LXIV. CHAP. earthquake shook the walls and cities of the provinces; the dismantled places were occupied by the Turks; and Gallipoli, the key of the Hellespont, was rebuilt and repeopled by the policy of Soliman. The abdication of Cantacuzene dissolved the feeble bands of domestic alliance; and his last advice admonished his countrymen to decline a rash contest, and to compare their own weakness with the numbers and valour, the discipline and enthusiasm, of the Moslems. His prudent counsels were despised by the headstrong vanity of youth, and soon justified by the victories of the Ottomans. Death of But as he practised in the field the exercise of the jerid, Soliman was killed by a fall from his horse; and the aged Orchan wept and expired on the tomb of his valiant son. Orchan and bis con Soli man. The reign and Eu. ropean of Amu rath I. A. D. 1360--359, But the Greeks had not time to rejoice in the death of their enemies; and the Turkish scymeconquests tar was wielded with the same spirit by Amurath the First, the son of Orchan, and the brother of Soliman. By the pale and fainting light of the Byzantine annals *, we can discern, that he subdued without resistance the whole province of Romania or Thrace, from the Hellespont to mount Hamus, and the verge of the capitol; and that Adrianople was chosen for the royal seat of his government and religion in Europe. Constantinople, whose decline is almost coeval with Sept. her After the conclusion of Cantacuzene and Gregoras, there follows a dark interval of an hundred years. George Phranza, Michael Ducas, and Laonicus Chalcondyles, all three wrote after the taking of Constantinople. LXIV. her foundation, had often, in the lapse of a thou- CHAP. sand years, been assaulted by the barbarians of the East and West; but never till this fatal hour had the Greeks been surrounded, both in Asia and Europe, by the arms of the same hostile monarchy. Yet the prudence or generosity of Amurath postponed for a while this easy conquest; and his pride was satisfied with the frequent and humble attendance of the Emperor John Palæologus and his four sons, who followed at his summons the court and camp of the Ottoman Prince. He marched against the Sclavonian nations between the Danube and the Adriatic, the Bulgarians, Servians, Bosnians, and Albanians; and these warlike tribes, who had so often insulted the majesty of the empire, were repeatedly broken by his destructive inroads. Their countries did not abound either in gold or silver; nor were their rustic hamlets and townships enriched by commerce, or decorated by the arts of luxury. But the natives of the soil have been distinguished in every age by their hardiness of mind and body; and they were converted by a prudent institution into the firmest and most faithful supporters of the Ottoman greatness The vizir of Amurath reminded his Sovereign, that, according to the Mahometan law, he was entitled to a fifth part of the spoil and captives; and that the duty might easily be levied, if vigilant officers were stationed at Gallipoli, to watch the See Cantemir, p. 37-41. with his own large and curious annotations. LXIV. Zaries. CHAP. the passage, and to select for his use the stoutest and most beautiful of the Christian youth. The advice was followed; the edict was proclaimed; many thousands of the European captives were educated in religion and arms; and the new militia was consecrated and named by a celebrated dervish. Standing in the front of their ranks, he stretched the sleeve of his gown over the head of the foremost soldier, and his blessing was delivered in these The Jani- words: "Let them be called Janizaries, (Yengi cheri, or new soldiers); may their countenance "be ever bright! their hand victorious! their sword "keen! may their spear always hang over the heads "of their enemies; and wheresover they go, may "they return with a white face * !" Such was the origin of these haughty troops, the terror of the nations, and sometimes of the Sultans themselves. Their valour has declined, their discipline is relaxed, and their tumultuary array is incapable of contending with the order and weapons of modern tactics; but at the time of their institution, they possessed a decisive superiority in war; since a regular body of infantry, in constant exercise and pay, was not maintained by any of the Princes of Christendom. The Janizaries fought with the zeal of proselytes against their idolatrous countrymen; and in the battle of Cossova, the league and independence of the Sclavonian tribes was finally crushed. As the conqueror walked over the * White and black face are common and proverbial expressions of praise and reproach in the Turkish language. Hic niger est, hunc tu Romane caveto, was likewise a Latin sen tence. LXIV. the field, he observed that the greatest part of the CHAP. slain consisted of beardless youths; and listened to the flattering reply of his vizir, that age and wisdom would have taught them not to oppose his irresistible arms. But the sword of his Janizarics could not defend him from the dagger of despair; a Servian soldier started from the crowd of dead bodies, and Amurath was pierced in the belly with a mortal wound. The grandson of Othman was mild in his temper, modest in his apparel, and a lover of learning and virtue; but the Moslems were scandalised at his absence from public worship; and he was corrected by the firmness of the mufti, who dared to reject his testimony in a civil cause : a mixture of servitude and freedom not unfrequent in Oriental history *. of Baia zet I. Ilderim, The character of Bajazet, the son and successor The reign of Amurath, is strongly expressed in his surname of Ilderim, or the lightning; and he might glory in an epithet, which was drawn from the fiery energy of his soul and the rapidity of his destructive march. In the fourteenth year of his reignt, he * See the life and death of Morad, or Amurath I. in Cantemir (p. 33-45.), the 1st book of Chalcondyles, and the Annales Turcici of Leunclavius. According to another story, the Sultan was stabbed by a Croat in his tent and this accident was alledged to Busbequius (Epist. i. p. 98.) as an excuse for the unworthy precaution of pinioning, as it were, between two attendants, an ambassador's arms, when he is intro. duced to the royal presence. The reign of Bajazet I. or Ilderim Bayazid, is contained in Cantemir, (p. 46), the 2d book of Chalcondyles, and the Anuales Turcici. The surname of Ilderim, or lightning, is an A. D. 13801403, March 9 LXIV. CHAP. he incessantly moved at the head of his armies, from Boursa to Adrianople, from the Danube to the Euphrates; and, though he strenuously laboured for the propagation of the law, he invaded, with impartial ambition, the Christian and Mahometan Princes of Europe and Asia. From Angora to Amasia and Erzeroum, the northern regions Euphrates of Anatolia were reduced to his obedience; he Danube. stripped of their hereditary possessions, his brother His conquests, from the to the emirs, of Ghermian and Caramania, of Aidin and Sarukhan; and after the conquest of Iconium the ancient kingdom of the Seljukians again revived in the Ottoman dynasty. Nor were the conquests of Bajazet less rapid or important in Europe. No sooner had he imposed a regular form of servitude on the Servians and Bulgarians, than he passed the Danube to seek new enemies and new subjects in the heart of Moldavia *. Whatever yet adhered to the Greek empire in Thrace, Macedonia, and Thessaly, acknowledged a Turkish master. obsequious bishop led him through the gates of Thermopyla into Greece; and we may observe, as a singular fact, that the widow of a Spanish chief, who possessed the ancient seat of the oracle of Delphi, deserved his favour by the sacrifice of a beauteous daughter. The Turkish communication between An an example, that the conquerors and poets of every age have felt the truth of a system which derives the sublime from the principle of terror. * Cantemir, who celebrates the victories of the great Stephen over the Turks, (p. 47.), had composed the ancient and modern state of his principality of Moldavia, which has been long promised, and is still unpublished. |