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the Crusades (Original)

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« Reply #105 on: December 31, 2007, 01:26:16 am »

 
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Baldwin of Boulogne (died April 2, 1118) was one of the leaders of the First Crusade, who became count of Edessa and then the second monarch and first titled king of Jerusalem. He was the brother of the first king, Godfrey of Bouillon.

Early life
Baldwin was a son of Eustace II of Boulogne and Ida of Boulogne, and the younger brother of Eustace III of Boulogne and Godfrey. As the youngest brother, Baldwin was originally intended for a career in the church, but he had given this up around 1080; according to William of Tyre, who lived later in the 12th century and did not know Baldwin personally: "in his youth, Baldwin was well nurtured in the liberal studies. He became a cleric, it is said, and, because of his illustrious lineage, held benefices commonly called prebends in the churches of Rheims, Cambrai, and Liège." Afterwards he lived in Normandy, where he married Godehilde (or Godvera), a member of a noble English family, but returned to Lorraine in order to take control of the county of Verdun (previously held by Godfrey).

First Crusade
In 1096 he joined the First Crusade with his brothers Godfrey and Eustace III of Boulogne, selling much of his property to the church in order to pay for his expenses. His wife Godehilde (or Godvera) also accompanied him. This was the second movement of crusaders; the first, the People's Crusade, had been composed of the lower classes and caused much destruction on their march before being destroyed in Asia Minor. When Godfrey passed through Hungary, King Coloman demanded a hostage to ensure their good conduct, and Baldwin was handed over until his companions had left Hungarian territory.

After entering Byzantine territory, there were a few skirmishes with the Greeks, who had also suffered from the People's Crusade. Baldwin commanded a detachment of troops which captured a bridge in the vicinity of Constantinople. After reaching the city, the mass of troops could not be restrained from pillaging the surrounding territory, and Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus was forced to provide a hostage in order to restore peace. The hostage, his son the future emperor John II Comnenus, was entrusted to the care of Baldwin. According to Anna Comnena, Baldwin reprimanded one of his soldiers who dared to sit on Alexius' throne in Constantinople.

Baldwin accompanied his brothers as far as Heraclea in Asia Minor, where he broke away from the main body of the crusaders with Tancred to march into Cilicia. Tancred was surely seeking to capture some land and establish himself as a petty ruler in the east, and Baldwin may have had the same goal. During his absence his wife fell ill and died at Marash. In September of 1097 he took Tarsus from Tancred, and installed his own garrison in the city, with help from a fleet of pirates from Boulogne. Tancred and Baldwin's armies skirmished briefly at Mamistra, but the two never came to open warfare and Tancred marched on towards Antioch. After rejoining the main army at Marash, Baldwin received an invitation from an Armenian named Pakrad, and moved eastwards towards the Euphrates, where he occupied Turbessel.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baldwin_I_of_Jerusalem
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« Reply #106 on: December 31, 2007, 01:26:32 am »

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Count of Edessa
Another invitation came from Thoros of Edessa, where Baldwin was adopted as Thoros' son and successor. When Thoros was assassinated in March of 1098, Baldwin became the first count of Edessa, although it is unknown if he played any role in the assassination. He ruled the county until 1100, marrying Arda, the daughter of Thoros I of Armenia, and acting as an ambassador between the crusaders and Armenians.

During these two years he captured Samosata and Seruj (Sarorgia) from the Muslims, and defeated a conspiracy by some of his Armenian subjects in 1098. During the Siege of Antioch he sent money and food to his fellow crusaders, although he himself did not participate. Kerbogha, the governor of Mosul, was marching to relieve Antioch but first stopped at Edessa, which he besieged for three weeks, to no avail. Kerbogha was later defeated at Antioch and the crusaders established a principality there. Later that year Baldwin had consolidated his power enough that he was able to march out and besiege Azaz with his brother Godfrey, where they defeated the forces of Ridwan of Aleppo.

At the end of 1099 he visited Jerusalem along with Bohemund I of Antioch, but he returned to Edessa in January 1100. After returning to Edessa, Baldwin aided in relieving the siege of Melitene, at which Bohemund was captured by the Danishmends. The Armenian ruler of the city, Gabriel, then recognized Baldwin as overlord of the city.

King of Jerusalem
After Godfrey's death in July of 1100 he was invited to Jerusalem by the supporters of a secular monarchy. He granted Edessa to a cousin, Baldwin of Bourcq, and on the way to Jerusalem he was ambushed by Duqaq of Damascus near Beirut. Duqaq’s troops were defeated and there was no further trouble on the way to Jerusalem, where he arrived at the beginning of November.

In Jerusalem Baldwin was opposed by his old enemy Tancred, as well as the new patriarch, Dagobert of Pisa, who would have preferred to set up a theocratic state while Godfrey was still alive. As soon as he arrived Baldwin set out on an expedition against the Egyptian territory to the south and did not return until the end of December. On Christmas Day he was crowned the first king of Jerusalem by the patriarch himself, who had in the meantime given up his opposition to Baldwin, although he refused to crown Baldwin in Jerusalem. The coronation took place instead in Bethlehem.

The struggle between church and state continued into the spring of 1101, when Baldwin had Dagobert suspended by a papal legate, while later in the year the two disagreed on the question of the contribution to be made by the patriarch towards the defence of the Holy Land. The struggle ended in the deposition of Dagobert in 1102.
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« Reply #107 on: December 31, 2007, 01:26:59 am »

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Expansion of the kingdom
In 1101 Baldwin captured Arsuf and Caesarea, with assistance from a Genoese fleet. In return the Genoese were granted trading quarters in these towns, and an archbishopric was established in Caesarea. In September of that year Baldwin defeated the Egyptians at the Battle of Ramlah, although it was believed in Jerusalem that the crusader army had been defeated and Baldwin had been killed. Tancred was prepared to take up the regency before it was finally reported that Baldwin had been victorious.

In 1102 another battle was fought at Ramlah, with remnants of the Crusade of 1101, including Stephen, Count of Blois, William IX of Aquitaine, and Hugh VI of Lusignan. This time the Egyptians were victorious; Baldwin lost most of his army including Stephen of Blois, but he himself escaped back to Arsuf on his horse (unusually for this period, especially considering the high death rate of horses during the First Crusade and afterwards, the name of the horse has survived: she was called Gazala). He did not want to risk venturing out of the city in fear of being captured by the Egyptians, so he was ferried back to Jaffa by the English pirate Godric of Finchale, and thence secretly to Jerusalem. The Egyptians were still in the field, however, and Baldwin met them again outside Jaffa, and this time was victorious.

In 1103 Baldwin besieged Acre, without success as it was relieved by an Egyptian fleet. That year he also paid the ransom for Bohemund of Antioch, who was still in prison following his defeat at Melitene; Baldwin preferred Bohemund to Tancred, who ruled Antioch as regent, and was also prince of Galilee earlier in Baldwin's reign. In 1104 however Baldwin was assisted by a Genoese fleet and Acre was captured. In 1105 another battle was fought at Ramlah and Baldwin was victorious here as well. In 1109 he acted as arbitrator of a council of the greatest barons outside the walls of Tripoli, and forced Tancred to give up his claim to the city. Soon after the city fell to the crusaders, forming the nucleus of the County of Tripoli. In 1110 Beirut was added to the territory of Jerusalem, again with help from the Genoese. Baldwin then travelled north to assist Edessa, under siege from Mawdud of Mosul.

