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

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

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[Footnote 73: I have read somewhere in Tacitus, or Grotius,
Subjectos habent tanquam suos, viles tanquam alienos. Some Greek
officers ravished the wife, and murdered the child, of their
Syrian landlord; and Manuel smiled at his undutiful complaint.]

[Footnote 74: See Reland, Palestin. tom. i. p. 272, 283, tom. ii.
p. 773, 775. This learned professor was equal to the task of
describing the Holy Land, since he was alike conversant with
Greek and Latin, with Hebrew and Arabian literature. The Yermuk,
or Hieromax, is noticed by Cellarius (Geograph. Antiq. tom. ii.
p. 392) and D'Anville, (Geographie Ancienne, tom. ii. p. 185.)
The Arabs, and even Abulfeda himself, do not seem to recognize
the scene of their victory.]

[Footnote *: Compare Price, p. 79. The army of the Romans is
swoller to 400,000 men of which 70,000 perished. - M.]

[Footnote 75: These women were of the tribe of the Hamyarites,
who derived their origin from the ancient Amalekites. Their
females were accustomed to ride on horseback, and to fight like
the Amazons of old, (Ockley, vol. i. p. 67.)]

[Footnote 76: We killed of them, says Abu Obeidah to the caliph,
one hundred and fifty thousand, and made prisoners forty
thousand, (Ockley vol. i. p. 241.) As I cannot doubt his
veracity, nor believe his computation, I must suspect that the
Arabic historians indulge themselves in the practice of comparing
speeches and letters for their heroes.]

[Footnote 77: After deploring the sins of the Christians,
Theophanes, adds, (Chronograph. p. 276,) does he mean Aiznadin?
His account is brief and obscure, but he accuses the numbers of
the enemy, the adverse wind, and the cloud of dust.
(Chronograph. p. 280.)]

[Footnote 78: See Abulfeda, (Annal. Moslem. p. 70, 71,) who
transcribes the poetical complaint of Jabalah himself, and some
panegyrical strains of an Arabian poet, to whom the chief of
Gassan sent from Constantinople a gift of five hundred pieces of
gold by the hands of the ambassador of Omar.]

After the battle of Yermuk, the Roman army no longer
appeared in the field; and the Saracens might securely choose,
among the fortified towns of Syria, the first object of their
attack. They consulted the caliph whether they should march to
Caesarea or Jerusalem; and the advice of Ali determined the
immediate siege of the latter. To a profane eye, Jerusalem was
the first or second capital of Palestine; but after Mecca and
Medina, it was revered and visited by the devout Moslems, as the
temple of the Holy Land which had been sanctified by the
revelation of Moses, of Jesus, and of Mahomet himself. The son
of Abu Sophian was sent with five thousand Arabs to try the first
experiment of surprise or treaty; but on the eleventh day, the
town was invested by the whole force of Abu Obeidah. He
addressed the customary summons to the chief commanders and
people of Aelia. ^79

[Footnote 79: In the name of the city, the profane prevailed over
the sacred Jerusalem was known to the devout Christians, (Euseb.
de Martyr Palest. c xi.;) but the legal and popular appellation
of Aelia (the colony of Aelius Hadrianus) has passed from the
Romans to the Arabs. (Reland, Palestin. tom. i. p. 207, tom. ii.
p. 835. D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, Cods, p. 269, Ilia,
p. 420.) The epithet of Al Cods, the Holy, is used as the proper
name of Jerusalem.]

