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| Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople (credit: Wikipedia) |
Stimulated by Pope Innocent III, whose tenure of that high office marked the apex of the medieval papacy, the Crusaders were originally bound for Egypt, because they believed that conquering it would be the key to regaining Jerusalem from the Muslims. The Crusaders gathered at Venice, Italy, but they could not raise enough money to sail to the Holy Land. They made an arrangement with the Venetians. For Venice, the Crusaders would conquer the Christian city of Zara; then the Venetians would take them on to Jerusalem. After conquering Zara, the Crusaders diverted to Constantinople rather than sail on to the Holy Land. The story of the fourth crusade might well be told with tears of humiliation for the disgrace which it was to Christendom.
A motley collection of French knights setting out from Venice by sea to fight in the Holy Land, the crusaders appealed to the Venetians for transportation and food. Venice held extensive commercial interests in the eastern Mediterranean and wished a Byzantine emperor who would be compliant and supported a candidate for the post. They were persuaded by Alexius, son of Isaac Angelus, the dispossessed Emperor of Byzantium, to restore him and his son to the throne.
The Crusaders set out on an expedition with an attack on their fellow Christians and in July 1203, they took Constantinople by assault. The bulk of the fourth Crusade never reached the Holy Land at all. It started at Venice (1202), captured Zara, encamped at Constantinople (1203), and finally, in 1204, stormed the city.
After an easy siege the gates were thrown open, and the Latins, the Franks, entered the city in triumph. The city was sacked. Naturally the Pope protested at this second diversion of the crusading army "Ye took not the Cross to avenge the wrongs of the prince Alexius," he wrote.
"Ye are under the solemn obligation to avenge the Crucified, to Whose service ye are sworn.”
The Crusaders knew that Constantinople was a richer prize than all the Holy Land - and that it could be taken more easily and attacked Constantinople, the richest Christian city in the world. They plundered the city and took its wealth, including the treasures of the great church Agia Sophia.
They battled against other Christian men and they raped Christian women instead of fighting the Muslims.
Constantinople had withstood Muslim armies for 5 centuries, it now fell. The imperial capital was stormed by the very men whose forefathers had promised rescue a century before.
Untold treasures of gold, silver, and holy relics were plundered during the subsequent pillage and rape. Literary classics, great and wonderful works of art and treasures untold were either destroyed or carried away.
Many of its priceless treasures were carried off to Europe. But the greatest prize of all were the relics. Bones, heads and arms of saints, the crown of thorns of Christ, St. Thomas, the doubter's finger.
The patriarch fled on an ass without a single attendant. Tombs were robbed. Women were raped. Churches were desecrated. Horses were ridden in the sanctuary. Communion cups and sacred vessels were used as drinking cups in drunken revels. Prostitutes danced on the altar. Icons, even portraits of Christ were used as gaming tables.
Eastern Christendom has never forgotten those three appalling days of pillage... What shocked the Greeks more than anything was the wanton and systematic sacrilege of the Crusaders. How could men who had specially dedicated themselves to God's service treat the things of God in such a way?
As the Byzantines watched the Crusaders tear to pieces the altar and icon screen in the Church of the Holy Wisdom, and set prostitutes on the Patriarch's throne, they felt that those who did such things were not Christians in the same sense as themselves .
The plunder that followed was one of the worst in all of history . No man, woman or child was safe from the ravagers. Robbery and rape were almost universal, mindless destruction widespread. Westerners killed indiscriminately, without mercy or restraint . For this to have been done by crusaders - men actually wearing the Cross of Christ - was a disgrace .The Greeks never forgot the sack of Constantinople in 1204; its memory, more than anything else, has prevented the union of the Orthodox and the Catholic Church from that day to this, despite several major efforts towards that direction.
The Byzantine Emperor was murdered by his own people in a revolt. Venice took much of the coast and islands of the Empire, and the crusaders set up a “Latin Empire” with a Latin, Baldwin of Flanders as emperor. Pope Innocent II could express disapproval, but for the Latins the Greeks were schismatics and heretics so their own rule was set up over the Greek Empire, which lasted 50 years.
The Latin and Greek Churches were declared to be reunited, and Latin emperors ruled as conquerors in Constantinople from 1204 to 1261. This is the first time the Byzantine capital was taken, and a landmark in the history of relations between eastern and western Christians. Knights could now choose to crusade against the Greeks instead of the Muslims.
Hated by the Greeks, deprived of help from home, the Latin Emperor was driven out in 1261 by the Greek emperor of Nicaia, and the Byzantine Empire was restored. After this disaster it was entirely impossible to restore the Byzantine military or economic system, it became a mere shadow of its former self, now reduced to only a Balkan state.
The Latin Empire of Constantinople is a complete freak of history. The Byzantine power was so shattered, it was now unable to check the Turkish sweep into Europe, and the hopes of uniting the eastern and western churches, which the possession of the Byzantine capital had inspired was blighted forever. The chief beneficiaries of this robbery were the Venetian who themselves took over the most lucrative parts of the former Empire, including Crete and the Aegean islands. Eastern Christendom has not forgotten those three appalling days of pillage.
The Crusaders did not bring peace, but a sword, and the sword was to sever Christendom to this day. Between the fall of Rome and the discovery of America the Fourth Crusade is the most important event in the history of European trade. It established the Venetian Empire.
Although other Christians had been transgressed, the Crusaders, who returned with many Byzantine eastern treasures, generally were not condemned by European society. Pope Innocent III even removed the ban that had excommunicated them. The acquisition of the Greek Empire was, after all, a great prize for the West. However, for Byzantium and the Greeks,the sacking of Constantinople by the Latins had paved the way for the Turks to conquer their Empire and themselves on that fatal day back on May 29, 1453 and for this, they will never forgive the West. - NOCTOC
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