On his return, Sidon was captured with aid from Sigurd I of Norway. In 1111 Baldwin assisted Tancred in besieging Shaizar, and then also besieged Tyre with no success. In 1113 Baldwin faced a large invasion by the combined forces of Toghtekin of Damascus and Aksunk-ur of Mosul, and though the kingdom was on the brink of destruction Baldwin was assisted by troops from Antioch and new arrivals of European pilgrims.

In 1113 he also married Adelaide del Vasto; he had abandoned his Armenian wife Arda in 1108, on the pretext that she had had sexual relations with Muslim men, although it is more likely that she was simply politically useless in Jerusalem, which had no Armenian population. Under the marriage agreement, if Baldwin and Adelaide had no children, the heir to the kingdom would be Roger II of Sicily, Adelaide's son by her first husband Roger I. Technically the marriage to Adelaide was bigamous because Arda was still alive in a monastery in Jerusalem, and it would later cause many problems both for Baldwin and Patriarch Arnulf, who had sanctioned it.

In 1115 he led an expedition into Oultrejordain and built the castle of Montreal. The Syrian Christians who lived in the area were invited to settle in Jerusalem to replenish the population, which had been mostly massacred in 1099. In 1117 he built the castle of Scandalion near Tyre, which was still in Muslim hands.

Death
In 1117 Baldwin also fell ill. He was convinced that the sickness was due to his bigamous marriage to Adelaide, and in response Adelaide was sent back to Sicily, much to her disgust. Baldwin recovered however, and in 1118 he marched into Egypt and plundered Farama. According to Fulcher of Chartres,

"Then one day he went walking along the river which the Greeks call the Nile and the Hebrews the Gihon, near the city, enjoying himself with some of his friends. Some of the knights very skillfully used their lances to spear the fish found there and carried them to their camp near the city and ate them. Then the king felt within himself the renewed pangs of an old wound and was most seriously weakened."

As 17th century historian Thomas Fuller remarked more succinctly, Baldwin "caught many fish, and his death in eating them."

Baldwin was carried back to Jerusalem on a litter but died on the way, at the village of Al-Arish on April 2. Fulcher of Chartres says "The Franks wept, the Syrians, and even the Saracens who saw it grieved also." His cousin Baldwin of Bourcq was chosen as his successor, although the kingdom was also offered to Eustace III, who did not want it.

Personal life
Fulcher described him as another Joshua, "the right arm of his people, the terror and adversary of his enemies." William of Tyre remarked that he was similar to Saul. Although William did not know him personally like Fulcher did, he left a detailed description of him:

"He is said to have been very tall and much larger than his brother…He was of rather light complexion, with dark-brown hair and beard. His nose was aquiline and his upper lip somewhat prominent. The lower jaw slightly receded, although not so much that it could be considered a defect. He was dignified in carriage and serious in dress and speech. He always wore a mantle hanging from his shoulders…[He] was neither stout nor unduly thin, but rather of a medium habit of body. Expert in the use of arms, agile on horseback, he was active and diligent whenever the affairs of the realm called him."

Baldwin's personal life was controversial. After abandoning Arda and marrying Adelaide it was suspected that he was homosexual, since he had no children with either, nor any from his first wife Godvera. William said that he "struggled in vain against the lustful sins of the flesh."

The Historia Hierosolymitana of Fulcher, who had accompanied Baldwin to Edessa as Baldwin's chaplain, and had lived in Jerusalem during his reign, is the primary source for Baldwin's career.

Sources
Fulcher of Chartres, A History of the Expedition to Jerusalem, 1095-1127, trans. Frances Rita Ryan. University of Tennessee Press, 1969.
Anna Comnena, The Alexiad, trans. E.R.A. Sewter. Penguin Books, 1969.
William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea, trans. E.A. Babcock and A.C. Krey. Columbia University Press, 1943.
Steven Runciman, A History of the Crusades, vols. I-II. Cambridge University Press, 1951-1952.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baldwin_I_of_Jerusalem
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« Reply #108 on: December 31, 2007, 01:27:17 am »

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Eustace III, was a count of Boulogne, successor to his father Count Eustace II of Boulogne. His mother was Ida of Lorraine.

He went on crusade in 1096 with his brothers Godfrey of Bouillon (duke of Lower Lorraine) and Baldwin of Boulogne. He soon returned to Europe to administer his domains. He married Princess Mary of Scotland, daughter of King Malcolm III of Scotland, and Saint Margaret of Scotland. Eustace and Mary had one daughter, Matilda of Boulogne.

When his youngest brother king Baldwin I of Jerusalem died in 1118, the elderly Eustace was offered the throne. Eustace was at first uninterested, but was convinced to accept it; he travelled all the way to Apulia before learning that a distant relative, Baldwin of Bourcq, had been crowned in the meantime. Eustace returned to Boulogne and died about 1125.

On his death the county of Boulogne was inherited by his daughter, Matilda, and her husband Stephen de Blois, count of Mortain, afterwards king of England, and at the death of Matilda in 1151 it was inherited by their son, Eustace IV of Boulogne, later their second son William and ultimately by their daughter Marie of Boulogne, since both sons died without children.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eustace_III_of_Boulogne
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« Reply #109 on: December 31, 2007, 01:27:38 am »

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Hugh of Vermandois (1053 – October 18, 1101), was son to King Henry I of France and Anne of Kiev, and the younger brother of King Philip I of France. He was in his own right Count of Vermandois. William of Tyre called him "Hugh Magnus", Hugh the Great, but he was an ineffectual leader and soldier, great only in his boasting. Indeed, Sir Steven Runciman is certain that "Magnus" is a copyist's error, and should be "minus", "the younger" (referring to Hugh as younger brother of the King of France).

In early 1096 Hugh and Philip began discussing the First Crusade after news of the Council of Clermont reached them in Paris. Although Philip could not participate, as he had been excommunicated, Hugh was said to have been influenced to join the Crusade after an eclipse of the moon on February 11, 1096.

That summer Hugh's army left France for Italy, where they would cross the Adriatic Sea into territory of the Byzantine Empire, unlike the other Crusader armies who were travelling by land. On the way, many of the soldiers led by fellow Crusader Emicho joined Hugh's army after Emicho was defeated by the Hungarians, whose land he had been pillaging. Hugh crossed the Adriatic from Bari in southern Italy, but many of his ships were destroyed in a storm off the Byzantine port of Dyrrha****m. Hugh and most of his army was rescued and escorted to Constantinople, where they arrived in November of 1096. Prior to his arrival, Hugh sent an arrogant, insulting letter to Emperor Alexius I, demanding that Alexius meet with him: "Know, O King, that I am King of Kings, and superior to all, who are under the sky. You are now permitted to greet me, on my arrival, and to receive me with magnificence, as befits my nobility." Alexius was already wary of the armies about to arrive, after the unruly mob led by Peter the Hermit had passed through earlier in the year. Alexius kept Hugh in custody in a monastery until Hugh swore an oath of vassalage to him.

After the Crusaders had successfully made their way across Seljuk territory and, in 1098, captured Antioch, Hugh was sent back to Constantinople to appeal for reinforcements from Alexius. Alexius was uninterested, however, and Hugh, instead of returning to Antioch to help plan the siege of Jerusalem, went back to France. There he was scorned for not having fulfilled his vow as a Crusader to complete a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and Pope Paschal II threatened to excommunicate him. He joined the minor Crusade of 1101, but was wounded in battle with the Turks at Heraclea in June, and died of his wounds in October in Tarsus.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_of_Vermandois
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« Reply #110 on: December 31, 2007, 01:27:58 am »

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Pope Urban II, né Otho of Lagery (or Otto or Odo) (1042 - July 29, 1099), was a pope from 1088 to July 29, 1099. He is most known for starting the First Crusade and setting up the modern day Roman Curia, in the manner of a royal court, to help run the Church.

