Chapter 14
In This Chapter
● Visiting Outremer
● Recruiting a new Crusader army
● Crusading in Europe
● Failing with the Second Crusade
The First Crusade (which I describe in Chapter 12) was a success. The papal army retook the Holy City of Jerusalem as well as a fair amount of other territory along the path to their destination. New European kingdoms and principalities were established, and a whole generation of Franks and other European people were born thousands of miles from their ancestral homes.
Of course, all this activity was happening during the volatile Middle Ages, and so it wasn’t going to last long. Within 50 years of the capture of Jerusalem in 1099, the Pope called for a second Crusade, and this time Europe’s big hitters were involved.
Maintaining Semi-Order in Outremer
After the First Crusade recaptured Jerusalem, Baldwin of Boulogne (previously the ruler of Edessa) was appointed king to rule over it (check out Chapter 12 for all about Baldwin). In addition to the Holy City, European armies had also taken control of other large cities and ports such as Edessa, Antioch, Tripoli and Acre (see the map in Figure 14-1). This loose federation of cities very much resembled those of Medieval Europe politically, with a king as overlord to a number of nobles who ruled under his authority. Europeans called this entire region of Crusader states Outremer, the land beyond the sea.
Figure 14-1: The Crusader states around the year 1140
The Muslim leaders of the near-east took the invasion of their territories rather lightly. They had no clear or coordinated way to respond to the occupations, and for the ultimate leader, the Seljuk Sultan based in Baghdad (in modern-day Iraq), affairs in Outremer were very much on the periphery of his empire and of little concern.
Securing Jerusalem and the other cities, however, was only half of the job for the Crusaders. Keeping hold of the region proved much more difficult. On a local level, Muslim people were prepared to take matters in to their own hands, as I discuss in the next section.
Responding to Holy War
The early years of Outremer were successful. In 1109 a Frankish army captured the important port of Tripoli after a near five-year siege and followed up with the sacking of Beruit in 1110. Homeless people fled from these areas to the remaining Arab strongholds of Aleppo and Damascus, the populations of these cities swelling by thousands as a result.
Whereas the Muslim leaders chose to placate the Franks by signing peace treaties, others who weren’t leaders turned to extreme action. A man from Aleppo called Abu al Fadil ibn al Kashshab was the first. Appalled by appeasement, he complained to Ridwan, the Seljuk ruler of Aleppo. His complaints were ignored, and so al Fadil took direct action. Gathering together a group of Sufis (a mystical Muslim sect) in February 1111, he set off to Baghdad to persuade the Sultan to act, setting off a full-scale riot during which the holiest places in the Sultan’s own mosque were destroyed.
The uprising worked. The Sultan’s attention was finally drawn to the problems in Aleppo and Damascus. He announced ‘Holy War against the infidel enemies of God’ and invoked jihad, the Islamic term meaning ‘struggle in the cause of the prophet’. Just as Pope Urban had called for a Holy War to retake Jerusalem, the Sultan now called for jihad to take it back.
All the Frankish successes in Outremer were suddenly thrown into a new light. The Crusader states now looked very small and vulnerable in comparison to the vastness of the Seljuk Empire and the hordes that their Sultan commanded. The Crusaders did manage to resist the first attempt at jihad, however, which had been led by a man called Mawdud (who was assassinated before he was able to attack the Franks). Nevertheless, the possibility of jihad showed the true weakness of the Crusaders’ position.
In 1118 King Baldwin died. His cousin, Baldwin of Edessa, replaced him as Baldwin II. Although the Franks continued to hold power, the vast majority of people living in Outremer were not European Christians. Constant appeals were made by the Frankish leaders in Outremer for more Europeans to settle in the new land but, despite the riches on offer, the response was slow. Many pilgrims visited Jerusalem, but few stayed. Those who did stay were shocked by the way Christians and Muslims had integrated and brought with them Western European values and ideas, which only increased tensions between groups.
Life in Outremer was a tinderbox. The only surprise was that things didn’t begin to fall apart until 1144.
The Knights Templar
One of the major developments following the foundation of Outremer was an increase in pilgrimages to Jerusalem. With European-occupied cities now lining the route to the Christian Holy Land, huge numbers of people began making pilgrimages on an annual basis. But the journey was still hazardous. Although many cities were friendly to pilgrims, the lands between the cities were full of bandits, in particular the route between the port of Jaffa and the Holy City.
