the unpopular ministers. Justinian was about to yield, and indeed had given the order, when the insurgents determined to depose him. Anastasius had left three nephews, Probus, Hypatius and Pom- peius. Failing to find the first the mob burned his house. The two other brothers remained in safety in the palace. Next day the greatest general of the age, Belisarius, who had but recently returned from a victorious campaign against the Persians, sallied forth from the palace with a body of barbarian troops, Goths and Heruls — for the garrison of the city could not be 32 The Ancient City trusted — and fierce fighting occurred for two days in the streets. The clergy did their utmost to restore peace, but were utterly unheeded, and in the evening of the 1 6th the Church of S. Irene, built by Constantine, was burnt, though not to the ground, and the Hospice of Samson, which stood between it and S. Sophia, were also destroyed. On the 1 7th, Saturday, the fire spread still further, and almost all the centre of the city was reduced to ashes. At night Justinian deter mined to give up Hypatius and Pompeius to the mob, hoping no doubt that if they were conspiring against him they would be less dangerous outside than within the palace. In spite of their reluctance he drove them forth to their own houses. Next day, early on the Sunday morning, the Emperor himself went down to the Hippodrome and made what was little better than an abject submission. He swore on the gospels to forgive all that had been done, if order were now restored. " The blame is not yours but all mine. For the punishment of my sins I did not grant your requests when first you spoke to me in this place." Some cried out that he swore falsely, and no heed was taken of his words. A few hours later Hypatius was proclaimed Emperor, and as the mob surrounded the palace it seemed that there was nothing for the Em peror but flight. It was then, when Justinian was ready to yield and cross the Bosphorus to the safety of Chalcedon, that Theodora showed herself worthy of the purple. "No time is this," she cried, "to ask whether a woman should be bold before men or valiant when men are afraid. They who are in extremest peril must think of nothing but how best to meet what lies before them. To fly, if ever it be expedient, would now not be so, I declare, even if it preserved us. For a man born into this light not to die is impossible ; but for one who has been Emperor to become an exile is c 33 The Story of Cotistantinople not to be endured. Let me never come to be without this purple robe nor live that day when men shall cease to call me their sovereign Lady. If you, Emperor, wish to escape, it is no hard matter. Here is the sea, and there lie the ships. But consider whether you may not one day wish that you had exchanged your mean safety for a glorious death. For me 1 love the ancient saying, 'How brave a sepulchre a kingdom is ! ' " Thus Theodora proved herself fit mate for a Caesar, and worthy of her crown ; and those who had counselled flight now found courage to resist. While Justinian's men planned an attack, the followers of Hypatius agreed upon delay, and he himself sent, it would seem, to make peace with the Emperor. As his messenger went, he was told that the Cxsar had fled, and then the unhappy pretender took upon him the dignity of Emperor. In a few hours Belisarius led his troops upon the multitude assembled in the Hippodrome, and before nightfall they forced their way in with fire and sword, and of all the citizens gathered in the Circus not one left it alive. Justinian was not told till too late that Hypatius had been willing to submit. The two brothers were dragged out with contumely, and the next morning before daylight they fell under the swords of the barbarian soldiers. The Emperor, it is said, would have spared them, but Theodora, " swearing by God and by him, urged him to have them killed." Zachariah of Mitylene says that more than 80,000 persons perished in the riot. At midday on Monday, January 1 9, Constantinople was at peace ; but it was in ruins. Three distinct conflagrations had reduced the grandest monuments of the city of Constantine to ashes. On the first two days of the riot all the buildings of the Augusteum were destroyed, and with them S. Sophia, the " Great 34 The Ancient City \v V Church, ' only its baptistery, it would seem, being saved. Two days later the buildings north-west of S. Sophia were in flames, and among them the Hospice for poor and sick folk, "founded in ancient times by a holy man whose name was Samson," and Constantine's Church of S. Irene. On the 17th the buildings round the "( Mese, the street which connected the forum of Constantine with the Augusteum, and the "great porticoes leading up to the agora named from Constantine, and many houses of rich men, and large property, were burned." Thus, a great part of what had been the first Byzantium, which was adorned with the finest buildings of Con stantine, was utterly de stroyed. To one who saw the blackened ruins, they seemed like the masses of molten lava round the crater of a volcano. To Justinian, already a great law-giver, came the task of building anew the imperial city. The Emperor began at once with the rebuilding of the Great Church of the Divine Wisdom. On the 23rd of February the work was begun: on December 26, 537, the new church was dedicated. " The pro cession," says Theophanes, who wrote from older materials in the eighth century, " started from the 35 THE BURNT COLUMN The Story of Constantinople church of the Anastasia," where S. Gregory of Nazianzus had long preached to the men of Byzantium, " Menas, the patriarch, sitting in the royal chariot, and the King walking with the people." In 558 the eastern part of the dome with the apse was destroyed by an earthquake and was rebuilt. Agathias, a con temporary historian, thus describes the building and the restoration : " Now the former church having been burnt by the angry mob, Justinian built it up again from the founda tions, as great, and more beautiful and wonderful, and this most beautiful design was adorned with much precious metal. He built it in a round form, with burnt brick and lime. It was bound together here and there with iron ; but they avoided the use of wood, so that it should no more be easily burnt. Now Anthemius was the man who devised and worked at every part. And when by the earthquake the middle part of the roof and the higher parts had been de stroyed, the Emperor made it stronger, and raised it to a great height. Anthemius was then dead, but the young man Isidorus and the other craftsmen, turning over in their minds the earlier design, and comparing what had fallen with what remained, estimated where the error lay, and of what kind it was. They deter mined to leave the eastern and western arches as they were. But of the northern and southern they brought towards the inside that portion of the building which was upon the curve. And they made tiiese arches wider, so as to be more in harmony with the others, thus making the equilateral symmetry more perfect. In this way they were able to cover the measurelessness of the empty space, and to take off some of its extent to form an oblong design. And again, they wrought that which rose up above it in the middle, whether cycle or hemisphere or whatever other name it may be 36 The Ancient City called. And this also became more straightforward and of a better curve, in every part agreeing with the line ; and at the same time not so wide but higher, so that it did not affright the spectators as before, but was set much more strong and safe." s. SOPHIA AND THE MINISTRY OF JUSTICE FROM THE SEA A more minute account of the work must be reserved till we pass from history to description. Here we have only to summarise and characterise the work of the great architects whom Justinian employed to rebuild his city. The opportunity was a great one. Constantinople was now the centre of the civilised world. Thither came in the sixth century a crowd as motley as those 37 The Story of Constantinople gathered together on the day of Pentecost, or a6 may be seen now on the bridge of Galata. Men of Mesopotamia and Syria, Persians, Greeks from the islands and the Peloponnese, men of Sicily and Africa, Alexandrines and Palestinian Jews, met with the Roman and with the barbarian subjects of the now again undivided empire. Of this vast gathering of the nations Byzantine art was the result and the reflexion. But adaptive as it was of every influence that came before the eyes of its great masters, it was, above all, like the city where it reached its highest glory, pre-eminently religious and Christian. The new style has been called " historical- dogmatic," and indeed it combined in a marvellous manner the traditions of different races under the unit ing power of the Catholic faith. The genius which gave to the Byzantine architecture its completed glory was that of Anthemius of Tralles, of whose skill contemporary writers write in enthusiastic applause. His works, says Agathias, " even if nothing were said about them, would suffice of themselves to win for him an everlasting glory in the memory of man as long as they stand and endure." The characteristics of the art of Anthemius at its highest development may be seen to-day in Constan tinople. There are few churches earlier than his time still standing. Among these may be the semi-basilican S. Thekla and S. Theodore of Tyrone, and certainly are S. John of the Studium and S. Irene. The last was rebuilt by Justinian immediately after the Nika insurrection in 532, but it belongs to the earlier style. Similar to it was the church of S. Peter and S. Paul, now destroyed, but of which some beautiful marble capitals lie in the sea close to the palace of Hormisdas. Later came the still standing church of S. Sergius and S. Bacchus, called by the people " little S. Sophia," built 3» The Ancient City about 527 by Justinian himself. This prepares the way for almost every feature which appears developed and completed in the great S. Sophia itself. The two most striking characteristics of the new style are the impost capital, and the merging of subsidiary spaces in one central building. The impost capital is probably first seen in the great cistern, also of Justinian's day. I may here repeat what I have said elsewhere.1 " Strygowski 2 regards this impost-capital as the work of the builder of the great cistern, who he thinks may have been Anthemius, here proving his fitness for the great work of S. Sophia. It was, he shows, an architectural revolution. The capital, with undercut volutes, was suitable for a straight architrave, but not for the arch. Hence a piece was inserted to transfer the weight from the angles to the centre. The Theodosian age used an inserted impost. The constructive activity of the age of Justinian produced the impost-capital. As to design, the capitals lying neglected about the city, together with those in situ in the churches and cisterns, furnish a perfect museum of the types with which others, dispersed over the whole area of the empire, agree in the minutest particulars of design and workmanship. The acanthus leaves, so familiar through all the work of the centuries — from the Golden Gate (388) onward, and the portico to S. John of the Studium a century later — assume the beautiful " windblown " design in the ruins near the " Rose Mosque." 3 The second feature is the arrangement which unites the longitudinal with the central building and makes 1 Church of the Sixth Century, pp. 259. 260. 2 B:j~unt . Zertschrift, 1. 65. 3 See Curtis, Broken Bits of Byzantium, ii. 54, 56. 39 The Story of Constantinople the whole effect of the interior of one piece by re lating every piece of work, pillar, arch, semi-dome, to the one vast central dome which crowns the whole. From without, but more clearly from within, the architecture of S. Sophia is seen to form one entire and perfect whole. It is impossible to conceive it deprived of a single feature without the sacrifice ot the whole. To mutilate would be to destroy. Seen then in its grandeur at S. Sophia the work of Justinian changed the appearance of the whole city. Procopius in his"Aedificia"records what was when he wrote in 558, a complete list of what had been built in the reign. Everywhere there were arising, as though by an enchanter's wand, palaces, churches, baths, aqueducts, great cisterns supported on exquisitely carved columns, new markets, houses for the great nobles, barracks, hospitals, convents. The splendour and beauty of the new city, its richness of decoration, marbles, statuary, mosaics, struck all beholders with amaze. The chroniclers, who in other times would have been satisfied to tell of military successes and court intrigues, now tell of measure ments and designs, and collect lists of gems and splendours of decoration. The reign of Justinian, in spite of many foreign dangers, and oppression at home, is the most magnificent period of early Byzantine history ; and the magnificence seemed to be expressed in the buildings of Constantinople. When Procopius in his JEdifices has told of the glories of S. Sophia, he goes on to speak of the Augusteum and its statues. Chiefest among them, one of Justinian himself as Achilles. Then S. Irene, then the churches of the Blessed Virgin at the Blachernae and at Balukli beyond the triumphal way. Church after church follows in his tale, and chief among them those which the mariner sees as he sails up the Golden 40 The Ancient City Horn. " As to the other buildings, it would be hard to name them all." The Hospice of Samson rose again from its ruins, probably close by where the gate of the old Seraglio now stands. The baths of Xeuxippus, which lasted down to the time of Mohammed the Conqueror, with the other buildings near the Augusteum and the forum of Constantine, were restored. " In addition to this he rebuilt and added great magnificence to the house named after Hormisdas, which stands close to the palace, to which he joined it," — that pathetic ruin whose broken wall hangs over the Marmora to-day. When the eulogist comes to the palace itself, words fail him to repeat its glories, the pictures, mosaics, marbles, that combine to make the walls glitter as with life. After works of beauty come those of use, and the cisterns receive as much praise as works more brilliant yet hardly more beautiful. It is buildings such as these that enable us to see what Justinian was to the capital of his Empire. Every year it seemed that new victories and new conversions were increasing the power of the Empire and the Church. While Belisarius reconquered Italy and made the name of the Caesar again honoured at Rome and Ravenna, ended the cruel rule of the Vandals in Africa and Sicily, crushed the. Goths of Spain, and kept the strong Persian prince at bay on the eastern frontier of the empire, Christian missions spread the faith of the orthodox Church to the Caucasus and the Sudan. Again and again did proces sions of returning warriors pass along the triumphal way, but the Emperor alone entered by the Golden Gate. It was in the Hippodrome that Belisarius celebrated his triumph over the Vandals. It was nigh six hundred years, Procopius thought, since any had had the same. But Belisarius walked with a proud humility 41 The Story of Constantinople from his own house to the Hippodrome, and thence from his own tent to the imperial throne. The rich spoils that were spread out were the treasures of all the years of Vandal conquest, and among them some of the vessels that Titus had brought from the temple at Jeru salem and Generic the Vandal conqueror had taken from Rome. These Justinian gave to churches in the Holy City. As the captives were led up to the im- TIIK GOLDEN GATE perial throne all eyes were fixed on the Vandal chief, Gelimer, wearing the purple, as in mockery, with his kindred about him, " himself the tallest and most beautiful of the Vandals." As he walked up to the throne he looked up, and uttering no lament for his fallen state, said with the poet's simple feeling, " Vanity of vanities." They stripped him of his robe and made him fall on his face before the Emperor. Beside him knelt his conqueror, and supplicated for his pardon, and the day was crowned by generosity such as the Emperor loved to show and the people to applaud. Such scenes became familiar to the people as the 42 The Ancient City years of victory rolled on. They saw, too, Belisarius, drawn through the streets in his chariot by the captives of his wars, when he received the dignity of Patrician. The empire of Justinian, based upon the old laws which he collected and enlarged, cherishing the traditions of old Rome, was eager to revive every glory of former days. " And then," says Procopius, who himself the bitterest of satirists of the present, looked not unkindly on the past, " men saw things long forgotten thus renewed by time." But the picture, brilliant though it was, was not unclouded. The city of the Caesars was again and again threatened by barbarians and struck by the visitation of God. In 542 Constantinople was devastated by a terrible pestilence, the bubonic plague, that has lost none of its terrors in fifteen hundred years. For four months it raged, and at its height Procopius declares that as many as ten thousand perished in a day. It spared no constitution and no age, and God alone could be the cause of it. Justinian, who was one of the few who recovered, was assiduous in charitable aid ; but the loss to the city could hardly be conceived — no trades, no shops, says the recorder of many horrors, remained, and " many for fear leaving their bad courses, consecrated themselves to God, and many when the danger was passed fell to their old despising of God again." After plagues came famines and earthquakes, and in the last year of the reign, the dread army of the Huns, under Zabergan, drew nigh even to the walls of Constantinople, murdering and ravaging as they came. Hastily the treasures of the church northwards of the city were brought for safety within the walls, and Belisarius in old age again came forward to save the empire. It was his last victory, and seven years later he passed away, honoured and beloved. The Emperor himself died but a few weeks later in Nov- 43 The Story of Constantinople ember 565. The glories of the reign had passed away before the aged ruler laid down his power ; but he left a reconquered Empire and a capital that was the wonder of the world. He left too a memory as a theologian, which the church for some centuries continued specially to honour in her most solemn service. Justinian, the legislator, the builder and the organizer of victory, seemed to the vision of Dante to dwell like the sun in perpetual light. SI come'l sol, che si cela egli stessi Per troppa luce, quando il caldo ha rose Le temperanze de' vapori spessi ; Per piu letizia si mi si nascose Dento al suo raggio la figura santa. To this aspect of his life we can give here but little attention ; but it is not to be doubted that it was as a theologian that the men of his Constantinople heard most of their ruler's doings. Far into the dark hours, says the chronicler of his reign, he sat writing the theological treatises which expressed the teaching of the Church ; night after night he would study in his library the writings of the Fathers, and the Sacred Scriptures, with some learned prelates or monks at hand, that he might discuss with them the questions as they rose before his mind. From the time of his predecessor he had been engaged in corresponding with Popes on theological points, and when he became sole ruler he determined once for all to settle the side issues which depended on the great Monophysite contest. Edict after edict, letter after letter, treatises closely argued and tightly packed with patristic and scriptural learning, and even hymns, showed the restless activity of the imperial theologian. When in 535 Anthemius of Trebizond was made Patriarch of Constantinople, and when Pope Agapetus came on a mission from the 44 The Ancient City Gothic King Theodahad, the discussion of articles of the faith brought the deposition of the patriarch as a monophysite, and the succession of Mennas, head of the hospice of Samson. Then came the conflic'. with the Origenists, which led indirectly to the controversy of " the Three Chapters " and the session of the Fifth General Council. Of this it were here a weariness to tell. Let it suffice to say that on May 5, 553, the Council met in the southern gallery of the great Church of the Divine Wisdom. The Pope himself was at Constantinople but he would not attend the sessions. He was lodged at first in the royal palace of Placidia at the eastern end of the promontory, beyond S. Irene, looking over the sea to Asia and the churches of Chalcedon. Then he fled by night to cross the Bos phorus and took refuge in the Church of S. Euphemia at Chalcedon where a hundred years before the council had sat. Embassies crossed and recrossed the sea ; even the great general Belisarius was an envoy, but Vigilius, when the Council met, refused ic join it, to speak, or to vote : and the Council made short work of the foolish, bombastic, hesitating pontiff. It con demned those who refused to receive its decisions and struck Vigilius out of the diptychs on which were in scribed the names of those prayed for at the Eucharist. But if there was no Roman patriarch present, there was the new patriarch of Constantinople, Eutychius, and the patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch, while he of Jerusalem sent proxies. To the decisions of the council a hundred and sixty-four signatures were affixed. Theologians still contest as to whether it was a free and open council ; but it was accepted beyond question, though after some years, by the whole Church. It did its work : it safeguarded the Catholic faith by stripping bare the meaning of statements which in directly attacked the Divine and Human Natures of the 45 The Story of Constantinople Incarnate Son. It condemned these subtle suggestions, and it preserved to the Church the real Christ of Whom she had learned. These theological questions stand out, it may seem to some to-day, too boldly in the history of the New Rome : but they know little of the capital of the East who do not know how close to its life lie these matters of dogma and definition. The very tradesmen at their work talked of them, as they talked in the time of Gregory ; and there was nothing which the crowds who thronged the markets and the basilicas in the days of Justinian more readily or more constantly discussed. Constantinople in these first centuries of her life had the theological interest closest to her heart ; as the years went on the needs of defence brought the military interest to the top. The city in Justinian's days was rich and full of bread. All the glory of the world seemed there to be gathered together, and with it the vice, which stern laws and the charitable institutions, founded by the imperial sovereigns, endeavoured as best they could to conquer or to heal. The thronged markets sold every kind of goods, for commerce or luxury. The monks who brought the silkworm from China to the Emperor's court enabled him to found an industry which added greatly to resources of his empire and the prosperity of his people. The mosaics, which glittered on the walls of the churches, were made by skilled artists in the city itself — carved work, images (the icons which the Greek Church has never ceased to love), jewellery, beautifully wrought, were among the manufactures of the great trading centre of the East ; and the military engines for which the Eastern army was renowned were made within the walls of the capital itself. The pages of Procopius and Agathias, of Lydus and John of Ephesus, show a busy hurrying life, elaborate adminis- 46 The Medieval City trative arrangements, official classes greedy and exclu sive, popular agitations hasty and fickle, an accumu lating luxury with all its accompaniments of oppression, avarice, and vulgar show. The millionaires of the sixth century, with their gout, their costly equipages, and their summer palaces on the Bosphorus or at Chalcedon, were a prominent feature in the life of the great city. Beside them were the dusky traders from the far East, the hordes of bearded monks ever ready to join in the logical squabbles or take part in popular riots, and the silent barbarian soldiers, opening wondering eyes on the disputes and the splendours of the imperial city, and prompt at the word of command to dethrone emperors or massacre their foes. In such a city it would have been strange if there were order or peace ; and indeed the constant complaint of the chroniclers is of nobles, clerics and artizans, whom it was impossible to restrain. Yet amid this scene of confusion at any moment the imperial power might show itself with arbritrary and brutal abruptness. When a servant maid by mischance spat on the robe of the dead Empress Eudocia as it was carried to the tomb she was executed immediately and without protest. 3. From Justin II. to the Latin Conquest. In 565 Justinian died, and the glory of his reign set in a dull glow that heralded storms. Justin II., his nephew, was a tyrant and a madman, but it was power which brought out his tyranny and his madness. When he came to the throne he spoke mildly and well. He made professions and promises in public places, before the masses of the population. They were strange scenes, such as the people of Byzantium often saw, and strangest of all to our minds is that which shows the citizens in the place of public 47 T"he Story of Constantinople games clamouring before the imperial throne for the payment of the debts of Justinian. Constantinople is still the same. Even when it looks cowed, it has still its impudence and its deter mination to criticise. Justin's doings were watched and mocked at, as if he had been the humblest trades man, by the city jesters. He built a golden chamber in the palace by the sea : he set up a pillar to record his virtues, and then some one affixed a tablet on it : Build, build aloft thy pillar, And raise it vast and high ; Then mount and stand upon it, Soar proudly in the sky ; East, south and north, and westward, Wherever thou shalt gaze, Nought shalt thou see but ruins, The work of thine own days. Meanwhile the barbarians were coming nearer to the Empire. The Avars demanded tribute, and the Turks, a name that was so soon to be a familiar terror, sent envoys to the Caesar's court. The enemies, it might seem, were already closing in when Justin became a lunatic, bursting into mad fits of rage, and drawn about the palace in a toy cart, while the " whole senate and city " knew of the sad fate of their Emperor. Sophia, his wife, had all the masterful genius of her aunt Theodora. It was she who gave the rule to Tiberius II., under whom the empire steadily de cayed. Maurice, his successor, was a severe ruler, whom the people learned to hate. When at last his reign ended in a revolution and a flight, it was the people of Constantinople, the demes and the factions of the Circus, who gave him to death, and placed the imperial crown on the head of Phocas, his successor. While Constantinople thus dethroned and set up the civil rulers of the Empire, it was claiming for its 48 The Mediaeval City patriarch the highest position in the Church. When at die beginning of the sixth century the patriarch John had signed the formula drawn up by Pope Hormisdas, he repudiated any claim to superiority on the part of the old Rome : the two cities and the two Sees he declared were one. As early as 5 1 8 the patriarch of Constantinople called himself " universal bishop": in 595 the great Pope Gregory, who had himself, as a papal envoy, seen the greatness of the Eastern See, vigorously protested, to the Emperor Maurice, against the assumption to the title. But while the patriarchs used the title in no exclusive sense, they were determined, as they are determined to-day, to assert the independence of their See and its equality with that of Rome. Ecclesiastical independence did not preserve the Empire from political weakness. Phocas was soon seen to be worse than Maurice, and one conspiracy after another was begun in the Hippodrome and ended by a massacre in the streets. The Green faction in the Circus called the Emperor a drunkard and a madman to his face. Famine and pestilence ravaged the crowded city, and when Heraclius, already a re nowned general, brought his fleet up the Hellespont and anchored at the Golden Horn the collapse of the power of Phocas was immediate, and a new Emperor was crowned in the church of S. Philip within the palace. The reign of Heraclius, gallant man though he was, began in almost unbroken disaster, and when in 615 Jerusalem fell into the hands of the Persians it seemed that the end was at hand. In the next year, as had already happened under Phocas, a Persian army encamped at Chalcedon. When negotiations were in vain, when Heraclius had even formed the idea of transferring the seat of Empire from Constan tinople to Carthage, and had only abandoned it after , " 49 The Story of Constantinople his preparations were far advanced, when the terror and indignation of the people forced him to take oath before the patriarch in S. Sophia that he would never leave "the Queen of Cities," at length the courage of the empire awoke, the nobles sacrificed their wealth and the churches their treasures, the fleet utterly de stroyed that of the Persians, and Heraclius delivered the city and the empire by a march as brilliant as it was daring. Leading five thousand veterans across Asia Minor and through the mountains he " penetrated into the heart of Persia and recalled the armies of the great king to the defence of their bleeding country." After three campaigns he returned in triumph and entered, as no Emperor since Theodosius the Great had done, by the Golden Gate. In his absence thirty thousand Avars, who had swept over the Balkan provinces like a devouring flame, broke through the great wall and encamped under the very walls of the city itself. Churches in the suburbs were burnt to the ground and the famous Church of the Theotokos in Blachernae was on the point of being destroyed, when some panic caused the Avar horsemen to retire. The danger was too obvious for the warning to be neglected, and the Senate, which had refused with contumely the offers of the barbarian leaders, allies of the Persian King, drove back the enemy and immediately increased the fortifications by a new wall. This splendid barrier, magnificent to-day in its ruins, stretched from the enclosure outside the palace of Blachernae, at the foot of the sixth hill, to the Golden Horn. It is flanked by three hexagonal towers. A year later, in 627, the Emperor, who dreaded even the sight of the sea, crossed the Bosphorus by a bridge of boats, decked with branches of trees to imitate a forest. Landing north of the city he marched S° The Mediaval City inland and crossed the valley at the head of the Golden Horn — below the " Sweet Waters of Europe "¦ — by a bridge made by Justinian nearly opposite the end of the walls. So along the triumphal way he went, past the new walls that have ever since borne his name, and entered by the Golden Gate, the Emperor who had vanquished the Persians, saved his empire, and brought back the greatest of all relics, the sacred wood of the true Cross, which S. Helena, the mother of Constan tine, had found near Calvary. But Heraclius was not to triumph unchecked. The fatal temptation of theological strife conquered even the conqueror of the Persians, and the beginning of the Monothelite controversy dates from the Ekthesis of Sergius the patriarch, a document which, if it were intended to make peace, certainly provoked war, that was not ended, though its area was defined, by the decision of the Sixth General Council, which met at Constantinople in 680, and condemned those who denied that Christ had two wills, human and divine. The dreary years of the latter half of the seventh century may be rapidly summarised. Constantinople saw the settlement of barbarians, Slaves and Bulgars, almost at its gates. Emperor succeeded emperor with out anyone appearing who was worthy to be the heir of Heraclius. At length in 672 the Saracens, who had long devastated Asia, brought a fleet up the Helles pont and besieged the city. Their total defeat by Constantine IV., whom his people nicknamed Pogo- natus (the bearded), was the greatest triumph of the Christian powers against the infidel ; it was won, it is said, by the newly-discovered " Greek fire," so long to be the terror of the foes of the Empire. Con stantinople proved herself the bulwark of Europe against the infidel. The nations of the West sent their envoys to applaud. Six hundred years later another Constantine S1 The Story of Constantinople was to fall, when his city was at length captured by the followers of Mohammed. Justinian II., the son of Constantine Pogonatus, was a great builder like his namesake, whom probably he sought to imitate ; but in character he was far from resembling the builder of S. Sophia. In the inimitable phrases of Gibbon, " The name of a triumphant law giver was dishonoured by the vices of a boy. . . . His passions were strong ; his understanding was feeble ; and he was intoxicated with a foolish pride that his birth had given him the command of millions, of whom the smallest community would not have chosen him for their local magistrate. His favourite ministers were two beings the least susceptible of human sym pathy, an eunuch and a monk ; to the one he abandoned a palace, to the other the finances ; the former cor rected the Emperor's mother with a scourge, the latter suspended the insolvent tributaries, with their heads downwards, over a slow and smoky fire. Since the days of Commodus and Caracalla, the cruelty of the Roman princes had most commonly been the effect of their fear ; but Justinian, who possessed some vigour of character, enjoyed the sufferings and braved the revenge of his subjects about ten years, till the measure was full of his crimes and of their patience." The attempt to banish a popular general whom he had long imprisoned was the occasion of a revolt which ca6t the Emperor from the throne ; and the hippo drome saw again an act of tragic vengeance, when the tongue and nose of the fallen Caesar were slit in the presence of the people who had borne with him too long. Let Professor Bury's summary continue the tale : — "Thetwenty years which intervened between the banish ment of Justinian in 695 and the accession of Leo the Isaurian in 7 1 7 witnessed a rapid succession of monarchs, 52 53 The Mediaeval City all of whom were violently deposed. Isaurian Leon- tius was succeeded by Apsimar, who adopted the name Tiberius, and these two reigns occupied the first ten years. Then Justinian returned from exile, recovered the throne, and 'furiously raged' for six years (705- 711). He was overthrown by Bardanes, who called himself Philippicus ; then came Artemius, whose im perial name was Anastasius ; ' and finally the years 716 and 7 1 7 saw the fall of Anastasius, the reign and fall of Theodosius, and the accession of Isaurian Leo, whose strong arm guided the Empire from ways of anarchy into a new path." 2 In the tragedies of these years Constantinople bore its full share, and no more strange contrast to the scene of his barbarous mutilation could be imagined than that when Justinian II. sat again, ten years later (705) in the hippodrome, with his feet on the necks of the two mooarchs who had filled his throne in the mean time. As the fickle people saw the " slit-nose," as they called him, triumphant over Leontius and Ap simar they called out in the words of the psalms, which came so readily to their lips, " Thou ha6t trodden upon the lion and the asp : the young lion and the dragon hast thou trodden under thy feet." Six years later (711) there was a more terrible tragedy. Justinian was justly dethroned and slain, and his little boy Tiberius, the child of his exile, was torn from the church of the Theotokos at Blachernae and cruelly butchered outside the palace wall. The next years were stained by crimes and follies hardly less revolting than those that had gone before ; there could be no more bitter irony than the single word which the humble tax-gatherer, who was elevated against his will to the imperial throne under the name of Theodosius III., inscribed upon his tomb — uyhia. — 1 Later Roman Empire, ii. 352. 55 The Story of Constantinople health was to be found nowhere for the empire in his day. His successor, Leo the Isaurian, whom the Senate and the patriarch of Constantinople chose in 718 to be their lord, had seen an adventurous life, and was already the general and imperator of the great eastern army. His first task was to defend the city against the Saracens. The great siege of 718, lasting twelve months, failed chiefly through his skill and patience. The invaders encamped before the city in August 717; the name of their Suleiman was one which was later to be very familiar to the Byzantines. When winter came it was one of those bitter seasons to which Con stantinople is often subject. For many weeks snow lay on the ground, and the besiegers suffered far more than the garrison. Leo defended the city with extra ordinary skill, and at length, at the right moment, by a well planned sortie he scattered the infidels, and of the great host of a hundred and eighty thousand men the Mohammedan historians say that only thirty thousand escaped back to the East. No greater feat was ever performed by the great empire, the bulwark of Christendom, than this heroic defence and splendid repulse. It was not wholly the work of Leo, for the Bul garians came from the north to his aid, and a pestilence, even before the storms of the Dardanelles destroyed their fleet, caused the withdrawal of the Saracen host. Then as an administrator he reformed the government, as a legist he reissued and revised the laws. The great earthquake of 739 caused the institution of a new tax, if not a new financial system. " Some of the oldest monuments in die city were thrown down by the shock, the statue of Constantine the Great, at the gate of Attalus ; the statue and 56 The Mediaeval City sculptured column of Arcadius ; the statue of Theo dosius I., over the Golden Gate, and the church of Irene, close to S. Sophia. The land walls of the city were also subverted ; and in order to repair the fortifications Leo increased the taxes by one-twelfth, or a miliarision in a nomisma." Thus Professor Bury.1 But to such acts, important though they were, Leo the Isaurian does not owe the fact that his name will never be forgotten in the history of the Empire which he ruled. It was he who began the attack upon the ancient custom of the Eastern churches which gave rise to the long and bitter icono- • clastic controversy. It were idle for a Western accustomed to the severity and restraint of English worship to pretend to judge without partiality the conflict which arose in the eighth century among the Easterns. To Englishmen it comes with a shock of surprise to learn that they are regarded as Romanists, as has recently happened, because they do not use incense in every public service of the Church, accord ing to the ancient usage of the East. Similarly it is with diffidence that we learn to recognise the reverence paid to icons, pictures of sacred things, as a true and helpful part of Oriental devotion. It tends, we think, to superstition ; as much perhaps as our grandfathers' pride in the black gown of the preacher, or the curious customs which led in England to the " plethoric Sunday afternoon." Leo the Isaurian, and after him his son, Constantine V. (nicknamed Copronymus by his people, probably "from his devotion to the stables"), of whom the latter certainly had no sense of the reality of religion, embarked on an ill-omened attempt to purge from the Church, and to destroy in the sacred buildings themselves, all the brilliant pictures and mosaics which commemorated the saints and received 1 Vol. ii., p. 423. S7 The Story of Constantinople the homage, bordering no doubt on superstition, of the faithful. They objected that it was a sin to represent Christ in art at all ; and that the representation of His Mother tended to the exaltation of her name into that of a Divinity. " Apostles of rationalism " these Emperors have strangely been called, who fought against an ineradicable passion of their people. As dear to the hearts of the Greek Christians as their subtle questionings into the deep meanings of divine things, their determination to be satisfied with nothing less than a precise and logical definition of the faith once for all given to the saints, was their craving for outward and visible signs to represent the gifts of God at once in the Divine Life and in the lives of the saintly followers of the Lord, and their own reverence and consecration of all that was beautiful in the work of man. The force of Mohammedanism had lain in its austere rejection of any outward image of Divine things ; heretics, Judaising or Monophysite, had from time to time taken up the cry against these innocent representations of the saints. If the " worship " of images tended to obscure the spiritual truth of religion, the destruction of all visible memorials of the saints, emblems of the divine attributes, or representations of the passion of Christ, was even more certain to tell against the real belief of a race at once ignorant and dramatic, to whom the eye was the constant teacher of the mind. However strange and unedifying the rever ence paid to icons may seem to the modern Western mind, it is but the shallowest ignorance which would call it idolatry, and it is plain that any hasty attempt to interfere with the popular expression of religious ideas must tend, if hastily and unskilfully conducted, to impair the faith of the people itself. Led by men who were believed by the enthusiastic and conservative Byzantines to be influenced by Monophysites, Jews 58 The Mediaeval City and Mohammedans, it was certain to provoke a desper ate resistance, and that the more widespread because the issue was not an intricate matter of scholastic teaching, but a plain issue of practice in which every day passions were deeply concerned. In 726, almost, it would seem, without warning, the Emperor Leo issued an edict that all images in churches should be utterly abolished. The patriarch, rather than consent to the action, resigned his office. The story of what followed may be given in the words of Mr Tozer.1 "The work of destruction now commenced in earnest; the statues were everywhere removed, and the pictures on the walls were whitewashed over, and though numerous outbreaks occurred, and some executions took place before it was accomplished, yet on the whole the opposition was not formidable. The act which caused the greatest indignation was the removal of the magnificent image of Christ which surmounted the bronze gateway of the imperial palace, and was the object of great reverence. In order to take down this statue and burn it, a soldier of the guard had mounted a ladder, when a number of women assembled at the spot to beg that it might be spared ; but, instead of listening to them, the soldier struck his axe into the face of the image. Infuriated by this, which appeared to them to be an insult offered to the Saviour Himself, they dragged the ladder from under his feet and killed him. The Emperor avenged his agent by executing some, and exiling others, of the offenders, and set up in the place of the statue a plain cross, with an inscription explaining the significance of the change. " In the defence of images there stood forth two champions, the one in the West, the other in the East ; and the points of view from which they * The Church and the Eastern Empire, pp. 106-108. 