u A y 



04 



B A V 



The commaud-in-cbicf \v;is intruded lo Bonnivet, whose 

 only qualification was |MT~I>II:I| cmirago. After \ 

 - and I'jriial successes. Bunmvct was COIL 

 to abandon his strong entrenchments at Biagraso, and 

 move nearer to the Aips, in expectation of reinforcements 

 from Switzerland. He was pursued by the imperial : 

 who attacked liis rear with great fury just as he had ren-heil 

 the banks of the Sesia. Bonnivct, while displaying much 

 valour in rallying his tro fl >!tdcd in thu arm by a 



ball from an arquehuis. Ho sent to Bayard immediately, 

 tolling him that the i':iln of thu army was in his . 



>'ii who Iv.id in vain throughout the campaign remon- 

 strated with Bunnivct on the course he was pursuing, 

 replied, 'It is now too late, but I cont.u. r. . my soul to my 

 Ci 1 : my li'b belongs to my country.' He then put him- 

 self at the head of the men-alarms, and kept the main- 

 body of the enemy occupied long enough to enable the 

 rest of the French forces to ir.akc g.nd tl,e.ir retreat. While 

 thus engaged he received a nurtal wound from a ball, and 

 fell from bis horse. He was pressed to withdraw from the 

 field, bul his answer was that he had never turned his 

 back upon an enemy. He ordered himself to be plan-;! 

 with his back against a tree, and his face to the enemy. In 

 this situation he was found by Bourbon, who expressed his 

 regret nt seeing him in this condition. ' 1'ily not me,' said 

 the dying man, ' I die as a man of honour ought, in the 

 discharge of my duty : they, indeed, are objects of pity 

 who fight against their king, their country, and their 

 oath.' The Marquis of Pescar.i, commander of the Spanish 

 troops, passing soon after, manifested (we quote from 

 Robertson's Charles K.book iii.) his admiration of Bayard's 

 virtues, as well as his sorrow for his fate, with the gene- 

 rosity of a gallant enemy ; and, finding that he could not be 

 removed with safety from that spot, ordered a tent to be 

 pitched there, and appointed proper persons to attend him. 

 He died, notwithstanding their care, as his ancestors for 

 several generations had done, on the field of battle. 1'es- 

 cara ordered his body to be embalmed and sent to his rela- 

 tions ; and such was the respect paid to his memory that 

 the Duke of Savoy commanded it to be received wi:h royal 

 honours in all the cities of his dominions. In Dauphinc, 

 Bayard's native country, the people of all ranks came out 

 in a solemn procession to meet it. 



(See Mi moires du Chevalier de Bayard, $v., with notes 

 by Theodore Godefroy, and the contemporary histories ; also 

 Brantome's works, and the Memnirrs de Bellay.) 



BAYAZID I., surnamed ILDIK1M, or the Lightning,' 

 in allusion to the rapidity of his military achievements, was 

 the son of the sultan of the Osmans, Murad I. Ho was 

 born A. Heg. 748 (A. n. 1347), and <-ame to the throne in 

 A. Heg. 792 (A. D. 1389), after his father had been killed 

 in an engagement with the Servians near Cossowa. The 

 O<man dominions at this epoch extended from the Danube 

 to the Euphrates : and Bayazid at the bead of his army was 

 almost incessantly moving from one extremity of his em- 

 pire to the other, to reduce his Mohammedan neighbours to 

 obedience, or to add to his possessions by conquest* from 

 the Christian powers of Europe. Brussa and Adrianonle 

 were respectively the Asiatic and European capitals of his 

 dominions, and the erection of a magnificent mosque in each 

 of them is one of the earliest acts of his reign that we find 

 recorded. This seemingly pious act forms a strong control 

 with his tohaviour to Yacub his only brother, whom he put 

 to death almost immediately on ascending the throne, from 

 no other motive than an apprehension that the example of 

 either Eastern princes mint encourage him to rebel, and 

 dispute Bayazid's right lo the throne. 



The conquests of the Osmans had, in the beginning of 

 the eighth century of the- Mohammedan oora (the fourteenth 

 after Christ), put an end to the Scljukide dominion in 

 western Asia, and on its ruins several small dynasties had 

 sprung up, the principal of which were thai of Sinopc and 

 mini on llie northern coasl of Asia Minor, and those 

 of Aidin, Zaruklian, and Kcrmiyan. These dynasties 

 Bayazid determined to destroy, and to embody their terri- 

 tories in his empire. Within the first year after his a 

 .Tig the throne he had conquered Zarukhan, Aidin, and part 

 <>f the northern coast of Anatolia : nor did his previous 

 marriage (in A. n. 1381) with a daughter of the prince of 

 Krrmnan prevent him from leading un expedition a 

 his father-in-law, whom he took prisoner and deprr 

 his territory. Bayazid had to encounter greater dilli> 

 in subduing the principality of Caramania. Timuriasli, hi* 



general, had conquered part of the country, when Ala-cddfn 

 lite reigiiii,.- i, defeated him in a bailie and link 



him prisoner. When . the 



banks of the D.uuibo engaged in a war with Stcphnn, the 

 I' Moldavia, who had beon instigated l>\ K (riorum 

 Bayazid (i. c. 'Bajazid the I-amo'), a Musidman chief on 

 the borders of the Black SIM, to invade Wullachia and Bes- 

 sarabia. On receiving the news of Thnurtash's i! 

