Images of Trebizond and the Pontos in Contemporary Literature in English with a Gothic Conclusion
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Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture Number 6 Gothic Matters Article 15 November 2016 Images of Trebizond and the Pontos in Contemporary Literature in English with a Gothic Conclusion Małgorzata Dąbrowska University of Łódź Follow this and additional works at: https://digijournals.uni.lodz.pl/textmatters Recommended Citation Dąbrowska, Małgorzata. "Images of Trebizond and the Pontos in Contemporary Literature in English with a Gothic Conclusion." Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture, no.6, 2020, pp. 247-263, doi:10.1515/texmat-2016-0015 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Arts & Humanities Journals at University of Lodz Research Online. It has been accepted for inclusion in Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory and Culture by an authorized editor of University of Lodz Research Online. For more information, please contact [email protected]. https://doi.org/10.1515/texmat-2016-0015 Małgorzata Dąbrowska University of Łódź Images of Trebizond and the Pontos in Contemporary Literature in English with a Gothic Conclusion A BSTR A CT A Byzantinist specializing in the history of the Empire of Trebizond (1204–1461), the author presents four books of different genres written in English and devoted to the medieval state on the south coast of the Black Sea. The most spectacular of them is a novel by Rose Macaulay, Towers of Trebizond. Dąbrowska wonders whether it is adequate to the Trebizondian past or whether it is a projection of the writer. She compares Macaulay’s novel with William Butler Yeats’s poems on Byzantium which excited the imagination of readers but were not meant to draw their attention to the Byzantine past. This is, obviously, the privilege of literature. As a historian, Dąbrowska juxtaposes Macaulay’s narration with the historical novel by Nicolas J. Holmes, the travelogue written by Michael Pereira and the re- ports of the last British Consul in Trabzon, Vorley Harris. The author of the article draws the reader’s attention to the history of a rather unknown and exotic region. The Empire of Trebizond ceased to exist in 1461, con- quered by Mehmed II. At the same time the Sultan’s army attacked Wal- lachia and got a bitter lesson from its ruler Vlad Dracula. But this Roma- nian hero is remembered not because of his prowess on the battlefield but due to his cruelty which dominated literary fiction and separated histori- cal facts from narrative reality. The contemporary reader is impressed by the image of a dreadful vampire, Dracula. The same goes for Byzantium perceived through the magic stanzas by Yeats, who never visited Istanbul. Rose Macaulay went to Trabzon but her vision of Trebizond is very close to Yeats’s images of Byzantium. In her story imagination is stronger than historical reality and it is imagination that seduces the reader. Małgorzata Dąbrowska As a historian of the Empire of Trebizond, generally unknown and therefore a rather exotic state of the Byzantine imperial family of the Great Komne- noi, which operated in 1204–1461 on the southern shore of the Black Sea, I would like to use my perspective while referring to a famous novel by Rose Macaulay, Towers of Trebizond. The question whether the title im- age invoked a myth or whether Trebizond really existed with its mysteri- ous towers might be of interest to academics dealing with contemporary English literature. The case is similar to that of Byzantium, whose fame in the milieu of literary scholars is due to the poems by William Butler Yeats, “Sailing to Byzantium” (217–18) and “Byzantium” (280–81). While the po- ems have often been the subject of analysis, it is worth stressing that for the author, the name “Byzantium” did not mean the Eastern Roman Empire 248 per se but its capital, Constantinople (whose ancient name was Byzantium), a famous city on the Bosporus, captured by the Turks in 1453. Yeats was clearly fascinated by the glamour of the emperor in his golden reception hall—Chrysotriklinos, which guides the reader to the Book of Ceremonies written in the 10th century by Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos (Constantinos Porphyrogennitos). This Byzantine source became popular due to the poet’s contemporary, John Bagnell Bury, an eminent Irish his- torian who gave lectures in Dublin and then in Cambridge in 1893–1927. Yeats was his student in Latin at High School in Dublin (Arkins 22). We can only speculate whether Bury’s analysis of the Book of Ceremonies published in 1907 inspired Yeats, who in the very same year appeared in Italy because of health reasons. The poet never reached Constantinople, that is Istanbul, but he visited Ravenna and the Byzantine monuments of the 6th century (Arkins 20). He was