Chapter LVIII: The First Crusade.—Part V

Jerusalem has derived some reputation from the number and
importance of her memorable sieges. It was not till after a long
and obstinate contest that Babylon and Rome could prevail against
the obstinacy of the people, the craggy ground that might
supersede the necessity of fortifications, and the walls and
towers that would have fortified the most accessible plain. 105
These obstacles were diminished in the age of the crusades. The
bulwarks had been completely destroyed and imperfectly restored:
the Jews, their nation, and worship, were forever banished; but
nature is less changeable than man, and the site of Jerusalem,
though somewhat softened and somewhat removed, was still strong
against the assaults of an enemy. By the experience of a recent
siege, and a three years’ possession, the Saracens of Egypt had
been taught to discern, and in some degree to remedy, the defects
of a place, which religion as well as honor forbade them to
resign. Aladin, or Iftikhar, the caliph’s lieutenant, was
intrusted with the defence: his policy strove to restrain the
native Christians by the dread of their own ruin and that of the
holy sepulchre; to animate the Moslems by the assurance of
temporal and eternal rewards. His garrison is said to have
consisted of forty thousand Turks and Arabians; and if he could
muster twenty thousand of the inhabitants, it must be confessed
that the besieged were more numerous than the besieging army. 106
Had the diminished strength and numbers of the Latins allowed
them to grasp the whole circumference of four thousand yards,
(about two English miles and a half, 107 to what useful purpose
should they have descended into the valley of Ben Hinnom and
torrent of Cedron, 108 or approach the precipices of the south
and east, from whence they had nothing either to hope or fear?
Their siege was more reasonably directed against the northern and
western sides of the city. Godfrey of Bouillon erected his
standard on the first swell of Mount Calvary: to the left, as far
as St. Stephen’s gate, the line of attack was continued by
Tancred and the two Roberts; and Count Raymond established his
quarters from the citadel to the foot of Mount Sion, which was no
longer included within the precincts of the city. On the fifth
day, the crusaders made a general assault, in the fanatic hope of
battering down the walls without engines, and of scaling them
without ladders. By the dint of brutal force, they burst the
first barrier; but they were driven back with shame and slaughter
to the camp: the influence of vision and prophecy was deadened by
the too frequent abuse of those pious stratagems; and time and
labor were found to be the only means of victory. The time of the
siege was indeed fulfilled in forty days, but they were forty
days of calamity and anguish. A repetition of the old complaint
of famine may be imputed in some degree to the voracious or
disorderly appetite of the Franks; but the stony soil of
Jerusalem is almost destitute of water; the scanty springs and
hasty torrents were dry in the summer season; nor was the thirst
of the besiegers relieved, as in the city, by the artificial
supply of cisterns and aqueducts. The circumjacent country is
equally destitute of trees for the uses of shade or building, but
some large beams were discovered in a cave by the crusaders: a
wood near Sichem, the enchanted grove of Tasso, 109 was cut down:
the necessary timber was transported to the camp by the vigor and
dexterity of Tancred; and the engines were framed by some Genoese
artists, who had fortunately landed in the harbor of Jaffa. Two
movable turrets were constructed at the expense, and in the
stations, of the duke of Lorraine and the count of Tholouse, and
rolled forwards with devout labor, not to the most accessible,
but to the most neglected, parts of the fortification. Raymond’s
Tower was reduced to ashes by the fire of the besieged, but his
colleague was more vigilant and successful; 1091 the enemies were
driven by his archers from the rampart; the draw-bridge was let
down; and on a Friday, at three in the afternoon, the day and
hour of the passion, Godfrey of Bouillon stood victorious on the
walls of Jerusalem. His example was followed on every side by the
emulation of valor; and about four hundred and sixty years after
the conquest of Omar, the holy city was rescued from the
Mahometan yoke. In the pillage of public and private wealth, the
adventurers had agreed to respect the exclusive property of the
first occupant; and the spoils of the great mosque, seventy lamps
and massy vases of gold and silver, rewarded the diligence, and
displayed the generosity, of Tancred. A bloody sacrifice was
offered by his mistaken votaries to the God of the Christians:
resistance might provoke but neither age nor sex could mollify,
their implacable rage: they indulged themselves three days in a
promiscuous massacre; 110 and the infection of the dead bodies
produced an epidemical disease. After seventy thousand Moslems
had been put to the sword, and the harmless Jews had been burnt
in their synagogue, they could still reserve a multitude of
captives, whom interest or lassitude persuaded them to spare. Of
these savage heroes of the cross, Tancred alone betrayed some
sentiments of compassion; yet we may praise the more selfish
lenity of Raymond, who granted a capitulation and safe-conduct to
the garrison of the citadel. 111 The holy sepulchre was now free;
and the bloody victors prepared to accomplish their vow.
Bareheaded and barefoot, with contrite hearts, and in an humble
posture, they ascended the hill of Calvary, amidst the loud
anthems of the clergy; kissed the stone which had covered the
Savior of the world; and bedewed with tears of joy and penitence
the monument of their redemption. This union of the fiercest and
most tender passions has been variously considered by two
philosophers; by the one, 112 as easy and natural; by the other,
113 as absurd and incredible. Perhaps it is too rigorously
applied to the same persons and the same hour; the example of the
virtuous Godfrey awakened the piety of his companions; while they
cleansed their bodies, they purified their minds; nor shall I
believe that the most ardent in slaughter and rapine were the
foremost in the procession to the holy sepulchre.

