Decline & Fall - Byzantium 03, page 36
part #3 of Byzantium Series
Retribution, however, quickly followed. When news of his conduct reached the Grand Master of the Temple, Roger was expelled from the Order and denounced to Pope Boniface VIII as a thief and an apostate. Fleeing by land to Genoa, he persuaded the Doria family to fit him out with a new vessel, the Olivetta, and embarked on a career of out-and-out
1See p. 225.
2The Mamelukes were a dynasty of Sultans that reigned over Egypt and Syria from the middle of the thirteenth to the beginning of the sixteenth centuries. Originally the Turkish slave bodyguard of the last Ayoubid Sultan in Cairo, they murdered him in 1250 and seized control; ten years later, their leader Baibars defeated the invading Mongols under Hulagu at Ain Jalut near Nazareth, and extended their rule over Palestine and Syria.
piracy - which, in the space of the next few years, was to multiply his wealth many times over. Only then did he offer his services to Frederick of Sicily, who immediately appointed him admiral. Roger soon proved as courageous a fighter on land as at sea, and quickly acquired a loyal following. So the Catalan Company was born.
Such was the man who, towards the end of 1302, sent two envoys to Andronicus Palaeologus, offering his Company's services for nine months. Despite the obvious advantages of such an engagement to him personally - putting him as it did effectively out of reach of both the Templars and the Pope, neither of whom had forgotten his treachery - he demanded, as usual, a high price. His men were to be given four months' wages in advance, at double the rate normally payable by the Empire to its mercenaries; he himself was to be granted the rank of megas dux -at that time fifth in the whole hierarchy of Byzantium - and to receive the hand in marriage of the Emperor's niece Maria, the daughter of his sister Irene and her husband, John III Asen of Bulgaria. To his chief of staff, Corberan d'Alet, would go the title of Seneschal of the Empire.
Andronicus, knowing full well that he had his back to the wall, accepted these conditions without demur; and in September 1302 a fleet of thirty-nine galleys and transports sailed into the Golden Horn, carrying not only some two and a half thousand fighting men - more than half of them cavalry — but also (to the Emperor's mild consternation) their wives, mistresses and children: a total of some six and a half thousand. Shortly afterwards, with full Byzantine ceremony, Roger married his bride in Constantinople; his men, however, behaved with less decorum. Fighting broke out between them and the local Genoese; and on the wedding night itself - if the Spanish chroniclers are to be believed - Roger was obliged to leave the bed of his sixteen-year-old bride to restore order in the streets. An estimate from the same source of three thousand Genoese dead is clearly an exaggeration; but enough damage had been done for the Emperor to insist on the Catalans' early departure from the capital. A few days later the entire Company, together with its womenfolk, crossed the Marmara to Cyzicus, at that very moment under siege by the Turks.
Now at last the Catalans proved their worth. Thanks to them, by the spring of 1303 the Turkish army was everywhere in retreat. On the other hand, Andronicus began to realize that he had unleashed forces which he could not begin to control. Hitherto all imperial mercenaries had been under Greek command, subject to the orders of the Emperor or one of his generals. The Catalans, by contrast, showed scant respect for their Byzantine employers. They took their own decisions and followed their own battle-plans; when there was any plunder to be taken, they kept it for themselves. Moreover their overbearing arrogance caused constant disaffection among their allies, and it was not long before the five hundred Alan mercenaries who were theoretically fighting at their side discovered that every Catalan was receiving double pay. The result was mutiny, followed by mass desertions; and by the time the Catalans reached the headquarters of the co-Emperor Michael IX at Pegae they had aroused such hostility among the Greeks that he closed the gates against them. But for Pegae they cared little; their eyes were on Philadelphia.
