XIV
It was a bitter humiliation for Manuel to share the imperial throne with the nephew whom he hated and distrusted. With him, the case of John was one of ‘like father, like son’, and certainly John had never given the emperor any cause to think that he was more patriotic, more loyal than Andronicus. But there was a strong party in the city in favour of John, and his association in governing Constantinople would remove the pretext of righting a wrong, which Bayezid had so skilfully used to interfere in the politics of what was now no more than a city empire.
When France refused to receive him as a vassal, Manuel decided upon a voyage in person to solicit the intervention of Europe. In spite of his misgivings, he felt that this was the only way of salvation left. His own sons were too young to raise to the purple, and Theodore had his hands full in the Morea. There was nothing to do but to leave the government in John’s care.
On December 10, 1399, Manuel embarked on a Venetian galley to make his supreme appeal to Europe. He stopped at Modon to leave the empress and his sons with Theodore. The despot of the Morea was opposed to the project. He told the emperor how the chevaliers of Rhodes, in conjunction with the Pope, were trying to get possession of the last theme of the empire, and that this scheme would have been successful had it not been for the Greek hatred and fear of the Catholic Church. He declared that Manuel, like their father, was embarking upon a hopeless voyage. Not only that, but he would run a risk of losing his empire entirely by leaving it in charge of John, who was more friendly to Bayezid and the Osmanlis than to his own family and race.[598]
Manuel would listen to no remonstrances, to no arguments. He said that his position was like that of Esther before she went in to the king: ‘If I perish, I perish.’ With that optimism which was one of his most redeeming traits, Manuel bade farewell to his family, and set out for Venice.
In the only city of Europe that could rival his own capital in splendour, he received a reception worthy of the cause for which he had come. The Senate, as usual, promised much. But they had by this time become thoroughly won over to the policy of quod vi armorum potest fieri, fiat arte et sagacitate, to quote the words of a contemporary record in their archives.[599] At Padua, Vicenza, and Milan, Manuel received an imperial ovation. Giovanni Visconti, shocked at the wretched appearance of the emperor’s suite, gave him money to be used for apparel fitting to the successor of Constantine and his companions.[600]
There was no attempt to arrange a conference with Boniface IX. Manuel, at this stage of his career, could not play the hypocrite so easily as his father had done. In fact, his orthodoxy was beyond suspicion. He did not hesitate in Paris to celebrate high mass according to the eastern rite, and never allowed the reunion of the churches to be the basis of his solicitations. In 1399, Boniface IX wrote a long burning letter to the Bishop of Chalcedon, his nuncio in Hungary, ordering him to preach and cause to be preached a crusade against the Osmanlis for the relief of Constantinople.[601] In 1400, he had ordered a crusade, with increase of indulgences.[602] But, when the Byzantine Emperor came to Italy, Boniface seemed to be more interested in the Kingdom of Naples than in the Kingdom of God.
From contemporary records, the reception of Manuel Palaeologos in France and in England was all that the proudest and most important sovereign of Christendom could wish for. This shadow of an emperor, who ten years before had been a retainer at the court of Bayezid too insignificant to be bidden to the emir’s table, and who was not even undisputed ruler of a single city, was treated by Charles VI and Henry IV as if he actually held the dominions entrusted by Constantine to his successors. This was especially true in England, where barons and peasants, in spite of the crusades, were still uncouth and ignorant. To them the East stood for a superior civilization, to which they must bow. There was a glamour in the name of Constantinople and in Manuel’s imperial title. Perhaps, even if they had realized the straits to which Manuel was reduced, it would have been the same; for it was not to the intrinsic worth or power of the man, but to the ten centuries of glory which he represented, that they did homage. The cry of AVE IMPERATOR had outlived the empire.
Manuel did not appreciate this. Because his optimism could not grasp the difference between what costs and what does not cost, he allowed himself to be cradled with false hopes for two years.
Henry IV had personally great sympathy with the mission of Manuel; for in Africa he had borne arms against the Moslems with the cross upon his breast, and, until he succeeded Richard II, it had always been his dream to lead a crusade. He understood the peril of Constantinople, and in a letter from Westminster, in January, 1401, he called the attention of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the necessity of helping Manuel, in order that Constantinople might not be lost, and authorized a collection in all the churches of his realm.[603] But Henry was not secure upon his throne. In France, the Dukes of Burgundy and Orleans were still struggling for the power that the insane king was unable to wield.
Manuel waited two years in western Europe. While he was making his heart sick with deferred hope, the great events that were to change the personal fortune of Bayezid, if not that of his family and his race, were shaping themselves in the East. It was a Moslem prince who was to afford a respite to Constantinople.
After Manuel left for the west, only the small force of chevaliers under Châteaumorand, who had remained behind from the crusaders of Boucicaut, saved Constantinople. The inhabitants of the city were so hungry that they slipped over the walls by cords, and surrendered themselves to the Osmanlis. John did nothing. There was no money in the imperial treasury. The crusaders got their own provisions by raids on the Asiatic shore of the Bosphorus, and by intercepting galleys. After the shock of the fall of Sivas, Bayezid realized that he must expend the best of his force and energy in solidifying his conquests in Europe and Asia, and in raising a larger army to combat Timur, if he threatened again to invade Anatolia.
Although the siege was not pushed with vigour, the city was on the point of yielding. The miserable John made a treaty to give up the city, should Bayezid beat Timur.[604] Even the patriarch Matthew was supposed to have an understanding with Bayezid to retain his position if the city were taken. In a proclamation, which vividly depicted the misery of the city, afflicted by six years of siege and famine, Matthew urged the inhabitants to repent of their crimes, and defended himself from the charge of having treated with Bayezid.[605]
Not only against Constantinople was Bayezid preparing the final blow. In the Morea, the Greeks feared for the safety of Modon, where Manuel had left his family.[606] Since 1399, the Venetian Senate had been alarmed by the gradual Ottoman conquest of Albania, and finally for the safety of Corfu, because the Osmanlis had appeared in force in the Adriatic.[607]
In the early spring of 1402, Ottoman activities ceased in the Balkan peninsula, and every soldier that could be mustered—Christian as well as Moslem—was hurried into Asia Minor; for a greater than Djenghiz Khan was marching westward.