59 The Story of Constantinople respectively regarded them illustrate the different feelings of the two churches on the subject. The former of these was Pope Gregory II., who at first strongly remonstrated with the Emperor on his edict, and afterwards, when he endeavoured to enforce its observance in Italy, encouraged his people to disregard the order, and defied his nominal sovereign in violent and even insulting language. At last he excommuni cated his nominee, the patriarch Anastasius. But he advocated the retention of images on the practical ground of their utility in instructing the young and ignorant, and as being an incentive to devotion. Far more exalted and more subtly defined was the position attributed to them by the other advocate, who spoke from the distant East. This was John of Damascus, otheiwise known as S. John Damascene, the last of the Fathers of the Greek Church. This learned and acute theologian, who in many ways was superior to the age in which he lived, at one time filled a civil post of some importance under the Caliphs, who now ruled in Syria, but afterwards retired to the monastery of S. Saba, in the wilderness of Engedi, the strange position of which, overhanging a deep gorge that leads down to the Dead Sea, is still the wonder of the traveller. As he lived in the dominion of the Sara cens he was beyond the reach of the Emperor's arm, and now undertook the cause of his suffering co religionists. In three powerful addresses he set forth his arguments for image worship. Some of them follow the familiar lines of defence, that these objects were memorials of the mysteries of the faith ; and that in the adoration of them the spiritual was reached through the medium of the material. But beyond this he made it plain that, to his mind, and the minds of those who thought with him, the worship of images was closely connected with the doctrine of the Incar- 60 The Mediaeval City nation, the earthly material having been once for all sanctified when the Son of God took human flesh, and being thenceforth worthy of all honour. From this we may learn both how it came to pass that the most religious men of the age became enthusiasts for what was in itself superstitious, and also what was the cardinal point of difference between them and their opponents. For, while the one side regarded figures of Christ as a degradation of a heavenly being, to the other they were a practical confession of His true humanity, and any disregard of them appeared in the light of a denial of the Incarnation. At last, when it was found that the Emperor persevered in his attack, the iconoclasts were anathematised by the orthodox congregations in all the Mahometan countries outside the Empire. Both John and Gregory protested throughout against the interference of the State with the Church in this matter as being beyond its pro vince ; and, owing to the close connection which existed between the clergy and the people, they were generally regarded as the assertors of liberty and of the right of private judgment in opposition to despotism." The indirect effects of Leo's action were even more important than the obvious ones. The division which ensued between Italy, resisting iconoclasm under the Pope's authority, and the imperial power made the Emperor decide to transfer to the patriarch of Con stantinople the jurisdiction over Sicily and Calabria, leaving to the Pope that over the exarchate of Ravenna which still nominally obeyed the Caesar. The meaning of this is thus expressed by Professor Bury. " The effect of this act of Leo, which went far to decide the mediaeval history of Southern Italy, was to bring the boundary between the ecclesiastical 61 The Story of Constantinople dominions of New Rome and Old Rome into co incidence with the boundary between the Greek and the Latin nationalities. In other words, it laid the basis of the distinction between the Greek and the Latin Churches. The only part of the Empire in which the Pope now possessed authority was the exarchate, including Rome, Ravenna and Venice. The geographical position of Naples, intermediate between Rome and the extremities of Italy, deter mined that its sympathies should be drawn in two directions ; in religious matters it inclined towards Old Rome, in political matters it was tenacious of its loyalty to New Rome." x But this was not all. An immigration of persecuted monks and priests as well as lay folk, begun long before, practically recolonised much of Southern Italy. Constantine Copronymus was far more eager than his father to push the iconoclastic campaign. In 761 he began a deliberate and bitter persecution of those who opposed him. Already, under Leo the Isaurian, the virgin Theodosia had been martyred. Her festival is still kept on May 29, and the church raised to her memory still stands transformed into a mosque just within the Aya Kapou, on the Golden Horn. Many whom the Greek Church still com memorates were now slain and others tortured. Con stantine was equally hostile to monks, and he was as bitter against his creatures whom he suspected as against those who openly disputed his will. The patriarch whom he had set up fell into disgrace in spite of his support of iconoclasm. He was degraded in S. Sophia, carried round the Hippodrome sitting backwards on an ass, and at last beheaded as a traitor. The successor of Constantine, Leo IV., was signifi cant only in that he followed his policy of persecution. 1 Vol. ii., p. 446. 62 The Mediaeval City He left the crown in 780 to his son Constantine and his widow Irene. Conspiracies, real or alleged, of his brothers were bitterly punished. The Empress Irene was satisfied so long as her son was still a boy to allow him a nominal share in the government ; but when he grew up and showed an independent spirit, she used the growing unpopularity which came upon him after his repudiation of his wife to raise a party against him, and hired troops to take his life. He escaped death only to lose his eyes, and his wicked mother, surrounded by degraded favourites, reigned alone. It was she whom the great Teutonic King Charles was ready to wed, and the failure of the negotiations led, with other more notable causes, to the creation of the new empire of the West, so long held by German Cassars, but professing still to be — as that of Con stantinople historically was — the heir of the ancient empire of the Roman world. Wicked as Irene was, it was given to her to restore peace to the Church, and to reunite though only for a time the Catholic Church throughout the world. So completely was the popular feeling against the icono clasts that it needed little of the intrigue or violence which Irene was so ready to use to secure the result she desired. In 786, when her worst passions had not been revealed and she still lived in union with her son, the seventh General Council met at Nicaea. It was attended by representatives from Italy as well as from the East, and as its decisions represent the use and teaching of the Eastern Church to-day, they may here be summarised. "At the seventh sitting (5th or 6th October), the definition (opog) of doctrine was drawn up ; after a summary repetition of the chief points of theology established by previous Universal Councils, it is laid down that the figure of the holy cross and holy images, whether coloured or plain, whether consisting of 63 The Story of Constantinople stone or of any other material, may be represented on vessels, garment, walls or tables, in houses or on public roads ; especially figures of Christ, the Virgin, angels, or holy men : such representations, it is observed, stimulate spectators to think of the originals, and, while they must not be adored with that worship which is only for God (karpiiu'j, deserve adoration {jirpoeyt-is^tsii)." 1 More strictly, the Council decreed that icons were to be used and adored like the cross and the gospels. But Irene's services to the Church were not allowed then, any more than we should allow them now, to pre serve her in power. The stars in their courses seemed to the superstitious to fight against her, and, though she held the crown she had so ill-won for five year6, the end came at last by the treachery of those she had raised to highest place. " For five years," says Gibbon, " the Roman world bowed to the government of a female ; and, as she moved through the streets of Constantinople, the reins of four milk-white steeds were held by as many patricians, who marched on foot before the golden chariot of their queen." But among the patricians whom she had chosen was the treasurer Nicephorus, who on October 31, 802, having captured his benefactress, and with some spark of generosity, undestroyed by his ambition and his avarice, sent her to banishment rather than to death, ascended the throne of the Caesars. With him began a new dynasty, a new century, and in some ways a new era for the imperial city. During the eighth century Constantinople, as a city, underwent a great change. This was not merely due to the incessant ebb and flow of population, the coming and going of different detachments of the imperial army, the founding of new monasteries by men from all parts of the Christian world, the opening of new commercial establishments, the coming of new trading embassies, 1 Bury, vol. ii., pp. 497-438. 64 The Mediaeval City but to one great and irremediable disaster. From 745 to 747 the city was devastated by the plague, that bubonic distemper, so familiar already but now more terribly destructive than ever before. The words of Theophanes, who lived when the remembrance of it was still fresh, though they have been often quoted, may be quoted again. They stand side by side with the modern records of the still powerful pestilence. "And in the spring of the first indiction (747) the pestilence spread to a greater extent, and in summer its flame culminated to such a height that whole houses were entirely shut up, and those on whom the office devolved could not bury their dead. In the embarrass ment of the circumstances, the plan was conceived of carrying out the dead on saddled animals, on whose backs were placed frameworks of planks. In the same way they placed the corpses above one another in waggons. And when all the burying-grounds in the city and suburbs had been filled, and also the dry cisterns and tanks, and very many vineyards had been dug up, the gardens too within the old walls were used for the purpose of burying human bodies, and even thus the need was hardly met." The effect of the great loss of life which ensued was felt at once. At the very time when multitudes were seeking refuge in Italy from the iconoclastic persecution, came this new depopulation, and Constantine found himself obliged to encourage, and even enforce, immi gration from every part of his dominions. Chiefly he brought Greeks from the mainland, and their places were filled by Slaves from the North. Greece and the Balkan States as they appear to-day, and even to some degree Constantinople itself took a new and marked departure in the middle of the eighth century. Constantinople received a new Greek population and, while its official classes still preserved the pomp and e 65 The Story of Constantinople dignity of Roman traditions, began to feel itself more than ever Greek. None the less it was still actively and obviously cosmopolitan. Scholars from all parts of the world came to the university where ancient classics were still read and where Greek was still a living tongue. Constantine actually made Nicetas, a man of Slavonic race, patriarch, and it is said that his clergy mocked at his pronunciation of the Greek of the Gospel. Armenians had already become almost as prominent in the city as they are to-day ; at the beginning of the ninth century one of them actually became Emperor. As early as the reign of Justin II. a large colony of traders from Central Asia was estab lished in the city. When communication became easier and the power of the Roman State, reviving under Heraclius, more wide spread, the riches of the city increased. It is noted that the influence of the Church was steadily directed against luxury, and that nothing at all like the scenes described by Juvenal or Petronius marked the Byzantium of the days of the iconoclasts. Constantine himself was a man who lived freely, and the monks whom he attacked commented severely on his life. But the rich men of Constantinople, as a rule, though they delighted in the outward adorning of gold and precious stones, and loved entertainments, the circus and excursions on the Bosphorus, lived on the whole simply. Though the churches, as well as the houses, glittered with mosaics and gems, the asceticism which the many monasteries kept always visibly before the eyes of the people, had its influence among the rich as well as the poor. Rich though the imperial city was it was rich most of all in its churches and its relics. And indeed the constant danger from without, and the pressing needs of a large population, both gave employ ment to great numbers and gave to the government always some practical work which kept up the taxes. 66 The Mediaeval City The laws, it has been observed, recognised the duty of the State to provide work for the people, and to see that they did it. Idleness was regarded as a crime as well as a sin : the State declared that for this reason it must actively discourage it, and no less because " it is unfair that strong men should live by the consumption of the superfluity of the labour of others, because that superfluity is owed to the weak." It is noted also that " besides the inevit able staff of public work men, who, in a city like Byzantium, where fires were frequent and earth quakes not uncommon, had much to do beyond the repairs necessitated by the wear and tear of time, the State also supported multitudes of bakers " — for the State still followed the Roman rule and provided the poor with bread as well as public games — " and we are taught that the gardens, to which we sometimes meet casual refer ences in the historians, were not the property of private citizens, but were parks for the people, kept up at the State's expense." Already we see that some of the features most prominent in the city to-day belonged to it in the early Middle Age. The great Dome of S. Sophia glittered upon the wayfarer as he sailed up towards the mouth of the Golden Horn, and the city as the soldier looked at it from the tower of Heraclius was a city set in bowers 67 THE ACQUEDUCT OF VALF.NS The Story of Constantinople of perpetual green. Another feature as prominent, which the foreigner sees from the heights of Pera, owes its preservation to Constantine Copronymus. The aqueduct of Valens had been destroyed by the Avars in the reign of Heraclius, Constantine brought thousands of workmen together and repaired it, and the water flowed as of old into the capacious cisterns which were the work of the greatest of eastern architects. The ninth century began with the new and short lived dynasty of Nicephorus. " His character," says Gibbon, " was stained with the three odious vices of hypocrisy, ingratitude and avarice ; his want of virtue was not redeemed by any superior talents nor his want of talents by any pleasing qualifications." The his torians, being ecclesiastics, resented his attempt to assert the most extreme claims of the iconoclastic emperors to rule the Church, and the people despised him for his treachery and his failures in war. He fell in 8 1 1 in battle against the Bulgarians. In six months his son, Stauracius, followed him to the tomb. Michael Rhangabe, who had married Procopia, the daughter of Nicephorus, then reigned for two years, but his weak ness caused his deposition, and the people of Con stantinople found a new sovereign, Leo the Armenian, forced upon them by the army. During his reign the imperial city was again besieged. Hadrianople was lost, and but for the death of the Bulgarian king it seems unlikely that Leo would have been able to drive back the forces which overran the peninsula. Yet Leo, conqueror though he was, was able to hold the crown but little longer than his predecessors. In 820 a conspiracy of his generals, which his own generosity had made possible, attacked him as he sang matins on Christmas Day, and slew him at the foot of the altar in the chapel. He did not reign without leaving a memorial of his rule which lasts to this day. The wall of 68 The Mediaeval City Heraclius was not thought fully to defend the quarter of Blachernae. Leo determined to build another wall and dig a broad moat in front of the Heraclian wall. " The wall of Leo," says Professor Van Millingen, " stands 77 feet to the west of the wall of Heraclius, running parallel to it for some 260 feet, after which it turns to join the walls along the Golden Horn." It is a strong fortification, and the number of attacks after wards delivered on diat quarter show how necessary it was that it should be strong. " Its parapet-walk was supported upon arches, which served at the same time to buttress the wall itself, a comparatively slight struc ture about 8 feet thick. With a view of increasing the wall's capacity for defence, it was flanked by four small towers, while its lower portion was pierced by numerous loopholes. Two of the towers were on the side facing the Golden Horn, and the other two guarded the extremities of the side looking towards the country on the west. The latter towers projected inwards from the rear of the wall, and between them was a gateway corresponding to the Heraclian gate of Blachernae." 1 Michael II., called the Stammerer, who was then brought from the dungeon to the throne, and on whose legs, — such was the haste of the revolution, — the fetters actually remained for some hours after he was Emperor, was twice besieged in Constantinople by a rival general, but was relieved by the Bulgarians, and showed to the captured leader, Thomas the Slavonian, none of the mercy that had been shown to himself. He died in 829, and his son Theophilus reigned in his stead. Of his character and reign the most contradictory reports are given ; but it is interesting to recall the scene of his choice of a wife, as Theophanes tells it. He deter mined to choose a bride from among the beauties of 1 Van Millingen, p. 168. 69 The Story of Constantinople Constantinople, and when they were assembled he walked between two lines of lovely damsels. When he came to the poetess Kasia, he addressed her in Sia ywcuicbs elffeppvr) t& rpavXa. She replied, more happily, aX\a Kal 5id yvvaiKbs rd. Kpt'nTova Trijy&fet. It was in the style of the old Greek poets : the leaders of each semichorus championing the cause of their sex in the immortal question : " Through woman evil things entered " ; " but also through woman better things well forth." The lady was too witty to be empress, and Theodora, who was chosen instead, be came not only a happy wife but a wise regent after the death of Theophilus. He died in 842, and Theodora was regent for her son Michael till 856. Her hus band had been Iconoclast, and he scourged those who would not receive his edict. His widow declared that he had repented on his death-bed, and procured his absolution after death. Before the year of his death was out Theodora had replaced the images and a synod had reiterated the right and benefit of image- " worship." But the independence of the Eastern Church was none the less fully secured ; and the indignant protests of Popes showed that they were be coming, as their own pretensions grew, more and more estranged from Constantinople. The wisdom of the mother was not rewarded in the life of her son. Michael III. was perhaps the most contemptible sovereign who ever sat on the imperial throne of the East. He gave himself up to pleasure and in particular to the Circus. He was a drunkard and buffoon, and he delighted to mock in public processions the most sacred ordinances of the 70 The Mediaeval City Christian religion. In 867 he was murdered by one whom he had raised almost to the purple. The years of his reign were diversified by sieges — notably the first attack of some hitherto unknown barbarians from die North-East. Between the ninth and the eleventh centuries Con stantinople was attacked four times by the Russians. The traders told of the riches of the city, and the barbarians were eager to carry them away. In June 860 they actually anchored in the Bosphorus and attacked the walls, but the return of Michael III. drove them off, and they were afterwards completely defeated. A second attempt is said to have taken place in 907, when the rough barks of the pirates were drawn over the isthmus; a third in 941 was as completely defeated ; and again in 1048 the Greek fire proved effective. But these later sieges were still in the far future when Michael, with the aid, men said, of the Blessed Virgin of the Blachernae, scattered the invaders, and passed again into the seclusion of his corrupt court, from whose recesses no news but that of murders and debaucheries seems ever to have penetrated without. "The state of society at the Court of Constantinople," says Finlay, " was not amenable to public opinion, for few knew much of what passed within the walls of the great palace ; but yet the immense machinery of the imperial administration gave the Emperor's power a solid basis, always opposed to the temporary vices of the courtiers. The order which rendered property secure, and enabled the industrious classes to prosper, through the equitable administration of the Roman law, nourished the vitality of the Empire, when the madness of a Nero and the drunkenness of a Michael appeared to threaten political order with ruin. The people, carefully secluded from public business, and almost 7" The Story of Constantinople without any knowledge of the proceedings of their government, were in all probability little better ac quainted with the intrigues and crimes of their day than we are at present. They acted, therefore, only when some real suffering or imaginary grievance brought oppression directly home to their interests or their feelings. Court murders were to them no more than a tragedy or a scene in the amphitheatre, at which they were not present." x Thus, when Caesar followed Caesar, with no change for the city over which they were supposed to rule, the intrigues and scandals which disgraced the reign of Michael III. raised scarce a stir among the people; and when he died by the hands of one who had taken — it was said — a base part in some of the most de graded of his acts, men hardly wondered and certainly did not condemn. Basil the Macedonian, had had a romantic life. As a boy he had wandered penniless to Constantinople, and slept on the steps of the church of S. Diomed. The kind ness shown to the wayfarer by the abbat of the monas tery attached to the church was rewarded, when Basil became Emperor, by the erection of a new church and monastery, some pillars of which still lie neglected upon the beach of the Sea of Marmora, not far from Yedi Koule station. His immense strength, personal beauty, and acute intelligence, soon made their way, and he completed his ascent to power it is said by marrying a mistress of Michael III. As sovereign and the founder of a dynasty, Basil the Macedonian was amongst the greatest of the Emperors. He was a successful warrior, an able administrator of finance, a great builder of churches, and a repairer of the walls. But his greatest glory is that of restorer of the ancient Roman law. He returned, as has been shown 1 History of Greece, vol. ii., p. 191. 72 The Mediaeval City by Professor Bury,1 to the principles of Justinian, in the Basilica, which were the most important reconstruction of Roman law in the Middle Ages, and the last it received. We must hurry over these years, in which Constanti nople itself underwent but few changes. Leo VI., the "philosopher," who has been more happily called a pedant, left no trace on the history of the city, save his name as a repairer on one of the towers of the sea walls by Koum Kapou. His son, Constantine VII., called Porphyrogenitus, because he was " born in the purple," {i.e. not when his father was Emperor, but because of the porphyry lined chamber reserved for his mother at his birth), was at first under the charge of his uncle Alexander and then of his mother Zoe, and lastly of a successful general Romanus, who surrounded him self with a galaxy of imperial sons, allowing Constantine VII. also still to retain the title of Emperor. " The studious temper and retirement of Constantine," says Gibbon, " disarmed the jealousy of power ; his books and music, his pen and his pencil, were a constant source of amusement ; and, if he could improve a scanty allowance by the sale of his pictures, if their price was not enhanced by the name of the artist, he was endowed with a personal talent which few princes could employ in the hour of adversity." Constantine was much more than a student. A plot against Romanus and the other Caesars enabled him to resume power, which he held with credit for seventeen years. As a writer he is one of the most important of all the Byzantine historians. The chief feature indeed of this age is its literary interest. Two Emperors ruled whose pride it was to be men of letters. Leo the wise, and Constantine born in the purple, were both men who wrote of war and l Gibbon, vol. v., pp. 525, appendix II., a most important and thorough investigation of a very interesting period of legal history. 73 The Story of Constantinople government as they knew them, and left to their suc cessors remarkable pictures of their times. Leo des cribes the military forces which had still a magnificent organisation and a record of victory and valour but little tarnished. The nobles of Constantinople could fight as well as intrigue. Rich, brave and popular, the ancient families which lingered so long after the Mo hammedan conquest in the ancient houses of the Phanar could always be relied upon to furnish gallant officers for the troops. Constantine wrote of the Themes, of the Imperial administration, and of the court ceremonial — the last an extraordinary work describing the dignity and state of the emperors, and regulating the minutest detail of the pomp with which their daily life was surrounded. The Court of the Eastern Empire indeed was by far the most brilliant of the Middle Ages, and the Empire itself, weak and corrupt though it may seem, was much the strongest government of the time, and the one under which life and property were most secure. The commerce of Constantinople was still greater probably than that of any other city of the world. East and West poured their treasures into the city. The reign of Constantine Porphyrogenitus was diversified, like those of so many of his predecessors, as has already been said, by revolutions, which placed many Caesars on at least the steps of the throne. Romanus and his sons Constantine (called the Eighth) and Stephen, came to an end in 945, and from that time till his death in 958 Constantine VII. reigned alone. His son, Romanus II., succeeded him, and to him came a time of war, in which his arms were victorious over the Mohammedans through the genius of his general, Nicephorus Phocas. In 963 Romanus died, and Nicephorus marrying, his widow Theophano, became joint Emperor with the young Basil. 74 The Mediaeval City Nicephorus was above all things a warrior. He recovered for the Empire the lands of Cilicia, North Syria, and Cyprus. His triumph in 966, celebrated in the Hippodrome and in the great street of the city, was the prelude to many another great military display ; yet not being sole Emperor, he never entered in triumph through the Golden gate, though it was at that gate that he was received in 963 when he began his joint reign.1 But his life as Emperor was an unhappy one. So un popular was he in the city, owing to his opposition to the lavish generosity of his predecessors and to his debasement of the coinage, that he was often stoned in the streets and had to fortify the great Palace ; and his portrait has been limned for posterity by his enemies. Chief among the pictures of medixval Constantinople is that drawn by Liudprand, bishop of Cremona, who came on behalf of the Emperor Otto I. to treat of a marriage between Theophano, the daughter of the Emperor Romanus, and the future Otto II. Liudprand had visited Constantinople in 948. Then he spoke of the great palace to which he was admitted to audience with Constantine Porphyrogenitus, of its golden tree in which golden birds of divers kinds sang sweetly, of the golden lions that guarded the throne, shaking the earth with the beat of their tails, and roar ing at the approach of the envoys — marvellous features of the Eastern Court which the Emperor had not for gotten to record in his account of the ceremonial. Then he saw, too, the Emperor recline at dinner after the ancient fashion, he saw the games of the Hippo drome, and he marvelled at the size of the fruit and at the extraordinary acrobatic strength of the boys of the circus. Then he was treated with great distinction. Now, in 968, his reception was very different. In his 1 On Nicephorus Phocas see the brilliant book of M. Schlumberger, " Un Empereur Byzantin au Xlim8 Siecle." 75 The Story of Constantinople letter to the two Ottos he declared that he even lodged in a roofless house, exposed to heat and cold, and constantly under guard, and that he suffered agonies from the resinous Greek wine. First he saw Basil, the Emperor's brother, and then he was admitted to the presence of Nicephorus himself, whom he describes as more a monster than a man, black as an Ethiop, and small as a pigmy. A pretty argument took place between envoy and Emperor ; the Greek refusing the imperial title to the German Caesars of the West, while the Western bishop would not allow any rights of the East to the Italian lands of old Rome. Their con verse was interrupted by the hour of prayer, and Liudprand joined the procession to S. Sophia. Trades men and low-born folk, says the contemptuous bishop, lined the streets, many of them barefoot, because of the holiness of the procession. Nicephorus alone wore gold and jewels. When they entered the great church the choir sang " Lo there cometh the morning star. The dawn riseth. He reflects the rays of the sun. Nicephorus our ruler, the pale death of the Saracens."1 The famous phrase, " pallida mors Saracenorum," which Liudprand uses, was to be terribly avenged ; but then it was a triumphant expression of the safety which the city owed to the wise Emperor. As he went, says Liudprand, "his lords the Emperors" (Basil and Constantine, the sons of Romanus) bowed before him. After the Eucharist the bishop dined with the Emperor, and was again, he says, subject to his taunts. " You are not Romans but Lombards," was die Eastern mockery of the German imperialism ; and 1 In modern times the greeting of a bishop at his entrance by a special anthem is still retained in the Greek Church ; as also the greeting of cardinals when they enter S. Peter's — " Ecce sacerdos " etc. 76 The Mediaeval City the reply was that to the Westerns diere was no name more contemptible than that of Roman. Such abrupt witticisms naturally consigned Liudprand again to his " hated dwelling, or more truly, prison." He wrote to Basil the curopalates (a post of honour second only to that of Caesar) and John Tzimisces the logothete, beseeching that if his mission was not favourably re ceived, he might return at once ; and then in an inter view with Nicephorus, in the presence of Basil the chamberlain (paraiinomenos) he pressed the proposal of Otto for a marriage. The Emperor replied that it was unheard of that a princess born in the purple, the child of an Emperor born in the purple, should be given in marriage to a " gentile " or " barbarian." So day by day the meetings were renewed and the proud Italian thought that he was treated each time with new indignity, being even set below a Bulgarian envoy — to whose master the Greeks would even allow the title of " Vasileus " (jSairiXlus) which they would not give to Otto, and towards whose people alone it seemed that the Eastern Empire at this time had any kindly feeling. Theology as well as politics were often in question, and the Italian bishop was mocked at for. the modernism of his doctrines, as the Greeks mock the Latins to-day. He was kept, he says, in company with five lions ; and the women, as he passed through the streets, called out in pity at his woe-worn appearance. Sometimes he visited the Emperor in the camp at Balukli (s/'s nriyac, he says, in one of his snatches of Greek ) and quoted Plato to him ; sometimes he had to listen to homilies of S. John Chrysostom read aloud ; more often he had to hear what seemed to him the grossest insults of the Germans and the Latins, insults which he gladly returned in his report to the Ottos upon " the wild ass Nicephorus," and which he even ventured, he says, to write on the 77 The Story of Constantinople wall of his prison in verses none too easily to be under stood. At length he was allowed to leave the city, " once most opulent and flourishing, now half-starved, perjured, lying, cunning, greedy, rapacious, avaricious, boastful." His report, as we have it, breaks off in a torrent of denunciations of the Greeks and their ways. His mission was a failure, but Theophano, refused by Nicephorus, was afterwards given by John Tzimisces, to be bride to Otto II. This curious survival of tenth century opinion illus trates the almost total severance which had now come about between the East and the West, and shows how natural was the destruction which was soon to come upon the city of the Caesars. The West had ceased to feel for the Eastern survival of empire anything of brotherhood or Christian fellowship. First it would seek to conquer the bulwark of Christendom for itself; then it would let it fall before the conquering infidels. Nicephorus did not long retain the throne he had so well defended. John Tzimisces (or Tchemchkik), an Armenian, who won the favour of the Empress Theo phano, joined in a plot to overthrow his benefactor, and Nicephorus was murdered in the palace. John Tzimisces reigned in his stead. He made treaty with the patriarch Polyeuctus, by which he gave up the claim that Nicephorus had asserted, that all episcopal nomina tions should only be valid by the Emperor's consent. He gave high promotion to the dignified and imposing Basil, the chamberlain whom Psellus the historian describes as so impressive a person. He banished the wicked Empress Theophano to the Princes' islands. Then he reigned as joint Emperor with the young Emperors Basil and Constantine, whose rights he was scrupulous to preserve. John Tzimisces was famous as a gallant defender of the empire. The people of Constantinople knew him 78 The Mediaeval City chiefly for the imposing ceremonies of his accession, of his second marriage with Theodora, daughter of Constantine VII., and of his departure for war against the barbarian invaders, when the clergy led him in pomp to his embarkation on the Golden Horn, and blessed his ships, and the citizens watched a naval sham fight from the walls. Domestic rebellions — those of Bardas, Sclerus, and of the family of Phocas — as well as the dangerous Russian invasions — dis tracted his reign : but Tzimisces was a successful general, and by his conquest over the Russians under Swiatoslaf he preserved the Empire, and began that association of teaching and Christian influence which is returned to-day by the orthodox Russians to the Church of Constantinople, which is their mother, and which now, in her time-honoured conservatism, weak though she is, she is inclined rather to resent than to welcome. From his conquest John Tzimisces returned in triumph to Constantinople through the Golden gate, followed by his soldiers and his captives, greeted by the Church and by the officers of his court, and watched by the vast population of the imperial city. It was one of the greatest of the triumphs, as it was one of the last. The ancient usages were retained in all their pomp. The senate met the Emperor at the gate with the conqueror's chaplet and with the golden chariot drawn by four white horses, in which they besought him to drive through the streets. Dramati cally he showed his sympathy with the religious feeling of his people ; the chariot should carry the Ikon of the Blessed Virgin which he had taken in Bulgaria and to which he attributed his victories : he would ride behind, clothed as an emperor and a general, and would offer in S. Sophia the crown of the conquered Bulgarian kings. Then in the palace the young Bulgarian chieftain Boris, who had followed his 79 The Story of Constantinople triumph on foot, was despoiled of the insignia of sovereignty, yet ranked among the officers of the imperial court. It was not the last of the victories of John Tzimisces. He returned more than once a con queror from Armenia and Mesopotamia. He died in 976, in the midst of his victories ; and since the young Emperors whom he had guarded were now grown to man's estate, men spoke of his death as mysterious and as probably due to poison. In Basil II. the Empire again had a warrior Em peror, but one who added to the delights of war the devotion of an almost monastic religion. While his brother, Constantine IX., confined himself to the court and its pleasures, Basil in many hard-won fights achieved the title of Bulgaroktonos, the slayer of the Bulgarians. For thirty-four years he fought the great King Samuel, who had built up a power in the Balkans, till at last he utterly broke up the Slavs, captured all their fortresses, and extended the frontier of the Empire to Belgrade, and so down the Danube to the Black Sea. It was, as Gibbon says, " since the time of Belisarius, the most important triumph of the Roman arms." Victories also he won in the East, but they served only to break down the kingdom of Armenia, and thus to destroy what might have been a bulwark against the infidel. Basil, who reigned from 963 to 1025, when he died at the age of sixty-eight, and who for more than fifty years was practically the sole ruler of the Empire, was a stern, vigorous man, sharp in speech, often cruel in victory, serious and re strained in life, but fond of mirth in his moments of ease. He was a complete contrast to his idle brother, who lived it seemed only for the Hippodrome and the society of the ladies of his court. Basil was never married. Constantine, who survived him three years, 80 The Mediaeval City left three daughters.1 During his long reign Basil had swept away all rivals from his path : the great chamberlain Basil had early been banished, and there was no dynasty to compete with the Macedonians in the last days of their power. Basil taught the people that the Emperor could rule without the intervention of courtiers, and thus when he died the imperial city looked for a man to be at its head. If they had feared rather than loved the great conqueror of the Bulgarians, they respected him because he had kept up the power of the Church and had pat ronised the learning which still had its home in the East. He left to his successors the alliance of the patriarchal See and a school of literature founded on classic models, which, with all its affectations, gave to the eleventh century an important group of historical writers. In no age, too, was Byzantine art, the art of working in ivory, of miniature, of mosaic, more vigor ous. With the death of Basil, however long it might be disguised, the decay began. When Constantine died his three daughters survived him, Eudocia who preferred a convent to a throne, and Zoe and Theodora, ladies of more ambitious temper. Zoe before her father died was wedded — she was forty- eight — to Romanus Argyrus, an elderly noble already married, whose wife was banished to a convent. Ro manus III. was for six years (1028- 1034) the nominal ruler of the Empire. He thought himself a philosopher and a warrior ; but, says Psellus, " he thought he knew far more than he did." Some of his acts were useful — as his repair of the walls after the earthquakes of 1032 and 1033, commemorated by an inscription on 1 The first part of the reign of these sovereigns, and the reign of John Tzimisces, are described with abundance of illustrative detail in M. Schlumberger's charming book, " L'Epopee byzantine a la fin du dixieme siecle." 