Philadelphia - now the relatively insignificant town of Alasehir, but then an important frontier city and military base - was also under siege, not by the Ottoman Turks but by another tribe, the Karamans, who were at that time and in that area more powerful still. After their arrival the Catalans lost no time. Despite a forced march of some 120 miles, they attacked at dawn on the following day. The Turks fought hard, but their arrows had next to no effect on the mail-clad Europeans. By noon, according to the Spanish chroniclers, some eighteen thousand of them lay dead on the field; the remainder, including the Emir himself, had fled. For Roger de Flor this was the perfect opportunity to follow up his victory. By pursuing his enemy, driving deep into Karaman territory, he might have inflicted upon the Emir a still more decisive defeat and opened the way for the Byzantine reconquest of Anatolia; but he did nothing of the sort. Instead, he led his men back to the coast to make contact with his fleet - which, he was pleased to discover, had filled in the time by occupying Chios, Lemnos and Lesbos.
In less than two years the former pirate had become a member of the imperial family, had scored decisive victories over both the Ottoman and the Karaman Turks and had secured much of south-western Asia Minor. After such triumphs there was little thought in his mind - if indeed there ever had been - of fighting selflessly for Byzantium. He was of course delighted to go on taking the Emperor's money; but the experience of the past few months had awoken new hopes - hopes of an independent Kingdom of his own in Anatolia where the country was fertile, the climate as benign as anywhere on earth, the only enemies weak and disunited. Henceforth, wherever he went, he exerted absolute authority — even going so far as to punish (if necessary by death) any Byzantines, civil, military or monastic, who offended him.
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At the beginning of 1304 Roger de Flor embarked on an ambitious expedition to the East. Why he did so is not altogether clear, since he must have known full well that he would thus be allowing both the Ottomans and the Karamans to regroup and rearm as best they might; but he and his Company set out in the early spring, and by the middle of August they had reached the 'Iron Gates' of the Taurus. A pass so narrow that the pack-mules had to be unloaded before they could be taken through it in single file, there could have been no more perfect place for an ambush; and Roger wisely decided to send out mounted scouts to reconnoitre. It was as well for him that he did, for there indeed a Turkish army lay waiting for him. Another desperate battle followed; once again the Catalans carried all before them. There, however, they halted. Several of Roger's junior commanders urged a further advance, across the Euphrates into Syria; but their leader would have none of it and gave the order to return.
Why did he do so? According to the chronicler Ramon Muntaner — who was with him on the campaign - messengers had arrived from the Emperor, recalling him to the West. By now Roger de Flor had long passed the stage at which imperial orders were to be unquestioningly obeyed. What concerned him was the fact that the expedition was taking him further and further out of touch: if there were a crisis in Constantinople, he must be in a position to take advantage of it. Besides, he had left vast quantities of treasure at Magnesia and was beginning to worry about its safety. And what about pay, for himself and his men? Despite their behaviour and their overbearing attitude to the Byzantines, they were still technically mercenaries and the Emperor now owed them nearly a year's wages. Finally, unprincipled adventurer as he was, Roger never liked unnecessary risks: again and again during this period of his career we find him taking the side of caution, restraining his more impulsive followers from their daredevil plans. On the high Anatolian plateau across which they would have to march, he explained, the onset of winter was only a few weeks away. They must retrace their steps while it was still safe to do so.
And so they did - but only to find that in their absence a Greek knight named Attaliotes had seized Magnesia, and with it all their accumulated treasure. At once they put the town under siege; but before it could be taken another, more urgent message reached them from the Emperor: that Theodore Svetoslav, the usurper who had driven the Mongols from Bulgaria and united most of it - including the Byzantine ports on the Black Sea - under his rule, had invaded Thrace and was already threatening Constantinople. Alone, Andronicus could do nothing; only with Catalan assistance could he hope to save his capital. Here was an appeal that could not be ignored: Roger immediately saw that Theodore presented a dangerous new complication, and that if not effectively dealt with he might prove a grave obstacle to his own long-term plans. Magnesia — which was stoutly defended — must be left till later. Marching through the Troad to the Hellespont, he led his men across the straits and pitched his camp in Gallipoli.