He was born into nobility in France at Lagery (near Châtillon-sur-Marne) and was church-educated. He was archdeacon of Reims when, under the influence of St. Bruno his teacher, he resigned and entered the cloister at Cluny where he rose to be prior. In 1078, Gregory VII summoned him to Italy and made him cardinal-bishop of Ostia.

He was one of the most prominent and active supporters of the Gregorian reforms, especially as legate in Germany in 1084, and was among the few whom Gregory nominated as possible successors to be Pope. Desiderius, abbot of Monte Cassino (who took the name Victor III) was chosen Pope initially, but after his short reign Odo was elected by acclamation (March 1088) at a small meeting of cardinals and other prelates held in Terracina. He took up the policies of Pope Gregory VII, and while pursuing them with determination showed greater flexibility and diplomatic finesse. At the outset he had to reckon with the presence of the powerful Antipope Clement III in Rome; but a series of well-attended synods held in Rome, Amalfi, Benevento, and Troia supported him in renewed declarations against simony, lay investiture, and clerical marriages, and a continued opposition to Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor.

In accordance with this last policy, the marriage of the countess Matilda of Tuscany with Guelph of Bavaria was promoted, Prince Conrad was helped in his rebellion against his father and crowned King of the Romans at Milan in 1093, and the empress (Adelaide or Praxedes) encouraged in her charges against her husband. In a protracted struggle also with Philippe I of France, whom he had excommunicated for his adulterous marriage to Bertrade de Montfort, Urban II finally proved victorious.

Crusades

Pope Urban II preaches the First Crusade at the Council of Clermont.Urban's crusading movement took its first public shape at the Council of Piacenza, where in March 1095 Urban received an ambassador from the Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus, asking for help against the Muslims. A great council met, attended by numerous Italian, Burgundian, and French bishops in such vast numbers it had to be held in the open air outside the city. At the Council of Clermont held in November of the same year, Urban's sermon proved the most effective single speech in European history, as he summoned the French people to wrest the Holy Land from the hands of the Turks. France, he said, was already overcrowded and the holy lands of Canaan were overflowing with milk and honey. He asked the Frenchmen to turn their swords in favour of God's service, and the assembly replied Dieu le veut! -- "God wills it!"

Urban II died on July 29, 1099, fourteen days after the fall of Jerusalem to the Crusaders, but before news of the event had reached Italy; his successor was Paschal II.

Urban II and Sicily
Far more subtle than the Crusades, but far more successful over the long run, was Urban's program of bringing Campagna and Sicily firmly into the Catholic sphere, after generations of control from the Byzantine Empire and the hegemony of Arab emirs in Sicily. His agent in the Sicilian borderlands was the Norman ruler Roger I. In 1098 Urban bestowed on Roger extraordinary prerogatives, some of the very same rights that were being withheld from temporal sovereigns elsewhere in Europe. Roger was to be free to appoint bishops ("lay investiture"), free to collect Church revenues and forward them to the papacy (always a lucrative middle position), and free to sit in judgment on ecclesiastical questions. Roger was to be virtually a legate of the pope within Sicily. In re-Christianizing Sicily, seats of new dioceses needed to be established, and the boundaries of sees established, with a church hierarchy re-established after centuries of Muslim domination. Roger's Lombard consort Adelaide brought settlers from the valley of the Po to colonize eastern Sicily. Roger as secular ruler seemed a safe proposition, as he was merely a vassal of his kinsman the Count of Apulia, himself a vassal of Rome, so as a well-tested military commander it seemed safe to give him these extraordinary powers, which were later to come to terminal confrontations between Roger's Hohenstaufen heirs and the 13th century Papacy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Urban_II
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« Reply #111 on: December 31, 2007, 01:28:19 am »

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The march to Jerusalem

Leaving Europe around the appointed time in August, the various armies took different paths to Constantinople and gathered outside its city walls in December of 1096, two months after the annihilation of the People's Crusade by the Turks. Accompanying the knights were many poor men (pauperes) who could afford basic clothing and perhaps an old weapon. Peter the Hermit, who joined the Princes' Crusade at Constantinople, was considered responsible for their well-being, and they were able to organize themselves into small groups, perhaps akin to military companies, often led by an impoverished knight. One of the largest of these groups, consisting of the survivors of the People's Crusade, named itself the "Tafurs".

The Princes arrived with little food and expected provisions and help from Alexius I. Alexius was understandably suspicious after his experiences with the People's Crusade, and also because the knights included his old Norman enemy Bohemund. In return for food, Alexius I requested the leaders to swear fealty to him and promise to return to the Byzantine Empire any land recovered from the Turks. Without food or provisions they eventually had no choice but to take the oath, though not until all sides had agreed to various compromises, and only after warfare had almost broken out in the city. Only Raymond avoided swearing the oath, instead allying with Alexius against their common enemy Bohemund.

Alexius agreed to send out a Byzantine army to accompany the crusaders through Asia Minor. Their first objective was Nicaea, an old Byzantine city, but now the capital of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rüm under Kilij Arslan I. The city was subjected to a lengthy siege, which was somewhat ineffectual as the crusaders could not blockade the lake on which the city was situated, and from which it could be provisioned. Arslan, from outside the city, advised the garrison to surrender if their situation became untenable. Alexius, fearing the crusaders would sack Nicea and destroy its wealth, secretly accepted the surrender of the city; the crusaders awoke on the morning of June 19, 1097 to see Byzantine standards flying from the walls. The crusaders were forbidden to loot it, and were not allowed to enter the city except in small escorted bands. This caused a further rift between the Byzantines and the crusaders. The crusaders now began the journey to Jerusalem. Stephen of Blois wrote home, stating he believed it would take five weeks. In fact, the journey would take two years.

The crusaders, still accompanied by some Byzantine troops under Taticius, marched on towards Dorylaeum, where Bohemund was surrounded by Kilij Arslan. At the Battle of Dorylaeum on July 1, Godfrey broke through the Turkish lines, but he too was surrounded, and the two crusader armies were saved only by the timely appearance of the troops led by the legate Adhemar, who defeated the Turks and looted their camp. Kilij Arslan withdrew and the crusaders marched almost unopposed through Asia Minor towards Antioch, except for a battle in September in which they again defeated the Turks.

The march through Asia was unpleasant. It was the middle of summer and the crusaders had very little food and water; many men died, as did many horses. Christians, in Asia as in Europe, sometimes gave them gifts of food and money, but more often the crusaders looted and pillaged whenever the opportunity presented itself. Individual leaders continued to dispute the overall leadership, although none of them were powerful enough to take command; still, Raymond and Adhemar were generally recognized as the leaders. After passing through the Cilician Gates, Baldwin of Boulogne set off on his own towards the Armenian lands around the Euphrates. In Edessa early in 1098, he was adopted as heir by King Thoros, a Greek Orthodox ruler who was disliked by his Armenian subjects. Thoros was soon assassinated and Baldwin became the new ruler, thus creating the County of Edessa, the first of the crusader states.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_crusade
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« Reply #112 on: December 31, 2007, 01:28:50 am »

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The Siege of Antioch took place during the First Crusade in 1097 and 1098. The first siege, by the crusaders against the Muslim city, lasted from October 21, 1097, to June 2, 1098. The second siege, against the crusaders who had occupied it, lasted from June 7 to June 28, 1098.

