April 12th: Today in 1204 the crusader army of the fourth crusade sacked Constantinople. The crusaders spared little, looting, murdering and defiling the holy sites. Pope Innocent III perhaps said it best:

You vowed to liberate the Holy Land but you rashly turned away from the purity of your vow when you took up arms not against Saracens but Christians… The Greek Church has seen in the Latins nothing other than an example of affliction and the works of Hell, so that now it rightly detests them more than dogs

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 12th, 2006 at 3:16 am and is filed under History. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.