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way.126 At this time, in Italy, Boccaccio was writing his famous Decameron which begins "with a description of the Black Death classical in its picturesqueness and measured solemnity", 127 when many brave men, fair ladies, and gallant youths "in the soundest of health, broke fast with their kinsfolk, comrades, and friends in the morning, and when evening came, supped with their forefathers in the other world."128 Scholars compare the description of Boccaccio with that of Thucydides, and some of them hold the humanist in higher estimation even than the classic writer.129

From Germany through the Baltic Sea and Poland the plague penetrated into Pskov, Novgorod, and Moscow, in Russia, where the Great Prince, Simeon the Proud, fell its victim in 1353, and spread all over Russia. In some cities, according to the statement of a Russian chronicle, no single man was left alive.180

Venice was actively preparing for war. After the horrors of the plague were somewhat forgotten, the Republic of St. Mark made an alliance with the King of Aragon. The latter was discontented with Genoa and consented, by his attacks upon the shores and islands of Italy, to distract the Genoese and thereby to facilitate the advance of Venice in the east. After some hesitation John Cantacuzene joined the Aragon-Venetian alliance against Genoa; he accused the "ungrateful nation of the Genoese" of forgetting "the fear of the Lord," devastating the seas "as if they were seized with a mania for pillaging," and of endeavoring permanently to disturb the seas and navigators by their piratical attacks."131

The chief battle, in which about 150 Greek, Venetian, Ara

120 On Norway see, for example, K. Gjerset, History of the Norwegian people (New York, 1915), I, 202.

127 A. N. Veselovsky, "Boccaccio, his Environment and Contemporaries", Veselovsky's Works (Petrograd, 1915), V, 448, 451 Sbornik Otdeleniya Russkaho Yazika i Slovesnosti, vol. 53 (1893), 444, 447 (in Russian).

128 Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron, First Day, Introduction.

120 See, for example, M. Korelin, The Earlier Italian Humanism and its historiography (Moscow, 1892), p. 495 (in Russian).

130 Nikonovskaya letopis. The Complete Collection of Russian Chronicles, vol. X, 224 (in old Russian).

131 See N. Iorga, "Latins et Grecs d'Orient et l'établissement des Turcs en Europe", Byz. Zeitschrift, XV (1906), 208.

gon, and Genoese vessels took part, was fought in the beginning of the sixth decade, in the Bosphorus; it had no decisive result; each side claimed victory. The friendly relations between the Genoese and Ottoman-Turks forced John Cantacuzene to give up his alliance with Venice and become reconciled with the Genoese, to whom he gave his promise not to support Venice henceforth; he also consented to give more territory to the Genoese colony of Galata. But after some clashes, Venice and Genoa, exhausted by the war, made peace. Since it failed to solve the chief problem in the conflict, the peace lasted only a short time; war burst out again, which may be called the war of Tenedos. Tenedos, one of the few islands of the Archipelago still in the hands of the Byzantine Emperors, possessed, owing to its position at the entrance into the Dardanelles, the greatest significance for the states which had commercial relations with Constantinople and the countries around the Black Sea. Since both shores of the straits were in the hands of the Ottoman Turks, Tenedos was an excellent observation-point of their actions. Venice, which had already for a long time dreamed of occupying this island, after long negotiations with the Emperor, at last got his consent. But the Genoese could not acquiesce in the cession of Tenedos to Venice; in order to prevent its accomplishment, they succeeded in raising a revolution at Constantinople which deposed John V, as has been mentioned above, and set his eldest son, Andronicus, upon the throne for three years. The war which had burst out between the two republics, exhausted both of them and ruined all the states which had commercial concerns in the East; at last, in 1381, the war ended with the peace of Turin, the capital of the Duchy of Savoy. A detailed and voluminous text of the conference of Turin has come down to us.132 With the personal participation of the count of Savoy, the conference discussed various general problems of international life, which was already very complicated at that time, and worked out the conditions of peace; of the latter, only those are interesting for our purpose which put an end to the

132 Liber jurium reipublicae Genuensis (Augustae Taurinorum, 1857), II, 858-906 (Monumenta historiae patriae, IX). Monumenta spectantia historiam slavorum meridionalium, IV, 119–63.

dispute between Venice and Genoa and referred to Byzantium. Venice was to evacuate the island of Tenedos, the fortifications of which were levelled to the ground; the island itself was on a set date to pass into the hands of the Count of Savoy (in manibus prefati domini Sabaudie comitis), who was related to the Palaeologi (on the side of Anne of Savoy, wife of Andronicus III). Thus, neither Venice nor Genoa gained this important strategic point, to whose possession they had so eagerly aspired.

