sons, Basil the Second and Constantine the Ninth, and two daughters,
Theophano and Anne. The eldest sister was given to Otho the Second,
emperor of the West; the younger became the wife of Wolodomir, great
duke and apostle of Russia, and by the marriage of her granddaughter
with Henry the First, king of France, the blood of the Macedonians, and
perhaps of the Arsacides, still flows in the veins of the Bourbon line.
After the death of her husband, the empress aspired to reign in the name
of her sons, the elder of whom was five, and the younger only two,
years of age; but she soon felt the instability of a throne which was
supported by a female who could not be esteemed, and two infants who
could not be feared. Theophano looked around for a protector, and threw
herself into the arms of the bravest soldier; her heart was capacious;
but the deformity of the new favorite rendered it more than probable
that interest was the motive and excuse of her love. Nicephorus Phocus
united, in the popular opinion, the double merit of a hero and a saint.
In the former character, his qualifications were genuine and splendid:
the descendant of a race illustrious by their military exploits, he
had displayed in every station and in every province the courage of
a soldier and the conduct of a chief; and Nicephorus was crowned with
recent laurels, from the important conquest of the Isle of Crete. His
religion was of a more ambiguous cast; and his hair-cloth, his fasts,
his pious idiom, and his wish to retire from the business of the world,
were a convenient mask for his dark and dangerous ambition. Yet he
imposed on a holy patriarch, by whose influence, and by a decree of the
senate, he was intrusted, during the minority of the young princes, with
the absolute and independent command of the Oriental armies. As soon
as he had secured the leaders and the troops, he boldly marched to
Constantinople, trampled on his enemies, avowed his correspondence with
the empress, and without degrading her sons, assumed, with the title of
Augustus, the preeminence of rank and the plenitude of power. But his
marriage with Theophano was refused by the same patriarch who had placed
the crown on his head: by his second nuptials he incurred a year of
canonical penance; a bar of spiritual affinity was opposed to their
celebration; and some evasion and perjury were required to silence the
scruples of the clergy and people. The popularity of the emperor was
lost in the purple: in a reign of six years he provoked the hatred
of strangers and subjects: and the hypocrisy and avarice of the first
Nicephorus were revived in his successor. Hypocrisy I shall never
justify or palliate; but I will dare to observe, that the odious vice of
avarice is of all others most hastily arraigned, and most unmercifully
condemned. In a private citizen, our judgment seldom expects an accurate
scrutiny into his fortune and expense; and in a steward of the public
treasure, frugality is always a virtue, and the increase of taxes too
often an indispensable duty. In the use of his patrimony, the generous
temper of Nicephorus had been proved; and the revenue was strictly
applied to the service of the state: each spring the emperor marched
in person against the Saracens; and every Roman might compute the
employment of his taxes in triumphs, conquests, and the security of the
Eastern barrier.
Chapter XLVIII: Succession And Characters Of The Greek Emperors.--Part IV.
Among the warriors who promoted his elevation, and served under his
standard, a noble and valiant Armenian had deserved and obtained
the most eminent rewards. The stature of John Zimisces was below the
ordinary standard: but this diminutive body was endowed with strength,
beauty, and the soul of a hero. By the jealousy of the emperor's
brother, he was degraded from the office of general of the East, to that
of director of the posts, and his murmurs were chastised with disgrace
and exile. But Zimisces was ranked among the numerous lovers of the
empress: on her intercession, he was permitted to reside at Chalcedon,
in the neighborhood of the capital: her bounty was repaid in his
clandestine and amorous visits to the palace; and Theophano consented,
with alacrity, to the death of an ugly and penurious husband. Some bold
and trusty conspirators were concealed in her most private chambers: in
the darkness of a winter night, Zimisces, with his principal companions,
embarked in a small boat, traversed the Bosphorus, landed at the palace
stairs, and silently ascended a ladder of ropes, which was cast down by
the female attendants. Neither his own suspicions, nor the warnings
of his friends, nor the tardy aid of his brother Leo, nor the fortress
which he had erected in the palace, could protect Nicephorus from a
domestic foe, at whose voice every door was open to the assassins. As
he slept on a bear-skin on the ground, he was roused by their noisy
intrusion, and thirty daggers glittered before his eyes. It is doubtful
whether Zimisces imbrued his hands in the blood of his sovereign; but he
enjoyed the inhuman spectacle of revenge. The murder was protracted by
insult and cruelty: and as soon as the head of Nicephorus was shown from
the window, the tumult was hushed, and the Armenian was emperor of the
East. On the day of his coronation, he was stopped on the threshold of
St. Sophia, by the intrepid patriarch; who charged his conscience with
the deed of treason and blood; and required, as a sign of repentance,
