Columbus: What They Wrote

Parrots, Peter Boell

Two contemporaries of Columbus report what they had learned about his voyages:

Pietro Bembo's History of Venice:
Heading from there [the Canaries] into the setting sun for 33 days together, he discovered six islands, two of them very large indeed, where nightingales sing in November and naked men of a gentle nature use boats made of a single tree trunk. These people have a cereal which they call maize, with much bigger ears and stalks than ours, reedy foliage, and very numerous plump grains which are attached to the ear and covered with a sheath in place of beards, which it casts off as it matures. they have very few kinds of quadrupeds, among them tiny dogs which are actually mute and do not bark. But they do have a great many types of birds, both larger and smaller than ours, so that some little birds are found which together with their nests weigh no more than a 24th of an ounce each. 

There are parrots of various shapes and colors in great abundance. They collect fleeces which grow by themselves from the woods and hills, but when they want to make them whiter and finer, they clean them and plant them by their homes. They have gold, which they collect in the sands of the rivers; they do not have iron. In its place they use specially hard and sharp stones, both for hollowing out their boats and for shaping other wood for domestic use and working gold. But the gold they work only for ornament, wearing it suspended from their pierced ears and nostrils -- they are indeed unacquainted with coinage, nor do they use any kind of money. 

*     *     *     *     * 

Piri Re'is: annotations on the Atlantic map:

These coasts are named the shores of Antilia. They were discovered in the year 896 of the Arab calendar. But it is reported thus, that a Genoese infidel, his name was Colombo, be it was who discovered these places. For instance, a book fell into the hands of the said Colombo, and be found it said in this book that at the end of the Western Sea [Atlantic] that is, on its western side, there were coasts and islands and all kinds of metals and also precious stones. The above-mentioned, having studied this book thoroughly, explained these matters one by one to the great of Genoa and said: "Come, give me two ships, let me go and find these places." They said: "O unprofitable man, can an end or a limit be found to the Western Sea? Its vapour is full of darkness." The above-mentioned Colombo saw that no help was forthcoming from the Genoese, he sped forth, went to the Bey of Spain [king], and told his tale in detail. They too answered like the Genoese. In brief Colombo petitioned these people for a long time, finally the Bey of Spain gave him two ships, saw that they were well equipped, and said:

"O Colombo, if it happens as you say, let us make you kapudan [admiral] to that country." Having said which he sent the said Colombo to the Western Sea. The late Gazi Kemal had a Spanish slave. The above-mentioned slave said to Kemal Reis, he had been three times to that land with Colombo. He said: "First we reached the Strait of Gibraltar, then from there straight south and west between the two . . . [illegible]. Having advanced straight four thousand miles, we saw an island facing us, but gradually the waves of the sea became foamless, that is, the sea was becalmed and the North Star--the seamen on their compasses still say star--little by little was veiled and became invisible, and be also said that the stars in that region are not arranged as here. They are seen in a different arrangement. They anchored at the island which they had seen earlier across the way, the population of the island came, shot arrows at them and did not allow them to land and ask for information.

The males and the females shot hand arrows. The tips of these arrows were made of fishbones, and the whole population went naked and also very . . . [illegible]. Seeing that they could not land on that island; they crossed to the other side of the island, they saw a boat. On seeing them; the boat fled and they [the people in the boat] dashed out on land. They [the Spaniards] took the boat. They saw that inside of it there was human flesh. It happened that these people were of that nation which went from island to island hunting men and eating them.

They said Colombo saw yet another island, they neared it, they saw that on that island there were great snakes. They avoided landing on this island and remained there seventeen days. The people of this island saw that no harm came to them from this boat, they caught fish and brought it to them in their small ship's boat [filika]. These [Spaniards] were pleased and gave them glass beads. It appears that he [Columbus] had read-in the book that in that region glass beads were valued. Seeing the beads they brought still more fish. These [Spaniards] always gave them glass beads.