105 (return) [ See the masterly description of Tacitus, (Hist. v.
11, 12, 13,) who supposes that the Jewish lawgivers had provided
for a perpetual state of hostility against the rest of mankind. *
Note: This is an exaggerated inference from the words of Tacitus,
who speaks of the founders of the city, not the lawgivers.
Praeviderant conditores, ex diversitate morum, crebra bella; inde
cuncta quamvis adversus loagum obsidium.—M.]

106 (return) [ The lively scepticism of Voltaire is balanced with
sense and erudition by the French author of the Esprit des
Croisades, (tom. iv. p. 386-388,) who observes, that, according
to the Arabians, the inhabitants of Jerusalem must have exceeded
200,000; that in the siege of Titus, Josephus collects 1,300,000
Jews; that they are stated by Tacitus himself at 600,000; and
that the largest defalcation, that his accepimus can justify,
will still leave them more numerous than the Roman army.]

107 (return) [ Maundrell, who diligently perambulated the walls,
found a circuit of 4630 paces, or 4167 English yards, (p. 109,
110: ) from an authentic plan, D’Anville concludes a measure
nearly similar, of 1960 French toises, (p. 23-29,) in his scarce
and valuable tract. For the topography of Jerusalem, see Reland,
(Palestina, tom. ii. p. 832-860.)]

108 (return) [ Jerusalem was possessed only of the torrent of
Kedron, dry in summer, and of the little spring or brook of
Siloe, (Reland, tom. i. p. 294, 300.) Both strangers and natives
complain of the want of water, which, in time of war, was
studiously aggravated. Within the city, Tacitus mentions a
perennial fountain, an aqueduct and cisterns for rain water. The
aqueduct was conveyed from the rivulet Tekos or Etham, which is
likewise mentioned by Bohadin, (in Vit. Saludio p. 238.)]

109 (return) [ Gierusalomme Liberata, canto xiii. It is pleasant
enough to observe how Tasso has copied and embellished the
minutest details of the siege.]

1091 (return) [ This does not appear by Wilken’s account, (p.
294.) They fought in vair the whole of the Thursday.—M.]

110 (return) [ Besides the Latins, who are not ashamed of the
massacre, see Elmacin, (Hist. Saracen. p. 363,) Abulpharagius,
(Dynast. p. 243,) and M. De Guignes, tom. ii. p. ii. p. 99, from
Aboulmahasen.]

111 (return) [ The old tower Psephina, in the middle ages
Neblosa, was named Castellum Pisanum, from the patriarch
Daimbert. It is still the citadel, the residence of the Turkish
aga, and commands a prospect of the Dead Sea, Judea, and Arabia,
(D’Anville, p. 19-23.) It was likewise called the Tower of
David.]

