Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/521

OF THE KOMAN EMPIRE 499 minion of a woman and a priest."^ The army of Cantacuzene, in sixteen divisions, was stationed on the banks of the Melas, to tempt or intimidate the capital ; it was dispersed by treachery or fear ; and the officers, more especially the mercenary Latins, accepted the bribes, and embraced the service, of the Byzantine court. After this loss, the rebel emperor (he fluctuated be- tween the two characters) took the road of Thessalonica with a chosen remnant ; but he failed in his enterprise on that im- portant place ; and he was closely pursued by the Great Duke, his enemy Apocaucus, at the head of a superior power by sea and land. Driven from the coast, in his march, or rather flight, into the mountains of Servia, Cantacuzene assembled his troops to scrutinise those who were worthy and willing to accompany his broken fortunes. A base majority bowed and retired ; and his trusty band was diminished to two thousand, and at last to five hundred, volunteers. The cral,-'^ or despot of the Ser- [Stephen 11 1 11 1111 Duflhan] vians, received him with generous hospitality ; but tlie ally was insensibly degraded to a suppliant, an hostage, a captive ; and, in this miserable dependence, he waited at the door of the bar- barian, who could dispose of the life and liberty of a Roman emperor. The most tempting offers could not persuade the cral to violate his trust ; but he soon inclined to the stronger side ; and his friend was dismissed without injury to a new vicis- situde of hopes and perils. Near six years the flame of discord burnt with various success and unabated rage: the cities were The cmi war. AD 1341-1317 distracted by the faction of the nobles and the plebeians — -the Cantacuzeni and Palaeologi ; and the Bulgarians, the Servians, and the Turks were invoked on both sides as the instruments of private ambition and the common ruin. The regent deplored the calamities of which he was the author and victim : and his own experience might dictate a just and lively remark on the ^ [The people seem to have clung to the legitimate heir ; the officials to have supported Cantacuzene.] 2" The princes of Servia (Ducange, Famil. Dalmaticas, &c., c. 2-4, 9) were styled Despots in Greek, and Cral in their native idiom (Ducange, Gloss. Grsec. p. 751). That title, the equivalent of king, ap|)cars to be of Sclavonic origin, from whence it has been borrowed by the Hungarians, the modern Greeks, and even by the Turks (Leunclavius, Pandect. Turc. p. 422), who reserve the name of Padishah for the Emperor. To obtain the latter instead of the former is the ambition of the French at Constantinople (Avertissement A I'Histoire de Timur Bee, p. 39). [The Servian and Bulgarian Krai, ' ' king," from which the Hungarian Kirdly, "king," is borrowed, seems to be derived from Karl the Great ; just as the German and Slavonic word for Emperor is from the name of Caesar. We find Kpd in a Greek diploma of King (and saint) Stephen of Hungary : eyw SreAai/os Xpto-nai'o? 6 KaX xpaK '^uoTj? Ovyypia^. It is cited in Hunfalvy's Magyarorszag Ethnographiaja, p. 322.]