Essays on the Latin Orient

by William Miller

This first Genoese occupation of Chios lasted only a quarter of a century; but even in that short time, under the firm and able rule of the Zaccaria, it recovered its former prosperity. Benedetto refortified the capital, restored the fallen buildings, heightened the walls, and deepened the ditch—significant proofs of his intention to stay. Entrusting Phocæa to the care of his nephew Tedisio, or Ticino, as his deputy, he devoted his attention to the revival of Chios, which at his death, in 1307, he bequeathed to his son, Paleologo, first-cousin of the reigning Emperor, while he left Phocæa to his half-brother, Nicolino, like himself a naval commander in the Genoese service. This division of the family possessions led to difficulties. Nicolino arrived at Phocæa and demanded a full statement of account from his late brother’s manager, Tedisio; the latter consented, but the uncle and the nephew did not agree about the figures, and Nicolino withdrew, threatening to return with a larger force, to turn Tedisio out of his post, convey him to Genoa, and appoint another governor, Andriolo Cattaneo della Volta, a connexion of the family by marriage, in his place. Nicolino’s son privately warned his cousin of his father’s intentions, and advised him to quit Phocæa while there was still time. At this moment the Catalan Grand Company was at Gallipoli, and there Tedisio presented himself, begging the chronicler Muntaner to enroll him in its ranks. The Catalan, moved by his aristocratic antecedents and personal courage, consented, and soon the fugitive ex-governor, by glowing accounts of the riches of Phocæa, induced his new comrades to aid him in capturing the place from his successor. The Catalans were always ready for plunder, and the alum-city was said to contain “the richest treasures of the world.” Accordingly, a flotilla was equipped, which arrived off Phocæa on the night of Easter 1307. Before daybreak next morning, the assailants had scaled the walls of the castle; then they sacked the city, whose population of more than 3000 Greeks was employed in the alum-manufactory. The booty was immense, and not the least precious portion of it was a piece of the true Cross, encased in gold and studded with priceless jewels. This relic, said to have been brought by St John the Evangelist to Ephesus, captured by the Turks when they took that place, and pawned by them at Phocæa, fell to the lot of Muntaner[467]. This famous “Cross of the Zaccaria” would seem to have been restored to that family, and we may conjecture that it was presented to the cathedral of Genoa, where it now is, by the bastard son of the last Prince of the Morea[468], when, in 1459, he begged the city of his ancestors to recommend him to the generosity of Pius II. Emboldened by this success, Tedisio, with the aid of the Catalans, conquered the island of Thasos from the Greeks and received his friend Muntaner and the Infant Ferdinand of Majorca in its castle with splendid hospitality. Six years later, however, the Byzantine forces recovered this island, whence the Zaccaria preyed upon Venetian merchantmen[469], and it was not for more than a century that a Genoese lord once again held his court in the fortress of Tedisio Zaccaria.

Meanwhile, Paleologo, in Chios, had continued the enlightened policy of his father, and reaped his reward in the renewed productiveness of the mastic-plantations. In 1314, when the ten years’ lease of the island expired, the strong fortifications, which his father had erected, and his near relationship to the Emperor procured him a renewal for five more years on the same terms[470]. He did not, however, long enjoy this further tenure, for in the same year he died, apparently without progeny. As his uncle, Nicolino, the lord of Phocæa and the next heir, was by this time also dead, the latter’s sons, Martino and Benedetto II, succeeded their cousin as joint-rulers of Chios, while Phocæa passed beneath the direct control of Nicolino’s former governor, Andriolo Cattaneo, always, of course, subject to the confirmation of the Emperor.

