XLII. terest, and animated only by a principle of honour CHAP. and gratitude. After their defeat, the fears of the emperor solicited a treaty, which was almost accepted by the moderation of the Comnenian: but the former was betrayed by his ambassadors, and the latter was prevented by his friends. The solitary Michael submitted to the voice of the people, and by the hands of the patriarch Isaac Comnenus was solemnly crowned: the sword, which he inscribed on his coins, might be an offensive symbol, if it implied his title by conquest; but this sword would have been drawn against the foreign and domestic enemies of the state. The decline of his health and vigour suspended the operation of active virtue, and the prospect of approaching death determined him to interpose some moments between life and eternity. But instead of leaving the empire as the marriage portion of his daughter, his reason and inclination concurred in the preference of his brother John, a soldier, a patriot, and the father of five sons, the future pillars of an hereditary succession. His first modest reluctance might be the natural dictate of discretion and tenderness, but his obstinate and successful perseverance, however it may dazzle with the show of virtue, must be censured as a criminal desertion of his duty, and a rare offence against his family and country. The purple which he had refused was accepted by Constantine Ducas, a friend of the Comnenian house, and whose noble birth was adorned with the experience and reputation of civil policy. In the monastic habit Isaac recovered his health, and survived two years his voluntary abdication. At the command of his abbot, he observed the rule of St. Basil, and executed the most servile offices of the convent; but his latent vanity was gratified by the frequent and respectful visits of the reigning monarch, who revered in his person the character of a benefactor and a saint. CHAP. Constantine If Constantine the Eleventh were indeed the subject most worthy of empire, we must pity the debaseXI. Ducas, ment of the age and nation in which he was chosen. A. D. 1059, In the labour of puerile declamations he sought, Dec. 25. without obtaining, the crown of eloquence, more Eudocia, A. D. 1067, May. precious, in his opinion, than that of Rome; and, in the subordinate functions of a judge, he forgot the duties of a sovereign and a warrior. Far from imitating the patriotic indifference of the authors of his greatness, Ducas was anxious only to secure, at the expense of the republic, the power and prosperity of his children. His three sons, Michael the Seventh, Andronicus the First, and Constantine the Twelfth, were invested in a tender age with the equal title of Augustus; and the succession was speedily opened by their father's death. His widow Eudocia was intrusted with the administration; but experience had taught the jealousy of the dying monarch to protect his sons from the danger of her second nuptials; and her solemn engagement, attested by the principal senators, was deposited in the hands of the patriarch. Before the end of seven months, the wants of the state called aloud for the male virtues of a soldier ; and her heart had already chosen Romanus Diogenes, whom she raised from the scaffold to the throne. The discovery of a treasonable attempt had exposed him to the severity of the laws: his beauty and valour absolved him in the eyes of the empress; and Romanus, from a mild exile, was recalled on the second day to the command of the Oriental armies. Her royal choice was yet unknown to the public, and the promise, which would have betrayed her falsehood and levity, was stolen by a dexterous emissary from the ambition of the patriarch. Xiphilin at first alleged the sanctity of oaths and the sacred nature of a trust; but a whisper that his brother was the future emperor relaxed his scruples, and forced him to con XLII. III. Dio A. D. 1067, fess that the public safety was the supreme law. He CHAP. resigned the important paper; and when his hopes were confounded by the nomination of Romanus, he Romanus could no longer regain his security, retract his declara- genes, tions, nor oppose the second nuptials of the empress. August. Yet a murmur was heard in the palace; and the Barbarian guards had raised their battle-axes in the cause of the house of Ducas, till the young princes were soothed by the tears of their mother, and the solemn assurances of the fidelity of their guardian, who filled the imperial station with dignity and honour.