Knights of Temple and Hospital, 1118

Posted on February 17, 2023 by Ruth

In the first year of King Baldwin II, a knight named Hugues (Hugh, Hugo) proposed the creation of a new monastic order. He had probably come to Jerusalem in 1114, on pilgrimage with the Count of Champagne. Hugues chose to stay and live out his life in the Holy City. He seems to have been part of a small band of unmarried knights from Champagne who all chose to stay.

A word about unmarried knights. It’s my impression that marriage and land went together. Heirs of land were obliged to marry as young as possible to produce more heirs. When a knight became the ruler of land, he was enabled to marry; we often see a knight gaining a title and marrying at the same time (as Baldwin II did). But knights without land often did not marry. The knight’s life expectancy was uncertain, and he had other opportunities for sex.

Unmarried knights were generally attached to a nobleman, the way Hugues and his friends had been followers of the Count of Champagne. Now, the small band of knights who stayed on were, in a sense, unemployed. Hugues’ Big Idea was to have the King create a monastic order for knights, which would give them jobs, a home, and a purpose. They were already poor; being monks made poverty respectable. Their new badge would show two men on one horse!

King Baldwin II granted them al-Aqsa Mosque as their living quarters; it was known as the Temple of Solomon, since it had been built on that foundation. The knights just called it The Temple. In a sense, they took on *policing* Jerusalem, especially with protecting foreign pilgrims in mind. Perhaps some of them had been robbed on arrival, so they knew the need.

In another part of the city, around the same time, another band of landless, unmarried knights gathered at the Order of St. John Hospital. This hospital had been established by merchants from Amalfi, Italy in 1023 when the Church of the Holy Sepulcher was rebuilt. It started as a hostel, but became an infirmary. Now, this small cluster of knights would have a foundation to support them, too, in their role of security guards to the pilgrims and monk-doctors.

Why was there suddenly this need for policing? It may be that when Baldwin I invited Syrian Christians to repopulate the city in 1115, the nature of city life changed dramatically. Underpopulated and barely functioning as an economy, Jerusalem had perhaps been fairly predictable. With new residents who had their boundaries and hierarchies to establish among themselves, crime may have skyrocketed.

Bernard of Clairvaux, the monk who was leading a reform movement at this time, publicly praised the monastic knight orders. Knights were usually wealthy; these knights voluntarily owned nothing and lived in austerity. Bernard’s praise led more knights to travel to the Holy Land and join up, and it also encouraged wealthy lay people to start leaving large donations to the orders. Both orders soon owned vast estates in France, although the individual knights supposedly owned nothing. In time, the Knights of the Temple (Knights Templars or just Templars) and the Knights of the Hospital became very wealthy, powerful organizations. The Hospital Order persists to this day, headquartered now in Rome.

But in the early years, we should picture them as they began: small groups of knights, often from the same region or families, who lived frugally in barracks near their stables. There’s no question that they were the embodiment of Cool in 1120. That’s why their orders grew so quickly: they were the hipsters of their day, and the lucky ones were able to say, “I was a Temple Knight before it went mainstream. Remember the old days when we slept in our stables? And only one horse for every two knights! That’s when it was best, now it’s sold out…”

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King Sigurd the Crusader

Posted on February 5, 2023 by Ruth

Norway decided to participate in the Crusade on its own schedule; it was at the outer rim of Christendom, so news of the First Crusade’s call arrived there slowly. Pilgrimages appealed to Scandinavians very much, since long voyages were part of their culture. At the time of the Pope’s call, King Magnus Barefoot was too busy conquering portions of Sweden, Scotland and Ireland to respond. But he died in 1103, leaving three sons to rule jointly. A group of scattered would-be Crusaders came back to Norway around this time, telling stories of the great lands to the south and the wonderful victories of the Crusade. There was a lot of popular enthusiasm in Oslo for mounting their own armed pilgrimage.

The three kings were all young, two teenagers and a little child. But they appear to have ruled harmoniously, perhaps because Magnus had left such a sprawling northern empire that there was room for all. Eystein, the oldest, seems always to have been an administrator at home. Sigurd, the second son, campaigned with his father as a teenager and was married to the Princess of Ireland. They decided that Sigurd was the obvious choice to lead a Crusade. It took some more time to build enough spare ships and recruit the men who would go.

Sigurd set out with sixty ships in 1107. They wintered over in England, with Henry I (son of William the Conqueror). In spring of 1108, they sailed south along France’s Atlantic coast, but it was slow going; they had to winter again in Santiago de Compostela—a whole year and they weren’t even into the Mediterranean yet! In spring 1109, they set out again, and it got a bit more interesting. First, they battled pirates. Next, they passed along the coast of Portugal, fighting Muslim rulers as far north as Lisbon.

