1

PRAISING A CITY:
NICAEA, TREBIZOND, AND THESSALONIKE*

Aslhan Akk

The late Byzantine period(1204-1461) was distinguished by the existence of multiple,
competing, and interconnected centers, superseding the imperial and Constantinopolitan
model of the middle period. Civic identity, defined largely in opposition to the "other",
which refers to the Latins in the earlier part of this period and the Turks in the latter, was
an integral component of the late Byzantine intellectual's self-definition. City enkomia, a
defunct genre, was revived in the late period by authors such as Theodore II Laskaris,
Theodore Metochites, John Eugenikos, Bessarion, and Mark Eugenikos to praise Nicaea,
Trebizond, and Thessalonike among other Byzantine cities. This paper provides three
competing visions of late Byzantine identity: Roman, Hellenic, and Christian. In spite of
their differences, these three alternate solutions to the question of Byzantine identity and
Byzantine self, all engaged with oppositions between inside and outside and developed
the notion of freedom in the context of autonomous centers, existing in opposition to
Constantinople.


A particular type of silver denomination, introduced into circulation during the
14
th
century, POLITIKON, in some series has the image of a castle or fortified city on the
reverse and only the inscription POLITIKON with a cross on the obverse.
1
(Figure: 1)
The image of the fortified city which adorns the coin, the absence of a particular
emperors image or inscription, and the inscribed word city or state is strikingly
different from earlier models of Byzantine coins.
2
It was probably minted in


* This paper grew out of discussions and a graduate seminar I took with the great Prof. Angeliki
Laiou. I extend thanks to Prof. Anthony Kaldellis for checking and correcting the translations in
this paper, to Christina Sideri, Prof. Paul Magdalino, and Dr. Suzan Yalman.
1
Michael F. Hendy, Studies in the Byzantine Monetary Economy c. 300-1450 (Cambridge, 1985), 532-
535; Michael F. Hendy, Catalogue of the Byzantine Coins in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection and in the
Whittmore Collection vol. 4 part. 1 (Wasington D.C., 1999), passim. Hendy writes that the
POLITIKON coin is similar to the western type coins, raising the interesting possibility of the
influence of Latin urban forms on the Byzantine sphere. I would like to thank Dr. Jonathan
Shea for providing further information on the POLITIKON coin.
2
The POLITIKON type coin is very different from the generic Byzantine coin described by Philip
Grierson, Byzantine Coinage (Washington D.C., 1999), 23. Most of those current in Byzantium fall
2
Constantinople circa 1340-1360 and demonstrates the importance of urban forms of
government in politics during this time.
3

Following the fall of Constantinople to the Latins in 1204 and the dissolution of
the political hegemony of the centralizing state, Constantinople was no longer the
exclusive center of political authority. Three splinter states were established: The
Empire of Nicaea, the Empire of Trebizond, and the Despotate of Epiros. Nicaea,
Trebizond, and Thessalonike, previously provincial cities, were elevated to the status of
capitals. The reconquest of Constantinople in 1261 by Michael VIII (1259-1282), co-
emperor of the Nicaean Empire, brought about only a limited reunification for the
various political entities in the Balkans and in Asia Minor. The political geography in
this late period was thus composed of multiple, inter-connected and competing
centers.
4

Nicaea, Trebizond, and Thessalonike were heavily fortified, as was the city
whose image we find on the POLITIKON coin. A plethora of coins from Thessalonike
also have the castle as symbol for the city although they are quite different from and
more traditional than the POLITIKON.
5
The image of the fortress is a clear
demonstration of the defensive features of the city. Belonging to one of these three
cities meant not only belonging to a particular community who shared similar
aspirations and customs but at the same time being protected from what lies outside.
Thus, the rise of urban autonomy with centripetal tendencies and the corresponding
formulation of civic identities were closely linked to thinking on what constitutes the
other.
6


into one of three groups: ruler representations, religious images, and functional types
consisting mainly marks of value. Pictorial types in the literal sense, such as objects or images
taken from nature or representations of public buildings and events, play almost no role at
all.
3
Bartusis cites an example from 1385 which indicates that the word politikon was used in
reference to either the city of Constantinople or the state. Mark C. Bartusis, The Late Byzantine
Army: Arms and Society, 1204-1453 (Philadelphia, 1992), 109.
4
Angeliki E. Laiou, Byzantium and the Neighboring Powers: Small-State Policies and
Complexities, in Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557), Perspectives on Late Byzantine Art and
Culture, ed. S. T. Brooks (New York, 2006), 42-53.
5
Ccile Morrisson, The Emperor, the Saint, and the City: Coinage and Money in Thessalonike
from the Thirteenth to the Fifteenth Century, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 57 (2003), 173-203.
6
E. Zachariadou,
, Ariadne 5 (1989), 345-352.

3
Confined within the walls, the citizens considered themselves to possess a long
history which distinguished them from the lawless enemy outside. In the earlier part of
this period, the Nicaeans referred to the Latins as the enemy. In the fifteenth-century,
on the other hand, the enemy was the barbarian Turks, the Ottomans. Interestingly,
both the Latins and eventually the Ottomans held Constantinople, the symbol of the
centralizing state in this geography. Most importantly, these three cities were closely
identified with the citizens. As we shall see below, civic identity and civic pride were
integral to the late period intellectuals self-definition.
This paper attempts to provide a sample of the various ways in which Nicaea,
Trebizond, and Thessalonike were represented by late period intellectuals from the 13
th

through the early 15
th
centuries. We mainly discuss one genre (city enkomion) and three
cities (Nicaea, Trebizond, and Thessalonike). The city enkomion, a laudatory
description of a city, is particularly suited to study the essence of a city. Given the
politically fragmented geography, when the encomiasts discuss the cities, they imply
political rule within the confines of the city rather than in an extended geography.
The encomiasts made use of structural oppositions between civilized/barbarian,
Christian/heathen, and more generally inside/outside, developing one or more of these
oppositions in their writings. They constructed their civic identity, as citizens of
Nicaea, Trebizond, or Thessalonike, vis--vis the other. All these oppositions were
nowhere better developed than in passages describing city walls.
Nicaea, Trebizond, and Thessalonike were set apart from the countryside by
awe-inspiring walls. From the 3
rd
century onwards, Byzantine cities were fortified due
to successive invasions by Goths, Sassanids, Arabs and various other peoples. In the late
period (1204-1461), extensive and exhaustive fortification of the three cities was once
again undertaken. According to Clive Foss, the Laskarid Emperor John Vatatzes (1222-
1254) was the greatest builder of medieval Nicaea.
7
Vatatzes built a second set of
fortifications around the earlier circuit of walls.
8
As a result, Nicaea was fortified by two
sets of walls, five kilometers in length. Similarly, the walls of Trebizond were refortified
in the late period. In the 14
th
and 15
th
centuries, the Grand Komnenoi Emperors
expanded the city by building new walls.
9
As for Thessalonike, the physical extent of
the city defined by the fortifications remained constant from the fifth to the fifteenth

7
Clive Foss, Nicaea: A Byzantine Capital and Its Praises (Brookline, 1996).
8
Ibid., 89-96.
9
Anthony Bryer and David Winfield, The Byzantine Monuments and the Topography of the Pontos
(Washington D.C., 1985), 184-95. Alexios II Grand Komnenos (1297-1330) built a fort (the inner
citadel) in Trebizond. Bartusis, Late Byzantine Army, 290.
4
century.
10
However, there were additions in the late period. Towers and an inner citadel
were heavily rebuilt and fortified. A continuous repair of the walls demonstrates that
the security of the city was foremost on the minds of its rulers. Fortification was a sine
qua non for the survival of any late medieval city. According to the fourteenth-century
church official Manuel Glabas the ability of towns to survive in the midst of hostile
territory depended on two facts: first, because of the fortifications, and (second)
because they always find a way to get along with their enemies.
11

The incorporation of these cities (and not only Nicaea, Thessalonike, and
Trebizond) into the Ottoman polity was a gradual process. The Ottomans first
established control over these cities hinterland, essential for trade and provisioning
and already shrinking as a result of continuing Ottoman attacks.
12
Nicaea was the first
to be incorporated into the Ottoman state in 1331. In the end, Thessalonike
13
and
Trebizond
14
were small islands of refuge in a land that was largely controlled by an
increasingly centralized and efficient Ottoman state.
15

