Chapter LII: More Conquests By The Arabs.—Part V

The third and most obvious cause was the weight and magnitude of
the empire itself. The caliph Almamon might proudly assert, that
it was easier for him to rule the East and the West, than to
manage a chess-board of two feet square: 102 yet I suspect that
in both those games he was guilty of many fatal mistakes; and I
perceive, that in the distant provinces the authority of the
first and most powerful of the Abbassides was already impaired.
The analogy of despotism invests the representative with the full
majesty of the prince; the division and balance of powers might
relax the habits of obedience, might encourage the passive
subject to inquire into the origin and administration of civil
government. He who is born in the purple is seldom worthy to
reign; but the elevation of a private man, of a peasant, perhaps,
or a slave, affords a strong presumption of his courage and
capacity. The viceroy of a remote kingdom aspires to secure the
property and inheritance of his precarious trust; the nations
must rejoice in the presence of their sovereign; and the command
of armies and treasures are at once the object and the instrument
of his ambition. A change was scarcely visible as long as the
lieutenants of the caliph were content with their vicarious
title; while they solicited for themselves or their sons a
renewal of the Imperial grant, and still maintained on the coin
and in the public prayers the name and prerogative of the
commander of the faithful. But in the long and hereditary
exercise of power, they assumed the pride and attributes of
royalty; the alternative of peace or war, of reward or
punishment, depended solely on their will; and the revenues of
their government were reserved for local services or private
magnificence. Instead of a regular supply of men and money, the
successors of the prophet were flattered with the ostentatious
gift of an elephant, or a cast of hawks, a suit of silk hangings,
or some pounds of musk and amber. 103

102 (return) [ Hyde, Syntagma Dissertat. tom. ii. p. 57, in Hist.
Shahiludii.]

103 (return) [ The dynasties of the Arabian empire may be studied
in the Annals of Elmacin, Abulpharagius, and Abulfeda, under the
proper years, in the dictionary of D’Herbelot, under the proper
names. The tables of M. de Guignes (Hist. des Huns, tom. i.)
exhibit a general chronology of the East, interspersed with some
historical anecdotes; but his attachment to national blood has
sometimes confounded the order of time and place.]

After the revolt of Spain from the temporal and spiritual
supremacy of the Abbassides, the first symptoms of disobedience
broke forth in the province of Africa. Ibrahim, the son of Aglab,
the lieutenant of the vigilant and rigid Harun, bequeathed to the
dynasty of the Aglabites the inheritance of his name and power.
The indolence or policy of the caliphs dissembled the injury and
loss, and pursued only with poison the founder of the Edrisites,
104 who erected the kingdom and city of Fez on the shores of the
Western ocean. 105 In the East, the first dynasty was that of the
Taherites; 106 the posterity of the valiant Taher, who, in the
civil wars of the sons of Harun, had served with too much zeal
and success the cause of Almamon, the younger brother. He was
sent into honorable exile, to command on the banks of the Oxus;
and the independence of his successors, who reigned in Chorasan
till the fourth generation, was palliated by their modest and
respectful demeanor, the happiness of their subjects and the
security of their frontier. They were supplanted by one of those
adventures so frequent in the annals of the East, who left his
trade of a brazier (from whence the name of Soffarides) for the
profession of a robber. In a nocturnal visit to the treasure of
the prince of Sistan, Jacob, the son of Leith, stumbled over a
lump of salt, which he unwarily tasted with his tongue. Salt,
among the Orientals, is the symbol of hospitality, and the pious
robber immediately retired without spoil or damage. The discovery
of this honorable behavior recommended Jacob to pardon and trust;
he led an army at first for his benefactor, at last for himself,
subdued Persia, and threatened the residence of the Abbassides.
On his march towards Bagdad, the conqueror was arrested by a
fever. He gave audience in bed to the ambassador of the caliph;
and beside him on a table were exposed a naked cimeter, a crust
of brown bread, and a bunch of onions. “If I die,” said he, “your
master is delivered from his fears. If I live, this must
determine between us. If I am vanquished, I can return without
reluctance to the homely fare of my youth.” From the height where
he stood, the descent would not have been so soft or harmless: a
timely death secured his own repose and that of the caliph, who
paid with the most lavish concessions the retreat of his brother
Amrou to the palaces of Shiraz and Ispahan. The Abbassides were
too feeble to contend, too proud to forgive: they invited the
powerful dynasty of the Samanides, who passed the Oxus with ten
thousand horse so poor, that their stirrups were of wood: so
brave, that they vanquished the Soffarian army, eight times more
numerous than their own. The captive Amrou was sent in chains, a
grateful offering to the court of Bagdad; and as the victor was
content with the inheritance of Transoxiana and Chorasan, the
realms of Persia returned for a while to the allegiance of the
caliphs. The provinces of Syria and Egypt were twice dismembered
by their Turkish slaves of the race of Toulon and Ilkshid. 107
These Barbarians, in religion and manners the countrymen of
Mahomet, emerged from the bloody factions of the palace to a
provincial command and an independent throne: their names became
famous and formidable in their time; but the founders of these
two potent dynasties confessed, either in words or actions, the
vanity of ambition. The first on his death-bed implored the mercy
of God to a sinner, ignorant of the limits of his own power: the
second, in the midst of four hundred thousand soldiers and eight
thousand slaves, concealed from every human eye the chamber where
he attempted to sleep. Their sons were educated in the vices of
kings; and both Egypt and Syria were recovered and possessed by
the Abbassides during an interval of thirty years. In the decline
of their empire, Mesopotamia, with the important cities of Mosul
and Aleppo, was occupied by the Arabian princes of the tribe of
Hamadan. The poets of their court could repeat without a blush,
that nature had formed their countenances for beauty, their
tongues for eloquence, and their hands for liberality and valor:
but the genuine tale of the elevation and reign of the
Hamadanites exhibits a scene of treachery, murder, and parricide.

