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MEDIEVAL HISTORY LIBRARY |
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BOOK
V.
CONRAD IV—WILLIAM—RICHARD.
CHAPTER
V.
MANFRED. [1260—1262.
Negotiation with the Pope — Revolution in
Tuscany — Manfred's growing Power in Italy — Death of Alexander IV — End
of Latin Empire of Constantinople — Syro-Franks
and Mamelukes — Election of Urban IV — his Enmity to Manfred,
Alexander IV, deeply mortified by the failure of
his own, and even of the triumph, anticipated from the long-dreaded Ezzelino di
Romano’s downfall, was induced, early in 1260, to make overtures to the
King of Sicily. They were eagerly met, for Manfred was painfully sensible
of the evils which the sentence of excommunication,
however unjustifiable, had brought upon his father, his brother, and
himself. But one of the conditions upon which his re-admission into the
bosom of the Church was to depend, in fact, the sine qua non condition,
was, the expulsion of all his Moslem subjects from his dominions. This was
requiring from Manfred, not only the violation of his plighted faith, as
well as of all the ties of gratitude, but an actual surrender at discretion.
If he thus deprived himself of the only troops upon whom, in any future
quarrel with the Roman See, he could rely, he would really lay his crown
at the Pope’s feet. He positively rejected the condition, adding, in his
anger, the injudicious retort, that he would rather invite double their
number from Africa. The negotiation was broken off, and in
the course of the summer, Manfred, having reinforced his army with
Africans, as threatened, made various inroads upon the estates of the
Church.
But, to the Sicilian monarch, the most important event
of the year was a revolution in Tuscany, that proved very advantageous to
his interests. The Ghibeline fuorusciti of
Florence, with Farinata degli (Jberti (celebrated
by Dante) at their head, growing restless in their asylum at Sienna,
determined to make an effort for the recovery of
their country, their property, and their rights. But, well knowing, that
in this they could not hope to succeed unaided, they sought assistance
from Manfred. He, occupied by his war with the Pope, and straitened in his resources,
could spare them no more than one hundred of his German horse; and
succour so small, the disappointed, and therefore angry, exiles, were inclined
to refuse. The clearer-sighted Farinata calmed them with the
remark: “Let us only have his banner with us, and we will quickly get
more troops out of him.” As the politic Florentine had expected, the
appearance of even the hundred horse at Sienna, with the royal banner of Sicily,
gave their little band of refugees both spirits and consequence. So
much, indeed, of the latter, that their confidence proved
infectious, and the Siennese marched out, with the Ghibelines,
and the Germans, to encounter the ruling Florentines, who, on their
part, were hurrying to chastise Sienna for sheltering those whom they had
chosen to banish. Farinata is said to have intoxicated the Germans for the
occasion, both with wine and with gold—mounds in perspective—as the reward
of victory; thus impelling them to almost superhuman
feats of temerity, rather than courage. They were supported by the exiles,
as also by the Siennese; and, after an obstinate struggle, victory
declared for the Ghibeline side; but the Germans, to whom this triumph was
mainly due, were slain to a man, and the Sicilian banner fell
into the hands of the routed Florentines, who solaced the vexation of
their discomfiture by offering insults, through his royal banner, to the
head of Italian Ghibelines, the son of the Emperor, whom they had alike
dreaded and abhorred.
In the general elation produced by this victory,
Farinata obtained from the principal Siennese merchants, the Salimbeni, a loan
of 20,000 gold pieces. This sum he sent Manfred, to defray, as he said,
the expense of the troops, whose assistance he vehemently implored;
confident that, thus strengthened, the Florentine fuorusciti could take ample vengeance, both for the loss of the Germans,
whose valour he extolled to the skies; and for the infamous treatment of
the royal banner by the Guelphs; who, even in defeat, had triumphed in
their power of thus insulting the King of Sicily. The seasonable supply of
money afforded Manfred the means of complying with the prayer so supported, and duly punishing the slayers of his soldiers
and insulters of his banner, whilst helping the Ghibelines to humble
the Guelphs. He named one of his most trusted officers, Giordano, Conte
d’Anglone, his Lieutenant in Tuscany, giving him a respectable body of
German troops, horse and foot, with which to second the operations
of the Ghibeline fuorusciti, revenging both
their slaughtered countrymen, and the insulted banner of Sicily.
As, even thus reinforced, Farinata did not feel equal
to besieging Florence, his next business was, to lure forth the Guelphs, in order to engage them in the open field. To this end,
he persuaded the Siennese to besiege Montalcino, a town, the dependent
ally of Florence, lying to the south of Sienna. But the Florentines had
no inclination for an action with the exiles, supported by such a
body of Germans: and Montalcino was exhorted to hold out, until Manfred
should be under the necessity of recalling his detachment. Disappointed, but
not baffled, Farinata had recourse to stratagem, and the whole transaction
is characteristic of age and country. He prevailed upon some members of
the Siennese magistracy, to address a letter to the Florentine magistracy,
professing, under the seal of secrecy, and in the name of a large portion
of their fellow-citizens as well as their own, attachment to
the Guelph cause, especially to the ultra-Guelph government of
Florence; and offering, in proof of such sentiments, to open one of the
gates of Sienna to the Florentine army, if, under colour of passing by, on
the way to throw provisions into Montalcino, the leaders could manage,
without awakening suspicion, to approach near enough to
take advantage of the act.