 Bayazid hastened from Europe into Asia, and wilhin a 

 short time snlidued the whole of Caramania, beside< which 

 he now added to his empire the towns of K ehr, 



AkscraV, Larcnda, Siwas (Sehaslel, Tokat, and K 

 riyah. Soon after he took away the dominions of Kertu- 

 lum Bayazid on the Black Sea; and when Kwtimim 

 Bayazid allowed his son, Isfendiar, to retain possession only 

 of Sinopc. 



The year 1391 is remarkable also for the capture of Phi- 

 ladelphia, or Alaihehr (i. e. ' The Variegated City'), the 

 last Greek town in Asia Minor that continued faithful to the 

 Byzantine empire. Its Greek commander made a \'\:- 

 resistance lo the besieging forces of Bayazid, and rejivscd 

 his invitation to surrender the fortress: while the Km per. r 

 Joannes and his son Manuel, then the confederates of the 

 sultan, were actually assisting in the siege. 



In 1393 Bayazid undertook another expedition into 

 Europe, in which he took possession of the towns of S'a' 

 and Venishehr (Larissa), and for the first time besieged 

 Constantinople. He compelled the emperor to give up his 

 plan of adding to the strength of the capital by new fortifi- 

 cations, and lo assign a separate suburb to the Turks with a 

 mosque and a kadhi, or judge, of their own. Bayazid at 

 the same lime built the fort of Guzelje, or Anatoli hissar, on 

 the eastern side of the Bosporus, which secured to him the 

 command of that channel. 



In '1396 Bayazid gained an important victory near 

 Nicopolis on the Danube over an army of a hundred thou- 

 sand Christians, including many of the bravest knights of 

 France and Germany, \\lio h:ul assembled under the stan- 

 dard of Sigismond, the king of Hungary, to check the I 

 progress of the Mohammedan power in Kuropc. The greater 

 part of the Christian forces were slain or driven into the 

 Danube. Sigismond escaped to Constantinople. S;\U- 

 lliousand Turks are staled lo have fallen in the same 1. 

 and when Bayazid became aware of the extent of bis lo>s. 

 he gave orders to put to death all the prisoners with ihc 

 exception of twenty-four nobles, who were subsequently ran- 

 somed. This great victory was soon followed by further con- 

 quests in Greece. The Morea was taken, and in 1397 

 (according to the oriental authorities quoted by M. vi n 

 Hammer, Gesch. des Osman-Reichs, i. 252) Athens fell 

 into the power of the Osmans. 



The dominions of Bayazid and Ihosc of Ihe Tartar con- 

 queror Timur now touched each other in the neighbourhood 

 of Erzerum and on Ihe banks of the Euphrates. With 

 doubtful limits between the two empires, which bad never 

 been defined by treaty, a cause for war between two j, 

 sovereigns eou'ld not long be wanting. Timur bad taken 

 possession of Siwas (the anticnt Sebaslc), on the Halvs, 

 then one of Ihe strongest and most flourishing cities 

 of Western Asia, and bad treated its inhabitants with great 

 cruelty. Bayazid was then engaged in his European do- 

 minions, which prevented him from resenting this violation 

 of his territory. About the same time two Musulman 

 princes, Ahmed Jclair and Kara Yussuf, whom Timur had 

 deprived of iheir possessions, tied for protection first to 

 Seifeddin Barkuk, the Sultan of Egypt, and subsequently 

 to Bayazid, who received them with kindness, and married 

 his son, Mustafa Chelebi, to a sister of Ahmed Jclair. Timur 

 sent two embassies for the purpose of demanding the sur- 

 render of the princes ; bul Bayazid refused to comply, and, 

 instigated by the advice of the princes, took possession 

 of Krzinjan,' a town situated on the Euphrates within the 

 dominions of Timur. Timur, who now determined to com- 

 mence an open war against Bayarid, begun the c.imi.aiLii 

 by taking Haleb, Atttakia, and other Suian towns that 

 :ibjcet to the Osmans. Ilow: , when bo 



d information of the approach of Bayuzid from ibe 

 west. The two sovereigns at the head <>f their a: 

 met in the plains of Angora, Ihe capital of the anticnt 

 Galatia. A decisive battle took place (according to M. von 

 Hammer's calculations on the 19th of Xnll.aj, A. II eg. 

 801, i. e. the 20th of July, A.D. 14(11 ), in which the U- 

 were totally defeated, and Bayazid became a prison 



