base practices he rose to the merit and glory of a holy war; and the invasion of Sicily was seconded by the zeal and policy of his brother Guiscard. After the retreat of the Greeks, the idolaters, a most audacious reproach of the Catholics, had retrieved their losses and possessions; but the deliverance of the island, so vainly undertaken by the forces of the Eastern empire, was achieved by a small and private band of adventurers.53 In the first attempt Roger braved, in an open boat, the real and fabulous dangers of Scylla and Charybdis; landed with only sixty soldiers on a hostile shore; drove the Saracens to the gates of Messina; and safely returned with the spoils of the adjacent country. In the fortress of Trani his active and patient courage were equally conspicuous. In his old age he related with pleasure, that, by the distress of the siege, himself, and the countess his wife, had been reduced to a single cloak or mantle, which they wore alternately that in a sally his horse had been slain, and he was dragged away by the Saracens; but that he owed his rescue to his good sword, and had retreated with his saddle on his back, lest the meanest trophy might be left in the hands of the miscreants. In the siege of Trani, three hundred Normans withstood and repulsed the forces of the island. In the field of Ceramio fifty thousand horse and foot were overthrown by one hundred and thirty-six Christian soldiers, without reckoning St. George, who fought on horseback in the foremost ranks. The captive banners, with four camels, were reserved for the successor of St. Peter; and had these barbaric spoils been exposed not in the Vatican, but in the Capitol, they might have revived the memory of the Punic triumphs. These insufficient numbers of the Normans most probably denote their knights, the soldiers of honourable and equestrian rank, each of whom was attended by five or six followers in the field; yet, with the aid of this interpretation, and after every fair allowance on the side of valour, arms, and reputation, the discomfiture of so many myriads will reduce the prudent reader to the alternative of a miracle or a fable. The Arabs of Sicily derived a frequent and powerful succour from their countrymen of Africa: in the siege of Palermo the Norman cavalry was assisted by the galleys of Pisa; and, in the hour of action, the envy of the two brothers was sublimed to a generous and invincible emula attigerit. Such is the preface of Malaterra (1. i. c. 25) to the horse-stealing. From the moment (1. i. c. 19) that he has mentioned his patron Roger, the elder brother sinks into the second character. Something similar in Velleius Paterculus may be observed of Augustus and Tiberius. 33 Duo sibi proficua deputans, animæ scilicet et corporis, si terram idolis deditai ad cultum divinum revocaret (Galfrid Malaterra, 1. ii. c. 1). The conquest of Sicily is related in the three last books, and he himself has given an accurate summary oʻ the chapters (p. 544-546). See the word Milites in the Latin Glossary of Ducange. 57 55 tion. After a war of thirty years, Roger, with the title of great count, obtained the sovereignty of the largest and most fruitful island of the Mediterranean; and his administration displays a liberal and enlightened mind above the limits of his age and education. The Moslems were maintained in the free enjoyment of their religion and property: 56 a philosopher and physician of Mazara, of the race of Mahomet, harangued the conqueror, and was invited to court; his geography of the seven climates was translated into Latin; and Roger, after a diligent perusal, preferred the work of the Arabian to the writings of the Grecian Ptolemy. A remnant of Christian natives had promoted the success of the Normans: they were rewarded by the triumph of the cross. The island was restored to the jurisdiction of the Roman pontiff; new bishops were planted in the principal cities; and the clergy was satisfied by a liberal endowment of churches and monasteries. Yet the Catholic hero asserted the rights of the civil magistrate. Instead of resigning the investiture of benefices, he dexterously applied to his own profit the papal claims: the supremacy of the crown was secured and enlarged by the singular bull which declares the princes of Sicily hereditary and perpetual legates of the Holy See, 58 Ropert To Robert Guiscard the conquest of Sicily was more glorious than beneficial: the possession of Apulia and Calabria was inadequate to his ambition; and he resolved to embrace or create the first occasion of invading, perhaps of subduing, the Roman empire of the East.59 From his first wife, the partner of his humble fortunes, he had been divorced under the pretence invades the Of odd particulars, I learn from Malaterra that the Arabs had introduced into Sicily the use of camels (1. ii. c. 33) and of carrier-pigeons (c. 42); and that the bite of the tarantula provokes a windy disposition, quæ per anum inhoneste crepitando emergit-a symptom most ridiculously felt by the whole Norman army in their camp near Palermo (c. 36). I shall add an etymology not unworthy of the xith century: Messana is derived from Messis, the place from whence the harvests of the isle were sent in tribute to Rome (1. ii. c. 1). 56 See the capitulation of Palermo in Malaterra, 1. ii. c. 45, and Giannone, who remarks the general toleration of the Saracens (tom. ii. p. 72). 