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The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]
- Автор: Gutenberg
- Год: 1905
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: История
Электронная книга - «The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]». Краткое содержание книги:
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 01
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 02 / (From the Rise of Greece to the Christian Era)
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 04
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 05 / (From Charlemagne to Frederick Barbarossa)
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 06 / (From Barbarossa to Dante)
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 08 / The Later Renaissance: from Gutenberg to the Reformation
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 09
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 10
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 13
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 14
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 17
The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 21 / The Recent Days (1910-1914)
We shall now see the effect of those conquests on the national character and habits; the avidity of place and power and wealth superseding religious enthusiasm; and the enervating luxury and soft voluptuousness of Syria and Persia sapping the rude but masculine simplicity of the Arabian desert. Above all, the single-mindedness of Mahomet and his two immediate successors is at an end. Other objects besides the mere advancement of Islamism distract the attention of its leading professors; and the struggle for worldly wealth and worldly sway, for the advancement of private ends, and the aggrandizement of particular tribes and families, destroy the unity of the empire, and beset the caliphate with intrigue, treason, and bloodshed.
It was a great matter of reproach against the caliph Othman that he was injudicious in his appointments, and had an inveterate propensity to consult the interests of his relatives and friends before that of the public. One of his greatest errors in this respect was the removal of Amrou ben-el-Ass from the government of Egypt, and the appointment of his own foster-brother, Abdallah Ibn Saad, in his place. This was the same Abdallah who, in acting as amanuensis to Mahomet, and writing down his revelations, had interpolated passages of his own, sometimes of a ludicrous nature. For this and for his apostasy he had been pardoned by Mahomet at the solicitation of Othman, and had ever since acted with apparent zeal, his interest coinciding with his duty.
He was of a courageous spirit, and one of the most expert horsemen of Arabia; but what might have fitted him to command a horde of the desert was insufficient for the government of a conquered province. He was new and inexperienced in his present situation; whereas Amru had distinguished himself as a legislator as well as a conqueror, and had already won the affections of the Egyptians by his attention to their interests, and his respect for their customs and habitudes. His dismission was, therefore, resented by the people, and a disposition was manifested to revolt against the new governor.
The emperor Constantine, who had succeeded to his father Heraclius, hastened to take advantage of these circumstances. A fleet and army were sent against Alexandria under a prefect named Manuel. The Greeks in the city secretly cooperated with him, and the metropolis was, partly by force of arms, partly by treachery, recaptured by the imperialists without much bloodshed.
Othman, made painfully sensible of the error he had committed, hastened to revoke the appointment of his foster-brother, and reinstated Amru in the command in Egypt. That able general went instantly against Alexandria with an army, in which were many Copts, irreconcilable enemies of the Greeks. Among these was the traitor Mokawkas, who, from his knowledge of the country and his influence among its inhabitants, was able to procure abundant supplies for the army.
The Greek garrison defended the city bravely and obstinately. Amru, enraged at having thus again to lay siege to a place which he had twice already taken, swore, by Allah, that if he should master it a third time, he would render it as easy of access as a brothel. He kept his word, for when he took the city he threw down the walls and demolished all the fortifications. He was merciful, however, to the inhabitants, and checked the fury of the Saracens, who were slaughtering all they met. A mosque was afterward erected on the spot at which he stayed the carnage, called the Mosque of Mercy. Manuel, the Greek general, found it expedient to embark with all speed with such of his troops as he could save, and make sail for Constantinople.
Scarce, however, had Amru quelled every insurrection and secured the Moslem domination in Egypt, when he was again displaced from the government, and Abdallah Ibn Saad appointed a second time in his stead.
Abdallah had been deeply mortified by the loss of Alexandria, which had been ascribed to his incapacity; he was emulous, too, of the renown of Amru, and felt the necessity of vindicating his claims to command by some brilliant achievement. The north of Africa presented a new field for Moslem enterprise. We allude to that vast tract extending west from the desert of Libya or Barca to Cape Non, embracing more than two thousand miles of sea-coast; comprehending the ancient divisions of Mamarica, Cyrenaica, Carthage, Numidia, and Mauritania; or, according to modern geographical designations, Barca, Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers, and Morocco.