Critics have argued that the composition of city enkomion was only a rhetorical
exercise, lacking authenticity. The enkomion, as a genre, has been dismissed at times as
unoriginal: too closely following antique models, the author of an enkomion is more

10
Charalambos Bakirtzis, The Urban Continuity and Size of Late Byzantine Thessalonike,
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 57 (2004), 35-64. Tafrali, La Topographie de Thessalonique, (Paris, 1913).
11
Klaus-Peter Matschke, The Late Byzantine Urban Economy, Thirteenth-Fifteenth Centuries,
in The Economic History of Byzantium, ed. Angeliki Laiou (Washington D.C., 2002), 479 (citing
Reinsch, Die Briefe, 391 (A18)).
12
Matschke, Late Byzantine Urban Economy, 479-81.
13
Thessalonike passed under Ottoman control in 1387 and remained under Ottoman rule until
1402, when Bayezid I was defeated by Timur, and the city was regained by the Byzantines. For
an account of the ways in which Thessalonians responded to the Ottoman threat as well as the
Latins in this period, see N. Necipolu, Byzantium Between the Ottomans and the Latins: Politics and
Society in the Late Empire, (Cambridge, 2009), 41-119.
14
Trebizond fell to Mehmed II in 1461. The terms of surrender were negotiated by Mehmed IIs
grand vizier Mahmud Pasha Angelovic who was a cousin of the Protovestiarios George
Amiroutzes. T. Stavrides, The Sultan of Vezirs: The Life and Times of the Ottoman Vezir Mahmud Pasha
Angelovic, (Leiden, Boston, Kln, 2001), passim.
15
The story of the rise of the Ottoman state from small beginnings into a centralized
bureaucratic state has been extensively studied by Ottomanists. For a classical treatment of the
subject, see Halil nalck, The Ottoman State: Economy and Society, 1300-1600 in An Economic
and Social History of the Ottoman Empire 1300-1914, ed. Halil nalck and Donald Quataert
(Cambridge, 1994), 9-380.
5
mindful of tradition than providing a truthful account of his times, writes Jenkins.
16
The
rift between reality and literature, argue the authors, was nowhere as wide as it was
during the late period when the Byzantine intellectuals appeared to be oblivious to a
dismal and deteriorating political situation. On the other hand, a recent reevaluation of
the enkomia on Nicaea and Trebizond suggests that not only were these rhetorical
pieces historically embedded but also that these two cities were represented as new
Constantinoples.
17

The thesis of this paper is that the city enkomia do reflect the dire conditions of
the late period and make extended use of the figure of the other, belonging to the
world outside the walls, as an integral component of civic self-representation. Helen
Saradi, who has diachronically studied the various city enkomia from the late antique
period to the fifteenth century, writes that, after the decline of cities in the 7
th
century,
it is only in the 13
th
-15
th
centuries that Byzantine intellectuals started composing city
enkomia again.
18
Further, she points out that the new found interest in city walls was
an innovation of this period.
19
The 3
rd
-century texts traditionally ascribed to Menander
Rhetor provided a theoretical model for city enkomia to generations of Byzantine
authors and singled out description of a citadel as a proper category for praise.
20
Yet,
Menanders advice on how to praise a citadel only makes references to the physical
location of the castle and does not at all refer to its symbolic value, as is frequently
found in these enkomia.
The element of beauty ( ) was a topos of city enkomia, used to describe
the fortifications as well as the city in general. Saradi has demonstrated that this theme
was a recurring theme from the late antique period until the 15
th
century.
21
More
importantly, their defensive function was paramount and these walls were
instrumental in constructing a civic identity: they provided a sense of locus to those
within and just by their existence, monuments of Reason ( ), they demarcated
the rational from the irrational:

16
Romilly J. H. Jenkins, The Hellenistic Origins of Byzantine Literature, Dumbarton Oaks Papers
17 (1963): 40.
17
Helen Saradi, The Monuments in the Late Byzantine Ekphraseis of Cities, Byzantinoslavica
69.3 (2011): 179-192.
18
Helen Saradi, The Kallos of the Byzantine City: The Development of a Rhetorical Topos and
Historical Reality, Gesta 34.1 (1995): 37-56.
19
Ibid., 45.
20
D. A. Russell and N. G. Wilson (ed. and tr.), Menander Rhetor (Oxford, 1981), 44-47.
21
Saradi, The Kallos, 49.
6
And bearing its towers; and all of it being enriched with the knowledge of Reason, and
having the dignity of a mother, it sends forth to you all that is good.
22


Your Most Illustrious City: Nicaea
The Nicaean Orations, one by Theodore II Laskaris(1254-1258) and a later one by
Theodore Metochites (1270-1332), composed in the thirteenth century, are the earliest
city enkomia to be discussed. The earlier oration by the Nicaean Prince, Theodore II
Laskaris was composed when Constantinople was still occupied by the Latins. It is the
praise of a capital rather than a provincial center. This speech was delivered in the
presence of the reigning Nicaean Emperor John Vatatzes, father of Laskaris. As in most
epideictic literature, the Oration is concerned with the present, is a part of the
ceremonial, and is short enough to be delivered in person.
23

The introductory chapter to Laskaris enkomion is a praise of the walls of the
city. The orator thus prefers to single out the fortifications, which provide security to
Nicaean citizens, to be the foremost defining characteristic of the city.
24
Such an
introduction does not follow the rules of rhetoric in which Byzantine authors were
heavily educated.
25
The theory of rhetorical composition dictated that the author of the
enkomion start out by acknowledging the difficulty of composing a piece which is to be
commensurate with the greatness of the subject matter.
26

What appears to modern eyes as a slight rearrangement of the compositions
outline must have been a forceful innovation to contemporaries. No doubt, Laskaris
was well acquainted with text-books (progymnasmata) which were culled from the
works of late antique authors and intended to instruct students concerning reading and
writing.
27
His audience, who were as educated in the art of rhetoric and the ancient
Greek classics, were tuned into the same semantic universe as Laskaris.
28
Working

22
Foss, Nicaea, 136-137 (emphasis added).
23
D. A. Russell and N. G. Wilson, Menander, xi-xxxiv.
24
Foss, Nicaea, 132.
25
Ibid., 155.
26
Henry Maguire, The Art of Comparing in Byzantium, The Art Bulletin, 70. 1 (March 1988): 88-
89.
27
Foss, 124. For the relation between the progymnasmata and the composition of ekphrasis in
the Byzantine period, see Ruth Webb, Ekphraseis of Buildings in Byzantium: Theory and
Practice, Byzantinoslavica, 69.3 (2011): 20-32 and Stratis Papaioannou, Byzantine Enargeia and
Theories of Representation, Byzantinoslavica, 69.3 (2011): 48-60.
28
Foss, 132. Laskaris makes special mention of the learning of his audience, the citizens of
Nicaea.
7
within the limits set by the genre of city-enkomion, Laskaris both adhered to and
deviated from the generic formula in his Nicaean Oration. In this way, he
communicated a meaning which would be readily recognizable to his audience.
29

The most original paragraph in Laskaris Oration, celebrates the building
activity of John Vatatzes. Vatatzes built a second outer wall for Nicaea in the 13
th

century.
30
One may suggest that this Oration is as much a victory oration as a praise of
Nicaea.
31
In the aftermath of 1204, the survival of their civilization depended upon the
survival of the splinter states: The Empire of Nicaea, The Empire of Trebizond, and the
Despotate of Epiros. Laskaris Oration is a laudatory piece, which celebrates the survival
of culture in Nicaea and a substantial component of this survival was due to the
building activities of the Laskarid Emperors.
What constituted this civilization, according to the Laskarid Prince? What did
these walls preserve? Nicaea was foremost a political community of citizens who were
distinguished by their piety and learning. Nicaea was superior to all barbarian cities
which took no part in reason, education, or philosophy.
32

It is worth pointing out that the enemies in Laskaris oration, generally refer to
the Latins rather than the Seljuks. In the later enkomia we will encounter, the
fifteenth-century enemy refers to the Ottoman Turks even in those instances when the
authors were anti-Unionists. There is clearly a redefinition of the category of the other
from the beginning of this period until the fifteenth century which is indicative of a
shift in the mental map of the intellectuals.
In this oration, Laskaris describes the city as being composed of equal citizens
who engaged in free discourse, debate and political activity, bringing to mind
Aristotles work on Politics. Indeed, the author makes explicit references to Aristotle,
Plato, and Socrates, confirming the role of classical Greek learning in his evaluation of
what constitutes an ideal political community.
33
More importantly, Nicaea was a

