The Christian Crusades
1095-1291
Since the time of Constantine,Christians had gone on pilgrimages to the Holy Land.Even though Moslems had ruled Jerusalem since 638,Christians were still allowed to visit the city.By the 11th century,however,the situation had changed.Just as the number and frequency of pilgrimages to Jerusalem was at new peaks,the Seljuk Turks took over control of Jerusalem and prevented pilgrimages.
The First Crusade
Pope Urban II (1088-1099,see art below) was responsible for assisting Emperor Alexus I (1081-1118) of Constantinople in launching the first crusade.He made one of the most influential speeches in the Middle Ages,calling on Christian princes in Europe to go on a crusade to rescue the Holy Land from the Turks.In the speech given at the Council of Clermont in France,on November 27,1095,he combined the ideas of making a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with that of waging a holy war against infidels.1
Dr.E.L.Skip Knox gives a summary of the pope's speech,which has been recorded differently in various sources:"The noble race of Franks must come to the aid their fellow Christians in the East.The infidel Turks are advancing into the heart of Eastern Christendom; Christians are being oppressed and attacked; churches and holy places are being defiled.Jerusalem is groaning under the Saracen yoke.The Holy Sepulchre is in Moslem hands and has been turned into a mosque.Pilgrims are harassed and even prevented from access to the Holy Land.
"The West must march to the defense of the East.All should go,rich and poor alike.The Franks must stop their internal wars and squabbles.Let them go instead against the infidel and fight a righteous war.
"God himself will lead them,for they will be doing His work.There will be absolution and remission of sins for all who die in the service of Christ.Here they are poor and miserable sinners; there they will be rich and happy.Let none hesitate; they must march next summer.God wills it!
"Deus vult!(God wills it) became the battle cry of the Crusader.
"The day after Urban's speech,the Council formally granted all the privileges and protections Urban had promised.The red cross was taken as the official sign of the pilgrims,and Bishop Adhemar of Le Puy was chosen as papal legate and the spiritual leader of the expedition."2
The First Crusade was the most successful from a military point of view.Accounts of this action are shocking.For example,historian Raymond of Agiles described the capture of Jerusalem by the Crusaders in 1099:
Some of our men cut off the heads of their enemies; others shot them with arrows,so that they fell from the towers; others tortured them longer by casting them into the flames.Piles of heads,hands and feet were to be seen in the streets of the city.It was necessary to pick one's way over the bodies of men and horses.But these were small matters compared to what happened at the temple of Solomon,a place where religious services ware ordinarily chanted.What happened there?If I tell the truth,it will exceed your powers of belief.So let it suffice to say this much at least,that in the temple and portico of Solomon,men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins.
Some of the results of the first crusade were not expected.Alexus I thought that the Byzantine territories would be returned to him and the Eastern Empire,but instead the European conquerors established four independent Latin kingdoms.In addition,three military orders (Hospitallers,Templars,and Teutonic Knights) came into power.The stated purpose of these orders was to protect pilgrims and holy sites.
The Jerusalem or Crusader's Cross was worn by Godfrey de Bouillon,the first ruler of the Jerusalem after it was taken from the Moslems.Usually the symbol has four small crosses between the arms.The five crosses symbolize the five wounds of the crucified Jesus.The Crusader's Cross can also be a single cross,as is shown in the art of St.Louis below.
Other Crusades
There were seven major Crusades.The era the Crusades the first began in 1095 with Pope Urban II's famous speech and the ended in 1291 when Acre,the last of the Latin holdings in Palestine,was lost.The major Crusades were:
the first,1095-1099,called by Pope Urban II and led by Peter the Hermit,Walter the Penniless,Godfrey of Bouillon,Baldwin and Eustace of Flanders,and others (see also first crusade);
the second,1147-49,headed by King Louis VII who was enlisted by Bernard of Clairvaux,was a disastrous failure,including the loss of one of the four Latin Kingdoms,the Duchy of Edessa;
the third,1188-92,proclaimed by Pope Gregory VIII in the wake of the catastrophe of the second crusade,which conducted by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa,King Philip Augustus of France and King Richard "Coeur-de-Lion" of England;
the fourth,during which Constantinople was sacked,1202-1204 (see also fourth crusade);
the fifth,which included the conquest of Damietta,1217-1221;
the sixth,in which Frederick II took part (1228-29); also Thibaud de Champagne and Richard of Cornwall (1239);
the seventh,led by St.Louis (Louis IX of France),1248-50; 3