Sigismund understood, and accepted the challenge. In 1392, he invaded Bulgaria, won an initial battle from the Osmanlis, who would have been annihilated had it not been for their new allies, the Wallachians, and, after a long siege, took Nicopolis on the Danube.[462] By this time Bayezid was able to send a large army into Bulgaria. When Sigismund realized how numerous were the forces coming against him, he saw that his victory bade fair to be nothing more than the acquisition of a prison. Before the Osmanlis could surround him, he wisely abandoned Nicopolis. The retreat became a rout.[463] It was on the return from this expedition that Sigismund met Elisabeth Morsinay, in the county of Hunyadi. From their union was born the great champion, who, while his imperial father was engrossed in theological disputes and the complex interests of the empire, battled bravely against Mohammed I and Murad II.
The expedition of 1392 demonstrated to Sigismund that Bayezid was a foe worthy of a European ruler, that he must be checked if Hungary were to be saved, and that the Hungarians could not again take the offensive against the Osmanlis without aid from western Europe. For the pretensions of Louis to the overlordship of the Balkan States, and the heartless propaganda of the Catholic faith, thinly disguising Louis’s inordinate ambitions, had turned the Balkan peoples against Hungary and ‘crusaders’ from the west. They chose rather to stand on the side of their Moslem enslavers.
Sigismund’s invasion of Bulgaria determined Bayezid to put an end to the arrangement concluded just before Kossova between Murad and Sisman. Bulgaria, like Thrace and Macedonia, was to be an integral part of the empire, and to become converted to Islam and ottomanized, in so far as that was possible. For Sisman, who had re-established himself in his old capital, was too uncertain an ally to be trusted in the event of another Hungarian invasion. In the spring of 1393, an army under Soleiman Tchelebi, Bayezid’s oldest son, to whom this was the first command, surrounded Tirnovo. The bulk of Soleiman’s army was composed of Macedonian Christians and renegades of the first generation. In midsummer,[464] after a three months’ siege, Tirnovo was taken by storm from the side of the old castle, which is still, in part, standing.[465] The inhabitants who escaped fire and sword were carried into captivity in Anatolia. Among them was the patriarch Euthymius.[466]
This was the end of the independence of Bulgaria and of the national church. The loss of the church was a more serious blow than the loss of independence. For the Bulgarian nationality suffered an eclipse of centuries. Under the laws of Mohammed the Conqueror for the ‘self-government’ of the Christian elements of the empire, the Bulgarians were included in the Greek millet (nation). Enemy to every influence, every movement that tended to lessen its temporal power, the Greek patriarchate of Phanar never wearied in its endeavours, and never withheld its approval of the foulest means, to stamp out the Bulgarian national spirit. One cannot visit the old monastery of Rilo without realizing that the Bulgarian sufferings have been more acute from Christian priests than from Moslem governors. One cannot follow the trail of unending persecution in the mute witness of unchurched communities from Monastir to the Black Sea through Macedonia and Eastern Rumelia, and to the Danube, through Bulgarian Serbia and trans-Rhodopian Moesia, without sympathizing with the Bulgarian aspirations of 1913, and without comprehending the wild rage and hatred that drove an ordinarily clear-headed and impassive people into the second Balkan war.[467]
When Tirnovo fell, Sisman was not found in his palace. His fate was a mystery even when Schiltberger went through Bulgaria with the crusaders three years later. Schiltberger believed that he died in captivity.[468] His son, Alexander, became a Moslem to save his life, and was given the governorship of Samsun.[469] He was killed fighting under the Ottoman flag, in 1420, in the rebellion of Dédé-Sultan. The royal family of Bulgaria had no other heirs.
Silistria, Nicopolis, Widin, and the other Danube fortresses were strongly garrisoned and fortified.[470] By conversion and immigration the Moslem population was cultivated, and grew rapidly on this northern frontier of the empire.
V
The battle of Kossova did not immediately affect Constantinople. Bayezid was intent upon arranging the new status quo in Serbia. After he had assured himself that Sigismund was not ready to attack him, he passed over into Asia Minor. There he devoted all his energies to the destruction of the Turkish emirates.
The old family feud of the Palaeologi continued.[471] In April 1390, John, the son of Andronicus, entered Constantinople, and set himself up as emperor in opposition to his grandfather and uncle. But upon Manuel’s return from Asia in September, he was compelled to flee.[472] The obligations of Manuel as Ottoman vassal were stronger than the exigencies of his precarious position at Constantinople. Although his father was in an enfeebled condition and the danger of a return of his nephew was very real, Manuel left again in November to follow Bayezid in the war against Karamania.
We have a striking record from Manuel’s own pen of his humiliation. Proper food was too dear for the purse of the heir of Constantine the Great. He was on the verge of starvation. In sharp contrast to his own wretchedness, he describes the barbaric splendour of the court of Bayezid, and the feasting in which he was too insignificant to have a share. The Osmanlis treated him with studied insolence and contempt.[473]