The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 5
by
Edward Gibbon

Part 10 out of 14



The favor and success of the Paulicians in the eleventh and
twelfth centuries must be imputed to the strong, though secret,
discontent which armed the most pious Christians against the
church of Rome. Her avarice was oppressive, her despotism
odious; less degenerate perhaps than the Greeks in the worship of
saints and images, her innovations were more rapid and
scandalous: she had rigorously defined and imposed the doctrine
of transubstantiation: the lives of the Latin clergy were more
corrupt, and the Eastern bishops might pass for the successors of
the apostles, if they were compared with the lordly prelates, who
wielded by turns the crosier, the sceptre, and the sword. Three
different roads might introduce the Paulicians into the heart of
Europe. After the conversion of Hungary, the pilgrims who
visited Jerusalem might safely follow the course of the Danube:
in their journey and return they passed through Philippopolis;
and the sectaries, disguising their name and heresy, might
accompany the French or German caravans to their respective
countries. The trade and dominion of Venice pervaded the coast
of the Adriatic, and the hospitable republic opened her bosom to
foreigners of every climate and religion. Under the Byzantine
standard, the Paulicians were often transported to the Greek
provinces of Italy and Sicily: in peace and war, they freely
conversed with strangers and natives, and their opinions were
silently propagated in Rome, Milan, and the kingdoms beyond the
Alps. ^28 It was soon discovered, that many thousand Catholics of
every rank, and of either sex, had embraced the Manichaean
heresy; and the flames which consumed twelve canons of Orleans
was the first act and signal of persecution. The Bulgarians, ^29
a name so innocent in its origin, so odious in its application,
spread their branches over the face of Europe. United in common
hatred of idolatry and Rome, they were connected by a form of
episcopal and presbyterian government; their various sects were
discriminated by some fainter or darker shades of theology; but
they generally agreed in the two principles, the contempt of the
Old Testament and the denial of the body of Christ, either on the
cross or in the eucharist. A confession of simple worship and
blameless manners is extorted from their enemies; and so high was
their standard of perfection, that the increasing congregations
were divided into two classes of disciples, of those who
practised, and of those who aspired. It was in the country of
the Albigeois, ^30 in the southern provinces of France, that the
Paulicians were most deeply implanted; and the same vicissitudes
of martyrdom and revenge which had been displayed in the
neighborhood of the Euphrates, were repeated in the thirteenth
century on the banks of the Rhone. The laws of the Eastern
emperors were revived by Frederic the Second. The insurgents of
Tephrice were represented by the barons and cities of Languedoc:
Pope Innocent III. surpassed the sanguinary fame of Theodora. It
was in cruelty alone that her soldiers could equal the heroes of
the Crusades, and the cruelty of her priests was far excelled by
the founders of the Inquisition; ^31 an office more adapted to
confirm, than to refute, the belief of an evil principle. The
visible assemblies of the Paulicians, or Albigeois, were
extirpated by fire and sword; and the bleeding remnant escaped by
flight, concealment, or Catholic conformity. But the invincible
spirit which they had kindled still lived and breathed in the
Western world. In the state, in the church, and even in the
cloister, a latent succession was preserved of the disciples of
St. Paul; who protested against the tyranny of Rome, embraced the
Bible as the rule of faith, and purified their creed from all the
visions of the Gnostic theology. ^* The struggles of Wickliff in
England, of Huss in Bohemia, were premature and ineffectual; but
the names of Zuinglius, Luther, and Calvin, are pronounced with
gratitude as the deliverers of nations.

[Footnote 28: The introduction of the Paulicians into Italy and
France is amply discussed by Muratori (Antiquitat. Italiae Medii
Aevi, tom. v. dissert. lx. p. 81 - 152) and Mosheim, (p. 379 -
382, 419 - 422.) Yet both have overlooked a curious passage of
William the Apulian, who clearly describes them in a battle
between the Greeks and Normans, A.D. 1040, (in Muratori, Script.
Rerum Ital. tom. v. p. 256: )

Cum Graecis aderant quidam, quos pessimus error

Fecerat amentes, et ab ipso nomen habebant.]

But he is so ignorant of their doctrine as to make them a kind of
Sabellians or Patripassians.]

[Footnote 29: Bulgari, Boulgres, Bougres, a national appellation,
has been applied by the French as a term of reproach to usurers
and unnatural sinners. The Paterini, or Patelini, has been made
to signify a smooth and flattering hypocrite, such as l'Avocat
Patelin of that original and pleasant farce, (Ducange, Gloss.
Latinitat. Medii et Infimi Aevi.) The Manichaeans were likewise
named Cathari or the pure, by corruption. Gazari, &c.]

[Footnote 30: Of the laws, crusade, and persecution against the
Albigeois, a just, though general, idea is expressed by Mosheim,
(p. 477 - 481.) The detail may be found in the ecclesiastical
historians, ancient and modern, Catholics and Protestants; and
amongst these Fleury is the most impartial and moderate.]

[Footnote 31: The Acts (Liber Sententiarum) of the Inquisition of
Tholouse (A.D. 1307 - 1323) have been published by Limborch,
(Amstelodami, 1692,) with a previous History of the Inquisition
in general. They deserved a more learned and critical editor.
As we must not calumniate even Satan, or the Holy Office, I will
observe, that of a list of criminals which fills nineteen folio
pages, only fifteen men and four women were delivered to the
secular arm.]

[Footnote *: The popularity of "Milner's History of the Church"
with some readers, may make it proper to observe, that his
attempt to exculpate the Paulicians from the charge of Gnosticism
or Manicheism is in direct defiance, if not in ignorance, of all
the original authorities. Gibbon himself, it appears, was not
acquainted with the work of Photius, "Contra Manicheos
Repullulantes," the first book of which was edited by Montfaucon,
Bibliotheca Coisliniana, pars ii. p. 349, 375, the whole by Wolf,
in his Anecdota Graeca. Hamburg 1722. Compare a very sensible
tract. Letter to Rev. S. R. Maitland, by J G. Dowling, M. A.
London, 1835. - M.]

A philosopher, who calculates the degree of their merit and
the value of their reformation, will prudently ask from what
articles of faith, above or against our reason, they have
enfranchised the Christians; for such enfranchisement is
doubtless a benefit so far as it may be compatible with truth and
piety. After a fair discussion, we shall rather be surprised by
the timidity, than scandalized by the freedom, of our first
reformers. ^32 With the Jews, they adopted the belief and defence
of all the Hebrew Scriptures, with all their prodigies, from the
garden of Eden to the visions of the prophet Daniel; and they
were bound, like the Catholics, to justify against the Jews the
abolition of a divine law. In the great mysteries of the Trinity
and Incarnation the reformers were severely orthodox: they freely
adopted the theology of the four, or the six first councils; and
with the Athanasian creed, they pronounced the eternal damnation
of all who did not believe the Catholic faith.
Transubstantiation, the invisible change of the bread and wine
into the body and blood of Christ, is a tenet that may defy the
power of argument and pleasantry; but instead of consulting the
evidence of their senses, of their sight, their feeling, and
their taste, the first Protestants were entangled in their own
scruples, and awed by the words of Jesus in the institution of
the sacrament. Luther maintained a corporeal, and Calvin a real,
presence of Christ in the eucharist; and the opinion of
Zuinglius, that it is no more than a spiritual communion, a
simple memorial, has slowly prevailed in the reformed churches.
^33 But the loss of one mystery was amply compensated by the
stupendous doctrines of original sin, redemption, faith, grace,
and predestination, which have been strained from the epistles of
St. Paul. These subtile questions had most assuredly been
prepared by the fathers and schoolmen; but the final improvement
and popular use may be attributed to the first reformers, who
enforced them as the absolute and essential terms of salvation.
Hitherto the weight of supernatural belief inclines against the
Protestants; and many a sober Christian would rather admit that a
wafer is God, than that God is a cruel and capricious tyrant.

[Footnote 32: The opinions and proceedings of the reformers are
exposed in the second part of the general history of Mosheim; but
the balance, which he has held with so clear an eye, and so
steady a hand, begins to incline in favor of his Lutheran
brethren.]

[Footnote 33: Under Edward VI. our reformation was more bold and
perfect, but in the fundamental articles of the church of
England, a strong and explicit declaration against the real
presence was obliterated in the original copy, to please the
people or the Lutherans, or Queen Elizabeth, (Burnet's History of
the Reformation, vol. ii. p. 82, 128, 302.)]

Yet the services of Luther and his rivals are solid and
important; and the philosopher must own his obligations to these
fearless enthusiasts. ^34 I. By their hands the lofty fabric of
superstition, from the abuse of indulgences to the intercesson of
the Virgin, has been levelled with the ground. Myriads of both
sexes of the monastic profession were restored to the liberty and
labors of social life. A hierarchy of saints and angels, of
imperfect and subordinate deities, were stripped of their
temporal power, and reduced to the enjoyment of celestial
happiness; their images and relics were banished from the church;
and the credulity of the people was no longer nourished with the
daily repetition of miracles and visions. The imitation of
Paganism was supplied by a pure and spiritual worship of prayer
and thanksgiving, the most worthy of man, the least unworthy of
the Deity. It only remains to observe, whether such sublime
simplicity be consistent with popular devotion; whether the
vulgar, in the absence of all visible objects, will not be
inflamed by enthusiasm, or insensibly subside in languor and
indifference. II. The chain of authority was broken, which
restrains the bigot from thinking as he pleases, and the slave
from speaking as he thinks: the popes, fathers, and councils,
were no longer the supreme and infallible judges of the world;
and each Christian was taught to acknowledge no law but the
Scriptures, no interpreter but his own conscience. This freedom,
however, was the consequence, rather than the design, of the
Reformation. The patriot reformers were ambitious of succeeding
the tyrants whom they had dethroned. They imposed with equal
rigor their creeds and confessions; they asserted the right of
the magistrate to punish heretics with death. The pious or
personal animosity of Calvin proscribed in Servetus ^35 the guilt
of his own rebellion; ^36 and the flames of Smithfield, in which
he was afterwards consumed, had been kindled for the Anabaptists
by the zeal of Cranmer. ^37 The nature of the tiger wa s the
same, but he was gradually deprived of his teeth and fangs. A
spiritual and temporal kingdom was possessed by the Roman
pontiff; the Protestant doctors were subjects of an humble rank,
without revenue or jurisdiction. His decrees were consecrated by
the antiquity of the Catholic church: their arguments and
disputes were submitted to the people; and their appeal to
private judgment was accepted beyond their wishes, by curiosity
and enthusiasm. Since the days of Luther and Calvin, a secret
reformation has been silently working in the bosom of the
reformed churches; many weeds of prejudice were eradicated; and
the disciples of Erasmus ^38 diffused a spirit of freedom and
moderation. The liberty of conscience has been claimed as a
common benefit, an inalienable right: ^39 the free governments of
Holland ^40 and England ^41 introduced the practice of
toleration; and the narrow allowance of the laws has been
enlarged by the prudence and humanity of the times. In the
exercise, the mind has understood the limits of its powers, and
the words and shadows that might amuse the child can no longer
satisfy his manly reason. The volumes of controversy are
overspread with cobwebs: the doctrine of a Protestant church is
far removed from the knowledge or belief of its private members;
and the forms of orthodoxy, the articles of faith, are subscribed
with a sigh, or a smile, by the modern clergy. Yet the friends
of Christianity are alarmed at the boundless impulse of inquiry
and scepticism. The predictions of the Catholics are
accomplished: the web of mystery is unravelled by the Arminians,
Arians, and Socinians, whose number must not be computed from
their separate congregations; and the pillars of Revelation are
shaken by those men who preserve the name without the substance
of religion, who indulge the license without the temper of
philosophy. ^42 ^*

[Footnote 34: "Had it not been for such men as Luther and
myself," said the fanatic Whiston to Halley the philosopher, "you
would now be kneeling before an image of St. Winifred."]

[Footnote 35: The article of Servet in the Dictionnaire Critique
of Chauffepie is the best account which I have seen of this
shameful transaction. See likewise the Abbe d'Artigny, Nouveaux
Memoires d'Histoire, &c., tom. ii. p. 55 - 154.]

[Footnote 36: I am more deeply scandalized at the single
execution of Servetus, than at the hecatombs which have blazed in
the Auto de Fes of Spain and Portugal. 1. The zeal of Calvin
seems to have been envenomed by personal malice, and perhaps
envy. He accused his adversary before their common enemies, the
judges of Vienna, and betrayed, for his destruction, the sacred
trust of a private correspondence. 2. The deed of cruelty was
not varnished by the pretence of danger to the church or state.
In his passage through Geneva, Servetus was a harmless stranger,
who neither preached, nor printed, nor made proselytes. 3. A
Catholic inquisition yields the same obedience which he requires,
but Calvin violated the golden rule of doing as he would be done
by; a rule which I read in a moral treatise of Isocrates (in
Nicocle, tom. i. p. 93, edit. Battie) four hundred years before
the publication of the Gospel.