112 (return) [ Hume, in his History of England, vol. i. p. 311,
312, octavo edition.]

113 (return) [ Voltaire, in his Essai sur l’Histoire Generale,
tom ii. c. 54, p 345, 346]

Eight days after this memorable event, which Pope Urban did not
live to hear, the Latin chiefs proceeded to the election of a
king, to guard and govern their conquests in Palestine. Hugh the
Great, and Stephen of Chartres, had retired with some loss of
reputation, which they strove to regain by a second crusade and
an honorable death. Baldwin was established at Edessa, and
Bohemond at Antioch; and two Roberts, the duke of Normandy 114
and the count of Flanders, preferred their fair inheritance in
the West to a doubtful competition or a barren sceptre. The
jealousy and ambition of Raymond were condemned by his own
followers, and the free, the just, the unanimous voice of the
army proclaimed Godfrey of Bouillon the first and most worthy of
the champions of Christendom. His magnanimity accepted a trust as
full of danger as of glory; but in a city where his Savior had
been crowned with thorns, the devout pilgrim rejected the name
and ensigns of royalty; and the founder of the kingdom of
Jerusalem contented himself with the modest title of Defender and
Baron of the Holy Sepulchre. His government of a single year, 115
too short for the public happiness, was interrupted in the first
fortnight by a summons to the field, by the approach of the
vizier or sultan of Egypt, who had been too slow to prevent, but
who was impatient to avenge, the loss of Jerusalem. His total
overthrow in the battle of Ascalon sealed the establishment of
the Latins in Syria, and signalized the valor of the French
princes who in this action bade a long farewell to the holy wars.

Some glory might be derived from the prodigious inequality of
numbers, though I shall not count the myriads of horse and foot
1151 on the side of the Fatimites; but, except three thousand
Ethiopians or Blacks, who were armed with flails or scourges of
iron, the Barbarians of the South fled on the first onset, and
afforded a pleasing comparison between the active valor of the
Turks and the sloth and effeminacy of the natives of Egypt. After
suspending before the holy sepulchre the sword and standard of
the sultan, the new king (he deserves the title) embraced his
departing companions, and could retain only with the gallant
Tancred three hundred knights, and two thousand foot-soldiers for
the defence of Palestine. His sovereignty was soon attacked by a
new enemy, the only one against whom Godfrey was a coward.
Adhemar, bishop of Puy, who excelled both in council and action,
had been swept away in the last plague at Antioch: the remaining
ecclesiastics preserved only the pride and avarice of their
character; and their seditious clamors had required that the
choice of a bishop should precede that of a king. The revenue and
jurisdiction of the lawful patriarch were usurped by the Latin
clergy: the exclusion of the Greeks and Syrians was justified by
the reproach of heresy or schism; 116 and, under the iron yoke of
their deliverers, the Oriental Christians regretted the
tolerating government of the Arabian caliphs. Daimbert,
archbishop of Pisa, had long been trained in the secret policy of
Rome: he brought a fleet at his countrymen to the succor of the
Holy Land, and was installed, without a competitor, the spiritual
and temporal head of the church. 1161 The new patriarch 117
immediately grasped the sceptre which had been acquired by the
toil and blood of the victorious pilgrims; and both Godfrey and
Bohemond submitted to receive at his hands the investiture of
their feudal possessions. Nor was this sufficient; Daimbert
claimed the immediate property of Jerusalem and Jaffa; instead of
a firm and generous refusal, the hero negotiated with the priest;
a quarter of either city was ceded to the church; and the modest
bishop was satisfied with an eventual reversion of the rest, on
the death of Godfrey without children, or on the future
acquisition of a new seat at Cairo or Damascus.

114 (return) [ The English ascribe to Robert of Normandy, and the
Provincials to Raymond of Tholouse, the glory of refusing the
crown; but the honest voice of tradition has preserved the memory
of the ambition and revenge (Villehardouin, No. 136) of the count
of St. Giles. He died at the siege of Tripoli, which was
possessed by his descendants.]

115 (return) [ See the election, the battle of Ascalon, &c., in
William of Tyre l. ix. c. 1-12, and in the conclusion of the
Latin historians of the first crusade.]

