Byzantium 1220 to 1330

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

BYZANTIUM: FROM RECOVERY TO RUIN, a detailed chronology: AD 1220-1331 From the first appearance of the Mongols to the surrender of Nicaea to the Ottoman Turks With extensive notes on the numbers, equipment and pay of the Early Palaeogian army. Compiled by Michael O’Rourke Canberra, Australia April 2010 Email: mjor (at) velocitynet (dot) com.au

Greek Emperors at Nicaea and Constantinople: John III Doukas Vatatzes, 1221-54. Theodore II Lascaris, 1254-58. Michael VIII Palaeologus, co-emperor 1259-61 with John IV Lascaris (at Nicaea), and sole emperor, 1261-82 (at Constantinople). Andronicus II Palaeologus, 1282-1328. Andronicus III Palaeologus, 1328-41. Introduction In the early 13th century, the leading Muslim powers of western Eurasia and north Africa were (from west to east:) 1 the Almohad Caliphate in southern Spain and NW Africa: east as far as our Libya; 2 the Ayyubid Sultanate, the creation of Saladin, d. 1193, in the Levant [Egypt-Palestine-Syria]; 3 the Seljuk (Turkish) Sultanate of Rum in central and eastern Anatolia; and in Persia, 4 the Empire of the Khwarizm Shah. Two small Latin Crusader statelets, much reduced since their 12th century heyday, held enclaves on the coast of Palestine and Lebanon-Syria. They were surrounded, except on the sea-side, by the Ayyubids, viz: (a) the ‘Kingdom of Acre’ under the Hospitaller knights, and (b) the Knights-Templar Principality of Antioch-Tripoli. The Mediterranean sphere was divided among two Greek states and two Latin powers. The Greek Despotate* of Epirus (later expanded into a so-called ‘Empire

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 of Salonica’) controlled western and central Greece. Lower Greece was in the hands of the so-called Latin Empire, which also ruled in Constantinople. Crete was under the rule of Venice. Finally, the ‘Empire of Nicaea’ held western Asia Minor. Thus there were three competing candidates for the ancient and prestigious throne of New Rome or Byzantium: (1) the Greek Despot of Epirus, Theodore Komnenos Doukas [1214-1230]; (2) the Latin Emperor, Robert of Courtenay [1221-28], who actually held Constantinople; and (3) the ‘Nicaean’ Greek monarch Theodore I Lascaris [12o5-21]. Theodore had been aged about 30 when the Fourth Crusade stormed Constantinople in 1204, ousted the Roman (Byzantine) emperor Isaac II, and installed a Western (Latin) ruler. It is also useful to mention the major Latin states in Europe. There were five of note: (a) the Kingdom of Hungary under the Arpads; (b) the ‘German Empire’ socalled, under the Hohenstaufen kings, which included Sicily and nominally also northern Italy; (c) France under the later Capetian kings; (d) Castile [the most powerful of several Christian kingdoms in Iberia]; and (e) England under the Plantagenets [Henry III]. Last of all—but very strong at sea—were the small ‘maritime’ states of northern Italy: Venice, Genoa and Pisa (the last being much weakened after 1284). (*) The Despot was not an especially tyrannical ruler; his title was just an ordinary Greek word (despotes) meaning ‘lord’ or ‘master’. Strong and Weak States McEvedy & Jones’ (1978) guesstimates of population will serve as a metric for the relative strength of the Christian states. We will take first the Greek or Aegean sphere. Their estimate for Greece [present-day boundaries] is one million people in about 1225. To this must be added a guess for the population of the Nicaean Empire. Here we can use one-third of what is now Turkey-in-Asia, namely two million people in the 13th century. Total: three million. When Greek rule was restored in Constantinople in 1261, emperor Michael VIII had about two million subjects, if we follow McEvedy & Jones. Other estimates for the restored empire of around 1265 run as high as five million, not falling to perhaps two million until the disastrous reign of Andronicus II (by AD 1312) (Treadgold 1997: 700, 841: see the discussion in the entries below for AD 1278 and 1282). This can be compared with McEvedy & Jones’ guesstimates for the Western powers in the early 1200s: Hohenstaufen Germany: perhaps 7 M including Sicily; France: perhaps 6 M people (allowing for the smaller size of 13th C France compared to today); Castile: about 3.25 M in 1225; and England: about 2.5 M. Finally we will note the likely size of the strongest Muslim state, the Ayyubid Sultanate: about 6 million people. The Early Palaeogian Army . . . . . . is described in detail in a long section placed before the entry, below, for AD 1328. 2

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

The following topics are mentioned in the following places: - Barding (horse armour): 1259 (Battle of Pelagonia); after 1328 (The Palaeologian Army in about 1330); and after 1333 (Ibn Battuta’s visit to Constantinople). - Bow-cases: after 1328. - Composite bow: after 1328 (The Palaeologian Army in about 1330). - Horse archers in Byzantine service: 1242; 1259 (Battle of Pelagonia); 1261; 1262-63; 1280-81 (Berat: Albanian campaign); 1301-02 (at Baphaeon); and 1320 (the army of Andronicus). - Kettle-shaped brimmed war-hat or “chapel-de-fer”: before the entry for 1251; and before 1263. - Lamellar armour: after the entry for 1262; after 1319; and after 1325. - Pronoiars: after 1261-63; before 1297-1330; 1298; before 1300; 1313-18; after 1321; before 1326-62; and after 1328. - Quivers: after 1328. - Varangians: 1259; 1263; 1271-72; 1272; 1301/02 (Battle of Baphaeon); 1305 (Battle of Apros); before 1320; 1325; and 1329 (Battle of Pelekanon). Geography and some Technical Terms “Adrianople” [Hadrianopolis]: Today’s Edirne in European Turkey. “Asia Minor”: today’s Turkey-in-Asia. It helps to know the location of two major rivers: in the SW, the Meander (Turkish: Büyük Menderes) which exits into the lower Aegean; and in the NW, the Sangarios (Tk Sakarya), whose lower stretch runs from near Ankara down to the Black Sea well to the east of Cosnatinople. It also helps to know the eastern Aegean coast: the two major islands are Lesbos and Chios [English pronunciation “kai-us”: rhymes with ‘bias’]. The town of Pergamum lay east of Lesbos, but inland. East of Chios was the key port town of Phocaea (modern Foca) with its famous alum mines. In SW Asia Minor there was an important cluster of large towns: Magnesia, Smyrna, Philadelphia, Tralles, Nymphaeum (Tk: Nif), Ephesus and Miletus. “Basileus”: The Greek word for emperor. Pronounced ‘vasilefs’. “Caria”: The SW sector of Asia Minor opposite Rhodes. More narrowly, ‘Caria’ 3

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 was alo the mediaval nme for the ancinet inland twon of Aphrodisias. “Constantinople” [Konstantinoupolis]: Present-day Istanbul. Located at the top of the Sea of Marmara [Gk: Propontis], on the European shore, at the bottom (southern) end of the Bosphorus [Tk: Istanbul Boghazi], the narrow strait that runs from the Marmara through to the Black Sea [Gk: Euxeinos Pontos]. “Bithynia”: The NW sector of Asia Minor, adjoining the Sea of Marmara and extending to the Asian shore of the Bosphorus. “Epirus”: Today’s west-central Greece and southern Albania. Capital: Arta. “Greeks”: This was a Western term. The Byzantines called themselves Rhomaioi (Romans). Arabic and Turkish: Rumi. Today’s Greeks call themselves ‘Ellenes (Hellenes). “Macedonia” [Gk Makedonía]: It is important to distinguish three references: (a) the ancient and modern region of Greece centred on Thessaloniki; (b) the Byzantine Theme (province) of Makedonia, which actually covered lower Thrace; and (c) ‘FYROM’: the modern Slavic state located today in what was historically SW Bulgaria/SE Serbia. In the 13th century Greek Macedonia began as part of the Latin Empire of Constantinople (”Romania”) and ended as part of the Byzantine (Roman/Greek) Empire. What is now FYROM began as part of Bulgaria and ended divided between Serbia and the Byzantine empire. “Morea”, Greek Moreas: The medieval name of the ancient Peloponnesus, the southernmost segment of modern Greece. The name possibly derived from the name of the mulberry tree [Gk: moréa], on which silk worms fed. More probably, given its long O [omega], it derives from moros, ‘fool, rebel, outlaw’, by implcation ‘lawless land’ (see discussion at www.mlahanas.de/Greece/Regions/Morea). The name first appears in the 10th century in Byzantine chronicles. “Thessaly”: The east-central segment of present-day Greece, centred on the city of Larissa. Cf Wallachia. “Thrace”: Modern Turkey-in-Europe plus our south Bulgaria. The ByzantineBulgarian border ran broadly west-east just beyond Byzantine Philippopolis (modern Plovdiv). “Türkmen”: Turkish nomads, i.e. non-farmers. Tent-dwellers herding sheep and goats. “Their [the Mongols] apparition brought some 200,000 people and the equivalent of three or four million sheep and goats, who displaced the nomads already there [in Asia Minor] and pressed them westward” (Lindner). 4

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

“Wallachia”: Vlach is the ‘exonym’ (outsiders’ name) for speakers of the several East Romance languages. There are two key references to be distinguished when we read of Vlachia or ‘Wallachia’: (1) The region of modern Romania immediately north of the Danube, which emerged as a distinct principality in 1330; and, of more relevance to us: (2): The duchy or “despotate” in greater Thessaly, 1271-1318, in what is now central Greece, whose best soldiers were Romance-speaking Aromanians or “Vlachs”. Greek name: Megáli Vlachía. Capital: Neopatras or Neai Patrai: modern Ypati (west of Lamia). Thessaly’s loyalties vacillated between Latin Achaia, Greek Epirus and Byzantium.