Note: Gibbon has not accurately rendered the sense of this
passage, which does not contain the maxim of charity Do unto
others as you would they should do unto you, but simply the maxim
of justice, Do not to others the which would offend you if they
should do it to you. - G.]

[Footnote 37: See Burnet, vol. ii. p. 84 - 86. The sense and
humanity of the young king were oppressed by the authority of the
primate.]

[Footnote 38: Erasmus may be considered as the father of rational
theology. After a slumber of a hundred years, it was revived by
the Arminians of Holland, Grotius, Limborch, and Le Clerc; in
England by Chillingworth, the latitudinarians of Cambridge,
(Burnet, Hist. of Own Times, vol. i. p. 261 - 268, octavo
edition.) Tillotson, Clarke, Hoadley, &c.]

[Footnote 39: I am sorry to observe, that the three writers of
the last age, by whom the rights of toleration have been so nobly
defended, Bayle, Leibnitz, and Locke, are all laymen and
philosophers.]

[Footnote 40: See the excellent chapter of Sir William Temple on
the Religion of the United Provinces. I am not satisfied with
Grotius, (de Rebus Belgicis, Annal. l. i. p. 13, 14, edit. in
12mo.,) who approves the Imperial laws of persecution, and only
condemns the bloody tribunal of the inquisition.]

[Footnote 41: Sir William Blackstone (Commentaries, vol. iv. p.
53, 54) explains the law of England as it was fixed at the
Revolution. The exceptions of Papists, and of those who deny the
Trinity, would still have a tolerable scope for persecution if
the national spirit were not more effectual than a hundred
statutes.]

[Footnote 42: I shall recommend to public animadversion two
passages in Dr. Priestley, which betray the ultimate tendency of
his opinions. At the first of these (Hist. of the Corruptions of
Christianity, vol. i. p. 275, 276) the priest, at the second
(vol. ii. p. 484) the magistrate, may tremble!]

[Footnote *: There is something ludicrous, if it were not
offensive, in Gibbon holding up to "public animadversion" the
opinions of any believer in Christianity, however imperfect his
creed. The observations which the whole of this passage on the
effects of the reformation, in which much truth and justice is
mingled with much prejudice, would suggest, could not possibly be
compressed into a note; and would indeed embrace the whole
religious and irreligious history of the time which has elapsed
since Gibbon wrote. - M.]



Chapter LV: The Bulgarians, The Hungarians And The Russians.

Part I.

The Bulgarians. - Origin, Migrations, And Settlement Of The
Hungarians. - Their Inroads In The East And West. - The Monarchy
Of Russia. - Geography And Trade. - Wars Of The Russians Against
The Greek Empire. - Conversion Of The Barbarians.

Under the reign of Constantine the grandson of Heraclius,
the ancient barrier of the Danube, so often violated and so often
restored, was irretrievably swept away by a new deluge of
Barbarians. Their progress was favored by the caliphs, their
unknown and accidental auxiliaries: the Roman legions were
occupied in Asia; and after the loss of Syria, Egypt, and Africa,
the Caesars were twice reduced to the danger and disgrace of
defending their capital against the Saracens. If, in the account
of this interesting people, I have deviated from the strict and
original line of my undertaking, the merit of the subject will
hide my transgression, or solicit my excuse. In the East, in the
West, in war, in religion, in science, in their prosperity, and
in their decay, the Arabians press themselves on our curiosity:
the first overthrow of the church and empire of the Greeks may be
imputed to their arms; and the disciples of Mahomet still hold
the civil and religious sceptre of the Oriental world. But the
same labor would be unworthily bestowed on the swarms of savages,
who, between the seventh and the twelfth century, descended from
the plains of Scythia, in transient inroad or perpetual
emigration. ^1 Their names are uncouth, their origins doubtful,
their actions obscure, their superstition was blind, their valor
brutal, and the uniformity of their public and private lives was
neither softened by innocence nor refined by policy. The majesty
of the Byzantine throne repelled and survived their disorderly
attacks; the greater part of these Barbarians has disappeared
without leaving any memorial of their existence, and the
despicable remnant continues, and may long continue, to groan
under the dominion of a foreign tyrant. From the antiquities of,
I. Bulgarians, II. Hungarians, and, III. Russians, I shall
content myself with selecting such facts as yet deserve to be
remembered. The conquests of the, IV. Normans, and the monarchy
of the, V. Turks, will naturally terminate in the memorable
Crusades to the Holy Land, and the double fall of the city and
empire of Constantine.

[Footnote 1: All the passages of the Byzantine history which
relate to the Barbarians are compiled, methodized, and
transcribed, in a Latin version, by the laborious John Gotthelf
Stritter, in his "Memoriae Populorum, ad Danubium, Pontum
Euxinum, Paludem Maeotidem, Caucasum, Mare Caspium, et inde Magis
ad Septemtriones incolentium." Petropoli, 1771 - 1779; in four
tomes, or six volumes, in 4to. But the fashion has not enhanced
the price of these raw materials.]

I. In his march to Italy, Theodoric ^2 the Ostrogoth had
trampled on the arms of the Bulgarians. After this defeat, the
name and the nation are lost during a century and a half; and it
may be suspected that the same or a similar appellation was
revived by strange colonies from the Borysthenes, the Tanais, or
the Volga. A king of the ancient Bulgaria, bequeathed to his
five sons a last lesson of moderation and concord. It was
received as youth has ever received the counsels of age and
experience: the five princes buried their father; divided his
subjects and cattle; forgot his advice; separated from each
other; and wandered in quest of fortune till we find the most
adventurous in the heart of Italy, under the protection of the
exarch of Ravenna. ^4 But the stream of emigration was directed
or impelled towards the capital. The modern Bulgaria, along the
southern banks of the Danube, was stamped with the name and image
which it has retained to the present hour: the new conquerors
successively acquired, by war or treaty, the Roman provinces of
Dardania, Thessaly, and the two Epirus; ^5 the ecclesiastical
supremacy was translated from the native city of Justinian; and,
in their prosperous age, the obscure town of Lychnidus, or
Achrida, was honored with the throne of a king and a patriarch.
^6 The unquestionable evidence of language attests the descent of
the Bulgarians from the original stock of the Sclavonian, or more
properly Slavonian, race; ^7 and the kindred bands of Servians,
Bosnians, Rascians, Croatians, Walachians, ^8 &c., followed
either the standard or the example of the leading tribe. From
the Euxine to the Adriatic, in the state of captives, or
subjects, or allies, or enemies, of the Greek empire, they
overspread the land; and the national appellation of the slaves
^9 has been degraded by chance or malice from the signification
of glory to that of servitude. ^10 Among these colonies, the
Chrobatians, ^11 or Croats, who now attend the motions of an
Austrian army, are the descendants of a mighty people, the
conquerors and sovereigns of Dalmatia. The maritime cities, and
of these the infant republic of Ragusa, implored the aid and
instructions of the Byzantine court: they were advised by the
magnanimous Basil to reserve a small acknowledgment of their
fidelity to the Roman empire, and to appease, by an annual
tribute, the wrath of these irresistible Barbarians. The kingdom
of Crotia was shared by eleven Zoupans, or feudatory lords; and
their united forces were numbered at sixty thousand horse and one
hundred thousand foot. A long sea-coast, indented with capacious
harbors, covered with a string of islands, and almost in sight of
the Italian shores, disposed both the natives and strangers to
the practice of navigation. The boats or brigantines of the
Croats were constructed after the fashion of the old Liburnians:
one hundred and eighty vessels may excite the idea of a
respectable navy; but our seamen will smile at the allowance of
ten, or twenty, or forty, men for each of these ships of war.
They were gradually converted to the more honorable service of
commerce; yet the Sclavonian pirates were still frequent and
dangerous; and it was not before the close of the tenth century
that the freedom and sovereignty of the Gulf were effectually
vindicated by the Venetian republic. ^12 The ancestors of these
Dalmatian kings were equally removed from the use and abuse of
navigation: they dwelt in the White Croatia, in the inland
regions of Silesia and Little Poland, thirty days' journey,
according to the Greek computation, from the sea of darkness.

[Footnote 2: Hist. vol. iv. p. 11.]

[Footnote 3: Theophanes, p. 296 - 299. Anastasius, p. 113.
Nicephorus, C. P. p. 22, 23. Theophanes places the old Bulgaria
on the banks of the Atell or Volga; but he deprives himself of
all geographical credit by discharging that river into the Euxine
Sea.]

[Footnote 4: Paul. Diacon. de Gestis Langobard. l. v. c. 29, p.
881, 882. The apparent difference between the Lombard historian
and the above- mentioned Greeks, is easily reconciled by Camillo
Pellegrino (de Ducatu Beneventano, dissert. vii. in the
Scriptores Rerum Ital. tom. v. p. 186, 187) and Beretti,
(Chorograph. Italiae Medii Aevi, p. 273, &c. This Bulgarian
colony was planted in a vacant district of Samnium, and learned
the Latin, without forgetting their native language.]

[Footnote 5: These provinces of the Greek idiom and empire are
assigned to the Bulgarian kingdom in the dispute of
ecclesiastical jurisdiction between the patriarchs of Rome and
Constantinople, (Baronius, Annal. Eccles. A.D. 869, No. 75.)]

[Footnote 6: The situation and royalty of Lychnidus, or Achrida,
are clearly expressed in Cedrenus, (p. 713.) The removal of an
archbishop or patriarch from Justinianea prima to Lychnidus, and
at length to Ternovo, has produced some perplexity in the ideas
or language of the Greeks, (Nicephorus Gregoras, l. ii. c. 2, p.
14, 15. Thomassin, Discipline de l'Eglise, tom. i. l. i. c. 19,
23;) and a Frenchman (D'Anville) is more accurately skilled in
the geography of their own country, (Hist. de l'Academie des
Inscriptions, tom. xxxi.)]

[Footnote 7: Chalcocondyles, a competent judge, affirms the
identity of the language of the Dalmatians, Bosnians, Servians,
Bulgarians, Poles, (de Rebus Turcicis, l. x. p. 283,) and
elsewhere of the Bohemians, (l. ii. p. 38.) The same author has
marked the separate idiom of the Hungarians.

Note: The Slavonian languages are no doubt Indo-European,
though an original branch of that great family, comprehending the
various dialects named by Gibbon and others. Shafarik, t. 33. -
M. 1845.]

[Footnote 8: See the work of John Christopher de Jordan, de
Originibus Sclavicis, Vindobonae, 1745, in four parts, or two
volumes in folio. His collections and researches are useful to
elucidate the antiquities of Bohemia and the adjacent countries;
but his plan is narrow, his style barbarous, his criticism
shallow, and the Aulic counsellor is not free from the prejudices
of a Bohemian.

Note: We have at length a profound and satisfactory work on
the Slavonian races. Shafarik, Slawische Alterthumer. B. 2,
Leipzig, 1843. - M. 1845.]

[Footnote 9: Jordan subscribes to the well-known and probable
derivation from Slava, laus, gloria, a word of familiar use in
the different dialects and parts of speech, and which forms the
termination of the most illustrious names, (de Originibus
Sclavicis, pars. i. p. 40, pars. iv. p. 101, 102)]

[Footnote 10: This conversion of a national into an appellative
name appears to have arisen in the viiith century, in the
Oriental France, where the princes and bishops were rich in
Sclavonian captives, not of the Bohemian, (exclaims Jordan,) but
of Sorabian race. From thence the word was extended to the
general use, to the modern languages, and even to the style of
the last Byzantines, (see the Greek and Latin Glossaries and
Ducange.) The confusion of the Servians with the Latin Servi, was
still more fortunate and familiar, (Constant. Porphyr. de
Administrando, Imperio, c. 32, p. 99.)]

[Footnote 11: The emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus, most
accurate for his own times, most fabulous for preceding ages,
describes the Sclavonians of Dalmatia, (c. 29 - 36.)]

[Footnote 12: See the anonymous Chronicle of the xith century,
ascribed to John Sagorninus, (p. 94 - 102,) and that composed in
the xivth by the Doge Andrew Dandolo, (Script. Rerum. Ital. tom.
xii. p. 227 - 230,) the two oldest monuments of the history of
Venice.]

