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 69: If we listen to the threats of Nicephorus to the
ambassador of Otho, Nec est in mari domino tuo classium numerus.
Navigantium fortitudo mihi soli inest, qui eum classibus
aggrediar, bello maritimas ejus civitates demoliar; et quae
fluminibus sunt vicina redigam in favillam. (Liutprand in Legat.
ad Nicephorum Phocam, in Muratori Scriptores Rerum Italicarum,
tom. ii. pars i. p. 481.) He observes in another place, qui
caeteris praestant Venetici sunt et Amalphitani.]

[Footnote 70: Nec ipsa capiet eum (the emperor Otho) in qua ortus
est pauper et pellicea Saxonia: pecunia qua pollemus omnes
nationes super eum invitabimus: et quasi Keramicum confringemus,
(Liutprand in Legat. p. 487.) The two books, de Administrando
Imperio, perpetually inculcate the same policy.]

[Footnote 71: The xixth chapter of the Tactics of Leo, (Meurs.
Opera, tom. vi. p. 825 - 848,) which is given more correct from a
manuscript of Gudius, by the laborious Fabricius, (Bibliot.
Graec. tom. vi. p. 372 - 379,) relates to the Naumachia, or naval
war.]

[Footnote 72: Even of fifteen and sixteen rows of oars, in the
navy of Demetrius Poliorcetes. These were for real use: the
forty rows of Ptolemy Philadelphus were applied to a floating
palace, whose tonnage, according to Dr. Arbuthnot, (Tables of
Ancient Coins, &c., p. 231 - 236,) is compared as 4 1/2 to 1 with
an English 100 gun ship.]

[Footnote 73: The Dromones of Leo, &c., are so clearly described
with two tier of oars, that I must censure the version of
Meursius and Fabricius, who pervert the sense by a blind
attachment to the classic appellation of Triremes. The Byzantine
historians are sometimes guilty of the same inaccuracy.]

[Footnote 74: Constantin. Porphyrogen. in Vit. Basil. c. lxi. p.
185. He calmly praises the stratagem; but the sailing round
Peloponnesus is described by his terrified fancy as a
circumnavigation of a thousand miles.]

[Footnote 75: The continuator of Theophanes (l. iv. p. 122, 123)
names the successive stations, the castle of Lulum near Tarsus,
Mount Argaeus Isamus, Aegilus, the hill of Mamas, Cyrisus,
Mocilus, the hill of Auxentius, the sun-dial of the Pharus of the
great palace. He affirms that the news were transmitted in an
indivisible moment of time. Miserable amplification, which, by
saying too much, says nothing. How much more forcible and
instructive would have been the definition of three, or six, or
twelve hours!]

[Footnote 76: See the Ceremoniale of Constantine Porphyrogenitus,
l. ii. c. 44, p. 176 - 192. A critical reader will discern some
inconsistencies in different parts of this account; but they are
not more obscure or more stubborn than the establishment and
effectives, the present and fit for duty, the rank and file and
the private, of a modern return, which retain in proper hands the
knowledge of these profitable mysteries.]

