To him I made this reply: “My master did not invade the city of Rome by force nor as a tyrant; he freed her from a tyrant’s yoke, or rather from the yoke of many tyrants. Was she not ruled by effeminate debauchers, and what is even worse and more shameful, by harlots? Your power, methinks, was fast asleep then; and the power of your predecessors, who in name alone are called emperors of the Romans, while the reality is far different.

If they were powerful, if they were emperors of the Romans, why did they allow Rome to be in the hands of harlots? Were not some of the holy popes banished, others so distressed that they could not procure their daily supplies nor money wherewith to give alms? Did not Adalbert send insulting letters to your predecessors, the emperors Romanos and Constantine? Did he not rob and plunder the churches of the holy apostles? Who of you emperors, led by zeal for God, troubled to punish so heinous a crime and bring back the holy church to its proper state?

Justinian, Valentinian, Theodosius

You neglected it, my master did not. From the ends of the world be rose, and came to Rome, and drove out the ungodly, and gave back to the vicars of the holy apostles all their power and honor. Those who afterwards rose against him and the lord pope, as being violators of their oath, sacrilegious robbers and torturers of their lords the popes, in accordance with the decrees of such Roman emperors as Justinian, Valentinian, Theodosius etc., he slew, beheaded, hanged, or exiled. If he had not done so, he himself would be an impious, unjust, cruel tyrant.

It is a known fact that Berengar and Adalbert became his vassals and received the kingdom of Italy with a golden scepter from his hand and that they promised fealty, under oath in the presence of your servants, men still alive and now dwelling in this city. At the devil’s prompting they perfidiously broke their word, and therefore he justly took their kingdom from them, as being deserters and rebels. You yourself would have done the same to men who had sworn fealty, and then revolted against you.

Read More about The Accession of Alexius and Interfamily Power Struggles part 15

He called you not emperor, which is Basileus in his tongue, but insultingly Rex, which is king in ours. I told him that the thing meant was the same though the word was different, and he then said that I had come not to make peace but to stir up strife. Finally he got up in a rage, and really wishing to insult us received your letter not in his own hand but through an interpreter. He is a man commanding enough in person but feigning humility: whereon if a man lean it will pierce his hand.

Falsehood a Ulysses

On the seventh of June, the sacred day of Pentecost, I was brought before Nicephorus himself in the palace called Stephana, that is, the Crown Palace. He is a monstrosity of a man, a dwarf, fat-headed and with tiny mole’s eyes; disfigured by a short, broad, thick beard half going gray; disgraced by a neck scarcely an inch long; piglike by reason of the big close bristles on his bead; in color an Ethiopian and, as the poet says, “you would not like to meet him in the dark”; a big belly, a lean posterior, very long in the hip considering his short stature, small legs, fair sized heels and feet; dressed in a robe made of fine linen, but old, foul smelling, and discolored by age; shod with Sicyonian slippers; bold of tongue, a fox by nature, in perjury and falsehood a Ulysses.

My lords and august emperors, you always seemed comely to me; but bow much more comely now! Always magnificent; how much more magnificent now! Always mighty; how much more mighty now! Always clement; how much more clement now! Always full of virtues; bow much fuller now! At his left, not on a line with him, but much lower down, sat the two child emperors, once his masters, now his subjects. He began his speech as follows: “It was our duty and our desire to give you a courteous and magnificent reception.

That, however, has been rendered impossible by the impiety of your master, who in the guise of an hostile invader has laid claim to Rome; has robbed Berengar and Adalbert of their kingdom contrary to law and right; has slain some of the Romans by the sword, some by banging, while others he has either blinded or sent into exile; and furthermore has tried to subdue to himself by massacre and conflagration cities belonging to our empire. His wicked attempts have proved unsuccessful, and so he has sent you, the instigator and furtherer of this villainy, under pretence of peace to act comme un espion, that is, as a spy upon us.”