surely impressed by the golden, colourful mosaics in the basilica of San Vitale, representing the imperial couple: Justinian and Theodora and their court. He did not need to go any further. Whatever was left of the glory of the Byzantine court could be seen in these mosaics, as pointed out by Otto von Simson in Sacred Fortress. Byzantine Art and Statecraft in Ravenna. But Byzantine studies have developed since Bury’s and Yeats’s time and one can find out much more about Byzantium, including the oppor- tunity of an excursion to Turkey in search of the traces of the so-called Second Rome. However abundant are the scholarly studies on Byzantium, many visitors arrive at the Bosporus with Yeats on their mind, as his poem from 1928 became an imaginative record of such a voyage. It is interesting to compare this phenomenon with the influence of contemporary Trabzon in north-eastern Turkey, previously called Trebizond. Are Rose Macaulay’s Towers from 1956 the same guiding star? To give an answer, it is necessary to introduce the Empire of the Great Komnenoi. Images of Trebizond and the Pontos The state emerged in 1204, at the time of the Fourth Crusade, and was a rival to the “Byzantine government in exile” (cf. Angold)—the Nicaean Empire and then to the Byzantines after the reconstruction of the Eastern Roman Empire by Michael VIII Palaiologos in 1261. But the rivalry did not last for too long. Michael VIII subjected the Komnenoi to his author- ity in 1282 but they maintained their sovereignty as an independent state (Geanakoplos 119–37, 327). The Empire of Trebizond flourished due to its geographical position on the southern coast of the Black Sea. Surrounded by the so-called Pontic Alps, it was well protected and soon became the crucial point of commercial exchange between the Black Sea and the Le- vantine territories. The Italian Republics had much to do with this success. Both Venice and Genoa strengthened their position due to their involve- ment in this business. 249 The Empire of the Great Komnenoi collapsed after the spectacular in- vasion of Mehmed II, who had already conquered Constantinople in 1453. Thus the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries were the most significant time in the history of Trebizond. Then the state became a part of the Ottoman Empire, and afterwards—a significant part of modern Turkey created by Kemal Pa- sha, the Ataturk. He started his war for independence in 1919 in Samsun, the Black Sea port. In his policy of promoting the Turkish identity in Asia Minor, he eliminated in a cruel way the long lasting minorities of Armenians and Greeks. The capital of the former Empire of Trebizond, at that time Trab- zon, became a purely Turkish town, in which the historical past of the Great Komnenoi was not emphasized. The Komnenian palace was already ruined; the main Byzantine churches were changed into mosques in the 15th century; the city walls were the visible remnants of the previous glory, but the town, as well as the whole region from Sinope to Hopa (Batumi was already in the Soviet Georgia) became completely Turkish. It did not however discourage scholars from being interested in this easternmost province of Turkey where the glory of the Great Komnenoi was still visible. The research on it began to flourish in the 1970s; it was connected with the well-known names of Anthony Bryer, Sergei Karpov and Rustam Shukurov (Bryer, The Empire of Trebizond and the Pontos, Peoples and Settlement in Anatolia and the Caucasus; Karpov, L’impero di Trebizonda, Istoriya Trapezundskoy Imperii; Shukurov, Velikiye Komnini i Vostok). While examining particular aspects of the Komnenian Empire they concentrated on the economic connections with the Italian republics as well as with Turkish emirates, which, before the aggression of Osman- lis, enjoyed good relations with Trebizondian emperors whose beautiful daughters they married, thus becoming the allies of their fathers-in-law (Bryer, “Greeks and Turkmens”). Małgorzata Dąbrowska But the history of that region had also known earlier heroes, that is the family of Gabras, the dukes of Chaldia in the military structure of the Byzantine state. Their name became famous in the 11th century, when after the defeat of the Byzantine army in the battle with the Seljuks at Manzik- ert in 1071 (cf. Friendly), Theodore Gabras managed to win Trebizond over from the Turks. His ambitions, however, led him to a rebellion, and it was his son who succeeded him. The family of Gabras became significant in this part of the Empire (Bryer, “A Byzantine Family”). The history of Trebizond has therefore two heroes: the Gabras and the Great Komnenoi, which enlarges the scope of scholarly interests from the 11th century till the end of the Middle Ages. Previous to that, from the 4th till the 11th century, the chroniclers did not take note of any spectacular 250 events in this region.