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THE ARAB CONQUEST OF EGYPT
REVOLT OF HERACLIUS
At the opening of the seventh century the Roman Empire seemed passing
from decline to dissolution. Sixty years earlier the power of Justinian had
spread from the Caucasus and Arabia in the east to the Pillars of Hercules in
the west, and his strong personality so filled men's minds that it seemed, as
the phrase ran, as if “the whole world would not contain him”. His splendour was equal to his power, and for a while at least
his wisdom was equal to his splendour. Moreover his
triumphs in the realms of science and art were even more striking than his
exploits in war : for of the two foremost achievements by which his name is
remembered, the Code and Digest of Justinian still remain the greatest
masterpieces of jurisprudence, while the Cathedral of St. Sophia stands to all
time as the most splendid monument and model of Byzantine architecture.
But the menace of decay was felt even in Justinian’s lifetime. To the
mischief, moral and political, which threatened the state, were added physical
calamities. The whole of the East was scourged by a plague, which broke out at Pelusium, and swept through Egypt to Libya and through
Palestine to Persia and Constantinople. After the plague came an earthquake,
which wrought almost as much destruction to the cities as the black death to
the peoples of the Empire. The last days of the great lawgiver were clouded by
a sense of gloom and foreboding. The government was breaking up, even before
his successor Justin closed his brief and nerveless reign in insanity.
Tiberius, who came to the throne in 578, gave some promise of better things. He
might at least have essayed to arrest the process of decay: but his life was
cut short before he could prove his worth, and he bequeathed to Maurice a
bankrupt exchequer, a discontented people, and a realm out of joint.
Only a man of the strongest brain and of unerring judgment could have
dealt with such a crisis: and Maurice, though well-meaning, was not the man for
the task. That blind disregard of changing circumstance which so often ruins
the application of wise principles marred and thwarted his policy. His army
reforms and his knowledge of military tactics—on which he wrote
excellently—could not save his forces from defeat; while his zeal for economy
to repair the finances of the state failed in its purpose, and so estranged and
wearied his people, that they tossed the crown contemptuously to an illiterate
and deformed rebel centurion—Phocas.
It now seemed as if nothing could save the Empire from ruin. The only
strength of Phocas was that of a tyrant upheld by a licentious army and a
corrupt nobility—a strength which diminished with every mile’s distance from
the capital. Thus all the provinces of the Empire lay under a kind of agony of
misrule, which was probably lightest in the regions torn by war with the
Persians or with the northern barbarians.
Certainly no part of the Roman dominion was in worse plight than Egypt.
There Justinian’s efforts to force the orthodox religion on the nonconforming
Copts had been partly balanced by Theodora’s open sympathy for their creed :
but all such sympathy was recklessly cancelled by Justin. So the ancient and
bitter strife between the Melkite and Monophysite parties was more embittered than ever : and for
the Copts it filled the whole horizon of thought and hope. Where the two
mainsprings of government were the religious ascendency and the material profit
of the Byzantine Court, and where the machinery worked out steady results of oppression
and misery, it is small wonder that the clash of arms was often heard in
Alexandria itself, while not only was Upper Egypt haunted by bands of brigands
and harried by raids of Beduins or Nubians, but even
the Delta was the scene of riots and feuds little short of civil war. The fact
is that the whole country was in a state of smouldering insurrection.
Phocas’ reign began on November 22, a.d. 602.
On that day he was crowned with all due solemnity by the Patriarch Cyriacus in the church of St. John at Constantinople, and
entering the city by the Golden Gate drove in state by the great colonnades and
through the principal streets amid crowds that received him with joyful
acclamations. By the beginning of the year 609 the Empire was ready for
revolution. It began at Pentapolis. The common form which the story takes is
that Crispus, who had married the daughter of Phocas, incurred the Emperor’s
furious resentment by setting up his own statue with that of his bride in the
Hippodrome : and that having thus quarrelled, he
plotted rebellion and invited Heraclius, the Prefect of Africa, to put the
scheme in action. The fact however is—and Cedrenus expressly records it—that Heraclius was planning insurrection unbidden of
Crispus. Indeed Crispus was not the man to take any initiative : but when he
heard of the unrest in Pentapolis, then he ventured to send secret letters of
encouragement, and promised help in the event of Heraclius making a movement on
Constantinople. Heraclius himself was somewhat old for an adventure of the
kind—he cannot have been less than sixty-five—but in his son and namesake, who
was now in the prime of life, and in Nicetas his friend and lieutenant-general,
he saw at once the fitting instruments of his design.
The plan of campaign has been much misunderstood. Gibbon lends the
great weight of his authority to the somewhat childish story that the two
commanders agreed upon a race to the capital, the one advancing by sea and the
other by land, while the crown was to reward the winner. They were starting, be
it remembered, from Cyrene : and given anything like similar forces at
starting, surely a more unequal competition was never devised. Heraclius had
merely to cross the Mediterranean, coast along Greece and Macedonia, and then
to fling his army on the capital: while Nicetas, according to the received
theory, marching to Egypt, had to tear that country from the, grasp of Phocas,
then to make a long and toilsome journey through Palestine, Syria, Cilicia and
Asia Minor, under such conditions that even a succession of brilliant victories
or the collapse of all resistance would, in mere point of time, put him out of
the running for the prize. No : if there was any idea at all of a race for
empire, which is extremely doubtful, the course was marked out with far more
simplicity and equality. For it must be obvious that the province of Pentapolis
could not have furnished material for a very considerable army, still less for
two armies : and what the leader of each expedition had to do was not merely to
set out for Byzantium, but to raise the standard of revolt as he went, to
gather supplies and reinforcements, and then possibly to unite in dealing a
crushing blow at the capital. In pursuance of this plan Heraclius was to
adventure by sea and Nicetas by land—unquestionably: but what Gibbon and the
Greek historians have failed to see clearly is this—that while the immediate
objective of Heraclius was Thessalonica, that of Nicetas was Alexandria : and
that all depended on the accession or subjugation of these two towns for the
success of the enterprise.
It is hardly doubtful that Heraclius had intimate relations with the
people of Thessalonica, or at least with a party among them: while Nicetas
calculated on a welcome or a slight resistance in Egypt, though, as will be
shown, his calculations were upset by the unforeseen intervention of a
formidable enemy. But I must again insist—in opposition to Gibbon—that Nicetas’
one aim was the conquest of Egypt: that Egypt was the pivot on which his
combinations with Heraclius turned, and the only barrier between him and
Constantinople: and that, when once he possessed the recruiting ground and the
granary of the Nile together with the shipping and dockyards of Alexandria, it
would have been madness to plunge through Syria and Asia instead of moving
straight to the Dardanelles and joining forces with Heraclius.
This then was the plan : Heraclius with his galleys was to make for
Thessalonica and there prepare a formidable fleet and army, while Nicetas was
to occupy Alexandria—the second city of the Empire—so as at once to cut off the
corn supplies from Constantinople, and to secure the strongest base for
equipping an armament against Phocas, or at least to prevent his deriving help
from that quarter.
The whole incident is dismissed by the well-known Byzantine historians
in a few lines, and the part played by Egypt in the revolution has hitherto
scarcely been suspected. But an entirely new chapter of Egyptian history has
been opened since the discovery—or rather since the translation into a European
language—of an Ethiopic MS. version of the Chronicle of John, bishop of Nikiou,
an important town in the Delta of Egypt. John himself, who lived in the latter
half of the seventh century of our era, must have spoken with many old men who
witnessed or remembered the events connected with the downfall of Phocas. His
Chronicle, therefore, is of very great importance. In spite of its passage from
language to language, where the MS. is not mutilated, its accuracy is often
most minute and striking: and though there are errors and inconsistencies, they
are balanced by the amount of new knowledge which it discloses. Indeed the work
throws all sorts of novel and curious lights on the history of the Eastern
Empire, of the Patriarchs of Alexandria, and of Egypt generally during a period
of extraordinary interest—a period which has suffered even greater neglect than
is warranted by the scantiness and imperfection of the materials; and it
supplements and corrects in many curious ways the inadequate and faulty
narratives of Theophanes, Cedrenus, and Nicephorus.
THE STRUGGLE FOR EGYPT
From the Egyptian bishop’s Chronicle we learn that even in Pentapolis
there was some fighting. By large expenditure of money Heraclius assembled here
a force of 3,000 men and an army of barbarians, i.e. doubtless Berbers, which he placed under the command of ‘Bonakis’
as he is called in the Ethiopic corruption of a Greek name. By their aid he won
an easy victory over the imperial generals Mardius, Ecclesiarius, and Isidore, and at one blow put an end to
the power of Phocas in that part of Africa. At the same time, Kisil the governor
of Tripolis sent a contingent which probably passed
to the south of Pentapolis. In any case Nicetas now began his advance along the
coast towards Alexandria, and was joined at some point by both Kisil and
Bonakis. He was secure of a friendly reception up to the very borders of Egypt:
for Leontius, Prefect of Mareotis, the Egyptian province on the western side of
Alexandria, had been won over, and had promised a considerable body of troops.
