1

through the agency of the priesthood, out of the proceeds of their movable property alone. This regulation, as might be expected, was violently opposed by a Pope so ambitious as Innocent III., who immediately declared it null and void. But necessity compelled the emperor and the barons to adhere to their decision; and they enforced the edict, in spite of the Pope's dissatisfaction and threats. The ecclesiastical affairs of the kingdom of Saloniki, and of the great fiefs in Greece, as far as the isthmus of Corinth, and the relations which the possessions. of the church were to hold, with reference to those of the feudal lords, were also regulated by a convention with the patriarch Morosini, and the metropolitans of Larissa, Neopatras, and Athens. By this convention the signors engaged to put the church in possession of all its lands, and to acknowledge and support the rights of the Latin clergy and their dependants. This convention, being extremely favourable to the views of the papal see, was ratified with much pleasure by Innocent III.1

Count Biandrate and the Lombard army continued nevertheless to resist the emperor and the parliament, and determined to defend their possessions with the sword. Henry, therefore, found himself compelled to take the field against them, in order to establish the imperial power in Greece on a proper feudal basis. He met with no resistance until he arrived at Thebes, in which count Biandrate had assembled the best portion of the Lombard troops. The army of Henry was repulsed in an attempt to take the place by assault; and it was not without great difficulty, and more by negotiation than force, that the imperial army at last entered Thebes.

1 Ducange, Histoire de Constantinople, 56.

2 The original text of this act is contained in the Bullarum Amplissima Collectio, Rome, 1740, tom. iii. No. xlii.; and in Buchon, Nouvelles Recherchesavant propos, 49. There is also a translation of it in Buchon, Histoire des Conquêtes des Français, 150; but this author, as is too frequently the case, omits to mention that the text is to be found in one of his own prior publications. For the confirmation, see Epist. Innocent. III, tom. ii. p. 496, edit. Baluze.

A. D.

1209.

§ 4.

CHAP. IV. The emperor immediately restored it to Otho de la Roche, its rightful signor. Henry then visited the city of Negrepont, where the signor of the island, Ravan dalle Carcere, induced Biandrate to make his peace with Henry; and the Lombard count soon after retired to Italy, leaving the empress-queen Margaret regent for her son, under the usual restrictions in favour of the suzerain's rights over the fortresses of his vassal while a minor.

The

A treaty was also concluded about this time between Henry and Michael, the Greek sovereign of Epirus, Great Vallachia, Acarnania, and Etolia, who consented to do homage for his possessions to avoid war. Greek naturally attached little importance to a ceremony which he regarded only as a public acknowledgment of the superior power of the Latin emperor.1

The remainder of Henry's reign was a scene of constant activity. At one time, he was engaged in defending the empire against foreign enemies; at another, he was forced to protect his Greek subjects against the tyranny of Pelagius, the papal legate, who made an attempt to compel all the orthodox Greeks to join the Latin rite, and by his own authority shut up the Greek churches and monasteries, and imprisoned the most active among the Greek clergy. A rebellion was on the point of breaking out, when the emperor ordered all the priests to be released, and the churches and monasteries to be reopened.2 The emperor Henry died, universally regretted, in the year 1216.

1 There exists a letter of Henry, giving an account of his victories over the four enemies of the Latin empire-Theodore Laskaris, emperor of Nicæa; Borislas, king of the Bulgarians; Michael, despot of Epirus; and Stratius, a near relation of the terrible Joannes of Bulgaria, who after that king's death governed an independent principality. The letter is dated Pergamus, 1212. -Martenne et Durand, Thesaurus Novus Anecdotorum, tom. i. 821; and Buchon's Villehardoin, 211.

"It would seem from some accounts that Henry took no step to protect his subjects on this occasion until a tumult arose at Constantinople, and twenty thousand Greeks assembled before the gates of the imperial palace, crying out that the emperor ought to rule the state, and defend his subjects against the frock.-Histoire Nouvelle des Anciens Ducs et autres Souverains de l'Archipel., 24.

EXTINCTION OF THE EMPIRE OF ROMANIA.