At the same fatal period, the Persian kingdom was again usurped
by the dynasty of the Bowides, by the sword of three brothers,
who, under various names, were styled the support and columns of
the state, and who, from the Caspian Sea to the ocean, would
suffer no tyrants but themselves. Under their reign, the language
and genius of Persia revived, and the Arabs, three hundred and
four years after the death of Mahomet, were deprived of the
sceptre of the East.

104 (return) [ The Aglabites and Edrisites are the professed
subject of M. de Cardonne, (Hist. de l’Afrique et de l’Espagne
sous la Domination des Arabes, tom. ii. p. 1-63.)]

105 (return) [ To escape the reproach of error, I must criticize
the inaccuracies of M. de Guignes (tom. i. p. 359) concerning the
Edrisites. 1. The dynasty and city of Fez could not be founded in
the year of the Hegira 173, since the founder was a posthumous
child of a descendant of Ali, who fled from Mecca in the year
168. 2. This founder, Edris, the son of Edris, instead of living
to the improbable age of 120 years, A. H. 313, died A. H. 214, in
the prime of manhood. 3. The dynasty ended A. H. 307,
twenty-three years sooner than it is fixed by the historian of
the Huns. See the accurate Annals of Abulfeda p. 158, 159, 185,
238.]

106 (return) [ The dynasties of the Taherites and Soffarides,
with the rise of that of the Samanines, are described in the
original history and Latin version of Mirchond: yet the most
interesting facts had already been drained by the diligence of M.
D’Herbelot.]

107 (return) [ M. de Guignes (Hist. des Huns, tom. iii. p.
124-154) has exhausted the Toulunides and Ikshidites of Egypt,
and thrown some light on the Carmathians and Hamadanites.]