It is thought that nowadays such a march would lie almost entirely
through a waterless desert; but there is abundant evidence to show that in the
seventh century of our era there were many flourishing towns, palm groves, and
fertile tracts of country, where now little is known or imagined to be but a
waste of rocks and burning sands. The subject is one of some interest to
scholars and to explorers, and some brief remarks upon it may be pardoned. From
Ptolemy we know that the province of Cyrene ceased on the eastern side at a
city called Darnis, where the province of Marmarica began. Moving eastward, Nicetas must have passed
among other places the city of Axilis, the towns of Paluvius, Batrachus, and Antipyrgus, and the promontory of Cataeonium,
all in the nome of Marmarica.
The nome of Libya began near Panormus,
and included among other towns Catabathmus, Selinus, and Paraetonium, or
Ammonia as it was also called according to Strabo. Paraetonium was the capital and the seat of government of the Prefect: the name seems to
have lingered in the Arabic Al Barton. Still further east in the same nome we come to Hermea, then to Leucaspis; and half way between Leucaspis and Chimovicus began the nome of Mareotis, in which the best known towns were Plinthine in Tainia, Taposiris Magna,
the fortress of Chersonesus, and the city of Marea or Mareotis.
Both Ptolemy and Strabo give many other names, and it is certain that in
the first century Egyptian territory was regarded as ending where Cyrenaic
began, and that there was no break of impassable country between them. Later
the nome of Libya suffered some decay, and in the
sixth century Justinian compensated the Prefect for the poverty of his province
by throwing the nome of Mareotis in with his
government. But even then the way from Pentapolis to Alexandria was in
well-defined stages, with no serious gaps or breaks : nor had the continuous
character of the route changed at the time of which I am writing. This is
proved beyond doubt. For we know that early in the seventh century the Persian
army, after the subjugation of Egypt, moved on by land to the conquest of
Pentapolis, and returned after a successful campaign, in which, according to
Gibbon, were finally exterminated the Greek colonies of Cyrene. This, be it
remembered, was only eight or nine years after the march of Nicetas. But Gibbon
is altogether mistaken in his view of the devastation wrought by Chosroes’
troops in that region. Great it was, but in no way fatal or final. On the
contrary, less than thirty years later, when 'Amr Ibn al Asi the Saracen captured
Alexandria, his thoughts turned naturally to Pentapolis, and to Pentapolis he
went, conquering Barca and Cyrene. There is no record
or hint of either mar.ch being regarded as a great military achievement or triumph
over natural difficulties.
Indeed nothing could be more false than to picture the route as lying
across inhospitable deserts. For there is express evidence that practically the
whole of the coast provinces west of Egypt continued well populated and well
cultivated for some three centuries after they fell under Arab dominion. The
Arab writer Al Makrizi mentions the city of Lubiah as the centre of a province
between Alexandria and Marakiah, showing that the classical names Libya and Marmarica were retained by the Arabs almost unaltered. In
another passage he says that, after passing the cities of Lubiah and Marakiah,
one enters the province of Pentapolis: and Al Kudai and Al Masudi concur in
similar testimony. The canton of Lubiah contained twenty-four boroughs besides
villages. Makrizi’s account of Marakiah—taken from Quatre-mère's version of it—is in substance as follows : “Marakiah
is one of the western districts of Egypt, and forms the limit of the country.
The city of that name is two stages, or twenty-four miles, distant from Santariah.
Its territory is very extensive and contains a vast number of palm-trees, of
cultivated fields, and of running springs. There the fruits have a delicious flavour, and the soil is so rich that every grain of wheat
sown produces from ninety to a hundred ears. Excellent rice too grows in great
abundance. Even at the present day there are very many gardens in this canton.
Formerly Marakiah was occupied by tribes of Berbers; but in the year 304 a.h. (916 a.d.) the inhabitants
of Lubiah and Marakiah were so harried by the Prince of Barca that they withdrew to Alexandria. From that date onwards Marakiah steadily
declined, and now it is almost in ruins. But it still preserves some remnant of
its ancient splendor.
The last words evidently refer to the city, not the province : they are
remarkable as showing how much was left even in 1400 a.d. and we may mention, as at any rate curious, the fact that the Portolanos, or Venetian navigation charts, of about the
year 1500, show at least an unbroken series of names along this part of the
shores of the Mediterranean. But Makrizi has also something to say of Mareotis.
Formerly he declares that it was covered with houses and gardens, which at one
time were dotted over the whole country westward up to the very frontiers of Barca. In his own time Mareotis was only a town in the
canton of Alexandria, and used that city as the market for the abundant produce
of its fruit-gardens. Champollion says that under the old Egyptian Empire it
was the capital of Lower Egypt, and gradually sank into decay after the foundation
of Alexandria. In the time of Vergil and Strabo it was, as they testify, at
least renowned for its wine. To-day the ruins that mark the site, twelve miles
west of Alexandria, are practically unknown, but the soil beneath the sand is
found to be alluvial, in confirmation of its ancient repute for fertility.
It is, then, clear that before the Arab conquest there was a continuous
chain of towns, and an almost unbroken tract of cultivated land, stretching
from Alexandria to Cyrene, and that the march of Nicetas demanded no great
qualities of generalship or endurance. Even at the present time it is probable
that the difficulties of the route are greatly exaggerated: for Muslim pilgrims
constantly make their way on foot from Morocco, Tunis, and Tripoli along the
coast to Egypt. The country abounds in Greek and Roman remains; but the people
are fanatics of the lowest type. The wandering Arab keeps out the wandering
scholar, and the whole region, though its shores are washed by the
Mediterranean and lie almost in sight of Italy and Greece, is more lost to
history and to archaeology than if it were in the heart of the Sahara. The fact
is, of course, as much due to the rule of the Turk as to the fanaticism of the Beduin: but the two form a combination enough to make travel
almost impossible. But if ever the country falls under a civilized power, it
will be a splendid field for exploration, and might even, with proper
engineering works, resume something of its ancient fertility and prosperity.
This digression, however, has taken long enough. It enables us to follow
the movements of Nicetas’ army, and to infer that though he met with few perils
on the way, yet that the time occupied on the march must have been
considerable. Meanwhile in the Egyptian capital plot and counterplot were
working. Theodore, son of Menas, who had been Prefect of Alexandria under the
Emperor Maurice, and one Tenkera (by whom Zotenberg wrongly thinks Crispus may be meant), had engaged together to put Phocas to
death and secure the crown for Heraclius. The Melkite Patriarch of Alexandria, another Theodore, who had received his seat from
Phocas, knew nothing of this conspiracy; but John, the Governor of the Province
and Commander of the Garrison, and yet another Theodore, the Controller of
Finance, revealed it to him: whereupon the three addressed a joint letter of
warning to Phocas.
The Emperor well knew the uncertain temper of the Egyptians : and, with
a view to humour them, he had lately sent from Syria
a large consignment of lions and leopards for a wild-beast show, together with
a collection of fetters and instruments of torture, as well as robes of honour and money, for just apportionment between his
friends and foes. But on receipt of the letter from the Patriarch, while
professing to disdain the menace of revolt, yet knowing the supreme necessity
of holding Egypt at all costs, he neither faltered in resolve nor paltered in
action. Summoning the Prefect of Byzantium, he took from him a solemn oath of
allegiance, and dispatched him with large reinforcements both for Alexandria
and for the important garrison towns of Manuf and Athrib in the Delta. At the
same time he sent urgent orders to Bonosus in Syria to hurl all his available
troops on Egypt. For Bonosus was now at Antioch, where he had been sent, with
the title of ‘Count of the East’ to crush a revolt of the Jews against the Christians—a
revolt which seems to have been rather religious than political, although the
threads of politics and of religion are often indistinguishable in the tissue
of history at this period. Yet so well or so ill did Bonosus achieve his bloody
work by wholesale massacre, by hanging, drowning, burning, torturing, and
casting to wild beasts, that he earned a name of execration and terror. Indeed
he was a man after Phocas own heart—a ‘ferocious hyena’ who revelled in slaughter—and he hailed Phocas’ message with delight.
Meanwhile Nicetas was nearing Alexandria on the west. The town of
Kabsain (which may possibly be identified with Fort Chersonesus)
surrendered, and the garrison were spared, but the prisoners of the revolting
faction were released and joined the march. Messengers were sent on ahead to
spread the rebellion in the country round the Dragon Canal —so called from its
serpentine windings—which was close to the city. But finding that the imperial
forces, strong in numbers and well armed, barred his
passage here, Nicetas summoned the general to surrender. “Stand aside from our
path”, he said, “and remain neutral, pending the issue of the war. If we fail,
you will not suffer; if we succeed, you shall be Governor of Egypt. But the
reign of Phocas is finished!”. The answer was brief—“We fight to the death for
Phocas”, and the battle began. It is probable that the general was the one
under special oath to defend the Emperor, and that he fought with better heart
than his soldiers. For Nicetas was completely victorious: the imperial general
was killed, and his head set on a pike and borne with the conquering standards
through the Moon Gate into the city, where no further resistance was offered.
John, the Governor, and Theodore, the Controller of Finance, took refuge in the
church of St. Theodore in the eastern part of the town : while the Melkite Patriarch fled to the church of St. Athanasius,
which stood by the sea shore. John of Nikiou is silent concerning the
Patriarch’s fate; but we know from other sources that he perished.