Above: The eastern Mediterranean in AD 1200. CHRONOLOGY BEGINS HERE 1220-37: Eastern Asia Minor: Zenith of the Seljuq (Turkish) sultanate of Rum under ‘Ala al-Din Kay Kubad I. Turkish rule is extended to the Black Sea and southern Anatolian coast. - See 1221. Cf 1223-24: expedition to Greek Crimea. Also 1242-43: Mongols arrive. 1220-22: FIRST MONGOL INCURSION: 5

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 Intrigued by stories of the Caspian Sea being landlocked, the Mongols sent a reconnaissance in force around the bottom or southern end of the sea on a twoyear journey, 1220-1221. First they crush (1220) the Khwarizm Shahdom in what is now NE Iran, and then carve a bloody track across Armenia and Georgia. Now for the first time, Christendom learned of the Mongols. Having crossed into Transcaucasia from Gpoergia, the first Mongol incursion reaches what is now Ukraine and Crimea, before they withdraw to the east vaia the Volga. Eastern Georgia fell under Mongol domination, but western Georgia remained free . . . f0r the time being. In the winter of 1220-1221 the Mongols attacked Georgia, then ruled by King George Lashen IV. This was the first campaign in which Mongol forces were opposed by a Christian army. Dennis Sinor (1999) proposes that, though Grigor of Akanc speaks of the "merciless slaughter" perpetrated by the "nation of the archers", it can be assumed that the small army commanded by Jebe and Subetei [Sübügätäi] had no intention of occupying on a permanent basis either Christian Georgia or Muslim Azerbaijan. 1221: 1. Macedonia: The Epirotes advance into Latin-ruled Macedonia, almost cutting off the highway from Latin-ruled Constantinople to Latin Thessaloniki (Bartusis p.23). See 1223-24. The Seljuk Apogee 2. South-central coast of Asia Minor: The Seljuk sultan Kay-Kubad - Kayqubad or Keykubad ‘the Great’ - acquires ex-Byzantine Alanya [Gk Kalonoros]; it became thereafter his summer residence. See 1228. The Christian Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia (on the mainland north of Cyprus) periodically held the port after 1204, and it was from an Armenian nobleman, Kir (“lord”) Fard, that Muslims took lasting control in 1221 when the Anatolian Seljuk Sultan Kayqubad exchanged governance of the inland town of Akshehir for it; as part of the deal Fard’s daughter married Kayqubad (Lloyd & Rice 1958: 34). “The Seljuks had a robust interest in reusing the classical past for decorative purposes in their fortifications, and were unusual in their acceptance of iconic sculpture, including sarcophagi. Sarre [Friedrich Sarre, the German archaeologist, d. 1945] has provided a photographic record of some of their spolia-rich* creations. The most famous are the walls of Konya, whose towers were erected by Alaeddin Kuykubad I in 1221; he encouraged the inclusion of figural sculpture, inscriptions, and having sculptured stones of various sorts set into both his gateways” (Greenhalgh, citing T. Talbot Rice, The Seljuks in Asia Minor, London 1961, p. 153 ff). (*) Spolia: Re-used materials taken from older buildings. 1221-28: Robert of Courtenay, Latin ruler in Constantinople, “a weak and feckless youth” 6

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 (says Norwich 1995: 193). See 1224. 1221/2-54: JOHN (Ioannes) III Ducas Vatatzes, emperor in Nicaea and Nymphaion. Aged about 29 at accession. A successful soldier from a military family, in 1212 John at age 20 had been chosen by the heirless Emperor Theodore I Laskaris as husband of his daughter Eirene Laskarina (d. 1239) and as heir to the throne. Later he marries Constance-Anna, Costanza von Hohenstaufen, a nautural (legitimised) daughter of the German-Sicilian emperor Frederick II. In this reign Nicaea remained the formal capital where the imperial coronations took place, but the emperor’s residence and the seat of government was moved (1222) from Nicaea to Nymphaeum, modern Nif (renamed Kemalpasha), inland from Izmir-Smyrna. Norwich 1995: 203 assesses Vatatzes as one of the greatest of all Greek/Byzantine emperors, at least among the later emperors. He more than doubled the size of his empire and strengthened the eastern border with the Seljuq Turks. “The Lascarid emperors, first at Nicaea, then - for the remainder of their Anatolian exile - at Nif or Nymphaeum in the southwest, attended to the economic, military, and physical reconstruction of west Anatolia below the plateau in order to finance their European campaigns and threats against Constantinople. They meant to revive Anatolia, but for the sake of Constantinople. They wanted Anatolia to prosper, but only so they could leave it. The agricultural prosperity achieved during the half-century of Lascarid rule centred in the south, in the valleys of the Gediz [near Smyrna] and Menderes [Meander] rivers. The silk production of Nicaea was Bithynia's major contribution. John Ill Ducas Vatatzes . . . fostered a more intensive exploitation of farm resources in the lands surrounding Manisa/Magnesia [north of Smyrna]. His egg ranch is perhaps best known for the crown* its profits bought.” —thus Lindner. (*) Vatatzes offered his wife, Irene, a crown "of eggs" or ‘egg-crown’, the famous öaton, bought with the proceeds of the sale of the first eggs from the imperial estate. Many of the purchasers of these eggs after 1243 were Seljuq refugees fleeing west from the Mongols: see under 1243 (Lippard 1984: 177). Sardis at this time was the seat of a small lordship, on the main highway between the frontier and the emperors’ favoured residence (Nymphaion) and the treasury (Magnesia/Manisa). The line of the hihway ran thus: Smyrna, Nymphaion, Sardis and Philadelphia. Ruth Macrides notes (in her translation of Akropolites) that the region Philadelphia-Nymphaion-Magnesia - which is to say: 7

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 the valley of the Hermus River (Gediz Nehri: east of Izmir) - formed the heartland of the Nicaean empire. The nearest ports to Nymphaion were Phocaea (Foca) amd Smyrna (Izmir). Money Although the hyperpyron survived the disaster of 1204, coins struck by the exiled “emperors of Nicaea” at the Magnesia mint in Asia Minor were little by little debased, falling to 18 carats under John III, r.1222–54 (Grierson 1999) 1221-25: The Seljuks under Kay Qubadh conquered the Mediterranean coast around Alanya from the Romaics in 1221 to 1225. c.1222: West-central Asia Minor: The small box-like three-storey palace at Nymphaeum (Nimphaion, Nif, modern Kemalpasa) was apparently built by John Vatatzes in about 1222. In Turkish the ruins are called Kiz Kulesi [see http://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kemalpa%C5%9Fa,_%C4%B0zmir: in Turkish]. The fact that it is one of only four remaining Byzantine imperial palaces built after 1204 is enough to make it important. It was probably the first to display Western influences, not heretofore seen in imperial Byzantine audience-halls. It appears striped, the two upper storeys being built with differently coloured layers of masonry. 1223: The Franciscan order, founded in N Italy, is recognised by Rome: piety is equated with poverty; + revitalisation of the Western church. 1223/24: Breakup of the Latin Empire: Theodore of Epirus—Theodoros Komnenos-Doukas Angelos—besieges (1223) and takes (1224) Thessaloniki from its Latin king, and establishes his court there. From 1228 he assumes the title “sovereign and emperor of the Romans”: basileus kai autokratõr Rõmaiõn; this briefly creates an Epirote “Empire of Salonika” (until 1246) (Heurtley et al. 1967). — The Epirote capture of Thessaloniki severed the land link between Latin Constantinople and Latin Athens; thus the Latin empire became dependent on maritime links. There were now two rulers claiming the title "Emperor of the Romans": John III Vatatazes in Nymphaeum and Theodore in Salonica-Thessaloniki. Or three if we count the Latin monarch in Constantinople itself. The central Byzantine realm was at this time divided among four states, two Greek/Romaic and two Latin: [1.] The Greek 'Empire of Nicaea', which comprised much of western Asia Minor; [2.] The 'Latin Empire' of Romania ruling 8

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 Constantinople, part of NW Asia Minor [see 1225], part of Thrace and (nearly all) the Peloponnesus; [3.] The Venetians controlled Crete and most of the Aegean islands; and [4.] The Greek ‘Empire of Salonika’ held the central Balkan peninsula. (Eastern Anatolia was dominated by the Seljuks of Rum, with a further "Greek-speaking"/Romaic statelet at Trebizond and an Armenian statelet in Cilicia.) — In short, a small Latin empire of Constantinople or “Romania” - mainly lower Greece and the capital - was wedged between two larger Greek states: the "empire of Salonika" (which included Epirus) and the Nicaean 'empire' in western Asian Minor. As noted, Venice ruled Crete and the Athens sector of the Aegean. — Thessaly, the so-called "Duchy of Neopatras", also called 'Great Wallachia', was dominated by Epirus, but was sometimes independent. (This Wallachia is not to be confused with a later Wallachia, which is part of present-day Rumania.) 2. Crimea: Using their new port of Sinope, the Seljuks tried to control the entire Black Sea. In 1223-24 (or 1225) they ventured a campaign in the Crimea— hitherto dominated by the Greeks of Trebizond—resulting in the brief occupation of the town of Sudak or Sughdaq [centre of the SE coast] (Zahariadou 1989: 213; Freely 2008: 73). 1224: 1. Asia Minor: John III of Nicaea/Nymphaeum decisively defeats the Latins at Poimanenon and occupies almost all their territory in Asia Minor, i.e. up to the coast opposite Gallipoli and its hinterlands. Langdon p.1 calls it a “stirring” victory. Neither side would have deployed large numbers. It has been said that at the height of its power, in the period 1204-24, the Latin empire possessed fewer than 1,000 cavalrymen (Cassidy p.310, citing Hendricks). Adding foot solders, the Latin side probably did not even reach 4,000. NW Asia Minor: After two years of consolidation, reorganisation and the building of a new army and fleet, in 1224 Vatatzes struck at and defeated a Frankish army on the same battlefield of Poemanenum or Poimanenon, located south of Cyzicus, west of Bursa, north of present-day Balikesir, where his father-in-law had been beaten 20 years previously (LBA p.23). Cyzicus, Lopadion (Ulubad) and Poimanenon form the points of an equilateral triangle. Poimanenon effectively ended Latin power in NW Asia Minor. The victory brought Nicaea much of the lands lost by Theodore I along the Aegean coast of Mysia.* From this position, Vatatzes used his new fleet** to take Samos, Chios and Lemnos from the Venetians and also to subjugate the minor despotate of Rhodes. (*) The region that bordered the south coast of the Sea of Marmara. (**) There were two main naval bases: one for the Aegean at Smyrna and one for 9

