The Walls of Constantinople

by B. Granville Baker

that in this valley wrested the ancient bulwark of Europe from the weak hands of the last Byzantine Emperor—the Turks. To do this we must go back into the records of the sixth century and notice the state of Asia and its relation to Europe at that time.

In the sixth century there appeared out of the East a race destined to overthrow Byzantine civilization and Persian splendour, a power destined to stretch its conquering arms from the Euphrates to the Pyrenees, and from the Red to the Black Sea. The nomad races of Arabia had never played an important part in the history of the world. They lived a patriarchal existence in their rocky fastnesses or desolate plains. Their system did not encourage national unity, concentration of strength on consolidation of resources. They had never engaged in agriculture nor practised any handicraft; their sole employments were the chase and the care of sheep and goats. It seemed that these dwellers in tents would never know anything better than the nomadic life. But a great force arose which united the groups of tribes into a nation—Mahomed the prophet—and having conquered and converted to his faith the whole Arabian peninsula, made ready with the forces under his control to spread his creed into all lands.

Mahomed’s general, Khaled, called the “Sword of God,” in a very short time after the prophet’s death subdued the Persian army and gained its empire for his master, the Caliph Abu Bekr, Mahomed’s successor as Commander of the Faithful. In the same reign Syria was conquered from Heraclius, Ecbatana and Damascus became Mahomedan towns like Mecca and Medina. Amron the general of Omar, the third Caliph, added Egypt to the new Empire, and in less than eighty years the Arabs had conquered every foe they encountered. But their power fell as quickly as it had risen. The Empire was divided into independent Caliphates, Spain, Egypt and Africa, but with the fate of these the traveller is well acquainted. Damascus became the capital of Calipha, and legend and history make much mention of the men who ruled there: Haroun-al-Rashid, the contemporary of Charlemagne, Al-Mamoon and others of his line. But the days of the Arab Empire were numbered, another race appeared in Asia Minor, coming from their hunting-grounds in Tartary—the Turks.

The origin of this newly-arrived people is obscure—they are said to claim descent from Japhet, and no doubt he will serve the purpose as well as any other of the sons of Noah. An English historian of the seventeenth century (Knolles) took sufficient interest in the Turks to write their history, and he begins with these remarks: “The glorious empire of the Turks, the present terrour of the world, hath amongst other things nothing in it more wonderful or strange than the poor beginning of itselfe, so small and obscure as that it is not well knowne unto themselves, or agreed upon even among the best writers of their histories; from whence this barbarous nation that now so triumpheth over the best part of the world, first crept out or took their beginning. Some (after the manner of most nations) derive them from the Trojans, led thereunto by the affinity of the word Turci and Teucri; supposing (but with what probability I know not) the word Turci, or Turks, to have been made of the corruption of the word Teucri, the common name of the Trojans.”

The “Ten Tribes” have also been called upon to act as ancestry to the Turkish nation, but have not as yet responded to the call. It is to be presumed that the Turks are a mixed race, at least a study of the various and very different types you see leads to that conclusion. At any rate the Turks were there, there’s no denying it, and made their power felt. From Tartary, where in the fifth century Bertezena established a short-lived Turkish Empire, this race spread in successive waves over the whole of Asia. One wave overran China, which remained for two hundred years under the Tartar sway. Another wave achieved the conquest of Bokhara and Samarkand, and gradually drew nearer to the western part of Asia, where they first heard of the splendours of the Empire of Constantinople. In the sixth century they sent an ambassador to Justinian, entered into alliance with him, and engaged to rout the Abari and protect the frontiers of the Empire from their inroads. They also defended it against the Persians, and defeated them on the Oxus.

By degrees they became formidable to the Eastern Empire, but their progress was checked by the Arabs, who in the eighth century overran their country and compelled them to embrace the Mahomedan faith. Soon the young race recovered its strength, and came to the assistance of the Caliph Motassem, whose nation was then on the down grade, and no longer supplied the men whose victorious arms had carried the Crescent triumphant to so many countries. Fifty thousand Turkish mercenaries were taken into the service of the Caliph, and, like the Prætorian Cohort of Rome, the Janissaries of Constantinople and the Mamelukes of Egypt, they in time assumed decisive voice in the Government.

A Turkish dynasty, that of the Samanians, ruled over most of the territories formerly possessed by the Arab Caliphs. Of this, Mahmud was the most famous; in the twelfth century he conquered Delhi, Multan and Lahore, and his victorious career was only checked by the waters of the Ganges; he was the first to bear the title of Sultan.

Another Turkish dynasty, the house of Seljuk, sprang up and dispossessed both Sultan and Caliph of the territories they had obtained. The dominions thus acquired were increased until the greater part of Asia Minor had gone to form the Turkish Empire. The city of Nice was captured to become the Turkish capital, and the Eastern Emperor Alexander Comnenus was forced to acknowledge Suleiman as master of Asia Minor.

But reverses were in store for the young Empire of the Turks; the Eastern Emperor gathered together an immense army of Macedonians, Bulgarians and Moldavians. He solicited the aid of the Crusaders, and bands of French and Norman knights, headed by Ursel Baliol, whom Gibbon calls “the kinsman,” or “father of the Scottish Kings.” The Turks were everywhere defeated. Nice and the western portions of Asia Minor were regained, and Iconium became the Turkish capital. Yet more trouble came to the house of Seljuk, and this time from the East, where Jenghiz Jehan with his fierce Mongols was abroad, under whose attacks the dynasty of Seljuk fell.