The Crusades, the Genoese and the Latin East - DSpace at ...

crusaders had been in and around Constantinople for a couple of months already. Now much did
the Genoese know about the events in Constantinople? Were they concerned with the progress of
the crusade or were they carrying on with their business plans regardless of the crusade's course
of development? Evidence suggests that by September 1203, Genoa had enough information
about the movements of the Fourth Crusade and about the plans to head from Constantinople
towards Egypt. Villehardouin mentioned several occasions in which crusaders left the crusading
army on merchants' ships and sailed separately to the Latin East. Five hundred crusaders had
already left from Zara, 170 and another group left the crusading army at Corfu. "' These large
groups of crusaders must have met many Genoese in the kingdom of Jerusalem. According to one
of the contracts in the cartulary of Giovanni di Guiberto from September 1203, the latest
information from the Latin East had come few months earlier, with merchants who departed from
Acre at the beginning of April. The document provides this information in an indirect way, as part
of the merchants' agreement on the exchange rate, which they calculated on the basis of the
bezant's value in the kingdom of Jerusalem as it was in April. '72 It is therefore safe to conclude
from the variety of sources that the merchants of Genoa knew by September 1203 of the diversion
of the crusade. This is also clear from the commercial ventures planned in the same autumn.
Indeed, the reaction of the Genoese
to these developments is interesting. The contracts from that
season do not mention Constantinople as a commercial destination. On the contrary, the few
contracts in which Byzantium is mentioned, or `Romania' as it was often referred to, appears as a
boycotted destination. 173 What is the meaning of this boycott?
The restriction has to be examined in the context of the commercial contracts which
contain similar prohibitions. What do they have in common and how should they be interpreted?
Such formulae or phrases boycotting different destinations can be found in the cartularies from
the twelfth century. It was, therefore, not a new phenomenon. On the other hand, such restrictions
were quite rare, which implies that they were not written off-hand or mindlessly. However,
because
there are only few such cases it makes it difficult to draw meaningful conclusions about
the motives for their inclusion. Several examples will explain the complexity of the analysis of
these cases.
170
Villehardouin, vol. 1, p. 100.
171
Villehardouin, vol. 1, p. 122.
172
GG, no. 574, from 17 September 1203
'73 Six merchants who travelled to various destinations were instructed not to travel to Constantinople.
Anselmo from Asti went to Sicily first (GG, 779,788), Bartholomew from Gaeta and Anselmo Calderono
travelled to the Latin East (GG, 835,640) Giovanni Sardo and Vivaldo from Rapallo travelled to
Alexandria but were instructed not to continue to Constantinople and several other destinations (GG, 649,
661). Some of these cases will be further discussed
in the following pages.
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