1444, Byzantium Resurrects

Chapter 189: Sugar War
Eastern Mediterranean, Crete, Rethymnon.

Crete is the second largest island in the eastern Mediterranean. It has been a wealthy place since ancient times. It has abundant water resources and light conditions, a relatively large area of ​​arable land, and no shortage of forestry and mining resources, making it self-sufficient.

This is more like a small continent than an island.

Crete is one of the birthplaces of ancient Greek civilization. The people on the island are brave and strong, and are rich in short bowmen. It is the hometown of the most famous archers in the ancient Roman Empire.

After the disaster in 1204, Latin colonists gained control of Crete. The Venetians bought the island from the Crusader lords at an extremely low price, defeated the Genoese who had arrived first, and officially assigned Crete to the Venetian Council, establishing the Kingdom of Candia.

Although Candia is a kingdom title, the governor sent to the island by the Venetian Council is called the "Duke of Candia". He has less autonomy and the power of personnel appointment and dismissal is firmly controlled by the Council.

The island's excellent land qualifications and unique geographical location quickly made it the most important overseas territory of the Republic of Venice. Italian nobles came here to establish vineyards, olive groves and palm gardens, and reap the wealth of the Cretan people.

After the failure of the Crusades, the Republic of Venice lost most of its territories in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and the importance of Crete increased.

As Muslims monopolized trade, the price of a precious commodity from India rose sharply, and Europeans were forced to look for new industrial bases.

This commodity is sucrose.

Sugarcane is a tropical and subtropical plant. Its precious properties enabled it to spread quickly to surrounding civilizations. India once became the world's most important sugar export base.

Around the seventh century AD, Arab merchants brought sugarcane to the Mediterranean region, and the white and sweet sugar soon became the favorite condiment of European aristocrats.

However, due to the high latitude of the European continent, the light and heat conditions are insufficient to support the growth of sugarcane. The few scattered sugarcane producing areas in southern Europe are completely unable to meet the growing demand for sugar.

The first large sugarcane producing area acquired by Europeans was the Levant. In the Kingdom of Jerusalem at that time, every household planted sugarcane, but the local small peasant economy seriously hindered the prosperity of the sugarcane industry. The defects in natural conditions and backward production technology also made the Levantine sugar inferior to Indian sugar in both quality and quantity.

As a result, Venetian merchants began to purchase white slaves from the Black Sea and established sugarcane plantations in the Levant, initially achieving a monopoly on sugar in European countries.

After the loss of the Levant, the Venetians urgently needed to find another sugarcane growing area to maintain their sugar hegemony.

They set their sights on the islands of Crete and Cyprus, which were close to the Levant.

The political situation on the island of Cyprus was relatively complicated. The traditional French land aristocracy and the Genoese who had seized the initiative were both obstacles to Venice's large plantations. The nearby Muslim forces also made most merchants wary. Due to various factors, the Venetians had not been able to completely take over the island.

At the same time, the Venetians' sugarcane experiment on Crete was a great success. More and more sugarcane plantations were established by Venetian colonists, and more and more Orthodox people were forced to engage in heavy labor.

However, due to the particularity of the commercial republic, the Italian nobles who migrated to Crete not only failed to assimilate the local people, but many of them became increasingly Hellenized and Orthodoxized, and their sense of identity with Crete became stronger and stronger.

Later, as the international situation changed, the Venetian government announced a tax increase. The dissatisfaction of some Hellenized Italian nobles on Crete with the Venetian government reached its peak. They joined forces with the lower-class Orthodox people to launch the vigorous "Saint Titus Uprising" and once occupied half of Crete.

Unfortunately, the Eastern Roman Empire at that time was plagued by internal and external troubles and was unable to provide any practical help to the Cretan rebels. The Venetians adopted scorched earth tactics, advancing step by step, gradually compressing the rebels' base and driving them into the mountains.

The Venetian Council also adopted a psychological tactic, agreeing to reduce taxes on Crete and grant partial religious autonomy, which shook the ideological foundation of the rebels.