Rahadi, the twentieth of the Abbassides, and the thirty-ninth of
the successors of Mahomet, was the last who deserved the title of
commander of the faithful; 108 the last (says Abulfeda) who spoke
to the people, or conversed with the learned; the last who, in
the expense of his household, represented the wealth and
magnificence of the ancient caliphs. After him, the lords of the
Eastern world were reduced to the most abject misery, and exposed
to the blows and insults of a servile condition. The revolt of
the provinces circumscribed their dominions within the walls of
Bagdad: but that capital still contained an innumerable
multitude, vain of their past fortune, discontented with their
present state, and oppressed by the demands of a treasury which
had formerly been replenished by the spoil and tribute of
nations. Their idleness was exercised by faction and controversy.
Under the mask of piety, the rigid followers of Hanbal 109
invaded the pleasures of domestic life, burst into the houses of
plebeians and princes, the wine, broke the instruments, beat the
musicians, and dishonored, with infamous suspicions, the
associates of every handsome youth. In each profession, which
allowed room for two persons, the one was a votary, the other an
antagonist, of Ali; and the Abbassides were awakened by the
clamorous grief of the sectaries, who denied their title, and
cursed their progenitors. A turbulent people could only be
repressed by a military force; but who could satisfy the avarice
or assert the discipline of the mercenaries themselves? The
African and the Turkish guards drew their swords against each
other, and the chief commanders, the emirs al Omra, 110
imprisoned or deposed their sovereigns, and violated the
sanctuary of the mosch and harem. If the caliphs escaped to the
camp or court of any neighboring prince, their deliverance was a
change of servitude, till they were prompted by despair to invite
the Bowides, the sultans of Persia, who silenced the factions of
Bagdad by their irresistible arms. The civil and military powers
were assumed by Moezaldowlat, the second of the three brothers,
and a stipend of sixty thousand pounds sterling was assigned by
his generosity for the private expense of the commander of the
faithful. But on the fortieth day, at the audience of the
ambassadors of Chorasan, and in the presence of a trembling
multitude, the caliph was dragged from his throne to a dungeon,
by the command of the stranger, and the rude hands of his
Dilamites. His palace was pillaged, his eyes were put out, and
the mean ambition of the Abbassides aspired to the vacant station
of danger and disgrace. In the school of adversity, the luxurious
caliphs resumed the grave and abstemious virtues of the primitive
times. Despoiled of their armor and silken robes, they fasted,
they prayed, they studied the Koran and the tradition of the
Sonnites: they performed, with zeal and knowledge, the functions
of their ecclesiastical character. The respect of nations still
waited on the successors of the apostle, the oracles of the law
and conscience of the faithful; and the weakness or division of
their tyrants sometimes restored the Abbassides to the
sovereignty of Bagdad. But their misfortunes had been imbittered
by the triumph of the Fatimites, the real or spurious progeny of
Ali. Arising from the extremity of Africa, these successful
rivals extinguished, in Egypt and Syria, both the spiritual and
temporal authority of the Abbassides; and the monarch of the Nile
insulted the humble pontiff on the banks of the Tigris.

108 (return) [ Hic est ultimus chalifah qui multum atque saepius
pro concione peroraret.... Fuit etiam ultimus qui otium cum
eruditis et facetis hominibus fallere hilariterque agere soleret.
Ultimus tandem chalifarum cui sumtus, stipendia, reditus, et
thesauri, culinae, caeteraque omnis aulica pompa priorum
chalifarum ad instar comparata fuerint. Videbimus enim paullo
post quam indignis et servilibius ludibriis exagitati, quam ad
humilem fortunam altimumque contemptum abjecti fuerint hi quondam
potentissimi totius terrarum Orientalium orbis domini. Abulfed.
Annal. Moslem. p. 261. I have given this passage as the manner
and tone of Abulfeda, but the cast of Latin eloquence belongs
more properly to Reiske. The Arabian historian (p. 255, 257,
261-269, 283, &c.) has supplied me with the most interesting
facts of this paragraph.]

109 (return) [ Their master, on a similar occasion, showed
himself of a more indulgent and tolerating spirit. Ahmed Ebn
Hanbal, the head of one of the four orthodox sects, was born at
Bagdad A. H. 164, and died there A. H. 241. He fought and
suffered in the dispute concerning the creation of the Koran.]

110 (return) [ The office of vizier was superseded by the emir al
Omra, Imperator Imperatorum, a title first instituted by Radhi,
and which merged at length in the Bowides and Seljukides:
vectigalibus, et tributis, et curiis per omnes regiones
praefecit, jussitque in omnibus suggestis nominis ejus in
concionibus mentionem fieri, (Abulpharagius, Dynart. p 199.) It
is likewise mentioned by Elmacin, (p. 254, 255.)]

