The Glory of the Crusades

by Steve Weidenkopf

  The reasons for the low turnout were numerous. Some neglected their vows; others could not afford to fulfill them. There was no papal directive ordering warriors to assemble in Venice, so many troops found their own passage to the Holy Land. The papal legate, Peter Capuano, arrived in late July and was appalled at the number of poor, sick, women, and noncombatants. He dispensed their Crusade vow, which was a humane decision, but it further lowered the number of Crusaders in Venice and deeply upset the Venetians, who refused even to recognize Peter as legate of the Crusade.378

  When Boniface of Montferrat strolled into Venice on the Feast of the Assumption of Mary, August 15, he faced the first major issue of his command. Since the expected number of Crusaders did not materialize in Venice, the Crusade leaders were unable to provide full payment in accordance with the treaty. The situation was tense as “the greatest commercial city in Latin Christendom faced a financial disaster. The evil consequences of the foolish treaty now stood starkly revealed. The Crusaders could not pay; the Venetians could not renounce payment.”379

  A Solution

  As summer turned to fall, Dandolo concocted a plan to remedy the situation. He approached the Crusade nobles with a plan to capture the city of Zara, a town on the Dalmatian coast 165 miles southeast of Venice. The debt owed the Venetians would be suspended until paid through the acquisition of booty.

  Zara had been previously under Venetian control but had rebelled. It was extremely important, because it was the first port along the Adriatic coast used by Venice for refurbishment and resupply of ships traveling to Outrémer.380 Venetians also relied on the oak from Dalmatian forests that flowed through Zara to construct their ships.

  Dandolo’s plan seemed to solve the problems facing the Crusaders but it produced a new and very serious quandary. King Emeric of Hungary (r. 1196–1204), who had taken the cross in 1200, controlled Zara. His lands, therefore, were protected by the Church; attacking a Crusader’s land resulted in excommunication.

  The Crusaders needed to fulfill their vows but required Venetian ships in order to do so. They did not have the money to pay the Venetians, whose plan to keep the Crusade from crumbling put their very souls at risk. The choice was between abandoning their vows and attacking a fellow Crusader.

  Debate raged among the Crusaders, but eventually most decided to accept Dandolo’s offer. Many believed keeping the Crusade intact was paramount, and if that involved attacking a Christian city to raise the money required for transport to Outrémer, then so be it. The papal legate opined that keeping the Crusade intact and paying their debt to the Venetians allowed participation in Dandolo’s plan, which was viewed as legitimate since Zara had rebelled against Venetian rule. “It was universally accepted in medieval Europe that a ruler had a right to stabilize his domains, quashing rebels and exacting oaths of loyalty, before leading his armies on Crusade.”381 In this view, Dandolo was merely exercising his rights in asking the Crusaders to help him attack Zara.

  The decision to support Dandolo’s plan was not unanimous, however, and many Crusaders left Venice, refusing to participate. Some even asked the papal legate to commute their vow. Innocent III did not approve of the diversion to Zara, and after Peter Capuano traveled to Rome to discuss the situation, Innocent sent letters to the Crusaders forbidding them from attacking Zara under pain of excommunication. But the leaders hid the pope’s letter from the rank and file.

  Arrival at Zara

  The Venetian fleet of over 200 ships arrived at Zara on the Feast of St. Martin of Tours, November 11, 1202. The day after the fleet’s arrival, emissaries from Zara approached the Crusader camp seeking to negotiate with Dandolo. They agreed to surrender the city in exchange for their lives.

  Dandolo agreed but said he needed to consult with the Crusade leaders, which was a bizarre response. The siege was a Venetian affair; the Crusaders only participated out of a need to pay their debts and had no leverage in any negotiation with Dandolo. His “decision was a bad one. Had the doge immediately accepted the surrender much of the trouble that followed would have been avoided.”382

  Simon de Montefort was one of many Crusaders who struggled with the decision to attack Zara and he actively sought to prevent the siege. While the Zarans waited for Dandolo to return, Simon visited them and misrepresented himself, claiming that he spoke for all French Crusaders. Simon told the Zarans the French had no intention of fighting fellow Christians and so they should not surrender to the Venetians. While Simon was convincing the Zarans to hold fast, Dandolo received the consent of the Crusade leaders and returned to find the Zarans missing.

