The Dream And The Tomb: A History Of The Crusades

by Robert Payne

  The doge or his naval staff had conceived new and extraordinarily powerful weapons. These were flying bridges attached to the high masts of the galleys, which could be made by a system of tackles and counterbalance weights to reach up to the parapets of the high walls. These flying bridges were sturdily built: three men abreast could walk across them in full armor. Hugh of Saint-Pol says the bridges were a hundred feet long, which may be true if we consider that they resembled a T with the mast forming the centerpiece. We are told that these bridges were protected against Greek fire with hides, which also protected them from arrows. Some of these bridges seem to have been built to form tunnels, so that a man could clamber along them and feel safe until he set foot on the parapet of the walls of Constantinople.

  The emperor of Constantinople had not lost hope. He believed he could defend the city. The Varangian Guard, which consisted mostly of Danes and Englishmen who were fanatically loyal to theemperor’s person, could be relied upon. The Pechenegs, recruited from southern Russia, were unlikely to go over to the enemy. The emperor’s main strength lay with the Greek army within the walls, which gave a good account of itself. Constantinople had become a fortress from which the Greeks, the Pechenegs, and the imperial guard could make sorties from the well-defended gates. There were many sorties, most of them from the Romanus Gate and from other gates near the Blachernae Palace. The Crusaders were forced to construct a palisade around their camp. “The Greeks,” wrote Villehardouin “never ceased to attack from one gate or another with the result that the whole army was called to arms six or seven times a day.” The Crusaders found the continual attacks punishing. In addition, they were running out of provisions. They lived on flour, and salted pork, and their dead horses. The Crusaders lost many of their best knights but captured Constantine Lascaris, who was one of the best Byzantine generals. And so the fighting continued for ten days, the Crusader army failing to penetrate the walls of Constantinople.

  But all this amounted to no more than a test of strength, with the Greeks demonstrating that they were perfectly capable of defending their city if the battles were fought in the customary way, with crossbows, swords, and lances. Now, quite suddenly, the Venetians, who had been making little use of their fleet while the fighting was going on near the Blachernae Palace, captured some of the towers and sent scouting parties into the city, by means of the flying bridges. None of these scouting parties seems to have progressed very far into the city, but it was not necessary to do so in order to employ their secret weapon. They set fire to a large area of the city. And the fire accomplished what all the weaponry of the Crusaders had failed to do: it conquered the city.

  Villehardouin gives a clear description of what happened. The fires were lit deliberately by the Venetians, who saw they were hopelessly outnumbered by an advancing Byzantine army. “When the emperor saw that the Venetians were in the city,” he wrote, “he sent his people against them in such numbers that we would be unable to endure their onslaught. So they set fire to the buildings between them and the Greeks, and the wind blowing from our side, the flames rose so high that the Greeks were unable to see our people, who fled to the towers they had seized and conquered.” The flames that saved a small army of Venetians who had climbed over the walls destroyed about a quarter of the city. The two great palaces remained untouched, but the flames reached the Church of Sancta Sophia, where the porch with the mosaics of the patriarchs was destroyed, and then they leaped along the Hippodrome and down to the seawalls. All through the night the high winds fanned the flames.

  Seeing the city in flames, the people lost heart, and the emperor, who had fought well and sometimes brilliantly, lost courage. During the night of July 17, he gathered up the imperial diadems and all the other treasure belonging to the court, including a thousand pounds of gold, and slipped out of the city. He rode to a place called Develtos on the shores of the Black Sea. He made no secret of his plans; he told everyone that he hoped in due course to raise an army and reconquer Constantinople. If he lost courage, it was because everyone else in Constantinople had lost courage. They were in a state of shock, traumatized, incapable of any further fighting, seeing the city burning to the ground.

  The Devastastion of

  Constantinople

  WHEN morning came, one emperor had fled, and another, the blinded Isaac II, sat on his throne in the Blachernae Palace with his empress beside him. Surrounded by court officials and ladies-in-waiting, they were conducting business as though nothing had happened. Villehardouin, who was sent as an envoy from the Crusader camp, observed that the emperor wore his most sumptuous robes, and the empress, the sister of the king of Hungary, was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen. On the previous day the courtiers had bowed and genuflected before another emperor. This day they gave no indication that they were living in a conquered city that was still burning.