The eastern empire of Romania, like the western or Germanic Holy Roman empire, was considered elective; but feudal prejudices, and the feudal organisation of the thirteenth century, stamped its government with an hereditary form, and the law of succession adopted in practice was that established for the great fiefs in France. Yoland, sister of the emperors Baldwin and Henry, was the person having a prior claim to the heritage; but as her sex excluded her from the imperial crown, her husband, Peter of Courtenay, was elected emperor by the barons of Romania. Peter was detained in France for some time, collecting a military force strong enough to enable him to visit his new empire with becoming dignity. When his army was assembled he visited Rome, where he received the imperial crown from the hands of Pope Honorius III. He landed in Epirus, to the south of Dyrrachium, with the intention of marching through the territories of Theodore, despot of Epirus, who had succeeded Michael as sovereign of that country; but he had entered into not arrangements with Theodore, hoping to force his way through the mountains by the Via Egnatia without difficulty. He was attacked on his march by the troops of Theodore; his army was routed, and he perished in the prisons of the despot of Epirus.

The empress Yoland reached Constantinople by sea; and as soon as she heard of her husband's captivity and death, undertook the regency in the absence of her eldest son, Philip count of Namur, who was regarded as heir to the imperial crown. Yoland died in 1219; but before her death, she secured the tranquillity of the empire by renewing the treaty of peace with the Greek emperor at Nicæa, Theodore Laskaris.

Philip of Namur refused to quit his Belgian county for

I

1216-1219.

CHAP. IV. the dignity of the emperor of Romania, and his younger brother, Robert, was elected emperor in his stead.

$5.

Conon of Bethune, who had been the principal councillor of the emperor Henry, and had acted as regent in the period that elapsed between the death of Yoland and the arrival of Robert, unfortunately for the empire died shortly after the coronation of Robert.

The race of warriors who had founded the empire was now nearly extinct, and most of their successors possessed neither the military talents nor the warlike disposition of their fathers. The Crusaders had been soldiers by choice, and great barons by accident. They were men who felt the physical necessity of active exertion; their successors were only soldiers from necessity, and because their position compelled them to appear in arms to defend their sovereign's throne and their own fiefs. The training they received may have fitted them for the tilt-yard, but it did not furnish them with the military qualifications required for a campaign. There was also another difference still more injurious to their position. Their fathers had commanded enthusiastic and experienced soldiers; the sons were compelled to lead inexperienced vassals or hired mercenaries. Many of the new barons, too, were younger sons, who possessed no revenues except what they drew from their Eastern fiefs, and consequently no nursery to supply them with the hardy followers who had supported the power of their fathers. Unfortunately for the Latin power, only the weaker-minded portion of the western nobility considered Greece a country in which glory and wealth could be gained; the young barons of Romania, consequently, were generally persons who thought more of enjoying their position than of improving it for the advantage of their posterity. The wealth, both of the emperor Robert and his barons, was consumed in idle pomp, and in what was called upholding the dignity of the imperial court, instead of being devoted to the

ADVENTURE IN THE IMPERIAL PALACE.

131

administrative and military necessities of their respective positions. The number of experienced soldiers daily decreased in the Frank empire, while the Greeks, observing the change, pressed forward with augmented energy. The Frank army was defeated by the emperor John III. Vatatzes, at the battle of Pemaneon, in the year 1224, and shortly after Adrianople was captured by Theodore, the despot of Epirus. From these wounds the empire of Romania never recovered.

The emperor Robert possessed neither the valour required to defend his dominions, nor the prudence necessary to regulate his own conduct. A fearful tragedy, enacted in the imperial palace with the greatest publicity, revealed to the whole world his weakness, and called the attention of all to his vices. The daughter of the knight of Neuville, one of the veteran Crusaders, recently dead, was betrothed to a Burgundian knight, when the young emperor fell in love with the fair face of the lady. His suit, aided by the favour of the mother, won her heart, and he persuaded mother and daughter to take up their residence in the palace. The rejected Burgundian, as soon as he saw his betrothed bride established as the emperor's mistress, vowed to obtain a deep revenge. The unheard-of boldness and daring of his project secured it the most complete success in all its horrible details. He assembled his relatives, friends, and followers; and, with this small band of adherents in complete armour, walked into the palace, where no suspicion of any outrage was entertained. Guided by a friendly assistant, he forced his way into the women's apartments, where the young lady's mother was seized, carried off by his friends, and drowned in the Bosphorus. The daughter was at the same time mutilated by her rejected lover, who cut off her nose and lips, and then left her in this frightful condition filling the palace with her moans, to receive such consolation as her imperial lover could bring. The spirit

A. D. 1224.