  In their place were Simon and Abbot Guy of Les Vaux-de-Cernay, who confronted Dandolo and the Crusade nobles. Holding a copy of Innocent’s letter, he commanded, “I forbid you, on behalf of the Pope of Rome, to attack this city, for those within are Christians and you are Crusaders!”383 Dandolo was furious and said to the Crusade nobles, “Lords, I had this city at my mercy, and your people have deprived me of it; you promised to assist me to conquer it, and I summon you to do so.”384

  Furious at Dandolo’s obstinacy in the face of a direct papal order to not attack the city, Simon said, “I have not come here to destroy Christians.”385 Simon refused to participate and retreated from the main host, establishing a camp with his followers some distance from the city. Disillusioned with the events at Zara, Simon eventually left the Crusade and traveled to the Holy Land on his own. He remained committed to the Crusading movement and became the main figure in the later Albigensian Crusade in southern France.

  The Siege of Zara

  As the Crusaders prepared their siege machines, sharpened their swords, and checked their armor in anticipation of the assault on Zara, its citizens draped crosses over the walls as a reminder to the Crusaders that they were attacking a Christian city.386 The ingenious tactic did not stop the attack.

  After a two-week siege, the Zarans sued for peace and surrendered on November 24. Entry into the city resulted in the plundering of churches, destruction of buildings, and general looting. Dandolo was eager to assert his authority over the city and, mindful of past grievances, ordered the execution and exile of various Zarans.387

  News of the sack of Zara reached Pope Innocent III, who wrote a letter to the Crusaders denouncing their actions and demanding they restore the city to the Hungarian king:

  Behold, your gold has turned into base metal and your silver has almost completely rusted since, departing from the purity of your plan and turning aside from the path onto the impassable road, you have, so to speak, withdrawn your hand from the plough … for when … you should have hastened to the land flowing with milk and honey, you turned away, going astray in the direction of the desert.388

  Innocent told the Crusaders their attack on Zara was “an outrage that is already notorious throughout almost the entire world.”389 Since the Crusaders attacked the lands of a fellow Crusader they were automatically excommunicated, and access to the indulgence—the reason that most joined the Crusade in the first place—was denied.

  A group of French envoys left the army and traveled to Rome to discuss the situation with Innocent and to request the lifting of the excommunication. Innocent granted their request on condition that the Crusaders restore Zara to the king of Hungary and promise to not attack other Christian lands, unless a just cause forced them to such an action and only after receiving papal

  approval. Innocent demanded the Crusade leaders send signed and sealed statements to Rome swearing they would obey all papal orders.390 Although he was furious at the actions of the Crusaders, “Innocent had no desire to destroy the Crusade by refusing to forgive them if they were truly sorry for their sins and willing to do penance, and as a priest he had no right to refuse absolution to the penitent.”391

  Although the French contingent sought out papal absolution, the Venetians refused to admit any wrongdoing. They believed their attack on Zara was justified and, therefore, they remained excommunicated.

  The path to Zar
a was not a calculated pre-meditated decision on the part of the Crusade leadership and, contrary to popular modern opinion, the Venetians did not secretly force the Crusade toward Zara and ultimately Constantinople. Rather, the reasons for the diversion were “pragmatic, ambitious and opportunistic: to secure the expedition’s funding and material resources on one hand and, on the other, to attempt to realign the politics of the eastern Mediterranean in favor of Rome, Outrémer, and the Crusade.”392

  A Byzantine Prince

  Travel in the Mediterranean Sea usually ceased during the winter months of November through March, so the Crusaders had to remain in Zara. During their stay, the Crusaders received envoys representing Alexius Angelus, a fugitive from the Byzantine Empire and son to the deposed emperor. The envoys asked the Crusaders to place the prince on the throne in Constantinople.