One day they saw gold around the arm of a woman, they took the gold and gave her beads. They said to them, to bring more gold, we will give you more beads, [they said]. They went and brought them much gold. It appears that in their mountains there were gold mines. One day, also, they saw pearls in the hands of one person. They saw that when; they gave beads, many more pearls were brought to them. Pearls were found on the shore of this island, in a spot one or two fathoms deep. And also loading their ship with many logwood trees and taking two natives along, they carried them within that year to the Bey of Spain. But the said Colombo, not knowing the language of these people, they traded by signs, and after this trip the Bey of Spain sent priests and barley, taught the natives how to sow and reap and converted them to his own religion. They had no religion of any sort. They walked naked and lay there like animals.

Now these regions have been opened to all and have become famous. The names which mark the places on the said islands and coasts were given by Colombo, that these places may be known by them. And also Colombo was a great astronomer. The coasts and island on this map are taken from Colombo's map.

 

Theodoros' Poem to Cleofe

 

Polyphemus and Galatea

This weekend the Byzantine Studies Association of North America is meeting at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. I am speaking Friday on the poem Theodoros Palaiologos wrote for Cleofe, or on the reasons why it is by Theodoros and not by Bessarion as asserted since Allatius pronounced it so in 1648 and so maintained up to this day by a remarkable number of people who should know better.

It is also asserted that the poem is in Bessarion's handwriting, but an examination of the script and comparison with other documents certainly by Bessarion shows several distinct differences in letter formation, even if the overall effect is similar. However, since it is not possible to assert that handwriting is the equivalent of authorship, we will just let that go.

It is, I think, in the contents of the poem itself that authorship is made clear, both in what Theodoros writes and in the use he has made of two other poems. I am putting all three poems here, the original texts and the translations Pierre MacKay and I have made, which is what I will use as the handout for my conference paper.

στϊχοι ἐπιτύμβιοι ἰάμβικοι ἐπὶ τῷ τάφῳ τῆς μακαρίτιδος βασιλίσσης κυρᾶς Κλεόπης τῆς Παλαιολογίνης MS. Venice. Marcianus 533 f. 48b

Καὶ σώμασι πρίν, φιλτάτη, ξυνημμένοι
μία τε σὰρξ ὄντες, θεοῦ φάσκει λόγος,
τῷ πνεύματι ξύνειμεν ἄρτι κρειττόνως,
σοῦ μὲν νοητῶς καὶ τρόπον μοι καὶ λόγον
βιόν τε καὶ νόημα πᾶν οὐρανόθεν
ἐμοῦ καθαρῶς καθορώσης ᾗ θέμις,
ἐμοῦ διχασθέντος δέ, φεῦ, ἐπωδύνως
θερμοῖς τε σὺν δᾶκρυσιν ἐκκαλουμένου
μέρος τὸ λεῖπον καὶ καλὸν δή μοι μέλος.

Ταύτῃ γὰρ ἐν ταύτῃ σε γράψας εἰκόνι
πάντως ἐμαυτὸν προσπαρέγραψα τρόπῳ,
ἑνώσεως θέλων ξυνῆφθαί σοι τρίτῳ
ὡς τοῦ πόθου σβέσαιμι τὴν δεινὴν φλόγα
ψυχῆς τ’ ἐπαντλήσαιμι οἰδαῖνον πάθος.

Ἀλλ’ ὦ θανοῦσα καὶ θεῷ ζῶσ’ ἀξίως,
ἡνίκα τοῖς σοῖς τὸ χρεὼν ταὐτῷ τάφῳ
ὀστᾶ συνάψῃ τἀμὰ τετράδι τρόπων
αἰσθήσεων ἔξω με δεῖξαν πεντάδος,
πέμπτον σύναψον κρειττον’ ἀλλον δὴ τρόπον
τρυφῆς μετασχείν καὶ θεοῦ θεωρίας,
σὺν σοὶ τὸ θαρρεῖν ὡς ἔχουσα καὶ μάλα
δοῦσα ξυνεργὸς ἁμὸς οἷα καὶ μέλος.

Funerary iambic lines on the tomb of the
blessed Basilissa, Lady Cleofe Palaiologina.

