Chapter XII: Front Matter (12)

The _First Crusade_, far more than any other, became the theme of a
multitude of writings, whose different degrees of value it is
all-important to distinguish. Until about 1840 the authority followed
for its history was naturally the great work of William of Tyre. For
the First Crusade William had followed Albert of Aix; and he had
consequently depicted Peter the Hermit as the prime mover in the
Crusade. But about 1840 Ranke suggested, and von Sybel in his
_Geschichte des ersten Kreuzzuges_ proved, that Albert of Aix was
_not_ a good authority, and that consequently William of Tyre must be
set aside for the history of the First Crusade, and other and more
contemporary authorities used. In writing his account of the First
Crusade, von Sybel accordingly based himself on the three contemporary
Western authorities--the _Gesta Francorum_, Raymond of Agiles, and
Fulcher. His view of the value of Albert of Aix, and his account of
the First Crusade, have been generally followed (Kugler alone having
attempted, to some extent, to rehabilitate Albert of Aix); and thus
von Sybel's work may be said to mark a revolution in the history of
the First Crusade, when its legendary features were stripped away, and
its real progress was first properly discovered.

Taking the Western authorities for the First Crusade separately, one
may divide them, in the light of von Sybel's work, into four
kinds--the accounts of eye-witnesses; later compilations based on
these accounts; semi-legendary and legendary narratives; and lastly,
in a class by itself, the "History" of William of Tyre, who is rather
a scientific historian than a chronicler.

(a) The three chief eye-witnesses are the anonymous author of the
_Gesta Francorum_, Raymund of Agiles, and Fulcher. The anonymous
author of the _Gesta_ (see Hagenmeyer's edition, Heidelberg, 1890) was
a Norman of South Italy, who followed Bohemund, and accordingly
depicts the progress of the First Crusade from a Norman point of view.
He was a layman, marching and fighting in the ranks; and thus he is
additionally valuable as representing the opinion of the ordinary
crusader. Finally he was an eye-witness throughout, and absolutely
contemporary, in the sense that he wrote his account of each great
event practically at the time of the event. He is the primary
authority for the First Crusade. Raymund of Agiles, a Provencal clerk
and a follower of Raymund of Toulouse, writes his _Historia Francorum
qui ceperunt Jerusalem_ from the Provencal point of view. He gives an
ecclesiastic's account of the First Crusade, and is specially full on
the spiritualistic phenomena which accompanied and followed the
finding of the Holy Lance. His book might almost be called the
"Visions of Peter Bartholomew and others," and it is written in the
plain matter-of-fact manner of Defoe's narratives. He too was an
eye-witness throughout, and thoroughly honest; and his account ranks
second to the _Gesta_. Fulcher of Chartres originally followed Robert
of Normandy, but in October 1097 he joined Baldwin of Lorraine in his
expedition to Edessa, and afterwards followed his fortunes. His
_Historia Hierosolymitana_, which extends to 1127, and embraces not
only the history of the First Crusade, but also that of the foundation
of the kingdom of Jerusalem, is written on the whole from a
Lotharingian point of view, and is thus a natural complement to the
accounts of the Anonymus and Raymund. His account of the First Crusade
itself is poor (he was absent at Edessa during its course), but
otherwise he is an excellent authority. A kindly old pedant, Fulcher
interlards his history with much discourse on geography, zoology and
sacred history. Besides these three chief eye-witnesses we may also
mention the _Annales Genuenses_ by the Genoese consul Caffarus,[64]
and the _Annales Pisani_ of Bernardus Marago, useful as giving the
mercantile and Italian side of the Crusade; the _Hierosolymita_ of
Ekkehard, the German abbot of Aura, who first came to Jerusalem about
1101 (partly based on the _Gesta_, but also of independent value: see
Hagenmeyer's edition, Tubingen, 1877); and Raoul of Caen's _Gesta
Tancredi_, composed on the basis of information supplied by Tancred
himself. The last two works, if not actually the works of
eye-witnesses, are at any rate first-hand, and belong to the category
of primary writers rather than to that of later compilations. Finally,
to contemporary writers we may add contemporary letters, especially
those written by Stephen of Blois and Anselm of Ribemont, and the
three letters sent to the West by the crusading princes during the
First Crusade (see Hagenmeyer, _Epistulae et Chartae_, &c., Innsbruck,
1901).[65]

(b) The later compilations are chiefly based on the _Gesta_, whose
uncouth style many writers set themselves to mend. In the first place,
there is the _Historia de Hierosolymitano itinere_ of Tudebod, which
according to Besly, writing in 1641, is the original from which the
_Gesta_ was a mere plagiarism--an absolute inversion of the truth, as
von Sybel first proved two centuries later. Secondly, besides the
plagiarist Tudebod, there are the artistic _redacteurs_ of the
_Gesta_, who confess their indebtedness, but plead the bad style of
their original--Guibert of Nogent, Balderich of Dol, Robert of Reims
(all c. 1120-1130), and Fulco, the author of a Virgilian poem on the
Crusades, continued by Gilo (_ob. c._ 1142). Of these, the monk Robert
was more popular in the middle ages than either the pompous abbot
Guibert or the quiet garden-loving archbishop of Dol.