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 the Hellespont at Holkos, near Lampsakos. In addition ships were sometime stationed at Stadeia (ancient Cnidus) on the Aegean between Bodrum and Rhodes and Lampsakos itself on the Sea of Marmara (on the Asian shore, at the top of the Hellespont opposite modern Gelibolu). —Macrides 2007: 100. Both John III and Theodore II undertook winter campaigns. After his victory against the Latins in Poimamenon (1224), John III conducted a series of operations against Latin possessions in Asia Minor and captured Poimamenon; Lentiana: a fortress between Lopadium and Cyzicus; Charioros and Berberiakion. Akropolites points out that these operations were mainly long sieges carried out during the winter and aimed at exhausting the besieged. –Thus Kyriakidis. 2. John III makes his first foray into Europe, where, faced with little resistance from the Latins, he takes most of Thrace (LBA p. 23). See 1277. Frederick II founds Naples University. 1224-30: Theodore Ducas—Theodoros Komnenos Doukas Angelos— rules at Thessaloniki. In 1228 he claims the title of emperor. The so-called ‘Empire of Salonica’ covered most of the central Balkans (Epirus to outer Thrace). John III Ducas Vatatzes’s ‘Nicaean Empire’ in Asia Minor was not much larger. See next. 1224-47: The Nicaean fleet wrests the islands of Lesbos, Chios, Samos and Icaria from the Latins. (Chios and Lesbos lie offshore from Smyrna, close upon the then capital of Nymphaeon; Samos and Ikaria are further south.) See next. - The reorganisation or revival of the fleet had probably begun under Theodore Lascaris, d. 1221, and was continued by Vatatzes (cf Savvides 1981: 98, citing Ahrweiler). - Lesbos remained under Byzantine rule 1224-1355. 1225: a. Treaty between Vatatzes and Robert of Constantinople. An exchange of territory brought the northern boundary of the Nicaean kingdom within sight of Nicomedia (Nicol, Epiros p.104). b. The Balkans: The army of Theodore of Epirus (ruling at Thessaloniki) advanced through the Aegean coast of Thrace and in 1225 (or 1227) seized Adrianople and the surrounding portions of Thrace from the Nicaeans. Cf 1227. Theodore marched from Serres NE along the Via Egnatia into Thrace and occupied Kavalla, Xanthi, Gratziana and Mosynopolis. From there he advanced to Didymoteichos and Adrianople. The latter had only just fallen into the hands of the Nicaeans. It promptly surrended to Theodore without a fight (Nicol, Epiros p.104). See 1225.3 below.

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 c. Thrace: Having struck a marriage alliance with Bulgaria, Theodore Angelus of Epirus advances with his army into inner Thrace and reaches the walls of Latin Constantinople; but of course the city is impregnable (ibid.) Following his withdrawal to Arta in Epirus, Theodore arranges for a synod to be convened; it duly declares him “faithful sovereign (basileus) and Roman emperor (autokrator Rhomaion) (Nicol, Despotate p.105). From about 1225: The Seljuqs of Rum establish a trade route from Egypt to their new port of Alanya, and thence across Anatolia to the Black Sea, the Crimea and the so-called Golden Horde [or “Kipchak Empire”:* Mongol-ruled Ukraine] (http://www.turkishhan.org/trade.htm). Cf 1228 – slipyard; and 1230. (*) Within a few generations the conquering Mongols were absorbed by the conquered Turkic populations. The process of assimilation was so fast that Al-'Umari, fl. 1342, could already state in his time that Mongols and Kipchaks seemed to belong to the same race (Sinor 1999). 1225-31: Langdon 1992 calls Vatatzes’ campaign in this period Byzantium’s “last” imperial offensive in the Meander Valley in SW Asia Minor. It would be better to say: its last effective offensive.* This meant postponing his plans to recover Constantinople. (*) Cf 1281: Nestongus’s expedition; and 1304: Catalans relieve Philadelphia. According to Langdon, this campaign “can be likened to a crusade in its zeal” (p.21). Hopwood (1999) rightly rejects this claim as “extravagant” (Hopwood, “Frontier’, p. 156; also Freely 2008: 73). Some estimates of the size of the Nicaean army are unbelievable, but George of Pelagonia’s “8,055” men (sic: Langdon, his note 186) is within the limit of credibility. Lascaris had led 2,000 men in 1211, but that was essentially a one-off flying column, and the usual total he was able to deploy at that time may have been more like 6,000. The main Greek sources, George of Pelagonia and Acropolites, do not give the size of the Turkish force(s) in 1225; but if we take the final zero off Nicodemus Hagiorites’s fantastic “63,000” we may have a credible figure, i.e. 6,300 men. The enemy were not the sultan’s professional forces, for Nicaea and Konya were at peace; rather the Turkish enemy was the irregular light horsemen of the borderlands. As Hopwood says, “John Vatatzes was marching against Türkmen, not Seljuks” (“Frontier”, p.157). Hagiorites’ figure might be correct if it meant the whole of the Turkish tribes - children, women and men - from whom the raiders were drawn.

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 The various accounts of the campaign show that the middle Cayster valley inland from Ephesus - around present-day Tire - was infested with “barbarians”, nomad Türkmen who were only nominally loyal to the Seljuq Sultan. Vatatzes first took his army from his capital Nyphaeum eastward – some 50 km - to Sardes; he then turned south-west and crossed the Cayster River [modern Küçük Menderes, ‘Little Meander’], specifically to Tire (Thera, Thyraea), immediately south of that river, and travelled thence west to Ephesus in the lower Cayster valley. Presumably he was clearing out Turkish strongholds as he went. From Ephesus he proceeded with his troops SE into the lower Meander (Menderes) Valley, past modern Selçuk to Magnesia-on-the-Meander: a distance of under 20 km. They campaigned thence up - that is: eastwards along - the Meander valley from Tralles (Aydin) to Nyssa, Antioch-on-the-Meander [modern Kuyucak, east of Nazilli] and Laodiceia [modern Denizli]. Evidently the two forces clashed below, i.e. a little to the west of, Antioch (Langdon p.32), i.e. near modern Nazilli. Then in a final sweep, Vatatzes turned north to Tripolis and Philadelphia (today’s Alasehir), and thence down the Hermus, i.e. west, to Sardes once again and on to Magnesia-on-the-Hermus (modern Manisa). —Langdon 1992. Cf 1264: Turks have returned. 1225-36: The Nicaeans take S Thrace from the Latin emperor. Cf 1227. c.1227: Birth of the Italian painter Giotto, first to move away from Byzantine-style art . . . cf 1231. 1227: Thrace: John III Vatatze's possession of Adrianople was terminated by Theodore Komnenos Doukas of Epirus and Thessalonica, who drove the Nicaean garrison out of Adrianople and annexed much of Thrace in 1227. 1227: d. Genghis Khan. See 1231. 1228: (Or ca. 1227:) The Seljuqs build a dockyard or slip-yard at Alanya: see plan in Rice 1961. Situated to the south of the Red Tower, right by the sea, there is a covered building, quarried out of the rock, where the big warships of the age were built and repaired in complete security. Galleys were stored out of water when not in use. The shipyard itself is 56.5 metres long, 44 (or 42.5) metres wide and consists of five chambers or galleries (long sheds). Each chamber is 7.70 metres wide and 42.30 metres deep, all opening to the sea. In other words, a snug fit for a large galley of about 5 x 30 metres (source: www.alanyaholidays.com/thehistoryandhistoricalsitesofalanya; accessed September 2006). 1228-29: 12

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 The ‘Sixth Crusade’ as later historians call it: The army of the German-Sicilian emperor Frederick II, later dubbed ‘the Great’, ‘sails’ [or rows: most of his ships were galleys] via Cyprus to Syria and proceeds overland thence to Palestine. The Ayyubids cede (1229) Jerusalem to the Latins, and declare a 10 year truce: see 1244. Emperor Frederick II, who had been excommunicated, chose to crown himself King of Jerusalem in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre [28 March 1229], and then departed (Abulafia 1992: 184). All sides, Jews, Muslim and Christians, were angered by Frederick's tolerance for the three religions … In February of 1229 the Egyptian ruler al-Kamil negotiated a 10-year peace with Frederick II and returned Jerusalem and other holy sites to the Crusader kingdom. Muslims and Jews were forbidden from the city, except for the Muslim holy sites around the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa. 1228-61: r. Baudouin de Courtenay or Baldwin II, Latin (Flemish) ruler in Constantinople. He was 11 years old at accession; the aged John of Brienne, 80 or nearly 80 years old, lately king of Jerusalem, served as regent. Cf 1230. Also 1235 – attack on Constantinople repulsed. - Constantinople's population apparently fell to a mere 35,000 people (Wikipedia, 2010, ‘Baldwin II’). 1229: 1. Crete: Rebellion against Latin (Venetian) rule by the Greek population (Gertwagen 1998) . See 1230. 2. A fine illuminated manuscript of Dioskorides’ De materia medica (dated 1229, now in the Topkapi Museum, Istanbul). - a text written by a pagan Greek, translated into Arabic, copied by a Christian scribe, for use by a Muslim reader. It was pobaly produced in Syria or northern Iraq Dioskorides, enthroned, wearing a generic toga-like garment, and, crowned with a halo, resembles an evangelist in a Romaic icon; and the presenters of the books, inclining toward him, look like Byzantine angels, but they wear long robes similar to modern Arab jibbas. All three of the protagonists wear turbans - even Dioskorides, with his halo. For a reference to Byzantine turbans, see 1320. 1229: The Hafsids (a Berber line) in Tunisia break with the Almohads of Morocco. Territory in 1230 The so-called Epirote "Empire of Salonika (Thessaloniki)" ruled most of the Balkans including part of Thrace, bordering Bulgaria (see next). Its rival the "Empire of Nicaea" ruled the western third of Asia Minor. These Romaic/Greek successor-states dominated the small 'Latin Empire' wedged between them. The Seljuk Sultan ruled the larger part of Asia Minor. See 1234, 1246. 13

