Andrew F. Stone. Gregory Antiochos on the "Crusade" of 1179. Revue des études byzantines, tome 63,...

8/3/2019 Andrew F. Stone. Gregory Antiochos on the "Crusade" of 1179. Revue des tudes byzantines, tome 63, 2005. pp.

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Andrew F. Stone

Gregory Antiochos on the "Crusade" of 1179In: Revue des tudes byzantines, tome 63, 2005. pp. 151-166.

Abstract

The author analyses the funeral oration given on January 20th, 1182 by Gregory Antiochos and tries to identify who were Manuel

Komnenos's enemies referred to, as is usual in this literary genre, in a rather allusive, yet precise way. They may have included

Louis VII King of France who gave up the leadership of the crusade due to illness and was replaced by Henri de Troyes, a

relation of his, also referred to in the oration. The enemy in the East would be the Seljuk sultan Kilic Arslan allied with Louis VII

against their common enemy, Saladin.

Rsum

REB 63, 2005, p. 151-166.

Andrew F. Stone, Gregory Antiochos on the Crusade of 1179. - En analysant l'oraison funbre dlivre le 20 janvier 1181 par

Grgoire Antiochos, l'auteur essaie d'identifier les ennemis de Manuel Comnne dsigns, comme l'habitude dans ce genre

littraire, de manire allusive, mais prcise. On compterait parmi eux le roi de France, Louis VII, qui avait renonc, en raison de

sa maladie, conduire une croisade dont il avait laiss le commandement son parent, Henri de Troyes, aussi mentionn dans

l'oraison. L'ennemi en Orient serait le sultan seldjoukide Kilidj Arslan qui se serait alli au roi Louis VII dans leur commune

hostilit Saladin.

Citer ce document / Cite this document :

Stone Andrew F. Gregory Antiochos on the "Crusade" of 1179. In: Revue des tudes byzantines, tome 63, 2005. pp. 151-166.

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GREGORY ANTIOCHOSON THE "CRUSADE" OF 1 179

Andrew F. STONE

The two surviving funeral orations for the emperor Manuel I Komnenos are,each in its own way, very significant documents. The oration by Eustathios1, whodelivered it even though he was no longer maistor ton rhetoron, "master of therhetors", but had been serving for several years as Metropolitan bishop of Thessaloniki, is of general interest by virtue of its description of Manuel as an individualand its justification of the main policies that Manuel pursued over his reign ( 1 143-1 180). The other oration is by Eustathios' pupil Gregory Antiochos , delivered, asthe title tells us, 120 days after Manuel's death (i.e. 20 January 1181, or , if by the"120 days" a period of four months is meant, 24 January). It is particularly interestings a result of one image that it introduces: a picture of the emperor crucified asa second Christ, stretching his palms to the west and the east, with a robber crucified n either side. The purpose of this article is to investigate this image, ascertainthe historical identity of these two robbers and determine which events or intriguesare alluded to in this way. The unstable political climate following Manuel's deathcan then briefly be considered1. We shall then offer judgement, in the light of thisoration, on the validity of the commonly-held view that the tensions which wereto splinter the Byzantine nobility into opposing factions" were already simmeringunder the surface during Manuel's reign".

1. Ed . T.L.F Tafel. Eustathii metropolitae Thessalonicensis opuscula, Frankfurt-am-Main 1832;repr. Amsterdam 1964. p. 196-214.2. Ed . W. Regel. Fontes Renan Byzantinarwn, Saint-Petersburg 1917, p. 191-228.3. Th e most recent treatment of the question of the "'civil war" of 1 18 is by C. Cupane, La GuerraCivile della primavera 1181 ne] racconto di Niceta Coniate e Eustazio di Tessalonica: Narratologicahistoriae ancilla'?, JOB 47 . 1997. p. 179-194; perhaps the best-known, however, is that of F. Cognasso.Partiti politici e lotte dinastiche in Bisanzio alla morte di Manuele Comneno, Reale Accademia dellaScienze di Torino, memorie classe II 62, 1 9 1 2. p. 21 3-3 17. esp. p. 237-254; see also C. Brand. ByzantiumConfronts the West 1180-1204. Cambridge Mass. 1968, p. 31-38.4. One of these was centred on the regent, the dowager empress Maria-Xene. and her lover, theprotosebastos Alexios Komnenos; the other, more popular, party was at first led by the Porphyrogennetaprincess Maria, the elder sister of the boy emperor Alexios II. and then by Manuel's cousin AndronikosKomnenos.5. Apart from the articles by Cognasso and Cupane cited above, there is the recent treatment byR.-J. Lilie. Des Kaisers Macht und Ohnmacht. Zum Zerfall der Zentralgewalt in Byz.anz vor dem viertenKreuzzug. Varia ( 4) . Bonn 1984. p. 11-119. esp. p. 87-88. Lilie puts forwardthe thesis that the deceased emperor's increased reliance on th e Latins from th e west and east was th eresult of his wishing to decrease his dependence on his family, th e so-called "Comnenian system", orRevue des Etudes Byzantines 63 . 2005. p. 151-166.


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152 ANDREW F. STONEIn attempting to answer the first question, that of the robbers' identity, we mustbe mindful that the twelfth century was the era of the crusades, enterprises whichthe Byzantines viewed with great distrust. The funeral orations of 1 1 80- 1181 fallbetween two crusades proper, that is, expeditions of western soldiers to the HolyLand in response to a call fo r military action by the pope of the day. Louis VIIof France and Conrad III of Germany had participated in the disastrous SecondCrusade (1147-1148). Conrad's nephew Frederick I Barbarossa had accompaniedhis uncle on this venture. The Third Crusade (1187-1192), in which Barbarossaalso took part, had not yet taken place. We shall adduce evidence (a letter of PopeAlexander III to the French clergy of 1171, a passage from Robert of Torigni andthe evidence of the Antiochos oration) to support an argument that King Louis hadplans to crusade towards the end of his life; he died, like Manuel, in 1180.The evidence of the Antiochan funeral oration will be considered step by stepas it appears, and we shall work our way towards positive identification of the three

