THE CRUSADES
The First Crusade took place
between 1095-1099 and was launched under the support
of Pope Urban II and the Roman
Catholic Church to regain control of Jerusalem,
liberate the Holy Sepulchre from the Moslems,
and to help the Byzantines
fight the infidel Seljuk
Turks advancing into the heart of Eastern
Christendom .
The crusade was started as a Peoples Crusade
led by a radical monk named Peter
the Hermit at the head of an army of
raging followers. Once in Anatolia and around
Nicea , the first capital
of the Seljuks in Anatolia, they started pillaging
and massacrating indiscriminately, making more
victims among the Byzantine christians. Seljuk
leader Kýlýç Arslan I
, realizing the danger, ambushed this army of
ragtag pilgrims, killing most of them.
The real army of Knights-Crusaders assembled at
Constantinople in 1097. Besides Bishop Adhémar
of Le Puy , the spiritual leader, the
crusade was led by Godfrey of Bouillon
, his brother Baldwin of Boulogne
and Sicilo-Norman Bohemond of
Taranto , to whom Byzantine Emperor Alexis
I Comnenus , who did not trust them,
demanded to take an oath of non-aggression which
was hardly respected. Joined by Raymond
of Toulouse , Robert of Normandy
and Hugh of Vermandois ,
they marched on Nicea, but Alexis had already
negotiated the release, without ransom, of the
family of Kýlýç Arslan who was in the east and
could not arrive in time to defend the city. Feeling
that they were cheated, the dislike of the crusaders
for the Byzantine Emperor grew even more after
this.
The Crusaders decided to split the forces: Bohemond
was regarded as the leader of the first army and
Raymond of Toulouse the leader of the second one.
From Nicaea, they proceeded to march through Anatolia.
The first major victory they won against the Turks
in July 1097 at Dorylaeum (near
Eskiþehir
), allowed them to march almost unopposed on their
way to Antioch . After 300 years
of Arab domination, the city had been retaken
by the Byzantines in 969, then in 1079 had fallen
to the Armenians, and was in the hands of the
Seljuk Turks since 1084 when the Crusaders arrived.
Bohemond besieged Antioch
in October 1097. The well-fortified city,
which could not be taken by force, fell on June
3, 1098 with the help of Firouz, an Armenian who
allowed the crusaders inside the walls . Antioch
was to become a Frankish principality for 170
years. After Bohemond was captured
by Malik Shah in 1100,
his nephew Tancred became regent
then prince, but later dynastic rivalries followed
marking this period. In 1098, Edesse
fell to Baldwin of Boulogne and was to become
a county for almost 50 years.
|
The
second group marched its way from Antioch
in January 1099 down the coast: Raymond
of Toulouse headed towards Tripoli, and
Godfrey of Bouillon towards Jerusalem
, which he conquered and pillaged,
slaughtering both Jewish and Muslim population.
However Godfrey refused to take the title
of King, saying that no man should wear
a crown where Christ had worn his crown
of thorns; instead, he took the title Defender
of the Holy Sepulchre . When he
died the next year, his brother and successor,
Baldwin I , not being so
scrupulous, had himself immediately crowned
King of Jerusalem . He
expanded the Kingdom, capturing the port
cities of Acre , Sidon
and Beirut .
Tyre was taken later by his successor and
cousin Baldwin II .
The First Crusade was to be the only one
to succeed in its objectives.
|
|
Conquest of
Jerusalem by the Crusaders, miniature |
For
the defense of these conquests and to ensure the
safety of European pilgrims that flowed towards
Jerusalem , two main military orders were created.
The Knights Templar Order (
the Templars) was founded in 1118 by Hugh of Payens,
its first Grand Master, and eight companions who
bound themselves by a perpetual vow, taken in
the presence of the Patriarch of Jerusalem. The
Order of the Hospital of St. John, or Knights
Hospitaller Order (1113), was originally
dedicated to nurturing and nursing the sick and
wounded, and evolved to include an armed escort
to pilgrims.
Templars seal «Sigillum
Militum Christi» Seal
of Bohemond III Prince of Antioch
The
Second Crusade was preached by Bernard
of Clairvaux on behalf of pope Eugenius
III . The crusade took place between
1145-48 after Edessa
( the weakest and least latinized Crusader state)
was recaptured by Zengi , the
Atabey of Mosul and Aleppo. The crusade was headed
by the King of the Romans Conrad III of
Hohenstaufen and Louis VII of
France . When the German army was annihilated
on Turkish territory by Seljuk Sultan Mesud
I in October 1147 at the Battle of Dorylaeum
( Eskiþehir
), Conrad fled to Nicea
where he met the King of France. While Conrad,
fallen ill, returned to Constantinople
from where he proceeded to the Holy Land by ship,
Louis VII went overland. In January 1148, on their
way to Attalaia ( Antalya
), the French infantry was attacked and decimated
by the Turks. Louis VII decided to take his own
household and as many knights as he could, boarded
ships, and set off for Antioch
, arriving on March 19, 1148. The remnant of the
Crusaders set out on foot for Antioch but fewer
than half of them ever reached the city, arriving
there in late spring. In early summer, at last
Louis arrived in Jerusalem where he met Conrad.
