Constantinople

Who holds it

Name

Alexios III; the eparch on 1 January 1200 is not pinned

Title

The emperor; the city is run by his prefect (eparch of the city)

Since

April 1195

Born

-

Family

-

Confidence

high

Choniates; the Partitio of 1204 for the suburban districts.

Lord in 1200

The emperor Alexios III, through the eparch of the city (name not pinned).

Overlord

The emperor.

What the town holds

• The city within the walls
• Pera across the Golden Horn with the tower that holds the chain
• The suburbs of the Golden Gate, Blachernae and the European Bosporus (Stenon)

How things stand that morning

The emperor's city, quiet on 1 January. The empress, the court, the patriarch and the Italian communities are all in residence; the prisoners Isaac II and his son are kept by the Golden Horn.

Charter

No charter. The guilds (systemata) are regulated by the Book of the Eparch; the Italian quarters hold their ground and privileges by imperial chrysobull.

Council

No town council. The senate of title-holders, the patriarch and his synod, the guild masters and the crowd (demos), which acclaims emperors and riots (1182, 1200).

Communities

Greeks; the Venetians, Pisans, Genoese and Amalfitans in their quarters (Venetians, Pisans, Genoese, Amalfitans); Jews (Rabbanites and Karaites) at Pera; Muslim merchants round the Mitaton mosque by the Golden Horn; Armenians, Georgians and Rus'; the English and Scandinavian Varangians.

Fairs and markets

Daily markets along the Mese and its forums and at the landings of the Golden Horn; no fair dates pinned.

Militia

No militia; the Varangian guard, the palace guards and hired troops. The crowd arms itself in a riot.

Walls and castle

The double land wall of Theodosius II with its moat, from the Golden Gate to Blachernae; Manuel I's wall round the Blachernae palace; the sea walls along the Marmara and the Golden Horn; the chain across the Golden Horn from the city to the tower of Galata at Pera. Palaces: Blachernae and the Great Palace.

Trade and crafts

Silk weaving and dyeing (the palace workshops and the private silk guilds), goldsmiths and jewellers, perfumers, candle-makers, money-changers and bankers (the money-changer Kalomodios is the richest man of the city), the grain, fish and wine trades, the carrying trade of the Black Sea and the Levant through the Italian quarters, Rus' traders. The tolls (kommerkion) of the harbours and of the straits at Hieron and Abydos (the last two in Asia) feed the treasury.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. early February 1200Riot against John Lagos, keeper of the prisons; the despotes Alexios Palaiologos brings troops in to restore order.Depends on: Lagos still in post. Stopped by: his removal.
2. 1200 or 1201 (not pinned)The emperor's financial officers arrest the rich money-changer Kalomodios; the merchants occupy Hagia Sophia and threaten to throw the patriarch John Kamateros from the altar unless he wins his release, which he does.Depends on: the treasury's hunger for cash. Stopped by: a full treasury.
3. 31 July 1201 (or 1200)John Komnenos the Fat is crowned in Hagia Sophia by his partisans and seizes the Great Palace; he is cut down the same day.Depends on: the plotters' secrecy. Stopped by: an alert guard.

Places of note

• Hagia Sophia, the patriarch's church: Seat of the patriarch John X Kamateros.
• Church of the Holy Apostles: Imperial burial church whose tombs were stripped for the German tribute in 1197.
• Pantokrator monastery: Komnenian foundation and mausoleum with its hospital; great estates in Thrace.
• Golden Gate: The ceremonial gate at the Marmara end of the land walls.
• Tower of Galata at Pera: The tower that holds the chain across the Golden Horn (approximate).
• The Mitaton mosque: The Muslim merchants' mosque by the Golden Horn (position approximate).

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: The city is richly described; the eparch and the officers of the quarters in 1200 are not pinned, and no source gives a population figure for 1200 that historians trust.

On the map: The tierra covers the city, Pera and the European suburbs (the Golden Gate, Blachernae and Stenon districts of 1204) out to the Kucukcekmece lake and the Black Sea mouth of the Bosporus; the Asian shore (Chrysopolis, Chalcedon) is drawn by the Anatolia sheet.

Primary sources for Byzantium

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Chronicle of Alberic of Trois-Fontaines, Alberic of Trois-Fontaines (about 1227 to 1241, at the Cistercian abbey of Trois-Fontaines in Champagne). The widest net of any Latin chronicle for 1200, compiled from dozens of sources, many now lost. Read online
• History of Niketas Choniates, Niketas Choniates (about 1185 to 1217, in stages, with a final revision in exile at Nicaea after 1204). The central narrative for the Byzantine Empire under Alexios III Angelos: the Bulgarian and Vlach war under Kaloyan, the breakaway of Ivanko in the Rhodopes and his capture by treachery in 1200, Dobromir Chrysos at Prosek and Strumica and the emperor's campaign and settlement with him, the Cuman raids into Thrace, John Komnenos the Fat's one-day revolt at Constantinople on 31 July 1200, the loosening of imperial control in the provinces and the rise of Leo Sgouros, and the court's fiscal abuses. Read online
• The Capture of Constantinople, Gunther of Pairis (about 1205 to 1210). Written at the Cistercian abbey of Pairis in Alsace from the account of its abbot Martin, who preached the crusade at Basel in 1200 (Gunther gives the sermon) and led a contingent from the Upper Rhine. Read online
• The Conquest of Constantinople, Robert de Clari, knight of Picardy (about 1205 to 1216). A rank-and-file crusader's account that begins with the preaching of the crusade and the taking of the cross in 1199 to 1200 by the counts of Flanders, Blois and Champagne and by the Picard lords, among them Peter of Amiens, Robert's own lord, then the negotiations with Venice. Read online
• The Palace Revolution of John Komnenos (31 July 1200), Nicholas Mesarites (1200 or soon after). An eyewitness narrative of the one-day coup of John Komnenos the Fat at Constantinople on 31 July 1200: the crowning of the usurper in Hagia Sophia, the mob's plunder of the Great Palace, the stand of the palace clergy and the guard at the church of the Virgin of the Pharos, where Mesarites was skeuophylax, and the recovery of the palace by Alexios III's men that night. Read online
• History of the doges of Venice (about 1229, with a continuation). The earliest surviving Venetian narrative close to the events. Read online
• The Conquest of Constantinople (Villehardouin), Geoffrey of Villehardouin (about 1207 to 1213). Opens with the preaching of Fulk of Neuilly and the tournament at Ecry (28 November 1199) where Theobald III of Champagne and Louis of Blois took the cross, then the taking of the cross by Baldwin of Flanders, Hugh of Saint-Pol, Geoffrey of Perche and others through early 1200, the assemblies at Soissons and Compiegne in 1200, and the six envoys sent to Venice in the winter of 1200 to 1201. Read online
• The History of the Seljuks of Rum, Ibn Bibi (Nasir al-Din Husayn ibn Muhammad) (about 1281 to 1285, at Konya). The main Seljuk narrative for Rum begins with Kilij Arslan II's partition of the sultanate among his sons and his death (1192), Kaykhusraw I's first reign at Konya, his deposition in 1196 to 1197 by Rukn al-Din Sulayman II, Kaykhusraw's wanderings to Cilician Armenia, Aleppo and Constantinople, Sulayman's reduction of his brothers' towns (Tokat, Malatya, Amasya, and Ankara by 1204) and his Erzurum and Georgian campaigns. Read online

7 more in the sources library for The Balkans and Byzantium.