The clergy and people now assembled, and agreed in their detestation of
Bonosus and his wild beasts and in their welcome to Heraclius' general. They set
the head of the slain commander on the gate; seized the palace and government
buildings, as well as the control of the corn and the exchequer; took
possession of all Phocas’ treasure; and last, but not least, secured the island
and fortress of Pharos and all the shipping. For Pharos, as Caesar saw and said
long before, was one key of Egypt, as Pelusium was
the other. Thus master of the capital, Nicetas dispatched Bonakis to carry the
revolution through the Delta. It proved an easy task, for everywhere the native
Egyptians hated the rule of Byzantium. Town after town made common cause with
the delivering army. Nikiou, with its bishop Theodore, flung open its gates: at
Manuf the faction in revolt plundered the house of Aristomachus,
the imperial governor, and those of the leading Romans; and nearly every
Prefect and every town cast in its lot against Phocas : so that after a
triumphant progress Bonakis returned to the capital. Only at Sebennytus or Samanud Paul, the
popular Prefect, stood to his colours, and Paul’s
friend Cosmas, blazing with courage, though crippled
with paralysis, was carried about the town to fire the garrison with his own
spirit; while at Athrib another friend of Paul, the Prefect Marcian, equally
refused to join the rebellion. The war was not yet over.
Bonosus had reached Caesarea when he heard of the fall of Alexandria.
The news only stung him to fiercer action. Shipping his whole force at that
port, he sailed swiftly southwards, and either landed his cavalry on the
confines of Egypt or was met there by a body of horse from Palestine. His plan
was now to relieve Athrib; and for this purpose he took his fleet in two
divisions, one by the main eastern branch of the Nile, and one by the Pelusiac channel, while the cavalry followed by land. Besides
the Prefect Marcian there was at Athrib a redoubtable lady named Christodora,
who from motives of private vengeance was a strong supporter of the Emperors
interest. Paul and Cosmas also had come from Manuf to
a council of war. In vain the Bishop of Nikiou and the Chancellor Menas wrote
urging Marcian and Christodora to throw down the statues of Phocas and
acknowledge Heraclius: for they heard of Bonosus’ arrival on the isthmus, and
the report was soon followed by the news of his occupation of Pelusium. His advance was watched in alarm by the Heraclian generals Plato and Theodore (really these Theodores are interminable), who had an army in the
neighbourhood of Athrib. They sent an urgent message for succour to Bonakis, who lost no time in moving up the western or Bolbitic branch of the Nile; but he reached Nikiou only to learn of Bonosus arrival at
Athrib. Quitting that town, Bonosus moved by the canal which branched off the
main river westwards in the direction of Manuf, and with him were Marcian and Cosmas and the relentless Christodora.
Paul now directed his march to join Bonosus, and the two imperial forces
had hardly united, when the army of Bonakis arrived on the scene. The encounter
was fierce but decisive. The rebel troops were completely routed—part hurled
into the waterway, part slain, part taken prisoner and thrown into irons.
Bonakis himself was captured alive, but put to death : another general,
Leontius, met the same fate : while Plato and Theodore managed to escape, and
sought sanctuary in a neighbouring monastery. Nikiou,
though a fortified city, was in no position to hold out against the victorious
army of Bonosus. Accordingly Bishop Theodore and the Chancellor Menas went out
to the conqueror in solemn procession, carrying gospels and crosses, and threw
themselves on his mercy. They might better have thrown themselves from their
city walls. Menas was cast into prison, fined 3,000 pieces of gold, tortured
with a prolonged bastinade, and set free only to die of exhaustion : while
Theodore was taken back to Nikiou by Bonosus, who now moved there with his
army. At the city gate Bonosus saw the statues of Phocas lying broken on the
ground, the work of the bishop, as Christodora and Marcian testified; and the
unfortunate Theodore was instantly beheaded. This execution was followed by
that of the generals Plato and Theodore, and of the three elders of Manuf —
Isidore, John, and Julian — all of whom had sought asylum in a monastery, and
were tamely surrendered by the monks. Of the general body of prisoners Bonosus
merely banished those who had been in Maurice’s service, but put to death all
who had ever borne arms under the flag of Phocas.
The tide of war has now fairly turned in favour of the reigning Emperor. Bonosus was virtually master of the Delta, from all
parts of which the rebel forces—afraid to fight and afraid to surrender—streamed
towards Alexandria by the vast network of waterways which covered the country.
For Bonosus himself it was an easy passage from Nikiou down the western main of
the Nile, and thence by the canal which ran to Alexandria.
Nicetas was well prepared to receive him. Within the city he had
organized a large army of regulars and irregulars, sailors and citizens, aided
warmly by the Green Faction. The arsenals rang with the din of forging weapons,
and. the walls were manned and furnished with powerful engines of defence. Paul
seems to have been sent on by Bonosus to attack the city with a fleet of
vessels on the south side, probably at the point where the fresh-water canal entered
through two enormous gateways of stone, which had been built and fortified by Tatian in the time of Valens. But as soon as Paul's
flotilla came within range of the city batteries, the huge stones which they
hurled fell crashing among his vessels with such deadly effect that he was
unable even to approach the walls, and drew off his ships to save them from
being disabled or sunk. Such was the force at that time of the Alexandrian
artillery.
FAILURE OF BONOSUS
Bonosus, who had performed at any rate the last stages of his journey by
land, seems nevertheless to have followed Cleopatra’s canal, i.e. the principal waterway leading from
the Bolbitic branch of the Nile to Alexandria. He
first pitched his camp at Miphamomis, and next at Dimkaruni, according to the
bishop’s Chronicle. Zotenberg has no note on these
places, and at first sight they are puzzling. But Miphamomis is called in the
text “the present Shubra”. This must be the Shubra by Damanhur. Now Champollion
speaks of a place called Momemphis, which he alleges
to have been seven leagues west of Damanhur, or Timenhor, as he gives the name
of the town in its ancient Egyptian form. We can have no hesitation in
identifying Miphamomis with Momemphis and in placing
it close to Damanhur: but then Champollion cannot be right in identifying it
with Panouf Khet, which the
Arabs called Manuf as Safli, and which the French
savant places twenty-one miles—an impossible distance— from Damanhur.
As to Dimkaruni, one cannot remember any such form elsewhere : but bearing
in mind that Dim—or Tim—in ancient Egyptian was a regular prefix denoting
‘town’ it seems beyond doubt that Dimkarfini is
merely a Coptic form of Chaereum or Karium. This
explanation fits accurately with the geography of that region; for Karium was
not only further west on the canal which Bonosus was following, as the context
requires, but was nearly half-way between Damanhur and Alexandria, being only
thirty-eight kilometres from the latter city and
thirty-one from Damanhur. From Karium Bonosus covered the remaining distance
without opposition, and arriving on the eastern side of the capital, he halted
his army within view of the walls and resolved to assault them on the following
day, Sunday. It would be interesting could we know by what means he hoped to
storm the lofty and powerful fortifications which guarded the Great City.
But the Alexandrians were in no mood to stand a siege. The story is that
a certain saint of Upper Egypt, called Theophilus the Confessor—who lived on
the top of a pillar, and there, it seems, acquired practical wisdom—counselled Nicetas to sally out and give battle.
Accordingly he marshalled his troops within the ‘Gate
of Aun’, where the splendid width of the great street
dividing the city lengthwise gave plenty of room for the muster. The name ‘Gate
of Aun’ is not explained by Zotenberg,
and at first sight does not connect with any known feature in Alexandrian
topography. But in another passage of the MS. we find Aun used as a synonym of Ain Shams. Now Ain Shams is the Arabic name for the town better known as
Heliopolis : and the ancient Egyptian for Heliopolis is On or Aon. The Gate of Aun is therefore the gate towards Heliopolis, which may
further be identified with the well-known Sun Gate closing the eastern end, as
the Moon Gate closed the western, of that broad avenue which ran east to west
in Alexandria, and was crossed at a sort of Carfax by
the other main avenue running north to south. It may be added that the
preference for old Egyptian forms shown in this use of Aun,
and in other passages, is a strong indication that John of Nikiou wrote this part
of the original in Coptic.
But to resume. The imperial forces were now ordered to advance against
the city, a mounted general leading the way. While they were still far out of
bowshot, they were harassed by a lively fire from the huge catapults roaring
and creaking on the city walls and towers. One of these projectiles struck the
general, smashing his jaw, unhorsing and killing him instantly : a second
killed another officer: and as the assailants wavered, thrown into confusion by
this dreaded artillery, Nicetas gave the order for a sortie. The Sun Gate was
thrown open, and his main force issued thence, formed line, and by a brilliant
charge broke the enemy’s ranks, and after a sharp struggle cut Bonosus’ army in
two and turned it to flight. When Nicetas saw that most of the fugitives were
streaming northwards, he put himself at the head of his reserve of black
troops, and sallied out from another gate by the church of St. Mark on the
north or seaward side of the city, near the north-east angle of the walls. He
soon headed off the flying soldiers and drove them back either under the
ramparts, where they were overwhelmed by volleys of stones and arrows, or else
among the prickly hedges which enclosed the suburban gardens, where they were
entangled and slain. Those of Bonosus’ men who fled to their left, or
southwards, soon found their way barred by the canal in front: behind they saw
the swords of their pursuers flashing: and, maddened by the press and panic,
they turned their weapons blindly one against another.