In 1119 two French knights, Hugues de Payens and Godfrey de Saint-Omer, came up with the idea of founding an order of armed monks to protect pilgrims. They gained the permission of King Baldwin II and established themselves on the Temple Mount of Jerusalem in what had been the Al Aqsa Mosque, reputedly the site of the original temple of Solomon. From this location, they took their name, the Knights of the Temple.
Within a century the order had become one of the most powerful forces in the Medieval World. Shrewd business dealings made them extraordinarily rich, and they extended their military activities into Eastern Europe. Their numbers grew larger and larger. Loyal only to the order and their Grandmaster, they were effectively a state within a state and became feared by European monarchs. In 1305 Pope Clement V ordered their dissolution and over the next few years a bloody persecution was the result (Chapter 16 contains more on the Knights Templar).
Due to their secrecy and air of mystique, the Templar order still fascinates writers and conspiracy theorists today. You can visit their old headquarters, Temple Church in London, and read all about them in The Templar Code For Dummies by Christopher L. Hodapp and Alice Von Kannon (Wiley, 2007).
Stepping up jihad in Edessa
All the cause of jihad really needed was an effective leader, and in 1126 Imad ed-Din Zengi stepped on to the scene. Originally the military leader who put down a revolt against the Sultan in Baghdad, Zengi was made emir (provincial governor) of Aleppo and Mosul in 1128 and began to covet Damascus to gain complete control of the region.
At the time, Damascus was friendly with the Crusader states and so Zengi set about trying to undermine their relationship, which wasn’t too hard. The Frankish leaders had a habit of falling out with each other anyway, and rarely needed the help of anybody else! Zengi wanted to isolate Damascus so that the city would either need him to come to its aid or be unable to resist his military advances. He never did manage to take advantage of the situation, and in the end his first target was much further north - the city of Edessa.
In 1144 Joscelin, the European ruler of Edessa, had a major argument with his immediate overlord Raymond of Antioch. Edessa lost the military support of Antioch and became a particularly tasty target for Zengi.
Crusading queen - Melisinde of Jerusalem
One of the most influential figures in Outremer during this period was Queen Melisinde of Jerusalem, who lived around 1105 to 1161. Melisinde was the eldest daughter of Baldwin II of Jerusalem and his wife, an Armenian princess called Morphia. Throughout the first half of the twelfth century Melisinde was probably the most influential political figure in the kingdom of Outremer, actively ruling as Queen of Jerusalem for over 20 years.
Throughout this period Melisinde was consistently undermined by her extremely unpleasant husband, Fulk of Anjou, who had ascended to the throne with her as joint ruler in 1131. This joint accession hugely offended the noble class of Jerusalem, for whom Melisinde was the true royal because she had the blood of Baldwin's family. The husband and wife grew hugely estranged and things reached a boiling point in 1134 when Fulk accused his wife of adultery with Hugh II, the Count of Jaffa. Fulk had bitten off more than he could chew and the nobility of Outremer, including the Patriarch of Jerusalem, sided with Melisinde. Fulk was forced to retract his accusations and return to his wife. From that point on he was utterly sidelined and Melisinde became the greatest political influence in the land.
All this time Melisinde was technically ruling for her young son Baldwin III who had not yet come of age, but hers was no regency by committee - Melisinde was the true queen. Fulk died in a hunting accident in 1143 that for once seems to have actually been a genuine accident!
In 1148 Melisinde was heavily involved in the council at Acre that decided the actions of the Second Crusade and was one of the few people to survive with her reputation unscathed from the debacle at Damascus that followed. Unsurprisingly, Melisinde wasn't keen to give up the reigns of government when Baldwin came of age and eventually she was forced into virtual civil war with him. In 1153 they were reconciled and Melisinde went into effective retirement concentrating most of her time on being a patron of the arts. She died in 1161 and the historian William of Tyre paid tribute to her as follows:
'She was a very wise woman, fully experienced in almost all affairs of state business, who completely triumphed over the handicap of her sex so she could take charge of important affairs.'
Whilst this account may seem patronising to us now, from a medieval writer in a society that was hugely dominated by men it was a tremendous compliment. After all, Melisinde enjoyed the longest and least-interrupted reign of any monarch in the history of Outremer. She serves as an important reminder of how some medieval women were able to rise above the restrictions of their society to truly make a mark on history.