57 John Leo Afer, de Medicis et Philosophis Arabibus, c. 14, apud Fabric. Biblioth. Græc. tom. xiii. p. 278, 279. This philosopher is named Esseriph Essachalli, and he died in Africa, A.H. 516-A.D. 1122. Yet this story bears a strange resemblance to the Sherif al Edrissi, who presented his book (Geographia Nubiensis, see preface, p. 88, 90, 170) to Roger king of Sicily, A.H. 548-A.D. 1153 (D'Herbelot, Bibliothèque Orientale, p. 786; Prideaux's Life of Mahomet, p. 188; Petit de la Croix, Hist. de Gengiscan, p. 535, 536; Casiri, Biblioth. Arab. Hispan. tom. ii. p. 9-13); and I am afraid of some mistake. 58 Malaterra remarks the foundation of the bishoprics (1. iv. c. 7), and produces the original of the bull (1. iv. c. 29). Giannone gives a rational idea of this privilege, and the tribunal of the monarchy of Sicily (tom. ii. p. 95-102); and St. Marc (Abrégé, tom. iii. p. 217-301, 1st column) labours the case with the diligence of a Sicilian lawyer. 59 In the first expedition of Robert against the Greeks, I follow Anna Comnena (the ist, iiid, ivth, and vth books of the Alexiad), William Appulus (1. ivth and vth, of consanguinity; and her son Bonemond was destined to imitate, rather than to succeed, his illustrious father. The second wife of Guiscard was the daughter of the princes of Salerno; the Lombards acquiesced in the lineal succession of their son Roger; their five daughters were given in honourable nuptials, and one of them was betrothed, in a tender age, to Constantine, a beautiful youth, the son and heir of the emperor Michael. But the throne of Constantinople was shaken by a revolution: the Imperial family of Ducas was confined to the palace or the cloister; and Robert deplored and resented the disgrace of his daughter and the expulsion of his ally. A Greek, who styled himself the father of Constantine, soon appeared at Salerno, and related the adventures of his fall and flight. That unfortunate friend was acknowledged by the duke, and adorned with the pomp and titles of Imperial dignity: in his triumphal progress through Apulia and Calabria, Michael 62 was saluted with the tears and acclamations of the people; and pope Gregory the Seventh exhorted the bishops to preach, and the Catholics to fight, in the pious work of his restoration. His conversations with Robert were frequent and familiar; and their mutual promises were justified by the valour of the Normans and the treasures of the East. Yet this Michael, by the confession of the Greeks and Latins, was a pageant and an impostor; a monk who had fled from his convent, or a domestic who had served in the palace. The fraud had been contrived by the subtle Guiscard; and he trusted that, after this pretender had given a decent colour to his arms, he would sink, at the nod of the conqueror, into his primitive obscurity. But victory was the only argument that could determine the belief of the Greeks; and the ardour of the Latins was much inferior to their credulity: the Norman veterans wished to enjoy the harvest of their p. 270-275), and Jeffrey Malaterra (1. iii. c. 13, 14, 24-29, 39). Their information is contemporary and authentic, but none of them were eye-witnesses of the war. 60 One of them was married to Hugh, the son of Azzo, or Axo, a marquis of Lomoardy, rich, powerful, and noble (Gulielm. Appul. 1. iii. p. 267) in the xith century, and whose ancestors in the xth and ixth are explored by the critical industry of Leibnitz and Muratori. From the two elder sons of the marquis Azzo are derived the illustrious lines of Brunswick and Este. See Muratori, Antichità Estense. ... Anna Comnena somewhat too wantonly praises and bewails that handsome boy, who, after the rupture of his barbaric nuptials (1. i. p. 23 [tom. i. p. 49, ed. Bonn]), was betrothed as her husband; he was ἄγαλμα φύσεως ο Θεοῦ χειρῶν φιλοτίμημα . χρυσοῦ givous äzoggov, &c. (p. 27 [tom. i. p. 57, ed. Bonn]). Elsewhere she describes the red and white of his skin, his hawk's eyes, &c., l. iii. p. 71 [tom. i. p. 135, ed. Bonn]. 6 Anna Comnena, 1. i. p. 28, 29 [tom. i. p. 58, sq., ed. Bonn]; Gulielm. Appul. l. iv p. 271; Galfrid Malaterra, 1. iii. c. 13, p. 579, 580. Malaterra is more cautious in his style; but the Apulian is bold and positive. Mentitus se Michaelem Venerat a Danais quidam seductor ad illum. As Gregory VII. had believed, Baronius, almost alone, recognises the emperor Michael (A.D. 1080, No. 44). 64 toils, and the unwarlike Italians trembled at the known and unknown dangers of a transmarine expedition. In his new levies Robert exerted the influence of gifts and promises, the terrors of civil and ecclesiastical authority; and some acts of violence might justify the reproach that age and infancy were pressed without distinction into the service of their unrelenting prince. After two years' incessant preparations the land and naval forces were assembled at Otranto, at the heel, or extreme promontory, of Italy; and Robert was accompanied by his wife, who fought by his side, his son Bohemond, and the representative of the emperor Michael. Thirteen hundred knights 63 of Norman race or discipline formed the sinews of the army, which might be swelled to thirty thousand followers of every denomination. The men, the horses, the arms, the engines, the wooden towers covered with raw