XIII
The treaty concluded between the Byzantines and Genoese in 1386 affords a striking illustration of Murad’s power after the Nish campaign. This treaty, whose text has been preserved, was signed by John and Andronicus Palaeologos, the podesta of Pera, and the Genoese ambassador. John Palaeologos bound himself to live in peace with his son Andronicus, and to move his army against all the enemies of Genoa ‘except Morat bey and his Turks’. The Genoese in turn promised to defend Constantinople ‘against all enemies of whatever nationality except the said Morat bey and his Turks, who acted according to the will of the said Morat bey’! Throughout the treaty, Murad is carefully excepted on both sides.[384]
Genoa made a formal treaty with Murad in 1385. Favours were granted to the Osmanlis who did business in Pera, in return for liberty to Genoese merchants to reside and conduct business in the states of Murad. The treaty recalls the friendship of the Genoese for Orkhan, and speaks of Murad as ‘the magnificent and powerful lord of lords, Moratibei, grand admiral[385] and lord of the admirals of Turchie’.[386] But in the very next year Genoa secretly joined an offensive league with Cyprus, Scio (Chios) and Mytilene ‘against that Turk, son of unrighteousness and evil, and also of the Holy Cross Morat bey, and his sect, who are attempting so grievously to attack the Christian race’.[387]
In the first year of Murad’s reign, the Venetian energy had become so sapped by prosperity and luxury that the Senate passed a sumptuary law.[388] The recent triumph over Genoa had given them a belief in their invincibility. Their self-sufficiency, and the growing disinclination to lay aside the pen and ledger for the sword and shield, were alarming symptoms of decay. The lesson of the Genoese at Chioggia was needed to teach the Venetians that the struggle for existence never ceases.
In spite of their vital interest in the development of the Levant, and the power that their wealth gave them in a generation when fighting strength could be purchased so easily, Venice made no effort to oppose the progress of Ottoman conquest. On the contrary, in 1368, long before an invasion of Albania was imminent, the Senate negotiated with the Osmanlis for the reddition of Scutari. This project was again taken up in 1384, in a tentative way, during negotiations to fix the customs-duties of Venetian merchant-vessels.[389] Following the example of Ragusa and Genoa, Venice concluded, in 1388, a commercial treaty with Murad.[390]
The traffic of the Italian republics with the Moslems had been denounced by Gregory X in 1272, by Boniface VIII in 1299, by Urban V in 1366, and by Gregory XI in 1372.[391] In vain the popes exhorted; in vain they threatened interdict and excommunication; in vain they held up to execration the abominable slave traffic. Trade interests alone decided the policies of the maritime cities. Their citizens never hesitated to cut each other’s throats for the opportunity of selling goods. To them the crusades were a purely commercial proposition. More than once the archives of Venice reveal the approval of the Senate upon the action of merchants who warned Moslem princes of the crusaders’ intentions. Guillaume d’Adam declared with reason that the Saracens maintained their supremacy in the Holy Land and Egypt through the support of the traders, who furnished them with Christian slaves to keep up their armies.[392] Genoa passed laws in 1315 and in 1340 against the slave traffic of the Black Sea,[393] but these laws were never enforced.[394]
Venice and Genoa turned a deaf ear to papal remonstrances and to papal appeals for aid in crusades against the Osmanlis. For the sake of preserving their commerce, they flattered Murad, and aided him, indirectly at least, to subjugate the Christians of the Levant. Their children of the third and fourth generation paid to the descendants of Murad the penalty of their greed. They lost their commerce in trying to save it.