Alarmed for a while at the news that the emperor was to receive help from the West, the Turks soon renewed their attacks upon imperial territory, and the Greek population almost everywhere fled before them. They attacked the wealthy cities on the Aegean coast of Asia Minor and occupied several of the islands of the Archipelago. Pachymer states[48] that they had inundated the country north of Pergamus so completely that no Roman dared entertain the hope of keeping his property, and all fled before the flood of invaders: some to the city of Pergamus, others to Adramyttium or Lampsacus, while others again crossed the Dardanelles into Europe. The reign of Othman is contemporaneous with one of the great periods of immigration from Central Asia. The numbers of the Turks were yearly augmented by such hordes that the Greek writers continually use metaphors derived from the torrent, from floods and inundations, to describe their overwhelming force. [Sidenote: Entry of Turks into Europe, 1306–7.] It was partly in order to resist this flood of invasion that the Catalan Grand Company had been invited to aid the emperor, but after having won several victories over the Turks, the lawlessness of the Spaniards forced the emperor to recognise that his Western auxiliaries were of no value for checking the progress of the enemy. The Christians of Asia Minor flocked to the capital to avoid the Company almost as much as to escape from the soldiers of Othman. Worse than all, to these Christians of Spain must be ascribed the introduction of the Turks into Europe. At the invitation of the Company, a band of them, as we have seen, crossed the Dardanelles to aid in attacking the empire which Roger and his Catalans had come to defend. About the same time, another band of Turks landed in Greece for the purpose of pillage. These invasions are epoch-marking, since from this time (1306–7), Europe was never entirely free from the presence of Turks. [Sidenote: Their progress in Asia Minor.]