Zengi and his forces attacked a Seljuk prince who was loyal to Joscelin. When Joscelin and his army left Edessa to support the prince, Zengi attacked the city. Although Edessa was surrounded by huge walls and towers, no army was in place to man the defences. Without any military support from Antioch, Zengi’s army took the city quickly. According to the chronicler Michael the Syrian:
The Turks [Seljuk Turks] entered Edessa with staves and swords drawn, indiscriminately slaughtering the old and the young, men and women, priests, deacons, monks, nuns, infants at the breast, and those promised to each other in marriage! The Syrian boar was victorious and devoured the sweetest fruit!
For the Crusader states, the fall of Edessa increased anxiety of attack but didn’t hugely change their lives - at least initially. After all, Edessa was the most far flung of the Crusader kingdoms and somewhat remote from the others (as the map in Figure 14-1 shows). Still, the situation was unstable and ripe for fears to get whipped into a frenzy.
In the Arab world, however, the fall of Edessa was hugely important, because it raised spirits and demonstrated that the Franks were beatable and cities could be retaken. Ironically, Zengi never lived to realise these dreams. He died in 1146, killed by one of his own eunuchs whom he threatened after catching him drinking from his own personal wine goblet!
Catching Crusade Fever
The First Crusade had drawn huge support from around Europe, but most of that support came from second-tier nobility without any direct involvement from the Holy Roman Emperor or any of the leading monarchs.
After the fall of Edessa, the situation changed in Europe, and the stakes rose even higher. Although it didn’t impact too much on Outremer, the fall of the first Crusader state created a big splash in Europe, which had grown used to stories of Frankish success.
Calling for another round
In 1145 Bishop Hugh of Jebail led an embassy from Outremer to Pope Eugenius III in Rome. Hugh presented the fears of the people of Outremer and requested help. Pope Eugenius went straight to the heart of the matter and decided the quickest way to help was a new Crusade. He is unlikely to have viewed it as the ‘Second Crusade’, which is more a modern term. Contemporary people would have just regarded it as another Crusade.
Eugenius III acted quickly and addressed a letter to the French king, Louis VII and the whole of the French nobility.
In his letter, Eugenius not only addressed religious devotion, but also clearly stated that Crusaders would receive more than spiritual benefits by participating in the new mission. He promised that individuals who went on Crusade would have their property legally protected under the authority of the Church while they were away (losing their home property had been a big problem during the First Crusade). Furthermore, Eugenius promised that participants wouldn’t end up out of pocket:
Whoever is oppressed by debt, and undertakes this holy journey with purity of heart, shall not pay interest on the money he has not repaid; and if others on their behalf, have been imprisoned because of interest, by our apostolic authority we absolve them from their obligation and their pledge.
In other words: crusade now - pay later! Eugenius was offering the deal of a lifetime. Not only were the nobility able to save their souls by going on Crusade, but they also had the personal guarantee of the pope to protect them and their property financially while they sought new fortunes abroad. Furthermore, although many people had died on the First Crusade and in the military operations since, according to the pope they would have all gone to Heaven. He was effectively giving potential recruits a personal guarantee. Unsurprisingly, many found the offer very attractive.
Broadening the appeal: Bernard ‘The Honey Tongued'
Although Pope Eugenius’s offer was brilliant, it was somewhat wasted on King Louis VII who had already decided on making a journey to Outremer several months earlier before the Pope had made his appeal. Louis agreed to go on Crusade, and he actively recruited others to the cause, incorporating his expedition with those planned by other people.
Bernard of Clairvaux made by far the greatest effort on the French recruiting front. A close friend of the French king, Bernard was the greatest orator of the age and spent 1146-47 travelling around France, the Low Countries (modern-day Belgium and The Netherlands) and Germany, preaching to the multitudes and developing a reputation of ‘Bernard the honey tongued’. Despite the fact that he preached only in French and Latin, many people who didn’t understand either language were still convinced to take part in the cause! (This ‘miracle’ led to Bernard’s canonisation in 1174.)
If anything Bernard was probably too successful. Eugenius had intended that only monarchs and nobility take part in the Second Crusade, envisioning a purely military expedition. But Bernard spoke to all classes in society. Indeed, to him anybody that didn’t go on Crusade was a sinner. Bernard’s message made an impact on everybody.
