1204. Constantinople: "after the ball"
The Battle of the Children of Israel against the Children of Benjamin. The Bible of Cardinal Maciejowski (Louis IX). The Morgan Library and Museum. New York. USA.
In the last article, which is part of my series of articles on the "Siege of Constantinople", I described the assault on the city walls of New Rome by the Crusaders on April 12, 1204. The besiegers, having been defeated in the previous assault, were in despair; for them the question was: either do or die. And the Constantinopleans, having already repelled one assault, were confident of their numerical superiority.
In any war and in any battle, a breakthrough in defense is facilitated by concentrating forces in one area, which is what the pilgrims did, as I wrote about in the previous article “1204. Fall of New Rome».
Having broken into the city, they, but especially the Amalfians and Pisans, who had been expelled from the city only recently, carried out a massacre in the coastal areas of the Golden Horn. The main part of the Roman army with noble commanders retreated to the Blachernae Palace, the smaller part - with the emperor into the depths of the city.
By evening, fearing a counterattack, the knights settled down to rest in the towers and on the sea walls, especially guarding the ships, which could always be used in the event of a counterattack by the Romans. At the Pantepopte monastery, in the red imperial tent, the kiton, Count Baldwin of Flanders settled down, who had captured the emperor's headquarters. His brother, Henri d'Eno, stood at Blachernae.
Eski Imaret Mosque, presumably the Pantepoptes (All-Seeing Savior) Monastery. Istanbul. Türkiye.
Marquis Boniface of Montferrat was in the vanguard. His detachment became closer to the center, where exactly, we do not know. It can be conditionally assumed that somewhere in the area of the modern Ataturk Boulevard, about 3 km to Hagia Sophia.
The barons held a council where they decided that tomorrow, i.e. April 13, they would begin the battle for the city. They assumed that it would last about a month, since the city was full of troops and many men. They also decided that in order to succeed, it was necessary to set the city on fire, since, from their point of view, the forces were unequal. And so it happened, perhaps out of fear that the Romans would attack at night, perhaps on purpose, but the soldiers either from the detachment of Marquis Boniface of Montferrat or Count Berthold von Katzelnebogen, fearing a night attack, set the city on fire. This fire caused great damage to the quarters in the north-east of the city.
Until midnight, Basileus Alexios V Mourzuphlos (Mourzuphlos, Μούρτζουφλος) tried in vain to gather troops for resistance. The Constantinople residents and soldiers who had boasted before had one thought: "Save yourself if you can," as Niketas Choniates wrote. The troops fled from the place of the breakthrough in the area of the Pantepopte Monastery. As a Russian witness of this event notes, Mourzuphlos was unable to persuade "the boyars and all the people" to gather and organize resistance inside the city, which could have corrected the situation. From the place where the crusaders broke through, near the Pantepopte Monastery, to the place where they fled, and they stopped at the Horse Market, most likely this is Taurus Square, the distance is 2,5 km. And from here to the center of the empire - the Great Palace and the Cathedral of St. Sophia - about 700 meters.
The usurper basileus decided not to be zealous any longer, but to act on the same principle as his subjects, going to the Great Palace. He took with him the wife of Tsar Alexei III Euphrosyne and her daughter, his mistress Eudocia, and fled the city, according to Choniates, by boat, according to de Villehardouin, through the Golden Gate.
As a Russian eyewitness of the events tells us:
Caesar fled from the city, the patriarch and all the boyars.
Hagia Sophia. Inside view. Istanbul. Türkiye. Photo by the author.
And the townspeople gathered at night in St. Sophia to decide what to do next. Two contenders for the empty throne immediately appeared, but Theodore Laskarit (1174–1218), who had previously fought actively against the pilgrim bandits and was married to another daughter of the deposed Alexei III, Anna, was elected. He came out to Milion at St. Sophia and called on the people to fight, but it was one thing to rebel, another to fight.
Even the Anglo-Saxon mercenaries, who had bravely and skillfully fought the Crusaders before and had served the Byzantine emperors for over 150 years, refused to resist the enemy without pay, but most likely they did not want to do so at all. Having lived in Constantinople for a long time, they had become part of the local environment and, of course, knew the mood in the capital and understood that there would be no resistance to the Crusaders. Therefore, Laskaris himself boarded a galley and sailed to Asia, heading for the city of Nicaea.
Meanwhile, the brave Latins, fully armed, lined up in detachments, were ready to enter the battle, assuming that the battle would be no less fierce than for the Sea Walls. But suddenly it became obvious that there would be no resistance, no one was blocking or fortifying the streets, no one was building barricades, no armed people were visible anywhere, and there was even a religious procession with banners.
I have already noted earlier, describing the events of the Fourth Crusade, that every time the pilgrims realized that their affairs were bad, the Romans, having a larger number of troops, weapons, silver and gold, retreated or fled, which gave them the opportunity to be convinced that God was on the side of the crusader army, which was emphasized by the authors who participated in the campaign and which the Romans also knew:
Why hast thou smitten us, O Lord, and there is no deliverance for us? We know, O Lord, our sins, the iniquities of our fathers. Cease therefore in thy mercy; destroy not the throne of thy glory.