The invention of the Greek fire did not, like that of gun
powder, produce a total revolution in the art of war. To these
liquid combustibles the city and empire of Constantine owed their
deliverance; and they were employed in sieges and sea-fights with
terrible effect. But they were either less improved, or less
susceptible of improvement: the engines of antiquity, the
catapultae, balistae, and battering-rams, were still of most
frequent and powerful use in the attack and defence of
fortifications; nor was the decision of battles reduced to the
quick and heavy fire of a line of infantry, whom it were
fruitless to protect with armor against a similar fire of their
enemies. Steel and iron were still the common instruments of
destruction and safety; and the helmets, cuirasses, and shields,
of the tenth century did not, either in form or substance,
essentially differ from those which had covered the companions of
Alexander or Achilles. ^77 But instead of accustoming the modern
Greeks, like the legionaries of old, to the constant and easy use
of this salutary weight, their armor was laid aside in light
chariots, which followed the march, till, on the approach of an
enemy, they resumed with haste and reluctance the unusual
encumbrance. Their offensive weapons consisted of swords,
battle-axes, and spears; but the Macedonian pike was shortened a
fourth of its length, and reduced to the more convenient measure
of twelve cubits or feet. The sharpness of the Scythian and
Arabian arrows had been severely felt; and the emperors lament
the decay of archery as a cause of the public misfortunes, and
recommend, as an advice and a command, that the military youth,
till the age of forty, should assiduously practise the exercise
of the bow. ^78 The bands, or regiments, were usually three
hundred strong; and, as a medium between the extremes of four and
sixteen, the foot soldiers of Leo and Constantine were formed
eight deep; but the cavalry charged in four ranks, from the
reasonable consideration, that the weight of the front could not
be increased by any pressure of the hindmost horses. If the
ranks of the infantry or cavalry were sometimes doubled, this
cautious array betrayed a secret distrust of the courage of the
troops, whose numbers might swell the appearance of the line, but
of whom only a chosen band would dare to encounter the spears and
swords of the Barbarians. The order of battle must have varied
according to the ground, the object, and the adversary; but their
ordinary disposition, in two lines and a reserve, presented a
succession of hopes and resources most agreeable to the temper as
well as the judgment of the Greeks. ^79 In case of a repulse, the
first line fell back into the intervals of the second; and the
reserve, breaking into two divisions, wheeled round the flanks to
improve the victory or cover the retreat. Whatever authority
could enact was accomplished, at least in theory, by the camps
and marches, the exercises and evolutions, the edicts and books,
of the Byzantine monarch. ^80 Whatever art could produce from the
forge, the loom, or the laboratory, was abundantly supplied by
the riches of the prince, and the industry of his numerous
workmen. But neither authority nor art could frame the most
important machine, the soldier himself; and if the ceremonies of
Constantine always suppose the safe and triumphal return of the
emperor, ^81 his tactics seldom soar above the means of escaping
a defeat, and procrastinating the war. ^82 Notwithstanding some
transient success, the Greeks were sunk in their own esteem and
that of their neighbors. A cold hand and a loquacious tongue was
the vulgar description of the nation: the author of the tactics
was besieged in his capital; and the last of the Barbarians, who
trembled at the name of the Saracens, or Franks, could proudly
exhibit the medals of gold and silver which they had extorted
from the feeble sovereign of Constantinople. What spirit their
government and character denied, might have been inspired in some
degree by the influence of religion; but the religion of the
Greeks could only teach them to suffer and to yield. The emperor
Nicephorus, who restored for a moment the discipline and glory of
the Roman name, was desirous of bestowing the honors of martyrdom
on the Christians who lost their lives in a holy war against the
infidels. But this political law was defeated by the opposition
of the patriarch, the bishops, and the principal senators; and
they strenuously urged the canons of St. Basil, that all who were
polluted by the bloody trade of a soldier should be separated,
during three years, from the communion of the faithful. ^83

[Footnote 77: See the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters, and, in
the Tactics of Leo, with the corresponding passages in those of
Constantine.]

[Footnote 78: (Leo, Tactic. p. 581 Constantin. p 1216.) Yet such
were not the maxims of the Greeks and Romans, who despised the
loose and distant practice of archery.]

[Footnote 79: Compare the passages of the Tactics, p. 669 and
721, and the xiith with the xviiith chapter.]

[Footnote 80: In the preface to his Tactics, Leo very freely
deplores the loss of discipline and the calamities of the times,
and repeats, without scruple, (Proem. p. 537,) the reproaches,
nor does it appear that the same censures were less deserved in
the next generation by the disciples of Constantine.]

[Footnote 81: See in the Ceremonial (l. ii. c. 19, p. 353) the
form of the emperor's trampling on the necks of the captive
Saracens, while the singers chanted, "Thou hast made my enemies
my footstool!" and the people shouted forty times the kyrie
eleison.]