main protagonists in the intrigue that the rhetor alludes to (i.e. Manuel, the robberon the west, the robber on the east). There are many pitfalls for the unwary here:the description of one of the protagonists as having an "Israelite" mind might suggest to some that this person was one of the crusader princes, in pursuit of the 1 1 80alliance with Saladin, something which a Byzantine might well have regarded withmistrust, for in this year a two years' truce had been agreed upon by the young kingof Jerusalem, Baldwin IV, and that increasingly powerful sultan of Egypt and largeparts of the Levant6 (we shall come to consider the question of Baldwin's participationn events in due course). Alternatively, the Byzantine suspicion of the motivesof crusading European monarchs and their alliances might lead us to think of thenegotiations between Barbarossa and Kilidj II Arslan, sultan of Ikonion7.Both interpretations, I believe, are blind alleys. Let us first present paragraphnineteen of the Antiochos oration and see why. The first part of this paragraph inRegel s edition may be translated as follows8:

come to that, the nobility at large. He cites Niketas Choniates as evidence of anti-Latin sentiment duringthe Regency, although he does not discuss the possibility that such anti-Latin sentiment could have beenretrospective, the result ofthat author's experience of the Fourth Crusade. We shall adduce the evidenceof William of Tyre in due course.6. Th e literature on the crusades is extensive. Apart from general histories such as those ofK.M. Setton and M.W. Baldwin, A History of the Crusades, Vol. I, The First Hundred Years,Philadelphia 1958, p. 575; S. Runciman, A History of the Crusades, Vol. Ill, The Kingdom of Jerusalem,Cambridge 1952; H.E. Mayer, tr . J. Gillingham, The Crusades, Oxford 1972; R. Grousset, Histoiredes Croisades et du Royaume Franc de Jrusalem, Paris 1935; there are also specialist histories of thecareer of Saladin, e.g. M.C. Lyons and D.E.P. Jackson, Saladin: the Politics of the Holy War, Cambridge1982, p. 144, 165; as well as specialist histories of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem: R. Rhricht,Geschichte des Knigreichs Jerusalem, 1100-1291, Innsbruck 1898; R.L. Nicholson, Joscelyn Hl andthe Fall of the Crusader States 1134-1199, Leiden 1973, p. 93; M. Baldwin, Raymond 111 of Tripolisand the Fall of Jerusalem (1140-1187), Princeton 1936, p. 33-35.7. Cf W. Georgi, Friedrich Barbarossa und die auswrtigen Machte: Studien zur Auenpolitik1159-80, Frankfurt-am-Main 1990, p. 334-6, with further literature. As B. Hamilton points out, Frederickalso had diplomatic exchanges with Saladin, Manuel I Komnenos and Baldwin IV of Jerusalem, in. Essays presented to Joan Hussey or her 80th Birthday, ed. J. Chrysostomides, Camberley1988, p. 353-375, esp. p. 355.8. Regel, p. 211s17.


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE "CRUSADE" OF 1 1 79 15 3But where now for us is the Phinehas, who at this time assumed zeal in pursuingthat pious Israelite mind, which also boasted most justly of its exhortation fromChrist, as it prostituted itself in a lawless collusion with an irreverent soul, a secondMidianite woman of another race, and thus he (i.e. Phinehas) distributed his stabbingin all directions in a manner similar to them; and who, with his warlike barbed lance,pierced this soul of a foreign race, and brandished the arrow with its sharpened quillof rumour, which went swiftly and flew across from east to west, and then prickedthe Israelite at the same time to a death which cheated us of our hope of seeing itmake a true expression of shame on his face?To be noted here is the fact that we are dealing at this point of the oration withthree personages in metaphorical guise. The first, the context of the passage willreveal, is the emperor, now absent. He is compared to the Lvite Phinehas of one of

the less-well known stories of the Book of Numbers in the Bible (Numbers 25. 1-9):the Israelites had incurred God's wrath by having sexual intercourse with theinhabitants of Edom and worshipping the Baal of Peor. The plague that had beenvisited on them was stopped only when Phinehas, finding an Israelite man whowas copulating with a Midianite woman, drove a spear through them both. Theother two parties, described as being in collusion in an unholy alliance, are represented, in the first case, as the sinning "Israelite" of the story, likewise killed (by therumour of the defeat of the third party), while the other is compared to the Midianitewoman.Who then was this person who was said to have an "Israelite mind", and waspunished by the emperor's action? As I hope to show, the metaphor need not bereferring to one of the crusading Franks already in Outremer. An "Israelite mind"may have the signification of "having the intention to go to the Promised Land likean Israelite". Whoever it was had some form of alliance with a non-Christian, our"Midianite woman". The deadly rumour, responsible for the "Israelite's" death, issaid to have travelled from east to the west. A western prince, then? The boast of an"exhortation from Christ" might suggest that this western personage was about toembark on a crusade. Now Frederick Barbarossa, who, as we have seen, went onboth the Second and the Third Crusades, did not die until 1190, drowning whentrying to cross the River Selef. However, king Louis VII, another western crusadingmonarch, did indeed die, like Manuel, in 1180, indeed, a few months before him.The mention of an "Israelite mind" may then have two significations; it could be areference to the kinship between Louis and his Frankish ex-compatriots in Outremer,and it could also, as we have suggested, refer to the act of journeying to the Holyor Promised Land. Let us make the tentative assumption that the person in the guiseof an "Israelite" is indeed Louis VII, who, as we shall see, is reported to have takenthe cross before the end of his life, and see where this hypothesis leads us. Thespeech then continues ':