The glory of the Bulgarians ^13 was confined to a narrow
scope both of time and place. In the ninth and tenth centuries,
they reigned to the south of the Danube; but the more powerful
nations that had followed their emigration repelled all return to
the north and all progress to the west. Yet in the obscure
catalogue of their exploits, they might boast an honor which had
hitherto been appropriated to the Goths: that of slaying in
battle one of the successors of Augustus and Constantine. The
emperor Nicephorus had lost his fame in the Arabian, he lost his
life in the Sclavonian, war. In his first operations he advanced
with boldness and success into the centre of Bulgaria, and burnt
the royal court, which was probably no more than an edifice and
village of timber. But while he searched the spoil and refused
all offers of treaty, his enemies collected their spirits and
their forces: the passes of retreat were insuperably barred; and
the trembling Nicephorus was heard to exclaim, "Alas, alas!
unless we could assume the wings of birds, we cannot hope to
escape." Two days he waited his fate in the inactivity of
despair; but, on the morning of the third, the Bulgarians
surprised the camp, and the Roman prince, with the great officers
of the empire, were slaughtered in their tents. The body of
Valens had been saved from insult; but the head of Nicephorus was
exposed on a spear, and his skull, enchased with gold, was often
replenished in the feasts of victory. The Greeks bewailed the
dishonor of the throne; but they acknowledged the just punishment
of avarice and cruelty. This savage cup was deeply tinctured
with the manners of the Scythian wilderness; but they were
softened before the end of the same century by a peaceful
intercourse with the Greeks, the possession of a cultivated
region, and the introduction of the Christian worship. The
nobles of Bulgaria were educated in the schools and palace of
Constantinople; and Simeon, ^14 a youth of the royal line, was
instructed in the rhetoric of Demosthenes and the logic of
Aristotle. He relinquished the profession of a monk for that of
a king and warrior; and in his reign of more than forty years,
Bulgaria assumed a rank among the civilized powers of the earth.
The Greeks, whom he repeatedly attacked, derived a faint
consolation from indulging themselves in the reproaches of
perfidy and sacrilege. They purchased the aid of the Pagan
Turks; but Simeon, in a second battle, redeemed the loss of the
first, at a time when it was esteemed a victory to elude the arms
of that formidable nation. The Servians were overthrown, made
captive and dispersed; and those who visited the country before
their restoration could discover no more than fifty vagrants,
without women or children, who extorted a precarious subsistence
from the chase. On classic ground, on the banks of Achelous, the
greeks were defeated; their horn was broken by the strength of
the Barbaric Hercules. ^15 He formed the siege of Constantinople;
and, in a personal conference with the emperor, Simeon imposed
the conditions of peace. They met with the most jealous
precautions: the royal gallery was drawn close to an artificial
and well-fortified platform; and the majesty of the purple was
emulated by the pomp of the Bulgarian. "Are you a Christian?"
said the humble Romanus: "it is your duty to abstain from the
blood of your fellow- Christians. Has the thirst of riches
seduced you from the blessings of peace? Sheathe your sword, open
your hand, and I will satiate the utmost measure of your
desires." The reconciliation was sealed by a domestic alliance;
the freedom of trade was granted or restored; the first honors of
the court were secured to the friends of Bulgaria, above the
ambassadors of enemies or strangers; ^16 and her princes were
dignified with the high and invidious title of Basileus, or
emperor. But this friendship was soon disturbed: after the death
of Simeon, the nations were again in arms; his feeble successors
were divided and extinguished; and, in the beginning of the
eleventh century, the second Basil, who was born in the purple,
deserved the appellation of conqueror of the Bulgarians. His
avarice was in some measure gratified by a treasure of four
hundred thousand pounds sterling, (ten thousand pounds' weight of
gold,) which he found in the palace of Lychnidus. His cruelty
inflicted a cool and exquisite vengeance on fifteen thousand
captives who had been guilty of the defence of their country.
They were deprived of sight; but to one of each hundred a single
eye was left, that he might conduct his blind century to the
presence of their king. Their king is said to have expired of
grief and horror; the nation was awed by this terrible example;
the Bulgarians were swept away from their settlements, and
circumscribed within a narrow province; the surviving chiefs
bequeathed to their children the advice of patience and the duty
of revenge.

[Footnote 13: The first kingdom of the Bulgarians may be found,
under the proper dates, in the Annals of Cedrenus and Zonaras.
The Byzantine materials are collected by Stritter, (Memoriae
Populorum, tom. ii. pars ii. p. 441 - 647;) and the series of
their kings is disposed and settled by Ducange, (Fam. Byzant. p.
305 - 318.)

[Footnote 14: Simeonem semi-Graecum esse aiebant, eo quod a
pueritia Byzantii Demosthenis rhetoricam et Aristotelis
syllogismos didicerat, (Liutprand, l. iii. c. 8.) He says in
another place, Simeon, fortis bella tor, Bulgariae praeerat;
Christianus, sed vicinis Graecis valde inimicus, (l. i. c. 2.)]

[Footnote 15: - Rigidum fera dextera cornu
Dum tenet, infregit, truncaque a fronte revellit.
Ovid (Metamorph. ix. 1 - 100) has boldly painted the combat of
the river god and the hero; the native and the stranger.]

[Footnote 16: The ambassador of Otho was provoked by the Greek
excuses, cum Christophori filiam Petrus Bulgarorum Vasileus
conjugem duceret, Symphona, id est consonantia scripto juramento
firmata sunt, ut omnium gentium Apostolis, id est nunciis, penes
nos Bulgarorum Apostoli praeponantur, honorentur, diligantur,
(Liutprand in Legatione, p. 482.) See the Ceremoniale of
Constantine Porphyrogenitus, tom. i. p. 82, tom. ii. p. 429, 430,
434, 435, 443, 444, 446, 447, with the annotations of Reiske.]

II. When the black swarm of Hungarians first hung over
Europe, above nine hundred years after the Christian aera, they
were mistaken by fear and superstition for the Gog and Magog of
the Scriptures, the signs and forerunners of the end of the
world. ^17 Since the introduction of letters, they have explored
their own antiquities with a strong and laudable impulse of
patriotic curiosity. ^18 Their rational criticism can no longer
be amused with a vain pedigree of Attila and the Huns; but they
complain that their primitive records have perished in the Tartar
war; that the truth or fiction of their rustic songs is long
since forgotten; and that the fragments of a rude chronicle ^19
must be painfully reconciled with the contemporary though foreign
intelligence of the imperial geographer. ^20 Magiar is the
national and oriental denomination of the Hungarians; but, among
the tribes of Scythia, they are distinguished by the Greeks under
the proper and peculiar name of Turks, as the descendants of that
mighty people who had conquered and reigned from China to the
Volga. The Pannonian colony preserved a correspondence of trade
and amity with the eastern Turks on the confines of Persia and
after a separation of three hundred and fifty years, the
missionaries of the king of Hungary discovered and visited their
ancient country near the banks of the Volga. They were
hospitably entertained by a people of Pagans and Savages who
still bore the name of Hungarians; conversed in their native
tongue, recollected a tradition of their long-lost brethren, and
listened with amazement to the marvellous tale of their new
kingdom and religion. The zeal of conversion was animated by the
interest of consanguinity; and one of the greatest of their
princes had formed the generous, though fruitless, design of
replenishing the solitude of Pannonia by this domestic colony
from the heart of Tartary. ^21 From this primitive country they
were driven to the West by the tide of war and emigration, by the
weight of the more distant tribes, who at the same time were
fugitives and conquerors. ^* Reason or fortune directed their
course towards the frontiers of the Roman empire: they halted in
the usual stations along the banks of the great rivers; and in
the territories of Moscow, Kiow, and Moldavia, some vestiges have
been discovered of their temporary residence. In this long and
various peregrination, they could not always escape the dominion
of the stronger; and the purity of their blood was improved or
sullied by the mixture of a foreign race: from a motive of
compulsion, or choice, several tribes of the Chazars were
associated to the standard of their ancient vassals; introduced
the use of a second language; and obtained by their superior
renown the most honorable place in the front of battle. The
military force of the Turks and their allies marched in seven
equal and artificial divisions; each division was formed of
thirty thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven warriors, and the
proportion of women, children, and servants, supposes and
requires at least a million of emigrants. Their public counsels
were directed by seven vayvods, or hereditary chiefs; but the
experience of discord and weakness recommended the more simple
and vigorous administration of a single person. The sceptre,
which had been declined by the modest Lebedias, was granted to
the birth or merit of Almus and his son Arpad, and the authority
of the supreme khan of the Chazars confirmed the engagement of
the prince and people; of the people to obey his commands, of the
prince to consult their happiness and glory.

[Footnote 17: A bishop of Wurtzburgh submitted his opinion to a
reverend abbot; but he more gravely decided, that Gog and Magog
were the spiritual persecutors of the church; since Gog signifies
the root, the pride of the Heresiarchs, and Magog what comes from
the root, the propagation of their sects. Yet these men once
commanded the respect of mankind, (Fleury, Hist. Eccles. tom. xi.
p. 594, &c.)]

[Footnote 18: The two national authors, from whom I have derived
the mos assistance, are George Pray (Dissertationes and Annales
veterum Hun garorum, &c., Vindobonae, 1775, in folio) and Stephen
Katona, (Hist. Critica Ducum et Regum Hungariae Stirpis
Arpadianae, Paestini, 1778 - 1781, 5 vols. in octavo.) The first
embraces a large and often conjectural space; the latter, by his
learning, judgment, and perspicuity, deserves the name of a
critical historian.

Note: Compare Engel Geschichte des Ungrischen Reichs und
seiner Neben lander, Halle, 1797, and Mailath, Geschichte der
Magyaren, Wien, 1828. In an appendix to the latter work will be
found a brief abstract of the speculations (for it is difficult
to consider them more) which have been advanced by the learned,
on the origin of the Magyar and Hungarian names. Compare vol. vi.
p. 35, note. - M.]

[Footnote 19: The author of this Chronicle is styled the notary
of King Bela. Katona has assigned him to the xiith century, and
defends his character against the hypercriticism of Pray. This
rude annalist must have transcribed some historical records,
since he could affirm with dignity, rejectis falsis fabulis
rusticorum, et garrulo cantu joculatorum. In the xvth century,
these fables were collected by Thurotzius, and embellished by the
Italian Bonfinius. See the Preliminary Discourse in the Hist.
Critica Ducum, p. 7 - 33.]

[Footnote 20: See Constantine de Administrando Imperio, c. 3, 4,
13, 38 - 42, Katona has nicely fixed the composition of this work
to the years 949, 950, 951, (p. 4 - 7.) The critical historian
(p. 34 - 107) endeavors to prove the existence, and to relate the
actions, of a first duke Almus the father of Arpad, who is
tacitly rejected by Constantine.]

[Footnote 21: Pray (Dissert. p. 37 - 39, &c.) produces and
illustrates the original passages of the Hungarian missionaries,
Bonfinius and Aeneas Sylvius.]

[Footnote *: In the deserts to the south-east of Astrakhan have
been found the ruins of a city named Madchar, which proves the
residence of the Hungarians or Magiar in those regions. Precis
de la Geog. Univ. par Malte Brun, vol. i. p. 353. - G.

This is contested by Klaproth in his Travels, c. xxi.
Madschar, (he states) in old Tartar, means "stone building." This
was a Tartar city mentioned by the Mahometan writers. - M.]

With this narrative we might be reasonably content, if the
penetration of modern learning had not opened a new and larger
prospect of the antiquities of nations. The Hungarian language
stands alone, and as it were insulated, among the Sclavonian
dialects; but it bears a close and clear affinity to the idioms
of the Fennic race, ^22 of an obsolete and savage race, which
formerly occupied the northern regions of Asia and Europe. ^* The
genuine appellation of Ugri or Igours is found on the western
confines of China; ^23 their migration to the banks of the Irtish
is attested by Tartar evidence; ^24 a similar name and language
are detected in the southern parts of Siberia; ^25 and the
remains of the Fennic tribes are widely, though thinly scattered
from the sources of the Oby to the shores of Lapland. ^26 The
consanguinity of the Hungarians and Laplanders would display the
powerful energy of climate on the children of a common parent;
the lively contrast between the bold adventurers who are
intoxicated with the wines of the Danube, and the wretched
fugitives who are immersed beneath the snows of the polar circle.

Arms and freedom have ever been the ruling, though too often the
unsuccessful, passion of the Hungarians, who are endowed by
nature with a vigorous constitution of soul and body. ^27 Extreme
cold has diminished the stature and congealed the faculties of
the Laplanders; and the arctic tribes, alone among the sons of
men, are ignorant of war, and unconscious of human blood; a happy
ignorance, if reason and virtue were the guardians of their
peace! ^28

[Footnote 22: Fischer in the Quaestiones Petropolitanae, de
Origine Ungrorum, and Pray, Dissertat. i. ii. iii. &c., have
drawn up several comparative tables of the Hungarian with the
Fennic dialects. The affinity is indeed striking, but the lists
are short; the words are purposely chosen; and I read in the
learned Bayer, (Comment. Academ. Petropol. tom. x. p. 374,) that
although the Hungarian has adopted many Fennic words, (innumeras
voces,) it essentially differs toto genio et natura.]

[Footnote *: The connection between the Magyar language and that
of the Finns is now almost generally admitted. Klaproth, Asia
Polyglotta, p. 188, &c. Malte Bran, tom. vi. p. 723, &c. - M.]