The army of Bonosus was cut to pieces. Marcian, Prefect of Athrib,
Leontius, Valens and many notable persons were among the slain; and such was
the effect of the victory that even the Blue Faction abandoned the cause of
Phocas. But Bonosus himself managed to escape and retreat to the fortress of Kariun, a place which figures again some thirty years later
in the advance of the Arabs under Amr on Alexandria.
It lay on both banks of the canal which connected the capital with the Nile. Ibn Haukal describes it in his
day as a large and beautiful town surrounded by gardens, and it still survives
as a village. What Paul and his flotilla were doing during the battle is
uncertain. They may have been making a diversion towards the south-west of the
city, but they do not seem to have been near the scene of the encounter either
to aid in the fight by land or to rescue survivors.
When at length Paul heard of this crushing defeat, he thought seriously
of surrendering and joining Nicetas; but he remained loyal to his party, and
secured his retreat by some means to Kariun, where he
joined Bonosus. That general—whose extraordinary resource and courage challenge
our reluctant admiration—had no thought of abandoning the struggle. He passed
rapidly by the canal to the western main of the Nile and ascended the stream to
Nikiou, which his troops still garrisoned. There he recruited his fleet, and,
after destroying a vast number of Alexandrian vessels, he succeeded in
dominating the river. But not being strong enough to confront Nicetas again, he
passed down another waterway (probably that called Ar Rugashat) towards Mareotis, and entered the Dragon
Canal on the west of Alexandria with the intention of seizing Mareotis as a
fresh base of operations against the capital. But Nicetas received intelligence
of his plan, and defeated it by sending to break down the bridge at a place
called Dafashir, near Mareotis, and so blocking the
canal.
Furious with this check, Bonosus, renouncing the methods of open
warfare, resolved to assassinate his rival. He persuaded one of his soldiers to
go as an envoy to Nicetas under pretence of arranging
terms of surrender. “Take a short dagger with you”, he said, “and conceal it under
your cloak. When you come close to Nicetas, drive it through his heart, so as
to kill him on the spot. You may escape in the confusion; but if not, you will
die to save the Empire, and I will take charge of your children at the royal
palace and will provide for them for life”. Such was the plot of Bonosus; but
it was betrayed by a traitor. One of his own followers named John sent a
message of warning to Nicetas; so that when the assassin appeared, he was at
once surrounded by a guard, who searched him and found the hidden dagger. The
weapon was used to behead him.
Thus baulked of his vengeance, Bonosus marched by land to Dafashir, and wreaked his spite by massacring the
inhabitants. Nicetas was hurrying to meet him : but Bonosus knew the folly of
risking a battle with the diminished remnant of his force. He therefore
retreated, crossed the Nile, and once more gained the shelter of Nikiou.
Instead of passing the river to pursue him, Nicetas remained on the western
side, and occupied the town and province of Mareotis with a considerable army.
The desperate valour of his foe and the baffling
rapidity of his movements still gave the general of Heraclius much cause for
anxiety, and he met his daring tactics with calculating prudence. It was not
till Nicetas had firmly secured his rear and the western bank of the Nile that
he passed over the river and advanced on Manuf. Here there was a very strong
fortress—one of the great works of Trajan—which might have held out for an
indefinite time if vigorously defended. But it is clear that popular sympathy
was with the revolting party, and that the imperial soldiers were losing heart,
in spite of the undaunted prowess of their leader. Many of the garrison took to
flight, and the citadel itself was taken after a feeble resistance.
Having thus mastered the country on both banks of the Nile, Nicetas
advanced on the town of Nikiou, which he had caught in a vice. At length the
indomitable spirit of Bonosus was broken. He fled under cover of darkness, and
either slipped past the besieging army eastward and got to Athrib, or else
dropped quickly down the main river, and then crossed by one of the innumerable
canals towards Tanis. In either case he reached Pelusium in safety, and took ship to Palestine: whence under the execration of the
people he passed on his way to Constantinople, and joined his master Phocas.
The fall of Manuf and Nikiou was the signal for the surrender of the other
imperial towns and generals. Paul, Prefect of Samanud,
and the vigorous cripple Cosmas were captured, but
frankly pardoned by the conqueror: and the Green Faction, who had made the
occasion of Nicetas’ success an excuse for maltreating the Blues and for open
pillage and murder, saw their leaders arrested and solemnly admonished to be on
their good behaviour. The two Factions were actually
reconciled: new governors were appointed to every town : law and order were
re-established : and Heraclius was master of Egypt.
It had been a long and a desperate struggle, with a romantic ebb and
flow of fortune. We have seen the country roused from its sullen torpor by the
sound of Heraclius’ trumpets : Nicetas capturing Alexandria almost without
striking a blow, and the revolution triumphant through Egypt : then Bonosus
flinging himself like a tiger on the head of the Delta, sweeping all before him
to the walls of Alexandria, and dashing against the city’s bulwarks only to
recoil crushed and disabled for any further contest save a guerilla warfare,
which he maintained for a time with fiery courage; then, brought to bay at
last, he cheated the enemies that surrounded him of their vengeance and stole
away in the night. It is a remarkable picture, drawn in strong colours, but bearing in every detail the image of reality;
it is one entirely unknown to history until revealed in the Chronicle of John
of Nikiou.
For not a word of all this dramatic struggle in Egypt occurs in the
Byzantine historians, except that the Chronicon Paschale speaking of 609 a.d. says, “Africa and Alexandria revolt”. Gibbon, who knows every page of their
writings, thus sums up what he gleaned from them about the revolution : “The powers of Africa were armed by the two
adventurous youths (Heraclius and Nicetas); they agreed that one should
navigate the fleet from Carthage to Constantinople, that the other should lead
an army through Egypt and Asia, and that the imperial purple should be the
reward of diligence and success. A faint rumour of
their undertaking was conveyed to the ears of Phocas, and the wife and mother
of the younger Heraclius were secured as the hostages of his faith: but the
treacherous art of Crispus extenuated the distant peril, the means of defence
were neglected or delayed, and the tyrant supinely slept till the African navy
cast anchor in the Hellespont”. There is no suspicion here of the part played
by Egypt in the revolution. Indeed a few pages later in the same chapter,
Gibbon, in treating of the Persian invasion of Egypt under Chosroes in 616 a.d., expressly speaks of that country as “the only
province which had been exempt, since the time of Diocletian, from foreign and
domestic war”, an extraordinary
statement, which Gibbon in part demolishes in his own brief but vigorous
account of the Copts in the following chapter. The truth is that the more one
studies this period, the clearer it becomes that Egypt was one of the most
restless and turbulent countries in the whole Empire, and, certainly since the
Council of Chalcedon, was in an almost chronic state of disorder. There is
abundant evidence of this not only within the wide range of the Chronicle of
John of Nikiou but in Renaudot’s well-known History of the Patriarchs of Alexandria and in other writings, apart from the particular story of Heraclius, with which
we are now dealing.
This is not the place for a discussion upon either the facts or the
sources of Egyptian history during the last two centuries of the Empire : but
when that record comes to be fully written, it will prove a record of perpetual
feud between Romans and Egyptians—a feud of race and a feud of religion—in which,
however, the dominating motive was rather religious than racial. The key to the
whole of this epoch is the antagonism between the Monophysites and the Melkites. The latter, as the name implies, were the
imperial or the Court party in religion, holding the orthodox opinion about the
two natures of Christ: but this opinion the Monophysite Copts, or native Egyptians, viewed with an abhorrence and combated with a
frenzy difficult to understand in rational beings, not to say followers of the
Gospel. The spirit of the savage fanatics who tore Hypatia to pieces at the altar was alive and unchanged: only now instead of being
directed against the supposed paganism of a young and beautiful woman, it was
divided between two sects each of which called itself children of Christ, and
called the other sons of Satan. But further, apart from all religious
dissensions, though crossed and complicated by them, the strife of the Blue and
the Green Factions was as real and as relentless on the banks of the Nile as in
any part of the Empire.
So much then for the domestic peace of Egypt at this period : and the
alleged freedom from foreign war is disproved at least by the invasion of the
Persians in the time of the Emperor Anastasius, when according to Eutychius, a writer born in Egypt, all the suburbs of
Alexandria were burnt down, battle after battle was fought between the Persian
invaders and the Egyptians, and the country was so harried that it escaped from
the sword only to be smitten by a famine which led to insurrection. And what is
to be said of the almost perennial persecutions and massacres, such as even
Justinian must be said to have countenanced? the petty rebellions, like that of Aristomachus under the Emperor Maurice? the outbursts
of organized brigandage, the Beduin raids, the
continual alarms and incursions of the Sudan tribes, who then as now menaced
the frontiers? If war was not often present in act, its phantom was always
hovering in the mirage of the Egyptian horizon.