1151 (return) [ 20,000 Franks, 300,000 Mussulmen, according to
Wilken, (vol. ii. p. 9)—M.]

116 (return) [ Renaudot, Hist. Patriarch. Alex. p. 479.]

1161 (return) [ Arnulf was first chosen, but illegitimately, and
degraded. He was ever after the secret enemy of Daimbert or
Dagobert. Wilken, vol. i. p. 306, vol. ii. p. 52.—M]

117 (return) [ See the claims of the patriarch Daimbert, in
William of Tyre (l. ix. c. 15-18, x. 4, 7, 9,) who asserts with
marvellous candor the independence of the conquerors and kings of
Jerusalem.]

Without this indulgence, the conqueror would have almost been
stripped of his infant kingdom, which consisted only of Jerusalem
and Jaffa, with about twenty villages and towns of the adjacent
country. 118 Within this narrow verge, the Mahometans were still
lodged in some impregnable castles: and the husbandman, the
trader, and the pilgrim, were exposed to daily and domestic
hostility. By the arms of Godfrey himself, and of the two
Baldwins, his brother and cousin, who succeeded to the throne,
the Latins breathed with more ease and safety; and at length they
equalled, in the extent of their dominions, though not in the
millions of their subjects, the ancient princes of Judah and
Israel. 119 After the reduction of the maritime cities of
Laodicea, Tripoli, Tyre, and Ascalon, 120 which were powerfully
assisted by the fleets of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa, and even of
Flanders and Norway, 121 the range of sea-coast from Scanderoon
to the borders of Egypt was possessed by the Christian pilgrims.
If the prince of Antioch disclaimed his supremacy, the counts of
Edessa and Tripoli owned themselves the vassals of the king of
Jerusalem: the Latins reigned beyond the Euphrates; and the four
cities of Hems, Hamah, Damascus, and Aleppo, were the only relics
of the Mahometan conquests in Syria. 122 The laws and language,
the manners and titles, of the French nation and Latin church,
were introduced into these transmarine colonies. According to the
feudal jurisprudence, the principal states and subordinate
baronies descended in the line of male and female succession: 123
but the children of the first conquerors, 124 a motley and
degenerate race, were dissolved by the luxury of the climate; the
arrival of new crusaders from Europe was a doubtful hope and a
casual event. The service of the feudal tenures 125 was performed
by six hundred and sixty-six knights, who might expect the aid of
two hundred more under the banner of the count of Tripoli; and
each knight was attended to the field by four squires or archers
on horseback. 126 Five thousand and seventy sergeants, most
probably foot-soldiers, were supplied by the churches and cities;
and the whole legal militia of the kingdom could not exceed
eleven thousand men, a slender defence against the surrounding
myriads of Saracens and Turks. 127 But the firmest bulwark of
Jerusalem was founded on the knights of the Hospital of St. John,
128 and of the temple of Solomon; 129 on the strange association
of a monastic and military life, which fanaticism might suggest,
but which policy must approve. The flower of the nobility of
Europe aspired to wear the cross, and to profess the vows, of
these respectable orders; their spirit and discipline were
immortal; and the speedy donation of twenty-eight thousand farms,
or manors, 130 enabled them to support a regular force of cavalry
and infantry for the defence of Palestine. The austerity of the
convent soon evaporated in the exercise of arms; the world was
scandalized by the pride, avarice, and corruption of these
Christian soldiers; their claims of immunity and jurisdiction
disturbed the harmony of the church and state; and the public
peace was endangered by their jealous emulation. But in their
most dissolute period, the knights of their hospital and temple
maintained their fearless and fanatic character: they neglected
to live, but they were prepared to die, in the service of Christ;
and the spirit of chivalry, the parent and offspring of the
crusades, has been transplanted by this institution from the holy
sepulchre to the Isle of Malta. 131

118 (return) [ Willerm. Tyr. l. x. 19. The Historia
Hierosolimitana of Jacobus a Vitriaco (l. i. c. 21-50) and the
Secreta Fidelium Crucis of Marinus Sanutus (l. iii. p. 1)
describe the state and conquests of the Latin kingdom of
Jerusalem.]

