INTRODUCTION TO PART II

Thessalonike, the “second city” of the Byzantine Empire and the major administrative, economic, and cultural center of medieval Macedonia, was the scene of almost uninterrupted military struggles and climactic political events between 1382 and 1430, which once resulted in the city's complete independence from Constantinople under Greek rule, and no fewer than three times in its subjection to foreign domination. In 1382 Manuel II Palaiologos, deprived recently of his right of succession to the imperial throne at the conclusion of a civil war in Constantinople, left the Byzantine capital with some followers and established himself in Thessalonike as Emperor. Acting independently of John V's government in Constantinople, Manuel started from his new base a vigorous campaign against the Ottomans with the aim of recovering the regions of Macedonia and Thessaly that had been conquered by them. In spite of some minor victories initially, at the end of four years under Ottoman siege the Thessalonians pressured Manuel to give up the struggle, and following his departure from the city they surrendered to the Ottomans in the spring of 1387. For the next sixteen years Thessalonike remained under Ottoman domination, until its restoration to Byzantium by the Byzantine—Ottoman treaty of 1403 signed in the wake of the battle of Ankara. The city was then ceded to John VII Palaiologos (d. 1408), who ruled there semi-independently as “Emperor of all Thessaly” to the end of his life.