It is clear, then, that many causes contributed to keep the whole
province in a state of unrest. And the divisions were at once so fierce and so
manifold that almost any determined invader might count on the aid of some
party within its borders. What helped Nicetas was a genuine detestation of
Phocas : the measure of his crimes was full even in the judgment of the Romans,
while to the Copts he was not merely a tyrant and an assassin, but the sign and
centre of that foreign power and that accursed creed, the existence of which in
Egypt embittered their daily bread. But it is probable that, even after the
flight of Bonosus, Nicetas felt his continued presence necessary to secure his
authority. Unfortunately the dates here are somewhat hard to follow. Apparently
John of Nikiou makes all the war, previous to the defeat of Bonosus before Alexandria,
take place in the seventh year of Phocas reign, i.e. before the close of 609 : the battle itself then would be about
the end of November, 609, and the subsequent events may have occupied a few
weeks longer. Still it would follow that Nicetas was in possession of Egypt in
the spring of 610.
On one point the bishop’s Chronicle is curiously silent—on the part
played in the contest by the powerful fortress of Babylon near Memphis. Next to
Alexandria, it was the strongest place in Egypt, and of course it was held by
an imperial garrison. In the war of the Arab conquest it was the first
objective of the Saracen commander, and its reduction sealed the triumph of the
Crescent. This is so fully set forth by the Chronicle, that one can only interpret
its silence to mean that Babylon surrendered to Nicetas without a conflict. But
if so, and if the war in Egypt was over by the spring of 610, it is more than
ever clear that Nicetas had no idea of racing for Constantinople. Else,
assuming that he could have drawn an adequate armament from Egypt, which there
is no reason to doubt, he might have reached the Byzantine capital and
overthrown Phocas six months in advance of Heraclius. It is true that Cedrenus assigns the massacre by Bon6sus at Antioch to 610,
which would make the whole Egyptian war fall within that year: but this
chronology is not consistent with the rest of Cedrenus:
it disagrees with the Chronicon Paschale: and
it is hopelessly at variance with our Ethiopic MS., in which generally speaking
the dates are remarkably trustworthy. The balance of evidence is then strongly
in favour of the earlier date, and we may take it
that Nicetas, having achieved the object of his mission, when he won the final
throw of the die on the Nile, was well content to hold the province pending the
advance of Heraclius, to keep centralized and friendly all the imperial forces
in the country, and to control its vast resources in corn and shipping on which
Constantinople largely depended.
ACCESSION OF HERACLIUS
Meanwhile how was Heraclius faring? Our information of his progress by
sea is scanty enough, nor does John of Nikiou add greatly to the meagre details of the Byzantine historians, who, like him,
reserve their descriptions for the closing scenes at Constantinople. But it is
clear that the progress was slow, and that like Nicetas he set out with a
comparatively small force of vessels, carrying some Roman and African troops on
board, and that he had to collect and organize both a fleet and an army with
which he might adventure against Phocas. At the islands where he touched, and
at the towns on the seaboard, he was welcomed, and recruits— particularly of
the Green Faction—flocked to his standard. Of resistance to his arms there is
no record : and yet it is certain that Heraclius never dreamt of moving direct
on Constantinople with the small force with which he started. On quitting
Africa he coasted along Hellas or threaded the islands slowly to Thessalonica,
where he fixed his base of operations and spent a considerable time—not less
than a year—in equipping a fleet and army and in strengthening his connection
with the disaffected party led by Crispus in the capital. Thessalonica was at
this time, as we know, strongly fortified, and it was one of the few places in
Macedonia which had withstood the hordes of Huns and other barbarians then
flooding the country1. It was in fact one of the gates of the Eastern Empire :
it commanded the trade routes from Carthage, Sicily, and the western
Mediterranean to Constantinople. Here then Heraclius established himself presumably
without a struggle, and so firmly that one writer, Eutychius,
appears to imagine him a native of the town. It must, however, be said that Eutychius’ whole account of the revolution is no less
imperfect as a record of events than confused in chronology: and on this point
he is clearly mistaken.
During the many months which Heraclius spent at Thessalonica, we can
only conceive of him as maturing plans, gathering resources, and removing
obstacles. What difficulties he had to encounter we cannot say: it is possible
that at this period, which is a blank in the annals, he may have displayed that
combination of calculating foresight and brilliant activity with which he
subsequently astonished the world in his Persian campaigns. But it was not till
September, 610, that all was ready, and the vast armament which he had
collected and provisioned weighed anchor from the harbour. On the leading
galleys reliquaries were carried, and the banner of the Cross waved at the
mast-head : while on Heraclius’ own vessel an image of special sanctity, “the
image not made with hands”, formed the figurehead. News of the arrival of the
fleet in the Dardanelles spread like wild-fire to the capital; and while
Crispus seems for the moment to have kept in the background, Theodore the
Illustrious and a large number of senators and officials declared for
Heraclius. According to John of Nikiou the city rabble also rose against the
Emperor, hurling imprecations on his head.
Phocas, meanwhile, seems to have been ill prepared for the storm that
had been so long in breaking. When he first received news of the revolt of
Egypt, there was a large fleet of corn-ships from Alexandria in harbour. These
he seized, and flung the sailors into prison in the fortress on the harbour of
the Hebdomon, where they were kept in long durance.
Yet after the failure of Bonosus’ expedition to reconquer Egypt, we read of no further serious efforts on the Emperor’s part. But it was
the shout of these Alexandrian prisoners, as they acclaimed the sails of
Heraclius, that sounded the first note of real alarm which was borne to Phocas.
The Emperor was then at the Hebdomon palace near the
fortress : but he sprang on his horse and galloped to a palace called the
palace of the Archangel within the walls. From the Chronicon Paschale we know that this was on a
Saturday; which must have been the 3rd October. Next day Bonosus was sent with
the imperial chariots and other troops to encounter any force landed by
Heraclius : but the charioteers, who had been won over by Crispus, revolted and
turned on their leader, who fled back, eating his heart with rage, to the city.
There in a fit of savage treachery Bonosus hurled fire into the quarter round
the palace called Caesarion : but, failing to kindle
a conflagration, he baffled for a while the pursuing mob, and escaped in a
small boat to the quay called Port Julian. Here, however, he was followed and
found, and the chase closed about him. He essayed a fierce but vain resistance
against overwhelming odds: then in the last extremity of danger he plunged into
the sea. As he rose a sword-cut clove his skull, and that indignant spirit fled
from the scene where it had wrought so much havoc. The body was taken out of
the water and dragged to the Ox Market, where it was burned in public ignominy
and execration.
This account of the death of Bonosus is put together from the records of Cedrenus, John of Nikiou, and the Chronicon Paschale. It is curious how well they
combine, and how little real disagreement there is between them; for although
the stories differ, it is rather by omission or addition than by any
discrepancy of fact. Moreover the points of coincidence are often very
striking; and as it is rather a coincidence of logic than of detail, it seems
to establish at once the independence of the writers and to carry a conviction
of their trustworthiness. There is no sign of the three writers relying on any
common document.
When the Emperor heard what had befallen Bonosus, he knew that his own
hour had come. He had no intention of resigning the crown, nor indeed any hope
of mercy in case he surrendered to his enemy: his only chance lay in fighting
to the bitter end, and the defection of his best troops made this chance almost
worthless. All he had now to rely upon was the allegiance of the Blue Faction,
or rather their furious hostility to the Green and their exasperation at the
first successes of the rival colour. Phocas
accordingly manned a fleet with the Blues in the harbour of St. Sophia, and
prepared to give battle to Heraclius. John of Nikiou is responsible for a
curious anecdote which, as far as I am aware, does not occur in any other
historian. He relates that Phocas and his chamberlain or treasurer, Leontius
the Syrian, knowing that after the death of Bonosus their own lives were in
imminent danger from the mob, took all the hoarded wealth of the imperial
treasury and sank it in the sea. All the riches of the Emperor Maurice, all the
vast store of gold and jewels which Phocas himself had amassed by confiscating
the property of the victims he had murdered, and last but not least all the
money and precious vessels which Bonosus had heaped up by his multiplied iniquities,
were now in a moment lost to the world. “Thus”, as the Egyptian bishop remarks,
“did Phocas impoverish the Eastern Empire”.
It was an act of triumphant spite such as well accords with the
character of the Emperor, and apparently it took place when victory declared
for Heraclius in the naval engagement. The treasure must have been taken on
board the Emperor’s galley, to save it from being plundered while the battle
was raging, and sunk bodily when the battle was lost. For though the contest
may have been stubborn, the issue was not doubtful. The imperial vessels were
defeated and driven on the shore or captured. All who could, escaped, and fled
for sanctuary to the Cathedral of St. Sophia. Phocas himself seems to have made
his way back with Leontius to the palace of the Archangel, where they were
followed and seized by Photius (or Photinus) and Probus.
The crown was struck off the Emperors head, and he was dragged with his
companion in chains along the quay, his raiment torn to pieces. There he was
shown to the victorious fleet and army, and with a storm of curses ringing in
his ears, he was haled into the presence of his
conqueror in the church of St. Thomas the Apostle.
It is probable that this church was chosen for Heraclius’ thanksgiving
service rather than St. Sophia, because the latter was too crowded with
refugees of the defeated Faction to admit of any large company or solemn
pageant. There is no necessity to draw on the imagination for many details of
the meeting between Phocas and Heraclius. We may picture a stately basilica
thronged with officers, senators and soldiers, priests standing in gorgeous
vestments round the altar laden with golden vessels, and the strains of the Te Deum dying away as Phocas is brought in
chains.