When the Norwegian ships entered the Mediterranean Sea, they were in the territory of the Taifa (city-state) of Majorca, made up of the rich Balearic Islands. They fought several battles, though they considered the fortress at Majorca too tough to attack. Norwegian epics recount huge victories at the islands of Formentera, Ibiza, and Minorca.

The Norwegian stories tell how the Moors of Formentera hid with their treasure in a cave that was halfway up a precipice. Sigurd attacked it by lowering two ships with ropes until they were level with the cave. The ships’ men attacked the cave with rocks, while more Norsemen climbed up to the cave from below. Then they set a bonfire in the cave’s mouth.

It’s not clear to me to whom the conquered islands and fortresses in Andalusia went. Perhaps Sigurd had found local Christians to place in power, or it may be that he considered it sufficient to kill, plunder, and move on. In 1109, the Norwegians arrived in Sicily, where Count Roger II, a boy of 12, welcomed them. At a feast, say the sagas, Sigurd proclaimed the Count to be a King, establishing the Kingdom of Sicily.

By 1110, they finally arrived in Jaffa or Acre and rode to Jerusalem.  In Old Norse, the city’s name was Jorsala, and the region was Jorsalaland. Sigurd’s nickname became “Jorsalafarer.” King Baldwin welcomed Sigurd and honored him with feasts and an honorary trip to the Jordan River. Baldwin even gave Sigurd a relic splinter of the True Cross to take back to Oslo, with the condition that Sigurd should invest the city with its own Archbishop.

It happened that there was a siege the Norwegians could help with, so they joined the other Crusaders at Sidon. To the Norwegians, the whole thing was a walk in the park; they won every battle they started, and their participation quickly reduced Sidon to surrender. The grueling First Crusade experiences of near disaster seem to have skipped Sigurd entirely. It was more like spring break.

The Norwegians returned by way of Cyprus, where they spent some time, and then Constantinople. Sigurd made a point of waiting to arrive in Constantinople until the right sort of wind would make his ships look most impressive. They were welcomed by the Emperor, who held a sort of Olympic Games in their honor. A lot of Norsemen chose to stay on at this magical city, joining the Emperor’s special Varangian Guard. “Varangian” was the Greek name for Scandinavians or Rus. Unlike Byzantine conscripts, the Varangian Guard had a very high standard of loyalty to the Emperor as they applied the Norse custom of fealty.

Sigurd left his ships in the Mediterranean and traveled overland through Bulgaria, Hungary, and Germany. He arrived home to great fame. His Crusade is most notable for being so easy and successful. He left no impression on the Holy Land apart from the fall of Sidon. His story seems to come from a different book from the rest of the First Crusade hardships and disasters.

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Baldwin I is Dead, Long Live Baldwin II

Posted on February 5, 2023 by Ruth

In 1115, King Baldwin I sent a general invitation to Syrian Christians to come resettle in Jerusalem. The city’s economy was very thin, since the Crusaders had killed so many of the residents in their original assault. The ensuing years of wars and threats had not made it seem an inviting neighborhood, to say the least. The city’s tax base had collapsed. Now, it looked like the Fatimids had given up on recapture; they no longer set out with a field army every spring. The Muslims to the east and north were still very much occupied with their civil wars. Life could go back to something like normal.

In that cluster of years, it looked like Baldwin I had found a good solution to his childless state. He put his wife, Queen Arda, in a convent. Then he married a woman who already had children. She was the widowed Countess of Sicily. In the marriage contract, her young son Roger II of Sicily was established as Baldwin’s heir, although he remained in Sicily. However, after two years of marriage, Baldwin I became ill and he believed that God was striking him down for his sin of bigamy. He annulled the marriage contract, with its inheritance clause, and sent the Countess home.

Baldwin I didn’t die from that illness, but he died soon after, in 1118. He had an old battle wound from his first months as king (1100), when a Turkish hunting party had speared him. He had lived for many years after, but apparently, sickness and internal injuries just caught up with him. He was probably about 60. The king was on campaign in Egypt, near El-Arish, when he died. He left instructions for his cook to bury his guts nearby, but to salt and spice his body thoroughly. The expedition carried him in this semi-mummified state back to Jerusalem. There, he was buried in state at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

The sudden death of Baldwin I created a dangerous power vacuum. Bohemund and Tancred had predeceased him, but there were always ambitious Normans around. Would Roger II of Sicily try to press his claim? He was bitterly angry at his mother’s being sent home in shame. Someone sent for Baldwin’s older brother Eustace of Boulogne, who reluctantly agreed to take up the duty if he must, but he was well over 60 and far away, and someone needed to take immediate action. Not only was there danger from Norman rivals, there was also the very immediate danger that the king’s death signaled weakness to surrounding kingdoms. They had come to respect Baldwin I’s tenacity at survival and resistance.