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

1230: 1. Vatatzes sends ships to aid the Byzantine rebels of Crete against their Latin (Genoese) rulers (Nicol 1992). See 1233. 2. Thrace: Theodoros Angelos, emperor of Thessaloniki, annuls the treaty signed with the Bulgarian tsar Ivan Asan II against Ioannis (John) Vatatzis and immediately declares war against the Bulgarians. His army is annihilated near Klokotnitsa on the Evros/Maritza near today’s Haskovo in what is now SE Bulgaria, about halfway between Adrianople/Edirne and Plovdiv (Norwich 1996: 196). Epirus attacks Bulgaria: The Bulgarians under John Asen destroy an EpiroteSalonikan army under Theodore - which will leave the way clear for Nicaea to claim the ‘Greek’ (Rhomaioi) mantle. Theodore was captured and later blinded. Cf 1241. — This victory briefly extended Bulgarian rule into modern-day Albania. — The Bulgarian Tsar, John Asen, invaded Thessalonica and captured the Thessalonican-Epirus Emperor, causing the ‘empire’ to disunite into its former kingdoms of Thessalonica and Epirus. John Asen then made an alliance with John Vatatzes, and the two forces assaulted Constantinople in 1235. The siege ended unsuccessfully when John Asen betrayed the Nicaeans, thinking that a new Byzantine power would be far more troublesome than the existing Latin Empire. — The "second Bulgarian empire" reached its peak under Ivan Asen II, tsar at Turnovo [d. 1241]. Bulgaria ruled the whole north Balkans from Belgrade to Adrianople and from N Epirus to the Danube mouth. A good soldier and administrator, Ivan restored order, controlled the boyars, and acquired much of Albania, Serbia, Macedonia, and part of Epirus (1230). See 1235, 1246. — The first indigenous Bulgarian coinage is created during this reign. Thrace: Theodore went on campaign against the Bulgarian tsar John Asen II (1218–41) in 1230, but was defeated at the battle of Klokotnica (located on the road between Adrianople and Philippopolis), and captured and blinded. The Bulgarians soon conquered Didymoteichon and many other towns in the southern Maritza or Evros valley; cf. Nicol, Epiros I, 109–11. Theodore was succeeded as ruler of Epiros by his nephew, Michael II Komnenos Doukas. The Bulgarian victory over Epiros at Klokotnica (near modern Haskovo) in 1230 extended Bulgaria’s rule west to the Adriatic at Dyrrachion. The marriage of John Asen's daughter to Theodore II Laskaris of Nicaea and the creation of a Bulgarian patriarchate in 1235 mark the apogee of Bulgarian power in this period. In an inscription on a white marble column in the Church of the Forty Martyrs at Trnovo (Bulgaria), the tsar of Bulgaria told of the results of his victory in this “inflated” style; “I, John Asen, in Christ God the faithful Tsar and Autocrat of the Bulgars, son of the old Tsar Asen … set forth on a march upon Romania [ie Thessaloniki] and defeated the Greek troops, and I have captured the Emperor 14

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 himself, Theodore Comnenus, with all his boyars [nobles], and taken all the countries from Hadrianople to Durazzo, the Greek territory, as well as the Albanian and Serbian territories. The Latins [Franks] have kept only the cities round Tsargrad itself, but even they have become subject to the power of my Majesty, for they have no king but myself, and only thanks to me have they continued their existence.” —Vasiliev 1928 3. Eastern Anatolia: Alâeddin Keykubad or Kay-Qubadh of Rum, allied with the Ayyubid (Egyptian) prince Ashraf, defeated Jala ad-Din, the Khwarizm Shah of Iran. In this campaign Kay-Qubadh ends the Seljuk dynasty of Erzurum and annexes its domains. He was to be the last of his line to die (1237) in independence. Cf 1231: Mongols. "With order and tolerance of all races and religions established, agriculture and mining activity revived, … to foreigners Turkey [i.e. Rum] seemed one of the richest of countries" (Encyc. Brit. 15th ed. p. 944). Cf next; also AD 1232: Sultan Han; and 1243. 4. Caria, SW Asia Minor: The Çardak han or caravansary (fortified rest house) is just outside Cardak, east of Denizli on the left side of the Denizli-Afyon road. According to the seven-line inscription above the door, the Han was built by order of one Esedettin Ayaz bin Abdullah el Sahabi by his freed slaves in the time of Alaeddin Keykubat. It appears to have been completed in 1230 in the month of Ramadan (source: Denizli Tourism website: http://www.denizli.org.tr/EN/content.asp?id=625; accessed 2010). 1230-35: Western Mediterranean: Spanish Christians (Aragonese) —first mention of Aragon in this chronology—conquer the Balearics from the ‘Moors’ (Almohads): Majorca falls 1230 and Ibiza in 1235. 1230-37: r. Prince Manuel Angelos Ducas: younger brother of Theodore I Doukas and ruler at Thessaloniki, 1230-ca. 1237. He reigned under the domination of his father-inlaw Tsar Ivan of Bulgaria. In 1233 he restored relations between his state, known to us as the "(ex)Empire of Salonica (Thessaloniki)", and the empire of Nicaea. His brother John succeeded him to the throne, 1237-42. Manuel Dukas, son of John Dukas, was Regent of Thessalonica (1230-37), +1241; 1m: ca 1216 Efimia, dau. of Stephen Nemanja the ‘Veliki-Zupan’ or senior chieftain of Serbia; 2m: ca 1225 Maria, dau. of Tsar Ivan Asen II of Bulgaria. 1230-34: The Aegean: Greeks on various islands revolt against their Italian rulers. 1231: RETURN OF THE MONGOLS: They complete the destruction of the Khwarizm Shahdom in Iran (1231) and briefly settle in Azerbaijan, 123142. See below: 1236. Also in 1231: Mongols conquer Diyarbakir in Mesopotamia, briefly ending Ayyubid rule (resumed 1244). 15

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

1231-32: E Aegean: Vatatzes reconquers (Latin-ruled) Lesbos, Chios, Samos and the neighbouring islands (Gregoras, cited in Treadgold 1997: 963n). See 1233-35. 1231-37: According to Vacalopoulos (1970: 37, 43), this period saw the first stirrings of a Greek nationalism. There does seem to have been a stirring of Greekness or Hellenism; but was it nationalism? - At any event Vacalopoulos notes that John III Ducas Vatatzes was prepared to use the words ‘nation’ (genos), ‘Hellene’ and ‘Hellas’ together in his correspondence with the Pope. John acknowledged that he was Greek, although bearing the title Emperor of the Romans: “the Greeks are the only heirs and successors of Constantine”, he wrote. In similar fashion John’s son Theodore II, acc. 1254, who took some interest in the physical heritage of Antiquity, was prepared to refer to his whole Euro-Asian realm as “Hellas” and a “Hellenic dominion”. (What Vacalopoulos does not examine is whether, like the Latins, they also called their Aegean world ‘Roman-ia’. See earlier under 1204: Imperii Romaniae.) Cf Acropolites’ “Hellenic land” under 1248. 1231-1252: Sicily, Florence and Genoa: The first gold coins minted in the Latin West for many centuries.* This signalled the re-emergence of the Western kingdoms from ‘semi-barbarism’: 1. the AUGUSTALE of Frederick II of 1231: mints at Messina and Brindisi, 2. the FLORIN of Florence; and 3. the GENOVINO of Genoa: both appeared first in 1252. Cf 1270s, 1284 (Venice). (*) The Eastern Empire had produced light-weight gold coins in Italy until the late 700s; as did the Lombards of Benevento. The last gold coins in the Latin West had been minted under the Frankish king Louis (d. 810) (Porteous p.56). Also Byzantine gold coins (nomismata) had continued to circulate in southern Italy until after the Norman conquest of Byzantine Italy (1071). The Byzantines were still issuing the gold hyperpyron at Nicaea and then (after 1261) at Constantinople. From 1285, however, they will switch largely to silver for their locally minted coins. - Silver coinage was minted at Trabzond [med. Trebizond] from the time of John I (acc. 1235). - The first Seljuq gold coins appear in 1233. They had to compete with the currency of Baghdad [now a minor state], the Ayyubids of Cairo, Aleppo [also Ayyubid] and Florence (the florin, from 1252); all were accepted throughout the sultanate of Rum (T Rice 1961: 110). 1231-67: Ruler of Epiros: Michael II Komnenos Doukas, reigned ca. 1231-ca. 1267/68. 1232: 16

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 Turkish Rum: Building [1229-32] of the Sultan Hani, the great fortified travellers' inn, east of Konya, west of Aksaray, on the Konya-Akasaray road that runs south of the great lake Tuz Gölü. This karavansarai is the largest or one of the largest, the “most splendid”, of its genre (4,500 sq.m.: 67m x 67m) (Freely 2008: 170). Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I built Aksaray Sultan Han in 1229/32. With its buttresses, turreted towers and sturdy walls, it has the appearance of a fort on the outside (details at http://www.turkishhan.org/sultanaksaray.htm). Between 1201 and 1243 nearly 30 fortified rest houses—karavansarai or ‘han— were erected along the Anatolian high roads for the protection of travelling merchants. See also 1253-54. 1232-34: West-central Asia Minor: Turkmen bands were operating freely on the borders of Byzantium, i.e. in Phrygia, in the valley of the upper Simav Cayi, the ancient Makestos, east of the Byzantine fortress outpost of Calamus, west of modern Kutahya, a Seljuk possession since 1182 (Langdon p.23). - To locate Kutahya, draw a line east from Edremit, Greek Adrymittium, to intersect with a line south from Iznik (Nicomedia). 1232/34: North-east China, lower Yellow River Valley: combined Mongol and Song (southern Chinese) forces attack the Jin/Chin; plague kills one million people in three years. The Jin/Chin used bombs and rudimentary guns ("fire lances") against the Mongols. "Fire lances" were tubes containing spears that were fired out by gunpowder.