(c) The growth of a legend, or perhaps better, a saga of the First
Crusade began, according to von Sybel, even during the Crusade itself.
The basis of this growth is partly the story-telling instinct innate
in all men, which loves to heighten an effect, sharpen a point or
increase a contrast--the instinct which breathes in Icelandic sagas
like that of _Burnt Njal_; partly the instinct of idolization, if it
may be so called, which leads to the perversion into impossible
greatness of an approved character, and has created, in this instance,
the legendary figures of Peter the Hermit and Godfrey of Bouillon
(qq.v.); partly the religious impulse, which counted nothing wonderful
in a holy war, and imported miraculous elements even into the sober
pages of the _Gesta_. These instincts and impulses would be at work
already among the soldiers during the Crusade, producing a saga all
the more readily, as there were poets in the camp; for we know that a
certain Richard, who joined the First Crusade, sang its exploits in
verse, while still more famous is the princely troubadour, William of
Aquitaine, who joined the Crusade of 1100. If we are to follow von
Sybel rather than Kugler, this saga of the First Crusade found one of
its earliest expressions (c. 1120) in the prose work of Albert of Aix
(_Historia Hierosolymitana_)--genuine saga in its inconsistencies,
its errors of chronology and topography, its poetical colour, and its
living descriptions of battles. Kugler, however, regards Albert as a
copyist, somewhat in the manner of Tudebod, of an unknown writer of
value, who belonged to the Lotharingian ranks during the Crusade, and
settled in the kingdom of Jerusalem afterwards (see Kugler, _Albert
von Aachen_, Stuttgart, 1885).[66] In the _Chanson des chetifs_ and
the _Chanson d'Antioche_ the legend of the Crusades more certainly
finds its expression. The former, composed at Antioch about 1130,
contained an idolization of the Hermit: the latter is a poem written
about 1180 by Graindor of Douai, who used as his basis the verses of
the crusader Richard (see the edition of P. Paris, 1848). It shows the
growth of the legend that Graindor regards the vision of the Hermit as
responsible for the Crusade, and makes the Crusade led by him precede,
and indeed occasion by its failure, the meeting at Clermont (which is
dated in May instead of November). Into the legendary overgrowth of
the First Crusade we cannot here enter any further[67]; but it is
perhaps worth while to mention that the French legend of the Third
Crusade equally perverted the truth, making Richard I. return home in
disgrace, while Philip Augustus stays, captures Damascus and mortally
wounds Saladin (cf. G. Paris, _L'Estoire de la guerre sainte_, Paris,
1897; Introduction).

(d) William of Tyre is the scientific historian and rationalizer,
weaving into a harmonious account, which was followed by historians
for centuries, the sober accounts of eye-witnesses and the picturesque
details of the saga--with somewhat of a bias towards the latter in
regard to the First Crusade. He was a native of Palestine, born about
1130, and educated in the West. On his return he was happy in winning
the good opinion of Amalric I.; he was made first canon and then
archdeacon of Tyre, and tutor of the future Baldwin IV. (1170); while
on Baldwin's accession he became chancellor of the kingdom and
archbishop of Tyre (1174-1175). He was a man often employed on
missions and negotiations, and as chancellor he had in his care the
archives of the kingdom. His temper was naturally that of a trimmer;
and he had thus many qualifications for the writing of well-informed
and unbiassed history. He knew Greek and Arabic; and he was well
acquainted with the affairs of Constantinople, to which he went at
least twice on political business, and with the history of the
Mahommedan powers, on which he had written a work (now lost) at the
command of Amalric. It was Amalric also who set him to write the
history of the Crusades which we still possess (in twenty-two books,
with a fragment of a twenty-third)--the _Historia rerum in partibus
transmarinis gestarum_. He wrote the book at different times between
1170 and 1183, when it abruptly ends, and its author as abruptly
disappears from sight. The book falls into two parts, the first (books
i.-xv.) derivative, the second (books xvi.-xxiii.) original. In the
second part he had his own knowledge of events and the information of
his contemporaries as his source: in the first he used the same
authorities which we still possess--the _Gesta_, Fulcher, and Albert
of Aix--in somewhat of an eclectic spirit, choosing now here, now
there, according as he could best weave a pleasant narrative, but not
according to any real critical principle. His book thus begins to be a
real authority only from the date of the Second Crusade onwards; but
the perfection of his form (for he is one of the greatest stylists of
the middle ages) and the prestige of his position conspired to make
his book the one authority for the whole history of the first century
of the Crusades. Nor was he (apart from his reception of legendary
elements into his narrative) unworthy of the honour in which he was
held; for he is really a great historian, in the form of his matter
and in his conception of his subject--diligent, impartial,
well-informed and interesting, if somewhat rhetorical in style and
vague in chronology.

[During the middle ages his work was current in a French translation,
known as the _Chronique d'outre-mer_, or the _Livre_ or _Roman
d'Eracles_ (so called from the reference at the beginning to the
emperor Heraclius). This translation also contained a continuation by
various hands down to 1277; while besides the continuation embedded in
the _Livre d'Eracles_, there are separate continuations, of the nature
of independent works, by Ernoul and Bernard the Treasurer. These
latter cover the period from 1183 to 1228; and of the two Ernoul's
account seems primary, while that of Bernard is in large part a mere
copy of Ernoul. But the whole subject of the continuators of William
of Tyre is dubious.]

To the Western authorities for the First Crusade must be added the
Eastern--Byzantine, Arabic and Armenian. Of these the Byzantine
authority, the _Alexiad_ of Anna Comnena, is most important, partly
from the position of the authoress, partly from the many points of
contact between the Byzantine empire and the crusaders. Anna's
narrative both furnishes a useful corrective of the prejudiced
Western accounts of Alexius, and serves to bring Bohemund forward into
his proper prominence. The Armenian view of the First Crusade and of
Baldwin's principality of Edessa is presented in the _Armenian
Chronicle_ of Matthew of Edessa. There is little in Arabic bearing on
the First Crusade: the Arabic authorities only begin to be of value
with the rise of the atabegs of Mosul (c. 1127). But Kemal-ud-din's
_History of Aleppo_ (composed in the 13th century) contains some
details on the history of the First Crusade; and the _Vie d'Ousama_
(the autobiography of a sheik at Caesarea in northern Syria, edited
and paraphrased by Derenbourg in the _Publications de l'Ecole des
langues orientales vivantes_) presents the point of view of an Arab
whose life covered the first century of the Crusades (1095-1188).

