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shall I match the lamentation with my words? But these things would be impossible not only for us who are so humble in our words, but also for those who are exceedingly lofty in thought. But who, like Jeremiah, would grant me a sea of tears and a deep-thundering sound of groans, that I might mourn the emperor fittingly?

4 It was necessary, therefore, O revered senate, and for all Romans, not only to greet the dead king with lamentations, nor only to pour out libations of groans, or to tear our cheeks, or to shave our hair, or to wail loudly and tearfully, or to wear black as an image and symbol of our grief; not thus only was it necessary to render him holy tribute, but, if it were holy, also to vomit forth our souls with him as he departed and to appear as corpses with him, we who were long ago given soul and life through him. For truly, the affairs of the Romans had long since been dead and mortified, truly seized by the Italian disease, from the time when, falling upon it in an assault, they took over the queen of cities, which held the place of the head for the whole Roman dominion. Therefore, as they enslaved the queen and took the mistress captive, from that point they subjected all her servants without difficulty. This, then, has become the common calamity for the Romans by the infinite judgments of God, into which not even Paul was able to peer, he who was lifted up to the third heaven and thence carried off to paradise. At any rate, the most divine Jerusalem suddenly became a desolation, and, in the words of the prophet, like a watchman's hut in a cucumber field and like a terebinth tree that has cast off its leaves. But God raised up that great king, I mean Theodore Laskaris, who took hold of the ship of the Romans as it was being tossed by the waves and sat at the helm and undertook its governance by God and his own most dexterous nature. He therefore was the first to stand against the many and great *** to ram against them mightily, and he fought manfully against the north winds and the ship-sinking storms of wickedness. Not much time passed, and he was taken by the stronger one, but he had entrusted the command of the merchant ship to one who was skilled for these things and knowledgeable, and of whom he had had much experience. And he, having received the vessel, very small indeed and such that it was not simply to be considered and seen as a hollow ship but not even a dromon or a light boat, but a tiny little boat, being truly so and called so, he brought it to such a size of height and breadth as to construct it not as a thirty-oared or forty-oared ship, things much talked of by the ancients or rather to say impossible to construct, but as a thousand-oared or ten-thousand-oared ship.

5 But why do I chatter on with metaphors and weary your ears by speaking figuratively, when it is possible to set forth the matters clearly and to place them before your eyes? Indeed, this great emperor, having accepted the command from the emperor and his father-in-law, embracing a just and proper inheritance and not seizing it as plunder, which has happened to many others, and a dominion so small that it was not famed as being sufficient even for a principality, let alone the renowned empire of the Romans, which in its breadth and size greatly surpassed others—for it was constrained by small and easily circumscribed borders and was encircled by rather weak ramparts, and these only in the east, since the Italian enjoyed the greater part of it. Having received such a dominion and considering within himself that for the right-minded the imperial dignity is not a pretext for luxury nor a reason for extravagance nor an incitement to indolence, but a starting-point for long contests and a cause of more thoughtful deeds, of wars and their consequent trophies, which God awards to those who fight tirelessly for just causes—having thought such things and raised his spirit on high and swelled it

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παρισώσω τὸν ἐκ τῶν λόγων ὀλοφυρμόν; ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν μὴ καὶ ἀδύνατα ἂν εἴη μὴ μόνον ἡμῖν τοῖς οὕτω χαμαιζήλοις περὶ τοὺς λόγους ἀλλὰ καὶ τοῖς ἄγαν ὑψηλοῖς τὴν διάνοιαν· ἀλλὰ τίς ἄν μοι χρήσαιτο καθ' Ἱερεμίαν θαλάσσας δακρύων καὶ στεναγμάτων ἦχον βαρύβρομον, ὡς ἂν θρηνήσαιμι προσηκόντως τὸν αὐτοκράτορα;

