The Genocidal Pope | The Life & Times of Innocent III

Leading his followers into war, then switching sides to fight the people he just helped win, leading one Crusade that accidentally destroyed Christian cities and another that did so intentionally, Pope Innocent III honestly did way more harm than good for the Catholic Church. But hey, he helped put an end to trial by ordeal and apparently preserved remnants of Roman law so now he overlooks the U.S. House of Representatives.

Footnotes:

00:00 See pinned comment for arguments for/against calling Innocent III genocidal

0:17 This is the popular figure for how many people died at the Massacre at Beziers. It's possible the town didn't have this many people, although considering Raymond Roger, one of the local nobility, promised he would defend the city it's possible that people from the countryside flocked there before Raymond ran away to Carcassonne and left Beziers completely defenseless. Either way, it was thousands upon thousands and Raymond Roger was more helpful than Raymond VI of Toulouse who went from "Cathar independence!" to "Kill them all!" in two years.

0:45 "Full Habsburg" in this case referring to the union of the HRE and Kingdom of Sicily that would have (and ultimately did) happen under Frederick II.

1:17 You'd think maybe it was a political assassination, but no, it was because a political marriage fell through. Funnily enough, the man who killed Philip Hohenstaufen was also named Otto.

1:33 If you don't get this reference, go watch my video on Machiavelli. The League of Cambrai is one of my all time favorite wars and I got to work with Blue from OSP on that one so it has a special place in my heart.

1:56 Not sure why France was all buddy-buddy with the Church more than everyone else. But this behavior would have later ramifications because something something the Church relying on France led to the Avignon Papacy.

2:49 Couldn't find out definitively whether it would be pronounced "volo" or "wolo" at this point in history, so I figured the elite Dandolo would say it closer to the Classical pronunciation and the soldiers would be a little more contemporary

3:33 I believe this is an overestimation, as upon looking for the exact numbers for this footnote. However, some 20,000 people were left homeless out of a city whose population was within a handful of hundreds of thousands.

4:12 In contrast to the more popular crusades, where there was usually some goal like "retake the Holy Land", the object of this Crusade was simply "kill the Cathars, wipe out Catharism", though it also had a political angle as the Cathars were pushing for political as well as religious independence.

4:36 If you're looking for more info, you should've taken my advice and gone to watch Religion for Breakfast's Gnosticism video.

4:57 It's worth noting that the crusaders actually tried to have all the Catholics leave the town and be spared (which would've been equally silly, if less deadly) but the Catholics living in Beziers got along with the Cathars quite well and refused to leave. At one point the bishop of the town tried to bring out 222 Cathars to spare the town, but couldn't bring them out because they were too supported by the town. So he tried to get all the Cathars in town to leave and save themselves, but all except a handful refused. It's entirely possible that this has all been exaggerated to make for a compelling story, but the point remains that the whole "kill everybody" thing only happened because inside Beziers, the Cathars weren't seen as enemies.

5:02 The quote attributed to Arnaud Amalric, the legate sent to besiege Beziers, is "Kill them all! God will know his own." It's doubtful that he said those words exactly, but it was certainly the vibe of the whole crusade.

5:13 See the footnote at 0:17 for info on the exact death toll, but basically every man, woman, and child was killed, people were slaughtered in the cathedral, which itself burned down, it was a mess.

5:19 I'm sure this is a wild misrepresentation of how napalm works, but the 20th century is a cold, dark place shrouded in mystery that I seldom dare to enter.

5:24 Both things that Innocent III did in the Fourth Lateran Council, canons 68 and 69

5:43 "But how did they get their ships?" I hear you ask. Well let's just say there were a lot of Genoese with smug grins on their faces in 1217.



Music (in order of appearance):

Kevin Macleod - Hidden Past
Karl Jenkins / Robert Longfield - The Armed Man
Concerto No. 6 in A Minor, Op 3, RV 356 - Vivaldi
Kevin Macleod - Master of the Feast