9. Ibid.. p. 21


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1 54 ANDREW F. STONEWhere is there for us the man who was as zealous as David at that time at seeingpeace over the lawless sinners? They made treaties with one another and wenttogether in peace, a wicked treaty, a peace transgressing the law, and those men didnot come to terms in reverence and observe religion, but rather they poured out theirhearts together in a single channel of plots, those men who were fashioned andcoloured with dissimilar complexions and separate in terms of their reverence andirreverence, but being copied into the same form by the infection of their similarintentions, and while they knew these figures outside themselves by different titles,one of them recognising them as our Lord Christ, and the other under the name of ateaching prophet, they put a single title on the monuments of their souls, becausethey were of one mind."David" must again be a reference to the deceased emperor, a popular point ofcomparison fo r the emperor among the encomiasts of Manuel's reign. Now wemust see what is said of the other two protagonists. Again they are represented ascolluding, and the rhetor stresses that one of them did not hold Christ to be divine,but rather a "teaching prophet", in the manner of a Muslim. The impression that weare in fact dealing with a Muslim in this instance is reinforced by the mention ofdissimilar complexions and differing degrees of reverence (i.e. for the Christianfaith). Let us read on10:Pilate, one would have said, and Herod were not of the same race or of the samereligion, and did not share a friendship until the suffering of Christ provided anexcuse, and again because of Christ, divinely named the Lord, who chose to sufferfor the sake of what had been allotted to him; and just as Herod and Pilate hadbeen hostile to each other because of various grounds for hatred and the enmitypreviously which existed before them, as we learn from the divine history, these menalso intermingled in friendship, in order that a draught of death should be mixed forthe Anointed One, and they are on a second coming to a conspiracy, in order that theemperor may undergo suffering on our account, and "the heathen and the peoplerage", and those who are so far separated from each other because of a differencein place and in religion, "as far as the west is from the east", as the ancestor of theLord said, "rulers take counsel together", and join hands, not being without knowledge f the one in the middle on account of their proximity. .The idea that Antiochos was talking of an alliance between a Muslim potentateand a western prince who intended to crusade is affirmed by the mention of "aseparation in place ( )", and an allusion to the fact that the twopotentates were on either side of Manuel, one in the west, one in the east. Theconcomitant sandwiching of the Byzantine empire between two powers whichwere perceived to have dishonourable motives resulted in a discomfort whichfound expression in our oration. Allusion is also made to the fact that the twopotentates (if my identification of them as Louis VII of France and Kilidj II Arslan

10. Ibid., p. 21128-21214.


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE "CRUSADE OF 1 179 15 5of Ikonion is correct) had had personal experience of the emperor , whose domainlay between them. That the alliance has as its end another crusade is convincinglyshown by the final part of the nineteenth paragraph' ::

. . . and due to their extreme separation they contribute plans and contrive wickedschemes, but you on the other hand, powerful emperor, have broken through thebonds of the common plans made by them, and have cast away from them the yoke(which unites them), which was on the necks of these fat bulls which underwent itand plough evil and have savage spirits, these bulls maddened by the gadfly comingfrom afar from the European land and from the Asian one, and they had it in theirminds to pull one plough and cut the Roman land into clods and turn it up and turnit upside-down, and to tread again on our land, imprinting their tracks far and widein our lives.First let us note the mention of a European and an Asian land, which supportsour hypothesis so far. The suspicion of the motives of the crusaders is a recurringmotif throughout Byzantine historiography and rhetoric' . John Kinnamos says ofthe Second Crusade, to adopt Charles Brand's translation' :Normans and French and the nation of Gauls and whoever lived around old Rome,and British and Bretons and simply the whole western array had been set in motion,on the handy excuse that they were going to cross from Europe to Asia to fight theTurks en route and recover the church in Palestine and seek the holy places, buttruly to gain possession of the Romans' (i.e. Byzantine) land by assault and trampleeverything down in front of them.We should note here, that since John Kinnamos' history was probably writtenduring the reign of Alexios II, he too was subject to the suspicion of Latins that wesee in the Antiochos oration. Eustathios of Thessaloniki, in his 1174 Epiphanyoration, also gives voice to distrust of the Latins' motives". We might concludethen, that any rumour of a further crusade would have caused the Byzantinesconsternation.

1 1 . I see the final sentence as referring to the 1 147 visit of King Louis VII to Constantinople (JohnKinnamos. ed . A. Mrineke. CSHB. Bonn 1836. p. 82-83 [thereafter Kinnamos]) and that of Kilidj IIArslan of Ikonion in 1161 (Kinnamos. p. 204-208); Niketas Choniates, ed. J.-L. Van Dieten, CFHB 1 1.Berlin and New York 1975 [thereafter Choniates]. p. 118-121).12. Regel, p. 212"21.1 3. A. Kolia-Dermitzake discusses this mistrust in a recent brief monograph. ' - .Athens 1994, making an important connection with the Byzantine experience not only in relation to theFirst Crusade, but also the Norman wars of Alexios Is reign.14. CM. Brand, Deeds of John and Manuel Komnenos by John Kinnamos, New York 1976. p. 58= Kinnamos. p. 67 .15. Some thirty years after the Second Crusade. Eustathios of Thessaloniki declared in his 1 174Epiphany oration (Regel, p. 105:i-106'= Eustathii Thessahmicensis opera minora, ed. P. Wirt h.CFHB 32 . Berlin and New York 2000 [thereafter Eustathios (Wirth)]. p. 2721MS4): "And who of thosestill surviving does not know the Germans and all their neighbours, who. as it were, poured the west.


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156 ANDREW F. STONEIf then our parallel to Pilate is King Louis, surely is not the natural parallel to"Herod" Kilidj Arslan? Louis, like Pilate, was a Latin, and Kilidj Arslan, likeHerod, an easterner. If Louis VII, near the end of his life, took the cross and intended o crusade one last time, the Muslim potentate to whom he would most profitably lly himself was the incumbent sultan of Rum, for two principal reasons. Thefirst is that the Seljuk sultanate lay directly in the path of the land route to the HolyLand; this route passed diagonally across Asia Minor by way of the Byzantine fortress of Dorylaion and the Seljuk capital of Ikonion. The second reason, perhapsmore telling as events transpired, was that Kilidj Arslan was a Muslim rival ofthe sultan Saladin, against whom the crusaders in the Holy Land were struggling,and, accordingly, a natural ally fo r Louis. We have been told that the one withan "Israelite mind" was located in the west, ruling out Baldwin IV or any othercrusader prince of Outremer.We shall come to the most difficult question, that of the participation of an

