The Fourth Crusade
The Fourth Crusade is undoubtedly the most ignominious of all Crusades – this one never even made it to the Holy Lands.

In August 1198, Pope Innocent III ordered a new Crusade. The Pope fancied the Church the true leader of the Crusades, and that should have been true if he weren’t widely ignored. France and England was busy with the 100 year war, and while the Pope had set March 1199 as the date of the Crusade, it wasn’t until November 1199 that something resembling an army got together. These Crusaders gathered at Venice, and being (once again) the splintered and squabbling force they always were, the Pope quickly lost control of what the Crusaders were supposed to be doing. The Venetians now saw a chance to manipulate the Crusaders for their own economic and political gains.

In 1200, Venice was the richest city in Europe, due to its trading links with the Islamic Empire and throughout the Mediterranean. It was also on poor terms with the Byzantine Empire. When the Crusaders arrived, the Doge (ruler) of Venice negotiated with the French and decided the Crusaders will be sent to the Holy Land on Venetian ships, thus eliminating the long and excruciating overland march. Unfortunately, the Crusaders lacked the money for the service – the Pope had to impose a highly unpopular income tax to raise the money in the first place, and now it wasn’t even enough to get the Crusaders to Palestine.

The Venetians decided the Crusaders can sack the Christian city of Zara for payment – the city had been lost for 15 years to the Byzantine Empire. The Crusaders had no choice but to comply – they had already run up enormous bills during their stay in Venice. At the same time, an exiled prince, Alexius IV, arrived in Venice from the Byzantine Empire, seeking help in overthrowing the current Byzantine Emperor on the throne. He promised the Crusaders money to pay for the ships – and promised the Venetians trading and political benefits should he be placed on the Byzantine throne.

And so, that was how the Crusaders became consumed by greed. They first sacked Zara, which caused Pope Innocent III to excommunicate all of them. That was unfortunate for the Crusaders, but it also gave them even more reason to attack Constantinople, since as religious status went, things couldn’t get any worse. In 1203, the Crusaders jointly attacked Constantinople with the Venetians, sacking the city and restoring Alexius IV to the Byzantine throne. However, Alexius IV had difficulty in paying off the Venetians AND the Crusaders, and the poor behaviour of the Crusaders in Constantinople (looting, raping and a burning of a mosque which also torched half the city) irritated the locals. Soon, the locals rebelled, which gave the Crusaders reason to attack the city and make off with everything of value. It was the worst looting Constantinople had ever experienced. Constantinople was the richest Christian city in the world as it was once the stronghold of the Eastern Roman Empire, and now it had been crippled by the Crusaders so badly it would never recover. It later fell to the Ottoman Empire which turned it into one of the greatest Muslim cities.

 

Legacy of the Fourth Crusade
After the sacking of Constantinople, the Crusaders returned home with their booty, persuading even the Pope to revoke their excommunicated status. Not a single thought of the Holy Land passed through the minds of these Crusaders.

The Fourth Crusade showcased a turning point in the history of Christian Europe. With the riches previously looted from the Islamic Empire and now the Byzantine Empire, the Crusaders were clearly now more interested in booty than they were in Holy Wars. One could defend the Fourth Crusade on the grounds that it was a victory for the Latin Papacy – if you believe the Crusades were Christianity’s gallant defense against the spread of Islam in the first place. This may have been true of the First Crusade, but not any of the subsequent ones. The pure travesty of the Fourth Crusade proved what the Crusades essentially were – a sham wrapped in layers of religious pretensions. The Crusaders (and Venetians) who attacked Constantinople knew exactly what they were doing – they were doing it for money and greed. This will become the main motivating factor for all later Crusades.

 

To Be Continued…

The Third Crusade
In 1174, a Kurdish Muslim by the name of Salah Ad-Din Yusuf Ibn Ayyub came to power in Egypt as Sultan, after the death of his lord, Nureddin. This man, an excellent military commander with considerable administrative and diplomatic talents, soon expanded his territory into Syria, northern Mesopotamia and Palestine. By 1186, all these areas were under his banner. By 1187, the man who became known to the world as Saladin had successfully attacked and defeated Jerusalem, prompting Pope Gregory VIII to issue a call for the Third Crusade in the same year.