119 (return) [ An actual muster, not including the tribes of Levi
and Benjamin, gave David an army of 1,300,000 or 1,574,000
fighting men; which, with the addition of women, children, and
slaves, may imply a population of thirteen millions, in a country
sixty leagues in length, and thirty broad. The honest and
rational Le Clerc (Comment on 2d Samuel xxiv. and 1st Chronicles,
xxi.) aestuat angusto in limite, and mutters his suspicion of a
false transcript; a dangerous suspicion! * Note: David determined
to take a census of his vast dominions, which extended from
Lebanon to the frontiers of Egypt, from the Euphrates to the
Mediterranean. The numbers (in 2 Sam. xxiv. 9, and 1 Chron. xxi.
5) differ; but the lowest gives 800,000 men fit to bear arms in
Israel, 500,000 in Judah. Hist. of Jews, vol. i. p. 248. Gibbon
has taken the highest census in his estimate of the population,
and confined the dominions of David to Jordandic Palestine.—M.]

120 (return) [ These sieges are related, each in its proper
place, in the great history of William of Tyre, from the ixth to
the xviiith book, and more briefly told by Bernardus
Thesaurarius, (de Acquisitione Terrae Sanctae, c. 89-98, p.
732-740.) Some domestic facts are celebrated in the Chronicles of
Pisa, Genoa, and Venice, in the vith, ixth, and xiith tomes of
Muratori.]

121 (return) [ Quidam populus de insulis occidentis egressus, et
maxime de ea parte quae Norvegia dicitur. William of Tyre (l. xi.
c. 14, p. 804) marks their course per Britannicum Mare et Calpen
to the siege of Sidon.]

122 (return) [ Benelathir, apud De Guignes, Hist. des Huns, tom.
ii. part ii. p. 150, 151, A.D. 1127. He must speak of the inland
country.]

123 (return) [ Sanut very sensibly descants on the mischiefs of
female succession, in a land hostibus circumdata, ubi cuncta
virilia et virtuosa esse deberent. Yet, at the summons, and with
the approbation, of her feudal lord, a noble damsel was obliged
to choose a husband and champion, (Assises de Jerusalem, c. 242,
&c.) See in M. De Guignes (tom. i. p. 441-471) the accurate and
useful tables of these dynasties, which are chiefly drawn from
the Lignages d’Outremer.]

124 (return) [ They were called by derision Poullains, Pallani,
and their name is never pronounced without contempt, (Ducange,
Gloss. Latin. tom. v. p. 535; and Observations sur Joinville, p.
84, 85; Jacob. a Vitriaco Hist. Hierosol. i. c. 67, 72; and
Sanut, l. iii. p. viii. c. 2, p. 182.) Illustrium virorum, qui ad
Terrae Sanctae.... liberationem in ipsa manserunt, degeneres
filii.... in deliciis enutriti, molles et effoe minati, &c.]

125 (return) [ This authentic detail is extracted from the
Assises de Jerusalem (c. 324, 326-331.) Sanut (l. iii. p. viii.
c. 1, p. 174) reckons only 518 knights, and 5775 followers.]

126 (return) [ The sum total, and the division, ascertain the
service of the three great baronies at 100 knights each; and the
text of the Assises, which extends the number to 500, can only be
justified by this supposition.]

127 (return) [ Yet on great emergencies (says Sanut) the barons
brought a voluntary aid; decentem comitivam militum juxta statum
suum.]

128 (return) [ William of Tyre (l. xviii. c. 3, 4, 5) relates the
ignoble origin and early insolence of the Hospitallers, who soon
deserted their humble patron, St. John the Eleemosynary, for the
more august character of St. John the Baptist, (see the
ineffectual struggles of Pagi, Critica, A. D 1099, No. 14-18.)
They assumed the profession of arms about the year 1120; the
Hospital was mater; the Temple filia; the Teutonic order was
founded A.D. 1190, at the siege of Acre, (Mosheim Institut p.
389, 390.)]