From there they intended to attack Damascus
which was the main threat for Jerusalem,
but within a couple of days they suffered so much
loss that they decided to return home. The Second
Crusade was a failure.
The
Third Crusade (1189-92) was launched
after Jerusalem had been recaptured by the armies
of Islam under Saladin , the
first Ayyubid sultan. It was conducted by the
Duke of Swabia, King of the Romans and German
Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa ,
who was the first to depart. He chose to passed
through Anatolia with his army, and entering Byzantine
land, he captured Philippopolis (Bulgaria) and
Hadrianopolis ( Edirne
) but he did not linger on the way because he
learnt Emperor Isaac II Angelus
had made a secret treaty with Saladin. Frederick
took the Seljuk capital of Konya
on May 18, 1189 but drowned in the Calycadnos
river (Göksu) in 1190 . Without his leadership,
his troops broke up and were quickly defeated.
King of France Philip II Augustus
and King of England Richard I the Lion-hearted
travelled by sea. After spending a few
month in Sicily, Philip August sailed directly
to Tyr but Richard captured Cyprus
(that he later sold to nominal King of Jerusalem,
Guy of Lusignan) and landed at Acre
where he joined the siege. The Third Crusade also
failed because the Crusaders could not retake
Jerusalem, but Richard and Saladin finalized a
treaty by which the city would remain under Muslin
control and allow unarmed Christian Pilgrims to
visit it. A coastal strip from Ascalon to Antioch
was restored to Crusader control and Saint-Jean
d'Acre became the nominal capital of
the remnant of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
The fourth Crusade was originally
designed in 1198 by Pope Innocent III
(who spent most of his pontificate preaching
a Crusade) to conquer Egypt and reconquer Jerusalem.
It was the last of the major crusades to be directed
by the Papacy, before the Popes lost much of their
power to the Holy Roman Empire and other secular
monarchs. In 1201, the Doge of Venice
Enrico Dandolo made an agreement with
French lords to provide ships for transport and
warships, and also to take part in any conquests
during the crusade. At the time, relations between
Constantinople and Venice were not good. Venice
had long enjoyed special trading rights in the
city, but lately she had seen her privileges reduce.
Emperor Manuel I Comnenus who
had been thinking of reconquering the Roman Empire
by force, and especially Italy, had ordered a
mass arrest of Venetians throughout the Empire
in 1171, and a great number of Latins in Constantinople
were massacred in 1182. Isaac II Angelus
renewed their privileges, but Alexius
III Angelus harassed the Venetians,
favoring the Genoeses and Pisans. Due to events
happening in Constantinople, the Fourth Crusade
quickly fell out of Papal control and took a dramatic
turn away from Palestine. Diverting the crusade
first to Zara (Croatia), in
1204 t he Crusaders ended by attacking
and sacking Constantinople , driving
out the Byzantine Emperor and installing one of
their own instead. The conquest
of Constantinople , in April 1204, marked
the end of the Fourth Crusade.
1204 - Conquest
of Constantinople by the Crusaders, miniature.
The
Fifth Crusade , which did not pass through
Anatolia, was the last general crusade Europe
mounted. Pope Innocent III called
for it in 1215 at the Fourth Lateran Council but
died in 1216 without seeing results. Honorius
III took over but few monarchs answered
his call. However in 1217, Leopold VI
of Austria was the first to depart and
was followed by Andrew II of Hungary ,
Hugh I of Cyprus and Bohemond
IV of Antioch . In addition, small armies
of French and German barons, counts and lords
sailed from Italy to Acre where they also joined
John of Brienne , the nominal
King of Jerusalem. During the winter of 1217-1218,
they only fought small-scale operations but they
knew that there was no point in attacking Jerusalem
as long as Egypt was strong. They decided to attack
Egypt beginning their siege of Damietta, but the
Christian forces had weakened considerably since
Andrew, Bohemond and Hugh had returned home early
in 1218. Pope Honorius III, agreeing with Innocent
III's opinion that a Crusade would succeed only
when it was led by the Church, in September 1218,
sent an army led by Cardinal Pelagius
who now emerged as the leader of the
Christians. The Crusaders took Damietta
in November 1219, but diseases killed
many of them. The Sultan offered to surrender
the entire territory of the kingdom of Jerusalem
if the Crusaders left Egypt. King John agreed
but Cardinal Pelagius rejected the offer and decided
to attack Cairo. In spite of the reinforcements
they received from Emperor Frederick II
(who himself did not come), their march
to Cairo was disastrous. As
a result, on August 1221, the Crusaders were forced
to a peace agreement by Sultan Al-Kamil
and Damietta was returned to the Egyptians.