For the _Second Crusade_ the primary authority in the West is the work
of Odo de Deuil, _De profectione Ludovici VII regis Francorum in
Orientem_. Odo was a monk attached by Suger to Louis VII. during the
Second Crusade; and he wrote home to Suger during the Crusade seven
short letters, afterwards pieced together in a single work. The _Gesta
Friderici Primi_ of Otto of Freising (who joined in the Second
Crusade) gives some details from the German point of view (i. c. 44
sqq.). The former is supplemented by the letters of Louis VII. to
Suger; the latter by the letters of Conrad III. to Wibald, abbot of
Stablo and Corvey. The Byzantine point of view is presented in the
[Greek: 'Epitome] of Cinnamus, the private secretary of Manuel, who
continued the _Alexiad_ of Anna Comnena in a work describing the
reigns of John and Manuel. It is from the Second Crusade that William
of Tyre, representing the attitude of the Franks of Jerusalem, begins
to be a primary authority; while on the Mahommedan side a considerable
authority emerges in Ibn Athir. His history of the Atabegs was written
about 1200, and it presents in a light favourable to Zengi and
Nureddin, but unfavourable to Saladin (who thrust Nureddin's
descendants aside), the history of the great Mahommedan power which
finally crushed the kingdom of Jerusalem.[68]

Side by side with Beha-ud-din's life of Saladin, Ibn Athir's work is
the most considerable historical record written by the Arabs.
Generally speaking the Arabic writings are late in point of date, and
cold and jejune in style; while it must also be remembered that they
are set religious works written to defend Islam. On the other hand
they are generally written by men of affairs--governors, secretaries
or ambassadors; and a fatalistic temper leads their authors to a
certain impartial recording of everything, good or evil, which seems
of moment.

The _Third Crusade_ was narrated in the West from very different
points of view by Anglo-Norman, French and German authorities. The
primary Anglo-Norman authority is the _Carmen Ambrosii_, or, as it is
called by M. Gaston Paris, _L'Estoire de la guerre sainte_. This is an
octosyllabic poem in French verse, written by Ambroise, a Norman
_trouvere_ who followed Richard I. to the Holy Land. The poem first
came to be known by scholars about 1873, and has been edited by M.
Gaston Paris (Paris, 1897). The _Itinerarium Peregrinorum_, a work in
ornate Latin prose, is (except for the first book) a translation of
the _Carmen_ masquerading under the guise of an independent work.
There seems no doubt that it is a piece of plagiary, and that its
writer, Richard, "canon of the Holy Trinity" in London, stands to the
_Carmen_ as Tudebod to the _Gesta_, or Albert of Aix to his supposed
original. The Third Crusade is also described from the English point
of view by all contemporary writers of history in England, e.g. Ralph
of Coggeshall, who used information gained from crusaders, and William
of Newburgh, who had access to a work by Richard I.'s chaplain Anselm,
which is now lost.[69] The French side is presented in Rigord's _Gesta
Philippi Augusti_ and in the _Gesta_ (an abridgment and continuation
of Rigord) and the _Philippeis_ of William the Breton. The two French
writers represent Richard as a faithless vassal: in the German
writers--Tagino, dean of Passau, who wrote a _Descriptio_ of
Barbarossa's Crusade (1189-1190); and Ansbert, an Austrian clerk, who
wrote _De expeditione Friderici Imperatoris_ (1187-1196)--Richard
appears rather as a monster of pride and arrogance. From the Arabic
point of view the life of Richard's rival, Saladin, is described by
Beha-ud-din, a high official under Saladin, who writes a panegyric on
his master, somewhat confused in chronology and partial in its
sympathies, but nevertheless of great value. The various continuations
of William of Tyre above mentioned represent the opinion of the native
Franks (which is hostile to Richard I.); while in Nicetas, who wrote a
history of the Eastern empire from 1118 to 1206, we have a Byzantine
authority who, as Professor Bury remarks, "differs from Anna and
Cinnamus in his tone towards the crusaders, to whom he is surprisingly
fair."

For the _Fourth Crusade_ the primary authority is Villehardouin's _La
Conquete de Constantinople_, an official apology for the diversion of
the Crusade written by one of its leaders, and concealing the arcana
under an appearance of frank naivete. His work is usefully
supplemented by the narrative (_La Prise de Constantinople_) of
Robert de Clary, a knight from Picardy, who presents the non-official
view of the Crusade, as it appeared to an ordinary soldier. The
[Greek: Chronikon ton en Rhomania] (composed in Greek verse some time
after 1300, apparently by an author of mixed Frankish and Greek
parentage, and translated into French at an early date under the title
"The Book of the Conquest of Constantinople and the Empire of
Rumania") narrates in a prologue the events of the Fourth (as indeed
also of the First) Crusade. The _Chronicle of the Morea_ (as this work
is generally called) is written from the Frankish point of view, in
spite of its Greek verse; and the Byzantine point of view must be
sought in Nicetas.[70]

The history of the later Crusades, from the Fifth to the Eighth,
enters into the continuations of William of Tyre above mentioned;
while the _Historia orientalis_ of Jacques de Vitry, who had taken
part in the Fifth Crusade, and died in 1240, embraces the history of
events till 1218 (the third book being a later addition). The _Secreta
fidelium Crucis_ of Marino Sanudo, a history of the Crusades written
by a Venetian noble between 1306 and 1321, is also of value,
particularly for the Crusade of Frederick II. The minor authorities
for the Fifth Crusade have been collected by Rohricht, in the
publications of the Societe de l'Orient Latin for 1879 and 1882; the
ten valuable letters of Oliver, bishop of Paderborn, and the _Historia
Damiettina_, based on these letters, have also been edited by Rohricht
in the _Westdeutsche Zeitschrift fur Geschichte und Kunst_ (1891). The
Sixth Crusade, that of Frederick II., is described in the chronicle of
Richard of San Germano, a notary of the emperor, and in other Western
authorities, e.g. Roger of Wendover. For the Crusades of St Louis the
chief authorities are Joinville's life of his master (whom he
accompanied to Egypt on the Seventh Crusade), and de Nangis' _Gesta
Ludovici regis_. Several works were written on the capture of Acre in
1291, especially the _Excidium urbis Acconensis_, a treatise which
emerges to throw light, after many years of darkness, on the last
hours of the kingdom. The Oriental point of view for the 13th century
appears in Jelaleddin's history of the Ayyubite sultans of Egypt,
written towards the end of the 13th century; in Maqrizi's history of
Egypt, written in the middle of the 15th century; and in the
compendium of the history of the human race by Abulfeda (+1332); while
the omniscient Abulfaragius (whom Rey calls the Eastern St Thomas)
wrote, in the latter half of the 13th century, a chronicle of
universal history in Syriac, which he also issued, in an Arabic
recension, as a _Compendious History of the Dynasties_.