129 (return) [ See St. Bernard de Laude Novae Militiae Templi,
composed A.D. 1132-1136, in Opp. tom. i. p. ii. p. 547-563, edit.
Mabillon, Venet. 1750. Such an encomium, which is thrown away on
the dead Templars, would be highly valued by the historians of
Malta.]

130 (return) [ Matthew Paris, Hist. Major, p. 544. He assigns to
the Hospitallers 19,000, to the Templars 9,000 maneria, word of
much higher import (as Ducange has rightly observed) in the
English than in the French idiom. Manor is a lordship, manoir a
dwelling.]

131 (return) [ In the three first books of the Histoire de
Chevaliers de Malthe par l’Abbe de Vertot, the reader may amuse
himself with a fair, and sometimes flattering, picture of the
order, while it was employed for the defence of Palestine. The
subsequent books pursue their emigration to Rhodes and Malta.]

The spirit of freedom, which pervades the feudal institutions,
was felt in its strongest energy by the volunteers of the cross,
who elected for their chief the most deserving of his peers.
Amidst the slaves of Asia, unconscious of the lesson or example,
a model of political liberty was introduced; and the laws of the
French kingdom are derived from the purest source of equality and
justice. Of such laws, the first and indispensable condition is
the assent of those whose obedience they require, and for whose
benefit they are designed. No sooner had Godfrey of Bouillon
accepted the office of supreme magistrate, than he solicited the
public and private advice of the Latin pilgrims, who were the
best skilled in the statutes and customs of Europe. From these
materials, with the counsel and approbation of the patriarch and
barons, of the clergy and laity, Godfrey composed the Assise of
Jerusalem, 132 a precious monument of feudal jurisprudence. The
new code, attested by the seals of the king, the patriarch, and
the viscount of Jerusalem, was deposited in the holy sepulchre,
enriched with the improvements of succeeding times, and
respectfully consulted as often as any doubtful question arose in
the tribunals of Palestine. With the kingdom and city all was
lost: 133 the fragments of the written law were preserved by
jealous tradition 134 and variable practice till the middle of
the thirteenth century: the code was restored by the pen of John
d’Ibelin, count of Jaffa, one of the principal feudatories; 135
and the final revision was accomplished in the year thirteen
hundred and sixty-nine, for the use of the Latin kingdom of
Cyprus. 136

132 (return) [ The Assises de Jerusalem, in old law French, were
printed with Beaumanoir’s Coutumes de Beauvoisis, (Bourges and
Paris, 1690, in folio,) and illustrated by Gaspard Thaumas de la
Thaumassiere, with a comment and glossary. An Italian version had
been published in 1534, at Venice, for the use of the kingdom of
Cyprus. * Note: See Wilken, vol. i. p. 17, &c.,—M.]

133 (return) [ A la terre perdue, tout fut perdu, is the vigorous
expression of the Assise, (c. 281.) Yet Jerusalem capitulated
with Saladin; the queen and the principal Christians departed in
peace; and a code so precious and so portable could not provoke
the avarice of the conquerors. I have sometimes suspected the
existence of this original copy of the Holy Sepulchre, which
might be invented to sanctify and authenticate the traditionary
customs of the French in Palestine.]

134 (return) [ A noble lawyer, Raoul de Tabarie, denied the
prayer of King Amauri, (A.D. 1195-1205,) that he would commit his
knowledged to writing, and frankly declared, que de ce qu’il
savoit ne feroit-il ja nul borjois son pareill, ne null sage
homme lettre, (c. 281.)]

135 (return) [ The compiler of this work, Jean d’Ibelin, was
count of Jaffa and Ascalon, lord of Baruth (Berytus) and Rames,
and died A.D. 1266, (Sanut, l. iii. p. ii. c. 5, 8.) The family
of Ibelin, which descended from a younger brother of a count of
Chartres in France, long flourished in Palestine and Cyprus, (see
the Lignages de deca Mer, or d’Outremer, c. 6, at the end of the
Assises de Jerusalem, an original book, which records the
pedigrees of the French adventurers.)]

136 (return) [ By sixteen commissioners chosen in the states of
the island: the work was finished the 3d of November, 1369,
sealed with four seals and deposited in the cathedral of Nicosia,
(see the preface to the Assises.)]

