The Capture of Constantinople

The "Hystoria Constantinopolitana" of Gunther of Pairis

Alfred J. Andrea

• Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN:
  9780812215861
• eBook ISBN:
  9780812201130
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European Medieval History
• Index: History

The armies of the Fourth Crusade that left Western Europe at the beginning of the thirteenth century never reached the Holy Land to fight the Infidel; they stopped instead at Byzantium and sacked that capital of eastern Christendom. Much of what we know today of those events comes from contemporary accounts by secular writers; their perspective is balanced by a document written from a monastic point of view and now available for the first time in English.The Hystoria Constantinopolitana relates the adventures of Martin of Pairis, an abbot of the Cistercian Order who participated in the plunder of the city, as recorded by his monk Gunther. Written to justify the abbot's pious pilferage of scared relics and his transporting them back to his monastery in Alsace, it is a work of Christian metahistory that shows how the sack of Constantinople fits into God's plan for humanity, and that deeds done under divine guidance are themselves holy and righteous.The Hystoria Constantinopolitana is one of the most complex and sophisticated historiographical work of its time, deftly interweaving moods and motifs, themes and scenes. In producing the first English translation and analysis of this work, Alfred Andrea has captured the full flavor of the original with its alternating section of prose and poetry. His introduction to the text provides background on Gunther's life and work and explores the monk's purpose in writing the Hystoria Constantinopolitana —not the least of which was extolling the virtues of Abbott Martin, who was sometimes accuse of laxity by his superiors in the Order.Gunther's work is significant for its effort to deal with problems raised by the participation of monks in the Crusades, making it a valuable contribution to both crusading and monastic history. The Capture of Constantinople adds to our knowledge of the Fourth Crusade and provides unusual insight into the attitudes of the participants and the cultural-intellectual history of the early thirteenth century.

Notes

Introduction

1. Wilhelm Wattenbach, ed., “Le Solymarius de Günther de Pairis,” Archives de l’Orient Latin 1 (1881): 551–561. A reprint of the Solimarius also accompanies Erwin Assmann’s edition of the Ligurinus: 501–512 (note 2).

2. Gunther der Dichter, Ligurinus, ed. Erwin Assmann, MGH, Script. rer. Germ. 63 (Hanover: Hahn, 1987), 151–495.

3. Gunther von Pairis, Hystoria Constantinopolitana: Untersuchung und kritische Ausgabe, ed. Peter Orth (Hildesheim and Zurich: Weidmann, 1994). An earlier, less satisfactory edition can be found in Paul Riant, ed., Exuviae sacrae Constantinopolitanae, 2 vols. (Geneva: I. G. Fick, 1877–1878), 1: 57–126. This latter edition is a reprint of Guntheri Alemanni, scholastici, monarchi et prioris Parisiensis, De expugnatione urbis Constantinopolitane, unde, inter alias reliquias, magna pars sancte cruris in Alemanniam est allata; seu, Historia Constantinopolitana, ed. Paul Riant (Geneva: I. G. Fick, 1875).

4. PL 212:101–222.

5. See the epilogue in chapter 25.

6. Assmann, Ligurinus, 17.

7. Ligurinus, 1: 14, 729; 10: 648 (pp. 151, 193, 494).

8. PL 212: 101–102.

9. See Peter Orth’s introduction to his recent edition of the HC for a good overview of the history of scholarly debate on this issue and the reasons why one must conclude that Gunther of Pairis composed all four works: “Die Verfasserfrage,” Hystoria Constantinopolitana, 1–42.

10. For quite different biographies of Gunther, see Erwin Assmann, Ligurinus, 58–102, and Hans Bayer, “Gunther von Pairis und Gottfried von Strassburg,” Mittellateinisches Jahrbuch 13 (1978): 140–183. Assmann argues that there were three Gunthers: the Gunther of the Solimarius and the Ligurinus; a Gunther of the HC; and a Gunther of the De oratione. Bayer believes that Gunther and Gottfried von Strassburg, the author of Tristan, were the same person. Gunther/Gottfried, a Cathar heretic, took refuge in Pairis in 1211/1212 and composed the HC in 1218/1219 as an occult anti-crusade parody.