Sir Joscelin of Tel Bashir, a follower of the younger Count Baldwin II, pressed for the Count to inherit from his cousin. After all, he had already been chosen to inherit Edessa, so in a way, he was already the legal heir. He was right there in Edessa, he was in good health, and he had a family. (Besides, then Sir Joscelin could become Count of Edessa.)

King Baldwin II was crowned on Easter Sunday in Jerusalem, with Morphia as Queen. Within days, the kingdom was invaded from the south by Fatimids, and from the east by Seljuk Turks! The new king and his allies scrambled as many knights onto the field as they could. Apparently, both invasions were more in the nature of probes. Had the city been easy to capture, they’d have fought. It’s also possible that both Muslim armies were dismayed by the presence of the other. They may have been racing to be the first one to invade, only to arrive simultaneously. As it happened, both invasion forces chose to leave.

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Life of Tancred, 1097-1112

Posted on January 22, 2023 by Ruth

Tancred was a young man of about 20 when Pope Urban preached the Crusade. His grandfather had conquered Sicily, so he was looking for a new frontier. The Crusade was perfect for him, since he already spoke some Arabic. He made his name first by rushing to help liberate Armenian towns in Cilicia, but at the same time, part of what made his name even then was his determination to own any town he helped to conquer—with resulting controversy.

Tancred really, really wanted to be King of Jerusalem. He believed he had been the first over the wall, and once he was in the urban fighting melee, he gave his banner to a group of frightened citizens on a rooftop. He believed it would protect them after he left, and they would be grateful to him, but someone slaughtered them anyway. Tancred was furious. “Prince of Galilee” definitely felt like a consolation prize, after that.

As the years went by, Tancred was always at the front of some battle; he was perhaps the hardest worker among them all, assiduously adding even small towns, overlooked ports and hilltops, in addition to the big city prizes where he assisted. But every time a title was being handed out or territory redivided, a tribunal of other Crusaders (led by one of the Boulogne brothers) would put him in the wrong and give him the short straw. He was always the Best Man, never the Groom. Literally too, he never married.

When Bohemund left him with an empty treasury, shrinking territory, and the joint regency of Antioch and Edessa, Tancred’s moment seemed to have come, but maybe not in the way he hoped. He was 29 and had vast tactical experience, but the momentum—or at least the funding—was at low ebb. What could he do? Tancred made a bold decision: he talked Antioch into supporting a deep round of taxation and he drew in the largest army he could create, leaving Edessa practically defenseless. He used the taxes to hire mercenaries, in addition to the local levy. It was time to expand.

Tancred picked a soft target: the town of Artah, in Aleppo’s zone. He set up a half-hearted siege of Artah, to provoke Radwan of Aleppo into coming out of his walled city. When the Aleppans came, Tancred pulled back as if fleeing. He chose his ground carefully, knowing that the Arabs and Turks preferred to fight on horseback with archery. He turned to battle where the ground was too broken and rocky for horses. The Aleppans could get no purchase in this setting and it was Radwan’s turn to flee. Tancred’s men occupied Artah, and now they had momentum. Each place they conquered could be plundered for ready cash. Town by town, hill by hill, they began to win back Antioch’s authority.

In 1106, little Cecilia of France (now about ten) arrived to marry Tancred. His titles had come and gone, so she’s recorded as Lady of Tarsus, not Princess of Galilee or Tiberias. But in practical terms, she was welcomed as the “Princess of Antioch”, without the formal title. Tancred was finally the real ruler of a small principality worth having: Antioch’s thick walls and Edessa’s rich farm fields, with authority expanding into Cilicia again. He refused to honor Bohemund’s humiliating Treaty of Devol, when the Emperor thoughtfully sent him a copy. He worked hard to make Antioch into a functioning small state.

Then, just when he was happy, in 1109 someone ransomed Count Baldwin II from Mosul. Tancred had to welcome Baldwin home, but he made it clear that “finders keepers, losers weepers” was going to be the rule. He did not turn over Edessa to its former count. By the following year, the Edessans (who supported Baldwin II’s return to governance) and the Antiochans under Tancred were drawing up lines for battle. This was just insane. Even more insane, the ruler of Mosul had released Baldwin II only after insisting on mutual vows of alliance, so Mosul sent archers against Tancred, too! How could this end well for anyone? The archbishop and King Baldwin I of Jerusalem used diplomacy to put Baldwin II and Tancred back into their original places.

In this second stint as Prince of Galilee, Tancred ruled for four years. During this time, he took the castle we know as Krak des Chevaliers. Muslims had built a fortress on the hilltop during the previous century. The Count of Tripoli held this fortress until, later, it was given to the Hospital order of knights. They rebuilt it into the massive pile it is today.

