1444, Byzantium Resurrects

Chapter 384: Crimson Purple City

It was early in the morning, and a bright sun rose from the sea, dyeing the Aegean Sea with fine waves golden. The cool sea breeze blew on the face, making people feel particularly comfortable.

The small town near the river estuary has beautiful scenery. Due to its small population, it has not yet suffered from the "alienation" of capitalism. The residents make a living by farming and fishing, and live a pretty good life. There is no unpleasant coal smoke, no running sewage, and the rural scenery and the ocean scenery complement each other. The ancient architectural ruins next to the city add a lot of cultural atmosphere.

Beside some blocked rivers, Saracen slaves were carrying mud and widening the river channels under the whip of their overseers. The mud was piled on the shore, and the villagers gathered here happily, using baskets to move the nutrient-rich mud into their own farmlands.

On a hill next to the city, an exquisite and beautiful cathedral is under construction. Engineers have cleverly combined ancient ruins with modern architecture, directly using the foundations and columns left by their ancestors. The architectural style also strives to be close to ancient ruins.

As the construction time given by their superiors was too short, everyone on the engineering team worked as hard as they could. A large number of Saracen slaves carried stones and wood up the hill, and a large number of horse-drawn carriages carrying construction materials ran at high speed on the newly built road.

On several walls that have been built, some artists are painting mosaics for the church. Pilgrims who have come from nearby villages look at the gradually taking shape portraits with respect and keep making the sign of the cross on their chests.

On the rooftop of the City Hall, Isaac was basking in the sun, drinking coffee, relaxing his tired body and mind, and preparing to greet a day's work in the best possible condition.

During these months, Isaac traveled non-stop in the three provinces of Anatolia. He did not dare to go to the chaotic inland plateau, but he left his footprints in most of the major cities along the Aegean Sea and the Black Sea.

In addition to the routine meetings with local forces, inspections of development conditions, investigations into administrative conditions and interviews with government officials, Isaac also arranged some key development projects for each major city based on local characteristics, such as the high-end nut processing industry in Trebizond, the tea planting industry in Rize, the commodity transshipment industry in Sinop, the mineral mining industry in Sakarya and the wool textile industry in Smyrna, Aydin and other cities. Among them, tea planting and wool textile are of course the top priorities, which are the industries that can really make a lot of money.

Then, Isaac also developed restoration plans for some cities that were once very prosperous but now seem a little desolate, such as the city of Nicaea, which was working at full capacity in ceramic manufacturing, and the city of Manisa, where a small coal field had been explored.

In terms of education, Isaac also negotiated with local governments of several large cities and planned three vocational and technical colleges. The three vocational and technical colleges are located in Nicaea, Smyrna and Aydin, respectively. They mainly train ceramic craftsmen and textile craftsmen. Each of them is small in scale, enrolling more than 100 people each year and training them for two years. During the training period, they can intern with the master craftsmen in the workshop as apprentices. Some apprentices who have already found jobs in the workshop can also sign up for technical training.

These professional skills do not require literacy and have a relatively low threshold. The college will negotiate with capitalists, and capitalists willing to invest will provide part of the teaching funds. After the apprentices graduate, the capitalists who participated in the training will also be given priority in recruiting senior craftsmen. From learning to work, it is a one-stop service, and everything is arranged very clearly.

At this time, highly skilled craftsmen were extremely scarce, and people with outstanding skills were the treasures of every workshop owner. There was basically no exploitation or oppression, as these were directed at those Saracen slaves who had no special skills.

Of course, even with the investment from capitalists, the increasing number of comprehensive universities and professional technical colleges still put an increasing financial burden on Isaac, but he did not regret it, but was very happy instead.

The money was originally earned through cruel colonial exploitation, and the right thing to do is to use it on ordinary people.

Isaac always attached great importance to professional skills, and improving the social status of senior craftsmen was also what he had been doing. His goal was to make the Eastern Roman Empire's craftsman training system as close as possible to the later German apprenticeship system, adopt a "dual system", and jointly run schools between schools and enterprises to improve the social status and technical level of craftsmen.

There is nothing shameful in learning professional skills to become a craftsman, and there is nothing to show off about studying literature, history, politics and law to enter the government. They are just jobs to support a family. Although Isaac's imperial government has undergone many expansions, most of the expanded positions are only middle and low-level clerks. The government power is still restricted, and the social status of government officials is not as high as it was hundreds of years ago.

In addition, Isaac donated his estate on the shores of Lake Nicaea to the Imperial Ministry of Education, asking them to convert it into the Imperial University of Mining and establish the Imperial Institute of Minerals in the university to study the utilization value, mining methods and smelting processes of various ores.