This letter was intrusted to two Minorite Friars, who
were taught to believe the treachery, the precise nature of which was
concealed from them, sincere. They were instructed to say, that the
despatch contained a proposal, momentously beneficial to Florence, but to
the success of which, as also to the personal safety of the writers,
such impenetrable mystery was indispensable, that they were forbidden
to deliver it, until satisfied as to the persons to whom the knowledge of
the contents would be intrusted and confined.
The Anziani of Florence, upon
receiving this communication, selected two of their own ultra-democratic body,
designated as Calcagni and Spedito, if, indeed, these
be not mere nicknames, for the office of perusing and judging
the epistle. They withdrew to read, and were
dazzled out of all caution by the brilliant prospect, of
simultaneously crushing the expelled Ghibelines, and subjugating
Sienna. Hastily forming their plan, they flew to the General Assembly, to
urge the rejection of all those prudential considerations, relative to
Manfred’s German troops, that had hitherto prevented their victualling
Montalcino, where, distress for provisions must
now be so great, that only immediate relief could prevent its
surrendering.
A popular assembly is generally enterprising, if not
enduringly courageous; the advice of the two Anziani was
received with acclamations, and the despatch of an army, escorting a
convoy, clamorously demanded. Conte Guido Guerra, indeed, and other
experienced warriors, objected, reminding their countrymen, that one
hundred German auxiliaries had lately given the victory to their
enemies, who were now supported by a much larger body of
German soldiers formidable, but could hardly retain these
auxiliaries for any length of time. Such remonstrances were met
by violence; Spedito coarsely taunting Tegghaio Aldobrandini, the sturdiest of the objectors, with
cowardice, who coolly replied: “Go thou as far as I do in the battle,
and thou shalt be called a brave man.” Cece Gherardini rose to
insist upon the same objections, when the Anziani forbade him
to speak, under penalty of a heavy fine: “I will pay the fine rather than
be silent to the injury of my country cried Cece. The fine was doubled,
trebled; still in vain; till at length the Anziani commanded
him, upon pain of death, to hold his peace. This insolent
democratic tyranny was clamorously applauded, and, with
heedless temerity, the relief of Montalcino decreed.
The war-bell, surnamed la Martinella. was rung,
the Carroccio was solemnly drawn forth, and from every family,
according to their pecuniary means, horsemen and footmen presented themselves.
The subject allies of Florence throughout Tuscany, and beyond its present
limits, as Lucca, Pistoia, Arezzo, Volterra, Perugia, Orvieto,
with other towns of both descriptions, of less note, sent
their contingents, and, by the end of August, the Podesta Rangoni and the Capitano del Popolo, Monaldo
Monaldeschi, marched southward, at the head of 3000 horse and
30,000 foot. They halted near Montaperto, where they took up a strong
position, equally adapted for protecting convoys to Montalcino, repulsing
an attack, and awaiting the result of their presumed intelligence with
Siennese traitors; the secret being, perforce, imparted to the
Florentine Generals.
Perhaps, when Farinata and his Siennese confederates
beheld the unexpectedly great success of their fraudulent invitation, they
may have wished the letter unwritten; since, for the defence of Sienna
itself, they could not muster much more than half the numbers, encamped so
menacingly near. But, whatever their thoughts, they
betrayed no symptoms of alarm; neither did the other Magistrates, who
were ignorant of the lure that had brought such an army upon them. The
Florentine leaders, having, it should seem, forgotten that not to awaken
suspicion of hostile intentions was part of the scheme, or being unable to
control their troops, now sent an insulting message, requiring
the Siennese to expel the Ghibelines, raise the siege of Montalcino, and,
renouncing every other alliance, conclude a league, offensive and
defensive, with Florence, of course in subordination to her. The
Magistrates promptly returned a bold refusal. Even before this answer could
have reached the camp, another message, transcending the first in
arrogant insolence, was delivered in Sienna. By this, the immediate,
unconditional, surrender of the city, with the demolition of such a portion
of the wall as might suffice to admit the triumphal entry of the victorious
Florentine cavalry, was demanded. A suspicion now arose amongst the
citizens, that, in nothing short of a traitorous correspondence with
persons within their walls, could so preposterous a demand have originated; but the suspicion neither chilled the
courage nor checked the defensive preparations of the Siennese, merely
stimulating to greater watchfulness.
The Salimbeni came gallantly forward to supply
pecuniary wants; and the aid of religion, to sanctify military measures, was
called in after a fashion which, if irresistibly provoking a smile from
the weakest and most superstitious in the nineteenth century, exercised a
salutary influence over mind and spirits of the wisest, in the
thirteenth. With solemn procession and holy rites, the Blessed
Virgin was appointed the Gracious Guide, and Sovereign Lady
of Sienna, when the keys of the city-gates were most reverentially placed
in the hand of her image. This done, the subjects of the Virgin
transmitted their second answer to the hostile camp; to wit, that Sienna
would be defended with the wonted courage, and it was hoped, with
the wonted success. Whilst all this was in progress, the fuorusciti had found means, notwithstanding the
increased vigilance, to establish a channel of secret
communication with those of their kinsmen and friends, who, having,
apparently, by a false show of Guelphism, avoided the
fate of their compatriot Ghibelines, were present with the Florentine
army. The object of this intercourse was, the
regulation of the conduct of this party during the impending action.