[Footnote 23: In the religion of Turfan, which is clearly and
minutely described by the Chinese Geographers, (Gaubil, Hist. du
Grand Gengiscan, 13; De Guignes, Hist. des Huns, tom. ii. p. 31,
&c.)]

[Footnote 24: Hist. Genealogique des Tartars, par Abulghazi
Bahadur Khan partie ii. p. 90 - 98.]

[Footnote 25: In their journey to Pekin, both Isbrand Ives
(Harris's Collection of Voyages and Travels, vol. ii. p. 920,
921) and Bell (Travels, vol. i p. 174) found the Vogulitz in the
neighborhood of Tobolsky. By the tortures of the etymological
art, Ugur and Vogul are reduced to the same name; the
circumjacent mountains really bear the appellation of Ugrian; and
of all the Fennic dialects, the Vogulian is the nearest to the
Hungarian, (Fischer, Dissert. i. p. 20 - 30. Pray. Dissert. ii.
p. 31 - 34.)]

[Footnote 26: The eight tribes of the Fennic race are described
in the curious work of M. Leveque, (Hist. des Peuples soumis a la
Domination de la Russie, tom. ii. p. 361 - 561.)]

[Footnote 27: This picture of the Hungarians and Bulgarians is
chiefly drawn from the Tactics of Leo, p. 796 - 801, and the
Latin Annals, which are alleged by Baronius, Pagi, and Muratori,
A.D. 889, &c.]

[Footnote 28: Buffon, Hist. Naturelle, tom. v. p. 6, in 12mo.
Gustavus Adolphus attempted, without success, to form a regiment
of Laplanders. Grotius says of these arctic tribes, arma arcus et
pharetra, sed adversus feras, (Annal. l. iv. p. 236;) and
attempts, after the manner of Tacitus, to varnish with philosophy
their brutal ignorance.]



Chapter LV: The Bulgarians, The Hungarians And The Russians.

Part II.

It is the observation of the Imperial author of the Tactics,
^29 that all the Scythian hordes resembled each other in their
pastoral and military life, that they all practised the same
means of subsistence, and employed the same instruments of
destruction. But he adds, that the two nations of Bulgarians and
Hungarians were superior to their brethren, and similar to each
other in the improvements, however rude, of their discipline and
government: their visible likeness determines Leo to confound his
friends and enemies in one common description; and the picture
may be heightened by some strokes from their contemporaries of
the tenth century. Except the merit and fame of military
prowess, all that is valued by mankind appeared vile and
contemptible to these Barbarians, whose native fierceness was
stimulated by the consciousness of numbers and freedom. The
tents of the Hungarians were of leather, their garments of fur;
they shaved their hair, and scarified their faces: in speech they
were slow, in action prompt, in treaty perfidious; and they
shared the common reproach of Barbarians, too ignorant to
conceive the importance of truth, too proud to deny or palliate
the breach of their most solemn engagements. Their simplicity
has been praised; yet they abstained only from the luxury they
had never known; whatever they saw they coveted; their desires
were insatiate, and their sole industry was the hand of violence
and rapine. By the definition of a pastoral nation, I have
recalled a long description of the economy, the warfare, and the
government that prevail in that state of society; I may add, that
to fishing, as well as to the chase, the Hungarians were indebted
for a part of their subsistence; and since they seldom cultivated
the ground, they must, at least in their new settlements, have
sometimes practised a slight and unskilful husbandry. In their
emigrations, perhaps in their expeditions, the host was
accompanied by thousands of sheep and oxen which increased the
cloud of formidable dust, and afforded a constant and wholesale
supply of milk and animal food. A plentiful command of forage
was the first care of the general, and if the flocks and herds
were secure of their pastures, the hardy warrior was alike
insensible of danger and fatigue. The confusion of men and
cattle that overspread the country exposed their camp to a
nocturnal surprise, had not a still wider circuit been occupied
by their light cavalry, perpetually in motion to discover and
delay the approach of the enemy. After some experience of the
Roman tactics, they adopted the use of the sword and spear, the
helmet of the soldier, and the iron breastplate of his steed: but
their native and deadly weapon was the Tartar bow: from the
earliest infancy their children and servants were exercised in
the double science of archery and horsemanship; their arm was
strong; their aim was sure; and in the most rapid career, they
were taught to throw themselves backwards, and to shoot a volley
of arrows into the air. In open combat, in secret ambush, in
flight, or pursuit, they were equally formidable; an appearance
of order was maintained in the foremost ranks, but their charge
was driven forwards by the impatient pressure of succeeding
crowds. They pursued, headlong and rash, with loosened reins and
horrific outcries; but, if they fled, with real or dissembled
fear, the ardor of a pursuing foe was checked and chastised by
the same habits of irregular speed and sudden evolution. In the
abuse of victory, they astonished Europe, yet smarting from the
wounds of the Saracen and the Dane: mercy they rarely asked, and
more rarely bestowed: both sexes were accused is equally
inaccessible to pity, and their appetite for raw flesh might
countenance the popular tale, that they drank the blood, and
feasted on the hearts of the slain. Yet the Hungarians were not
devoid of those principles of justice and humanity, which nature
has implanted in every bosom. The license of public and private
injuries was restrained by laws and punishments; and in the
security of an open camp, theft is the most tempting and most
dangerous offence. Among the Barbarians there were many, whose
spontaneous virtue supplied their laws and corrected their
manners, who performed the duties, and sympathized with the
affections, of social life.

[Footnote 29: Leo has observed, that the government of the Turks
was monarchical, and that their punishments were rigorous,
(Tactic. p. 896) Rhegino (in Chron. A.D. 889) mentions theft as a
capital crime, and his jurisprudence is confirmed by the original
code of St. Stephen, (A.D. 1016.) If a slave were guilty, he was
chastised, for the first time, with the loss of his nose, or a
fine of five heifers; for the second, with the loss of his ears,
or a similar fine; for the third, with death; which the freeman
did not incur till the fourth offence, as his first penalty was
the loss of liberty, (Katona, Hist. Regum Hungar tom. i. p. 231,
232.)]

After a long pilgrimage of flight or victory, the Turkish
hordes approached the common limits of the French and Byzantine
empires. Their first conquests and final settlements extended on
either side of the Danube above Vienna, below Belgrade, and
beyond the measure of the Roman province of Pannonia, or the
modern kingdom of Hungary. ^30 That ample and fertile land was
loosely occupied by the Moravians, a Sclavonian name and tribe,
which were driven by the invaders into the compass of a narrow
province. Charlemagne had stretched a vague and nominal empire as
far as the edge of Transylvania; but, after the failure of his
legitimate line, the dukes of Moravia forgot their obedience and
tribute to the monarchs of Oriental France. The bastard Arnulph
was provoked to invite the arms of the Turks: they rushed through
the real or figurative wall, which his indiscretion had thrown
open; and the king of Germany has been justly reproached as a
traitor to the civil and ecclesiastical society of the
Christians. During the life of Arnulph, the Hungarians were
checked by gratitude or fear; but in the infancy of his son Lewis
they discovered and invaded Bavaria; and such was their Scythian
speed, that in a single day a circuit of fifty miles was stripped
and consumed. In the battle of Augsburgh the Christians
maintained their advantage till the seventh hour of the day, they
were deceived and vanquished by the flying stratagems of the
Turkish cavalry. The conflagration spread over the provinces of
Bavaria, Swabia, and Franconia; and the Hungarians ^31 promoted
the reign of anarchy, by forcing the stoutest barons to
discipline their vassals and fortify their castles. The origin of
walled towns is ascribed to this calamitous period; nor could any
distance be secure against an enemy, who, almost at the same
instant, laid in ashes the Helvetian monastery of St. Gall, and
the city of Bremen, on the shores of the northern ocean. Above
thirty years the Germanic empire, or kingdom, was subject to the
ignominy of tribute; and resistance was disarmed by the menace,
the serious and effectual menace of dragging the women and
children into captivity, and of slaughtering the males above the
age of ten years. I have neither power nor inclination to follow
the Hungarians beyond the Rhine; but I must observe with
surprise, that the southern provinces of France were blasted by
the tempest, and that Spain, behind her Pyrenees, was astonished
at the approach of these formidable strangers. ^32 The vicinity
of Italy had tempted their early inroads; but from their camp on
the Brenta, they beheld with some terror the apparent strength
and populousness of the new discovered country. They requested
leave to retire; their request was proudly rejected by the
Italian king; and the lives of twenty thousand Christians paid
the forfeit of his obstinacy and rashness. Among the cities of
the West, the royal Pavia was conspicuous in fame and splendor;
and the preeminence of Rome itself was only derived from the
relics of the apostles. The Hungarians appeared; Pavia was in
flames; forty-three churches were consumed; and, after the
massacre of the people, they spared about two hundred wretches
who had gathered some bushels of gold and silver (a vague
exaggeration) from the smoking ruins of their country. In these
annual excursions from the Alps to the neighborhood of Rome and
Capua, the churches, that yet escaped, resounded with a fearful
litany: "O, save and deliver us from the arrows of the
Hungarians!" But the saints were deaf or inexorable; and the
torrent rolled forwards, till it was stopped by the extreme land
of Calabria. ^33 A composition was offered and accepted for the
head of each Italian subject; and ten bushels of silver were
poured forth in the Turkish camp. But falsehood is the natural
antagonist of violence; and the robbers were defrauded both in
the numbers of the assessment and the standard of the metal. On
the side of the East, the Hungarians were opposed in doubtful
conflict by the equal arms of the Bulgarians, whose faith forbade
an alliance with the Pagans, and whose situation formed the
barrier of the Byzantine empire. The barrier was overturned; the
emperor of Constantinople beheld the waving banners of the Turks;
and one of their boldest warriors presumed to strike a battle-axe
into the golden gate. The arts and treasures of the Greeks
diverted the assault; but the Hungarians might boast, in their
retreat, that they had imposed a tribute on the spirit of
Bulgaria and the majesty of the Caesars. ^34 The remote and rapid
operations of the same campaign appear to magnify the power and
numbers of the Turks; but their courage is most deserving of
praise, since a light troop of three or four hundred horse would
often attempt and execute the most daring inroads to the gates of
Thessalonica and Constantinople. At this disastrous aera of the
ninth and tenth centuries, Europe was afflicted by a triple
scourge from the North, the East, and the South: the Norman, the
Hungarian, and the Saracen, sometimes trod the same ground of
desolation; and these savage foes might have been compared by
Homer to the two lions growling over the carcass of a mangled
stag. ^35 [Footnote 30: See Katona, Hist. Ducum Hungar. p. 321 -
352.]

[Footnote 31: Hungarorum gens, cujus omnes fere nationes expertae
saevitium &c., is the preface of Liutprand, (l. i. c. 2,) who
frequently expatiated on the calamities of his own times. See l.
i. c. 5, l. ii. c. 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7; l. iii. c. 1, &c., l. v. c.
8, 15, in Legat. p. 485. His colors are glaring but his
chronology must be rectified by Pagi and Muratori.]

[Footnote 32: The three bloody reigns of Arpad, Zoltan, and
Toxus, are critically illustrated by Katona, (Hist. Ducum, &c. p.
107 - 499.) His diligence has searched both natives and
foreigners; yet to the deeds of mischief, or glory, I have been
able to add the destruction of Bremen, (Adam Bremensis, i. 43.)]

[Footnote 33: Muratori has considered with patriotic care the
danger and resources of Modena. The citizens besought St.
Geminianus, their patron, to avert, by his intercession, the
rabies, flagellum, &c.

Nunc te rogamus, licet servi pessimi,
Ab Ungerorum nos defendas jaculis.

The bishop erected walls for the public defence, not contra
dominos serenos, (Antiquitat. Ital. Med. Aevi, tom. i. dissertat.
i. p. 21, 22,) and the song of the nightly watch is not without
elegance or use, (tom. iii. dis. xl. p. 709.) The Italian
annalist has accurately traced the series of their inroads,
(Annali d' Italia, tom. vii. p. 365, 367, 398, 401, 437, 440,
tom. viii. p. 19, 41, 52, &c.)]

[Footnote 34: Both the Hungarian and Russian annals suppose, that
they besieged, or attacked, or insulted Constantinople, (Pray,
dissertat. x. p. 239. Katona, Hist. Ducum, p. 354 - 360;) and
the fact is almost confessed by the Byzantine historians, (Leo
Grammaticus, p. 506. Cedrenus, tom. ii. p. 629: ) yet, however
glorious to the nation, it is denied or doubted by the critical
historian, and even by the notary of Bela. Their scepticism is
meritorious; they could not safely transcribe or believe the
rusticorum fabulas: but Katona might have given due attention to
the evidence of Liutprand, Bulgarorum gentem atque daecorum
tributariam fecerant, (Hist. l. ii. c. 4, p. 435.)]

[Footnote 35: - Iliad, xvi. 756.]

