Decline & Fall - Byzantium 03 (8 page)

The rabble army that had followed Peter the Hermit across Europe in the summer of 1096, only to be annihilated on the plains of western Asia Minor a few months later, was in no way typical of the armies of the First Crusade. Over the next nine months Alexius Comnenus was to find himself the unwilling host to perhaps another seventy or eighty thousand men, and a fair number of women, led by some of the richest and most powerful feudal princes of the West. The challenges presented by this horde - economic, logistic and military, but above all diplomatic — were unparalleled in Byzantine history; the Empire was fortunate indeed in having at its head during this most critical period a man possessed of sufficient tact and intelligence to meet them, with what proved to be a quite extraordinary measure of success.

The basic problem was one of trust - or rather the lack of it. Alexius simply did not believe in the high Christian motives professed by most of the leaders of the Crusade. His unhappy experience of Roussel of Bailleul and later of Robert Guiscard had convinced him that the Normans at least were out for what they could get - ideally the Empire itself but, failing that, their own independent principalities in the East. This latter objective did not worry him unduly: a few Christian buffer-states between himself and the Saracen might prove to be no bad thing. The important points so far as he was concerned were, first, that such principalities should not be founded on territory that properly belonged to the Empire and, second, that their princes should acknowledge him as their suzerain. Feudalism in Western Europe was, he knew, based on solemn oaths of fealty; he therefore resolved to demand such an oath from all the leaders who should pass through Constantinople in respect of any conquests that they might make in the future.

The first of these leaders, Hugh of Vermandois, was the younger brother of King Philip I of France. He appeared in Constantinople in early November 1096, severely shaken by a disastrous shipwreck in the Adriatic; and after Alexius had loaded him with rich presents, willingly swore the oath required of him. The next two, however, proved somewhat less tractable. They were Godfrey of Bouillon, Duke of Lower Lorraine, and his brother Baldwin of Boulogne - who, as a younger son without a patrimony, had brought his wife and children with him and was determined to carve out a kingdom for himself in the East. With them were many prominent knights from northern France and the Low Countries, together with a large and well-trained army. They travelled via Hungary, with no serious mishap until they reached Selymbria
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on the Marmara where, for reasons unclear, morale suddenly broke down and the army ravaged the surrounding countryside for a week; but the brothers were finally able to reassert their authority and arrived two days before Christmas near the present Eyiip on the upper reaches of the Golden Horn, where they were required by the imperial authorities to pitch their camp.

A day or two later, Hugh of Vermandois arrived as a special emissary from Alexius, with an invitation to an au
dience at the Palace of Blacher
nae to take the necessary oath. Godfrey categorically refused, pointing out that in return for his Dukedom he had already sworn fealty to the Western Emperor Henry IV; besides, he had by this time heard of the catastrophe that had befallen Peter's army, which the few survivors were openly attributing to Byzantine treachery. Alexius, now seriously concerned, reduced the provisions that he had made available to the Crusaders' camp; but when Baldwin began raiding the neighbouring suburbs he was obliged to give in, and so the stalemate continued for three long months until the Emperor, learning that new Crusading armies were on their way, decided to cut off supplies altogether. He thus provoked his unwelcome guests into open aggression - which was almost certainly just what he had intended. He himself could not have initiated violence on a Christian army that had arrived - ostensibly at least - under the flag of friendship; but if he excused the brothers the oath of allegiance, how could he hope to impose it on those who would follow? Clearly the time had come for a showdown, and this was the best way to ensure it.

Godfrey and Baldwin - whom he had allowed to move their camp to the hill of Galata opposite Constantinople - now crossed the Golden

1 Now Silivri.

Horn and drew up their men at its junction with the northern end of the city walls, immediately outside Blachernae. Alexius, horrified by their lack of regard for religious proprieties - it was the Thursday of Holy Week - and convinced that they were making a bid for the Empire itself, brought out his own troops (though not before giving them strict and secret orders not to engage) and commanded his archers to fire from the walls over the enemy's heads. At first these tactics seemed to work: the Crusaders withdrew, having killed only seven of the imperial soldiers. But when they suddenly returned to the assault, the Emperor decided that he had had enough and sent in his crack regiments to do battle. Bewildered and demoralized, the Frankish troops turned and fled. The brothers had no choice but to capitulate. On Easter Sunday they and their leading knights swore their oaths at last. Immediately, amicable relations were restored. Alexius showered them with presents and entertained them all to a banquet. The next day he shipped the lot of them over the Bosphorus.