29
Margaret Mullett, The Madness of Genre, DOP, 46 (1992): 243 I have no qualms in seeking to
detect the then meaning as distinct from the now meaning and attempting to reconstruct
what Jauss calls the horizon of expectation of what Stanley Fisch calls an interpretive
community. I take genre to be a major component of the horizon of expectations of Byzantine
literary society, an interpretive community if there ever was one.
30
Foss, Nicaea, 159.
31
Laskaris makes numerous references to the name of the city Nicaea and the verb to
conquer. ex. Foss, Nicaea, 138.
32
Ibid., 134.
33
Ibid., 138.
8
Christian city. Being Christian, Nicaean citizens surpassed in their knowledge the
Athenians; they had inner knowledge of God where the latter had none.
34
Hellenic
culture and Christianity defined the ideal society, fostered within the walls of Nicaea.
Through the emphasis on walls, the binary opposition between the ideal society
within and all that is outside became the organizing principle of Laskaris account.
35

The walls delimited the geography of Nicaea and distinguished the city from the other
who was outside, not only physically but also culturally. Defenses, in this sense, both
refer to the actual physical walls and to the citizens within, fortified with knowledge of
God and with external knowledge pertaining to classical Greek texts, the sciences, and
medicine .
36
Laskaris makes a brief reference to the Persians in a neutral manner. The
Latins, on the other hand, are depicted as the braggart Italian voice, the wild beasts
cubs, the rot of Italian power and with unsound pride, lacking all the internal and
external qualities associated with the Nicaeans.
37

` Metochites enkomion on Nicaea was similarly composed as an oration to be
delivered in person and in the presence of a Byzantine Emperor, this time Andronikos II
Palaiologos. (1282-1328).
38
Yet, there is a crucial difference between the two Orations:
Laskaris treated Nicaea as the capital, while Metochites, composing his Oration in 1290,
addressed Nicaea as a second or even third city, since Constantinople, reconquered
from the Latins in 1261, was, during this time, once again the capital. Further, the other
plays a minimal role in this exposition, possibly indicating the less than autonomous
status of Nicaea at this time. Yet, similar to Laskaris, Metochites too displays civic pride
when praising the city he grew up in. He devotes lengthy passages to the fortifications
of Nicaea. Indeed, the survival of Nicaea in the aftermath of 1204, is explained by
Metochites by reference to the nature of the city as a castle, and to the
defenses she provides to the whole Roman Empire.
39
Strictly speaking, Nicaea would
not qualify as an acropolis geographically. The city lies on a plain and does not boast

34
Ibid., 138. Saradi in The Monumenst in the Late Byzantine Ekphraseis of Cities considers the
metaphysical element to be paramount in the ekphraseis of Nicaea.
35
This opposition works in more ways than simply delineating physical space, ie.
civilized/barbarian, Christian/heathen, internal wealth/external wealth, internal
knowledge/external knowledge etc.
36
Foss, Nicaea, 144. The author equates defences with victory, which is a very passive
understanding of victory.
37
Ibid., 149.
38
Ibid., 128 .
39
Ibid., 188.
9
any hills. Thus, it is the second sense of the word, a tower of defense, which
Metochites must have had in mind. In an earlier passage, the author describes the
fortifications:
She relies on herself and her external circuits, so finely constructed that it
is at once a pleasure and a marvel to behold their undeceived foresight,
their great unconquerable beauty, their splendid barrier. Such is the
unyielding strength of the whole construction from the arrangement of its
materials and such are the towers in it: they strive upward, trusting in their
foundations; below, they stand forward from the continuous defense, and
meet the enemy as champions unwearied and unmoved.
40

The distinction between outside and inside is emphasized when Metochites, in a
rhetorical manner, invites his audience to come inside and admire the accomplishments
within.
41
Moving from outside to inside, one would have to traverse three circuits, a
moat, an outer wall which was mainly built under John Vatatzes, and an inner wall built
pre-1204.
42
These walls inhabited a liminal zone. Approached from within they installed
a sense of security but when the enemy approached them from without they were
unsociable and fearsome.
Both Laskaris and Metochites provide an ekphrasis of Nicaea, a prose depiction of
the physical city. Ruth Webb has demonstrated that the use of ekphrasis in describing
Byzantine religious architecture was not a simple task.
43
Ekphrasis is not an objective
translation of a visual object to the verbal medium. Further, as these Orations were to be
delivered in Nicaea, it is a paradox that the authors chose to describe what was
immediately visible to their audience. In the words of Webb, such ekphrasis should be
considered a weaving of time and space.
44
The physical object, the fortifications and the
buildings of the city, are a-temporal: they provide clues to the present as well as the past.
The Orations were construed as a means to transcend the banal which was visible and to
provide an introduction to the hidden. Contextualizing the physical description of the
city within a historical narrative, the encomiasts aimed to elucidate the locus where the

40
Ibid., 175.
41
Ibid., 176.
42
Ibid., 159 (citing A. M. Schneider, Die Stadtmauer von Iznik (Nicaea) (Berlin, 1938) and C. Foss and
D. Winfield, Byzantine Fortifications, an Introduction (Pretoria, 1985).)
43
Ruth Webb, The Aesthetics of Sacred Space: Narrative, Metaphor, and Motion in
Ekphraseis of Church Buildings, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 53 (1999): 59-74.
44
Ibid., 72.
10
past, the present, and the future converged.
45
A community of Christian citizens, a
physical space wherein sacred buildings abounded, and the embodiment of Christian and
Roman history, the city of Nicaea was interpreted as holy space.
Two historical events, having implications for the development of Christianity,
stand out in Metochites narrative: Nicaea was the chosen site for the First Ecumenical
Council which determined the course of Christianity
46
; and the city provided refuge in
1204 not only to the Roman government in exile but also to the Church, nobly
resisting the tide of evil as a citadel for the whole Roman state. she received the seat
of religion.
47

After 1204, Constantinople was no longer the center of political power or the
exclusive capital of cultural development.
48
Provincial cities, such as Nicaea, benefited
from the political situation, transforming into self-governing urban centers. The
encomiasts vision of an urban political community, Hellenic and Christian, is a
departure from earlier constructions of imperial authority, which incorporated
Constantinople and Roman administrative structures. Such a vision reflects the
transformation of political thinking during this time.

It is Right to Honor Ones Fatherland: Trebizond
In similar manner, Trebizond benefited from being the capital of a splinter state
in the aftermath of 1204. The Empire of Trebizond was established as an independent
state just prior to the Latin conquest.
49
By the fifteenth century, the city was girt with
awesome walls. A substantial portion of these fortifications remain today. The Grand
Komnenoi Emperors patronized building activity, in particular the strengthening of
defensive walls. A second outer-wall was built during the 14
th
century. Most
importantly, the acropolis of Trebizond was rebuilt and extended in various stages

45
Ibid.; R. Ousterhout, Temporal Structuring in the Chora Parekklesion, Gesta 34 (1995): 76.
Webb and Ousterhouts observations on the relation of text to physical object, in particular to
holy space, are just as valid in the context of city enkomia.
46
Foss, Nicaea, 184.
47
Ibid., 188.
48
Angeliki Laiou (ed.), Urbs Capta: The Fourth Crusade and its Consequences (Paris, 2005).
49
William Miller, Trebizond: The Last Greek Empire, (New York, 1926). Nicolas Oikonomides
demonstrated in an excellent study the centrifugal tendencies of the Byzantine Empire on the
eve of the Fourth Crusade. Nicolas Oikonomides, La decomposition de lempire byzantine la
veille de 1204 et les origins de lempire de Nice: A propos de la Partitio Romaniae, XVe Congrs
International dtudes Byzantines, vol. 1.1 (Athens, 1979), 3-28.
11
from 1204 until the fall of the city in 1461 to Mehmed II.
50
The citadel was positioned on
the highest point in the city, the southernmost tip of the walled area. Referred to as
Korth, Koulaj (1337), Palatio (1376), it was the seat of government and also the palace of
the Grand Komnenoi.
51