"Italian" shortly. Let us adduce further argumentation by abandoning temporarilythe order of events used in this oration, and turning back to the latter portion of thesixteenth paragraph (Regel's divisions)10:Such were these events of the fortunate day on the Maiandros experienced by theRomans, when by encircling the Persian barbarians they completed the circuitaround them, and they were defended by your name, the Lord Emperor; if you werenot illustriously present in body at this time with your valiant deeds, al l the same thematter was recorded as a deed completed by you alone of all people, and the waystrodden by you then were in many watered places, on the Maiandros, when fearimprinted your presence upon the barbarians and cast a shadow from your manifestationver their sallying against us, as if they were going under you, as you pursuedthem also in the direction of the waters, although your footprints could not be recognised as manifest for the eyes; thus there was both your presence and absence, thusyou were very near and far away, thus not even pursuing him, you were making afugitive of the barbarian; for also your hand did not think it worthy to accomplishthe deed itself, but your mind was to the fore doing everything excellently, evenif your hand was distant, and the intelligence within you summoned the abyssmentioned by David of a strongly flowing river, which gaped wide to gulp downthe treaty-breaking Persian people.

on the yonder side of the Adriatic, into our land, who, as another might say, came around like theleaves and blossoms of springtime and were like stars in number or like the pourings of sand, carelessly exaggerating their number according to the custom of rhetoric?..." (and at Regel, p. 1O73"IO =Wirth, p. 2732t) 27): "... They were aroused not only by boldness in their invincible numbers, but by thefact that the reign was still in its early stages. And not long before, you were entrusted with the governmentf the universe and therefore it came upon them to reckon that if they heaped themselves up to agreat height like a wave they would knock the steering-oars out of the helmsman's hands and placesome great evil in this vessel of the world, for which God, after building it and setting it at other timesunder other helmsmen, has now found the best man and ceased from his labours."16. Regel, p. 2092 '7.


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE '"CRUSADE" OF 1 1 79 157The mention of the River Maiandros makes it unequivocal that at this pointof the oration the enemy in question is the Seljuk Turks of the Sultanate of Rum, orat least the Turkoman nomads nominally subject to their sultan. We know from

Niketas Choniates that Manuel did campaign in person on the Maiandros againstthis foe, as well as sending an army against them under the command of JohnVatatzes which likewise was victorious1 . The fact that we have a campaign on theMaiandros in which the emperor was absent, as he was in the Vatatzes campaign,might suggest to some that this was the campaign referred to by our rhetor. As forthe broken treaty in question, one thinks first of the treaty made in the aftermath ofManuel's advance on Ikonion of 1176'*. There were, however, campaigns subsequent to this, and treaties could have been concluded following any of these.Therefore it is equally, perhaps more, possible that the reference is to a latercampaign on the Maiandros, of 1 180, from which the emperor, due to his terminalillness (which set in March 1 180"), was also absent.The ensuing part of the Antiochos oration is interesting by merit of the amplification f an image used in an earlier oration, by Gregory's master Eustathios, ofwhat is probably the same campaign on the Maiandros. Gregory says :

only you have persuaded at this time all the satraps, who were drunken and tooktheir wine neat and revelled in their stupor, which went as late as and into the middleof their nights, to learn new ways recently and to drink water, from their divingheadlong into the middle of the currents of the waters of the river and being bornealong by them until they have had their fill. you have shaken into them that greataffliction of fear of water which is in their thoughts as a result, so that they cowerwith fear at the very nature of the waters from now henceforth and a trembling surgeis made in their hearts at the sight of them alone, even if they are waveless and stilland steadfastly unmoving and they do not quiver, and so that, as in a mirror of water,imagining for the most part images of the bravery of the Romans, these men remainclose by them, and, since they are sent below, they break ranks in the face of us .We must not forget our purpose here, and must substantiate our suggestion thatthe foe on the eastern side of Manuel to whom our rhetor was referring was indeedthe Sultan of Rum. Let us look at the eighteenth paragraph in two segments, the first

of which says ':

17. These two victories are recorded by Choniates, p. 192-195. The event is also celebrated inan encomium for Manuel by Eustathios (Wirth), p. 229-249. For the dating of the oration, refer toA. F. Stone, Manuel I Komnenos, the Maiandros campaigns of 1 177-1178 and Thessaloniki, BalkanStudies 38 . 1997, p. 21-29. 1 stand by my dating of these campaigns, even though I now believe theoration by Eustathios for John Doukas ( stathios [Wirth"|. p. 195-201 ) belongs to Lent 1 179. and theoration for Manuel also belongs to 1 179.18. Chmtes, p. 189.19. Ibid.. p. 220.20. ki;c,t-.i . p. 209ls:"; 245"".21. Rrghi .. p. 210' -'