Although, my dearest, we were once united,
being one flesh, the word of God claims
that it is better now to be together in the spirit,
you, living in thought, looking down from Heaven
upon my life, my words, my ways, and thought,
seeing all clearly as it is your right,
I, alas, torn apart, living in pain,
calling out for you with scalding tears,
for me, one thing is left, one good thing, song.

And so, portraying you in this image,
I have put myself beside you in every sense
wishing to be united in a third form of union.
so as to quench the terrible fire of longing
and to empty out the agony from my soul.

But, you who have died but live with God, deservedly,
when in the same tomb necessity brings
my bones together with yours in the fourth way
then, showing me what lies beyond the five senses
unite with me in the fifth and greater way
to share in delight and in the sight of God
my courage lies with you, who possess and indeed
give me, as my fellow-poet, this song.

Malatesta "dei Sonetti" di Malatesti

Rime

       Morta è la sancta donna che tenea
mio spirto unito, tacito e contento;
anzi vive nel cielo, e io in tormento
remaso sono, altr’uom ch’io non solea:
      non huom, ma bruto, sì che ben dovea
sequire il corpo suo di vita spento,
né mai partir da lato al monimento,
ma incenerarmi ove ’l suo cor giacea,
      ché forse l’alma lei sequita arebbe
nel triumpho celeste, ove si vive
eternalmente per divina possa.
      Se pur di seguir lei fusser stà prive
le forze mie, almen stato serebbe
sepulto il corpo presso a le sacr’ossa.

       The holy lady is dead, who used to keep
my spirit united, quiet and content;
Now she lives in heaven, and I in torment
am left, another man from what I was:
      not man, but brute, so that I had best
have followed her body now bereft of life,
never to depart from her tomb-side
but scatter my ashes where her heart lies.
      Perhaps my soul might follow her
in the celestial triumph, where all live
eternally by divine power.
      Then if my efforts still left me prevented
from following her, my body would at least
be buried close beside her sacred bones.

Theocritus XI, 1–4 (Cyclops).

Οὐδὲν ποττὸν ἔρωτα πεφύκει φάρμακον ἄλλο,
Νικία, οὔτ’ ἔγχριστον, ἐμὶν δοκεῖ, οὔτ’ ἐπίπαστον,
ἢ ταὶ Πιερίδες· κοῦφον δέ τι τοῦτο καὶ ἁδύ
γίνετ’ ἐπ' ἀνθρώποις, εὑρεῖν δ’ οὐ ῥᾴδιόν ἐστι.

There is no other drug for love, Nicias, nor salve, nor poultice,
except the Muses, and this is something sweet and gentle
for men, yet it is not easy to discover it.

Gregorio of Nauplion, Glass Painter

Mayster Grigorius de Napolis,31 March 1280

end of first line, second paragraph from the bottom

Gregorios of Nauplion first appears as a painter of glass, pittore di moioli, in Murano in this document from 1280, and between then and 1288 he shows up another thirty times.  He is the first "foreign" painter to appear in Muranese records, but as a foreigner was anyone from outside the commune of Venice, it is remarkable that the foreigner was Greek.

Really, there is no information about him, beyond the fact that one of these records shows that in December 1280 he took on Piero, Vido's son, as an apprentice for 11 months, and all the others indicate that people had trouble getting him to pay his debts.  It appears that a major reason for glass-worker debts at that time was failure to pay up for wood for the glass furnaces, and for the frit that was melted down for glass-making. He lived in the parish of S. Stefano, and the remnants of that church are shown here in front of S. Pietro Martire.

 How Gregorios got from Nauplion to Murano (Nauplion was then under the de la Roche Dukes of Athens), and where he learned to paint glass (Corinth would be likely) -- all that is anyone's guess.

No Murano glass survives from that time, so we don't know what his painting might have looked like. Surviving records have an order for 100 glasses with three figures around a tree, another order for glasses with garlands and pearls.  This is one of the earliest survivals, from 1330, modelled on Islamic glass.  Those little white dots are probably what is meant by pearls.

The Murano glass industry was producing in large and standardized amounts.  There are orders for 750 drinking glasses, 26 footed glasses, two large cases of footed glasses with garlands and pearls for export to Romania -- that would be Constantinople or Greece or Crete, 600 footed cups and 600 footed cups with a thread around the foot and the mouth.