The theologian John Eugenikos (c. 1394- c. 1455), with connections to Mistra,
composed an enkomion on Trebizond that has close textual parallels with Bessarions.
John Eugenikos, the brother of Mark Eugenikos, was an opponent to the Union of the
Churches similar to his brother who was the leader of the anti-Union party. A
Constantinopolitan, born on the island of Imbros to a Trapezuntine father, John
Eugenikos appears to have been deeply concerned with the survival of Byzantine
civilization and Byzantine cities, in particular. Apart from his enkomion on Trebizond,
he wrote enkomia on Corinth , the village of Petrina, the island of Imbros and its two
cities, as well as a Lament on the Fall of Thessalonike in 1430.
52

Eugenikos description of Trebizond has generally been referred to for its
bucolic qualities.
53
We, on the other hand, would like to draw attention to one of the
introductory passages which deals with fortifications and freedom:
54


The city is secured with firm walls and towers. It is protected on each side
by a river and a ravine and further fortified all around by a circuit of rough

50
Bryer and Winfield, Topography, 186-95. In the fourteenth century there was a rebuilding and
heightening of all earlier work with a further crenellated wall, except at the central waist, the
southwest hall came then into being. Perhaps the complicated southern gateway arrangements
were built at this time. But this point still remained the weakest, and, in the face of Ottoman
threats, John IV completed the defenses by building the upper storeys of the great southern
power
51
Ibid., 184. Panaretos distinguishes between the Kastro, or Middle City, and the Citadel by
referring to the latter as Koulaj (i.e. the Turkish Kule), in 1337 and 1351Lazaroupoulos had
described it as h korth in 1223. p. 195, By 1223 there was a korte which, though it could
withstand the Melik at the southern and northern ends (along the line of present curtain wall)
clearly needed further defenses.
52
John Eugenikos in S. P. Lampros (ed.), , vol. 1 (Athens,
1912/23), 47-55.
53
Costas N. Constantinides, Byzantine Gardens and Horticulture in the Late Byzantine Period,
1204-1453: the Secular Sources, Byzantine Garden Culture, ed. A. Littlewood, H. Maguire, and J.
Wolschke-Bulmahn, 92.
54
John Eugenikos, ed. O. Lampsides,
, Archeion Pontou 20 (1955): 3-38.
12
terrain. On top, in the place of the acropolis
55
, it is strongly fortified by a
splendid palace situated in the most opportune location hard by the peaks.
It always deters the approach of the enemies from afar and provides
complete safety to the inhabitants. It is clear that neither up to now nor
even in the future will it ever fall to the hated enemy. Even when it was
surrounded by such nations of barbarians, the city never knew a servile
day...
56

According to this, the citizens of the Empire of Trebizond enjoyed continuous
freedom within the walls of the city. Specifically, they enjoyed freedom from
despotic barbarian rule. But what was the nature of this freedom? Did John
Eugenikos have in mind Aristotles ideal city: For though in nature the king must
be superior, in race he should be the same as his subjects.?
57
Indeed, the Grand
Komnenoi were Greek-speaking; they were not an alien race who had usurped the
throne by means of force. The tradition relating the founding of the Empire of
Trebizond, describes it as a peaceful process.
58

Bessarions (c.1403-1472) enkomion on Trebizond, a rich, dense, and lengthy
narrative, provides fulfilling answers on the nature of that freedom which the city
provided to its inhabitants.
59
Bessarion, one of the most interesting intellectuals of the
15
th
century, was a native of Trebizond. In early adulthood, he had moved to
Constantinople and later to Mistra in the Peloponnesos, where he was a student of

55
The use of anti+gen. construction to describe the position of the palace is problematic.
However, Bessarions description situates the palace on the acropolis. Bessarions description
of the palace is translated by Cyril Mango in The Art of the Byzantine Empire 312-1453, (Toronto,
Buffalo, London, 1986), 252-253.
56
Ibid., 27.


.
, , ,

.
57
Aristotle, Politics, tr. H. Rackham (Cambridge, London, 1944), 1.259b.
58
A. A. Vasiliev, The Foundation of the Empire of Trebizond (1204-1222), Speculum 11 (1936):
21. In April 1204, Alexius took possession of Trebizond, apparently without meeting strong
resistance.
59
Bessarion, ed. S. P. Lampros, , Neos Hellenomnemon 13.2 (1916):
145-204. L. Mohler, Kardinal Bessarion als Theologe, Humanist, und Staatsmann, 3 vols. (Paderborn,
1923-1942.)
13
Plethon(c. 1360-1452), the controversial Platonist and possibly the most important
philosopher Byzantium produced.
60
Back in Constantinople, Bessarion was appointed a
legate to the Council of Ferrara-Florence in 1438-1439. The failure of the Council to
unite the Churches prompted Bessarion, a pro-Unionist, to leave Constantinople in
1440 and settle in Italy where he was ordained a Cardinal in 1439 and after 1463 titular
Latin patriarch of Constantinople. Bessarion is considered a seminal figure in the Italian
Renaissance. His defense of Plato, originally composed in Greek but printed in Latin, in
response to the Aristotelian George of Trebizonds attacks on the ancient philosopher
and on Bessarions teacher Plethon, introduced Plato to the west as interpreted from
late antiquity until the fifteenth century by Byzantine tradition.
61

The date of Bessarions enkomion on Trebizond is unknown, but it was possibly
composed circa 1440 and before the final departure of Bessarion to Italy.
62
Unlike the
Nicaean enkomia, it was probably not an Oration to be delivered in person, being rather
lengthy. Neither was it addressed to fellow citizens of Trebizond nor to the
Trapezuntine Emperor.
63
The unique copy of the enkomion is found in a manuscript
that contains Bessarions early writings and that he bequeathed in 1468 to the Republic
of Venice as part of his extensive donation which eventually formed the Marciana
Library.
64

In the enkomion, a classical view of freedom ( ), defined as freedom
from foreign rule, is the most important quality which is attributed to the city of
Trebizond.
65
Bessarions narrative is informed by Greek political and ethical theory as it
was being reformulated by Plethon and his circle at this time. Bessarion distinguishes
Trebizond from many other cities, writing: Our city came into being and where before

60
C. M. Woodhouse, George Gemistos Plethon: The Last of the Hellenes, (Oxford, 1986); Franois
Masai, Plthon et le Platonisme de Mistra (Paris, 1956.)
61
James Hankins, Plato in the Italian Renaissance, volume 1 (Leiden, New York, Copenhagen, Kln,
1990.)
62
Lampros dates the enkomion to before 1438. Lampros, , 196.
For the dating to 1439-1440, see infra footnote 90.
63
Ibid., 148.
64
L. Labowsky, Bessarions Library and the Biblioteca Marciana (Rome, 1979.)
65
Dimiter G. Angelov, Three Kinds of Liberty as Political Ideals in Byzantium, Twelfth to
Fifteenth Centuries, Proceedings of the 22
nd
International Congress of Byzantine Studies, Sofia, 22-27
August 2011, vol. 1 (Sofia, 2011), 311-331. In part of this essay, Angelov demonstrates that one
particular definition of freedom, which is freedom from foreign rule, reemerged in the
fourteenth century as a response to the Turkish and, in particular, Ottoman threat to the
Byzantine state.
14
it was not in existence. Having come into being, it did not perish, having the former
quality in common with all other cities [i.e., that it came into existence], but the latter
not with very many [i.e., that it did not perish].
66
Plethons Advisory Address to Despot
Theodore II, composed circa 1416 in Mistra, is concerned, among other things, with
those cities that did not perish, attributing their success to constitutions which were a
combination of virtue and chance.
67
Thus, political success was fundamentally linked to
freedom since chance is defined as those instances which afford humans the ability to
choose. Laonikos Chalkokondyles, also a student of Plethon and the author of the
Apodeixis, wrote a platonic passage on the mechanism of tides on the English coast,
describing the natural phenomenon as a disharmonious conjunction of two forces: one
and the other , the first one leading to generation and the latter one
to decay.
68
Interestingly the word , describing the pull of the moon on the
waters in this passage, is not generally used for natural mechanisms but is found in
ethical contexts, denoting free will. Thus, it is related to the nature of the moon, which
according to Plethon and the tradition he is coming from, is an ensouled celestial body.
In similar manner, , the constraint imposed by violent necessity and describing
the effect of the pneuma on the waters, is used in an ethical context in correspondence
between Plethon and Bessarion regarding fate and free will and which describes two
similar forces related to generation and decay.
69
Did Bessarion envisage the
mechanisms concerning generation and decay to be fundamentally linked to freedom,
similar to Plethon and Chalkokondyles? This question may be answered by examining
the ways in which Bessarion described the origins of the city of Trebizond and its
history through the course of time.
Indeed, the emphasis on freedom is clearly noted in Trebizonds origins.
70