Above: A Genoese galley. 1233-34: 1. The caesar Leo Gabalas of Rhodes, encouraged by the Venetians, revolts against Anatolian Romaic (Nicaean) overlordship. Gabalas was de facto a vassal

17

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 of Venice (Akropolites, trans. Macrides p.248). See next, and 1233-35. 2. John Vatatzes’s navy was still rather weak. In 1233, during an expedition to recover Crete from Venice, he lost “30” galleys, which must have been over half of his navy, and in 1234 he failed to capture Rhodes (LBA p.24). See next, and cf 1234. There is no record of Greek Fire still being used by the Byzantines in the late period (LBA p.341). Either the knowledge of how to make it had been lost in 1204 or perhaps the ingredients could no longer be obtained. Cf 1249 – Egypt. 1233-35: East Aegean: Vatatzes notionally recovers Rhodes from the local Greek ruler, Leo Gabalas. Leo recognises Vatatzes’ suzertainty but also signs a pact with the Venetians of Crete (Setton p.52; Treadgold 1997: 724). 1235-36: The Nicaean Emperor John III Vatatzes besieged Latin Constantinople (1235) in alliance with the Bulgarian Tsar John Asen II. The latter sent 25 large galleys to help Vatatzes in the siege of Constantinople. The city was saved by the intervention of a (smaller) Venetian fleet. A second attack in 1236 also failed (LBA p.24; Treadgold 1997: 724). 1234: Pope Gregory IX establishes the Inquisition in Languedoc [Toulouse etc: in modern-day southern France] in order to destroy the Cathar "heresy". Catharism was effectively dead in western Europe by 1300. 1235: 1a. – Renewed pact between Nicaea and Bulgaria: Vatatzes’ 13 years old son, Theodoros II Doukas Laskaris, the future Emperor in Nicaea, acc. 1254, marries 11 yrs old Elena, 1224-ca. 1254, dau. of Ivan Asen II, Tsar of Bulgaria; and concurrently: 1b. - The Bulgarian patriarchate at Trnovo reverts to Orthodoxy (rejecting Rome), and, under this treaty, the Nicaeans recognise its independence or “autocephaly”. Bulgaria had broken with Rome in 1232, with the concurrence of the Eastern patriarchs; the treaty now supplied political recognition (Obolensky p.314; Norwich 1996: 197). 1c. Ivan and Vatazes jointly besiege Latin Constantinople. Formerly Latin Thrace was apportioned between Nicaea and Bulgaria, leaving the Latins only Constantinople, which held out against a Nicaean-Bulgarian siege (1235-36). Nicaea now ruled the Gallipoli peninsula and the Thracian littoral 18

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 west of the city (ODB ii: 1094; Norwich 1996: 197; Treadgold 1997: 724). During this siege the prince of Achaia, Geoffrey II, came to the aid of the Latin Empire with 100 knights, 800 archers and six vessels (Wikipedia, 2010 under ‘Achaea’). Moorish Minorca paid tribute to Aragon (Spain) but remained effectively independent. Italian painting: Bonaventura Berlinghieri's altarpiece of Saint Francis is painted (1235) in the Italo-Byzantine style, which is characterized by a strict formality, a linear flatness, a shallow space, and an emphasis on the spiritual. Cf 1236, 1245, 1291, 1297. 1235-36: Thrace: With Bulgarian aid, the Nicaeans under Vatatzes launch a “massive” campaign against Latin Romania (Langdon’s word: 1992 p.39); but they fail to take the capital. The Latins from Achaia sent aid. The Latins prevailed on land and at sea: the Ventians captured 25 Greek galleys including the flagship (Setton et al., History of the Crusades, 2005: 219). The sources mention some Turkish mercenaries serving on the Nicaean ships during the attack on Constantinople (Langdon, note 175). 1235-36: South-west China: The Mongol general Kuoduan Hequ started to attack the region of Sichuan with the Chengdu plain. The occupation of this region had often been an important step for the conquest of the south. The important city of Xiangyang, the gateway to the Yangtse plain, that was defended by the Song general Cao Youwen, capitulated in 1236. 1235-39: Seljuqs attack the Crimea and establish a protectorate over Sudaq. Trebizond and Genoa has hitherto dominated the Crimea. Al-Andalus/Castile: On 29 June 1236, after a siege of several months, Córdoba of the Almohads was captured by King Ferdinand III of Castile, during the Spanish Reconquista. 1236: "Still one Europe, not two": - 'The Madonna and Child' by the Italian artist Berlinghiero of Lucca, died by 1236, now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art NY, is one of the outstanding examples of Western art influenced by Byzantium. Image at: http://www.hri.org/MFA/thesis/spring97/byzantium.html. But see 1245: Cimabue. 1236-43: MAJOR MONGOL INCURSIONS. By 1238 they will defeat the north Russian principalities and in 1239 occupy Georgia and raid into old 19

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 Armenia. Ani was sacked in 1239. They will sack Christian Kiev in 1240; and then smash through Poland and Hungary 1241-42. The corps based in Azerbaijan is directed into Armenia and then eastern Asia Minor, where they attack the Seljuks of Rum (1242-43), who accept tributary status. The whole of Georgia and Armenia also submit to the Mongols. 1236-48: The south of Spain: rise of Castile. Christians under Ferdinand III of Leon-Castile advance along the valley of the Guadalqivir, taking Moorish Cordoba 1236 and the capital Seville 1248. This effectively brought the Reconquista to its climax, if not quite its end. They also advance to the east coast, taking Valencia 1238 and Murcia 1243. + 123839: in Grenada, beginning of the building of the Alhambra (“red castle”). 1237-38: In winter: The Mongols cross the Volga into Russia. Riazan was stormed on 21 December 1237, then Moscow (a minor town or large village at that time), and on 8 February 1238, Vladimir. 1237-42: r. John Ducas, nominal ruler at Thessalonica, claiming the title of emperor. His father Theodore, who was blind [see above 1230], had recently been released by the Bulgarians and proceeded to depose his brother, the Despot Manuel Komnenos Dukas. Being blind, Theodore called his son ‘emperor’ and ruled in his name from the nearby town of Edessa (Treadgold 1997: 724). See 1242: capture of Theodore and deposition of John Ducas. Epirus was ruled separately by Michael II Komnenos Dukas, nephew of Manuel and Theodore. 1237-1261: Baldwin II of Courtenay [Baudouin II de Courtenay], last Latin ruler in Constantinople. He began his personal rule only after the death (1237) of his father-in-law, John of Brienne. Baldwin travelled in Western Europe seeking financial and military aid for his precarious throne. To obtain funds he sold a large part of the (imagined) True Cross and other sacred relics to Louis IX of France and at one time pawned his son to the Venetians. See 1240. The realm which Baldwin governed was after 1240 little more than the city of Constantinople. His financial situation was desperate, and his life was chiefly occupied in begging at European courts. 1238: (Or in 1237:) The Balkans: The Nicaeans under Vatatzes engage in war with the Cumans* in the service of Baldwin. The Bulgarians join Baldwin and the Cumans in an unsucessful attack on the Greek-held fortress of Tzurulum in eastern Thrace (Norwich 1996: 197; Langdon p.21). (*) The Kipchaks or Cumans, Greek: Koumanoi, known to the Russians as Polovtsy, were a pagan Turkish people living in the Black Sea-Caspian 20

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 (Rumanian-Ukrainian) steppe. After 1241, they formed the core population of the ‘khanate of the Golden Horde’. Sulatn Baybars of Egypt, d. 1277, was an ethnic Kipchak. ca. 1239: Ioannes (John) Komnenos Kantakouzenos Angelos, the later pinkernes (Imperial Butler) and Dux of the Thrakesion Theme for the Nicaean Empire (1244-49), +as the monk Joannikios before 1257; m. before 1240 Eirene Eulogia Palaiologina (*1218 +1284), sister of the future Emp Michael VIII Palaiologos. http://genealogy.euweb.cz/byzant/byzant5.html, under ‘Kantakuzenos family’; accessed 2010. 1239: Mongols sack Kars and Ani, capital of Armenia. 1239-41: The “Baba’i rebellion” in Turkish Anatolia. Nomadic Türkmen bands, many of them refugees from the Khwarizmians and Mongols, try to throw off the rule of the sedentary urban Seljuks. This left Anatolia seriously weakened on the eve of another Mongol incursion (Langdon p.11). 1240: 1. Mongols sack Kiev, 6 December (note: in winter). They then proceeded against Hungary. 2. (or in 1241) Nicaean naval campaign leads to the re-capture of Nicomedia from the Latins. Akropolites says the Nicaeans lost 13 of 30 vessels they dispatched; this is the only time he ever mentions the size of the fleet. Islam: The young Rumi ("Mevlana"), the future famous Muslim mystic, returns to Konya after studies in Aleppo and Damascus - became a mystic c.1244; died 1273; wrote mainly in Persian. When Rumi and his movement were established in Konya, the city was still under the influence of Christianity, and the Greek language was common among communities around the city. Thus the Sufis could not avoid being influenced by the Greek culture and philosophy that were promoted by the Christians. Rumi wrote a handful of his poems in Greek. By 1240 there were many sets of trade routes across Seljuk Anatolia, all with strings of hans (khans or caravanserai) or ‘fortified motels’ for traders and travellers. Judged by the number of hans, the most important trade route into the Seljuq capital Konya was the one that ran SW from Kayseri (map in Nicolle 2008: 19). By about 1240: The Latin West comes back to cultural parity or near parity with the 'Greek' or Byzantine East: This is signalled by the 21