Isaac provided the university with sufficient initial funding, and also moved the Imperial Mineral Exploration Bureau here, specifically ordering them to conduct the latest research on various minerals in Anatolia.

Anatolia is located in a volcanic earthquake zone, so there is no shortage of minerals. However, due to its location in the plateau and hills, mining and exploration are difficult. The transportation costs of some inland minerals are high. The conditions are indeed not as good as those in England and Germany. There are no large-scale high-quality shallow coal fields. Paphlagonia and Manisa do have coal resources, but they are basically only enough for local consumption. It is still unlikely to export large quantities to other cities.

However, Anatolia is not without its own unique advantages, such as its abundant and easily exploitable chromium ore resources and its strategically valuable rare earth resources.

Of course, rare earth resources can only shine in the 21st century, and for now they are just a pile of meaningless waste rock.

As for chromium ore, the quality and reserves of Anatolia's chromium ore are good, but it still failed to occupy the main market in the original time and space - South Africa's chromium ore reserves accounted for 40% of the world's total.

However, precisely because the chromium ore in Anatolia is shallow and of excellent quality, Isaac may be able to discover it in advance and use it in steel production to improve the strength and corrosion resistance of steel.

In the original time and space, chromium was not extracted from chrome lead ore until the 18th century by French scientists. In fact, this was a detour, because the main use of chrome lead ore was not to refine chromium at all, but to become a dye or decoration because of its bright color. Later generations would use the more convenient chromite to refine chromium.

Even though the chromite ore in Anatolia is of quite high quality, it is still very difficult to extract chromium. However, Isaac can completely avoid extracting chromium and only use the intermediate product as an iron smelting additive to achieve performance improvement.

As for chromium single element plating, it is simply impossible with the current level of technology.

Human beings' use of chromium seems to date back to a long time ago. The hardworking and intelligent Chinese people seemed to be able to add chromium-containing coatings to bronze ware in the pre-Qin period. The most famous chromium-containing product is the 2,500-year-old immortal Sword of Goujian, King of Yue. However, how it was extracted and processed has not been fully understood by later generations, and Isaac naturally did not know either.

"Chromium" is a Greek word, which originally means "brilliant colors". Many chromium salts have quite stunning colors and patterns. While discovering chromium ore, people may also find some associated gem mines. Even if the research on chromite has not yielded results for the time being, these capitalists who were "tricked" by Isaac into investing in mining can still make a little money.

Furthermore, among the associated minerals of chromite, there is an ore called serpentine, which has some handicraft value due to its complex patterns, but its main chemical use is to produce calcium magnesium phosphate fertilizer through calcination with added materials, which has an excellent effect in improving acidic soil.

Compared with other fertilizers, the biggest advantage of calcium magnesium phosphate fertilizer is that the raw materials are simple and easy to obtain. They can be obtained from nature, and even primary chemical products such as sulfuric acid and hydrochloric acid are not needed. After acquiring coke technology and blast furnace technology from the East, the smelting furnaces of the Eastern Roman Empire can fully provide the temperature required for calcination.

Isaac listed the research on chromium ore as a first-level project of the Imperial University of Mining and the Institute of Minerals, and asked them to contact the members of the Academy of Chemistry of the Royal Academy of Sciences to try to make good use of this most valuable mineral on the Anatolian Peninsula.

It doesn't matter if they fail, their experimental records will be copied and stored in the library of the Grand Palace. The failure of the predecessors will become the ladder to success for the future generations. While the Eastern Roman Empire is at its peak, these research projects that may not produce much results for the time being must be started as soon as possible, so as to avoid being abandoned by future generations due to short-sightedness.

Over the years, Isaac has been encouraging scientific research and technological innovation, allowing the church to interpret the exploration of science as the only way to explore God. He spends a lot of money every year to support those seemingly unrealistic dreams, hoping that after his sudden death, the descendants of the Eastern Roman Empire will still have the ability to conduct independent research and have the innovative power to lead the times.

These things are of course very expensive, but Isaac has many ways to make money. At worst, he can drive his powerful ships and guns to the colonial natives to borrow some money, and they will surely agree.

After touring Anatolia, Isaac received a letter from Constantinople. The imperial government had passed the "Pilgrimage Economy Decree" and the Crown Prince Constantine signed his name on it. The opposition of some priests would not affect the overall situation. The Orthodox Church was not the Catholic Church. It was basically a special government department of the Eastern Roman Empire. The highest decision-making power was still in the hands of the emperor.