  Villehardouin reminded the emperor, who had been released from prison during the night, that he wore his sumptuous robes at the pleasure of the Crusaders, who were the real rulers. He made his demands. First, Isaac must give surety for the covenants signed by his son, the young Alexius. The emperor was surprised: he had never heard of these covenants. Villehardouin issued an ultimatum. The emperor must accept the supremacy of the pope. He must give 200,000 marks to the Venetians and the Franks, together with enough provisions to support them for a year; in addition he must send ten thousand troops on his own ships and at his own expense to assist in the projected invasion of Egypt. Finally, during his lifetime, he must maintain five hundred knights in the territories about to be conquered.

  Isaac pointed out that the demands being made on him were very onerous, and he did not see how they could be implemented. Nevertheless, since his son had signed the covenant, he could not refuse. Some time later in the day the blinded emperor and the son quarreled, the son saying that it was absurd that the empire be ruled by a blind man; he, Alexius, should be crowned emperor. Isaac lost the argument and abdicated in favor of his son.

  On August 1, 1203, Alexius was crowned Emperor. Isaac continued to hold court, blind and half-mad, devoting himself to prayers and prophecies, dreaming that power would one day be restored to him and that his son would turn away from Frankish vices. Meanwhile, Alexius, believing all the promises whispered into his ears by the doge and the marquis of Montferrat, suffered from the illusion that he was a real emperor. In fact he was merely a pawn who would be swept off the chessboard when the doge and the marquis had no further use for him.

  According to the covenant, the reigning emperor of Byzantium must offer submission to the Pope of Rome. Alexius did so, and in due course received a commendatory letter from the pope, who showed his gratification by absolving Alexius of all the sins he had committed in the past, and by exhorting him to make sure that the entire Orthodox Church follow his example. The supremacy of the papacy was of importance to the pope, but of very little importance to the Greeks, who continued to worship in the old way.

  For a short while, the conquered city of Constantinople enjoyed a precarious peace. Under Alexius, an army went out in search of the other Alexius who had taken refuge at Develtos where the Crusaders joined the young emperor, demanding, as might be expected, an exorbitant fee for their services. The emperor was forced to pay them whatever they asked for, but there came a time when it became necessary to stop payment.

  One of those who was prepared to defy the invaders was a certain Alexius Ducas nicknamed “Murzuphlus,” because of the heavy eyebrows growing across the bridge of his nose. He belonged to an aristocratic family which had given two emperors to Byzantium. Until recently he had been in prison; the young emperor ordered his release and made him chief steward. Murzuphlus was totally uncompromising. He hated the Crusaders and the Venetians. The young emperor, on the other hand, delighted in their company, and was once seen wearing the cloth cap of a Crusader to whom he had loaned the imperial tiara. He enjoyed gambling with the Crusaders and enjoyed visiting them in the camp they had set up
across the harbor in the region called Estanor. But Murzuphlus had a winning and powerful personality, and he prevailed upon the emperor to such an extent that the doge grew alarmed and summoned the emperor into his presence. “Will you pay?” the doge asked. The emperor replied that he had paid enough. It was becoming clear that the fighting between Crusader and Greek wasn’t over.

  This time, the Greeks possessed some advantages. It was winter now, not the best time for employing flying bridges to scale the walls. The currents of the Bosphorus were treacherous. The Crusader army was starving again. Murzuphlus ordered the construction of fire ships: they were small boats filled with fats, oils, and dry kindling, to be let loose against the Venetian fleet when there was a favorable wind. If, as it happened, they did little damage, the fire ships still threatened the entire existence of the fleet. Meanwhile, the army was living on dry biscuits, and the cost of an egg had risen to two pennies. The conquerors were beginning to feel the strength of the conquered.