Presently, one of the number, deserting, brought to Sienna intelligence of
great dissensions amongst the hostile leaders; and the tidings reviving
the confidence of the Siennese, the threatened multitude shouted as
clamorously for battle, as the threateners had before.
The army, with which the Siennese Podesta, Troghisio, Roffredo d’Isola, the Capitano del Popolo, the Conte d’Anglone, and
Farinata degli Uberti, were to encounter the Florentine host, amounted
only to 17,000 men, but of these 1,500 horse, and 2,000 foot were the
German veterans, whose great superiority to the burgher militia of
the enemy, made them an army in themselves. Further to counterbalance
so alarming a disparity of numbers, 400 German horse, and 800 Siennese
foot were ordered to pass out by a remote gate, and, taking a circuit,
fall upon the enemy from an unexpected quarter. These
arrangements completed, the above-named chiefs, on the 4th of September,
led forth their troops in martial array; and, to the no small perplexity of the
Florentine generals, came against them through the very gate, which they
were expecting to see treacherously opened for their admittance. But
they felt strong in their numerical advantage—being nearly two to one,—as in their well-chosen position; and the troops,
unconscious of the disappointment of their leaders, fought gallantly. For
a while, the fortune of the day was theirs.
But now d’Anglone charged with his dreaded horsemen,
and at the same instant, the Ghibelines in the Guelph ranks executed their
preconcerted movement. One of them, named Bocca d’Abati,
rode up to Pazzi, the leader of the Florentine cavalry, and, unresisted because unsuspected, with one sweep of his sword cut off the arm,
which, at that very instant, was waving the colours of his
corps. Their fall dispirited the whole body; and Bocca d’Abati’8 party,
simultaneously tearing off their Florentine cockades, mounted that of the
King of Sicily, whilst shouting: “Down with the Guelphs!” Indescribable
confusion ensued amongst the Florentine cavalry, and presently,
without striking another blow, they fled. The infantry more perseveringly
maintained the contest, and was still fighting, when the detached
division, reaching the field, fell upon their flank. This unexpected
attack consummated the bewilderment of the Guelphs; and the foot,
following the example of the horse, in their turn fled. In vain,
the heroic septuagenarian Tornaguinci, Commander
of the Carroccio guard, gave his own life, his son’s, and those of
three kinsmen, in defence of his charge. In the utter rout,
their resistance became hopeless, and both Carroccio and Martinella were
the victors’ prize. The loss of the Florentines has been
variously estimated, at from 2500 killed, and 1500 taken, up to
10,000 killed and 20,000 taken; and, considering the customary slaughter of
fugitives, may be safely reckoned at about 15,000 altogether. The loss
on the Ghibeline side was trifling, and the Siennese
exultingly instituted an annual celebration of their victory, by religious
rites and martial games.
Montalcino, despairing of relief, surrendered; but the
next fruit of the victory was far otherwise important. The hitherto
sovereign Guelph faction shrank, notwithstanding the unimpaired condition of
the walls, from the task of defending Florence against the attack they
expected; and, upon the 13th of September, evacuated the town, retiring to
Lucca. Upon the 16th, the Ghibeline fuorusciti,
escorted by Manfred’s Germans, and conducted by his Lieutenant, d’Anglone,
entered Florence in pacific triumph. The whole population swore fealty to
Manfred, as suzerain of Italy: as though the sovereignty of
Italy really were transferred from the Imperial crown to
the Sicilian. The great Tuscan Ghibeline, Conte Guido Novello, was placed
at the head of the Florentine government,—in some
degree of subordination, however, to d’Anglone, the King’s representative
in Tuscany;—and the town undertook to pay a
German garrison for two years. The boundary fortresses betwixt Florence
and Sienna were dismantled, in token of the intimate union of the
two cities; and the whole of Tuscany, with the exception
of Lucca, acknowledged the suzerainty of Manfred, looking more
to Sienna than to Florence as the intermediate head. The Pope instantly
interdicted all commercial intercourse between his faithful children, and
the allies or the thralls of the excommunicated usurper.
This interruption of trade was not the only
inconvenience experienced in Tuscany, where tranquillity could hardly be said
to reign. At Lucca, indeed, the despondent Guelphs, for the moment, merely
wrangled amongst themselves, casting the faults and blunders, that had led
to their disaster, in each others’ teeth, which
they did, when practicable, by means of a proverb, or old saw. Thus contemporaneous chroniclers report that
Aldobrandini, taunting Spedito with the results
of his policy, wound up his speech with an Italian proverb, purporting,
that fools commit follies and wise men suffer from them; when Spedito retorted by another, that to be led by a fool is
yet worse than to be one. In other places, more effective hostilities were
either carried on, or attempted. Pisa and Sienna flattered themselves the
time was come, for wreaking their long-nursed
vengeance upon Florence. They represented to Conte Giordano that she was
still Guelph at heart, and would assuredly again join this faction,
when relieved from the constraint of his dreaded Germans.
Therefore, they argued, must Florence be rendered
impotent; and, to effect this
purpose, they advised treating her much as Milan had treated Lodi and
Como, and been treated by Frederic Barbarossa; viz., reducing her to
the condition of a village. The bare suggestion aroused
the indignation of Farinata degli Ilberti. He
exclaimed, that he had fought not to consummate the ruin of his
native city, but to enhance her prosperity and glory; and that, even
should he stand alone, he would again fight to the last drop of his blood
in her defence. His patriotic ardour carried the day, and d’Anglone
rejected the proposal. And now, with an incident or two, half pleasingly,
half revoltingly, as characteristic of the times, as the proverb-fraught
satire, or rhetoric, the affairs of Tuscany may, for the present, be
dismissed.
