SOURCE PROBLEM: WHO DIVERTED THE FOURTH CRUSADE?

          The Fourth Crusade was one of the most counterproductive military expeditions in history.  Launched as an attempt to save the Crusader States, it doomed them.  It destroyed Constantinople, the largest Christian city and the bulwark of Eastern Christianity. Its immediate result was a puny Latin Empire that was a continuing drain on scarce crusader resources.  Moreover it definitively alienated Eastern and Western Christians from that time forward, creating hostility still not transcended even by today’s ecumenical movements. 

            How did a crusade, launched with good intentions and promoted by Innocent III, the most politically powerful medieval pope, manage to go so wrong?  Was its diversion the result of a series of accidents?  Or was it deliberate?  Did Innocent, the Holy Roman Emperor Philip of Swabia, Marquis Boniface of Montferrat, the Venetians, or some other conspirators deliberately and treasonously set out to attack Constantinople in order to advance their own agendas? 

            Your job is to affix responsibility for the fiasco of the Fourth Crusade.  Was there a conspiracy to derail this crusade?  Or was its misdirection simply the result of a series of unfortunate events?  Can anyone be blamed?   To attempt an answer it is necessary to compare the sources carefully: who knew what?  When?  What did they know and when did they know it?

             To help you out here, the source bibliography, already formatted, can be downloaded right here. Print the bibliography (adjusting the font and other characteristics if necessary) and attach it to your paper. This page will not count as part of your recommended number of pages. If you use a parenthetical citation system, the first item within the parenthesis should be the initial name found in an entry in this bibliography and the second and final item should be a page reference.          If you use a footnote citation system, the first reference to an item should provide full bibliographical information, reformatted to conform to footnote style (the author's name in proper order, citation elements separated by commas or parentheses rather than periods, etc.); subsequent footnote references should consist only of an author's last name, a very short form title, and a page reference.

The Sources

          Geoffrey of Villehardouin (d. about. 1213), Marshall of Champagne, was one of the most powerful leaders of the crusade, ranking behind only the Marquis of Montferrat and the Counts of Flanders and Blois.  He was often the envoy and spokesman for the crusaders.  He participated in their highest councils. He remained in the Latin Empire, where his descendents became lords of Morea (in the Peloponnese).  His Chronicles, therefore, ought to be an incredibly informed contemporary source.  But because he and his reputation became inexorably linked to the success of the crusade, can his account be assumed to be objective?            --See Joinville and Villehardouin: Chronicles of the Crusades 5-73

          Robert of Clari (d. about 1216) wrote an Old French account of La Conquête de Constantinople. He was a simple knight serving under Lord Peter of Amiens.  His perspective has been described as “a view from the ranks.”  He dwells on the picturesque and the marvelous.  Although he was an eyewitness, he was not necessarily well informed about the private thoughts and motives of the leaders.                                                             –Robert of Clari, The Conquest of Constantinople  chapters i-xxx  and  xxxi-lx                                 

            Innocent III (pope 1198-1216) is the first pope for whom we have a complete series of registers of correspondence.  But do his public letters reveal his true motives and policies?  In the years 1204 to 1209 an anonymous author, apparently a member of the papal curia devoted to Innocent, utilized these registers to compose the Gesta Innocentii III. But is he too eager to exalt his hero and too quick to blame everyone else?                                                   --The Deeds of Pope Innocent III, excerpts         

          Nicetas Choniates (d. 1217), a Byzantine bureaucrat who fled to Nicea after the Latin conquest of Constantinople, wrote a History that is the most important Byzantine source for 1118-1206.  He knows little about Latin motives but can help clarify chronology                                                                                                           --Nicetas Choniates, Historia, excerpt

             Gunther of Pairis (d. ca. 1220) , a German Cistercian monk, who had been born in Basel and had been active in the imperial court prior to becoming a monk, wrote an account of Abbot Martin of Pairis's participation in the 1204 sack of Constantinople (written August 1207-June 1208).                    --Gunther, Historia Constantinopolitana, excerpt.

            The History of the Doges of Venice was written by an anonymous high ranking Venetian soon after 1229.  It presents Venice’s view of what happened in a narrative that glosses over many potential problems.                                                                                                --History of the Doges of Venice, excerpts