 

 

The call was answered by Richard the Lionhearted of England (first English Crusaders), Philip II of France, and Frederick Barbarossa of Germany. Barbarossa’s expedition got off on an inauspicious start; his army watched him drown in the river Saleph on his way to Jerusalem. Perhaps the 70 year-old Barbarossa should have been more careful. The German army was the largest Crusader army, and with the death of Barbarossa they disintegrated, some returning home and some joining the other Crusaders. Once again, the Crusaders arrived in the Holy Lands a fragmented and bickering bunch.

Of all the Crusader kings, Richard the Lion-hearted stood out. He was a good field commander and had some mild chivalrous qualities, even though the concept of chivalry didn’t exist in Europe at the time (it was an Arab invention). He was not a generous man, though. Nevertheless, his prowess in battle meant that Saladin, with many chivalrous qualities of his own, considered him a worthy opponent.

The Crusaders first attacked Acre in 1191, which eventually surrendered after a long siege. However, the Crusaders immediately broke into argument after the capture of the city, causing Duke Leopold of Germany (now in charge of the German Crusade) to leave the Crusaders in anger, and Philip II to return to France due to poor health. Richard was now in charge of the Crusade, and his immediate demands to the city of Acre and to Saladin was to give over two thousand prisoners, to return the True Cross, and to pay two hundred thousand gold piece. Saladin had the first two, but not the latter, but he was honour bound to fulfill the duty and so went about it as quickly as he could. When proceedings were too slow, Richard executed 2700 Muslim men, women and children outside the city walls of Acre as payback.

Richard decided to march south, and showed signs of being the first Crusader king with a clue. Not only did he keep close to the shoreline to enable food and water supplies, but he forbade his knights to be lured away into ambushes by Turkish light cavalry. This ensured he was able to fight off continual attacks, and eventually captured Arsuf and Jaffar. However, disaster at home struck. Richard finds that his brother John was plotting against his claim to the throne with Philip II of France, and ended up having to forge a 3-year treaty with Saladin so he can return home and put things back into order. While travelling back to England, he was captured by Duke Leopold in revenge, and was only ransomed after 2 years. He died when he was 41. Saladin died a year after he signed the peace treaty with Richard.

 

 

Richard the Lion-heart came to be known as one of the greatest Crusader kings (though I believe that title should go to Frederick II of Germany), and the Third Crusade also gained some territory for the Frankish kingdoms. However, it was still a failure by the terms of the Crusades as it failed to capture Jerusalem. If Richard had a larger force he would have been able to do it, since at the start of the Crusade, Saladin was already aged and was not in his top form. However, a more lasting legacy of the Third Crusade is probably the figure of Saladin, who was one of the very few Arabs to be thought of in such a positive light by both Crusaders and Muslims.

 

To Be Continued…

Bernard of Clairvaux
But first, The Second Crusade. Which was an ignoble failure, by the way. Not only did it fail to make any significant gains in territory for the Frankish kingdoms, but it was also tarred by sordid rumours about the shenanigans of the nobles who led the army.

The Second Crusade began in 1145, when Pope Eugenius III issued a papal bull authorising a new crusade. This was in response to the loss of Edessa, the Frankish kingdom established in the First Crusade, to Turkish troops in December 1144. However, his call was widely ignored by the French and German nobles, until an influential Cistercian monk known as Bernard of Clairvaux began to preach to the people, encouraging them to participate in The Second Crusade. 50,000 answered the call to “take on the cross” (and also the remission of sins), most prominently Louis VII of France, his wife Eleanor of Aquitane, and Conrad III of Germany. The Second Crusade was born.

And yet, it seemed the Crusaders hadn’t learnt much from the First Crusade, even though they were well aware of why it failed. The Second Crusade was fragmented like the first one. Not only did The French and German Crusader kings hate each other; they were also under-supplied and continually ambushed all the way to Antioch (a city captured in the First Crusade). Upon their arrival in Antoich, they were sucked into the factionalism and ambitions of the various Christian lords already there, and ended up attempting an ill-fated siege of Damascus. Trouble was, Damascus was a politically neutral Muslim city which had forged a peace treaty with Jerusalem. Being a powerful city with some powerful friends, they were able to send for help from neighbouring Muslim states. Due to poor tactics, the Crusader army had to retreat within a week. They returned to Europe with their numbers depleted and humiliated. To top it all off, Eleanor of Aquitane (wife of Louis VII), was rumoured to have had a torrid affair with Raymond of Toulous, the ruler of Antioch (also her uncle).

The Second Crusade tarnished the reputation of Bernard of Clairvaux, it’s instigator, for the final few years of his life. However, he was more successful in another venture of his: the establishment of the Knights Templar in 1118 AD.