If the Ghibeline Tuscan cities were not indulged with
the destruction of their rising rival, in the gratification of more
individual or private enmities they were; ay, even after the object of
such enmity was gone to his last account. As for instance, a question had
some years back been mooted in the Florentine Councils, respecting the
expensive maintenance of a castle, situate near the Pisan frontier,
and the authorities had decided upon its demolition. Pisa had long felt
this castle a thorn in her side; and, unsuspicious of a determination so
congenial to her wishes, had at this very time offered a large bribe to
one Ottobuono, an influential man of the lower
orders, to procure its destruction. Enlightened by the offer as to the
real importance of the stronghold, Ottobuono hastened to the Great Council, and, by his vehement remonstrances,
obtained the rescinding of the previous resolution. This incorruptible
patriot had now been three years dead and buried. The Pisans dug up
his corpse, which they dragged ignominiously through the streets, and
flung into a ditch.
The Florentine Ghibelines, as a matter of course,
retaliated their sufferings to the uttermost upon the Guelphs, destroying all
property of their vanquished and fugitive adversaries, upon which they
could lay hand, and extorting immoderate ransoms from their prisoners. One of
them, Gherardino Cerchio, was weighed, and
required to balance himself with gold in the opposite scale, as the price
of his liberty. But to shed Guelph blood was, seemingly, a pleasure too
exquisite to be generally relinquished, even for such a price. Farinata
degli Uberti, having captured Cece Buondelmonte in a skirmish, took him up
on the crupper of his own horse, to carry him to a place of
safety. The act incurred universal reprobation, as a display
of clemency, so mischievously unseasonable, that Farinata’s brother, Asino degli Uberti, galloping after them, with
a stroke of his battle-axe, slew Cece, even whilst clinging to Farinata
for protection.
To Alexander IV, this revolution in Tuscany was a
heavy blow; the evil consequences of which he vigorously exerted himself
to remedy. He addressed the most urgent exhortations to the Guelphs
congregated at Lucca, to recover their lost domination at Florence, and he
reiterated the excommunications launched against Manfred, and all who
held faith or intercourse with that enemy of religion. But the fuorusciti at Lucca were too few to act
openly, Manfred’s partisans were inured to such ecclesiastical thunderbolts;—in fact, the lavish as profligate use
made of those church-weapons, in quarrels purely temporal,
for purposes purely selfish, by Innocent IV and Alexander IV, had
gone so far towards desecrating their character, that they were losing
their terrors, save when supported by the passions of the people. Whilst
thus striving for more extensive power, Alexander still durst not risk his
person amongst the turbulent Romans, though unremitting in his
efforts to pave the way for so doing. Through his various emissaries, he
prevailed upon one party to nominate King Richard to the then vacant post
of Senator; thinking thus to obtain an efficient protector. But
another, and far more numerous party, elected
Manfred to the senatorship; and he, with power
and influence daily increasing throughout Italy, was at hand to inforce his claims; whilst Richard was not tempted by
an invitation so partial, to involve himself in the troubles of Italy,
superadded to those of Germany and England. In the ensuing month of March, 1261, Alexander IV died, at Viterbo.
During the few months that the Roman See remained
vacant the long-tottering Latin Empire of Constantinople expired. Baldwin
II had, for years, been soliciting aid from the different European
sovereigns. From the devout French King he had hoped again to purchase
succours with the most revered of the relics he still possessed; but
all they purchased him was a subsistence for himself; neither an auxiliary
army, nor the means of hiring mercenary troops, for the defence of his crown,
were to be wrung from St. Lewis. At length the death of his competitor,
the active Vatazes, speedily followed by that of his son and successor,
Theodore Lascaris, leaving only an infant heir, promised an interval, at
least, of peace; and Baldwin returned home, to prepare, during the
respite, for the resumption of hostilities. But, in such a state of
destitution did he return, that he was reduced to the necessity of coining
lead, taken from the roofs of churches and palaces, into money, and
destroying fine houses to supply himself with firewood; until at length,
by giving his son Philip in person as a guarantee, he obtained a loan from
the Venetian house of Capelli.
The smaller Greek princes meanwhile encroached upon
the very limited territories that had fallen to the Emperor’s share,
till the dimensions of his empire were actually ludicrous;
but Constantinople was spared, perhaps respected. The respite from bolder
hostilities proved too short to be of value. In 1258, Michael Paleologus,
descended through females from the Comneni,
dethroned the minor, Theodore Lascaris, possessing himself of the Nicene
empire; when, his ambition merely whetted by the dignity he had acquired,
he meditated wresting Constantinople from the Latin usurpers. He sought
and found useful allies in the Genoese, who, nearly excluded by the
Venetians and Pisans from the ports of Tyre and Acre, and wholly by
the Venetians from those of the Eastern Empire, where
they monopolized all trade, were ready, in their jealous hatred of
commercial rivals, to co-operate with the Greeks in overthrowing Latin
sovereignty at Constantinople, by which Venice, and Venice alone, had
profited. They gladly supplied the vessels wanted by the Emperor
of Nicaea, to transport his troops across the Euxine. He sought
allies and auxiliaries even amongst the Mongols, of whom the Asiatic
Christians seem still to have entertained no fears. Nogai, one of the Mongol
chiefs, having established an independent state, if a nomad
community merit the name, in advance of the main horde,
Michael secured his friendship, by giving him his
illegitimate daughter, Euphrosyne, to wife.