The deliverance of Germany and Christendom was achieved by
the Saxon princes, Henry the Fowler and Otho the Great, who, in
two memorable battles, forever broke the power of the Hungarians.
^36 The valiant Henry was roused from a bed of sickness by the
invasion of his country; but his mind was vigorous and his
prudence successful. "My companions," said he, on the morning of
the combat, "maintain your ranks, receive on your bucklers the
first arrows of the Pagans, and prevent their second discharge by
the equal and rapid career of your lances." They obeyed and
conquered: and the historical picture of the castle of Merseburgh
expressed the features, or at least the character, of Henry, who,
in an age of ignorance, intrusted to the finer arts the
perpetuity of his name. ^37 At the end of twenty years, the
children of the Turks who had fallen by his sword invaded the
empire of his son; and their force is defined, in the lowest
estimate, at one hundred thousand horse. They were invited by
domestic faction; the gates of Germany were treacherously
unlocked; and they spread, far beyond the Rhine and the Meuse,
into the heart of Flanders. But the vigor and prudence of Otho
dispelled the conspiracy; the princes were made sensible that
unless they were true to each other, their religion and country
were irrecoverably lost; and the national powers were reviewed in
the plains of Augsburgh. They marched and fought in eight
legions, according to the division of provinces and tribes; the
first, second, and third, were composed of Bavarians; the fourth,
of Franconians; the fifth, of Saxons, under the immediate command
of the monarch; the sixth and seventh consisted of Swabians; and
the eighth legion, of a thousand Bohemians, closed the rear of
the host. The resources of discipline and valor were fortified
by the arts of superstition, which, on this occasion, may deserve
the epithets of generous and salutary. The soldiers were
purified with a fast; the camp was blessed with the relics of
saints and martyrs; and the Christian hero girded on his side the
sword of Constantine, grasped the invincible spear of
Charlemagne, and waved the banner of St. Maurice, the praefect of
the Thebaean legion. But his firmest confidence was placed in
the holy lance, ^38 whose point was fashioned of the nails of the
cross, and which his father had extorted from the king of
Burgundy, by the threats of war, and the gift of a province. The
Hungarians were expected in the front; they secretly passed the
Lech, a river of Bavaria that falls into the Danube; turned the
rear of the Christian army; plundered the baggage, and disordered
the legion of Bohemia and Swabia. The battle was restored by the
Franconians, whose duke, the valiant Conrad, was pierced with an
arrow as he rested from his fatigues: the Saxons fought under the
eyes of their king; and his victory surpassed, in merit and
importance, the triumphs of the last two hundred years. The loss
of the Hungarians was still greater in the flight than in the
action; they were encompassed by the rivers of Bavaria; and their
past cruelties excluded them from the hope of mercy. Three
captive princes were hanged at Ratisbon, the multitude of
prisoners was slain or mutilated, and the fugitives, who presumed
to appear in the face of their country, were condemned to
everlasting poverty and disgrace. ^39 Yet the spirit of the
nation was humbled, and the most accessible passes of Hungary
were fortified with a ditch and rampart. Adversity suggested the
counsels of moderation and peace: the robbers of the West
acquiesced in a sedentary life; and the next generation was
taught, by a discerning prince, that far more might be gained by
multiplying and exchanging the produce of a fruitful soil. The
native race, the Turkish or Fennic blood, was mingled with new
colonies of Scythian or Sclavonian origin; ^40 many thousands of
robust and industrious captives had been imported from all the
countries of Europe; ^41 and after the marriage of Geisa with a
Bavarian princess, he bestowed honors and estates on the nobles
of Germany. ^42 The son of Geisa was invested with the regal
title, and the house of Arpad reigned three hundred years in the
kingdom of Hungary. But the freeborn Barbarians were not dazzled
by the lustre of the diadem, and the people asserted their
indefeasible right of choosing, deposing, and punishing the
hereditary servant of the state.

[Footnote 36: They are amply and critically discussed by Katona,
(Hist. Dacum, p. 360 - 368, 427 - 470.) Liutprand (l. ii. c. 8,
9) is the best evidence for the former, and Witichind (Annal.
Saxon. l. iii.) of the latter; but the critical historian will
not even overlook the horn of a warrior, which is said to be
preserved at Jaz-berid.]

[Footnote 37: Hunc vero triumphum, tam laude quam memoria dignum,
ad Meresburgum rex in superiori coenaculo domus per Zeus, id est,
picturam, notari praecepit, adeo ut rem veram potius quam
verisimilem videas: a high encomium, (Liutprand, l. ii. c. 9.)
Another palace in Germany had been painted with holy subjects by
the order of Charlemagne; and Muratori may justly affirm, nulla
saecula fuere in quibus pictores desiderati fuerint, (Antiquitat.
Ital. Medii Aevi, tom. ii. dissert. xxiv. p. 360, 361.) Our
domestic claims to antiquity of ignorance and original
imperfection (Mr. Walpole's lively words) are of a much more
recent date, (Anecdotes of Painting, vol. i. p. 2, &c.)]

[Footnote 38: See Baronius, Annal. Eccles. A.D. 929, No. 2 - 5.
The lance of Christ is taken from the best evidence, Liutprand,
(l. iv. c. 12,) Sigebert, and the Acts of St. Gerard: but the
other military relics depend on the faith of the Gesta Anglorum
post Bedam, l. ii. c. 8.]

[Footnote 39: Katona, Hist. Ducum Hungariae, p. 500, &c.]

[Footnote 40: Among these colonies we may distinguish, 1. The
Chazars, or Cabari, who joined the Hungarians on their march,
(Constant. de Admin. Imp. c. 39, 40, p. 108, 109.) 2. The
Jazyges, Moravians, and Siculi, whom they found in the land; the
last were perhaps a remnant of the Huns of Attila, and were
intrusted with the guard of the borders. 3. The Russians, who,
like the Swiss in France, imparted a general name to the royal
porters. 4. The Bulgarians, whose chiefs (A.D. 956) were
invited, cum magna multitudine Hismahelitarum. Had any of those
Sclavonians embraced the Mahometan religion? 5. The Bisseni and
Cumans, a mixed multitude of Patzinacites, Uzi, Chazars, &c., who
had spread to the Lower Danube. The last colony of 40,000
Cumans, A.D. 1239, was received and converted by the kings of
Hungary, who derived from that tribe a new regal appellation,
(Pray, Dissert. vi. vii. p. 109 - 173. Katona, Hist. Ducum, p.
95 - 99, 259 - 264, 476, 479 - 483, &c.)]

[Footnote 41: Christiani autem, quorum pars major populi est, qui
ex omni parte mundi illuc tracti sunt captivi, &c. Such was the
language of Piligrinus, the first missionary who entered Hungary,
A.D. 973. Pars major is strong. Hist. Ducum, p. 517.]

[Footnote 42: The fideles Teutonici of Geisa are authenticated in
old charters: and Katona, with his usual industry, has made a
fair estimate of these colonies, which had been so loosely
magnified by the Italian Ranzanus, (Hist. Critic. Ducum. p, 667 -
681.)]

III. The name of Russians ^43 was first divulged, in the
ninth century, by an embassy of Theophilus, emperor of the East,
to the emperor of the West, Lewis, the son of Charlemagne. The
Greeks were accompanied by the envoys of the great duke, or
chagan, or czar, of the Russians. In their journey to
Constantinople, they had traversed many hostile nations; and they
hoped to escape the dangers of their return, by requesting the
French monarch to transport them by sea to their native country.
A closer examination detected their origin: they were the
brethren of the Swedes and Normans, whose name was already odious
and formidable in France; and it might justly be apprehended,
that these Russian strangers were not the messengers of peace,
but the emissaries of war. They were detained, while the Greeks
were dismissed; and Lewis expected a more satisfactory account,
that he might obey the laws of hospitality or prudence, according
to the interest of both empires. ^44 This Scandinavian origin of
the people, or at least the princes, of Russia, may be confirmed
and illustrated by the national annals ^45 and the general
history of the North. The Normans, who had so long been
concealed by a veil of impenetrable darkness, suddenly burst
forth in the spirit of naval and military enterprise. The vast,
and, as it is said, the populous regions of Denmark, Sweden, and
Norway, were crowded with independent chieftains and desperate
adventurers, who sighed in the laziness of peace, and smiled in
the agonies of death. Piracy was the exercise, the trade, the
glory, and the virtue, of the Scandinavian youth. Impatient of a
bleak climate and narrow limits, they started from the banquet,
grasped their arms, sounded their horn, ascended their vessels,
and explored every coast that promised either spoil or
settlement. The Baltic was the first scene of their naval
achievements they visited the eastern shores, the silent
residence of Fennic and Sclavonic tribes, and the primitive
Russians of the Lake Ladoga paid a tribute, the skins of white
squirrels, to these strangers, whom they saluted with the title
of Varangians ^46 or Corsairs. Their superiority in arms,
discipline, and renown, commanded the fear and reverence of the
natives. In their wars against the more inland savages, the
Varangians condescended to serve as friends and auxiliaries, and
gradually, by choice or conquest, obtained the dominion of a
people whom they were qualified to protect. Their tyranny was
expelled, their valor was again recalled, till at length Ruric, a
Scandinavian chief, became the father of a dynasty which reigned
above seven hundred years. His brothers extended his influence:
the example of service and usurpation was imitated by his
companions in the southern provinces of Russia; and their
establishments, by the usual methods of war and assassination,
were cemented into the fabric of a powerful monarchy.

[Footnote 43: Among the Greeks, this national appellation has a
singular form, as an undeclinable word, of which many fanciful
etymologies have been suggested. I have perused, with pleasure
and profit, a dissertation de Origine Russorum (Comment. Academ.
Petropolitanae, tom. viii. p. 388 - 436) by Theophilus Sigefrid
Bayer, a learned German, who spent his life and labors in the
service of Russia. A geographical tract of D'Anville, de
l'Empire de Russie, son Origine, et ses Accroissemens, (Paris,
1772, in 12mo.,) has likewise been of use.

Note: The later antiquarians of Russia and Germany appear to
aquiesce in the authority of the monk Nestor, the earliest
annalist of Russia, who derives the Russians, or Vareques, from
Scandinavia. The names of the first founders of the Russian
monarchy are Scandinavian or Norman. Their language (according to
Const. Porphyrog. de Administrat. Imper. c. 9) differed
essentially from the Sclavonian. The author of the Annals of St.
Bertin, who first names the Russians (Rhos) in the year 839 of
his Annals, assigns them Sweden for their country. So Liutprand
calls the Russians the same people as the Normans. The Fins,
Laplanders, and Esthonians, call the Swedes, to the present day,
Roots, Rootsi, Ruotzi, Rootslaue. See Thunman, Untersuchungen
uber der Geschichte des Estlichen Europaischen Volker, p. 374.
Gatterer, Comm. Societ. Regbcient. Gotting. xiii. p. 126.
Schlozer, in his Nestor. Koch. Revolut. de 'Europe, vol. i. p.
60. Malte-Brun, Geograph. vol. vi. p. 378. - M.]

[Footnote 44: See the entire passage (dignum, says Bayer, ut
aureis in tabulis rigatur) in the Annales Bertiniani Francorum,
(in Script. Ital. Muratori, tom. ii. pars i. p. 525,) A.D. 839,
twenty-two years before the aera of Ruric. In the xth century,
Liutprand (Hist. l. v. c. 6) speaks of the Russians and Normans
as the same Aquilonares homines of a red complexion.]

[Footnote 45: My knowledge of these annals is drawn from M.
Leveque, Histoire de Russie. Nestor, the first and best of these
ancient annalists, was a monk of Kiow, who died in the beginning
of the xiith century; but his Chronicle was obscure, till it was
published at Petersburgh, 1767, in 4to. Leveque, Hist. de Russie,
tom. i. p. xvi. Coxe's Travels, vol. ii. p. 184.

Note: The late M. Schlozer has translated and added a
commentary to the Annals of Nestor;" and his work is the mine
from which henceforth the history of the North must be drawn. -
G.]

[Footnote 46: Theophil. Sig. Bayer de Varagis, (for the name is
differently spelt,) in Comment. Academ. Petropolitanae, tom. iv.
p. 275 - 311.]