Joining the party: Conrad III
Although Eugenius III had conceived of a purely military expedition drawn from France and Italy, the Second Crusade quickly took on a life of its own. During Christmas 1146 the German king, Conrad III responded to the pope’s call and announced that he too was taking the cross and making the journey to Jerusalem.
Conrad was an interesting character. He had tried to make himself German king following the death of his uncle, Henry V in 1125 (see Chapter 13), but that process ended up taking 13 years and a series of wars before his title was confirmed. Leaving nothing to chance, Conrad took advantage of the pope’s offer to secure all lands of Crusaders by having his son crowned as his successor before he left for the Holy Land.
At the time, no one held the title of Holy Roman Emperor, although several claimed it. Conrad frequently referred to himself as emperor, as do several sources at the time, but no pope ever crowned him with that title.
Going on Crusade - without leaving Europe
The enthusiasm for a new Crusade was reflected by more than just individuals travelling with the armies of Louis VII or Conrad III to the Holy Land. A whole other range of military expeditions took place during the middle of the twelfth century, focusing on populations within Europe.
Many people saw the preaching of Bernard of Clairvaux (see the preceding ‘Broadening the appeal: Bernard ‘The Honey Tongued’) and others as a way to justify their own mercenary desires and often horrible actions. In some cases, their claims and justifications were very dubious indeed.
Tussling with the Jews
As during the First Crusade (turn to Chapter 12 for more details), the first victims of the new expedition were the Jewish communities of Europe. While the armies gathered in Germany to accompany Conrad III to the Holy Land, various leaders decided to attack the Jewish populations of Cologne, Mainz, Worms and elsewhere. Jews and many others who felt threatened fled their homes and found sanctuary in the city of Nuremburg.
At this point Bernard of Clairvaux intervened. Bernard seems to have shared the prevailing view of his time that the Jews were the killers of Christ and as such were enemies of God. Even so, he preached that Jews shouldn’t be killed in return:
The Jews are not to be persecuted, nor killed, nor even forced to flee. God says ‘Slay not my enemies, lest my people forget’ [Psalm 59.11]. Alive, the Jews are signs to us, a continual reminder of the Lord’s passion.
Whatever the logic behind his statement, the pogroms stopped, but this wouldn’t be the last time that Jewish communities were attacked in the name of Crusade (see Chapter 16).
Wounding the Wends
Another target closer to home were the Wends, Slavic people who lived in northeastern Germany and had been a continual enemy to the German kings. During the two decades prior to the Second Crusade, the bishops of eastern Germany had been trying to convert the pagan Wends, without a great deal of success. In 1147 several German princes were given papal permission to try rather more violent tactics.
A mixed force of German and Danish warriors attacked the Wendish fortress of Dobin in the northeast of Germany. The attack was successful, and the inhabitants of the local area converted to Christianity. However, by the time the armies had made their way back west, the Wends of Dobin had resumed their pagan lifestyle.
The only real result of this forceful conversion attempt was that the Wends now paid a higher annual tribute to their German neighbours. So the effort wasn’t so much a Crusade as a protection racket!
Battling in the Baltic
The even odder Baltic Crusade took place in 1147. Vladislav the Duke of Bohemia, motivated by the words of Bernard of Clairvaux, decided to take the fight to a people known as the Pomeranians, who lived between Germany and Poland on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea. The Crusaders considered the Pomeranians to be pagan.
Vladislav’s forces laid siege to the Pomeranian capital of Stettin. In response, the inhabitants of the city raised crosses above the city walls and declared their willingness to convert to Christianity. This tactic scuppered Vladislav’s plans for conquest because the bishops of Saxony immediately intervened and decided that a peaceful conversion should take place.
Vladislav returned home having lost many men and gained no new territory. Still, with the mass conversions, Bernard of Clairvaux was probably pleased with the result!
Punishing Portugal
In a truly curious incident, Portugal was the most easterly country in Europe attacked during the Crusades and technically the farthest from Jerusalem!
As elsewhere, the call for Crusade had been effective in northern Europe. In the summer of 1147, a group made up of Crusaders from England, Normandy, northern Germany and the Low Countries (modern-day Belgium and The Netherlands) set sail around the Atlantic coast of modern-day France and Spain on their way to the Holy Land.
