CHAPTER VII. HISTORY OF THE DUKES OF ATHENS-1205-1456 SECT. I.-ATHENS BECOMES A FIEF OF THE EMPIRE OF ROMANIA THE portion of Greece lying to the south of the kingdom of Saloniki was divided by the Crusaders among several great feudatories of the empire of Romania. According to the feudal code of the time, each of these great barons possessed the right of constructing fortresses, coining money, establishing supreme courts of justice, and waging war with his neighbours; consequently, their number could not be great in so small an extent of country. The lords of Boudonitza, Salona, Negrepont, and Athens are alone mentioned as existing to the north of the isthmus of Corinth, and the history of the petty sovereigns of Athens can alone be traced in any detail. The slightest record of a city which has acted so important a part in the history of human civilisation must command some attention; and fortunately her feudal annals, though very imperfect, furnish matter for study and instruction. Athens and Thebes-for the fate of these ancient enemies The fief of Berthold of Katzenellenbogen was in eastern Greece, and it must have been as large and as valuable as the fiefs of Otho de la Roche or William de Champlitte, for he was probably a more powerful baron than either; yet we are ignorant of its position. The superscription of the letter of Pope Innocent III. to the barons, concerning the detention of church lands and tithes, seems to indicate that there were other great feudatories. "Nobilibus viris Balmo Thessalonicensi comestabulo, Ottoni de Rocca domino Athenarum. Domino Nigripontis, T. de Ostremuncourt et aliis principibus Romania."-Epist. Inn. III., tom. ii. p. 261., edit. Baluze. Marchioni CHAP. VII. was linked together-were then cities of considerable wealth, with a numerous and flourishing population. § 1. Otho de la Roche, a Burgundian nobleman, who had distinguished himself during the siege of Constantinople, marched southward with the army of Boniface the kingmarquis, and gained possession of Athens in 1205.1 Thebes and Athens had probably fallen to his share in the partition of the empire, but it is possible that the king of Saloniki may have found means to increase his portion, in order to induce him to do homage to the crown of Saloniki for this addition. At all events, it At all events, it appears that Otho de la Roche did homage to Boniface, either as his immediate superior, or as viceroy for the emperor of Romania.2 We possess some interesting information concerning the events that occurred at Athens immediately previous to its conquest by Otho de la Roche, though unfortunately this information does not give us any minute insight into the condition of the population. Still, it allows us to perceive that the social as well as the political condition of the people was peculiarly favourable to the enterprise of the Crusaders. The people of Athens and Thebes were living in the enjoyment of wealth and tranquillity when the news reached them that Constantinople was besieged by the Franks and Venetians. The greatest grievance then endured in the cities where no regular garrisons were maintained arose out of fiscal extortion and judicial corruption, both of which certainly increased to an alarming degree under the emperors of the house of Angelos. But these abuses were palliated, and prevented from assuming a highly oppressive form, whenever the bishop 1 Geoffrey de Villehardoin, De la Conqueste de Constantinople. Note of Ducange at page 325 of his edition. 2 The title assumed by the Otho de la Roche, as lord of Athens and Thebes, was Grand-Sire, Μέγας Κύριος, derived by some from the title of Μέγας Пpμμukηpus, which Constantine the Great was said to have conferred on the governor of Thebes. The general belief, both of the Byzantines and Latins, was that either this title or that of duke had been the ancient title of the governors of Athens. Compare Nicephorus Gregoras, p. 146, and Livre de la Conqueste, Greek text of Copenhagen, v. 2132. LEO SGUROS ATTACKS ATHENS. 155 of the place exerted his influence to restrain injustice within the strict bounds of the established laws. The direct judicial authority of the bishops, and their acknowledged political influence as protectors of the municipal magistracy, gave them virtually a superintending control over the agents of the central administration in the distant provinces of the empire. The authority of the central administration had been greatly weakened by the usurpation and misgovernment of Alexius III., and the power of the local governors and great landed proprietors had been proportionally increased.1 The support of many wealthy and influential individuals had been purchased by Alexius at a ruinous price. Some had been entrusted with civil and military commands; and others, particularly in Greece, had been allowed to assume the authority of imperial officers without any legal warrant.2 Leo Sguros, a Peloponnesian.noble, who held the office of imperial governor of Nauplia, took advantage of the general disorder, and assumed the administration over the cities and fortresses of Argos and Corinth. As soon as 1 Tafel (De Thessalonicâ ejusque Agro, 462,) has published a memorial of the archbishop Michael Akominatos to the emperor Alexius III., which gives a curious picture of the abuses then prevailing in the Byzantine fiscal administration. It represents Athens as a city thinly inhabited, with a declining population, impoverished and in danger of being reduced by the emigration of its inhabitants to a Scythian waste. The good Archbishop here alludes to Aristophanes, Acharn. 