As long as the descendants of Ruric were considered as
aliens and conquerors, they ruled by the sword of the Varangians,
distributed estates and subjects to their faithful captains, and
supplied their numbers with fresh streams of adventurers from the
Baltic coast. ^47 But when the Scandinavian chiefs had struck a
deep and permanent root into the soil, they mingled with the
Russians in blood, religion, and language, and the first
Waladimir had the merit of delivering his country from these
foreign mercenaries. They had seated him on the throne; his
riches were insufficient to satisfy their demands; but they
listened to his pleasing advice, that they should seek, not a
more grateful, but a more wealthy, master; that they should
embark for Greece, where, instead of the skins of squirrels, silk
and gold would be the recompense of their service. At the same
time, the Russian prince admonished his Byzantine ally to
disperse and employ, to recompense and restrain, these impetuous
children of the North. Contemporary writers have recorded the
introduction, name, and character, of the Varangians: each day
they rose in confidence and esteem; the whole body was assembled
at Constantinople to perform the duty of guards; and their
strength was recruited by a numerous band of their countrymen
from the Island of Thule. On this occasion, the vague
appellation of Thule is applied to England; and the new
Varangians were a colony of English and Danes who fled from the
yoke of the Norman conqueror. The habits of pilgrimage and piracy
had approximated the countries of the earth; these exiles were
entertained in the Byzantine court; and they preserved, till the
last age of the empire, the inheritance of spotless loyalty, and
the use of the Danish or English tongue. With their broad and
double-edged battle-axes on their shoulders, they attended the
Greek emperor to the temple, the senate, and the hippodrome; he
slept and feasted under their trusty guard; and the keys of the
palace, the treasury, and the capital, were held by the firm and
faithful hands of the Varangians. ^48

[Footnote 47: Yet, as late as the year 1018, Kiow and Russia were
still guarded ex fugitivorum servorum robore, confluentium et
maxime Danorum. Bayer, who quotes (p. 292) the Chronicle of
Dithmar of Merseburgh, observes, that it was unusual for the
Germans to enlist in a foreign service.]

[Footnote 48: Ducange has collected from the original authors the
state and history of the Varangi at Constantinople, (Glossar.
Med. et Infimae Graecitatis, sub voce. Med. et Infimae
Latinitatis, sub voce Vagri. Not. ad Alexiad. Annae Comnenae, p.
256, 257, 258. Notes sur Villehardouin, p. 296 - 299.) See
likewise the annotations of Reiske to the Ceremoniale Aulae
Byzant. of Constantine, tom. ii. p. 149, 150. Saxo Grammaticus
affirms that they spoke Danish; but Codinus maintains them till
the fifteenth century in the use of their native English.]

In the tenth century, the geography of Scythia was extended
far beyond the limits of ancient knowledge; and the monarchy of
the Russians obtains a vast and conspicuous place in the map of
Constantine. ^49 The sons of Ruric were masters of the spacious
province of Wolodomir, or Moscow; and, if they were confined on
that side by the hordes of the East, their western frontier in
those early days was enlarged to the Baltic Sea and the country
of the Prussians. Their northern reign ascended above the
sixtieth degree of latitude over the Hyperborean regions, which
fancy had peopled with monsters, or clouded with eternal
darkness. To the south they followed the course of the
Borysthenes, and approached with that river the neighborhood of
the Euxine Sea. The tribes that dwelt, or wandered, in this
ample circuit were obedient to the same conqueror, and insensibly
blended into the same nation. The language of Russia is a
dialect of the Sclavonian; but in the tenth century, these two
modes of speech were different from each other; and, as the
Sclavonian prevailed in the South, it may be presumed that the
original Russians of the North, the primitive subjects of the
Varangian chief, were a portion of the Fennic race. With the
emigration, union, or dissolution, of the wandering tribes, the
loose and indefinite picture of the Scythian desert has
continually shifted. But the most ancient map of Russia affords
some places which still retain their name and position; and the
two capitals, Novogorod ^50 and Kiow, ^51 are coeval with the
first age of the monarchy. Novogorod had not yet deserved the
epithet of great, nor the alliance of the Hanseatic League, which
diffused the streams of opulence and the principles of freedom.
Kiow could not yet boast of three hundred churches, an
innumerable people, and a degree of greatness and splendor which
was compared with Constantinople by those who had never seen the
residence of the Caesars. In their origin, the two cities were
no more than camps or fairs, the most convenient stations in
which the Barbarians might assemble for the occasional business
of war or trade. Yet even these assemblies announce some
progress in the arts of society; a new breed of cattle was
imported from the southern provinces; and the spirit of
commercial enterprise pervaded the sea and land, from the Baltic
to the Euxine, from the mouth of the Oder to the port of
Constantinople. In the days of idolatry and barbarism, the
Sclavonic city of Julin was frequented and enriched by the
Normans, who had prudently secured a free mart of purchase and
exchange. ^52 From this harbor, at the entrance of the Oder, the
corsair, or merchant, sailed in forty-three days to the eastern
shores of the Baltic, the most distant nations were intermingled,
and the holy groves of Curland are said to have been decorated
with Grecian and Spanish gold. ^53 Between the sea and Novogorod
an easy intercourse was discovered; in the summer, through a
gulf, a lake, and a navigable river; in the winter season, over
the hard and level surface of boundless snows. From the
neighborhood of that city, the Russians descended the streams
that fall into the Borysthenes; their canoes, of a single tree,
were laden with slaves of every age, furs of every species, the
spoil of their beehives, and the hides of their cattle; and the
whole produce of the North was collected and discharged in the
magazines of Kiow. The month of June was the ordinary season of
the departure of the fleet: the timber of the canoes was framed
into the oars and benches of more solid and capacious boats; and
they proceeded without obstacle down the Borysthenes, as far as
the seven or thirteen ridges of rocks, which traverse the bed,
and precipitate the waters, of the river. At the more shallow
falls it was sufficient to lighten the vessels; but the deeper
cataracts were impassable; and the mariners, who dragged their
vessels and their slaves six miles over land, were exposed in
this toilsome journey to the robbers of the desert. ^54 At the
first island below the falls, the Russians celebrated the
festival of their escape: at a second, near the mouth of the
river, they repaired their shattered vessels for the longer and
more perilous voyage of the Black Sea. If they steered along the
coast, the Danube was accessible; with a fair wind they could
reach in thirty-six or forty hours the opposite shores of
Anatolia; and Constantinople admitted the annual visit of the
strangers of the North. They returned at the stated season with a
rich cargo of corn, wine, and oil, the manufactures of Greece,
and the spices of India. Some of their countrymen resided in the
capital and provinces; and the national treaties protected the
persons, effects, and privileges, of the Russian merchant. ^55

[Footnote 49: The original record of the geography and trade of
Russia is produced by the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus,
(de Administrat. Imperii, c. 2, p. 55, 56, c. 9, p. 59 - 61, c.
13, p. 63 - 67, c. 37, p. 106, c. 42, p. 112, 113,) and
illustrated by the diligence of Bayer, (de Geographia Russiae
vicinarumque Regionum circiter A. C. 948, in Comment. Academ.
Petropol. tom. ix. p. 367 - 422, tom. x. p. 371 - 421,) with the
aid of the chronicles and traditions of Russia, Scandinavia, &c.]

[Footnote 50: The haughty proverb, "Who can resist God and the
great Novogorod?" is applied by M. Leveque (Hist. de Russie, tom.
i. p. 60) even to the times that preceded the reign of Ruric. In
the course of his history he frequently celebrates this republic,
which was suppressed A.D. 1475, (tom. ii. p. 252 - 266.) That
accurate traveller Adam Olearius describes (in 1635) the remains
of Novogorod, and the route by sea and land of the Holstein
ambassadors, tom. i. p. 123 - 129.]

[Footnote 51: In hac magna civitate, quae est caput regni, plus
trecentae ecclesiae habentur et nundinae octo, populi etiam
ignota manus (Eggehardus ad A.D. 1018, apud Bayer, tom. ix. p.
412.) He likewise quotes (tom. x. p. 397) the words of the Saxon
annalist, Cujus (Russioe) metropolis est Chive, aemula sceptri
Constantinopolitani, quae est clarissimum decus Graeciae. The
fame of Kiow, especially in the xith century, had reached the
German and Arabian geographers.]

[Footnote 52: In Odorae ostio qua Scythicas alluit paludes,
nobilissima civitas Julinum, celeberrimam, Barbaris et Graecis
qui sunt in circuitu, praestans stationem, est sane maxima omnium
quas Europa claudit civitatum, (Adam Bremensis, Hist. Eccles. p.
19;) a strange exaggeration even in the xith century. The trade
of the Baltic, and the Hanseatic League, are carefully treated in
Anderson's Historical Deduction of Commerce; at least, in our
language, I am not acquainted with any book so satisfactory.

Note: The book of authority is the "Geschichte des
Hanseatischen Bundes," by George Sartorius, Gottingen, 1803, or
rather the later edition of that work by M. Lappenberg, 2 vols.
4to., Hamburgh, 1830. - M. 1845.]

[Footnote 53: According to Adam of Bremen, (de Situ Daniae, p.
58,) the old Curland extended eight days' journey along the
coast; and by Peter Teutoburgicus, (p. 68, A.D. 1326,) Memel is
defined as the common frontier of Russia, Curland, and Prussia.
Aurum ibi plurimum, (says Adam,) divinis auguribus atque
necromanticis omnes domus sunt plenae .... a toto orbe ibi
responsa petuntur, maxime ab Hispanis (forsan Zupanis, id est
regulis Lettoviae) et Graecis. The name of Greeks was applied to
the Russians even before their conversion; an imperfect
conversion, if they still consulted the wizards of Curland,
(Bayer, tom. x. p. 378, 402, &c. Grotius, Prolegomen. ad Hist.
Goth. p. 99.)]

[Footnote 54: Constantine only reckons seven cataracts, of which
he gives the Russian and Sclavonic names; but thirteen are
enumerated by the Sieur de Beauplan, a French engineer, who had
surveyed the course and navigation of the Dnieper, or
Borysthenes, (Description de l'Ukraine, Rouen, 1660, a thin
quarto;) but the map is unluckily wanting in my copy.]

[Footnote 55: Nestor, apud Leveque, Hist. de Russie, tom. i. p.
78 - 80. From the Dnieper, or Borysthenes, the Russians went to
Black Bulgaria, Chazaria, and Syria. To Syria, how? where?
when? The alteration is slight; the position of Suania, between
Chazaria and Lazica, is perfectly suitable; and the name was
still used in the xith century, (Cedren. tom. ii. p. 770.)]



Chapter LV: The Bulgarians, The Hungarians And The Russians.

Part III.

But the same communication which had been opened for the
benefit, was soon abused for the injury, of mankind. In a period
of one hundred and ninety years, the Russians made four attempts
to plunder the treasures of Constantinople: the event was
various, but the motive, the means, and the object, were the same
in these naval expeditions. ^56 The Russian traders had seen the
magnificence, and tasted the luxury of the city of the Caesars.
A marvellous tale, and a scanty supply, excited the desires of
their savage countrymen: they envied the gifts of nature which
their climate denied; they coveted the works of art, which they
were too lazy to imitate and too indigent to purchase; the
Varangian princes unfurled the banners of piratical adventure,
and their bravest soldiers were drawn from the nations that dwelt
in the northern isles of the ocean. ^57 The image of their naval
armaments was revived in the last century, in the fleets of the
Cossacks, which issued from the Borysthenes, to navigate the same
seas for a similar purpose. ^58 The Greek appellation of
monoxyla, or single canoes, might justly be applied to the bottom
of their vessels. It was scooped out of the long stem of a beech
or willow, but the slight and narrow foundation was raised and
continued on either side with planks, till it attained the length
of sixty, and the height of about twelve, feet. These boats were
built without a deck, but with two rudders and a mast; to move
with sails and oars; and to contain from forty to seventy men,
with their arms, and provisions of fresh water and salt fish. The
first trial of the Russians was made with two hundred boats; but
when the national force was exerted, they might arm against
Constantinople a thousand or twelve hundred vessels. Their fleet
was not much inferior to the royal navy of Agamemnon, but it was
magnified in the eyes of fear to ten or fifteen times the real
proportion of its strength and numbers. Had the Greek emperors
been endowed with foresight to discern, and vigor to prevent,
perhaps they might have sealed with a maritime force the mouth of
the Borysthenes. Their indolence abandoned the coast of Anatolia
to the calamities of a piratical war, which, after an interval of
six hundred years, again infested the Euxine; but as long as the
capital was respected, the sufferings of a distant province
escaped the notice both of the prince and the historian. The
storm which had swept along from the Phasis and Trebizond, at
length burst on the Bosphorus of Thrace; a strait of fifteen
miles, in which the rude vessels of the Russians might have been
stopped and destroyed by a more skilful adversary. In their
first enterprise ^59 under the princes of Kiow, they passed
without opposition, and occupied the port of Constantinople in
the absence of the emperor Michael, the son of Theophilus.
Through a crowd of perils, he landed at the palace-stairs, and
immediately repaired to a church of the Virgin Mary. ^60 By the
advice of the patriarch, her garment, a precious relic, was drawn
from the sanctuary and dipped in the sea; and a seasonable
tempest, which determined the retreat of the Russians, was
devoutly ascribed to the mother of God. ^61 The silence of the
Greeks may inspire some doubt of the truth, or at least of the
importance, of the second attempt by Oleg, the guardian of the
sons of Ruric. ^62 A strong barrier of arms and fortifications
defended the Bosphorus: they were eluded by the usual expedient
of drawing the boats over the isthmus; and this simple operation
is described in the national chronicles, as if the Russian fleet
had sailed over dry land with a brisk and favorable gale. The
leader of the third armament, Igor, the son of Ruric, had chosen
a moment of weakness and decay, when the naval powers of the
empire were employed against the Saracens. But if courage be not
wanting, the instruments of defence are seldom deficient.
Fifteen broken and decayed galleys were boldly launched against
the enemy; but instead of the single tube of Greek fire usually
planted on the prow, the sides and stern of each vessel were
abundantly supplied with that liquid combustible. The engineers
were dexterous; the weather was propitious; many thousand
Russians, who chose rather to be drowned than burnt, leaped into
the sea; and those who escaped to the Thracian shore were
inhumanly slaughtered by the peasants and soldiers. Yet one third
of the canoes escaped into shallow water; and the next spring
Igor was again prepared to retrieve his disgrace and claim his
revenge. ^63 After a long peace, Jaroslaus, the great grandson of
Igor, resumed the same project of a naval invasion. A fleet,
under the command of his son, was repulsed at the entrance of the
Bosphorus by the same artificial flames. But in the rashness of
pursuit, the vanguard of the Greeks was encompassed by an
irresistible multitude of boats and men; their provision of fire
was probably exhausted; and twenty- four galleys were either
taken, sunk, or destroyed. ^64

[Footnote 56: The wars of the Russians and Greeks in the ixth,
xth, and xith centuries, are related in the Byzantine annals,
especially those of Zonaras and Cedrenus; and all their
testimonies are collected in the Russica of Stritter, tom. ii.
pars ii. p. 939 - 1044.]