A delegation of priests came to the French camp, apparently with a religious procession, as Choniates reported. The Angles, Danes and other mercenaries and foreigners who were in service in Constantinople went over to the side of the pilgrims, "complaining" about the treacherous Greeks and assuring that there were no nobles or troops left in the city, only the poor. The defectors also managed to take part in the plundering of the capital along with the pilgrims.
This is what a siege looked like in this period: 12th–13th centuries. Miniature from the “Liber ad honorem Augusti” by Peter of Eboli. Bern City Library. Switzerland.
Time to Rob
In this situation the crusaders rushed to plunder, as Marshal Champagne swore, and our historical informant:
Since the creation of the world, never has so much booty been captured in any city.
The barons, having gathered at a meeting, agreed how they would distribute the best houses in the city, and sent their men to occupy them before the common knights plundered them.
The Roman nobility, those who had not managed to escape, and those who were in the palaces, surrendered to the noble lords of the Crusaders. Thus, the Blachernae Palace, a new, one might say, more modern building, although damaged by fire in 1203, but still with countless treasures, was occupied by Baldwin's brother, Henri.
And Boniface of Montferrat "rode along the coast" to capture the palace, as the crusaders called it, the Lion's Mouth, Bucoleon. It is not entirely clear from a topographic point of view how and along which coast the marquis rode when his troops were stationed in the central part of Constantinople, and it was easier and faster for him to get along the Mese street to the Hippodrome, and then go down the street along the Hippodrome to the south, to Bucoleon, along the modern Aksakal street, approximately 3,2 km. Most likely, Villehardouin was mistaken: at that time there was no road along the city walls. Nevertheless, having "rode" there, he found in the palace many noble ladies, two princesses from the West and untold riches. The beauty of the palace, built in the antique style from marble, made an indelible impression on the invaders.
The barons decided that all captured wealth should be taken to three churches under the protection of 10 noble knights and 10 noble Venetians known for their honesty.
When the goods were brought there, this goods turned out to be so great (there were so many expensive vessels, gold and silver, and gold-embroidered fabrics, and so many jewels that it was a real miracle, all this goods), that never since the creation of the world, [no one] has seen and captured so much goods, and moreover such rare nobility and such rich, neither in the time of Charlemagne, nor in the time of Alexander, nor before, nor after, and I, for my part, believe that in the forty richest cities of the world there is hardly so much wealth as was found in Constantinople.
But... Uncontrolled looting of everything and everyone began, even churches and monasteries were robbed, violence was committed not only against laywomen but also against nuns. Seizure of houses, torture and beating of homeowners.
Chest. Constantinople, 10th century. Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul in Troyes. France.
The Crusaders managed to fight among themselves for the house they liked, and the nobility took the best decorations and riches for themselves.
The imperial treasurer Choniates, who himself found himself in the captured city, describes these events:
Therefore everyone had to fear for his life: in the streets there was weeping, wailing and lamentation; at the crossroads there was sobbing; in the temples there were pitiful groans; husbands were exhausted with grief; wives were screaming, they were dragged, enslaved, torn from those with whom they had previously been united bodily, and violated! The noble by birth wandered disgraced, the venerable elders weeping, the rich beggars. So in the squares; so in the back streets; so in open public places; so in secret refuges! There was no place that was not found, or that could provide protection for those trying to save themselves somehow, but everywhere and everything was filled with every kind of evil.
De Clari wrote that the barons allowed the inhabitants to exercise their right to leave or stay, and Choniates also confirms this, although he writes that the robbed, ragged and naked Romans left their city, weeping over the kidnapping of their “beautiful daughter-bride and her corruption, or were grieving over the loss of their spouse.”
A Russian who found himself in Constantinople notes that the Pope twice forbade the Crusaders' excesses; indeed, there was a letter from the Pope forbidding the attack on the Christian capital. When Pope Innocent learned of the debacle that had taken place in Constantinople, he called the expedition a shameful caricature.
“Two thirds of the earth’s wealth,” collected, according to the Romans, in the city of Constantine, was stolen by the crusaders.
J. de Villehardouin very roughly, and without what had already been paid to the Venetians, estimated the entire loot at 400 thousand marks or 97,9 tons in terms of the Troyes or royal mark. This amount did not include the loot that went to the Venetians for the rent of the ships, and the remainder of the amount that Alexei IV promised the crusaders for returning to the throne, more than 100 thousand marks. Only recently, Richard the Lionheart bought his freedom for 150 thousand marks, two budgets of England. And according to the calculations of the outstanding French historian J. Le Goff, the annual "turnover" of money in England in the middle of the 266th century was XNUMX thousand marks.
Another trophy. Casket. Constantinople, 10th century. Venetian Palace. Rome. Italy. Photo by the author.