that he should separate himself from his more criminal associate. This
sally of apostolic zeal was not offensive to the prince, since he could
neither love nor trust a woman who had repeatedly violated the most
sacred obligations; and Theophano, instead of sharing his imperial
fortune, was dismissed with ignominy from his bed and palace. In their
last interview, she displayed a frantic and impotent rage; accused
the ingratitude of her lover; assaulted, with words and blows, her son
Basil, as he stood silent and submissive in the presence of a
superior colleague; and avowed her own prostitution in proclaiming the
illegitimacy of his birth. The public indignation was appeased by her
exile, and the punishment of the meaner accomplices: the death of an
unpopular prince was forgiven; and the guilt of Zimisces was forgotten
in the splendor of his virtues. Perhaps his profusion was less useful
to the state than the avarice of Nicephorus; but his gentle and generous
behavior delighted all who approached his person; and it was only in the
paths of victory that he trod in the footsteps of his predecessor. The
greatest part of his reign was employed in the camp and the field:
his personal valor and activity were signalized on the Danube and the
Tigris, the ancient boundaries of the Roman world; and by his double
triumph over the Russians and the Saracens, he deserved the titles of
savior of the empire, and conqueror of the East. In his last return from
Syria, he observed that the most fruitful lands of his new provinces
were possessed by the eunuchs. "And is it for them," he exclaimed, with
honest indignation, "that we have fought and conquered? Is it for them
that we shed our blood, and exhaust the treasures of our people?" The
complaint was reÎchoed to the palace, and the death of Zimisces is
strongly marked with the suspicion of poison.
Under this usurpation, or regency, of twelve years, the two lawful
emperors, Basil and Constantine, had silently grown to the age of
manhood. Their tender years had been incapable of dominion: the
respectful modesty of their attendance and salutation was due to the age
and merit of their guardians; the childless ambition of those guardians
had no temptation to violate their right of succession: their patrimony
was ably and faithfully administered; and the premature death of
Zimisces was a loss, rather than a benefit, to the sons of Romanus.
Their want of experience detained them twelve years longer the obscure
and voluntary pupils of a minister, who extended his reign by persuading
them to indulge the pleasures of youth, and to disdain the labors of
government. In this silken web, the weakness of Constantine was forever
entangled; but his elder brother felt the impulse of genius and the
desire of action; he frowned, and the minister was no more. Basil
was the acknowledged sovereign of Constantinople and the provinces
of Europe; but Asia was oppressed by two veteran generals, Phocas and
Sclerus, who, alternately friends and enemies, subjects and rebels,
maintained their independence, and labored to emulate the example of
successful usurpation. Against these domestic enemies the son of Romanus
first drew his sword, and they trembled in the presence of a lawful and
high-spirited prince. The first, in the front of battle, was thrown from
his horse, by the stroke of poison, or an arrow; the second, who had
been twice loaded with chains, and twice invested with the purple, was
desirous of ending in peace the small remainder of his days. As the
aged suppliant approached the throne, with dim eyes and faltering steps,
leaning on his two attendants, the emperor exclaimed, in the insolence
of youth and power, "And is this the man who has so long been the object
of our terror?" After he had confirmed his own authority, and the peace
of the empire, the trophies of Nicephorus and Zimisces would not
suffer their royal pupil to sleep in the palace. His long and frequent
expeditions against the Saracens were rather glorious than useful to the
empire; but the final destruction of the kingdom of Bulgaria appears,
since the time of Belisarius, the most important triumph of the Roman
arms. Yet, instead of applauding their victorious prince, his subjects
detested the rapacious and rigid avarice of Basil; and in the imperfect
narrative of his exploits, we can only discern the courage, patience,
and ferociousness of a soldier. A vicious education, which could not
subdue his spirit, had clouded his mind; he was ignorant of every
science; and the remembrance of his learned and feeble grandsire might
encourage his real or affected contempt of laws and lawyers, of artists
and arts. Of such a character, in such an age, superstition took a firm
and lasting possession; after the first license of his youth, Basil the
Second devoted his life, in the palace and the camp, to the penance of
a hermit, wore the monastic habit under his robes and armor, observed a
vow of continence, and imposed on his appetites a perpetual abstinence
from wine and flesh. In the sixty-eighth year of his age, his martial
spirit urged him to embark in person ferso the clergy and the curse of
the people. After his decease, his brother Constantine enjoyed, about
three years, the power, ersrather the pleasures, of royalty; and his
only care was the settlement of the succession. He had enjoyed sixty-six
years the title of Augustus; and the reign of the two brothers is the
longest, and most obscure, of the Byzantine history.