[Footnote 82: Leo observes (Tactic. p. 668) that a fair open
battle against any nation whatsoever: the words are strong, and
the remark is true: yet if such had been the opinion of the old
Romans, Leo had never reigned on the shores of the Thracian
Bosphorus.]

[Footnote 83: Zonaras (tom. ii. l. xvi. p. 202, 203) and
Cedrenus, (Compend p. 668,) who relate the design of Nicephorus,
most unfortunately apply the epithet to the opposition of the
patriarch.]

These scruples of the Greeks have been compared with the
tears of the primitive Moslems when they were held back from
battle; and this contrast of base superstition and high-spirited
enthusiasm, unfolds to a philosophic eye the history of the rival
nations. The subjects of the last caliphs ^84 had undoubtedly
degenerated from the zeal and faith of the companions of the
prophet. Yet their martial creed still represented the Deity as
the author of war: ^85 the vital though latent spark of
fanaticism still glowed in the heart of their religion, and among
the Saracens, who dwelt on the Christian borders, it was
frequently rekindled to a lively and active flame. Their regular
force was formed of the valiant slaves who had been educated to
guard the person and accompany the standard of their lord: but
the Mussulman people of Syria and Cilicia, of Africa and Spain,
was awakened by the trumpet which proclaimed a holy war against
the infidels. The rich were ambitious of death or victory in the
cause of God; the poor were allured by the hopes of plunder; and
the old, the infirm, and the women, assumed their share of
meritorious service by sending their substitutes, with arms and
horses, into the field. These offensive and defensive arms were
similar in strength and temper to those of the Romans, whom they
far excelled in the management of the horse and the bow: the
massy silver of their belts, their bridles, and their swords,
displayed the magnificence of a prosperous nation; and except
some black archers of the South, the Arabs disdained the naked
bravery of their ancestors. Instead of wagons, they were
attended by a long train of camels, mules, and asses: the
multitude of these animals, whom they bedecked with flags and
streamers, appeared to swell the pomp and magnitude of their
host; and the horses of the enemy were often disordered by the
uncouth figure and odious smell of the camels of the East.
Invincible by their patience of thirst and heat, their spirits
were frozen by a winter's cold, and the consciousness of their
propensity to sleep exacted the most rigorous precautions against
the surprises of the night. Their order of battle was a long
square of two deep and solid lines; the first of archers, the
second of cavalry. In their engagements by sea and land, they
sustained with patient firmness the fury of the attack, and
seldom advanced to the charge till they could discern and oppress
the lassitude of their foes. But if they were repulsed and
broken, they knew not how to rally or renew the combat; and their
dismay was heightened by the superstitious prejudice, that God
had declared himself on the side of their enemies. The decline
and fall of the caliphs countenanced this fearful opinion; nor
were there wanting, among the Mahometans and Christians, some
obscure prophecies ^86 which prognosticated their alternate
defeats. The unity of the Arabian empire was dissolved, but the
independent fragments were equal to populous and powerful
kingdoms; and in their naval and military armaments, an emir of
Aleppo or Tunis might command no despicable fund of skill, and
industry, and treasure. In their transactions of peace and war
with the Saracens, the princes of Constantinople too often felt
that these Barbarians had nothing barbarous in their discipline;
and that if they were destitute of original genius, they had been
endowed with a quick spirit of curiosity and imitation. The
model was indeed more perfect than the copy; their ships, and
engines, and fortifications, were of a less skilful construction;
and they confess, without shame, that the same God who has given
a tongue to the Arabians, had more nicely fashioned the hands of
the Chinese, and the heads of the Greeks. ^87

[Footnote 84: The xviith chapter of the tactics of the different
nations is the most historical and useful of the whole collection
of Leo. The manners and arms of the Saracens (Tactic. p. 809 -
817, and a fragment from the Medicean Ms. in the preface of the
vith volume of Meursius) the Roman emperor was too frequently
called upon to study.]

