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Wolff, R. L.; Hazard, H. W. (ed.) / Volume II: The later Crusades, 1189-1311
(1969)
VI: The Latin Empire of Constantinople, 1204-1261, pp. 186-233
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Page 187
VI THE LATIN EMPIRE OF CONSTANTINOPLE, 1204-1261 On April 13, 1204, the fifth day of the second siege, the crusaders and Venetians took Constantinople. When order had been Our excellent narrative sources for the Fourth Crusade, both western and Byzantine, break off not long after the foundation of the Latin Empire. Villehardouin's account stops with events of the year 1207; Robert of Clan records one event as late as i2i6, but after the year 1205 he is writing from hearsay only; Nicetas Choniates closes his history in 1206. None of the narrative sources for the period of the Latin Empire is in the same class as these. Villehardouin found his continuator for the years 1207-1209 in the Old French work of Henry of Valenciennes, Histoire de l'empereur Henri, ed. and tr. N. de Wailly, in his edition of Villehardouin (Paris, 1874), pp. 304-420; ed. J. Longnon (Paris, 1948), in the Documents relatifs a l'histoire des croisades, publiés par l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres. Ernoul continues to furnish information needing confirmation from other sources. For the period 1220-1242, one must consult the vernacular Chronique rimée de Philippe Mouskes (ed. [F.] de Reiffenberg, Brussels, 1838), II, Collection de chroniques belges inédites; also MGH, SS., XXVI (partial text only). The Old French La Cronique des Vénéciens de Maistre Martin da Canal, ed. F.-L. Polidori, Archivio storico italiano, VIII (1845), 229-798, gives important details, especially naval, from the Venetian point of view. A fourteenth-century Venetian chronicle preserving a good tradition is the Latin Andreae Danduli chronicon (RISS, XII; new ed., Bologna, 1939 ff.). Aubrey of Trois-Fontaines (MGH, SS., XXIII) continues to be very useful. The work of the Dominican Simon of St. Quentin, which furnishes information on the Latins in Asia Minor unavailable elsewhere, is preserved in Vincent of Beauvais, Biblioteca mundi (Douai, 1624). For the complicated but useful Franciscan source material see G. Golubovich, Biblioteca bio-bibliografica della Terra Santa e deli' Oriente Francescano, 5 vols. (Quaracchi, 1906-1927); idem, "Disputatio Latinorum et Grecorum," Archivum Franciscanum historicum, XII (1919), 418-470; L. Wadding, Annales Minorum, 27 vols. (Quaracchi, 1931-1934). Three works of the fourteenth-century Venetian, Marino Sanudo (Torsello), are also useful: Secreta fidelium crucis (ed. J. Bongars, Gesta Dei per Francos, Hanover, 1611, II); Istoria del regno di Romania (ed. C. Hopf, Chroniques grécoromanes, Berlin, 1873, pp. 99-170), the Italian version of a lost Latin original, dealing mostly with the Morea; and, short but very valuable, a supplement to Villehardouin (ed. Hopf, ibid., pp. 171 ff.; ed. R. L. Wolff, "Hopf's So-called 'Fragmentum' of Marino Sanudo Torsello," The Joshua Starr Memorial Volume, Jewish Social Studies, publication V, New York, 1953, pp. 149-159). The most important single Greek narrative source for the whole period 1204-1261 is Georgii Acropolitae opera (ed. A. Heisenberg, Leipzig, 1903, I), but this deals only occasionally with the Latins, and reveals a detailed knowledge of events only beginning with the 1240's. George Pachymeres, De Michaele et Andronico Palaeologis, Libri XIII (2 vols., CSHB, Bonn, 1835) is useful for the last years of the Latin occupation; Nicephorus Gregoras, Byzantina historia (3 vols., CSHB, Bonn, 1829-1855) is occasionally helpful. The Greek verse chronicle of the Morea (ed. J. Schmitt, London, 1904; ed. P. Kalonaros, Athens, 1940) also supplies an occasional detail, as do the French and Aragonese versions (see bibliographical note to chapter VII for full references). A. Heisenberg, "Neue Quellen zur Geschichte des lateinischen Kaisertums und der Kirchenunion," Sitzungsberichte der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissen schaften, Philosophisch-philologische und historische Klasse (Munich, 1922-1923), I, II, and III, published very important texts of the Greek archbishop of Ephesus, Nicholas Mesarites. M. A. Andréeva, "A propos de l'éloge de l'empereur Jean III Batatzès par son fils Theodore 187
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