The Barons' Crusade by Lower Michael;

Author:Lower, Michael;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Published: 2018-02-12T05:00:00+00:00

8

The Constantinople Crusade

In the preceding chapters we have examined the widespread consequences of Gregory’s crusade appeal. It is now time to focus in upon the expeditions to which the appeal actually led. As one by one Bela of Hungary, Thibaut of Champagne, Peter of Brittany, and Richard of Cornwall declined invitations to aid the Latin empire, it became clear that only one Catholic magnate of any note was willing to lead an expedition to Constantinople. This was Baldwin of Courtenay, the nineteen-year-old marquis of Namur, who also happened to be heir to the Latin empire. Despite his self-interest and the most strenuous papal support, he was able to raise only a modest army in defense of his inheritance. By following his expedition we see the consequences of the Holy Land crusaders’ unwillingness to support the pope’s favored cause. The army that assembled to defend Constantinople was much smaller than the one that went to Syria. The schismatic and heretic John Asen, against whom Gregory had inveighed, actually provided more support for the crusade than many of the leaders to whom Gregory had appealed. In the end, the campaign proved ineffective as an instrument of papal policy. Overshadowed by the Barons’ Crusade, Baldwin’s expedition represented a poor return on the massive investment Gregory IX had made in trying to save the Latin empire in the latter half of the 1230s.

Baldwin had come to the West in search of support in 1236, immediately after the second siege of Constantinople.1 His first stop was the papal curia.2 There he found ambitious plans for assisting the empire already underway: Gregory had issued his appeals to Bela of Hungary and Thibaut of Champagne in December 1235, and Peter of Brittany had taken the cross for Constantinople in October 1236. From the beginning, Peter made it clear that he intended to lead his own crusade to Latin Greece. He would not subordinate himself to anyone, not even to the heir of the empire he had sworn to defend.3 Since Peter declined to crusade with Baldwin, Baldwin decided to recruit a small army of his own, which he would take back to Constantinople as quickly as possible. With this aim in mind Gregory issued crusading privileges to Baldwin in December 1236 and ordered the bishops of Arras, Cambrai, and Tournai to commute the vows of 400 Holy Land crusaders in their dioceses, focusing on the friends and relations of Baldwin and John of Brienne.4

Baldwin made his way from the curia to Paris, hoping to arouse the interest of his great aunt Blanche of Castile and her son King Louis IX in his cause.5 In this he succeeded, despite making a poor impression at court. Blanche, it is reported, found him “infantile in speech” and despaired for the fate of the empire under his rule.6 Even so, she and Louis would prove staunch supporters of Baldwin in the years to come. Anxious to court royal favor, Baldwin had come to France for another reason as well. His elder

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