The Foundation of the Ottoman Empire; a history of the Osmanlis up to the death of Bayezid I (1300-1403)

by Herbert Adams Gibbons

XII

The blockade of Constantinople, in spite of all the concessions that Manuel had made to Bayezid,[574] had become an active and pressing siege before the Nicopolis expedition. In 1394, Bayezid had given orders from Adrianople to pursue the siege vigorously.[575] But it was not until the spring of 1396 that Bayezid contemplated seriously the taking of the city by assault. He was diverted by the coming of the crusaders to Nicopolis. After Sigismund and his allies had been defeated, Bayezid returned to Constantinople and called upon Manuel to surrender the city.

The Constantinopolitans, stunned by the disaster which had attended the Christian arms on the Danube, urged Manuel to yield, in order that they might be free from the calamities that would follow a successful assault. But Manuel had been cheered by the arrival of six hundred chevaliers and a small gift of money from France. He resisted his people, and gave no answer to Bayezid.[576] He married his eldest son John to the daughter of the Russian prince Vassili, whose dowry was in gold pieces.[577] An inventory was made of the treasures of St. Sophia.[578] Through the Patriarch, Manuel tried to get the Russian and Polish Christians interested in the fate of the seat of orthodoxy.[579]

From Europe came the usual promises of aid. It is a merciful dispensation of Providence that men ground their hopes upon desires rather than upon realities. Manuel was merely human when he continued to receive strength and inspiration from what experience should have taught him were will-o’-the-wisps. Henry of Lancaster was projecting a new crusade;[580] but his energies were very soon directed towards a crown rather than a cross. The Duc d’Orléans, in response to a letter from Manuel to King Charles VI, answered for his insane brother by promising to come in person to the relief of Constantinople. Almost immediately afterwards he accepted rich presents from Bayezid.[581]

Venice, in 1397, urged Manuel and the Genoese of Pera, ‘for the honour of Christianity’ and because the alternative ‘would be to the peril and shame of Christianity’, not to treat with Bayezid. This advice was weakened by a saving clause at the end of the letter to the effect that, if the Constantinopolitans and Perotes did treat with Bayezid, they should include Venice, for ‘it would be too risky for the Venetians to be at war alone with the Turks’.[582] Although Venice sent ten galleys to Constantinople, and Genoa five galleys,[583] the republics followed consistently their policy of flattering Bayezid, and trying to make him believe that their dispositions towards him were altogether friendly.[584]

At the time that he summoned Manuel to deliver Constantinople, Bayezid fortified the gulf of Nicomedia, and built at Scutari the castle called Guzel Hissar.[585] About the same time, the castle of Anatoli Hissar was built at the mouth of the Sweet Waters of Asia, the narrowest point on the Bosphorus. When Clavijo passed through the Bosphorus, in 1403, he spoke of this castle as strongly built and strongly fortified, in prophetic contrast to the ruined Byzantine fortress directly opposite on the European shore.[586]

Perhaps it was because of the advice of Ali Pasha, who told him that the taking of Constantinople would bring upon him a really effective European intervention, or because he preferred to expend his energies in the Greek peninsula and in Asia Minor, that Bayezid did not carry out his threat to Manuel. These are the common explanations of the failure to follow up the victory of Nicopolis with the extinction of the Byzantine Empire.[587] As far as the Greeks were concerned, the inheritance of the Caesars was his. He had successfully defended against Europe what he had won. Constantinople could have been taken by assault. In fact, from his spies within the city, Bayezid knew that the inhabitants were favourable to surrender, and would probably force the hand of Manuel, if the Osmanlis made a show of beginning the assault. Bayezid must have been deterred from this enterprise, however, by the realization of his inability to hold the city without having the mastery of the sea.

One of Bayezid’s chief claims to greatness as a statesman is the way in which he handled Venice and Genoa. At any time during his reign, the Italian republics could have cut him off from Asia if he were in Europe, or from Europe if he were in Asia. Bayezid was master of most of the Balkan peninsula and of half of Anatolia; but he did not control the path from one portion of his empire to the other. Since he had come to the throne, Genoa had fallen under the influence of France. There was a strong anti-Ottoman sentiment in the Venetian Senate, which at any instant might crystallize into open hostility.[588] Europe was for the moment stirred over the fate of the Nicopolis crusaders. Bayezid knew that this was not the time to take Constantinople.

Then, too, after the great victories of Kossova and Nicopolis, and his successful campaign against Karamania, Bayezid allowed himself to succumb to the insidious temptations that assail the warrior when he passes from the tent to the palace. It was not astonishing that the pleasures of the table and of the harem proved irresistible to him. Bayezid, who had the best qualities of his age, allowed himself to become debauched by indulgence in shameful and unspeakable vices. His brilliant mental and physical qualities began to suffer the inevitable eclipse. His example was contagious. For, as the Osmanlis say, ‘the fish begins to corrupt at the head’.