Background
Antioch had been captured from the Byzantine Empire by the Seljuks only very recently, in 1085. The Byzantine fortifications dated from the time of Justinian I and they had recently been rebuilt and strengthened; the Seljuks had taken the city through treachery and the walls remained intact. Since 1088, its Seljuk governor had been Yaghi-Siyan. Yaghi-Siyan was well aware of the crusader army as it marched through Anatolia in 1097, and he appealed for help from neighbouring Muslim states, but to no avail. To prepare for their arrival, he imprisoned the Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, John the Oxite, and exiled the Greek and Armenian Orthodox population, although the Syrian Orthodox citizens were permitted to stay.

Arrival of the crusaders
The crusaders arrived at the Orontes River outside Antioch on October 20, 1097. The three major leaders of the crusade at this point, Godfrey of Bouillon, Bohemund of Taranto, and Raymond IV of Toulouse initially disagreed over what to do next: Raymond wanted to make a direct assault, while Godfrey and Bohemund preferred to set siege to the city. Raymond reluctantly acquiesced and the crusaders partially encircled the city on October 21. The city's Byzantine fortifications were strong enough to resist a direct attack, although Yaghi-Siyan may not have had enough men to adequately defend the city, and he was relieved and emboldened when the crusaders did not attack immediately. Bohemund encamped on the northeast corner of the city at the Gate of St. Paul, Raymond set his camp further to the west at the Gate of the Dog, and Godfrey placed his troops at the Gate of the Duke, also further to the west, where a bridge of boats was built across the Orontes to the village of Talenki. To the south was the Tower of the Two Sisters and at the northwest corner the Gate of St. George, which was not blockaded by the crusaders, and were used throughout the siege to supply Yaghi-Sian with food. On the southern and western side of the city was the hilly area known as Mt. Silpius, where the citadel and the Iron Gate were located.

First siege

The Siege of Antioch, from a medieval miniature paintingBy mid-November Bohemund's nephew Tancred had arrived with reinforcements, and a Genoese fleet had sailed into the port at St. Symeon, bringing extra food and supplies. The siege dragged on, and in December Godfrey fell ill and food supplies that had been plentiful were running out with the approaching winter. At the end of the month Bohemund and Robert of Flanders took about 20,000 men and went foraging for food to the south, but while they were gone, Yaghi-Siyan made a sortie out of the Gate of St. George on December 29 and attacked Raymonds encampment across the river at Talenki. Raymond was able to turn him back but was not able to capture the city itself. Meanwhile, Bohemund and Robert were attacked by an army under Duqaq of Damascus, which had marched north to come to Antioch's aid. Although the crusaders were victorious here as well, they were forced to retreat to Antioch with little food. The month ended inauspiciously for both sides: there was an earthquake on December 30, and the aurora borealis the next night, and the following weeks saw such unseasonably bad rain and cold weather that Duqaq had to return home without further engaging the crusaders.

Famine
Due to lack of food there was a famine in the crusader camp, killing both men and horses, one in seven men was dying of starvation and only 700 horses remained. Supposedly some of the poorer soldiers, the remnants of the Peoples' Crusade led by Peter the Hermit and called Tafurs, became cannibals, eating the bodies of dead Turks. Others ate horses, although some knights preferred to starve. Local Christians, as well as the exiled Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Simeon, now living on Cyprus, attempted to send food but this did not relieve the famine. Some knights and soldiers began to desert in January of 1098, including Peter the Hermit, although he was quickly found and brought back to the camp by Tancred, his prestige tarnished.

Tatizius departs
In February, the Byzantine general and legate Tatizius, who had remained with the crusaders as an advisor and a representative of Emperor Alexius I, suddenly left the crusader army. According to Anna Comnena, who presumably spoke with Tatizius personally, the crusaders refused to listen to his advice and Bohemund had informed him that the other leaders were planning to kill him, as they believed Alexius was secretly encouraging the Turks. Bohemund, on the other hand, claimed that this was treachery or cowardice, reason enough to break any obligations to return Antioch to the Byzantines, and he too would leave unless he was allowed to keep Antioch for himself when it was captured. Knowing fully that Bohemund had designs on taking the city for himself, and that he had probably engineered Tatizius' departure in order to facilitate this, Godfrey and Raymond did not give in to his blackmail, but the minor knights and soldiers wanted to recognize his demands and he gained their sympathies. During these events, Yaghi-Siyan continued to seek help from his neighbours, and an army under Ridwan arrived at Antioch from Aleppo. Like Duqaq before him, he too was defeated, at Harim outside Antioch, on February 9.

English reinforcements
In March an English fleet led by Edgar Atheling arrived at St. Simeon from Constantinople, where Edgar was living in exile. They brought with them raw materials for constructing siege engines, but these were almost lost on March 6 when Raymond and Bohemund (neither of whom trusted the other enough to deliver the material alone) were attacked on the road back to Antioch by a detachment of Yaghi-Siyan's garrison. With Godfrey's help, however, the detachment was defeated and the materials were recovered. Although Edgar had been given his fleet and the siege materials by emperor Alexius, the crusaders did not consider this to be direct Byzantine assistance. The crusaders set to work building siege engines, as well as a fort, called La Mahomerie, to block the Bridge Gate and prevent Yaghi-Siyan attacking the Crusader supply line from the ports of Saint Simon and Alexandretta, whilst also repairing the abandoned monastery to the west of the Gate of Saint George, which was still being used to deliver food to the city. Tancred garrisoned the monastery, referred to in the chronicles as Tancred's Fort, for 400 silver marks, whilst Count Raymond of Toulouse took control of La Mahomerie. Finally the crusader siege was able to have some effect on the well-defended city. Food conditions improved for the crusaders as spring approached and the city was sealed off from raiders.

Fatimid embassy
In April a Fatimid embassy from Egypt arrived at the crusader camp, hoping to establish a peace with the Christians, who were, after all, the enemy of their own enemies, the Seljuks. Peter the Hermit, who was fluent in Arabic, was sent to negotiate. These negotiations came to nothing. The Fatimids, assuming the crusaders were simply mercenary representatives of the Byzantines, were prepared to let the crusaders keep Syria if they agreed not to attack Fatimid Palestine, a state of affiars perfectly acceptable between Egypt and Byzantine before the Turkish invasions. But the crusaders could not accept any settlement that did not give them Jerusalem. Nevertheless the Fatimids were treated hospitably and were given many gifts, plundered from the Turks who had been defeated in March, and no definitive agreement was reached.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Antioch
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« Reply #113 on: December 31, 2007, 01:29:11 am »

Jeremy Dokken

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Capture of Antioch

The Massacre of Antioch, by Gustave DoreThe siege continued, and at the end of May 1098 a Muslim army from Mosul under the command of Kerbogha approached Antioch. This army was much larger than the previous attempts to relieve the siege. Kerbogha had joined with Ridwan and Duqaq and his army also included troops from Persia and from the Ortuqids of Mesopotamia. The crusaders were luckily granted time to prepare for their arrival, as Kerbogha had first made a three-week long excursion to Edessa, which he was unable to recapture from Baldwin of Boulogne, who had taken it earlier in 1098.