For a moment the fallen Emperor and his victorious vassal stand fronting
each other. Their portraits are well known as drawn by Cedrenus.
Heraclius was in the prime of life—his age was about thirty-five—of patrician
family, of middle stature and muscular build, deep-chested, with well-knit
athletic frame : his hair and beard were fair, his complexion bright and clear,
his eyes pale blue and singularly handsome. Altogether a man of frank and open
presence and aristocratic mien, with a look of power, physical and
intellectual: a face denoting courage, insight, ability, and perhaps that
unscrupulousness which Eutychius commemorates. Phocas
was of the same height: but there the resemblance ended. His person was
repulsive from its hideous deformity: his beardless face was crossed by a deep
and ugly scar which flushed and blackened in his fits of passion: his jutting
eyebrows met on a low forehead under a shock of red hair, and the eyes of a
savage glared beneath them. Foul of tongue, besotted in wine and lust, ruthless
and remorseless in torture and bloodshed—such was the ex-centurion whose lash
had scourged the Eastern Empire for eight years, and who now was called to
answer for his deeds. As crime after crime was unfolded, “Is this”, said
Heraclius, “the way you have governed ?”. “Are you the man”, was the retort, “to
govern better?”
Sentence of death was passed, and it is a reproach rather to the manners
of the time than to the character of Heraclius that its execution was accompanied
by horrible barbarities—though perhaps not much worse than the drawing and
quartering which our own law formerly sanctioned. Phocas body was dismembered :
first the hands and feet were cut off, then the arms, and after other
mutilations the head at last was severed, put on a pole, and carried about the main
streets of the city. Meanwhile the trunk was dragged along the ground to the
Hippodrome, and thence to the Ox Market, and burned on the spot where Bonosus’
ashes were hardly cold. The banner of the Blue Faction (not the Green, as
Gibbon says) was also burned, and a statue of Phocas was carried through the
Hippodrome in mock procession by men clad in white dalmatics and bearing
lighted tapers, and was thrown on the fire. “They burned Phocas, Leontius, and
Bonosus and scattered their ashes to the winds : for all men hated them”
According to John of Nikiou, Heraclius was crowned—against his own
wishes—in the same church of St. Thomas; and after his prayer was ended, he
repaired to the palace, where all the dignitaries of the city rendered him
homage. Cedrenus makes the imperial coronation take
place in the chapel of St. Stephen attached to the palace, while the Chronicon Paschale puts
it out of order between the burning of Phocas’ body and his statue, naming no
place. It is curious that the Egyptian chronicle confirms the story of
Heraclius reluctance to accept the crown—a reluctance emphasized by the Chronicon Paschale as
well as the Byzantine historians. But his scruples were overcome: and on
October 5 in the year 610 he was proclaimed Emperor, with Fabia,
his betrothed wife, whose name was changed to Eudocia, as Empress.
Nicetas does not seem to have made any effort to join Heraclius before
Constantinople: for though John of Nikiou uses language apparently implying his
presence in the city at the time of Phocas fall, Zotenberg must be right in thinking that “Nicetas” there is a mere slip on the part of
writer or copyist for “Crispus”. The fact of Nicetas leaving Egypt to join
forces with Heraclius, and succeeding in his object, would not have been
buried, if it were a fact, in the obscurity of a chance allusion. But I must
again differ from Gibbon, who says :—
“The voyage of Heraclius had been easy and prosperous, the tedious march
of Nicetas was not accomplished before the decision of the contest: but he submitted
without a murmur to the fortune of his friend”
The truth, as I have shown, is just the reverse. It was Nicetas’ march
which on the whole was easy and prosperous: and in spite of the dangers and
delays arising from the intervention of Bonosus, he reached his final goal, the
possession of Egypt, long before Heraclius was able to move from Thessalonica.
From which it is fair to argue that Heraclius in his voyage had difficulties
and adversities to master, of which we have no record and no measure.
EGYPT UNDER THE NEW EMPEROR
Nicetas was confirmed by the Emperor in the governorship of Alexandria
or, as it might be called, the Viceroyalty of Egypt. The adherents of Phocas
had now been killed or banished, or had thrown off their allegiance to the lost
cause, and the chief work of Nicetas was the resettlement of the Roman civil
service and the reorganization of the Roman military service, which between
them held Egypt in fee for the Empire. Both these services were filled by the
ruling class to the general exclusion of the Copts or natives, and the system
was so far analogous to the British administration of India : it differed
profoundly and fatally in this, that the whole machinery of government in Egypt
was directed to the sole purpose of wringing profit out of the ruled for the
benefit of the rulers. There was no idea of governing for the advantage of the
governed, of raising the people in the social scale, of developing the moral or
even the material resources of the country. It was an alien domination founded
on force and making little pretence of sympathy with
the subject race. It held the Greek capital of Alexandria and the ancient
Egyptian capital of Memphis, with its great bulwark the Roman fortress of
Babylon on the eastern side of the Nile, and from Syene to Pelusium it occupied a chain of fortress towns. From
these its soldiers and tax-gatherers patrolled the country, keeping order and
collecting money, while Roman merchants and Jewish traders settled freely under
protection of the garrisons, keenly competing with their Coptic rivals.
Alexandria itself was as difficult a city to govern as any in the world
with its motley population of Byzantine Greeks, Greeks born in Egypt, Copts,
Syrians, Jews, Arabs, and aliens of all nations. Yet Nicetas seems really to have
won the respect, if not the affection, of the fickle and turbulent
Alexandrians. One of his first measures was to grant a three years’ remission
of the imperial taxes, an act of singular favour,
which heightened the popularity already gained by his record as a brilliant
soldier. That he remained at Alexandria is no longer open to question. True, we
hear of him at Jerusalem before the Persian advance to that city, where he is
said to have saved some of the holy relics—the spear and the sponge—from
capture : but as we shall see he returned to Alexandria again.
The fact doubtless is that Heraclius ordered him to Palestine in hope
that he might offer an effectual resistance to the Persian armies, whose
numbers and strength he greatly under-estimated; and that Nicetas had no
alternative but to beat a hasty retreat.
But here most unfortunately the history of Egypt is extremely difficult
to recover. The annals of John of Nikiou, which up to this point have furnished
a wealth of information, now become totally silent. There is in the MS. a blank
of thirty years, just as if some malignant hand had torn out every page on
which the record of the reign of Heraclius was written. Some Armenian and other
eastern authorities who deal with this period throw much light upon the history
of some parts of the Empire : but, like the Byzantine historians, they have
little to say on the subject of Egypt. Yet dimly through the gloom one may mark
the movement of those great events which at the close of the Emperors life
closed the book of Byzantine overlordship in Egypt.
In tracing the story of Egypt during the thirty years between the
accession of Heraclius and the Arab conquest we are mainly dependent on ecclesiastical
writers or writers with a strong religious bias. The truth is that in the
seventh century in Egypt the interest of politics was quite secondary to the
interest of religion. It was opinion on matters of faith, and not on matters of
government, which formed and divided parties in the state; and religion itself
was valued rather for its requirement of intellectual assent to certain
propositions than for its power to furnish the springs of moral action. Love of
country was practically unknown, and national or racial antagonisms derived
their acuteness mainly from their coincidence with religious differences. Men
debated with fury upon shadows of shades of belief and staked their lives on
the most immaterial issues, on the most subtle and intangible refinements in
the formulas of theology or metaphysics. And the .fierce battles which Juvenal
describes as turning in his day on the relative merit of cats or crocodiles as
objects of worship found their analogue in Christian Egypt:—
Numina vicinorum
Odit uterque locus, cum solos credat habendos
Esse deos quos ipse colit.
Times had changed, but the temper of the people was the same. Inasmuch
then as parties and party divisions were essentially sectarian, it is rather
the lives of saints and patriarchs than those of warriors or statesmen, which
have survived to furnish the sources of Egyptian history.
The resulting difficulties are not lessened by the fact that at this
time, as ever since the Council of Chalcedon in 451, each of the two great
parties into which the Church was cloven had its own separate Patriarch and
administration. These parties, it may be repeated, are distinguished by the
familiar names Jacobite or Coptic and Melkite or Royalist. The Jacobites were by creed Monophysites, by race mainly, though not exclusively, native Egyptians,
while the Melkites were orthodox followers of
Chalcedon and for the most part of Greek or European origin. Severus of Ushmunain and all the authorities agree that, whatever
Emperor reigned, the policy of suppressing the Jacobite heresy in Egypt was pursued with relentless intolerance : while the Jacobites aimed no less at extirpating all that stood in
the following of Chalcedon.
It has already been shown that the Melkite Patriarch, who was called Theodorus, was slain at the
capture of Alexandria by Nicetas in 609. The revolt of Heraclius was directed
against the imperial power at Constantinople, and in joining it the Copts
doubtless hoped for better treatment than they had received under the iron rule
of Phocas. Nor at first were they greatly disappointed. The Coptic Patriarch
Anastasius, who had been on the throne for five years at the time of the
rebellion, retained his seat for another six years till his death on 22 Khoiak (18 Dec.), a.d. 616. And
although the Melkites remained in possession of power
and held the principal churches in Alexandria, yet the Copts were able to build
or rebuild several churches of their own, such as those of St. Michael, St.