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15 8 ANDREW F. STONEBut where now for us is the one who alone squeezed out the fat from the Persianarmies with the meat-eating mouth of his sabre furiously and scattered them, asDavid says, like chaff in the face of the wind22? The revered book of the law says thatMoses reduced a calf, the golden image, the one of cast metal, the calf-headed one,to little pieces in his heart's rage, and strewed them into the water, and made the sonsof Israel drink them; for here also if the fullness of the Persians' despicable natureas not been ground to mince, nevertheless, being cut up in the custom of warwith swords limb from limb and being reduced to pieces, they were strewn upon thewaters of the river. I think that, if he also mixed the water to become a drink for thesons of the New Israel among us, not sullying their history, all the same this draughtwas made and it was found not good to drink, with the stream sullied by barbarianblood.The imagery of this part of the oration, apart from the interesting synkrisis withthe action of Moses over the golden calf, is not particularly original, since similarimagery had been used previously in the Eustathian oration mentioned above. Moretelling is the second part of this paragraph (presented in abbreviated form)21:For even if he has struck the Persian beast from the east, and it has now been castdown before your feet, and, wounded, by this and the one from the west who conspiredith it against us, the Italian, it has struck at the same time; and that thing whichan ambidextrous spearman and one who brandishes two spears tipped with bronzewill do to those fighting from up close, who are broken together, when he has overthrown them with a sword wielded by both hands, this, one cast of the spear fromthe emperor, will be revered by me after it has thrust and sunk into their chests withits head, and brought on destruction shared by both of those men, who have struckinstantaneously. So like that truly far-shadowing spear, it has gone beforehand fromthe east to the western climes and divided its two-edged spear-head so that it cu t thehearts of both dynasts with its piercing; like the single stretching of a bow and onearrow flying from it , although that bow is formed from two tongues" , it was thusheld open, it thus opened wide, so as to stretch at the same time to the east and thewest, and divide the extremities of the ribs of the untameable beasts which form itand somehow lurk on either side in a double slaughter.The image is then one of a bow formed from two ribs, one from the beast on theeast, one from that on the west. The "ambidextrous spearman" in question, reference to other panegyrics will show, could either be the new emperor Alexios II s,and this excerpt will then deal with the question of his revenge, or perhaps morelikely, his deceased father, who is properly the subject of the oration. Not only isthe imagery not immediately obvious, but this passage is, from the point of view22. Psalm 18.42 of the Septuagint.23. Regel, p. 21020-2117.24. In a double -entendre has both the sense of "from two ribs (of the bow)" and "of twodifferent languages".25. Cf. Eustathios, p. 89" 12 = Wirth, p. 25755".


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE "CRUSADE" OF 1179 15 9of the historian, the most interesting, and problematic, portion of the oration. Wecould well imagine that the references to the slaughter of an enemy on the eastrefers to Seljuk casualties in a battle in which the previous emperor was not therein person. But then we are left to explain away the other half of the double slaughterf Regel, 2 1 1 \ Perhaps this refers to the death of king Louis, who, if I am correct,once again is said to die as a result of the news travelling from east to west. Thedifficulties aside, it can be appreciated that the contents of this passage reinforcethe argumentation that has already been made.How, however, should we interpret the rhetor's claim that this "Italian" or"Latin" (terminology which was frequently applied to the French as well as Italiansproper in the time of Antiochos !1), It seems that there mayhave been a fourth protagonist involved, a third conspirator. Indeed, as we shallsee, there were in fact four parties altogether who were regarded as being in collusion by our rhetor. Now, Conrad, Marquis of Montferrat, brother unto Manuel'sson-in-law Renier, travelled to Constantinople in 1179/1180" to negotiate whatshould happen to his new prisoner, Archbishop Christian of Mainz, one-time besieger of that Byzantine foothold in Italy, Ancona (and enemy of Manuel andConrad both). Could this be our "Italian", collaborating with Louis in his designfor a crusade? But Conrad of Montferrat, it must be appreciated, was evidently ongood terms with Manuel. However, as it transpires, we have a second candidate:Henry of Troyes, Count of Champagne and brother-in-law of King Louis, who, aswe are told by the Continuator of Sigebert of Gembloux, took the cross in 1 177 andwith "many others" set out fo r the Holy Land (in 1 1 79). This anonymous Continuatorsays briefly s:

Louis, King of the French, and Henry, Senior King of the English, formed a magnificent pact. Henry, Count of Troyes, with many others, intending to set out forJerusalem, took the cross. Philip Count of Flanders was received by the princesand knights of Outremer with great honour.William of Tyre, historian of early Outremer, mentions meeting Henry of Troyesat Brindisi in Autumn 1179, together with Louis' brother Peter of Courtenay andLouis' nephew Philip, bishop-elect of Beauvais, who were about to take ship for

Outremer \ We therefore have a better candidate for our "Italian" here, Henry ofTroyes, a powerful figure in France of his day.

26 . E.g. Choniates. p. 6736 et al.27 . Pseudo-Benedict of Petersborough, Rerum Britannicarum Scriptures Medii Aevi 49, repr. 1 965,p. 243-244; L. Usseglio, / marchesi di Monferrato, Casale 1926, p. 424; T. Ilgen. Markgraf Conradvon Montferrat, Marburg 1880, p. 162.28 . The continuator of Sigebert of Gembloux, MGH SS 6, ed. Betuman, p. 416.29 . William of Tyre, ed. R.B.C. Huygens, Guillaume de Tyr, Chronique. Turnhout 1986, cit.Cupane = PL. vol. 201 (thereafter William of Tyre] =A History of Deeds done beyond the Sea byWilliam, Archbishop of Tyre. tr . E.A. Babcock. and A.C. Krey. New York 1976). NM . 30 (29). PL.col. 846. Babcock and Krey, p. 443-444. who tells of meeting Henry of Troyes. Peter of Courtenay andPhilip at Brindisi.


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1 60 ANDREW F. STONELet us now consider the high point of the oration, which uses a very movingdevice, the imagery of the Crucifixion, with the Anointed (Em)manuel crucified,and a crucified robber on either side30: how were you, our Jesus, taken from such a wicked conspiracy along the way todeath because of a simultaneous zeal for the divine and desire for a lot of pietyamong us from you as you inflicted a two-ply scourge upon yourself; how did thiswhole drama of the passion of Christ come to be visited (upon us) and a cross beplanted for you, the pain from the battle on our behalf, and how have you been fastened to this stake of the pangs of war and received nails from casts and shootings,and the piercing from lances and hurlings of javelins, so that they would not go intoyour hands, feet, side, and against your entire body? how then until the last expiryof breath have you observed the scheme of the one who was crucified, stretching tothe right and the left, and spreading out your hands at the same time to the east andthe west and dividing your palms between the rising sun and the setting one, andstretching them back again heavily against the dynasts at either extreme of the earth,whom my speech and everything sees as tw o wicked thieves hanging on either sideof you, pinned to the wood of a prevailing lack of sense that they possess, and theyare lifted together with insubstantial aspirations against us on high, both spitting outidle ranting and using words of ill omen against us with overwheening foolishness.But you yourself have broken the legs of one with the blows of a club in divinely-ordained war and you have checked his running and advances against us, when heknew that he was stricken and agreed that you were lord, and not conforming to thecommand "remember", he sought only forgiveness for his lawlessness, and he hasreceived it; but you did not indeed break the legs of the other in the same way, butcrushed him totally from head to foot, with rumour alone fluttering swiftly as far aseven him.If my interpretation of the allusions is the correct one, the first robber, the onewho sought forgiveness, and only had his legs broken in Gregory's imagery, wasthe Seljuk sultan. He evidently received clemency from Manuel. Louis would bethe other robber, who was totally crushed. Once again the news of the Seljuk defeaton the Maiandros is represented as the cause of Louis' death.The next two paragraphs, by the principle of amplification which was held by

