Robin Pierson
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Episode 328 – In the Nick of Timur
🕑 Added 2025-05-30 18:04:10 +0000 UTCPic: Bayezid held captive by Timur, painting by Stanisław Chlebowski (1878)
Manuel II Palaiologos refuses to play vassal to Sultan Bayezid. So the Ottomans set up a permanent blockade of New Rome. The siege would last for eight years and only a miracle could save the Romans.
Period: 1391-1402
Comments
The Children of Jack Acid
Wait a minute...so Romania really DID die in 1204? Or maybe even 1071? It seems the rest is just Turks not finalizing the paperwork, while they were distracted by plagues and Khans.
David Schouten
Would have been a beautiful coincidence, but at the current pacing, I doubt the podcast will last another year of narrative before 1453.
Christopher Green
More of a rain check than a miracle.
Jcm
that bit about two envoys each with a different key is so crazy to me, it's almost too crazy to make up!
Mark Simms
Great episode. All the ingredients. Siege, desperation, bizarre bravery. Humanity at it's most raw
Xylem
I mean, just delaying the inevitable. Maybe peacefully surrendering to the Ottomans would've been a better outcome.
Kωnstantinos T.
There are some pieces of correspondence between Bayezid and Timur that have survived from the time and mainly consist of them taunting each other, pretty funny to read. Also I remember reading the journal of the first Austrian ambassador to Greece who was present during the Independence war in the 1820's. He travels throughout mainland Greece the Aegean islands as well as the west coast of Anatolia. He does mention Timur's sack of Smyrna and the pyramids of heads that were erected there.
Paul Astalas
Nice introduction. But I was wondering if Robin would go alternative history. After all just yesterday was the the 29th of May, the day when the City actually fell. Maybe the podcast will end in the (almost) same day as the City did. But no, it was just Timur punishing the ottomans.
Guillem N
John VII: you couldn't live with your own failure. where did that bring you?Back to me
Jack Hanke
Tamerlane is one of the true monsters of history. I can't believe this episode got me to cheer him on. He really is the savior in this particular story, though.
Maxwell Elkiss
Also, when it comes to untimely interventions, does anyone else notice an odd parallel between Timur’s Intervention against Bayzeid in 1402 and Pope Leo’s intervention with Attila in 455 for the Western Romans?
Liutprand
It’s interesting how much the difference in personalities between Murad and Bayezid seems to inform their different actions. Murad was no saint but compared to his utterly vicious son he seems a lot more preferable. Combined with the sudden appearance of timur giving the Byzantines another 51 years of life, it’s strong testament to how much individual actions and personalities can completely alter history. It’s also kind of insane how across their two reigns, the Ottomans have practically reconstructed the empire of Basil II in about 40 years. Also as a slight correction, the Chagataj Khanate was more based in the Turkic Stan’s of Central Asia (Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan) than Pakistan, which is a bit farther south and East.