A blue thread is common in that early Murano glass, and the first time I visited Monemvasia, in June 1978, I found part of the foot of a glass with a deep blue thread around the edge.  I found another fragment of threaded glass at Mistra two days later.

Lift a glass to Gregorios of Nauplion.

My great appreciation to Michael Pettinger for discovering Gregorios for me in Vetro e Vetrai di Murano, Vol. 3, by Luigi Zecchin.

Stone Clamps

 Houses in Longanikos

Kostis Kourelis wrote recently about stone masons in the Morea.  He gives me the explanation for some photographs I took in the interior of the country after Jack Davis called my attention to the stone clamps on old houses:

"In summary, architectural labor from the 18th to the early 20th century was organized in itinerant groups of masons. They would specialize on the finer aspects of construction, such as the corners, quoins, the windows, openings and roofing and would hire local work for the unspecialized work, such as building infill walls."  Such construction is shown in the next pictures.

 Main street through Longanikos

Main street through Leondari

 Leondari

Stones were secured with iron clamps, and each group signed its work with its own design of clamp. You can see at least 8 of them around the large doorway -- click to enlarge --  in the photograph at the top, and at least 6 around the smaller. Similarly, you can find at least 8 clamps for the left-hand doorway in Leondari and 10 for the second.

Here are two such signatures from a group that worked in Tegea:

Tegea

 

Tegea

All the other towns here are mountain towns.  Mountains are made of stone.  Tegea is on flat, damp land.  These Tegea houses were immediately around the remains of the temple of Athena Alea and were built of its stones.  I was there two years ago with a learned group, and there was an interminably long lecture about the remaining stones of the temple.  No one seemed to care, or even notice, all the stone houses -- with their spolia.  Tegea houses are plumped full of spolia, like puddings with raisins.

Apparently a great deal has been written about these clamps, and many photographs taken, but they were new to me.  

South of Leondari

Ag. Nicholaos, Karitena

 

Dimitsana

Dimitsana bell tower

 

Dimitsana

Many of these itinerant groups were Albanians and there was a new wave of stone workers in the 1980s and 1990s.  These were the men I saw working on the palace at Mistra when I was there in 1995.

I like these continuities: so much of Greek history has been discontinuous.  In 1480 and 1480 when Bartolomeo Minio was rebuilding the walls of Nauplion, he could find no one who knew how to build in stone.  He had to have five masons and a master-builder sent out from Venice.  Travelers write about the shabbiness of Venetian towns in Greece and their proneness to fire.  I found good evidence that Venetian houses were for the most part wooden, at least above the ground floor, and standardized sizes of planks and nails were shipped out from Venice for their construction.

There was no Morea-made iron in the 15th century. Minio had to order clamps -- and nails, and anything of iron -- ready-made from Venice, again in standardized sizes. Already before 1420, Plethon had worried to Manuel II and Theodoros II about the lack of local skills and Moreote dependence on foreign imports,  In the 1440s, Bessarion wrote Constantine, concerned about the lack of Greek skills -- iron-working was one he particularly mentioned, along with ship-building and weaponry -- and suggested that eight young men be sent to Italy to learn. More on that later.

Diana Gilliland Wright, “The Wooden Towns of the Stato Mar: Medieval Construction in Nauplion,” 

 Studi Veneziani 40 (2000) 169-178.

Interlaced Circles

I wrote earlier about the inscription on the facade of Ca' Dario.  This entry is about the interlaced circles on the facade, three of them.

This is what four of the top names in Venetian architecture have to say about them:

1. No house front is richer in colored stones, and this has often been pointed out as a consequence of Dario's years in Byzantium.  . . . Rather than Byzantium, it may instead reflect Dario's ego.  If he wanted to make a pretty show, he succeeded.
2. . . . Cima da Conegliano's Healing of Anianus . . . the polychrome marble intarsias on the building are remarkably similar to those on the facade of Palazzo Dario.  Giovanni Dario wanted for his house what he had seen in the work of this impressionable painter; he wanted freedom of invention untrammeled by the rules and limitations of architectural dogma.
3. Little is known of his earlier missions to Cairo . . . but while there he seems to have noticed the "telephone-dial" motif that he chose to adorn his own house.   . . .  The Venetian masons, unfamiliar with the Egyptian precedent, set the marble discs in their interlaced Byzantinizing borders by reference to local cosmatesque mosaic pavements such as that of San Marco.
4. The architect may also have had descriptions of byzantine palaces in mind, . . .

