ANNI MIRABILES: 1204
What was the most important year ever? Andrew Marr suggests it was probably 1776, but Bruce Clark, The Economist's international editor, thinks otherwise ...
From INTELLIGENT LIFE Magazine, Summer 2009
On April 12th 1204, an army of Crusaders, supposedly bent on advancing Christian interests in the Holy Land, captured the greatest Christian city in the world and ran amok. Sanctuaries were defiled, works of art stolen and tens of thousands of people burned out of their homes.
It was this episode, rather than the formal split between Orthodox Christianity and Rome in 1054, which marked the real parting of ways between the Christian East (Russia included) and the Christian West. The bitterness left by the sacking so divided the Christian world that it became vulnerable to the advancing Ottomans: that in turn ensured that at least one Muslim world power (the Ottoman empire) would remain in existence even when Christian Europe was at the height of its global hegemony.
The unbridgeable intra-Christian schism also helped to give Russia a sense that it belonged to a different geopolitical block, and thus had a different historic destiny, from the Christian West’s. Even now, when the wealthy, well-armed nations of the West look east, they face a geopolitical landscape whose main features (including shifting and volatile relations between Islam and the Christian East) reflect the events of 1204, when Christianity split down the middle.
In the coming days, other Economist writers will cast their votes for the most important year ever (eg, 5BC), and then you can cast your own (see poll at right).
Picture credit: Alan Kitching
(Bruce Clark is The Economist's International section editor and religious affairs correspondent.)
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1204 is indeed the most
June 18, 2009 - 00:47 — Sotirios Bellos (not verified)1204 is indeed the most important date for Western history. It signals the realization of division of christianity which posed a permanent and uncurable suspicion between Eastern Christianity and Western Christianity and their corresponding policies. As a result, Russia will from now on be hostile to the West, something which is still observable. It also signals the initiation of the so-called Eastern Questions, with the weakening of the Byzantine Empire and the start of the Muslim expansion in a strategic area which spreads to the Middle East. The results of that can be traced to WWI, WWII and in today's geopolitical developments.
Finally 1204 signals the very end of the real Roman Empire, whose last remaining part was Byzantium (a name falsely given to an empire that was self characterized as Eastern Roman Empire). It is important to remember that the Western Roman Empire was conquered by germanic tribes attacks, which (e.g Charlemagne) started to claim in a doubtful way the name of the Roman Empire (e.g Holy Roman Empire). However what was later called as Roman was a falsification and actually consisted of the conquerors of Western Roman Empire, which some centuries later turned East to complete the destruction of the Roman Empire.
whats the most important time
June 19, 2009 - 02:21 — Viktor Carras (not verified)The most important time of all is now. because its the only time we really have the power to do something
ego centric?
August 12, 2009 - 07:13 — DECT phones (not verified)Victor your arguement wqould be true if you were the most important person in the universe.
However you are not, thus it isnt.
Now is the most important time in your universe !
However understand the important semantic difference between 'your universe' and 'the universe'.
Interesting views that do
November 13, 2009 - 08:40 — BT Converse (not verified)Interesting views that do rightfully point at 1204 as the most imporant year. It is worth while noting that whilst in history this goes down as an important day, how relevant and important it is to this generation is a different thing entirely.
It signals the realization
December 24, 2009 - 21:40 — Emo (not verified)It signals the realization of division of christianity which posed a permanent and uncurable suspicion between Eastern Christianity and Western Christianity and their corresponding policies. As a result, Russia will from now on be hostile to the West, something which is still observable. It also signals the initiation of the so-called Eastern Questions, with the weakening of the Byzantine Empire and the start of the Muslim expansion in a strategic area which spreads to the Middle East.
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