10. Another Slavic version is conveniently spoken of as the ‘Memoirs of the Polish Janissary.’ Its author, after serving with the Turks and, according to his own statement, being present at the siege, withdrew to Poland. The original MS. was first published in 1828.
The Turkish authors available who speak of the siege are:
11. Sad-ud-din, ‘The Capture of Constantinople from the Tajut-Tevarikh (1590),’ translated into English by E. J. W. Gibb (Glasgow, 1879). This work professes to be based on the accounts of earlier Turkish historians.
12. ‘Tarich Muntechebati Evliya Chelibi,’ a translation of which is given in the elder Mordtmann’s ‘Eroberung.’
13. Ahmed Muktar Pasha’s ‘Conquest of Constantinople and the Establishment of the Ottomans in Europe,’ brought out only in 1902, on the anniversary of the present sultan’s accession.
14. An Armenian ‘Mélodie Élégiaque,’ written by a monk named Philip, who was present at the siege. This was printed in Lebeau’s ‘Histoire du Bas-Empire.’ Dethier published the original version in Armenian.
I gratefully acknowledge my indebtedness to Dr. Mordtmann’s studies of the archæology and topography of Constantinople,[9] and to Professor A. van Millingen’s ‘Byzantine Constantinople’[10] a work which is the most careful study of the history of those parts of the walls and other portions of the city treated of which has yet been published. I must also tender him sincere thanks for many suggestions made in the course of friendly intercourse and in the discussion of matters of mutual archæological interest, and for permission to reproduce his map of Constantinople. All future writers on the topography and archaeology of Constantinople will be under obligations to Dr. Mordtmann and Professor van Millingen, who have worthily continued the work of Gyllius and Du Cange.
A few words must be added as to the title of this book. Why, it may be asked, should it be the ‘Destruction of the Greek Empire’? Why not follow the example of the late Mr. Freeman, and of his distinguished successor, Professor J. B. Bury, and speak of the ‘Later Roman Empire’? My plea is one of confession and avoidance.
I admit that when Charles the Great, in 800, became Roman Emperor in the West the imperial territory of which the capital was Constantinople may correctly be spoken of as the Eastern Roman Empire. But I avoid condemnation for not adopting this name and for not calling the empire Roman by pleading that I am reverting to the practice of our fathers in the West during many centuries, and by defending their practice. The Empire has sometimes been described as Byzantine and sometimes as the Lower Empire. But these names are undesirable, because the first has a vague and doubtful meaning, since no two writers who employ it use it to cover the same period; and the second has a derogatory signification which the researches of Freeman and Professor Bury, Krumbacher, Schlumberger, and other modern writers, have shown to be undeserved. The name ‘Roman’ has more to recommend it. The Persians and the Arabs knew the empire simply as Roman, and the overwhelming reputation of Rome led them to speak even of Alexander the Great as ‘Iskender al Roumy.’ The name of Rome, or Roum, given to Roumelia, and found in other places as far east as Erzeroum, had been applied when the Latin element dominated the empire. The tradition of Rome passed on to the Turks, and the inhabitants of the empire were and are to them I-roum or Romans. The Byzantine writers usually called themselves Romans. But the term Roman can hardly be applied to the empire without distinguishing it as Eastern, and while it is true that down to 1453 the empire was Roman in name, there is some danger in employing the term of forgetting how far the New Rome and its territory had become Hellenised, and that a large portion of the population preferred the name Greek. There had been a long struggle within the empire itself between those who wished to adopt the latter designation and those who desired to call it Roman. The inhabitants of Greece were indeed for centuries preceding and during the Crusades disloyal subjects of Constantinople. Even during the reign of Heraclius (610 to 641), they insisted upon being called Hellenes rather than Romans. From that time onwards a contest was continued as to whether the name of Greek or Roman should be applied to the population. The influence of the Greeks henceforth was constantly working to Hellenise the empire. In the reign of Irene, at the time when the Western Roman Empire commenced to have a separate existence, Greek influence was especially strong. Lascaris, four centuries later, when he made his stand at Nicaea after the Latin conquest, spoke of the empire as that of Hellas. On the recovery of the city under Michael, the Church generally employed the term Roman, but declared that Greek and Roman might be employed indifferently. Various writers speak of the Latins as Romans and of the Byzantines as Hellenes.[11] Manuel Bryennius represents the preacher in St. Sophia as calling upon his hearers to remember their Greek ancestors and to defend their country as they had done. At times the people were appealed to as the descendants alike of Greeks and Romans.
As being a continuation of the Roman Empire whose capital was New Rome, the empire is correctly called Roman, and the name has the advantage of always keeping in view the continuity of Roman history. It was the Eastern Roman Empire which declined and fell in 1453. But if we admit that the empire continued to be Roman till 1453, it must be remembered, not only that its characteristics had considerably changed, but that to the men of the West it had come to be known as the Greek Empire. Latin had been as completely forgotten as Norman French was by English nobles in the time of Edward III. Greek had become the official language, as did English in our own country. The inscriptions on the coins since the time of Heraclius are in Greek. The Orthodox Church, which aided as much as even law in binding the inhabitants of the country together, employed Greek, and Greek almost exclusively, as its language, and, although the great defenders of the term Roman as applied to the population are found among its dignitaries, the Church was essentially Greek as opposed to Roman, both in the character of its thought and teaching and in the language it employed. Hence it is not surprising that to the West during all the middle ages, the Empire was the Greek Empire, just as the Orthodox Church was the Greek Church.[12] The Empire and the Church were each alike called Greek to distinguish them from the Empire and Church of the West. It is in this general use of the word Greek that I find my justification for speaking of the capture of Constantinople, and the events connected with it, as the Destruction of the Greek Empire.[13]