rhetorical theory to be appropriate for panegyric, even the genre of the epitaphios,flesh out this imagery of the Passion more fully. The rhetors speaking on this dayare like the soldiers who cast lots for the crucified Christ's tunic. It is bespatteredwith spots of blood from the imperial campaigns. The purple of his mantle is thepurple of this gore. Paragraph twenty-two digresses, first comparing the tunic to aPanathenaic robe, and then using an imagery of fowling and fishing fo r the massacref the Seljuk Turks, before the rhetor turns back to the subject of the Crucifixionin paragraph twenty-three31:

30. Regel, p. 21222-2132131. Ibid. , p. 21726-218".


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE "CRUSADE1 OF 1 1 79 161Such were your world-saving sufferings after the manner of Christ, like the cross,like the nailing and the spearing. We know of the fame of Christ's cross, but yourcrucifixion on the stake of your reputation is surpassingly famed because of itspower; the insolent race has been dragged down from its haughtiness by thesecrucifiers of Christ; the Pharisees are shamed, the scribes have gone away unsuccessful; the two-horse team from the east and west, unfulfilled in their plots againstyou, have been rid of, an Annas, one will say, and a Caiaphas, wolves gaping emptily,branded with iron32 on the sinews of their necks, and casting their heads onto theirchests they, have left the one who held them in contempt alone; they have forgottentheir haughtiness and they have relaxed their tone to gaping and laxity, the brows oftheir foreheads overshooting the mark; for it was necessary for them long ago to beconfused in their tongues and to obtain different dialects, from the time when the onewho descended from above divided and split their common voice to discord and theone tongue to many tongues, so that they could no longer be emboldened because oftheir one mouth and one voice, but in another way however that they should jumpover the boundaries which have been set down and dare to make battle against God,with one purpose and conspiracy and consideration, raising as a tower against ustheir diabolical designs.It would be convenient if we could identify a pair of foes who were in a father-in-law to son-in-law affinity, as in the case of the Biblical figures Annas andCaiaphas, one in the west and one in the east; more on this below. We might addhere that the imagery of talking in different tongues as a result of an upset of a

common enterprise after the manner of the Tower of Babel story is another toposthat we find in the rhetoric of this period. Interesting however is the mention of acommon tongue once shared by our Annas and Caiaphas which has, it would seem,developed into different dialects, if we take the passage literally as well as figuratively. As for the reference to "brows overshooting the mark", this does not makemuch sense unless we understand it be an oblique reference to an Aristophaneanphrase (Lysistrata 8) : "you must notmake a bow with your brows".The speech then develops another theme as follows' :And where is the one who cuts the Persian, this foe who is a wicked child of a slavegirl and a slave, in two, like the parable"*, who was at one with the Celt, who wasaware of the crime made in common with the other, whereas the former (i.e. theemperor) has commanded him, who is his slave again and always a slave, but theother participant of this, the Italian, clearly being separated and parted from hiscommon purpose, after assuming in the manner of hypocrites a false guise of friendship, n reality a veiled face of hostility as on the stage and hypocritical good will,as in a drama? There there is wailing and the gnashing of teeth; yea. grieving deeply32. Although the Greek says, "branded iron sinews" ( ). understandinghypallage here makes for more satisfying sense.33. Regil. p. 218:x219'.34. Regel directs us to Matthew 24.48. 5 1 .


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1 62 ANDREW F. STONEfor him, the whole of the like race from Italy sings its dirge, and it is the one whognashes its teeth against each other, because it would have lied about its calling fromChrist and participated in a plot of the impious and exchanged the calling of heterodoxy for the friendship of like faith, and in order that it should not even not bemaddened from the same cup as them, then from one mixing-bowl of conspiracy itwould partake in a long drunkenness made in common with them.The identification of the co-conspirator of the "Persian", i.e. the Turk, on thewest as "the Celt" must surely clinch the argument that Louis VII is the robbercrucified on the western side of the empire, and Kilidj Arslan that on the eastern.First, we see that the term "Celt" and "Italian" are used interchangeably here; thenwe have a second reference to the reconciliation between Kilidj Arslan and theemperor. The dirge sung in "Italy" would be a reference to the funeral rites andaftermath of Louis' death.Let us, however, turn back to the mention of an Annas and a Caiaphas, one inthe west and one in the east. We have mentioned Conrad of Montferrat. Now, theyoungest son of William V the Old of Montferrat, Renier, was married to MariaPorphyrogenneta, Manuel's daughter by his first wife, Bertha-Irene of Sulzbach.Therefore he was brother-in-law to the new emperor, Alexios II. Of interest here isthe fact that a third son, William Longs word (died 1 177) was King Baldwin IV ofJerusalem's brother-in-law by virtue of the former's marriage to the heiress of thekingdom, Sibyl \ The relationship between Alexios and King Baldwin was therefore, in an admittedly tortuous kind of way, one of brotherly affines. Louis VIIwas his father-in-law. It is these affinities to the emperor, I believe, that are evoked

here by Gregory Antiochos when he talks of an Annas (Louis) and a Caiaphas(Baldwin IV) at Regel, 2182. If this seems a little far-fetched we may care to lookat the final part of the twenty-fourth paragraph ":. . . and you have fallen into dangers from rivers, dangers from foreigners, dangers indeserts and dangers in the sea; but since because of this great danger you are not ableto put in a number the dangers from false brothers, lo, that false brother, the latterman (i.e. my Louis), restored them for you through his own actions, in letters, intreaties, in things to be written, in things to be remembered in inscriptions, writingbeforehand and signing that he is the brother, and this man rekindled difficultdangers for you, but God ameliorated those dangers, and rather dipped him intothe evils that resulted from that and his volte-face.I think that this supports the hypothesis outlined above. King Louis is beingvituperated for his deceit in sponsoring a crusade led by Henry of Troyes, one inwhich Baldwin was complicit. As fo r the talk of treaties, Louis had diplomatic35. William ofTyrk, XXI, 13(12), PL , col. 826-827, Babcock and Krey, p. 415-416.36. Regbl, p. 2191"27.37 . The Greek reads , "recovered for himself. Since (se. ) is inthe accusative, rather than the genitive, I have translated "restored them" rather than "saved himselffrom them". It must be conceded that this translation is in accord with the remainder of the sentence.