Of all the leaders of the First Crusade, there was one whom Alexius Comnenus mistrusted more than any other. Bohemund, now Prince of Taranto - who arrived in Constantinople on 9 April 1097, at the head of an army which included no fewer than four other grandsons and two great-grandsons of old Tancred de Hauteville - was the eldest son of Robert Guiscard who, had he not succumbed to that most fortunate epidemic twelve years before, might well have displaced Alexius on the Byzantine throne. The fact that Robert had divorced his first wife -Bohemund's mother - to marry the formidable Sichelgaita, and that he had subsequently left his Italian dominions to the latter's son Roger Borsa, made Bohemund arguably more dangerous than ever: having nothing to hope for in Italy, he could be expected to wreak still greater havoc in the East. Moreover, his military reputation - based as much on his brilliant leadership and the care with which he trained his men as on his own outstanding personal courage on the battlefield - was unmatched in Europe. As to his looks, even Anna Comnena finds it hard to withhold her admiration:

Bohemund's appearance was, to put it briefly, unlike that of any other man seen in those days in the Roman world, whether Greek or barbarian . . . His stature was such that he towered almost a full cubit over the tallest men. He was slender of waist and flanks, with broad shoulders and chest, strong in the arms; in general he was neither too slim nor heavily-built and fleshy, but of perfect proportions . . . To the acute observer he appeared to stoop slightly . . .

The skin all over his body was very white, except for his face which was both white and red. His hair was lightish-brown and not as long as that of other barbarians - it did not hang on his shoulders but was cut short, to the ears. Whether his beard was red or any other colour I cannot say, for the razor had attacked it, leaving his chin smoother than any marble; yet it gave an impression of redness. His eyes were light blue and gave some hint of the man's spirit and dignity. He breathed freely through broad nostrils
...
He had about him a certain charm, but it was somewhat dimmed by the alarm inspired by his person as a whole; there was a hard, savage quality in his aspect — owing, I suppose, to his great stature and to his eyes: even his laugh sounded like a threat to others.

The Emperor received him the day after his arrival and, according to Anna, politely reminded him of his former hostility. Bohemund cheerfully admitted it, pointing out, however, that this time he had come of his own free will, as a friend. When asked to take the oath of allegiance, he agreed at once. Alexius's relief was admittedly somewhat mitigated when his guest then asked point-blank to be named Grand Domestic of the East - effectively commander-in-chief of the entire imperial army in Asia; but when he in turn suggested that such an appointment was not for the time being appropriate - although it might well in due course become so - the Prince of Taranto seemed to accept this obvious piece of prevarication philosophically enough. Bohemund was in fact playing his cards beautifully. A southerner himself, he knew and understood the Greeks and spoke their language; and, unlike the other Crusaders who preceded and followed him, he was well aware that success in his great enterprise - which, however it might turn out, must certainly begin by his being accepted as leader of the whole expedition - would largely depend on having the
basileus
on his side. To antagonize him at this stage would be folly. With this thought in mind he had specifically forbidden his soldiers, on pain of instant execution, any marauding or other misbehaviour on their way to Constantinople. So far they had shown themselves to be in every respect model Crusaders, and he was determined - at least for the time being - that they should remain so. A fortnight later he and his army were conveyed in their turn across the Bosphorus, while Alexius struggled to come to terms with the next arrival.

Raymond IV of Saint-Gilles, Count of Toulouse and Marquis of Provence, was the oldest, richest and most distinguished of the Crusaders. He was also the most experienced: as the husband of Princess Elvira of Aragon he had fought man
y a battle against the Moors in
Spain. Finally, from the point of view of Alexius Comnenus, he was by far the most difficult. Though already in his late fifties, he had been the first nobleman to take the cross at Clermont and had publicly vowed never to return to the West; his wife and his son Alfonso had accompanied him. His was almost certainly the largest of the properly-organized Crusading armies — perhaps some ten thousand strong. He travelled with his friend Bishop Adhemar of Le Puy, to whom Pope Urban had entrusted the spiritual well-being of the Crusade; and there can be little doubt that, like Bohemund, he coveted the military leadership for himself.

