Introduction
The Piraeus Lion has seen some remarkable history pass before his eyes, from the days when Scandinavian and English mercenaries were taking the fight to the Normans in Italy, to the day when the Turks came knocking imperiously on the doors of Vienna.
THE Arsenal at Venice is graced by two marble lions looted by Venetian commander Francesco Morosini from Piraeus, near Athens, in 1687. The lions, already a feature of the Greek port for fifteen centuries, were his trophies following a brief liberation of Athens and the Peloponnese from the Ottoman Empire.
After capturing Constantinople in 1453,* the Ottoman Turks advanced steadily beyond Greece into central Europe, as far as Poland and Austria. Defeat at Vienna in 1683, and an alliance of Christian states, the ‘Holy League’, forced them to retreat, ceding the Peloponnese to Morosini, and signing the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1699.
One of the Piraeus lions is etched with ornate though badly-worn lettering, not in Greek or Arabic, but in Norse runes. Shortly after William of Normandy conquered England in 1066,* Scandinavian and English mercenaries were resisting another Norman invasion in Italy, as members of Constantinople’s elite Varangian Guard.* Some evidently passed through Piraeus, leaving a touching memorial to a fallen comrade, Horsi.*
See The Fall of Constantinople. Constantinople was the capital of the Roman Empire from 330 to 1453, during which time the empire was predominantly Christian.
English kings recruited Scandinavians for the elite corps of the ‘Thingmen’ in London, from Canute (r. 1016-1035) to the Norman Conquest, and about twenty years after the Conquest thousands of Englishmen sailed away to the Byzantine Empire, and enlisted in the Varangian Guard. See Welcome to Micklegarth. For another story about the Vikings in Greece, see The Luck of the Draw.
The Norse runes are so worn as to be barely legible, and much educated guesswork is required to fill in the blanks. The reconstructions of Carl Christian Rafn (1795-1864) and Erik Brate (1857-1924) are almost entirely different. Rafn’s version suggests bragging graffiti; Brate’s suggests a tribute to ‘a good warrior, Horsi’, cut down in the midst of his forces. For a map of the Europe-wide spread of the Vikings from the eighth century to the eleventh, see Voyages of the Vikings. The city on the Black Sea marked Miklagard is Constantinople, or Istanbul.
Archive
Word Games
Spinners Find in Think and Speak
For each group of words, compose a sentence that uses all three. You can use any form of the word: for example, cat → cats, go → went, or quick → quickly, though neigh → neighbour is stretching it a bit.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 Another. Ornate. Port.
2 Evident. Letter. Some.
3 Christian. Conquer. Trophy.
Variations: 1. include direct and indirect speech 2. include one or more of these words: although, because, despite, either/or, if, unless, until, when, whether, which, who 3. use negatives (not, isn’t, neither/nor, never, nobody etc.)
Opposites Find in Think and Speak
Suggest words or phrases that seem opposite in meaning to each of the words below. We have suggested some possible answers; see if you can find any others.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
Variations: 1.instead of opposites, suggest words of similar meaning (synonyms). 2.use a word and its opposite in the same sentence. 3.suggest any 5 opposites formed by adding dis-.
Statements, Questions and Commands Find in Think and Speak
Use each word below in a sentence. Try to include at least one statement, one question and one command among your sentences. Note that some verbs make awkward or meaningless words of command, e.g. need, happen.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 Sign. 2 Guard. 3 Pass. 4 Advance. 5 State. 6 Force. 7 Feature. 8 Resist. 9 Wear.
Variations: 1. use a minimum of seven words for each sentence 2. include negatives, e.g. isn’t, don’t, never 3. use the words ‘must’ to make commands 4. compose a short dialogue containing all three kinds of sentence: one statement, one question and one command
High Tiles Find in Think and Speak
Make words (three letters or more) from the seven letters showing below, using any letter once only. Each letter carries a score. What is the highest-scoring word you can make?
Your Words ()
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