In the declining age of the caliphs, in the century which elapsed
after the war of Theophilus and Motassem, the hostile
transactions of the two nations were confined to some inroads by
sea and land, the fruits of their close vicinity and indelible
hatred. But when the Eastern world was convulsed and broken, the
Greeks were roused from their lethargy by the hopes of conquest
and revenge. The Byzantine empire, since the accession of the
Basilian race, had reposed in peace and dignity; and they might
encounter with their entire strength the front of some petty
emir, whose rear was assaulted and threatened by his national
foes of the Mahometan faith. The lofty titles of the morning
star, and the death of the Saracens, 111 were applied in the
public acclamations to Nicephorus Phocas, a prince as renowned in
the camp, as he was unpopular in the city. In the subordinate
station of great domestic, or general of the East, he reduced the
Island of Crete, and extirpated the nest of pirates who had so
long defied, with impunity, the majesty of the empire. 112 His
military genius was displayed in the conduct and success of the
enterprise, which had so often failed with loss and dishonor. The
Saracens were confounded by the landing of his troops on safe and
level bridges, which he cast from the vessels to the shore. Seven
months were consumed in the siege of Candia; the despair of the
native Cretans was stimulated by the frequent aid of their
brethren of Africa and Spain; and after the massy wall and double
ditch had been stormed by the Greeks a hopeless conflict was
still maintained in the streets and houses of the city. 1121 The
whole island was subdued in the capital, and a submissive people
accepted, without resistance, the baptism of the conqueror. 113
Constantinople applauded the long-forgotten pomp of a triumph;
but the Imperial diadem was the sole reward that could repay the
services, or satisfy the ambition, of Nicephorus.

111 (return) [ Liutprand, whose choleric temper was imbittered by
his uneasy situation, suggests the names of reproach and contempt
more applicable to Nicephorus than the vain titles of the Greeks,
Ecce venit stella matutina, surgit Eous, reverberat obtutu solis
radios, pallida Saracenorum mors, Nicephorus.]

112 (return) [ Notwithstanding the insinuation of Zonaras, &c.,
(tom. ii. l. xvi. p. 197,) it is an undoubted fact, that Crete
was completely and finally subdued by Nicephorus Phocas, (Pagi,
Critica, tom. iii. p. 873-875. Meursius, Creta, l. iii. c. 7,
tom. iii. p. 464, 465.)]

1121 (return) [ The Acroases of Theodorus, de expugnatione
Cretae, miserable iambics, relate the whole campaign. Whoever
would fairly estimate the merit of the poetic deacon, may read
the description of the slinging a jackass into the famishing
city. The poet is in a transport at the wit of the general, and
revels in the luxury of antithesis. Theodori Acroases, lib. iii.
172, in Niebuhr’s Byzant. Hist.—M.]

113 (return) [ A Greek Life of St. Nicon the Armenian was found
in the Sforza library, and translated into Latin by the Jesuit
Sirmond, for the use of Cardinal Baronius. This contemporary
legend casts a ray of light on Crete and Peloponnesus in the 10th
century. He found the newly-recovered island, foedis detestandae
Agarenorum superstitionis vestigiis adhuc plenam ac refertam....
but the victorious missionary, perhaps with some carnal aid, ad
baptismum omnes veraeque fidei disciplinam pepulit. Ecclesiis per
totam insulam aedificatis, &c., (Annal. Eccles. A.D. 961.)]

