Of the thirty thousand persons who inhabited Janina a few hours
previously, perhaps one half had escaped. But these had not fled many
leagues before they encountered the outposts of the Otto man army,
which, instead of helping or protecting them, fell upon them, plundered
them, and drove them towards the camp, where slavery awaited them. The
unhappy fugitives, taken thus between fire and sword, death behind and
slavery before, uttered a terrible cry, and fled in all directions.
Those who escaped the Turks were stopped in the hill passes by the
mountaineers rushing down to the rey; only large numbers who held
together could force a passage.
In some cases terror bestows extraordinary strength, there were mothers
who, with infants at the breast, covered on foot in one day the fourteen
leagues which separate Janina from Arta. But others, seized with the
pangs of travail in the midst of their flight, expired in the woods,
after giving birth to babes, who, destitute of succour, did not survive
their mothers. And young girls, having disfigured themselves by gashes,
hid themselves in caves, where they died of terror and hunger.
The Albanians, intoxicated with plunder and debauchery, refused to
return to the castle, and only thought of regaining their country and
enjoying the fruit of their rapine. But they were assailed on the way by
peasants covetous of their booty, and by those of Janina who had sought
refuge with them. The roads and passes were strewn with corpses, and the
trees by the roadside converted into gibbets. The murderers did not long
survive their victims.
The ruins of Janina were still smoking when, on the 19th August, Pacho
Bey made his entry. Having pitched his tent out of range of Ali’s
cannon, he proclaimed aloud the firman which inaugurated him as Pacha of
Janina and Delvino, and then raised the tails, emblem of his dignity.
Ali heard on the summit of his keep the acclamations of the Turks who
saluted Pacho Bey, his former servant with the titles of Vali of Epirus,
and Ghazi, of Victorius. After this ceremony, the cadi read the
sentence, confirmed by the Mufti, which declared Tepelen Veli-Zade to
have forfeited his dignities and to be excommunicated, adding an
injunction to all the faithful that henceforth his name was not to be
pronounced except with the addition of “Kara,” or “black,” which is
bestowed on those cut off from the congregation of Sunnites, or Orthodox
Mohammedans. A Marabout then cast a stone towards the castle, and the
anathema upon “Kara Ali” was repeated by the whole Turkish army, ending
with the cry of “Long live the sultan! So be it!”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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