Further, Bessarion considered the Hellenic contribution, which is equated with

66
Lampros (ed.), , 149.
, , , .
67
S.P. Lampros, , vol. 4, (Athens, 1930), 116.
.
, , ,
,
.
68
E. Dark (ed.), Laonici Chalcocandylae historiarum demonstrations, (Budapest, 1922),
vol. 1, 88-90.
69
L. Mohler, Kardinal Bessarion, vol. 3, 466-467.
70
Lampros (ed.), , 171
15
freedom as we shall see, to the constitution of the city of Trebizond to be preceded only
by divine origins:
In contrast to other cities which have alternated in turn between ruling
others and being enslaved. Our city, which was truly constituted by a
divine allotment and brought into being by the labors of divine men, with
God giving his assent, was not diminished through the length of time.
being established, almost as long ago as when the Greeks began to flourish;
the city never yielded to time. but was and still is the very same city just
as if it had been settled yesterday or the day before that.
71


Bessarion does not describe Trebizond as being free by reason of the
individual freedoms of its citizens. He does not mention any political association
between the city (a governing structure) and its citizens. The city, not yielding to
the vicissitudes of chance, was free because it retained its original foundation as
divinely appointed and Hellenic. Bessarion sets out to represent that very kernel
of Trapezuntine identity which stayed immutable through the course of time. A
grand sweep of historical narrative, Bessarions enkomion is a demonstration that
Trebizond stayed unaltered with respect to its original foundation.
The choice of historical narrative as genre was deliberate. Bessarions
understanding of freedom can only be comprehended as a dialectic process, a
clash between the civilized people of Hellenic descent and the barbarians. The
category of the barbarian ( ) is a guiding motif throughout Bessarions
account. In the earlier chapters, the author renders an account of how Athenians
founded free cities in Asia Minor in their own image.
72
These earliest
establishments brought the Greeks into contact with the barbarians of Asia, all of
them servile races according to Bessarion. The city of Trebizond was founded by
the Greeks of Sinop which had been earlier established by Athenians. Surrounded
on all sides by barbarians from the very beginning, the Greeks were distinguished
by their use of the Greek language, love of freedom, and exercise of equality

71
Ibid., 149. , ,
. ,
, , ....
, ....

.
72
Ibid., 150.
16
among citizens.
73
Bessarion, thus, believed such qualities to secure the
permanence of his fatherland.
The establishment of Roman rule in Asia Minor appears as the next stage in
the protracted battle between the Greeks and the barbarians but is complicated
by the fact that Romans were not Hellenes. Defeating Mithridates in battle,
Pompey the Great established Roman hegemony over Syria, Cilicia, Paphlagonia,
Cappadocia, Iberia, Albania, Armenia and in Mesopotamia over Phoenicia,
Palestine, Judea, and Arabia. Bessarion characterizes the nature of this expansion
as servitude for some provinces ( , ,
etc.)
74

In contrast to the subjugation of a multitude of regions by the Romans,
Roman rule in Trebizond was a suitable match. The Romans had developed a
precise and accurate understanding of and sympathy for the Greek language and
more importantly for Hellenic culture. Roman identity was infused with Hellenic
ideals, Bessarion tells us.
75
It was not out of compulsion that the city of Trebizond
became incorporated into the Roman Empire. The city adopted Roman political
rule, judging it to be most profitable and deeming only the Romans to be worthy
of holding authority over itself.
76

Nevertheless, the use of such words as yielding ( ) and surrender
() with respect to the establishment of Roman rule in Trebizond,
demonstrates that Bessarion considered Roman political rule to be not only
external to the Hellenic cultural heritage of the city but also a structure of power.
Bessarion envisaged Trapezuntine identity to be separate from Roman identity.
The city was a Hellenic entity in essence and Roman only with respect to political
rule. Further, Bessarion refers to the classical Roman Empire in these passages
and not the Byzantine one.
Bessarions emphasis on the Hellenic heritage of Trebizond is a clear
departure from earlier constructions of Trapezuntine civic identity, notably

73
Ibid., 167-68.

, .
74
Ibid., 174.
75
Ibid., 174-176.
76
Ibid., 176.
,

.
17
Panaretos chronicle. Panaretos (c.1320- c.1390), the official court chronicler of
the Empire of Trebizond, referred to the inhabitants of the Empire as Romans
and never utilized the word, Hellene.
77
Panaretos choice probably reflected the
association of the Megas Komnenoi with the Komnenoi. Bessarions emphasis on
the Hellenic heritage may be explained by his association with the Mistra circle.
78

Laonikos Chalkokondyles, the fifteenth-century historian who composed the
Apodeixis closely modeled on Herodotos, was the only historian, writing in Greek,
who relinquished the Byzantine claim to Roman identity. Chalkokondyles
consistently and systematically referred to the Byzantines as Hellenes and
reserved the title Roman to exclusively refer to westerners.
In the enkomion, from the establishment of Roman political rule over Asia
Minor, it is a short step to the establishment of Byzantion as capital of the Roman
Empire. Bessarion discusses this event in the most general terms. He makes no
reference to Constantine I and does not even mention Constantine Is conversion
to Christianity in connection with the transfer of the capital.
79

The defeat and capture of Romanos IV Diogenes(1068-1071) in 1071 by the
Seljuks and the subsequent reconquests and successes of Alexios I Komnenos
(1081-1118) remain the exception to Bessarions summary dismissal of the
Byzantine Empire. Alexios I Komnenos was elevated to the Roman throne during
a time when the barbarians were literally at the gates of the capital:
The Barbarians had run down all of Asia and sheered it of its beauties with
impunity. Since no one stood in their way, they transformed all of Asia into
a Scythian desert and they were not bounded in their greed. They advanced
and subdued everything as far as Chalcedon on the continent across from
Byzantion. Saracens came out of Egypt and enslaved Syria, Palestine, and
Pamphilia. while Turks came out of Persia itself and from even lower

77
Michael Panaretos, ed. O. Lampsides, (Athens, 1958), 78, 79, and
119.
78
For three accounts of the ways in which Roman and Hellenic identities were conceptualized
in the Byzantine period see Angeliki Laiou, From Roman to Hellene, The Byzantine Fellowship
Lectures 1 (1974): 13-28; Anthony Kaldellis, Hellenism in Byzantium : The Transformations of Greek
Identity and the Reception of the Classical Tradition, (Cambridge, 2007); Dimiter Angelov, Imperial
Ideology & Political Thought in Byzantium, 1204-1330 (Cambridge, 2007).
79
Lampros (ed.), , 176.
18
regions and overran everything as far as Bithynia itself, in the absence of
anyone to oppose them, and enslaved it.
80



In these grievous times, Alexios I Komnenos restored the Empire. Bessarions narration
of these events function in two ways: The Seljuks are the latter-day Persai and take
their place in the primordial clash between the civilized and the barbarians. The
narration also works as a comparison between Alexios I Komnenos, savior of the Roman
Empire, and Alexios I Megas Komnenos (1204-1222), founder of the Empire of
Trebizond. The comparison, clearly intended as a standard rhetorical device to
demonstrate the worth of the latter ruler, shows not only that the Grand Komnenoi
were descended from the prestigious Komnenoi house, but also that they were
successful state-builders.
81
Thus, under the reign of the Grand Komnenoi, instead of
being enslaved by another, Trebizond enslaved many others and extended its
frontiers.
82

Bessarion praises Trebizond and the Grand Komnenoi at the expense of
Constantinople as we shall see. Most interestingly, Bessarion refers to
Constantinople with its ancient name, Byzantion, throughout his account. We
find similar usage also in Plethon and Laonikos Chalkokondyles. Further,
Bessarions and Chalkokondyles description of the translation of the capital to
Byzantion and the role of Constantine I in that event very closely follow that of
Plethon.
83
Plethon had said that Constantine I came to Byzantion from Rome and