II. The documents bearing on the history of the Crusades and the Latin
kingdom of Jerusalem are various. Under the head of charters come the
_Regesta regni Hierosolymitani_, published by Rohricht, Innsbruck,
1893 (with an Additamentum in 1904); the _Cartulaire generale des
Hospitaliers_, by Delaville Leroulx (Paris, 1894 onwards); and the
_Cartulaire de l'eglise du St Sepulcre_, by de Roziere (Paris, 1849).
Under the head of laws come the assizes of the Kingdom, edited by
Beugnot in the _Recueil des historiens des croisades_; and the assizes
of Antioch, printed at Venice in 1876. G. Schlumberger has written on
the coins and seals of the Latin East in various publications; while
Rey has written an _Etude sur les monuments de l'architecture
militaire_ (Paris, 1871). The genealogy of the Levant is given in _Le
Livre des lignages d'outre-mer_ (published along with the assizes).

BIBLIOGRAPHIES.--The best modern account of the original authorities
for the Crusades is that of A. Molinier, _Les Sources de l'histoire de
France_, vols. ii. and iii. W. Wattenbach's _Deutschlands
Geschichtsquellen_ gives an account of Albert of Aix (vol. ii., ed.
1894, pp. 170-180) and of Ekkehard of Aura (ibid. pp. 189-198). Von
Sybel's _Geschichte des ersten Kreuzzuges_ contains a full study of
the authorities for the First Crusade; while the prefaces to
Hagenmeyer's editions of the _Gesta_ and of Ekkehard are also
valuable. Gaston Dodu, in the work mentioned below, begins by a brief
account of the original authorities, which is chiefly of value so far
as it deals with William of Tyre and the history of the assizes; and
H. Prutz has also a short account of some of the historians of the
Crusades (_Kulturgeschichte_, pp. 453-469). Finally reference may be
made to the works of Kugler and Klimke above mentioned, and to J. F.
Michaud's _Bibliographie des croisades_ (Paris, 1822).

_Modern Writers._--The various works of R. Rohricht present the
soundest, if not the brightest, account of the Crusades. There is a
_Geschichte des ersten Kreuzzugs_ (Innsbruck, 1901), a _Geschichte des
Konigreichs Jerusalem_ (ibid. 1898) and a _Geschichte der Kreuzzuge in
Umris_ (ibid. 1898). For the First Crusade von Sybel's work and
Chalandon's _Alexis I^er Comnene_ may also be mentioned; for the
Fourth A. Luchaire's volume on _Innocent III: La Question d'Orient_;
while for the whole of the Crusades Norden's _Papstum und Byzanz_ is
of value. B. Kugler's _Geschichte der Kreuzzuge_ (in Oncken's series)
still remains a suggestive and valuable work; and L. Brehier's
_L'Eglise et l'orient au moyen age_ (Paris, 1907) contains not only an
up-to-date account of the Crusades, but also a full and useful
bibliography, which should be consulted for fuller information. On
points of chronology, and on the relations between the crusaders and
their Mahommedan neighbours, W. B. Stevenson's _The Crusaders in the
East_ (Cambridge, 1907) is very valuable. On the constitutional and
social history of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem Dodu's _Histoire des
institutions du royaume latin de Jerusalem_ is very useful; E. G.
Rey's _Les Colonies franques en Syrie_ contains many interesting
details; and Prutz's _Kulturgeschichte der Kreuzzuge_ contains both an
account of the Latin East and an attempt to sketch the effects of the
Crusades on the progress of civilization. The works of Gmelin and J.
Delaville-Leroulx on the Templars and Hospitallers respectively are
worth consulting; while for Eastern affairs the English reader may be
referred to G. Lestrange's _Palestine under the Moslem_, and to
Stanley Lane-Poole's _Life of Saladin_ and his _Mahommedan Dynasties_
(the latter a valuable work of reference). (E. Br.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Fulcher of Chartres, 1, i. For what follows, with regard to the
Church's conversion of _guerra_ into the Holy War, cf. especially the
passage--"Procedant contra infideles ad pugnam jam incipi dignam ...
qui abusive _privatum certamen_ contra fideles consuescebant
distendere quondam."

[2] Tradition credits a pope still earlier than Gregory VII. with the
idea of a crusade. Silvester II. is said to have preached a general
expedition for the recovery of Jerusalem; and the same preaching is
attributed to Sergius IV. in 1011. But the supposed letter of
Silvester is a later forgery; and in 1000 the way of the Christian to
Jerusalem was still free and open.

[3] The comte de Riant impugned the authenticity of Alexius' letter
to the count of Flanders. It is very probable that the versions of
this letter which we possess, and which are to be found only in later
writings like Guibert de Nogent, are apocryphal; Alexius can hardly
have held out the bait of the beauty of Greek women, or have written
that he preferred to fall under the yoke of the Latins rather than
that of the Turks. But it is also probable that these apocryphal
versions are based on a genuine original.

[4] Ekkehard, _Chronica_, p. 213.

[5] The _Chanson de Roland_, which cannot be posterior to the First
Crusade--for the poem never alludes to it--already contains the idea
of the Holy War against Islam. The idea of the crusade had thus
already ripened in French poetry, before Urban preached his sermon.

[6] Book i. c. iii. (in Muratori, _S.R.I._, v. 550).

[7] Ekkehard, _Chronica_, 214.

[8] Later legend ascribed the origin of the First Crusade to the
preaching of Peter the Hermit. The legend has been followed by modern
historians; but in point of fact Peter is a figure of secondary
importance.(See PETER THE HERMIT.)

[9] Godfrey's army numbered some 30,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry
(Rohricht, _Erst. Kreuzz._ 61): Urban II. reckons Bohemund's knights
as 7000 in number (_ibid._ 71, n. 7).

[10] The Genoese had been invited by Urban II. in September 1096 "to
go with their gallies to Eastern parts in order to set free the path
to the Lord's Sepulchre."

[11] Thus already on the First Crusade the path of negotiation is
attempted simultaneously with the Holy War. On the Third Crusade, and
above all on the Sixth, this path was still more seriously attempted.
It is interesting, too, to notice the part which the laity already
plays in directing the course of the Crusade. From the first the
Crusade, however clerical in its conception, was largely secular in
its conduct; and thus, somewhat paradoxically, a religious enterprise
aided the growth of the secular motive, and contributed to the escape
of the laity from that tendency towards a papal theocracy, which was
evident in the pontificate of Gregory VII.