703. It is always difficult to appreciate the precise value of such declamation. Modern official correspondence concerning Athens shows us that any condition of public affairs can be represented by diplomatic agents, who are often poorer rhetoricians than Michael, under totally different aspects, merely because a minister has been changed. Now as the Archbishop informs us that Athens possessed ships, suffered in its commercial affairs from pirates, paid a ship tax, and was considered by the imperial officials as a place from which more money could be extorted than from the fertile regions of Thebes and Euboea, we must conclude that the city possessed considerable wealth, trade, and population. This memorial is published with a German translation in Dr Ellisen's Michael Akominatos von Chona Erzbischof von Athen. That Athens was no longer in the flourishing condition she enjoyed in the time of Basil II. is, however, evident from the Panygericon or Oratio in Isaacium 11. It seems the city was then unable to make the customary coronation offering from poverty.-Tafel, Thessalonica, 459. Ellisen, 58. 2 Leo Chamaretos, ruler of Lacedæmon, appears to have belonged to this class. A. D. 1204. CHAP. VII. he heard of the arrival of the Crusaders before Constan$ 1. tinople, he collected a considerable army and fleet, and proceeded to extend his authority beyond the isthmus, apparently with the intention of forming an independent principality in Greece. His first expedition was directed against Athens, of which he hoped to render himself master without difficulty, as it was defended by no regular garrison. The Athenians, however, were not disposed to submit tamely to the usurpation of the Peloponnesian chief. They perhaps flattered themselves with the hope that, in existing circumstances, they might recover the privileges of a free city; and they were fortunate enough to find a prudent, disinterested, and energetic chief in their archbishop, Michael Akominatos, the elder brother of the historian Nicetas. When Sguros made his appearance in the plain of Athens, descending by the pass communicating with the Eleusinian plain, through which the remains of the Sacred Way may still be traced, the archbishop went out to dissuade him from attacking Athens, since the attempt would infallibly lead to a civil war which must prove ruinous to Greece, exposed as it then was to immediate danger of a hostile invasion. Sguros treated the solicitations of the archbishop with contempt, and, persisting in his design, forced his way into the city, which was not fortified in such a way as to enable it to offer any opposition. But the archbishop animated his flock to defend their independence. The inhabitants, on the first report that Sguros meditated attacking them, had transported all their most valuable effects into the Acropolis, where they soon showed their enemy that they were both able and willing to make a long defence. Sguros, seeing there was no immediate prospect of taking the citadel, raised the siege and marched northward. On retiring, he barbarously set fire to the city in several places, plundered the surrounding country, and, after collecting a large supply of cattle and provisions, proceeded GREEK POPULATION SUBMITS TO CRUSADERS. 157 to invest Thebes, which surrendered without giving him Thebes, Chalcis, and Athens opened their gates, and received the Franks as their deliverers from the tyranny of Sguros and the Peloponnesians. There appears to be no doubt that the Greeks generally obtained very favourable capitulations from their conquerors: the inhabitants were secured in the possession of their private property, local institutions, established laws, and national religion. Under the protection of the Franks, therefore, they hoped to enjoy a degree of personal security to which the anarchical condition of the Byzantine empire, since the death of Manuel I. in 1180, had rendered them strangers.1 The Athenians were not disappointed in their expectations; for, though the Byzantine aristocracy and dignified clergy were severe sufferers by the transference of the government into the hands of the Franks, the middle classes long enjoyed peace and security. The noble archbishop Michael, who for thirty years had ruled the see of Athens as a spiritual father and political protector, was compelled to seek refuge at Keos, where he spent his 1 Nicetas, p. 391, indicates that there was some danger of internal disorders at Athens. He alludes to a young noble who opposed the archbishop, and whom any other pastor would gladly have given up to Sguros to be put to death. The Frank Chronicle of the Conquest of the Morea affords repeated testimony that the Crusaders systematically respected the established institutions of the Greeks, and gave them written capitulations. For the life of the archbishop Michael, see Michael Akominatos con Chona, by Dr Adolf Ellisen, Göttingen, 1846. A. D. 1205. |