[Footnote 57: Cedrenus in Compend. p. 758]

[Footnote 58: See Beauplan, (Description de l'Ukraine, p. 54 -
61: ) his descriptions are lively, his plans accurate, and except
the circumstances of fire-arms, we may read old Russians for
modern Cosacks.]

[Footnote 59: It is to be lamented, that Bayer has only given a
Dissertation de Russorum prima Expeditione Constantinopolitana,
(Comment. Academ. Petropol. tom. vi. p. 265 - 391.) After
disentangling some chronological intricacies, he fixes it in the
years 864 or 865, a date which might have smoothed some doubts
and difficulties in the beginning of M. Leveque's history.]

[Footnote 60: When Photius wrote his encyclic epistle on the
conversion of the Russians, the miracle was not yet sufficiently
ripe.]

[Footnote 61: Leo Grammaticus, p. 463, 464. Constantini
Continuator in Script. post Theophanem, p. 121, 122. Symeon
Logothet. p. 445, 446. Georg. Monach. p. 535, 536. Cedrenus,
tom. ii. p. 551. Zonaras, tom. ii. p. 162.]

[Footnote 62: See Nestor and Nicon, in Leveque's Hist. de Russie,
tom. i. p. 74 - 80. Katona (Hist. Ducum, p. 75 - 79) uses his
advantage to disprove this Russian victory, which would cloud the
siege of Kiow by the Hungarians.]

[Footnote 63: Leo Grammaticus, p. 506, 507. Incert. Contin. p.
263, 264 Symeon Logothet. p. 490, 491. Georg. Monach. p. 588,
589. Cedren tom. ii. p. 629. Zonaras, tom. ii. p. 190, 191, and
Liutprand, l. v. c. 6, who writes from the narratives of his
father-in-law, then ambassador at Constantinople, and corrects
the vain exaggeration of the Greeks.]

[Footnote 64: I can only appeal to Cedrenus (tom. ii. p. 758,
759) and Zonaras, (tom. ii. p. 253, 254;) but they grow more
weighty and credible as they draw near to their own times.]

Yet the threats or calamities of a Russian war were more
frequently diverted by treaty than by arms. In these naval
hostilities, every disadvantage was on the side of the Greeks;
their savage enemy afforded no mercy: his poverty promised no
spoil; his impenetrable retreat deprived the conqueror of the
hopes of revenge; and the pride or weakness of empire indulged an
opinion, that no honor could be gained or lost in the intercourse
with Barbarians. At first their demands were high and
inadmissible, three pounds of gold for each soldier or mariner of
the fleet: the Russian youth adhered to the design of conquest
and glory; but the counsels of moderation were recommended by the
hoary sages. "Be content," they said, "with the liberal offers
of Caesar; it is not far better to obtain without a combat the
possession of gold, silver, silks, and all the objects of our
desires? Are we sure of victory? Can we conclude a treaty with
the sea? We do not tread on the land; we float on the abyss of
water, and a common death hangs over our heads." ^65 The memory
of these Arctic fleets that seemed to descend from the polar
circle left deep impression of terror on the Imperial city. By
the vulgar of every rank, it was asserted and believed, that an
equestrian statue in the square of Taurus was secretly inscribed
with a prophecy, how the Russians, in the last days, should
become masters of Constantinople. ^66 In our own time, a Russian
armament, instead of sailing from the Borysthenes, has
circumnavigated the continent of Europe; and the Turkish capital
has been threatened by a squadron of strong and lofty ships of
war, each of which, with its naval science and thundering
artillery, could have sunk or scattered a hundred canoes, such as
those of their ancestors. Perhaps the present generation may yet
behold the accomplishment of the prediction, of a rare
prediction, of which the style is unambiguous and the date
unquestionable.

[Footnote 65: Nestor, apud Leveque, Hist. de Russie, tom. i. p.
87.]

[Footnote 66: This brazen statue, which had been brought from
Antioch, and was melted down by the Latins, was supposed to
represent either Joshua or Bellerophon, an odd dilemma. See
Nicetas Choniates, (p. 413, 414,) Codinus, (de Originibus C. P.
p. 24,) and the anonymous writer de Antiquitat. C. P. (Banduri,
Imp. Orient. tom. i. p. 17, 18,) who lived about the year 1100.
They witness the belief of the prophecy the rest is immaterial.]

By land the Russians were less formidable than by sea; and
as they fought for the most part on foot, their irregular legions
must often have been broken and overthrown by the cavalry of the
Scythian hordes. Yet their growing towns, however slight and
imperfect, presented a shelter to the subject, and a barrier to
the enemy: the monarchy of Kiow, till a fatal partition, assumed
the dominion of the North; and the nations from the Volga to the
Danube were subdued or repelled by the arms of Swatoslaus, ^67
the son of Igor, the son of Oleg, the son of Ruric. The vigor of
his mind and body was fortified by the hardships of a military
and savage life. Wrapped in a bear-skin, Swatoslaus usually slept
on the ground, his head reclining on a saddle; his diet was
coarse and frugal, and, like the heroes of Homer, ^68 his meat
(it was often horse-flesh) was broiled or roasted on the coals.
The exercise of war gave stability and discipline to his army;
and it may be presumed, that no soldier was permitted to
transcend the luxury of his chief. By an embassy from
Nicephorus, the Greek emperor, he was moved to undertake the
conquest of Bulgaria; and a gift of fifteen hundred pounds of
gold was laid at his feet to defray the expense, or reward the
toils, of the expedition. An army of sixty thousand men was
assembled and embarked; they sailed from the Borysthenes to the
Danube; their landing was effected on the Maesian shore; and,
after a sharp encounter, the swords of the Russians prevailed
against the arrows of the Bulgarian horse. The vanquished king
sunk into the grave; his children were made captive; and his
dominions, as far as Mount Haemus, were subdued or ravaged by the
northern invaders. But instead of relinquishing his prey, and
performing his engagements, the Varangian prince was more
disposed to advance than to retire; and, had his ambition been
crowned with success, the seat of empire in that early period
might have been transferred to a more temperate and fruitful
climate. Swatoslaus enjoyed and acknowledged the advantages of
his new position, in which he could unite, by exchange or rapine,
the various productions of the earth. By an easy navigation he
might draw from Russia the native commodities of furs, wax, and
hydromed: Hungary supplied him with a breed of horses and the
spoils of the West; and Greece abounded with gold, silver, and
the foreign luxuries, which his poverty had affected to disdain.
The bands of Patzinacites, Chozars, and Turks, repaired to the
standard of victory; and the ambassador of Nicephorus betrayed
his trust, assumed the purple, and promised to share with his new
allies the treasures of the Eastern world. From the banks of the
Danube the Russian prince pursued his march as far as Adrianople;
a formal summons to evacuate the Roman province was dismissed
with contempt; and Swatoslaus fiercely replied, that
Constantinople might soon expect the presence of an enemy and a
master.

[Footnote 67: The life of Swatoslaus, or Sviatoslaf, or
Sphendosthlabus, is extracted from the Russian Chronicles by M.
Levesque, (Hist. de Russie, tom. i. p. 94 - 107.)]

[Footnote 68: This resemblance may be clearly seen in the ninth
book of the Iliad, (205 - 221,) in the minute detail of the
cookery of Achilles. By such a picture, a modern epic poet would
disgrace his work, and disgust his reader; but the Greek verses
are harmonious - a dead language can seldom appear low or
familiar; and at the distance of two thousand seven hundred
years, we are amused with the primitive manners of antiquity.]

Nicephorus could no longer expel the mischief which he had
introduced; but his throne and wife were inherited by John
Zimisces, ^69 who, in a diminutive body, possessed the spirit and
abilities of a hero. The first victory of his lieutenants
deprived the Russians of their foreign allies, twenty thousand of
whom were either destroyed by the sword, or provoked to revolt,
or tempted to desert. Thrace was delivered, but seventy thousand
Barbarians were still in arms; and the legions that had been
recalled from the new conquests of Syria, prepared, with the
return of the spring, to march under the banners of a warlike
prince, who declared himself the friend and avenger of the
injured Bulgaria. The passes of Mount Haemus had been left
unguarded; they were instantly occupied; the Roman vanguard was
formed of the immortals, (a proud imitation of the Persian
style;) the emperor led the main body of ten thousand five
hundred foot; and the rest of his forces followed in slow and
cautious array, with the baggage and military engines. The first
exploit of Zimisces was the reduction of Marcianopolis, or
Peristhlaba, ^70 in two days; the trumpets sounded; the walls
were scaled; eight thousand five hundred Russians were put to the
sword; and the sons of the Bulgarian king were rescued from an
ignominious prison, and invested with a nominal diadem. After
these repeated losses, Swatoslaus retired to the strong post of
Drista, on the banks of the Danube, and was pursued by an enemy
who alternately employed the arms of celerity and delay. The
Byzantine galleys ascended the river, the legions completed a
line of circumvallation; and the Russian prince was encompassed,
assaulted, and famished, in the fortifications of the camp and
city. Many deeds of valor were performed; several desperate
sallies were attempted; nor was it till after a siege of
sixty-five days that Swatoslaus yielded to his adverse fortune.
The liberal terms which he obtained announce the prudence of the
victor, who respected the valor, and apprehended the despair, of
an unconquered mind. The great duke of Russia bound himself, by
solemn imprecations, to relinquish all hostile designs; a safe
passage was opened for his return; the liberty of trade and
navigation was restored; a measure of corn was distributed to
each of his soldiers; and the allowance of twenty-two thousand
measures attests the loss and the remnant of the Barbarians.
After a painful voyage, they again reached the mouth of the
Borysthenes; but their provisions were exhausted; the season was
unfavorable; they passed the winter on the ice; and, before they
could prosecute their march, Swatoslaus was surprised and
oppressed by the neighboring tribes with whom the Greeks
entertained a perpetual and useful correspondence. ^71 Far
different was the return of Zimisces, who was received in his
capital like Camillus or Marius, the saviors of ancient Rome.
But the merit of the victory was attributed by the pious emperor
to the mother of God; and the image of the Virgin Mary, with the
divine infant in her arms, was placed on a triumphal car, adorned
with the spoils of war, and the ensigns of Bulgarian royalty.
Zimisces made his public entry on horseback; the diadem on his
head, a crown of laurel in his hand; and Constantinople was
astonished to applaud the martial virtues of her sovereign. ^72

[Footnote 69: This singular epithet is derived from the Armenian
language. As I profess myself equally ignorant of these words, I
may be indulged in the question in the play, "Pray, which of you
is the interpreter?" From the context, they seem to signify
Adolescentulus, (Leo Diacon l. iv. Ms. apud Ducange, Glossar.
Graec. p. 1570.)

Note: Cerbied. the learned Armenian, gives another
derivation. There is a city called Tschemisch-gaizag, which means
a bright or purple sandal, such as women wear in the East. He
was called Tschemisch-ghigh, (for so his name is written in
Armenian, from this city, his native place.) Hase. Note to Leo
Diac. p. 454, in Niebuhr's Byzant. Hist. - M.]