Read More about The Accession of Alexius and Interfamily Power Struggles part 2

And when, after twenty days, I did go away, from there, that man to whom I had given the carpet ordered the ship’s master, after passing a certain promontory, to put me ashore and let me die of hunger. This he did because he bad searched my baggage to see if I had any purple vestments concealed, and, when he had wanted to take one, I had prevented him. Oh you Michaels, you Michaels, where have I ever found so many of you and such ones! For my ‘keeper in Constantinople gave me over to his rival Michael – a bad man to a worse, the worse one to a rascal.

My guide was also called Michael-a simple man, indeed, but one whose simplicity harmed me almost as much as the wickedness of the others. But from the hands of these little Michaels I came into you, O great Michael half hermit, half monk! I tell you and I tell you truly; the bath will not avail you, in which you do assiduously get drank for love of St. John the Baptist! For those who seek God falsely, shall never merit to find Him!

(The manuscript containing Liutprand’s report breaks off here suddenly.)

translated in the appendix of Ernest F. Henderson, , Select Historical Documents of the Middle Ages , (London: George Bell, 1910), pp. 440-477 [pagination preserved] The text has been modernized slightly by the changing of archaic verb forms [“thou wert” and so forth], and by the Americanization of the spelling.

Liudprand of Cremona (c.922-c.972): Embassy to Constantinople, 963 excerpts

Liudprand of Cremona (c.922-c.972) made several trips to Constantinople. Embassy to Constantinople discusses his tmission to the Emperor Nicephorus Phocas on behalf of Emperor Otto I.of the Holy Roman Empire.

… On the fourth of June, as I said above, we arrived at Constantinople and waited with our horses in heavy rain outside the Carian gate until five o’clock in the afternoon. At five o’clock Nicephorus ordered us to be admitted on foot, for he did not think us worthy to use the horses with which your clemency bad provided us, and we were escorted to the aforesaid hateful, waterless, draughty stone house. On the sixth of June, which was the Saturday before Pentecost, I was brought before the emperor’s brother Leo, marshal of the court and chancellor; and there we tired ourselves with a fierce argument over your imperial title.

Read More about Mrs Bullfrog Part 2

Leaving Leucate, their, on the nineteenth day before the Calends of January (Dec. 14), and navigating ourselves since, as we said above, our sailors had fled – on the fifteenth (Dec. 18) we came to Corfu; where, before we had left the ship, a certain war-commander met us – Michael by name, a Chersonite, born in the place called Cherson. He was a hoary-headed man, jovial faced, good-natured in his discourse, always pleasantly laughing; but, as it afterwards turned out, a devil at heart – as God showed to me even then by clear enough proofs, if only my mind could then have understood them.

Terrified that Michael

For at the very time when, with a kiss, he was wishing me the peace that he did not bear in his heart, all Corfu-a great island, namely-trembled; and not only once but three times on the same day did it tremble. Four days later, moreover, -namely on the eleventh day before the Calends of January (Dec. 22)-while, sitting at table, I was eating bread with him who was treading me under foot, the sun, ashamed at such an unworthy deed, hid the rays of his light, and, suffering an eclipse, terrified that Michael, but did not change him.

I will explain, then, what I had done to him for the sake of friendship, and what I received from him by way of reward. On my way to Constantinople I gave to his son that most costly shield, oiled and worked with marvelous art, which you, my august masters, gave to me with the other gifts to give to my Greek friends.

Now, returning from Constantinople, I gave the father a most precious vestment; for all of which he gave me the following thanks – Nicephorus had written that, at whatever hour I should come to him, without delay he should place me or a Greek ship and send me to the chamberlain Leo. He did not do this; but detained me twenty days and nourished me not at his own but at my, expense; until an envoy came from the aforesaid chamberlain Leo, who rated him for delaying me. But because he could not bear my reproaches, laments, and sighs, he went away and handed me over to a man so sinful and utterly bad that he did not even permit me to buy supplies until he had received from me a carpet worth a pound of silver.

Read More about The Accession of Alexius and Interfamily Power Struggles part 25

But may what I have written concerning this suffice until, being snatched from the hands of the Greeks, through the grace of God and the prayers of the most holy apostles I may come to you. And then it may not weary me to say what it burdens me now here to write. Now let us return to the matter in hand.

