Page:Destruction of the Greek Empire.djvu/50

16 Holy Roman Empire was solemnly excommunicated. While nothing was said about the alliance with the Seljukian Turk, Frederick was condemned for allowing his daughter to be married to a schismatic Greek. Large sums were ordered to be contributed by the dignitaries of the Church and by the religious orders for the succour of the empire. St. Louis again gave Baldwin a welcome, and entertained him at his court during nearly two years while aid was being collected. The pope gave power to absolve from sins those who should join the Crusade or contribute to the support of the empire. But, as Matthew Paris says, his empire nevertheless daily decayed. It was not till 1248 that Baldwin returned to his impoverished capital. Perhaps the lowest depth of degradation was attained by him when in 1259 his necessity was so great that he was obliged to put his only son in pledge to certain Venetian nobles as security for the payment of what he had borrowed. The unfortunate lad was taken to Venice, and his father was unable to redeem him until after the recapture of Constantinople.

Before the death, in 1258, of Theodore Lascaris the Second, the ruler of Nicaea was acknowledged emperor, not merely throughout the northern part of Asia Minor, but in the kingdom of Macedonia, and even in a considerable portion of Thrace. His successor, John, was a boy. John's guardian was Michael Palaeologus, who was proclaimed emperor in January 1259–60. Seeing that there was some disorder in Nicaea, occasioned by the disputes between those in favour of the boy, who, in the ordinary course of succession, would have been emperor, and those who had recognised that the times were too critical to allow him to reign, and had consequently followed Michael, the Latin emperor, Baldwin, judged the moment opportune to stipulate for concessions. Accordingly he sent a mission to Nicaea to learn what Michael would give in order to avoid war. The historian Acropolitas, who was at Nicaea at the time, records what passed. The emperor mocked the ambassadors. They asked that he should surrender Salonica. The reply was that that city was the emperor's birthplace; how could he