Rogue Sword, CHAPTER II.
"'...the signors have closed the membership of the Grand Council and hanged Bocconio (?) who dared protest. So the Republic is become entirely the engine of the merchant princes.'" (pp. 49-50)
The Knights Hospitallers made an alliance with the Tartar Ghazan Khan. (p. 50)
Co-Emperor Michael Paleologus had the leader of the Grand Catalan Company assassinated and besieged the Company in Gallipoli. Emperor Andronicus had their ambassadors murdered. The Catalans captured Perinthos. Hugh swears by the Rood. (p. 51)
Lucas can recite maxims of K'ung-Fu-Tze. He and Hugh play chess. (p. 53)
Now let me read something else over a second mug of breakfast coffee. Blogging is becoming hard work!
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
IOW, however unjustly brutal the Catalans were to the Byzantines, it was not unprovoked! Murdering their leader and the ambassadors sent to Andronicus II in protest would enrage any similar body of mercenaries.
I have wondered what might have happened if the Eastern Romans had behaved otherwise and shown good faith to the Grand Company? They had originally been hired to help New Rome regain Anatolian territories lost to invading Turkic tribes. However difficult it would have been to adroitly manage such prickly and formidable soldiers, that would have been far better than what actually happened!
I was interested by the mention of Lucas quoting from the ANALECTS of Confucius, which I too have read (Arthur Waley's translations). It reminded me as well of how Lucas quoted from the Gospel (Matthew, I think), to En Jaime.
I can see why blogging has become such hard work for you! And why you need to take a few days off blogging sometimes. But I appreciate your zeal!
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I should have written earlier that I looked up the reference to how Lucas and Brother Hugh played chess. I wondered if I should include that text from ROGUE SWORD in my "Amdersonian Chess" article. But when I looked up page 53 of that book, I saw it was only a terse, en passant mention of the game, so I decided I did not need to revise my article.
And I appreciated you linking this blog piece to my article!
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Paul!
Incidentally, after a long hiatus, this blog piece and my thinking about the chess reference on page 53 of ROGUE SWORD, has gotten me to again playing my ancient but formidable chess computer. Alas, so far, it's still beating me! (Smiles)
Ad astra! Sean
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