178 THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE. in Western history which, for its tenacity and its continuity, can be compared with the struggle made by the empire against the Seljnkian Turks. To compare small things with great, just as the Philistines were repeatedly defeated by the Judges in Bible story, but very shortly had again to be met, so the Xew Rome during a century and a half inflicted all but crushing defeats upon the hordes of Asia, only to find that after a few months other hordes had taken their place and had again to be fought. The empire during this period of almost constant warfare in Asia Minor, around the Balkans, and on the west coast of the Balkan peninsula, had made a long, and in the main a suc- cessful, resistance to the attacks of her foes. We have seen that when her strength had been sorely spent, five-and-twenty years of dynastic struggles, occasioned in part by the fact that she was passing through a transition period from absolute to oligarchical rule, still further weakened her. Scarcely three months passed during the last quarter of the twelfth century in which a new claimant for the throne did not make his ap- pearance. Unfortunately during that period the actual occu- pants of the throne were imbecile and incompetent men. The empire had held together in spite of these rulers. All attacks directed against the city itself had failed. All attacks by land would probably have continued to fail but for the remarkable combination of circumstances which led to her destruction. She had encouraged trade with Italy, and had treated foreign merchants with generous indulgence. Each of the flourishing states of the Italian peninsula had shared in her prosperity and had prospered by her adversity. They found their op- portunity to obtain the trade of the East while Constantinople was fighting the battles of Europe. Venice had been pecul- iarly the favored city of the New Home. Her fleets had been the naval arm of the empire until, under the demoralization of the later occupants of the imperial throne, when court fa- vorites had plundered the stores intended for the navy and had allowed the fleet to fall into decay, the empire had virtu- ally ceased to have a navy. The resistance which had been offered to the attacks made on land commands our admiration.
