Thanks to Villehardouin’s presence on the embassy we have an eye-witness account of the events inside Constantinople on 18 July 1203. The four envoys rode out of the crusader camp and headed the few hundred yards towards the city walls. Escorts met them and they proceeded to the Blachernae palace. The presence of the Varangian guard at the gates showed that the new regime had the support of this vital faction. Shouldering their heavy battle-axes, the guard formed a menacing corridor right up to the main door of the palace itself. As he had in St Mark’s 15 months earlier, Villehardouin found himself amongst a small group of crusaders entering a magnificent but unfamiliar building, not knowing how he would be received. In Venice he was, at the very least, assured of the support of the city’s ruler, the doge, but in Constantinople he had no such guarantees. After several days of trying to batter their way into the Blachernae palace, four of the crusaders now found themselves freely entering the magnificent building.
They were taken into one of the ceremonial halls and there, waiting for them, was the Byzantine court in all its splendour. The room was crammed with the noble families of Constantinople, so tightly packed that there was hardly room to move. All wore their most splendid apparel: shining silks, dazzling jewels and long, flowing robes. As Villehardouin and his three companions moved into the room filled with the buzz of an alien language, they fell under the gaze of hundreds of eyes. Some expressions conveyed fear towards the men who threatened calamity on their city; some transmitted anger at the death and destruction already inflicted on Constantinople; others still may have viewed the westerners with disdain - the barbarians of popular Byzantine imagination. Yet more may have tried to appear welcoming, to reassure the aggressors that the struggle was over.
At the end of the hall, seated on their imperial thrones, were Isaac and his wife, Margaret, the sister of King Emico of Hungary. Villehardouin described the emperor as being dressed in the most costly robes imaginable; he was also quite taken by the empress whom he described as ‘a very beautiful woman’. Villehardouin appreciated the irony in seeing the couple seated there in such splendour when, only the previous day, they had been held as prisoners by the very same people who now fawned around them. If these people could change allegiance to one of their own so quickly, what of their loyalty to outsiders?
The Byzantine nobles paid their respects to the envoys and the four men walked down the hall to the imperial thrones. Isaac acknowledged them with due honour and, through an interpreter, asked them to speak. The crusaders replied that they wished to converse with the emperor in private, on behalf of Prince Alexius and their companions in the western army. This was a carefully calculated move: the promises made by the young man included many highly sensitive issues, such as the submission of the Orthodox Church to Rome and the payment of huge sums of money to the crusaders. If these matters were raised in front of the full Byzantine court they were likely to provoke outrage. At worst the physical safety of the envoys might be threatened; more likely, Isaac would face such an immediate and spontaneous demonstration of anger that he would be unable to agree any of the proposals put to him.
The emperor accepted the suggestion and stood up. Maria took him by the hand and led him into another chamber, accompanied only by a man identified by Villehardouin as his chancellor (probably a senior Byzantine noble), an interpreter and the four envoys. Thus far the whole tenor of the meeting had revealed a remarkable compliance on the part of the Greeks, dictated by the perilous and turbulent circumstances of the moment. Foreign rulers who visited Constantinople were usually treated to displays designed to show off the power and wealth of the Byzantine Empire and an integral part of this procedure was to demonstrate the manifest superiority of the Greeks. For example, while a visiting ruler was allowed to sit next to the emperor, his throne would be lower, making clear to all the proper order of affairs. King Louis VII of France had been obliged to submit to this gentle humiliation when he met Manuel Comnenus in 1147. The contemporary Greek writer, John Kinnamos, reported: ‘When he came inside the palace, the emperor was seated on high, and a lowly seat, which people who speak Latin call a chair, was offered to him.’
1
In 1203, however, Villehardouin and his colleagues were in an unprecedentedly strong position for visitors to the imperial court - made evident by the rapid acceptance of their request for a private audience.