The crusaders left for home, having failed once
again.
The Sixth Crusade was led between
1228-1229 by the King of Sicily, King of the Romans
and German Emperor Frederick II of Hohenstaufen
, who had not joined the Fifth Crusade
for domestic political reasons . In 1225 he married
Yolande of Jerusalem , daughter
of John of Brienne , the nominal
King of Jerusalem. Having been a long time under
papal pressure, Frederick had now a good opportunity
to fulfill the crusading vow he had taken in 1215
and again in 1220 . In 1227, he was about to set
sail when he fell ill and was excommunicated by
Gregory IX because of all the
years of repeated delays. Ignoring the pope's
decision, he finally left in June 1228. In the
meantime, his wife Yolanda, Queen of Jerusalem,
died as a result of giving birth to their son
Conrad . The Emperor arrived
at Acre in September but found
the Templars, Hospitallers and local barons reluctant
to cooperate with an excommunicant . As he had
little opportunity to wage war in these conditions,
he conducted his crusade by dipomatic negotations
with Al-Kamil , the Ayyubid sultan
of Egypt. A treaty was signed, by the terms of
which Jerusalem , Bethlehem
and Nazareth were
returned to the Christians . In return, the Moslems
were allowed free access to and within the city
where they retained their possessions. Also, a
ten-year truce was concluded which would allow
Al-Kamil to concentrate on re-uniting Syria with
Egypt. Frederick II entered Jerusalem on March
17, 1229. Because both the pope and Patriarch
of Jerusalem condemned the treaty, he crowned
himself King of Jerusalem on March 18. Legally,
however, he was actually regent for his son, the
future Conrad IV . But Jerusalem
was placed under interdict by the patriarch. By
liberating Jerusalem, Frederick had only succeeded
in making himself hated by most of the Palestinian
barons. He left in May 1229 to deal with the threat
of the pope who had proceeded to attack his Italian
possessions.
Plenty
of crusades followed, but t he Seventh Crusade
was the last of the major crusades.
The Seventh Crusade was undertaken
upon Louis IX of France's (St.
Louis) own initiative after Jerusalem was retaken
by the Moslems in 1244. Louis IX took the cross
in 1244, but did not leave until 1248. He sailed
to Cyprus where
he was joined by the Grand Master of the Hospital,
the Grand Master of the Temple, and many of the
Palestinian barons. Egypt again was the object
of attack because if it was defeated, the future
of the Holy Land would be assured. Damietta fell
again in June 1249. Old sultan Ayub ,
who died in November, offered Jerusalem for Damietta
but the Crusaders, quite sure to have an advantage
over the Egyptians and their Mamluke
(slave soldiers) army, refused and led an expedition
to Cairo. They won a victory upon Egyptian commander
Fakhr ad-Din who was killed, but in February 1250,
t he king's brother, Robert of Artois
and the Templars were trapped and killed
in Mansourah by new Mamluke
leader Baibars . Turanshah
, summonned by the sultana, arrived from
Syria to Cairo and captured Louis IX and
his retreating army. In May a revolution occured
leading to a new split between Cairo and Damascus:
ill-treated by the sultan, the Mamlukes revolted
and Baibars killed Turanshah. The Mamlukes would
now rule here for almost three hundred years as
the slave-sultans. Damietta was surrendered to
the Egyptians, and Louis IX was released in exchange
of a high ransom of which only a half was paid.
He sailed for Acre and remained in the Holy Land
until 1254, helping to strengthen the fortifications
of the Christian colonies. In 1251, Louis IX promised
to aid the Mamlukes at Cairo against the Ayyubids
at Damascus and negociated an exchange of prisonners
and the lifting of the rest of the ransom. In
1253, Yusuf , a great-grandson
of Saladin, appealed to the Caliph at Baghdad
to arbitrate between himself and the Mamluke Sultan.
The Caliph was more concerned to unite them against
the invading Mongols
and the alliance with the Christians was forgotten.
Louis returned to France in April 1254.
The
Eighth Crusade was undertaken in 1270
by Louis IX of France, haunted
by his failure, in reaction to the fall of Jaffa
and Antioch
. He attacked Tunis in the first
place and gained a victory, but the crusade was
cut short when he died of a fever in August 1270.
The
Ninth Crusade was led between 1271–1272
by Prince Edward (later Edward
I of England). He landed at Acre but retired the
following year after concluding a truce. In 1289
Tripoli fell to the Moslems,
and in 1291 Acre , the last Christian
stronghold, followed. After the fall of Acre,
no further Crusades were undertaken in the Holy
Land, although several were preached.
