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POSITIONS OF THE TKOOPS 249 and danger. The emperor himself fixed his headquarters in the same position. In this valley the choicest troops of the city and those of the sultan were thus face to face. Between the Adrianople Gate and Tekfour Serai was a contingent of Italians under three brothers, Paul, Antony, and Troilus Bocchiardo. They were stationed, says Phrantzes, at the Myriandrion, because there the city was in great jeopardy ; 1 Leonard says, ' in loco arduo Myriandri ; ' Dolfin, speaking of the same place under a somewhat different name, says ' in loco arduo Miliadro, dove pareva la cita piu debole.' 2 This contingent had been provided by the Bocchiardi at their own cost. The men were furnished with spingards and balistas for hurling stones at the enemy. The Caligaria — that is, the gate of that name, now called Egri Capou or Crooked Gate — and the walls thence as far as Tekfour Serai were defended by Caristo, an old Venetian, and by a German named John Grant, who had taken service with the emperor. Over the imperial palace at Blachern waved the flag of the Lion of St. Mark side by side with the banner of the emperor, to denote that Minotto, the Venetian bailey, was in command in that district. Archbishop Leonard and other Genoese, together with Hieronymus, were with him to assist in defending the walls as far as the Xyloporta on the edge of the Golden Horn. On the emperor's left the walls were guarded by Cataneo and Theophilus Palaeologus at the Silivria Gate, while Contarini, the most renowned member of the Venetian colony, and Andronicus Cantacuzenus defended the walls around the Golden Gate and to the sea. 3 Under these leaders, along the whole length of the landward wall, Geno- ese, Venetians, and Greeks fought side by side. Between a tower in the current off Seraglio Point and the Imperial Gate — that is, at the Acropolis, and thus 1 oirov Kal iv itce'ipois rots fxepeffiv 7] ir6is ?jv iiriKivSvvos. Phrantzes, p. 253. 2 P. 1013. The locus arduus of the Myriandrion is the highest site of the city walls. Professor Van Millingen makes it identical with the Mesoteichion (p. 85), but Critobulus distinguishes between the two places (ch. xxvi.). 3 Leonard ; but Phrantzes says, p< 253, that Manuel, a Genoese, was in com- mand at the Golden Gate.