Decline & Fall - Byzantium 03 (65 page)

What were Manuel's motives in exiling his nephew? Throughout his absence in the West, John VII's behaviour had been exemplary. He had ruled conscientiously and well without, so far as we know, the slightest attempt to assert his own claims at the expense of his uncle's; he had concluded an extraordinarily favourable treaty with Suleyman which had immeasurably strengthened the imperial position; and on Manuel's return he had surrendered the s
upreme power unhesitatingly and
with good grace. Yet Manuel was by nature neither unjust nor vindictive; he would surely not have acted as he did without good cause. Was it just a clash of personalities? Did he simply find his nephew unbearable and decide that Constantinople was not big enough for them both? Was he perhaps angry with John for having agreed to surrender the city to Bayezit - assuming that he had indeed done so - after the Sultan had dealt successfully with Tamburlaine? Or was he, even after his experience in the West, still bent on military action against the Turks and frankly disgusted by the terms of the recent agreement, however favourable it might in the short term have appeared? But if so, why had he himself signed it immediately on his return?

Several other theories have been put forward, none of them entirely convincing. One suggests that John's exile was a mere pretence -nothing more than an attempt by the Emperor to appease Tamburlaine, who was angry about what he considered the pro-Turkish policy of Byzantium after the battle of Ancyra. Another adduces two little-known contemporary texts referring to the death, at the age of seven, of the young Emperor
(
'basileus')
Andronicus Palaeologus, presumably the son of John VII and his wife Irene Gattilusio. (Until recently, the existence of this small and shadowy figure was not even suspected; nowadays, however, it is more or less generally agreed.
1
) If, the theory goes, little Andronicus was born after Manuel's departure to the West - and it seems unlikely that, had John already produced an heir, the Empire would have been entrusted to him for so long - and if his father had had him crowned co-Emperor before Manuel's return, it is hardly surprising that the latter acted as he did. The principal objection to all this is that although the texts refer to Andronicus as
basileus
they give no indication of when he received his coronation. If such a ceremony had indeed occurred during the senior Emperor's absence it is hard to believe that it would not have been mentioned by any other source; it is thus a good deal more likely that John had crowned his son not in Constantinople at all but as
'basileus
of Thessaly' during his later years in Thessalonica - in which case the entire theory falls to the ground.

The truth will never be known. Fortunately, John seems to have settled with every appearance of contentment in Thessalonica, showing no regrets for his days of power in the capital, causing his uncle no

1
One other piece of evidence for the existence of Andronicus V is an ivory at Dumbarton Oaks in Washington DC, almost certainly depicting John and Andronicus together at Thessalonica in
1403/4.

further trouble and spending much of his time in establishing and endowing various religious and charitable foundations for the salvation of his soul. He died in September
1408,
having first donned the monastic habit and adopted - like his great-grandfather John Cantacuzenus - the monkish name of Joasaph. His presumed heir, the
basileus
Andronicus V, having predeceased him, the senior line of the Palaeologus was now extinct.

Manuel once again took up the reins of government in Constantinople, to find that there had occurred an extraordinary reversal of roles. Only a few years before, rival Byzantine Emperors had been contending for power, while the Turkish Sultan had amused himself by playing one off against the other to his own considerable advantage. Now it was the Turkish lands that were in chaos, for the Turks had no law of primogeniture and no less than four of the sons of Bayezit were fighting for the Ottoman crown; and the Emperor, who after the recent treaty was compelled to show at least a degree of friendship to his erstwhile enemies, found himself ineluctably drawn into the struggle.

The first round of that struggle was already over by the time Manuel returned to Constantinople. One of the four warring Princes, Isa, who had managed to establish himself in Brus
a after the departure of Tambur
laine, was driven out by his brother Mehmet. He had fled to Constantinople, where he had been given temporary refuge by John VII; but he had soon returned to Anatolia, only to suffer another defeat by Mehmet, who had immediately had him murdered. Then in
1404
another of the princes, Musa, who had shared his father's captivity but had been released after Bayezit's death to escort his body back to his capital for burial, declared war on his brother
Suleyman
in Adrianople. After three years of inconsequential skirmishing
Suleyman
, with uncharacteristic spirit, crossed into Asia Minor and, in Mehmet's absence, seized Brusa in the spring of
1407.
His supremacy, however, did not last long: Musa, encouraged by Mehmet, invaded Thrace and began whipping up support from the neighbouring Christian states, and in
1409
Suleyman was obliged to hurry back to Europe to save his own territory.

All this merely confirmed Manuel in his view that, whatever the immediate advantages of the
1403
treaty, he could not indefinitely rely on Turkish friendship even in Adrianople, let alone in Anatolia. Still less could he relax his efforts to alert the Christian nations of Europe and to obtain their active assistance. Already in
1404
he had sent new embassies
to France and Aragon; two years later he renewed his agreement with Venice, and in
1407
he wrote once again to Doge Steno, imploring him to settle his differences with the Genoese and launch a joint campaign against the Turks. Now after all was the ideal time to act, while the Ottoman Sultanate was torn by fratricidal strife; such a chance might never recur. But the Venetians remained unmoved. In the same year he sent one of his closest friends, the scholar Manuel Chrysoloras who had recently enjoyed such success in Florence and Milan, as his personal ambassador to King Charles VI in Paris. Chrysoloras carried with him, as a present for the King, a priceless manuscript of the works of Dionysius the Areopagite, bound in gold and ivory and containing a superb miniature of the Emperor, his wife and their three eldest sons.
1
Charles was delighted with it, but made no further offers of help; nor did the Kings of England and Aragon, to whom Chrysoloras presented himself at later stages of his journey.