80
Ibid., 182.
, , ,
,
.... ,
,
,
.
Part of this passage could also be translated as Since nothing stood in their way possibly
referring to walls. This ambiguity in the text, that it could alternately refer to human agency or
to walls, strengthens the argument that walls were associated with freedom.
81
Henry Maguire, The Art of Comparing in Byzantium, The Art Bulletin, vol. 70.1 (1988), 89.
Maguire calls the device of comparison an essential part of the mental equipment of any
educated Byzantine.
82
Lampros (ed.), , 184.
83
See supra footnote 78.
19
did not mention his conversion to Christianity in (lecture?) notes, synthesizing
the narratives of historians.
84
Chalkokondyles was even more laconic in his
description of the translation of the capital and omitted Constantine Is name
similar to Bessarion:
They turned over Rome to their great archbishop and crossed over to
Thrace. With the Emperor leading the way, they came upon Thrace, and settled in
the land that is nearest Asia; choosing Byzantion, a Hellenic city, to be their
metropolis
85

Bessarions choice to refer to Constantinople as Byzantion was deliberate
and systematic. He consistently referred to the city as Byzantion and did not
substantively engage with its imperial legacy. Bessarion makes five references to
Byzantion and glosses over the history of the Byzantine Empire from its inception
in the fourth century until the fifteenth century in the course of a few pages.
Such cursory treatment is significant. Constantinople, as second Rome, was
a prominent element of Roman identity before 1204.
86
In addition to being the
seat of government, Constantinople was the religious, economic, and cultural
center of the Empire. It was the common patris, a forum, both to the residents
and to all those who lived in the provinces.
87
Bessarions work reflects a complete
emancipation from this conception of Constantinople. The earliest instances of
this decentralizing tendency may be traced to the Latin occupation of
Constantinople which freed the provincial cities from the grasp of Constantinople
and allowed them to develop both urban institutions and also independent civic
identities.
88
Bessarions evaluation of Constantinople may thus be seen as part of a

84
Plethon, Monac. Gr. 490, fol. 155v. Ignatio Hardt, Catalogus Codicum Manusciptorum Graecorum
Bibliothecae Regiae Bavaricae (Munich, 1812), 126.
85
E. Dark (ed.), Laonici Chalcocandylae, vol. 1, 4.
, , ,
,
.
86
For the role of Constantinople as an important element in the construction of Byzantine
identity see Paul Magdalino, Constantinople and the Outside World, ed. D. Smythe, Strangers
to Themselves: The Byzantine Outsider (Variorum, 2000).
87
Ruth Macrides, The Competent Court, ed. Angeliki Laiou and Dieter Simons, Law and Society
in Byzantium, Ninth-Twelfth Centuries (Washington D.C., 1994), 121.
88
A. P. Kazhdan and Ann Wharton Epstein, Change in Byantine Culture in the Eleventh and Twelfth
Centuries, (Berkeley, 1985), 31-56. We also find a similar portrayal of Constantinople in Theodore
IIs enkomion on Nicaea. Foss, Nicaea, 148-149. Theodore contrasts the city of Constantine with
20
broader process of rising urban autonomy and his specifically classical Roman
emphasis over the medieval past, fares well with similar tendencies in
Renaissance Italy.
89
Indeed, by dating the subjugation of Trebizond to Roman rule
to a period prior to the translation of the capital to Byzantion, Bessarion
constructs a Roman identity for Trebizond that is independent of Constantinople.
In Bessarions account, Trebizond is configured as the last bastion of Roman
rule in the entire region of the eastern Mediterranean. Indeed, Nicaea and
Thessalonike, among other Byzantine cities, were already captured by the
Ottomans. As for Constantinople, Bessarion not only refers to the city as
Byzantion, he also points out that our city alone was seen to be superior and
impregnable against all and that Byzantion concedes to the barbarians and
received servitude.
90
Among all the previously Roman cities, Trebizond alone
was unconquered. Pamphilia, Cilicia, Galatia, Cappadocia, and Armenia, all were
enslaved. Every single city, every countryside, all races of people; they were
subjugated. Trebizond, graced by its geography and its distant location on the

the new capital of the Laskarids. (Constantinople) like some initiate pagan, ignored them (the
other cities). and that city was running away like a hired hand.
89
The Florentine Leonardo Bruni (c. 1370-1444), for example, was mining the Roman past and
Roman historians, in particular Livy, to offer a new vision of historiography, with a focus on
city-states, developing a theory of republicanism, distancing himself from the medieval period
and offering a tri-partite division of history (the classical period, the middle ages, and the
now of Bruni.) Hans Baron, The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance; Civic Humanism and
Republican Liberty in an Age of Classicism and Tyranny (Princeton, 1966); James Hankins, "The
''Baron Thesis'' after Forty Years and Some Recent Studies of Leonardo Bruni," Journal of the
History of Ideas 56.2 (1995); Quentin Skinner, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought. Volume 1,
the Renaissance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), passim.
90
Lampros (ed.), , 177. ,
,

. (emphasis added) This internal evidence may be helpful
in dating Bessarions enkomion to 1439-1440. Chalkokondyles writes that John VIII concluded
an agreement with Murad II after he returned to Constantinople from the Council of Florence-
Ferrara in 1439. E. Dark (ed.), Laonici Chalcocandylae, vol. 2, 80-81. The enkomion was previously
dated to circa 1436. See Saradi, The Monumenst in the Late Byzantine Ekphraseis of Cities,
180. By dating it to 1439-1440, a date that constitutes a shift in Byzantine politics, one better
understands Bessarions decision to accept the position of Cardinal and immigrate to Italy.
21
limits of Roman rule, escaped.
92
Laonikos Chalkokondyles, writing in the
aftermath of 1461, had also emphasized the superiority of Trebizond over
Constantinople. While Chalkokondyles refers to the Trapezuntine ruler Alexios IV
Komnenos (1417-1429) simply as Emperor in his dealings with Constantinople,
he qualifies the ruling Emperor in Constantinople, John VIII Palaiologos (1425-
1448) as Emperor of Byzantion and the Byzantines as the Hellenes of
Byzantion.
93

Bessarion envisaged rightful political authority in the context of a historical
process closely linked to freedom from barbarian rule. The citizens and the rulers
of Trebizond did not only possess the same cultural attributes, they were also
joined by sharing a common history. Bessarion defined Trapezuntine identity to
be foremost free, Hellenic and in possession of a long and distinguished history,
marked and defined by unceasing struggle with various barbarians. Roman
elements, as we have seen, contributed to the strength of that identity but did not
take part in the founding of the city. We could also say that Bessarion considered
the city of Trebizond to be heir to a tradition of governance, a medieval synthesis
of Hellenic and Roman cultural and administrative forms which had taken
centuries to evolve. As an urban community located in a rather constricted
physical space, the citizens of Trebizond must have created their identity through
imagined and shared pasts. The question remains regarding the extent to which
the common stock of images, concepts, events, and symbols which the citizens of
Trebizond associated with their history overlap with that of Bessarion.
95


Alas, Thessalonike Has Fallen
A cylindrical ivory pyxis, celebrating the reestablishment of Byzantine
rule in Thessalonike and the entry of John VII Palaiologos into the city in 1403,
commemorates the event. (Figure: 2) Oikonomides research has identified the
context for, and the identities of the two sets of Emperor, Empress and co-
Emperor depicted on the pyxis.
96
In addition, the pyxis has images of musicians,
dancers, and a model of the city which is presented to John VII. Oikonomides

92
Ibid.
93
E. Dark (ed.), Laonici Chalcocandylae, vol. 2, 219.
95
J. Fentress and C. Wickham Social Memory (Blackwell, 1992.)
96
Nicolas Oikonomides, John VII Palaeologus and the Ivory Pyxis at Dumbarton Oaks,
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 31 (1997): 329-37.
22
wrote that the festivities, visualized on the pyxis, allude to the Psalm 150 of
David:

Praise him with the sound of trumpet:
praise with the psaltery and harp.
Praise him with the timbrel and dance:
praise him with stringed instruments and organs.
Praise him upon the loud cymbals:
Praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.
Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.

An illuminated 11
th
century Byzantine Psalter supports Oikonomides identification.
97

(Figure: 3) This richly illuminated Psalter contains a full page painting, representing
fourteen dancing women who form a circle with eight musicians standing inside the
circle, which is inserted at the end of the Book of Psalms (Psalm 150 of David). The
illumination is also inscribed with the name of Miriam, a reference to Miriams song in
Exodus, part of the Orthodox liturgy, and more generally to the victory of Moses over
the Egyptians:

20. And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her
hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with
dances.
21. And Miriam answered them, sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed
gloriously; the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea.