"Health and happiness to every one that follows the right
way! We require of you to testify that there is but one God, and
that Mahomet is his apostle. If you refuse this, consent to pay
tribute, and be under us forthwith. Otherwise I shall bring men
against you who love death better than you do the drinking of
wine or eating hog's flesh. Nor will I ever stir from you, if it
please God, till I have destroyed those that fight for you, and
made slaves of your children." But the city was defended on every
side by deep valleys and steep ascents; since the invasion of
Syria, the walls and towers had been anxiously restored; the
bravest of the fugitives of Yermuk had stopped in the nearest
place of refuge; and in the defence of the sepulchre of Christ,
the natives and strangers might feel some sparks of the
enthusiasm, which so fiercely glowed in the bosoms of the
Saracens. The siege of Jerusalem lasted four months; not a day
was lost without some action of sally or assault; the military
engines incessantly played from the ramparts; and the inclemency
of the winter was still more painful and destructive to the
Arabs. The Christians yielded at length to the perseverance of
the besiegers. The patriarch Sophronius appeared on the walls,
and by the voice of an interpreter demanded a conference. ^*
After a vain attempt to dissuade the lieutenant of the caliph
from his impious enterprise, he proposed, in the name of the
people, a fair capitulation, with this extraordinary clause, that
the articles of security should be ratified by the authority and
presence of Omar himself. The question was debated in the council
of Medina; the sanctity of the place, and the advice of Ali,
persuaded the caliph to gratify the wishes of his soldiers and
enemies; and the simplicity of his journey is more illustrious
than the royal pageants of vanity and oppression. The conqueror
of Persia and Syria was mounted on a red camel, which carried,
besides his person, a bag of corn, a bag of dates, a wooden dish,
and a leathern bottle of water. Wherever he halted, the company,
without distinction, was invited to partake of his homely fare,
and the repast was consecrated by the prayer and exhortation of
the commander of the faithful. ^80 But in this expedition or
pilgrimage, his power was exercised in the administration of
justice: he reformed the licentious polygamy of the Arabs,
relieved the tributaries from extortion and cruelty, and
chastised the luxury of the Saracens, by despoiling them of their
rich silks, and dragging them on their faces in the dirt. When
he came within sight of Jerusalem, the caliph cried with a loud
voice, "God is victorious. O Lord, give us an easy conquest!"
and, pitching his tent of coarse hair, calmly seated himself on
the ground. After signing the capitulation, he entered the city
without fear or precaution; and courteously discoursed with the
patriarch concerning its religious antiquities. ^81 Sophronius
bowed before his new master, and secretly muttered, in the words
of Daniel, "The abomination of desolation is in the holy place."
^82 At the hour of prayer they stood together in the church of
the resurrection; but the caliph refused to perform his
devotions, and contented himself with praying on the steps of the
church of Constantine. To the patriarch he disclosed his prudent
and honorable motive. "Had I yielded," said Omar, "to your
request, the Moslems of a future age would have infringed the
treaty under color of imitating my example." By his command the
ground of the temple of Solomon was prepared for the foundation
of a mosch; ^83 and, during a residence of ten days, he regulated
the present and future state of his Syrian conquests. Medina
might be jealous, lest the caliph should be detained by the
sanctity of Jerusalem or the beauty of Damascus; her
apprehensions were dispelled by his prompt and voluntary return
to the tomb of the apostle. ^84

[Footnote *: See the explanation of this in Price, with the
prophecy which was hereby fulfilled, p 85. - M]

[Footnote 80: The singular journey and equipage of Omar are
described (besides Ockley, vol. i. p. 250) by Murtadi,
(Merveilles de l'Egypte, p. 200 - 202.)]

[Footnote 81: The Arabs boast of an old prophecy preserved at
Jerusalem, and describing the name, the religion, and the person
of Omar, the future conqueror. By such arts the Jews are said to
have soothed the pride of their foreign masters, Cyrus and
Alexander, (Joseph. Ant. Jud. l. xi c. 1, 8, p. 447, 579 - 582.)]

[Footnote 82: Theophan. Chronograph. p. 281. This prediction,
which had already served for Antiochus and the Romans, was again
refitted for the present occasion, by the economy of Sophronius,
one of the deepest theologians of the Monothelite controversy.]

[Footnote 83: According to the accurate survey of D'Anville,
(Dissertation sun l'ancienne Jerusalem, p. 42 - 54,) the mosch of
Omar, enlarged and embellished by succeeding caliphs, covered the
ground of the ancient temple, (says Phocas,) a length of 215, a
breadth of 172, toises. The Nubian geographer declares, that this
magnificent structure was second only in size and beauty to the
great mosch of Cordova, (p. 113,) whose present state Mr.
Swinburne has so elegantly represented, (Travels into Spain, p.
296 - 302.)]

