The Destruction of the Greek Empire and the Story of the Capture of Constantinople by the Turks

by Edwin Pears

In the twenty years that followed, a body of Spanish mercenaries played a prominent part in the Sicilian troubles. Spain had been engaged for three hundred years in a long and almost continuous struggle against the Moors. Fathers had dedicated their sons in successive generations to the defence of Christianity and their country, and the result was already to have formed a nation of brave and disciplined soldiers, such as Western Europe had not seen since the best days of the Roman empire. Peter of Aragon had supplied a band of such soldiers to fight against France in Sicily and Calabria.

In 1301 the marriage of Catherine of Courtenay, daughter of Philip, and granddaughter of Baldwin the Second, with Charles of Valois, son of Philip the Second of France, and brother of the king, put an end to the troubles in Sicily with the French.

Now that, in 1302, peace was concluded in Sicily, their employers were anxious to be rid of the now useless mercenaries; for, though their courage, their recklessness of danger, and their prowess were indisputable, their lawlessness, their cruelty to the inhabitants of the country where they were encamped, and their insubordination, even to their own officers, were no less remarkable. Moreover, Frederic of Sicily was unable to pay them, and they had already commenced to pay themselves by general plunder. Unaccustomed to work, and used only to a life of rapine, they were ready to take service under any leader who appeared able to offer them good chances of pillage; but woe to the country to which they were sent, and to the cause which they promised to serve!

Among their leaders was a German named Robert Blum, whose name became changed or translated to Roger de Flor. He was a typical instance of the worst kind of soldier of fortune of the middle ages. He entered the order of the Templars, but was degraded because he betrayed the Christians in return for bribes from the Moslems. Then he turned pirate, and sought foreign service. The French refused to have anything to do with him. He had therefore gone over to the enemy, and the king of Sicily made him vice-admiral. He robbed for his master wherever he could find anything to steal. If he met an enemy, he took all he could carry away, without acknowledgment; if a friend, he took what he wanted, and gave acknowledgments of a very doubtful value, which were to be paid by the king of Sicily at the end of the war.

When the Sicilian war was over, the Grand Master of the Temple urged the pope to insist that Roger de Flor should be surrendered for punishment. Roger learned that such a demand was about to be made[33] and anticipated extradition by taking service with the Greek emperor, nominally to fight against the Turks, promising to bring with him a body of Spanish troops. The alarm of Andronicus at the report of the expedition of Charles of Valois against him was great. It looked as if all Western princes were about to enter upon a new crusade for the recapture of Constantinople. Hence he was prepared to welcome aid from any source.

In 1303 Roger de Flor arrived at Constantinople with a fleet of seven ships and eight thousand men, who are described by Pachymer as Catalans and Amogavares, the latter being adventurers from other parts of Spain than Catalonia. This band was soon spoken of as the Catalan Grand Company.

Roger was accompanied by Fernand Ximenes, who was also at the head of a large body of retainers who were desirous of taking service under the emperor. The reputation which Roger de Flor bore as the most daring of soldiers caused him to be eagerly welcomed by the emperor, who conferred upon him the title of Grand Duke and hoped much from his services. His reckless followers knew only one virtue—that of courage. Their first adventure showed, however, the spirit of lawlessness which existed in his army. The emperor had borrowed a large sum of money from the Genoese which Roger alleged that he had employed in raising new troops. When the Genoese applied to Roger for payment it was refused. The emperor sent a high official to arrange the difficulty, and the Catalans cut him in pieces. The Grand Company were at this time encamped outside the city walls in the neighbourhood of the present Eyoub. They seized the monastery of St. Cosmas and held it as a fortress. The Genoese erected barricades on the shore of the Golden Horn, and a struggle took place between the two in which many were killed on both sides.

Shortly afterwards the Spaniards were induced to cross the Marmora to Cyzicus, and a quarrel ensued between them and the Alans, one of the first of many Asiatic tribes who had pushed their way into the valley of the Danube, and a band of whom had been taken into the imperial service. The son of the leader of the Alans was killed, and his soldiers vowed vengeance. Roger de Flor then pushed on to attack the Turks. He was seen at his best when he met the enemy. He raised the siege of Philadelphia and defeated the various armies sent against him, killing, it is said, thirty thousand Turks and driving the rest of them out of Lydia and Caria. But he was almost as terrible to the Christians whom he had been sent to protect as he was to the Moslems. His progress through Asia Minor was marked by constant plunder. Pachymer says that those subjects of the emperor who fell into his hands after they had escaped from the enemy had thrown themselves out of the smoke into the fire. Those who gave up their property had difficulty in saving their lives. The remark is made on the occasion of Roger’s visit to Philadelphia, which he pillaged as if it had been an enemy’s city. He treated Pergamos and Ephesus in the same way. His ships plundered the islands of Chios, Lemnos, and Mytilene. The inhabitants of Magnesia resisted his exactions, and he therefore laid siege to the city and did his utmost to capture it. It was in vain that the emperor sent orders to raise the siege and to attack Turks and not Christians. The Alans who were with him urged obedience and withdrew when Roger refused. It was only after a long siege that he recognised that he was unable to capture the city and abandoned the attempt. In retreating he plundered the Greeks as remorselessly as he did the Turks against whom he had been sent. ‘Notwithstanding,’ says Pachymer, ‘that the emperor had prepared all that was needed for the support of Roger and his army, the peasants were robbed of everything they possessed and were left without either seed-corn or oxen for ploughing. At the news of his coming many abandoned their farms and took refuge in the islands. He appropriated to his own use the tithes and other taxes which should have gone to the emperor.’ Indeed there appears no reason to doubt the assertion that this adventurer had now formed the intention of carving out a kingdom for himself. It is possible indeed, and is in conformity with his conduct, that from the first he had entertained such an intention. From this time until his death he became the enemy of the emperor whom he had come to aid.

When the Greek troops heard of the outrages on their countrymen they asked the emperor to be led against the Catalans instead of against the Turks. But the emperor himself was unwilling to break with Roger and his army, or even that they should be distant from the city so long as he expected the arrival of the great expedition intended for its capture. He still also cherished the hope that the services of the Grand Company might be employed against the Turks in case the expedition from the West did not arrive. While he was hesitating, Berenger of Catalonia arrived with new reinforcements in nine large vessels, and soon he and Roger presented themselves at the imperial court. Roger urged the emperor to subsidise Berenger, and in reply to the question why the latter had come answered, because he had heard of the liberality of the emperor’s payments. In a formal assembly he reproached Roger with the lawlessness of his troops, with the injury he had done to the Greeks, and especially with the burden of expenses he had cast upon the empire. Finally, however, he consented to receive Berenger and to assign to him a portion of the tithes for the maintenance of the Catalan armies.

When, shortly after, a deputation of Catalans was sent to the emperor demanding further pay, he replied by emptying in their presence sacks full of letters complaining of exactions by the Spaniards. In spite of these complaints and of the exactions and lawlessness of the Grand Company, he appears to have been unwilling to lose their services. He recounted the money payments he had made, but promised to give them more than they had asked if only they would at once return to attack the enemy in Asia. The deputation knew the emperor’s anxiety and desire to keep his own troops for the defence of the city against the expedition of Charles, and therefore refused to return without further payment. All argument was useless. Berenger was dissatisfied with the offers made to him personally and sailed away from the Golden Horn during the night for Gallipoli, which city was held by his countrymen. Roger pleaded in vain for more money to be paid at once. It was not there to be given. The tension between the Spaniards and the emperor became so great that the latter sent orders to his son Michael, encamped near Apros, to be ready against an attack by the Catalans.