97
Tilman Seebass, Iconography and Dance Research, Yearbook for Traditional Music 23 (1991):
37-40. Ioli Kalavrezou, 142. Psalter in ed. Helen C. Evans and William D. Wixom, The Glory of
Byzantium: Art and Culture of the Middle Byzantine Era A. D. 843-1261 (New York, 1997), 206-207. For
the manuscript more generally see Ioli Kalavrezou, Nicolette Trahoulia, and Shalom Sabar,
Critique of the Emperor in the Vatican Psalter gr. 752, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 47 (1993): 195-
219. Following the interpretation Kalavrezou et al. suggest in this article, the painting of the
chorus of dancers and musicians might be related to Michael Keroularios being hailed as a
martyr by those within the walls of the city (symbolized by the dancers) after Keroularios
death. As the last miniature in the Psalter, it would be a suitable image to describe the outcome
of the confrontation between Keroularios and Isaac Komnenos.
23
In this section, it is worth exploring the significance of such representations of dancers
and musicians in Byzantine art and literature. Not only did images of dancers allude to
victory celebrations, they also functioned as personifications of city-walls, further
demonstrating the association of walls with victory. Metochites, in his enkomion on
Nicaea, describes the fortifications of the city:

Their (fortifications) friendliness to one another and unwillingness to
stand far apart might look to you like some surrounding circle of dancers,
orderly and very pleasing for the city to enjoy within, yet armed, if an
enemy approach them from outside, and unsociable for him to meet with.
98


In like manner, the joyous figures on the ivory pyxis from Thessalonike are partly
formed by a circle of dancers and musicians and celebrate the return of the city to
Byzantine rule. Further, the model of the city, presented to John VII, is a fortified castle,
which was the symbol of the city depicted on coins from Thessalonike.
99
The fortified
castle/acropolis was both the seat of government and palace in Thessalonike, similar in
function to the palace situated on the acropolis in Trebizond. These visual and literary
examples illustrate that the fortifications and the citadel did not only serve to defend
the city. They were an intimate component of civic identity, physical manifestations of
the citys history, strength, and wisdom.
There are numerous enkomia on Thessalonike, celebrating the citys such
exemplary qualities.
100
A greater number of these enkomia are similar to the Nicaean
Orations. They provide an ekphrasis of the city and praise its fortifications, citadel
(acropolis), buildings, natural resources, the education and worth of its citizens. These
enkomia closely follow rhetorical models, elaborated as early as the 3
rd
century by
Menander. They also provide original information. By way of example, one may
mention Nikephoros Choumnos and Demetrios Kydones works. Choumnos, appointed
governor of Thessalonike in 1309, wrote an encomiastic letter to the citizens of the city.
As well as providing an ekphrasis of the city, Choumnos also appealed to the citizens to

98
Foss, Nicaea, 175 (emphasis added).
99
Ccile Morrisson, The Emperor, the Saint, and the City: Coinage and Money in Thessalonike
from the Thirteenth to the Fifteenth Century.
100
Herbert Hunger, Laudes Thessalonicenses, .
, 50 1939-1989, (Thessalonike, 1992), 101-13; Franz Tinnefeld, Intellectuals in Late
Byzantine Thessalonike, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 57 (2003), 153-72; B. Nerantze-Barmaze,
(Thessalonike, 1999).
24
practice justice in government, touching upon current problems of the city such as
the venality of the judges and the lawyers.
101
Demetrios Kydones, writing a monody on
the fall of the city to the Zealots in 1345, skillfully weaved together the praise of the
city with a condemnation of the murder of its citizens during the uprising.
102

A standard variant of city enkomia were laments, composed on the occasion of
the citys fall to the enemy. Kydones monody on the fall of Thessalonike to the Zealots
may qualify as such a lament. More radical examples, depicting the fall of the city to
the Ottoman Turks in 1430, utilize the same rhetorical toolsreferences to
fortifications, buildings, political constitution, citizensbut they invert all the good
qualities associated with the city. Mark Eugenikos, Metropolitan of Ephesos, and his
brother John Eugenikos wrote two such laments on the fall of Thessalonike.
103
These
laments examine the absence of lawful rule in 1430. The structural oppositions
betweencivilized/Barbarian, Christian/Saracen, Divine order/Chaos, inside/outside
already present in the Nicaean Orations and partly in Bessarions Enkomion on
Trebizond, are developed to their natural conclusions. The enemy is no longer an
enemy in battle but an abominable enemy, an opponent so markedly different in
manner of speech, custom, and political organization, or lack thereof, that he is
configured as the ultimate other.
In 1430 during the Ottoman siege, the fortifications gave way to the barbarians.
Wail O Walls and Cities writes John Eugenikos.
104
The implications could not be
clearer. Formerly, the fortifications were joyous structures embodying the victory of
God and tangible displays of Biblical scripture. The city being sacked by the Ottomans,
the citizens did not sing the song of Miriam nor did the fortifications appear to dance in
a stately and delightful manner. Instead of songs of victory, they were expected to sing
songs of lament. John Eugenikos continues to write that it was the barbarians, savage
animals descended from Hagar, who danced a wild dance, rattling and singing songs of
triumph.
105
Mark Eugenikos, too, used similar symbolism: The cursed barbarian danced
around the holy churches and the raging mad mouths raised a war-cry upon the sacred

101
Tinnefeld, Intellectuals in Late Byzantine Thessalonike, 165.
102
Demetrios Kydones, Patrologia Graeca vol. 109 (1863), coll. 639-52; J. W. Barker (tr.), The
Monody of Demetrios Kydones on the Zealot Rising of 1345 in Thessalonike,
(Thessalonike, 1975), 285-300.
103
Marios I. Pilavakis and Dimitrios Vamvakas (ed. and tr.), (Athens, 1977.)
104
Ibid., 80.
105
Ibid.
25
altar and profaned.
106
Using and inverting symbolically laden motifs, such as the
fortifications and the dancing and singing associated with victory celebrations, the
encomiasts were able to convey the extent to which they believed Thessalonike was
destroyed, both its physical site but more importantly its institutions.
In these Laments, the ideal government is a thing of the far past and Mark
Eugenikos urges his audience to remember that time when the city was once ruled by
pious Emperors who had secured the city, furnishing it with what is needed.
107
He
continues to state that To have been governed and then to have fallen is worse than to
have never been governed.
108
Describing the fall of Thessalonike, the author writes
that the city was demolished to its foundations and completely obliterated.
109

The history of the city of Thessalonike during the 14
th
and 15
th
centuries,
complicated and reflecting the political disorder of the Byzantine polity during this
time, confirms Mark Eugenikos criticism concerning lack of proper rule. Hotly
contested in the 13
th
century between the Despotate of Epiros and the Empire of Nicaea,
Thessalonike was incorporated into the Nicaean Empire in 1246 during the reign of
John Vatatzes. During the Second Civil War in the 1340s, the opponents of John VI
Kantakouzenos(1347-1354) killed his aristocratic supporters in Thessalonike.
110
The
Zealots established political rule over the city. Such autonomy of political rule was
unprecedented in Byzantine history. Thessalonike was returned to the fold of the
Byzantine Empire in 1349. The city benefitted from Manuel II Palaiologos rule, who
established himself in Thessalonike in 1382 and withstood Ottoman encroachments.
Yet, such resistance did not prove to be adequate. The Ottomans captured Thessalonike
in 1387. A turn of fortune, the defeat of the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid I by the army of
Timur at the battle of Ankara in 1402, resulting in the Ottoman civil war, allowed the
Byzantines to reincorporate Thessalonike into the Empire, which is the event being
celebrated on the Dumbarton Oaks ivory pyxis.
111
In the 15
th
century the meager