[Footnote 84: Of the many Arabic tarikhs or chronicles of
Jerusalem, (D'Herbelot, p. 867,) Ockley found one among the
Pocock Mss. of Oxford, (vol. i. p. 257,) which he has used to
supply the defective narrative of Al Wakidi.]

To achieve what yet remained of the Syrian war the caliph
had formed two separate armies; a chosen detachment, under Amrou
and Yezid, was left in the camp of Palestine; while the larger
division, under the standard of Abu Obeidah and Caled, marched
away to the north against Antioch and Aleppo. The latter of
these, the Beraea of the Greeks, was not yet illustrious as the
capital of a province or a kingdom; and the inhabitants, by
anticipating their submission and pleading their poverty,
obtained a moderate composition for their lives and religion.
But the castle of Aleppo, ^85 distinct from the city, stood erect
on a lofty artificial mound the sides were sharpened to a
precipice, and faced with free-stone; and the breadth of the
ditch might be filled with water from the neighboring springs.
After the loss of three thousand men, the garrison was still
equal to the defence; and Youkinna, their valiant and hereditary
chief, had murdered his brother, a holy monk, for daring to
pronounce the name of peace. In a siege of four or five months,
the hardest of the Syrian war, great numbers of the Saracens were
killed and wounded: their removal to the distance of a mile could
not seduce the vigilance of Youkinna; nor could the Christians be
terrified by the execution of three hundred captives, whom they
beheaded before the castle wall. The silence, and at length the
complaints, of Abu Obeidah informed the caliph that their hope
and patience were consumed at the foot of this impregnable
fortress. "I am variously affected," replied Omar, "by the
difference of your success; but I charge you by no means to raise
the siege of the castle. Your retreat would diminish the
reputation of our arms, and encourage the infidels to fall upon
you on all sides. Remain before Aleppo till God shall determine
the event, and forage with your horse round the adjacent
country." The exhortation of the commander of the faithful was
fortified by a supply of volunteers from all the tribes of
Arabia, who arrived in the camp on horses or camels. Among these
was Dames, of a servile birth, but of gigantic size and intrepid
resolution. The forty-seventh day of his service he proposed,
with only thirty men, to make an attempt on the castle. The
experience and testimony of Caled recommended his offer; and Abu
Obeidah admonished his brethren not to despise the baser origin
of Dames, since he himself, could he relinquish the public care,
would cheerfully serve under the banner of the slave. His design
was covered by the appearance of a retreat; and the camp of the
Saracens was pitched about a league from Aleppo. The thirty
adventurers lay in ambush at the foot of the hill; and Dames at
length succeeded in his inquiries, though he was provoked by the
ignorance of his Greek captives. "God curse these dogs," said the
illiterate Arab; "what a strange barbarous language they speak!"
At the darkest hour of the night, he scaled the most accessible
height, which he had diligently surveyed, a place where the
stones were less entire, or the slope less perpendicular, or the
guard less vigilant. Seven of the stoutest Saracens mounted on
each other's shoulders, and the weight of the column was
sustained on the broad and sinewy back of the gigantic slave.
The foremost in this painful ascent could grasp and climb the
lowest part of the battlements; they silently stabbed and cast
down the sentinels; and the thirty brethren, repeating a pious
ejaculation, "O apostle of God, help and deliver us!" were
successively drawn up by the long folds of their turbans. With
bold and cautious footsteps, Dames explored the palace of the
governor, who celebrated, in riotous merriment, the festival of
his deliverance. From thence, returning to his companions, he
assaulted on the inside the entrance of the castle. They
overpowered the guard, unbolted the gate, let down the
drawbridge, and defended the narrow pass, till the arrival of
Caled, with the dawn of day, relieved their danger and assured
their conquest. Youkinna, a formidable foe, became an active and
useful proselyte; and the general of the Saracens expressed his
regard for the most humble merit, by detaining the army at Aleppo
till Dames was cured of his honorable wounds. The capital of
Syria was still covered by the castle of Aazaz and the iron
bridge of the Orontes. After the loss of those important posts,
and the defeat of the last of the Roman armies, the luxury of
Antioch ^86 trembled and obeyed. Her safety was ransomed with
three hundred thousand pieces of gold; but the throne of the
successors of Alexander, the seat of the Roman government of the
East, which had been decorated by Caesar with the titles of free,
and holy, and inviolate was degraded under the yoke of the
caliphs to the secondary rank of a provincial town. ^87