Raymond’s son Bertrand became the Count of Tripoli in 1109. Tancred became very fond of Bertrand’s teenage son Pons. In 1112, Tancred’s bride Cecilia was 15, old enough to actually be a wife, while Tancred was 36. But before they could marry, a typhoid epidemic came through and Tancred became terminally ill. He told Pons, who was about Cecilia’s age, to marry the “widow,” and he set aside land between Antioch and Tripoli to be her dowry. Almost certainly it was land he had recently conquered with his own heritage in mind. And then he died.

Tancred’s life feels more familiar than some of the others’ lives, because while he constantly strove for achievement, the outcome always fell short of expectations. It’s so human. After his death, a “Life of Tancred,” Gesta Tancredi, circulated in Europe. Later, the Italian poet Tasso wrote a romanticized version, which Voltaire made into a play, which Rossini made into an opera, “Tancredi.”

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Bohemund: Glory and Shame, 1104-11

Posted on January 22, 2023 by Ruth

Bohemund, son of the Norman who conquered Sicily, was described as a tiger by Anna Comnena, Emperor Alexios’s daughter. His ferocious assault on Albania in past years had advertised Norman strength, and when he set out as a leader in 1097, everyone expected him to be the star. His crafty mind had landed him the Princedom of the biggest city in the region, but ever since then, life had been rocky, including his three years as a hostage among nomads.

In Antioch, Bohemund explained to everyone that while he was in captivity, he frequently prayed to St. Leonard, and now that he was free, he was under oath to give a silver model of shackles to the Cathedral of the saint in France. He would recruit more Crusaders while in France and return in glory! To make sure he could travel and recruit in style, he emptied the treasuries of Antioch. He packed up the gold and silver in locked chests and just legally stole it. Tancred, the nephew who had been reluctant to welcome him back, was left with regencies of both Edessa and Antioch, but without funds to do anything in either.

Bohemund was an enemy of the Byzantines by now; his un-neighborly actions had made it very clear to them that he classed them with the Turks or lower. Unfortunately, he had to pass through a lot of Byzantine territory in order to get back to Italy and France. According to the Emperor’s daughter Anna, he sneaked through dangerous parts by lying in a coffin with a rotting dead chicken. No Byzantine guards wished to search that coffin! It was a clever ruse if he actually did this, but the fact that he had to sneak in such a shameful way was not his proudest resume point.

In Italy, Bohemund was welcomed as a hero. Taranto and Apulia could bask in his conquering glory. Someone in his retinue wrote a history of the Crusading years, and Bohemund used some of the Antiochan gold to fund its copying and distribution. Naturally, it centered on each of Bohemund’s heroic acts as well as on the shameful, sneaking, lying actions of the despicable Greeks, his new enemies.

Bohemund visited St. Leonard’s shrine as promised, and while in France, he also married a princess. You may recall that King Philip was having bigamy problems around this time and was under excommunication. As a result, he had two daughters to give away, an old one and a young one.

Bohemund’s bride was Constance, who was 28 and newly divorced. One perk of the feudal marriage system was that widows and divorcees who still brought dowries and estates did not lose market value. Constance had already given birth to a son who died, and she was still elegant and pretty. Her brother Louis would be king; it was a very good match.

Constance’s little half-sister Cecilia, on the other hand, was only about 8. Bohemund at 52 was clearly too old for Cecilia, but Tancred at 31 seemed appropriate. The point wasn’t that Cecilia was actually old enough to be married, but that her legal and financial affairs could be settled now. Tancred would be near 40 when she was actually old enough to have children, but they assumed he’d still be interested. She was sent to Antioch in a separate retinue, by ship. (Don’t worry, it will work out okay for Cecilia in the end.)

Bohemund and his wife raised a new army of foot soldiers and younger knights, and with Pope Paschal’s blessing, they set off eastward. Along the way, Bohemund II was born to Constance. But there’s a catch: Bohemund wasn’t going back to Antioch. His really burning grudge was against the Byzantines, not the Arabs or Turks, and he led his army straight across the Adriatic Sea to Christian Greece.

His assault on Thessaly was such a disaster that the Emperor forced Bohemund into one of the most humiliating treaties of all time. It was signed at the fortress of Diabolis (now Devol) in Albania. (the Treaty of the Devil!) The Emperor kindly granted to Bohemund the right to remain Duke (not prince) of Antioch, but with the feudal ties all reorganized. He was now a vassal of Constantinople, and his city would have a Greek Orthodox patriarch, not Roman Catholic. On his death, Antioch would revert to the Empire, though his heirs could keep Edessa as vassals.