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 completion of Chartres cathedral, SW of Paris, an early highpoint in the so-called “Gothic” style of Western architecture. Cf 1290. 1241: The Mongols smash through Hungary and Poland: Battle of Mohi, east of Budapest, and Battle of Leignitz, NW of Cracow. The army reached Cracow, already abandoned, on 24 March; it then divided into two. By strange coincidence (or careful planning?), both victories were won on the same day, 9 April 1241. Reconnaissance patrols were then sent into Italy and Austria, and a Mongol detachment rode on briefly to the Dalmatian coast at Spalato (1242). Thomas of Splatao describes their armour as “made from layers of bull’s hide, usually thick, impenetrable and very secure” (Sweeny 1980). See below under 1242-43. 1241: d. Ivan Asen II of Bulgaria. His rule extended from modern Albania and northern Serbia east to the mouth of the Danube, and south to western Thrace and a section of the northern Aegean coast, separating "Greek"-ruled Thessaloniki from Latin-ruled Constantinople. But the Mongol incursion of 1241 seriously weakened the Bulgarians. Cf 1242, 1246. 1242: Europe: Having crossed the Hellespont, John III Vatatzes leads a Nicaean invasion of the Balkans accompanied by the now liberated Theodore Angelus. Vatatzes and the Grand Domestic, Andronikos Palaiologos, led the army overland, while Manuel Kontophre led the fleet along the coast. Old Theodore had been liberated earlier by the Bulgarians and assumed effective control of the small Thessalonican despotate or “empire”; Vatazes cunningly invited Theodore to Nicaea and arrested him (1241). Theodore went back to Macedonia as Vatatzes’ captive; and there his John Ducas, the nominal emperor of Thessalonica, submitted to Vatatzes. John accepted a demotion to the rank of despot. A title also garnted to his younger brother Demetrius (Norwich 1996: 198). See 1246. Vatatzes’ target appears to have been the important centre of Thessalonica, but his attempts to capture the city through force or subversion failed and he was not prepared for a protracted siege. Also there was news of a Mongol atck on the Sultanate of Konya, which signalled danger to the Nicaean east. The expedition was not a total loss as Vatatzes received the submission of the Despot of Thessaly (as he now became), who agreed to give up the title “emperor”, to recognise Nicaean suzerainty over his territory and to give Nicaea control of the Aegean coast west to the Strymon River. Vatatzes became the sole claimant to the heritage of the Byzantine throne (Nicol, Epiros p. 139; Bartusis, LBA p.24). Cf 1246.

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 The Nicaean expedition was made up mainly of Cumans* with whom Vatatzes had recently struck a treaty; they served in return for lands along the empire’s Anatolian borders (Nicol, Epiros p. 138; Treadgold 1997: 725). (*) Strengthening the defence in Asia: In 1241/42 a large mass of Cumans fleeing from, or rather: fearful of, the Mongols were settled within Byzantine lands, namely in the Meander valley and east of Philadelphia. The Byzantine Skythikon regiment in John’s army would have consisted largely of Cuman allies in native equipment, i.e. mounted archers. Bartusis notes that they participated in Vatatzes’ abortive siege of Thessaloniki of 1242 (LBA p.26). As pictured in Nicolle’s Eastern Europe (1988), a Cuman cavalryman wore a pointed conical helmet and short-sleeved mail shirt, usually under a long, open kaftan, and carried a bow and sabre. The Limits of Mongol Power It has been calculated that the Hungarian range-lands could provide for the mounts of fewer than 80,000 warriors - indeed probably more like 40,000, clearly far below the strength of the Mongol army. Thus the Mongol high command found itself in a position similar to that of a commander of a modern armoured division running short of fuel. Further advance to the west, into Transdanubia, would have made matters worse. It was the habit of the Mongols to stop fighting in the spring and let their horses go free to water and graze and to multiply so that they would be ready for war in the autumn. This is the reason why in the spring of 1242 the Mongols withdrew from devastated, overgrazed Hungary to the abundant pastures of the steppe in modern Ukraine, where they could replenish and strengthen their herds, on which their military power rested. —Sinor 1977. 1243: Anatolia: Proceeding west from old Armenia and Iran, the pagan MONGOLS INVADE THE SULTANATE OF ICONIUM. Rum’s neighbours, John III Vatatzes and the king of Armenia, went (early 1243) to Kayseri to plan the defence. In 1242-43 the Mongols invaded Seljuk territory, and although John III was worried they might attack him next, they ended up eliminating the Seljuk threat to Nicaea. See 1245-46. In June 1243 the army of the Seljuk sultan Keyhüsrev or Kay-Khusraw II, r. 123646, was crushed by the Mongol commander Bayju or Baidu at Kuse Dag or Kosedag between Erzincan and Trebizond in NE Asia Minor, and the Anatolian Seljuks passed under Mongol suzerainty as vassals. Bayju’s army pressed on as far as Kayseri (Nicolle 2008: 23). Kay-Khusraw II fled to Konya and then to Antalya, leaving his minister to come to terms with the Mongols. Cilician 23

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 Armenia also submitted to the Mongols, and Türkmen revolts broke out along the Nicaean-Seljuk western frontiers. See 1245, 1256. It seems that one decisive factor was the much larger number of light horsearchers on the Mongol side. The Seljuqs had become acclimatised to Middle Eastern warfare, and depended to a great extent on heavily armoured closecombat cavalry supported by infantry (Nicolle loc. cit.). As well as Latin mercenaries, Kaykhusraw had with him detachments sent by various allies and vassals, namely Nicaea, Trebizond (his vassal) and Aleppo. (Armenia withdrew from the alliance.) John Vatatzes contributed 400 lancers (Bartusis, LBA). Qq Or Thedore II?? Cf Cassidy notes to Pachymeres p.114

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

25

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 From 1243: Westward migration of the ‘Turcomans’ or nomadic Turkish tribes as a result of the Mongol invasions. Cf 1261, emirate of Menteshe. The Seljuq economy was destroyed, and a great epidemic followed the Mongol invasion. Thus the migrants were frequently more like refugees than invaders (Lippard 1984: 177). After 1243 there was a no man’s land on the frontier between the Nicaea and Seljuk lands; the Mongols penetrated no further west than Kayseri until 1256 – see there. Fearing the worst, Vatatzes set about strengthening his frontier defences. 1244: German marriage alliance: Aged about 52, Ioannes [John] III Dukas Vatatzes/Batatzes, Emperor of Nicaea since 1221, marries 12 years old Constantia, Constance or Costanza [renamed Anna] von Hohenstaufen, the illegitimate or ‘legitimised’ dau. of the Italo-German emperor Frederick II. Her mother was briefly recognized as Frederick’s lawful wife and all her children were thereafter treated as legitimate (Gardner 1912: 168). Cf 1246, 1250. Anna’s brother Manfred was afterwards King of Sicily. Anna herself returned there in 1263. Muslim mysticism: In Konya, d. Shams al-Din, teacher of the young Rumi. The latter will found the Mevlevi order of whirling dervishes . . . Palestine: An army of Khwarizmi Turks, fleeing from the Mongols, enters Palestine as agents of the Sultan of Egypt. They sack Muslim-ruled Damascus and Latin-ruled Jerusalem. The latter is nominally restored to Muslim (Egyptian) rule, allies of the Khwarezmids. The Latins tried but failed to recover Jerusalem. At La Forbie (Harbiya), NE of Gaza, the French Count of Jaffa and Ascalon, Walter [Gauthier] de Brienne of Jaffa, led a combined Syrian-Latin force of 11-13,000 men: 1,000 Crusader cavalry including Templars and Hospitallers; 6,000 Crusader infantry; 4,000 Syrian (“Damascenes”: rebel Ayyubid) heavy cavalry and some Bedouin light horse (perhaps 2,000). They fought an army of 11-16,000 troops led by an Egyptian (loyalist Ayyubid) general Baibars*: 6,000 Mamluk (Egyptian) professional heavy cavalry and 10,000 Khwarezmids including many irregulars. Walter’s army was all but totally annihilated (Bradbury 2004). The Mamluks were able to hold off the Latin and Syrian knights while the highly mobile Khwarezmi horsemen evaded them. Also Baibars seems to have used more scientific tactics; Walter relied on the courage and bravado of the all-out charge. The battle marked the true collapse of Christian power in Outremer (the Levant). (*) Not be confused with the identically named Baibars who later became Mamluk sultan. 26

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330

Above: Note the absence of plate armour. 1244-46: Demetrius Angelos Comnenus Ducas, aged about 22, succeeds his older brother as Despot of Thessalonica under Nicaean suzerainty. See 1246. 1245/46: Anatolia: Conflict between the sons of Kay-Khusraw, or Keyhüsrev, leads briefly to the division of Rum into two competing princedoms (nominally under Mongol suzerainty). Kilijarslan IV rules west of the Halys River - i.e. Konya and the south-west: bordering the Nicaean realm: cf 1256; while Keykavus II rules at Kayseri and ‘east’ (north-east) of the Halys River. Cf 1256. 1246: 1. Greece: The Epirotes under Michael II Angelos, Despot of Epirus, invade the Frankish Duchy of Athens and Thebes. In response, the feudal overlord of the duchy, the new prince of Achaia, quickly rides north with a force of “8,000 cavalry”, and the Epirotes withdraw (Nicol, Epiros p. 142).

