19 - Laments by Nicetas Choniates and Others for the Fall of Constantinople in 1204

Summary

Perhaps Meg Alexiou has said all that needs to be said in her Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition about the famous lament for the fall of Constantinople, with which Nicetas Choniates concludes his narrative of the sack of the city by the Latins. Other treatments of this lament have had little to add. As one might expect from Nicetas Choniates, his lament is in literary terms a highly accomplished piece of writing interweaving a major theme – the parallel of the fall of Constantinople and the fall of Jerusalem – with a minor theme – the struggle of Hellenism against the forces of barbarism. He develops the latter more fully in his De Signis, as it is conventionally known, where he itemises the classical statuary destroyed by the crusaders. Normally, as Anthony Kaldellis has warned, it is a mistake to take anything that Nicetas Choniates writes at face value. However, the lament is not laughter in disguise. Choniates rebukes those who to the strains of the lyre make fun of Constantinople's plight. In this case, he means exactly what he says, which may be the reason why there is so little to say about it.

Choniates’ History contains another lament for the fall of Constantinople, which Nicetas Choniates purports to have extemporised as he passed through the gates of Constantinople into exile.

He reproached the walls of Constantinople, which stood as tall as ever, for failing to protect the Byzantines. He beseeches the city to intercede with God for them, but the main theme is what is going to happen to them now that they have been torn away ‘like darling children from their adoring mother’. This lament is far more emotional and personal than his earlier and much more formal lament. It has more in common with the other laments for Constantinople penned by Nicetas Choniates and others, such as his brother Michael, in the funeral orations which they delivered in the aftermath of the fall. These are of great value for the way they bring out the emotional response of a group of highly educated members of the Byzantine elite to the fall of Constantinople. It is this emotional response on which I shall concentrate.