The only way to keep the treaty from being enforced was for Bohemund just not to return to Antioch. The agreement was between him and Alexios, and if Alexios considered it binding on their heirs, Bohemund didn’t. Bohemund was now covered in shame. With Constance and their toddler, he drifted back to Italy. His army’s survivors probably straggled home, too. In 1111, Bohemund died a natural death and was buried in Taranto. Constance stayed there, as regent of Taranto and Apulia, raising little Bohemund II.

The treaty was really a brilliant move for Alexios. Had it been enforceable, it would have achieved what he hoped originally: the return of rich Antioch to his tax base and the strengthening of Greek naval power along the north Mediterranean.

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Hostages and Ransom, 1103

Posted on January 22, 2023 by Ruth

By 1103, Count Baldwin II of Edessa, his lieutenant Joscelin of Tel Bashir, and other Crusaders had finally raised the sum of gold to buy Bohemund’s freedom. A tenth of the gold was levied from a local Muslim who wanted an alliance, so that’s interesting. Equally interesting, his own nephew Tancred didn’t contribute. Tancred clearly wanted to continue being regent of Antioch and resented it when his uncle Bohemund came home.

Bohemund probably learned a lot about life with the Turks, but we’ll never know what it was since he was not a literary man. His first major action was to collect Count Baldwin II and Sir Joscelin and start getting revenge on the Turks. It worked out very badly: on the plains near Harran they met a combined Turkish force and the Edessans become isolated and surrounded. Many Edessan knights and soldiers died, and both Count Baldwin II and Sir Joscelin were captured! Hostages, again.

What I find the most interesting about this hostage-taking is that Count Baldwin II spent the next four years in Mosul. He’s an interesting guy, all around. He was a knight who came with the Boulogne brothers; I presume got his knight training in a little “school” with Eustace, Godfrey, and Baldwin, since that was a common way to form friendships and feudal bonds even among children. He was a little younger, about 25 years old when he joined the Crusade. We know little about Baldwin’s past but much about his adult lifetime.

Baldwin II married Morphia of Melitene, probably at the same time that he assumed the status of Count. Unlike most of the other Crusaders, he really turned into a family man. Morphia was pregnant when he was captured, and gave birth to a daughter, named Melisende. There’s a big gap between Melisende and the next baby, of course, but eventually they had four daughters. Four daughters is significant; when no boys were born, Baldwin II didn’t try to have the marriage annulled and start over.

By contrast, in 1105 the older Baldwin I King of Jerusalem (formerly Count of Edessa) was tired of his Armenian wife Arda. She had no children, and perhaps he felt time was running out. He put her in a convent; I don’t think he had any valid excuses to annul or divorce. He married the widowed Countess of Sicily who brought gold and a thousand archers as her dowry. Later, he set her aside, too.

The younger Baldwin II came from a monolingual French culture, unlike his age-peer Tancred who grew up in Arabic-fluent southern Italy. I like to think that Baldwin began learning basic Armenian in Edessa, to help with governing and then to talk to Morphia. There’s no doubt little Melisende spoke nothing but Armenian when her father came home from Mosul. Did he learn some Arabic or Turkish in Mosul? Four years is a long time to pass with nothing to do, and Baldwin seems to have been a very active man. He would have sought opportunities to observe the economy of Mosul, and perhaps he got some Arabic or Turkish martial arts training as well. We can only speculate, but it may have been a significant education for him.

The older Crusaders never really adjusted to the Levant; they were intruders, always. But Baldwin II went native in a way they didn’t. He had no interest in his hometown of Bourg (sometimes spelled Bourcq), apart from bringing his sister out to marry one of the younger lords. He and Morphia established the royal family of Jerusalem that we read about for the rest of the Crusades. He wasn’t royalty in Europe; but when he put down roots in Palestine, he became it. Baldwin II is my favorite First Crusader.

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Mt. Pilgrim and Raymond’s Legacy, 1101-5

Posted on January 4, 2023 by Ruth

Raymond of Toulouse had taken a vow not to return home. He had missed out on the prizes of Antioch and Jerusalem, but his army had taken some towns and forts in the vicinity of Tripoli. Among these early captures was the castle that later become known as the Krak des Chevaliers, one of the most famous Crusader fortresses. But in the early years, the governor of Tripoli placated him with assistance, staving off a direct assault.

Since the Fatimids had shown that they might be able to wipe out the Crusader Kingdom, Tripoli’s governor lost interest in pacifying the Crusaders. In 1101, Raymond had besieged and taken a nearby port, Tortosa, while Tripoli tried to defend it. Detente was over; they were now parties in a state of war.