We don't have any documentation for Dario's restoration of the little Gothic house he was given on the Grand Canal, but various things make 1486 look about right.  After he returned from Constantinople in 1485, Dario was treasurer of the scuola of S. Giovanni Evangelista which Pietro Lombardo was redecorating in 1485. During the 80s, Lombardo was also supervising the construction and ornamentation of the Miracoli. 

So it would not have been unlikely for him to have worked with Dario on turning the little Gothic house into a jewel box.  The Lombardo new constructions were highly symmetrical, Venetian Gothic wasn't, and apart from the asymmetry, the slanting slightly-drunk walls show the medieval fashion for building Venetian walls wider at the bottom than at the top.

As you can see, there has been a remarkable amount of extravagant prose expended in an attempt to explain Dario's choice of ornamentation, and especially for the interlaced circles.  They are infinitely pleasing, but they are no more Byzantine than they are late Roman and Venice was always a part of the Byzantine world.  We find these circles all over the place in the 5th and 6th centuries, and they reappeared in the late 12th century as far away as Westminster Abbey 

when the Cosmati set the fashions for church ornamentation a century and a half before that Egyptian "precedent."  S. Marco was nothing if not fashionable, and they ended up all through the rebuilt 13th C church in explorations of the variety of ways of interlacing circles -- on crosses antique even then,

in the treasury,

on carvings over the doors, 

on the floor of the narthex, 

on the floor by the pulpits.  

And on the south side, facing you when you come up from the water.

The Cretan, Giovanni Dario, was in love with Venice and called her quella cità sancta.  Ego? He had pulled Venice out of lethal situations, twice, with the Ottomans, and had several times worked wonders in Cairo.  Venice thanked him with what has become everyone's favorite house in Venice.  It seems silly to go to so much trouble for explanations -- Byzantine (the lack of survivals in Constantinople make this anyone's guess), Cairo?

a painting (a painting done several years after Ca' Dario)?  Dario saw  interlaced circles all over S. Marco and all over most other Italian churches he visited.  He saw them on the Miracoli.  Why would he not have chosen Venetian motifs for this house he dedicated the Spirit of the City?

GENIO. VRBIS. JOHANNES. DARIVS

 

There are more details here.

On Vacation: Byzantine Humor

Enjoy the Dumbarton Oaks theatron: Of Mice and Muses.

And the script, translations by the best:

On Vacation: Roman Glass

I am fascinated by frescos of Roman glass. These come from Poppea's villa in Rome, and villas at Pompeii and Stabiae.

On Vacation

Drawing of a Greek woman, Gentile Bellini 1480.

Mistra: A Poem

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Resident by Mistra

Here on the black butt of the mountain they spattered an angle
of the Morea with their strongholds, so galvanized East to West
in feudalities of stone. How, here, to disentangle
Villehardouin from Paleologues? That hawk's nest

of a keep tumbled on the crest armored the Franks' baron,
while they below of the thunderous, the now crashed and sunken lizard-written hall 
 fought him, sword to adze in the bloody defiles, pounded him from his warren.
Saints fade their eastern look on the murals now. South down the mountain wall

the Pantanassa crosses her convent in cypresses, serene
strokes on white plaster where nuns are alive next the welter
of wrecked chapels. Beyond, the staggering slopes lean
up into air angels live in, and by St. Barbara's shelter

peoples of the plain ascend in processionals red gold and white
to splash one day a year with singing in the cold growth of light.

Richmond Lattimore 

This poem, printed here for its archaeological value, was published in Poetry Magazine in 1958.  Richmond Lattimore, poet and translator, is best known for his great translations of the Iliad (1951), the Odyssey (1965) and the Oresteia (1969), among much else.