8l The Story of Constantinople the fourth tower from the Sea of Marmora, shows. But the historian mocks at his long drawn-out building of the monastery of S. Mary Peribleptos and says that a "whole mountain was excavated" to supply the stones. It was his most enduring memorial, and, several times rebuilt, it still survives in the possession of the Armenians as the monastery of S. George, not far from the Psamatia station. But the Emperor's dreams of war, philosophy and building, were rudely disturbed by the intrigue of his wife with a young Paphlagonian soldier, Michael. He professed to disbelieve it, though it was notorious to the court. His complaisance perhaps allowed him to die in peace, though some said he was killed by a slow poison. On the very day of his death Zoe elevated Michael to the throne, and before the burial of Ro manus the senate kissed the right hand of his successor. Michael appears before us in the pages of the rhetori cal Psellus as almost a hero and a saint. He reclaimed sinners after the manner of Justinian, he reformed the administration, he daily worshipped God in the services of the Church, and nightly walked the streets to watch and to prevent crime. One of the strangest pictures of mediaeval Constantinople is that which Psellus gives us of the unwearied Emperor, disguised in monkish dress, passing swiftly " like lightning " through the streets at night, watching that his people might be pre served from crime. Yet with all his virtues he was a drunkard, and the epileptic fits to which he became more and more subject were probably due to his vices. So terribly did his affliction increase upon him that when he gave audience it was necessary to surround him with curtains which could in a moment be drawn to hide his paroxysms, and when he rode his guards formed a circle about him. His greedy relations sur rounded him and urged him to provide for them, and 82 The Mediaeval City when he had signalised his reign by a heroic defence of the Empire against a rising of the Bulgarians he re turned in triumph only to retire to a monastery and to die. Zoe emerged from the seclusion in which she had passed the last years of her young husband's life, and was induced by her family to make his nephew, Michael Kalaphates Emperor. Raised to the throne by his family he set himself at once to reduce it to the lowest depths. " The names of kinship, the common tie of kindred blood, appeared to him mere childishness, and it would have been nothing to him if one wave had engulfed all his kin." The same measure he meted to the nobles and the officials ; but he courted popularity with the traders and the populace more than any of his pre decessors had done, and when he showed himself in the streets silk carpets were strewn before him and he was greeted as the noblest of the Caesars. Yet he relied too much upon the fickle mob. When the senate con sented to his banishment of Zoe, shorn as a nun, to Prince's Island, he proclaimed his act in the forum of Constantine for the acceptance of the people. But Constantinople again showed that, favoured as it had been like a petted child, it could show its power. The people assembled in knots at street corners and protested against the banishment of the heiress of the Macedonian warrior. The conclaves became a riot and the riot a revolution. Women ran through the streets tearing their hair and beating their breasts. Officers of State joined the mob, and they rushed to destroy the houses of the Emperor's family. Zoe was hastily recalled from Prinkipo, and shown in purple robes to the people in the Hippodrome. But it was too late. The mob broke open the monastery of the Petrion (by the Phanar) where her sister Theodora had long lived in retirement, and forced her 83 The Story of Constantinople to go with them to S. Sophia and there the patriarch Alexius and the vast crowd hailed her as Empress. The Emperor and his uncle took refuge in the church of the Studium. They were dragged from the altar and their eyes were put out ; and Zoe and Theodora, who hated each other, became joint Empresses. Their rule was extravagant and reckless ; and while the State was advancing rapidly towards bankruptcy, the aged Zoe took a third husband, after two attempts at choice, wedding Constantine Monomachus, who reigned from 1 042 to 1054 as Constantine X. The old Empress and her young husband gave themselves entirely to pleasure, to luxury and buffoonery. The Emperor, " generous in giving and knowing how to confer benefits after the manner of an Emperor, beauti fied the city by the building of the magnificent monastery of S. George at the Mangana (near Deirmen Kapou on the Mamora), and amused the citizens by showing them an elephant and a camelo- pard. The court which Constantine and Zoe gathered round them was a strange assembly ; its chief person age was the Emperor's mistress Skleraina, whom the Empress treated as a friend. The people resented the conjunction and cried " we will not have Skleraina to reign over us, nor on her account shall our purple-born mothers, Zoe and Theodora, die." The aged Zoe herself appeased them. It was an extraordinary state of society, reminding us of the eighteenth century in France : the intrigues that Psellus tells are indeed hardly credible. But the social corruption coexisted with a real revival of learning. Constantinople became the centre of a new study of literature, which had decayed since the iconoclastic emperors set themselves to destroy culture and Leo III. abolished the University. Constantine refounded the University, endowing two chairs — philosophy and law — which were held by 84 The Mediaeval City Psellus and his friend, John Xiphilinos. A revival of the study of the classics followed this institution : Psellus considered himself a Platonist, and he thought himself worthy to represent as well as to revive the best traditions of Greek literature. In the hands of Anna Comnena and her contemporaries, the purism which the writers affected became little more than an Attic euphuism. While the Emperor and his friends were thus busy with trifles, and the government was in the hands sometimes of wise ministers such as Leichudes, some times of mere thieves, the throne was constantly threatened by revolts (of which the most famous was that of George Maniakes) and by direct attacks on the city, such as that of the Russians, and in 1047 of Leo Tornikos. This latter was nearly successful. Many of die citizens were ready to join him, and but for the military skill shown by Constantine (if we rightly read the rhetorical description of Psellus) Leo would probably have entered and found himself welcomed as Emperor. In 1054 Constantine X. died, and the aged Theodora, the last survivor of the Macedonian house, came forth again from her convent and reigned with the aid of ministers who were at least capable and honest. On her death, after two years as sole ruler, the throne passed, by her wish, to an able but aged soldier, Michael Stratioticus. Psellus shows that the accession of this sovereign marked a crisis in the history of the Empire. Con stantine X. had reformed the Senate, opening it to all men of merit apart from their birth. Michael VI. thought he could rely entirely on the civil functionaries, but the army was still strong enough to dictate to the Emperor, and his unwise acts led to an alliance between the generals and the energetic patriarch Michael Ceru- 85 The Story of Constantinople larius. Michael attempted to negotiate with Isaac Comnenus, whom the army had chosen as their leader, and who was encamped at Nicaea (Isnik) ; but before the envoys, among whom was Psellus, had completed their mission, a rising in the city, led by some dis contented senators, had dethroned and slain Michael, and the whole city was waiting to welcome Isaac as Emperor. Constantinople in this revolution decisively chose her own Emperor. The Senate and the chiefs of certain " clubs " (the successors of the factions of the Circus so prominent four centuries before) guided, as seems probable, by the patriarch, carried the city with them. Isaac they summoned from Skutari : Michael departed to a monastery with the patriarch's kiss of peace. The scene when Isaac was about to cross the Bos phorus to receive his crown was a dramatic one. He called Psellus, the envoy of his deposed rival, to him, and said, when the philosopher spoke of the enthusiasm of the people, " I liked thy tongue better when it reviled me than now when it speaks smooth words." But he began his reign by an amnesty, for he made Psellus president of the Senate, and Michael the patriarch — however much he may have distrusted him — he treated with the fullest confidence and honour. While these political and dynastic changes had sup plied the Empire with a new ruler almost every year, the growing alienation between East and West had been marked decisively by the separation of the Churches. Two great names embody in the East the final protest against Roman assumption. The Church of Constantinople had never abandoned its claim to equality with that of Rome, though it allowed to the ancient city the primacy of honour. Photius, who became patriarch in 858, and died in 86 The Mediaeval City 891, owed his throne to an election which was not canonical, and though a council in 861 at Constanti nople, at which papal legates were present, confirmed him in his office, Pope Nicholas I. declared that its decisions were illegal, and that Photius was deposed and excommunicated, while the Emperor himself was at tacked in language of peculiar vehemence. The papal claim to decide between two claimants to the patri archate was fiercely resented. Photius declared the equality of his see with that of Rome. To the Roman claim of jurisdiction, complicated also by assertions of supremacy over the Bulgarian Church, were added points of theological contention which the churches debated with as much eagerness, and it would seem, as little desire, to arrive at a reasonable solution. The addition of the words Filioque to the Nicene Creed, asserting the Procession of die Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son, was, and is, resented by the Greeks as an addition to "the faith once for all delivered to the Saints." The use of unleavened bread in the Holy Eucharist was regarded in the East as an heretical innovation. There were, and are, other points of dispute ; but none, it is probable, but for the strong national feeling of Italy and of Greece, would have caused a final breach. The position which Photius defended with skill and vigour in the ninth century was reasserted by Michael Cerularius in the eleventh. He regarded the teaching of the West on the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, says Psellus, a j an intolerable heresy; and he was prompt to reassert jurisdiction over the churches of Apulia, now conquered by die Normans and made subject to Rome. The final breach came from Rome itself. On July 16, 1054, two legates of the Pope laid on the altar of S. Sophia the act of excommunication which severed the patriarch from the communion of the West, and con- 87 The Story of Constantinople demned what were asserted to be seven deadly heresies of the Eastern Church. But to return to the imperial revolution. Isaac Comnenus, who was called to the thione in 1057, had been brought up in the palace, but he was none the less a warrior and a man of determination, who had served the Empire well. He reigned only for two years, and then retired to end his days in religion, in the famous and beautiful monastery of the Studium, which looks from a slight elevation over the Sea of Marmora, some half mile away, and whose half ruined walls are to-day among the most striking of the memorials of the past that Constantinople can show. With the beginning of the dynasty of the Comneni the causes which brought about the fall of the Empire can clearly be traced. The imperial power, concen trated more and more in the imperial household, and finally in the Emperor himself, had come to be devoted chiefly, in the hands of feeble or self-indulgent em perors, to the maintenance of imperial dignity and pride in the city itself. The magnificent administration which had presented a coherent and effective govern ment while the rest of Europe was in " the dark ages," was beginning to sink into a mere machine for the support of a luxurious Court. The Empire was neglected. The aristocracy of Byzantium was treated with severity or contempt. The officials of the State were the mere nominees of the Emperor. For their interest and for the pursuit of popularity among the people it was that government seemed to exist. Every year, as the defences of the Empire grew weaker, the shows of the Hippodrome, the festivals of die Church, the entertainments of the palace, grew more splendid. When the other States of Europe were yet in their cradle, when England as a Power had hardly begun to 88 The Mediaeval City exist, the long history of the Empire was verging irresistibly towards decay. " The domestics of the Basilian dynasty carried on the work of political change," says Finlay,1 "by filling the public offices with their own creatures, and thereby destroying the power of that body of State officials, whose admirable organisation had repeatedly saved the Empire from falling into anarchy under tyrants or from being ruined by peculation under aristocratic influence. In this manner the scientific fabric of the imperial power, founded by Augustus, was at last ruined in the East as it had been destroyed in the West. The Emperors broke the government to pieces before strangers de stroyed the Empire. " The revolution which undermined the systematic administration was already consummated before the rebellion of the aristocracy placed the imperial crown on the head of Isaac Comnenus. No organised body of trained officials any longer existed to resist the egoistical pretensions of the new intruders into minis terial authority. The Emperor could now make his household steward prime minister, and the governor of a province could appoint his butler prefect of the police. The Church and the law alone preserved some degree of systematic organisation and inde pendent character. It was not in the power of an emperor to make a man a lawyer or a priest with the same ease with which he could appoint him a chamberlain or a minister of State." The decay of which the general causes are thus sketched can clearly be traced in the series of his torians who give us the records of die years from the accession of John Comnenus to the conquest of Con stantinople by the Crusaders, from the year 1057, that is, to the year 1204. Psellus, monk, secretary of 1 " History of Greece," vol. Hi., p. 4. 89 The Story of Constantinople State, philosopher, statesman, gives, as we have already seen, a close account of the intrigues of the court. Michael Altaleiates records the years 1034-1079. Nicephorus Bryennius and his wife, Anna Comnena, wrote from within the story of the politics of Alexius Comnenus, the former to some extent, the latter very greatly, influenced by the classic revival, and en deavouring to form their work on classic models. John Cinnamus, Nicetas Acominatos, John Scylitzes, John Zonaras, are all chroniclers who have special sources of information ; and the result is that for the century of decay which culminated in the collapse of the Empire before the Latins, we have information almost complete. The Emperor Isaac was assisted at the first by the able patriarch Michael Cerularius, who put into exercise all the claims of his predecessors to power and independence, to equality with Rome, and to superiority over the churches related to the patri archate. Strife soon broke out between Emperor and patriarch. Michael appeared in the red boots which marked the imperial dignity, declaring that he was the equal of the Emperor ; and of the Emperor himself he said, in what seems to have been a popular proverb, " Oven, I built you, and I can knock you down." He was seized and banished to Proconnesus. After the retirement of Isaac Constantine, Ducas, like the Comneni a Cappadocian, and a friend of their own, reigned for eight years, 1059- 1067, and left the reputation of a man anxious only to save money, and thus unable to protect the frontiers of the Empire. Under him we learn the import ance of the Emperor's personal guard of Varangians — a body of barbarian warriors founded early in the eleventh century, and consisting at first of Russians, whom the wars of Nicephorus Phocas, John Tzimisces 90 The Mediaeval City and Basil Bulgaroktonos had taught the Empire to respect ; and of Scandinavians, and later of Danes, and after the Norman Conquest of fugitive English men, who, rather than serve the foreign conquerors of their own land, gladly came to win fame and wealth as the guardians of the Caesar's throne. Con stantine XI. paid the Varangians while he neglected the rest of his army. The Empire paid the penalty in the ravaging of Armenia by the Seljuk Turks, and of Bulgaria by the Tartars. When he died in 1067, already the name of Alp-Arslan, the Sultan of die Seljuks, struck terror into the Asiatic provinces of the Empire, and the sceptre of the Caesars fell to Michael VII., a child who could not protect what his father had not cared to defend. The mother of the young Emperor, Eudocia, married a gallant general, Romanus Diogenes, who, with the title of joint Emperor, won but little power in the palace, but was readily allowed to lead the armies in the field. Of his campaigns it is only needful to say that, while for a time he held back the Seljuks, in 1 07 1, at Manzikert, on the Armenian frontier, his troops were scattered by the overwhelming hordes of the barbarians, and when night fell Alp-Arslan placed his foot upon the neck of the prostrate Caesar, his captive. In Constantinople a new revolution followed the news of the Emperor's defeat. John Ducas, brother of Constantine XL, for a time held the post of Regent for his nephew. When Romanus was released from captivity he was seized and his eyes were put out, a crime which resulted in his death. The scenes of blood and treachery which marked these years, when the Court still kept up its splendours in the presence of pestilence, famine, and decay, are almost incredible ; but the vengeance that was surely coming shows the 91 The Story of Constantinople weakness that resulted from the reign of corruption and crime. Michael VII. was called Parapinakes, "the peck-stealer," a name " given him because in a year of famine he sold the measure of wheat to his subjects a fourth short of its proper contents." He was over thrown by an adventurer named Nicephorus Botoniates, whose reign of three years was a period of vice and waste which brought the Empire rapidly nearer to its fall. Michael VII. retired, like Romanus, to the Monastery of the Studium, where as titular bishop of Ephesus, he passed the last years of his life in peace. Three years exhausted the patience of the nobles with the aged and debauched Nicephorus. Maria, once wife of Michael VII. and now wife of his successor, formed a plot against him, and from a number of conspira tors, Alexius Comnenus, son of the Emperor Isaac, was chosen to lead the troops who determined to give a new Caesar to the exhausted Empire. In 1 08 1 the friends of the conspirators escaped through the gate of Blachernae with horses they had stolen from the Imperial stables. They returned with an army : the German guards who held the gate of Charisius (Edirne Kapou) were bribed, and the ad herents of Comnenus poured into the heart of tne city. A battle at first seemed certain, for the Varan gians stood boldly across the forum of Constantine to defend the approaches to the great palace. But when George Palaeologus, a gallant officer connected by marriage with the Comneni, secured the fleet, the heart of the aged Nicephorus failed him, and he fled to S. Sophia, whence he was removed like so many of his predecessors to a monastery. Alexius Comnenus was not strong enough to restrain the motley rabble who had entered in his train. The city was given over to pillage. The very palaces and monasteries were spoiled by the barbarians from the 92 The Mediaeval City Balkans. It was from this date that the ruin of the city began. If the churches still maintained their relics and their jewels, the commercial prosperity, which all through these years of imperial corruption and weakness it had struggled to maintain, now began to slip from its grasp. It was clear that property was no more safe than life ; and as the Italian cities began to secure the commerce of the Levant, the merchants of Constan tinople fell behind in the race for wealth, and saw the trade that had been theirs taken by the Venetians, the Pisans and the Genoese, who now settled at their very gates. Alexius Comnenus was at first not sole Emperor. Constantine Ducas, the son of Michael VII., was also called Emperor, but he soon died. Alexius then reigned alone, but not without many plots against him. Within, the city managed to suppress the conspirators ; without, he suffered defeat from the Normans at Durazzo, and preserved with difficulty the Thessalian province. He won fame among his people as a per secutor of Paulicians and Bogomils ; and Basil, a monk, was entrapped by Alexius into a confession of his heretical opinions and then burnt as a heretic in the Hippodrome, to the delight of the people of Constan tinople. He kept off the Turks, though they were now (1092) settled so near as to have Smyrna for their capital. But his chief danger came from the Crusades. In spite of the breach between the Churches it was impossible for the Eastern Emperor openly to do other wise than welcome the hosts who in response to the preaching of Peter the Hermit and the call of Urban II. marched through Hungary and Bulgaria and arrived outside the land walls in a ragged and disordered con dition. Hugh of Vermandois had landed near Dur azzo, but had been treated almost as a foreigner, and having been made to do homage to Alexius, awaited in 93 The Story of Constantinople the imperial city the arrival of the rest of the hosts. His treatment was resented by Godfrey of Bouillon ; but the skill and tact of Alexius triumphed. In the palace of the Blachernae, while the hosts were encamped outside the walls, the Emperor received the leaders, among them Godfrey, Bohemond, and Peter the Her mit himself, and by cajoling some, bribing others, threatening those who seemed weakest, he procured that they all should do him homage and promise to convey to him all of his Empire that they should re cover from the Turks. To the people of Constantinople the warriors of the West seemed like ignorant and half-brutal children, ever gabbling, boasting, and changeable. The warlike garb of the Latin priests and bishops disgusted the Greeks and widened the breach between the Churches. The climax seemed to come on the day when the chiefs did homage to the Emperor. Thus the story is told by Anna Comnena, who was herself then fourteen years old, and may not improbably have witnessed the scene. " As soon as they approached the great city, they occupied the place appointed for them by the Emperor, near to the monastery of the Cosmidion.1 But this multitude was not, like the Hellenic one of old, to be re strained and governed by the loud voices of nine heralds. They required the constant superintendence of chosen and valiant soldiers to keep them from violating the commands of the Emperor. He, meantime, laboured to obtain from the other leaders that acknowledgment of his supreme authority which had already been drawn from Godfrey himself. But notwithstanding the willing ness of some to accede to this proposal, and their assist- 1 This was the suburb named after the church of SS. Cosmas and Damian. The monastery was fortified, and stood on the top of the hill overlooking the Golden Horn. It was granted by Alexius to Bohemond. 94 The Mediaeval City ance in working on the minds of their associates, the Emperor's endeavours had little success, as the majority were looking for the arrival of Bohemond, in whom they placed their chief confidence, and resorted to every art with the view of gaining time. The Emperor, whom it was not easy to deceive, penetrated their motives ; and by granting to one powerful person demands which had been supposed out of all bounds of expectation, and by resorting to a variety of other devices, he at length prevailed, and won general assent to the following of the example of Godfrey, who also was sent for in person to assist in this business. " All, therefore, being assembled, and Godfrey among them, the oath was taken ; but when all was finished, a certain noble among these counts had the audacity to seat himself on the throne of the Emperor. The Emperor restrained himself and said nothing, for he was well acquainted of old with the nature of the Latins. " But the Count Baldwin stepping forth, and seizing him by the hand, dragged him thence, and with many reproaches said, ' It becomes thee not to do such things here, especially after having taken the oath of fealty. It is not the custom of the Roman Emperors to per mit any of their inferiors to sit beside them, not even of such as are born subjects of their empire ; and it is necessary to respect the customs of the country.' But he, answering nothing to Baldwin, stared yet more fixedly upon the Emperor, and muttered to himself something in his own dialect, which, being interpreted, was to this effect — ' Behold, what rustic fellow is this, to be seated alone while such leaders stand around him ! ' The movement of his lips did not escape the Emperor, who called to him one that understood the Latin dialect, and inquired what words the man had spoken. When he heard them the Emperor said 95 The Story of Constantinople nothing to the other Latins, but kept the thing to himself. When, however, the business was all over, he called near to him by himself that swelling and shameless Latin, and asked of him, who he was, of what lineage, and from what region he had come. ' I am a Frank,' said he, ' of pure blood, of the nobles. One thing I know, that where three roads meet in the place from which I came, there is an ancient church, in which whosoever has the desire to measure himself against another in single combat, prays God to help him therein, and afterwards abides the coming of one willing to encounter him. At that spot a long time did I remain, but the man bold enough to stand against me I found not.' Hearing these words the Emperor said, ' If hitherto thou hast sought battles in vain the time is at hand which will furnish thee with abundance of them. And I advise thee to place thy self neither before the phalanx, nor in its rear, but to stand fast in the midst of thy fellow-soldiers ; for of old time I am well acquainted with the warfare of the Turks.' With such advice he dismissed not only this man, but the rest of those who were about to depart on that expedition." A scene such as this made the Greeks regard the Westerns simply as barbarians, and they rejoiced when the host at last passed over the Bosphorus to fight the Turks. For the first year Alexius remained with the army ; but as they became divided among themselves, and refused to give up to him the territory they con quered in the East, he returned to Constantinople, satisfied with the conquest which had driven back the Turks in Asia for more than 200 miles. While the Empire gained by its most dangerous enemy being thus driven back, it lost seriously in other ways. " Between 1098 and 1099 a continual stream of armed pilgrims traversed the Byzantine Empire," 96 The Mediaeval City everywhere bringing ruin and devastation with them. One detachment of Lombards actually attempted to storm the Blachernae quarter and were only with great difficulty taken over to Asia, where they slaughtered Christians as readily as Turks. Open war broke out between Bohemond and Alexius, and it was the last success of Alexius that he was able to beat off the attacks of the Christians of the West. He died in 1 1 1 8, his last hours disturbed by a plot in which his wife Irene and his daughter Anna were engaged to compel his son John to yield the Empire to Anna's husband, Nicephorus Bryennius. Alexius may have seemed to leave the Empire stronger dian he found it ; but in truth, though its military power was greater, its commercial greatness was passing away. The development of trade in the Levant through the establishment of Christian king doms in die East by the Crusaders reduced the trade of Constantinople, it has been estimated, by " a third or even a half in the fifty years that followed the first crusade." A system of financial extortion and a debased coinage brought the merchants of the city still nearer to ruin, and that ruin seemed consummated when they found the Genoese and Pisans settled with special privileges in their midst. But the new Emperor at least kept up appearances. He was a conqueror, and he was popular among his subjects, called at first Maurojoannes (Black John), from his dark complexion, he soon became called Kalo- joannes, for his goodness rather than his beauty. At the first he was met by conspiracy. His sister Anna was ready to have him murdered that she and her husband might ascend the throne. He discovered the plot, and after a few weeks restored her to all her possessions. His brother Isaac fled from Con stantinople to the Turks, and though he returned, his G 97 The Story of Constantinople son afterwards became a Mohammedan. For chief minister the Emperor had a Turkish slave who had been captured by his father at Nicaea and brought up with him. These instances show how closely the Empire, in spite of its Christianity, was drawing nigh to the Turks, a state of affairs paralleled by the relations between Christians and Moors in Spain in the days of El Cid Campeador, and which made the conquest, when it came, less abrupt and terrible than it seems to-day. The reign of John Comnenus (1118-1143) was perhaps the brightest in the later years of the Empire. " Feared by his nobles, beloved by his people," says Gibbon, " he was never reduced to the painful neces sity of punishing, or even of pardoning, his enemies. During his government of twenty-five years1 the penalty of death was abolished in the Roman Empire, a law of mercy most delightful to the human theorist, but of which the practice, in a large and vicious com munity, is seldom consistent with the public safety. Severe to himself, indulgent to others, the philosophic Marcus would not have disdained the ardess virtues of his successor, derived from his heart and not borrowed from the schools. He despised and moderated the stately magnificence of the Byzantine Court, so oppres sive to the people, so contemptible to the eye of reason. Under such a prince innocence had nothing to fear and merit had everything to hope ; and without assuming the tyrannic office of a censor he introduced a gradual though visible reformation in the public and private manners of Constantinople." Manuel I., his youngest son, whom he chose for his military daring in preference to his brother Isaac, was " a mere knight errant, who loved fighting for fight- 1 His reign was really only a little over twenty-four years and a half. 98 The Mediaeval City ing's sake, and allowed his passion for excitement and adventure to be his only guide." It is said that he made a special payment to secure the good will of the clergy on his accession ; but he was vicious as well as passionate, and the crimes of his court received a licence from his own acts. Buffoonery as well as vice seems to have marked the life of Constantinople, for the popular minister, John Kameratos, was renowned as the greatest drinker of his time, as being able to swallow a vast quantity of raw beans and drink " the water contained in an immense porphyry vase at two draughts," and he was favoured by the Emperor chiefly for his powers as a singer and dancer. Manuel him self was skilled in surgery and was a theologian as well as a warrior, but his abilities were of no service to the Empire. The citizens saw the Italians en croaching upon them at every point. Heavy taxation was continued, but the army and navy alike decayed in his time. Only the public games were kept up, and outwardly Constantinople was as gay and wealthy as ever. Benjamin of Tudela, a Jew who visited the city in 1161, wrote of the magnificence that he saw everywhere, and the riches of the traders and nobles, and in the Hippodrome he said that " lions, bears and leopards were shown, and all nations of the world were represented, together with surprising feats of jugglery." With all this, and especially after the war with Venice, which was ended in 1 1 74, the city was really becoming poor, and it might almost seem defenceless. Manuel did much for the defences ; a large part of the land walls, defending the palace of Blachernae, was added by him ; an inscription on the tower close to Narli Kapoussi records his repair of part of the sea wall ; and he built many other gates and additional fortifica tions. It was indeed time. The eleventh century saw the position of the 99 The Story of Constantinople Empire and the safety of the imperial city continually threatened not only by active attacks but by internal dissensions ; dissensions which, it has been well said, would have settled themselves a century before, but which now both weakened the city and made its weakness apparent to the world. How weak the city was, was seen in 1 1 46, when a Norman fleet sailed up the Hellespont, and the ad miral robbed the imperial gardens of fruit. Bulgars, Serbians, Turks, had all at different times threatened the city, and without success, but its internal weakness was made the more evident as the century went on by the division which was arising between the Emperor and his people. Manuel I. was believed to be at heart a Latin ; his campaigns of the West, his marriages to Western wives, his neglect of the fleet, his encourage ment of foreign settlers in the capital, all increased his unpopularity. Matters were not improved under the boy, Alexius II., when the struggle between his mother and the minister she favoured, and his sister, took place in the streets of the city, and in S. Sophia itself. The dynastic dispute was complicated, like all the disputes in Constantinople, by ecclesiastical interests, and the return of a patriarch who had been driven out was one of those picturesque scenes in which the people delighted, which showed their independence of the government, but revealed also, only too plainly, that there was now no union in Church or State. A few words may suffice to explain and date the events of the latter part of the twelfth century. Manuel up to his death in 1 1 80 retained all the appearance of a victorious Emperor, though he suffered a severe defeat in 1 176, at Myriokephalon in Phrygia, from the Seljukian Turks. Crusading princes, the Turkish Sultan Kilidji Arslan, and the Christian King, Amaury of Jerusalem, visited him at Constantinople, The Mediaeval City and were received with ostentatious splendour. Alexius II., his son and successor, was a boy of thirteen, and in two years the streets of the imperial city witnessed a desperate encounter between his supporters and those of his sister Maria, which swept up to the walls of S. Sophia. Then Andronicus, the cousin of the Em peror Manuel, was recalled from banishment, and he signalised his acquisition of power by a massacre of the Latins in the city. From this he proceeded to slay every one who stood in his way, till, in 1 183, having murdered the young Alexius, he seated himself on the throne. For two years he continued a course of crimes greater than those that any sovereign ever committed, till a popular insurrection crowned a descendant of the great Alexius. Andronicus, though the vilest of men, had made a serious effort to reform the administration and reduce the influence of the nobles. His fall left the Empire to its fate. The miserable end of the wickedest of the Em perors, as it is told by a recent writer from the pages of Nicetas, may well serve to illustrate the horrors with which the Empire in its fall was only too familiar. He was confined in the prison called after the Cretan Anemas, who was first imprisoned there by Alexius Comnenus. " He quitted it only to die at the hands of his infuriated subjects. On the eve of his execution he was bound with chains about the neck and feet, like some wild animal, and dragged into the presence of his successor, Isaac Angelus, to be subjected to every indignity. He was reviled, beaten, struck on the mouth ; he had his hair and beard plucked, his teeth knocked out, his right hand struck off with an axe, and then was sent back to his cell, and left there without food or water or attention of any kind for several days. When brought forth for execution, 101 The Story of Constantinople he was dressed like a slave, blinded of one eye, mounted upon a mangy camel, and led in mock triumph through the streets of the city to the Hippo drome, amidst a storm of hatred and insult, seldom, if ever, witnessed under similar circumstances in a civilised community. At the Hippodrome he was hung by the feet on the architrave of two short columns which stood beside the figures of a wolf and a hyena, his natural associates. But neither his pitiable condition, nor his quiet endurance of pain, nor his pathetic cry, " Kyrie eleison, why dost Thou break the bruised reed ? " excited the slightest commiseration. Additional and indescribable insults were heaped upon the fallen tyrant, until his agony was brought to an end by three men who plunged their swords into his body, to exhibit their dexterity in the use of arms." * Isaac Angelus was little more worthy of his position than the man whom he displaced. He gave himself to enjoyment, to building, to luxury of every kind. He lost Bulgaria and Cyprus, and when his own general, Alexis Branas, turned against him and led his troops to besiege Constantinople, it was saved only by Conrad of Montferrat, the husband of the Emperor's sister Theodora, who was then in the city on his way to the East. The troops of Branas assembled outside the walls and attacked, but were driven back from the gate of Charisius (Edirn& Kapoussi) : the famous icon of the Blessed Virgin, believed to have been painted by S. Luke, was carried round the walls : then a sortie led by Conrad scattered the rebels and brought the revolt to an end. But Isaac was incapable of ruling. He retained his throne with difficulty for ten years. At length in 1195, when he was on the way to the 'Van Millingen, tValls of Constantinople, p. 157. 102 The Mediaeval City Bulgarian war, he was betrayed by his brother Alexius. He was not, as would have happened two centuries before, made a monk : he was imprisoned in a monastery, blinded, and left to die in peace. No one foresaw his restoration. Alexius III., called also Angelus Comnenus, was no wit better than his brother, but he had a clever wife, Euphrosyne, in whom the worst characteristics of the Eastern Empresses were reproduced. Her profligacy and extravagance completed the ruin of the Empire, and when the fourth crusade turned its arms against the city it fell an easy prey. It has been well said of the rule of the early Byzantines — during the period, that is, that extended from the foundation of the city by Constantine down to the death of Michael VI. and the end of the Macedonian dynasty — that no other government has ever existed in Europe which has secured for so long a time the same advantages to the people. There was a general security for life and property ; there was a magnificent system of law ; there was a genuine and commanding influence of religion ; and municipal government was, for the age, well developed. But this can only be accepted with considerable qualifica tions. If the government itself did not change, the dynasties often did ; if there was a good code of laws, there were terrible and barbarous punishments, and there were often periods of mob-rule ; if there was a sound system of municipal government, it was far from a complete check on the excesses of imperial power. But the most striking characteristic of these centuries, when all deductions have been made, is the stability of the government. As the city and the Empire were ruled under Isaac Comnenus, so, save for changes more superficial than real, had it been ruled under 103 The Story of Constantinople Justinian. The new families of merchant princes that had grown up and lined the Bosphorus with their houses, were as much in touch with the old system as the old families had been. Trading interests had become stronger and stronger with each century, and trading interests are in the main conservative. But the century and a half that followed the accession of the Comneni told inevitably in favour of further changes. First there was the slow and terrible advance of the Turks, cutting away strip by strip the outskirts of the Empire. Then there was the ex haustion proceeding from the constant passage through the Empire of crusaders, often pillaging, always con tending, a continual drain upon the material resources of the land. More important still was the great and rapid increase of dynastic contentions. As ever, in ternal dissension was the real cause of the self-betrayal which gave up Constantinople in 1204 to the robbers of the West. The condition of Constantinople at the beginning of the thirteenth century has been the subject of more than one exhaustive examination. We must briefly summarise what is known of the capital at this period of its greatest riches, and perhaps its greatest weak ness. First and most prominently, it was a great commercial centre. Subordinate to its commerce were its art, rich and wonderful though that was, its military power, even its popular and all-embracing religious spirit. Commerce influenced all these. It gathered together all the nations of the earth, and it inspired them with greed for its treasures. Constantinople was, as it still is to some extent, in spite of the revolutions wrought by railways and by steamships, the most im portant outlet of commerce in the world. All the traffic of Asia naturally came that way ; the great caravans of Central Asia, the trade of Palestine, Asia 104 The Mediaeval City Minor, Persia, even Egypt, journeyed naturally to the New Rome. So naturally was Constantinople the centre of trade that she acted as a sort of universal banker. Her coins were in use in India and in distant England. And the merchants who made their living in Con stantinople had, like those of the Hansa in London, their own permanent settlements. You may see to-day the great khans or caravanserais where the merchants and pilgrims congregate, the walls strong to resist attacks, the gates closed at nightfall, the arrangements for common meals and common ablutions ; and as you pass by you see the dark figures clustering in the door ways, or sitting on the marble steps, in their picturesque colours, and with that strange far-away look on their faces that you learn to know so well in the land where there is never any more pressing need than repose, or any delight more sweet. The custom of these great common lodgings, and very often the buildings them selves, go back far into the Middle Ages. In the thirteenth century they held great colonies of mer chants strong for mutual combination and defence. Many of them were near to the wharves, as close within the walls as might be, and some without. No visitor to-day can fail to be struck by the great khan hard by the Mosque of Valide Sultan, which he passes when he has crossed the Galata Bridge on his way to S. Sophia. The traders of the thirteenth century were by no means all Christians. Jews and even Mohammedans were allowed to settle in the imperial city, and Geoffrey of Vinsauf bitterly says " it would have been right even to have rased the city to the ground, for, if we believe report, it was polluted by new mosques, which its perfidious Emperor allowed to be built that he might strengthen the league with the Turks." It 105 The Story of Constantinople seemed strange to the Western that such toleration should be allowed. The Jews and the Albigenses were the only " dissenters " he had met ; but in the East there were not only the Romanists, but the Monophysite Armenians and the Nestorian Chaldeans ; Jews and Mohammedans made no such very great addition to the parliament of religions. And they all, infidels and heretics alike, brought their riches to the great mart. As the Turks advanced over Asia, scattering ruin and blight before their path, the riches of the devastated cities fled to shelter behind the Byzantine walls. No city it seemed to a Jewish observer of the time was so rich or so full of business save Baghdad. Gold was nothing accounted of; it covered the walls and pillars of the palace, it made the throne of the Emperor, the lamps of S. Sophia, the vessels of many an almost forgotten church. "The whole Empire had been put under contribution for the adornment of the capital. The temples and public buildings of Greece, of Asia Minor, and of the islands of the Archipelago, had been ransacked to embellish what its inhabitants spoke of as the Queen City, and even Egypt had contributed an obelisk and many other monuments." All who saw the city were amazed at its riches, at the magnificence of its buildings, of its churches, palaces, houses of nobles and merchants. Marble and stone houses filled the chief streets ; the splendid marble from the quarries of the Proconnesus, the stone which still stands firm in the massive dwell ings of the Phanar. There were of course then as now many houses of wood, and fires were constant, but those who noted the fine houses destroyed as more than in the three largest cities of France, noted also that of those that remained as of the treasures of the churches there was " neither end nor measure." And with all this there was a profound sense of security, so often 1 06 The Mediaeval City and so unwarrantably contemporaneous with a marked development of luxurious life. Constantinople had never been captured, men easily believed that it never would be. Its walls, so magnificent in their decay, had proved and were thought still to be impregnable. The subtle influence of Oriental habits had eaten, it seemed, into the life that had been so strong and fierce under Justinian or Heraclius. Men, as they had ceased to contend earnestly for faith or morals, had sunk down into a luxurious pleasure-loving life, almost like that of old Rome or modern London. Some of the worst features of Asiatic life had already been introduced ; the entourage of the Sultan that is now so conspicuous at the Selamlik had its counterpart in the court of the Comneni. The Emperor's favourites were coming to be the administrators of the Empire : so bitterly complains the chronicler Nicetas — " these creatures who guard the mountains and the forests for the Emperors' hunting with as great care as the old pagans guarded the groves sacred to the gods, or with a fidelity like that with which the destroying angel guards the gates of Paradise, threatened to kill any one who attempted to cut timber for the fleet" : it was at the crisis of the Empire. And while the Empire was ruled by eunuchs and the court by mistresses the Emperors of the twelfth century lived in luxury, effeminacy, and indolence. It had come to be thought — what a contrast from the days of the sleepless Justinian ! — that work was impossible for a Caesar of the East. And the example spread, as such examples always do, downwards. It was easy for there to be a general who could not lead, soldiers who could not fight, sailors who could not navigate beyond the Bosphorus. And there was no hope of regeneration from a strong Church preaching righteousness. The Emperors in the time of their power had reduced 107 The Story of Constantinople the patriarchs to impotence : and now there was no one in the Church to resist, as there was no one in the State to lead. Yet still the immemorial protest of the Church was not altogether silenced. Historians show that there were many priests and monks who preached and lived according to a high standard of morality and religion. Learning still survived, and piety, without ostentation but never wholly without influence. It is not necessary to detail the causes which led to the diversion of the fourth Crusade upon Constantinople. Venice, it is enough to say, betrayed the Christian cause by a secret treaty with the infidel, and then formed a plot for the capture of the city. Alexius III. had deposed Isaac Angelus in 1 195 ; his son Alexius was allowed to escape and secretly took ship for Italy and eventually threw himself upon the charity of his brother-in-law, Philip of Swabia, the claimant of the imperial crown of the West. He was assisted ; and by a series of complicated intrigues the Crusaders were in duced to undertake the capture of Constantinople and the restoration of the Empire to the supposed rightful heir, as a step towards the accomplishment of the duty to which they were pledged, the recovery of the Holy Land. The Pope's wishes were set aside, the honest leaders were hoodwinked, and Dandolo won the day. On the 23rd of June 1204 the crusading fleet anchored at San Stefano. Thence they saw the magnificent city that lay before them. " Be sure," says Villehardouin, " there was not a man who did not tremble, because never was so great an enterprise undertaken by so small a number of men." Next day they sailed up to the Bosphorus, past the walls, crowded with spectators, to the anchorage of Chalcedon. The Emperor sent to know their intentions : they ordered him to surrender the crown to the young Alexius. Then came another of diose picturesque scenes of 108 The Mediaeval City which the mediaeval history of the New Rome is so full. It was determined to show the young prince to the people whom he came to recover to their allegiance. The splendid