After the death of the younger Romanus, the fourth in lineal
descent of the Basilian race, his widow Theophania successively
married Nicephorus Phocas and his assassin John Zimisces, the two
heroes of the age. They reigned as the guardians and colleagues
of her infant sons; and the twelve years of their military
command form the most splendid period of the Byzantine annals.
The subjects and confederates, whom they led to war, appeared, at
least in the eyes of an enemy, two hundred thousand strong; and
of these about thirty thousand were armed with cuirasses: 114 a
train of four thousand mules attended their march; and their
evening camp was regularly fortified with an enclosure of iron
spikes. A series of bloody and undecisive combats is nothing more
than an anticipation of what would have been effected in a few
years by the course of nature; but I shall briefly prosecute the
conquests of the two emperors from the hills of Cappadocia to the
desert of Bagdad. The sieges of Mopsuestia and Tarsus, in
Cilicia, first exercised the skill and perseverance of their
troops, on whom, at this moment, I shall not hesitate to bestow
the name of Romans. In the double city of Mopsuestia, which is
divided by the River Sarus, two hundred thousand Moslems were
predestined to death or slavery, 115 a surprising degree of
population, which must at least include the inhabitants of the
dependent districts. They were surrounded and taken by assault;
but Tarsus was reduced by the slow progress of famine; and no
sooner had the Saracens yielded on honorable terms than they were
mortified by the distant and unprofitable view of the naval
succors of Egypt. They were dismissed with a safe-conduct to the
confines of Syria: a part of the old Christians had quietly lived
under their dominion; and the vacant habitations were replenished
by a new colony. But the mosch was converted into a stable; the
pulpit was delivered to the flames; many rich crosses of gold and
gems, the spoils of Asiatic churches, were made a grateful
offering to the piety or avarice of the emperor; and he
transported the gates of Mopsuestia and Tarsus, which were fixed
in the walls of Constantinople, an eternal monument of his
victory. After they had forced and secured the narrow passes of
Mount Amanus, the two Roman princes repeatedly carried their arms
into the heart of Syria. Yet, instead of assaulting the walls of
Antioch, the humanity or superstition of Nicephorus appeared to
respect the ancient metropolis of the East: he contented himself
with drawing round the city a line of circumvallation; left a
stationary army; and instructed his lieutenant to expect, without
impatience, the return of spring. But in the depth of winter, in
a dark and rainy night, an adventurous subaltern, with three
hundred soldiers, approached the rampart, applied his
scaling-ladders, occupied two adjacent towers, stood firm against
the pressure of multitudes, and bravely maintained his post till
he was relieved by the tardy, though effectual, support of his
reluctant chief. The first tumult of slaughter and rapine
subsided; the reign of Caesar and of Christ was restored; and the
efforts of a hundred thousand Saracens, of the armies of Syria
and the fleets of Africa, were consumed without effect before the
walls of Antioch. The royal city of Aleppo was subject to
Seifeddowlat, of the dynasty of Hamadan, who clouded his past
glory by the precipitate retreat which abandoned his kingdom and
capital to the Roman invaders. In his stately palace, that stood
without the walls of Aleppo, they joyfully seized a
well-furnished magazine of arms, a stable of fourteen hundred
mules, and three hundred bags of silver and gold. But the walls
of the city withstood the strokes of their battering-rams: and
the besiegers pitched their tents on the neighboring mountain of
Jaushan. Their retreat exasperated the quarrel of the townsmen
and mercenaries; the guard of the gates and ramparts was
deserted; and while they furiously charged each other in the
market-place, they were surprised and destroyed by the sword of a
common enemy. The male sex was exterminated by the sword; ten
thousand youths were led into captivity; the weight of the
precious spoil exceeded the strength and number of the beasts of
burden; the superfluous remainder was burnt; and, after a
licentious possession of ten days, the Romans marched away from
the naked and bleeding city. In their Syrian inroads they
commanded the husbandmen to cultivate their lands, that they
themselves, in the ensuing season, might reap the benefit; more
than a hundred cities were reduced to obedience; and eighteen
pulpits of the principal moschs were committed to the flames to
expiate the sacrilege of the disciples of Mahomet. The classic
names of Hierapolis, Apamea, and Emesa, revive for a moment in
the list of conquest: the emperor Zimisces encamped in the
paradise of Damascus, and accepted the ransom of a submissive
people; and the torrent was only stopped by the impregnable
fortress of Tripoli, on the sea-coast of Phoenicia. Since the
days of Heraclius, the Euphrates, below the passage of Mount
Taurus, had been impervious, and almost invisible, to the Greeks.