Once sequestered with the emperor, Villehardouin acted as the crusaders’ spokesman. He respectfully pointed out the great service they had rendered to Prince Alexius and how they had kept the terms of their agreement with him. Then he played the crusaders’ best card: ‘We cannot, however, allow him to come here until he has given us a guarantee for the covenant that he has made with us. He therefore, as your son, asks you to ratify this covenant in the same terms and the same manner as he himself has done.’
2
With some apprehension, Isaac enquired as to the details of the agreement and Villehardouin duly spelled them out.
Isaac’s scarred and sightless eyes could betray nothing, but his shocked silence revealed that he was deeply taken aback by the terms of the covenant. The scale of these demands was quite horrifying and he knew it might well be impossible for him to deliver everything required, particularly given the weakness of his own political power base. On the other hand, he longed to embrace his own son again, the young man whom he had not held, or spoken to, for over three years. Moreover, although he was still determined to rule, Isaac recognised that his authority was compromised by his blindness. It was therefore necessary to have a successor and co-ruler from the Angeloi dynasty firmly in place. The fact that the Byzantines’ inner circle had chosen to restore him to the throne showed how much they feared the crusaders and how badly the flight of Alexius III had damaged morale. Isaac had to hope that this fear extended to accepting the loss of their religious independence and fulfilling a huge financial commitment to the papacy’s holy warriors.
Isaac’s reply to Villehardouin displayed the tensions between the political reality and his personal emotions: ‘These are very hard conditions and I do not really see how we can put them into effect. All the same you have rendered both my son and me such outstanding services that if we were to give you the whole of our empire, it would be no more than you deserve.’
3
Villehardouin may be finessing the moral worth of the crusaders’ actions here, as well as casting an uncannily accurate prophecy into Isaac’s mouth, but the general sentiment expressed by the emperor is just about credible. More revealing is Villehardouin’s aside that various opinions were expressed in the course of the interview, which is probably intended to convey that there was an intense and heated discussion. Yet the crusaders were unbending: Prince Alexius had made a deal, guaranteed by Isaac’s son-in-law, Philip of Swabia; the westerners had completed their part of the bargain and, if the emperor wished to meet his son again, he had to consent to the agreement in full. Finally, Isaac relented and swore to fulfil the covenant. A charter was drawn up by way of confirmation and the golden imperial seal was affixed. One copy remained with Isaac, the other was given to the envoys. With the formalities now completed, they bade the emperor farewell and, doubtless highly satisfied with their work, returned to the camp bearing the imperial charter.
For Prince Alexius this must have been a huge relief. The turmoil and uncertainty in Constantinople could have meant disaster for his father and brought about a final rejection of his own claim to the throne. Yet at this particular time everything seemed to have fallen his way. The nobles told the prince to prepare himself to re-enter Constantinople. The Greeks threw open the gates of the city and received him enthusiastically. For the young Alexius this was the end of a remarkable journey. From the dark years between 1195 and 1201 when he had spent months as a prisoner inside the city, to his bold escape in Thrace, to the rejections at Hagenau and Rome; the success of his approach to the crusade leaders; the near-implosion of the expedition on Corfu; and then the weeks of besieging his home city - this moment marked the close of his quest. He was feted and welcomed by the people of Constantinople and was reunited with his father at last.
A splendid ceremonial feast celebrated these momentous events. Hugh of Saint-Pol reported a joyous and dignified occasion; Niketas Choniates, as a Byzantine eye-witness, expressed a rather more jaundiced view of the proceedings. The leading crusader nobles came to the Great Palace, doubtless dressed in their finest cloaks and robes, where they sat at tables in one of the halls. At the head of the room, Isaac and Prince Alexius presided over the event. At a victory dinner there were speeches and both Isaac and his son delivered glowing eulogies to the men who had restored them to power. Niketas, who rarely missed an opportunity to express his dismal view of the young man, scorned the ‘power-loving’ and ‘childish’ prince. He also deplored the lavishness of the occasion. Jesters, entertainers and musicians performed; the servants produced fine, dainty foods, all in the opulent and ornate surroundings at the heart of imperial Constantinople. Niketas could not stomach this sycophantic behaviour towards the western barbarians, the men who had just humiliated his beloved city. The fact that Isaac and Prince Alexius could barely afford such luxuries only exacerbated his feelings of dark displeasure.