Venetian galleys sailed up to the walls of the Sea of Marmora, and stopped where the crowds that thronged them could see. Then loud voices proclaimed the presence of the young Alexius, and demanded the loyal assent of the people to the restoration of his father. Only mocking laughter came back from the walls. Then the Crusaders prepared for the attack. First it was necessary to break the chain which crossed the Golden Horn from Galata, near what is now Tophane, to near the point of die peninsula of Byzantium. A fierce attack was made on the watch-tower at Galata, from which the chain began. It was captured, the chain was loosed, and the fleet sailed up the Golden Horn. The army was dien landed beyond the walls, where is now Eyoub, and took up a position opposite the Blachernae quarter, which had so long been felt to be the weakest point. They were opposed then by the wall of Manuel Comnenus which extended south ward of the wall of Heraclius, and considerably in advance of the old Theodosian fortification. Moats, walls, towers, stood before them, a defence hitherto unbroken, and which even before the last fortification was erected it had been found impossible to over throw. And so it proved again. When the attack on July 17, 1203, was directed against the northern point of the wall of the Blachernae quarter, near the Xylo-porta, it was utterly defeated. And so again when Dandolo, the old blind Doge, dauntless in bravery as adept in cunning, led the attack from his galleys, their success was but temporary. The old sea-dog had his galley drawn up close to the walls, threw himself on shore, 109 The Story of Constantinople on the narrow strip of land that stood between the water and the walls, and planted the gonfalon of S. Mark on one of the towers. The ends of the flying bridges were thrust from the vessels on to the towers and thus twenty-five were captured. But the Vene tians could not maintain their position, and when the Greeks were reported to have made a sortie from the gate of S. Romanus, south of the Blachernae quarter, they withdrew to help these other Crusaders who were attacked. Meanwhile within the walls disaffection with the government of Alexius III. was growing into readi ness to accept the new sovereign to be set up by the Crusaders rather than to risk the chances of capture. Alexius himself would do nothing to protect the city : and when he brought out his troops to the sortie, he retired with them before any fighting took place. Before the next day he himself fled across the sea, deserting his wife and children and the city. The imprisoned Isaac was at once released and placed upon the throne. This was far from satisfying the greed of the Crusaders. It took away from them every honest cause for attack. So they demanded through Ville- hardouin, who has himself written us the account of it, that Isaac should consent to the hard terms which Alexius his son had agreed to — that the Empire should be placed under the Roman Pope ; that 200,000 marks of silver should be given to the army, and that they should be supported for a year ; that 10,000 of them should be taken to Egypt in Greek vessels at the Emperor's expense, and supported there for a year ; and that Isaac should agree, during the whole of his life, to keep five hundred knights for the defence of the Holy Land. The Emperor, though from the first he said that he The Mediaeval City thought it would be impossible to carry it out, felt bound to give his consent to the convention. Alexius was crowned in S. Sophia as joint occupant of his father's throne, and it seemed as if the danger was at an end. But it was only just begun. Some of the Crusaders wanted to push on at once to the Holy Land or to Egypt ; but they had not enough money, and no ships. And the Venetians who held the ships delayed : they cared for nothing but that the army should be divided. Within the city the fiercest opposition was aroused when it was known that Alexius had promised to subordinate the Church to Rome. He was making large exactions too, to pay the men who had brought him back to his country. Feeling against him rose rapidly in the capital. He left with Boniface of Mont- ferrat to pursue the fugitive Emperor to Adrianople. During his absence the populace, eager to vent their rage upon the foreigners, attacked the Pisan quarter : a sort of retaliatory measure was the attack of the Crusaders on a Saracen mosque between S. Irene and the sea. The Saracens had legal rights of tolera tion, and the Christians of Constantinople defended them. The riot ended, as riots so often do in the East, in a fire — and before it was over a great strip of the most thickly populated part of the city, running right across from the Golden Horn to the Mamora, was utterly destroyed. Confusion soon reigned within the city. The old Emperor, so long imprisoned, was weak and foolish : but young Alexius was equally weak and enjoyed his new sovereignty without the slightest dignity. He drank and gambled in the Crusaders' tents, took off his imperial circlet, and wore the woollen caps of his boon companions. And he could not find money to pay the incessant demands of the greedy host. As new taxes were levied the m The Story of Constantinople citizens resisted, and eventually the Western troops became really in need. They had not enough pro visions : why were they waiting : why were the ships not ready to carry them on their quest ? At length all the allies agreed to demand formally of the Emperor the payment of the money that was pro mised ; if he refused they would defy him to his face. The scene was another of those dramatic audacities which so often flash across the history of the city. Villehardouin and five others stood before the Em perors on their thrones in the palace of Blachernae, and their spokesman, Conan de Bethune, spoke thus : " We come to summon you in the presence of your barons to fulfil the agreement made between you and us. If you fulfil it, well ; if not, take note that the barons will hold you neither for lord nor friend, but they will deem themselves free to take what belongs to them as they can get it. They give you warning that till they have defied you they will do you no harm. They will not betray you ; that is not the custom of their land. Now you have heard what we have said, and you will take counsel on the matter how you will." No such speech, men said, had ever been made to a Roman Emperor ; and Villehardouin wonders that the envoys were allowed to depart in peace. But for a week or two nothing happened. Yet the city was slowly rising to fever point. Attacks were made on the Venetian fleet ; the people assembled in the great Church of S. Sophia and debated how they could drive out the foreigner, and replace the dastard Emperors. Then it seemed to Alexius that he must protect himself. He called on Boniface of Montferrat to protect the palace with Frenchmen and Italians. That sealed his fate. Alexius 'Ducas, a kinsman ot the Emperors and protovestiarios of the household, whom the people called 112 The Mediaeval City " Mourtozouphlos " on account of his thick overhang ing eyebrows, determined to dethrone the Cxsars and replace them. He prevailed on Alexius to leave the palace for safety, and at once placed him in chains. In a few days both he and his father were dead, and Alexius V. was crowned in S. Sophia. The new Emperor set himself at once to defend the city, and at once he drew down on him the vengeance of the Crusaders. They were, of course, the defenders of Isaac Angelus and his son. " Never was so horrible a treason committed by any people as de posing and imprisoning young Alexius," says Ville hardouin, who had a few days before taken part in insulting him to his face. When a little later they heard that he was dead, they paused for a while as though in dismay : their difficulties grew on them : the storms of a January at Constantinople made them reluctant to embark : and yet what could they do ? Henry Dandolo met the new Emperor in confer ence within the walls, and demanded the submission of the Church to Rome and an immediate payment of money. It is said that there was a treacherous attempt to capture the Emperor. At any rate no compromise was arrived at, and the divergent parties among the Crusaders agreed to besiege the city. Long was the debate before the final step was taken. They talked, says Villehardouin in his quaint way, before and behind. At last it was agreed how to divide the spoil, how a new Emperor and a new patriarch should be chosen. On April 9, 1204, the first attack was delivered, on the Petrion or Phanar, and the gate now called Petri Kapoussi at the east of the church of the Patriarchate was first attacked. The invaders were repulsed. A second attack, on the 12th, was more successful. " The flying bridge of the Pelerine H 113 The Story of Constantinople lodged itself on a tower and allowed a bold French knight, Andre d'Urbois^, to rush across, seize the tower, and clear a way for their comrades to follow. Here ladders were then landed, the walls scaled, three gates forced, and the city thrown open to the whole host of the invaders." In vain did Mourtozophoulos try to rally his troops ; he was forced to take refuge in the palace of the Bucoleon. In the night he fled through the Golden Gate, through which before Em perors had entered only in triumphal procession. Next day the Crusader6 entered ; the palaces were occupied ; the troops marched through the streets ; and then the horrible work of plunder and ravage began. Nicetas, the Grand Logothete, whose own house was burnt earlier in the siege, and who now had to escape with his family as best he might, tells piteous tales of the horrors that ensued. Of the destruction of precious things it seems impossible to draw an ade quate picture. S. Sophia, then the richest as well as the finest church in the world, was utterly despoiled ; and what had been "an earthly heaven, a throne of divine magnificence, an image of the firmament created by the Almighty," became like a bare barn, and was defiled by the most disgraceful scenes of profanity and horror. When the church had been stripped of everything it contained, the altars of precious metals broken up to be melted down, the vestments and carpets and hang ings carried off, the sacred vessels packed up with the other plunder as if they were common things, the sacred icons torn down from the splendid iconostasis ; when the tombs of the emperors had been rifled, and the body of Justinian cast out like that of a criminal in the search for treasure, it might be thought that the worst was over. It was not so. Then began the hunt for relics which made not the least degrading 114 The Mediaeval City part of the work of these soldiers of Christ. Well was it said by a contemporary that if these soldiers had when they besieged the city the shield of the Lord, now when they had taken the city they threw away His shield and took the shield of the devil. Bitter, and well deserved, were the words of Nicetas. " You have taken up the Cross, and have sworn on it and on the Holy Gospels to us that you would pass over the territory of Christians without shedding blood and without turning to the right hand or to the left. You told us that you had taken up arms against the Saracens only, and that you would steep them in their blood alone. You promised to keep yourselves chaste while you bore the Cross, as became soldiers enrolled under the banner of Christ. Instead of defending His tomb, you have outraged the faithful who are members of Him. You have used Christians worse than the Arabs used the Latins, for they at least respected women." Of the extraordinary quantity of ecclesiastical plunder taken by the Crusaders we have the records collected by Comte Riant in his monumental (and delightful) volumes of Exuvia Sacne Constantinopo/itana. It may be observed, to begin with, that he collects no less than a hundred and forty-four letters relating to the reception in the West of these stolen relics. To these are added endless references in the chroniclers of the time, who were enchanted with the riches that poured upon their religious houses, and displayed all the passion of a collector of antiquities combined with the business instincts of a dealer in curiosities and the piety of a hagiologist. In spite of all this evidence — and there is more of it, in inscription, later lives of the saints, and the like — it is impossible to discover exactly all that was stolen, because the lists of the relics pre served in the churches of Constantinople at the actual time of the siege have disappeared. But it is possible •'5 The Story of Constantinople of course, from earlier lists, as well as from the sources already named, to discover what were the greater part of the relics taken. The riches of Constantinople were well known to the Crusaders when they turned to besiege it. The stories of the earlier crusades were well known, when the Greeks had loved to show the treasures of the imperial city, the riches of S. Sophia, and even of the imperial palace. In the East were almost all the most sacred survivals, nearly all that remained in fact, or was believed to remain, of the relics of the Saviour, His Mother, and most of His Apostles. In the West, till the thirteenth century, there was practically nothing but the relics of Western, and, therefore, comparatively modern, saints, and the few more sacred treasures that had been given by Eastern sovereigns to those of the West. For three days the pillage went on. Churches escaped no more than palaces or private houses. Indeed they were more greedily ransacked: and after the days of direct pillage there came weeks, months, of deliberate search for relics which had been con cealed. The result was, as M. Riant says, to rob Constantinople of two distinct sorts of sacred objects ; of relics, with or without their reliquaries, and of ecclesiastical furniture. It seems that the treasures taken were supposed to be placed in a common fund and divided proportionately among the nations con cerned ; but there was a great deal of chicanery and jobbery as well as of direct spoliation ; ecclesiastical furniture certainly was supposed to be divided like the other booty, but the relics were regarded as too sacred for anything but direct robbery. It should be added, also, that much that was not taken at first was acquired during the period of the Latin Empire in ways more or less legitimate. The robbery went on for forty years. Time would fail to tell of the wonderful things that 116 The Mediaeval City were discovered and stolen. Almost every country in Europe received some fragments of the True Cross, found by S. Helena. Besides this there were drops of die Saviour's Blood, one of His teeth, some of His hair, the purple robe, some of the bread blessed at the Last Supper, and countless relics of the Blessed Virgin and the Apostles. The heads of S. John Baptist and of many of the Apostles found their way to the West. Venice was incomparably the largest gainer, but even the little church of Bromholm in Norfolk, by a gift which was the result of a double robbery, became the possessor of a fragment of the true Cross. The Crusaders were not content with taking relics of the primitive Church, but must needs take also the mortal remains of the Greek Fathers ; you may see the head of S. Chrysostom to-day in the cathedral of Pisa. The reliquaries, the exquisite examples of Byzantine art, that were scattered about the West, remain very often even now to witness to the completeness of the spoliation. But artistically the things that were destroyed, broken up or melted down, were far more precious than those that survived. If S. Mark's still possesses the horses that once stood in the Hippodrome of Constantinople, we know that magnificent statues of Juno, of Paris, of Bellerophon, an exquisite figure of Helen, of which Nicetas pathetically deplores that " she who had formerly led all spectators captive could not soften the heart of die barbarians," and many ancient works, statues, medallions, vases, were destroyed in the furnace. There are remains of ancient art in Constantinople to-day ; but when we think of the pillage of 1 204 and of the Mohammedan Conquest we marvel that there is anything more ancient than the sixteenth century, or more valuable than a kettle or a candlestick of old time, to be found in the whole city. 117 The Story of Constantinople The capture of the city was followed by the election, by twelve electors representing the Crusaders, of an Emperor for the throne of the Caesars. Baldwin Count of Flanders, by what process of intrigue we do not know, was chosen. He was carried in triumph by Montferrat and the great lords ; he received the rever ence of those who had been his equals in the campaign ; he was led in pride to S. Sophia, and, with the Latin rite but wearing the Byzantine regalia, he was con secrated, crowned and enthroned a week after his election, as Caesar and Augustus. But this was not all. It is possible that in time the citizens, weary of their decadent rulers, might have come to accept without active discontent the rule of a gallant and chivalrous Christian knight such as Bald win. But the Crusaders, and most of all the Pope, would not be content with this. If they were justified at all in the havoc they had made it was only because the Easterns were heretics and idolaters and schis matics. The Church of Constantinople was "re bellious and odious" to that of Rome. It must be brought to submission. So a century later the case is summed up, " God delivered the city into the hands of the Latins because the Greeks declared that the Holy Ghost proceeded only from the Father, and celebrated the mass with leavened bread." Such was the feel ing. — though the expression of it is somewhat of an anachronism, — that animated now the leaders of the hosts, which, sated with their debauchery, began to feel something of an inevitable remorse. But Innocent III. was of too pure a soul to coun tenance the iniquity that had been committed. Among all the shameless hypocrisies of the time his words of denunciation ring out true. Even the union of the Churches on which he had set his heart seemed to him now to be impossible. " Disappointment, shame, and 118 The Mediaeval City anxiety weaken us when we ask whether the Greek Church can enter into union with the Apostolic see when that Church had seen among the Latins only the works of darkness." Meanwhile the Venetians set canons in the Church of S. Sophia, and elected Morosini to be patriarch. It was an empty honour. In fifty-seven years a Greek again was seated on the throne of Justinian, and the Liturgy of S. Chrysostom was again sung in S. Sophia ; but long before that revolts had made the Latin hold on the East more and more precarious, and the city more and more able to reassert its ancient independence. 4. From the Latin Conquest to the Conquest by the Turks. It is unnecessary to tell of the division of the Empire among the conquerors, or of how a daughter of Alexius III. wedded the heroic Greek who still fought on, Theodore Lascaris, and was the ancestress of one who eventually brought back the old Empire ; of how Mourtozouphlos was caught by the Latins and cast down from the top of the column of Arcadius, or of how Greek states sprang into existence on every side ; how Baldwin the Emperor was captured by the Bulgarians and died a horrible death. These events all happened within two years. Henry, the brother of Baldwin, reigned in his stead. Henry Dandolo the old doge died "in the fulness of years and glory" and was buried, it would seem, in S. Sophia, where the great slab that covered his grave is still to be seen. Ten years later Henry the Emperor passed away, and Peter of Courtenay, husband of his sister Yolande reigned in his stead. He reigned though crowned in Rome, only to be captured on 119 The Story of Constantinople his way to Constantinople, and to pass away from history to an unknown fate. Robert, his son, was crowned in S. Sophia in 1221. His fate was hardly less ignominious. His successors, the child Baldwin II. (Courtenay) and John of Brienne, were besieged in Constantinople by the Greek so-called Emperor of Nicaea and John Asen, the Bulgarian king, but the aged joint-Emperor successfully defended the city. The young Baldwin went as a beggar to the chief courts of Europe, was the pensioner of S. Louis, seated himself with difficulty on the throne, descended to an ignoble marriage treaty with a Mohammedan Sultan and sold the Crown of Thorns to the king of the Franks. In the weakness into which they had fallen, it is not to be wondered that the survivors of the Latin conquerors were easily vanquished by the advancing power of the Greeks, and on July 25th, 1261, John Ducas and Michael Palaeologus were welcomed back by the exultant Greeks to the throne of the Caesars. It was Alexius Strategopoulos, General and Caesar, who captured the city. By night he led his men to the gate of the Pege (tuXjj r?js «Ti7?s)— the gate which led out to the spring of Balukli, now called the gate of Selivria. The Latins had built up the entrance, but some of the soldiers scaled the walls, and aided by friends within, killed the guards, broke down the barricade, and opened the gate. A few days later the Emperor, Michael Palaeologus, entered in triumph. He walked as far as the church of S. John of the Studium. Then he mounted his horse and rode on to S. Sophia. So the Greeks had won back their city. But the results of the Latin con quest and the years of strife dial followed it were not undone. The historian of that conquest has thus summed them up. J2Q The Mediaeval City " The results of the Fourth Crusade upon European civilisation were altogether disastrous. The light of Greek civilisation, which Byzantium had kept burning for nearly nine centuries after Constantine had chosen it as his capital, was suddenly extinguished. The hardness, the narrowness and the Hebraicism of western civilisation were left to develop themselves with little admixture from the joyousness and the beauty of Greek life. Every one knows that the Turkish conquest of Constantinople dispersed throughout the West a know ledge of Greek literature, and that such knowledge contributed largely to the bringing about of the Reformation and of modern ways of thought. One cannot but regret that the knowledge of Greek literature was so dearly bought. If the dispersion of a few Greeks, members of a conquered and therefore despised race, but yet carrying their precious manuscripts and knowledge among hostile peoples, could produce so important a result, what effect might not reasonably have been hoped for if the great crime against which Innocent protested had not been committed ? Western Europe saw the sparks of learning dispersed among its people. The light which had been continuously burning in a never forgotten and, among the literary class, a scarcely changed language, had been put out. The crime of the Fourth Crusade handed over Constantinople and the Balkan peninsula to six centuries of barbarism, and rendered futile the attempts of Innocent and subsequent statesmen to recover Syria and Asia Minor to Christendom and civilisation. If we would understand the full significance of the Latin conquest of Constantinople, we must try to realise what might now be the civilisation of Western Europe if the Romania of six centuries ago had not been destroyed. One may picture not only the Black Sea, the Bosphorus, and the Marmora surrounded by 121 The Story of Constantinople progressive and civilised nations, but even the eastern and southern shores of the Mediterranean given back again to good government and a religion which is not a barrier to civilisation." 1 The restored Empire of the Greeks was ruled for some years with wisdom and enthusiasm. Michael Palaeologus was of an ancient family already .allied with the imperial house, and " in his person the splendour of birth was dignified by the merit of the soldier and statesman." He was admitted as the guardian, and then as the colleague, of the child- Emperor John. The gallant Varangians, the northern soldiers whose force had been replenished by fresh blood from year to year, and had never deserted the imperial house, had raised him to the throne, and he ruled with a severity and determination that bore down all opposition. It was his first task to cleanse and restore the palace of Blachernae, left filthy and dilapidated by Baldwin II. Then he set about the restoration of the walls. His chief attention was paid to the sea walls, which he raised seven feet by means of wooden erections covered with hide ; and later he began to make a double line of walls to protect the sea side of the city as the land side was protected. He took the harbour of the Kontoscalion (in front of what is now Koum Kapoussi) for a dockyard, had it dredged and deepened, protected by an iron mole and " surrounded with immense blocks, closed with iron gates." But he was determined to rule alone, and before the end of the year he had blinded his young colleague and banished him. He was ex communicated by the patriarch Arsenius, and a schism was caused by his banishment of the prelate, which was not healed for nearly fifty years. 1 Pears, Conquest of Constantinople, p. 403. 122 The Mediaeval City Fearing a renewed invasion by the Latins he did his utmost to make alliances to protect himself. He estab lished the Genoese in a settled concession at Galata, hoping to make them a firm support against their rivals of Venice. But this act only made the commercial rivalries stronger, and planted a power which soon be came hostile on the very shores of the capital and in command of the Golden Horn. " The Roman Em pire," says Gibbon, " might soon have sunk into a province of Genoa, if the Republic had not been checked by the ruin of her freedom and naval power." No less disastrous was the attempt of Michael to unite with the Roman Church. Urban IV. had taken up the cause of the young Baldwin and called on the powers to make Crusade. Michael endeavoured to meet him by diplomacy if not by submission. His envoys attended the council held at Lyons in 1274 by the Pope Gregory X. Veccus, who had long op posed the union of the churches, underwent a sharp im prisonment in the prison of Anemas, but being convinced of the error of his opinions was released to mount the patriarchal throne. But all these measures were in vain. On questions of faith it should not have been impossible for candid men, as the history of Veccus shows, to bring the churches into essential union, but the claim of the Popes to supremacy, which they emphasised by the mission of legates, was one which the Church of Constantinople has never admitted. Michael died in 1282. Already his attempt had failed, and he died excommunicated by pope and patriarch. The restorer of the Empire was unworthy to rank among its heroes, and the historian of the Greek people has described him in language of severity that is well deserved. " He was selfish, hypocritical, able and accomplished, an inborn liar, vain, meddling, ambitious, cruel and rapacious. He has gained renown as the restorer of 123 The Story of Constantinople the Eastern Empire ; he ought to be execrated as the corrupter of the Greek race, for his reign affords a signal example of the extent to which a nation may be degraded by the misconduct of its sovereign when he is entrusted with despotic power." Of his intrigues, the most important of which was his encouragement of the revolt of John of Procida against the French in Sicily, ever memorable as the Sicilian Vespers, it can only be said that they may have saved him from attack. Catalan mercenaries, who after the expulsion of the French from Sicily came into the ser vice of the Empire, overwhelmed its fairest provinces with rapine and disaster. It is a history which makes Gibbon for once ascend the pulpit of the preacher of righteousness. " I shall not, I trust, be accused of superstition ; but I must remark that, even in this world, the natural order of events will sometimes assume the strong appearances of moral retribution. The first Palaeologus had saved his Empire by involving the kingdoms of the West in rebellion and blood ; and from these seeds of discord uprose a generation of iron men, who assaulted and endangered the Empire of his son." Andronicus II., indeed, had a long but disastrous reign. He continued his father's works at the harbour of the Kontoscalion. He repaired the sea walls, and in 1 3 1 7, when his wife, Irene, died and left him some money, the impoverished Caesar was able to undertake a general repair of the whole of the fortifications. Otherwise he is known in the history of the city only for his disputes with the patriarch, his abject sub missions, and his misfortunes. His son, Michael IX., was from 1295 to 1320 the associate of his throne, and won universal praise. His grandson, Andronicus III., sank to the pleasures which had disgraced so many of his predecessors, but when his iniquities were 124 The Mediaeval City too flagrant to be concealed, when his brother Manuel was murdered, it was believed, through his orders, and his father, Michael IX., died of grief, he took up arms against his grandfather, secured his own corona tion, and then the absolute submission of the aged Emperor Andronicus lived in 1332 in the great palace, but in absolute penury. He took monastic vows and died, no longer as Emperor, but as the poor monk Antony. Andronicus the younger (III.), though he married princesses of Western houses, did not add to the dignity of the Eastern Empire. He died in 1 341, and left behind him a child of eight, the son of his second wife, Agnes of Savoy. He was protected by John Cantacuzene, who had protected his father, and finally won him the crown, and who himself bore a character that was high among the best of the Byzantine statesmen and generals. But palace in trigues and attacks of interested politicians against him, at last obliged him, as he declares — for he is his own historian — to assume the Imperial title. In the war that ensued it seems that while the people sup ported the Palaeologi, the officials supported the new claimant. It gave the opportunity to the Servian king, Stephen Dashan, to extend his territories and threaten to replace the Emperors as leaders of the Greek peoples. Strip by strip the territory of the Empire was shorn away, and Serbians, Turks, and Albanians left little to be conquered by Cantacuzene. At last, after previous failures, he advanced to the walls again in 1347 and was admitted secretly by his friends through the Golden Gate. ¦ For once, what was practically a change of dynasty was accomplished without bloodshed. John Cantacuzene became Em peror and gave his daughter in marriage to John Palaeologus. It is said by a contemporary that so poor 125 The Story of Constantinople were even the imperial houses that at the wedding feast the illustrious personages had to be served in earthenware and pewter : strange change from the time when the very walls of the palace glittered with gold. In seven years the balance of power changed com pletely. War, first joint against the Serbians, then hostile against each other, was ended, it seemed, in favour of Cantacuzene by the assistance — a woeful precedent — of the Turks, now settled in Europe and the masters of Adrianople. But when the successful Emperor tried to associate his son Matthew on the throne, the feeling of Constantinople turned strongly against him. In 1358, John Palaeologus whose seat of government had been fixed at Thessalonica, arrived, with but two galleys and two thousand men, on a dark night at the gate of the Hodegetria on the Sea of Marmora. Bringing their vessels quite close to the gate, they made every sign of distress, throwing out oil-jars and uttering cries for help. The stratagem succeeded ; the guards opened the gate and came to their assistance. They were overpowered, and the troops rushed in and captured the adjoining tower. The city rose in favour of the young Palaeologus, and John Cantacuzene with great willingness, if he is to be believed in his own case, retired from the throne and entered a monastery, where he died in 1383. Each change of Emperor marked the more clearly the coming end of the Empire. John VI. Palaeologus "carelessly watched the decline of the Empire for thirty-six years," from the day when he became sole ruler. He saw the growth of the Turkish power, and he sought the aid of Urban V. for the final contest that he saw must come. In 1361 he was decisively defeated before Adrianople, and in later years he was little better than the vassal of the Sultan. He himself went to Rome in 1 369, and submitted to the Latin 126 The Mediaeval City Church, on the points of the Procession of the Holy Spirit, the use of unleavened bread and the supremacy of the Roman See. So poor was he that he was arrested at Venice, on his return, for debt. The Caesar of the East had indeed sunk low. He was compelled to aid Sultan Murad with troops, and during his absence in Asia, apparently in 1374, his eldest son, Andronicus, secured Constantinople, in alli ance with the Turkish Sultan's son, also a rebel against his father. By the aid of Murad, Andronicus was seized. He was imprisoned in the tower of Anemas with his wife and his son John, then only five years old. He was to have been blinded, but perhaps in mercy the sight of one eye was not harmed. After two years he was released, and he at once made alliance with the Genoese and with the Sultan Bayezid, and marched to the capital. He caught his father and his brother Manuel, who were at the palace of the Pege, now the village of Balukli, and sent them with his younger brother Theodore to the prison in which he himself had been confined, " as Zeus," says the historian Ducas, with a classic touch such as the Greeks always delighted to use, " cast his father Kronos and his brothers Pluto and Poseidon into Tartarus." Andronicus entered the city by the Selivri Kapoussi (gate of the Pege), and held the throne for two years and a half. Bayezid urged him to kill his father and brothers, but he would not ; and within two years, in some way, as to which the historians — none of whom are strictly contemporary — differ, they escaped, and with the aid of Murad, or Bayezid (for again the dates are doubtful), attacked the city, entered by the gate of S. Romanus, and defeated Andronicus, who was allowed to retire to Selivria as ruler of the adjacent lands. In 1384 Manuel was recognised as heir to his father. These changes were 127 The Story of Constantinople all effected by the aid of the Turks, and of the cities of Genoa and Venice, who, it might seem, gave the city to whom they would ; and when John VI. began to repair the walls which thirty-six years before he had himself despoiled, he was stopped by order of Bayezid and compelled to destroy what he had done. In his time decay visibly laid its hand on the still splendid city. Many of the streets, it is said, were almost in ruins, the palaces empty, and the costliest and most beautiful treasures of the ancient Byzantine art had been sold to the Genoese and the Venetians. But for the defeat of Bayezid by Timur, the prize would have fallen into the hands of the Turks half a century before it was theirs at last. Manuel II. had an unquiet reign. Forced to yield on every side to the demands of the Sultan, blockaded in Constantinople, he was at last forced to admit his cousin John, the son of Andronicus, as joint Emperor, in 1399, a title which he seems so have borne but a short time. For a while it seemed that the distractions and defeats of the Turks might give opportunity for a revival of the Empire. In 141 1 a Turkish attack on Constantinople was driven off; but the Greeks were incapable of using their own victories or the weakness of their enemies ; and though Manuel made some reforms in the administration the members of his house hold thwarted him on every side. The years of peace were wasted, and in 1422 Murad II. appeared before the walls of the imperial city. The defeat of the Turks — their last — was soon followed by the death of Manuel ( 1425). John VII. set himself to repair the walls, but he could not re build or repopulate the city. The decay, in spite of the outward splendour, the disgraceful subjection of the Emperor to the Turks, and the hatred of the Greeks 128 The Mediaeval City for the Westerns, all struck the keen observer Ber- trandon de la Brocquiere, a Burgundian knight, who visited the city in 1433. The despairing effort of the Emperor was to win the help of a new crusade by union with the Latin Church. Those who have stood in admiration before the frescoes of Benozzo Gozzoli in the Riccardi Palace at Florence will remember the solemn impressive figure of John Palaeologus, in his gorgeous robes, as he rides in the procession of the Magi, a stately personage con trasting markedly with the bourgeois Medici who follow him. Italians knew the Eastern Emperor, for in 1438 he stood with the patriarch before the Council of Ferrara, and in the next year, in Florence itself accepted, with his bishops (save the bishop of Ephesus), the doctrines of the Latins, and joined on July 6, 1439, in the proclamation beneath the dome of Brunelleschi, then only three years completed, of the unity of the Catholic Church of East and West. When he returned to Constantinople the people refused to accept the union, and even the bishops who had signed the decrees of Florence now repudiated their act as a sin. No help came from the West ; and John died in 1448, having preserved his throne even by temporising with the Turks. Constantine Palaeologus was the eldest surviving son of the Emperor Manuel. He could only ascend the throne by the consent of the Sultan, and when that was obtained he was crowned in Sparta, where he had ruled. On the 12th of March 1449 he entered Con stantinople. The city was receiving its new lord with exultation and joy, says his friend and chronicler Phrantzes. So long as Murad still reigned they were indeed safe, but when Mohammed II. became Sultan it was clear that there would be war. Constantine turned — it was his only hope — to the 1 129 The Story of Constantinople West for aid. He sent an embassy to Rome begging for help, and showing willingness to renew the union of the Churches. The Pope, Nicholas V., sent back Cardinal Isidore, who had once been a Russian bishop, but, having accepted the decrees of Florence, bad remained loyal to them, and was an exile from his country in consequence. He arrived at Constantinople in November 1452, bringing some money and a few troops. On December 12, 1452, the union was ratified in S. Sophia, and Cardinal Isidore said mass according to the Latin rite. From that day the people regarded the church as desecrated. In the church and monastery of the Pantokrator the monk Gennadios preached against the crime and folly of the union. Many of the great nobles cried out against it ; one even declared that the Sultan would be a far better lord than the Pope. As Constantine rode through the streets daily the mob mocked and reviled him ; and some cried out " rather than that we should be Latins would we be Turks." The holy sacrifice of the Body and Blood of Christ they rejected, declaring that it was polluted. Even if an angel from heaven had descended and declared that he would save the city if only the people would unite with the Roman Church the people would have refused. So the chroniclers describe the disunion within. Without, the preparations were complete. The conquerors of Constantinople had had a romantic history. A horde of barbarians, coming from the far East, and a branch of the race known to Chinese his torians as the Hiung-no, they emerge into history in the sixth century, then assuming the name of Turk, which they were to make famous. In the latter half of that century they became known to the rulers of Con stantinople. In 568 embassies came to the Emperor from the Northern Turks. Eight years later an 130 The Mediaeval City embassy was sent to the Southern Turks. At the very end of the century an embassy came to the Emperor Maurice in 598 from the Khan of the Turks, now claiming to be a great sovereign. But it was more than six centuries before the Empire came face to face with the actual tribe which should found the power that was to take its place. Pressed hard by the Seljuks, with territories limited to the Bithynian pro vince, it was not till the beginning of the fourteenth century that Osman, the founder of the Osmanlis, came forward as a leader who should begin a line of mighty sovereigns. Legends surround the life of Osman ; his dream of a great tree which should overshadow the world, of Constantinople won by clashing swords, of the ring of universal Empire, his romantic love suit, belong perhaps to history, but only as it appears magnified by an imagination fired by the wonderful successes of later years. More certain are the capture of Nicaea and of Brusa, accomplished by his son, — the latter still the picture of a Turkish city, with its innumerable mosques, its trees and gardens, its popu lation half-military, but now wholly languid and quiebcent. The sword of Osman is still the sign of power among his descendants. It rests in the tiirbeh of Eyub, the companion of Mohammed himself, who fell not by the sword but by disease during the first Moslem attack on Constantinople in 672, and over whose grave Mohammed the Conquero1' built a tomb, to the Moslems the most sacred of all in the city they had made their own. Osman was brought to Brusa only to be buried. His son Orchan carried fire and sword nearer and nearer to the goal. It was he who founded the terrible corps of the Janissaries, Christian child captives trained by the sternest methods to be the fiercest cham pions of Islam. In 1326 Orchan captured Nicomedia ; 131 The Story of Constantinople in 1330 he defeated the imperial host led against him by the Emperor himself, and Nicaea fell into his hands. He showed the wisdom and restraint which, combined with the daring and ferocity of his men, served to strengthen the Turkish power step by step in the districts it won. Nicaea was not pillaged. Its citizens were allowed to live on in peace under Moslem laws, and Orchan himself by every act of charity and of devotion to his religion sought, and won, the respect of the people whom he had conquered. Then for twenty years he rested and prepared. Brusa was enriched with mosques and hospitals, tombs of soldiers and prophets, fountains, baths, colleges of students of the Koran. There rest to-day the first six Sultans, among "some five hundred tombs of famous men, pashas, scheiks, professors, orators, physicians, poets, musicians." The years of waiting ended when in 1 346 the power of Orchan was so great, and was recognised to be so dangerous, that John Cantacuzene, the Christian Caesar, did not hesitate to purchase his friendship by the gift of his daughter Theodora, in a marriage performed with all the pomp of a State ceremonial, but without even the form of a Christian blessing. The friendship thus bought was never yielded. The Osmanlis crossed to Europe in freebooting bands, and ravaged up to the very walls of Constantinople ; and when the Genoese whom Cantacuzene had settled at Galata fought with him and destroyed his fleet, it was with the aid of Orchan that they fought against their benefactor. In 1 3 56 Orchan's son, Suleiman, inspired like his grand father by a dream or a vision which he took as a super natural summons, crossed to Europe with but thirty- nine companions, and took the fort of Tzympe near Gallipoli. In three days there were three thousand Turks settled in Europe. It was the beginning of an Empire which lasts to this day. The occupation <32 The Mediaeval City of Gallipoli followed, and when Orchan died in 1359, the Turks had settled down to wait, for a hundred years, till the Queen city herself should fall into their hands. Before him his son Suleiman had passed away ; and his tomb at the northern entrance to the Hellespont seemed to mark the country for the possession of the Turks. " For a hundred years he was the only Ottoman prince who lay buried in European earth ; and his tomb continually incited the races of Asia to perform their pilgrimage to it with the sword of con quest. Of all the hero-tombs," says Von Hammer, " which have hitherto been mentioned in connection with Ottoman history, there is none more renowned, or more visited, than that of the second Vizier of the Empire, the fortunate crosser of the Hellespont, who laid the foundation of the Ottoman power in Europe." Already the military organisation was founded, and the system which had made in the brother of Orchan as Vizier the civil ruler of the