Angelus, SS. Cosmas and Damian, besides various
monasteries, to all of which Anastasius appointed priests and ordained bishops.
There seems no reason to doubt that Heraclius was genuinely anxious to
win over the Coptic party, and at the same time Nicetas felt bound to recompense
their services rendered. Hence although the Byzantine Court still appointed a Melkite Patriarch in place of the slain Theodorus,
they chose, on the special recommendation of Nicetas, a man whose life and
character so far commanded the admiration of the Jacobites,
that they honoured him during his lifetime and after
death enshrined his memory in the Coptic calendar. It is curious to find that
Nicetas was at a later date largely instrumental in bringing about the union of
the Monophysite Syrian with the Coptic Church, a fact
which shows that his abiding attitude to the Copts was one of sympathy rather
than mere tolerance.
The new Melkite Archbishop was John the Compassionate,
or the Almoner—a name bestowed upon him for his great acts of charity. But his
lavishness was not wholly without a method. He told those about him to go through
the city and take note of all his “lords and helpers”. When they questioned his
meaning, he explained: “Those whom you call paupers and beggars I call lords
and helpers: for they truly help us and grant us the Kingdom of Heaven”. So a
roll of the poor was prepared, and they received daily relief to the number of
7,500. The governor Nicetas, watching with envy the ceaseless flow of wealth
from the Patriarch, went to him one day and said, “The government is hard
pressed for money : what you receive is gotten freely without impoverishing anybody
: therefore give it to the treasury”. The Patriarch answered: “What is offered
to the heavenly King must not be given to an earthly. I can give you nothing.
But yours is the responsibility, and the store of the Lord is under my bed”. So
Nicetas called his retainers, and ordered them to take the money. As they were
leaving, they met men carrying in their hands little jars labelled “Best Honey” and “Unsmoked Honey”, and Nicetas asked
for a jar for his own table. The bearers whispered to the Patriarch that the
vessels were full of gold : nevertheless John sent a jar to Nicetas with a
message advising him to have it opened in his own presence, and adding that all
the vessels he had seen were full of money. Nicetas thereupon went in person to
the Patriarch and returned all the money he had taken, together with the jar
and a handsome sum besides.
Stories of this kind at least show the power and resources of the
pontiff at Alexandria, and it is interesting to learn also that the Church had
its own fleet of trading vessels. It is related that one such ship with a cargo
of 20,000 bushels of corn was driven so far out of its course by storms that it
reached Britain, where there happened to be a severe famine. It returned laden with
tin, which the captain sold at Pentapolis. In another instance we hear of a
flotilla of thirteen ships, each carrying 10,000 bushels of grain, which lost
all their burden in a tempest in the Adriatic. They belonged to the Church, and
besides corn they carried silver, fine tissues, and other precious wares. Nor
can it be doubted that the Church had its share of the enormous grain trade
between Alexandria and Constantinople which Justinian carefully reorganized.
And beyond the profits of such traffic and the voluntary offerings of the
people, the Church had endowments of land which brought in large revenues.
Hence it is not surprising to learn that, while John the Almoner astonished the
world by his bounty, Andronicus, who succeeded Anastasius as Coptic Patriarch,
and was for some few months at any rate contemporary with John, was scarcely
less famed for his wealth and his charity.
Although the double succession of pontiffs was maintained, and although
the early policy of Heraclius was to bring about a reconcilement between the
two great branches of the Church of Egypt, yet as a rule the Coptic Archbishop
was unable to maintain his seat in the metropolis. The hostility between the
two sects, even when smouldering, was ready to burst
into a blaze when fanned by the slightest gust of passion; and the government
could not in common prudence brook the presence of the rival Archbishops in the
capital. When, for example, Anastasius welcomed the Patriarch of Antioch, we
find him living at the Ennaton, a famous monastery,
which lay near the shore nine miles westward of Alexandria, and from there he
went forth in solemn procession to meet his visitor1. Nor did he go to
Alexandria, but summoned thence his clergy and held in the monastery that
conclave which resulted in the re-establishment of full communion with Antioch.
But Andronicus, the successor of Anastasius, offers a remarkable
exception to this rule of non-residence. At the time of his election he was
deacon at the Cathedral church of Angelion in
Alexandria, and there in the cells attached to the Cathedral he continued to
reside during the whole period of his primacy, which lasted six years. This
immunity from banishment was due to the fact that he belonged to a noble
family, and had the support of powerful kinsmen in the government of the city.
What the personal relations of the two Patriarchs were is not known; but John
the Almoner died a few months after Andronicus came to the Coptic throne, and
it is doubtful whether George, the successor of John in the Melkite chair, lived in Alexandria at all, so that the personal question may never have
become dangerous.
It is useless to regret that these not very interesting details of
matters ecclesiastical furnish the chief record that remains of the history of
Egypt during the first five or six years following the revolt of Heraclius. But
it is time now to pass to those great events with which the eastern part of the
Empire was ringing, events which had their instantaneous echo on the banks of
the Nile, and which were destined to shake the Byzantine power in Egypt to its
foundations and prepare the way for the Arab conquest. But the great conflict
between the Empire and Persia took place on a wider stage; and in order to
understand its bearing upon the fortunes of Egypt, it is necessary to follow
its vicissitudes, if only in rough outline.
PERSIAN CONQUEST OF SYRIA
When Chosroes, grandson of Anushirwan, the great King of Persia, had a
few days after his enthronement been driven from his kingdom by the rebel
usurper Bahram, he fled with his two uncles across the Tigris, cutting the
ropes of the ferry behind him to baffle his pursuers. He pushed on to Circesium
on the Euphrates, wishing to pray at a Christian shrine for deliverance from
his enemies. Thence he is said to have wandered irresolute and despondent; and
hesitating whether he should seek protection with the Huns or with the Romans, he
threw the reins on his horse’s neck and left the decision to chance. His animal
carried him to the Roman frontiers, and he became the guest of the nation with
whom his country had been waging war for the space of nearly seven centuries.
He was well received by the Emperor Maurice, or rather by his
lieutenant, at Hierapolis. The Emperor is said himself to have sent him a
treasure of priceless jewels and to have given him his daughter Mary in
marriage. It is of more importance that he espoused the cause of the Persian
prince, and sent Narses with a vast army to recover the kingdom from Bahram.
The issue was decided in a bloody battle on the river Zab in the district of Balarath, where, although the
Persian commander fought with his usual adroitness and valour,
his army was outnumbered and cut to pieces. Bahram fled to Balkh, where the
ministers of the King’s vengeance soon tracked him down and destroyed him.
Chosroes was thus by Roman aid placed on the throne of Persia; a picked
regiment of a thousand Romans formed his body-guard; and peace was established
between the two Empires. It is even said that Chosroes turned Christian, and
his costly offerings at the shrine of St. Sergius and his letters to the
Patriarch of Antioch are quoted as evidence of his preference for the Jacobite profession of faith.
No doubt his education and his close relations with the Christian
Empire, as well as his marriage, softened the traditional hostility of a Magian to the Christian religion. But the Romans claimed as
the reward of their alliance an annexation of territory which brought their
Empire up to the banks of the Araxes; and while this loss was galling to Chosroes
and his people, the King’s leanings to an alien religion were equally galling
to his priests, and were doubtless quickly corrected. He was consequently
driven by powerful forces, religious and political, to break the pact with
Byzantium. He got rid of the Roman guard, and he quarrelled with Narses who was in command at Dara; whereupon
Maurice, anxious to soothe the Kings enmity, replaced Narses by Germanus
It was at this time that the deformed and ferocious Phocas, having secured
the supreme power at Byzantium, had the Emperor Maurice and all his sons and
his daughters put to death. Chosroes hardly needed now the pretext his
indignation furnished for a declaration of open war. Any doubt he may have felt
was removed when Narses set up the standard of revolt at Edessa, dividing the
Empire against itself. It is true that Narses, venturing in a fit of foolish
confidence to visit his partisans at the capital, was seized by Phocas and
burnt at the Hippodrome; but the die was cast. When therefore Lilius, the envoy of Phocas, reached Germanus at Dara and was sent on with every mark of honour to the Persian court, bearing letters and royal gifts for the King, Chosroes
flung the Emperors ambassador into a dungeon and marched his forces into
Armenia.
It is not within the scope of this work to follow the campaigns of
Chosroes against Phocas. They neither fall within the period under review, nor
connect, save by their broad results, with the history of Egypt; and the present
writer could add little or nothing to the records already written. Suffice it
therefore to say that after overrunning Armenia, which had so often been the
battlefield of contending empires, the Persian King divided his forces, and
sent one army southward to the conquest of Syria and another westward through
the heart of Asia Minor with the design of reaching Constantinople. The order
of events is by no means clear; but it is the fortune of the southern force
that concerns us here, and so slow was its progress that the fall of Antioch
only coincided with the coronation of Heraclius. Had the motive of Chosroes in
waging war been merely revenge against Phocas, the death of that tyrant might
have ended the strife: but the Great King had proved the weakness of his
enemies, and the success of his arms only fired his ambition. He now aimed at nothing
less than the total subjugation of the Roman Empire. It was no visionary
scheme. In numbers, equipment, and discipline his troops were far superior to
those of the enemy; his commanders—now that Bonosus and Narses were dead—were
unrivalled; his treasury was full and his people united, while the Emperors
people were divided, and his exchequer wellnigh exhausted.
