Vasilief, A History of the Byzantine Empire

Byzantium and the Crusades

Policies of Manuel I and the Second Crusade 

Page 8

Roger realized what danger might threaten him from the alliance of Byzantium with Germany, who had promised to send the Emperor a land army, and Venice, who had already sent her vessels. Roger resorted to skillful diplomatic maneuvers in order to create all possible difficulties for Byzantium. Owing to the Sicilian fleet and intrigues, the Duke Welf, an old enemy of the Hohenstaufens, rose against Conrad in Germany, who was therefore prevented from marching into Italy to support Manuel; then the Serbs supported by the Hungarians (Ugrians) also opened hostilities against Manuel, whose attention was thereby diverted towards the north. Finally, Louis VII, afflicted by the failure of the crusade and irritated at the Greeks, came, on his return journey from the East, to a friendly understanding with Roger and was preparing a new crusade which threatened Byzantium with unavoidable danger. The abbot Suger, who had governed France during Louis absence, was the initiator of a new crusading enterprise, and the famous Bernard of Clairvaux was even ready himself to stand at the head of the army. A French abbot wrote to the Sicilian King: Our hearts, the hearts of almost all our Frenchmen are burning with devotion and love for peace with you; we are induced to feel thus by the base, unheard of and mean treachery of the Greeks and their detestable king (regis) to our pilgrims .... Rise to help the people of God take vengeance for such affronts.

Roger also was strengthening his relations with the pope. In general the West regarded with disfavor the alliance between the orthodox sovereign of Germany and the schismatic Emperor of Byzantium. It was thought in Italy that Conrad had already become affected with Greek disobedience, and the Papal curia was therefore making attempts to restore him to the path of truth and obedient service to the Catholic church. Pope Eugenius III, the abbot Suger, and Bernard of Clairvaux were working to destroy the alliance between the two empires. Thus, in the middle of the twelfth century, V. Vasilievsky explained, there was on the point of coming into existence a strong coalition against Manuel and Byzantium at the head of which stood King Roger, to which Hungary and Serbia already belonged, which France as well as the Pope was about to join, and to which it was endeavored to draw Germany and her king. If the coalition had been realized, the year 1204 would have seen Constantinople already threatened.

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