In 1368, the last rebel army, led by leaders Venier and Calergis, moved to the southwestern border, where they were betrayed by local people and all of them died.

It is worth mentioning that Venier was a completely Italian, and Calergis also had a considerable amount of Latin blood. They worked hard for the cause of freedom for Crete, but in the end they were betrayed by the local Greek Orthodox Christians.

Under the Venetians' soft and hard tactics, the St. Titus Uprising was declared bankrupt, and the Eastern Roman Empire missed the best opportunity to recover the treasure island.

Later, the Republic of Venice sent a large number of immigrants to Crete, built numerous forts, and adopted a series of measures to suppress opposition sentiment on the island. Since then, no large-scale uprising has broken out in Crete again.

However, as the international situation changed again, the isolated island of Crete was forced into the storm.

In a sugarcane plantation east of Rethimnon, Qasim stood under the shade of a tree, holding a whip, looking anxiously at the people working in the fields.

The sun was very hot, and the scorching summer heat was scorching the earth. The nearest stream had dried up, and the serfs had to carry water from a distant river for irrigation. The sweet fresh water was right before their eyes, but the supervisors' whips made them dare not drink it. They could only look up at the sun that was gradually setting, hoping that it would go down quickly.

It was in the afternoon, the hottest time of the day, and serfs would occasionally faint on the ground due to heatstroke. Whenever this happened, the Italian overseers would always curse and walk out of the shade, waving their barbed whips, leaving bloody marks on the serfs' backs.

Some people are suddenly awakened by the pain and continue to work hard, but more people, once they fall down, can never get up again.

thump--

An old serf suddenly fell in front of Cassim, and a big hole appeared in the wooden barrel. Fresh water gushed out and was immediately swallowed up by the dry land.

A look of despair flashed across the old man's face. He didn't care about his cracked lips, and threw himself towards the wooden barrel, trying desperately to block the cracks with his bony fingers, but in the end it was in vain.

Looking at the gradually flowing water, the old man seemed to see his own life slipping away.

The colonists were reluctant to kill their own labor force and destroy producers, so they either paid huge compensation or took on more labor.

For this penniless old man, this was tantamount to death.

The old man's lips were trembling. The long hours of labor under the scorching sun had left him dying. He tried hard to support his body, but could not get up.

Qasim turned around to look at his colleagues who were chatting under the shade of the tree. Seeing that they didn't notice the situation here, he hesitated for a moment, untied the water bag from his waist, and poured it into the old man's mouth.

The old man sucked it greedily, raised his head, saw his savior, recognized him, and sighed.

"Thank you, young master."

Cassim laughed at himself and helped the old man up.

"I'm no longer a young master."

"But we all still remember the kindness you and your father have shown us."

Cassim's eyes dimmed and he walked aside silently.

"What's going on here?"

The manager of the plantation saw the old man stop and walked over with several supervisors. He immediately caught a glimpse of the leaking barrel.

"Greek pig! Going lazy again!"

After saying that, a supervisor swung the whip in his hand, but when he saw Cassim standing beside him, his eyes shrank and he lowered his arm that was raised in the air.

"Ok?"

The steward frowned and walked up to Cassim.

"Overseer Cassim, what's going on here?"

"I accidentally tripped him while walking and broke the bucket. All the losses caused by this incident were deducted from my wages."

"I am very sorry, Lord Steward."

Cassim replied woodenly.

The manager couldn't find any loophole for a moment and put on a smiling face.

"Since you said so, I will believe it for the time being. The lost property will be deducted from your wages."

"Who made you our young master a few months ago?"

Seeing that Cassim still had a humble look on his face, the steward felt disappointed.

"but,"

He turned around and looked at the old man kneeling on the ground.

“If you make a mistake, you have to bear the consequences.”

"Fifty lashes!"

Cassim's eyes narrowed, and he was about to step forward, but his view was blocked by the steward.