  Alexius had fled the court of his uncle, Alexius III, in the fall of 1201. In order to free his father and return his family to power, Alexius Angelus needed an army; the Crusade army at Zara was in need of cash. So, the envoys presented Alexius’ offer to help the Crusade leaders once they had installed him as emperor. He promised to unite the Byzantine Church with Rome; join the Crusade at the head of an army of 10,000 troops; permanently maintain a corps of 500 knights in the Holy Land; and pay 200,000 silver marks, enough to settle the Venetian debt with a surplus to finance the campaign in Outrémer.

  Alexius had previously visited Rome and asked Pope Innocent for assistance, but the pope had rebuffed the prince’s request and now told Boniface of Montferrat, the Crusade leader, to have nothing to do with the Byzantine refugee. Despite the papal warning, Boniface and the Crusade nobles agreed to help Alexius. When Innocent heard the news in the spring of 1203 he wrote a letter warning the nobles against traveling to Constantinople and adjuring them “not to return to their previous sins [attacking another Christian city] like dogs returning to their own vomit.”393

  Recognizing that the Crusade nobles might be motivated to help Alexius because he promised reunion with Rome or because the current ruler of Byzantium was a usurper, Innocent wrote: “Let no one among you rashly convince himself that he may seize or plunder Greek lands on the pretext that they show little obedience to the Apostolic See, or because the emperor of Constantinople deposed his brother, blinded him, and usurped the empire.”394 He pointedly told the Crusaders to “give up these pointless diversions and feigned commitments: cross over to save the Holy Land.”395

  Unfortunately, the Crusade leaders did not heed the pope’s commands and instead agreed to help Alexius. The “business of the cross” seemed subservient to the business of the Crusade nobles.

  The Fourth Crusade nobles were placing their hopes on the promises of a refugee prince with no political experience and unproven popularity. Some modern observers read malice into the Crusade from the beginning, believing that the Venetians, or even the Church, specifically launched the Crusade to attack Constantinople. And indeed, among the general populace, the memory of the Fourth Crusade is one of barbaric acts against fellow Christians. Yet the historical record proves that the results of the Fourth Crusade were not planned from the beginning and were definitely not pursued or supported by the Church. Pope Innocent III specifically and repeatedly exhorted and threatened the Crusaders to choose the correct path and make their way to Jerusalem. It is true that “the diversion to Byzantium was no accident, but [it was] rather the result of conscious choices painfully, openly and controversially reached. [But] the motives behind them were immediate, contradictory, self-deluding and muddled rather than treacherous or malign.”396

  Constantinople—Queen of Cities

  The Crusaders arrived at Constantinople on the Feast of St. John the Baptist, June 24, 1203. They were awe-struck by the view. Constantinople was a majestic city unlike anything the Crusaders knew in the West. It boasted a population of 500,000 in the city and another 300,000 in the surrounding area.397 By comparison, Florence and Venice contained 50,000–100,000 people and London only 25,000–50,000.398 Constantinople was not only the center of imperial political power but also an economic powerhouse. The inhabitants of the “Queen of Cities” adorned their churches not only in gold, silver, and jewels but also in saintly relics.

  The walls of the city were a formidable obstacle and the Crusaders were outnumbered by the garrison three to one. Although the city had surrendered to rival claimants as recently as 1081, in its 900 year history Constantinople had never been conquered by a foreign army.

  The Crusaders initially believed the installation of Alexius Angelus would be a peaceful coup, based on Alexius’s word and his description of the situation in the city. They soon found out his assessment was completely wrong. When news of the Crusaders’ approach reached Alexius III, he sent Nicolo Rosso, a native of Lombardy and resident of Constantinople, to ascertain why the Crusaders had arrived and what they wanted. They told Rosso that they did not recognize the authority of Alexius III and demanded he relinquish the throne in favor of his young nephew.