hides, were embarked on board one hundred and fifty vessels: the transports had been built in the ports of Italy, and the galleys were supplied by the alliance of the republic of Ragusa. At the mouth of the Adriatic Gulf the shores of Italy and Epirus incline towards each other. The space between Brundusium and Durazzo, the Roman passage, is no more than one hundred miles; 65 at the last station of Otranto it is contracted to fifty; and this narrow distance had suggested to Pyrrhus and Pompey the sublime or extravagant idea of a bridge. Before the general embarkation the Norman duke despatched Bohemond with fifteen galleys to seize or threaten the isle of Corfu, to survey the opposite coast, and to secure an harbour in the neighbourhood of Vallona for the landing of the troops. They passed and landed without perceiving an enemy; and this successful experiment displayed the neglect and decay of the naval power of the Greeks. The islands of Epirus and the maritime towns were subdued by the arms or the name of Robert, who led his fleet and army from Corfu (I use the modern appellation) to the siege of Durazzo. That city, the western Siege of Ipse armata militiæ non plusquam Mccc milites secum habuisse, ab eis qui eidem negotio interfuerunt attestatur (Malaterra, 1. iii. c. 24, p. 583). These are the same whom the Apulian (1. iv. p. 273) styles the equestris gens ducis, equites de gente ducis. Eis Tgiáxorta xıλiáde,, says Anna Comnena (Alexias, 1. i. p. 37 [tom. i. p. 75, ed Bonn]); and her account tallies with the number and lading of the ships. Ivit in [contra] Dyrrachium cum xv millibus hominum, says the Chronicon Breve Normannicum (Muratori, Scriptores, tom. v. p. 278). I have endeavoured to reconcile these reckonings. 65 The Itinerary of Jerusalem (p. 609, edit. Wesseling) gives a true and reasonable space of a thousand stadia, or one hundred miles, which is strangely doubled by Strabo (1. vi. p. 433 [p. 283, ed. Casaub.]) and Pliny (Hist. Natur. iii. 16). 66 Pliny (Hist. Nat. iii. 6, 16) allows quinquaginta millia for this brevissimus cursus, and agrees with the real distance from Otranto to La Vallona, or Aulon (D'Anville, Analyse de la Carte des Côtes de la Grèce, &c., p. 3-6). Hermolaus Barbarus, who substitutes centum (Harduin, Not. lxvi. in Plin. 1. iii.), night have been corrected by every Venetian pilot who had sailed out of the gulf. key of the empire, was guarded by ancient renown and recent fortifications, by George Palæologus, a patrician, victorious in the Oriental wars, and a numerous garrison of Albanians and Macedonians, who, in every age, have maintained the character of soldiers. In the prosecution of his enterprise the courage of Guiscard was assailed by every form of danger and mischance. In the most propitious season of the year, as his fleet passed along the coast, a storm of wind and snow unexpectedly arose: the Adriatic was swelled by the raging blast of the south, and a new shipwreck confirmed the old infamy of the Acroceraunian rocks.67 The sails, the masts, and the oars were shattered or torn away; the sea and shore were covered with the fragments of vessels, with arms and dead bodies; and the greatest part of the provisions were either drowned or damaged. The ducal galley was laboriously rescued from the waves, and Robert halted seven days on the adjacent cape to collect the relics of his loss and revive the drooping spirits of his soldiers. The Normans were no onger the bold and experienced mariners who had explored the ocean from Greenland to Mount Atlas, and who smiled at the petty dangers of the Mediterranean. They had wept during the tempest; they were alarmed by the hostile approach of the Venetians, who had been solicited by the prayers and promises of the Byzantine court. The first day's action was not disadvantageous to Bohemond, a beardless youth,68 who led the naval powers of his father. All night the galleys of the republic lay on their anchors in the form of a crescent; and the victory of the second day was decided by the dexterity of their evolutions, the station of their archers, the weight of their javelins, and the borrowed aid of the Greek fire. The Apulian and Ragusian vessels fled to the shore, several were cut from their cables and dragged away by the conqueror; and a sally from the town carried slaughter and dismay to the tents of the Norman duke. A seasonable relief was poured into Durazzo, and, as soon as the besiegers had lost the command of the sea, the islands and maritime towns withdrew from the camp the supply of tribute and provision. That camp was soon afflicted with a pestilential disease; five hundred knights perished by an inglorious death; and the list of burials (if all could obtain a decent burial) amounted to ten thousand persons. Under these calamities 67 Infames scopulos Acroceraunia, Horat. carm. i. 3. The præcipitem Africum decertantem Aquilonibus et rabiem Noti, and the monstra natantia of the Adriatic, are somewhat enlarged; but Horace trembling for the life of Virgil is an interesting moment in the history of poetry and friendship. ∞ Tay de sis Tày máywra avroû iqucpávτwy (Alexias, 1. iv. p. 106 [tom. i. p. 193, ed. Bonn]). Yet the Normans shaved, and the Venetians wore their beards: they must have derided the no beard of Bohemond; an harsh interpretation! (Ducange, Not. ad Alexiad. p. 283.) |