The justice and freedom of the constitution were maintained by
two tribunals of unequal dignity, which were instituted by
Godfrey of Bouillon after the conquest of Jerusalem. The king, in
person, presided in the upper court, the court of the barons. Of
these the four most conspicuous were the prince of Galilee, the
lord of Sidon and Caesarea, and the counts of Jaffa and Tripoli,
who, perhaps with the constable and marshal, 137 were in a
special manner the compeers and judges of each other. But all the
nobles, who held their lands immediately of the crown, were
entitled and bound to attend the king’s court; and each baron
exercised a similar jurisdiction on the subordinate assemblies of
his own feudatories. The connection of lord and vassal was
honorable and voluntary: reverence was due to the benefactor,
protection to the dependant; but they mutually pledged their
faith to each other; and the obligation on either side might be
suspended by neglect or dissolved by injury. The cognizance of
marriages and testaments was blended with religion, and usurped
by the clergy: but the civil and criminal causes of the nobles,
the inheritance and tenure of their fiefs, formed the proper
occupation of the supreme court. Each member was the judge and
guardian both of public and private rights. It was his duty to
assert with his tongue and sword the lawful claims of the lord;
but if an unjust superior presumed to violate the freedom or
property of a vassal, the confederate peers stood forth to
maintain his quarrel by word and deed. They boldly affirmed his
innocence and his wrongs; demanded the restitution of his liberty
or his lands; suspended, after a fruitless demand, their own
service; rescued their brother from prison; and employed every
weapon in his defence, without offering direct violence to the
person of their lord, which was ever sacred in their eyes. 138 In
their pleadings, replies, and rejoinders, the advocates of the
court were subtle and copious; but the use of argument and
evidence was often superseded by judicial combat; and the Assise
of Jerusalem admits in many cases this barbarous institution,
which has been slowly abolished by the laws and manners of
Europe.

137 (return) [ The cautious John D’Ibelin argues, rather than
affirms, that Tripoli is the fourth barony, and expresses some
doubt concerning the right or pretension of the constable and
marshal, (c. 323.)]

138 (return) [ Entre seignor et homme ne n’a que la foi;.... mais
tant que l’homme doit a son seignor reverence en toutes choses,
(c. 206.) Tous les hommes dudit royaume sont par ladite Assise
tenus les uns as autres.... et en celle maniere que le seignor
mette main ou face mettre au cors ou au fie d’aucun d’yaus sans
esgard et sans connoissans de court, que tous les autres doivent
venir devant le seignor, &c., (212.) The form of their
remonstrances is conceived with the noble simplicity of freedom.]

The trial by battle was established in all criminal cases which
affected the life, or limb, or honor, of any person; and in all
civil transactions, of or above the value of one mark of silver.
It appears that in criminal cases the combat was the privilege of
the accuser, who, except in a charge of treason, avenged his
personal injury, or the death of those persons whom he had a
right to represent; but wherever, from the nature of the charge,
testimony could be obtained, it was necessary for him to produce
witnesses of the fact. In civil cases, the combat was not allowed
as the means of establishing the claim of the demandant; but he
was obliged to produce witnesses who had, or assumed to have,
knowledge of the fact. The combat was then the privilege of the
defendant; because he charged the witness with an attempt by
perjury to take away his right. He came therefore to be in the
same situation as the appellant in criminal cases. It was not
then as a mode of proof that the combat was received, nor as
making negative evidence, (according to the supposition of
Montesquieu; 139 but in every case the right to offer battle was
founded on the right to pursue by arms the redress of an injury;
and the judicial combat was fought on the same principle, and
with the same spirit, as a private duel. Champions were only
allowed to women, and to men maimed or past the age of sixty. The
consequence of a defeat was death to the person accused, or to
the champion or witness, as well as to the accuser himself: but
in civil cases, the demandant was punished with infamy and the
loss of his suit, while his witness and champion suffered
ignominious death. In many cases it was in the option of the
judge to award or to refuse the combat: but two are specified, in
which it was the inevitable result of the challenge; if a
faithful vassal gave the lie to his compeer, who unjustly claimed
any portion of their lord’s demesnes; or if an unsuccessful
suitor presumed to impeach the judgment and veracity of the
court. He might impeach them, but the terms were severe and
perilous: in the same day he successively fought all the members
of the tribunal, even those who had been absent; a single defeat
was followed by death and infamy; and where none could hope for
victory, it is highly probable that none would adventure the
trial. In the Assise of Jerusalem, the legal subtlety of the
count of Jaffa is more laudably employed to elude, than to
facilitate, the judicial combat, which he derives from a
principle of honor rather than of superstition. 140

