De capta thessalonica 3 a work by eustathios of thessalonica on its hopefully later capture, which had been weakened by a narrative of cachexia during

 Bearable and full of mourning and wanting springs of tears and some such things, but he who, as they say, was sown in a net and, like us, was caught u

 Most people raised their eyes as to mountains, to the acropolis, where they eagerly awaited help would be for them. but what especially accuses the gr

 Having practiced stretching out his hands like a woman to his pursuers, to slip into a fortress and to give trouble to those who ran after him, lest t

 David, who had lost his senses, whom i had previously blessed when he was in his right mind. and i thus also admired the emperor andronikos in other t

 Completely under age, not only unable to rule a very great empire by himself, but not even to be firmly disposed as boys are, of course, he had alread

 The protostrator alexios and john the eparch, and imprisonment held them and before that, things exceedingly dishonorable. but the boiling of anger on

 For should one measure things beyond measure?) a great disturbance of those of the palace, as much as was for god and the truth according to him, of

 But when the illusion proved false and the war was brought to an end in the late afternoon, having cast down many and filled the southern cemetery, th

 Thus men suffer for for the most part we multiply and magnify what we admire, as being unable to be precise because the soul is confounded by astound

 The present evils are fitting. and to recount the terrible things of that time, all that the latins saw, the fire which spread through their quarters,

 Kontostephanos, an energetic and sensible man, and countless others. but these things were unknown to the crowd and they did not know that he raged ag

 And he also sent them into exile into perpetual banishment. and after a short while, having divided those who had been imprisoned, he separated them i

 To be shamed but if not even so he should yield, being stubborn, to try even violence, and they say it is better for that one to suffer what he does

 Moreover and not enduring it if, having just found an opportunity, he would not take wing, like some demonic figure, he himself tries to surpass in ev

 Having said what seemed best, he was quiet. and for the rest, so that i may not chatter on about worldly unpleasantness, a rush of evils takes place t

 Manuel, and he curses, that he would not come to a worthy state of living in peace, that those alone would be grandeurs when his father died. and he b

 The marchese was left to remain in peace, just as neither was the kral of hungary and any other powerful neighbor. and generally, wherever there was m

 A certain boy, who appeared to be of a similar complexion and age to the emperor alexios. and that child was, they say, a peasant boy from somewhere i

 He annihilated the rest. and his knights were so boastful in their nature that each would stand against three hundred men in war, not at all unlike co

 About to happen, inferring it from many signs. we, at least, anticipating the enemy's attack, sent away those who were children of constantinople with

 For the man was truly master of his hands but he provoked the victorious one to exhaust his desire to laugh at the emperor, and drove the matter to a

 Laws of city-takers, in which, on account of their unwieldiness from size, no effect shone forth, but those around the eastern parts, and they were es

 Not to meddle further, unless they should choose to suffer evils. though he was obliged to supply sufficient grain for the city, he neglected it to su

 Having completely withdrawn his skill, lets the ship be dashed against a reef and sink to the bottom with its cargo and men. so too a guard of a fruit

 Of those seated around to release even one stone from a sling, then also to suggest to the sandal-stitchers on the walls to reproach the latins rounda

 The besiegers because the latins had entirely turned to resisting against choumnos, he, having with difficulty opened the gates and having allowed, fo

 To rebuke the general and to join in leading towards the good. and one might call these men, who had undertaken to remain in the city, no longer civil

 Stripping and running down the streets, known to those who saw them, thus giving proof that they were formerly conspirators. and there is no way that

 He wished, and as a result the enemy host was more emboldened, and even more so especially when, after choumnos had joined battle, though it was possi

 Very strongly fortified. we spoke thus, and the speech flowed away at random, itself as well. and the small stone-throwers were vexing the city, casti

 To the enemies. and with the soldiers shouting in a common cry, komnenos, halt and dismount, he, as if snorting back a final mount up and as you

 But i think this was stranger than that, that when rain poured down from what the enemies were scattering, plowing, indeed, but not sowing the beautif

 In blood, i was led about on horseback through heaps of others, the greater part of whom lay strewn before the wall, so densely packed, that my little

 Of the storm. and if it were made useless for the trees, and especially the fig trees, whose unripe fruit was unlawfully served to the savage beasts f

 But this would be judged as bordering on fighting against god. for the barbarians, rushing in even against each one of them, were committing all sorts

 They tore down when they arrived. and the ruler restrained the murders there, but there was no stopping the suffocation of those who fled into the chu

 By the command of the counts. and it was a sabbath, not having a flight, which one might evangelically pray to avert, but the destruction of so great

 Redness. it was therefore a task to recognize even one's dearest friend among them and each man would ask each other who on earth he might be, becaus

 Thus confounding good order and dissolving the sacred harmony. and i spoke reverently about this also to count alduin, if somehow order might be estab

 To crush the man, goading the horse to kick. thus did these men love us, frequently for every word and every deed putting forward as a justification f

 Of the longed for ones the executioners, or may they have pity. for something like this did indeed happen at times, as if a hungry and biting lion, th

 To relate moderate things out of countless ones but the events of the nights, not even they fail to rival these in contention. and for a time, with t

 They grieved those who kept treasure-houses by ransacking them for the sake of wealth, thus themselves implying that they understood hades as plouton.