The suggestion to encourage religious pilgrimage was initially proposed by the emperor's brother Manuel, and was eventually approved by Isaac and promulgated by the imperial government. Government officials changed the five major pilgrimage sites originally planned by Isaac to seven, adding the Rila Monastery in Bulgaria and the city of Carthage in Africa to achieve a "balance" and prevent all pilgrimage sites from being under the control of Greco-Romans.

Isaac guessed that this might be related to the party struggle within the government, but he didn't care, it was normal.

Later, a letter from his younger brother Manuel was also sent to Isaac. In the letter, he first praised Basil's erudition, then praised the efficiency of the Eastern Roman government in the pilgrimage economic bill, and finally stated his own requirements. He wanted to order ocean-going ships from the Eastern Roman shipyard at the lowest price and recruit graduates of the navigation school to continue to develop his Uruguayan colony.

Isaac naturally agreed to his request in full. It was certainly a good thing to let this capable brother focus his energy on the great voyages of discovery.

Serbia itself did not have the qualifications to carry out great voyages. It did not have sufficient sailors, good ports, a maritime tradition, or a shipbuilding industry. It was only because Manuel was too obsessed and worked hard to govern the country that Serbia got a ticket of the lowest level. If they really wanted to join the feast of dividing the world, they could only take refuge under the banner of the Eastern Roman Empire.

The greater the colonial interests of Serbian nobles and merchants and the deeper their dependence on the Eastern Roman shipping routes, the less likely Serbia would rebel. Even if the monarchs wanted to rebel, they would have to weigh the huge losses that would result from the severance of the shipping routes.

In the long run, achieving assimilation and control through economy and capital is far more effective than forceful conquest.

At this stage, Serbia has basically been connected to the trade network and capital market of the Eastern Roman Empire. Manuel's centralization action did surprise Isaac, but that was all. A large part of his funding came from dividends from royal companies, and Serbian merchants and nobles also actively participated in the Eastern Roman financial market. This bond of interests will become more solid with the expansion of the capital market. The possibility of hostility between the two sides is small, but the possibility of peaceful reunification is considerable.

On the rooftop, Isaac stood up and looked at the construction site on the hill.

The name of this city is Ephesus, a thousand-year-old city in Anatolia and one of the seven pilgrimage sites designated by the Patriarchate of Constantinople. Isaac came here this time to provide some guidance for the revitalization project and pilgrimage of Ephesus.

The city of Ephesus is located in western Anatolia, with Smyrna to the north and Secae and Aydin on the banks of the Mendres River to the south. It is close to the mouth of the Bayinder River and is only less than one kilometer away from the Aegean Sea. It has excellent transportation conditions and geographical location.

A long time ago, Ephesus was not as dilapidated as it is today. The Temple of Artemis stood here and early Christianity spread here. As a city with a great name in the Bible, Ephesus once became the second largest city in the country during the ancient Roman period. Even after the division of the East and the West and the rise of Constantinople, Ephesus was still one of the top five cities in the Eastern Roman Empire.

When Ephesus dominated the Aegean Sea, Constantinople and Thessalonica were just insignificant small city-states.

However, the successive rise of Constantinople, Smyrna and Thessalonica greatly reduced Ephesus's share of trade. The occasional earthquakes destroyed the city several times. The siltation of the Bayinder River also made the maritime trade on which Ephesus depended increasingly difficult. Under these factors, Ephesus showed signs of decline hundreds of years ago. The expansion of the Turks in Anatolia undoubtedly accelerated this process. By the end of the 15th century, Ephesus had become a small town.

In the original time and space, the city of Ephesus would decline day by day under the rule of the Ottoman Empire until it was finally abandoned.

For Isaac, Ephesus is undoubtedly a cultural treasure of the Eastern Roman people. Its ancient architectural ruins record the glorious history of ancient Greece, ancient Rome and early Christianity. It is not as hopeless as the ancient city of Troy. It would be a pity if it were left to ruin.

In order to save the ancient city of Ephesus, Isaac ordered the formulation of the Ephesus Revitalization Plan, which would improve the city's conditions in three aspects. It would not seek to restore its past prosperity, but at least it would not be abandoned at will.

First, to solve the transportation problem, in order to reconnect Ephesus to the ocean, Isaac ordered local officials in the province of Asia to mobilize slaves and dig waterways so that the Bayinder River would once again become an excellent waterway between Ephesus and the Aegean Sea, making the exchange of goods more convenient.