The crusaders knew they would have to take the city before Kerbogha arrived if they had any chance of survival. Bohemund secretly established contact with Firouz, an Armenian guard who controlled the Tower of the Two Sisters but had a grudge with Yaghi-Siyan, and bribed him to open the gates. He then approached the other crusaders and offered to let them in, through Firouz, if they would agree to let him have the city. Raymond was furious and argued that the city should be handed over to Alexius, as they had agreed when they left Constantinople in 1097, but Godfrey, Tancred, Robert, and the other leaders, faced with a desperate situation, gave in to his demands.

Despite this, on June 2, Stephen of Blois and some of the other French crusaders deserted the army. Later on the same day, Firouz instructed Bohemund to feign a march out to meet Kerbogha, and then to march back to the city at night and scale the walls. This was done. Firouz opened the gates and a massacre followed. The remaining Christians in the city opened the other gates and participated in the massacre themselves, killing as much of the hated Turkish garrison as they could. The crusaders, however, killed some of the Christians along with the Muslims, including Firouz's own brother. Yaghi-Siyan fled but was captured by some Syrian Christians outside the city. He was decapitated and his head was brought to Bohemund.

Second siege

The ramparts of Antioch climbing Mons Silpius during the CrusadesBy the end of the day on June 3, the crusaders controlled most of the city, except for the citadel, which remained in hands of Yaghi-Siyan's son Shams ad-Daulah. John the Oxite was reinstated as patriarch by Adhemar of Le Puy, the papal legate, who wished to keep good relations with the Byzantines, especially as Bohemund was clearly planning to claim the city for himself. However, the city was now short on food, and Kerbogha's army was still on its way. Kerbogha arrived only two days later, on June 5. He tried, and failed, to storm the city on June 7, and by June 9 he had established his own siege around the city.

More crusaders had deserted before Kerbogha arrived, and they joined Stephen of Blois in Tarsus. Stephen had seen Kerbogha's army encamped near Antioch and assumed all hope was lost; the deserters confirmed his fears. On the way back to Constantinople, Stephen and the other deserters met Alexius, who was on his way to assist the crusaders, and did not know they had taken the city and were now under siege themselves. Stephen convinced him that the rest of the crusaders were as good as dead, and Alexius heard from his reconnaissance that there was another Seljuk army nearby in Anatolia. He therefore decided to return to Constantinople rather than risking battle.

Discovery of the Holy Lance
Meanwhile in Antioch, on June 10 an otherwise poor and insignificant monk by the name of Peter Bartholomew came forward claiming to have had visions of St. Andrew, who told him that the Holy Lance was inside the city. The starving crusaders were prone to visions and hallucinations, and another monk named Stephen of Valence reported visions of Christ and the Virgin Mary. On June 14 a meteor was seen landing in the enemy camp, interpreted as a good omen. Although Adhemar was suspicious, as he had seen a relic of the Holy Lance in Constantinople, Raymond believed Peter. Raymond, Raymond of Aguilers, William, Bishop of Orange, and others began to dig in the cathedral of St. Peter on June 15, and when they came up empty, Peter went into the pit, reached down, and produced a spear point. Raymond took this as a divine sign that they would survive and thus prepared for a final fight rather than surrender. Peter then reported another vision, in which St. Andrew instructed the crusader army to fast for five days (although they were already starving), after which they would be victorious.

Bohemund was skeptical of the Holy Lance as well, but there is no question that its discovery increased the morale of the crusaders. It is also possible that Peter was reporting what Bohemund wanted, rather than what St. Andrew wanted, as Bohemund knew, from spies in Kerbogha's camp, that the various factions frequently argued with each other, and they would probably not work together as a cohesive unit in battle. On June 27 Peter the Hermit was sent by Bohemund to negotiate with Kerbogha, but this proved futile and battle with the Turks was thus unavoidable. Bohemund drew up six divisions: he commanded one himself, and the other five were led by Hugh of Vermandois and Robert of Flanders, Godfrey, Robert of Normandy, Adhemar, and Tancred and Gaston IV of Béarn. Raymond, who had fallen ill, remained inside to guard the citadel with 200 men, now held by Ahmed Ibn Merwan an agent of Kerbogha.

Battle of Antioch
On Monday, June 28, the crusaders emerged from the city gate, with Raymond of Aguilers carrying the Holy Lance before them. Kerbogha hesitated against his generals' pleadings, hoping to attack them all at once rather than one division at a time, but he underestimated their size. He pretended to retreat to draw the crusaders to rougher terrain, while his archers continuously pelted the advancing crusaders with arrows. A detachment was dispatched to the crusader left wing, which was not protected by the river, but Bohemund quickly formed a seventh division and beat them back. The Turks were inflicting many casualties, including Adhemar's standard-bearer, and Kerbogha set fire to the grass between his position and the crusaders, but this did not deter them: they had visions of three saints riding along with them, led by St. George, St. Demetrius, and St. Maurice. The battle was short. When the crusaders reached Kerbogha's line, Duqaq deserted, and most of the other Turks panicked. Soon the whole Muslim army was in retreat.

Aftermath
As Kerbogha fled, the citadel under command of Ahmed ibn Merwan finally surrendered, but only to Bohemund personally, rather than to Raymond; this seems to have been arranged beforehand without Raymond's knowledge. As expected, Bohemund claimed the city as his own, although Adhemar and Raymond disagreed. Hugh of Vermandois and Baldwin of Hainaut were sent to Constantinople, although Baldwin disappeared after an ambush on the way. Alexius, however, was uninterested in sending an expedition to claim the city this late in the summer. Back in Antioch Bohemund argued that Alexius had deserted the crusade and thus invalidated all of their oaths to him. Bohemund and Raymond occupied Yaghi-Siyan's palace, but Bohemund controlled most of the rest of the city and flew his standard from the citadel. It is a common assumption that the Franks of northern France, the Provencals of southern France, and the Normans of southern Italy considered themselves separate "nations" and that each wanted to increase its status. This may have had something to do with the disputes, but personal ambition is more likely the cause of the infighting.

Soon a epidemic broke out, possibly of typhus, and on August 1 the legate Adhemar died. In September the leaders of the crusade wrote to Pope Urban II, asking him to take personal control of Antioch, but he declined. For the rest of 1098, they took control of the countryside surrounding Antioch, although there were now even fewer horses than before, and Muslim peasants refused to give them food. The minor knights and soldiers became restless and starvation began to set in and they threatened to continue to Jerusalem without their squabbling leaders. In November, Raymond finally gave into Bohemund for the sake of continuing the crusade in peace and to calm his mutinous starving troops. At the beginning of 1099 the march was renewed, leaving Bohemund behind as the first Prince of Antioch, and in the spring the Siege of Jerusalem began under the leadership of Raymond.

The Siege of Antioch quickly became legendary, and in the 12th century it was the subject of the chanson d'Antioche, a chanson de geste.

References
Hans E. Mayer, The Crusades, Oxford, 1972.
Edward Peters, ed., The First Crusade: The Chronicle of Fulcher of Chartres and Other Source Materials, University of Pennsylvania, 1971.
Steven Runciman, The History of the Crusades, Vol I, Cambridge University Press, 1951.
Kenneth Setton, ed., History of the Crusades, Madison, 1969-1989 (available online).
Jonathan Riley-Smith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading, University of Pennsylvania, 1986.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Antioch
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« Reply #114 on: December 31, 2007, 01:29:58 am »

 
Jeremy Dokken

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The Siege of Jerusalem took place from June 7 to July 15, 1099 during the First Crusade.