On the eighth day before the Ides of December (Dec. 6) we came to Leucate, where, by the bishop of that place a eunuch, as by other bishops everywhere, we were most unkindly received and treated. In all Greece – I speak truly and do not lie – I found no hospitable bishops. They are at the same time poor and rich; rich in gold, with which they play from full coffers; poor in servants and implements. Alone they seat themselves at their bare little tables, placing before themselves their ship-biscuit; and then not drinking, but sipping their bath-water from a very small glass.

They, themselves sell and buy; they themselves close and open their doors; they are their own stewards, their own ass-drivers, their own “capones”-but ha! I was going to write “caupones,” but the thing itself is so true that I was compelled to write the truth even when I did not wish to-for really, I say, they are “caupones “-that is, eunuchs- which is against the ecclesiastical law; and they are also ” capones,” that is, tavern keepers; which is also against the canons. One can say of them –

Lettuce does end the meal that with lettuce has had its beginning,
Lettuce, which too was wont to close the meals of their fathers.’
[Martial ep. Xiii]

I would consider them happy in their poverty if this were an imitation of the poverty of Christ.

Pay to Nicephorus

But nothing impels them to this save sordid gain and the cursed thirst for gold. But may God spare them! I think they do this because their churches are tributary. For the bishop of Leucate swore to me that every year his church had to pay to Nicephorus a hundred pieces of gold; and in like manner the other churches, more or less, according to their means. How wicked this is is demonstrated by the acts of our most holy father Joseph; for when he, ii; the time of famine, made all Egypt tributary to Pharaoh, he permitted the land of the priests to be free from tribute.

Read More about Report of his Mission to Constantinople part 26

And so Polyeuctus, the patriarch of Constantinople, wrote a privilege for the bishop of Hydronto to this effect -. that be should by his authority have permission to consecrate bishops in Acerenza, Tursi, Gravina, Matera and Tricarico: which, however, evidently belong to the diocese of the lord pope. But why need I say this when, indeed, the church of Constantinople itself is rightly subject to our holy catholic and apostolic church of Rome.

We know-nay, we have seen-that the bishop of Constantinople did not use the pallium except with the permission of our holy father. But when that most godless Alberic,-whom cupidity, not by drops, but, as it were, by torrents, had filled-usurped for himself the Roman city, and held the lord pope like his own slave in his dwelling, the emperor Romanus made his own son, the eunuch Theophylactus, patriarch.

Vile transaction the shameful custom

And since the cupidity of Alberic was not hidden from him, he sent to him very great gifts, bringing it about that, in the name of the pope, letters were sent to the patriarch Theophylactus, by the authority of which be and his successors alike might use the pallium without permission from the popes. From which vile transaction the shameful custom arose that not only the patriarchs but also the bishops of all Greece should use the pallium. How absurd this is, I do not need to make clear.- It is therefore my plan that a sacred synod be held, and Polyeuctus be summoned to it. But if he be unwilling to come and to amend the faults that have been mentioned above, then let that be done which the holy canons shall decree.

Do you in the mean. time, most potent emperors, continue to labor as you have done; bring it about that, if Nicephorus be unwilling to obey us when we arrange to proceed against him canonically, he will hear you, whose forces this half-corpse will not dare to meet. This, I say, is what the apostles, our masters and follow fighters, wish us to do. Rome is not to be despised by the Greeks because Constantine went away from it; but rather to be the more cherished, venerated and adored for the reason that the apostles, the holy teachers Peter and Paul, came thither.