[12] Before he left, Raymund had played in Jerusalem the same part of
dog in the manger which he had also played at Antioch, and had given
Godfrey considerable trouble. See the articles, GODFREY OF BOUILLON
and RAYMUND OF TOULOUSE.

[13] For an account of the kings of Jerusalem see the articles on the
five BALDWINS, on the two AMALRICS, on FULK and JOHN OF BRIENNE and
on the LUSIGNAN (family).

[14] The genuineness of the letter (on which, by the way, depends the
story of Godfrey's agreement with Dagobert) has been impeached by
Prutz and Kugler, and doubted by Rohricht. It is accepted by von
Sybel and Hagenmeyer.

[15] Yet the north always continued to be more populous than the
south; and the Latins maintained themselves in Antioch and Tripoli a
century after the loss of Jerusalem. The land was richer in the
north: it was protected by its connexion with Cyprus and Armenia: it
was more remote from Egypt--the basis of Mahommedan power from the
reign of Saladin onwards.

[16] Pisa naturally connected itself with Antioch, because Antioch
was hostile to Constantinople, and Pisa cherished the same hostility,
since Alexius I. had in 1080 given preferential treatment to Venice,
the enemy of Pisa.

[17] This is the year in which the kingdom may be regarded as
definitely founded. The period of conquest practically ends at this
date, though isolated gains were afterwards made. The year 1110 is
additionally important by reason of the accession of Maudud al Mosul,
which marks the beginning of a Moslem reaction.

[18] Ilghazi died in 1122. His successor was Balak, who ruled from
1122 to 1124, and succeeded in capturing in 1123 Baldwin II. of
Jerusalem. The union of Mardin and Aleppo under the sway of these two
amirs, connecting as it did Mesopotamia with Syria, marks an
important stage in the revival of Mahommedan power (Stevenson,
_Crusades in the East_, p. 109).

[19] Maudud (the brother of the sultan Mahommed) may be regarded as
the first to begin the _jihad_, or counter-crusade, and his attack
expedition of 1113, which carried him so far into the heart of
Palestine, may be considered as the first act of the _jihad_
(Stevenson, op. cit. pp. 87, 96).

[20] Aleppo had passed from the rule of Timurtash (son of Ilghazi and
successor of Balak) into the possession of Aksunkur, 1125.

[21] Stevenson, however, believes that Zengi was _not_ animated by
the idea of recovering Jerusalem. He thinks that his principal aim
was simply the formation of a compact Mahommedan state, which was,
indeed, in the issue destined to be the instrument of the _jihad_,
but was not so intended by Zengi (op. cit. pp. 123-124).

[22] There are certain connexions and analogies between the kingdom
of Sicily and that of Jerusalem during the twelfth century. In either
case there is an importation of Western feudalism into a country
originally possessed of Byzantine institutions, but affected by an
Arabic occupation. The subject deserves investigation.

[23] The holders of fiefs (_sodeers_) both held fiefs of land and
received pay; the paid force of _soudoyers_ only received pay. An
instance of the latter is furnished by John of Margat, a vassal of
the seignory of Arsuf. He has 200 bezants along with a quantity of
wheat, barley, lentils and oil; and in return he must march with four
horses (Rey, _Les Colonies franques en Syrie_, p. 24).

[24] For the history of the orders see the articles on the TEMPLARS;
ST JOHN OF JERUSALEM, KNIGHTS OF; KNIGHTS, and the TEUTONIC ORDER.
The Templars were founded about the year 1118 by a Burgundian knight,
Hugh de Paganis; the Hospitallers sprang from a foundation in
Jerusalem erected by merchants of Amalfi before the First Crusade,
and were reorganized under Gerard le Puy, master until 1120. The
Teutonic knights date from the Third Crusade.

[25] As was noticed above, there were apparently separate assizes for
the three principalities, in addition to the assizes of the kingdom.
The assizes of Antioch have been discovered and published. The
assizes of the kingdom itself are twofold--the assizes of the high
court and the assizes of the court of burgesses. (1) The assizes of
the high court are preserved for us in works by legists--John of
Ibelin, Philip of Novara and Geoffrey of Tort--composed in the 13th
century. We possess, in other words, _law-books_ (like Bracton's
treatise _De legibus_), but not _laws_--and law-books made after the
loss of the kingdom to which the laws belonged. There are two vexed
questions with regard to these law-books. (a) The first concerns the
origin and character of the laws which the law-books profess to
expound. According to the story of the legists who wrote these
books--e.g. John of Ibelin--the laws of the kingdom were laid down by
Godfrey, who is thus regarded as the great [Greek: nomothetes] of the
kingdom. These laws (progressively modified, it is admitted) were
kept in Jerusalem, under the name of "Letters of the Sepulchre,"
until 1187. In that year they were lost; and the legists tell us that
they are attempting to reconstruct _par oir dire_ the gist of the
lost archetype. The story of the legists is now generally rejected.
Godfrey never legislated: the customs of the kingdom gradually grew,
and were gradually defined, especially under kings like Baldwin III.
and Amalric I. If there was thus only a customary and unwritten law
(and William of Tyre definitely speaks of a _jus consuetudinarium_
under Baldwin III., _quo regnum regebatur_), then the "Letters of the
Sepulchre" are a myth--or rather, if they ever existed, they existed
not as a code of written law, but, perhaps, as a register of fiefs,
like the Sicilian _Defetarii_. Thus the story of the legists shrinks
down to the regular myth of the primitive legislator, used to give an
air of respectability to law-books, which really record an unwritten
custom. The fact is that until the 13th century the Franks lived
_consuetudinibus antiquis et jure non scripto_. They preferred an
unwritten law, as Prutz suggests, partly because it suited the
barristers (who often belonged to the baronage, for the Frankish
nobles were "great pleaders in court and out of court"), and partly
because the high court was left unbound so long as there was no
written code. In the 13th century it became necessary for the legists
to codify, as it were, the unwritten law, because the upheavals of
the times necessitated the fixing of some rules in writing, and
especially because it was necessary to oppose a definite custom of
the kingdom to Frederick II., who sought, as king of Jerusalem, to
take advantage of the want of a written law, to substitute his own
conceptions of law in the teeth of the high court. (b) The second
difficulty concerns the text of the law-books themselves. The text of
Ibelin became a _textus receptus_--but it also became overlaid by
glosses, for it was used as authoritative in the kingdom of Cyprus
after the loss of the kingdom of Jerusalem, and it needed expounding.
Recensions and revisions were twice made, in 1368 and 1531; but how
far the true Ibelin was recovered, and what additions or alterations
were made at these two dates, we cannot tell. We can only say that we
have the text of Ibelin which was used in Cyprus in the later middle
ages. At the same time, if our text is thus late, it must be
remembered that its content gives us the earliest and purest
exposition of French feudalism, and describes for us the organization
of a kingdom, where all rights and duties were connected with the
fief, and the monarch was only a suzerain of feudatories. (2) The
assizes of the court of burgesses became the basis of a treatise at
an earlier date than the assizes of the high court. The date of the
redaction (which was probably made by some learned burgess) may well
have been the reign of Baldwin III., as Kugler suggests: he was the
first native king, and a king learned in the law; but Beugnot would
refer the assizes to the years immediately preceding Saladin's
capture of Jerusalem. These assizes do not, of course, appear in
Ibelin, who was only concerned with the feudal law of the high court.
They were used, like the assizes of the high court, in Cyprus; and,
like the other assizes, they were made the subject of investigation
in 1531, with the object of discovering a good text. The law which is
expounded in these assizes is a mixture of Frankish law with the
Graeco-Roman law of the Eastern empire which prevailed among the
native population of Syria.