Toward this rich land of promise, yet virgin of Islamitish seed, Abdallah, at the head of the victorious Saracens, now hopefully bent his ambitious steps.
EVOLUTION OF THE DOGESHIP IN VENICE
A.D. 697
WILLIAM CAREW HAZLITT
The early authentic history of Venice is intimately connected with that of the Lombards, of whom the first mention is made by Paterculus, the Roman historian, who wrote during the first quarter of the first century of our era. He speaks of the Langobardi[68] (Lombards) as dwelling on the west bank of the Elbe. Tacitus also mentions them in his Germany. From the Elbe they wandered to the Danube, and there encountered the Gepidæ, a branch of the Goths. The Lombards subdued this tribe, after a contest of thirty years.
By this victory Alboin, the young Lombard King, rose to great power and fame. His beauty and renown were sung by German peasants even in the days of Charlemagne. His name "crossed the Alps and fell, with a foreboding sound, upon the startled ears of the Italians," and toward Italy he turned for conquest. From Scythia and Germany adventurous youth flocked to his standard. Many clans and various religions were represented in his ranks, but these diversities were overshadowed by a common devotion to the hero-leader.
In 568 the Lombards marched from Pannonia into Italy, conquered the northern part, still called Lombardy, and founded the kingdom of that name, which was afterward greatly extended, and existed until overthrown by Charlemagne in 774.
Before the invading hosts of Alboin, wealthy inhabitants of the larger cities of the province of Venetia fled to the islands of Venice, where earlier fugitives had sought shelter from King Attila and his Huns. A thriving maritime community had been established, which about this time had developed into a semi-independent protectorate of the Byzantine or Eastern Empire, attached to the exarchate of Ravenna.
Afterward Venice underwent many political changes, among which one of the most interesting to students of history is that of the institution of the dogeship, as hereafter related. This step was taken for more than one reason of internal organization and policy, and it was also made urgent by the encroachments of the Lombards, which had become a menace to Venetian territory and commerce.
The republic (Venetian) on her part contemplated with inquietude the rise of one monarchy after another on the skirts of the Lagoon, for the Venetians not unnaturally feared that as soon as these fresh usurpers had established themselves, they might form the design of adding the islands of the Adriatic to their dominion, and of acquiring possession of the commercial advantages which belonged to the situation held by the settlers. For the Lombards, though not ranking among maritime communities, were not absolutely strangers to the laws of navigation, or to the use of ships, which might place them in a position to reduce to their control a small, feeble, and thinly peopled area, separated from their own territories only by a narrow and terraqueous strait. Moreover, the predatory visits of Leupus, duke of Friuli, whose followers traversed the canals at low tide on horseback, and despoiled the churches of Heraclia, Equilo, and Grado, soon afforded sufficient proof that the equestrian skill of the strangers was capable of supplying to some extent any deficiency in nautical knowledge.
Venice at present formed a federative state, united by the memory of a common origin and the sense of a common interest; the arrengo, which met at Heraclia, the parent capital, at irregular intervals to deliberate on matters of public concern, was too numerous and too schismatical to exercise immediate control over the nation; and each island was consequently governed, after the abolition of the primeval consulate, in the name of the people, by a gastaldo or tribune, whose power, nominally limited, was virtually absolute. This administration had lasted nearly two centuries and a half, during which period the republic passed through a cruel ordeal of anarchy, oppression, and bloodshed. The tribunes conspired against each other; the people rebelled against the tribunes. Family rose against family, clan against clan. Sanguinary affrays were of constant occurrence on the thinly peopled lidi, and amid the pine-woods, with which much of the surface was covered; and it is related that in one instance at least the bodies of the dead were left to be devoured by beasts and birds of prey, which then haunted the more thickly afforested parts.