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I turned around and saw the entire army of the Franj, in combat formation. The interpreter said, ‘the King reminds you not to forget the existence of this multitude of soldiers’.
I replied. ‘Well then, tell the King that there are fewer soldiers in his army than there are Frankish captives in the prisons of Cairo’.
The King nearly choked, then he brought the interview to a close; but he received us a short time later and concluded the truce.
Ibn Abd al-Zahir, an envoy of Baybars, relating a story of one of his missions to Acre.
Baybars made a secret pilgrimage to Mecca in 1269 and claimed guardianship over the Holy Cities. He also established trade relations with Sicily, first with Manfred, to whom he sent a giraffe and Mongol prisoners, and later with Sicily’s new king, Charles of Anjou. Sicily’s navy and strategic position made it a potential launch pad for any Crusade.
Charles’s usurpation of the throne benefited Baybars as Charles’s ambitions in Italy and his designs on Constantinople, now back in Byzantine hands, had frightened the Italian maritime republics to such an extent that they all rapidly made trade treaties with the sultan, who controlled Alexandria and the trade of India now that the Crusader ports were withering away.
These relationships became important in 1270 in the miring of King Louis IX’s last Crusading venture. The Italians, who were to carry his army to the Levant, dragged their feet and the king’s own brother, Charles of Anjou, appeared strangely reluctant to attack Egypt. The Crusade was eventually diverted to Tunis on the rather odd assumption that its ruler was converting to Christianity. It was a disaster. Pestilence did more damage to the Crusaders than the Muslim armies could ever have hoped to. King, later Saint, Louis died in Tunis of dysentery. His ventures had been largely unsuccessful but in 1248 he had obtained the Crown of Thorns which Baldwin II, the impecunious Latin Emperor of Constantinople, had hocked to the Venetians for 13,134 ducats, and so Louis’s place in the lore of Crusading was secured.
Charles assumed command of the project and then abandoned it after securing trade agreements for Sicily from the Tunisians. Nothing was achieved for Outremer. Baybars then swiftly took the White Castle of the Templars and moved on to the great prize of Crak des Chevaliers, the immense Hospitaller castle that sat between Hama and Homs. The castle was encircled and despite heavy rain slowing down the bringing up of siege engines a brief but very effective barrage began. Crak, on an otherwise impenetrable mountain, had one accessible spur and the final assault was launched along it after sappers brought down one of the massive towers on the outer wall. The Mamluks swarmed into the outer ring of defences and two weeks later they were able to force their way into the inner enclosure. There was a spirited defence by the knights but after ten days they capitulated and were given safe conduct to Tripoli.
Prince Edward of England arrived too late at Tunis but sailed on to Outremer with a small force. He began intriguing with the Ilkhan Abagha, but despite a feint into Syria by the Mongols, little came of this. It was however enough for Baybars to offer Acre a treaty, which was accepted, and then to order Edward’s assassination.
Edward was stabbed by a poisoned dagger as he lay sleeping in his chamber. The wound was not fatal, but the prince lay near death for several months, and as soon as he was well enough he departed Outremer. Perhaps dealing with Baybars made an impression on the prince, since as Edward I of England he gained a reputation as being calculating and ruthless.