"The Greeks are hateful, and the Venetians who sympathize with the Greeks are even more hateful."

"I understand, but—"

"Want to follow in your father's footsteps?"

Upon hearing this, Qasim opened his mouth, his face turned pale, he took a half step back and lowered his head deeply.

This manor located east of Rethymnon was built by his grandfather, a Venetian merchant. While doing business in Albania, he met his grandmother, a noble lady, by chance. The two fell in love at first sight, took their belongings and fled far away to Crete, where they bought a house and started a family.

My grandfather was a Roman Catholic, but my grandmother was an Albanian Orthodox Christian. The religious difference did not affect their relationship, and they gave birth to three children, two girls and one boy.

Because of his grandmother, Cassim's father treated the local Orthodox Christians in Crete very well. He was kind and merciful and never forced the people to work for him. The family employed more than a dozen long-term workers to cultivate the wheat fields, sugarcane fields and vineyards. During the busy farming season, he would also hire some short-term workers from nearby villages, providing them with food and accommodation, and they were never short of weekly wages.

It is for this reason that the nearby villagers have always liked Qasim's father very much and have worked extra hard for him.

Later, Cassim's father married the daughter of a local noble, a Greek Orthodox Christian.

At that time, Venice was at its peak, and the customs were different from those of today. The Grand Council encouraged intermarriage between Venetian nobles and Greek nobles, and the union of Cassim's parents was widely publicized by the government as a representative of "Wicked goodwill."

Cassim's mother was also a devout Orthodox Christian. She often donated money to St. Titus Church and built an Orthodox church next to the manor, allowing villagers to come and worship.

At this point, Qasim's family became more and more famous in the local area. When Qasim was born, his father invited all the villagers from the three nearby villages to a banquet. Everyone was in high spirits, and everyone's face was filled with happy smiles.

Ten years ago, my mother passed away. The villagers who had benefited from her spontaneously escorted the coffin to the church, and countless people lined the streets in tears.

However, just when Qasim thought that such carefree days would continue, something unexpected happened.

The powerful rise of the Eastern Roman Empire changed the fate of countless people. Venice's successive defeats in the eastern Mediterranean caused the Great Council to increasingly hate and distrust the Greek Orthodox Christians. Persecutions against the Greek Orthodox Christians occurred one after another in major cities. The Duke of Candia's spies began to move around, claiming to arrest rebels but actually looting at will.

Three years ago, a group of Venetian rioters broke into the manor's territory and burned down the church built by his mother. This incident completely angered his good-tempered father. He ignored the obstruction of his close followers and went to Rethymnon to meet the mayor and express his opinions.

In his view, the lower-class Greek Orthodox Christians had not rebelled for many years, and the Eastern Empire was only a distant memory to them, so they would not take up swords for it.

The people did not like most of the foreign Venetians, but they did not necessarily have much affection for the Eastern Empire, which had abandoned them many times.

My father believed that this persecution actually disrupted the situation in Crete that had finally been calmed down, and instead pushed the lower-class Greek Orthodox Christians to the side of the Eastern Empire.

However, the city lord scolded his father, thinking that he had betrayed Venice, married a Greek woman and gave birth to a bastard, and that he had evil intentions.

However, at the wedding that year, the city lord served as the witness for his parents and gave a speech to all the guests with a smile.

The father was caught off guard by the huge change in his old friend. He could only return home in a depressed mood and stare at the ruins of the church for the whole day.

If it were only like this, life could still be barely going on, but the torrent of the times swept in once again, and eventually turned into a mighty wave.

Venice's sugar hegemony was coming to an end. Decades ago, under the impetus of Prince Henry, the Portuguese successfully planted sugarcane in the Azores and Madeira Islands, but their sugar was mainly sold to the English and the Hanseatic League, and did not pose any threat to the Venetian sugar hegemony in a short period of time.

However, when the first sugarcane fleet from West Africa arrived at the port of Birinchi, the Venetian sugarcane merchants finally felt a little fear.