Raymond could use Tortosa as a port and power base. He chose to dedicate the rest of his life to forcing Tripoli into submission. To that end, he built a castle on a nearby hill. It must have taken a full year to build this castle, 1102-1103, with blocks of stone being rolled up the hill in full view. Surely, the rulers of Tripoli could have attacked and stopped him, but apparently not. Without additional forces from Damascus or Aleppo, they could not overcome Raymond’s Provencal army that stood guard.

Raymond called the hill Mons Peregrinus, the Pilgrim Mountain. The new fort was named for him, using his personal surname of St-Gilles. It’s not clear if he lived in the fortress, or if he had a camp or house in a nearby town. Castles in Europe were primarily residential, while these Crusader fortresses were primarily defensive. It seems likely that Raymond and most of his men would prefer, though, to close a gate at night and feel secure. The fort is still in existence, but it has been ruined and rebuilt several times.

In 1105, Raymond of Toulouse died of battle wounds, leaving a complex legacy. Of first importance to our age, one of his clerks wrote an account of his role in the Crusade, a written record that we prize more than any citadel. Of first importance to his age, he left one heir who was directly on hand to take control of the fortress. This was his nephew William-Jordan, who was already a Crusader; but he also had two sons. Raymond had been married three times, with legitimacy issues in each case. His official heir was a child, Alfonso Jordan, but his oldest son Bertrand had been governing Toulouse. Bertrand set out immediately when he heard the news, and eventually he pushed out William-Jordan.

When Tripoli fell in 1109, Bertrand became its first Count. He even supervised the official burning of Tripoli’s library, too. Much as we would like to see such destruction as something only an uncouth “other” would do, this European, at least, did it.

Raymond left some lasting alliances and victories to his credit. In his personal rivalry with Bohemund, Raymond had chosen to side with the Byzantine Emperor. He was the only Crusader who remained on good terms with Alexios. King Baldwin could largely ignore the Emperor and focus on his border challenges, but Bohemund’s Antioch was really part of Cilicia, so he and the Emperor were always in each other’s faces. The Armenians kept flipping allegiance from Byzantium to Antioch and back, as Tancred or Bohemund created less or more threat. (At one point, Tancred led a full invasion into the towns he had first helped to liberate.) Greek ships helped Raymond capture Tortosa, near their port of Latakia, and Raymond helped smooth the way of the 1101 Faint-hearted Crusaders.

On the debit side, Raymond’s legacy included the loss of Ascalon and a few other port towns. He had been so eager for a truly important title that he got into stalemate struggles with Godfrey of Jerusalem. Godfrey wanted all nearby cities to be attached to Jerusalem in the feudal structure, so he refused to agree that Raymond could be Duke or Prince of Ascalon. It’s another of those points that might have altered history: had Raymond, a powerful and wealthy lord with a large contingent of surviving men, occupied Ascalon, he could have really secured the southern border. Without the title, he refused to lift a finger, and so Ascalon remained a Fatimid port, keeping the war frontier dangerously close to Jaffa and Jerusalem.

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The Crusade of the Faint-Hearted, 1101-2

Posted on January 4, 2023 by Ruth

In 1101, the new Pope Paschal called for another wave of pilgrim fighters to go east. Some of them were fresh faces, including the Archbishop of Milan leading another disorganized crowd of poor men, but some were First Crusaders who had broken their vows. For this reason, it wasn’t called the Second Crusade by historians, rather the Crusade of the Faint-Hearted. The Second Crusade was still 45 years away.

Hugh of Vermandois, the French King’s brother, was one of the oath-breakers who now returned. Stephen of Blois, the deserter who had told the Emperor not to bother trying to rescue the Crusaders in Antioch, was another. His wife was the daughter of William the Conqueror; her brothers were now kings of England, and she couldn’t bear being married to a shamed oath-breaker.

William the Duke of Aquitaine came on this Crusade 1.2. He had skipped Crusade 1.0 because he did not yet have an heir; his son William was born the year Jerusalem was captured. His wife was Raymond of Toulouse’s niece and actually the rightful ruler, so while Raymond was gone, they took over Toulouse. Now, though, Duke William needed to raise money for Crusading, so he just mortgaged it back to Raymond’s son.

He was an incorrigible philanderer who, when he returned from the Holy Land, moved his mistress named Dangerosa into the ducal palace, further humiliating the mother of his children. He was also the first great troubadour whose work still survives. None of this matters for the Crusade, but he’s such a colorful character that he seems worth pointing out. In Crusade histories, we often run across people who are main characters in other stories. If I were telling the story of the Troubadours, I’d be talking about him a lot.

The first tranche of new Crusaders fought their way across Turkey with the help of the Byzantine Emperor. They were trying to rescue Bohemund Prince of Antioch from his captivity in a Danishmend/Turk yurt, but they didn’t succeed. The Turks united this time and won a grueling three-day battle, and the French prince Hugh died. Apparently, the entire Aquitainian army was killed,  leaving only the Duke and a few companions to continue to Jerusalem.