[Footnote 85: Leon. Tactic. p. 809.]

[Footnote 86: Liutprand (p. 484, 485) relates and interprets the
oracles of the Greeks and Saracens, in which, after the fashion
of prophecy, the past is clear and historical, the future is
dark, enigmatical, and erroneous. From this boundary of light and
shade an impartial critic may commonly determine the date of the
composition.]

[Footnote 87: The sense of this distinction is expressed by
Abulpharagius (Dynast. p. 2, 62, 101;) but I cannot recollect the
passage in which it is conveyed by this lively apothegm.]

Chapter LIII: Fate Of The Eastern Empire.

Part IV.

A name of some German tribes between the Rhine and the Weser
had spread its victorious influence over the greatest part of
Gaul, Germany, and Italy; and the common appellation of Franks
^88 was applied by the Greeks and Arabians to the Christians of
the Latin church, the nations of the West, who stretched beyond
their knowledge to the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. The vast
body had been inspired and united by the soul of Charlemagne; but
the division and degeneracy of his race soon annihilated the
Imperial power, which would have rivalled the Caesars of
Byzantium, and revenged the indignities of the Christian name.
The enemies no longer feared, nor could the subjects any longer
trust, the application of a public revenue, the labors of trade
and manufactures in the military service, the mutual aid of
provinces and armies, and the naval squadrons which were
regularly stationed from the mouth of the Elbe to that of the
Tyber. In the beginning of the tenth century, the family of
Charlemagne had almost disappeared; his monarchy was broken into
many hostile and independent states; the regal title was assumed
by the most ambitious chiefs; their revolt was imitated in a long
subordination of anarchy and discord, and the nobles of every
province disobeyed their sovereign, oppressed their vassals, and
exercised perpetual hostilities against their equals and
neighbors. Their private wars, which overturned the fabric of
government, fomented the martial spirit of the nation. In the
system of modern Europe, the power of the sword is possessed, at
least in fact, by five or six mighty potentates; their operations
are conducted on a distant frontier, by an order of men who
devote their lives to the study and practice of the military art:
the rest of the country and community enjoys in the midst of war
the tranquillity of peace, and is only made sensible of the
change by the aggravation or decrease of the public taxes. In
the disorders of the tenth and eleventh centuries, every peasant
was a soldier, and every village a fortification; each wood or
valley was a scene of murder and rapine; and the lords of each
castle were compelled to assume the character of princes and
warriors. To their own courage and policy they boldly trusted
for the safety of their family, the protection of their lands,
and the revenge of their injuries; and, like the conquerors of a
larger size, they were too apt to transgress the privilege of
defensive war. The powers of the mind and body were hardened by
the presence of danger and necessity of resolution: the same
spirit refused to desert a friend and to forgive an enemy; and,
instead of sleeping under the guardian care of a magistrate, they
proudly disdained the authority of the laws. In the days of
feudal anarchy, the instruments of agriculture and art were
converted into the weapons of bloodshed: the peaceful occupations
of civil and ecclesiastical society were abolished or corrupted;
and the bishop who exchanged his mitre for a helmet, was more
forcibly urged by the manners of the times than by the obligation
of his tenure. ^89

[Footnote 88: Ex Francis, quo nomine tam Latinos quam Teutones
comprehendit, ludum habuit, (Liutprand in Legat ad Imp.
Nicephorum, p. 483, 484.) This extension of the name may be
confirmed from Constantine (de Administrando Imperio, l. 2, c.
27, 28) and Eutychius, (Annal. tom. i. p. 55, 56,) who both lived
before the Crusades. The testimonies of Abulpharagius (Dynast.
p. 69) and Abulfeda (Praefat. ad Geograph.) are more recent]

