invited to occupy the rock; but the liberty-loving inhabitants soon drove
out the petty tyrant whom they had summoned to their aid, and, with the
consent of Thomas, placed their city under the protection of his patron,
the Pope. Pius II gladly appointed both spiritual and temporal governors
of the fortress which had so long been the stronghold of Orthodoxy, and
of that nationalism with which Orthodoxy was identical[313].
But the papal flag did not wave long over Monemvasia. The Orthodox Greeks
soon grew tired of forming part of the Pope’s temporal dominion, and
preferred the rule of Venice, the strongest maritime power interested
in the Levant, whose governors were well known to be “first Venetians
and then Catholics.” The outbreak of the Turco-Venetian War of 1463, and
the appearance of a Venetian fleet in the Ægean, gave the citizens their
opportunity. The Pope, as Phrantzes informs us, had no wish to give up
the place; but he was far away, his representative was feeble, the flag
of Venice was for the moment triumphant in Greek waters, and accordingly
in 1463 or 1464, the inhabitants admitted a Venetian garrison. On
September 21, 1464, the Senate made provision for the government of
this new dependency. A _Podestà_ was to be elected for two years at an
annual salary of 500 gold ducats, this salary to be paid every three
months out of the revenues of the newly-conquered island of Lemnos. Six
months later, it was decreed that in case there was no money available
for the purpose at Lemnos, the _Podestà_ should receive his salary from
the Cretan treasury[314]. From that time to 1540 Monemvasia remained a
Venetian colony. Once, indeed, a plot was organised in the ancient city
of the Palaiologoi for the purpose of wresting the place from the claws
of the Lion of St Mark. Andrew Palaiologos, the still more degenerate
son of the degenerate Thomas, had, in 1494, transferred all his Imperial
rights and claims to King Charles VIII of France, then engaged in his
expedition to Naples, in the Church of San Pietro in Montorio at Rome.
In accordance with this futile arrangement his partisans at Monemvasia,
where the Imperial name of Palaiologos was still popular, schemed to
deliver the city to his French ally[315]. But the plans of Charles VIII,
and with them the plot at Monemvasia, came to nought. Venice remained
mistress of the Virgin fortress.
[Illustration: PLATE IV
MONEMVASIA. KASTRO.]
[Illustration: PLATE V
Fig. 1. MONEMVASIA. TOWN WALLS AND GATE.
Fig. 2. MONEMVASIA. MODERN TOWN AT BASE OF CLIFF.]