Geoffrey of Villehardouin (c. 1150 – c. 1213) was a
French knight
A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood finds origins in the Gr ...
and
historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...
who participated in and chronicled the
Fourth Crusade
The Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) was a Latin Christian armed expedition called by Pope Innocent III. The stated intent of the expedition was to recapture the Muslim-controlled city of Jerusalem, by first defeating the powerful Egyptian Ayyubid S ...
. He is considered one of the most important historians of the time period,
[Smalley, p. 131] best known for writing the eyewitness account ''
De la Conquête de Constantinople'' (''On the Conquest of Constantinople''), about the battle for Constantinople between the Christians of the West and the Christians of the East on 13 April 1204. The ''Conquest'' is the earliest French historical prose narrative that has survived to modern times. Ηis full title was: "Geoffroi of Villehardouin, Marshal of Champagne and of
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...
".
Biography
A
layman
In religious organizations, the laity () consists of all members who are not part of the clergy, usually including any non-ordained members of religious orders, e.g. a nun or a lay brother.
In both religious and wider secular usage, a layperson ...
and a
soldier
A soldier is a person who is a member of an army. A soldier can be a conscripted or volunteer enlisted person, a non-commissioned officer, or an officer.
Etymology
The word ''soldier'' derives from the Middle English word , from Old French ...
,
[Smalley, p. 141] Geoffroi was appointed Marshal of Champagne from 1185 and joined the Crusade in 1199 during a tournament held by Count
Thibaud III of Champagne
Theobald III (french: Thibaut; 13 May 1179 – 24 May 1201) was Count of Champagne from 1197 to his death. He was designated heir by his older brother Henry II when the latter went to the Holy Land on the Third Crusade, and succeeded him upon his ...
. Thibaud named him one of the
ambassador
An ambassador is an official envoy, especially a high-ranking diplomat who represents a state and is usually accredited to another sovereign state or to an international organization as the resident representative of their own government or sov ...
s to
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
to procure ships for the voyage, and he helped to elect
Boniface of Montferrat
Boniface I, usually known as Boniface of Montferrat ( it, Bonifacio del Monferrato, link=no; el, Βονιφάτιος Μομφερρατικός, ''Vonifatios Momferratikos'') (c. 1150 – 4 September 1207), was the ninth Marquis of Montferrat ( ...
as the new leader of the Crusade when Thibaud died.
Although Geoffroi does not say so specifically in his own account, he probably supported the diversion of the Crusade first to
Zara and then to
Constantinople
la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه
, alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...
. While at Constantinople he also served as an ambassador to
Isaac II Angelus, and was in the
embassy
A diplomatic mission or foreign mission is a group of people from a state or organization present in another state to represent the sending state or organization officially in the receiving or host state. In practice, the phrase usually deno ...
that demanded that Isaac appoint
Alexius IV
Alexios IV Angelos or Alexius IV Angelus ( el, Ἀλέξιος Ἄγγελος) (c. 1182 – February 1204) was Byzantine Emperor from August 1203 to January 1204. He was the son of Emperor Isaac II Angelos and his first wife, an unknown Palai ...
co-emperor.
After the conquest of the
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
in 1204 he served as a military leader, and led the retreat from the
Battle of Adrianople
The Battle of Adrianople (9 August 378), sometimes known as the Battle of Hadrianopolis, was fought between an Eastern Roman army led by the Eastern Roman Emperor Valens and Gothic rebels (largely Thervings as well as Greutungs, non-Gothic A ...
in 1205 after
Baldwin I was captured by the forces of the
Second Bulgarian Empire
The Second Bulgarian Empire (; ) was a medieval Bulgarians, Bulgarian state that existed between 1185 and 1396. A successor to the First Bulgarian Empire, it reached the peak of its power under Tsars Kaloyan of Bulgaria, Kaloyan and Ivan Asen II ...
. In recognition of his services,
Boniface of Montferrat
Boniface I, usually known as Boniface of Montferrat ( it, Bonifacio del Monferrato, link=no; el, Βονιφάτιος Μομφερρατικός, ''Vonifatios Momferratikos'') (c. 1150 – 4 September 1207), was the ninth Marquis of Montferrat ( ...
gave to Geoffroi the city of
Messinopolis
Mosynopolis ( el, Μοσυνόπολις), of which only ruins now remain in Greek Thrace, was a city in the Roman province of Rhodope, which was known until the 9th century as Maximianopolis (Μαξιμιανούπολις) or, to distinguish it ...
in
Thrace
Thrace (; el, Θράκη, Thráki; bg, Тракия, Trakiya; tr, Trakya) or Thrake is a geographical and historical region in Southeast Europe, now split among Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey, which is bounded by the Balkan Mountains to t ...
. After the Crusade, he was named Marshal of the
Latin Empire
The Latin Empire, also referred to as the Latin Empire of Constantinople, was a feudal Crusader state founded by the leaders of the Fourth Crusade on lands captured from the Byzantine Empire. The Latin Empire was intended to replace the Byzanti ...