people. Now the settlement in Europe was begun. Murad (or Amu- rath, as our forefathers called the name), the younger brother of Suleiman, succeeded his father. In less than thirty years he had transformed the face of Southern Europe, and made the Emperor of Rome but a dependent of his power. He landed and estab lished his armies in Thrace. He defeated the Hun garians and Serbians and captured Nisch ; he pressed southwards and Adrianople fell into his hands ; and then when the circle of Turkish territory was drawn closely round Constantinople, he turned northwards and became the conqueror of the northern lands ruled by princes Christian yet still barbarian, who had long before this conquered them from the Empire. In 1389 Murad was slain, after a great victory, by Milosch Kobilovitsch, the hero of Serbian legend. Bayezid, his son, reigned in his stead ; and he began "33 The Story of Constantinople the fatal custom which still further consolidated the monarchy. On the very day of his accession he had his brother murdered, and so wise was the precedent considered that by the time of Mohammed the Conqueror it became a law that every brother of the Sultan should be slain. He began, too, it is asserted, the hideous vices which have stained the Empire of his successors, and which degraded the courts of the Sultan with the guilt of the rulers and the shame of their captives. The battle of Kossova, the last fight of Murad, was followed before long by that of Nicopolis, in which the choicest chivalry of Europe went down before the fierce onslaught of the Turkish squadrons. The captives, all but twenty-four knights, who were spared, were butchered in cold blood in the presence of their comrades, before the tent of Bayezid. Then Bayezid led his hosts to the conquest of Greece; and in 1397 Athens fell before his arms. The Caesars bowed before him, suffered a mosque to be built within the walls of Constantinople, and actually joined their arms to his for the capture of the one Greek city which remained free in the midst of the European conquests of the Turks. When at last the insolent Sultan demanded that the crown of the Emperors should be yielded to him, and threatened to exterminate the inhabitants of the capital if he were not obeyed, it is said that the nobles replied : " We know our weakness, but we trust in the God of justice, who protects the weak and lowly, and puts down the mighty from on high." It was an answer that befitted the ancient city. Before the attack was made that seemed certain to prove fatal to the last stronghold, the capital of the Christian Empire, Bayezid was called away to meet the onslaught of the greatest of conquerors, Timur the Tartar. The great battle of Angora shattered 134 The Mediaeval City the Turkish power, destroyed the Janissaries and left Bayezid himself a prisoner in the hands of Timur. Before a year was over, the proud Sultan died, and the power which he had made so great was utterly crushed beneath the feet of the Tartars. Brusa itself was left in ruins, and not only the son of Bayezid, who was safe in Adrianople, made sub mission, but even the Emperor paid tribute to Timur. Then the conquering horde swept back again to the Far East, and the Turks set to work to rebuild again the power that had been shattered. Domestic warfare succeeded the destruction at the hands of foreign foes, and Mohammed I., the youngest son of Bayezid, established his authority over his brothers as ruler of the Osmanlis by the aid of the Emperor Manuel Palaeologus. His brother Musa laid siege to Constantinople, and the troops of Moham med actually joined with those of Manuel in the successful defence of the city. Mohammed was the ally, almost the subject, of the Emperor, and when he died he sought to commend his children to Manuel's care. Mohammed died in 1421 at Adrianople. His son Murad II. had to fight for his throne against a pretender whom the Emperor had set free, and whom he overcame only by the help of the Genoese galleys which carried him from Asia to Europe. In 1422 he was ready to revenge himself on the Greeks. His army encamped before the walls of Constantinople, and his own tent was set up in the garden of the Church of the Blessed Virgin of the Fountain (Balukli). He brought his cannon to bear upon the walls that cross the valley of the Lycus, but without success. The walls of Theodosius were still too strong, and the fierce attack on the gate of S. Romanus was a failure now, as it would not be thirty years later. '35 The Story of Constantinople The city was stoutly defended. John Palaeologus, the Emperor's son, commanded a garrison inspired by the fullest religious enthusiasm : and when a vision of the Blessed Virgin, the Panhagia, was seen on the walls, both by assailants and defenders, the siege was given up ; and the Sultan did not attempt to renew it. Still, a tribute was paid by the Emperor, and it must have been clear to the Osmanlis that the capture was but for a short time deferred. But Murad had to undergo defeats at the hands of the Hungarians, which he amply avenged : and his two abdications showed that he was weary of power, if not incapable of wielding it. The end of his reign saw him repeatedly over-matched by the Albanian hero, Scanderbeg, whom he himself had trained among the Janissaries. In 1451 he died; and then the greatest triumph of the Osmanlis was at hand. The early history of Mohammed II. has been thus summed up, in the clear-cut eloquence of Dean Church. " Three times did Mohammed the Conqueror ascend the Ottoman throne. Twice he had resigned it, a sullen and reluctant boy of fourteen, whom it was necessary to inveigle out of the way, lest he should resist his father to the face, when, to save the State, he appeared to resume his abdicated power. The third time, seven years older, he sprang on the great prize with the eagerness and ferocity of a beast of prey. He never drew bridle from Magnesia, when he heard of his father's death, till on the second day he reached Gallipoli, on his way to Adrianople. To smother his infant brother in the bath was his first act of power ; and then he turned, with all the force of his relentless and insatiate nature to where the inheritor of what remained of the greatness of the Caesars — leisurely arranging marriages and embassies — still detained from the Moslems the first city of the East ; .36 The Mediaeval City — little knowing the savage eye that was fixed upon him, little suspecting the nearness of a doom which had so often threatened and had been so often averted." It did not need the half-defiant attitudes of Con stantine XII. to arouse the young Sultan : as soon as he had concluded a truce with his northern foes he began to make those elaborate preparations which should ensure success in the great conquest. His first act was to secure the isolation of the capital. Already he held the passage of the Dardanelles ; now he would secure that of the Bosphorus. In 1393 Bayezid had built on the Asiatic shore, some five miles above Constantinople, the fortress which was the first distinct menace to the imperial city. Anadoli Hissar, the " Asiatic Castle," still stands overhanging the water's edge, a splendid mediaeval building of four square towers with one great central keep. In 1452 a cor responding tower was begun on the other side of the sea, at the point where the passage is narrowest. The first stone was laid by Mohammed himself on March 26, 1452, and by the middle of August the castle was completed. The design of this Roumeli Hissar represented the name of the Prophet and the Sultan, the consonants standing out as towers. Protests were unheeded and the two envoys sent by the Emperor to remonstrate were butchered at once. A Venetian galley was sunk as it passed, to prove the range of the guns. Its crew were slain when they swam ashore. A Hungarian engineer was employed to direct a cannon foundry, and a vast store of materials of war was accumulated for the siege. After another winter's preparation all was ready, and early in the spring of 1453 a vast Turkish host1 was ranged from the 1 There are many different estimates given by the different writers. La Jonquiere, perhaps the latest, decides on 200,000 Kp. 158). '37 The Story of Constantinople Golden Horn to the Marmora. The sea was covered by three hundred vessels and it seemed as if succour was cut off on every side. On April 6, 1453, the siege began. The last message of the Roman Emperor to the Turkish Sultan had been somewhat in these words : " As it is plain thou desirest war more than peace, as I cannot satisfy thee by my vows of sincerity or by my readiness to swear allegiance, so let it be according to thy will. I turn now and look above to God. If it be His will that the city should become thine, where is he who can oppose His will ? If He should inspire thee with a wish for peace, I shall indeed be happy. Nevertheless I release thee from all thy oaths and treaties to me, I close the gates of my city, I will defend my people to the last drop of my blood. And so, reign in happiness till the Righteous and Supreme Judge shall call us both before the seat of His judgment." It was in this spirit that Constantinople stood to meet the foe. Mohammed when he came in sight of the walls, spread his carpet on the ground and turning towards Mecca prayed for the success of his enterprise. Everywhere throughout the camp the Ulemas promised victory and the delights of Paradise. On April 7, the Turkish lines were drawn opposite the walls. The tent of the Sultan himself was placed opjwsite the gate of S. Romanus (Top Kapoussi). Thence to his right the Asiatic troops stretched down to the sea, to his left past the gate of Charisius (Edirne Kapoussi), the European levies extended northwards to the Golden Horn. Within four days sixty-nine cannon were set in position against the walls, and with them ancient engines, such as catapults and balistae, discharging stones. On the heights about Galata also a strong body of troops was placed. Within, measures had been taken to repair the walls, <38 The Mediaeval City but it is said that the money had been embezzled by the two monks, skilled in engineering, to whom it had been given, and in some places the fortifications were not strong enough to support cannon. Constantine sought help from every side. On April 20, four ships laden with grain forced their way through the Turkish fleet, but they added few if any to the defenders. The Venetian aid that had been promised did not arrive even at Euboea till two days after the Turks had captured die city. Of troops within, Phrantzes, who himself had charge of the search, states that there were hardly seven thousand in all, of whom two thousand were foreigners. Others give higher numbers, but there is no reason to doubt the accuracy of the Emperor's most trusted friend. Strange it seems that outside, in the Sultan's army, some thirty thousand Christians were fighting for the infidels. Phrantzes says that when he heard that some of the Byzantine nobles had left the city, the Emperor only heaved a deep sigh. Of the arrangements for defence, the fullest accounts can be found in the writings of Phrantzes and Ducas, the letters of Archbishop Leonardo of Mitylene and of Cardinal Isidore, the report of the Florentine Tedardi, two poems, and a Slavonic MS. quoted by M. Mijatovich.1 Here it is needless to tell how each wall was manned. It may suffice to say that during the few weeks that passed, while the Christians still kept their foes at bay, there was no rest for the besieged. Sometimes when the Emperor went on his rounds to inspect the defences he found the weary soldiers asleep at their posts. He seemed himself to be sleepless ; every hour that he did not devote to the defences he seemed to spend at prayer. 1 M. Mijatovich in his " Constantine the last Emperor of the Greeks," gives a vivid account of the siege, but he is far from accurate in dealing with the topography. 141 The Story of Constantinople He visited every post himself; he even crossed the Golden Horn in a 6mall boat to be sure of the security of the great chain which stretched from the tower of Galata to what is now called Seraglio Point. Every hour he had to contend with new difficulties, with monks declaring that defence was hopeless because of the union with the Latins, with Italian mercenaries clamouring for pay. He was compelled to take the furniture of the churches when the treasures of the palace were quite exhausted, but he promised if God should free the city to restore to Him fourfold. After nearly a week in which the heavy Turkish cannon thundered against the walls, the gunners learned at last from the Hungarian envoys to their camp how to direct their fire. At length, on April 1 8, at the hour of vespers, a great attack was made. The people rushed out from the churches, and the air was filled with the cries of the combatants, the ringing of the bells, the clash of arms. The attack was strongest against the weak walls by the Blachernae quarter, and by the gate of S. Romanus. After hours of hard fighting it was repulsed, and Te Deum was sung in all the churches for the victory. The victory of the 18th, followed by that of the 20th, when the ships broke up the whole Turkish fleet and rode triumphantly into the Golden Horn, in spirited the besieged. But on the 21st the cannonade. brought down one of the towers that defended the gate of S. Romanus. The Sultan was not on the spot, and the Turks were not ready to make assault, so the oppor tunity passed. After these victories the Emperor hoped that it was possible to induce the Sultan to retire. He offered to surrender everything but the city, and there were some in the infidel camp who would have been ready to make terms, but Mohammed would offer only that the whole Peloponnesus should be Constantine's 142 The Mediaeval City in undisturbed possession, if he would yield the city. The' terms were rejected, and the Emperor prepared for the worst. But still the Turks were far from the end of their task. Long though the extent of land walls was that had to be manned, it was not difficult to protect it with a comparatively small . force. A low counter-scarp enclosed a moat, over which rose the scarp surmounted by breastworks. Above this was the line of the outworks, with towers advanced he; e and there from their surface. Behind, and also protected by high towers, was the inner or great wall, with breast work and rampart. It was " the most perfect of Eastern fortresses," 1 and might indeed seem impregnable. Every wall had its " military engines capable of playing on the siege- works of the beleaguering army." And as the walls " were loopholed at a stage below the battlements," the " garrison could fire not merely from the parapets but from a well protected second line of openings." While therefore it was quite possible to defend the land walls, the besieged relied for ultimate safety on being able to leave without risk the walls of the Golden Horn and the sea practically undefended. The Turkish fleet would not venture to draw near to the Marmora walls. The Golden Horn was safe with Galata on the other side — though the Genoese held aloof, through treaty probably with Mohammed — and the chain across. The Sultan had already tried to force the chain but failed. So it seemed safe : — " Till Birnam wood shall come to Dunsinane." But the genius of the Sultan, or as one authority says, a Christian in his army, devised a scheme which at once 1 Mr Oman, History of the Art of War, Middle Ages, pp. 526-7, speaks of three walls; but the scarp was quite low. and there were only two walls behind it. '43 The Story of Constantinople made him the master of the city. He determined to transport his fleet overland into the Golden Horn from the Bosphorus. An extraordinary feat it was, but it was splendidly performed. A narrow canal was dug, paved, and set with rollers. The point of starting was between Top Haneh and Beshiktash, out of the range of the fort at Galata. Thence, between two and three miles up the valley of Dolma Bagtche the seventy or eighty ships were drawn by night up the hill of Pera to the point where now the gardens stand just below the Hotel Bristol, and thence down the hill to the bay of Kassim Pasha where now stands the great Arsenal.1 When the watchers on the towers of Galata and the Kentatarion by the Gate of Eugenius could see through the fogs of dawn on the morning of April 22, the great fleet was no longer before them in the Bosphorus, but behind in the Golden Horn there rode the gallant vessels with their flags flying in the breeze. The north-east wall must be reinforced. How could it be done ? The Venetian ships in the harbour determined to attack the Turks before they could complete the great pontoon which they were preparing to bring up. For some days, however, nothing was done. The attacks on the land walls continued and were beaten back, often with heavy loss. But each day provisions were growing less and the defenders were growing weaker. On the morning of April 28th two Venetian galleys, three smaller ships, and two stored with fire, ad vanced upon the Turks. They were received with the fire of four cannon. The great galley of Gabrielo 1 There is much dispute as to the route taken by the ships and a9 to almost every point connected with the passage. 1 would only say that it seems to me that the view of Professor Van Millingen, which I have followed in the text, is the most satisfactory. 14+ The Mediaeval City Trevisani sank, and one of the smaller ships. Only one of the Turkish ships caught fire. The Venetians who swam to shore when their ships sank were be headed next day in sight of the defenders of the walls. A bitter revenge was taken. Over two hundred and fifty Turks had at some time or other been captured and lay in the prisons of Constantinople. They were now all beheaded on the walls in sight of their kindred. The horrible act made certain what would be the fate of the city if it fell. And internal dissensions made the fall seem im minent. The Venetians accused the Genoese and the Genoese the Venetians for the failure of their attack on the Turkish fleet, till Constantine himself called their leaders before him and besought them to be at peace. "The war without," he said, "is enough; by the mercy of God seek not war among ourselves." " So," says Phrantzes, " with much speech at length he pacified them." Next day and on the first of May the Turkish cannon did some damage ; but in some parts the fire was utterly unable to penetrate or dislodge the splendid masonry, and one tower near the Lycus, it is said, was struck by over seventy balls without suffering in the slightest ; and the great gun built by the Hungarian mercenary Ourban was dismounted by the fire of the cannon directed by the gallant Genoese engineer Giustiniani, who, with four hundred of his country men, manned the walls near the gate of S. Romanus. Mohammed himself was standing by the gun at the moment, and in rage called his troops at once to the assault. They crossed the counter-scarp and began to pull down the scarp where it had been repaired ; but again the defenders drove them back. It was said when the attack began the walls were but half manned, as some of the soldiers had actually k 145 The Story of Constantinople left their posts to go home to dine. This laxity, as soon as it was discovered, was of course stopped ; but it shows how utterly the people, safe for centuries behind their defences, had forgotten the meaning of war. The Emperor on the 3rd of May sent out a ship which penetrated through the Turkish fleet, being disguised with Turkish colours, to beg aid. It was plain that if it were much delayed it would be too late. A council of war, indeed, advised the Emperor to escape while it was still possible. The Patriarch and the Senators urged him to go, assuring him that he could then easily gather an army to relieve the city. " The emperor," we are told, " listened to all this quietly and patiently. At last, after having been for some time in deep thought, he began to speak : ' I thank you all for the advice which you have given me. I know that my going out of the city might be of some benefit to me, inasmuch as all that you foresee might really happen. But it is im possible for me to go away : how could I leave the churches of our Lord, and His servants the clergy, and the throne, and my people in such a plight ? What would the world say of me ? I pray you, my friends, in future do not say to me anything else but, ' Nay, sire, do not leave us.' Never, never, will I leave you. I am resolved to die here with you.' And saying this, the Emperor turned his head aside, because tears filled his eyes ; and with him wept the Patriarch and all who were there." 1 In the next two days a ship was sunk, and the other Christian vessels were compelled to withdraw outside the chain. A Genoese merchant ship was also sunk, and when the merchants of Galata protested, declaring 1 Quoted by M. Chedomil Mijatovich, from a Slavonic MS. 146 The Mediaeval City that they were entirely neutral, the Grand Vizier pro mised to compensate them, when the city was taken. During the next week the breach by the gate of S. Romanus was daily widened, and on the 7th of May a desperate attack was made upon the walls. But again with splendid courage the Turks were beaten back, though some of the bravest of the defenders fell. On the 1 2th of May a breach was made in the walls north of the palace of the Porphyrogenitus, and thousands of Turks poured in. It was only the arrival of Constantine himself, summoned hastily from a council of war, that drove forth the hosts after hot fighting. The Emperor would have pushed ' through and fought hand to hand in the ditch, we are told, if he had not been held back by his nobles. From this date every effort was concentrated upon the gate of S. Romanus. There more cannon were directed ; and in return men were brought from the fleet, now felt to be useless, to man the walls. One of the towers fell ; and new engines were con stantly being brought, with clever shelters for the archers. A great erection covered with bulls' hide was destroyed by a gallant attack from the walls, to the surprise of the Turks, who thought the feat im possible. Mines and countermines every day were dis covered ; every day the defenders were becoming weaker. On the 23rd an envoy from the Sultan was admitted to the city. Again, and for the last time, Constantine was offered a sovereignty in the Pel- oponnese, freedom for all who chose to depart, and security for the persons and possessions of all who should choose to remain after the surrender. Again he rejected the offer. No doubt he thought that it was impossible to trust it ; nor could the Roman Emperor endure to yield the city that had been but once captured in its age-long history. " We H7 The Story of Constantinople are prepared to die." The last hope failed just after the last bold defiance was returned : the ship sent out re turned, to say that nowhere had it found the vessels of the relieving force. The people began to see portents in the sky, when the great bonfires in the Turkish camp were reflected on the great dome of S. Sophia. The Emperor stood on the walls watching the enemy keeping festival, it seemed, with sounds of music, and shrill cries and the beating of drums. As he watched, says one who saw him, the tears coursed down his cheeks. He knew what mu6t come, but he was ready to fight to the last. Again he was urged to fly, the Patriarch declaring that the city now must fall. Again, and for the last time he refused. " How many Emperors, great and glorious, before me have suffered and died for their country ? Shall I be the one to fly ? No, I will die with you ! " The ladies of the imperial household, the sister- in-law of the Emperor and her attendants, were sent away in a ship of Giustiniani's ; and everything was prepared for the worst. By gigantic efforts the walls were repaired, and so well was the work done that even the Sultan was for a moment half dismayed. Already there were many in the Turkish camp who thought the enterprise too hazardous to continue. It was known that a Venetian fleet was on the way, and that a league was being formed by the Pope. After long debate it was decided to make one last assault, and, if that failed, to raise the siege. On the night of the 28th, Mohammed visited all the posts, and promised to his soldiers all the pillage of the city, encouraging them by every hope for this world and the next. In the city priests bearing the sacred icons went through the streets. It was for the last time For the last time Constantine called his officers 148 The Mediaeval City together and spoke to them in brave words which burnt themselves into the memory of the faithful Phrantzes. " Brothers and fellow -soldiers, be ready for the morn. If God gives us grace and valour, and the Holy Trinity help us, in Whom alone we trust, we will do such deeds that the foe shall fall back with shame before our arms." Then, says the chronicler, the wretched Romans strengthened their hearts like lions, sought and gave pardon, and with tears embraced each other as though mindful no more of wife or children or earthly goods, but only of death, which, for the safety of their country, they were glad to undergo. Constantine for the last time went to the great church, and there, before all the bishops, asked the pardon of all whom he had wronged. Then he re ceived his last communion. For the last time the Holy Sacrifice was offered in S. Sophia, and then the last of the Caesars and his nobles went forth to die. Before cock-crow he was again at his post ; and with the first streak of dawn the Turkish troops poured forth to the attack. Again and again they were forced back, and again forced forward by the troops behind them. The moat had been filled with earth and stones ; but a great palisade of stones covered with hides had been set up below the inner wall. The Janissaries at length rushed up to the breach, but even they were driven back. The critical moment came when a wound compelled Giustiniani to retire, and a few minutes after the Turks discovered a gate in the outer wall that had been newly opened, near to the gate of Charisius, and below the palace of the Porphyrogenitus, found it unprotected, and entering through it turned upon the defenders from within. Already the Genoese had left their posts when their 149 The Story of Constantinople leader withdrew. The Janissaries again advanced ; they stormed the barricade, and at the moment when some discovered the Kerko-porta,1 others forced their way through the gate of Charisius, and others through the great breach near where the great Caesar had stood. When the city was entered he was in the street calling his men around him. He rode forward, cutting his way through the foe, with some of the bravest of his nobles round him. At length he fell, near the gate of S. Romanus, by an unknown hand, and the conquer ing Turks swept over hi6 body. The age-long fight which the Imperial East had waged against barbarism was over. The city of the Caesars and the Church was in the hands of the infidel. The land where the scholarship of the ancient world and the law of the pioneers of equal justice had been preserved unbroken, was now trodden under foot of those whose life was formed on quite other models. Europe had stood by for centuries and watched the gallant battle waged by the Christians who manned the bulwarks of her civilisation. She had now to learn what was meant by the substitution of the Koran for the Bible, of Mohammed for Christ. Within a few hours of the capture of the gate of S. Romanus the whole city was overrun by the victorious troops. At first they slew all whom they saw, but when it was plain that all opposition was over they began to make captives, tying them together with ropes and dragging them on as they advanced further into the city. In the last hours of the siege thousands had gathered in the great church of S. Sophia. There many still thought that they must find safety. God, they fancied, could not allow the infidel to desecrate the fairest church in all the world. An angel, it had been prophesied, would descend at the last 1 See Van Millingen, pp. 89 and 99. 150 The Mediaeval City moment and strike the enemies of Christ to the dust. The great doors were shut, and the hushed thousands stood in prayer. The cries of the victors came nearer and nearer, and at last the doors of the narthex were beaten in and the savage soldiery rushed in, slaying at first, then seizing captives, tearing down every Christian symbol, and shattering with their axes the magnificent iconostasis, before which, twelve hours before, Con stantine and his gallant men had bent in reverent devotion.1 At noon Mohammed himself entered the city by the gate of S. Romanus. He rode straight down the wide street which leads to S. Sophia, followed by the greatest of his officers and the holy men of the Mussul man faith. At the great door he dismounted, and taking earth from the ground he poured it on his head, as mindful of the end of all earthly conquests. Then he entered, and when he saw that wonderful sight which still strikes dumb with awe the greatest and the meanest of mankind, he stayed. Then, after some minutes' silence, he passed up to the altar. As he went he saw a soldier wantonly breaking up the beauti ful pavement with his axe, and sternly forbade him, with a blow. As the priests stood before him he assured them of his protection, and he bade those Christians who still stood unfettered in the church to go to their homes in peace. Then the Sultan ordered one of the Ulemas to mount the pulpit and read forth to the conquerors from the Koran, and he himself mounted upon the marble altar 1 The icons were hewn down, the ornaments everywhere torn off, the altar stripped of its coverings, the lamps and sacred vessels stolen ; everything, says Ducas, of silver and gold or other precious substance was taken away, and the church was left naked and desolate. '5' The Story of Constantinople and prayed. Two legends have grown up round these first moments of the Mussulman triumph in the great church. It is said that aB the first infidel entered a priest was celebrating the Eucharist, and that he passed into the wall, which mysteriously opened for him and closed when he had passed, bearing the Body and Blood of the Lord. He will return, they say, when the Christians again have S. Sophia for their own. The other legend points to a pillar at the south-east where a mark like a blood-stained hand stands out on the white marble. There it declared, Mohammed riding his horse over heaps of dead, made an impress of blood and victory, and ordered the slaughter to be stayed. As the day went on it became known that some of the most notable of the defenders had escaped. Tedardi the Florentine, whose record of the siege is one of the most valuable we possess, when at last he saw that the fight was hopeless, fled to the harbour and with many others swam out to the Venetian ships some of which put out to sea and escaped. Giustiniani's wound had proved mortal. Cardinal Isidore, in disguise, was taken captive, but a Genoese of Galata bought his freedom. Many escaped to Galata. Some paid large ransoms : some were slaughtered, whether Latins or Greeks, in spite of the money they gave. Most of the Greeks were made captive. The duke Notaras and his family were at first spared, but when Mohammed demanded that the duke's son, a boy of fourteen, should be sent to him in the palace, he refused, and he and all his sons were put to death. The usual fate of the Greek nobles however was that the fathers were slain, the boys taken to the barracks of the Janissaries, and the women and girls to the harems of the sultan and his chief favourites. Some forty thousand Greeks perished during the siege, fifty thousand it is supposed became captives, ten thousand, it is possible, 152 The Mediaeval City some few rich, most the very poor, retained their free dom if not their homes.1 The body of Constantine, recognised by the purple buskins, was found in a heap of dead. His head was cut off and borne to the Sultan. It was exposed on a column in front of the palace. The body was buried with respect, and over its grave, not far from where the mosque of Suleiman now stands, a lamp has always been kept burning, but the Ottoman government has sternly repressed the attempt of the faithful Greeks to turn it into a place of pilgrimage and prayer. So ended the Roman empire of the East. Its fall was an undying disgrace to Christendom, which stood by and would not help. But it fell chiefly through its own weakness. Military power and religion had been the strength of the Empire ; corruption had eaten away the first, and the luxury and vice of the imperial court had shown that the Christian faith had failed to hold its own. In the hour of their despair the Emperors turned again to Christ, but it was too late to save the Empire which their defiance of His laws had brought to desolation. The Church of Constantinople must pass through the fire6 of persecution, and recover in its isolation, if it might be, the strength of the first days. When Mohammed passed from the great church, he rode along the Hippodrome, and when he came to the Berpent column from Delphi he struck off one of the three heads. He had done, he might have said, with the old world. It was the day of the new peoples : a day which began with the destruction of the old. As he walked through the deserted halls of the great palace he repeated the words of Firdusi : Now the spider draws the curtain in the Csesar's palace hall, And the owl is made the sentinel on Afrasiab's tower of watch. 1 These are Finlay's figures. '53 CHAPTER II Constantinople under the Turks /CONSTANTINOPLE soon became Stambul' in the mouth of the Turks, a corruption it may be of the i'tc. rrjv n'X/i which they had often heard in the mouth of the Greeks. The crescent of Byzan tium became the symbol of the Ottoman power. A new city began to be raised on the ruins of the old. Some privileges were left to the Christians. Galata and Pera were from the first confirmed in their independence and freedom of trade ; yet step by step the Turkish sway was es tablished over them, and though the foreign liber ties still exist, and are reinforced by the privi leges, from time to time increased, of the am bassadors and their households and the colonies they protect, the Sultan's rule i6 complete on both J54 ^£5 IN THE CEMETERY AT SCUTARI Constantinople under the Turks sides of the Golden Horn. After three days of plunder, Mohammed set himself to make order. He declared that he would protect the Greek Church. A new patriarch, George Scholarios or Gennadios, was installed : his ecclesiastical jurisdiction was recognized. He was allowed to hallow new churches, and one little humble oratory remained undefiled by the infidel. On the hill above the Phanar, hidden away in a side street, by a high wall, stands the little white-washed sanctuary round which on the fatal day the fight had surged. The Turks still call it Kan Klisse, the church of blood. The Greeks know it as S. Mary Mouchliotissa (the Mongolian), in memory, not only of the B.V.M., but of Mary the daughter of Manuel Palaeologus, who had married the Khan of the Mongols, and after his death returned to Constantinople and built or restored the little church. Mohammed gave it to the architect Christodoulos, and by special firman, preserved it to the Christians. The patriarchal throne was moved first to the Church of the Apostles, soon destroyed to make the mosque of the conqueror ; thence to the Pammakaristos (Fetiyeh Djami) ; thence to the Church of the Wal- lachian palace in the Phanar, now the monastery of the Jerusalem patriarchate. At last, in 1 60 1, it was moved to the ancient Petrion, where it remains. The palace of the patriarch is close by : the walls still show remains of the ancient fortifications, and of the stones of the monastery where the Empress Theodora lived so long in retirement. The church has a beautiful icono6tasis of dark olive wood, and a patriarchal throne and pulpit, all probably of the seventeenth century, but which the faithful delight to ascribe to much earlier days. The throne is called the throne of S. John Chrysostom, the pulpit his '55 The Story of Constantinople pulpit ; but their only claim to the title is that they belong to his successors, in an unbroken line. In this sheltered spot, and in the district of Phanar, stretching between the inner bridge over the Golden Horn and the ultra-Moslem suburb of Eyub, remain the last links of Constantinople with the ancient Christian city. Round the patriarchal church, with the Christian schools and colleges, in the houses that are still half fortresses, cluster ancient memories that survive to-day. Gautier wrote fancifully, " Hither ancient Byzantium has fled. Here in obscurity dwell the descendants of the Comneni, the Dukai, the Palaiologoi, princes with no lands, but whose ancestors wore the purple and in whose veins flows imperial blood." Still in these dark houses, dusty and begrimed without, there survives some of the ancient Greek society, that has passed through so many changes, and hopes at lea6t to witness one more. The conquest of Constantinople had less effect than might have been expected upon the position of the Greek Church. Gennadios whom Mohammed made Patriarch, had been the bitter opponent of the reunion of the churches, and he had even declared that the destruction of the Empire would be the certain result of the concessions to the Latins. Mohammed desired that the Church should retain its power. If he pro tected it there might grow up some general feeling of acceptance of the Moslem rule. Thus synods were still allowed to meet, the patriarch was allowed to hold courts Christian, and to enforce his sentences with excommunication. But none the less the Church had no means of resisting the absolute power of the Sultan. At any moment patriarch, bishop or priest could be deposed, banished, executed, by his sole will. The Church has never ceased to 156 Constantinople under the Turks live in a position of danger, at the mercy of an alien lord, and amid an infidel people ; and at any moment she is liable to an active persecution, and her members to martyrdom. The earlier patriarchs after the conquest seem to have been disturbed in their office by scandals, intrigues, difliculties of every kind. Before long the Sultan demanded payment on each new election, and it is represented that it was only by bribes that the election proceeded at all. Simony appears to have been rife. It was but slowly and under persecution that the Church was purged from these sins and became again fully worthy of the reverence of the whole Greek people. The encouragement of learning in the present century, the high character of the patriarchs, the times of danger through which they have passed, have left the Church the true centre of the national life which still remains. Nor has the widespread influence of the patriarchate failed to preserve some relics of the power of the ancient Empire. During the seventeenth century, while the Morea was in the hands of the Venetians, the Patriarch of Constantinople still nomin ated the bishops, revenues still reached him from the monasteries ; and his excommunications were still valid in the lands which did not own the Sultan as lord. The Patriarch still claims ecclesiastical jurisdic tion over the Balkan lands, though the Porte has appointed a Bulgarian exarch, in accord with the wishes of the government, to act as head of the Orthodox in that principality, and Roumania has atao freed herself ; Serbia still struggles to be free : but it can hardly be doubted that should the lands ever be reunited, they would all gladly return to the obedience of the Patriarchate. But this by anticipation : Mohammed set himself to found a new city. Land was freely granted to rich '57 The Story of Constantinople families from other cities : it is said that five thousand families, Greeks and Turks, were soon induced to settle in what had been the richest city in the world. Four thousand Servians were planted outside the walls to recolonize the villages that the war had destroyed. As the conquest spread Greeks and Albanians were forcibly deported to the capital. The Christians of Constantinople alone were freed from the tribute of their children. Before he died Mohammed saw the city again populous and in prosperity. He founded a new city on the ruins of the old : the new population, half Christians, but predominantly Turks, gave new life ; and the new life was made to centre round the new buildings which Christian art inspired the Moslems to build. Gradually the city became not only Oriental, but Mohammedan. It is thus we see it to-day. Of the buildings let us speak later. Now let us see the work that was done by Mohammed the Conqueror and his successors. The Turkish power depended upon the charac teristic institution of the Janissaries. From the time of Orchan it was the law of the Turks to require from all the Christian subjects of their power a tribute of their children. These were at once made Mussulmans, brought up very strictly in their faith, skilfully taught, and trained to hardness. As time showed their capacity, they were divided into two classes ; those who had no special physical strength were set to work in the offices of State ; the others underwent the strict discipline which produced the finest military corps in Europe, the Janissaries. Unmarried, without family ties, connected neither among themselves nor with the people, these soldiers, it was said by their founder, Khalil-Djendereli, would belong solely to their sovereign, from whom they would have their sole reward. It was an original ,S8 Constantinople under the Turks and daring thought, to make each conquest the basis of future victories. " Let the Christians support the war ; let themselves furnish the soldiers by who6e means we shall fight." The first batch of Christian captives thus set apart in 1 328 were brought before a renowned dervish, Hadji Bektash. Thus he blessed them. " Let them be called Yeni-Tscheri (new soldiers) : they shall be conquerors in every fight ; let their countenance be ever white and shining, their arm strong, their sword sharp, their arrow swift." No troops ever more powerfully affected the imagination of friends and foes. Among the Turks they were always the leaders, the forlorn hope. Among Christians the terror of their name spread over Europe. In every war they gained new laurels, and from the moment when they stormed the walls of Constantinople they began to be, slowly but cer tainly, the sole strength of the Ottoman power. At first the absolute servants of the Sultan, before two centuries were over they became his masters. Their numbers increased rapidly. Within a few years their numbers reached twelve thousand, and in the seven teenth century they were more than three times as numerous. The description of the English traveller Sandys shows perhaps better than any other record what impression they made upon Christians at the height of their power. " The Janissaries," he says,1 " are those that bear great sway in Constantinople : in so much that the Sultans themselves have been sometimes subject to their insolencies. They are divided into severall companies under severall Captaines ; but all com manded by their Aga : a place of high trust, and the third in repute through the Empire : howbeit, 1 Sandys' Travels, pp. 48, 49, ed. 1627. '59 The Story of Constantinople their too much love is to him an assured destruc tion. These are the flower of the Turkish infan- tery, by whom such wonderfull victories have been atchieved. They call the Emperour father (for none other is there for them to depend on), to whose valour and faith in the time of warre he committeth his person : they having their stations about the royal pavillion. They serve with harquebushes, armed be sides with cymiters and hatchets. They weare on their heads a bonnet of white felt, with a flap hanging downe behind to their shoulders ; adorned about the browes with a wreathe of metall, gilt, and set with stones of small value ; having a kind of sheathe or rocket of the same erected before, wherein such are suffered to sticke plumes of feathers as have behaved themselves extraordinarie bravely. They tucke up the skirts of their coates when they fight, or march : and carry certaine dayes provision of victuals about with them. Nor is it a cumber : it being no more than a small portion of rice, and a little sugar and hony. When the Emperor is not in the field, the most of them reside with him in the Citie : ever at hand upon any occasion to secure his person, and are