[Footnote 85: The Persian historian of Timur (tom. iii. l. v. c.
21, p. 300) describes the castle of Aleppo as founded on a rock
one hundred cubits in height; a proof, says the French
translator, that he had never visited the place. It is now in
the midst of the city, of no strength with a single gate; the
circuit is about 500 or 600 paces, and the ditch half full of
stagnant water, (Voyages de Tavernier, tom. i. p. 149 Pocock,
vol. ii. part i. p. 150.) The fortresses of the East are
contemptible to a European eye.]

[Footnote 86: The date of the conquest of Antioch by the Arabs is
of some importance. By comparing the years of the world in the
chronography of Theophanes with the years of the Hegira in the
history of Elmacin, we shall determine, that it was taken between
January 23d and September 1st of the year of Christ 638, (Pagi,
Critica, in Baron. Annal. tom. ii. p. 812, 813.) Al Wakidi
(Ockley, vol. i. p. 314) assigns that event to Tuesday, August
21st, an inconsistent date; since Easter fell that year on April
5th, the 21st of August must have been a Friday, (see the Tables
of the Art de Verifier les Dates.)]

[Footnote 87: His bounteous edict, which tempted the grateful
city to assume the victory of Pharsalia for a perpetual aera, is
given. John Malala, in Chron. p. 91, edit. Venet. We may
distinguish his authentic information of domestic facts from his
gross ignorance of general history.]

In the life of Heraclius, the glories of the Persian war are
clouded on either hand by the disgrace and weakness of his more
early and his later days. When the successors of Mahomet
unsheathed the sword of war and religion, he was astonished at
the boundless prospect of toil and danger; his nature was
indolent, nor could the infirm and frigid age of the emperor be
kindled to a second effort. The sense of shame, and the
importunities of the Syrians, prevented the hasty departure from
the scene of action; but the hero was no more; and the loss of
Damascus and Jerusalem, the bloody fields of Aiznadin and Yermuk,
may be imputed in some degree to the absence or misconduct of the
sovereign. Instead of defending the sepulchre of Christ, he
involved the church and state in a metaphysical controversy for
the unity of his will; and while Heraclius crowned the offspring
of his second nuptials, he was tamely stripped of the most
valuable part of their inheritance. In the cathedral of Antioch,
in the presence of the bishops, at the foot of the crucifix, he
bewailed the sins of the prince and people; but his confession
instructed the world, that it was vain, and perhaps impious, to
resist the judgment of God. The Saracens were invincible in fact,
since they were invincible in opinion; and the desertion of
Youkinna, his false repentance and repeated perfidy, might
justify the suspicion of the emperor, that he was encompassed by
traitors and apostates, who conspired to betray his person and
their country to the enemies of Christ. In the hour of adversity,
his superstition was agitated by the omens and dreams of a
falling crown; and after bidding an eternal farewell to Syria, he
secretly embarked with a few attendants, and absolved the faith
of his subjects. ^88 Constantine, his eldest son, had been
stationed with forty thousand men at Caesarea, the civil
metropolis of the three provinces of Palestine. But his private
interest recalled him to the Byzantine court; and, after the
flight of his father, he felt himself an unequal champion to the
united force of the caliph. His vanguard was boldly attacked by
three hundred Arabs and a thousand black slaves, who, in the
depth of winter, had climbed the snowy mountains of Libanus, and
who were speedily followed by the victorious squadrons of Caled
himself. From the north and south the troops of Antioch and
Jerusalem advanced along the sea-shore till their banners were
joined under the walls of the Phoenician cities: Tripoli and Tyre
were betrayed; and a fleet of fifty transports, which entered
without distrust the captive harbors, brought a seasonable supply
of arms and provisions to the camp of the Saracens. Their labors
were terminated by the unexpected surrender of Caesarea: the
Roman prince had embarked in the night; ^89 and the defenceless
citizens solicited their pardon with an offering of two hundred
thousand pieces of gold. The remainder of the province, Ramlah,
Ptolemais or Acre, Sichem or Neapolis, Gaza, Ascalon, Berytus,
Sidon, Gabala, Laodicea, Apamea, Hierapolis, no longer presumed
to dispute the will of the conqueror; and Syria bowed under the
sceptre of the caliphs seven hundred years after Pompey had
despoiled the last of the Macedonian kings. ^90