.
In 1207, Geoffroi began to write his chronicle of the Crusade, ''On the Conquest of Constantinople''. It was in French rather than
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
, making it one of the earliest works of French
prose
Prose is a form of written or spoken language that follows the natural flow of speech, uses a language's ordinary grammatical structures, or follows the conventions of formal academic writing. It differs from most traditional poetry, where the f ...
. Villehardouin's account is generally read alongside that of
Robert of Clari Robert de Clari (or Cléry, the modern name of the place, on the commune of Pernois) was a knight from Picardy. He participated in the Fourth Crusade with his lord, Count Peter of Amiens, and his brother, Aleaumes de Clari, and left a chronicle ...
, a French knight of low station,
Niketas Choniates
Niketas or Nicetas Choniates ( el, Νικήτας Χωνιάτης; c. 1155 – 1217), whose actual surname was Akominatos (Ἀκομινάτος), was a Byzantine Greek government official and historian – like his brother Michael Akominatos, wh ...
, a high-ranking Byzantine official and historian who gives an eyewitness account, and
Gunther of Pairis
Gunther of Pairis otherwise Günther von Pairis, Gunther der Dichter, Guntherus Parisiensis, Guntherus Poeta, Guntherus Cisterciensis (c. 1150 – c. 1220) was a German Cistercian monk and author, writing in Latin.
His best-known work is his ''Hi ...
, a
Cistercian
The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...
monk who tells the story from the perspective of Abbot Martin who accompanied the Crusaders.
Villehardouin's nephew
Geoffroi I of Villehardouin went on to become
Prince of Achaea
The Prince of Achaea was the ruler of the Principality of Achaea, one of the crusader states founded in Greece in the aftermath of the Fourth Crusade (1202–1204). Though more or less autonomous, the principality was never a fully independent s ...
in
Morea
The Morea ( el, Μορέας or ) was the name of the Peloponnese peninsula in southern Greece during the Middle Ages and the early modern period. The name was used for the Byzantine province known as the Despotate of the Morea, by the Ottoman ...
(the medieval name for the
Peloponnesus
The Peloponnese (), Peloponnesus (; el, Πελοπόννησος, Pelopónnēsos,(), or Morea is a peninsula and geographic region in southern Greece. It is connected to the central part of the country by the Isthmus of Corinth land bridge which ...
) in 1209. Villehardouin himself seems to have died shortly afterwards. His son Erard had taken the title of ''seigneur de Villehardouin'' in 1213. There is evidence of his children raising memorials for him in 1218, suggesting he died around this time.
See also
*
Chronicle of the Morea
The ''Chronicle of the Morea'' ( el, Τὸ χρονικὸν τοῦ Μορέως) is a long 14th-century history text, of which four versions are extant: in French, Greek (in verse), Italian and Aragonese. More than 9,000 lines long, the ''Ch ...
*
Henry of Valenciennes
Henry of Valenciennes was an early 13th-century French writer, historian and chronicler of the Latin Empire.
Biography
Henry of Valenciennes was a chronicler under Henry of Flanders who left for the Fourth Crusade with the army of his patron. In ...
Notes
References
* This article focuses on a critical review of ''De la Conquête de Constantinople''.
*''Chronicles of the Crusades'' (Villehardouin and
Jean de Joinville
Jean de Joinville (, c. 1 May 1224 – 24 December 1317) was one of the great chroniclers of medieval France. He is most famous for writing the ''Life of Saint Louis'', a biography of Louis IX of France that chronicled the Seventh Crusade.''V ...
), translated by Margaret R. B. Shaw (Penguin).
*Colin Morris, "Geoffroy de Villehardouin and the Conquest of Constantinople", ''History'' 53 (February 1968): 24-34
*
* Cristian Bratu, « Je, auteur de ce livre »: L’affirmation de soi chez les historiens, de l’Antiquité à la fin du Moyen Âge. Later Medieval Europe Series (vol. 20). Leiden: Brill, 2019 ().
* Cristian Bratu, “''Je, aucteur de ce livre'': Authorial Persona and Authority in French Medieval Histories and Chronicles.” In ''Authorities in the Middle Ages. Influence, Legitimacy and Power in Medieval Society''. Sini Kangas, Mia Korpiola, and Tuija Ainonen, eds. (Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 2013): 183–204.
* Cristian Bratu, “''Clerc, Chevalier, Aucteur'': The Authorial Personae of French Medieval Historians from the 12th to the 15th centuries.” In ''Authority and Gender in Medieval and Renaissance Chronicles''. Juliana Dresvina and Nicholas Sparks, eds. (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012): 231–259.
External links
Villehardouin's chronicle translated by T. Marzial (1908), at the Internet Medieval Sourcebook website
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Geoffrey Of Villehardouin
1150s births
1213 deaths
13th-century French historians
Villehardouin
French chroniclers
Villehardouin family
12th-century French people
Marshals of the Latin Empire
French male non-fiction writers
Christians of the Third Crusade
Christians of the Fourth Crusade
French memoirists