Pope Urban II appointed a bishop, Adhemar of Monteil, Bishop of Le Puy, as his official legate, or representative on the official mission. Adhemar had been to the Holy Land before, and recently; he knew what Seljuk Muslim Palestine was like. He led the official First Crusade made up of well-armed and disciplined noblemen. He was himself the younger son of a Frankish noble family, so his training and manners fit well with his role of diplomacy among counts and kings.
The choice to follow Adhemar on what was officially billed as a “pilgrimage” was also a test of loyalty to Pope Urban II. Anyone could travel to the Holy Land, but only those approved by Urban were official crusaders with the promise of absolved sin. The King of Germany, Holy Roman Emperor, was not going to bow the knee to Urban in order to go along. He still stubbornly recognized only his own appointed Pope Clement III. His distant cousin, King Philip of France, also chose not to go. He was under ban of excommunication concerning his second wife, who was actively bearing him children while he was in his 50s. In order to make peace with the Pope, he had to divorce her, so he chose to stay home. William II, King of England, was not free to go, although an active King of England participated in a later crusade.
The next rank of royalty made up most of the First Crusade. Philip’s younger brother Hugh Count of Vermandois was one of the leaders. Hugh was not a skilled warrior, and like Philip he was getting on in years and had gained weight. But he had what mattered most: a large feudal estate that could afford the cost and manpower of raising a private army. The current Duke Robert of Normandy was younger brother to the King of England. He was another middle-aged knight, no longer at the top of his form, but with plenty of feudal ties to exploit and money to spend. But both Normandy and France had previously endorsed the anti-Pope, Clement III. In order to bask in the glow of holy war, they had to change their alliance, abandoning the King of Germany to his private pout.
The chief ruler of southern Italy, a Norman named Bohemund, was one of the Pope’s newer allies. He was the son of Robert Guiscard, the fiercest Norman brigand to invade Sicily and Italy. Robert conquered most of southern Italy, styling himself Count of Apulia and leaving his son as Prince of Taranto. Robert and Bohemund were both involved in the Norman attempt to help a Byzantine prince regain the throne, so they had previously traveled and fought in what’s now Croatia and Serbia. They were enemies of the reigning Byzantine Emperor, but alliances could shift very quickly and easily sometimes. Bohemund was all in favor of boosting Pope Urban’s power base and converting his part of Italy to Roman Catholicism; “saving” the Byzantine Emperor was the new way of fighting against him, that’s all.
Raymond IV Count of Toulouse joined the princes. Toulouse was an independent County for much of the medieval period, often allied against France. Three more Counts joined, bringing in the wealth of Flanders, Blois and Boulogne.
The Count of Boulogne rode with his brothers, and together they became the most famous personalities of the First Crusade. They’re worth looking at on their own, partly because they tell us a lot about the state of governance around 1100, and partly because of their later fame.