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Moreover, on the day of the Ascension of the Lord we began to attack the city on all sides, and to construct machines of wood, and wooden towers, with which we might be able to destroy towers on the walls. We attacked the city so bravely and so fiercely that we even undermined its wall …
The anonymous chronicler of the Gesta Francorum.
Siege warfare had not moved very far forward in over a millennium in Europe. The representations of Trajan’s campaign in Dacia of a tormentum or ballista from Roman times equate pretty much with the machinery that the Crusaders applied to the first target of their campaign to free Jerusalem after being shipped across the Bosphorus by the Byzantine navy.
The problem was that fortifications had moved on. The city of Nicaea had walls of such thickness and height that the lightweight counterbeam siege engines that the Crusaders applied to its walls in limited numbers were quite incapable of knocking out even a few of its well-cemented stones, let alone creating a breach in a wall through which they could enter the city.
The Turkish defenders also employed their own artillery which included the ‘Black Bullish’, an immense crossbow that shot quarrels, huge bolts, and the sardonically-named ‘Playful’, a quick-firing mangonel, at any of the religious processions that the Crusaders dared to attempt around the city’s walls. They also secured bales of hay to the walls to lessen the impact of the besiegers’ missiles and moved their own artillery to points where they expected the Crusaders rams and towers to be brought up.
This said, the Crusaders were tenacious and made it clear to the Turkish garrison that they would not move from the city until it capitulated. The Gesta Francorum gives us an account of Kilij Arslan’s abortive attempt to relieve the city and to enter it via its middle gate:
This gate was besieged on that very day by the Count of Saint Gilles and the Bishop of Puy. The Count, approaching from another side, was protected by divine might, and with his most powerful army gloried in terrestrial strength. And so he found the Turks, coming against us here. Armed on all sides with the sign of the cross, he rushed upon them violently and overcame them. They turned in flight, and most of them were killed. They came back again, reinforced by others, joyful and exulting in assured outcome of battle, and bearing along with them the ropes with which to lead us bound to Khurasan. Coming gladly, moreover, they began to descend from the crest of the mountain a short distance. As many as descended remained there with their heads cut off at the hands of our men …
The garrison wisely surrendered the city, not to the Crusaders, but on easy terms to the Byzantine forces accompanying the pilgrims on their march through Anatolia. Alexius’ troops entered the city quietly on boats via Lake Ascanius. The Crusaders watched the standards of the emperor being raised above the city, many of them in helpless fury. The issue of who was to be the legitimate overlord of the Crusade’s conquests was first broached at Nicaea and would soon enough sour relations between many of the Crusader lords and their erstwhile ally.