 

Knights Templar
The First Crusade created an image that was new to Europe – that of the fighting monk. Can Men of God kill others in his name? Apparently so, as the Knights Templar were as aggressive as they were enterprising. A Cistercian military order who answered only to the Pope, they were originally created to make the routes to the Holy Lands safe for Christian Pilgrims. However, they soon expanded into trading with the Islamic Empire, and their numbers swelled along with their wealth. This was eventually to lead to their downfall.

The Knights Templar has often been accredited with the invention of the Banking System, namely the concept of the note of credit. This is not true. Paper money had existed in China since the 9th Century AD, and banks were already in existence across China, India and the Islamic Empire in 10th Century AD. By the time of the First Crusade, a letter of credit can be drawn up in Islamic Spain, then later cashed in India along the Silk Road. What the Knights Templar did was merely extend this system into Europe, along with all the luxuries from the Silk Road, unseen before by the European nobles.

Unfortunately, there was never enough gold in Europe to pay for all the luxury items the Knights Templar traded, and soon many nobles had run up enormous debts. The Knights Templar also became tremendously wealthy and influential, and as resentment grew among the European kings, they schemed to destroy the organisation. They succeeded in 1307, when the French Crown accused the Knights Templar of heresy. The result was the persecution of the order and its annihilation in 1314.

However, similar organisations such as the Hospitalers and Teutonic Knights soon filled the void left by the Knights Templar. And this time the monarchs of Europe ensured that they were under the control of the kings rather than the Pope or the order’s leader.

 

To Be Continued…

NB. The Arabs and Turks called all Europeans “Franks”, while to the Crusader States, all Muslims were “Saracens”.

 

The Crusades (Part 3)
First, The Crusader Army took Nicaea (capital of Seljuk sultan, Qilij Arslan), and returned it to the Byzantine Empire; since they have promised to return captured Byzantine lands back to their owners from the Turks. Next, Edessa was practically given to them in 1096, as it was still under Byzantine rule (despite being in Muslim Seljuk territory) and was ruled by a childless and aged Armenian, Toros. This established the first Frankish kingdom which was to hold until 1144.

As The Crusaders marched on, the local population fled the towns before they arrived. Others gave them food or looked the other way so they would just keep marching and not sack their towns and cities. Next, The Crusaders arrived at Antioch, one of those cities with a Christian population, and attempted to siege it. That proved quite difficult as Antioch itself covered 25 miles, was well defended with 400 towers and had a strong citadel. It took 9 months and a traitor from within before Antioch fell, and all the Turkish inhabitants were slaughtered by The Crusaders in their zeal – including the Christians. Attacks from other Muslim states soon followed, but the crusaders were able to fend them off, creating the second Frankish kingdom. The city was recaptured by the Muslims in 1268.

 

 

And finally, the real aim of the Crusades: Jerusalem. In July 1099, parts of the now-fragmented Crusader Army arrived at Jerusalem, and began an ill-organised siege that only saw fruition when The Crusaders managed to scrounge enough wood to build catapults. The north wall of the city was breached after 7 days, and when the defenders saw the city walls have fallen, they fled to the Dome of the Rock and surrendered. Only the lord of the city, Iftikhar, was able to bribe his way out safely.

What happened next was a stain on Crusader history. The entire city was slaughtered – Muslims and Jews, men and women, young and old were shown no mercy. When the violence ended 3 days later, The Crusaders were knee-deep in bodies, blood and entrails, as some of The Crusaders also believed that Arabs swallowed their gold when they were fleeing from attackers. Holy places, including the Dome of the Rock, was sacked for their gold and riches. Afterwards, The Crusaders decided to choose their king, and Godfrey of Bouillon was elected as ruler. He died a year later, and was succeeded by a series of rather ineffectual “Kings of Jerusalem” (which included a leper), until the city was recaptured by the Muslims in 1187.

Theoretically speaking, most of The Crusaders went home after the capture of Jerusalem, and the First Crusade was officially over. However, the truth was that many Crusaders stayed behind, lured by the wealth they found in the Islamic cities which was unmatched in Europe at the time. When this booty was brought back to the Christian kingdoms, it only fanned the greed of minor nobles that later ended up preying on Muslim trade caravans as they travelled the trade routes (The most notorious of whom was Reginald of Chatillon). This was to continue until the rise of a famous Islamic leader, general and chivalrous warrior: Saladin.

 

To Be Continued…