4
With the end of the siege, the crusaders had achieved their primary short-term goal and the immediate, sapping tension of war slackened. They had succeeded in defeating the Byzantine emperor and had done so without incurring terrible casualties. Their worries concerning food and security seemed over; with these practical matters assured they could look to the future and, fortified by the honour and the victory granted to them by God, they could turn to the Holy Land.
For the people of Constantinople, in the short term, the mortal threat to their city appeared to be at an end. Isaac’s return to power quelled the fear of the fires, the bombardment and the slaughter that the barbarian warriors outside their walls might wreak. Yet, as Isaac had doubtless indicated during his discussions with the envoys, in spite of appearances, many of the Greeks viewed the westerners with the deepest suspicion and those aware of the agreement between the emperor and the crusaders were profoundly unhappy at the tenor of the terms. Conscious of this awkward atmosphere, Isaac acted prudently and quickly to alleviate the situation.The crusader army camped just outside the walls was too obvious a reminder of the westerners’ military might. Thousands of his people had lost their homes and possessions and they had no reason to rejoice at the crusaders’ all-too-visible presence. Isaac begged them to move back across the Golden Horn to the districts of Galata and Estanor where there was slightly less risk of dispute with the citizens of Constantinople. The nobles recognised the good sense in this proposal and immediately agreed to it. The emperor further smoothed the move by arranging for a good supply of food. The crusaders took over houses and settled in while the Venetians drew up their fleet along the shore of the Golden Horn to protect their boats from harm over the winter months and to repair any that had been damaged during the siege operations.
As the new regime took over, it had to respond - as new rulers always must - to petitions for clemency or favour. One individual released was Alexius Ducas, a leading Byzantine nobleman who had been imprisoned for the last seven years. Ducas, known universally as Murtzuphlus on account of the heavy eyebrows that grew together over his nose, was duly freed and soon took over the post of
protovestarius,
or chamberlain, a high court official. Within twelve months this formidable operator would give the crusaders grave cause to regret his liberation.
Another request came from a Muslim, Kaykhusraw, the brother of the sultan of Iconium. Like Isaac, he had been dispossessed by his younger brother and he too wanted the crusaders’ help in regaining what he regarded as rightfully his. Their success at Constantinople encouraged him to ask them to serve him in the same way. As Prince Alexius had done, Kaykhusraw proposed huge financial incentives and, in another similarity, even offered to be baptised a Christian and to lead his people into the Catholic fold as well. Robert of Clari reports that the French nobles and the doge assembled to discuss the matter at length. Many of the ruling houses in the medieval world had claimants and counter-claimants. Were the crusaders to be cast as the perpetual forces of right, forever intervening to re-establish proper order? And did their remit now extend to the Muslim world as well? While Kaykhusraw may have had a just cause, and the introduction of the Seljuk empire into the Christian orbit would be an astonishing achievement, the meeting decided to reject his plea. Their whole enterprise was beginning to rely on too many, as yet unfulfilled, promises of money and religious submission. How might those in the West - already hostile to their enterprise - react when they heard of an alliance with a Muslim emir, however positive his intentions purported to be? In truth, Kaykhusraw’s idea may not have been quite as far-fetched as it first appears because in later decades the papacy made serious attempts to persuade the Seljuks to convert to Christianity and there was a genuine dialogue between the two parties.
5
In the circumstances of 1203, however, this was not a realistic idea and Kaykhusraw was told as much. He asked the crusaders why they could not help and was informed that the frailty of the regime in Constantinople—and the fact that the westerners were still waiting for the money promised to them - meant that they could not leave the city. Kaykhusraw was furious at this rejection and stormed back to Asia Minor to try to retake his lands without the crusaders’ help.
6