Unlike the Prince of Taranto, however, Raymond seems to have made little attempt to control his men, whose taste for indiscriminate rape and pillage brought them into repeated confrontation with their imperial Pecheneg escort. Within a few days of their arrival on Byzantine territory two Provencal knights had been killed. Soon afterwards the Bishop of Le Puy inadvertently strayed from the road; he too was attacked — and quite badly wounded - by the Pechenegs before they realized their mistake and returned him to his flock. Raymond himself narrowly escaped a similar fate as he passed Edessa, while at Roussa in Thrace his army actually forced its way into the town and plundered it. A day or two after this outrage, messengers arrived from Alexius urging him to come at once to Constantinople, in advance of the rest; in his absence the situation grew rapidly worse, until the Pecheneg escort decided that things had gone far enough. Supported by several Byzantine regiments stationed in the region, they attacked the Crusaders and defeated them in pitched battle, taking possession of their baggage and equipment.

News of the debacle was brought to Raymond just as he was preparing for his first audience with the Emperor. It did not improve his temper. At the outset, he made it clear to all concerned that he had no intention of taking the oath. To do so would not only have meant surrendering the special authority that he believed he had received from the Pope; it would also have risked his being subordinated to Bohemund if, as rumour in Constantinople had it, the latter was to be appointed by the Emperor to a senior imperial post. Raymond is unlikely to have made this last point directly to Alexius; he did however say that if the
basileus
himself were to assume personal command of the Crusading army, then he, Raymond, would be happy to serve under him. To this Alexius could only reply that much as he might wish to do so, in present conditions he could not leave the Empire. So the stalemate continued for the better part of a fortnight, while one Western leader after another pleaded with the Count of Toulouse to change his mind rather than imperil the success of the whole expedition. Finally, a compromise was reached: the Count agreed to swear a type of oath common in the Languedoc, promising to respect the life and honour of the Emperor and to see that nothing should be done to his detriment; and Alexius, realizing that this was the best he could hope for, very sensibly accepted.

And so we come to the fourth and last expedition of the Crusade -that of Robert, Duke of Normandy, eldest son of William the Conqueror, who set out in September 1096. With him rode his brother-in-law Count Stephen of Blois and his cousin Count Robert II of Flanders, the three of them sharing the command of an army which included Bishop Odo of Bayeux and many distinguished noblemen and knights from Normandy, Brittany and England. Travelling by way of Italy through Lucca (where Pope Urban granted them an audience), Rome and Monte Cassino, they finally reached the Norman Duchy of Apulia, where Duke Roger Borsa gave them a warm welcome. Thence Robert of Flanders - despite the fact that Roger was his brother-in-law - pressed on almost at once, taking ship from Bari to Epirus in the first week of December. For the Duke of Normandy and the Count of Blois, however, the delights of South Italy proved irresistible: it was April 1097 before they set sail across the Adriatic. Alas, the first ship to leave Brindisi almost immediately capsized and went, with some four hundred passengers and their horses and mules - to say nothing of many coffers stuffed with gold and silver - to the bottom: a disaster which sent a good many of the less enthusiastic Crusaders straight back to their homes.
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Those who persisted were rewarded by an agreeable and uneventful journey — apart from a flash flood in the Pindus mountains, which swept away a pilgrim or two. They reached Constantinople in early May. All their predecessors were by now safely in Asia Minor, and the leaders -none of whom made any difficulties over the oath of allegiance - were enchanted by the Emperor's generosity, as well as by the quality of the food, horses and silken robes that he pressed on them. 'Your father, my love,' wrote Stephen of Blois somewhat tactlessly to his wife Adela, the Conqueror's daughter, 'made many great gifts, but compared with this man he was almost nothing.'
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The rank and file were less lavishly