 Through all of us and most provident. for it is reported to us that he ordered all-night vigils around the great churches, he jesting even then. for w

 They busied their swords upon them, and afterwards they left completely empty what it contained within, both things for healing and with which the suf

 They cast our people in, and declaring blessed not them but the disease, and now perhaps even death according to the people of gades, among whom hades

 Is fitting, but only by thanksgivings and glory to the most high, from whom and through whom are our affairs. what then prevents me from ceasing after

 Mercilessness towards those who offend in some small way, from which came the merciless thing that just now cast us down, a most just thing, since we,

the present evils are fitting. And to recount the terrible things of that time, all that the Latins saw, the fire which spread through their quarters, apart from the plunderings, the conflagrations at sea from the fire hurled by the Romans against those who rushed to flee on ships, the things on the shores, the things around the streets, would be a long task, and how the men of Andronicus fell not only upon the armed Latins, but also upon the defenseless for whom mercy was reserved; for even their women and infants were cast upon swords. And this was terrible, but not so much as when, with maternal wombs being ripped open, the iron delivered the embryos and before its time of seeing the sun, the darkness of Hades received the little one, dead before it had even fully lived. This was bestial and incomparable to other madnesses. At that time there also fell a holy man among the Latins, I do not know whether he had come from the elder Rome on an embassy or from Sicily, but in any case being either a Roman or a Sicilian. And he did not simply fall, but with his whole sacred vestment, which he put on as a protection against weapons, in the hope that the wicked might respect him. And these things became for us the goads for what we have suffered. For to us, not even the temples of God were places of asylum. For not even they remained inviolate, when corpses of all kinds, 36 among whom were also holy persons, were strewn upon their foundations, and walls and fair colonnades were spattered with blood, in places where the sacred roofs were raised low. But these things later. But at that time the evil for the Latins was so great, that crying out against Andronicus they seemed to be justified against us and their petitions to be heard by God. And thus, as my account has already tediously related, Andronicus entered that city of broad avenues. And his purpose for the rest of his subsequent actions, and truly his priority, was to secure for a short time the empire for the young Alexios as a matter of trade, and to shake the mother from her power, once he had gotten rid of the aforementioned Protosebastos, giving him as a first offering to the Furies. And so he set about goading on the beginnings of his actions. And he there swore oaths, of such a kind and so many, of which one was established on the great all-venerable bema as on a foundation which cannot be shaken by Christians; for in it were consolidated the blood and body of Christ the Savior, things awful and precious to all; and he gave cause to suspect the security of imperial loyalty and the false inscription of humility. For Andronicus, having thrown himself to the ground and gently lifted the soft imperial foot with his hand, placed it upon his hard neck, making a show of how he would thus always be trodden underfoot by the emperor. And not only that, but he also lifted him lightly and set him upon his own shoulder, this too as a symbol of holding him as his head, as is holy. These things were so. And the more sagacious and those capable of having truly good aim were hesitant to be with the man, not very many of them, knowing full well what sort of man he was feigned to be; but the majority were led astray from the truth and, seeing his paths in bloom, did not look beneath for the pits, being themselves good Christians and governed by the reasoning that a man would not dare to violate such oaths, being of good birth and seeing that the things of God were otherwise inclined towards him, and being persuaded that one must yield to emperors, for whom nature, having chained the empire, has suited it and has well spun together the thread of rule. And thus it was for all. But he, at first having devised flattery so as to win over the citizens and having accomplished what he proposed, then put on a show of feigned reluctance, as if, while flowing forth for the good of the city, he were encountering waterfalls, which were checking his current as into a sort of counter-flow. For which reason he also pretended to wish to withdraw again to the land of the Paphlagonians. But this was wrath against the well-born and the powerful in every respect, whom, while plotting novelties, he suspected 38 would oppose him. And among them was a leading part, the Angels on earth, as has been said, that tribe having both preeminence of birth and being well-endowed with manliness and imperial loyalty and intelligence, and the megas doux the