106
Ibid., 42. ,
.
107
Ibid., 64.
108
Ibid., 64.

, .
109
Ibid., 48.
110
O. Tafrali, Thessalonique au quatorzime sicle (Paris, 1913); Peter Charanis, Internal Strife in
Byzantium, Byzantion, 15 (1941): 208-30.
111
For a narrative account of the Ottoman civil war, see Dimitris J. Kastritsis, The Sons of Bayezid:
Empire Building and Representation in the Ottoman Civil War of 1402-1413 (Leiden, Boston, 2007).
26
Byzantine forces were inadequate to defend the city and the citizens of Thessalonike
turned over their city to the Venetians in 1422.
During the Ottoman siege in 1430, the majority of the Latins, rulers of the city,
escaped the city and sailed to Meteora.
112
Shaking from fear and uncertainty, the Latins
do not come across as particularly courageous nor as worthy citizens of the city in
Mark Eugenikos account. Indeed, it would be more righteous to die on such a day,
Mark Eugenikos reminds us, than to face eternal damnation.
113
The Venetians and the
notables of the city do not act morally, but shamefully, considering their worldly
escape more important than their salvation.
114
The poor citizens of the city, on the
other hand, took refuge in the churches. The Venetians are not presented as ideal
rulers by the anti-unionist Mark Eugenikos. Such evaluation of the governing body is in
stark contrast to the other enkomia. Laskaris, Metochites, and Bessarion provide
narratives wherein the ideal overlaps with the actual. The Venetians, on the other
hand, lacked the necessary qualities associated with proper governance, according to
Mark Eugenikos. By 1430 Thessalonike was no longer part of the Roman polity. Both
John and Mark Eugenikos make references to the glorious past of the city under Roman
rule. Since the city was stripped of Roman administrative structures, Christianity
appears as the most important component of civic identity according to these authors.
Mark and John Eugenikos adopted the view that constructed proper rule as Christian
rule and did not significantly develop the Hellenic component. Thus, Mark Eugenikos
conceptualization, who was also a student of Plethon, is markedly different from that of
his contemporary Bessarion, alerting us to the different ways in which the Byzantine
heritage was being evaluated at this time. However, an emphasis on freedom is
similarly implicit in these laments on Thessalonike since the event which the
encomiasts choose to elaborate is the loss of that freedom.

The barbarians are distinguished from the citizens, not by their lack of
understanding of Hellenic culture or Roman political structures, but by their lack of
Orthodoxy. The authors supply certain attributes to describe the barbarians; these are
exact negations of Christian values: The barbarians are murderous, killing even

112
Marios I. Pilavakis and Dimitrios Vamvakas, , 36.

.
113
Ibid., 38. ,

,
, .
114
Ibid., 40. ,
.
27
pregnant women, the old, and the holy monks
115
; They are licentious, dragging and
defiling pious virgins out of their houses, treating them as if they were toys in a
brothel
116
; They have no respect for the holy, looting churches, defiling the abodes of
the saints, and trampling upon icons; They are greedy, desiring the gold, silver, and
precious stones which adorn the shrines, with no understanding for the proper
contexts of these objects.
117

Symeon , the Archbishop of Thessalonike (1416/7-1429), who opposed both the
Venetians and the Turks, similarly argued that Christianity should be the guiding spirit
in a polity. The Archbishop was instrumental in turning over the city to the Latins
rather than to the Ottomans in 1422.
118
The Ottomans, upon capturing the city,
considered the already deceased Archbishop responsible for the Latin rule and ripped
his body apart and defiled the grave, according to Mark Eugenikos.
119
Symeon of
Thessalonikes role as community leader and policy maker is symptomatic of the nature
of politics in the late period. The clergy gained both in charisma and in actual power.
Symeon of Thessalonikes commentary on the anointment of the Emperor by the
Patriarch, is symbolic of the relation between the two:
In the palace of Christ, sole eternal king, the emperor was answerable to
the patriarch, who alone was qualified to confer the insignia of power and
to sanctify kingship, because he possessed on earth the power of the Holy
Spirit.
120


Dagron writes that the role of the Byzantine Emperor was reduced to that of an
attendant in the Church in the fifteenth century.
121
The Church, on the other hand,

115
Ibid., 40, 44.
116
Ibid., 44.

.
117
Ibid., 42. , ,
,

,
,
.
118
David Balfour, Politico-Historical Works of Symeon Archbishop of Thessalonike (1416/7 to 1429)
(Vienna, 1979), 164-65.
119
Marios I. Pilavakis and Dimitrios Vamvakas, , 46.
120
Gilbert Dagron, Emperor and Priest: The Imperial Office in Byzantium, tr. J. Birrell, (Cambridge,
2003), 280.
121
Gilbert Dagron, Emperor and Priest, 278-81.
28
gained both in influence and in prestige. It comes as no surprise that the Orthodox
Church, recognized by Mehmed II in the aftermath of 1453 as an Ottoman institution,
would become the institutional legacy of the Byzantine period. Thus, Mark and John
Eugenikos lament the fall of the Christian city and Christianity is the defining attribute
that distinguishes Thessalonike from the enemy.

The late medieval intellectuals wrote their city enkomia to illustrate the ways in
which just rule was associated with urban forms of government. Further, they used the
foil of the other and the barbarian to elaborate the antithesis to such rule.
Metochites and Laskaris, closely following rhetorical models for writing city-enkomia,
constructed a narrative, paying tribute to all the necessary elements: fortifications,
history of the city, and the worth of its citizens. What is distinctive in these 13
th
century
enkomia is that the encomiasts were already focused on the Hellenic identity of the
city, stressing classical Greek models of rule in addition to Roman structures. Indeed,
classical Greek models were more suitable for describing and evaluating a city-state or
rather a state with a more limited hinterland than, for example, middle Byzantine
political models.
According to the encomiasts of Trebizond, the distinguishing characteristic of
the city was its freedom. John Eugenikos did not supply much information regarding
the nature of such freedom, only expressing its relation to the defenses of the city.
Bessarion chose to write a historical narrative to properly praise the city. Freedom, he
argued, should be conceptualized as being free from despotic barbarian rule. In the
opening paragraph of his enkomion, Bessarion wrote that humans are the only living
things who are free, employing classical Greek political philosophy at the outset to
emphasize his position as a Hellene.
122
Thus, a proper ruling structure is one that allows
the citizens to exercise their freedom. The encomiast proceeded to illustrate, utilizing a
dialectical historical narrative that such rule is only provided by Hellenic and Roman
administrative structures and never by barbarian states. Bessarions narrative also
functions as a critique of fifteenth-century Constantinople in line with that of Plethon
and of Laonikos Chalkokondyles, foreshadowing Bessarions eventual decision to
immigrate to Italy.
As for Thessalonike, the two laments written by John and Mark Eugenikos
provided a somewhat different evaluation of what constitutes proper rule. These
laments are infused with Christian motifs, downplaying Hellenic and Roman elements.
However these enkomia are also constructed around an opposition to the other.

122
Lampros, , 146.
29
Abandoning Roman and Hellenic models, the encomiasts retained traditional motifs
associated with the city, such as those of dancers and musicians, and used these motifs
to paint a massacre scene. John and Mark Eugenikos evaluated the contemporary
(Venetian) or recent (late 14
th
century Byzantine) ruling structures of Thessalonike and
found them to be deficient. This is quite different from the enkomia on Nicaea and
Trebizond, wherein the encomiasts praised the political structures of their hometowns.
In spite of their differences, both with respect to genre (oration, historical
narrative, lament) and content, these city enkomia make use of a shared vocabulary of
motifs and symbols. The encomiasts chose to elaborate on the fortifications of these
cities. The fortifications were not purely defensive structures. They played an
important role in the construction of autonomous civic identities. The image of the
city, either its citadel or its external circuit of defenses, was used on coins and other
visual media to represent all that was within. The external circuit of defenses also
played a more symbolic role, marking the limits of a rationally governed polity.
Metochites reference to the walls as orderly dancers and John and Mark Eugenikos use
of the symbolism associated with walls to refer to the barbarians suggest that walls
were not merely physical structures but were perceived in human terms and with a
component of free will.
30
LIST OF FIGURES:

1) BILLON POLITIKON
Probably Constantinople, circa 1340-1360
Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, DC (58.160)
(photo courtesy of the Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine Collection, Washington DC)

2) Pyxis with Castle, Royal Figures, Dancers, and Musicians
Thessalonike?, 1403-1404(?)
Dumbarton Oaks, Washingthon, DC (36.24)
(photo courtesy of the Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine Collection, Washington DC)

3) Miniature with Miriam, Dancers, and Musicians from Byzantine Psalter, 1058/9
Vat. Gr. 752, fol. 449v
(photo after H. Evans and W. Wixom, The Glory of Byzantium, pl.142)



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