[379] Silvestre de Sacy, in Mém. de l’Acad. des Inscript., vii. 327-34. But the commandant could hardly have been carried by his falconer in such a fashion as far as Philippopolis. The Ottoman historians probably forgot that Ishtiman, at the mouth of the pass, on the road to Philippopolis from Sofia, contained an Ottoman garrison.
[380] According to the anonymous Ein gantz neu Reysebuch von Prag auss biss gen Constantinopel, Nürnberg, 1622, p. 33, Sofia was captured in 1362. Hadji Khalfa, Rumeli, p. 51, with whom Schéfer, ed. Bertrandon de la Broquière, p. 202 n., seems to agree by citing, says Sofia capitulated in 780 (1378). Seadeddin, i. 125, is followed by Hammer, i. 250, Klaić, p. 237, and others in fixing the date as 1382. But these same authorities give 1375 and 1376 for Nish, which is altogether impossible. Phr., I. 26, p. 80, seems to place the capture of Sofia for 1385. This is the most reasonable date. It is consistent both with the topography of the places in question and with Murad’s methods of campaigning, as exemplified by all his conquests, to place the taking of Sofia close to the end of his reign, and within a year or two before the capture of Nish. To corroborate this date, letters in the collection of Feridun can be cited. Indje Balaban’s letter to Murad, announcing the acquisition of Sofia, is not dated. But immediately after it is the response of Murad, in which he gives to Indje Balaban for life the government of the new province, and states that he is sending him a fine horse and robes of honour because of his success. This letter is dated from Adrianople in the middle of the month of Redjeb, 788, which corresponds to 1386 in our era. These letters are in MS. Bibl. Nat., Paris, fonds turc, No. 79, pp. 31-2.
[381] Nish, from its geographical position, could not have fallen in 1375, as Chalcocondylas says. Hammer, i. 241, and Zinkeisen, i. 230, show an amazing nonchalance in transporting the Osmanlis from Kavalla, Drama, and Serres in the course of this one year, 1375. Engel, Geschichte von Serbien, p. 341, who, according to Hammer, ‘deceives himself by thirteen years in placing the capture of Nish in 1388’, is eleven years nearer the truth than Hammer! Strumnitza, from a diploma delivered in the name of the Serbian empress Eudoxia (Müller, Acta Serbica, CXXXI), was independent in 1379. Sofia did not fall before 1382. How, then, could Nish have been an Ottoman fortress from 1375?
[382] Von Kállay, i. 166.
[383] For distances between cities in the Balkan peninsula, see Jireček’s important and interesting work, Die Heerstrasse von Belgrad nach Konstantinopel und die Balkanpässe, p. 122. Jireček, for time of transit, depends upon Hadji Khalfa.
[384] Text in Sauli, ii. 260-8.
[385] armiratus or amiratus, then amiralus, of which we have made admiral, originally had nothing whatever to do with the sea. It is a corruption of emir.
[386] ‘Magnificus et potens dominus, dominus Moratibei, magnus armiratus et dominus armiratorum Turchie’: the whole text is reproduced from the Genoese archives by Belgrano, in Atti della Società Ligure di Storia, xiii. 146-9, and by Silvestre de Sacy, in Notices et Extraits, xi. 58-61. Cf. Canale, ii. 59.
[387] ‘Contra illum Turcum filium iniquitatis et nequiciae, ac Sancte Crucis inimicum, Moratum bey et eius sectam, cristianum genus sic graviter invadere conantes.’ The text of this treaty is also in Belgrano, ibid., xiii. 953-65.
[388] Text in Romanin, iii. 386-9. There was an earlier law of similar nature enacted in 1334.