The two brothers, who had thus succeeded to Chios, possessed all the vigorous qualities of their race. One contemporary writer after another praises their services to Christendom, and describes the terror with which they filled the Turks. The Infidels, we are told, were afraid to approach within twelve miles of Chios, because of the Zaccaria, who always kept a thousand foot-soldiers, a hundred horsemen, and a couple of galleys ready for every emergency. Had it not been for the valour of the Genoese lords of Chios “neither man, nor woman, nor dog, nor cat, nor any live animal could have remained in any of the neighbouring islands.” Not only were the brothers “the shield of defence of the Christians,” but they did all they could to stop the infamous traffic in slaves, carried on by their fellow-countrymen, the Genoese of Alexandria, whose vessels passed Chios on the way from the Black Sea ports. Pope John XXII, who had already allowed Martino to export mastic to Alexandria in return for his services, was therefore urged to give the Zaccaria the maritime police of the Archipelago, so that this branch of the slave-trade might be completely cut off[471]. Sanudo[472], with his accurate knowledge of the Ægean, remarked that the islands could not have resisted the Turks so long, had it not been for the Genoese rulers of Chios, Duke Nicolò I of Naxos, and the Holy House of the Hospital, established since 1309 in Rhodes, and estimated that the Zaccaria could furnish a galley for the recovery of the Holy Land. Martino was specially renowned for his exploits against the Turks. No man, it was said, had ever done braver deeds at sea than this defender of the Christians and implacable foe of the Paynim. In one year alone he captured 18 Turkish pirate ships, and at the end of his reign he had slain or taken more than 10,000 Turks[473]. The increased importance of Chios at this period is evidenced by the coins, which the two brothers minted for their use, sometimes with the diplomatic legend, “servants of the Emperor[474].” Benedetto II was, however, eclipsed by the greater glories of Martino. By marriage the latter became baron of Damala and by purchase[475] lord of Chalandritza in the Peloponnese, and thus laid the foundations of his family’s fortunes in the principality of Achaia. He was thereby brought into close relations with the official hierarchy of the Latin Orient, from which the Zaccaria, as Genoese traders, had hitherto been excluded. Accordingly, in 1325, Philip I of Taranto, who, in virtue of his marriage with Catherine of Valois, was titular Latin Emperor of Constantinople, bestowed upon him the islands of Lesbos, Samos, Kos, and Chios, which Baldwin II had reserved for himself and his successors in the treaty of Viterbo in 1267,—a reservation repeated in 1294—together with those of Ikaria, Tenedos, Œnoussa, and Marmara, and the high-sounding title of “King and Despot of Asia Minor,” in return for his promise to furnish 500 horsemen and six galleys a year whenever the “Emperor” came into his own[476]. The practical benefits of this magnificent diploma were small—for Martino already ruled in Chios, with which Samos and Kos seem to have been united under the sway of the Zaccaria, while the other places mentioned belonged either to the Greeks or the Turks, over whom the phantom Latin Emperor had no power whatever. Indeed, this investiture by the titular ruler of Constantinople must have annoyed its actual sovereign, who had not, however, dared to refuse the renewal of the lease of Chios, when it again expired in 1319.

But Martino had given hostages to fortune by his connexion with the Morea. His son, Bartolommeo, was captured by the Catalans of Athens in one of their campaigns, sent off to the custody of their patron, Frederick II of Sicily, and only released at the request of Pope John XXII in 1318. As the husband of the young Marchioness of Boudonitza, he was mixed up also in the politics of Eubœa and the mainland opposite, while he is mentioned as joining the other members of his family in their attacks upon the Turks.

For a time Martino managed to preserve good relations with the Greek Empire. In 1324, the lease of Chios was again renewed, and in 1327 Venice instructed her officials in the Levant to negotiate a league with him, the Greek Emperor, and the Knights against the common peril[477]. But by this time the dual system of government in the island had broken down: Martino’s great successes had led him to desire the sole management of Chios, and he had accordingly ousted his brother from all share in the government and struck coins for the island with his own name alone, as he did for his barony of Damala[478]. His riches had become such as to arouse the suspicions of the Imperial Government that he would not long be content to admit himself “the servant of the Emperor”; the public dues of the island amounted to 120,000 gold pieces a year, while the Turks paid an annual tribute to its dreaded ruler, in order to escape his attacks. It happened that, in 1328, when the quinquennial lease had only another year to run and the usual negotiations for its renewal should have begun, that Andronikos III, a warlike and energetic prince, mounted the throne of Constantinople, and this conjunction of circumstances seemed to the national party in Chios peculiarly favourable to its reconquest. Accordingly, the leading Greek of the island, Leon Kalothetos, who was an intimate friend of the new sovereign’s Prime Minister, John Cantacuzene, sought an interview with the latter’s mother, whom he interested in his plans. She procured him an audience of the Emperor and of her son, and they both encouraged him with presents and promises to support the expedition which they were ready to undertake. An excuse for hostilities was easily found in the new fortress which Martino was then engaged in constructing without the consent of his suzerain. An ultimatum was therefore sent to him ordering him to desist from his building operations, and to come in person to Constantinople, if he wished to renew his lease. Martino, as might have been expected from his character, treated the ultimatum with contempt, and only hastened on his building. Benedetto, however, took the opportunity to lodge a complaint against his brother before the Emperor, claiming 60,000 gold pieces, the present annual amount of his half-share in the island, which he had inherited but of which the grasping Martino had deprived him.