Read More about Report of his Mission to Constantinople part 12

You have nothing to bestow on your brother; bestow something on the emperors who love your brother by putting their trust in Him who knows all things. You know with what labor and exertion, with what vigils and at what expense-snatching it from the hands of the godless-they have enriched, honored, exalted, and brought back to its proper condition, the Roman church of your brother the apostle Peter. But if my works cast me into peril, let their merits at least free me; and let not those whom your aforesaid brother in the faith and in the flesh, Peter the chief apostle of the apostles, wishes to have rejoice and prosper, be saddened by this-that is, through 2ne whom they themselves had sent! ”

Beaten back against the waves

This is not, oh my masters and august emperors, this is not flattery. I tell you truly, and I do not sew pillows under my arms-the thing, I say, is true – after two days, through your merits the sea became calm and so tranquil, that when our sailors deserted us, we ourselves sailed the boat to Leucate – a hundred and forty miles, namely suffering no danger or discomfort, except a little at the mouth of the river Acheloi, where its current running down rapidly is beaten back against the waves of the sea.

How then, most mighty emperors, will you repay the Lord for all that which for your sakes He did to me. I will tell you how God wishes this and demands this to be done. And although He can do it without you, He wishes nevertheless that you shall be His instruments in this. matter. For He himself furnishes what shall be offered unto Him keeps what He demands from us, in order to crown His own work. Pay attention then, I beg.

Nicephorus, being a man who scorns all churches, on account of the wrath in which he abounds towards you, has ordered the patriarch of Constantinople to raise the church of Hydronto to the rank of a bishopric, and not to permit any longer, throughout all Apulia and Calabria, that the divine mysteries be celebrated in Latin, but to have them celebrated in Greek. He says that the former popes were traders and that they, sold the Holy, Spirit – that Spirit by which all things are vivified and ruled -, which fills the universe; which knows the Word,; which is co-eternal, and of one substance with God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ, without beginning, without end, for eve-r true; who (‘Christ) I ‘not valued at a fixed price, but is bought by the clean-hearted for as much as they hold Him to be worth.

Read More about That Brute Simmons part 3

After writing these verses, on the sixth day before the Nones of October (Oct. 2), at the tenth hour, I entered my boat with my guide, and left that once most rich and flourishing, now half-starved, perjured, lying, wily, greedy, rapacious, avaricious, vain-glorious city; and after forty nine days of ass-riding, walking, horse-riding, fasting, thirsting, sighing, weeping, groaning, I came to Naupactus, which is a city of Nikopolis.

And here my, guide deserted me after placing us on two small ships, and committing us to two imperial messengers who were to being me by sea to Hydronto. But since their Orders did not include the right of levying from the Greek princes, they were everywhere repulsed ; so that we were not supported by them, but they by us. How often did I revolve within me that verse of Terence : “They themselves need help whom you do choose to defend you.”

River Offidaris

On the ninth day before the Calends of December, then (Nov. 23), we left Naupactus and I arrived at the river Offidaris in two days – my companions not remaining in the ships, which could not hold them, but advancing along the shore. From our position on the river Offidaris we looked over to Patras, eighteen miles distant, on the other shore of the sea.

This place of apostolic suffering, which we had visited and adored on our way to Constantinople, we now omitted-I confess my fault-to visit and adore. My unspeakable desire, my august lords and masters, of returning to you and seeing you was the cause of this; and if it had not been for this alone, I would, I believe, have forever perished.

A storm from the south rose against me-madman that I was,-disturbing the sea to its lowest depths with its ragings. And when it had continued to do this for several days and nights: on the day before the Calends of December (Nov. 30)-on the very day, namely, of His passion-I recognized that this had happened to me of my own fault. Trouble alone taught me to give ear to its meaning. Famine, indeed, had begun to violently oppress us. The inhabitants of the land thought to kill us, in order to take our goods from us.

The sea, to hinder our flight, was raging high. Then, betaking myself to the church which I saw, weeping and wailing, I said: “Oh holy apostle Andrew, I am the servant of your fellow fisherman, brother and fellow apostle, Simon Peter; I have not avoided the place of your suffering or kept away from it through pride; the command of my emperors, the love of them, urges me to return home. If my sin has moved you to indignation, may the merit of my august masters lead you to mercy.

Read More about Report of his Mission to Constantinople part 8

Having done and said these things they gave to me a letter written and sealed with gold to bring to you; but it -was not worthy of you, as I thought. They brought also other letters sealed with silver and said: “We judge it unseemly that your pope should receive letters from the emperor; but the marshal of the court, the emperor’s brother, sends him an epistle which is good enough for him – .not through his own poor envoys but through you to the effect that ‘ unless he come to his senses, he shall know that he shall be utterly confounded.”

