GEOFFREY DE VILLEHARDOUIN
(Geoffroi de Villehardouin)
In one of the most bizarre events in the History of Christianity, the Christian Crusaders of the 4th Crusade diverted from their destination in Egypt and attacked Constantinople—the Christian seat of the Eastern Roman Empire and the Eastern Orthodox Church. At the time Byzantium was a much larger city than any in France. (Istanbul still is.) This event is the major historical barrier that maintains the schism between the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church.
Geoffroi de Villehardouin (c. 1150 – c. 1213–1218) was a knight and historian who participated in and chronicled the Fourth Crusade. He is considered one of the most important historians of the time period, best known for writing the eyewitness account De la Conquête de Constantinople (On the Conquest of Constantinople), about the battle for Constantinople between the Christians of the West and the Christians of the East on 13 April 1204. The Conquest is the earliest French historical prose narrative that has survived to modern times. Ηis full title was: "Geoffroi of Villehardouin, Marshal of Champagne and of Romania".