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2. Thrace: John III Vatatzes advances against the Bulgarians, captures Adrianople, and takes NW Thrace. Impressed by this, the Greek population of Thessaloniki, until now a small separate despotate or ‘empire’, open their gates to him (December) (Setton 1976; Fine 1994: 156). This isolates the Latin emperor in Constantinople. When Emperor John III Doukas Vatatzes campaigned near the city during his invasion of Bulgaria in 1246, the local nobility conspired to arrest the despot Demetrios and turn over the city to the Nicaean emperor. Thessalonica, December 1246: Ioannes (John) III Vatatzes made a quick and victorious advance through the central Balkans, during which he captured Serrhai, Melenikon [Melnik: the region of the middle Strymon valley], Skopje, Velessa [modern Veles: on the upper Vardar in FYROM] and Prilep, and entered the city of Saint Demetrios (Thessaloniki) in triumph. He installed as its governor the Great Domestic Andronikos Palaiologos. Much of the "empire" of Thessaloniki was annexed, so that the Nicaean frontier was carried to the Adriatic. And about half of Bulgaria was ceded to John. To the south, the Wallachian (Vlach) principality of “Neopatras” (Thessaly) was left independent until 1318. See 1248. — The Vlach language remained widely spoken in what is now north-central Greece well into the 20th century. All the Vlach groups use various words derived from romanus (Roman) to refer to themselves: Români, Rumâni, Rumâri, Aromâni, Arumâni etc. This can be confusing because the Greek-speaking subjects of the Byzantine emperor also called themselves Romans (Gk Rhomaioi, singular Rhomaios). 1246-48: Peloponnesus: A long but finally successful Frankish-Venetian siege of Imperial Monemvasia. (Monemvasia would return to Byzantine rule in 1259.) Achaia was nominally part of the Latin Empire: Prince William II Villehardouin [acc. 1246] was a poet and troubadour, and his court—at Mistra from 1249—had its own mint, literary culture, and form of spoken French. The Principality produced the Chronicle of Morea, a valuable verse history of the Crusader States in Greece. Achaea's laws became the basis for the laws of the other Crusader States, combining aspects of Byzantine and French law, and nobles often used Romaic titles such as logothetes and protovestarios, although these titles were adapted to fit the conceptions of Western feudalism (source: http://www.mlahanas.de/greeks/medieval/lx/principalityofachaea.html). 1246-75: SE Anatolia: The Karamanid beylik (lordship, principality) was established by the warlord Karamanoglu Mehmed Bey (an islamised Cilician Armenian) in 1246. Bey = ‘chieftain or leader’. In 1256 the town Laranda, SE of Konya, was captured and renamed Karaman. It became the capital of the Karamanid state in 1275.

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 1247: fl. Nicephorus Blemmydes, abbot, scholar and man of letters. In 1225 he declined an offer to become Patriarch. Tutor to the dauphin Theodore, the future Nicaean emperor (from 1254), Nicephorus wrote many prose works including an interesting autobiography. He wrote on medicine, philosophy, theology, mathematics, astronomy, logic, and rhetoric. He wrote in 1264-1265 an autobiography in two versions (a rare literary genre in Byzantium). 1248: 1. Epirus acknowledges Vatatzes as emperor; the Epirote ruler Michael II receives the title of “despot” from Vatatzes. — ‘Neo-Hellenism’: Acropolites chose the Pindos mountain chain in central Greece as the boundary between Epirus and what Nicaean Greeks called “our Hellenic land”, neatly disqualifying the Despotate of Epirus as potential Roman (Byzantine) rulers (cited in M Angold, Church and Society in Byzantium under the Comneni: 1081-1261, Cambridge 1995 p.528). 2. The Morea (Peloponnesus): The Byzantine outpost at Monemvasia briefly falls to a Frankish force: cf 1259. William II de Villehardouin succeeded in effecting the conquest of Laconia, with the reduction of the fortress of Monembassia or Monemvasia. After a three-year siege by Venetians and the French prince of Achaia, Geoffrey de Villehardouin, the ‘city’ (kastron, ‘fortified town’) surrendered because of famine. A year later (1249), perceiving the strategic importance of the hill of Mystra, in the mountains west of ancient Sparta, he raised a castle, the ruins of which survive to this day, on its summit (Andrews et al. 2007). 3. The Genoese briefly seize Rhodes from Nicaea; they were expelled after a few months (NCMH 1999: 427). Spain: Ferdinand II of Castile takes Muslim Seville. The Almohads had abandoned Spain in 1228-29, leaving the local Muslim lords to their fate. Morocco: The Banu Marin clan - hence "Marinids" - capture Fez. See 1269. 1248-50: 1. 'Seventh Crusade': Louis IX of France sails to Cyprus where he winters (1248) before proceeding (1249) to Ayyubid Egypt. Egypt would, Louis thought, provide a base from which to attack Jerusalem, and its wealth and supply of grain would keep the crusaders fed and equipped. He takes the NE port of Damietta and penetrates along a main waterway into the Nile delta; there the French are blockaded by Egyptian galleys and defeated in 1250 (surrender 6 April). This was followed by a coup in Egypt: the Mamluk leaders killed the last Ayyubid sultan; Louis was freed by them in return for gold (Setton et al. 2006: 761). See 1250. One reads that "60,000" French and others were defeated by "70,000" 29

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 Egyptians and Turks. Keen 1999: 126 wisely prefers a figure of just 15-25,000 for the number of combatants in Louis’s army. The Muslims deployed Greek Fire or something similar against them. Significantly, the Egyptians launched their Greek Fire (if it was that*) not using force-pumps or siphons in the old Byzantine manner but in earthenware pots hurled from catapults. Joinville: "This was the fashion of the Greek fire: it came on as broad in front as a vinegar cask, and the tail of fire that trailed behind it was as big as a great spear; and it made such a noise as it came that it sounded like the thunder of heaven. It looked like a dragon flying through the air. Such a bright light did it cast, that one could see all over the camp as though it were day, by reason of the great mass of fire, and the brilliance of the light that it shed." (*) Interestingly there is no evidence that Greek Fire was still being used by the Imperials themselves in the late period (LBA p.341). Either the knowledge of how to make it had been lost in 1204 or perhaps the ingredients could no longer be obtained. 2. William [Guillaume] II moved the capital of Achaea to the newly built fortresstown of Mistra, near Sparta, in 1249. Lurier p.23 calls him the “most celebrated prince of Morea’s history”. Crossbowmen and Archers in Western Armies As will be seen, on some estimates, crossbowmen comprised as many one-fifth of an army; the true figure is more like one in eight. In English armies, the proportion of longbow-archers was higher. According to earlier writers, in the French army which landed at Damietta in Muslim Egypt in 1248, out of a total of 50,000 men, 5,000 (one tenth) were crossbowmen. Modern writers prefer a total figure of about 20,000 in all, and crossbowmen may have numbered as few as 2,500. French vs Flemish: The French army of the Comte d'Artois, which was defeated by the Flemish at Courtrai (‘Battle of the Golden Spurs’) in 1302, and which also allegedly numbered some 50,000 men, supposedly included 10,000 French or foreign cross-bowmen (one-fifth), according to earlier writers. Modern writers argue that the French at Courtrai were a classic feudal army of only about 8,000; or even as few as 6,500! There was a core of 2,500 noble cavalry, including knights and squires. According to Clifford Rogers, they were supported by 1,000 crossbowmen, 1,000 pikemen and up to 3,500 light infantry, totalling around 8,000 - so crossbowmen were only one eighth (Clifford J. Rogers, "The Age of the Hundred Years War." In Maurice Keen, ed. Medieval Warfare: A History 136-160. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). At Crecy in 1346 the French army comprised some 12,000 [or 10,000] heavy cavalry, 17,000 light cavalry retainers, 6,000 Genoese crossbowmen 30

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 [the chronicler Froissart says “15,000”], and more than 20,000 [or 14,000] militia levies who were inexperienced and poorly armed [bracketed figures from Dougherty 2008: 164]. Total regulars: perhaps 35,000. If we omit the levies, the crossbowmen represented about one sixth of the professional army. The English army of Edward III at Crecy had 7,000 to 10,000 (a third or more) archers (longbowmen) out of a total strength of 19,000 men. Or perhaps 7,000 (up to 64%) in a total of 11,000 (Wikipedia, 2009, ‘Battle of Crecy’). Alternatively 5,500 longbowmen (65%) in a total of 8,500 (Dougherty 2008: 164). Primitive cannons were used at Crecy, but not to any decisive effect: "The English guns cast iron balls by means of fire ... They made a noise like thunder and caused much loss in men and horses ... The Genoese were continually hit by the archers and the gunners...[by the end of the battle] the whole plain was covered by men struck down by arrows and cannon balls" (Villani). At Poitiers in 1356 the French forces consisted of perhaps 8,000 heavy cavalry, 8,000 light cavalry, 4,500 mercenaries including 2,000 crossbowmen, and possibly 15,000 militia levies. If one ignores the levies, crossbowmen made up about one in ten. Another estimate of French numbers is 3,000 crossbowmen, 500 mounted men at arms and 17,000 dismounted men at arms. If so, then about one in seven were crossbowmen. At Najera (Navarette) in 1367 the English under the Black Prince defeated the French and Castilians. The Franco-Castilian totals were 6,000 ‘men-at-arms’ [meaning heavy cavalry], 4,000 jinetes [light cavalry with javelins], 6,000 crossbowmen and ‘44,000’ other infantry. Let us omit half the 44,000 infantry – the total of regulars then becomes 38,000 – crossbowmen making up about one in six. 1250: (a). d. Frederick II Hohenstaufen ‘the Great’ of Germany and “Sicily” (i.e. S Italy and Sicily). (b) fl. Albertus de Groot ‘Magnus’, German-Latin philosopher and theologian, a Dominican monk. Born in Bavaria, educated at Padua and Bologna, he taught in S Germany and at Paris. Teacher to Thomas Aquinas. (c) (or 1252:) First Mamluk or “slave-soldier” ruler of Egypt. Cf 1260. In March of 1250 the French crusader king Louis finally returned to Damietta, but he was taken captive on the way there, fell ill with 31