In regard to both assizes, it is most important to bear in mind that
we possess not laws, but law-books or custumals--records made by
lawyers for their fellows of what they conceived to be the law, and
supported by legal arguments and citations of cases. But, as Prutz
remarks, Philip of Novara _lehrt nicht die Wissenschaft des Rechts,
sondern die des Unrechts_: he does not explain the law so much as the
ways of getting round it.

[26] For instance, the abbey of Mount Sion had large possessions, not
only in the Holy Land (at Ascalon, Jaffa, Acre, Tyre, Caesarea and
Tarsus), but also in Sicily, Calabria, Lombardy, Spain and France (at
Orleans, Bourges and Poitiers).

[27] One must remember that these reinforcements would often consist
of desperate characters. It was one of the misfortunes of Palestine
that it served as a Botany Bay, to which the criminals of the West
were transported for penance. The natives, already prone to the
immorality which must infect a mixed population living under a hot
sun, the immorality which still infects a place like Aden, were not
improved by the addition of convicts.

[28] The manorial system in the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem was a
continuation of the village system as it had existed under the Arabs.
In each village (_casale)_ the _rustici_ were grouped in families
(_foci_): the tenants paid from 1/4 to 1\3 of the crop, besides a
poll-tax and labour-dues. The villages were mostly inhabited by
Syrians: it was rarely that Franks settled down as tillers of the
soil. Prutz regards the manorial system as oppressive. Absentee
landlords, he thinks, rack-rented the soil (p. 167), while the
"inhuman severity" of their treatment of villeins led to a
progressive decay of agriculture, destroyed the economic basis of the
Latin kingdom, and led the natives to welcome the invasion of Saladin
(pp. 327-331).

The French writers Rey and Dodu are more kind to the Franks; and the
testimony of contemporary Arabic writers, who seem favourably
impressed by the treatment of their subjects by the Franks, bears out
their view, while the tone of the assizes is admittedly favourable to
the Syrians. One must not forget that there was a brisk native
manufacture of carpets, pottery, ironwork, gold-work and soap; or
that the Syrians of the towns had a definite legal position.

[29] After 1143 one may therefore speak of the period of the
Epigoni--the native Franks, ready to view the Moslems as joint
occupants of Syria, and to imitate the dress and habits of their
neighbours.

[30] Doubt has been cast on the view that a troubled conscience drove
Louis to take the cross; and his action has been ascribed to simple
religious zeal (cf. Lavisse, _Histoire de France_, iii. 12).

[31] We speak of First, Second and Third Crusades, but, more exactly,
the Crusades were one continuous process. Scarcely a year passed in
which new bands did not come to the Holy Land. We have already
noticed the great if disastrous Crusade of 1100-1101, and the
Venetian Crusade of 1123-1124; and we may also refer to the Crusade
of Henry the Lion in 1172, and to that of Edward I. in 1271-1272--all
famous Crusades, which are not reckoned in the usual numbering.
Crusades appear to have been dignified by numbers when they followed
some crushing disaster--the loss of Edessa in 1144, or the fall of
Jerusalem in 1187--and were led by kings and emperors; or when, like
the Fourth and Fifth Crusades, they achieved some conspicuous success
or failure. But it is important to bear in mind the continuity of the
Crusades--the constant flow of new forces eastward and back again
westward; for this alone explains why the Crusades formed a great
epoch in civilization, familiarizing, as they did, the West with the
East.

[32] This body of crusaders ultimately reached the Holy Land, where
it joined Conrad (who had lost his own original forces), and helped
in the fruitless siege of Damascus. The services which it rendered to
Portugal were repeated by later crusaders. Crusaders from the Low
Countries, England and the Scandinavian north took the coast route
round western Europe; and it was natural that, landing for provisions
and water, they should be asked, and should consent, to lend their
aid to the natives against the Moors. Such aid is recorded to have
been given on the Third and the Fifth Crusades.

[33] Manuel was an ambitious sovereign, apparently aiming at a
world-monarchy, such as was afterwards attempted from the other side
by Henry VI. As Henry VI. had designs on Constantinople and the
Eastern empire, so Manuel cherished the ambition of acquiring Italy
and the Western empire, and he negotiated with Alexander III. to that
end in 1167 and 1169: cf. the life of Alexander III. in Muratori, _S.
R. I._ iii. 460.

[34] The prize was won by Raynald of Chatillon (q.v.).

[35] Nureddin, unlike his father, was definitely animated by a
religious motive: he fought first and foremost against the Latins
(and not, like his father, against Moslem states), and he did so as a
matter of religious duty.

[36] Henry II., as an Angevin, was the natural heir of the kingdom of
Jerusalem on the extinction of the line descended from Fulk of Anjou.
This explains the part played by Richard I. in deciding the question
of the succession during the Third Crusade.