as were the Pretorian cohorts with the Romanes. They are in number about forty thousand : whereof the greater part (I meane of those that attend on the Court) have their being in three large Serraglios ; where the juniors do reverence their seniors, and all obey their severall commanders (as they their Aga) with much silence and humility. Many of them that are married J a breach of their first institution) have their private wellings : and those that are busied in forreine em ployments, are for the most part placed in such garri son townes as do greatly concerne the safetie of the Empire. Some are appointed to attend on Embas sadors ; others to guard such particular Christians as will 1 60 Constantinople under the Turks be at the charge.both about the City, and in their travels, from incivilities and violences, to whom they are in themselves most faithfull : wary and cruell, in pre venting and revenging their dangers and injuries ; and so patient in bearing abuses, that one of them of late being strucken by an Englishman (whose humorous swaggering would permit him never to review his countrey) as they travelled along through Morea, did not onely not revenge it, nor abandon him to the pillage and outrages of others, in so unknowne and savage a country ; but conducted him unto Zant in safety, say ing, God forbid that the villany of another should make him betray the charge that was committed to his trust. They are al of one trade or other. The pay that they have from the Grand Signior is but five aspers a day : yet their eldest sons as soone as borne are inrolled, and received into pension ; but his bounty extendeth no further unto his progeny (the rest reputed as natural Turks), nor is a Janizary capable of other preferments than the command of ten, of twenty, or of an hundred. They have yeerly given them two gowns apiece, the one of violet cloth, and the other of stanmell, which they weare in the City : carrying in their hands a great tough reede, some seven feet long, and tipped with silver ; the weight whereof is not seldome felt by such as displease them. Who are indeed so awefull, that Justice dare not proceed publikely against them (they being only to be judged by their Aga), but being privately attached, are as privately throwne into the sea in the night time. But then are they most tumultuous (whereto they do give the name of affection) upon the dangerous sicknesses of their Emperours ; and upon their deaths commit many outrages. Which is the cause that the great Bassas as well as they can, do conceale it from them, untill all things be provided for the presentment of the next for l 161 The Story of Constantinople them to salute. Whereupon (besides the present larges) they have an Asper a day increase of pension : so that the longer they live, and the more Emperours they outlive, the greater is their allowance. But it is to be considered, that all these beforenamed, are not onely of that tribute of children. For not a few of them are captives taken in their child-hood ; with divers Renegados, that have most wickedly quitted their religion and countrey, to fight against both : who are to ¦ the Christians the most terrible adversaries. And withall they have of late infringed their ancient customes, by the admitting of those into these orders, that are neither the sons nor grandsons of Christians ; a naturall Turke borne in Constantinople, before never knowne, being now a Barsa of the Port." To the English traveller's record may be added information of the Venetian ambassador's relazioni, which speak of the severe military training which the lads underwent, the strict asceticism in food, drill, garb, and tell that at night they all lay in a long room, lighted, and patrolled all night by a watchman, who walked up and down that they might learn thus to sleep in the midst of alarms. Children of every nation, Poles, Bohemians, Russians, Italians, Germans, as well as tribute slaves from Greece and the Balkan lands, they knew no home but that narrow court in the Seraglio, no master but the Sultan, no hope but the hope of plunder and the paradise of Islam. So great was the power of the training, the comradeship, the fanaticism, that but one of all the Christians forcibly made Moslem and brought up among the Janissaries is known to have taken the opportunity to escape and return to Chris tendom. The single hero was Scanderbeg, who alone arrested the triumphant progress of Mohammed II. One of the most curious memorials of the old 162 Constantinople under the Turks Turkish State is that which is preserved to-day in the museum at the end of the At-meidan. There a hundred and thirty-six figures, huge painted dolls, represent the terrible troops in their habits as they lived. On the stairs are figures in chain armour, in the hall above the representations of the different ranks, and the officers named after the kitchen duties they were supposed to perform. It was one great family, in idea, with the Sultan as father. He gave the food, and their great kettles in which it was cooked were also their drums, with spoons for drumsticks. A strange grotesque sight are these bright figures in their long robes, with here and there, for contrast, an example of the new uniform introduced by Mohammed II. The museum is almost deserted ; but there is no more characteristic memorial of the great days of the Turks. Let the visitor not imagine that he may sketch or take notes or look at the book of drawings which he may find in the room. He will hear the familiar Turkish word Tasak ! and the book will be snatched from his hands. But this by the way. When Mohammed II. took Constantinople and settled the Janissaries in the outer court of the Seraglio, once the Acropolis, they were only beginning to be the centre of power. Yet even then they were the most characteristic institution of the Osmanlis. While Constantinople was assuming the aspect which it was to bear for centuries, of an entirely eastern town, with minarets everywhere, khans, shrouded women, the strange solemn social life of the East, Mohammed the Conqueror was adding every where to his empire. Servia and Bosnia were annexed, Albania and Cyprus subdued ; the whole of Asia Minor was under his rule. He died on May 2, 1 48 1 , and left the name of the greatest of the Turkish rulers. His laws, his organisation of the judicial and religious 163 The Story of Constantinople class of the Ulemas, the teachers of the people, were more permanent than his victories. But when he died the power that he had founded rested securely on the great maxim which his successors were, from his practice, to develop till it became a fixed theory of government — that the children of Christians were alone those who should enjoy the highest dignities of the empire. The visitor to Constantinople remembers Mohammed most of all by the magnificent mosque which towers over the city and is seen in such striking effects of light from the heights of Pera. With the name of his successor is associated a mosque as beautiful and as famous. Bayezid succeeded his father in spite of a plot of the Grand Vizier to give the throne to his younger brother Djem, whose romantic adventures fill so large a space in the French and papal diplomacy of the end of the fifteenth century. His reign (1481- 1512) was marked like his father's by great victories, and the once famous Turkish fleet owes its origin to him. In him first appears the contemplative lethargic character which was to become marked in some of the later Sultans. Eastern writers called him a philosopher; and when he had ceased even to pretend to be a warrior his troops insisted on his giving up the throne to his son Selim. Three weeks after his resignation he died. Rarely has he who has once been Sultan lived long in retire ment. Selim, with ferocious zest, carried out, though he did not inaugurate, another custom of the Ottoman monarchy. He swept away all possible claimants to his throne, strangling his two brothers and five of his nephews. He followed the victorious course of his predecessors ; he fought in Persia, he seized Egypt and occupied Jerusalem, and Mecca, the centre of Mohammedan reverence, passed under his power. 164 Constantinople under the Turks Savage and relentless as he was — it became a proverb of hatred, " Would that thou wast the Vizier of Sultan Selim " — he was yet, like so many of his race, a poet, and the friend and patron of learned men. He died near Adrianople on the 22nd of September 1 520, and left the throne to his son Suleiman, one of the greatest of the Sultans. Suleiman began with mercy. Justice and bene volence, he declared that he took for the principles of his government. He freed prisoners, he declared that he would rule in accordance with the precepts of the Koran. From the first his reign was a succession of victories. In 1521 Belgrade surrendered; in 1522 he conquered the isle of Rhodes, so long the gallantly defended outpost of Christendom in the Mediterranean. For a time after these great successes he turned to pleasure, but threatened insubordination among the Janissaries awoke the barbarity which was never far below the surface in the great Turkish Sovereigns, and Mustafa the aga with several of the officers paid for their independence with their lives. It was necessary, Suleiman saw, to continue war, to find employment for his turbulent force ; and in 1526 he marched against Hungary with a force of a hundred thousand men. At Mohacz the Christian army was utterly defeated after a gallant fight, in which Suleiman himself was for a time in great danger, and in which at the end the flower of Hungarian chivalry with their King at their head perished by the sword or in the river through which they tried to escape. Buda Pesth fell into the hands of the conqueror. All the prisoners taken at Mohacz were massacred, and over a hundred thousand slaves were led back to Turkey. The spoils were enormous. The library of the old Seraglio and the treasury still hold some of the choicest manuscripts of the famous library of 165 The Story of Constantinople Mathias Corvinus. Suleiman returned in triumph to Constantinople. To the passage of armies on their way to victory the people of the great city had now become familiar as in the greatest days of the Empire. Thirteen times, it is said, did Suleiman pass through the gates on warlike expeditions and thirteen times did he return a conqueror. He led his forces to the walls of Vienna, and though he was at length compelled to withdraw, he inflicted a blow on the Empire which it took long to recover, and he showed to Europe that a new and terrible power had come to take part in the affairs of the West. In Persia, if he was not entirely suc cessful, yet he added new territories to the Empire. A pirate fleet under his sanction swept the seas. He defeated the combined fleets of Spain, Italy, and Venice. During a reign of forty-six years he kept Europe and Asia at war. But his greatest triumphs were not those of the battlefield. He made the great Sovereigns of Christendom count him as their equal. Every prince of the time was anxious to enter into negotiation with him. Their envoys came to Con stantinople, and were treated as suppliants. To every indignity they submitted for the sake of winning the alliance of " the grand Turk," the Sultan whom Europe came to call " the magnificent." France was the first to make alliance with the infidel ; and in spite of the papal curse the Moham medan power was introduced as a prominent actor in the politics of Europe by the most Christian King, Francis I. The Sultan of sultans, King of kings, giver of crowns to the kings of the world, the shadow of God upon the earth, Suleiman, the ever victorious, assured the prostrate King of France that he need not fear, for that every hour his horse was saddled, his sword girt on, and he was ready to defend and to 1 66 Constantinople under the Turks overthrow. A solemn treaty in February 1535 united France and Turkey in bonds of perpetual amity. It was renewed in 1553; and the alliance remained an important fact in the politics of Europe for more than two hundred years. Renowned for his victories in diplomacy and war, Suleiman's fame was even greater as a patron of art and letters. It was through him first that the Christendom of the sixteenth century heard of the glories of Eastern literature, and that Europe began to imitate Asia. It was the great age of Turkish poets. The court of Suleiman was thronged by poets who vied with each other in celebrating the glories of their master. Every bazaar of the East rang with his praises : in far distant lands the in genious verse-makers made his victories, his pleasures, his magnificence, the theme of their elaborate com positions. Trade poured into Stambul. All the riches of the East, the wonderful carpets and em broideries, the exquisite metal-work, the dignified designs of the pen and the brush, fixed their natural home in the court of the magnificent Suleiman. Under him the architecture of the Moslems reached its culmination : the splendid mosque named after him, with the tiirbehs around it, represent the great work of his age, worthy of commemoration as lengthy as that which Procopius gave to the edifices of his sovereign. Great as conqueror, as builder, and as restorer of ancient work, Suleiman may well be called, in yet another aspect, the Turkish Justinian. He was great also as a legislator, and his work completed that of Mohammed II. He laid down the limits of the privileges of the Ulemas, the powers of the Sheikh- ul-Islam and the Grand Vizier. Financial organisa tion, so essential to the security of his conquests, was made under his rule into an elaborate system. The 167 The Story of Constantinople penal code was revised, simplified, and, on the whole, rendered less severe. Every change, every reform, showed the guiding genius of the great Sultan ; arbitrary as the worst of his race, unrestrained always in the exercise of his authority, he yet showed an Eastern despotism at its best, animated by a zeal for justice, for regularity, for the welfare of the people. Suleiman, whose name exercised so great a fascina tion over the imagination of the West, was the hero, Christian romancers thought, of a grand passion. The name of Roxelana became famous in the drama and poetry of Europe. Her story was indeed a striking one. Khurrem, " the joyous one," was a Russian captive, who, in the later years of the mighty Sultan, obtained an absolute control over him. From a slave, placed among hundreds of other captives in the harem, she rose to be herself Sultan,1 the wife of the Com mander of the Faithful. It was contrary to all precedent that Suleiman de posed the mother of hi6 eldest son from her rank and made Roxelana Sultan. The French Ambassador accounts for the elevation in this way. " Roxelana wished to found a mosque for the weal of her soul, but the mufti told her that the pious works of a slave turned only to the advantage of her lord : upon this special ground Suleiman declared her free. This was immediately followed by the second step. The free woman would no longer comply with those desires of Suleiman which the bondswoman had obeyed, for the fetwa of the mufti declared that this could not be without sin. Passion on the one side and obstinacy on the other at last brought it about that Suleiman made her his wife. A treaty of marriage was rati- 1 The form " Sultana " is only a Western one. The Turks use the word Sultan for both sexes, placing it after the name in the case of a female. 1 68 Constantinople under the Turks Bed, and Roxelana was secured an income of 5000 sultanins." 1 The extraordinary influence which this remarkable woman exercised over the great Sultan was new, it seemed, to the Empire ; it was not only new, but destructive to the military system of the Turks that any special attachment should be formed which should attract the Sultan to the home rather than the camp. The Sultans, with all their gross pleasures, had been ever warriors ready to desert everything for their mili tary duties, and had ruled their Empire as well as their army solely by their own will. Suleiman seemed to open the way to influences which would be de structive to the Turkish power ; and one of the greatest of the Viziers a century later said that all his suc cessors were fools or tyrants. Be this so or not, Suleiman and Roxelana were unique in Turkish history. Their devotion to each other appeared to be complete : and the passionate love which grew rather than diminished with years, marked the history of the court with the stains of sacrifice and crime. Mustafa, the Sultan's eldest son, stood in the way of the children of Khurrem. The Vizier Rustem Pacha was her devoted slave, owing to her his elevation to the dignity of the Sultan's vicegerent. He brought to Suleiman reports that Mustafa was allying with the Shah of Persia to dethrone him, and was winning the Janissaries to his side, a charge to which his valour and ability, and his great popularity with the soldiers, might seem to give some colour. Suleiman himself, on his Syrian cam paign, ordered his son to appear before him. On September 21, 1553 — the day was long remembered — the gallant Mustafa was brought with great pomp 1 Quoted by Ranke, Ottoman and Spanish monarchies [Eng. trans.], p. 12. 169 The Story of Constantinople and ceremony to the tent of the Sultan. When he entered he found only the seven mutes armed with the fatal bowstring. He was seized, and before he could utter more than one cry, he was murdered. The thick tapestry at the back of the tent was drawn aside and Suleiman entered to gaze upon the body of his son. Even then the vengeance was not complete. The child of the murdered Mustafa was stabbed at Brusa in his mother's arms. The horror that was felt at these crimes became evident when the Janissaries demanded the punishment of Rustem, and when Djihanghir, the son of Suleiman and Roxelana, died of grief for the brother to whom he was devoted. The new grand Vizier was sacrificed also : and not long after wards the beautiful Roxelana, Khurrem, passed away. The great Sultan gave her the most beautiful of tombs. The art of the Mussulmans was centered in that last home which the love of Suleiman could bestow. " Without, the scented roses twine, The Suleymanieh tow'rs o'erhead, The flagstones, flecked with shade and shine, Re-echo to the pilgrim's tread, And soft grey doves their wings outspread In the blue vault above the shrine." If Roxelana was the evil genius of Suleiman, his reign was not more happy after her death. Her two elder sons, Selim and Bayezid broke into open war. Bayezid attacked Selim, and, betrayed, it would seem by the basest of intrigues, he was defeated, and fled to Persia. Every letter that he wrote to his father was suppressed, and the Persians sold him to his brother by whom he and his four sons were put to death. A few months later his fifth son, a child of three, was strangled at Brusa by the Sultan's orders. 170 Constantinople under the Turks To the last, Suleiman led his troops to the field. He died on August 3c, 1566, while he was con ducting the siege of Szigeth, a small fortress in Hungary. The grand Vizier concealed his death from the army and sent messengers at once to Selim, who hastened to Constantinople. Suleiman left behind him a name more famous than any of his predecessors save Mohammed the Conqueror. His lofty and enterprising genius, his heroic courage, his strict observance of the laws of Islam tempered at times by a wise tolerance, the order and economy which were combined with his magnificence and grandeur, his love of knowledge and the protection he extended to learned men, all mark him out, says the historian of the Ottomans, among the noblest of his race. Selim II. began ill by not paying the largesse which the Janissaries expected from a new sovereign. They mutinied, and he was obliged to yield. His father had altered the ancient rule which required the Janissaries only to go to the war when the Sultan himself took the field. The Janissaries now compelled him to allow the enrolment of their children in their ranks. Selim was no warrior, and he was glad to send his troops without him. He preferred, the ambassadors say, "the society of eunuchs and of women, and the habits of the serai to the camp : " he " wore away his days in sensual enjoyments, in drunkenness and indolence." "Whoever beheld him and saw his face inflamed with Cyprus wine, and his short figure rendered corpulent by slothful indulgence, expected in him neither the warrior nor the leader of warriors. In fact, nature and habit unfitted him to be the supreme head, that is the life and soul, of that warlike State."1 1 Ranke, quoting Barbaro, the Venetian ambassador. 171 The Story of Constantinople He was the first of the Turkish Sovereigns who was unworthy of the throne that had been won by hard and incessant work. " I think not of the future," he himself said, " I live only to enjoy the pleasure of each day as it passes." A drunkard ruling over the Mussulmans, sworn to total abstinence from all in toxicating drinks, was a grotesque and disgusting anomaly. The people mocked while they followed the example. " Where shall we get our wine to-day," they said, " from the Mufti (priest) or from the Kadi (judge) ? " But whatever might be the character of the Sultan, it had become a fixed policy with the Turks that the Empire could only be carried on by aggressive war. Under Selim, though without his personal intervention, war was made with Russia, but without success : the conquests of Suleiman in Arabia were made complete, and Yemen fell into the hands of the Turks. Then it was determined to complete the conquest of the Mediterranean : war was declared against Venice, and Cyprus was captured in August 1571. But this capture, which Selim described to Barbaro as "cutting off one of the arms of the Republic " was avenged by the famous naval league against the Turks. On October 7, 1 57 1 , Don John of Austria utterly destroyed the Turkish fleet at Lepanto, capturing 130 galleys, 30,000 prisoners, and 15,000 Christian slaves. It was the first sign of the long decline of the Ottoman power. Europe awoke to the belief that the Turks were not invincible. The news was received with consternation in Con stantinople. An outbreak of Mohammedan fanaticism, as so often since, found its expression in the ferocity of the Sultan. Selim issued orders for the massacre of all the Christians in the city : happily his Vizier deferred the execution of the command, and it was 172 r\ f 1 wuML ¦i v!lil»lP" •73 Constantinople under the Turks revoked. The incident is characteristic. From 1453 , the Christian inhabitants of the capital have held their lives simply at the pleasure of the Commander of the Faithful. At any moment the word may be spoken which the loyal Turk must obey " For an order has come from the Padishah I must go and kill the Giaour." The butchery was countermanded in 1 57 1, but little more than twenty years later it was again seriously proposed. When the Spaniards in 1595 sacked Patras, the extermination of the Christians in Constantinople "was discussed in the divan, but the result was con fined to the publication of an order for the expulsion of all unmarried Greeks from Constantinople within three days."1 This was in the reign of Murad III., and when he died, in the same year, " the Janissaries, in their wonted manner, fell to spoiling Christians and Jews, and were proceeding to further outrages, when their aga, to restrain their insolence, hung up a Janissary taken in the act of murdering a rayah." The alarm of Mussulman Constantinople was ended by the speedy reconstruction of a fleet, and by the capture of Tunis. But with none of these triumphs was it possible to associate the name of Selim. He died on December 12, 1574, "the victim," in the phrase of the Vicomte A. de la Jonquiere, " de sa passion pour le vin." Murad III. his son and successor was not without good instincts. He was a striking contrast to his father. He loved study, he was temperate, he was a soldier. But the terrible custom, now become almost a law of state, laid its frightful burden of crime upon him at the moment of his succession. For eighteen hours he refused to be proclaimed, he argued with the Muftis Finlay, vol. v. p. 92. See Von Hammer, viii. 134, 317. ¦75 The Story of Constantinople and the Ministers, to save the lives of his brothers. But he yielded, willingly or unwillingly, and the chief. of the mutes wa6 summoned to his presence, shown the body of the dead Sultan, and given nine handker chiefs for the nine princes in the Seraglio. Weeping, Murad gave the order, 6ays the Venetian ambassador : and men thought when he began his reign that he would be sober, wise, and just. He did not long retain the reputation. He began a war with Persia and his troops were engaged on the Hungarian frontier. But he followed the example of his father. He did not himself lead his armies in the field. He rarely left the seraglio, where he gave himself up entirely to the pleasures which appealed so powerfully to the Moslem. The harem and the treasury became his sole delights. The ambassadors tell stories that sound fabulous of his insane desire for gold. He stripped ornaments from ancient works of art and coined them into money ; he collected from every quarter ; he pinched and starved everything but his private pleasures, and year after year he cast into the great marble well which he had made beneath his bed " two and a half millions of gold, all in sequins and sultanins." Under him the sale of offices, which was begun by Rustem, the vizier to whom Roxelana induced Suleiman to give his favour, became a settled and almost fundamental rule of the state. Even judicial and military offices were given for bribes, and the money was caressed by the insane Murad and cast into the pit over which he slept. The ambassadors describe in ludicrous language the impression which Murad made upon them. He sat in state to receive them, he received their presents, he listened to them with a stupid 6tare ; then he " went back to his garden, where in deep sequestered spots his women played before him, danced and sang, or his dwarfs made sport for him, or his mutes, awkward and mounted on 176 Constantinople under the Turks as awkward horses, engaged with him in ludicrous combats, in which he struck now at the rider now at the horse, or where certain Jews performed lascivious comedies before him." In fact the Sultans were be coming ridiculous, without ceasing to be terrible. As for government, Murad left it to his vizier, a Bosnian, Mohammed, who held his office in three reigns and far surpassed any European minister in riches and power. It was he who peacefully arranged the succession of both Selim 'and Murad, and so long as he lived there was order and firmness in the government. But after his death the chief office was passed from hand to hand, according to the Sultan's fancy, and always a large sum found its way, at each change of viziers, into the pit of gold. The elevation of Ferhat reads like a tale in the Arabian Nights. Murad would wander like Haroun al-Raschid through the bazaars. One day he heard a cook bewailing the misgovernment of the city. He questioned him, approved his replies, and next day summoned him to the palace and appointed him to the office whose holder he had criticised, from which he rose to be vizier. It was a perilous rise. Ferhat did not long retain his position, but at least he escaped with his life. It was different with others, and the precedent of handing over officers to the vengeance of the Janissaries was set in 1 590, when the soldiers attacked the Seraglio and demanded the execution of the Beyler bey of Roumelia and another. The plane tree of the Janissaries began its deadly history. Murad died on January 6, 1596. His eldest son and successor, whose mother was a Venetian, marked his accession by the most bloody of all the murders which inaugurated the reign of the Sultans. He had his nineteen brothers strangled in his presence, and then proceeded to govern as though he had no objects but those of the most exalted virtue. After a few M 177 The Story of Constantinople weeks he left all the work to his ministers, and was himself ruled entirely by his mother. In 1 596, how ever, the disasters of his army induced him to go himself to the war in Wallachia. The sacred standard of the Prophet, preserved at Eyub, was unfurled, and on the field of Kereskte, Mohammed won a great victory over the Austrians. He returned in triumph to Constanti nople, where the rest of his reign was marked by re bellions and misfortunes on all sides. The plague made fearful ravages in the crowded streets of Stambul. It penetrated into the Seraglio, and it is said that seven teen princesses, sisters of Mohammed, died. The sipahis rose and demanded the heads of the eunuchs who ruled under favour of the Valideh Sultan. They were given up and strangled. But then the Sultan deter mined to take vengeance, he entrusted its execution to the Janissaries. The sipahis were ordered to lay down their arms ; if they failed to do so they were threatened with the penalties of treason. The soldiers thereupon delivered up their officers, who were put to death. The Sultan himself died in 1603. His son Ahmed succeeded him, an elder son having been put to death on pretence of having shown independence of character which threatened the throne. Ahmed I. was but fourteen when he came to the throne. Well served by a wise Grand Vizier, his reign was marked by some signs of activity, and, strange to say, by two years of peace. But the treaty of Sitvakorok (1606) with Austria was another step in the decline of the Ottomans. Ahmed did something to redress the corruption that had infected the government. He administered justice like the chieftains of old ; he received petitions, and saw that grievances were redressed. He began, as he grew up, to read of the exploits of Suleiman, and to promise himself that he would surpass them ; but he 178 Constantinople under the Turks had no stability of purpose, and his reign passed away in disasters, with the murder of the one eminent man, Nousouh Pacha, who might have saved the State, and with the introduction of usages which seemed to the Ulemas to strike at the very heart of Moslem law. Constantinople was almost abandoned to mob-rule because the muftis forbade the use of tobacco, which was introduced by the Dutch. It is impossible now to conceive a Turk without this solace; and it is strange that it needed the most ingenious arguments and the most stubborn defiance to procure the with drawal of the edict which forbade it to the Moslem. The poets, we are told, called tobacco, coffee, opium, and wine the four elements in the world of happiness ; the Ulemas replied that they were the four chief servants of the devil. The people settled the question for themselves. With Ahmed the custom of butchering the brothers of the new Sultan had ceased. He not only spared the life of his brother Mustafa, but left directions that he should succeed him on the throne. But the custom which he began was even more fatal to the power of the Turks than that which he ended. The succession of the oldest male of the royal house might not itself have been a misfortune. But from the time when the princes ceased to be strangled they were kept in the Seraglio, with no knowledge of the work of government, trained only to a voluptuous and effeminate life. Mustafa had almost lost his wits when he became Sultan ; he had been a prisoner for nearly forty years. Within three months his violence, his promotion of two pages to be Pashas of Cairo and of Damascus, his dislike of the female sex, convinced the ministers that he was incapable of governing ; he was again removed to the Seraglio, and Osman II., the 6on of his brother Ahmed, was elevated to the throne. '79 The Story of Constantinople Of the troubles which beset the ambassadors and how they were redressed more shall be said hereafter. Osman's six years of rule were disturbed by sterner men. The Janissaries again showed that their power was greater than that of the Sultan. Osman decimated them in war, and executed many who drank wine ; but they were too strong for him, dragged the unhappy Mustafa again from prison, and again declared him to be the ruling Sultan. The Kafess (cage), the splendid building in the grounds of the old Seraglio, which even now may not be approached, which had so long held him prisoner, has memories of no 6tranger history than his. When he was dragged forth he trembled before his nephew, and threw himself at his feet. Osman taunted the Janissaries with the weakness of the ruler they preferred to himself; but it was not weakness that the Janissaries feared. Osman was dragged to the Seven Towers, and there, after a desperate struggle, he was strangled in a dungeon. Within a few months the idiot Mustafa was again deposed and sent back to the Kafe6s, where soon afterwards the bowstring ended his miserable life. For the few months of his nominal reign he was entirely in the hands of the soldiery ; minister after minister was given up to them, and ended his life by the bowstring or on the fatal tree. The Janissaries held Constanti nople in terror, and raised and deposed a Sultan as easily as a minister. Murad IV., still a child, the surviving son of Ahmed, was made Sultan in 1623. In him the Turks had again a masterful and determined ruler. His mother the Valideh, and his Vizier Hafiz, made the first years of his reign distinguished if not glorious. Till 1632 he trained himself in all military exercises; he rode, he drew the bow with the best of the Janissaries. Then came the revolt of the Sipahis and 180 Constantinople under the Turks Janissaries, which gave him his opportunity. Con stantinople was for many days in the hands of the military mob, reinforced by dissaffected troops who had returned from Persia. They assembled in the Atmeidan (the old. Hippodrome) ; thence they went to the Seraglio and demanded the " seventeen heads " of the Sultan's chief advisers and friends. For some days Murad held out. He summoned the Vizier, Hafiz, who rode through the crowd, past the barracks of the Janissaries, in at the Orta Kapou, after dis mounting, the stones of the mob falling round him as he disappeared. Murad ordered him to escape to Juntan. Within a few hours the Sultan was com pelled to come forth to the people and hold Divan. They demanded the seventeen — the " vizier, the aga of the Janissaries, the deftarder, and even a boy, because he was liked by the Sultan." " Give us the heads," they cried. " Give the men up to us, or it shall be the wor6e for thee." Murad summoned Hafiz to return to die. The Vizier came back, made the ablution of the Moslem law before death, went forth calmly to the mob, and was hewn in pieces outside the. gate of the Seraglio. " Infamous assassins," cried Murad, " who fear neither Allah nor his prophet, some day if God wills you shall find your victims terribly avenged." "The sole remedy against abuses is the sword," one said to the Sultan ; and the rest of his life showed how well he understood the lesson. One by one the leaders of the revolt were secretly assassinated; their bodies were found floating on the Bosporus. The Janissaries and the sipahis were ostensibly received into favour again, justice was promised, and the strict rule of law. But it was a reign of terror that Murad inaugurated. His first execution had given him a passion for blood. Sometimes he gratified it in the chase, when he The Story of Constantinople slaughtered thousands of head, driven together by an army of beaters. More often it was displayed in the slaughter of men. In the year 1637 it was declared that he had executed 25,000 men, many of them with his own hand. " He was now terrific to behold. His savage black eyes glared threateningly in a countenance half hidden by his dark brown hair and long beard ; but never was its aspect more peculiar than when it showed the wrinkles between the eye brows. His skill with the javelin and the bow was then sure to deal death to some one. He was served with trembling awe. His mutes were no longer to be distinguished from the other slaves of the Serai, for all conversed by signs. While the plague was daily carrying off fifteen hundred victims in Constantinople, he had the largest cups brought from Pera, and drank half the night through, while the artillery was dis charged by his orders." 1 Drunken and brutal as he was he had still much of the terrible force of the early Ottomans. He led his own troops to battle, and when they flinched — for the old spirit seemed to have deserted even the Janissaries — he drove them forward with his own sword. He appears in history as the Conqueror of Bagdad (1638) a conquest marked, it is said, by a massacre of 25,000 people. He was the last Sultan whom the people of Constantinople saw return in triumph from a war of which he himself had been the leader. He died on February 9, 1640, leaving behind him no child. Only his mother's craft had prevented the murder of his only brother, the last of the race of Osman. He left behind him an empire which seemed entirely subdued to the Sultan's will. But the terror which he had inspired could not endure ; and while it lasted it could only paralyse the forces which should : Ranke, p.«S. 182 Constantinople under the Turks have given strength and permanence to the empire. Greedy, avaricious to an extent as enormous but not so ridiculous as Murad III., the supreme passion of his life was the lust of blood. It became an insanity ; at night he would rush through the streets, cutting down all whom he met. Yet he died in his bed ; the time had not come when Sultans were murdered as easily as Viziers. Ibrahim, his successor, had been imprisoned in the Kafess since he was a child of two. He had lived through the reigns of Mustafa, Osman and Murad. He had been allowed no offspring. He was utterly ignorant of politics and war. He cared for nothing but the pleasures of the harem. When the soldiers went in to announce his accession he would not believe that they desired anything but his death. He would not be convinced till the corpse of his brother was brought before him. Then he screamed with insane delight, "The empire is at last delivered from its butcher." His reign of nine years was a horrible mixture of tragedy and farce. In licentiousness he outdid the worst of his predecessors, in folly the silliest of them. The capture of the child of a favourite slave led to the war of Candia : the marriage by his orders of his baby daughter to a rich Pacha was used as an occasion to strangle the bridegroom and seize his treasures. At length the shameful crimes of the sovereign, of which murder seemed the least, caused an organised insur rection in the city. The chief Mufti, whose daughter had been shamefully used by the Sultan, assembled all the mollahs, and the officers of the Janissaries and the sipahis in the Orta djami (a mosque on the Etmeidan, the old quarter of the Janissaries, now destroyed). They first demanded the execution of the Vizier. When that was refused, the Janissaries secured the gates, surrounded the Seraglio, caught 183 The Story of Constantinople and slew the Vizier. In S. Sophia, the Mufti, the Sheik-ul-Islam, proclaimed to a vast multitude the iniquities of the Sultan, and demanded his deposi tion. Solemnly the Osmanlis declared Ibrahim, the padishah, the king of kings, the commander ot the faithful, unworthy to reign. His little child, Mohammed, only seven years old, was fetched from the charge of his mother, the famous Valideh Sultan, and invested with the ensigns of sovereignty. Ibrahim was again carried to the Kafess. Ten days later ap peared the mutes, with the Vizier and the Sheik-ul- Islam ; and the bowstring ended the life of Ibrahim. Mohammed IV. reigned for nearly forty years, 1649- 1687, and he filled a great space in the history of his time. Foreign observers — notably that most entertaining writer Paul Ricaut, Esquire, " late secre tary to his Excellency the Earl of Winchelsea, Em bassador Extraordinary for His Majesty Charles II., to Sultan Mahomet Han the Fourth Emperor of the Turks, now Consul of Smyrna, and Fellow of the Royal Society," in his " History of the present state of the Ottoman Empire," and a certain escaped slave (unless indeed it be an ingenious gentleman of Grub Street) who wrote in 1663 "A new survey of the Turkish Empire and Government " — made Europe well acquainted with the customs of the Turks, and the manners, especially the least pleasing manners, of their rulers. The Turk become better known, yet hardly less terrible ; and our knowledge of the revolutions of Constantinople now comes to us, for the first time, largely from English observers. The story must be briefly sketched. In the first year of the child- Sultan's reign tragedies of the palace succeeded each other with fearful rapidity. There was a contest between the Valideh, the mother, and Kiosem (as Ricaut calls her), the 184 Constantinople under the Turks grandmother of Mohammed. The aga of the Janissaries took part against Sinan the Vizier, who, with the old queen, determined to put a young child, Suleiman, on the throne. Sinan took prompt measures. He entered the Seraglio, had the Valideh aroused and sent to the bedside of her son. The household was armed. Suspected traitors were slain before Mohammed's eyes, and their blood bespattered his dress as he sat on his throne. While within the Seraglio there was this confusion, without the whole city was in disturbance, and the people were all aroused to defend their Sultan. Ricaut's description is worth quoting. He derived his knowledge from some persons intimately concerned, and the way he tells the tale, from which a short passage is here given, shows how Eastern doings struck the Westerns of his day. " These preparations," he says,1 " were not only in the Seraglio, but likewise without ; for the Visier had given order to all the Pashaws and Beglerbegs, and other his Friends, that without delay they should repair to the Seraglio with all the force they could make, bringing with them three day8 Provision, oblig ing them under pain of Death to this Duty. In a short space so great was this concourse, that all the Gardens of the Seraglio, the outward Courts and all the adjoining Streets were filled with armed Men : from Galata and Tophana came boats and barges loaden with Powder and Ammunition and other necessaries ; so that in the morning by break of day appeared such an Army of Horse and Foot in the Streets, and Ships and Gallies on the Sea, as ad ministered no small terrour to the Janizaries ; of which being advised, and seeing the concourse of the people run to the assistance of the King, they 1 Pp- 3*-3z- ,85 The Story of Constantinople thought it high time to bestir themselves ; and there fore armed a great company of Albaneses, Greeks and other Christians to whom they offered Money, and the Title and Priviledges of Janizaries, promising to free them from Harach, or Impositions paid by the Christians ; which Arguments were so prevalent, that most taking Arms, you might see the Court and City divided, and ready to enter into a most dread con fusion of a Civil War." The end of the matter was that "the old queen" was dragged naked from the Seraglio, a horror un known in Turkish history, and bowstrung outside the Orta Kapou. The banner of the Prophet was un furled. The Janissaries rallied to it. Their aga was deserted and slain, with his accomplices, and (by re tributive justice) the Vizier was stabbed in the streets. Tranquillity was re-established, and the government was carried on from the harem. From 1649 to 1656 six Viziers were deposed or strangled, Pacha after Pacha broke into open revolt, the Janissaries and sipahis fought against each other as if there had been no Christians to conquer, and in turn demanded from the Sultan the heads of those whom they chose to proscribe. The Valideh Sultan was wisely and care fully educating her son. In 1656 she gave him the be6t of teachers and viziers in Kuprili Mohammed. With him began the age of the great Viziers who for a time revived the glory of the Turks. He showed with severity that he intended to rule ; and the Turks have always submitted to one who knows how to command. The sipahis were sent away from Constantinople and settled in the provinces. A rising was sternly checked, and four thousand corpses were thrown into the sea. Thus began the rule of the Kuprilian Viziers, which lasted from 1659 to 1702, a half century of varying fortunes, but never wholly 186 fOUNTAIN IN TIIK COURT Of THE MOSQUE OK VALIDEH Constantinople under the Turks unfavourable to the Turks. The interminable war with Candia