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De expugnatione Thessalonicae

OF JOHN THE CLERIC AND KOUBOUKLEISIOS KAMINIATES ON THE CAPTURE OF THESSALONICA

1.1 How excellent among good things is the love of labor, bearing witness in itself to the possession of all virtue. 1.2 And your love of labor, along with your other advantages, has become manifest in this as well, O best and most learned of men, Gregory, both by what you write to us and by what you seek to learn from us through letters. 1.3 For it is a display of no small virtue and diligent zeal to wish to have acquired knowledge of many things, and especially of those through which the soul conceives the divine fear and, as it were, imparts from this some necessary starting-points to the contemplative part of the mind, from which it is taught to turn away from sin as the creator of death, and to cling to virtue, whose end is eternal life for those who choose it. 1.4 But I, for two reasons, thought for a time to put off fulfilling the command: both judging it burdensome to write about such things to so great a man as you, whose words guide his actions, and whose actions, agreeing with his words, give back precision to one another (for already fame proclaims your perfection in all things, and has made you known to our ears even when you are silent), and also because I was unable to explain well the things about which you made your inquiry, putting forward my own ignorance as a plausible excuse, so as not to treat with insolence nor belittle with my speech the renown of the matters requested by you, matters that have nearly filled the whole world under the sun with their report. 1.5 But since this also occurred to me, along with what has already been said, that I might not, in addition to my other debts, be called to account for disobedience—a passion terrible and destructive in its nature, and one that persuaded our first parents from the beginning to despise the divine law itself—I have come to fulfill your request, trusting in your judicious and most sympathetic friendship. 1.6 For I know well that the lack of beauty and harmony in this account and the meaning of what is said will not be rejected by the technical methods nor indeed by the scientific scales of your pure and great wisdom, but rather that the ensuing narrative of what will be said, being true and foreign to all falsehood and fabrication, will be absolved of all blame. 2.1 You sought to learn through your letter the manner in which we live in confinement, having been given over into the hands of barbarians, and how we exchanged a foreign land for our own, of what fatherland we are, and what are the circumstances concerning it. 2.2 For you said that you inferred from that brief conversation, through which we met for a short time as you were passing through Tripolis, that we were full of a long narration, and that both the things that have already befallen us and those expected hereafter are great and beyond all tragedy. 2.3 For at that time you yourself also happened to be wandering on account of the same calamity as ours, and were being led there together with some captives, whom you said were your countrymen, Cappadocians, with whom you were also being sent to the city of Antioch, explaining that the sorrows had nowhere ceased; 2.4 at which time you also saw us, as you yourself bear witness, having both the freshness of our grief and the traces of the preceding fear seated on our faces, so that even in silence our complexion cried out our misfortune. 2.5 But if I should wish to go through these things one by one, I would make the account long and not suitable for the need, overstepping the law of proportion, not to mention that I would also weary your tireless hearing, even if you are eager to listen to what is said. 2.6 But since, then, you promised this at the beginning, to listen attentively, I begin the account of our affairs thus. 3.1 We, O friend, are of the fatherland of Thessalonica; for I shall first make it known to you, through which

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De expugnatione Thessalonicae

