Werzit

Intel - History
Crusades

"In God we trust.
All others we monitor."

• Due to a split in the church, two Pope’s had been selected (One was French, one Italian) Pope Urban VI and Clement VII
• Each of these popes declared the other to be a false Pope, and excommunicated him.
• The Eastern Church would not accept the pope as the head of the Christian faith. In 1054 Pope Leo IX and Patriarch Michael Cerularius excommunicated each other.

• Council of ConstanceChose a new Pope. At this point there were 3.
• All 3 Popes were forced to resign by the Holy Roman Emperor and they chose a new one, Martin V.

• October 14, 1066 Normandy, England
• Normans and Saxons fought the Battle of Hastings, that would forever change the course of English history.
• After Harold (King of the Saxons) was killed by an arrow in his eye, the Normans won a decisive victory.
• William the Conqueror declared England his personal property. English lords who supported Harold lost their lands.

• Defeat showed the Seljuks that the Byzantines were not invincible
• West saw The Battle of Manzikert as a signal that Byzantium was no longer capable of being the protector of Eastern Christianity.

• The Byzantine emperor did not have enough money or troops to fight back so he asked the Pope for help.
• "Come then, with all your people and give battle with all your strength, so that all this treasure shall not fall into the hands of the Turks… Therefore, act while there is still time lest the kingdom of the Christians shall vanish from your sight and, what is more important, the Holy Sepulcher (the tomb where Jesus was buried) shall vanish. And in your coming you will find your reward in heaven, and if you do not come, God will condemn you."

• Alexius was somewhat afraid the Crusaders had designs on Constantinople as well as Jerusalem

• Pope Urban II: "If any one through devotion alone, and not for the sake of honor or gain, goes to Jerusalem to free the church of God, the journey itself shall take the place of all penance.“

• He called upon Christians to “Enter upon the road to the Holy Sepulcher; wrest that land from the wicked race, and subject it to yourselves…”

• Led by such personalities as Peter the Hermit and Walter the Penniless, they set out in three groups and quickly devolved into disorder, hunger, and ill-discipline
• “Led by Godfrey of Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine; Hugh of Vermandois, a brother of the king of france; Robert, Duke of Normandy, a son of Willian the conqueror; Bohemund of Tarent; and Tan-cred of Hauteville, the son and nephew of Robert Guiscard, etc.”

• Led by Peter the Hermit, Walter the Penniless, Godfrey of Bouillon, Baldwin and Eustace of Flanders, and others

• His call motivated over 30,000 European Christians to take the cross.
• No restraint in dealing with the infidel
• The change was justified based on the Biblical accounts of the conquest of Canaan by Joshua

• Pope Urban traveled to various cities for nine months preaching the Crusade and offering extraordinary inducements to include a plenary indulgence remitting all punishments due to sin for those who died on the Crusade

• For peasants, the crusade provided a chance to escape from their lords who ruled their existence. All serfs who took the cross were released from their obligations to stay on the land and pay rent to their lord.
• Serfs were allowed to leave the land to which they were bound
• Citizens were exempted from taxes
• Debtors were given a moratorium on interest
• Prisoners were freed and death sentences were commuted by a bold extension of Papal authority to life service in Palestine

• Men tired of hopeless poverty
• Adventurers seeking action
• Merchants looking for new markets
• Lords whose enlisting serfs had left them laborless
• Sincerely religious individuals wanting to rescue the land of Christ
• A war which would count as full penance

• Drive Turks from Anatolia
• Heal Great Schism on Roman Catholic Terms
• Recapture Jerusalem, the Holy Land and (return) the Holy Lands to Christian control
• apocalyptic visions & prophecies, holy war tradition in the scripture

• To subject the Eastern orthodox churches to Rome
• To make the kings and noble vassals under his spiritual leadership
• To unite European Christians in a common cause

• Boys trained for the knighthood from the age of seven, became a knight at twenty-one

• The word “crusade” comes from the Latin word crux, meaning cross. “to take up the cross” meant to became a crusader. Christians sewed symbols of the cross onto their clothing before going into battle.

• The word “crusade” comes from the Spanish cruzade which means “marked with the cross”

• Communication was difficult and carrier pigeons were used to pass information along.

• "But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me" (Luke 19:27)

• Led the papacy to the height of its power, dominating almost all of Europe.

• They are the most well known of the religious knights.
• They had great wealth and became very powerful.
• When they would not loan money to King Phillip IV of France, he had many of them tortured and killed.

• The Pope ordered them to disband.
• They became a secret organization.