went on, and the Austrian and Hungarian campaigns succeeded each other with undeviating regu larity. The Turks met Montecuculi, and Sobieski, in the field ; and when they were defeated they were at least not disgraced. In 1683 Kara Mustafa, the Vizier, was defeated before Vienna and the Turks were driven back to Belgrade. Though he was the Sultan's son-in-law an order was sent to the camp for him to die ; he placed the cord with his own hands round his neck. In the year of continuous warfare, when the forces of the empire bore the Turkish banners against Venice, as well as the Empire, the vices and neglect of the Sultan passed for a time almost unheeded. But in 1687 the defeat of the army led to a demand for the punishment of the general, Suleiman Pacha. Mohammed saw that this was but a step towards his own deposition. He sacrificed his minister, and ordered the execution of his own brother Suleiman, that there might be no one to replace him. But it was too late. The army, in rebellion, marched on Constantinople, released Sulei man and invested him as Sultan. Mohammed was imprisoned till his death in 1693. Suleiman II. reigned but four years, but he showed an unexpected ability. His accession was marked by what had now become a custom, an insurrection of the Janissaries. The house of the Grand Vizier was Backed, his harem was violated, and the most shameful atrocities were committed in the streets. Constan tinople seemed to be given over to pillage ; the bazaars were attacked, and some private houses were pillaged. The Shiek-ul-Islam was obliged to arouse the Ulemas and display the standard of the Prophet over the gate of the Seraglio, and when the Janissaries, like spoilt children, returned to their allegiance, their 187 The Story of Constantinople leaders were executed and peace was restored. In Suleiman the people had again a sovereign who lived according to the precepts of the Koran. His wisdom and impartiality, extended even to allowing the Christians of Constantinople to rebuild some of their ancient churches, were recognised even by fanatics and he was counted a saint. His wars were carried on by Kuprili Mustafa, to whom also his brother Ahmed II. ( 1 691- 1 69 5) abandoned all the power of government, at the death of that wise statesman at the head of the defeated army of the Turks at Salankanem. Mustafa II. (169 5- 1 703) was the son of Mohammed IV. His first proclamation to his people wa6 a strange document to issue from the arbitrary sovereign of the Osmanlis. He attributed all the defeats and mis fortunes of the last reigns to the vices of the Sultans. " While the Padishahs who have ruled since our sublime father Mohammed have heeded nought but their fondness for pleasure and for ease, the unbelievers, the unclean beings, have invaded with their armies the four quarters of Islam." In any other monarchy it would have been dangerous indeed to criticise after this fashion. At Constantinople neither the pen nor the voice was of much importance. It was the sword that ruled. And the sword of the Sultan had ceased to be victorious. In 1697 Mustafa was utterly defeated by Prince Eugene at Zenta. Again a Kuprili was called to command, but by the treaty of Carlowitz, 1699, by which Hungary and Transylvania were given up, the dismemberment of the Empire had begun. For the last two years of his reign Mustafa aban doned his capital and lived in a palace at- Adrianople. An intrigue deposed him in 1703, and his brother Ahmed reigned in his stead. He began his reign by 188 Constantinople under the Turks executing all those who had taken part in his elevation, an act which he followed by appointing another Kuprili Vizier. The next year was marked by the beginning of serious wars with Russia, the bizarre sojourn of Charles XII. at Bender, and the treaty of Passarowitz (1718). The wars in which Turkey was now year by year involved continued the slow process of the dismemberment of Turkey ; but Constantinople hardly felt the blows which struck the Empire at its ex tremities. The description which English travellers give of the city shows that strangers passed freely about in it, and that in many respects it was superior to other European capitals as they were then, and particularly in the condition of its streets, to what it became a hundred years later, and remains to-day. A passage from Pococke's travels (published in 1745) is worth quoting here. His description of the four "royal" mosques he saw, those of Ahmed, Suleiman, Selim, and Mohammed the Conqueror, shows that they were much as they are to-day, but on the other hand S. Sophia and the Church of the Studium are mani festly worse now than then ; the latter indeed, now a mere ruin, was then " the finest mosque next after Saint Sophia." Of the city he writes thus l : — " Great part of the houses of Constantinople are built with wooden frames, mostly filled up with unburnt brick ; and a great number of houses are made only of such frames covered with boards. They have not withstanding very good rooms in them ; and the streets are tolerable, with a raised footway on each side. The street of Adrianople is broad, and adorned with many public buildings; to the south of it there is a vale which is to the north of the seventh hill. The bazestans or shops of rich goods are such as have been described in other places ; and many of the shops for 1 Travels, vol. ii., pp. 127-128. .89 The Story of Constantinople other trades are adorned with pillars, and the streets in which they are, covered over in order to shelter from the sun and rain. There are also several large kanes, where many merchants live, and most of these have apartments in them, where they spend the day, and retire at night to their families in their houses. The bagnios also are to be reckoned another part of the magnificence of Constantinople, some of them being very finely adorned within. The fountains, likewise, are extremely magnificent, being buildings about twenty feet square, with pipes of water on every side; and within at each coiner there is an apartment, with an iron gate before it, where cups of water are always ready for the people to drink, a person attending to fill them ; these buildings are of marble, the fronts are carved with bas-reliefs of trees and flowers and the eaves projecting six or seven feet ; the soffit of them is finely adorned with carved works of flowers, in alto relievo, gilt with gold in a very good taste, so that these buildings make a very fine appearance." Dr Pococke was certainly a somewhat dull person, and as certainly a thorough Englishman. One feels that he never quite got over his surprise that S. Sophia was not like Westminster Abbey or the Golden Gate like Temple Bar. Happily we have a contrast to him in the literature of his time. Certainly the most charming, perhaps the most characteristic, account of the city of the Sultan that the eighteenth century has left us, is that of the Lady Mary Wortley Montague. Her husband was appointed ambassador to the Sub lime Porte in 17 16, and she accompanied him. The letters which form the records of her journey out, of her life in Constantinople and of her return, serve to show, as the " Lady " who wrote a preface to them when they were published says she i6 ' malicious enough 190 J/;'*:- INTERIOR OF MOSQUE OF AHMEO I. 191 Constantinople under the Turks to desire,' " to how much better purpose the ladies travel than their lords." The skill and point with which she tells the most ordinary incidents of her travels, no less than fixes on the contrasts that are so striking between what she sees and what her corres pondents are accustomed to, gives the letter an im perishable charm. But not a little also is due to the position of the writer. Merchants, and ordinary travel lers, as she says, had told the world long before a great deal about the marvels of the Turkish Empire ; but Lady Mary was a woman,' a very clever woman, and an ambassador's wife. She had the entree where few others could go, and she knew as very few others did how to describe what she had seen. The position of an European ambassador's household in Pera in the eighteenth century, was by no means entirely pleasant, and indeed it was not wholly without risks, even for an ambassador's wife. Lady Mary, however, went everywhere and saw everything, and, in the midst of a good deal of domestic discomfort, ac commodated herself amazingly to the cosmopolitan and polyglot life which she came to delight in. " I live," she wrote, "in a place that very well represents the tower of Babel, in Pera they speak Turkish, Greek, Hebrew, Armenian, Arabic, Persian, Russian, Slav onian, Wallachian, German, Dutch, French, Eng lish, Italian, Hungarian, and what is worse, there are ten of these languages spoken in my own family." Children of three years old often speak five languages, she says, a statement that would be as nearly true now as it was then. This she professes to find annoying, it was really delightful, other things were not so pleasant. Constantinople in earlier times had not been a pleasant resort for ambassadors. The Memoires sur I'ambassade de France en Turquie, written by M. !e Comte de N 193 The Story of Constantinople Saint-Priest, at the end of the eighteenth century, 6how how difficult and dangerous had been the position of the envoys. They are a brilliant sketch of the work of the able French ambassadors who had endeavoured from the time of Francis I. and Suleiman the Magni ficent, to confirm an alliance which should secure to Fiance a flourishing trade in the Levant, and a power ful ally against the House of Hapsburg. Their success was considerable, but it was not infrequently interfered with by their own eccentricities. Savari de Lancosme (1585) was so rash that his cousin Savari de Braves was sent out to supersede him, and he promptly in duced the Turks to imprison him in the Seven Towers. Achille de Harlay Sanay (1611-17) procured the escape of an imprisoned Pole, and was in consequence himself " outrage en sa personne et celle de ses gens " and made to pay 20,000 piastres. The Comte de Marcheville in 1639, found "le logis de l'ambassadeur si infame, qu'on ne se pouvait imaginer qu'un ambassa- deur effectif put y demeurer." He built, among other additions, two chapels, " one public, the other interior." The Turks were furiously enraged, and after a good deal of acrimonious complaints, in which the people of Galata shared, the unhappy ambassador was expelled the country. De la Haye, a few years later, spent three months in the Seven Towers, and M. de Vautelec also had unpleasant experiences. M. de Ferriol, illuminating his house on the occasion of the birth of a French prince, found himself in danger of expulsion. As late as 1798, a French ambassador, on the declaration of war, was imprisoned as usual in the Seven Towers. Lady Mary's friend the French ambassadress might tell her of some of these catastrophes, but she shows no fear that they would happen to herself. Her descriptions were evidently written with perfect freedom, day by day, and it is that which preserves 194 Constantinople under the Turks their freshness after nearly two centuries. A passage or two will bring vividly before us what English folk then thought of the Turkish power, and of the sights of the capital. Here she speaks of the Constitution, just as an ortho dox English politician would wish to speak. " The Grand Signior, with all his absolute power, is as much a slave as any of his subjects, and trembles at a Janizary's frown. Here is, indeed, a much greater appearance of subjection than amongst us ; a minister of state is not spoke to, but upon the knee ; should a reflection on his conduct be dropt in a coffee-house (for they have spies everywhere) the house would be raz'd to the ground, and perhaps the whole company put to torture. No huzzaing mobs, senseless pam phlets, and tavern disputes about politics ; A consequential ill that freedom draws ; A bad eliect, — but from a noble cause. None of our harmless . calling names ! but when a minister here displeases the people, in three hours time he is dragged even from his master's arms. They cut off his hands, head, and feet, and throw them before the palace gate, with all the respect in the world ; while the Sultan (to whom they all profess an unlimited adoration) sits trembling in his apartment, and dares neither defend nor revenge his favourite. This is the blessed condition of the most absolute monarch upon earth, who owns no law but his will." To live close to such scenes was an education in Oriental politics. Lady Mary lived still nearer to the outward show and pomp of the Oriental despots. The state of the Sultans was reflected on the am bassadors of powers with whom they desired to be friendly. When she travelled from Selivria, along '95 The Story of Constantinople the shore of the Marmora, Lady Mary and her husband had from the "Grand Signior" "thirty covered waggons for our baggage, and five coaches for the country for my women." Of the Sultan's own state she was mo6t impressed, as travellers are to-day, by the Selamlik. Thus she describes it: " I went yesterday, along with the French am bassadress, to see the Grand Signior in his passage to the mosque. He was preceded by a numerous guard of Janizaries, with vast white feathers on their heads, as also by the spahis and bostangees (these are foot and horse guards) and the royal gardeners, which are a very considerable body of men, dressed in differ ent habits of fine lively colours, so that, at a distance, they appeared like a parterre of tulips. After them the Aga of the Janizaries, in a robe of purple velvet, lined with silver tissue, his horse led by two slaves richly dressed. Next him the kyzlier-aga (your lady ship knows this is the chief guardian of the Seraglio ladies) in a deep yellow cloth (which suited very well to his black face) lined with sables. Last came his Sublimity himself, arrayed in green, lined with the fur of a black Muscovite fox, which is supposed worth a thousand pounds sterling, and mounted on a fine horse, with furniture embroidered with jewels. Six more horses, richly caparisoned were led after him ; and two of his principal courtiers bore, one his gold, and the other his silver coffee-pot, on a staff; another carried a silver stool on his head for him to sit on." Her skill certainly lay chiefly in describing social functions or eccentricities, and her description of S. Sophia — indeed she makes an apology for her ignor ance of architecture — shows a characteristic absence of feeling or artistic knowledge. What she says of the mosque of Suleiman however, is worth quoting. " That of Sultan Solyman, is an exact square, with 196 Constantinople under the Turks four fine towers in the angles ; in the midst is a noble cupola, supported with beautiful marble pillars ; two lesser at the ends, supported in the same manner ; the pavement and gallery round the mosque, of marble ; under the great cupola, is a fountain, adorned with such fine coloured pillars, that I can hardly think them natural marble ; on one side is the pulpit of white marble, and on the other the litde gallery for the Grand Signior. A fine stair-ca6e leads to it, and it is built up with gilded latrices. At the upper end is a sort of altar, where the name of God is written ; and, before it, stand two candlesticks, as high as a man, with wax candles as thick as three flambeaux. The pavement is spread with fine carpets, and the mosque illuminated with a vast number of lamps. The court leading to it, is very spacious, with galleries of marble, of green columns, covered with twenty-eight leaded cupolas on two sides, and a fine fountain of basons in the midst of it." The liberality which allowed Christian ladies to see the mosques, and even permitted Lady Mary, in spite of the horror of her friends and the terrified protests of the French ambassadress, to go about in Stambul much as she would have walked in S. James's, was especially the characteristic of the reign of Suleiman II., himself something of a savant, and of Ahmed II., who actually allowed a printing press to be established in the city. But none the less society and government were essentially barbarous. Ahmed III. was himself deposed in 1730 by an insurrection of the Janissaries. His nephew Mahmud I., son of Mustafa II., was his successor. Again within three weeks the leaders of the revolution were executed before his face. " These executions " it is quaintly said, " when they became known, instead of exciting the slightest sedition, gave the greatest joy to the 197 The Story of Constantinople inhabitants of the capital." Step by step the Turks lost ground, by treaties with Persia (1732) and with Austria and Russia, by the mediation of Fiance (Belgrade, 1739) ; and the new policy of governing the lands of Wallachia and Moldavia by " Fanariotes " (Greeks of the ancient families who still dwelt in the Phanar), was far from successful. In Constantinople itself there were emeutes if not insurrections, and in cendiary fires which gave occasion for them. They were the usual means of expressing dissatisfaction with the government, and the usual means were taken to meet them, by the execution of the Sultan's ministers. Mahmiid died in 1 7 54. He was thought at least to have done no harm ; and his successor, Osman III., was regarded as equally blameless. Mustafa III. (J757-I774-) had been many years in the Kafess. He was the son of Ahmed III. His reign was a succession of misfortunes. The astute policy of Catherine II. and her agents in Serbia and Croatia, arousing the religious enthusiasm of the Christians against the Moslems, the utter neglect of the Turkish army and ordnance, the ignorance of the ministers, and the superstition of the people, seemed to invite a certain and immediate destruction of the Empire. Disaster after disaster at last awoke the Sultan and his ministers to the necessity of employing European aid, and the French ambassador Saint- Priest with the Baron de Tott was successful in re forming the army, introducing the bayonet, founding a school of mathematics, and infusing a new spirit into the Turks. Mustafa died in 1774, at a time of unexpected success. He had seen at least the necessity of reform. Abdul Hamed I., his brother, who succeeded him, had been forty-four years a captive. He was not the prince to restore the power of his Empire: the treaty 198 Constantinople under the. Turks of Kutchuk-Kainardji (1774) further reduced its territory, and gave the cause for war eighty years afterwards by the clause allowing to Russia a right to represent to the Porte the grievances of the Christians in European Turkey. In 1788 the Crimea was captured by Russia ; in 1 789 Abdul Hamed died. His nephew Selim III. (1 789-1 807) had to deal with all the difficulties introduced into the East by the partition of Poland, the schemes of Napoleon, and the Mediterranean policy of Pitt. To follow these wars which resulted from the new political situation would be impossible. It need only be said that the French occupation of Egypt, and the decisive entrance of England into the Eastern question created as great a revolution in the position of Turkey as had occurred in any Monarchy of the West. The old alliance with France was broken. It became the interest of England to preserve the tottering power of Turkey as a counterpoise to Russia, and as a security for her own interests in the East. Internally Turkey, under the energetic Selim, made a new start. A cannon foundry was begun at Galata, the Top-haneh so familiar to-day : new troops, drilled and armed after the European fashion were embodied ; new taxes were levied, and a financial administration was organized which made some pretence of following Western ideas. After what has been said so often, it may almost go without saying that there was an insurrection of the Janissaries to express the orthodox opinion of these reforms. The separation of the artillery from the Janissaries, and the creation of new regiments of infantry for Constantinople, to act as a counterpoise to the Janissaries, caused a serious revolt which was entirely successful, and the Sultan was obliged to receive the Aga as his chief minister. In the very '99 The Story of Constantinople midst of these troubles occurred the famous mission of Colonel Sebastiani, which led to the forcing of the Dardanelles by the English fleet under Admiral Duckworth. The fleet destroyed a small Turkish flotilla in the Marmora and cast anchor before the city. It was centuries since the people of Constant inople had seen a hostile fleet threatening their city. They worked night and day to repair the fortifications, to mount cannon, and to man the walls with an efficient force. In five days nine hundred cannon were placed upon the walls, and the English fleet had to retire. The Sultan was forced to declare war against Great Britain. Within a few weeks he was deposed by another insurrection of the Janissaries, encouraged by the Sheik-ul-Islam. Again they assembled in the At- meidan, again they overturned their kettles, their picturesque method of declaring that they would no longer eat the food of the Sultan, — attacked the Seraglio, murdered all the ministers, and deposed the Sultan. The ministers had gladly died that they might save their master. It was not sufficient. Can a Padishah, who by his conduct and his laws attacks the principles of the Koran, be allowed to reign ? Impossible. And Selim retired to the Kafess. Mustafa IV. was a mere name under which the rule of the successful revolutionaries was legitimated. Assassination and execution proceeded. The Grand Vizier, in command of the army in Bulgaria, was beheaded. He was the most conspicuous of a hundred victims. The Pasha of Rustchuk, Mustafa, called " Bairak- dar " (the Standard-bearer), led 40,000 men to Con stantinople, to restore Selim. He had with him the standard of the Prophet, which had accompanied the late Grand Vizier to the field. Encamped outside 200 Constantinople under the Turks the walls, he allowed Mustafa still to hold the palace : a few murders and a few depositions were all that marked the suspense. On July 28, 1808, Mustafa Bairakdar entered the city, declared the Sultan deposed, and advanced to the Seraglio to restore Selim III. While the troops were kept back at the gates, the Sultan determined to secure himself. Selim, after a desperate struggle, was murdered in the Kafess. " Take Sultan Selim to the Pasha of Rustchuk, since he de mands him," said Mustafa, and the body wrapped in a carpet was thrown out. Mahmud, the last surviving prince of the house of Osman, but narrowly escaped : the murderers sought him everywhere, but he was concealed, under a heap of rugs. The avengers of blood burst in ; he was rescued : Mustafa IV. was thrust into the Kafess, and Mahmud II. at the age of twenty-three ascended the throne. The reign of Mahmud ( 1 808- 1839) witnessed the first real introduction of Turkey into the atmosphere of the West. He had been trained by the deposed Selim, to hate the Janissaries, to play the part, strange indeed, of a reforming Sultan. Bairakdar was at his side. It seemed at first that only a new and more blood thirsty tyrant had begun to reign. On the day of his accession, thirty-three heads were exposed on the outer gate of the Seraglio, the Bab-i-Humayoun : many of the leaders of the Janissaries were strangled and thrown into the Bosporus : even the women who had shown joy at Selim's murder were sewn up in sacks and drowned at Seraglio point. Within a few months the government of the new Sultan and his Vizier was in danger of ending like those that had preceded it. On November 14, 1808, a new revolt of the Janissaries broke out. They surrounded the palace of the Porte and set fire to it. Bairakdar 201 The Story of Constantinople the Vizier escaped, but only a few days later to meet death by exploding a powder magazine rather than fall into the hands of his enemies. For four days the streets were abandoned to carnage, and to the horrors of blood were added those of fire. M. de Jucherau, a Frenchman then at Pera, has left a vivid description, which is supplemented by that of an English traveller. " No one," says that eloquent author, " attempted to stay the conflagration, which in a short time made terrible progress. Soon the most populous quarter of Constantinople was covered with a sheet of fire. The cries, the groans of women, and old men and children, attracted no attention and excited no pity., In vain they raised their suppliant hands, in vain they begged for beams or planks to save themselves from their burning houses by their roofs : their supplications were vain : they were seen with indifference to fall and to disappear among the flames. The desire of de struction was the only feeling that then prevailed ! Sultan Mahmood beheld the awful spectacle from one of the lofty towers of the Seraglio, but not ' like another Nero,' as some have unjustly asserted — the flames were not of his lighting, and he was anxious that they should cease. He ordered Cadi-Pasha to stop his carriage, and to retire with his troops within the walls of the Seraglio, and despatched a hatti- sheriff to the Janissary-agha, commanding him, as he valued his head, to exert himself to stay the conflagration. As Mahmood was Sultan, and from the pledge he had in his hands, was likely to continue so, even when the revolt should end, the Janissary- agha trembled at the imperial mandate and obeyed ; but the fire was too intense and active to be subdued or arrested, even by throwing to the ground whole stacks of houses : it vaulted over the chasms thus 202 Constantinople under the Turks made, and only found ' sufficient obstacles in the public squares and in the mosques, whose vast cupolas and massy stone walls have frequently preserved Constantinople from entire destruction.' " 1 The fire raged from the Seraglio to the aqueduct of Valens, and a man-of-war in the harbour directed its cannon on the barracks of the Janissaries in the At meidan. The troops of the barracks on the other side of the Horn, at the Arsenal and at Top-Haneh, threw in their lot with the Janissaries. Mahmud within the Seraglio took the precaution which he had so long refrained from : he ordered the murder of his brother Mustafa IV., and the body was thrown out to the Janissaries. In a few hours Mahmud outwardly submitted. The new troops were disbanded ; the barracks were destroyed ; the military schools, the mathematical institution, the printing press, every sign of the dangerous introduction of Western ideas, entirely disappeared. Even the ladies of the Seraglio ceased to learn French, and Mahmud abandoned the enervat ing amusements of the opera and the ballet. For six teen years a curtain fell, raised only to show an occasional massacre. Constantinople returned to its condition as the most orthodox of Moslem cities. It was at this time that the greatest of all European ambassadors at Constantinople first made acquaintance with the power in whose fortunes he was to become so powerful a factor. Stratford Canning came to Stambul in 1808, as secretary to a special mission. These were his first impressions of Turkey. "The state2 of Turkey itself was anything but satisfactory in view of those powers who did not wish the Porte to become the prey either of Russia or 1 Constantinople in 1828, by C. MacFarlane, p. 306. 2 Life of Lord Stratford de Reddiflc, by Stanley Lane Poole, 1 volume edition, p. 18. 203 The Story of Constantinople of France. The throne of the empire was filled by a young Sultan, who had recently succeeded to his brother Mustafa, whose immediate predecessor, their cousin Selim, had fallen a sacrifice to the mutinous spirit of the Jannissaries. Mahmud, the reigning sovereign, was for some time the last of his race. Young, ignorant, and inexperienced, he had everything to apprehend from the circumstances in which he was placed. Both morally and materially his empire was bordering on decrepitude. The old political system of Turkey had worn itself out. The population was not yet prepared for a new order of things. A depreciated currency, a disordered revenue, a mutinous militia, dilapidated fortresses, a decreasing population, a stag nant industry, and general misrule, were the monu ments which time had left of Ottoman domination in the second capital of the Roman empire and through out those extensive regions which had been the successive seats of civilisation, ever varying, generally advancing, from the earliest periods of social settlement and historical tradition. A continual and often a sanguinary antagonism of creeds, of races, of districts and authorities within the frontier, and frequent wars of little glory and much loss with the neighbouring powers, had formed of late the normal condition of the Porte's dominions." Most European observers thought that the Ottoman power was doomed to almost immediate extinction ; and the next few years increased the illusion. The Mussulman population was everywhere declining ; a new Greek power was rising ; and Ali Pasha at Janina seemed likely to establish a new Mussulman domina tion which should destroy the Turkish rule. Within a few years Greece secured her independence by re bellion. But Canning saw plainly enough that Turkey was still strong. As early as 1809 he wrote thus: — 204 Constantinople under the Turks " Very false notions are entertained in England of the Turkish nation. You know much better than 1 do the mighty resources and native wealth which this enormous empire possesses. I am myself a daily witness of the personal qualities of the inhabitants, qualities which if properly directed are capable of sustaining them against a world of enemies. But the government is radically bad, and its members, who are all alive to its defects, have neither the wisdom nor the courage to reform it. The few who have courage equal to the task know not how to reconcile reforma tion with the prejudices of the people. And without this nothing can be effected." l From 1821 the tide turned. The defects of the Turkish government did not avail against the valour of the Sultan's army, and the dimensions of Europe. The tragedies of those days passed far from Constantinople. Missolonghi, Navarino, Athens, Janina, Adrianople, are names that bring each its memory ; but within the city of the Caesars and the Sultans a different tale was told. It was the great era of reform, when at last Mahmud was able to use his strength, and re-establish the power of the Padishah. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the authority of the Commander of the Faithful had sunk, decade by decade, till the murder of a Sultan who showed an independent policy was as certain as the sunrise. The Janissaries were the real masters of the city, and of the Empire. The force which had been raised to carry out the absolute will of the Sultan had now entirely superseded him. Anarchy was sub stituted for the rule of an irresponsible despot. But Mahmud had a character of strength unknown in any Sultan for two centuries. He had matured his plans, 1 Life of Lord Stratford de Rcddiffe, by Stanley Lane Poole, 1 volume edition, p. 19. 205 The Story of Constantinople and in 1826 he was able to carry them into execution. But for an utterly unforeseen disaster he would doubt less have been able to secure his triumph earlier than he did. In 1823 the arsenal and cannon foundry at Top-haneh were entirely destroyed by fire. A vast quantity of military stores and ammunition was destroyed. Pera and Galata suffered severely. It is said that fifty mosques and six thousand houses were destroyed. Mahmud attributed the fire to the Janissaries ; and he became the more determined to destroy them. Already he had dealt with another enemy. In 1821 the plots of the Hetairists, working for the liberation of Greece, became known. Mahmud immediately ordered all Greeks not engaged in trade to be de ported from Constantinople. Then he ordered the patriarch and Synod of Constantinople to excommuni cate the leaders who had engaged in the massacre of Moslems. The act was issued ; nor can the Church be regarded as having done anything but what was demanded by Christian charity. Hardly was the excommunication issued before a number of rich Greeks escaped from the city, evidently with the intention of joining the revolutionary armies. On March 26 the city was filled with troops, and arms were issued to the citizens. Several Hetairists were executed ; and when the news came of the murder of Moslems in Greece, Mahmud, who had already imprisoned seven Greek bishops, ordered the public execution of a number of prominent Greeks, who were entirely innocent, solely for the purpose of alarming their compatriots. But this was not sufficient. On Easter Day, April 22, 1821, the Patriarch of Constantinople, Gregorios, was summoned, at dawn, when he had finished the offering of the Holy Eucharist in his Cathedral Church, into the hall of 206 HOUSES IN THE PHANAR 207 Constantinople under the Turks the Synod at the Phanar, by the officers of the Sultan. There, before the clergy and the heads of the chief Greek families, he was declared deposed by the authority of the State, and the trembling priests were required to elect a new Patriarch in his stead. Within a few hours Gregorios was hung from the gate of the patriarchate, with a document pinned to his breast, declaring him a traitor in that he knew of the Hetairist conspiracy, and did not reveal it. Of the charge there is no known proof; and the Greeks have always regarded him as a martyr. If he knew the details of the conspiracy at all it is more than probable that he knew them only in confession ; nor is it at all probable that he knew anything but that the Greeks intended to strike for their freedom. Three bishops were executed on the same day. It was not a day to be forgotten. When the body of the martyred Gregorios was taken down it was given to the Jews to be dragged through the streets and cast into the sea. It was recovered by night and taken by ship to Odessa, where it was interred with solemn ceremonial as the remains of a saint and martyr. This horrible deed was followed by the outbreak of anarchy in Constantinople. The Janissaries called for a massacre of the Christians in the city to avenge the Moslems who had been killed in Greece. The Christian quarters were attacked, the Christian villages on the Bosphorus were robbed, and the patriarchate was sacked. Greek clergy and nobles were executed daily, and four bishops were among the slain. No Christians were allowed to leave the city without a passport or vengeance was exacted upon the family. The massacres that occurred in Constantinople were tolerated if they were not organised by the authorities ; several subjects of Western nations were murdered. o 209 The Story of Constantinople All that was done by Christian Europe was to protest. The Russian ambassador left Constantinople, having demanded that the massacres should cease and the churches be rebuilt that had been destroyed. Mahmud replied that only traitors were ill-treated. But the massacres ended, at least for a time. While all danger of a Christian rising in Constanti nople was thus prevented, Mahmud was maturing the plans which in 1825 made him at last an absolute ruler, at least in his own city. For seventeen years Mahmud prepared for this great stroke. First by gifts and offices he detached many of the supporters of the Janissaries and the Ulemas from the party which supported them. Some less important members of the body were arrested for infraction of the laws and were publicly executed. Others were secredy made away with. The Sultan was surrounding him self with an elaborate spy system and with agents who were capable of dealing in detail with those whom he wished to be put out of the way. Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, in his " Memoirs," says : " I remember that in crossing the Golden Horn from time to time I had observed loose mats floating here and there upon the water, and that in answer to my enquiries I had been told in a mysterious manner that they had served for covering the bodies thrown after private executions into the harbour." All this was done slowly ; the power of the Janissaries was gradually undermined ; "almost unparalleled craft and cruelty," some observers called the process, but to Mahmud it seemed absolutely necessary. In 1826 the Sultan perceived that the time limit had come. A meeting of all the chief functionaries of the Empire and chief officers of the Janissaries was held. They agreed to submit to the new military discipline and organisation which the Sultan designed. 210 Constantinople under the Turks All signed their names. On June 1 2 the first exercises of the new order were begun. On the 16th the in ferior officers and the soldiers declared that they would not submit. The revolt was proclaimed in the ancient manner. The kettles were overturned, and the whole force was called to arms. Mahmud crossed from Bekistasch to the Seraglio ; the standard of the Prophet was displayed; the city was filled with the troops upon whom the Sultan could rely ; the Moslem population rallied round the green flag. The people assembled in the Atmeidan (theHippodrome); Mahmud went to the mosque of Ahmed. The Janissaries were summoned to submit to the ' new order. They in return demanded the destruction of the " subverters of the ancient usages of the Empire." Then their fate was sealed. They had advanced to the mosque of Bayezid ; they were rapidly driven back and hemmed in in their quarters in the Etmeidan. Then from every side artillery was directed upon them. From his house in Pera Stratford Canning, at dinner, saw " two slender columns of smoke rising above the opposite horizon." What did they mean ? The Sultan, he was answered, had fired the barracks of the Janissaries. The rest of the tragedy may best be told in Canning's own words : x " The Sultan was determined to make the most of hi6 victory. From the time of his cousin Selim's death he had lived in dread of the Janissaries. A strong impression must have been made upon his mind by the personal danger which he had encountered. It was said that he had escaped with his life by getting into an oven when the search for him was hottest. His duty as sovereign gave strength as well as dignity to his private resentment. That celebrated militia, which in earlier times had extended the bounds of the 1 Life, pp. 137-138. 211 The Story of Constantinople empire, and given the title of conqueror to so many of the Sultans, which had opened the walls of Constan tinople itself to their triumphant leader, the second Mohammed, were now to be swept away with an unsparing hand and to make room for a new order of things, for a disciplined army and a charter of reform. From their high claims to honour and confidence they had sadly declined. They had become the masters of the government, the butchers of their sovereigns, and a source of terror to all but the enemies of their country. Whatever compassion might be felt for individual sufferers, including as they did the innocent with the guilty, it could hardly be said that their punishment as a body was untimely or undeserved. The complaints of those who were doomed to de struction found no echo in the bosoms of their con querors. They were moBtly citizens having their wives, their children, or their parents, to witness the calamity which they had brought in thunder on their necks. Many had fallen under the Sultan's artillery ; many were fugitives and outlaws. The mere name of Janissary, compromised or not by an overt act, operated like a sentence of death. A special commission sat for the trial, or rather for the condemnation of crowds. Every victim passed at once from the tribunal into the hands of the executioner. The bowstring and the scimitar were constantly in play. People could not stir from their houses without the risk of falling in with some terrible sight. The Sea of Marmora was mottled with dead bodies. Nor was the tragedy con fined to Constantinople and its neighbourhood. Mes sengers were sent in haste to every provincial city where any considerable number of Janissaries existed, and the slightest tendency to insurrection was so promptly and effectually repressed, that no disquieting reports were conveyed to us from any quarter of the 212 Constantinople under the Turks Empire. Not a day passed without my receiving a requisition from the Porte, calling upon me to send thither immediately the officer and soldiers comprising my official guard. I had no reason to suppose that any of them had been concerned in the revolt, and I was pretty sure that they could not repair to the Porte without imminent danger of being sacrificed. I ven tured, therefore, to detain them day after day, first on one pretext, then on another, until, at the end of a week, the fever at headquarters had so far subsided as to open a door for reflection and mercy. Relying on this abatement of wrath, I complied, and the inter preter whom I directed to accompany them, gave every assurance on their behalf which I was entitled fo offer. The men were banished from the capital, but their lives were spared, and many years later I was much pleased by a visit from their officer, who displayed his gratitude by coming from a distance on foot to regale me with a bunch of dried grapes and a pitcher of choice water. Let me add that this instance of good feeling on the part of a Turk towards a Christian is only one of many which have come to my know ledge." On June 17, 1826, the Janissaries ceased to exist. The Sheik-ul-Islam formally proclaimed the extinction of the corps. A solemn divan was held within the Seraglio, and the victory of Mahmud was ratified by the council. Then Canning writing on the 20th records the end of the revolution which reestablished the authority of the Sultan in a position as absolute and despotic as it had been in the days of Mohammed II. " The Sultan's ministers are still encamped in the outer court of the Seraglio, and I grieve to add that frequent executions continue to take place under their very eyes. This afternoon, when the person, 213 The Story of Constantinople to whom I have already alluded, was standing near the Reis Efendi's tent, his attention was suddenly caught by the sound of drums and fifes, and on turning round he saw, to his utter astonishment, a body of Turks in various dresses, but armed with muskets and bayonets, arranged in European order, and going through the new form of exercise. He supposes the number to have been about two thousand, but never before having seen troops in line he may have been deceived in this particular. He says that the men acted by word of command, both in marching and in handling their arms. The Sultan, who was at first stationed at the window within sight, descended after a" time, and passed the men in review. His Highness was dressed in Egyptian fashion, armed with pistols and sabre, and on his head in place of the Imperial turban was a sort of Egyptian bonnet. " Rank, poverty, age, and numbers are alike impotent to shelter those who are known as culprits or marked as victims. It is confidently asserted that a register has been kept of all persons who, since the accession of the Sultan, have in any way shown a disposition to favour the designs of the Janissaries, and that all such individuals are diligently sought out and cut off as soon as discovered. Respectable persons are seized in the street and hurried before the Seraskier or Grand Vizier for immediate judgment. There are instances of elderly men having pleaded a total ignorance of the late conspiracy, and being reminded of some petty incident which happened twenty years ago, in proof of their deserving condign punishment as abettors of the Janissaries. Whole companies of labouring men are seized and either executed or forcibly obliged to quit Constantinople. " The entrance to the Seraglio, the shore under the Sultan's windows, and the sea itself, are crowded Constantinople under the Turks with dead bodies — many of them torn and in part devoured by the dogs." 1 Theophile Gautier adds even more gruesome details. To the destruction of the Janissaries was added that of the Becktash derviches. Then the new army was formed, organized, drilled. For the rest of his reign, Mahmud' s chief thought was to perfect the reforms which he had inaugurated in blood. When in 1834 he struck coins bearing his own portrait, so grave a breach of the rules of the Koran caused another insurrection. It was suppressed with fearful severity, and added four thousand victims to the tale. But the coinage had to be called in. Fanatics, whom the people regarded as saints, coveted martyr dom by seizing the Sultan's bridle as he rode over the new bridge which he had made from Galata to Stambfjl, calling him " Giaour Padishah " and paying Heaven's vengeance on his head. Nothing moved Mahmud. Without, misfortunes befell his power on every side. He held steadfastly on, and when he died in 1839, he left behind him a strong govern ment, and an appearance — it may have been little more — of approximation to the ways of Western Europe. The aim of Mahmud, indeed, was not unlike that of Peter the Great : he wished to make his State an integral part of the European system. Hitherto, admitted though she was into European politics, coveted as ally and dreaded as a foe, Turkey had occupied no place among the permanent factors of European politics. Mahmud thought to make Turkey, really and essentially, a European power. It was impossible. The external events of the reign, the revolt of Mohammed Ali, the treaty of Adrianople, the creation of Greece as an independent State, important as they 1 Life, p. 139. 