4 Ἔδει μὲν οὖν ἡμᾶς, ὦ σεμνὴ γερουσία, καὶ πάντας Ῥωμαίους μὴ ὀλοφυρμοῖς μόνον τεθνηκότα δεξιοῦσθαι τὸν βασιλέα μηδὲ μόνον σπείσασθαι στεναγμοὺς ἢ δρύψασθαι παρείας ἢ καταξᾶναι τρίχας ἢ μέγα κωκῦσαι καὶ δακρυό φυρτον ἢ μελανειμονῆσαι πάθους εἰκόνα καὶ σύμβολον· οὐχ οὕτως οὖν ἔδει μόνον ἐκείνῳ τὴν ὁσίαν χαρίσασθαι, ἀλλ' εἴπερ ἦν ὅσιον καὶ τὰς ψυχὰς ἀπιόντι συναπερεύξασθαι καὶ νεκροὺς σὺν αὐτῷ φανῆναι τοὺς πάλαι ψυχωθέντας καὶ ζωωθέντας γε δι' αὐτοῦ. ἐτεθνήκει μὲν γὰρ ὡς ἀληθῶς πρὸ μακροῦ τὰ Ῥωμαίων πράγματα καὶ νενέκρωται, ἀληθῶς Ἰταλικῇ τῇ νόσῳ κατασχεθέντα, ἐξ οὗ τὴν βασιλίδα τῶν πόλεων, ἣ κεφαλῆς λόγον ἐπεῖχε πάσῃ τῇ Ῥωμαίων ἀρχῇ, ἐξ ἐφόδου παρεισπεσόντες τῇ δυναστείᾳ τούτων συμπαρεστή σαντο. ὡς οὖν ἠνδραποδίσαντο τὴν βασίλισσαν καὶ τὴν κυρίαν ἠχμαλωτεύσαντο, ἐντεῦθεν ἅπαν ἀπραγμόνως θερα πευτικὸν ὑπηγάγοντο. αὕτη μὲν οὖν ἡ κοινὴ Ῥωμαίοις γεγένηται συμφορὰ τοῖς ἀπείροις κρίμασι τοῦ θεοῦ, εἰς ἃ μηδὲ Παῦλος παρακύπτειν δεδύνηται, ὁ εἰς τρίτον ἀρθεὶς οὐρανὸν κἀκεῖθεν ἀπαχθεὶς εἰς παράδεισον. ἐγένετο γοῦν ἐξάπινα ἡ θειοτέρα Ἱερουσαλὴμ εἰς ἐρήμωσιν, καὶ τὸ τοῦ προφήτου φάναι ὡς ὀπωροφυλάκιον ἐν σικυηλάτῳ καὶ ὡς ἀποβεβληκυῖα τὰ φύλλα ταύτης τερέβινθος. ἀλλ' ἤγειρεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν μέγαν ἐκεῖνον βασιλέα, Θεόδωρον λέγω τὸν Λάσκαριν, ὃς τῆς τῶν Ῥωμαίων νηὸς κλυδαζομένης συνεπελάβετο καὶ ἐπὶ τῶν οἰάκων κεκάθικε καὶ τὴν ταύτης κυβέρνησιν ὑπὸ θεοῦ καὶ τῆς αὐτοῦ δεξιωτάτης φύσεως ἀνεδέξατο. πρῶτος οὖν αὐτὸς ταῖς τῶν πολλῶν καὶ μεγάλων ἀντεκατέστη*** πολλῷ ἀντεμβολεῖν καὶ τοῖς ἀπαρκτίαις καὶ σκαφοδύταις καικίαις ἀνδρικῶς ἐμαχέσατο. οὐ πολὺς ὁ χρόνος, κἀκεῖνος οὖν παρείληπται πρὸς τοῦ κρείττονος, τὴν δὲ τῆς ὁλκάδας ἡγεμονίαν τῷ δεξιῷ πρὸς ταῦτα καὶ ἐπιστήμονι καὶ οὗ πεῖραν εἴληφεν ἐκ πολλῶν ἐγκεχείρικεν. ὁ δὲ τὸ σκάφος παραλαβὼν σμικρότατον πάνυ καὶ ὅσον οὐχ ἁπλῶς κοίλην νῆα ἀλλ' οὐδὲ δρόμωνα ἢ λέμβος λογίζεσθαί τε καὶ φαίνεσθαι, τυννουτοῒ δὲ πλοιάριον καὶ ὂν ὡς ἀληθῶς καὶ λεγόμενον, εἰς τοσοῦτον ἤγαγε μέγεθος ὑψώσεώς τε καὶ πλατυσμοῦ, ὥστε οὐ τριακοντήρη ἢ τεσσαρακοντήρη, τὰ περι θρύλλητα τοῖς παλαιοῖς ἢ μᾶλλον εἰπεῖν ἀδυνατοῦντα πρὸς σύμπηξιν, ἀλλὰ χιλιοντήρη ἢ μυριοντήρη ταύτην κατασκευά σασθαι.

5 Ἀλλὰ τί ἀδολεσχῶ ταῖς μεταφοραῖς καὶ τροπολογῶν βαρύνω τὰς ἀκοάς, ἐξὸν τρανῶς διασαφῆσαι τὰ πράγματα καὶ ὑπ' ὄψιν αὐτὰ παραστήσασθαι; ὁ μὲν δὴ βασιλεὺς οὗτος ὁ μέγας τὴν ἡγεμονίαν παρὰ τοῦ βασιλέως καὶ κηδεστοῦ προσδεξάμενος, κλῆρον δίκαιον καὶ ἀνῆκον ἀγκαλισάμενος σχοίνισμα ἀλλ' οὐχ ἅρπαγμα συλησάμενος, ὃ πολλοῖς ἑτέροις ἐπισυμβέβηκε, καὶ ἡγεμονίαν τοσαύτην ὅσην οὐδὲ εἰς ἀρχὴν ἀρκοῦσαν εἶναι περίπυστον, μήτοι γε βασιλείαν Ῥωμαίων τὴν περιώνυμον, ἣ τῷ πλάτει καὶ τῷ μεγέθει κατὰ πολὺ τῶν ἄλλων διέφερε-μικροῖς γὰρ αὕτη καὶ εὐπεριγράπτοις τοῖς ὁρίοις περιεσφίγγετο καὶ ἀσθενεστέροις περιεκυκλοῦτο θριγγώμασι καὶ τούτοις εἰς τὴν ἑῴαν μόνον, ἐπεὶ τὰ πλείω ταύτης ἐκαρποῦτο ὁ Ἰταλός. τοιαύτην δὲ τὴν ἡγεμονίαν οὗτος παρειληφὼς καὶ ὑπολογισάμενος καθ' αὑτὸν, ὡς οὐ τρυφῆς ὑπόθεσις γίνεται τὸ βασιλικὸν τοῖς εὖ φρονοῦσιν ἀξίωμα οὐδὲ χλιδῆς λόγος οὐδὲ βλακείας παράνυξις, ἀλλ' ἀφορμὴ ἀγώνων μακρῶν καὶ περιφρονεστέρων ἔργων αἰτία, πολέμων τε καὶ τῶν παρεπομένων τροπαίων, ἃ θεὸς ἐπι βραβεύει τοῖς ἀόκνως μαχομένοις ἐπὶ δικαίοις τοῖς πράγμασι- τοιαῦτα δὴ διανοηθεὶς καὶ εἰς ὕψος ἄρας τὸ φρόνημα καὶ ἐξογκώσας