Their reasonably large contingent of around 150-200 ships encountered bad weather during the voyage and they were forced to dock at the city of Oporto, where they met with the Portuguese king Afonso I. Although he was technically king, he was still seeking to drive out the Moors (Muslim invaders) who had for so long dominated the country. At the time, Afonso was laying siege to the Moors in the city of Lisbon.
Afonso persuaded the Crusade army to join the siege and help him. It took four months, but finally in October the Moorish leaders surrendered. A mass slaughter followed, and many of the Crusade army stayed behind to enjoy the riches of Portugal. One of their number, Gilbert of Hastings, was elected as the new Bishop of Lisbon. The pope officially approved their victory and it became considered one of the acts of the reconquista, or reconquest, when lands that were formerly in Christian hands were retaken from the Muslim rulers who’d seized them.
Therefore, the first attacks against Muslims during the Second Crusade took place far, far from the Holy Land. And, in the event, the Portuguese Crusade was a whole lot more successful than the official expedition proved to be.
Venturing East Again: The Second Crusade
Personalities with large egos dominated the Second Crusade. Pope Eugenius III, Bernard of Clairvaux, King Louis VII of France and King Conrad III of Germany were all involved in the expedition, each having their own ideas about how it should proceed.
In particular, the kings of France and Germany both felt that they ought to be in charge. As a result, two separate armies were engaged on the Second Crusade and were essentially in competition to see who won the most fame and glory.
The two armies travelled separately to the Holy Land, setting off in early summer 1146, the Germans in May and the French in June. Like the First Crusade, the journey was extremely hard with the two armies virtually living off the lands around them as they went.
Determining precisely how many people were involved is difficult, but Conrad had at least 20,000 men and Louis around the same number. Including all the other people associated with armies and the baggage train, around 50,000 people made their way towards the Byzantine city of Constantinople.
Going with the Germans
Conrad III and his army left from Vienna accompanied by the German cardinal Theodwin as the Pope’s representative. They faced a potentially tricky journey as King Geza II of Hungary was technically an enemy of Conrad’s, and they would need to pass through Geza’s territory. As it turned out he let the Crusaders pass through unhindered. A good job too otherwise the Crusade might have been fairly brief!
Meeting up with Manuel the unwelcoming
The Byzantine emperor in 1146 was Manuel Comnenus, the son of Alexius I who had experienced the First Crusade. Based on his father’s experiences, Manuel took a fairly sceptical view of how much benefit Byzantium would derive from the enterprise and was very concerned about two European armies arriving at his capital. (The situation wasn’t helped when German soldiers caused a riot in the Byzantine city of Phillipopolis after trying to kill a juggler who was so good they suspected him of practising witchcraft!)
Accordingly, when Conrad arrived at Byzantium, Manuel persuaded him to move on and not wait for Louis as he had previously agreed to. Conrad was itching to get with things and didn’t take too much persuading. A good move for Manuel but not, as things turned out, for Conrad.
Experiencing defeat at Dorylaeum
Conrad and his army marched on, led by Greek guides supplied to them by Manuel. Somewhere on the road to the town of Dorylaeum, however, the guides deserted them. The Germans were left without the local knowledge they needed to find water and shelter, but they struggled on down the eastern road.
Just at their weakest point, Conrad’s army was surprised by a huge Turkish force, led by the son of Kilij Arslan, who had been defeated by the army of the First Crusade at Dorylaeum (as described in Chapter 12). The Turks were looking for revenge, and they got it. The exhausted and thirsty Germans were taken completely by surprise and massacred. One chronicler paints a grisly picture of the attack:
Nothing could be heard except the depths of grief and the groans and crashes of the dying; on the other side nothing but the awful shout of ‘Death to the pilgrims!’ as the Saracens [Seljuk Turks] urged each other on with mouths contorted like dogs.
Of Conrad’s army, only around 2,000 men remained. Conrad himself travelled back to Constantinople while what was left of his army joined up with the French as they made their own way eastwards.
Following the French
The French portion of the Second Crusade didn’t go particularly well. Continual attacks from Seljuk warriors reduced Louis’s army to stragglers, and the lack of available supplies made their problems even worse.
Eventually they reached the port of Attalia (in southeast modern-day Turkey) and hit another problem - the fleet provided by Manuel to take them to Antioch (see Figure 14-1) was too small. Louis made a cold-blooded decision, taking the majority of the ships for himself and his household, he set sail for Antioch leaving the rest of his army to travel overland and fend for themselves.