A lineal succession of five emperors, in a period of one hundred and
sixty years, had attached the loyalty of the Greeks to the Macedonian
dynasty, which had been thrice respected by the usurpers of their power.
After the death of Constantine the Ninth, the last male of the royal
race, a new and broken scene presents itself, and the accumulated years
of twelve emperors do not equal the space of his single reign. His elder
brother had preferred his private chastity to the public interest, and
Constantine himself had only three daughters; Eudocia, who took the
veil, and Zoe and Theodora, who were preserved till a mature age in a
state of ignorance and virginity. When their marriage was discussed in
the council of their dying father, the cold erspious Theodora refused
to give an heir to the empire, but her sister Zoe presented herself a
willing victim at the altar. Romanus Argyrus, a patrician of a graceful
person and fair reputation, was chosen for her husband, and, on his
declining that blindness or death was the second alternative. The
motive of his reluctance was conjugal affection but his faithful wife
sacrificed her own happiness to his safety and greatness; and her
entrance into a monastery removed the only bar to the Imperial nuptials.
After the decease of Constantine, the sceptre devolved to Romanus
the Third; but his labors at the indulgence of pleasure. Her favorite
chamberlain was a handsome Paphlagonian of the name of Michael, whose
first trade had been that of a money-changer; and Romanus, either from
gratitude, connived at their criminal intercourse, accepted
a slight assurance of their innocence. But Zoe soon justified the Roman
maxim, that every adulteress is capable of poisoning her husband; and
the death of Romanus was instantly followed by the scandalous marriage
and elevation of Michael the Fourth. The expectations of Zoe were,
however, disappointed: instead of a vigorous and grateful lover, she
had placed in her bed a miserable wretch, whose health and reason
were impaired by epileptic fits, and whose conscience was tormented by
despair and remorse. The most skilful physicians of the mind and
body were summoned to his aid; and his hopes were amused by frequent
pilgrimages to the baths, and to the tombs of the most popular saints;
the monks applauded his penance, and, except restitution, (but to whom
should he have restored?) Michael sought every method of expiating his
guilt. While he groaned and prayed in sackcloth and ashes, his brother,
the eunuch John, smiled at his remorse, and enjoyed the harvest of
a crime of which himself was the secret and most guilty author. His
administration was only the art of satiating his avarice, and Zoe became
a captive in the palace of her fathers, and in the hands of her slaves.
When he perceived the irretrievable decline of his brother's health,
he introduced his nephew, another Michael, who derived his surname of
Calaphates from his father's occupation in the careening of vessels:
at the command of the eunuch, Zoe adopted for her son the son of a
mechanic; and this fictitious heir was invested with the title and
purple of the CÊsars, in the presence of the senate and clergy. So
feeble was the character of Zoe, that she was oppressed by the liberty
and power which she recovered by the death of the Paphlagonian; and at
the end of four days, she placed the crown on the head of Michael the
Fifth, who had protested, with tears and oaths, that he should ever
reign the first and most obedient of her subjects. The only act of his
short reign was his base ingratitude to his benefactors, the eunuch and
the empress. The disgrace of the former was pleasing to the public: but
the murmurs, and at length the clamors, of Constantinople deplored
the exile of Zoe, the daughter of so many emperors; her vices were
forgotten, and Michael was taught, that there is a period in which the
patience of the tamest slaves rises into fury and revenge. The citizens
of every degree assembled in a formidable tumult which lasted three
days; they besieged the palace, forced the gates, recalled their
_mothers_, Zoe from her prison, Theodora from her monastery, and
condemned the son of Calaphates to the loss of his eyes or of his life.
For the first time the Greeks beheld with surprise the two royal sisters
seated on the same throne, presiding in the senate, and giving audience
to the ambassadors of the nations. But the singular union subsisted no
more than two months; the two sovereigns, their tempers, interests,
and adherents, were secretly hostile to each other; and as Theodora was
still averse to marriage, the indefatigable Zoe, at the age of sixty,
consented, for the public good, to sustain the embraces of a third
husband, and the censures of the Greek church. His name and number
were Constantine the Tenth, and the epithet of _Monomachus_, the single
combatant, must have been expressive of his valor and victory in some
public or private quarrel. But his health was broken by the tortures
of the gout, and his dissolute reign was spent in the alternative
of sickness and pleasure. A fair and noble widow had accompanied
Constantine in his exile to the Isle of Lesbos, and Sclerena gloried in
the appellation of his mistress. After his marriage and elevation,
she was invested with the title and pomp of _Augusta_, and occupied a
contiguous apartment in the palace. The lawful consort (such was the
delicacy or corruption of Zoe) consented to this strange and scandalous
partition; and the emperor appeared in public between his wife and his
concubine. He survived them both; but the last measures of Constantine
to change the order of succession were prevented by the more vigilant
friends of Theodora; and after his decease, she resumed, with the
general consent, the possession of her inheritance. In her name, and by
the influence of four eunuchs, the Eastern world was peaceably governed
about nineteen months; and as they wished to prolong their dominion,
they persuaded the aged princess to nominate for her successor
Michael the Sixth. The surname of _Stratioticus_ declares his military
profession; but the crazy and decrepit veteran could only see with the
eyes, and execute with the hands, of his ministers. Whilst he ascended
the throne, Theodora sunk into the grave; the last of the Macedonian
or Basilian dynasty. I have hastily reviewed, and gladly dismiss, this
shameful and destructive period of twenty-eight years, in which the
Greeks, degraded below the common level of servitude, were transferred
like a herd of cattle by the choice or caprice of two impotent females.