The river yielded a free passage to the victorious Zimisces; and
the historian may imitate the speed with which he overran the
once famous cities of Samosata, Edessa, Martyropolis, Amida, 116
and Nisibis, the ancient limit of the empire in the neighborhood
of the Tigris. His ardor was quickened by the desire of grasping
the virgin treasures of Ecbatana, 117 a well-known name, under
which the Byzantine writer has concealed the capital of the
Abbassides. The consternation of the fugitives had already
diffused the terror of his name; but the fancied riches of Bagdad
had already been dissipated by the avarice and prodigality of
domestic tyrants. The prayers of the people, and the stern
demands of the lieutenant of the Bowides, required the caliph to
provide for the defence of the city. The helpless Mothi replied,
that his arms, his revenues, and his provinces, had been torn
from his hands, and that he was ready to abdicate a dignity which
he was unable to support. The emir was inexorable; the furniture
of the palace was sold; and the paltry price of forty thousand
pieces of gold was instantly consumed in private luxury. But the
apprehensions of Bagdad were relieved by the retreat of the
Greeks: thirst and hunger guarded the desert of Mesopotamia; and
the emperor, satiated with glory, and laden with Oriental spoils,
returned to Constantinople, and displayed, in his triumph, the
silk, the aromatics, and three hundred myriads of gold and
silver. Yet the powers of the East had been bent, not broken, by
this transient hurricane. After the departure of the Greeks, the
fugitive princes returned to their capitals; the subjects
disclaimed their involuntary oaths of allegiance; the Moslems
again purified their temples, and overturned the idols of the
saints and martyrs; the Nestorians and Jacobites preferred a
Saracen to an orthodox master; and the numbers and spirit of the
Melchites were inadequate to the support of the church and state.

Of these extensive conquests, Antioch, with the cities of Cilicia
and the Isle of Cyprus, was alone restored, a permanent and
useful accession to the Roman empire. 118

114 (return) [ Elmacin, Hist. Saracen. p. 278, 279. Liutprand was
disposed to depreciate the Greek power, yet he owns that
Nicephorus led against Assyria an army of eighty thousand men.]

115 (return) [ Ducenta fere millia hominum numerabat urbs
(Abulfeda, Annal. Moslem. p. 231) of Mopsuestia, or Masifa,
Mampsysta, Mansista, Mamista, as it is corruptly, or perhaps more
correctly, styled in the middle ages, (Wesseling, Itinerar. p.
580.) Yet I cannot credit this extreme populousness a few years
after the testimony of the emperor Leo, (Tactica, c. xviii. in
Meursii Oper. tom. vi. p. 817.)]

116 (return) [ The text of Leo the deacon, in the corrupt names
of Emeta and Myctarsim, reveals the cities of Amida and
Martyropolis, (Mia farekin. See Abulfeda, Geograph. p. 245, vers.
Reiske.) Of the former, Leo observes, urbus munita et illustris;
of the latter, clara atque conspicua opibusque et pecore,
reliquis ejus provinciis urbibus atque oppidis longe praestans.]

117 (return) [ Ut et Ecbatana pergeret Agarenorumque regiam
everteret.... aiunt enim urbium quae usquam sunt ac toto orbe
existunt felicissimam esse auroque ditissimam, (Leo Diacon. apud
Pagium, tom. iv. p. 34.) This splendid description suits only
with Bagdad, and cannot possibly apply either to Hamadan, the
true Ecbatana, (D’Anville, Geog. Ancienne, tom. ii. p. 237,) or
Tauris, which has been commonly mistaken for that city. The name
of Ecbatana, in the same indefinite sense, is transferred by a
more classic authority (Cicero pro Lego Manilia, c. 4) to the
royal seat of Mithridates, king of Pontus.]

118 (return) [ See the Annals of Elmacin, Abulpharagius, and
Abulfeda, from A. H. 351 to A. H. 361; and the reigns of
Nicephorus Phocas and John Zimisces, in the Chronicles of Zonaras
(tom. ii. l. xvi. p. 199—l. xvii. 215) and Cedrenus, (Compend. p.
649-684.) Their manifold defects are partly supplied by the Ms.
history of Leo the deacon, which Pagi obtained from the
Benedictines, and has inserted almost entire, in a Latin version,
(Critica, tom. iii. p. 873, tom. iv. 37.) * Note: The whole
original work of Leo the Deacon has been published by Hase, and
is inserted in the new edition of the Byzantine historians. M
Lassen has added to the Arabian authorities of this period some
extracts from Kemaleddin’s account of the treaty for the
surrender of Aleppo.—M.]