The marching force had a desperate time. Lacking supplies and under constant assault, barely half Louis’s men made it to Antioch. Louis himself was fine, arriving at Antioch in fine style in March 1148.
Encountering Nur ed-Din: A new enemy
By the time the now-combined army of the Second Crusade reached their destination, the Holy Land had changed hugely. The depleted army of the Second Crusade was going to face a new and different threat in the form of one man - Nur ed-Din.
Nur ed-Din was the second son of Zengi, the emir of the cities of Aleppo and Mosul who had captured Edessa in 1144 (see the earlier section ‘Stepping up jihad in Edessa’). Chaos initially followed his father’s death in 1146, which the Franks tried to exploit by taking back lost forts and territory. Their efforts didn’t last long, however; Nur ed-Din seized control of his father’s power base in Aleppo and in a series of bold moves set about securing Seljuk territory.
'My husbands and I': Eleanor of Aquitaine
Arriving at Antioch with King Louis in 1148 was his wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine. Accompanying your husband on Crusade was unusual - particularly for such a high-profile wife - but throughout her life, Eleanor proved to be a controversial figure.
Eleanor was the daughter of William, Duke of Aquitaine, and when she married the French king, the union brought together the two most powerful noble families in France.
Various reasons were suggested at the time to explain why she accompanied her husband, ranging from her own pious devotion to a combination of her supposed infidelity and Louis's insane jealousy.
Whatever the case, rumours of infidelity dogged her at Antioch (see the later section 'Losing focus in Antioch'). On the journey home she and Louis fell out in spectacular style, even making the journey on separate ships! On reaching France, they applied to Pope Eugenius III for an annulment to their marriage, but he initially tried to reconcile them. As the marriage had yet to produce a son (they had produced two daughters), Louis was keen to end the marriage as well. In the end Louis managed to have the marriage dissolved on the basis of consanguinity, which means that they were too closely related (Louis and Eleanor were cousins, four times removed). Theirs doesn't sound like a happy marriage at all. It seems that Eleanor was never very satisfied by Louis, whom she described as 'more monk than man'!
With the marriage over, Eleanor became one of the most eligible single women in Europe, more for her vast land in southern France than for her personal charm, although this was considerable. Several suitors tried to woo her, but she eventually married Henry, Duke of Anjou and Normandy. Within a few months he also became King of England, Henry II. Theirs was another tumultuous marriage, but the absolutely huge territories that they controlled kept them together for political reasons. She bore Henry II five sons and three daughters and lived through a civil war (see Chapter 15) that saw her imprisoned in England for 16 years.
Eleanor outlived her second husband and died in 1204 aged 82, which was impressive for the time. She had a remarkable life that saw her involved with just about every key figure of the age. No other woman in the medieval period made such an impact or inspired so many later writers. To this day historians still write biographies of Eleanor and novelists produce fictionalised versions of her life. With a life so rich and interesting it can't have been too difficult to do! She was memorably portrayed by Katherine Hepburn, in the film The Lion in Winter(1966), who provided just the right mix of beauty and fierce intelligence.
Ignoring Mosul, Nur ed-Din focused his attentions on Aleppo and, more importantly, Outremer. Like his father before him, his goal was to seize control of Damascus which, at the time, was still on good terms with Outremer.
Despite being only 29 in 1146, Nur ed-Din was an inspirational leader. He surrounded himself with Islamic scholars and academics and made full use of their teachings to inspire jihad among his followers. He took a hard line, going as far as to ban anybody who served in his retinue from drinking alcohol.
Losing focus in Antioch
As if Nu red-Din wasn’t a tough enough enemy to face, Louis VII was making something of a mess of his time in Antioch. He was received with massive splendour by Raymond of Antioch, who personally was keen on forcing Nur ed-Din as far away from his city as possible and hoped at some point to take back Edessa, too.
Unfortunately for Raymond, Louis had no intention of fighting Nur ed-Din by himself. His only target was Jerusalem. Conrad III and the small number of his troops that remained had already set sail for Acre (check out Figure 14-1) with the intention of meeting Louis in Jerusalem.