Of course, the Bagnar is not a big river. Small boats in ancient Greece and Rome could indeed reach the city from the sea via the river, but with the progress of the times, ships became larger and larger, and merchants were not willing to risk running aground by sailing into the Bagnar, and were not willing to dock in the inland port of Ephesus. Even if Isaac successfully dug the river, the Bagnar could only be navigated by small boats, and Ephesus was still far less competitive than a purely coastal city like Smyrna.

Sometimes, just one kilometer often determines the fate of a city.

However, Isaac did have a solution. He directly incorporated an Ottoman-era seaport town at the mouth of the Bayinder River into the control of Ephesus, and gradually relocated most of the population and industries of the old city of Ephesus there, thus achieving the goal of "emptying the cage and replacing the bird."

In this way, Ephesus reappeared on the map. The new city area could still engage in maritime trade, and the old city area could attract population through cultural and religious industries. Due to the close distance, with the development of the city, the two city areas would eventually be connected into one, and the city of Ephesus would be revived.

Second, it attracts population. The city of Ephesus has a long history and rich cultural heritage. It is one of the most famous cities in early Christianity. It is said to be the place where the apostle John sorted out documents and the place where the Virgin Mary lived for the last time.

Isaac had these claims confirmed directly by the church, and funded the reconstruction of the Basilica of the Virgin Mary in Ephesus. He also decided to store the Sinaiticus manuscript of the Book of Ephesians that he had bought from a collector in the Basilica of the Virgin Mary, allowing pilgrims to visit it and promoting it vigorously in major newspapers.

Whether the Virgin Mary died here or not, and whether the Sinaiticus manuscript is the original, is not important at all. However, these two points alone are not enough. Ephesus is no longer a rival to Smyrna in terms of maritime trade. Even relying on religious pilgrimages, it is difficult to restore its past glory. It is necessary to find a special industry for it.

So Isaac ordered people to look through ancient books and, based on actual needs, they finally found a way out for the city of Ephesus.

Thinking of this, Isaac drank the coffee in one gulp, walked down the town hall, gave a few instructions to the guards, mounted his horse, and headed towards the new city area of ​​Ephesus by the sea.

The distance of less than one kilometer passed in the blink of an eye. Although the port town in front of us was not prosperous, it was very peaceful.

Going around the main street, Isaac came to a group of houses far away from the town center. There were a large number of shallow reefs on the sea not far from the houses. Some fishermen built fishing rafts next to the reefs and cultivated oysters, abalone and various edible shellfish.

The seafood farming industry has appeared very early. The relevant technology is not mature, but it is completely sufficient. At the end of the 15th century, the most famous seafood farming base was the small town of Cancale in France. The fishermen here would provide a large number of fresh oysters to the city of Paris every year, and even won the favor of the king.

The weather was very clear. Looking down at the sea from a high place, Isaac could vaguely see the outline of some land. Those were the islands in the Eastern Aegean Sea, very close to the city of Ephesus.

As he approached the house, Isaac immediately smelled an indescribable stench, like a rotting animal corpse.

Seeing Isaac coming, the person in charge immediately ran over to greet him. Isaac waved his hand to stop him from speaking, and came to the door of the large workshop in the center, watching quietly.

The workshop is divided into four parts. There is a height difference between the first three parts, and a sloped slide is used to connect them in the middle.

The workers in the first section would use iron sticks to take out the conch meat, throw away the conch shell, put a large amount of conch meat into bamboo baskets, and pass it to the workers in the second section along the slide.

The workers in the second department were responsible for the further processing of the snail meat, but what was puzzling was that they only removed the glands of the snail with a thin blade, and threw all other parts into a wooden barrel and discarded them.

Next, the workers in the third section will also receive the fruits of labor of the workers in the previous section through the chute. They will weigh the glands, divide them into standardized equal parts, and then put them into lead pots filled with salt water and simmer them over a slow fire.

The fourth part is a large drying yard located on an open space, which is responsible for the final drying of the boiled conch glands. The magical thing is that these originally ordinary soft bodies actually reveal a gorgeous crimson purple color.

This is the gland of the murex, and this workshop is the murex purple extraction workshop specially set up by Isaac.

The Roman Empire was fond of purple. This bright and colorful murex purple, which was not easy to fade, was regarded by many emperors as a symbol of power and wealth, and it was forbidden for others to use it privately. Queen Theodora's words "the purple robe is the most beautiful shroud" are still engraved in the hearts of many people.

Of course, the Roman emperor's ban did not cause much trouble to the people, because murex purple was too expensive, and even if there was no ban, ordinary people could not afford it.

The shallow reefs along the Mediterranean coast are rich in dye murex, but the purple dye that can be extracted from one dye murex is extremely rare. In addition, the process is complicated and the loss rate is high, so the price has remained high.