[Footnote 70: In the Sclavonic tongue, the name of Peristhlaba
implied the great or illustrious city, says Anna Comnena,
(Alexiad, l. vii. p. 194.) From its position between Mount Haemus
and the Lower Danube, it appears to fill the ground, or at least
the station, of Marcianopolis. The situation of Durostolus, or
Dristra, is well known and conspicuous, (Comment. Academ.
Petropol. tom. ix. p. 415, 416. D'Anville, Geographie Ancienne,
tom. i. p. 307, 311.)]

[Footnote 71: The political management of the Greeks, more
especially with the Patzinacites, is explained in the seven first
chapters, de Administratione Imperii.]

[Footnote 72: In the narrative of this war, Leo the Deacon (apud
Pagi, Critica, tom. iv. A.D. 968 - 973) is more authentic and
circumstantial than Cedrenus (tom. ii. p. 660 - 683) and Zonaras,
(tom. ii. p. 205 - 214.) These declaimers have multiplied to
308,000 and 330,000 men, those Russian forces, of which the
contemporary had given a moderate and consistent account.]

Photius of Constantinople, a patriarch, whose ambition was
equal to his curiosity, congratulates himself and the Greek
church on the conversion of the Russians. ^73 Those fierce and
bloody Barbarians had been persuaded, by the voice of reason and
religion, to acknowledge Jesus for their God, the Christian
missionaries for their teachers, and the Romans for their friends
and brethren. His triumph was transient and premature. In the
various fortune of their piratical adventures, some Russian
chiefs might allow themselves to be sprinkled with the waters of
baptism; and a Greek bishop, with the name of metropolitan, might
administer the sacraments in the church of Kiow, to a
congregation of slaves and natives. But the seed of the gospel
was sown on a barren soil: many were the apostates, the converts
were few; and the baptism of Olga may be fixed as the aera of
Russian Christianity. ^74 A female, perhaps of the basest origin,
who could revenge the death, and assume the sceptre, of her
husband Igor, must have been endowed with those active virtues
which command the fear and obedience of Barbarians. In a moment
of foreign and domestic peace, she sailed from Kiow to
Constantinople; and the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus has
described, with minute diligence, the ceremonial of her reception
in his capital and palace. The steps, the titles, the
salutations, the banquet, the presents, were exquisitely adjusted
to gratify the vanity of the stranger, with due reverence to the
superior majesty of the purple. ^75 In the sacrament of baptism,
she received the venerable name of the empress Helena; and her
conversion might be preceded or followed by her uncle, two
interpreters, sixteen damsels of a higher, and eighteen of a
lower rank, twenty-two domestics or ministers, and forty-four
Russian merchants, who composed the retinue of the great princess
Olga. After her return to Kiow and Novogorod, she firmly
persisted in her new religion; but her labors in the propagation
of the gospel were not crowned with success; and both her family
and nation adhered with obstinacy or indifference to the gods of
their fathers. Her son Swatoslaus was apprehensive of the scorn
and ridicule of his companions; and her grandson Wolodomir
devoted his youthful zeal to multiply and decorate the monuments
of ancient worship. The savage deities of the North were still
propitiated with human sacrifices: in the choice of the victim, a
citizen was preferred to a stranger, a Christian to an idolater;
and the father, who defended his son from the sacerdotal knife,
was involved in the same doom by the rage of a fanatic tumult.
Yet the lessons and example of the pious Olga had made a deep,
though secret, impression in the minds of the prince and people:
the Greek missionaries continued to preach, to dispute, and to
baptize: and the ambassadors or merchants of Russia compared the
idolatry of the woods with the elegant superstition of
Constantinople. They had gazed with admiration on the dome of
St. Sophia: the lively pictures of saints and martyrs, the riches
of the altar, the number and vestments of the priests, the pomp
and order of the ceremonies; they were edified by the alternate
succession of devout silence and harmonious song; nor was it
difficult to persuade them, that a choir of angels descended each
day from heaven to join in the devotion of the Christians. ^76
But the conversion of Wolodomir was determined, or hastened, by
his desire of a Roman bride. At the same time, and in the city
of Cherson, the rites of baptism and marriage were celebrated by
the Christian pontiff: the city he restored to the emperor Basil,
the brother of his spouse; but the brazen gates were transported,
as it is said, to Novogorod, and erected before the first church
as a trophy of his victory and faith. ^77 At his despotic
command, Peround, the god of thunder, whom he had so long adored,
was dragged through the streets of Kiow; and twelve sturdy
Barbarians battered with clubs the misshapen image, which was
indignantly cast into the waters of the Borysthenes. The edict
of Wolodomir had proclaimed, that all who should refuse the rites
of baptism would be treated as the enemies of God and their
prince; and the rivers were instantly filled with many thousands
of obedient Russians, who acquiesced in the truth and excellence
of a doctrine which had been embraced by the great duke and his
boyars. In the next generation, the relics of Paganism were
finally extirpated; but as the two brothers of Wolodomir had died
without baptism, their bones were taken from the grave, and
sanctified by an irregular and posthumous sacrament.

[Footnote 73: Phot. Epistol. ii. No. 35, p. 58, edit. Montacut.
It was unworthy of the learning of the editor to mistake the
Russian nation, for a war-cry of the Bulgarians, nor did it
become the enlightened patriarch to accuse the Sclavonian
idolaters. They were neither Greeks nor Atheists.]

[Footnote 74: M. Levesque has extracted, from old chronicles and
modern researches, the most satisfactory account of the religion
of the Slavi, and the conversion of Russia, (Hist. de Russie,
tom. i. p. 35 - 54, 59, 92, 92, 113 - 121, 124 - 129, 148, 149,
&c.)]

[Footnote 75: See the Ceremoniale Aulae Byzant. tom. ii. c. 15,
p. 343 - 345: the style of Olga, or Elga. For the chief of
Barbarians the Greeks whimsically borrowed the title of an
Athenian magistrate, with a female termination, which would have
astonished the ear of Demosthenes.]

[Footnote 76: See an anonymous fragment published by Banduri,
(Imperium Orientale, tom. ii. p. 112, 113, de Conversione
Russorum.]

[Footnote 77: Cherson, or Corsun, is mentioned by Herberstein
(apud Pagi tom. iv. p. 56) as the place of Wolodomir's baptism
and marriage; and both the tradition and the gates are still
preserved at Novogorod. Yet an observing traveller transports
the brazen gates from Magdeburgh in Germany, (Coxe's Travels into
Russia, &c., vol. i. p. 452;) and quotes an inscription, which
seems to justify his opinion. The modern reader must not
confound this old Cherson of the Tauric or Crimaean peninsula,
with a new city of the same name, which has arisen near the mouth
of the Borysthenes, and was lately honored by the memorable
interview of the empress of Russia with the emperor of the West.]

In the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries of the Christian
aera, the reign of the gospel and of the church was extended over
Bulgaria, Hungary, Bohemia, Saxony, Denmark, Norway, Sweden,
Poland, and Russia. ^78 The triumphs of apostolic zeal were
repeated in the iron age of Christianity; and the northern and
eastern regions of Europe submitted to a religion, more different
in theory than in practice, from the worship of their native
idols. A laudable ambition excited the monks both of Germany and
Greece, to visit the tents and huts of the Barbarians: poverty,
hardships, and dangers, were the lot of the first missionaries;
their courage was active and patient; their motive pure and
meritorious; their present reward consisted in the testimony of
their conscience and the respect of a grateful people; but the
fruitful harvest of their toils was inherited and enjoyed by the
proud and wealthy prelates of succeeding times. The first
conversions were free and spontaneous: a holy life and an
eloquent tongue were the only arms of the missionaries; but the
domestic fables of the Pagans were silenced by the miracles and
visions of the strangers; and the favorable temper of the chiefs
was accelerated by the dictates of vanity and interest. The
leaders of nations, who were saluted with the titles of kings and
saints, ^79 held it lawful and pious to impose the Catholic faith
on their subjects and neighbors; the coast of the Baltic, from
Holstein to the Gulf of Finland, was invaded under the standard
of the cross; and the reign of idolatry was closed by the
conversion of Lithuania in the fourteenth century. Yet truth and
candor must acknowledge, that the conversion of the North
imparted many temporal benefits both to the old and the new
Christians. The rage of war, inherent to the human species,
could not be healed by the evangelic precepts of charity and
peace; and the ambition of Catholic princes has renewed in every
age the calamities of hostile contention. But the admission of
the Barbarians into the pale of civil and ecclesiastical society
delivered Europe from the depredations, by sea and land, of the
Normans, the Hungarians, and the Russians, who learned to spare
their brethren and cultivate their possessions. ^80 The
establishment of law and order was promoted by the influence of
the clergy; and the rudiments of art and science were introduced
into the savage countries of the globe. The liberal piety of the
Russian princes engaged in their service the most skilful of the
Greeks, to decorate the cities and instruct the inhabitants: the
dome and the paintings of St. Sophia were rudely copied in the
churches of Kiow and Novogorod: the writings of the fathers were
translated into the Sclavonic idiom; and three hundred noble
youths were invited or compelled to attend the lessons of the
college of Jaroslaus. It should appear that Russia might have
derived an early and rapid improvement from her peculiar
connection with the church and state of Constantinople, which at
that age so justly despised the ignorance of the Latins. But the
Byzantine nation was servile, solitary, and verging to a hasty
decline: after the fall of Kiow, the navigation of the
Borysthenes was forgotten; the great princes of Wolodomir and
Moscow were separated from the sea and Christendom; and the
divided monarchy was oppressed by the ignominy and blindness of
Tartar servitude. ^81 The Sclavonic and Scandinavian kingdoms,
which had been converted by the Latin missionaries, were exposed,
it is true, to the spiritual jurisdiction and temporal claims of
the popes; ^82 but they were united in language and religious
worship, with each other, and with Rome; they imbibed the free
and generous spirit of the European republic, and gradually
shared the light of knowledge which arose on the western world.

[Footnote 78: Consult the Latin text, or English version, of
Mosheim's excellent History of the Church, under the first head
or section of each of these centuries.]

[Footnote 79: In the year 1000, the ambassadors of St. Stephen
received from Pope Silvester the title of King of Hungary, with a
diadem of Greek workmanship. It had been designed for the duke
of Poland: but the Poles, by their own confession, were yet too
barbarous to deserve an angelical and apostolical crown.
(Katona, Hist. Critic Regum Stirpis Arpadianae, tom. i. p. 1 -
20.)]

[Footnote 80: Listen to the exultations of Adam of Bremen, (A.D.
1080,) of which the substance is agreeable to truth: Ecce illa
ferocissima Danorum, &c., natio ..... jamdudum novit in Dei
laudibus Alleluia resonare ..... Ecce populus ille piraticus
..... suis nunc finibus contentus est. Ecce patria horribilis
semper inaccessa propter cultum idolorum ... praedicatores
veritatis ubique certatim admittit, &c., &c., (de Situ Daniae,
&c., p. 40, 41, edit. Elzevir; a curious and original prospect of
the north of Europe, and the introduction of Christianity.)]

[Footnote 81: The great princes removed in 1156 from Kiow, which
was ruined by the Tartars in 1240. Moscow became the seat of
empire in the xivth century. See the 1st and 2d volumes of
Levesque's History, and Mr. Coxe's Travels into the North, tom.
i. p. 241, &c.]

[Footnote 82: The ambassadors of St. Stephen had used the
reverential expressions of regnum oblatum, debitam obedientiam,
&c., which were most rigorously interpreted by Gregory VII.; and
the Hungarian Catholics are distressed between the sanctity of
the pope and the independence of the crown, (Katona, Hist.
Critica, tom. i. p. 20 - 25, tom. ii. p. 304, 346, 360, &c.)]



Chapter LVI: The Saracens, The Franks And The Normans.

Part I.

The Saracens, Franks, And Greeks, In Italy. - First
Adventures And Settlement Of The Normans. - Character And
Conquest Of Robert Guiscard, Duke Of Apulia - Deliverance Of
Sicily By His Brother Roger. - Victories Of Robert Over The
Emperors Of The East And West. - Roger, King Of Sicily, Invades
Africa And Greece. - The Emperor Manuel Comnenus. - Wars Of The
Greeks And Normans. - Extinction Of The Normans.

The three great nations of the world, the Greeks, the
Saracens, and the Franks, encountered each other on the theatre
of Italy. ^1 The southern provinces, which now compose the
kingdom of Naples, were subject, for the most part, to the
Lombard dukes and princes of Beneventum; ^2 so powerful in war,
that they checked for a moment the genius of Charlemagne; so
liberal in peace, that they maintained in their capital an
academy of thirty-two philosophers and grammarians. The division
of this flourishing state produced the rival principalities of
Benevento, Salerno, and Capua; and the thoughtless ambition or
revenge of the competitors invited the Saracens to the ruin of
their common inheritance. During a calamitous period of two
hundred years, Italy was exposed to a repetition of wounds, which
the invaders were not capable of healing by the union and
tranquility of a perfect conquest. Their frequent and almost


 


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