But it was to the old East-Roman, not merely to the
Constantinopolitan empire of the Flemish and French Earls, that Michael
aspired, and he began by making himself master of some of the European
provinces, before he risked alarming western Europe by an attack upon
the capital. In 1259, he conquered the kingdom of Thessalonica, from his
own kinsman and namesake, Michael Comnenus, the despoiler of the infant
heir of Boniface. To the acquisition of Greek territories from Greek
princes, Europe paid little attention; and now he turned his thoughts
to Constantinople. But in this he seems to have contemplated a difficult
and hazardous operation: for, selecting his most cautious general, Alexius
Strategopulos, esteemed even superlatively so, he sent him with a small
body of troops, hardly even to make an inroad upon the Latin empire, but
to explore the state of the country in the neighbourhood of the capital; ascertain,
as far as might be, the prospect of success in an attempt upon
the city ; and judge, both as to the manner in which such an attempt
should be made, and of the force that would be requisite.
But, once across the Bosphorus, Strategopulos found himself surrounded by crowds of malcontent Greeks and disbanded
soldiers—deserters from a service in which pay was seldom forthcoming—all
prepared to join an invader. So strongly did they represent to him the
disaffection of the Greek inhabitants of the metropolis towards
their alien rulers, the paucity of Latin inhabitants, and the well-nigh
total deficiency of troops—Venice seems to have neglected her share of the
capital, and her fleet was in the Euxine—that even this hyper-cautious
leader was tempted to risk a bold stroke. In the night of the 24th of July, 1261, by a forced march, he reached the
metropolis of the once mighty empire. The gates were locked, but not
a sentry gave notice of an approaching foe, the few
appointed watchers being apparently fast asleep. One division of the
small troop, commanded by Strategopulos, scaled
the unoccupied walls, others broke open the long-walled-up Golden
Gate, and all, as they entered, set the adjoining houses on fire, to
increase the confusion and alarm. A bewildering tumult ensued. Baldwin
himself, the Latin Patriarch, and the principal Latin nobles, conscious
of their unpopularity, appear to have been literally frightened out
of their wits. They all fled for shelter on board the Venetian trading
vessels in the port; and, in the morning of the 25th, Strategopulos found himself undisputed master of Constantinople. Thus expired the Latin
Empire of the East, after lingering through an imperfect existence of
57 years, 3 months, and a few days. Baldwin II and his
son Philip spent the remainder of their lives in vainly soliciting
European assistance to recover their lost throne; and the daughter of the
latter, Catherine de Courtenay, by her marriage with Charles de Valois,
grandson of St. Louis, and younger brother of Philip IV, ultimately vested
the pretensions of her family to the East-Roman Empire, in that
branch of the third royal dynasty of France, which, under the name of
Valois, ascended the throne.
To return to the year 1261. Michael Paleologus
hastened to seat himself upon the unexpectedly recovered throne of his
ancestors; and, at once to adorn, honour, and sanctify his triumphal
entry, a picture of the Virgin—again the reputed work of St. Luke, being
the third found at Constantinople—was borne before him. But the
empire thus recovered was dissimilar indeed to the realm of
those ancestors, even to that lost by Murzuflos. The Asiatic portion,
with few exceptions beyond the fragmentary empires of Nicaea and of
Trebizond—this last an independent rival state—had long been in the hands
of Turks, Turkmans, and Tartars. In Europe, small Greek and Latin princes
held really independent states throughout Greece, Epirus, and Thessaly;
the Venetians, for the present his determined enemies, were Lords of the
islands and of part of the Morea; for Dalmatia, he had to wage war with
both Venice and Hungary, as for nearly all the rest with Bulgaria.
Even of Constantinople itself, he was obliged to cede a suburb, Galata, to
the Genoese, in addition to exemption from tolls, and a monopoly of the
commerce of the Euxine, as due remuneration of their services.
Every chance of the reunion of the Greek with the
Latin church was, by this catastrophe, finally extinguished; and, to the
absorption of recent Popes, in purely papal, if not actually personal
interests and passions, may this reinvigoration of the schism be, in some
measure, imputed. So may, in the same degree, the daily
increasing distress and danger of the remnant of the kingdom
of Jerusalem; but there, as at Constantinople, many were the
conspiring sources of evil. The insanely virulent and pertinacious conflicts
between the Venetians, the Pisans, and the Genoese, deprived the royal
officers of the dear-bought support of those commercial states; whilst
the equally and more criminally virulent and pertinacious conflicts of the
Templars and the Hospitalers—in the year 1261,
the Hospitalers vanquished the Templars in
an affray so bloody as to leave but one Red-Cross Knight in Syria,
till the European preceptories sent others to supply the place of the
slain—was calculated to chill the sympathy and even the compassion for the Syro-Franks, that might have been awakened by the
constant progress of the Mamelukes under Bibars Bondocdar. This
formidable leader of a formidable body, in the year 1260, had
defeated the Mongols, driving them out of Syria, of which
the Mamelukes remained nearly undisputed masters. And now, feeling no
further need of veiling his object, he completed his series of murders,
committed or instigated, with that of the Eyubite prince, Kotuz, and assumed the Sultanship of
Egypt and Damascus.