Fifty pieces of gold

When I had received this, they let me go, giving me kisses which were very sweet, very loving. But as I went away they sent me a message right worthy of themselves but not 6f me-to the effect, namely, that they would give me horses for myself personally and for my companions, but none for my luggage. And thus, being very much annoyed, as was natural,- I had to give to my guide as pay, objects of the worth of fifty pieces of gold. And as I had no means of retaliating upon Nicephorus for his ill deeds,’ I wrote these verses on the wall of -my hated habitation, and upon a wooden table:

False is Argolian faith, be warned and mistrust it O Latin;
Heed you and let not your ear be lent to the words that they utter.
when it will help him the Argive will swear by all that is holy!
Lofty, with windows tall, ornate with varying marble,
This-dwelling, deficient in water, admits the sun in its confines,
Fosters the bitterest cold, nor repels the heat when it rages
Liutprand a bishop I, from Cremona a town of Ausonia,
Hither for love of peace to Constantinople did journey;
Here I was kept confined throughout the four months of the summer.
For before Bari’s gates had appeared the emperor Otto,
Striving to take the place by-flame alike and by slaughter.
Thence, by my prayers induced, he hastens to Rome, his own city
Greece meanwhile having promised a bride for the son of the victor.
O had she ne’er been born, and I had been spared this grim journey
Safely avoiding the wrath that Nicephorus since has poured on me-
He who prohibits his stepchild from wedding the son of my master!
Lo, the day is at hand, when war, impelled by fierce furies,
Wildly shall rage o’er earth’s limits, should God not see fit to avert it.
Peace which is longed for by al1, because of his guilt will be silent!

Read More about The Accession of Alexius and Interfamily Power Struggles part 6

“But,” they said, -these things are prohibited; and when the emperor spoke as you say he did, he could not imagine that you would even dream of such things as these. For, as we surpass other nations in wealth and wisdom, so also we ought to surpass them in dress; so that those who are singularly endowed with virtue, should have garments unique in beauty.”

“Such a garment can hardly be called unique,” I answered, ” when with us the street-walkers and conjurers wear them.”

“Where do they get them? ” they asked.

“From Venetian and Amalfian traders,” I said, ” who, by bringing them to us, support themselves from the food we give them.”

“Well, they shall not do so any longer,” they said. They shall be closely examined , and if any thing of this kind shall be found on them they shall be punished with blows and shorn of their hair.”

Margrave Berengar

“In the time of the emperor Constantine, of blessed memory,” I said, ” I came here not as bishop but as deacon; not sent by an emperor or king but by the margrave Berengar; and I bought many more and more precious vestments, which were neither looked at nor viewed by the Greeks nor stamped with lead. Now, having become a- bishop by the mercy of God, and being sent by the magnificent emperors Otto and Otto, father and son, L am so insulted that my vestments are marked after the manner of the Venetians; and, as they are being transported for the use of the church entrusted to me, whatever seems of any worth is taken away.

Are you not weary of insulting me, or rather my masters, for whose sake I am derided? Is it not enough that I am given into custody, that I am tortured by hunger and thirst, that I could not return to them, being detained until now,-without, to fill the measure of their disrespect to them, my being robbed of my own things ? Take away from me at least only what I have bought; leave me those things that have been given me as a gift by my friends!

“The emperor Constantine,” they said, “was a mild man, who always stayed in his palace, and by such means as this made the natives friendly to him; but the emperor Nicephorus, a man given to war, abhors the palace as if it were the plague. And he is called by us warlike and almost a lover of strife; nor does he make the nations friendly to him by paying them, but subjects them to his rule by terror and the sword. And in order that you may see what is our opinion of your royal masters, all that has been given to you of this color, and all that has been bought shall revert to us by the same process.”

Read More about The Accession of Alexius and Interfamily Power Struggles part 14