> invalidates the war goal of the Crusades
>>18655229Maybe if Alexios just paid what he owed to the crusading army on his doorstep then things could have turned out differently. Alas, all it proved was that the civilized people of Europe could never trust Byzantine savages.
>>18655291This. The Crusaders were brought there by Byzantines on promises to restore Alexios and his father in exchange for all the funding they needed to go on crusade. Then the Greeks betrayed them and put them on do or die footing outside of Constantinople. The Greeks literally fucked around and found out.
>>18655291>>18655297then why did the pope excommunicate them
>>18655303Sacking Constantinople was never the goal of the Crusade and the Pope couldn’t be seen as condoning it at the time. It doesn’t mean it wasn’t justified practically speaking. They ended up there because Alexios promised to fund the crusade if they helped him, they helped him, and then he told them to fuck off and starve or to just be outright killed.
>>18655395What about the fact that the crusaders showed up with 1/3 of the men they promised and demanded full payment? In fact, they asked for double the amount of their debt they owed to the Venetians.
>>18655303Because the Pope wasn't owed money by the Byzantine emperor, and actually wanted to do a crusade. But the guy bankrolling the entire expedition wanted his fucking money.
>>18655400The crusaders completely bungled the beginning of the crusade. They falsely presumed a plan that the rest of the crusaders weren’t bound to follow, thus why the showed up to Venice with 1/3 of what they expected and why the desperately needed the money. They fucked up, but Alexios knew they needed money badly to get to the Holy Land, he promised them the money they needed and more, and the crusaders duly fulfilled their end of their bargain with Alexios. They showed up and put Alexios and his father back on the throne. Then Alexios betrayed them and was so incompetent he got overthrown again. What did the post-Alexios government do? Fucked around, didn’t agree to anything, and kept attacking a desperate force that already proved they were superior militarily to the Byzantines. You can say the crusaders were disparate for money, but that’s like promising a former MMA fighter a bunch of money to carry some boxes into your house, and then refusing to pay him. Then you lock the door behind him and try to fight him because you won’t pay him. The Greeks were fucking retarded.
>>18655229>>18655291>>18655297>>18655303>>18655395>>18655400>>18655407>>18655421https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_LatinsThe Byzantines deserved it
>>18655421Alexios was overthrown again because he was basically robbing his own people at swordpoint in a frantic effort to raise funds to pay the crusaders. After he fell from power, popular feeling against the Latins was so strong that no authority figure in Byzantium could have raised the funds. Shit like this happened all the time in the Middle Ages because liquid money was very scarce and ambitious princes always underestimated how hard it would be to collect revenue to pay off their mercs. The fuckup that really screwed Byzantium was making their regular native army shitty on purpose because they were paranoid and didn't want their generals to be able to make a bid for the crown. That's why the Greek soldiers bolted the instant the crusaders mounted the wall and let them take the city even though the crusaders didn't have enough troops to take a city that size according to conventional wisdom of the day.
>>18655229pay your mercs or don't hire them at all
>"I will make you rich">doesn't make you richAnything is fair game at that point.
>>18655421>Then Alexios betrayed themMaybe, instead of being retarded and evil, he now discovered that the empire did not have the money he had believed it did?
>>18655291maybe if the crusaders could've actually payed the Venetians for their ships?the entire thing was a clusterfuck, the first crusade ending in a failure probably would've inadvertently done christendom a favour in the long run.
>>18655291>Maybe if Alexios just paid what he owed to the crusading army on his doorstep then things could have turned out differently. Alas, all it proved was that the civilized people of Europe could never trust Byzantine savages.Absolutely kosher post from smash-and-grab merchant who destroyed Constantinople and left it in ruin instead making something useful with it.
>>18655407>Because the Pope wasn't owed money by the Byzantine emperor, and actually wanted to do a crusade. But the guy bankrolling the entire expedition wanted his fucking money.OK, looter.
>>18655678>the mighty Roman Empire brought low by its own former colony Any other cases like this in history?
>>18655708>Any other cases like this in hist-ACK
>>18655717>en florealWhy are the French so cute?
>>18655528>>18655667Alexios didn’t just fail to pay them. He began open hostilities with them on the eve of being overthrown. Then the guy’s who replaced them thought they were big and bad and went straight into fighting rather than trying to work something out. And the crusaders didn’t know the Byzantines didn’t have the money. How about you don’t make promises you can’t keep and then sperg out when you’re in a losing situation.
>>18655291Christian brotherhood matters more than any economic debt, those Venetian bankers were Jewish anyways
>>18655467Actually the Massacres of the Latins received little attention at the time and Venetians who later sacked Constantinople actually benefited from the massacre.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins>The impact of the massacre was negligible; it was almost immediately forgotten and only helped Venice re-establish relations with the Byzantine Empire, as their mercantile opponents, the Genoese and the Pisans, had been eliminated from the city.>The massacre received negligible attention, at the time, and it quickly disappeared from the memories of the Latins in Constantinople.[4] It reduced, but did not halt, Genoese and Pisan trade activities in Constantinople, although relations between the states and the communities were back to normal after 1192, with treaties extending reduced tax rates for transactions being signed.[19][20] In fact, some Genoese and Pisans, despite having been victims of the massacre, fought on the side of the Byzantine Empire during the Sack of Constantinople (Fourth Crusade) in 1204.[21]>Only a handful of Venetians were present in Constantinople during the massacre, as they were prohibited from doing business there, and the few who remained escaped the city safely, as they were warned by certain people, presumably by their Greek friends.[4][22] The only reference to the massacre in Venetian records appears tucked away in a commercial document made in Alexandria in June 1182.[22] Venetian chroniclers made no mention of the events and the Republic never requested restitution for damages from later Byzantine emperors either.[22]>Indeed, the events were a "boon" for Venice.[22] It greatly benefited from the massacre, as their Genoese and Pisan opponents were eliminated from the city and Andronikos was forced to turn to Venice for support.[11][22]
>>18655229Anyone who call Alexios the "rightful heir" is just as retarded as the crusaders and has no idea how Roman government worked. Calling them "not Romans" is also retarded because it's the same government Augustus set up, there never was a hereditary head of state system set up. And there is no such thing as a rightful heir.
You love to see ChristZOG trying to reconcile how the Fourth Crusade resisted Sunni power.
>>18655839>And the crusaders didn’t know the Byzantines didn’t have the moneyThey probably could have guessed at some point? Do you think no one raised it to them over the more than half a year it took for them to drive alexios' popularity through the floor then decide to take over?
>>18655883I know it wasn’t the reason for the sacking of Byzantium, I’m just saying I have zero sympathy for the Byzantines getting sacked after they pulled that move
>>18655887Sunni Sissies have been losing to jews for 70 years now. Shia of all people are the only ones fighting back.
>>18655886>the same government Augustus set upComplete delusional cope by Byzaboos. Continuity with the Augustan government died during the Crisis of the Third Century and its aftermath. And the last vestiges of connection to the old Roman state died during the Arab conquests. Byzantium was merely one of many successor states trying to associate itself with historical legitimacy, no different than the Carolingian Empire.
