Edwin Pears
Venetians and Crusaders take Constantinople (1204)
Plunder of the Sacred Relics

Part of Constantinople on the web section of Elpenor's history resources [15 Pages]

Page 9

    THE TOTAL amount distributed among the crusaders and Venetians shows that the wealth of Constantinople had not been exaggerated. Eight hundred thousand pounds were given to the crusaders, a like sum to the Venetians, with the one hundred thousand pounds due to them. These sums had been collected in hard cash from a city where the inhabitants were hostile, and where they had in their wells and cisterns an easy means of hiding their treasures of gold, silver, and precious stones—a means traditionally well known in the East. Abundance of booty was taken possession of by the troops which never went into the general mass. Sismondi estimates that the wealth in specie and movable property before the capture was not less than twenty-four million pounds sterling.

    The distribution was made during the latter end of April. Many works of art in bronze were sent to the melting-pot to be coined. Many statues were broken up in order to obtain the metals with which they were adorned. The conquerors knew nothing and cared nothing for the art which had added value to the metal. The weight of the bronze was to them the only question of interest. The works of art which they destroyed were sacrificed not to any sentiment like that of the Moslem against images which they believed to be idols or talismans. No such excuse can be made for the Christians of the West Their motive for destroying so much that was valuable was neither fanaticism nor religion. It was the simple greed for gain. No sentiment restrained their cupidity. The great statue of the Virgin which ornamented the Taurus was sent as unhesitatingly to the furnace as the figure of Hercules. No object was sufficiently sacred, none sufficiently beautiful, to be worth saving if it could be converted into cash. Amid so much that was destroyed it is impossible that there were not a considerable number of works of art of the best periods. The one list which has been left us by the Greek logothete professes to give account of only the larger statues which were sent to the melting-pot. But it is worth while to note what were these principal objects so destroyed.

    Constantinople had long been the great storehouse of works of art and of Christian relics, the latter of which were usually encased with all the skill that wealth could buy or art furnish. It had the great advantage over the elder Rome that it had never been plundered by hordes of barbarians. Its streets and public places had been adorned for centuries with statues in bronze or marble. In reading the works of the historians of the Lower Empire the reader cannot fail to be struck alike with the abundance of works of art and with the appreciation in which they were held by the writers.

Previous Page / First / Next

On Line Resources for Constantinople

Reference address : https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/fathers/pears-constantinople-1204.asp?pg=9