The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]

GEORGE FINLAY

From the enthronement of the Commenian dynasty in A.D. 1081, which was accomplished through a successful rebellion, attended by shameful treachery and rapine, the Byzantine empire, and especially Constantinople, its capital, passed through many vicissitudes; but the sack of the city by Alexius Commenus, the founder of the line, was remembered by the populace to the disadvantage of all his successors; the last of whom, Andronicus I, ended his reign in 1185. John, the son of Alexius (1118-1143), ruled with discretion and ability, and recovered some territory from the Turks.

Manuel I, the son of John (1143-1181), ruled during a period of almost constant war, and for a time he held the enemies of the empire in check. But he appears to have been more endowed with courage and the spirit of enterprise than with good judgment, and his conduct of the empire coincided with events that, as seen in history, contributed to its decline, which after his death followed rapidly. As this decline is to be dated especially from the passing but not ineffectual invasion of Roger II, King of Sicily, in 1146, some account of that, together with a view of conditions immediately preceding, becomes important in a work like this.

The century and a half before Roger's invasion had been a period of tranquillity for the distinctively Greek people of the empire, who had increased rapidly in numbers and wealth, and were in possession of an extensive commerce and many manufactures. Therefore they were perhaps the greatest sufferers from the adverse events which befell the State.

The emperor Alexius I had concluded a commercial treaty with Pisa toward the end of his reign. Manuel renewed this alliance, and he appears to have been the first of the Byzantine emperors who concluded a public treaty with Genoa. The pride of the emperors of the Romans—as the sovereigns of Constantinople were styled—induced them to treat the Italian republics as municipalities still dependent on the Empire of the Caesars, of which they had once formed a part; and the rulers both of Pisa and Genoa yielded to this assumption of supremacy, and consented to appear as vassals and liegemen of the Byzantine emperors, in order to participate in the profits which they saw the Venetians gained by trading in their dominions.

Several commercial treaties with Pisa and Genoa, as well as with Venice, have been preserved. The obligations of the republics are embodied in the charter enumerating the concessions granted by the Emperor, and the document is called a chrysobulum, or golden bull, from the golden seal of the Emperor attached to it as the certificate of its authenticity.

In Manuel's treaties with the Genoese and Pisans, the republics bind themselves never to engage in hostilities against the empire; but, on the contrary, all the subjects of the republics residing in the Emperor's dominions become bound to assist him against all assailants; they engage to act with their own ships, or to serve on board the imperial fleet, for the usual pay granted to Latin mercenaries. They promise to offer no impediment to the extension of the empire in Syria, reserving to themselves the factories and privileges they already possess in any place that may be conquered. They submit their civil and criminal affairs to the jurisdiction of the Byzantine courts of justice, as was then the case with the Venetians and other foreigners in the empire. Acts of piracy and armed violence, unless the criminals were taken in the act, were to be reported to the rulers of the republic whose subjects had committed the crime, and the Byzantine authorities were not to render the innocent traders in the empire responsible for the injuries inflicted by these brigands. The republicans engaged to observe all the stipulations in their treaties, in defiance of ecclesiastical excommunication or the prohibition of any individual, crowned or not crowned.

Manuel, in return, granted to the republicans the right of forming a factory, erecting a quay for landing their goods, and building a church; and the Genoese received their grant in an agreeable position on the side of the port opposite Constantinople, where in after-times their great colony of Galata was formed. The Emperor promised to send an annual of from four hundred to five hundred gold bezants, with two pieces of a rich brocade then manufactured only in the Byzantine empire, to the republican governments, and sixty bezants, with one piece of brocade, to their archbishops. These treaties fixed the duty levied on the goods imported or exported from Constantinople by the Italians at 4 per cent.; but in the other cities of the empire, the Pisans and Genoese were to pay the same duties as other Latin traders, excepting, of course, the privileged Venetians. These duties generally amounted to 10 per cent. The republics were expressly excluded, by the Genoese treaty, from the Black Sea trade, except when they received a special license from the Emperor. In case of shipwreck, the property of the foreigners was to be protected by the imperial authorities and respected by the people, and every assistance was to be granted to the unfortunate sufferers. This humane clause was not new in Byzantine commercial treaties, for it is contained in the earliest treaty concluded by Alexius I with the Pisans. On the whole, the arrangements for the administration of justice in these treaties prove that the Byzantine empire still enjoyed a greater degree of order than the rest of Europe.