John J. Giebfried - The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204: The Fourth Crusade

The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204: The Fourth Crusade — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work

Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204: The Fourth Crusade" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

1234567...34

The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204

REACTINGCONSORTIUMPRESS

This book is a reacting game. Reacting games are interactive role-playing games in which students are responsible for their own learning. Reacting games are currently used at more than 400 colleges and universities in the United States and abroad. Reacting Consortium Press is a publishing program of the Reacting Consortium, the association of schools that use reacting games. Barnard College is the host institution for the Reacting Consortium and Reacting Consortium Press. For more information visit http://reactingconsortiumpress.org.

The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204

URTHCRUSADE

JOHN J. GIEBFRIED

KYLE C. LINCOLN

2021 John J. Giebfried and Kyle C. Lincoln

All rights reserved

Set in Utopia and The Sans by Westchester Publishing Services

ISBN 978-1-4696-6411-8 (pbk.: alk. paper)

ISBN 978-1-4696-6412-5 (ebook)

Cover Illustration: Detail from Bodlein Library, MS 587, fol. 1r.

Distributed by the University of North Carolina Press

116 South Boundary Street

Chapel Hill, NC 27514-3808

www.uncpress.org

The Fourth Crusade is in chaos. Its leaders had hoped that by diverting to Constantinople they would pay off their debts, secure Byzantine aid, and win the obedience of the Greek Orthodox Church for the papacy. Now the emperor they installed has been brutally murdered, and his killer sits on the Byzantine throne. The Crusaders must now decide: Should they let this crime go unpunished and continue on to Jerusalem, or should they dare to attack the largest, richest, and most well-defended city in the Christian world? Students will play as Crusaders from one of four historical factionsthe Northern French, Imperial, Venetian, or Clerical Crusaderseach with unique personal and faction goals. In the end they will reenact the moment that changed Crusading and the relationship between the Eastern and Western Christian worlds forever.

Contents

Part One

G AME O VERVIEW

P rologue

Murder in Constantinople

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been, well, lets see, more than a year since my confession on the lagoon in Venice. When we heard the call to crusade preached by the Cistercian brothers of the abbey of Bonmont near the shores of Lac Leman, our father had the highest of hopes for the Holy Land, but we didnt know anything about the venture. It was a hard trip back for him across the Jura Mountains to our farm in Cologny, with cross sown on his travelling cloak, where our little farm makes the finest cheeses for the lords of Gex near Geneva. By the time he came home, he was already taken with consumption.

He passed away that November and my brother, William and I held together our farm through the snows. When spring came, the parish priest told us the bishop of Geneva had decreed we could send money to support a soldier fighting for the marquis in the crusade, or one of us could go in Fathers stead. I made my way toward Venice with my fathers cross sewn on my shoulder and a sword on my back, carrying with me the staff of a humble and penitent pilgrim.

You know the rest, Father. We all grew hungry on the lagoon, waiting for the armies to arrive. When the day finally came to set out for Jerusalem, there were celebrations, and the wind was swift those first nights. It was my first time on a boat like thatnot a little river skiff or a ferry, I mean. In those days, it was exciting, if a little hard on the belly. Now, I dont think I will ever stomach another long boat ride without getting sick for what has happened.

When we made landfall outside that city, I asked one of the Venetian sailors what the name of the town was called and how long we were staying. I cant remember his answer to the second question, but I remember the first one. Oh, God forgive us, I will hear the name of that city with my last breath: Zara. Word came down from the doge and the counts that the town was supposed to be in the hands of a good Christian who would give us aid and supplies and that maybe even more soldiers would join us.

There was a troubadour from Provence named Raimbaut, whom I had befriended on our passage. His dialect was thick, but eventually we understood each other. We talked to pass the time, mostly with the others on our round-ship, and it was a pleasant trip, mostly. The sun and the spray of the ships made my face feel fine. When we got to Zara we were tired, and Raimbaut looked more pale and yellow than he should have on our second day at Zara. He told me that the king whose town Zara was had betrayed God and the church and we had received orders to capture the town and take what supplies we could to avenge the dishonors done to Christ Jesus. Many lords, abbots, and knights left our company there, sailing on without aid of supplies to Jerusalem. Many nights I wish I had been brave enough to join them. Instead, I helped load a trebuchet that tossed stone after stone against the citys walls, killing many brave Christian men who defended the battlements.

By the time we made it to Constantinople, the count of Biandrate, told us in the Gray Stork, which was our round-ship, that we were sailing first to deliver the emperor of Constantinople to his palace. He had been betrayed by a dastardly uncle who deposed and barbarically blinded the boys father and true emperor. The palaces and the churches of the Queen of Cities were being held hostage by the usurper, and the count said that we, by order of the Lord Pope Innocent, were to go honorably to his aid so that he would be restored to the place that God himself had destined him to hold.

I never saw the emperor when we were travelling, and I think I saw him only once while we were assembled on the plain outside the city. I know that he was young, or at least that he was called Alexius the Young. Raimbaut said that this was common on pilgrimages like ours. The emperors of Constantinople often pretended to love God and honor the church, but instead they double-crossed many. Even the great German emperors Conrad III and Frederick Barbarossa had been betrayed by the emperors of Constantinople when they had come in the time of our fathers and grandfathers. Raimbauts friend Pierre told me that we were probably going to have to fight to defend the true emperor of Constantinople, since he was a pilgrim like we were. Pilgrims were bound by honor and their vows to defend one another. Even if the emperor of Constantinople did not obey the pope, he was a brother Christian too. This emperor, the young one, had promised to bring the church back together. Conduct that honorable was proof enough of his noble heart and his faithfulness. Or so we thought, Father.

That was some time ago. Since then, the young emperor has been deposed and murdered by a monsterwho like every other Greek seems to be named Alexius. The traitor-emperor has attacked our ships and proven himself not only dishonorable but also a heathen, damned with the devil. So here we sit, waiting for the marquis, the doge, and the other lords to decide how best to attack those walls.

Those walls are taller than the tallest tree on our farm, Father, taller than the cathedral in Geneva. Ive never seen any like them. I dont know how well get past them. I think that unless God has more mercy for my family yet, I will not survive an attack on those walls. I know that I have sinned many times on this journey, but if I dont make it to Jerusalem to fulfill my vow, I have done everything to remain true to my vow to take up the cross. Father, forgive me for what I must do in the name of the true church and in the name of the pilgrimage and with the blessings of the work of Christ. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Next page

1234567...34

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

Similar books «The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204: The Fourth Crusade»

Look at similar books to The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204: The Fourth Crusade. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.

Piter Frankopan

The First Crusade: The Call from the East

Donald E. Queller

The Fourth Crusade: The Conquest of Constantinople

Ernle Bradford

The Great Betrayal: The Great Siege of Constantinople

Mark C. Bartusis

The Late Byzantine Army: Arms and Society, 1204-1453

Morgan

Byzantium

Angeliki Lymberopoulou

Cross-Cultural Interaction Between Byzantium and the West, 1204–1669: Whose Mediterranean Is It Anyway?

Phillips

Holy warriors: a modern history of the crusades

Gunther von Pairis

The capture of Constantinople: the Hystoria Constantinopolitana of Gunther of Pairis

Jonathan Riley-Smith

The Crusades: A History: Third Edition

Michael Angold

The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans: Context and Consequences

Jonathan Phillips

The Fourth Crusade and the Sack of Constantinople

David Nicolle

The Fourth Crusade 1202-04

Discussion, reviews of the book The Remaking of the Medieval World, 1204: The Fourth Crusade and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.