The late Professor Kölbing (Siege of Corinth, 1893, p. xxvii.), in commenting on the sources of the poem, suggests, under reserve, that Byron may have derived the incident of Minetto's self-immolation from an historic source—the siege of Zsigetvar, in 1566, when a multitude of Turks perished from the explosion of a powder magazine which had been fired at the cost of his own life by the Hungarian commander Zrini.
It is, at least, equally probable that local patriotism was, in the first instance, responsible for the poetic colouring, and that Byron supplemented the meagre and uninteresting historic details which were at his disposal by "intimate knowledge" of the Corinthian version of the siege. (See Memoirs of the Life and Writings of the Right Hon. Lord Byron, London, 1822, p. 222; and Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Lord Byron, by George Clinton, London, 1825, p. 284.)
It has been generally held that the Siege of Corinth was written in the second half of 1815 (Kölbing's Siege of Corinth, p. vii.). "It appears," says John Wright (Works, 1832, x. 100), "by the original MS., to have been begun in July, 1815;" and Moore (Life, p. 307), who probably relied on the same authority, speaks of "both the Siege of Corinth and Parisina having been produced but a short time before the Separation" (i.e. spring, 1816). Some words which Medwin (Conversations, 1824, p. 55) puts into Byron's mouth point to the same conclusion. Byron's own testimony, which is completely borne out by the MS. itself (dated Jy [i.e. January, not July] 31, 1815), is in direct conflict with these statements. In a note to stanza xix. lines 521-532 (vide post, pp. [471]-473) he affirms that it "was not till after these lines were written" that he heard "that wild and singularly original and beautiful poem [Christabel] recited;" and in a letter to S. T. Coleridge, dated October 27, 1815 (Letters, 1899, iii. 228), he is careful to explain that "the enclosed extract from an unpublished poem (i.e. stanza xix. lines 521-532) ... was written before (not seeing your Christabelle [sic], for that you know I never did till this day), but before I heard Mr. S[cott] repeat it, which he did in June last, and this thing was begun in January, and more than half written before the Summer." The question of plagiarism will be discussed in an addendum to Byron's note on the lines in question; but, subject to the correction that it was, probably, at the end of May (see Lockhart's Memoir of the Life of Sir W. Scott, 1871, pp. 311-313), not in June, that Scott recited Christabel for Byron's benefit, the date of the composition of the poem must be determined by the evidence of the author himself.
The copy of the MS. of the Siege of Corinth was sent to Murray at the beginning (probably on the 2nd, the date of the copy) of November, and was placed in Gifford's hands about the same time (see letter to Murray, November 4, 1815, Letters, 1899, iii. 245; and Murray's undated letter on Gifford's "great delight" in the poem, and his "three critical remarks," Memoir of John Murray, 1891, i. 356). As with Lara, Byron began by insisting that the Siege should not be published separately, but slipped into a fourth volume of the collected works, and once again (possibly when he had at last made up his mind to accept a thousand guineas for his own requirements, and not for other beneficiaries—Godwin, Coleridge, or Maturin) yielded to his publisher's wishes and representations. At any rate, the Siege of Corinth and Parisina, which, says Moore, "during the month of January and part of February were in the hands of the printers" (Life, p. 300), were published in a single volume on February 7, 1816. The greater reviews were silent, but notices appeared in numerous periodicals; e.g. the Monthly Review, February, 1816, vol. lxxix. p. 196; the Eclectic Review, March, 1816, N.S. vol. v. p. 269; the European, May, 1816, vol. lxxix. p. 427; the Literary Panorama, June, 1816, N.S. vol. iv. p. 418; etc. Many of these reviews took occasion to pick out and hold up to ridicule the illogical sentences, the grammatical solecisms, and general imperfections of technique which marked and disfigured the Siege of Corinth. A passage in a letter which John Murray wrote to his brother-publisher, William Blackwood (Annals of a Publishing House, 1897, i. 53), refers to these cavillings, and suggests both an apology and a retaliation—
"Many who by 'numbers judge a poet's song' are so stupid as not to see the powerful effect of the poems, which is the great object of poetry, because they can pick out fifty careless or even bad lines. The words may be carelessly put together; but this is secondary. Many can write polished lines who will never reach the name of poet. You see it is all poetically conceived in Lord B.'s mind."
In such wise did Murray bear testimony to Byron's "splendid and imperishable excellence, which covers all his offences and outweighs all his defects—the excellence of sincerity and strength."
TO
JOHN HOBHOUSE, ESQ.,
THIS POEM IS INSCRIBED,
BY HIS
FRIEND.
January 22nd, 1816.