Vasilief, A History of the Byzantine Empire

The fall of Byzantium

The policies of Byzantium in the fourteenth century

Page 7

The chief battle, in which about 150 Greek, Venetian, Aragonese, and Genoese vessels took part, was fought in the beginning of the sixth decade, in the Bosporus. It had no decisive result; each side claimed victory. The friendly relations between the Genoese and Ottoman-Turks forced John Cantacuzene to give up his alliance with Venice and become reconciled with the Genoese, to whom he gave his promise not to support Venice henceforth. He also consented to give more territory to the Genoese colony of Galata. But after some clashes Venice and Genoa, exhausted by the war, made peace. Since it failed to solve the chief problem in the conflict, the peace lasted only a short time; again a war broke out, the war of Tenedos.

Tenedos, one of the few islands of the Archipelago still in the hands of the Byzantine emperors, possessed, owing to its position at the entrance into the Dardanelles, the greatest significance for the states which had commercial relations with Constantinople and the countries around the Black Sea. Since both shores of the straits were in the hands of the Ottoman Turks, Tenedos was an excellent observation point of their actions. Venice, which had already for a long time dreamed of occupying this island, after long negotiations with the Emperor at last got his consent. But the Genoese could not acquiesce in the cession of Tenedos to Venice; in order to prevent its accomplishment, they succeeded in raising a revolution at Constantinople which deposed John V and set his eldest son, Andronicus, upon the throne for three years. The war which had broken out between the two republics exhausted both of them and ruined all the states which had commercial concerns in the East. At last, in 1381, the war ended with the peace made at Turin, the capital of the Duchy of Savoy.

A detailed and voluminous text of the conference of Turin exists. With the personal participation of the count of Savoy, the conference discussed various general problems of international life, which was already very complicated at that time, and worked out the conditions of peace; of the latter, only those are interesting here which put an end to the dispute between Venice and Genoa and which referred to Byzantium. Venice was to evacuate the island of Tenedos, the fortifications of which were leveled to the ground; the island itself was on a set date to pass into the hands of the Count of Savoy (in manibus prefati domini Sabaudie comitis), who was related to the Palaeologi (on the side of Anne of Savoy, wife of Andronicus III). Thus neither Venice nor Genoa gained this important strategic point, to whose possession they had so eagerly aspired.

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