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

by Edwin Pears

John had no liking for religious controversies within his own Church, and although Cantacuzenus in his retirement wished that the most important of them should be continued John forbade it. There was a curious theological controversy, related by the writers of the time, which is of value as showing that in the midst of the most grave political difficulties the Byzantine people had not yet lost their interest in religious questions. Barlaam, a Calabrian abbot of the Greek Church—who, as we have seen, had been sent to Rome to negotiate for Union and aid because, among other reasons, he was well acquainted with Latin, ‘better indeed than with Greek’[76]—charged certain monks at Mount Athos and their followers, known as Bogomils, with heresy, called them Omphalopsychae, Messalians, men who believed that by looking long at their navel they could see God with mortal eyes,[77] or at least with the uncreated light of Mount Tabor. Barlaam’s great opponent was Palamas, archbishop of Salonica. The party headed by Palamas was favoured by Cantacuzenus, whose mother, indeed, was a Bogomil. The controversy waxed fierce and bitter, but Barlaam was unable to obtain the condemnation he desired. It raged for fifteen years until forcibly put an end to by John on the withdrawal of his colleague.[78]

By far the most important difficulty which John had to face was the constantly increasing encroachments by the Turks. Their influence at the beginning of his sole occupancy of the throne is shown by the consent he was forced to give to the engagement of his infant daughter to the son of Orchan, the great Turkish leader and successor of Othman. Their influence at a later period, in 1374, is shown by his having been forced into an alliance with Murad and, towards the end of his reign, by his having to destroy a part of the walls of the capital at Murad’s bidding.

At no period of his life did the emperor show that he possessed ability above the average. Neither he nor any of his ministers rose above mediocrity. He nevertheless recognised the danger to his empire from the advance of the Mahometans, the powerlessness of his own unaided subjects to resist that advance, and the expediency of obtaining help from the West. In dealing with some of the questions which disturbed his subjects he possessed a certain aloofness which made him examine them as a statesman. It is probably true, as Gibbon suggests,[79] that in his appeals to Rome he was greatly influenced by his mother, Anne of Savoy. She had been brought up as a member of the Latin Church and, though compelled on her marriage to change her name and her religion, she yet remained attached to the Church and country of her childhood. Her struggles during the minority of her son had not tended to make her look with favour on the Orthodox, and her influence upon her son’s mind was probably sufficient to make him regard with as much favour the Church to which his mother had belonged as that of which he was now the temporal head. He had come to regard the differences between the two Churches as matters rather for ecclesiastics than for statesmen. He personally was ready to accept the Union of the Churches and even papal supremacy in religious matters, provided that in return he could obtain aid from the West against the enemies of the empire. But, whatever were his own sentiments towards the Church of Rome, his conduct during the long period of thirty-five years showed that he felt the need of external aid if the empire were to be saved. His reign is one long series of efforts to obtain it. He was ready to humiliate himself, to use all his powers of persuasion for Union, provided that the pontiffs would induce Western rulers to fight the Turks.

Renewed efforts by popes against Moslems.

Hope was probably stimulated in the empire by the fact that the pope and the West generally seemed at last to recognise that, in their own interest, measures should be taken to defend the empire. Moreover, the danger was now so pressing, not only to the Greeks but to Europe, that it appeared possible to obtain aid without submitting to the humiliating conditions hitherto imposed. While John knew that to persuade the Orthodox Church to acknowledge any of its doctrines as heretical, and especially to induce the ecclesiastics to accept the supremacy of the pope, was almost impossible, he professed himself ready to make his own submission. The Union of the Churches could be accomplished at a later day. There appeared reason to hope that the pope regarded the danger from the Moslems mainly from the statesman’s point of view and desired mutual action. John was so far justified in this hope that it may be confidently asserted that had the counsels of more than one of the popes during his reign been followed there would have been a concerted action against the common enemy sufficient to have delayed the Turkish progress, and possibly to have altogether arrested it. We shall see, however, that, although all the states of Western Europe still acknowledged the supremacy of the pope, their interests and jealousies were as diverse as they have been in modern times, and that the pontiff was able neither to induce nor to compel the nations acknowledging his supremacy to act in concert.

Knowing from his own visit to Italy and from the negotiations carried on by Cantacuzenus that Rome was predisposed to aid, John, immediately he became sole ruler, sent an embassy to the pope. His delegates were authorised to make the emperor’s submission to the papal authority in exchange for the undertaking by the pope to furnish galleys against the Turks.

In the following year, 1356, John sent a golden bull to the pope at Avignon containing the terms of his submission.[80] The pope thereupon expressed his satisfaction by a reply to the emperor, and while communicating the good news to the knights of Rhodes, the king of Cyprus, and the doge of Venice, invited them to make preparations to aid the Christian cause. So far, however, as the empire was concerned, the series of efforts made at the pope’s instigation were without any satisfactory result. Ill planned, inadequately supported, unenergetically pursued, they were all almost useless. Six years afterwards—namely, in 1362—John was invited to join the kings of France and Denmark and Guy de Lusignan of Cyprus in a Crusade against the Saracens, an expedition of quite secondary importance to the empire. To the men of the West, Turks and Saracens were all the same. The Greeks knew better. Two years passed and a new pope, Urban the Fifth, was still organising a plan against the Saracens. In reply to the pontiff’s invitation John promised all the aid possible to the new Crusade, though pointing out that the benefit to the empire would be slight. But the sovereigns of the West had had enough of Crusades and would not respond to the call from Avignon. The companies of military monks who were in France equally refused to take part in the proposed undertaking, and the efforts of the pope only succeeded in inducing a few English adventurers to join with Peter of Lusignan in a fruitless attack upon Egypt.

At length, in 1366, a more hopeful Crusade, or at least one more likely to result in advantage to the empire, was proclaimed. At the bidding of the pope, Louis, king of Hungary, and Amadeo of Savoy proposed to attack the Turks and to aid the emperor. Once more the condition was attached that John should complete the Union of the Churches. But, once again, the crusading army was weakened by the division of forces judged necessary for an attempt at the same time upon the Saracens. Nor would other states join. In vain the pope threatened the Genoese, Venetians, and Spaniards with all the terrors of an interdict if they gave aid to the enemy. They continued to trade with the Saracens as before. In vain he exhorted the sovereigns of Western Europe to go to the aid of Cyprus and Rhodes, and promised them indulgences if they would take part in this war of the Cross. They turned deaf ears to his summons.

In 1367 Urban had entered Rome, and one of his first acts on taking possession of the chair of St. Peter was to exhort the Genoese and Venetians to facilitate the voyage of John to the imperial city. The emperor was willing enough to go to Rome, provided that there was a reasonable chance of obtaining substantial aid. He had made submission once and was ready to do all that he could to complete the Union the pope so greatly desired, but he knew much better than the pope how difficult it would be to induce his people to accomplish the proposed task. His needs, however, were great, and the summons of the pope was urgent. Accordingly, in 1369, he ventured on the dangerous step of leaving Constantinople. He was received with every honour in the elder Rome, and made a profession of faith which satisfied the four cardinals who had been deputed to receive it. An encyclical notified the great news to all Christian princes. The pope allowed John to negotiate with English mercenaries then in Italy for service, granted him religious privileges, loaded him with presents, and requested the rulers of the states through which he had to pass on his homeward journey to receive him with the respect due to his rank. Urban at the same time addressed a letter to the Greek clergy urging them to accept the Union.