Background
After the successful siege of Antioch in June of 1098, the crusaders remained in the area for the rest of the year. The papal legate Adhemar of Le Puy had died, and Bohemund of Taranto had claimed Antioch for himself. Baldwin of Boulogne remained in Edessa, captured earlier in 1098. There was dissent among the princes over what to do next; Raymond of Toulouse, frustrated, left Antioch to capture the fortress at Ma'arrat al-Numan. By the end of the year the minor knights and infantry were threatening to march to Jerusalem without them.

The siege of Arqa
At the end of December or early in January, Robert of Normandy and Bohemund's nephew Tancred agreed to become vassals of Raymond, who was wealthy enough to compensate them for their service. Godfrey of Bouillon, however, who now had revenue from his brother's territory in Edessa, refused to do the same. On January 5, Raymond dismantled the walls of Ma'arrat, and on January 13 began the march south, barefoot and dressed as a pilgrim, followed by Robert and Tancred. Proceeding down the coast of the Mediterranean, they encountered little resistance, as local Muslim rulers preferred to make peace and give supplies rather than fight. The local Sunnis may have also preferred Crusader control to Shi'ite Fatimid rule.

Raymond planned to take Tripoli for himself to set up a state equivalent to Bohemund's Antioch. First however, he besieged nearby Arqa. Meanwhile, Godfrey, along with Robert of Flanders, who had also refused to become Raymond's vassal, joined together with the remaining crusaders at Latakia and marched south in February. Bohemund marched out with them but quickly returned to Antioch. At this time Tancred left Raymond's service and joined with Godfrey, due to some unknown quarrel. Another separate force, though linked to Godfrey's, was led by Gaston IV of Béarn.

Godfrey, Robert, Tancred, and Gaston arrived at Arqa in March, but the siege continued. The situation was tense not only among the military leaders, but also among the clergy; since Adhemar's death there had been no real leader, and ever since the discovery of the Holy Lance by Peter Bartholomew in Antioch, there had been accusations of fraud among different clerical factions. Finally, in April, Arnulf of Chocques challenged Peter to an ordeal by fire. Peter underwent the ordeal and died of his wounds, thus discrediting the holy lance as a fake and one of Raymonds holds on his ultimate authority over the Crusade.
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« Reply #115 on: December 31, 2007, 01:30:25 am »

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The siege of Jerusalem
The siege of Arqa lasted until May 13 when the crusaders left, having captured nothing. The Fatimids had attempted to make peace, on the condition that the crusaders not continue towards Jerusalem, but this was of course ignored; Iftikhar ad-Dawla, the Fatimid governor of Jerusalem, apparently did not understand why the crusaders were there at all. On the 13th they came to Tripoli where the ruler of the city gave them money and horses. According to the anonymous chronicle Gesta Francorum, he also vowed to convert to Christianity if the crusaders succeeded in capturing Jerusalem from his Fatimid enemies. Continuing south along the coast, the crusaders passed Beirut on May 19, Tyre on May 23, and turning inland at Jaffa, reached Ramlah on June 3, which had already been abandoned by its inhabitants. The bishopric of Ramlah-Lydda was established there at the church of St. George (a popular crusader hero) before they continued on to Jerusalem. On June 6, Godfrey sent Tancred and Gaston to capture Bethlehem, where Tancred flew his banner from the Church of the Nativity. On June 7 the crusaders reached Jerusalem itself. Many cried upon seeing the city they had journeyed so long to reach.

As with Antioch the crusaders put the city to a siege, in which the crusaders themselves probably suffered more than the citizens of the city, due to the lack of food and water around Jerusalem. The city was well-prepared for the siege, and the Fatimid governor had expelled most of the Christians. Of the estimated 7,000 knights who took part in the Princes' Crusade, only about 1,500 remained, along with another 12,000 healthy foot-soldiers (out of perhaps as many as 20,000). Godfrey, Robert of Flanders, and Robert of Normandy (who had now also left Raymond to join Godfrey) besieged the north walls as far south as the Tower of David, while Raymond set up his camp on the western side, from the Tower of David to Mount Zion. A direct assault on the walls on June 13 was a failure. Without water or food, both men and animals were quickly dying of thirst and starvation and the crusaders knew time was not on their side. Coincidentally, soon after the first assault, a number of Christian ships sailed into the port at Jaffa, and the crusaders were able to re-supply themselves for a short time. The crusaders also began to gather wood from Samaria in order to build siege engines. They were still short on food and water, and by the end of June there was news that a Fatimid army was marching north from Egypt.

The barefoot procession
Faced with a seemingly impossible task, their spirits were raised when a priest by the name of Peter Desiderius claimed to have a divine vision in which the ghost of Adhemar instructed them to fast for three days and then march in a barefoot procession around the city walls, after which the city would fall in nine days, following the Biblical example of Joshua at the siege of Jericho. Although they were already starving, they fasted, and on July 8 they made the procession, with the clergy blowing trumpets and singing psalms, being mocked by the defenders of Jerusalem all the while. The procession stopped on the Mount of Olives and sermons were delivered by Peter the Hermit, Arnulf of Chocques, and Raymond of Aguilers.

The final assault and massacre
Throughout the siege, attacks were made on the walls, but each one was repulsed. Meanwhile, three siege engines were completed and were rolled up to the walls on the night of July 14 much to the surprise and concern of the garrison. On the morning of July 15, Godfrey's tower reached his section of the walls near the northeast corner gate, and according to the Gesta a Flemish knight named Lethold was the first to cross into the city, followed by Godfrey, his brother Eustace, Tancred, and their men. Raymond's tower was at first stopped by a ditch, but as the other crusaders had already entered, the Muslim guarding the gate surrendered to Raymond.

Once the Crusaders had breached the outer walls and entered the city almost every inhabitant of Jerusalem was killed over the course of that afternoon, evening and next morning. Muslims, Jews, and even any remaining Christians were all massacred with indiscriminate violence. Many Muslims sought shelter in the Al-Aqsa Mosque, where, according to one famous account in Gesta, "...the slaughter was so great that our men waded in blood up to their ankles..." According to Raymond of Aguilers "men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins." Tancred claimed the Temple quarter for himself and offered protection to some of the Muslims there, but he could not prevent their deaths at the hands of his fellow crusaders. The Fatimid governor withdrew to the Tower of David, which he soon surrendered to Raymond in return for safe passage for himself and bodyguards to Ascalon. They were the only ones to escape alive.

Aftermath
Following the massacre, Godfrey of Bouillon was made Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri (Protector of the Holy Sepulchre) on July 22, refusing to be named king in the city where Christ had died. Raymond had refused any title at all, and Godfrey convinced him to give up the Tower of David as well. Raymond then went on a pilgrimage, and in his absence Arnulf of Chocques, whom Raymond had opposed due to his own support for Peter Bartholomew, was elected the first Latin Patriarch on August 1 (the claims of the Greek Patriarch were ignored). On August 5, Arnulf, after consulting the surviving inhabitants of the city, discovered the relic of the True Cross.

On August 12, Godfrey led an army, with the True Cross carried in the vanguard, against the Fatimid army at the Battle of Ascalon on August 12. The crusaders were successful, but following the victory, the majority of them considered their crusading vows to have been fulfilled, and all but a few hundred knights returned home. Nevertheless, their victory paved the way for the establishment of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem.