[Footnote 88: See Ockley, (vol. i. p. 308, 312,) who laughs at
the credulity of his author. When Heraclius bade farewell to
Syria, Vale Syria et ultimum vale, he prophesied that the Romans
should never reenter the province till the birth of an
inauspicious child, the future scourge of the empire. Abulfeda,
p. 68. I am perfectly ignorant of the mystic sense, or nonsense,
of this prediction.]

[Footnote 89: In the loose and obscure chronology of the times, I
am guided by an authentic record, (in the book of ceremonies of
Constantine Porphyrogenitus,) which certifies that, June 4, A.D.
638, the emperor crowned his younger son Heraclius, in the
presence of his eldest, Constantine, and in the palace of
Constantinople; that January 1, A.D. 639, the royal procession
visited the great church, and on the 4th of the same month, the
hippodrome.]

[Footnote 90: Sixty-five years before Christ, Syria Pontusque
monumenta sunt Cn. Pompeii virtutis, (Vell. Patercul. ii. 38,)
rather of his fortune and power: he adjudged Syria to be a Roman
province, and the last of the Seleucides were incapable of
drawing a sword in the defence of their patrimony (see the
original texts collected by Usher, Annal. p. 420)]

Chapter LI: Conquests By The Arabs.

Part VI.

The sieges and battles of six campaigns had consumed many
thousands of the Moslems. They died with the reputation and the
cheerfulness of martyrs; and the simplicity of their faith may be
expressed in the words of an Arabian youth, when he embraced, for
the last time, his sister and mother: "It is not," said he, "the
delicacies of Syria, or the fading delights of this world, that
have prompted me to devote my life in the cause of religion. But
I seek the favor of God and his apostle; and I have heard, from
one of the companions of the prophet, that the spirits of the
martyrs will be lodged in the crops of green birds, who shall
taste the fruits, and drink of the rivers, of paradise. Farewell,
we shall meet again among the groves and fountains which God has
provided for his elect." The faithful captives might exercise a
passive and more arduous resolution; and a cousin of Mahomet is
celebrated for refusing, after an abstinence of three days, the
wine and pork, the only nourishment that was allowed by the
malice of the infidels. The frailty of some weaker brethren
exasperated the implacable spirit of fanaticism; and the father
of Amer deplored, in pathetic strains, the apostasy and damnation
of a son, who had renounced the promises of God, and the
intercession of the prophet, to occupy, with the priests and
deacons, the lowest mansions of hell. The more fortunate Arabs,
who survived the war and persevered in the faith, were restrained
by their abstemious leader from the abuse of prosperity. After a
refreshment of three days, Abu Obeidah withdrew his troops from
the pernicious contagion of the luxury of Antioch, and assured
the caliph that their religion and virtue could only be preserved
by the hard discipline of poverty and labor. But the virtue of
Omar, however rigorous to himself, was kind and liberal to his
brethren. After a just tribute of praise and thanksgiving, he
dropped a tear of compassion; and sitting down on the ground,
wrote an answer, in which he mildly censured the severity of his
lieutenant: "God," said the successor of the prophet, "has not
forbidden the use of the good things of this worl to faithful
men, and such as have performed good works. Therefore you ought
to have given them leave to rest themselves, and partake freely
of those good things which the country affordeth. If any of the
Saracens have no family in Arabia, they may marry in Syria; and
whosoever of them wants any female slaves, he may purchase as
many as he hath occasion for." The conquerors prepared to use, or
to abuse, this gracious permission; but the year of their triumph
was marked by a mortality of men and cattle; and twenty-five
thousand Saracens were snatched away from the possession of
Syria. The death of Abu Obeidah might be lamented by the
Christians; but his brethren recollected that he was one of the
ten elect whom the prophet had named as the heirs of paradise.
^91 Caled survived his brethren about three years: and the tomb
of the Sword of God is shown in the neighborhood of Emesa. His
valor, which founded in Arabia and Syria the empire of the
caliphs, was fortified by the opinion of a special providence;
and as long as he wore a cap, which had been blessed by Mahomet,
he deemed himself invulnerable amidst the darts of the infidels.
^*