Due to reasons of heat and light, the sugar produced in Crete was crushed by West African sugar in both quality and quantity. A large amount of West African sugar quickly dominated the markets in the western Mediterranean and North Africa, and gradually penetrated into Italy.

Not long ago, the Venetian Armada was defeated near Malta, and the emperor returned to Italy and occupied the port of La Spezia on the Ligurian coast, finally opening a gap in northern Italy, where trade was most prosperous.

After the establishment of the Free City of La Spezia, the emperor's sugar no longer had to pay large taxes to the Genoa authorities to enter the Italian market. The trade barriers of neighboring countries collapsed under the huge profits, and officials and smugglers colluded with each other to gradually infiltrate from the coast to the inland.

The abundant funds brought by the sugar trade made the merchants in La Spezia earn a lot of money. They also had sufficient funds to bribe neighboring countries and use real money to create a huge market.

In early 1461, Mayor Di Marco of the Free City of La Spezia united the Republic of Lucca, the Duchy of Parma, the Duchy of Ferrara and several surrounding small city-states to form a customs union on sugar, advocating the unification of sugar tariffs and winning by quantity.

Two months later, smugglers overran Florence, and three months later, the Duchy of Milan joined the Sugar Alliance.

Large amounts of high-quality and low-cost West African sugar entered northern Italy through the port of La Spezia, and were then transported to the more distant Holy Roman Empire via various trade routes.

For the Free City of La Spezia, the sugar trade was a godsend, and they could make a lot of money from it.

This was also a good thing for the other northern Italian states. They finally no longer had to buy expensive sugar from the Venetians, and they could even act as middlemen and make a small profit.

For the Republic of Venice, they lost another commodity that could bring in huge profits, but it was still bearable.

At least, the emperor's hand has not yet reached out to spices and cotton.

But for Crete, this was tantamount to a catastrophe.

Sugarcane is the most valuable commodity in Crete and also their most competitive commodity.

After losing the profits from sugar cane, the landowners on Crete began to go bankrupt in large numbers, their disappointment and dissatisfaction with the Venetian government grew day by day, and hatred towards Greek Orthodox Christians rose again.

In order to stabilize the situation on Crete, the Venetian Council sent spies to West Africa to conduct a field survey of the sugarcane plantations in the St. William Islands, and ultimately came to a subjective conclusion that completely ignored the natural geographical conditions.

West Africa used black slaves for farming, which was extremely cheap, and the traditional estates on Crete could not compare with it at all.

As a result, the lords on Crete also began to imitate the West African plantations, purchasing Black Sea and North African white slaves and exploiting the serfs even more cruelly.

However, the emperor's second move followed closely.

On May 1461, 5, Isaac, co-emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, signed an embargo decree against the Republic of Venice in Carthage, strictly prohibiting anyone from exporting any goods, including slaves, to the Republic of Venice.

Of course, where there are laws there are bound to be lawbreakers, and smugglers can still get slaves, but the price has simply been raised to a higher level.

In order to hold on to their purse strings tightly, the angry Cretan landowners decided to directly use the Orthodox people as labor on the plantations.

Kasim's father didn't want this to happen, so he gathered the villagers together and announced that he would close the sugarcane plantation and plant grapes instead. There would be a reduction in labor and wages, and he hoped that they would understand.

The news spread quickly, and Cassim's father was immediately denounced by the plantation owners as a traitor.

Two weeks ago, the city of Rethymnon sent people to investigate the matter, put my father under house arrest, and seized all their property. They were so crazy that they forced the three surrounding villages to plant sugarcane in their fields, regardless of whether the land was suitable.

Thanks to the efforts of his uncle Cassim, his father was temporarily saved and Cassim was able to continue working as an overseer on the plantation.

A shrill scream rang in his ears, bringing Cassim back to reality from his painful memories.

Whip after whip struck the old man's back, echoing in the sky above the plantation and in the hearts of the onlookers.

After fifty lashes, the old man's skinny body had turned into a bloody corpse.