[37] The taxation levied in the West was also attempted in the East,
and in 1183 a universal tax was levied in the kingdom of Jerusalem,
at the rate of 1% on movables and 2% on rents and revenues. Cf. Dr A.
Cartellieri, _Philipp II. August_, ii. pp. 3-18 and p. 85.

[38] Stevenson argues (op. cit. p. 240) that this truce was already
practically dissolved before Raynald struck, and that Raynald's
"action may reasonably be viewed as the practical outcome of the
feeling of a party."

[39] The "economic" motive for taking the cross was strengthened by
the papal regulations in favour of debtors who joined the Crusade.
Thousands must have joined the Third Crusade in order to escape
paying either their taxes or the interest on their debts; and the
atmosphere of the gold-digger's camp (or of the cave of Adullam) must
have begun more than ever to characterize the crusading armies.

[40] The Crusades in their course established a number of new states
or kingdoms. The First Crusade established the kingdom of Jerusalem
(1100); the Third, the kingdom of Cyprus (1195); the Fourth, the
Latin empire of Constantinople (1204); while the long Crusade of the
Teutonic knights on the coast of the Baltic led to the rise of a new
state east of the Vistula. The kingdom of Lesser Armenia, established
in 1195, may also be regarded as a result of the Crusades. The
history of the kingdom of Jerusalem is part of the history of the
Crusades: the history of the other kingdoms or states touches the
history of the Crusades less vitally. But the history of Cyprus is
particularly important--and for two reasons. In the first place,
Cyprus was a natural and excellent basis of operations; it sent
provisions to the crusaders in 1191, and again at the siege of
Damietta in 1219, while its advantages as a strategic basis were
proved by the exploits of Peter of Cyprus in the 14th century. In the
second place, as the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem fell, its
institutions and assizes were transplanted bodily to Cyprus, where
they survived until the island was conquered by the Ottoman Turks.
But the monarchy was stronger in Cyprus than in Jerusalem: the fiefs
were distributed by the monarch, and were smaller in extent; while
the feudatories had neither the collective powers of the haute cour
of Jerusalem, nor the individual privileges (such as jurisdiction
over the bourgeoisie), which had been enjoyed by the feudatories of
the old kingdom. Till 1489 the kingdom of Cyprus survived as an
independent monarchy, and its capital, Famagusta, was an important
centre of trade after the loss of the coast-towns in the kingdom of
Jerusalem. In 1489 it was acquired by Venice, which claimed the
island on the death of the last king, having adopted his widow (a
Venetian lady named Catarina Cornaro) as a daughter of the republic.
On the history of Cyprus, see Stubbs, _Lectures on Medieval and
Modern History_, 156-208. The history of the kingdom of Armenia is
closely connected with that of Cyprus. The Armenians in the
south-east of Asia Minor borrowed feudal institutions from the Franks
and the feudal vocabulary itself. The kingdom was involved in a
struggle with Antioch in the early part of the 13th century. Later,
it allied itself with the Mongols and fought against the Mamelukes,
to whom, however, it finally succumbed in 1375.

[41] The kingdom of Jerusalem is thus from 1192 to its final fall a
strip of coast, to which it is the object of kings and crusaders to
annex Jerusalem and a line of communication connecting it with the
coast. This was practically the aim of Richard I.'s negotiations; and
this was what Frederick II. for a time secured.

[42] M. Luchaire, in the volume of his biography of Innocent III.
called _La Question d'Orient_, shows how, in spite of the pope, the
Fourth Crusade was in its very beginnings a lay enterprise. The
crusading barons of France chose their own leader, and determined
their own route, without consulting Innocent.

[43] As a matter of fact, there is some doubt whether Alexius arrived
in Germany before the spring of 1202. But there seems to be little
doubt of Philip's complicity in the diversion of the Fourth Crusade
to Constantinople (cf. M. Luchaire, _La Question d'Orient_, pp.
84-86).

[44] It is true that in 1208 Venice received commercial concessions
from the court of Cairo. But this _ex post facto_ argument is the
sole proof of this view; and it is quite insufficient to prove the
accusation. Venice is _not_ the primary agent in the deflection of
the Fourth Crusade.

[45] Already under Innocent III. the benefits of the Crusade were
promised to those who went to the assistance of the Latin empire of
the East.

[46] In 1208 Innocent excommunicated Raymund VI. of Toulouse on
account of the murder of a papal legate who was attempting to
suppress Manichaeism, and offered all Catholics the right to occupy
and guard his territories. Thus was begun the First Crusade against
heresy. Raymund at once submitted to the pope, but the Crusade
continued none the less, because, as Luchaire says, "the baronage of
the north and centre of France had finished their preparations," and
were resolved to annex the rich lands of the south. In this way
land-hunger exploited the Albigensian, as political and commercial
motives had helped to exploit the Fourth Crusade; and in the former,
as in the latter, Innocent had reluctantly to consent to the results
of the secular motives which had infected a spiritual enterprise. The
Albigensian Crusades, however, belong to French history; and it can
only be noted here that their ultimate result was the absorption of
the fertile lands, and the extinction of the peculiar civilization,
of southern France by the northern monarchy. (See the article
ALBIGENSES.)

[47] A canon of the third Lateran council (1179) forbade traffic with
the Saracens in munitions of war; and this canon had been renewed by
Innocent in the beginning of his pontificate.

[48] He had promised the pope, at his coronation in 1220, to begin
his Crusade in August 1221. But he declared himself exhausted by the
expenses of his coronation; and Honorius III. consented to defer his
Crusade until March 1222. The letter of the pope informing Pelagius
of this delay is dated the 20th of June: it would probably reach his
hands _after_ his departure from Damietta; and thus the Cardinal gave
the signal for the march, when, as he thought, the emperor's coming
was imminent.

[49] Joinville, ch. x.

[50] John of Brienne had only ruled in right of his wife Mary. On her
death (1212) John might be regarded as only ruling "by the courtesy
of the kingdom" until her daughter Isabella was married, when the
husband would succeed. That, at any rate, was the view Frederick II.
took.

[51] Amalric I. of Cyprus had done homage to Henry VI., from whom he
had received the title of king (1195).