2I5 The Story of Constantinople were in the history of the Ottoman power, hardly affected Constantinople. In 1832, Stratford Canning returned on a special mission to Constantinople. He found the outer change extraordinary. Mahmud received him as an European sovereign would receive. He began to think a real reform of Turkey possible. He secured the concession that he sought on behalf of Greece : "The new Hellas was lifted up to -that great mountain ridge whence the eye of the traveller may range un checked over the pastures of Thessaly." Canning, after renewed experience of the delays and intrigues of the Turkish ministers, bade farewell to the Sultan for the last time. His character of Mahmud is too important to be omitted from our view. It may well conclude what we have to say of the most important reign in recent Turkish history. " Resolution and energy were the foremost qualities of his mind. His natural abilities would hardly have distinguished him in private life. In personal courage, if not deficient, he was by no means superior. His morality, measured by the rules of the Koran, was anything but exemplary. He had no scruple of taking life at pleasure from motives of policy or interest. He was not inattentive to changes of circumstance, or insensible to the requirements of time. There was even from early days a vein of liberality in his views, but either from want of foresight, or owing to a certain rigidity of mind, he missed at critical times the precious opportunity and incurred thereby an aggravated loss. His reign of more than thirty years was marked by disastrous wars and compulsory cessions. Greece, Egypt, and Algiers escaped successively from his rule. He had to lament the destruction of his fleet at Navarino. On the other hand, he gathered up the reins of sovereign power, which had fallen from the 2 16 Constantinople under the Turks hands of hi6 immediate predecessors; he repressed rebellion in more than one of the provinces, and his just resentment crushed the mutinous Janissaries once and for ever. Checked no longer by them, he intro duced a system of reforms which has tended greatly to renovate the Ottoman Empire, and to bring it into friendly communion with the Powers of Christendom. To him, moreover, is due the formation of a regular and disciplined army in place of a factious fanatical militia, more dangerous to the country than to its foes. Unfortunately his habits of self-indulgence kept pace with the revival of his authority, and the premature close of his life superseded for a while the progress of improvement. Mahmud when young had rather an imposing countenance ; his dark beard set off the paleness of his face, but time added to its expression. His stature was slightly below the average standard, his countenance was healthy, he wrote well, he rode well, and acquired a reputation for skill in archery. It may be said with truth that whatever merit he possessed was his own, and that much of what was wrong in his character and conduct resulted from circumstances beyond his control. Peace to his memory I " 1 Abdul-Mejid ( 1839-186 1), the son of Mahmud II., had been brought up in the harem. He was only sixteen at his accession, and was utterly ignorant of politics. But he had some wise ministers, and the defeats of the earlier part of his reign were wisely utilised. In 1841 came the practical separation of Egypt, the family of Mohammed Ali being established there as perpetual pashas or deputies of the Sultan, pay ing tribute, but otherwise free and guaranteed in their position by the Powers. Unquestionably the great figure in Constantinople 1 Life, pp. 164-165. 217 The Story of Constantinople during the reign of Abdul Mejid was Stratford Canning, who came in 1842 as British ambassador. He remained till 1852. He returned in 1853, and he left finally in 1858. During these years he devoted himself to the preservation of Turkey as a Power, but only with the hope, and on the condition, that she should become civilized. It may have been a hopeless task, but in the endeavour it is astounding to observe the high measure of success which came to the noble Englishman who gave the best years of his life to it. Kinglake has immortalised him as "the great Elchi." No greater ambassador ever lived ; and his greatness lay in the fact that he passed entirely beyond the range of ordinary diplomatic functions, and made himself as really a part of the Empire to which he was accredited as he was essentially the representa tive of the British nation. Needless to tell again the tale that has been so well told, of his diplomatic triumphs, of his supreme honesty and loyalty, of his ceaseless energy, of his magnificent services to humanity and religion. Throughout the whole of his life in Turkey he kept his one aim steadily before his eyes, and never deviated from it. If Turkey could be saved he would save her ; but it could only be done by carrying out what had been the real intention of Mahmud the reformer, and making an Oriental despotism resemble an European government with constitutional guarantees for personal and religious freedom. That in the long-run he utterly failed is now quite plain. What he wrote more than fifty years ago, in spite of super ficial outward changes is really true to-day. "There is no such thing as system in Turkey. Every man according to his means and opportunities gets what he can, commands when he dares, and submits when he must." None the less Canning won real victories. 218 Constantinople under the Turks He procured a declaration that the punishment of death should no longer be inflicted on those who gave up Islam for Christianity. " It was the first dagger," he wrote himself, " thrust into the side of the false prophet and his creed." And indeed so long as Lord Stratford de Redcliffe remained at Constantinople justice, toleration, good government made progress such as could hardly have been conceived before. It is needless here to inquire how far the success of Turkey in the Crimean War led to the casting aside of all reforms, or whether the war was justified or how it was caused. Russia's declaration of her protectorate over the Orthodox Church ; the belief of England and France that they were bound to protect Turkey against wanton aggression ; the earnest desire of "the great Elchi " to avoid war : these things may be read in the Blue Books s and in Kinglake'6 great History. Constantinople saw the encampment of British troops at Gallipoli and at Skutari ; and then came the sad days of the hospitals on the Asiatic shore and the English cemetery where sleep so many English dead. The Hatti-Humayun of February 21, 1856, seemed to embody all that the best friends of Turkey could have wished, in its abolition of all distinctions telling unfavourably against the exercise of any religion, its fine declarations of freedom and equality among all subjects of the Porte. But who could enforce it ? The story is pitiful, and it shall not here be told. Rather let it be remembered when we sail into the harbour of Constantinople that the Crimean Memorial Church which stands boldly on the heights of Pera was the sign of the noble work for religion and freedom that had been done by the great Englishman whose 1 See the correspondence respecting the rights and privileges of the Latin and Greek Churches in Turkey, presented to Parliament 1854. 219 The Story of Constantinople last public act in the city it was to lay the foundation- stone, and whose noble life is simply commemorated on a tablet within its walls. It was in 1858 that this great embassy ended. Three years later Abdul Mejid died ; and his brother Abdul Aziz was girt with the sword in the mosque of Eyub. Under his rule outward reforms progressed gaily, but the reckless extravagance of the Sultan brought the country to financial ruin. Reforms, in surrections, the creation of Roumania, the insurrection of Crete, how did these affect Constantinople ? Not at all. Only daily the financial disorder became more apparent. On May 10, 1876, the city witnessed a scene which might have seemed proof that Turkey was regenerated. The Sultan's son was stopped in the streets by crowds who demanded the dismissal of the Grand Vizier and the Sheik-ul-Islam. From the gorgeous new palace which he had built on the Bosporus came the reply of Abdul Aziz — " His Majesty is deeply touched with the proof of confidence you place in him. It is his pleasure in no way to resist the will of his faithful people." But it was merely one of those delusive pictures which remind one of the tricks of the genii in the Arabian Nights. There was no real change ; and on May 29, again resort was had as in the old days to the Sheik-ul- lslam. A reformer, who had been but a few days elevated to the post, he declared the lawfulness of deposing a Sultan whose conduct was insensate, who had no political judgment, who spent on himself 6ums which the Empire could not afford. At dawn on May 30 the palace of Dolma Bagtche was surrounded by troops, the Sultan was declared a prisoner, and then was hurried across to the old Seraglio. A few days later he returned to the gorgeous palace of Tcheragan. On June a., he was found dead. It was certified that Constantinople under the Turks he had opened his veins with a pair of scissors. Few Sultans have long survived deposition. Murad V. the eldest son of Abdul Mejid was received at the Seraskierat with enthusiasm. An nouncements were made which declared him a re former. He was Sultan for only three months. Within the first few days a number of the ministers were murdered, as they sat in Council, by the brother of the wife of Abdul Aziz. A few weeks later it was declared that the Sultan was incapable of Government. He was deposed with as much ease as his predecessor, no one knows to-day whether he is alive or not, and Abdul Hamed II., his brother, reigned in his stead. Of his reign little need be said. It has seen the Bulgarian atrocities, the defeat of Turkey by Russia, the encamp ment of the Russian troop6 at San Stefano, the procla mation of a Constitution, a parliament with two houses opened by the Sultan himself. It has seen also the sup pression of that Constitution ; it has seen the liberty of Bulgaria, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Cyprus and Crete. And Constantinople, what may be told here in brief is what cannot be forgotten. The Sultan no longer lives, like his predecessors, within earshot of his people. Yildiz-Kiosk high on the hills above the Bosphorus secludes him from the world. No longer does the Commander of the Faithful visit the mosques of Stambul or ride through the streets with a gorgeous military display. The massacres for which precedent was set centuries ago have again given the city a ghastly fame. In October 1895 crowds of Softas — religious students — assembled in the Atmeidan and a massacre of Armenians began. The riots lasted for three days. The authorities declared that the cause was the re volutionary plots of the Armenians themselves, that they did their utmost to preserve order, and that they would punish all who were responsible. Ten months The Story of Constantinople passed. Constantinople in the spring of 1896 was outwardly at peace, but arrests were constantly being made, and there was a general feeling of insecurity. On August 28, 1896, a band of Armenians seized the Otto man Bank at Galata, killing the guard and imprison ing the officials. After some hours they were allowed to depart under a safe conduct. But for nearly two days the city was given up to massacre. Bands of Moslems rose simultaneously at different parts before the police or the military appeared, led or accompanied by Softas, by soldiers, by police officers. When the troops appeared they looked on. The scenes in the streets beggar description. Christians were butchered wherever they appeared, were chased into houses and over roofs, were shot in their houses by men who took the tiles from the roofs across the street, broke the windows, and then fired into the rooms where Armenians had crowded for refuge. The churches were filled with people who sought sanctuary, who had lost everything they possessed and dared not leave the security of the sacred walls. The churches of Pera and Galata, the buildings of the Patriarchate in the Psamatia quarter seemed the only safe places. Of the numbers killed no count can be given ; two thousand certainly perished, but five thousand has been declared to have been the total of the victims. For days the dead-cart passed through the streets and the murdered Christians were carried off with indescribable brutality to be cast into huge pits or into the sea. It is im possible as yet to tell the full story. It seems still like a horrible dream, a reminiscence of the worst terrors of the Middle Age. The two acts of tragedy by which it has been attempted to destroy a large, and that perhaps the richest and most progressive, part of the population of Constantinople, emphasise an important historical fact. 222 STREET IN GALATA 223 Constantinople under the Turks Not only by the importations of Mohammed II. , but gradually during the four centuries and a half that have elapsed since the Conquest, the population of Con stantinople has changed its character. Pera and Galata are the home of a mixed race, of whom every writer says hard words, and of many nationalities still striving to preserve their separate life. Greeks, Italians, Germans, French, English, immigrants from the Balkan lands, are the most prominent, after the Jews and the wealthy Armenians. The divisions that are to be seen in the Orthodox Church, per petuated by politicians for their own purposes, are the reflection of the national and political divisions that we pass through on our way to Constantinople and find there in full force. Every league nearer to the city walls, as the railway drags its tedious length, is a step nearer to barbarism ; and Pera is indeed but a poor outpost of civilisation. It has over it a veneer of the West. As you walk through the streets you might think yourself in an inferior Italian city ; when you descend to Galata, down steep streets, half stair ways, you pass through the gate of the Middle Ages into a town like any cosmopolitan seaport, crowded with sailors and travellers of all nations. The Galata bridge, the most wonderful pathway in Europe, with its thousands of passengers in every strange garb, its Parisian carriages, its Arab 6teeds bearing alert officers, its beggars, mollahs, white tur- baned and white coated toll-takers, its ceaseless stream of life all day long, brings you to the harbour, the historic anchorage of great ships for fifteen hundred years or more. " Eothen " has said once for all what comes to mind as we gaze at that magnificent sight, life, ships, walls, domes, minarets. " Even if we don't take a part in the chaunt about ' Mosques and Minarets,' we can still yield praises to p 225 The Story of Constantinople Stamboul. We can chaunt about the harbour ; we can say and sing that nowhere else does the sea come so home to a city ; there are no pebble shores — no sand bars — no slimy river beds — no black canals — no locks nor docks to divide the very heart of the place from the deep waters ; if being in the noisiest part of Stamboul, you would stroll to the quiet side of the way amidst those cypresses opposite, you will cross the fathomless Bosphorus ; if you would go from your hotel to the Bazaars, you must pass by the bright blue pathway of the Golden Horn, that can carry a thousand sail of the line. You are accustomed to the gondolas that glide among the palaces of St Mark, but here at Stamboul it is a hundred-and-twenty-gun-ship that meets you in the street. Venice strains out from the steadfast land, and in old times would send forth the chief of the state to woo and wed the reluctant sea ; but the stormy bride of the Doge is the bowing slave of the Sultan — she comes to his feet with the treasures of the world — she bears him from palace to palace — by some unfailing witchcraft, she entices the breezes to follow her, and fan the pale cheek of her lord — she lifts his armed navies to the very gates of his garden — she watches the walls of his serail— she stifles the intrigues of his Ministers — she quiets the scandals of his Court — 6he extinguishes his rivals, and hushes his naughty wives all one by one, so vast are the wonders of the deep ! " 1 But you cross the bridge, or you take a caique, and land under the old walls ; you pass through some gateway, scarcely recognisable ; and in a moment you are in a new life. It is the East. The hundreds of solemn figures climbing the hill to the daily afternoon prayers at the mosque of Mohammed the Conqueror ; the busy market that goes on outside the walls, the stalls 1 Eothen, pp. 30, 31. 226 Constantinople under the Turks displaying everything that man needs to buy, the carpets, the great earthenware vessels, marked in white wax with delicate arabesques, the fresh fruits, the strange liquors, the stranger cates. A few yards off and you are among the streets that belong to par ticular trades, the workers in brass, the cobblers, the blacksmiths, the horse-dealers, the sellers of every con ceivable object under the sun, all in their windowless shops, laughing, talking, selling, with that stately mien which makes a ceremonial of the simplest act. There is no vulgar European haste here, no chattering im patience to serve or to bargain ; the ages as they have passed over the place seem to have left their Bolemn im press on the people. Let the story-teller come and amuse them ; for themselves they will not hurry or fret or speed. All is dignified, stately, restrained. This is % Turkish quarter, but the Turks are rarely indeed of pure blood. Almost every Asiatic race, and many European nationalities, have gone to make the Turks of Stambul — pilgrims from the far East, Christian slaves, converts to Islam from every quarter of the globe. Negroes are constantly to be met with, eunuchs, slaves, and free trading folk. Pass further on and you are among the Jews, who remain as large a pro portion of the population as in the fifteenth century, when some forty thousand of them were to be found in Stambul. It was they who first opened regular shops for the sale of manufactured goods, and the greatest shops in the Bazaar to-day are the property of Jews. In the great Bazaar with its intricate streets and quarters, a great desolation reigns. The Jews and the Europeans have invaded its recesses, and the pictures that the old books draw of the hag gling and the humour and the riches, have no meaning to-day. In the enclosure of the Ahmediyeh you may see characteristic Eastern sights. There a man 227 The Story of Constantinople sits being shaved. There are stalls heaped with fruit. There are sellers pressing rich stuffs and linen on Turkish ladies as they pass. And indeed it is not all stateliness even among the Turks. Desert the streets of the leather-sellers and the bra6s-workers, come down to the markets by the mosques, and there is enough vigorous and vivacious life. In the harbour among the shipping, where the rowers of caiques clam our for employment, in the Greek quarter, or in the Psamatia among the poorer Armenians, there is plenty of stir and movement. For a succession of pictures, there is no city like Constantinople. Pilgrims from the far East, Mongolians, Persians, men of Bokhara and Khiva, negroes from the heart of Africa, armed many of them to the teeth, most with the strange wist ful half frightened look of strangers and foreigners in a civilisation of which they have not dreamed ; the groups at the fountains, the staid ancients smoking solemnly at the doors, the closed windows with the wooden lattices, through which sometimes comes a sound of soft music, the tramp of armed men, the clatter of cavalry as they trot up the street, the endless processions of donkeys and draught horses, and some times camels, — these sights and sounds are, in the sun light by the old walls, in the narrow streets, or by the great domed mosques, never to be forgotten or to be rivalled in Europe to-day. Constantinople remains, with all its changes, a city of the dark ages. At any moment the cur tain may be lifted on a scene of tragic horror, and meanwhile there is the grotesque mimicry of Western civilisation, the parade of meaningless forms, justice, government, finance, which in a moment may be destroyed, which never have, it is hardly an exaggera tion to say, any real meaning. How does the city fare ? Even now, interviews with officials, walks through 228 Constantinople under the Turks the streets of Stambul, the sights of each day, remind one irresistibly of " a chapter in Gibbon or some tale of wonder in the Arabian Nights." Soberly and solemnly the Turks go about their business. Before the horrors of the last decade an observer who knew well the people and the history wrote these words. " I have been present in the city during the de position of two Sultans. The most striking character istic in the circumstances attending these depositions was the utter indifference of the great body of the native, and especially of the Moslem, population to the change which was being made. There was a small but active party which took action, but beyond this there was comparatively very little excitement ; no re sistance, no rioting, no expression of dissatisfaction. When newspaper correspondents and foreigners gener ally were aware that a revolution was in preparation, it is impossible to believe that thousands of Turks and rayahs were in ignorance of the fact. The general feeling among the Sultan's subjects was one of in difference. If the conspirators failed it would go hardly with them. If they succeeded it would go hardly with the Sultan. That business only regarded the parties concerned. Beyond a vague belief that any change could hardly be followed by a worse con dition of things than had existed, there was no public sentiment on the matter."1 The words would be as true to-day. Save only at moments of sudden and fanatic excitement, organised there can be no doubt at least under the impression that there is a religious duty, and a command which may not be disobeyed, the calm of the city is un broken. We seem to be standing with Candide when he heard the news that " two viziers of the bench and the mufti had just been strangled at Constantinople, 1 Pears, Conquest of Constantinople. 229 The Story of Constantinople and several of their friends impaled," and when he heard the instructive comments of the old Turk who never knew the name of any vizier or mufti. " I presume," said that sage, " that in general such as are concerned in public affairs come to a miserable end, and that they deserve it ; but I never enquire what is doing at Constantinople. I am content with sending thither the produce of my garden, which I cultivate with my own hands." To-day it would seem that the people of Constantinople are of the same mind with this philosopher. " Our country is rich, capable of prosperity, and of supporting in comfort twenty times its present population ; but alas a gang of robbers has seized it," are the published words of a Turkish prince. Vice and luxury and despotism triumph. Eh bien ! je sais qu'ilfaut cultiver notre jardin. This at any rate may be said. It is idle to prophecy the future of the Ottoman power in Europe. Has the last Greek war really strengthened it? Does the ap proach of Russia foreshadow an occupation of Con stantinople and the longed for return of S. Sophia to the worship of the Orthodox Church ? Of all people the English are the least fitted to foresee the future. Nothing can be more ludicrous than the letters of Tom Hughes, an observer acute enough, written from Con stantinople in 1862, in which he says that Islam is all but dead, and that what the Turks want is the English public-school system. The Turk hears such things with a smile ; ilfaut cultiver notre jardin. 230 CHAPTER III The Churches ""THOUGH as it has already been 6aid there is but one church which has survived the Turkish conquest without ever ceasing to be used for its divine purpose, there are very many buildings in Constantinople still remaining, with more or less change, that were once hallowed to the worship of the Church of Christ. Very many have perished, the most notable among them that Church of the Holy Apostles, which was destroyed by Mohammed the Conqueror to build the great mosque which bears his name. But those which still remain were among the chiefest wonders of the City of the Emperors, and there is not one of them which does not deserve an extensive study. The volumes that have been written on Byzan tine architecture cannot be compressed into a few pages. It must suffice to recall what are the chief characteristics of the style which may still be seen in its perfection at Constantinople, as at Salonica. The origin of what had so wide an extension over the East, of the art which made a new de parture under Constantine, and a still more im portant one under Justinian, is simply the basilica, the law court of ancient Rome. A long nave and aisles separated by rows of pillars, surmounted by a flat roof and ending in an apse : that is the familiar type of which a splendid example built under Byzantine influence is to be found in the church of S. Apollinare The Story of Constantinople SHOWING EARLY FORM OF IMPOST Nuovo at Ravenna. To this simple design the Ea6t added the develop ment of the dome. In the sixth century the domical style decisive ly replaced the basilican ; and nowhere can the tran sition be more clearly traced than in Constanti nople. We have then, in our examination of the still remaining specimens of Byzantine art, to observe first the basilicas, then the combination of basilica with dome, then the ex amples of the completed domical style. But thi6 Metal is by no means all. By- Sodtt Zantine art, in the carving of capitals, in the creation of the impost-capital, in its achievement of " teach- fflp^ ing the column to support the arch," in sculpture, in bronze work, in the detail of inscriptions, and above all, in mosaic, is worth the most attentive study, and happily in spite of time, war and barbarism, Constantinople CAPITALS FROM S. SOPHIA (IMPOST Still furnishes a fruitful absorbed) field for the student. 232 The Churches Of the basilicas which existed before the time of Justinian, there are two impressive examples remaining. The first is the church of S. John Baptist, once attached to the monastery called the Studium. It was originally built in 463, and was attached to the monastery founded by one of the early emigrants from the old Rome, Studius. This monastery became the most important centre of the Akoimetai, the "sleepless ones," an order which kept up perpetual intercession for the sins of the world, and whose importance from the fifth century to the time of the Latin Conquest was very great;1 It was in this church that many of the icons were preserved during the first fury of iconoclasm : in the monastery, Isaac Comnenus and Michael VII. assumed the monastic habit. The church has undergone several restorations, but is now in a ruinous state. It was turned into a mosque under Bayezid II. — it is called Mir Achor Djami— but its structural arrangements have not been altered. It is a basilica with two aisles and apse, narthex and atrium. On each side the aisles are divided from the nave by seven marble pillars, the capitals Corinth ian, the work below Byzantine. The design on the capitals is that of the double acanthus, " one leaf lying over and within another." Outside in the atrium the columns are Corinthian, and so also below in the great crypt or cistern. The door of the narthex is inserted between the two columns. Of the many memorials that the church once contained only one may now be seen. In a wall marking a small enclosure behind the apse, at the north-east, is a tombstone upside down on which may be traced 1 See especially " Les De'buts du Monachisme a Constanti nople" (Pargoire) in Revue des questions historiques, Jan. 1899 pp. 133, sqq. Z33 The Story of Constantinople the Greek inscription to the memory of Dionysios, a Russian monk, who fell asleep on September 6, J387- Beautiful in its ruin, with the creepers hiding many of the great gaps in the Western entrance, the church of S. John Baptist does not differ essentially from the common Western type of basilica. The galleries (now without floors) mark, it has been said, the advent of organised monasticism earlier than in COURTYARD OF THE CHURCH OF THE STUDIUM the West ; but there is, save for some of the work on the pillars, nothing of an especially Byzantine style about the church. It seems certain to perish in a few years if nothing is done. Meanwhile it should be visited by every student of history or art. S. Irene, now within the grounds of the Seraglio, is of more importance. It owes its original foundation to Constantine, but it suffered severely in the Nika riot and was rebuilt by Justinian in 532. It was again restored in 740. Little if anything has been done to it since the Turkish Conquest, and it may be 234 The Churches taken as certain that its original structure remains practically unaltered. For the historical interest of its contents as well as for its architectural importance, it is well worth a visit ; but it is rarely that permission is accorded to view it.1 It has been used since the Turkish Conquest as an armoury, and an irade from the Sultan himself is necessary to authorise the Minister of Ordnance to permit any one to see it. Its form is basilican, a nave with two aisles and an apse. The dome rests upon a drum lighted by twenty windows. It is probable that this was built by Justinian. In the apse is a characteristic feature which shows what must have been the arrangement at S. Sophia. There are five rows of seats for the clergy, facing west — an unusual number of seats I think, for at Ravenna there is but one row. Under the seats there is a passage round the ap6e. There were originally a narthex and an atrium. The narthex seems to have been thrown into the church, as is shown by the heavy pier supporting the gallery, with its counterpart in the outer walls ending abruptly at the wall plate. It seems probable that this was done in order to make room for the second dome, the original structure being that of the ordinary Roman basilica. The atrium seems to have undergone many changes : possibly it is entirely of Mohammedan work, as it has pointed arches. The interior of the church is solemn and impressive, an effect due to the great dignity of the general lines. Originally no doubt the walls and domes were covered with mosaics. Part of the apse still bears its decoration uncovered with the wash which is over all the rest of the surface. A gigantic cross of black tesserse stretches up the vault, and large 1 In 1896 and 1899 application was made on my behalf by the British Ambassador; on the last occasion the Sultan granted an irade. *35 The Story of Constantinople inscriptions remain over the arch. The apse is lighted by three great windows, a feature never seen in Roman basilicas till much later. The columns which support the galleries are plain, the arch resting on simple un- carved blocks. It may be seen, even from this brief description, how interesting the church is as a re presentation in Constantinople of the style brought to the East by the Christian architects of the Empire, and exposed to many foreign influences, but as yet showing no important signs of departure from the original type. But the church is interesting not only architecturally, but historically. It has never been used for the worship of Islam. It could be restored in a few hours to the worship of the Christian Church. Its incongruous contents, too, have an interest. There are weapons of the Crusaders, chainmail, great swords ; the curious machines of Alexius Comnenus ; keys of conquered cities, bags of earth in token of conquest. There are five fine bells, two with dates 1600 and 1658, one dedicated "Vero Deo Patri Filio Spiritui Sancto." There are swords of the Janissaries, and their curiously shaped helmets, and their famouB kettle drums, differ ing in size according to the number of companies that were assembled. Most interesting of all, perhaps, are the fragments of the great chain which stretched across the Golden Horn. In the court are two fine sarco phagi, which are called those of Constantine and Irene. These two examples of the basilican style are clear and distinct. There are other churches which have basilican features, but do not belong to the period before Justinian, and are worthy of detailed exam ination. S. Thekla stands back from the walls on the Golden Horn not far from the gate now called Aivan Serai Kapoussi, which was once the Porta Kiliomene. The foundation of this is not earlier than 236 3 0opVvia Atr^i.r, M M I £#. #cr^u* p.-?? Barvt'ste'-y. ConrARATivt Sixes Of GRCftT AMD LlTTL-E $ ^OPVIIA. Plati or<53. ^Sergius ahd Bacchus. 237 The Churches the ninth century, and Anna Comnena mentions its restoration in the eleventh. It is a curious survival of an early style, for it has no dome, and is simply a basilica about forty feet long and twenty broad, with an apse. It was gaily restored a few years ago, and bears as a mosque the name of Toklou Ibrahim Dedeh Mesjid. S. Theodore Tyrone (Killise Djami) stands not far to the west of the mosque of Suleiman. It was built about 450, but much of the present building is of the twelfth century. It is not improbable that in its chief features it may be older than any church in Constantinople. The central dome has ten arches, perhaps originally windows, now closed. All the domes are small, and the columns are without orna ment. There are narthex and exo-narthex, and in the latter is a mysterious opening, full of stones and frag ments of mortar, leading, it is said, to a long passage which the Turks fancy once led to S. Sophia. But more interesting than either of these is that unique building which the Turks have happily named " Kutchuk Aya Sofia," little S. Sophia, the Church of S. Sergius and S. Bacchus.1 It stands not far from Koum Kapoussi in the Marmora Walls, and quite close to the railway. Originally it was con nected with the Church of S. Peter and S. Paul. Procopius describes the churches as standing obliquely towards each other, " joined together, and vieing one with another. They have," he says, " a common en trance, are equal to one another in all respects, are surrounded by a boundary wall, and neither of them exceeds the other or falls short of it, either in beauty, size, or any other respect ; for each alike reflects the rays of the sun from its polished marble, and is alike covered with rich gold and adorned with offerings. 1 This can be reached from the Hippodrome by a road going southwards, and easy to find. 239 The Story of Constantinople. In one respect alone they differ, that the one is built longitudinally, whereas the columns of the other for the most part stand in a »emi-circle. The portico at their entrance is common to both, and from its great length is called narthex (i.e. a reed). The whole propylea, the atrium, and the doors from the atrium, and the entrance to the palace, are common to both." A door now closed at the south of the narthex shows where was the entrance to the Church of S. Peter and S. Paul. S. Sergius and S. Bacchus has happily suffered but little. It has, as has been said, a struc tural narthex. The atrium can still be traced in the arrangement of the Turkish houses and garden separated now from the church by a narrow pathway. The Church of S. Sergius and S. Bacchus is a square with a dome. Columned exedras fill out the angles of the square under the domed vaults, and the piers supporting the dome form an octagon. A small apse is added at the east end. The ground plan of the church almost exactly repeats that of S. Vitale at Ravenna, which was probably begun a year before its companion in Constantinople. The resemblance is most marked in the six windows of the apse, the galleries and the columns on which they rest. The details also of the work closely resemble each other. We have the simplest form of the impost capital and the eight-lobed melon-formed capital. Vine-leaves form part of the decoration of some of the capitals and of the frieze : some ^ay that this is a fanciful allusion to the associations of the name of one of the saints to whom the church is dedicated. Many crosses are cut in the marble of the west gallery ; and on the south side over the imperial entrance from the palace are the monograms of Justinian and Theodora. Justinian built the Church in 527, and dedicated it to the soldier saints who were martyred under 240 The Churches Maximianus, to commemorate his preservation when he was charged with treason during the reign of Anastasius. An inscription commemorates ' the Em peror "inspired by pity," and his wife Theodora, " the divinely crowned." Its historic associations are interesting. It was there that representatives of the Latin Church on a visit to Constantinople were generally allowed to worship according to their own rite. It is probable that Gregory the Great, who was so long the Papal representative at the Byzantine court, often said mass there. It suffered severely during the Latin conquest, and it was re paired by Michael VIII. Interesting, and in spite of whitewash and colouring, even beautiful in itself, it is important architecturally as illustrating the process which developed the design of S. Irene into that of S. Sophia. Closely re sembling S. Vitale at Ravenna, it is yet, in little, a very distinct anticipation of the great church of the Divine W isdom of which we have now to speak. Something has been said already (above, pp. 35-39) of the historic circumstances under which this, " the fairest church in all the world," as our Sir John Mandeville hath it, was built. Hardly a month after the burning of the first church of the Divine Wisdom in 532, the new building was begun. On S. Stephen's Day 537, it was consecrated. In 558 much of it was seriously damaged by an earthquake, the eastern part of the dome, with the apse, being thrown down, "destroying in its fall the holy table, the ciborium, and the ambo." At their restoration, the dome was raised twenty feet. From the first, it was recognised as the greatest work that had ever been completed by architects. Not only the eulogists of Justinian, but every chron icler of the age, and for some centuries after, bear Q 241 The Story of Constantinople testimony to the fascination which its splendour and dignity exercised upon the imagination of beholders. It was the great outward expression of the power of a world-empire consecrated to the religion of Christ. It was the symbol of the offering of all beautiful things, all art, now conquered from the corruptions of paganism, all riches, all human skill and thought, to God the Creator. The Divine Wisdom which made the world and designed all things so great and so fair, was to hallow all, now that man offered them up in continual sacrifice to God from Whom alone their use and blessing came. S. Sophia's was the highest outward expression which man had given to the idea of God'6 omnipotence and omnipresence, and to the absolute dependence of man upon the Divine ordering of life. " Anima naturaliter Christ iana " was the noble saying of Tertullian. The Church of S. Sophia was the expression of that thought by the genius of Anthemius of Tralles under the direction of Justinian, Caesar and Augustus. We can hardly see the great church better than with the words of Procopius, the first to describe it, before us. In his " Aedificia," a glorification perhaps too glorious of the great Emperor's wisdom in his buildings, the strange historian, half soldier, half philosopher, who followed the greatest captain of the age in his cam paigns, who lived in the close presence of the splendid works which made the men of the sixth century famous in the history of the world, and yet had a mind utterly sceptical as to real goodness, entirely credulous of evil, perhaps for once threw aside his sardonic humour when he wrote of the great church. Here at least, in all those high-wrought pages, he is sincere. Justinian, he 6ays, is highly to be regarded for his wisdom and his good fortune that he found architects 242 The Churches and workmen so skilful, and was "able to choose the most suitable of mankind to execute the noblest of his works." It was this, he says, which caused the matchless achievement. Cost was not spared, workmen were brought from every land. "The church1 consequently presents a most glorious spectacle, extraordinary to those who behold it, and altogether incredible to those who are told of it. In height it rises to the very heavens, and overtops the neighbouring buildings like a ship anchored among them, appearing above the rest of the city, which it adorns and forms a part of it. One of its beauties is that being a part of and growing out of the city, it rises so high that the whole city can be seen as from a watch-tower. The length and breadth are so judiciously arranged that it appears to be both long and wide without being disproportionate. " It is distinguished by indescribable beauty, excel ling both in its size, and in the harmony of its measures, having no part excessive and none deficient; being more magnificent than ordinary buildings, and much more elegant than those which are not of so juBt a proportion. The church is singularly full of light and sunshine ; you would declare that the place is not lighted by the sun from without, but that the rays are produced within itself, such an abundance of light is 1 Aedif. I. i. — The translation here used is that of Mr Aubrey Stewart, published by the Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society, with alterations by the late Mr Harold Swainson, as published in the admirable work of Mr W. R. Lethaby and himself, Sancta Sophia, Constantinople, a Study of Byzantine Building, 1894 (pp. 24-29). Messrs Lethaby and Swainson insert explanatory divisions of the description, thus 'The Apse,' etc. I have inserted the Greek words where they have trans literated them, and made an occasional slight alteration. The value of Messrs Lethaby and Swainson's work as an archi tectural translation is great. 243 The Story of Constantinople poured into this church. The Apse. — Now the head (orpottuwov) of the church (that is to say the part towards the rising sun, where the sacred mysteries are performed in honour of God) is built as follows. The building rises from the ground not in a straight line, but setting back somewhat obliquely, it retreats in the middle into a rounded form which those who are learned in these matters call semi-cylindrical, rising perpendicularly. Apsoid and Semidome. — The upper part of this work ends in the fourth part of a sphere, and above it another crescent-shaped (/ijjuis/dss) structure is raised upon the adjacent parts of the building, admirable for its beauty, but causing terror by the apparent weakness of its construction ; for it appears not to rest upon a secure foundation, but to hang dangerously over the heads of those below, although it is really supported with especial firmness and safety. Exedras. — On each side of these parts are columns standing upon the floor, which are not placed in a straight line, but arranged with an inward curve of semicircular shape, one beyond another like the dancers in a chorus. These columns support above them a crescent-shaped structure. Opposite the east wall is built another wall, containing the entrances, and upon either side of it also stand columns, with stonework above them, in a half-circle exactly like those previously described. Great Piers and Arches. — In the midst of the church are four masses of stone called piers (;rE