• The members of the Religious knights were both monks and knights; they took vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience that all monks took, but they added a fourth vow-- to protect pilgrims and fight the infidels.

• The Crusaders slaughtered between 10 to 20 thousand Muslims, including women and children and burned a Jewish synagogue, killing religious leaders.

• Jerusalem Cross was worn by Godfrey de Bouillon, the first ruler of Jerusalem after it was taken from the Moslems. The five crosses are for the five wounds of the crucified Jesus.
• Blood reportedly ran knee-deep
• 70,000 Muslims were slaughtered

• The city was drowned in a bloodbath. The Jews were burnt alive in the synagogue where they hid themselves. Women were raped and children thrown against the walls of the city.

• (the chronicler Geoffrey Villehardouin said that never since the creation of the world had so much booty been taken from a city), in G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (1969), p. 164-5, quoted from Helen Ellerbe, The Dark Side of Christian History
• Eventually the kingdom was parceled into practically independent fiefs and barons assumed all ownership of land, reducing the former owners to the condition of serfs

• The native Christian population came to look back on the era of Muslim rule as a golden age

• One of the Crusaders had a vision of Christ, who said that the Holy Lance was in the city. The Holy Lance was found and added to the zeal of the crusaders. After five days of fasting they attacked the Turks who camped outside of the city and took their possessions. They did not rape the women, they simply “speared them through.”

• Results – Byzantine territories not returned to Alexus I and Eastern Empire
• Instead, European conquerors establish four different independent Latin kingdoms-Duchy of Edessa, Principality of Antioch, Duchy of Tripolis, and Kingdom of Jerusalem-Three military orders come into power

• Second Crusade – St Bernard of Clairvaux preached it and Conrad III of Germany and Louis VII of France executed it.

• At Dorylaeum, the Germans were defeated so badly that barely one in ten Christians survived

• Pope Eugenius III declared forgiveness of all sins and life eternal to all crusaders who died confessing their sins

• The lower classes could have their taxes canceled or paid by the church avoid jail by going; plunder for personal gain.

• In 1175, Saladin brought Egypt and Muslim Syria under one rule

• In 1185, he signed a four-year truce with the Latin kingdom but the Christians violated it by attacking a Muslim caravan and capturing Saladin’s sister

• He declared a holy war against the Christians and captured Jerusalem in 1187
• His terms were much more generous than those of the Crusaders in 1099
• Was much more peaceful in his conquest, killed no civilians after the battle

• German Emperor – Barbarossa
• English King – Richard the Lion Hearted
• French King – Philip Augustus

• In the end Richard and Saladin signed a peace for three years beginning Sept 2, 1192
• Richard would keep the coastal cities he had captured from Acre to Jaffa
• Muslims and Christians could pass freely into and from each other’s territory
• Pilgrims would be protected in Jerusalem
• But… Jerusalem would remain in Muslim hands

• Those who gave money or participated in the crusade received full forgiveness for sin.

• A bunch of noblemen gathered together with 20,000 soldiers.

• They were aided by merchants from Venice, who committed all of Venice’s wealth and resources to help the crusaders, in exchange for the promise of half of the wealth the army acquired or stole during their journey. When the secret agreement to invade Egypt was disclosed, many soldiers who had considered themselves pilgrims abandoned the army.

• In exchange for its financial support, Venice exacted a promise that the Crusaders would capture the important port of Zara and turn it over to her
• Zara belonged to Hungary and was stiff competition to Venice’s maritime trade
• Pope Innocent III denounced the scheme but to no avail

• Byzantine Emperor Isaac Angelus is deposed and asks the Crusaders to reinstate him in return for money, troops, and supplies

• 1204 – Crusaders take over Constantinople. They realize that Isaac Angelus is not able to keep his promise and they sack the city.

• The influence of the Catholic Church and the position of the pope declined and the schism between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Church widened

• After a period of nearly 200 yrs with brutal king-rule, the Magna Carta was signed…June 15, 1215
• Nobles stormed the castle and forced King John to agree to the Great Charter.
• Guaranteed rights included no taxation without representation, a jury trial, and the protection of the law.
• The Normans used the word parlement (from parler – to speak) to describe their great council

• Guaranteed basic political rights…
• Safeguard their own rights
• Limit the Monarch’s powers.
• English people of all classes argued that it applied to every citizen.
• Kings had to consult a council of advisors.

• Those who gave money or participated in the crusade received full forgiveness for sin.

• Frederick II of Germany did little fighting and a lot of negotiation
• Treaty gave the Crusaders Jerusalem and all the other holy cities and a truce of ten years
• He was widely condemned for conducting the Crusade by negotiating rather than fighting.