ΙΩΑΝΝΟΥ ΚΛΗΡΙΚΟΥ ΚΑΙ ΚΟΥΒΟΥΚΛΕΙΣΙΟΥ ΤΟΥ ΚΑΜΙΝΙΑΤΟΥ ΕΙΣ ΤΗΝ ΑΛΩΣΙΝ ΤΗΣ ΘΕΣΣΑΛΟΝΙΚΗΣ

1.1 Ὡς ἀρίστη τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἡ φιλοπονία καὶ πάσης ἀρετῆς κτῆσιν ἐν ἑαυτῇ μαρτυροῦσα. 1.2 σοῦ δὲ μετὰ τῶν ἄλλων πλεονεκτημάτων ἔκδηλον καὶ ἐν τούτῳ καθέστηκε τὸ φιλόπονον, ὦ ἀνδρῶν βέλτιστε καὶ πολυμαθέστατε Γρηγόριε, οἷς τε πρὸς ἡμᾶς γράφεις καὶ οἷς παρ' ἡμῶν ἐπιζητεῖς διὰ γραμμάτων μαθεῖν. 1.3 οὐκ ὀλίγης γὰρ ἀρετῆς καὶ φιλοπόνου σπουδῆς ἐπίδειξιν ἔχει τὸ πολλῶν ἐθέλειν εἰληφέναι πραγμάτων γνῶσιν, καὶ μάλιστα δι' ὧν ψυχὴ τὸν θεῖον φόβον ἐγκυμονεῖ καὶ οἷον χρειώδεις τινὰς ἀφορμὰς ἐκ τούτου τῷ θεωρητικῷ μέρει τοῦ νοὸς ἐμβιβάζει, ἐξ ὧν διδάσκεται τῆς μὲν ἁμαρτίας ἐκκλίνειν ὡς δημιουργοῦ τοῦ θανάτου, ἔχεσθαι δὲ τῆς ἀρετῆς, ἧς τὸ τέλος ζωὴ αἰώνιος τοῖς αἱρουμένοις αὐτήν. 1.4 ἐγὼ δὲ τὴν ἐπιταγὴν πληρώσειν ἀναβαλέσθαι τέως ἐδόκουν δυοῖν ἕνεκεν, τό τε πρὸς σὲ περὶ τοιούτων γράφειν ἐπαχθὲς κρίνων, ἄνδρα τοσοῦτον, οὗ λόγοι μὲν τὰς πράξεις ἰθύνουσι, πράξεις δὲ συμφωνοῦσαι τοῖς λόγοις τὸ ἀκριβὲς ἀλλήλοις ἀντιδιδόασιν (ἤδη γὰρ ἡ φήμη βοᾷ τὴν σὴν ἐν ἅπασι τελειότητα, καὶ σιωπῶντα ταῖς ἡμετέραις ἐγνώρισεν ἀκοαῖς), καὶ τὸ μηδὲν δύνασθαι περὶ ὧν τὴν ζήτησιν ἐποιήσω καλῶς ἐξηγήσασθαι, τὴν οἰκείαν ἀμαθίαν ὡς εὐπρόσωπον προβαλλόμενος ἀπολογίαν, ὥστε μὴ καθυβρίσαι μηδὲ σμικρῦναι τῷ λόγῳ τὸ περιφανὲς τῶν παρὰ σοῦ ζητηθέντων πραγμάτων, καὶ πραγμάτων ἐκείνων τῶν μικροῦ δεῖν ἅπασαν πληρωσάντων τῇ ἀκοῇ τὴν ὑφ' ἥλιον. 1.5 ἀλλ' ἐπειδὴ καὶ τοῦτό μοι μετὰ τῶν ἤδη λεχθέντων ἐπῆλθε, μὴ πρὸς τοῖς ἄλλοις ὀφλήμασι καὶ παρακοῆς ἀπαιτηθείην δίκας, τἆλλα μὲν φύσει δεινοῦ πάθους καὶ ὀλεθρίου, καὶ αὐτοῦ δὲ τοῦ θείου νόμου περιφρονῆσαι τοὺς γενάρχας ἡμῶν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἀναπείσαντος, ἥκω πληρώσων τὸ αἰτηθέν, τῇ σῇ θαρρήσας εὐγνώμονι καὶ συμπαθεστάτῃ φιλίᾳ. 1.6 εὖ γὰρ οἶδα μήτε ταῖς τεχνικαῖς μεθόδοις μήτε μὴν ταῖς ἐπιστημονικαῖς τρυτάναις τῆς σῆς ἀκραιφνοῦς καὶ μεγάλης σοφίας τὸ ἀκαλλὲς τοῦ τῇδε λόγου καὶ ἀνάρμοστον ἢ τῶν λεγομένων τὸν νοῦν ἀποδοκιμάζεσθαι, ἀληθῆ δὲ μᾶλλον καὶ παντὸς ἀλλοτρίαν καὶ ψεύδους καὶ πλάσματος τὴν τῶν ῥηθησομένων προβαίνουσαν συγγραφὴν ἁπάσης μέμψεως ἀπολύεσθαι. 2.1 Ἐζήτησας μαθεῖν διὰ τῆς ἐπιστολῆς τὸν τρόπον δι' ὃν τὴν φρουρὰν οἰκοῦμεν βαρβάρων χερσὶν ἐκδοθέντες, καὶ πῶς τὴν ἀλλοτρίαν ἀντὶ τῆς ἰδίας διημειψάμεθα, ποίας τέ ἐσμεν πατρίδος, καὶ τίνα τὰ κατ' αὐτήν. 2.2 τεκμαίρεσθαι γὰρ ἔφης ἐκ τῆς μικρᾶς ἐκείνης ὁμιλίας, δι' ἧς παροδεύοντί σοι τὴν Τρίπολιν ὀλίγον συνεγενόμεθα, πλήρεις μὲν ὄντας ἡμᾶς μακρᾶς ἐξηγήσεως, μεγάλα δέ τινα καὶ πάσης τραγῳδίας ἐπέκεινα τά τε ἤδη συμβεβηκότα ἡμῖν καὶ τὰ ἐς ὕστερον προσδοκώμενα. 2.3 καὶ γὰρ ἔτυχες τότε καὶ αὐτὸς ἀλητεύων κατὰ τὴν αὐτὴν ἡμῶν συμφοράν, καί τισιν αἰχμαλώτοις ἐκεῖσε συνεπαγόμενος, οὓς ἔλεγες ὁμοπατρίους εἶναί σοι Καππαδόκας, μεθ' ὧν καὶ τὴν πρὸς Ἀντιόχου πόλιν ἐστέλλου, μηδαμοῦ στῆναι τῶν ἀλγεινῶν ἐξηγούμενος· 2.4 ὁπότε καὶ ἡμᾶς ἑώρας, ὡς καὶ αὐτὸς μαρτυρεῖς, τό τε νεαρὸν τοῦ πένθους ἔχοντας καὶ τὰ ἴχνη τοῦ προλαβόντος φόβου τοῖς προσώποις ἡμῶν ἐγκαθήμενα, ὡς καὶ σιωπῶντας βοᾶν τὴν συμφορὰν ἐκ τοῦ χρώματος. 2.5 ἀλλὰ περὶ τούτων εἰ καθ' ἕκαστον ἐπεξιέναι βουληθείην, μακρὸν ἂν εἴη καὶ τῇ χρείᾳ μὴ κατάλληλον τὸν λόγον ποιήσομαι, τῆς συμμετρίας τὸν νόμον καθυπερβαίνων, ἵνα μὴ λέγω ὅτι καὶ τὴν σὴν ἀρρᾴθυμον ἀκοὴν ἀποκναίσω, εἰ καὶ ὅτι δι' ἐφέσεως ἔχεις τοῖς λεγομένοις ἐπακροάσασθαι. 2.6 ἀλλ' ἐπειδὴ τοίνυν τοῦτο κατ' ἀρχὰς ὑπέσχου, τὸ νουνεχῶς ἀκούειν, ἄρχομαι τῶν καθ' ἡμᾶς ὧδε. 3.1 Ἡμεῖς, ὦ φίλος, πατρίδος ἐσμὲν Θεσσαλονίκης· αὐτὴν γὰρ πρώτην γνωριοῦμαί σοι, δι' ἧς