11. Ligurinus, 1: 82–88; 10: 648–649 (pp. 157, 494).

12. Jean-Marie Jenn, “L’Abbaye cistercienne de Pairis en Alsace des origines à 1452” (diss., École des Chartes, 1968), 104–123.

13. Jenn, ibid., 322, following the lead of Albert Pannenborg, “Magister Guntherus und seine Schriften,” Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte 13 (1873): 331, contends that Pairis enjoyed a reputation for scholarship and general cultural activities at this time, and he concludes that this was a prime reason for Gunther’s attraction to the abbey. Jenn’s sole piece of evidence is a single, somewhat disconnected sentence in the anonymous De rebus Alsaticis ineuntis saeculi XIII, MGH, SS, 17: 236, no. 10, which states that Pairis (or Paris; the Latin is Parisius) was noted for the studies that flourished there. It is far from certain that this statement, which follows a short paragraph dealing with the state of Alsatian monasticism in the mid- and late thirteenth century, even refers to Pairis. The editor, Philippe Jaffe, assumed the reference was to the university of Paris, which had been dealt with at great length in an earlier, not especially relevant section of this Dominican document. Even if we assume that the abbey of Pairis is referred to here, the assertion proves virtually nothing, as far as the monastery’s intellectual life in the age of Martin and Gunther is concerned. The context of the entire De rebus makes obvious that the author is describing Alsace after the coming of the Dominican friars—that is, after the probable death date of Gunther.

My own survey of all known manuscripts from Pairis, which today reside in the municipal library of Colmar, leads to the conclusion that thirteenth-century Pairis was conventionally Cistercian and not a center of learning. Although a fair number of standard Cistercian liturgical texts and a Bible survive, there is only one work which might in any way be termed a piece of secular learning—an incomplete treatise on meteorology dating from either the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Significantly, this text, which is more practical than academic, is bound with a commentary on the Song of Songs and other devotional materials: Catalogue général des manuscripts des bibliothèques publiques de France: 56, Colmar (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, 1969), no. 10. See also, nos. 3, 222, 227, 228, 235, 237–240, 270, 285, 286, 357, 360, and 361.

14. Ligurinus, 10: 576–577 (p. 491); De oratione, 13: 3 (col. 220).

15. De oratione, 12: 1 (col. 207).

16. Philippe André Grandidier, Histoire de l’église et des évêques-princes de Strasbourg, Oeuvres historiques inédites, 3 vols. (Colmar: Georg, 1865), 3:12.

17. A survey of Grandidier’s notes, which were posthumously published as Alsatia sacra ou statistique ecclésiastique et religieuse de l’Alsace avant la Révolution avec des notes inédites de Schoepflin, Nouvelles oeuvres inédites de Grandidier, 3, 4, ed. August in M. P. Ingold (Colmar: Huffel, 1899), reveals no other Gunther functioning as a canon in Alsace during the late twelfth or early thirteenth century.

18. There is some uncertainty over the dates of their respective tenures. In Alsatia sacra, 1: 48 (vol. 3 of Nouvelles oeuvres) the single date of 1171 appears next to Henry’s name, while Morand’s dates are given as 1181–1203. In Histoire de l’église… de Strasbourg, 50, n. 5, Grandidier notes that Morand was scholasticus from 1185 to 1203. On p. 12, n. 6, he cites a charter of 1157 witnessed by Henricus Magister scolarum and a donation of 1162 witnessed by Henry de Hasenburch, “scholasticus and later also bishop.” Henry was elected bishop of Strassburg late in 1180 and assumed his duties in 1181. In the catalogue of canons of 1181 he is still listed as master of studies: ibid, 9. If Morand became scholasticus only in 1185 and not in 1181, one or more of three things could have happened. Bishop Henry might have continued to teach. Possibly he retained the title of scholasticus for several years after his election, in order to collect the income from the benefice, while paying a vicar (Morand?) to do the actual teaching. Possibly some unknown person held this position from 1181 to 1185, but an unlikely possibility at best. Whatever the case, it is hardly imaginable that Gunther served as either Bishop Henry’s vicar or Strassburg’s master of studies during that four year period, since he had to have been tutoring Conrad at that time.