Raymond of Toulouse joined them, and more new crusading nobles arrived. They were able to do a little good, capturing another much-needed port. But once they had arrived in Jerusalem for Easter, it looked like the fighting was over. Relieved to have their vows checked off, their honor rescued, and still alive, they set sail for Europe. But the winds turned, and some of their ships came back to Jaffa (the lucky Duke of Aquitaine got home).

In Jaffa, the stranded nobles got bad news: their swords were definitely needed again. A large Fatimid army under al-Afdal’s son was on the march from Ascalon, and King Baldwin was panicking. So Stephen of Blois, Hugh of Lusignan (Raymond of Toulouse’s half-brother), the Count of Burgundy, and Conrad Constable of Germany took their knights and turned back into the desert, with King Baldwin’s small contingent of knights.

The last time Baldwin faced this scenario, he had ridden against a Fatimid army that outnumbered him about 5 to 1, but carrying the True Cross relic, he had narrowly survived and at last prevailed. Assuming that the Fatimid army this time was merely a raiding party, he set out to attack again, instead of waiting for reinforcements from Raymond or Tancred. But this time, King Baldwin had made a tragic mistake. His 200 knights were engulfed by a full-scale field army, and there were almost no survivors.

After the first onslaught and as darkness fell, those still living made it into a small desert fort, but it was impossible to survive when morning came. During the night, King Baldwin and five knights escaped out a back gate. All of the men left behind were killed in battle, with one exception. Conrad, Duke/Constable of Germany, fought so ferociously outside the little fort that no Fatimids could come near him and survive. At last they offered him generous surrender terms, awed by his courage and skill. He was taken to Egypt and released.

Meanwhile, King Baldwin had a harrowing experience: alone, he tried to escape. A few miles away, he hid in a thicket of reeds, but the Fatimids set it on fire. His horse Gazelle was very fast and by dint of several days’ hiding and riding, they evaded Fatimid patrols. Baldwin tried to get back to Jerusalem, but there were too many enemies. Turning north, he made it to the port city of Arsuf, where he (and Gazelle, surely) collapsed.

In Arsuf, Baldwin was met by his Crusader Count of Tiberias with a small contingent of knights. He heard that the Fatimids were now besieging Jaffa but had not assaulted Jerusalem. Instant, unexpected action might be decisive. English legend has it that Baldwin was given a lift to Jaffa by an English pirate called Godric, who stayed in the Holy Land long enough to reform into St. Godric.

Queen Arda had been left in Jaffa for safekeeping with a tiny reserve force. This was the second time she found herself in this position; the previous year, in the First Battle of Ramla, she had been told that the king was dead. She had been reluctant to surrender, and it paid off: the king turned up the next morning with a small force, reporting that somehow they had won. But it was too much to ask for a second miracle of the same kind. The Fatimid commander found a dead Crusader who looked like Baldwin and began parading the mutilated remains around, calling out that the king was dead. Queen Arda could see no option but to surrender.

Just in time, St. Godric’s boat came into Jaffa harbor from the unexpected north, bearing the king himself. Legend gives him a shining banner that could be seen from afar, and the reinforcements from Tiberias came with him, of course. Small as their forces were, they fought Jaffa free of besiegers and saved the queen.

Somehow, the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem still hung on. As long as the king survived and no cities were actually taken, the Fatimid expedition had been a loss. Baldwin’s escape was not honorable, but his sheer tenacity at surviving alone, with his eventual rescue of Jaffa, restored his honor.

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Caesarea, 1101: Bad Cop, Good Cop

Posted on January 4, 2023 by Ruth

The Crusaders did not yet have a good port, since Antioch was actually inland a bit on the Orontes River. The ports in this area had all been fortified by Greek or Roman founders, so they had serious walls and other defenses. It took years for the Latins to conquer Tyre and Sidon, and they never captured Ascalon. They could use ports like Jaffa and Haifa, but at first they didn’t control them. Most of the ports readily made contracts with the Crusaders to pay tribute, to keep out of trouble. (It was on a friendly visit to the Muslim governor of Caesarea that King Godfrey had suddenly sickened and died.)

King Baldwin I’s forces were at an all-time low. His chaplain, Fulcher, noted that he had about 300 knights at this time. Most of the territory around the isolated Crusader outposts was hostile. On a hunting expedition, Baldwin was injured nearly to death by a small Muslim raiding party. It was just too dangerous for Franks to settle in and think of the “Kingdom of Jerusalem” as their land the way France had been.