καθήκει τὰ παρόντα κακά. Καὶ ἀφηγεῖσθαι μὲν τὰ τότε δεινά, ὅσα εἶδον οἱ Λατῖνοι, τὸ πῦρ, ὃ τὰ κατ' αὐτοὺς ἐπενείματο, δίχα γε τῶν ἀφαρπαγέντων, τοὺς κατὰ θάλατταν ἐμπρησμοὺς ἐκ τοῦ παρὰ Ῥωμαίοις ὠμβρημένου πυρὸς τοῖς ἐπὶ πλοίων φεύγειν ὁρμήσασι, τὰ κατ' αἰγιαλούς, τὰ περὶ τὰς ἀμφόδους, ἔργον ἂν εἴη πολύ, καὶ ὡς οὐ μόνον τῶν ἀνθοπλιτῶν Λατίνων κατεφέροντο οἱ τοῦ Ἀνδρονίκου, ἀλλὰ καὶ ὅσοις περιεποιεῖτο ἔλεον τὸ ἀπάλαμνον· καὶ γυναῖκες γὰρ αὐτῶν ἐρριπτοῦντο ξίφεσι καὶ βρέφη. Καὶ τοῦτο μὲν δεινόν, οὐχ οὕτω δέ, ὡς ὅτε καὶ γαστέρων ἀναρρηγνυμένων μητρικῶν ἐμαιοῦτο σίδηρος τὰ ἔμβρυα καὶ πρὸ ὥρας βλέποντος ἡλίου τὸ μικρὸν ὁ τοῦ Ἅδου σκότος μετεξεδέχετο αὐτό, τεθνηκὸς πρὶν ἢ καὶ ζῆσαι τὸ τέλειον. Θηριῶδες τοῦτο καὶ ἀσύγκριτον μανίαις ἑτέραις. Ἔπεσε τότε καὶ ἀνὴρ ἱερὸς ἐν Λατίνοις, οὐκ οἶδ' εἴτε ἀπὸ τῆς πρεσβυτέρας ἥκων Ῥώμης κατὰ πρεσβείαν εἴτε Σικελίαθεν, πάντως δὲ ἢ Ῥωμαῖος ὢν ἢ Σικελός. Καὶ οὐχ ἁπλῶς ἔπεσεν, ἀλλὰ μετὰ τῆς παρ' ἐκείνῳ ἱερᾶς ὅλης περιβολῆς, ἣν ὅπλων πρόβλημα περιέθετο, εἴ πως αὐτὸν αἰδέσονται οἱ κακοί. Καὶ γέγονε καὶ ταῦτα ἡμῖν προκεντήματα, ὧν ἐπάθομεν. Ἡμῖν γὰρ οὐδὲ οἱ ναοὶ τοῦ θεοῦ ἄσυλοι. Οὐδὲ γὰρ οὐδ' αὐτοὶ ἄχραντοι ἔμειναν, ὅτε νεκροὶ μὲν 36 ἐστρώννυον αὐτοῖς τὰς κρηπῖδας παντοδαποί, ἐν οἷς καὶ ἱερὰ πρόσωπα, αἵματι δ' ἐρράδατο τοῖχοι καλαί τε μεσόδμαι, παρ' ὅσοις αἱ ἱεραὶ στέγαι ταπειναὶ ᾔροντο. Ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν ὕστερον. Τότε δὲ τηλίκον ἦν τὸ κακὸν τοῖς Λατίνοις, ὡς ἐκβοήσαντας κατὰ τοῦ Ἀνδρονίκου δοκεῖν δικαιωθῆναι καθ' ἡμῶν καὶ ἀκουστὰς θεῷ γενέσθαι τὰς αἰτήσεις αὐτῶν. Καὶ οὕτω μέν, ὡς ἔφθη στενολεσχήσας ὁ λόγος, κατέδυ πόλιν ἐκείνην εὐρυάγυιαν ὁ Ἀνδρόνικος. Καὶ ἦν σκοπὸς αὐτῷ τοῦ λοιποῦ τῶν ἐφεξῆς πράξεων καὶ ἀληθῶς προὔργου στερεῶσαι μὲν πρὸς μικρὸν τὴν βασιλείαν ἐμπορικῶς τῷ μικρῷ Ἀλεξίῳ, κατασεῖσαι δὲ τῆς κραταιότητος τήν τε μητέρα, ἐπεὶ τὸν ἱστορούμενον Πρωτοσεβαστὸν ἀποσκευάσοιτο, πρωτόλειον ἐκεῖνον Ἐριννύσιν ἐκδούς. Καὶ κατέμενεν οὕτω