Sources
Hans E. Mayer, The Crusades, Oxford, 1965.
Jonathan Riley-Smith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading, Philadelphia, 1999.
The Siege and Capture of Jerusalem: Collected Accounts Primary sources from the Internet Medieval Sourcebook.
Climax of the First Crusade Detailed examanination by J. Arthur McFall originally appeared in Military History magazine.
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« Reply #116 on: December 31, 2007, 01:30:46 am »

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Page 5: The Final Assault

The defenders were concentrating their forces in front of the towers, so Godfrey of Bouillon made a last-minute decision. During the night his tower was slowly wheeled a half mile down the line to face the north wall near Herod's Gate. The other siege machinery was dismantled, moved and reassembled--even a trebuchet, the most-used throwing machine of the period, consisting of many huge pieces of timber, hundreds of stones that were used as ammunition, and heavier stones for the counterweight that propelled the missiles. To disassemble, move and reassemble such a machine in the dark must have required a nearly superhuman effort.

The final assault was launched on the night of July 13. According to Raymond of Aguilers, a reliable source, the effective strength of the army was now 12,000 fighting men, including the workmen, the sailors and other nonprofessionals, and 1,200 to 1,300 knights. He did not try to assess the number of old men, women and children. Raymond of Toulouse, in position along the southern wall, struggled to fill in the moat and maneuver one siege tower against the wall, but the defenders kept him at bay. Heralds announced that any man who brought three large stones to hurl into the ditch would receive one denarius. Thus was the job completed.

Godfrey of Bouillon, Robert of Normandy and Tancred chose to attack the northern wall just east of Herod's Gate. Their huge battering ram pounded a hole in the outer wall, and the rubble was used to fill in the moat. In mail and helmets, with an overhead ceiling constructed of shields, the attackers stormed the walls through a hail of arrows and stones. The straw reinforcing the walls was set afire with flaming arrows.

As the huge siege tower inched ever closer to the wall, the Egyptians responded with catapult loads of Greek fire. The sulfur-and-pitch-based compound (the exact composition of which was a closely guarded secret and still a mystery today) was the napalm of the Middle Ages. Flaming pottery full of Greek fire shattered upon impact to splatter clinging flames over everything and everyone nearby. Rags soaked in the substance were wrapped around wooden bolts, imbedded with nails so they would adhere to whatever they hit, and hurled against the huge towers. Again and again the towers were set on fire, and each time the flames were extinguished with water and vinegar or by beating out the fire.

Bales of hay, soaked in oil and wax so they would burn long after they reached the ground, were hurled over the walls, especially around the two towers. Buildings were burning, there were pools of fire outside the walls and smoke permeated the air. Two Muslim women were observed casting a spell over the nearest catapult, but a stone from the hexed machine killed them and, according to the Crusaders' account, "broke the spell."

The Crusaders fought all night and day of the 14th without establishing a foothold. By evening, Raymond had succeeded in wheeling his tower against the wall. The defense was fierce, with the governor in personal charge of this area. Raymond could not secure a foothold, and the tower was eventually burned to the ground on July 15. Few who were inside escaped.

Crusaders' accounts grudgingly praised the accuracy of the Muslim catapults, which destroyed many of their machines. The Crusaders' ram became stuck and blocked the path of the northern tower. But the next morning Godfrey's tower, with its three fighting levels surmounted by a large gilded figure of Christ, was against the north wall, close to Herod's Gate. Godfrey and his brother, Eustace of Boulogne, commanded from the top story. The defenders lassoed the tower and tried to topple it, but knights cut the ropes with their swords.

Later that same morning, the Crusaders began to feel exhausted from the continuous fighting, and they met to debate whether the battle should be ended. Before a decision was reached, a knight atop the Mount of Olives signaled for the Count of Toulouse to advance. Godfrey of Bouillon ordered his men to renew their fire attack against the bales of hay and cotton shielding the walls. The wind changed; huge clouds of smoke choked and blinded the defenders, causing some to flee.

Immense timbers had been attached to the walls to keep the towers from closing with them. The Crusaders seized one of these and nailed it to the tower, then swung the bridge into place. The Franj now had a way into the city. Two Flemish knights, Litold and Gilbert of Tournai, led the pick of the Lotharingian contingent across. Godfrey himself soon followed. With him were his brother, Eustace, the Count of Flanders and Robert of Normandy. It was about noon on Friday, July 15, and many were acutely aware that they were entering Jerusalem at the hour of Christ's death.

According to Professor Joshua Prawer of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, this most crucial part of the fighting took place along a portion of the wall "65 meters (71 yards) between the second tower east of Herod's Gate and the first salient square in the wall beyond it," across the road between the present-day Rockefeller Museum and the wall. Control of a section of the wall allowed the invaders to use scaling ladders to pour more and more men into the city. Godfrey remained on the wall, encouraging the newcomers and directing men to open the Gate of the Column to allow the masses of the Crusaders inside. It was said that the ghost of Adhémar of Le Puy was seen among those rushing to open the gate.


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« Reply #117 on: December 31, 2007, 01:31:05 am »

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Page 6: Massacre

Tancred and his men, who had been close behind the Lorrainers, penetrated deep into the city. The Muslims fled toward the temple area and took refuge in the al-Aqsa Mosque, but Tancred was upon them before they could establish their defenses. They quickly surrendered, offered a large ransom, and Tancred gave them his banner to display over the mosque. Tancred's forces had already pillaged the Dome of the Rock, one of the holiest places of Islam, earning them a great fortune.

The people of the Jerusalem reeled back in confusion, trying desperately to escape the invaders. When the Crusaders overran the southern walls, Iftikhar realized that all was lost. Withdrawing into the Tower of David, he prepared to make his last stand.

The Tower of David, the strongest part of the entire defensive network, was an octagonal citadel whose foundations had been welded together with lead. Although it was obvious to them that the city was lost, Iftikhar and his soldiers continued to fight. In the words of Amin Maalouf, "What else could they do?"

Then the Franj stopped fighting, and a messenger brought an offer from Raymond of Toulouse. The Egyptian general and his men would be allowed to leave if they would surrender the tower to him.

Although Raymond was respected for his skill and valor in battle, the white-haired sexagenarian also had a reputation for treachery. By continuing the battle against the Egyptians, however, he and his Provençals were missing out on the looting that was then in progress. The Franks were arguing about who would get which house, and Raymond was being left out. Iftikhar finally agreed to surrender if Raymond would personally guarantee the safety of him and his men. Raymond agreed and they departed that night. They were the only Muslims to escape the fall of Jerusalem. Most of the others were killed, while a few were taken as slaves.

The Crusaders spent at least that night and the next day killing Muslims, including all of those in the al-Aqsa Mosque, where Tancred's banner should have protected them. Not even women and children were spared. The city's Jews sought refuge in their synagogue, only to be burned alive within it by the Crusaders. Raymond of Aquilers reported that he saw "piles of heads, hands and feet" on a walk through the holy city. Men trotted across the bodies and body fragments as if they were a carpet for their convenience. The Europeans also destroyed the monuments to Orthodox Christian saints and the tomb of Abraham.

There were no recorded instances of ****. The massacre was not insanity but policy, as stated by Fulcher of Chartres: "They desired that this place, so long contaminated by the superstition of the pagan inhabitants, should be cleansed from their contagion." The Crusaders intended Jerusalem to be a Christian city--and strictly a Latin Christian city. "This is a day the Lord made," wrote Raymond of Aguilers. "We shall rejoice and be glad in it."