The year
1407
saw the death after a long illness of Manuel's brother Theodore, Despot of the Morea. He had been an excellent ruler who, despite constant difficulties with both the Turks and his Frankish neighbours - and more recently with the Knights of St John - had somehow managed to maintain both the integrity of his dominion and the imperial prestige. The Emperor, who had loved and admired him, wrote a long funeral oration in his honour; then in the summer of
1408,
he travelled himself to Mistra to pay his respects at his tomb and - since the Despot had left no legitimate male issue - to enthrone his own second son, another Theodore, in his place. He was still there in September, when the news came of the death of John VII. This he was able to receive with rather more equanimity; none the less, John had also left no heir and the succession had to be provided for. The Emperor accordingly hurried to Thessalonica, where he installed his third son, the eight-year-old Andronicus.

It was obviously Manuel's hope, when he returned to Constantinople early in
1409,
to bring these two provinces, Thessaly and the Morea, directly under his own control, thereby strengthening both the power and the prestige of the Empire in the Greek peninsula; but before he could do very much more in this direction he found himself swept up once again in the struggle for the Ottoman Sultanate. That autumn a

1
Though now in the Louvre, this manuscript was intended for the library of the Abbey of Saint-Denis - the patron saint of France having been wrongl
y identified with the Arcopagite
throughout the Middle Ages.

desperate Suleyman appeared in Constantinople. He had, it appeared, returned to Adrianople only to find himself under attack by his brother Musa, who had invaded Thrace from beyond the Danube and was even now preparing to march on the city. Addressing the Emperor as his beloved father, he explained that without Byzantine help he could not hope to survive the coming onslaught - doubtless reminding Manuel that Musa, if victorious, would prove an infinitely less agreeable neighbour than himself. As an earnest of his good intentions he offered two young members of his family, a boy and a girl, as hostages, and took a niece of Manuel's - an illegitimate daughter of his late brother the Despot Theodore - as his own bride.

Alas, the marriage was not long to endure. In the first two battles between the brothers, in June and July
1410,
Suleyman was victorious; but, though he was never lacking in physical courage, there was a fundamental weakness in his character which somehow deprived him of staying power. The winter following, while Musa concentrated on building up his military strength, Suleyman locked himself up in his palace and surrendered himself to his favourite pastimes of drinking and debauch. Early in
1411
his contemptuous troops deserted him - many were also disgusted by his pro-Christian policy — and Adrianople fell almost without a struggle. Taken prisoner, he was brought on
17
February before his brother, who instantly had him strangled.

For Byzantium, this was serious news indeed. The Emperor, certainly, had no delusions about Musa, who had inherited all the violence and savagery of his father Bayezit, all his energy and efficiency, all his hatred of the Christians. One of his first actions on assuming power in Adrianople was to abrogate the treaty of
1403
and to declare his brother's various concessions null and void. He then sent a number of his regiments down into Thessaly to besiege Thessalonica, while he himself led the main body of the army directly against Constantinople, leaving the usual trail of devastation behind him. By this time, too, he had apparently been able to assemble a small naval squadron, which sailed unimpeded through the Hellespont and the Sea of Marmara to renew the old blockade.

The dismay of the people of Constantinople, finding themselves facing a siege by land and sea for the second time in ten years, can well be imagined. Fortunately, however, they were not called upon to undergo the tribuladons that they had suffered in the days of Bayezit. The Byzantine navy, weak as it was, proved sufficient to drive the Turkish ships back into the Mediterranean, allo
wing supplies to be brought in;
meanwhile, despite everything that the Turks could hurl against them, the Land Walls proved as impregnable as ever. But Musa, powerless as he was to take the city by storm, showed no inclination to depart; and there is no telling how long the stalemate might have continued had the Emperor not resorted to the undercover diplomacy that he so well understood. There was, he knew, one chance only of eliminating Musa from the political scene: his brother Mehmet. Early in
1412
he dispatched a secret embassy to Mehmet's court at Brusa.

The fight for power among the sons of Bayezit had now polarized: two contenders only were left, Musa and Mehmet. To Mehmet, a far more sensible and balanced character than his brother, a Byzantine alliance seemed a small price to pay for the undisputed throne of the Ottomans. He rode at once to Chrysopolis, where Manuel met him and escorted him over to Constantinople. There he entertained him lavishly for three days while a Turkish army of fifteen thousand was being ferried across the Bosphorus. On the fourth day Mehmet led his men against his brother, still encamped beneath the walls of the city. The first attack was unsuccessful, though not disastrous; seeing that Musa's army was stronger than he had expected, Mehmet retired before much damage was done and returned to Asia Minor for reinforcements. His second attack, in which he was supported by Byzantine troops and a small army provided by Stephen Lazarevich, also ended in failure; but Mehmet was not easily discouraged. On
15
June
1413
a whole new army was transported on Byzantine vessels across the straits for a third attempt. By now Musa in his turn had alienated many of his men - not, like
Suleyman
, by his fecklessness, but by his cruelty and brutality - and had suffered many desertions; one look at the size of Mehmet's force was enough for him to order an immediate retreat. He and his men were driven back to Adrianople and beyond, and were
finally defeated in pitched battl
e at Camurlu in Serbia on
5
July. He himself fought to the end, when he too was brought before his brother and strangled.

Go and say to my father the Emperor of the Romans that, with the help of God and the support of my father the Emperor, I have recovered my hereditary dominions. From this day forth I am and shall be his subject, as a son to his father. He will find me neither unheeding nor ungrateful. Let him but command me to do his bidding, and I shall with the greatest of pleasure execute his wishes as his servant.