"This is what happens when you're lazy!"

The butler roared loudly and swung the whip, making a loud whip flower in the air.

Some of the serfs had sad faces, while others had angry eyes.

"Don't blame us! Blame your Greek emperor. If it weren't for him, you would still be able to live a comfortable life like in the past few years!"

No one answered. The serfs stared at the steward in silence, which made him feel uneasy for a moment.

"That's all for today, we'll continue tomorrow!"

The manager left in a hurry after saying something, and secretly decided to add a few more supervisors.

Qasim took off his supervisor's gear in a daze and started his journey home.

There were many corpses hanging on the big trees on the roadside. They were all guerrillas who resisted the government. Some were Cretans and some were Italians.

Where there is oppression, there is resistance. The brutal acts of the Venetian government on the island of Crete have angered many lower-class people and Hellenized Italian expatriates. They have risen up in various places, but without a unified leadership organization, they have been divided and disintegrated and defeated one by one.

Due to different interests, the rebel army was divided into several factions.

The moderates advocate reaching a compromise with the government through some means to force them to change their policies. Of course, this is impossible. In the eyes of the carnivores, they are also rebels and must be eliminated.

The hardliners wanted to overthrow the rule of the Republic of Venice, but their demands were different. Some advocated independence and, like the last major uprising, the establishment of the Republic of St. Titus. Most of these people were Italians.

Others advocated asking for help from the Eastern Empire and returning to the embrace of the empire. Most of these people were the lowest class of people who truly had nothing and were eager to have a place in the new political landscape.

Qasim shook his head, unwilling to look at the guerrillas' corpses with their eyes wide open, and quickened his pace.

Back at a thatched house, the guards at the door showed the most basic respect to the former young master and did not make things difficult for him.

Inside the thatched hut, my father, wearing shackles, sat by the window, watching the sunset over the mountain.

"came back?"

The father asked woodenly.

"I don't want to do it anymore."

Qasim got straight to the point.

His father glared at him and pointed out the window.

"As long as they exist, we will never have peace."

Qasim switched to Albanian.

"What do you want?"

"Unite the people, kill them, and rescue you."

Cassim said murderously.

"And then? Wait to be wiped out by the army that arrives?"

Cassim remained silent, he hadn't thought about it that much yet.

"Kid, since you don't want to stay here, go to the mountains and find the guerrillas."

My father sighed.

"And you? What will you do?"

Kasim asked.

"If you become stronger, you can save me."

"If you continue to stay here, we will end up being persecuted even more severely."

"What about the family's land? Will we let the Venetians occupy it?"

Kasim said unwillingly.

"That's the inheritance left by my grandfather!"

My father was silent for a moment.

"My child, there are only two things in this world worth pursuing for a lifetime: land and freedom."

“But when land becomes a shackle to freedom, it loses its value.”

"Go ahead and hide in the mountains."

Cassim raised his head and met his father's gentle gaze.

"This is the last madness of the Venetians. Whether out of interests or emotions, the emperor of the Eastern Empire will not sit idly by and watch Crete."

"Your uncle sent a message that several Orthodox nobles have also begun secret activities. The spirit of Saint Titus is still alive, and the descendants of the Kalergis family are still alive."

"I am already dying, there is no need for you to waste your thoughts on me."

My father sighed.

"I will get you out."

Kasim said forcefully.

“I’ve grown up, these days, and it’s not entirely without reward.”

"Just wait and see. One day, I will make them pay with blood!"

After saying this, Qasim walked out of the cell, said hello to several guards, and walked towards the path of the village.

The moonlight spread across the world. The bodies of the guerrillas were still hanging on the trees. Qasim mustered up his courage and scanned the bodies one by one. Somehow, their originally hideous faces became friendly, as if with an encouraging smile.

Cassim took out the cross left by his mother, kissed it gently, turned around and ran deep into the jungle.

He knew that in the open space in the woods, there was a group of equally passionate young people waiting for his appearance.

(End of this chapter)