From this night of slavery, a ray of freedom, or at least of spirit,
begins to emerge: the Greeks either preserved or revived the use of
surnames, which perpetuate the fame of hereditary virtue: and we now
discern the rise, succession, and alliances of the last dynasties of
Constantinople and Trebizond. The _Comneni_, who upheld for a while the
fate of the sinking empire, assumed the honor of a Roman origin: but
the family had been long since transported from Italy to Asia. Their
patrimonial estate was situate in the district of Castamona, in the
neighborhood of the Euxine; and one of their chiefs, who had already
entered the paths of ambition, revisited with affection, perhaps with
regret, the modest though honorable dwelling of his fathers. The first
of their line was the illustrious Manuel, who in the reign of the second
Basil, contributed by war and treaty to appease the troubles of the
East: he left, in a tender age, two sons, Isaac and John, whom, with the
consciousness of desert, he bequeathed to the gratitude and favor of his
sovereign. The noble youths were carefully trained in the learning of
the monastery, the arts of the palace, and the exercises of the camp:
and from the domestic service of the guards, they were rapidly promoted
to the command of provinces and armies. Their fraternal union doubled
the force and reputation of the Comneni, and their ancient nobility was
illustrated by the marriage of the two brothers, with a captive princess
of Bulgaria, and the daughter of a patrician, who had obtained the name
of _Charon_ from the number of enemies whom he had sent to the infernal
shades. The soldiers had served with reluctant loyalty a series of
effeminate masters; the elevation of Michael the Sixth was a personal
insult to the more deserving generals; and their discontent was inflamed
by the parsimony of the emperor and the insolence of the eunuchs. They
secretly assembled in the sanctuary of St. Sophia, and the votes of the
military synod would have been unanimous in favor of the old and valiant
Catacalon, if the patriotism or modesty of the veteran had not suggested
the importance of birth as well as merit in the choice of a sovereign.
Isaac Comnenus was approved by general consent, and the associates
separated without delay to meet in the plains of Phrygia at the head
of their respective squadrons and detachments. The cause of Michael was
defended in a single battle by the mercenaries of the Imperial guard,
who were aliens to the public interest, and animated only by a principle
of honor and gratitude. After their defeat, the fears of the emperor
solicited a treaty, which was almost accepted by the moderation of
the Comnenian. But the former was betrayed by his ambassadors, and the
latter was prevented by his friends. The solitary Michael submitted
to the voice of the people; the patriarch annulled their oath of
allegiance; and as he shaved the head of the royal monk, congratulated
his beneficial exchange of temporal royalty for the kingdom of heaven;
an exchange, however, which the priest, on his own account, would
probably have declined. By the hands of the same patriarch, Isaac
Comnenus was solemnly crowned; the sword which he inscribed on his coins
might be an offensive symbol, if it implied his title by conquest;
but this sword would have been drawn against the foreign and domestic
enemies of the state. The decline of his health and vigor suspended
the operation of active virtue; and the prospect of approaching death
determined him to interpose some moments between life and eternity. But
instead of leaving the empire as the marriage portion of his daughter,
his reason and inclination concurred in the preference of his brother
John, a soldier, a patriot, and the father of five sons, the future
pillars of an hereditary succession. His first modest reluctance might
be the natural dictates of discretion and tenderness, but his obstinate
and successful perseverance, however it may dazzle with the show of
virtue, must be censured as a criminal desertion of his duty, and a rare
offence against his family and country. The purple which he had refused
was accepted by Constantine Ducas, a friend of the Comnenian house,
and whose noble birth was adorned with the experience and reputation
of civil policy. In the monastic habit, Isaac recovered his health,
and survived two years his voluntary abdication. At the command of his
abbot, he observed the rule of St. Basil, and executed the most servile
offices of the convent: but his latent vanity was gratified by the
frequent and respectful visits of the reigning monarch, who revered in
his person the character of a benefactor and a saint.