obtained even more ample privileges; finally, in the year 1123, they had made themselves masters of one-third of the city of Tyre, while leaving the other two-thirds in the possession of the king. They immediately established there an ambassador to represent the Republic, with the title of Bailo, and a consul to protect their financial interests.
1123. Fall of Tyre, Aliense; same ceiling.
The taking of Tyre was largely due to the personal courage and firmness of the Doge Domenico Michiel. Under apparently hopeless conditions, and when his troops were thoroughly discouraged, without money to pay their wages or supplies to feed them, he succeeded in maintaining his influence over them, and ultimately led them to victory. One of the most extraordinary devices to which he had recourse in the absence of coin was the creation of a leather currency. He actually had vast quantities of leather cut into tokens and stamped with a sign that promised redemption if they were presented to the treasury in Venice when the expedition reached home; and these tokens circulated as notes do nowadays, and were ultimately redeemed in gold. It is to this circumstance that the arms of the Michiel family make allusion, displaying one-and-twenty pieces of money upon alternate bends, azure and argent.
The influence which the Venetians acquired in Constantinople during the first half of the twelfth century showed itself in the construction of churches and convents in the city itself, and in the establishment of great commercial storehouses and markets, where they used their own Venetian weights, measures, and money, as if they were in Venice itself. Their wares paid no duty
Rom. ii. 61.
on entering the Greek Empire; they required the Greeks to speak of the Doge under the title of Protospartos, or august prince, and the patriarch of Venice was designated as ‘Hypertimos,’ and derived considerable fees from the Eastern capital, while the basilica of Saint Mark enjoyed a tribute from the Byzantine Empire. In fact, during a certain length of time, the importance of the Republic was almost as great in Constantinople as in Venice itself, and
Rom. ii. 49, 61.
was a source of considerable anxiety to the emperors. They did their best to oppose the growing power of the Venetians, but the assistance of the latter was absolutely necessary to them in order
1148. Defeat of Roger, Marco Vecellio; same ceiling.
to repulse the attacks of the Normans of Sicily, who even succeeded in penetrating into the suburbs of Constantinople; and for some time the Greeks were obliged to bear with the official pretensions of the Republic, as well as with the insults and humiliations suffered by the Greek soldiers at the hands of their foreign allies.