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE "CRUSADE"' OF 1 179 16 3exchanges with Manuel, and a treaty sealed by the marriage of his daughter Agnesto Alexios, when heir-apparent, on March 2, 1180. Louis therefore had provedhimself to be "a false brother" unto Manuel. Baldwin IV could be considered bythe practice of rhetoric as having shown himself to be a second "false brother",this time to the emperor Alexios, hence the plural at 219/21. Incidentally, Joscelinof Courtenay, the Seneschal of the kingdom of Jerusalem, had been present inConstantinople negotiating the terms of an alliance between the Byzantine empireand Jerusalem on Baldwin's behalf at the time of Manuel's death".The evidence of the speech, when considered together with western sources,would therefore suggest that King Louis, as we shall see, as a belated response toPope Alexander Ill's calling fo r a crusade, authorised the pilgrimage of Henry ofTroyes some time prior to January 1181, made a pact of some kind with KilidjArslan, but was prevented from seeing the achievement of his aim by his death.There is also reference to a campaign waged by the Byzantines against KilidjArslan's Turks, though the emperor himself was not present.One might object to this hypothesis on the grounds that the argument, based onan attempt to make sense of highly allusive imagery, is somewhat tenuous, if this isall we have to base it on. However, we may add as a footnote two Western sourcesfor a French crusade, to be led by Louis VII at the end of his life, together with hisformer enemy Henry Plantagenet, though the attempt was evidently aborted. Themost important source is Robert of Torigni, admittedly a source which is treatedwith suspicion by some modern scholars, but now we have the reinforcing evidence of the Antiochos oration. This is what Robert says :

Louis, king of France, and Henry, king of England, met and had a parley not far fromNonancourt; and there they made a treaty of peace and firm concord between them,that they might take the Cross, and make a journey to Jerusalem; and if one if thosekings should meet his fate on that journey - may God forbid it - the survivor wouldtake possession of all the treasure and all the men and all the equipment as if it werehis own. and complete the journey on his behalf and on that of the deceased.The passage reveals how it is probable that already in 1178 (the date suppliedby Robert) there were concerns fo r Louis' health, which could well have been areason fo r the aborting of his intended personal crusade; it transpires that the kingmade a pilgrimage instead to the tomb of Thomas Becket ". Louis' motive? Probablyo be reconciled with his Creator before the moment of death. He hoped toexonerate himself further by authorising a "crusade" made in his stead by Henryof Troyes.

38 . William of- Tyrl. XXII. 5 (6), PL , col. 852. Babcock and Krky. p. 453; Hamilton, 370-37 1 :Nicholson, p. 97-98: refer also to the histories mentioned in note 6.39 . Robkrt of ToRKiNi. Chronique de Robert de Torigni. ed. L. Df.i.isli:. Vol. 2. Rouen 1873. p. 77 ;for modern suspicion of the report, see M. Pacalt. Louis VII et son Royaume. Paris 1 964. p. 216.40 . RoBiki ToKiciNi. p. 83-84: . . 216-217.


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164 ANDREW F. STONEAdmittedly this passage of Robert of Torigni is suspect in the light of theContinuator of Sigebert of Gembloux passage cited above, which says merelythat Louis and Henry Plantagenet "formed a pact". However, the alliance betweenLouis and Kilidj Arslan that is alluded to by our funeral oration would make more

sense if Louis intended to crusade in person, retracing his footsteps of 1 147. RecallRegel, 21214"21. His health decreed otherwise, and Henry of Troyes evidently led asmaller-scale expedition, which could travel by sea.We have suggested that this "crusade" was a belated response to a call ofAlexander III. The primary source in question is Alexander's 1171 encyclical letterto the clergy of France41, which says in part:Although all of you have been able to learn of the desolation, tribulations and oppress ion of the cities, castles and other places of the eastern land from the accountsof travellers, we nevertheless have considered it necessary, albeit after a delay, toindicate this to you, and solicit urgently your charity in showing compassion in return for such great evils. Indeed, through the agency of divine and obscure judgement, with the quaking of the land, many cities and towns, some totally, some inpart, are destroyed and convulsed from their foundations, in the ruins of which ahuge multitude of men has been suffocated. From this certain enemies opposed toChrist, assuming boldness, have occupied many places by invasion and tyrannisethem. Among these they have captured the great and populous familial Church ofNazareth with their totally sinful behaviour, and have taken the clergy and otherinhabitants into captivity so , we ask you all, we warn and exhort in the Lord andenjoin you, in return for remission of your sins, to receive both devotedly andhumbly the brothers and messengers of the aforesaid clergy who are sent to you toexpound their burdens and needs, and extend to them the solaces of charity andassistance and aid so that you may receive from the Almighty Lord, who lets nogood deed go unrewarded, prizes of an eternal reward, and may you earn fromthankful God, the boon of coming into the joys of happiness above.Tusculum, December 8.What then of the larger picture, the ramifications of the evidence of this speechas regards the political climate in Constantinople in early 1 1 8 1 ?Niketas Choniates42 and Eustathios of Thessaloniki11 are our Byzantine sourcesfo r the events subsequent to the death of Manuel, those of the tumultuous reignof Alexios II Porphyrogennetos and his successor, the usurper Andronikos IKomnenos. We have additional sources in William of Tyre and Michael the Syrian.When Manuel lay dying he assumed the monk's habit and the monastic nameMatthew, and he dictated that his widow-to-be Maria of Antioch should similarly41. PL 200, col. 757-758; for this, see also M. Pacaut, Louis VII et Alexandre III, in Revued'histoire de l'glise de France 39, 1953, p. 5-45, especially p. 43 .42 . Chmtes, p. 223-241, deals with the events surrounding the Kaisars Maria Porphyrogennetaand her husband, whereas 243-274 deal with Andronikos' rise to power.43 . Eustathios, p. 18-27, on the conspiracy of the Kaisars, and p. 26-53 on the rise of Andronikos.