[Footnote 91: Abulfeda, Annal. Moslem. p. 73. Mahomet could
artfully vary the praises of his disciples. Of Omar he was
accustomed to say, that if a prophet could arise after himself,
it would be Omar; and that in a general calamity, Omar would be
accepted by the divine justice, (Ockley, vol. i. p. 221.)]

[Footnote *: Khaled, according to the Rouzont Uzzuffa, (Price, p.
90,) after having been deprived of his ample share of the plunder
of Syria by the jealousy of Omar, died, possessed only of his
horse, his arms, and a single slave. Yet Omar was obliged to
acknowledge to his lamenting parent. that never mother had
produced a son like Khaled. - M.]

The place of the first conquerors was supplied by a new
generation of their children and countrymen: Syria became the
seat and support of the house of Ommiyah; and the revenue, the
soldiers, the ships of that powerful kingdom were consecrated to
enlarge on every side the empire of the caliphs. But the
Saracens despise a superfluity of fame; and their historians
scarcely condescend to mention the subordinate conquests which
are lost in the splendor and rapidity of their victorious career.

To the north of Syria, they passed Mount Taurus, and reduced to
their obedience the province of Cilicia, with its capital Tarsus,
the ancient monument of the Assyrian kings. Beyond a second
ridge of the same mountains, they spread the flame of war, rather
than the light of religion, as far as the shores of the Euxine,
and the neighborhood of Constantinople. To the east they
advanced to the banks and sources of the Euphrates and Tigris:
^92 the long disputed barrier of Rome and Persia was forever
confounded the walls of Edessa and Amida, of Dara and Nisibis,
which had resisted the arms and engines of Sapor or Nushirvan,
were levelled in the dust; and the holy city of Abgarus might
vainly produce the epistle or the image of Christ to an
unbelieving conqueror. To the west the Syrian kingdom is bounded
by the sea: and the ruin of Aradus, a small island or peninsula
on the coast, was postponed during ten years. But the hills of
Libanus abounded in timber; the trade of Phoenicia was populous
in mariners; and a fleet of seventeen hundred barks was equipped
and manned by the natives of the desert. The Imperial navy of the
Romans fled before them from the Pamphylian rocks to the
Hellespont; but the spirit of the emperor, a grandson of
Heraclius, had been subdued before the combat by a dream and a
pun. ^93 The Saracens rode masters of the sea; and the islands of
Cyprus, Rhodes, and the Cyclades, were successively exposed to
their rapacious visits. Three hundred years before the Christian
aera, the memorable though fruitless siege of Rhodes ^94 by
Demetrius had furnished that maritime republic with the materials
and the subject of a trophy. A gigantic statue of Apollo, or the
sun, seventy cubits in height, was erected at the entrance of the
harbor, a monument of the freedom and the arts of Greece. After
standing fifty-six years, the colossus of Rhodes was overthrown
by an earthquake; but the massy trunk, and huge fragments, lay
scattered eight centuries on the ground, and are often described
as one of the wonders of the ancient world. They were collected
by the diligence of the Saracens, and sold to a Jewish merchant
of Edessa, who is said to have laden nine hundred camels with the
weight of the brass metal; an enormous weight, though we should
include the hundred colossal figures, ^95 and the three thousand
statues, which adorned the prosperity of the city of the sun.