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The First Crusade and Byzantium
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Page 19
One part of the crusading armies went to Constantinople by land, another part by sea. Like Peter the Hermit's bands, the crusaders ravaged the places they traversed and performed all kinds of violence. A witness of this passage of the crusaders, Theophylact, the archbishop of Bulgaria, explained in one of his letters the cause of his long silence and thereby accuses the crusaders; he wrote: My lips are compressed; first of all, the passage of the Franks, or their invasion, or I do not know how one may call it, has so affected and seized all of us, that we do not even feel ourselves. We have drunk enough the bitter cup of invasion As we have been accustomed to Frankish insults, we bear misfortunes more easily than before, because time is a good teacher of all.
It is obvious that Alexius Comnenus had good reason to distrust such defenders of the crusading idea. The Emperor waited with irritation and alarm for the crusading armies which were approaching his capital on all sides and which in their number were quite unlike the modest bodies of auxiliaries for which he had appealed to the West. Some historians have accused Alexius and the Greeks of perfidy and disloyalty to the crusaders. Such charges must be rejected, particularly after attention is turned to the pillaging, plundering, and incendiarism of the crusaders on their march. Also one must now reject the severe and antihistoric characterization of Gibbon, who wrote: In a style less grave than that of history I should compare the Emperor Alexius to the jackal, who is said to follow the steps, and to devour the leavings, of the lion. Of course, Alexius was not a man humbly to pick up what the crusaders left to him. Alexius Comnenus showed himself a statesman, who understood what a threat to the existence of his Empire the crusaders presented; therefore, his first idea was, as soon as possible, to transport the restless and dangerous comers to Asia Minor, where they were to carry on the task for which they had come to the East, that is to say, fighting the infidels. An atmosphere of mutual distrust and malevolence was created between the Latins and the Greeks; in their persons stood face to face not only schismatics, but also political antagonists, who later on were to settle their controversy by the power of the sword. An educated Greek patriot and learned literary man of the nineteenth century (Bikelas) wrote:
To the Western eye the Crusades present themselves in all the noble proportions of a great movement based upon motives purely religious, when Europe appears the self-sacrificing champion of Christianity and of civilization, in the vigour of her strong youth and the glory of her intellectual morning. It is natural that a certain honourable pride should still inspire any family of the Latin aristocracy which can trace its pedigree to those who fought under the banner of the Cross. But when the Easterners beheld swarms of illiterate barbarians looting and plundering the provinces of the Christian and Roman Empire, and the very men who called themselves the champions of the Faith murdering the Priests of Christ on the ground that they were schismatics, it was equally natural that they should forget that such a movement had originally been inspired by a religious aim and possessed a distinctively Christian character. The appearance (of the crusaders) upon the stage of history is the first act in the final tragedy of the Empire.
The special historian of Alexius Comnenus, Chalandon, was inclined to apply, at least in part, to all the crusaders the characteristics attributed by Gibbon to the followers of Peter the Hermit: The robbers, who followed Peter the Hermit, were wild beasts, without reason and humanity.
A History of the Byzantine Empire - Table of Contents
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Reference address : https://ellopos.net/elpenor/vasilief/first-crusade.asp?pg=19