A Spanish traveller, Pero Tafur, who visited Constantinople in 1437 gives a very interesting description of Tenedos; he writes: "we came to the island of Tenedos, where we anchored and disembarked. While the ship was being refitted we set out to see the island, which is some eight or ten miles about. There are many conies, and it is covered with vineyards, but they are all spoilt. The harbour of Tenedos looks so new that it might have been built today by a masterhand. The mole is made of great stones and columns, and here the ships have their moorings and excellent anchorage. There are other places where ships can anchor, but this is the best, since it is opposite the entrance to the Straits of Romania (Dardanelles). Above the harbour is a great hill surmounted by a very strong castle. This castle was the cause of much fighting between the Venetians and Genoese until the Pope sentenced it to be destroyed, that it might belong to neither. But, without doubt, this was very ill-advised, since the harbour is one of the best in the world. No ship can enter the Straits without first anchoring there to find the entrance, which is very narrow, and the Turks, knowing how many ships touch there, arm themselves and lie in wait and kill many Christians."'132a

As for the acute question of the trade-monopoly of the Genoese in the Black Sea and Maeotis, especially in the colony of Tana, Genoa, according to the conditions of the peace of Turin, was obliged to give up her intention of closing the Venetian markets of the Black Sea and of shutting off access to Tana. The commer

132a Andanças é viajes de Pero Tajur por diversas partes del mundo avidos (14351439), Madrid, 1874, pp. 135-36 (Colleccion de libros españoles raros ó curiosos, vol. VIII). Pero Tafur, Travels and adventures 1435-1439, transl. and edited with an Introduction by Malcolm Letts (New York and London, 1926), pp. 113-14.

cial nations resumed their intercourse with Tana, which, situated at the mouth of the river Don, was one of the very important centres of trade with eastern peoples. Peaceful relations between Genoa and the elderly John V, who had regained the throne, were restored. Byzantium had again to steer a way between the two republics, whose commercial interests in the East, despite the terms of peace, continued to collide. However, the peace of Turin, which ended a great war, caused by the economic rivalry of Venice and Genoa, was of great importance because it allowed the nations which maintained intercourse with Romania to resume their trade, which had been interrupted for many years. But their further destiny depended upon the Ottoman Turks, to whom, as was already obvious at the end of the fourteenth century, belonged the future of the Christian East.

Manuel II (1391–1425). Constantinople and the Turks. The crusade of Sigismund, of Hungary, and the battle of Nicopolis. The expedition of Marshal Boucicaut.-In one of his essays, Manuel II wrote: "When I had passed my childhood and not yet reached the age of man, I was encompassed by a life full of tribulation and trouble; but according to many indications, it might have been foreseen that our future would cause us to look at the past as a time of clear tranquillity."133 Manuel's presentiments did not deceive him.

We know in what a desperate and humiliating position Byzantium or, rather, Constantinople was in the last years of the reign of John V. At the moment of his death, Manuel was at the court of the Sultan Bayazid. When tidings of his father's death reached him, he succeeded in fleeing from the Sultan and arrived in Constantinople, where he was crowned Emperor. In a statement of a Byzantine source, Bayazid, fearing the popularity of Manuel, regretted not having murdered him during his stay at the Sultan's court. Bayazid's envoy sent to Constantinople to Manuel, as the same Byzantine historian (Ducas) relates, gave the new Emperor these words from the Sultan: "If you wish to

133 See Berger de Xivrey, Mémoire sur le vie et les ouvrages de l'empereur Manuel Paléologue, Mémoires de l'Institut de France. Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres (Paris, 1853), XIX, part 2, 25-26.

execute my orders, close the gates of the city and reign within it; but all that lies outside belongs to me."134 Thereafter Constantinople was practically in a state of siege. The only relief for the capital lay in the unsatisfactory condition of the Turkish fleet; for that reason the Turks, though possessing both sides of the Dardanelles were unable for the time being to cut off Byzantium from intercourse with the outside world through this strait. Especially terrible to the Christian East was the moment when Bayazid, by craftiness, gathered together in one place the representatives of the families of the Palaeologi with Manuel at their head, and the Slavonic princes; he seems to have intended to do away with them at once, "in order that," to quote the Sultan's words given in a writing of Manuel, "after the land had been cleared of thorns, by which he meant us (that is to say, the Christians), his sons might dance in the Christian land without fearing to scratch their feet."135 The representatives of the ruling families were spared, but the severe wrath of the Sultan struck many nobles of their retinue.

In 1392 Bayazid organized a maritime expedition in the Black Sea ostensibly against Sinope. But the Sultan put the Emperor Manuel at the head of the Turkish fleet. Therefore Venice thought that this expedition was directed not against Sinope, but against the Venetian colonies, south of the Dardanelles, in the Archipelago-not a Turkish expedition, but a disguised Greek expedition, supported by Turkish troops. As a recent historian says, the Oriental problem of the end of the fourteenth century might have been solved by the formation of a Turko-Greek Empire.136 This interesting episode, the knowledge of which is afforded us by the archives of Venice, had no important results. Shortly after, the friendly relations between Byzantium and Bay

134 Ducae, Hist. Byz., XIII (ed. Bonn., p. 49).

135 Manuelis Palaeologi, Oratio funebris in proprium ejus fratrem despotam Theodorum Palaeologum. Migne, Patr. Graeca, vol. 156, col. 225.

138 M. Silberschmidt, Das orientalische Problem zur Zeit der Entstehung des Türkischen Reiches nach Venezianischen Quellen. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Beziehungen Venedigs zu Sultan Bajezid I, zu Byzanz, Ungarn und Genua und zum Reiche von Kiptschak (1381-1400). Leipzig-Berlin, 1923, pp. 78-79. The author uses a misleading term, "Griechisches Reich türkischer Nation" (p. 79). See R. Salomon, in his Review of Silberschmidt's book, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, XXVIII (1928), 144.

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