Crusades and Crusaders in Medieval Greece 55
easier to acquiesce to Union. However, on the Latin side there was mistrust
of the Greek commitment to the unionist cause. Benedict xii stated that “if
the Greeks are strengthened [... ] by ourselves and other faithful before the
said Union [is achieved], they will afterwards turn their backs on us and the
Church”.94 The disagreement on this point persisted down to the very end: on
the eve the Ottoman conquest, Pope Nicholas v insisted on the implementa-
tion of the Union that had been agreed at the Council of Florence, before any
military assistance to the Byzantine capital.
Aside from the central themes, of course, crusade rhetoric and imagery was
adapted to conform to the sensitivities of the time, the recipients and audience
of each crusade call, and the particular inclinations of the pope who made
the relevant proclamation. Crusade calls to the French king and nobility, for
example, emphasised the special role of France as a devoted daughter of the
Roman Church and as an exemplar among kingdoms in fighting for the faith;
the links of kinship and race between the intended recruits and the Franks set-
tled in Greece were also invoked.95 In the 15th century, and in keeping with the
rise of humanism, the theme of the defence of civilisation and the fountain of
classical wisdom from Turkish barbarity was added. This was adeptly exploited
by Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini in his crusade rhetoric, famously calling the
capture of Constantinople and the consequent destruction of its libraries
“a second death of Homer and Plato”; although, after his elevation to the papal
throne as Pius ii, he toned down the humanist elements and stressed the more
traditional themes of the defence of the faith, the desecration of holy places,
the suffering of Christians, and the eventual goal of the Holy Sepulchre.96
Finally, as Turkish power grew further, the theme of the imminent threat
to the Christian heartlands, as far as Germany and Italy made its appearance.
In his instructions to crusade preachers in 1463, alongside traditional themes
such as avenging Christ and helping the Christian brothers in the East, Cardinal
Bessarion advised that the audience should be told that:
... the Turk, not content [with what he has], is making eager preparations
to subjugate the entire world, starting with Italy. All delay is disastrous,
because he acquires a new kingdom every day and gets stronger, while we
lose a kingdom and get weaker. So, if we are unmoved by love for religion
94 Aloysius L. Tautu, ed., Acta Benedicti xii (1334–1342), pc/cico, 2 vols. (Vatican, 1958),
nos. 42–43; Housley, Later Crusades, p. 63.
95 For example, Pressutti, Regesta Honorii, nos. 859, 5006.
96 Bisaha, “Pope Pius ii”, esp. pp. 40–44 (quotation at 40).