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GREGORY ANTIOCHOS ON THE "CRUSADE" OF 1 1 79 ] 65take the veil as the nun Xenes . He appointed a regency council of twelve, includinghe patriarch Theodosios Boradeiotes, to govern for his successor, the minorAlexios, and entrusted the care of his son to Maria-Xene4. It was not long beforethe nephew of Manuel, the protosebastos Alexios, in his thirst for power and lustfo r Maria-Xene's beauty, predominated over the others of the regency council, totheir resentment J" .

The result of this envy was a plotted coup d 'tat to be carried out on 2 1 February181" ; leading the conspirators was Maria Porphyrogenneta, who, as a princessborn in the purple, resented the upstart protosebastos particularly. This Maria andher followers are commonly known as the Caesarean party or the party of theKaisars (to use the Greek form of the title). The planned coup did not proceedaccording to plan, and it was revealed by one of the conspirators41. A trial was heldand those revealed to have taken part in the conspiracy were condemned to imprisonment, save Maria Porphyrogenneta and her husband Renier-John, who fled totake sanctuary in the Great Church4. The subsequent intrigues and battles are not ofdirect interest to this article, suffice it to say that the Caesarean party was defeatedin battle by that of the protosebastos and the empress-dowager, despite the populacebeing on their side, and it awaited the arrival of Andronikos on the scene tobreak the protosebastos' hold on power.

It may be seen then, that the outbreak of hostilities, the eruption of a backswellof resentment against the intruding Latins (whose influence became even strongerunder the protosebastos' regime'*'), was due to take place within the space of amonth after the delivery of Antiochos' oration. Interesting is the fact that, despitethe empress-dowager and the protosebastos being undoubtedly in his audience,Antiochos feels free to vent a typically Byzantine anti-Latin sentiment against kingLouis. In other words, as Paul Magdalino has recognised, the court rhetor was notmerely a justifier of imperial policy, but could declare his personal views, or thoseof the group whom he represented, on the matters with which his speeches dealt.The conventional wisdom, shared by such scholars as Cognasso and Brand,is that it took an individual emperor as forceful as Manuel to prevent disruptionbetween the native Byzantines and the Latins in Constantinople \ Eustathios numbers the latter at 60 000 at the time of Andronikos' massacre of them . Niketas

44. This detail is not stated explicitly by our two Byzantine historians, but is mentioned by Wn.i iamoeTyrk. XXII. II (10), 12-13. PL. col. 858, Babcock and Krey. p. 462.45 . Chmtes, p. 253-54; Eustathios, The Capture of Thessaloniki, ed. J.R. Melville-Jones, p. 18-19 (Greek text with facing English translation); Michael the Syrian, Chronique de Michel le Syrien,ed. J.-B. Chabot. Paris 1899. repr. Brussels 1963. ill, p. 381. who supplies the number.46 . Chmtes, p. 224: Eustathios. Capture, p. 18-21.47 . Chmtes, p. 231, supplies the date as th e feast day for St Tiro, the first Saturday of Lent.2 I February in 1 18 I .48 . Chmtes, p. 23 1-32; Elstathios, Capture, p. 20-21 (a s n. 45); William of ; \ kl . XXII. 5. PL.col. 852. Babcock and Kri- . p. 453; Ci pane, p. 181.49 . ("homvus. p. 232; hi stmhios. Capture, p. 20-23.50. SoCotiwsso. p. 226-227.51. Coci.nasso. p. 217: Brand, p. 14.52 . siaihios. Capture, p. 34-35.


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166 ANDREW F. STONEChoniates, living with the memory of the sack of Constantinople in 1204, claimsthat the Latins are more outrageous in their treatment of the Byzantines than eventhe Ishmaelite infidel \ William of Tyre is a witness to the long-standing antagonism etween Greek and Latin that Manuel's favouritism towards the latter hadcreated"'.To be sure, Choniates and Eustathios came to their conclusions with the clarifyingens of hindsight. The oration with which we are dealing predates the attemptedkaisars' attempted coup. Nevertheless, it contains unflattering, even condemningimagery for the one described as a thief and a second Pilate, which we have argued,is Louis VII of France in metaphorical guise. Since the oration dates to early 1181,the assumption that Latin anti-sentiment was already present in Constantinoplevery soon after Manuel's death is warranted. The conventional wisdom, that therewas tension between native Byzantines, particularly the populace of the city, andprivileged Italian traders and other Latins already present, but simmering below thesurface, in Manuel's reign, which was managed by the emperor by his forcefulpersonality, therefore would seem to be justified.So t is that we have seen two interesting aspects of the genre of panegyric, evenin the case of funeral oratory. First there is the allusion to historical details whichare not fully documented by other primary sources. Secondly, we gain a feel fromit fo r the political atmosphere in Constantinople at the time. Further study of thisoften overlooked panegyrical material promises to yield yet further historical information as it is taken in hand and subjected to close scrutiny.Andrew F. Stone

53 . Choniates, p. 576.54 . William of Tyre, XXII, 10 (9), PL , col. 858, Babcock and Krey, p. 461-462.

Andrew F. Stone. Gregory Antiochos on the "Crusade" of 1179. Revue des études byzantines, tome 63,...

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Transcript of Andrew F. Stone. Gregory Antiochos on the "Crusade" of 1179. Revue des études byzantines, tome 63,...