Nauplion: The Siege of 1500

In the 15th century, July and August were the times for massacres -- Negroponte on 12 July 1471, Otranto on 14 August 1480, Modon on 9 August 1500. Under Ottoman law, a city that did not surrender was up for grabs.  Modon tried to surrender, but the white flag was not seen in the turmoil.  And massacres happened in late summer, because the Ottoman armies could not leave home before mid-May because of the length time needed to send messengers across the expanses of the empire and for men to get to the meeting points.  There is an adequate account of the war here.

On this date in August 1500, Nauplion was put under Ottoman siege.  Expecting a siege, Venice and Crete had sent men and supplies, but most support had to be sent to Modon and much of the available shipping was involved in that disaster. It is difficult to work out the sequence of events  now: more difficult in 1500 as reports did not get to Venice until October, being written days after the events they relate, and arriving out of order.

The Sultan, Beyazid, after watching the executions at Modon, accompanied the Ottoman governor of the Morea and 30,000, or 10,000, or 60-70,000 troops -- reports differ -- to Nauplion. They arrived on the 25th or 26th -- reports differ -- and immediately encountered a band of stratioti to whom it was suggested that Nauplion might surrender. Beyazid's tents were set up by the church of Santa Veneranda on the side of Palamidi. [Now Ag. Pareskevi, the church is still there, on private property.]

On the 26th, Ottoman messengers were sent with formal offers of surrender and were turned away. Polo Contarini, governor of Coron which had insisted on surrender against his own wishes, was used as an emissary.  Januli Stathi reported that he was brought up to the gate by three Turks, and then there was this conversation: Contarini said, "Modon is taken, Coron has surrendered, and you, poor fellows, what are you going to do?"  Stathi replied, "We are going to fight for our faith. We have all taken an oath that we will all die rather than surrender."  Contarini, "I will die with you."  A moving account, Stathi's.

Contarini's own account said that he had been dressed up by the Turks, given a gold collar, and promised great things should Nauplion surrender.   He was brought up by ten or fifteen Turks to the walls where a row of crossbowmen trained their sights on him.  Terrified -- swords at his back, arrows at his front -- he called out, "Don't you recognize me?" -- he had formerly been castellan in Nauplion -- "I'm Polo Contarini!"  Some men came out and embraced him.  Making a gesture to negate what he was saying, he said what he was supposed to say about handing over the keys of the city.  While they were making their formal response, he broke away from his guards and darted through the city gate.

Inside Nauplion, he found a great deal of confusion, some arguing for surrender and others arguing against.  There was a good supply of food and water, but not of ammunition. That same day, the governors of Nauplion -- Jacomo de Renier and Alvise Barbarigo -- put him with 19 other men on a small boat called a gondola and sent them off to find the Captain General for more information and instructions.  Gorlin of Ravenna, a commander of foot soldiers, sent a letter with them saying they in Nauplion were all united, soldiers and residents alike, and would live and die to the honor of the Signoria.

Contarini and the boatmen spotted the Ottoman fleet down in the bay, and went ashore at Kyparissia.  They went through the mountains and down to Monemvasia, and then Vatika where the Venetian Captain General was anchored with the Venetian fleet.  Two of them were captured by the Turks, but the rest got through safely. 

Outside the walls of Nauplion, there was frequent skirmishing ["scaramuzava"] between stratioti and Ottomans -- now reported to be 100,000. The stratioti were splendid, at least at the beginning, and were reported riding back and forth with Turkish heads on their short spears.

The Ottoman fleet arrived in the bay on the 28th, and anchored at Kiveri-Myloi, across from Nauplion, where it could take on fresh water.  There was general panic in Nauplion, particularly among the peasants who were unused to city walls and who knew what was happening to their homes and lands. Everyone had heard what happened at Modon. 

To defend against the Ottoman fleet, Renier and Barbarigo had the Venetian galleys unloaded and planks taken to make a great palisade along the marsh [You can see a hint of this if you click on the image below.]  Then five galleys and all the little boats -- all the fishermen's boats -- were sunk around the island fortress and along the harbor to prevent the arriving Ottoman ships from being able to get close. The rest of the boats were burnt. The sailors tented over the plateia with the sails from the galleys.  The Greek and Venetian priests concelebrated a mass on the plateia, and all the men embraced each other in turn, asking forgiveness for any offenses.