  Dandolo and the Crusade leaders believed that the people of Constantinople were unaware that Alexius Angelus was in their company. To remedy this, Dandolo, Alexius, and Boniface of Montferrat boarded a Venetian galley and sailed along the walls of the city, getting as close as ten feet at times. The Crusaders called out to the citizens gathered on the walls to view the strange flotilla, saying, “Here is your natural lord. If you hold back, we will do to you the very worst we can.”399

  The Crusaders expected the citizens to shout for joy at seeing the return of their lost prince. They were shocked to hear only curses instead, as various objects rained down upon them from the walls. It seemed to the Crusaders as if no one in the city even knew who the prince was.400

  The rejection of Alexius Angelus at the walls dampened the Crusaders’ spirits. A peaceful coup was no longer a viable tactic; the Crusaders now knew they would have to fight. However, the besieging of the Queen of Cities with a force well below the number of defenders was a daunting prospect. Villehardouin succinctly described the situation when he commented, “Never have so many been besieged by so few.”401

  The Main Assault

  The Crusade leaders met to plan the main assault and disagreements quickly arose over the plan. The Venetians wanted a marine attack across the harbor with a focus on attacking weak parts of the fortifications, whereas the French, not comfortable fighting from ships, preferred a land assault on the walls. The leaders knew they needed to develop a plan and implement it quickly because they only had enough provisions for a two-to three-week siege.

  The nobles agreed on a plan that most military planners would immediately fault: to split their forces and concentrate them on two different points of attack. The Venetians decided to embark on an amphibious assault against the walls whereas the French planned an attack against the walls near the Blachernae Palace. Previous attackers of Constantinople had focused on the middle city walls where the defenses were the lightest. The French chose to attack an area with some of the city’s strongest defenses. It was a poor choice.

  On July 17, the French Crusaders, using a battering ram and carrying scaling ladders, began their assault. The walls were defended by Pisan troops and by the feared Varangian Guards, and the attack quickly became a disaster: only fifteen Crusaders managed to climb up the walls, and all but two were killed.402

  The Venetian attack fared better primarily due to their unique ships and the leadership of Dandolo. The Venetians had modified their ships with platforms that provided a location for troops to bombard the defenders with missiles and serve as a heightened position from which to climb on top of the walls. The success of the Venetian attack, which began to push through the city, prompted Alexius III to order an element of the Varangian Guards to break contact with the French and assist the defenders fighting against the Venetians.

  The arrival of the Varangians caused the Venetians to fall back. As they did so, they set a defensive fire in the city to separate their line of a
ttack from the Greek defenders. The fire raged out of control and ultimately burned 120 acres in the city and left 20,000 inhabitants homeless.403 It was the first of three devastating fires the Crusaders would set in Constantinople.

  The people of Constantinople were upset at the fire’s devastation and clamored for Alexius III, who had been quite passive during the Crusader attack, to do something. Heeding the murmuring of the people, Alexius III launched a counterattack with more than 30,000 troops against the French Crusader host. The French, recognizing that they were massively outnumbered, sent word to the Venetians to send reinforcements as quickly as possible. In the meantime the French took the drastic measure of outfitting the camp noncombatants—including cooks, tailors, and smiths—for battle. They wore pots from the kitchen for helmets and horse quilts for armor, and used knives and other cooking instruments for weapons.

  The Flemish were in the vanguard and began the march toward the Byzantine line, but as they moved farther away from the Crusader camp they suddenly halted, as their commanders became afraid that they were getting too far ahead of the main force. To re-form the line they began a small tactical withdrawal, which from the perspective of those in the main body looked like a general retreat. Medieval chivalry demanded resoluteness in the face of an enemy and retreating was a stain on one’s honor, so the Crusaders in the main body charged forward, causing significant confusion within the army. It was a perfect opportunity for the Byzantines to attack but shockingly, the opposite occurred: Alexius III ordered a retreat.

  Although the retreat of the Byzantines was perplexing, and devastating to morale, it was in line with Alexius III’s goal for the sortie. He did not wish to engage the Crusaders in open battle but rather wanted to halt the Venetian advance by forcing them to divert troops and attention to the French sector. This tactical objective was achieved. At the end of the day’s battle, the Venetian advance was halted with heavy casualties and the French were forced to abandon their assault and regroup. Despite the tactical success, the Byzantine failure to engage in combat and drive the French from the field was a strategic disaster. Fleeing in the face of an inferior enemy was tantamount to treason, and the decision increased the people’s criticism of Alexius III’s behavior during the siege. Alexius III took stock of his situation and decided fleeing was the better part of valor.