Many of the Popes introduced to the reader in these
pages, if not endowed with the qualities most to be desired in the Head of the
Christian Church, have been remarkable men; and another such man, the
successor of Alexander IV, though elected by accident, not choice,
certainly was. At the death of the last pontiff the sacred college
consisted of only eight Cardinals, some of whom were favourably disposed
towards Manfred and the Ghibelines: wherefore, that this small conclave should
ever agree in the selection of a new occupant for St. Peter’s Chair,
seemed hopeless. At length, weary of three months’ confinement, amid
protracted dissension rather than deliberation, the members devised a species
of lottery, which, debarring them from all choice, as from all present
chance of the tiara, should compel unanimity, and thus terminate the
strife of clashing interests. They resolved to accept as the Pope
designated by Heaven, the first eligible subject, who, upon the 29th of
August, should knock at the door of the conclave. This fortunate
individual proved to be Jacques Pantaleon, a low-born Frenchman, already
Patriarch of Jerusalem: and he was immediately proclaimed Pope, as Urban IV.
But, if accident placed the papal tiara upon the bead
of a cobbler’s son, it was to talent, combined with great energy and
diligence, that the cobbler’s son owed a position, rendering such an
accident possible. As a humble priest he had, amidst difficulties and dangers,
successfully taught Christianity, in heathen Prussia and Livonia; he had
been equally successful in political missions; and his abilities and
indefatigable assiduity, thus proved, had procured him the bishopric of
Verdun, followed by the patriarchate of the Holy Land. Two answers of
his, illustrative of his character, have been recorded.
Being taunted, when Patriarch, with the meanness of his family, he is
said to have replied: “Noble birth is the gift of nature; to become noble,
the work of virtue and intellect.” The second speech was addressed to a
sycophant, who eagerly congratulated him upon his exaltation to
the papacy, and was: “The external
splendour of a position strikes every eye, and seems enviable; the internal duties, cares, and perplexities, are unknown
to all, and can be shared by none.” That Urban, with his experience,
and so just a view of the pontifical office, should have adopted the
policy of his predecessors in regard to the Suevo-Norman race, is no slight exemplification of the
almost impossibility of any change in the Papal system, or principles of
government. The fears of the overwhelming power of Frederic II, should he,
by subjugating Lombardy, effect the virtual union of his southern with his
northern realm, which actuated Gregory IX and Innocent IV, and had
been entertained by Innocent III and Honorius III, had for Urban no
existence. The very occupation of the Sicilian throne by Manfred, whose
imperfect legitimacy would be a bar to any pretension, on his part, to
Germany or the Holy Roman Empire, and who advanced none, really
consummated the severance of the crowns for which Innocent III had been
anxious. Yet did Urban IV, without other intelligible object than to tread
in the footsteps of Alexander IV and Innocent IV, carry out their system,
with a recklessness as to the means, and persecute Manfred with a frank
intensity of inveterate hatred, scarcely comprehensible in a man so
sensible of the duties imposed upon him by his assumption of universal
spiritual paternity.
The continuous disturbances at Rome making a residence
there inconvenient as well as hazardous, Urban established his court at
Orvieto. This done, his first measure was, to give the sacred College a more
decidedly Guelph aspect, by creating nine new Cardinals, all thoroughly
devoted to the exaltation of the Papacy. The second, less easy of
accomplishment, was a strenuous endeavour to relieve the Holy See from the
various burthens, debts, and embarrassments, consequent upon the
expensively ambitious schemes of his two immediate predecessors. Even when
possessed of funds sufficient to repay the money borrowed upon security of
Church lands, the mortgagees were often unwilling to restore the estates
that they held in pawn, and long defied his
efforts to recover them. Further to straighten his resources, claims to
many Church fiefs, as gifts, were advanced by relations of several
deceased Popes.
But, thus to free his
dominions from the load cramping him, was with Urban only the means to an end;
and— strange to say!—this end, beyond all
others—beyond even that properly favourite papal object, the
organization of a Crusade to protect Palestine—was the
dethronement of Manfred, the utter ruin of the Suevo-Norman
dynasty. By such persecution Alexander had driven Manfred, who would
probably have been content with reigning quietly over the Sicilies, into
seeking, in sheer self-defence, to extend his sovereignty. And so
successful had his endeavours been, that one modern writer ascribes the
death of Alexander IV, to vexation at Manfred’s virtues and power.
