OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

met, the Greeks" enjoyed above sixty years thebenefit of this equal partition. Encouraged bythe ministers of the divan, who wished to eludethe fanaticism of the sultan, the Christian advo-cates presumed to allege that this division hadbeen an act, not of generosity, but of justice;not a concession, but a compact; and that if onehalf of the city had been taken by storm, theother moiety had surrendered on the faith of asacred capitulation. The original grant had in-deed been consumed by fire; but the loss wassupplied by the testimony of three aged janiza-ries who remembered the transaction; and theirvenal oaths are of more weight in the opinion ofCantemir, than the positive and unanimous con-sent of the history of the times. p

The remaining fragments of the Greek king-dom in Europe and Asia I shall abandon to the perial fa.;Turkish arms; but the final extinction of the two Comnenualast dynasties ' 1 which have reigned in Constan- “ 0 < ^ 1 “"-

• From the Turco-Graecia of Crusius, &c. Spondanus (a. d. 1453,

No. 21, 1458, No. 16) describes the slavery and domestic quarrels ofthe Greek church. The patriarch who succeeded Gennadius threwhimself in despair into a well.

p Cantemir (p. 101-105) insists on the unanimous consent of theTurkish historians, ancient as well as modern, and argues, that theywould not have violated the truth to diminish their national glory,since it is esteemed more honourable to take a city by force than bycomposition. But, 1. I doubt this consent, since he quotes no parti-cular historian, and the Turkish annals of Leunclavius affirm, with-out exception, that Mahomet took Constantinople per vim (p. 329). 2.

The same argument may be turned in favour of the Grpeksof the times,who would not have forgotten this honourable and salutary treaty. Vol-taire , as usual, prefers the Turks to the Christians.

’ For the genealogy and fall of the Comneni of Trebizoud see Dit-cange (Fam. Byzant. p. 195); for the last Palaeologi , the same accu-rate antiquarian (p. 244,247,248). The Palaeologi of Montferrat werenot extinct till the next century; but they had forgotten their Greekorigin and kindred.

VOL. XII,

241

CHAP.

LXVIII.

K