At this point the precise chronology becomes uncertain: Greek and Spanish sources give conflicting - and extremely one-sided - accounts of what took place, and it is impossible to reconcile them altogether. It seems, however, that some time during the winter of 1304—5 word came from the co-Emperor Michael that the services of Roger de Flor and his men would not after all be necessary; and soon afterwards Roger learned that Michael had promulgated an edict to the Byzantine forces that the Grand Duke was no longer to be obeyed. No explanation was offered, no indication of how the Bulgar crisis had been settled so suddenly and with such apparent ease. Could it have been - one cannot help wondering - that there had in fact been no Bulgar crisis at all, that the whole thing had been nothing more than a fabrication designed to bring Roger and his men back from the East to where the Byzantines could keep a proper eye on them?
However that may be, it was fortunate for Roger de Flor that he should have been within reach of Constantinople when, early in 1305, a fleet of nine Spanish galleys appeared in the Golden Horn, commanded by a certain Berenguer d'Entenca, an old comrade-in-arms from the Sicilian campaign whom James II of Aragon had now appointed his special envoy to the Emperor. The purpose of Berenguer's visit, apart from the bringing of reinforcements - which had not been asked for, though they were none the less welcome for that - remains something of a mystery: the rumour, assiduously spread by the Genoese, that he was connected with a secret conspiracy to restore the Latin Empire was not to be borne out by subsequent events, while Gregoras's claim that he had been invited by Andronicus in the hopes of playing him off against Roger seems little short of absurd. At all events the envoy was received with every honour and was soon afterwards himself awarded the title of megas dux, Roger being simultaneously promoted to the rank of Caesar.
This latter honour was admittedly in some degree deserved: the Catalan Company had fought at least three decisive battles against the Turks in Anatolia, to say nothing of innumerable minor skirmishes from which they had almost always emerged victorious. But it was also intended as a palliative. Michael doubtless realized that his action at the time of the Bulgar scare had antagonized Roger both dangerously and unnecessarily. Moreover the Company had by now been a full year without pay, and its two commanders, in their heated negotiations with the Emperor, were adopting an increasingly threatening tone. Unfortunately there was little - as usual - that Andronicus could do. The imperial coffers were empty. Recently he had been obliged to debase the coinage yet again: the gold content of the hyperpyron - the name, ironically enough, meant 'highly refined' - was now down to less than twenty per cent, and Roger angrily refused to be fobbed off with what he understandably described as base metal. Berenguer d'Entenga showed his indignation more forcibly still: he returned the gold and silver dinner service on which his meals had been provided - although, if Pachymeres is to be believed, not before he had put them to the most ignoble uses -boarded his flagship and set sail for the Company's camp at Gallipoli. As he left Blachernae, he ostentatiously hurled his ducal regalia overboard in full sight of the palace.
At last agreement was reached - though only after Andronicus had granted Roger's demand for the whole of Byzantine Anatolia in fief; and in the spring of 1305 the Catalans began their return to Asia. Before leaving for his new domains, however, Roger decided to make a formal visit to Michael IX, whom he had never met and who was then at Adrianople. The co-Emperor, he knew, had no love for himself and his men, whom he mistrusted even more than did his father; Roger's real purpose may well have been to try to improve relations between them, or at least to reach some sort of understanding - as he had so signally failed to achieve with Andronicus.1 His pregnant wife Maria and her mother both implored him not to venture among his openly avowed enemies, but he ignored them both and on 23 March 1305 set off, with an escort of three hundred cavalry and a thousand infantry, for Michael's headquarters.
Roger was received in Adrianople with full honours and remained there over a week - a clear enough sign, surely, that he saw this as something more than a courtesy visit. Was Michael deliberately playing
1 Of the several theories that have been put forward as to Roger's real reason for his visit to Michael IX, the most interesting is that of Alfonso Lowe, in The Catalan Vengeance, who speculates that he was deliberately lured to his death by Andronicus and Michael together, on the pretext of discussing the elimination of Theodore Svetoslav and his replacement by the rightful ruler of Bulgaria, Roger's own brother-in-law. But it is only speculation; we shall never know.