Manfred’s anxiety, for relief from excommunication and
interdict for himself and his subjects, now seems to have been the only alloy
to his prosperity. Having early lost his first wife, Beatrice of Savoy, he
had, the year after his coronation, married Helena, daughter to the Greek
Prince of Epirus and Etolia. Helena was reputed the most beautiful
princess, as was Manfred the handsomest prince, of the day; and the deeply
enamoured, newly-wedded pair wished but to enjoy
their connubial happiness, amidst the pleasures of their gay, luxurious,
literary, and, comparatively speaking, polished court. But these
pleasures were of the kind, so acrimoniously condemned by the Popes
at Frederic II’s Court, of which theirs was the reflex or continuation:
Manfred, being, like his father, a patron and a votary of letters and the
arts, had, also like him, surrounded himself with poets, musicians,
artists of all descriptions; and contended with troubadours, or
their Italian rivals for, the laurel crown of poesy, whilst
admiring the graceful movements and the skill of the Saracen dancing
girls, who would naturally be recalled by Frederic to amuse his few hours
of repose and recreation, when his sacrificing them failed to propitiate
Innocent IV. That there might be much in the song and the dance
probably offensive to an austere churchman, as it would be to
both the taste and the delicacy of a more refined age,
is indisputable, since coarseness, such as might almost deserve the
name of licence, seems the usual style of imperfect civilization. The Guelph
writers, who reprobate the Sicilian Court as a sink of iniquity, do so in
language that, in a latter generation, would prove complete destitution of
decency. During this phase of civilization, mixed companies of men and
women, the most highly educated and polished of their day, are found
discussing subjects such as now can hardly be indicated. No grounds
for suspecting Manfred’s court of immorality appear. Manfred himself is
repeatedly said to have inherited all his father’s great and fine
qualities, unblemished by his laxity of principle relative to women; a
felicitous deficiency in his heritage, a confirmation of which is
afforded, both by the evidently close and happy union in which
he lived with his Queen—of his first marriage little is known, but
Helena died of his loss—and by his stringent laws for the protection of
female chastity. He suffered no difference of rank to palliate the guilt
of seduction, or to exempt the proudest noble from repairing by marriage
the injury, which the reputation of the meanest maiden had suffered
from him, provided that her reputation were otherwise
unblemished. So strictly did he inforce this
law, that his own Chamberlain, Conte Amelio di Molise,
vainly endeavoured, by a great pecuniary sacrifice, to -escape taking
to wife a girl of previously unimpeached fame, with whom he had been
surprised; Manfred imprisoned him until he married her. And so effective,
did the operation of such a law, so inforced,
prove, that the chastity of Manfred’s court is eulogized by a
contemporary, in language too plain for translation or transcription; thus vividly demonstrating the compatibility of virtue
with indelicacy, in the unrefined.
But Manfred allowed neither such pleasures, nor the
happiness of his domestic life, to interfere with the duties of his
station. He regularly administered justice in person, then held to be one of
the highest of those duties, and he studied in every way to promote the
interests of his kingdom. He repaired the damage Naples had
suffered from the wrath of his harsher brother, and brought back to its original seat his father’s University, which
Conrad, as part of the merited punishment of her disloyalty
had transferred to Salerno. There Manfred left only that which was
there before the transfer, namely, the school of medicine, with its
necessary adjuncts; compensating the Salernitans for the privation by so
improving their harbour, as to attract commerce thither. He founded many
schools of humbler description, thus to extend
the benefits of education to the lower orders; and, understanding that the
health of the inhabitants of Siponto was
seriously injured by the proximity of noxious marshes, he built upon a
hill at some little distance, a town, named after himself
Manfredonia, to which he removed the suffering Sipontans.
But, amidst his enjoyments and his occupations, excommunication
and interdict pressed upon him like a nightmare. Even his own clergy
he could not everywhere induce to treat them as invalid, because grounded
upon injustice; and where he could not, the district suffered under the
privation of the rites of religion. The more bigoted of his subjects
shuddered at living under an excommunicated King, and deemed the sentence
rightfully incurred by his toleration of Mohammedans. Whilst to many, who
had no fanatical horror of their Saracen fellow-countrymen, or of the
style of their monarch’s court, the degree of refinement marking it,
being uncongenial, was matter of censure, or of ridicule, as unmanly.
Manfred joyfully hailed the election of a new pope as
affording reasonable hopes of reconciliation, and re-admission into the Church.
Early in 1262, he sent a congratulatory embassy to Urban, bearing the most
liberal offers,—the immediate evacuation of the
Estates of the Church by his troops, included—in return for the repeal
of the sentences of excommunication and interdict, which, with the
recognition of Manfred as King of Sicily, they were to solicit. But, some disturbances just then occurring in the
insular half of the kingdom, the Guelphs flattered themselves that these
foreboded the overthrow of the monarch and the Ghibelines. Under this
illusion; Urban advanced preposterous pretensions, and, upon the
Envoy’s remonstrating, broke off the negotiation.
The hopes of the Guelphs were disappointed. The Conte
di Bizano, Lieutenant or Governor of Sicily, was indeed assassinated by a
German follower of the Hohenbergs; but the expected rebellion did not
ensue. The murderer fled to Trapani, which Bizano’s successor, Federigo Lancia, besieged and took; immediately executing
him and his accomplices. The Sicilian malcontents shortly after this
discomfiture lighted upon a beggar, who, as it chanced, bore to the
deceased Emperor a resemblance, sufficient to offer means of exciting
troubles. They disseminated rumours of Frederic II having resolved to
expiate his manifold sins by a pilgrimage of several years*
duration, and caused his death to be announced, in order to facilitate his
departure unattended and unknown; from which pilgrimage, having performed his
vow, he had now returned to resume the government of his realms. No tale
is too extravagant to find believers, amongst those whose
interests would be advanced by its truth. The fictitious emperor
was presently encircled by a band, of fidelity-vowing
vassals, deceived, or deceivers; but the beggar, like the German assassin,
was speedily captured by Lancia, tried, convicted, sentenced to death, and
executed, with eleven of his accomplices. Manfred now visited Sicily, and,
from the enthusiastic loyalty of his reception, Urban might judge
that the troubles from which he had anticipated the overthrow of the race,
hated of Popes, had rather confirmed and strengthened his authority.