In the early autumn of 1329, Andronikos assembled a magnificent fleet of 105 vessels, including four galleys furnished by Duke Nicolò I of Naxos, with the ostensible object of attacking the Turks but with the real intention of subduing the Genoese lord of Chios. Even at this eleventh hour the Emperor would have been willing to leave him in possession of the rest of the island, merely placing an Imperial garrison in the new castle and insisting upon the regular payment of Benedetto’s annuity. Martino, however, was in no mood for negotiations. He sank the three galleys which he had in the harbour, forbade his Greek subjects to wear arms under pain of death, and shut himself up with 800 men behind the walls, from which there floated defiantly the flag of the Zaccaria, instead of the customary Imperial standard. But, when he saw that his brother had handed over a neighbouring fort to the Emperor, and that no reliance could be placed upon his Greek subjects, he sent messengers begging for peace. Andronikos repulsed them, saying that the time for compromise was over, whereupon Martino surrendered. The Chians clamoured for his execution; but Cantacuzene saved his life, and he was conveyed a prisoner to Constantinople, while his wife Jacqueline de la Roche, a connexion of the former ducal house of Athens, was allowed to go free with her family and all that they could carry. Martino’s adherents were given their choice of leaving the island with their property, or of entering the Imperial service, and the majority chose the latter alternative. The nationalist leaders were rewarded for their devotion by gifts and honours; the people were relieved from their oppressive public burdens. To Benedetto the Emperor offered the governorship of Chios with half the net revenues of the island as his salary—a generous offer which the Genoese rejected with scorn, asserting that nothing short of absolute sovereignty over it would satisfy him. If that were refused, he only asked for three galleys to carry him and his property to Galata. Andronikos treated him with remarkable forbearance, in order that public opinion might not accuse an Emperor of having been guilty of meanness, and, on the proposal of Cantacuzene, convened an assembly of Greeks and of the Latins who were then in the island—Genoese and Venetian traders, the Duke of Naxos, the recently appointed Roman Catholic bishop of Chios and some other Frères Prêcheurs who had arrived—in order that there might be impartial witnesses of his generosity. Even those of Benedetto’s own race and creed regarded his obstinate refusal of the Imperial offer with disapprobation; nor would he even accept a palace and the rank of Senator at Constantinople with 20,000 gold pieces a year out of the revenues of Chios; nothing but his three galleys could he be persuaded to take. His object was soon apparent. Upon his arrival at Galata, he chartered eight Genoese galleys, which he found lying there, and set out to reconquer Chios—a task which he considered likely to be easy, as the Imperial fleet had by that time dispersed. The Chians, however, repulsed his men with considerable loss, the survivors weighed anchor on the morrow, and Benedetto II succumbed barely a week later to an attack of apoplexy, brought on by his rage and disappointment[479].