As if things weren’t bad enough, rumours were flying around Antioch that Louis’s wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine, had begun an affair with Raymond who also happened to be her uncle! One explanation for the rumours could have been that both Eleanor and Raymond spoke the southern French language of Occitan that was unintelligible to outsiders. Modern historians still debate whether there was anything more substantial to the rumours; whatever the truth, Eleanor doesn’t seem to have been terribly happy with Louis.
When Louis announced that he was intending to march to Jerusalem, Eleanor apparently demanded to stay behind. Louis’s response was to send his men to kidnap her and bring her by force to his camp outside the city. Another chapter in a stormy marriage!
Louis set sail for Jerusalem with a furious wife and left behind a disappointed and angry Raymond of Antioch. Unfortunately, things were only going to get worse.
Dead-ending at Damascus
Eventually the significantly reduced army of the Second Crusade staggered south. In the end only the German contingent reached Jerusalem, where the most pressing question was what to do next. The city itself was secure, and the only territory that had been lost was Edessa, which Louis had recently decided not to attack with Raymond.
The Frankish leaders came to a shocking decision. At a council at Acre in May 1148, they elected to attack Damascus. This decision was bizarre for several reasons, including the fact that the city was their only ally in the Seljuk Empire and Unur, the governor of Damascus, had been on friendly terms with the Franks for decades.
The motivations behind the decision are cloudy at best. The only notion that makes much sense is that the Franks wanted to strike at the heart of Nur ed-Din’s ambitions by capturing the famous city before him. Some historians suggest that Queen Melisinde of Jerusalem persuaded them to attack the city, but she would have only been pushing at their existing desire to win a famous victory.
Whatever the reason, it was a bad idea because Damascus had previously proved to be all but impregnable to invading armies. Neither Zengi nor Nur ed-Din had managed to take it, and little reason existed to see how a weakened Frankish army would succeed.
The chronicler William of Tyre describes the difficulties of taking the city:
On its western side and its northern side Damascus is surrounded far and wide by orchards like thick groves which stretch out for five miles or more towards Lebanon . . . these orchards provide a valuable defence for the city . . . it was in this place that our princes had initially decided to attack.
These dense orchards were difficult to move through and full of towers and defensive earthworks that prevented an attacking army from moving quickly or staying undetected.
Incredibly, when the Crusader forces attacked on 28 May 1148, they managed to seize control of the orchards and force the Damascene army back into the city. But having won such a great position, they threw it away.
When Muslim reinforcements began to appear from the north, the Crusaders left the orchards to go back to the plains because they feared that their camp would be attacked. The orchard was immediately reoccupied by the Muslim army from Damascus. When they reached the plains, the Crusaders realised that they were now outside the virtually impregnable northern walls of the city and no water supply in the area existed because the governor Unur had blocked all the wells. They were absolutely stuck with no choice but to retreat.
To the immense embarrassment of all involved, and realising that the game was up, the Crusaders were forced to retreat back into Outremer. On the way, they were constantly menaced by mounted Seljuk archers and lost many men on the march. Eventually they made it back to port and sailed home almost immediately.
Playing the blame game
Despite the prophetic visions of Bernard of Clairvaux and his immense oratory on the subject, the Second Crusade was a complete and total failure. Medieval chronicler William of Tyre very clearly attributed the failure to the local leaders in Outremer rather than to Louis or Conrad:
The men returned to their own kingdoms by the same route that they had come, and held in suspicion all the ways of our princes, rightly declining to take any part in their plans. This was the case not only while they remained in the East: even after they returned to their own lands they remained mindful of the wrongs they had suffered.
William’s judgement is a little harsh. The Second Crusade hadn’t exactly been going well when it arrived in Antioch, and a third of the army was lost at Dorylaeum only two weeks after leaving Constantinople! Everybody was at fault for one of the most disastrous military campaigns in medieval history. The knock-on result of the entire affair was that European monarchs and nobles were less willing to lend support to the leaders of Outremer in the future.
The big winner in the Second Crusade was Nur ed-Din, despite never facing the Crusader army in battle. In April 1154 he finally captured Damascus. Unlike the Crusaders, he secured a mole inside the city who let down a rope to help his soldiers get inside and open the gates. The threat to Outremer of an unfriendly Damascus was huge. In addition, within 30 years another Crusade was needed to resist an even greater threat - Saladin, the Muslim ruler of Egypt and Syria (see Chapter 15).