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 dysentery, and was cured by an Arab physician. The Battle of Fariskur was fought on 6 April 1250 between the French Crusaders led by Louis IX and an Egyptian army. The French had been in retreat following a failed siege of Al Mansurah. The Egyptians were victorious, and Louis IX was captured along with his army and ransomed in exchange for the surrender of Damietta, captured earlier in 1248 - the only real achievement of the Crusade. Image: There is a good line drawing of Mamluk cavalrymen in Dougherty 2008: 36. In May Louis was ransomed in return for Damietta and 400,000 livres, and he immediately left Egypt for Acre, one of the few remaining possessions of the crusaders in Syria. Meanwhile, the Mameluk soldiers of Egypt revolted. Turanshah, as-Salih's successor, took control of Cairo, creating a Mameluk dynasty that would eventually conquer the last of the crusader territories. Cf 1252: Baybars. Western knights c.1225: The helmet might be either a ‘great helm’ (cylindrical ‘head-pot’) or a simple rounded helmet leaving the face open. Mail from head to foot. The main change since c.1180, besides the helm, is the surcoat: a loose cloth outer-coat extends to below the knee. Shields are shorter than in 1180; but still kite-shaped. + Lance and sword. (See generally Hopkins 1996.) The ‘great helm’ was never adopted by Byzantine soldiers , ie other than by the Latin mercenaries employed by Constantinople; the Byzantines in this period generally preferred the kettle-shaped brimmed war-hat. 1251: The Balkans: Michael of Epirus invades Nicaean territory, taking Prilep and briefly advancing into Macedonia. See 1252. 1251-65: Reign of Hulagu, Mongol prince, conqueror of Persia and founder of the ‘Empire of the Il-Khans’ or Mongol-Persian “Ilkhanate”. See 1256. 1252: The Balkans: Vatatzes’ last campaign was a major offensive against Epiros. Leading a substantial army, he conquered west as far as Prilep and Ochrid (LBA p.35). The subsequent treaty also gave him Dyrrachion. -Norwich, 1996: 200, dates this to 1253. Following an unsuccessful campaign against the Nicaeans, Michael II (Angelus ‘Nothos’) of Epirus is forced to cede the eastern portion of his domains (Thessaly) to Nicaea. Dyrrachium also went to Nicaea. 1252: (a) The Italians begin minting gold coins (see above). (b) Spain: Astronomers finish the Tabulae Alfonsinae, drawn up for Alfonso X of Castile.

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O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 (c) Egypt: The Mamluk general Baybars, born a Kipchak Turk in Crimea, seizes power in Ayyubid Egypt (or after 1260). Territory in 1252 (after the map in Bartusis, LBA): The Empire of Nicaea, having recaptured a large section of the Balkans –Thrace, Macedonia and Thessaly - was already the strongest of the Christian powers in the Aegean region. In Europe it ruled a swathe of land from Epiros to S Bulgaria, running from (or near) the Adriatic to the Thracian Black Sea coast. A notional line running broadly east-west through Adrianople indicates the Bulgarian-Nicene border. In Asia, Nicaea ruled the whole NW quarter of Anatolia. The Latin ‘empire’ was a tiny rump, i.e. just Constantinople and the small peninsular areas east and west of the capital. Tracking anti-clockwise, Nicaea’s neighbours were: Bulgaria [cf 1253-56 below]; Serbia; a reduced Epirus (which before 1252 had extended through Thessaly to the Aegean coast south of Thessalonica); the Latin principality of Achaia ruling the whole Morea; various Venetian possessions in the S Aegean including Crete; and the Latin Duchy of Athens (our east-central Greece). The Sultanate of Rum, ruling three-quarters of Asia Minor, included mainland Caria north of Romaic Rhodes until 1258 (cf 1253-54). 1253: 1. The army general Michael Palaiologos (aged 29)—the future Basileus in Nicaea, 1259-82 (restored 1261 to Constantinople)—marries Theodora Dukaina Batatzaina, the emperor’s 13 years old niece. See 1256. 2. Venetian naval power was challenged in this period by Genoa. It took three major wars with Genoa, the first in 1253-99, before Venetian maritime supremacy was assured. Michael Paleologus would ally himself with Genoa (in 1261) in order to recover New Rome (Constantinople). Cf 1270s. Compasses and charts began to be used in the Mediterranean by about this time … see 1270. 1253-54: Caria, SW Asia Minor: A great part of the Seljuq caravanserai (Tk: han) called Akhan (ak-han) survives today just six km from ancient Laodiceia, present-day Denizli City on the Ankara highway. The westernmost of all the caravansaries, it was constructed by Karasungur bin Abdullah in 1253-54 when he was governor of Ladik/Laodiceia (Wikipedia, 2010, ‘Denizli’; Freely 2008: 138). See 1258 – taken by the Nicaeans. The region was contested ground; but there was peace between Nicaea and Konya, and the sultan wanted trade with Byzantium to be protected. Ak Han was the westernmost point in a line of hans built in 1201-07. They provided strongpoints for the protection of goods and traders in an area where security was at a 33

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 premium (Hopwood, “Frontier” p.156). Cf 1256: Türkmen detain Michael Palaeologus SE of Nicaea. “The uç [“ootch”, frontier] was debatable [sic] land, under the control of nomadic groups. Sedentarists [farming communities] could only be protected by the presence of forts, to which they could retire on the arrival of the nomads, and at which strong defensive forces could be concentrated. . . . East of Magnesia and Philadelphia . . . Türkmen controlled the countryside: whoever controlled the strong-points such as Laodikeia/Denizli or Philadelphia/Alasehir controlled the surrounding area. . . . the cities [read: fortress-towns] at the heads of the valleys were the crucial centres by which regions might be won” (Hopwood p.155). 1253/54: The Mongol prince Khubilai is victorious in southern China: he outflanked the Song Chinese forces by capturing Dali (modern Yunnan). 1254: 50th anniversary of the capture of Constantinople by the Latins. The late emperor John III had been 12 when it was lost. 1254-58: THEODORE II Ducas Lascaris, emperor in Nicaea and Nymphaeum. Son of John II Ducas and Irene Lascarina (herself the daughter of Theodore Lascaris, d. 1221), Theodore II was aged 33 at accession. His wife was Helena, eldest daughter of the Bulgarian ruler. Bartusis calls him a “sickly vacillating scholar” (LBA p.35); but he lead a vigorous campaign in 1255 (see there). He wrote two works on natural philosophy, Kosmike delosis (Cosmic Exposition) and Peri phusikes koinonias (On Physical Community), in which he brought simple mathematical schemes to bear on elemental theory and cosmology. 1254-55: Greece: The general Alexios Strategopoulos was based at Serres in 1254, and in the next year, he participated, along with pinkernes (Imperial Butler) Konstantinos Tornikes, in a failed campaign against the Bulgarian fortress of Tzepaina in the western Rhodope mountains. As a result, and because of his close connection to the aristocratic faction around Michael Palaiologos, he was removed of his offices (Wikipedia 2010, under ‘Alexios Strategopoulos’). See next. 1255: Turkish Rum: The Flemish monk Willem Van Ruysbroeck (‘William of Rubruck’) 34

O’Rourke: BYZANTIUM, RECOVERY AND RUIN 1220-1330 travelled east to try to convert the Mongols; on his return journey in 1255 he passed through Eastern Anatolia (Rum). Writing 12 years after the Mongol victory at Kosedag, he remarks that the Turkish sultan Kayka’us II, r. 1246-60, had “no money [literally ‘without a treasure’], few soldiers and many enemies” (quoted by Cassidy p.113). Cf 1256: Seljuq defeat near Aksaray. Van Ruysbroeck also underlines that the great majority of the Sultan’s subjects were non-Muslims, i.e. Armenians and Greeks. 1255-56: The Nicaean army battles the Bulgarians for control of Thrace and Macedonia. The struggle continued from the winter of 54/55 to winter 55/56. In 1255 Theodore II’s army campaigned against the Bulgarians in the Rhodopi mountains and captured the fortresses of Peristitza, Stenimachos [inland E of Thessaloniki] and Krytzimos, which the Bulgarians had recently seized, without encountering significant resistance. However, the imperial army faced difficulties, since it reached (1256) Tzepaina in the western Rhodopes in mid winter. The cold weather combined with the mountainous geographical background of that campaign did not allow the army to stay there for long and to carry out an attack. Theodore II, ignoring the forthcoming winter and the severe weather conditions, assembled a “large” military force in Adrianople (Gregoras states that Theodore II assembled a much larger army than his father’s) and marched (south-west) on Tzepaina. But the conditions and lack of supplies - possibly reflecting poor planning - forced them to pull back (Savvas Kyriakidis, ‘The Nicaean armies: Logistics, Weather and Geography’, online at www.wra1th.plus.com/byzcong/comms/Kyriakidis_paper.pdf Akropolites mentions the presence of the servants of the soldiers (unarmed or lightly armed auxiliaries) in the 1255 campaign of Theodore II in Tzepaina. 1256: 1. Asia: “In 1256 he [the 33 years old soldier and future emperor Michael Palaeologus] … fled to the Seljuk court for refuge from Lascarid suspicions and … served Konya as head of the contingent of foreign soldiers. “On the way across the frontier zone east of Nicaea, nomads had ambushed him [and robbed him of all of his possessions]. The ‘Greek’ (Rhomaioi) chronicler Acropolites described his captors. The Turkmen, according to him, >>lie in ambush on the farthest frontiers of the Seljuks. Filled with irreconcilable hatred against the Romans, they take pleasure in looting them and seizing booty