The blind doge proposed a more equitable division of the loot, of course, after the Venetians had received everything they had down to the last penny, which pleased the poor knight and our informant De Clari, but the ordinary participants, as usual, were left with nothing. They were allocated, according to Marshal Champagne, 100 thousand marks. Moreover, later, while some of the knights, after taking Constantinople, went to seize other Roman cities in Thrace, their houses were occupied, and part of the loot was divided without them.
What was looted?
The world of the Middle Ages is a world of meager material goods, but New Rome looked completely different against this background, although in the few written sources that describe its buildings, squares and wealth, we often encounter complaints that the city is "not the same anymore." It seems to me that Constantinople looked the same as part of old Istanbul looks today.
On the street of old Istanbul, not far from the Molla-Gurani Mosque, the Church of St. Theodore. Istanbul. Türkiye. Photo by the author in 2012.
But the palaces and squares, the gigantic churches, such as the surviving to this day St. Sophia, St. Irene and Little Sophia, the Church of St. Sergius and Bacchus, must have had a shocking effect.
It is enough to compare St. Mark's Cathedral, as it was planned and as it became after the acquisition of marble columns and cladding from Constantinople.
However, they say that the real Constantinople can be seen in St. Mark's Square, where it was built as the Church of the Holy Apostles, the Doge's Palace - the Boukoleon, and the square itself - the Diplocion.
We know that the city burned three times during the pilgrims' assaults, and the last powerful fire occurred during the current assault, we know nothing about the destruction of buildings during the looting. The city's residents and monks actively hid treasures and relics.
The barons tried to regulate the plundering, not in terms of controlling the reprisals against the inhabitants, but in terms of controlling the concealment of the stolen goods. Several warriors were hanged for this.
According to a Russian witness, the following was stolen from St. Sophia:
The decorated doors of the temple, the pulpit, 12 pillars were stripped, four arks and tyablas, 12 crosses, the altar with pillars, all made of silver, were cut. The knights seized 40 altar cups and other utensils, precious stones and pearls, icon frames, simply 40 kadi of pure gold, they collected frames of gold and silver from all over the temple.
Patriarchal chalice made of sardony. Constantinople. 11th – 12th centuries. Treasury of St. Mark. Venice. Italy. Photo by the author.
It should be noted that in the sources that we have, and in the later stories of travelers to Constantinople, it turns out that the robbers either did not touch something, or robbed only part of it. For example, in Hagia Sophia, a huge curtain embroidered with gold was preserved, and De Clari told in detail about the interior of Hagia Sophia, probably saw it all later, and not during the robbery. The Church of the Holy Apostles was untouched, St. Andrew, St. Luke and St. Timothy were buried here, Gregory of Nysian and John Chrysostom and most of the emperors were buried. De Clari writes that the temple was more beautiful and richer than Hagia Sophia.
St. Mark. "Pillars of Acre", columns and marble from the Church of St. Polyeuctus. Venice. Italy. Photo by the author.
It was not plundered during the events described, but later, by the first patriarch of Latin Constantinople, the Venetian aristocrat Tommaso Morosini.
In addition to collecting precious metals and money, horse equipment and weapons during robberies, the eyes of Christ's greedy warriors were also turned to holy relics, which we still encounter today in many places in the West.
The robbers also did not ignore the sculptures, the works of the greatest masters of antiquity, collected in Constantinople from all over the empire... including Rome, which was plundered by Emperor Constans II (630-668).
"Souvenir" from Constantinople. Marble head on the railing of St. Mark. Venice. Italy. Photo by the author.
Many copper sculptures, masterpieces of antiquity, were melted down into copper coins.
Well, from the hippodrome, a luxurious stadium, completely decorated both on the porticoes and on the field itself, the Venetians took and took to themselves the only quadriga of antique horses in the world today.
However, having seen the beauty of the Byzantine temples and palaces, they stole and brought back a huge amount of “building material”, marble slabs and all kinds of columns, and a number of sculptures that we can see in Venice today.
Thus, the Church of St. Polyeuktos, the largest in Byzantium before the construction of St. Sophia in the 6th century, was used for construction, although by the 10th century it had fallen into disrepair, perhaps even then its fantastic decoration began to be used for other construction. Some of the columns were used in the construction of St. Mark, and some were placed nearby.
Icon of the Virgin Mary Nikopia. 11th century. St. Mark. Venice. Italy. Photo by the author.
The base of the Golden Altar, or Pala d'Oro, was borrowed from the Pantocrator Monastery (now the Zeyrek Mosque), the Venetians took away a huge amount of treasure, some of which are now in the Treasury of St. Mark, but of the silver plates from the 6th-7th centuries, only one remained, all the rest were melted down for money by another "robber", Napoleon, who captured Venice.
And finally, rediscovered in the 11th century, the icon of the Virgin Mary of Nikopea, a symbol of the military glory of the Roman Empire since the 6th century, was transferred to the Venetians.
Where to see a Byzantine city of this period in modern Istanbul, I will tell in the next article.
To be continued ...
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