Martino, after eight years in captivity, was released by the intervention of Pope Benedict XII and Philip VI of France in 1337, and treated with favour by the Emperor, who “gave him a command in the army and other castles,” as some compensation for his losses[480]. In 1343, Clement VI appointed him captain of the four papal galleys which formed part of the crusade for the capture of the former Genoese colony of Smyrna from Omar Beg of Aïdin, the self-styled “Prince of the Morea[481]”—a post for which his special experience and local knowledge were a particular recommendation in the eyes of the Pope. Martino desired, however, to avail himself of this opportunity to reconquer Chios from the Greeks, and invited the Knights and the Cypriote detachment to join him in this venture, to which his friend, the Archbishop of Thebes, endeavoured to force the latter by threats of excommunication. The Pope saw, however, that this repetition on a smaller scale of the selfish policy of the Fourth Crusade would have the effect of alienating his Greek allies, and ordered the Latin Patriarch of Constantinople to forbid the attack[482]. Martino lived to see Smyrna taken in December, 1344, but on January 17, 1345, the rashness of the Patriarch, who insisted on holding mass in the old Metropolitan Church against the advice of the naval authorities, cost him his life. Omar assaulted the cathedral while service was still going on, Martino was slain, and his head presented to that redoubtable chieftain[483]. When, in the following year, the Genoese retook Chios, and founded their second long domination over it, his descendants did not profit by the conquest. But his second son, Centurione, retained his baronies in the Morea, of which the latter’s grandson and namesake was the last reigning Prince.

After the restoration of Greek rule in Chios and the appointment of Kalothetos as Imperial viceroy, Andronikos III had proceeded to Phocæa. By this time the Genoese had abandoned the old city and had strongly fortified themselves in the new town, purchasing further security for their commercial operations by the payment of an annual tribute of 15,000 pieces of silver and a personal present of 10,000 more to Saru-Khan, the Turkish ruler of the district. The Emperor, having placated this personage with the usual Oriental arguments, set out for Foglia Nuova. Andriolo Cattaneo chanced to be absent at Genoa on business, and the Genoese garrison of 52 knights and 400 foot-soldiers was under the command of his uncle, Arrigo Tartaro. The latter wisely averted annexation by doing homage to the Emperor, and handed the keys of the newly constructed castle to his Varangian guard. After spending two nights in the fortress, in order to show that it was his, Andronikos magnanimously renewed the grant of the place to Andriolo during good pleasure. But Domenico Cattaneo, who succeeded his father not long afterwards with the assent of the Emperor, lost, in his attempt to obtain more, what he already had.

Cattaneo, not content with the riches of Foglia Nuova, coveted the island of Lesbos, which had belonged for just over a century to the Greeks, and it seemed in 1333 as if an opportunity of seizing it had arisen. The increasing power of the Turks, who had by that time taken Nicæa and Brusa and greatly hindered Greek and Latin trade alike in the Ægean, led to a coalition against them; but, before attacking the common enemy, the Knights, Nicolò I of Naxos, and Cattaneo made a treacherous descent upon Lesbos, and seized the capital of the island. The crafty Genoese, supported by a number of galleys from his native city, managed, however, to outwit his weaker allies, and ousted them from all share in the conquered town, whither he transferred his residence from Foglia Nuova. Andronikos, after punishing the Genoese of Pera for this act of treachery on the part of their countrymen, set out to recover Lesbos. The slowness of the Emperor’s movements, however, enabled Cattaneo to strengthen the garrison, and Andronikos, leaving one of his officers to besiege Lesbos, proceeded to invest Foglia with the aid of Saru-Khan, whose son with other young Turks had been captured and kept as a hostage by the Genoese garrison. The place, however, continued for long to resist the attacks of the allies, till at last Cattaneo’s lieutenant prevailed upon them to raise the siege by restoring the prisoners to their parents and pledging himself to obtain the surrender of the city of Mytilene, which still held out, and which the Emperor, fearing troubles at home, had no time to take. Cattaneo, indeed, repudiated this part of the arrangement, and bribery was needed to seduce the Latin mercenaries and thus leave him unsupported. From Lesbos he retired to Foglia, which the Emperor had consented to allow him to keep on the old terms; but four years later, while he was absent on a hunting party, the Greek inhabitants overpowered the small Italian garrison and proclaimed Andronikos III[484]. Thus ended the first Genoese occupation of Phocæa and Lesbos—the harbinger of the much longer and more durable colonisation a few years later. Two gold coins, modelled on the Venetian ducats, of which the first of them is the earliest known counterfeit, have survived to preserve the memory of Andriolo and Domenico Cattaneo, and to testify to the riches of the Foglie under their rule[485].