19. Ligurinus, 1: 735–736 (p. 194).

20. Assmann, Ligurinus, 126, n. 511, disagrees. He argues that Ligurinus means The Book on Liguria; by extension, Solimarius would mean The Book on Jerusalem.

21. Ligurinus, 1:73–74. (p. 156), 10: 644–650 (p. 494).

22. Ibid., 10: 650 (p. 494).

23. In the Ligurinus Gunther now mentions the wedding that had taken place, “in our time”: ibid., 5: 419 (p. 319). This certainly seems to suggest that Gunther completed and dedicated the Solimarius sometime in 1186 or early 1187 and finished work on the Ligurinus in either 1186 or 1187.

24. Henry, Frederick, Otto, Conrad, and Philip: Ligurinus, 1:56–101 (pp. 155–158).

25. Ibid., 10: 652 (p. 494).

26. The thirteenth-century rhetorician Eberhard the German listed the Solimarius among a select group of literary works representative of the highest standards of rhetorical excellence: Evrardus Alemannus, Laborintus, lines 647–48, in Les Arts poétiques du Xlle et du XIIIe siècle, Bibliothéque de l’École des Hautes Études 238, ed. Edmond Faral (1924; Paris: Champion, 1958), 360.

27. Ligurinus, 1: 34–37 (p. 153); 3: 219–224 (pp. 242–243).

28. Ibid., 10: 586–590 (p.491).

29. Ibid., 1: 33 (p. 153), where he compares Frederick to Charles the Great.

30. See especially ibid., 3: 369–580 (pp. 251–261), where Gunther paraphrases Barbarossa’s speech to the citizens of Rome, as reported by Otto of Freising. Karl Langosch, Politische Dichtung um Friedrich Barbarossa (Berlin: Schneider, 1943), 76, states that Gunther’s work is more German in outlook than its model, the Gesta of Otto of Freising and Rahewin. That is, the Ligurinus’s concept of empire is consonant with Carolingian and Ottonian traditions.

31. While he branded Arnold of Brescia a heretic and “false doctor,” Gunther agreed that Arnold had been correct in calling for a moral reformation of the clergy: Ligurinus, 3: 263–348 (pp. 246–250).

32. Otto of Freising and Rahewin, The Deeds of Frederick Barbarossa, trans. Charles C. Mierow, Records of Civilization, Sources and Studies 49 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1953), 294–297 and 308–330.

33. Ligurinus, 10:117–126 (pp. 470–471).

34. Ibid., 10: 576–585 (p-491).

35. Walter Stach, “Politische Dichtung im Zeitalter Friedrichs I. Der Ligurinus im Widerstreit mit Otto und Rahewin,” Neue Jahrbücher fur deutsche Wissenschaft 13 (1937): 385–410, disagrees. He argues that the differences between the Ligurinus and the Gesta of Otto of Freising and Rahewin must be understood in the light of the critical political situation of late 1186 and early 1187. A Milanese, Urban III (1185–1187), was on the papal throne, and his violently anti-Hohenstaufen prejudices were precipitating the last of Frederick I’s conflicts with the papacy. It was in this context that Gunther composed the Ligurinus, a tale of earlier imperial victories in the face of the hostility of Pope Hadrian IV. To the contrary, if Gunther was revising Otto of Freising and Rahewin to fit the circumstances of a new papal-imperial crisis, ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Dedication page
• Contents
• Preface
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• The Capture of Constantinople
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index