Editing Fourth Crusade (section)

=== Contemporary opposition to the sack of Constantinople ===
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| source = [[Niketas Choniates]] laments the fall of Constantinople to the Crusaders.<ref>{{Cite book |first1=Niketas |last1=Choniates |first2=Harry J.  |last2=Magoulias |title=O City of Byzantium: Annals of Niketas Choniatēs |publisher=Wayne State University Press |year=1984 |isbn=978-0-8143-1764-8 |page=317 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=O8arrZPM8moC}}</ref>
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Several prominent Crusaders, including [[Enguerrand III, Lord of Coucy]], [[Simon de Montfort, 5th Earl of Leicester]] and [[Guy of Vaux-de-Cernay]], among others, disagreed with the attacks on Zara and Constantinople and refused to take part in them. Indeed, most of the Crusaders did not take part in the attacks in Constantinople or did so unwillingly.{{sfn|Queller|Compton|Campbell|1974}}

Byzantinist [[Jonathan Harris (historian)|Jonathan Harris]] wrote that when the decision was made to divert to Constantinople "A sizeable proportion [of Crusaders] left the army and made their own way to the Holy Land. Those who remained only agreed very reluctantly to the diversion when subjected to a mixture of financial and emotional blackmail. Even then, many hesitated before the final attack in April 1204, and had serious doubts as to whether it was legitimate to attack a Christian city in this way".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Harris |first=Jonathan |date=2004 |title=The Debate on the Fourth Crusade |journal=History Compass |volume=2 |issue=1 |doi=10.1111/j.1478-0542.2004.00114.x |issn=1478-0542}}</ref>

The French nobleman [[Simon de Montfort, 5th Earl of Leicester|Simon de Montfort]], in particular, did not participate and was an outspoken critic. He and his associates, including Guy of Vaux-de-Cernay, left the crusade when the decision was taken to divert to [[Constantinople]] to place [[Alexius IV Angelus]] on the throne. Instead, Simon and his followers travelled to the court of [[King Emeric]] of Hungary and thence to [[Akko|Acre]].{{sfn|Phillips|2004|p=137}} Several other substantial contingents, including the large [[Flanders|Flemish]] fleet with [[Marie of Champagne]] on board, sailed directly to Acre as well.<ref name=":3">{{Cite book |last=Tyerman |first=Christopher |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GIOVDwAAQBAJ |title=The World of the Crusades |date=2019 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-24545-5 |page=250}}</ref>

Monk and poet [[Guiot de Provins]] wrote a satirical play in response to the Crusade accusing the papacy of [[avarice]].<ref name=":2">{{Cite book |last=Throop |first=Palmer A. |url=http://archive.org/details/criticismofcrusa0000thro |title=Criticism of the Crusade: A Study of Public Opinion and Crusade Propaganda |date=1975 |publisher=Porcupine |isbn=978-0-87991-618-3 |page=30}}</ref> Somewhat later, [[Guilhem Figueira]] wrote a ''[[sirventes]]'' and repeated these accusations, asserting that greed was the primary factor behind the crusade. He harshly stated:<ref name=":2" />
{{Blockquote|text=Deceitful Rome, avarice ensnares you, so that you shear the wool of your sheep too much. May the Holy Ghost, who takes on human flesh, hear my prayer and break your beak, O Rome! You will never have a truce with me because you are false and perfidious with us and the Greeks ... Rome, you do little harm to the Saracens, but you massacre Greeks and Latins. In hell-fire and ruin you have your seat, Rome.|author=}}
However, [[Pope Innocent III]] also opposed the sack; he neither sanctioned it nor knew about it. Innocent III had forbidden the Crusaders to attack the Byzantine Empire, instructing the leader, [[Boniface of Montferrat]], that "The crusade must not attack Christians, but should proceed as quickly as possible to the Holy Land".{{sfn|Queller|Madden|1997|p=38}} When he found out about the events he wrote two angry letters addressed to Boniface. One of them reads:<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Perry |first=David M. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cJuYEAAAQBAJ&dq=SACRED+PLUNDER+T+VENICE+T+AND+THE+AFTERMATH+OF+THE+FOURTH+CRUSADE&pg=PP1 |title=Sacred Plunder: Venice and the Aftermath of the Fourth Crusade |date=2015 |publisher=Penn State Press |isbn=978-0-271-06681-3 |pages=14, 65, 69–71}}</ref>
{{Blockquote|text=How will the Greek Church... return to ecclesiastical unity and devotion to the Apostolic See, a church which has seen in the Latins nothing except an example of affliction and the works of Hell, so that now it rightly detests them more than dogs?... It was not enough for them [the Latins] to empty the imperial treasuries and to plunder the spoils of princes and lesser folk, but rather they extended their hands to church treasuries and, what was more serious, to their possessions, even ripping away silver tablets from altars and breaking them into pieces among themselves, violating sacristies and crosses, and carrying away relics.}}
Historian [[Robert Lee Wolff]] interprets the two letters from Innocent III as a sign of the Pope's "early spirit of understanding for the Greeks".<ref name=":1" />

Only one contemporary Arab-Muslim historian, [[Ibn al-Athir]], provided a detailed report of the sack of Constantinople by the Crusaders.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Kedar |first1=Benjamin Z. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fFjUDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT92 |title=Crusades |volume=6 |last2=Phillips |first2=Jonathan |last3=Riley-Smith |first3=Jonathan |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-351-98562-8}}</ref> It struck him as "an atrocity in its scale of rapine, slaughter and wanton destruction of centuries of classical and Christian civilisation".<ref name=":3" />