Still the Syrian country was difficult: siege methods were tedious: and
a great amount of time was wasted every year in winter quarters. Hence it was
not till the fifth year of Heraclius reign that the Persian general Khorheam after taking Damascus and Caesarea advanced to the
capture of Jerusalem. From his head quarters at
Caesarea, Khorheam, it seems, sent envoys calling on
Jerusalem to surrender to the Great King; and the city was actually delivered
up to the Persian officers by the Jews, who had prevailed over the Christian
population . Some months later, however, the Christians rose in revolt, slew
the Persian chiefs, overmastered the garrison, and closed the gates. The Shah-Waraz then advanced to beleaguer the town : but aided by
the Jews he succeeded in undermining the walls, and on the nineteenth day from
their arrival his troops entered by the breach and took the city by storm.
Scenes of massacre, rapine, and destruction ensued. The most reasonable
estimate, which is that of Sebeos and of Thomas Ardzrouni, places the slain at 57,000 and the captives at
35,000, while the Byzantine historians say loosely that 90,000 perished. The
Armenians are probably nearer the truth, but it is certain that many thousand
clergy and monks, saints and nuns, were put to the sword. After twenty-one days
of plunder and slaughter, the Persians retired outside the walls, and set fire
to the city. Thus the church of the Holy Sepulchre and all the famous churches of Constantine were destroyed or dismantled. The
Holy Rood, which had been buried in its golden and bejewelled case, was unearthed when its hiding-place had been disclosed under torture, and
with countless holy vessels of gold and silver was carried away as plunder,
while great multitudes, including the Patriarch Zacharias, were driven into
captivity. The reliquary of the Holy Cross and the Patriarch were sent as presents
to Mary the wife of Chosroes : but of the ordinary captives many were redeemed
by the Jews for the mere pleasure of putting them to death, if Cedrenus is to be believed. “All these things happened not
in a year or a month but within a few days” pathetically exclaims the writer of
the Chronicon Paschale, and
the date is accurately fixed to the month of May, 615.
So the Holy City was smitten with fire and sword. But of the remnant
that escaped slaughter and captivity many fled southward to the Christian
cities of Arabia1—quiet communities whose peace was already disturbed by echoes
of the cry of the rising prophet of Islam. Yet it was probably in connection
with this very triumph of the idolatrous Persians at Jerusalem that Mohammed
uttered his famous prophecy : “The Romans have been overcome by the Persians in
the nearest part of the land; but after their defeat they shall overcome in
their turn within a few years”. But the main refuge of the scattered Christians
was in Egypt, and particularly Alexandria, where the population was already
swollen by crowds of refugees who had been flocking thither during the whole
course of the Persian invasion of Syria.
The bounty and resources of John the Almoner were already strained by
the prevailing destitution, even before the exiles from Jerusalem were thrown
upon the city. To add to the troubles of the time, that same summer saw a
serious failure of the Nile flood, and the result was a devastating famine
throughout the land of Egypt. Gifts nevertheless poured in to the Church, and few
of those who came to John, “as to a waveless haven”,
for refuge were disappointed. Besides the daily dole of food for the needy the
good Patriarch provided almshouses and hospitals for the sick and wounded, and
scorned even to rebuke those wealthy men who were mean enough to take advantage
of his charity. But such lavishness could not last: and as the famine grew
fiercer, John found his chest becoming empty. In this strait he was sorely
tempted by a layman who had been twice married and was therefore disqualified
for orders, but who offered a vast sum of money and a great weight of corn as
the price of his ordination. John had only two measures of corn remaining in
his granary : but in the end he rejected the offer, and was rewarded almost on
the moment by the news that two of the Church cornships,
with large cargoes of grain, had just rounded the Pharos from Sicily, and were
moored in the harbour.
Yet the good works of the Patriarch were not bounded by Egypt or
confined to feeding the hungry. No sooner had the Holy City been sacked than a
certain monk named Modestus, who had escaped the
slaughter, wandered through Palestine begging for alms to reinstate the ruined
churches. He was successful in his mission, and returning with a great sum of
money to Jerusalem, he found that the Jews had now forfeited the special
protection of the Persians, which they had at first received as the guerdon of
their service to the conquerors. The Christians were again in favour, and Modestus being
appointed civil and spiritual head of the community, was suffered to rebuild
the churches. Indeed, as Sebeos relates, Chosroes had
sent special orders to treat the captives kindly, to resettle them, and to
restore the public buildings. He also sanctioned the expulsion of the Jews—an
order which was carried out with the greatest alacrity.
The same historian gives a letter written by Modestus to Koumitas, Metropolitan of Armenia, after the
completion of the work upon the churches. “God now has made our adversaries
friends”. it says, “and shown us mercy and pity from our captors. But the Jews
. . . who presumed to do battle and to burn those glorious places, are driven
out from the Holy City, and must not inhabit it nor see the holy places
restored to their magnificence”. And again: “All the churches of Jerusalem have
been set in order, and are served by clergy: peace reigns in the City of God
and round about it”
Not less curious is the narrative, given by the same writer, of a kind
of council held by the Christians at the suggestion of Chosroes. The story is
preserved in a letter sent by the Armenian Catholicus and bishops in reply to a message from Constantine, successor to Heraclius. The
latter relates that the Great King ordered all the bishops of the East and of
Assyria to assemble at his Court, remarking: “I hear that there are two parties
of Christians, and that the one curses the other : which is to be regarded as
in the right? They shall come to a general assembly to confirm the right and
reject the wrong”. One Smbat Bagratouni and the King’s
chief physician were made presidents. It is specially recorded that Zacharias,
the Patriarch of Jerusalem, was present, “and many other wise men who had been
carried into captivity from Alexandria”. The council proved very turbulent, and
the King had to expel all sects but those who followed the doctrines of Nicaea,
Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon. These several doctrines he ordered the
assembled divines to examine and report upon. Memorials representing various
opinions were submitted to the King, who discussed and pondered them. Finally, Zacharias
and the Alexandrian divines were separately asked to pronounce the truth under
oath, and they declared the right faith to be that approved by the Councils of
Nicaea, Constantinople, and Ephesus, but not that of Chalcedon : in other words
they pronounced for the Monophysites. Thereupon the King ordered a search to be
made in the royal treasury or library for the document of the Nicaean faith,
which was found, and declared to be in agreement with the faith of the
Armenians. Accordingly Chosroes issued an edict that “All the Christians under
my rule shall accept the faith of the Armenians”. Among those who so agreed are
named “the God-loving queen Shirin, the brave Smbat,
and the chief royal physician”. The instrument embodying the right confession
of faith, as the result of the council, was sealed with the Great King’s seal,
and deposited with the royal archives.
This singular episode, embedded in the letter of the Armenian bishops
and so preserved to history, is the most striking evidence we possess of
Chosroes’ attitude to the Christians. The letter itself has the ring of truth,
and there is no reason whatever to question its genuineness. It was written
somewhere about the year 638, or some twenty years after the council which it
records, and which was assembled not long after the Persian capture of
Jerusalem. The Great King is here revealed in a new light. He is no fanatical
heathen monarch, persecuting or warring against the believers in the Cross. On
the contrary, he acknowledges the right of the Christians to their belief,
shows a curious speculative interest in their tenets, is puzzled by their most
unchristian fightings and anathemas, and either from
kindly wishes for their welfare or from mere motives of state policy he desires
to compose their differences. He was present at the debate, put questions, and
weighed answers. When his mind was made up and his decision given, he seems to
have threatened some of the bishops that he would put them to the sword and
pull down their churches if they disobeyed his ordinance. But on the whole the
story shows a toleration verging on sympathy for the Christian religion—the
same frame of mind which is displayed in the order restoring the Christian
outcasts to Jerusalem and enabling them under Modestus to rebuild the churches. John of Nikiou relates that Hormisdas’
father, the great Anushirwan, after secretly professing Christianity, was
baptized by a bishop. However that may be, the influence of Christian queens,
physicians, and philosophers at the court clearly enlightened the King’s mind
and softened his disposition towards the Christian religion. We have far more
reason for astonishment at the normal toleration which the Church enjoyed under
Persian rule than for surprise at the occasional outbursts of ferocity from
which it suffered.
But to resume. The contribution offered by John of Alexandria towards
the reinstatement of the churches in Jerusalem is said to have been a thousand
mules, a thousand sacks of corn and of vegetables, a thousand vessels of
pickled fish, a thousand jars of wine, a thousand pounds of iron, and a
thousand workmen : and John wrote in a letter to Modestus—“Pardon
me that I can send nothing worthy the temples of Christ. Would that I could
come myself and work with my own hands at the church of the Resurrection”. He
is also recorded to have sent a large convoy of gold, corn, clothing, and the
like, under charge of one Chrysippus— though this,
albeit separately related, may be the same story in another form—and to have
commissioned Theodore bishop of Amathus in Cyprus,
Gregory bishop of Rhinocolura, and Anastasius, Abbot
of the monastery of the Great Mountain of St. Anthony, with large sums of money
to recover and redeem as many captives as they could. This was in the latter
half of 615.
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