Manfred’s royalty and power received at this time the
sanction of foreign admittance: James of Aragon asking the hand of Constance,
the only child of Manfred’s first marriage, for his own son and heir, Don
Pedro. The proposal is commonly ascribed to the princess’s being
her father’s heir; and that Helena, at the moment,
had not produced a son, to supersede her, seems as certain, as
that, eventually, the calamities of her family replaced her
more decidedly in that position. But leaving Conradin, whom Manfred
called his heir, out of the question, the daughter of a man not yet thirty
years of age, recently married to a wife under twenty, would scarcely be
sought as an heiress. The King of Aragon’s proposal, whatever the
motive, appears to have been most displeasing to Urban, who endeavoured,
in a very prolix epistle, to persuade him to recall it. To this end he
taxed Manfred with the usurpation of his nephew’s birthright—a strange
Charge from him who disputed, almost denied, Conradin’s right to
anything but his grandmother’s kingdom of Jerusalem—with the murder of Borello
d’Anglone, and of a Bavarian envoy; with the invasion and partial
occupation of the dominions of the Church; and with the
persecution of ecclesiastics, in addition to heresy, cruelty, and
Voluptuousness ; winding up the whole with an accusation of
offering delusive terms of peace, which he was predetermined
to break. King James, though a pupil of Simon de Montfort, seems to
have paid little attention to this papal exhortation; for it is dated
April 27th, 1262, and upon the 13th of June the wedding was splendidly
celebrated at Naples.
The degree of Urban’s anger, at the failure of his
interposition, may be estimated from his endeavour to punish Don Jayme’s
obduracy in regard to the marriage of his son, by
breaking off his daughter’s, and thus disappointing his hopes of seeing her
Queen of France. She was affianced to Lewis IX’s eldest son and heir, Philip
surnamed le Hardi, and Urban pressed the saintly King, to
break off his engagement with a refractory monarch, who had sought an
excommunicated usurper’s child for his son. But the bigotry of Lewis never
made him the blind thrall of a Pope, and the marriage of Philip to Isabel
of Aragon, followed Don Pedro’s to Constance of Sicily, in the
very teeth of Urban’s admonitions. Indeed, the manner
in which this really pious monarch, the
personified devotion of his age, ventured to judge for himself touching
excommunications, disregarding such as appeared to him unjustly denounced, is
not a little remarkable.
The new accusation brought by Urban against Manfred of
murdering his sister-in-law’s ambassador—it may be observed that, tacitly,
he acquits him of parricide, fratricide, and nepoticide—requires
a little explanation. Some Guelph historians relate that the widowed
Empress, when informed of Manfred’s having, upon a report
of Conradin’8 death, ascended the throne, sent two ambassadors, named by
some Krokkus and Boascianus, by others, Bussarus and Groffius, to contradict the report, and
claim the Sicilies for her living son; and that Manfred, after vainly trying to
incite his partisans amongst the Roman nobility to waylay these dreaded
revealers of his fraud, if not of his attempt to murder Conradin,
hired a nephew of the opulent and-highly respected Cardinal Annibale,
to assassinate them. Such a tale is hardly susceptible of disproof; and as
the relators adduce no evidence in its support, all that can be done, is
to state such admitted facts, in any way bearing thereon, as may have
been distorted or exaggerated into the accusation.
One such fact is, that Elizabeth did send an embassy
to Manfred upon his election, which embassy reached his Court in perfect
safety, and there, apparently in a public audience, announcing that
Conradin was alive and well, demanded the restoration of the kingdom.
Manfred’s answer is thus recorded: “By hard fighting I conquered this
kingdom from two Popes, who positively refused to cede a single foot of it
to Conradin; and it was moreover committed to me by the Heads of the
nation.
Upon these grounds I claim the sovereignty for myself
during my life; but, at my death, let the nephew succeed to the uncle. If,
however, my nephew desires to be a fitting and efficient King of these
realms, he must come hither, and learn our
manners and customs.” Now such an embassy having been courteously
received, and, after being allowed publicly to announce Conradin’s life,
and advance his claim, dismissed with an invitation to the claimant
to come and be educated as heir, what possible motive could Manfred have
for murdering others, sent either for the same purpose, or to carry a
rejoinder to his reply? But there exists a letter, addressed by
Italian Guelphs to Conradin, relating an occurrence, that
might easily be transformed into this sanguinary violation of the law
of nations by Manfred. The letter, which is professedly official, states that
persons, calling themselves envoys from Conradin, and leaders of a small
troop, had visited the writers, and made them proposals for
conjointly attacking Manfred; but that Manfred had sent a band
of mercenaries against these belligerent envoys, who were all slain.
These self-entitled envoys are probably those mourned over by Urban and
the Guelph historians; and they clearly could not even pretend to the
sanctity of the ambassadorial character. Whether authorized or not
by Conradin’s mother and uncles, they were simply either partisans,
or leaders of mercenaries, trying to recruit their numbers for an inroad
upon Apulia, or perhaps merely to sell their services; and either way
enemies in arms, whom Manfred was perfectly justified in opposing by
armed troops.
BOOK
V.
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