  Since the young emperor had signed the covenant, placing Byzantium in debt to the invaders, Murzuphlus decided that the time had come to destroy the emperor. This was easily done. He simply went to the palace with an armed guard, strangled Alexius with a bowstring, and proclaimed himself emperor. Then he saw to it that a letter was shot from the city into the Crusader camp, announcing that he was the reigning emperor. A little later he sent another letter in the same way, announcing that as emperor of Byzantium he could no longer tolerate the presence of the invaders, who were ordered to vacate their camp within a week or face the consequences. The barons defied him, answering that they intended to punish him for murdering Alexius and that they would not rest until they had reconquered Constantinople and received the money the former emperor had promised them.

  Murzuphlus, now the Emperor Alexius V Ducas, was a man of feverish energy and ferocious ambition. Realizing that the barons seriously intended to reconquer the city, he commanded that the towers and walls be strengthened. He was exceedingly brave, and when he heard that Count Henry of Flanders had gone off with a foraging party to the town of Philea, he led his troops out of Constantinople in an effort to head off the foraging party when it returned to the Crusader camp. He wore the imperial golden helmet and carried the icon of the Virgin, which the Greek emperors carried into battle. Count Henry of Flanders was a far more experienced soldier than Alexius V Ducas, who was outgeneraled and forced to flee the battlefield. In his flight he lost the golden helmet, the imperial standard, and the icon of the Virgin. Count Henry exulted in his victory, and arranged that the captured treasure should be shown to the people of Constantinople. A galleon moved up and down the straits with the helmet, the standard, and the icon roped to the masthead. For the new emperor the loss of the symbols associated with his command over the Byzantine empire was ominous to the highest degree.

  The barons were already discussing the partition of the empire. They would elect an emperor who would possess a fourth part of the empire and a fourth part of the city as his own; the remaining three parts would be divided between the Venetians and the rest. They swore on relics that they would bring all the gold, silver, and precious cloths to a central pool, where everything would be divided according to this rule. They also swore on relics that they would despoil no women of their garments—anyone who did so would be condemned to death—and that they would not lay a hand on monks or priests, or break into churches and monasteries. Once they captured Constantinople, all these admirable oaths would be forgotten.

  The siege, they knew, would be difficult. Alexius V Ducas, with a demoralized army, no navy, an empty treasury, and a burned city, was nevertheless a man to be reckoned with. He strengthened the land gates, and the wooden towers built above the stone towers were covered with hides. His people were well armed and determined; even the soldiers, demoralized by so many sudden changes of rulers, and the nobles, who detested him because he had murdered his way to the throne, recognized him as their commanding general. The emperor set up his vermilion tent on high ground that permitted him to see what was happening beyond the walls of the city. From this vantage point, he could give orders by means of trumpeters who were able to be heard all over the city.

  The first serious attack took place on Friday, April 9, when the Venetians lined up their fleet and attempted, with their catwalks attached to the masts, to land men on the walls, while the Franks attempted to mine the walls. The Venetians failed to climb over the walls because they were too high, and the Greeks dropped heavy stones on the Frankish miners. According to Robert of Clari, Alexius V Ducas ordered his trumpeters to proclaim a triumph, and he said, “See, my lords, am I not a good emperor? Did you ever have so good an emperor? Have I not done well? We need fear them no longer. I will have them all hanged and dishonored!”

  While Alexius V Ducas exulted, the Venetians and the Franks could scarcely believe their misfortune. They spent Sunday at prayers; they received communion and listened to sermons in which the priests celebrated the righteousness of their cause and the need for Constantinople to bow down to their just conquerors. On Monday, the attack was resumed, with the ships lined up in front of the seawalls along the Golden Horn.