139 (return) [ See l’Esprit des Loix, l. xxviii. In the forty
years since its publication, no work has been more read and
criticized; and the spirit of inquiry which it has excited is not
the least of our obligations to the author.]

140 (return) [ For the intelligence of this obscure and obsolete
jurisprudence (c. 80-111) I am deeply indebted to the friendship
of a learned lord, who, with an accurate and discerning eye, has
surveyed the philosophic history of law. By his studies,
posterity might be enriched: the merit of the orator and the
judge can be felt only by his contemporaries.]

Among the causes which enfranchised the plebeians from the yoke
of feudal tyranny, the institution of cities and corporations is
one of the most powerful; and if those of Palestine are coeval
with the first crusade, they may be ranked with the most ancient
of the Latin world. Many of the pilgrims had escaped from their
lords under the banner of the cross; and it was the policy of the
French princes to tempt their stay by the assurance of the rights
and privileges of freemen. It is expressly declared in the Assise
of Jerusalem, that after instituting, for his knights and barons,
the court of peers, in which he presided himself, Godfrey of
Bouillon established a second tribunal, in which his person was
represented by his viscount. The jurisdiction of this inferior
court extended over the burgesses of the kingdom; and it was
composed of a select number of the most discreet and worthy
citizens, who were sworn to judge, according to the laws of the
actions and fortunes of their equals. 141 In the conquest and
settlement of new cities, the example of Jerusalem was imitated
by the kings and their great vassals; and above thirty similar
corporations were founded before the loss of the Holy Land.
Another class of subjects, the Syrians, 142 or Oriental
Christians, were oppressed by the zeal of the clergy, and
protected by the toleration of the state. Godfrey listened to
their reasonable prayer, that they might be judged by their own
national laws. A third court was instituted for their use, of
limited and domestic jurisdiction: the sworn members were
Syrians, in blood, language, and religion; but the office of the
president (in Arabic, of the rais) was sometimes exercised by the
viscount of the city. At an immeasurable distance below the
nobles, the burgesses, and the strangers, the Assise of Jerusalem
condescends to mention the villains and slaves, the peasants of
the land and the captives of war, who were almost equally
considered as the objects of property. The relief or protection
of these unhappy men was not esteemed worthy of the care of the
legislator; but he diligently provides for the recovery, though
not indeed for the punishment, of the fugitives. Like hounds, or
hawks, who had strayed from the lawful owner, they might be lost
and claimed: the slave and falcon were of the same value; but
three slaves, or twelve oxen, were accumulated to equal the price
of the war-horse; and a sum of three hundred pieces of gold was
fixed, in the age of chivalry, as the equivalent of the more
noble animal. 143

141 (return) [ Louis le Gros, who is considered as the father of
this institution in France, did not begin his reign till nine
years (A.D. 1108) after Godfrey of Bouillon, (Assises, c. 2,
324.) For its origin and effects, see the judicious remarks of
Dr. Robertson, (History of Charles V. vol. i. p. 30-36, 251-265,
quarto edition.)]

142 (return) [ Every reader conversant with the historians of the
crusades will understand by the peuple des Suriens, the Oriental
Christians, Melchites, Jacobites, or Nestorians, who had all
adopted the use of the Arabic language, (vol. iv. p. 593.)]

143 (return) [ See the Assises de Jerusalem, (310, 311, 312.)
These laws were enacted as late as the year 1350, in the kingdom
of Cyprus. In the same century, in the reign of Edward I., I
understand, from a late publication, (of his Book of Account,)
that the price of a war-horse was not less exorbitant in
England.]

VOLUME SIX