Then some ships arrived from Genoa. A Genoese commander whose ships had been dismantled to make siege towers in Jerusalem had sent word home for more sailors and boats. The arrival of the fresh recruits put the Genoese commander back in business as a power broker. Baldwin I made a deal to split the loot for any ports they would conquer by working together.

The small port of Arsuf surrendered within three days, and it was rewarded with generous terms. This was a typical practice of the time, meant to be the “good cop” side of the attackers’ public face. The ruler who surrendered might stay on as part of the administration, and the people’s lives would be relatively undisturbed. But the act only worked when the “bad cop” was shocking even in a time when death was a commonplace.

The next big target was Caesarea, a magnificent port built by the Romans but somewhat gone to seed under Arab use. Its walls were three meters thick, and it had inner walls from even older fortifications. In Herod’s time, it had a palace, temples, an aqueduct and a huge amphitheater, as well as massive governmental office buildings. The Byzantines had filled in some of the harbor to build more city out into the water. Arab Caesarea was a Fatimid-ruled city, like Jerusalem (as opposed to being ruled by a Turkish warlord). The city refused to surrender, since it seemed likely that a Fatimid army could rescue them.

On land, Crusaders used mangonels, a type of catapult, to bombard the city’s wall and rooftops. The Genoese ships blockaded at sea. After three weeks, the city surrendered, but this type of surrender was not rewarded with restraint. Caesarea had to pay for its resistance and the cost of three weeks’ siege. Franks, Normans and Genoese rushed into the city and began looting and killing. The men were killed, the women and children enslaved. Chroniclers wrote about rivers of blood and stinking piles of bodies in the streets.

The wealth of the city was divided among the attackers, who all went home rich. The Genoese recorded that they also found a thousand merchants hiding in the mosque and agreed to let them go in exchange for ransom. They knew their priorities!

The Genoese also found a fancy hexagonal cup made of Egyptian green glass. Perhaps because glassmaking was relatively primitive in Europe, the finders believed the cup was carved from a single emerald that had magic properties. The legend grew: the cup was a gift to Solomon from the Queen of Sheba, and it had then become the cup Jesus used at the Last Supper. They took it home, where it is still housed in honor in a cathedral. Unfortunately, it was later taken by Napoleon, and the glass was broken by the time the French returned it.

The next big port at hand was Acra, or Acre. The good cop stopped in for a confidential chat with its Fatimid governors. You may not believe it, but Acre just surrendered.

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First Crusader Loss: Melitene, 1100

Posted on January 4, 2023 by Ruth

n 1100, Bohemund Prince of Antioch was called on to fulfill his feudal vows and help protect a northern part of Armenian Cilicia. A tribe of Turks called the Danishmends (after their leader, whose name “Danishmend” in Persian means “wise man”) who lived north of the Armenians were pushing southward. They were attacking the town of Melitene, ruled by an Armenian named Gabriel. We know Gabriel was part of the Armenian-Crusader network because in 1101, the new Count Baldwin II of Edessa married his daughter Morphia. But for now, Gabriel and Morphia were in danger.

Bohemund left Antioch in the hands of his nephew, Tancred Prince of Galilee, and collected knights with his cousin, Richard of Salerno. Bohemund, Tancred, and Richard were all Normans whose fathers had conquered and settled in Sicily and southern Italy. It’s said that Richard and Tancred could speak some Arabic, certainly a plus in ruling Antioch.

The Danishmend ruler Ghazi had met the Crusaders once before, while they were crossing Anatolia. He didn’t intend to lose this time. His men ambushed the Normans as they went north across unfamiliar ground, and many Crusaders were killed. Bohemund and his cousin Richard, though, were captured alive. Ghazi personally kept Bohemund for ransom, but he sold Richard to Emperor Alexios I Comnenos. Now two Crusader enemies had valuable hostages.

Having Bohemund, a leading prince, captured alive by barbarians was humiliating, and it also signaled to the surrounding Turkish emirs and beys that if they were a bit more clever, they too could win battles with the Franks. The Crusaders seemed invincible when they first arrived, but now their numbers were badly reduced. The hostage-taking also tested the unity and resources of the Crusaders. If they couldn’t come up with the sum that Ghazi and Alexios were demanding, just how rich were they? And if they didn’t have the unified will to ransom some of their top commanders, how much of a “state” were they? If they were as disunified as the Turkish rulers, they could be picked off one by one, or tempted into alliances against each other.

Bohemund and Richard were finally ransomed and released in 1103, but for the next set of stories, they should be considered sidelined. Bohemund might have been held in a yurt, for all we know; I like to picture him there. Did he learn some Turkish over the course of three years? I hope so. And while they were both released, it didn’t end happily for Gabriel, Baldwin II’s Armenian father-in-law. He was killed by the Danishmends while trying to negotiate the ransom payments.

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