for time, so as to summon enough reinforcements to deal with the Catalans as necessary? Perhaps he was. All we can say for certain is that on 5 April, the eve of his departure for Gallipoli, Roger de Flor was assassinated. Pachymeres - who was over a hundred miles away in Constantinople - identifies the assassin as George Gircon, the Alan chieftain whose son had been killed by the Catalans at Cyzicus and who had long nurtured a particular hatred for their leader; he goes on to report that the murder took place on the threshold of the private apartments of the co-Empress, Rita-Maria of Armenia, though precisely what Roger was doing there he does not explain. Western sources on the other hand - which may in the circumstances be more reliable - while also attributing the crime to Gircon, claim that the scene was a farewell banquet, given by Michael in his honour. Towards the end of the feast the latter withdrew according to normal custom, leaving his guests to continue their drinking at their leisure; then, suddenly, the doors were flung open and a fully-armed company of Alan mercenaries burst into the hall. The Catalans - surrounded, outnumbered and almost certainly drunk - stood no chance. Roger was killed with the rest.
No longer was there any question of an alliance between the Greeks and the Catalan Company. Henceforth it was open war.
As soon as the news reached the Catalan camp at Gallipoli, the move to Asia stopped; those who had already crossed the straits were summoned back, and the peninsula on which the town stood was declared Spanish territory. The Company then drove across Thrace taking, as it marched, a terrible vengeance. It had of course been seriously depleted at Adrianople; but an active programme of recruitment had attracted companies of Turks and Bulgars and before long it was as numerous as ever. Michael IX, now seriously alarmed by a turn of events for which he had been at least partially responsible, did his utmost to halt its advance; but his army was smashed by the Catalans near the castle of Aprus near Rhaedestum (Tekirdag) and he himself, after fighting with conspicuous courage, narrowly escaped with his life.
The province of Thrace, lying as it did across the direct road to Constantinople from the West, had suffered much hardship over the centuries. It had been ravaged by Avars and Huns, by Gepids and Bulgars, by Scythians and Slavs and Christian Crusaders. But the Catalans were the worst. So savage were their massacres, so unspeakable their atrocities, that it sometimes seemed as though they were determined to leave no single Thracian alive. Farms and villages - sometimes whole towns were abandoned, as thousands of panic-stricken refugees streamed into Constantinople, leaving their cornfields ablaze behind them. Adrianople and Didymotichum remained impregnable, but their garrisons no longer dared to take any initiative. Once one of the richest and most fertile territories of the Byzantine Empire, Thrace was now a desert.
But deserts are little more rewarding to their conquerors than to their inhabitants, and in the summer of 1308 the Catalans turned west towards Thessalonica. They failed to capture the city, but they destroyed several smaller towns and plundered and pillaged the monasteries of Mount Athos before descending first into Thessaly and then, in 1310, yet further south into Boeotia where they took service with Walter of Brienne, the French Duke of Athens and Thebes. Walter had long had his eye on Thessaly, and with Catalan help he effortlessly brought the young and ailing John II Ducas1 to his knees. Before long, however, Walter discovered in his turn that the Catalans were dangerous employees, easier to hire than to dismiss. On 15 March 1311 they annihilated his army on the banks of the Cephissus river; he himself was killed, together with most of his knights. The victors then advanced to Athens, where they set up their own Duchy. It was to last another seventy-seven years.
And so the Catalans pass out of our story. In less than a single decade they had inflicted almost as much damage on the Byzantine Empire as the Turks had done in a century. And they had been paid by the Emperor to do it. In order to find their wages, Andronicus Palaeologus had been obliged to debase his coinage and to impose still heavier taxes on his already desperate subjects. The damage they had done in Thrace was to take generations to repair; the flood of refugees they had driven from their homes was to create near-famine in Constantinople. Had they kept to the terms of their agreement with Andronicus, concentrating on pushing back the Turks and renouncing all territorial ambitions for themselves, they might have turned back the Islamic tide and the whole future history of the Levant might have been changed. Alas, they did not; instead, almost exacdy a century after the Fourth Crusade, they dealt the Empire that they had come to save yet another paralysing blow, from which it would not recover.
