Fourth Crusade
Capture of Constantinople
The Crusaders began their assault on April 9, 1204. The initial attack was driven back and the Crusaders took a couple of days to re-group. They returned to the assault on the 13th. After some sharp fighting, the Venetians were able to go over the walls, while almost at the same time, another group broke down one of the city gates along the sea wall. Murzuphlus abandoned the city almost immediately, taking with him some jewels plus the widow and daughter of Alexius IV.
The first time the Crusaders captured the city, it was done in the name of Alexius IV, ostensibly to drive out a usurper and to restore the rightful emperor. This time, however, the attack was purely one of conquest and the Latins put the city to the sack. It was the worst looting the city ever experienced.
Constantinople was the richest city in Christendom, for it had been accumulating its wealth for almost a thousand years. Over the next three days, the Latins managed to carry off a great deal of it. According to the terms of the agreement, after three days, the loot was collected in great piles and apportioned out: three-eighths of it to Venice, one quarter to the new emperor, and the rest divided among the remaining Crusaders. Literal shiploads of gold, silver, jewels, art work, and sacred relics left the city that year. Between the plunder and the fires that broke out during the two captures of the city, Constantinople was ravaged so badly that it simply never recovered. It would not return to anything like its former glory until the Ottomans had conquered it and turned it into a great Muslim city.