-- I shall next relate his valiant but unsuccessful efforts to resist the progress of the Turks. A new and a formidable enemy now invaded the eastern provinces of the empire. Since the decline of the caliphs, the discord and degeneracy of the Saracens respected the Asiatic provinces of Rome, which, by the victories of Nicephorus, Zimisces, and Basil, had been extended as far as Antioch and the eastern boundaries of Armenia. Twenty-five years after the death of Basil, his successors were suddenly attacked by an unknown race of barbarian shepherds, the Turks or Turkmans, who emigrated from beyond the Caspian Sea, and united the Scythian valour with the fanaticism of new proselytes. As the progress of our history has brought us to the nation by which Constantinople was finally subdued, it may be proper to say a few words respecting the origin and progress of its conquerors. The Scythian empire of the sixth century was long since dissolved, but fragments of the nation (each a powerful and independent people) were scattered over the desert from China to the Oxus and the Danube, where a colony of Hungarians were admitted into the republic of Europe. A swarm of these northern shepherds overspread Persia; their princes of the house XLII. CHAP. of Seljuk erected a splendid and solid empire, from Samarcand to the confines of Greece and Egypt, and the Turks maintained their dominion in Asia Minor till the victorious crescent was planted on the dome of St. Sophia. One of the greatest princes of that age was Mahmood or Mahmud *, the Gaznevide who reigned in the eastern provinces of Persia from 997 to 1028. For him the title of sultan was first invented, and his kingdom was enlarged from Transoxiana to the neighbourhood of Ispahan, from the shores of the Caspian to the mouth of the Indus. He surpassed the boundaries of the conquests of Alexander. Delhi, Lahore, and Moultan, were compelled to open their gates, and the fertile kingdom of Guzerad was subdued. Massoud, the son and successor of Mahmood, experienced a reverse of fortune. He was defeated by emigrants of the eastern Turkmans †, and the memorable day of Zendecan founded in Persia the dynasty of the Shepherd Kings. The victorious Turkmans proceeded to the election of a sovereign; and if the probable tale of a Latin historian may be credited, it was by lot of arrows ‡ that the important prize was assigned to Togrul Beg, the grandson of Seljuk, whose surname has been immortalized by the greatness of his posterity. By the arms of Togrul the Gaznevides were driven from Persia to the Indus, the dynasty of the Bowides was annihilated, and the sceptre of Irak passed from the Persian to the Turkish nation. By the conquest of I am indebted for his character and history to D'Herbelot (Bibliotheque Orientale, Mahmud, p. 533–537), M. de Guignes (Histoire des Huns, tom. iii. p. 155 -173), and our countryman Colonel Alexander Dow (vol. i. p. 23-83.) See a just and natural picture of these pastoral manners, in the history of William archbishop of Tyre (1. i. c. 7, in the Gesta Dei per Francos, p. 633, 634), and a valuable note by the editor of the Histoire Genealogique des Tartars, p. 535-538. The first emigration of the Turkmans, and doubtful origin of the Seljukians, may be traced in the laborious history of the Huns by M. de Guignes, and the Bibliotheque Orientale of D'Herbelot, Elmacin, and Abulpharagius. Willerm. Tyr. l. i. c. 7, p. 633. The divination by arrows is ancient and famous in the East. XLII. Media he approached the Roman confines, and the CHAP. shepherd presumed to despatch an ambassador to demand the tribute and obedience of the emperor of Constantinople. In 1055 Togrul was called to the deliverance of the caliph Cayem, who slumbered in the palace of Bagdad, a venerable phantom. Togrul obeyed the summons, and it gave a new kingdom to his arms. The sultan of Persia overcame the rebellious emirs, and the caliph solemnly declared him the temporal lieutenant of the vicar of the prophet. Myriads of Turkish horse, under his command, overspread a frontier of 600 miles, from Taurus to Arseroum, and the blood of 130,000 Christians was a grateful sacrifice to the Arabian prophet; yet the arms of Togrul did not make any deep or lasting impression on the Greek empire: the torrent rolled away from the open country, and the sultan retired, without glory or success, from the siege of an Armenian city. Obscure hostilities were continued or suspended with a vicissitude of events, and the bravery of the Macedonian legions renewed the fame of the conqueror of Asia. Alp Arslan, Togrul Beg died in 1063, and leaving no issue, Reign of his nephew Alp Arslan succeeded to the title and A. D. 1063 prerogatives of sultan. The name of Alp Arslan, -1072. the valiant lion, is expressive of the popular idea of the perfection of man; and the successor of Togrul displayed the fierceness and generosity of the royal animal. He passed the Euphrates at the head of the Turkish cavalry, and entered Cæsarea, the metropolis of Cappadocia, to which he had been attracted by the fame and wealth of the temple of St. Basil *. The solid structure resisted the destroyer, but he carried * For these wars of the Turks and Romans, see in general the Byzantine histories of Zonaras and Cedrenus, Scylitzes, the continuation of Cedrenus and Nicephorus Bryennius Cæsar. For the Orientals, I draw as usual on the wealth of D'Herbelot (see titles of the first Seljukides) and the accuracy of De Guignes, (Hist. des Huns, tom. iii. 1. 10.) |