[52] It may be argued that the Crusade against a revolted Christian
like Frederick II. was not misplaced, and that the pope had a true
sense of religious values when he attacked Frederick. The answer is
partly that men like St Louis _did_ think that the Crusade was
misplaced, and partly that Frederick was really attacked _not_ as a
revolted Christian, but as the would-be unifier of Italy, the enemy
of the states of the church.

[53] The following table of the Ayyubite rulers serves to illustrate
the text:--

Shadhy.
|
+----+----+
| |
Shirguh. Ayyub (both generals in the army of the Atabegs of Mosul).
|
+---------+---------------+
| |
Saladin Malik-al-Adil I.
+ 1193 + 1218.
|
+----------------+---+--------------+---------------------+
| | | |
Malik-al-Kamil, Malik-al-Muazzam, Malik-al-Ashraf, Malik-al-Salih Isma'il
Sultan of Egypt Sultan of Damascus ruler of Khelat, sultan of Damascus,
+ 1238. + 1227. and after 1227 1237-1244. From
| | of Damascus, him Damascus passed
| | + 1237. to Malik-al-Salih
| Malik-al-Nasir Ayyub of Egypt at
| of Kerak the battle of Gaza.
|
+--+--------------------+
| |
Malik-al-Adil II. Malik-al-Salih Najm
deposed 1240. al-din Ayyub, sultan
of Egypt, and after
1244 of Damascus,
+ 1249.
|
+-----------+
|
Turanshah, deposed 1250, and
succeeded by the Mameluke Aibek.

[54] Though Europe indulged in dreams of Mongol aid, the eventual
results of the extension of the Mongol Empire were prejudicial to the
Latin East. The sultans of Egypt were stirred to fresh activity by
the attacks of the Mongols; and as Syria became the battleground of
the two, the Latin principalities of Syria were fated to fall as the
prize of victory to one or other of the combatants.

[55] Of the four Latin principalities of the East, Edessa was the
first to fall, being extinguished between 1144 and 1150. Antioch fell
in 1268; Tripoli in 1289; and the kingdom itself may be said to end
with the capture of Acre, 1291.

[56] Michael Palaeologus had actually appealed to Louis IX. against
Charles of Anjou, who in 1270 had actively begun preparations for the
attack on Constantinople.

[57] The dream of a Crusade to Jerusalem survived de Mezieres; a
society which read "romaunts" of the Crusades, could not but dream
the dream. Henry V., whose father had fought with the Teutonic
knights on the Baltic, dreamed of a voyage to Jerusalem.

[58] The union of 1274, conceded by the Palaeologi at the council of
Lyons in order to defeat the plans of Charles of Anjou, had only been
temporary.

[59] Brehier, _L'Eglise el l'Orient_, p. 347.

[60] _Cambridge Modern History_, i. 11. It is perhaps worth remarking
that something of the old crusading spirit seems still to linger in
the movement of Russia towards Constantinople.

[61] While from this point of view the Crusades appear as a failure,
it must not be forgotten that elsewhere than in the East Crusades did
attain some success. A Crusade won for Christianity the coast of the
eastern Baltic (see TEUTONIC ORDER); and the centuries of the Spanish
Crusade ended in the conquest of the whole of Spain for Christianity.

[62] Authors like Heeren (_Versuch einer Entwickelung der Folgen der
Kreuzzuge_) and Michaud (in the last volume of his _Histoire des
croisades_) fall into the error of assigning all things to the
Crusades. Even Prutz, in his _Kulturgeschichte der Kreuzzuge_,
over-estimates the influence of the Crusades as a chapter in the
history of civilization. He depreciates unduly the Western
civilization of the early middle ages, and exalts the civilization of
the Arabs; and starting from these two premises, he concludes that
modern civilization is the offspring of the Crusades, which first
brought East and West together.

[63] It is difficult to decide how far Arabic models influenced
ecclesiastical architecture in the West as a result of the Crusades.
Greater freedom of moulding and the use of trefoil and cinquefoil may
be, but need not be, explained in this way. The pointed arch owes
nothing to the Arabs; it is already used in England in early Norman
work. Generally, one may say that Western architecture is independent
of the East.

[64] His somewhat legendary treatise, _De liberatione civitatum
Orientis_, was only composed about 1155.

[65] There is also an _Inventaire critique_ of these letters by the
comte de Riant (Paris, 1880).

[66] Von Sybel's view must be modified by that of Kugler, to which a
scholar like Hagenmeyer has to some extent given his adhesion (cf.
his edition of the _Gesta_, pp. 62-68). Hagenmeyer inclines to
believe in an original author, distinct from Albert the copyist; and
he thinks that this original author (whether or no he was present
during the Crusade) used the _Gesta_ and also Fulcher, though he had
probably also "_eigene Notizen und Aufzeichnungen_."

[67] See Pigonneau, _Le Cycle de la croisade_, &c. (Paris, 1877); and
Hagenmeyer, _Peter der Eremite_ (Leipzig, 1879).

[68] On the bibliography of the Second Crusade see Kugler, _Studien
zur Geschichte des zweiten Kreuzzuges_ (Stuttgart, 1866).

[69] Of these writers see Archer's _Crusade of Richard I._, Appendix
(in Nutt's series of Histories from Contemporary Writers).

[70] The bibliography of the Fourth Crusade is discussed in Klimke,
_Die Quellen zur Geschichte des vierten Kreuzzuges_ (Breslau, 1875).

CRUSENSTOLPE, MAGNUS JAKOB (1795-1865), Swedish historian, early became famous both as a political and a historical writer. His first important work was a _History of the Early Years of the Life of King Gustavus IV. Adolphus_, which was followed by a series of monographs and by some politico-historical novels, of which _The House of Holstein-Gottorp in Sweden_ is considered the best. He obtained a great influence over King Charles XIV. (Bernadotte), who during the years 1830-1833 gave him his fullest confidence, and sanctioned the official character of Crusenstolpe's newspaper _Faderneslandet_. In the last-mentioned year, however, the historian suddenly became the king's bitterest enemy, and used his acrid pen on all occasions in attacking him. In 1838 he was condemned, for one of these angry utterances, to be imprisoned three years in the castle of Waxholm. He continued his literary labours until his death in 1865. Few Swedish writers have wielded so pure and so incisive a style as Crusenstolpe, but his historical work is vitiated by political and personal bias.