προκεντῆσαι τὰς τῶν πρακτέων ἀρχάς. Καὶ ὡσιώσατο μὲν ἐνταῦθα καὶ ὅρκους, καὶ αὐτοὺς οἵους καὶ ὅσους, ὧν εἷς καὶ ὁ ἐπὶ τοῦ μεγάλου πανσεβάστου βήματος τεθεμελιωμένος εἰς κρηπῖδα, ἣν οὐκ ἔστι κατασεῖσαι Χριστιανοῖς· εἰς αὐτὸ γὰρ ἦν συμπεπηγὼς τὸ αἷμα καὶ τὸ σῶμα τοῦ σωτῆρος Χριστοῦ, τὰ πᾶσι φρικτὰ καὶ πάντιμα· ἐδίδου δὲ ὑπονοεῖν ἀσφάλειαν πίστεως βασιλικῆς καὶ τὸ τῆς ταπεινότητος ψευδεπίγραφον. Πεδοῖ γὰρ ἑαυτὸν ῥίψας ὁ Ἀνδρόνικος καὶ ἁπαλὸν βασιλικὸν πόδα χειρὶ ἄρας ἠρέμα τῷ σκληρῷ τραχήλῳ ἐπέθετο, φαντάζων ὡς οὕτως ὑπὸ πόδα τῷ βασιλεῖ ἀεὶ πατήσεται. Καὶ οὐ μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐλαφρίσας ἐπεκάθισεν ὤμῳ σφετέρῳ πρὸς σύμβολον καὶ τοῦτο τοῦ εἰς κεφαλὴν αὐτὸν ἔχειν, καθάπερ ὅσιον. Ἦσαν ταῦτα. Καὶ οἱ μὲν ἀγχινούστεροι καὶ οἷοι ἔχειν τὸ ἀληθῶς εὐεπήβολον ὤκνουν πρὸς τῷ ἀνδρὶ εἶναι, οὐ πάνυ πολλοὶ ἐκεῖνοι, εὖ ὅτι μάλιστα εἰδότες οἷος πέπλαστο· οἱ δὲ πλείους παρήγοντο τοῦ ἀληθοῦς καὶ ἠνθισμένας τὰς ἐκείνου τρίβους ὁρῶντες τοὺς βοθύνους οὐχ ὑπεβλέποντο, ἀγαθοὶ καὶ οὗτοί γε ὄντες Χριστιανοὶ καὶ λογισμῷ διοικούμενοι, ὡς οὐκ ἄρα τοιούτους ὅρκους συγχέαι κατατολμήσει ἄνθρωπος, γένους εὖ ἔχων καὶ ὁρῶν τὰ τοῦ θεοῦ ἄλλως ἐπιρρεπῶς ἔχοντα πρὸς αὐτὸν καὶ πεπιστωμένος χρῆναι βασιλεῦσιν εἴκειν, οἷς ἡ φύσις ἁλυσιδώσασα τὴν βασιλείαν ἡρμόσατο καὶ τὸ τῆς ἀρχῆς μήρυμα εὖ συνεκλώσατο. Καὶ οὕτω μὲν οἱ ξύμπαντες. Ὁ δὲ τὰ πρῶτα κολακείαν σκευωρήσας ὡς ὑπαγαγέσθαι τὸ πολιτικὸν καὶ ἀνύσας ὃ προύθετο, εἶτα καὶ ἀκκίζεσθαι προεβάλετο, οἷα ἐν τῷ προρρέειν ἐπὶ ἀγαθῷ τῆς πόλεως ἐπιτυγχάνων καταρράκταις, οἵπερ αὐτῷ ἀναχαιτίζουσι τὸ ῥεῦμα ὡς εἰς ἀνάρρουν τινά. ∆ιὸ καὶ ἀναχωρεῖν ἐθέλειν εἰς τὴν τῶν Παφλαγόνων αὖθις ἐσκήπτετο. Τὰ δ' ἦν κότος κατὰ τῶν καὶ εὐγενῶν καὶ ἰσχυρῶν εἰς τὸ πᾶν, οὕς, μελετῶν καινά, ὑπώπτευεν 38 ἐναντιωσομένους αὐτῷ. Ἦν δὲ ἐν αὐτοῖς κορυφαῖον μέρος οἱ, ὡς ἐρρέθη, ἐπὶ γῆς Ἄγγελοι, φῦλον ἐκεῖνο καὶ γένους ἔχον τὸ ὑπερέχον καὶ ἀνδρίας εὖ ἧκον καὶ πίστεως βασιλικῆς καὶ συνέσεως, καὶ ὁ μέγας δοὺξ ὁ