The Crusaders cut open the stomachs of the dead because someone said that the Muslims sometimes swallowed their gold to hide it. Later, when the corpses were burned, Crusaders kept watch for the melted gold that they expected to see flowing onto the ground. While the slaughter was still going on, many churchmen and princes assembled for a holy procession. Barefoot, chanting and singing, they walked to the shrine of the Holy Sepulchre through the blood flowing around their feet. Reports that the blood was waist deep are believed to have come from a later misreading of a Bible passage. However, in the official letter "To Lord Paschal, Pope Of The Roman Church, to all the bishops and to the whole Christian people" from "the Archbishop of Pisa, Duke Godfrey, now by the grace of God Defender of the Holy Sepulchre, Raymond, Count of St. Gilles, and the whole army of God," the Crusaders recorded that "in Solomon's Portico and in his Temple our men rode in the blood of the Saracens [Muslims] up to the knees of their horses."

There would still be a few battles, including one at Ascalon on August 12 in which 10,000 Crusaders led by Godfrey of Bouillon easily routed what they called "the army of the Babylonians"--actually, the belated Egyptian relief column under Emir al-Afdal--but the First Crusade had accomplished its ultimate purpose. The holy city of Jerusalem was in Christian hands.

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« Reply #118 on: December 31, 2007, 01:31:38 am »

Jeremy Dokken

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The Crusade of 1101 and the establishment of the kingdom


Having captured Jerusalem and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the crusading vow was now fulfilled. However, there were many who had gone home before reaching Jerusalem, and many who had never left Europe at all. When the success of the crusade became known, these people were mocked and scorned by their families and threatened with excommunication by the clergy. Many crusaders who had remained with the crusade all the way to Jerusalem also went home; according to Fulcher of Chartres there were only a few hundred knights left in the newfound kingdom in 1100. In 1101 another crusade set out, including Stephen of Blois and Hugh of Vermandois, both of whom had returned home before reaching Jerusalem. This crusade was mostly annihilated in Asia Minor by the Seljuks, but the survivors helped reinforce the kingdom when they arrived in Jerusalem. In the following years assistance was also provided by Italian merchants who established themselves in the Syrian ports, and from the religious and military orders of the Knights Templars and the Knights Hospitaller which were created during Baldwin I's reign.

Analysis of the First Crusade

Aftermath

The success of the First Crusade was unprecedented. Newly achieved stability in the west left a warrior aristocracy in search of new conquests and patrimony, and the new prosperity of major towns also meant that money was available to equip expeditions. The Italian naval towns, in particular Venice and Genoa, were interested in extending trade. The Papacy saw the Crusades as a way to assert Catholic influence as a unifying force, with war as a religious mission. This was a new attitude to religion: it brought religious discipline, previously applicable to monks, to soldiery—the new concept of a religious warrior and the chivalric ethos.

The First Crusade succeeded in establishing the "Crusader States" of Edessa, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Tripoli in Palestine and Syria (as well as allies along the Crusaders' route, such as Cilician Armenia).

Back at home in western Europe, those who had survived to reach Jerusalem were treated as heroes. Robert of Flanders was nicknamed "Hierosolymitanus" thanks to his exploits. The life of Godfrey of Bouillon became legendary even within a few years of his death. In some cases the political situation at home was greatly affected by absence on the crusade: while Robert Curthose was away, Normandy had passed to his brother Henry I of England, and their conflict resulted in the Battle of Tinchebrai in 1106.

Meanwhile the establishment of the crusader states in the east helped ease Seljuk pressure on the Byzantine Empire, which had regained some of its Anatolian territory with crusader help, and experienced a period of relative peace and prosperity in the 12th century. The effect on the Muslim dynasties of the east was gradual but important. The instability of the Muslim territories in the east had at first prevented a coherent defense against the aggressive and expansionist Latin states. Cooperation between them remained difficult for many decades, but from Egypt to Syria to Baghdad there were calls for the expulsion of the crusaders, culminating in the relative unity of the eastern Muslim world and the recapture of Jerusalem under Saladin later in the century.

The pilgrims

Although it is called the First Crusade, no one saw himself as a "crusader." The term crusade is an early 12th century term that first appears in Latin over 100 years after the "first" crusade. Nor did the "crusaders" see themselves as the first, since they did not know there would be more. They saw themselves simply as pilgrims (peregrinatores) on a journey (iter), and were referred to as such in contemporary accounts.

The pilgrims
Although it is called the First Crusade, no one saw himself as a "crusader." The term crusade is an early 12th century term that first appears in Latin over 100 years after the "first" crusade. Nor did the "crusaders" see themselves as the first, since they did not know there would be more. They saw themselves simply as pilgrims (peregrinatores) on a journey (iter), and were referred to as such in contemporary accounts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_crusade

[ 12-17-2005, 09:15 AM: Message edited by: Jeremy Dokken ]
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« Reply #119 on: December 31, 2007, 01:32:03 am »

Jeremy Dokken

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   posted 12-17-2005 09:14 AM                       
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Popularity of the Crusade

What started as a minor call for military aid turned in to a mass migration of peoples. The call to go on crusade was very popular. Two medieval roles, holy warrior and pilgrim, were merged into one. Like a holy warrior in a holy war, one would carry a weapon and fight for the Church with all its spiritual benefits, including the privilege of an indulgence or martyrdom if one died in battle. Like a pilgrim on a pilgrimage, one would have the right to hospitality and personal protection of self and property by the Church. The benefits of the indulgence were therefore twofold, both for fighting as a warrior of the Church and for travelling as a pilgrim. Thus, an indulgence would be granted regardless of whether one lived or died. In addition, there were feudal obligations, as many crusaders went because they were commanded by their lord and had no choice. There were also family obligations, with many people joining the crusade in order to support relatives who had also taken the crusading vow. All of these motivated different people for different reasons and contributed to the popularity of the crusade.

Spiritual versus earthly rewards

Older scholarship on this issue asserts that the bulk of the participants were likely younger sons of nobles who were dispossessed of land and influenced by the practise of primogeniture, and poorer knights who were looking for a new life in the wealthy east.

However, current research suggests that although Urban promised crusaders spiritual as well as material benefit, the primary aim of most crusaders was spiritual rather than material gain. Moreover, recent research by Jonathan Riley-Smith instead shows that the crusade was an immensely expensive undertaking, affordable only to those knights who were already fairly wealthy, such as Hugh of Vermandois and Robert Curthose, who were relatives of the French and English royal families, and Raymond of Toulouse, who ruled much of southern France. Even then, these wealthy knights had to sell much of their land to relatives or the church before they could afford to participate. Their relatives, too, often had to impoverish themselves in order to raise money for the crusade. As Riley-Smith says, "there really is no evidence to support the proposition that the crusade was an opportunity for spare sons to make themselves scarce in order to relieve their families of burdens." (The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading, pg. 47)

As an example of spiritual over earthly motivation, Godfrey of Bouillon and his brother Baldwin settled previous quarrels with the church by bequeathing their land to local clergy. The charters denoting these transactions were written by clergymen, not the knights themselves, and seem to idealize the knights as pious men seeking only to fulfill a vow of pilgrimage.

Further, poorer knights (minores, as opposed to the greater knights, the principes) could go on crusade only if they expected to survive off of almsgiving, or if they could enter the service of a wealthier knight, as was the case with Tancred, who agreed to serve his uncle Bohemund. Later crusades would be organized by wealthy kings and emperors, or would be supported by special crusade taxes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_crusade
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