  There was no battle that day, just a long and difficult effort to take possession of one of the towers. Only four or five ships had masts tall enough for this purpose. Two of these ships, tied together, were the Paradisus and the Peregrina, belonging to the bishops of Soissons and Troyes. From one of them, a knight called Andrew of Dureboise succeeded in entering a tower, crawling on hands and knees; because he was in armor, the defenders of the tower were unable to kill him. While the defenders fled to a lower floor, he was able to lash the catwalk to the tower, and many more were able to join him. Another tower was captured soon afterward. But while the capture of the towers lifted the morale of the Venetians and the Franks, the real breakthrough came from the small groups who landed on the little strip of land between the wall and the sea. In peaceful times there were sea gates, which were now bricked up. The men who landed attempted to cut their way through these sea gates with picks. They surmised rightly that the brick fills were only a few feet deep, whereas the walls themselves were much thicker. They had found the weakest element in the complex system of defense. While they worked, the Greeks poured boiling pitch, Greek fire, and heavy stones on them. But the work continued. Axes and swords were used; so were knives. Anything that could tear through brick was brought into play. The fate of Constantinople depended on how quickly men could break down a sea gate.

  Aleaumes of Clari, the brother of the chronicler Robert of Clari, was the first to see daylight on the other side. Robert, observing his brother’s determination to enter Constantinople, hung on to his legs, but to no avail; Aleaumes insisted on climbing out of the hole and singlehandedly confronting the Greeks, who were so amazed at the sight of a man covered with brick dust that they did nothing but gape at him. He drew his sword and lunged at them, and they fled. Aleaumes called back; “Hurry, my lords! I see them drawing back afraid and beginning to run away!” Through the tunnel carved in brick came ten knights and sixty sergeants. The emperor’s trumpets were giving orders to stop the invaders, and the emperor himself, a stone’s throw away, spurred his horse and rode at them. But then he thought better of it and turned back in the direction of his vermilion tents, where his guards were waiting to defend him. It was his worst mistake.

  While all this was going on, there was fighting on the walls. Peter of Amiens, in command of the group that broke through the bricked-up wall, saw another sea gate nearby and sent some of his men to attack it. When this gate was opened, transports were brought up, and knights in armor rode off the gangplank and entered the city, as though they were on holiday. Soon there were hundreds of knights inside the walls, but there was no enemy in sight. Alexius V Ducas had fled, leaving behind his vermilion tents and his coffers full of treasure, which Peter of Amiens claimed by right of conquest.

  The emperor had taken refuge in the Bucoleon Palace
. Early the next morning, he slipped out of the Golden Gate, hoping to make his way to Thrace and to mount an attack on Constantinople another day. Meanwhile the Venetians and the Franks who had entered the city remained in the region of the monastery of the Pantepoptos—the monastery of the All-Seeing Christ—with their weapons at the ready, for they expected the Greeks to attack during the night or at first light.

  When morning came, there was only a great silence. At last some priests came, and some soldiers of the Varangian Guard. They brought strange news. The emperor and his army and most of the rich people had fled, leaving only the poor people behind. Constantinople was open to them. They could do as they pleased with it: they could destroy it or plunder it or use it for whatever purposes they saw fit. The news stunned the invaders, who had expected hard fighting.

  The great nobles chose the greatest houses for themselves. The marquis of Montferrat chose the vast Bucoleon Palace and the Church of Sancta Sophia and the nearby houses of the patriarchate. Count Henry of Flanders chose the Blachernae Palace. The soldiers set up house in the mansions of the rich until they were thrown out by unruly noblemen who wanted the mansions for themselves. It was understood that for three days all would have license to rape, murder, and pillage. Anarchy reigned. The churches were profaned; libraries were sacked; bronze statues dating back to classical Greece were overturned and then carried away to be melted down. The high altar at Sancta Sophia was covered with a sheet of gold and encrusted with jewels. The invaders tore out the jewels with their daggers. A prostitute was set up on the patriarch’s throne to sing and dance. Since neither the Venetians nor the Franks possessed any respect for the Orthodox Church, they sometimes regarded the churches as pleasure halls and entertained themselves before the altars. Three churches were converted into storehouses for the gold and silver and costly cloths that were set aside for the barons. The rank and file, although promised treasures of their own, received very little; and those who took gold and silver valuables were summarily executed. The barons regarded the city as their own private property. When the massed treasure of all the palaces and churches of Constantinople was valued, the barons received 450,000 marks and only 100,000 marks was reserved for lesser ranks. Each knight received 20 marks, each priest and knight’s servant received 10 marks, and each foot soldier received 5 marks. It was not a very generous distribution of the spoils.