[Footnote 89: On this subject of ecclesiastical and beneficiary
discipline, Father Thomassin, (tom. iii. l. i. c. 40, 45, 46, 47)
may be usefully consulted. A general law of Charlemagne exempted
the bishops from personal service; but the opposite practice,
which prevailed from the ixth to the xvth century, is
countenanced by the example or silence of saints and doctors ....
You justify your cowardice by the holy canons, says Ratherius of
Verona; the canons likewise forbid you to whore, and yet - ]

The love of freedom and of arms was felt, with conscious
pride, by the Franks themselves, and is observed by the Greeks
with some degree of amazement and terror. "The Franks," says the
emperor Constantine, "are bold and valiant to the verge of
temerity; and their dauntless spirit is supported by the contempt
of danger and death. In the field and in close onset, they press
to the front, and rush headlong against the enemy, without
deigning to compute either his numbers or their own. Their ranks
are formed by the firm connections of consanguinity and
friendship; and their martial deeds are prompted by the desire of
saving or revenging their dearest companions. In their eyes, a
retreat is a shameful flight; and flight is indelible infamy."
^90 A nation endowed with such high and intrepid spirit, must
have been secure of victory if these advantages had not been
counter-balanced by many weighty defects. The decay of their
naval power left the Greeks and Saracens in possession of the
sea, for every purpose of annoyance and supply. In the age which
preceded the institution of knighthood, the Franks were rude and
unskilful in the service of cavalry; ^91 and in all perilous
emergencies, their warriors were so conscious of their ignorance,
that they chose to dismount from their horses and fight on foot.
Unpractised in the use of pikes, or of missile weapons, they were
encumbered by the length of their swords, the weight of their
armor, the magnitude of their shields, and, if I may repeat the
satire of the meagre Greeks, by their unwieldy intemperance.
Their independent spirit disdained the yoke of subordination, and
abandoned the standard of their chief, if he attempted to keep
the field beyond the term of their stipulation or service. On
all sides they were open to the snares of an enemy less brave but
more artful than themselves. They might be bribed, for the
Barbarians were venal; or surprised in the night, for they
neglected the precautions of a close encampment or vigilant
sentinels. The fatigues of a summer's campaign exhausted their
strength and patience, and they sunk in despair if their
voracious appetite was disappointed of a plentiful supply of wine
and of food. This general character of the Franks was marked
with some national and local shades, which I should ascribe to
accident rather than to climate, but which were visible both to
natives and to foreigners. An ambassador of the great Otho
declared, in the palace of Constantinople, that the Saxons could
dispute with swords better than with pens, and that they
preferred inevitable death to the dishonor of turning their backs
to an enemy. ^92 It was the glory of the nobles of France, that,
in their humble dwellings, war and rapine were the only pleasure,
the sole occupation, of their lives. They affected to deride the
palaces, the banquets, the polished manner of the Italians, who
in the estimate of the Greeks themselves had degenerated from the
liberty and valor of the ancient Lombards. ^93

[Footnote 90: In the xviiith chapter of his Tactics, the emperor
Leo has fairly stated the military vices and virtues of the
Franks (whom Meursius ridiculously translates by Galli) and the
Lombards or Langobards. See likewise the xxvith Dissertation of
Muratori de Antiquitatibus Italiae Medii Aevi.]

[Footnote 91: Domini tui milites (says the proud Nicephorus)
equitandi ignari pedestris pugnae sunt inscii: scutorum
magnitudo, loricarum gravitudo, ensium longitudo galearumque
pondus neutra parte pugnare cossinit; ac subridens, impedit,
inquit, et eos gastrimargia, hoc est ventris ingluvies, &c.
Liutprand in Legat. p. 480 481]

[Footnote 92: In Saxonia certe scio .... decentius ensibus
pugnare quam calanis, et prius mortem obire quam hostibus terga
dare, (Liutprand, p 482.)]

[Footnote 93: Leonis Tactica, c. 18, p. 805. The emperor Leo
died A.D. 911: an historical poem, which ends in 916, and appears
to have been composed in 910, by a native of Venetia,
discriminates in these verses the manners of Italy and France:

- Quid inertia bello

Pectora (Ubertus ait) duris praetenditis armis,

O Itali? Potius vobis sacra pocula cordi;

Saepius et stomachum nitidis laxare saginis

Elatasque domos rutilo fulcire metallo.