The Ottoman fleet left the bay on the 4th, and went to Spetses where it was held for several days by the bora, a N -NE wind.  Then the fleet went to Aigina, and eventually started back to the Dardanelles, with the Venetian fleet in pursuit.

A number of Greeks wanted to go over to the Turks.  The issue was settled when a band of Albanians killed twenty of them and put an end to such talk.  Somehow word of this incident was taken by land across the Morea and then to Corfu, where it was sent on to Venice. Spies were sent from Corfu to get more information about Nauplion but they were captured and killed.  Skirmishing continued, with many reports of Turks "tagliato a pezo." The Turks put a trebuchet on Palamidi, and offered the Manessi and Busichei clans 1000 horses to come over, but they refused.

Meanwhile, Coltrin, was working on the walls.  He reinforced the round tower at the end of the wall that you see below [the inlet had not been dug then] and reinforced the advance wall.  He dug out a cistern for the tower and planned four more, as the autumn rains had begun.  Since boats could now come and go, he sent off an order for 2400 planks, 200 shovels, and other implements for construction. The wall building continued under fire.  Nauplion men and women voluntarily worked day and night, carrying stones and dirt. A German cannonier, Corangian Lanier, arrived from nowhere and was put in charge of the island fortress.

A hundred and twenty-eight men were reported missing -- some known dead, some known to have levanted, some known to have been killed.  There were 551 horses within the walls, many in poor condition, and many more horsemen whose mounts were dead.  There seems to have been a good bit of coming and going, with occasional skirmishes, people going off to find their families, and some joining the Ottoman army.  Not knowing how long the food in storage would have to last, decisions had to be made about how much grain could be spared for the horses.  Gorlin was extremely ill, and was put on a boat to be taken where he could get help.

Then in the early hours of 15 October, the Ottoman army moved out, burning a few houses and leaving mounds of rubble and their dead. A small number of troops were left on the Argos-Nauplion border  -- 4,000 or 10,000 -- to continue the siege. The stratioti continued, as the report said, "to treat them badly," also raiding down in the Morea where they loaded up on loot the Ottomans had had to leave behind.

The withdrawal happened because Beyazid had seen he could do nothing to take Nauplion -- having lost 16,000 men there, or it happened because word had come of a disaster to an Ottoman army in Hungary.  There was extensive evidence of dysentery in the Ottoman camp. Beyazid had gone to Megara.  Or Negroponte.  Or Thessalonike.  Or Constantinople. Bits of news arrived in Venice from all over and no one there was sure what was happening.  What certainly must have happened is that the Ottoman army was short of food.  Without supplies from the fleet, there was no way an army of 10,000 or 100,000 could have kept itself supplied off the countryside.  Further, the Ottoman army normally disbanded in the fall so the men could return home for the winter plowing and sowing.  So an end to the siege might reasonably have been anticipated.

That is pretty much it.  There are no tidy wrap-up reports but there was no massacre in Nauplion in 1500 and very few deaths at all. Barbarigo and Renier saved the city by the simple decision to destroy their boats.  Once the Turkish army had left, there was no produce to bring into the city from the countryside, and no firewood.  People were hungry. Bartolomeo Minio, captain of Crete, sent as much food as he could -- beans, biscuit, some flour, but Crete was stretched thin, having lost many ships and men at Modon, and then having to supply the Venetian fleet.  Nauplion was safe for another 38 years, but it was always under strain as the Turks who occupied the whole Morea, with the exceptions of Monemvasia and Nauplion, put pressure on the boundaries and moved in closer.

The top image is a detail from a 16thC icon  of the Crucifixion. The helmets  and spears are appropriate for 1500 and the Italian soldiers would have had them. The stratioti would have been lucky to have much of anything.  The Camoccio map of Nauplion is the first known, published in 1571 but made before 1540.  It makes clear the advance wall and the Albanian houses between it and the city wall.  The information here comes from Volume 3 of Sanudo's Diarii.