The Romans in the classical era had invented the method of breeding murex, but the growth cycle of artificially bred murex is very long, and they are easy to die for unknown reasons, and the breeding cost is also high.

Isaac put a lot of effort into solving these problems.

"Your Majesty, what do you think?"

The person in charge looked at Isaac respectfully.

"Our dye extraction workshop is basically on the right track. The methods you provided are very useful. We use the slide and quantitative weighing to improve efficiency, and use large-scale unified extraction to spread labor costs."

"Now, each worker only needs to complete his or her own work and does not need to worry about other processes at all, which greatly speeds up our extraction speed."

"Yeah, that's good, just a small improvement."

Isaac nodded.

"I'm not too worried about the extraction, but what about the source of the murex?"

"Your Majesty, there are two main sources of murex."

the person in charge said.

"The first one is the method you provided, and the second one is through acquisition."

"There are many islands and reefs near Ephesus, and there are a lot of murex. Some fishermen specialize in fishing, and some children also earn some pocket money by picking up murex. We have our own boats, and every once in a while we will buy the murex caught by fishermen on nearby islands and transport them here for centralized processing."

Isaac thought about it and said nothing.

The method he provided was actually quite simple. He simply gave up on artificial breeding which was too difficult, and instead ordered people to find other shellfish that the murex loved to eat, and release them on offshore fishing rafts, providing the murex with sufficient food and a comfortable living environment, allowing them to automatically climb onto the fishing rafts.

However, this method is not safe after all. Over time, all the murex in an area of ​​sea will be fished out.

This is not an empty talk. In the 21st century of the original time and space, the number of dye murex has become very scarce, and they can no longer be seen in many sea areas.

Not long ago, Isaac lifted the restrictions on murex purple. All Eastern Roman citizens were eligible to wear clothes dyed with murex purple, as long as they did not deliberately imitate the royal family's attire. In his mind, the emperor's authority did not need a bright piece of clothing to maintain.

In this context, Murex purple will soon become a precious commodity that dignitaries will flock to, and this beautiful creature will soon be caught up in the feast of capital. Development is indeed necessary, but a restrictive bill on the fishing of Murex must be promulgated as soon as possible, for the sake of future generations.

"Are the citizens of Ephesus interested in your workshop model? Is there anyone willing to open their own Murex purple extraction workshop?"

Isaac looked at the person in charge.

"Uh... Your Majesty, most of the people in Ephesus are farmers and fishermen, and their acceptance of these new things is limited. For now, no."

The person in charge said awkwardly.

"However, some capitalists have come to take a look. Some of them are amazed by the slide transmission mode you proposed, while others are interested in extracting murex purple. They may open a workshop here."

"Okay, let's leave it like this for now. This kind of thing can't be rushed."

"In the future, the murex purple extraction industry may become a pillar industry in the new city of Ephesus."

Isaac finished speaking and turned his gaze towards the busy workers.

This was a royal industry opened by Isaac personally. These workers were foreigners who had just arrived in the Eastern Roman Empire and temporarily enjoyed permanent residence. Isaac provided them with fairly good jobs by opening a large number of workshops and incorporated them into the social system of the Eastern Roman Empire.

When the three years are up, these people will have basically learned the simplest Greek, and perhaps saved up their wages for the past few years. Whether they continue to work or start their own business, a better life is just around the corner.

These workers looked good and had rosy complexions. Although they had to endure the stench of the extraction workshop, their eyes were still filled with longing for the future.

Isaac nodded slightly, jumped on his horse, gave a few instructions to the person in charge, and decided to leave this thousand-year-old city, which might be able to restore its former glory by relying on the murex purple extraction industry.

"Your Majesty, where are we going now?"

The captain of the guard came over.

"I have to find the coachman and make plans for the rest of the tour."

"No need. I've seen what I should see and taken care of what I should take care of. I'm quite satisfied."

Isaac smiled.

"Let's go back. The Olympus Cathedral is almost finished. The previous few football matches successfully livened up the atmosphere. The first Olympic Games will be officially held soon. I must go to preside over the ceremony."

"At that time, in addition to the provinces, the Viceroyalties, colonies, free cities and dependent states will all send their own delegations. This will be a real grand event, and we must show our best side!"

……

On September 1477, 9, after completing some arrangements for the extraction of murex purple, the Eastern Roman Emperor Isaac ended his tour of Anatolia and returned to Constantinople on a ship, preparing to use an international event to announce the official arrival of the Eastern Roman Golden Age.

(End of this chapter)