Non eadem Gallos similis vel cura remordet:

Vicinas quibus est studium devincere terras,

Depressumque larem spoliis hinc inde coactis

Sustentare -

(Anonym. Carmen Panegyricum de Laudibus Berengarii Augusti, l. n.
in Muratori Script. Rerum Italic. tom. ii. pars i. p. 393.)]

By the well-known edict of Caracalla, his subjects, from
Britain to Egypt, were entitled to the name and privileges of
Romans, and their national sovereign might fix his occasional or
permanent residence in any province of their common country. In
the division of the East and West, an ideal unity was
scrupulously observed, and in their titles, laws, and statutes,
the successors of Arcadius and Honorius announced themselves as
the inseparable colleagues of the same office, as the joint
sovereigns of the Roman world and city, which were bounded by the
same limits. After the fall of the Western monarchy, the majesty
of the purple resided solely in the princes of Constantinople;
and of these, Justinian was the first who, after a divorce of
sixty years, regained the dominion of ancient Rome, and asserted,
by the right of conquest, the august title of Emperor of the
Romans. ^94 A motive of vanity or discontent solicited one of his
successors, Constans the Second, to abandon the Thracian
Bosphorus, and to restore the pristine honors of the Tyber: an
extravagant project, (exclaims the malicious Byzantine,) as if he
had despoiled a beautiful and blooming virgin, to enrich, or
rather to expose, the deformity of a wrinkled and decrepit
matron. ^95 But the sword of the Lombards opposed his settlement
in Italy: he entered Rome not as a conqueror, but as a fugitive,
and, after a visit of twelve days, he pillaged, and forever
deserted, the ancient capital of the world. ^96 The final revolt
and separation of Italy was accomplished about two centuries
after the conquests of Justinian, and from his reign we may date
the gradual oblivion of the Latin tongue. That legislator had
composed his Institutes, his Code, and his Pandects, in a
language which he celebrates as the proper and public style of
the Roman government, the consecrated idiom of the palace and
senate of Constantinople, of the campus and tribunals of the
East. ^97 But this foreign dialect was unknown to the people and
soldiers of the Asiatic provinces, it was imperfectly understood
by the greater part of the interpreters of the laws and the
ministers of the state. After a short conflict, nature and habit
prevailed over the obsolete institutions of human power: for the
general benefit of his subjects, Justinian promulgated his novels
in the two languages: the several parts of his voluminous
jurisprudence were successively translated; ^98 the original was
forgotten, the version was studied, and the Greek, whose
intrinsic merit deserved indeed the preference, obtained a legal,
as well as popular establishment in the Byzantine monarchy. The
birth and residence of succeeding princes estranged them from the
Roman idiom: Tiberius by the Arabs, ^99 and Maurice by the
Italians, ^100 are distinguished as the first of the Greek
Caesars, as the founders of a new dynasty and empire: the silent
revolution was accomplished before the death of Heraclius; and
the ruins of the Latin speech were darkly preserved in the terms
of jurisprudence and the acclamations of the palace. After the
restoration of the Western empire by Charlemagne and the Othos,
the names of Franks and Latins acquired an equal signification
and extent; and these haughty Barbarians asserted, with some
justice, their superior claim to the language and dominion of
Rome. They insulted the alien of the East who had renounced the
dress and idiom of Romans; and their reasonable practice will
justify the frequent appellation of Greeks. ^101 But this
contemptuous appellation was indignantly rejected by the prince
and people to whom it was applied. Whatsoever changes had been
introduced by the lapse of ages, they alleged a lineal and
unbroken succession from Augustus and Constantine; and, in the
lowest period of degeneracy and decay, the name of Romans adhered
to the last fragments of the empire of Constantinople. ^102