CRUSADE

any of a series of military expeditions organized by Western Christians against Muslim powers in order to take possession of or maintain control over the Holy City of Jerusalem and the places, particularly the shrine of the Holy Sepulchre, associated with the earthly life of Jesus Christ. Between 1095, when the First Crusade was launched, and 1291, when the Latin Christians were finally expelled from their bases in Syria, historians have formally enumerated eight major expeditions. Many other lesser ventures also took place, and even after 1291 there were attempts to recover what had been lost. This period of roughly two centuries was one of significant social, economic, and institutional growth in western Europe. As a consequence, each of the Crusades reflected the particular conditions prevailing in Europe at the time, and their influence on Europe varied as new situations developed in the East. any of a series of European military expeditions, often counted at eight although numbering many more than that, which were directed against Muslim control of Jerusalem and the Christian shrine of the Holy Sepulchre and that took place from 1095 to 1270. During the 11th century, feudal Europe underwent revivals of both expansive commerce and religion. Pilgrimages to Jerusalem and other holy places in the East became increasingly popular. At the same time, the Byzantine Empire, with its capital at Constantinople (now Istanbul), was being threatened by the rising power of the Seljuq Turks. The Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus turned to Europe, specifically to the pope of the Roman church, for aid. At the church council meeting at Clermont in 1095, Pope Urban II called for a Christian army to aid Alexius and to recapture the Holy Sepulchre. Armies were raised by such knights as Hugh of Vermandois, Bohemond, Raymond of Saint-Gilles, and Robert of Flanders. Smaller, generally ill-organized bands were collected by sundry lesser warriors, adventurers, and zealots. Over the next two years they assembled in and around Constantinople and prepared to march south across what today is Turkey. After a long siege they captured the heavily fortified town of Antioch in 1098. On July 15, 1099, Jerusalem fell to the crusaders, and its Muslim and Jewish inhabitants were slaughtered. In the following decades the crusaders gained control of a narrow strip of the Palestine coast and established the kingdom of Jerusalem, the county of Tripoli, the principality of Antioch, and the county of Edessa, the so-called crusader states, under various European rulers. In 1144 the Seljuq ruler Zangi, who had established a strong Muslim state at Mosul, captured the city of Edessa from the crusaders. When news of Edessa's fall reached Europe, Pope Eugenius III called for the Second Crusade. During this Crusade, armies led by Emperor Conrad III of Germany and King Louis VII of France joined forces in Jerusalem in the spring of 1148 and with 50,000 men struck north at Damascus. They began a siege at Damascus but were forced to retreat by an army led by Zangi's successor, Nureddin, and the Second Crusade ended in humiliating failure. Nureddin occupied Damascus in 1154, and his nephew Saladin gained control of all of Egypt in 1169 and occupied Aleppo in 1183, thus encircling the crusader states. In 1187 Saladin destroyed most of Jerusalem's army in a battle at Hattin near the Sea of Galilee and on October 2 captured Jerusalem and most of the other European strongholds. Shocked by the fall of Jerusalem, Pope Gregory VIII called for the Third Crusade. The largest crusader army yet assembled set out under the command of Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in May 1189, but Frederick's death by drowning a year later saved Saladin from having to confront him. In 1191 Richard I the Lion-Heart of England conquered the Byzantine province of Cyprus and then joined Phillip II Augustus of France in the siege of Acre. In July Acre fell and its inhabitants were slaughtered. After failing to reach Jerusalem, in 1192 Richard I negotiated a five-year peace treaty with Saladin that permitted European pilgrims access to holy shrines. The Fourth Crusade, called in 1198 by Pope Innocent III to strike against Egypt, took a bizarre course. The crusader army was unable to pay for ships and outfitting obtained from Venice and so agreed to assist the Venetians in capturing the city of Zara, in Hungary (now Zadar, Croatia), and then moving against Constantinople. Constantinople fell on April 13, 1204, and the crusaders sacked the city. The crusaders and Venetians then established the Latin Empire of Constantinople, which was to last a little over 60 years. Although the crusaders were repudiated by Pope Innocent III, the Fourth Crusade destroyed any hope of alliance between the Byzantine and Latin churches. It also mortally wounded the Byzantine Empire. A wave of revived crusading fervour in Europe produced the pathetic Children's Crusade of 1212, in which thousands of children were lost or sold into slavery. Three years later Innocent III called for another strike at the Muslim world. The Fifth Crusade, manned chiefly by French and German crusaders, captured Damietta, near the Nile, in 1219. Floods stopped a march on Cairo, and the crusade ended indecisively with an eight-year truce. This was the last crusade organized directly by the papacy. On the Sixth Crusade, Emperor Frederick II of Germany, who had been excommunicated for his many delays in setting out, negotiated in 1229 a treaty which returned Jerusalem to the Europeans for 10 years. In 1244, forced west by the advancing Mongols, the Khwarezmian Turks sacked Jerusalem with Egyptian help. King Louis IX of France launched another crusade in 1248, but the Seventh Crusade, like the Fifth, failed in Egypt. King Louis led the last of the numbered crusades, the Eighth, 22 years later, but shortly after landing in Tunis, most of the army, and Louis, died of disease. Although ill-starred expeditions continued to be launched, even into the 15th century, the era of the Crusades had come to an end. After the Mamluks of Egypt succeeded in driving back the Mongols from Syria, the Mamluk sultan Baybars I dealt harshly with the crusaders, many of whom had formed alliances with the Mongols. In 1268 the Mamluks captured Antioch and slaughtered all its inhabitants. Tripoli fell in 1289, and Acre, the last Latin outpost on the mainland, fell in 1291. Additional reading The standard bibliographic work on the Crusades, including sources, secondary studies, and journal articles, is H.E. Mayer, Bibliographie zur Geschichte der Kreuzzge, 2nd ed. (1965). A similar study in English, somewhat briefer but well organized, is Aziz S. Atiya, The Crusade: Historiography and Bibliography (1962, reprinted 1976). The best full-scale treatments of the Crusades in English are Steven Runciman, A History of the Crusades, 3 vol. (195154, reissued 1987); Kenneth M. Setton (ed.), A History of the Crusades, 2nd ed. (1969 ), a cooperative work by a number of historians; and Carl Erdmann, The Origin of the Idea of Crusade (1977; originally published in German, 1935), a classic in the history of the Crusades. Alternative interpretations to Erdmann are Jonathan Riley-Smith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading (1986); and Louis Riley-Smith and Jonathan Riley-Smith, The Crusades: Idea and Reality, 10951274 (1981). Briefer studies include Jonathan Riley-Smith, The Crusades: A Short History (1987); Jean Richard, Saint-Louis: Crusader King of France, ed. and abridged by Simon Lloyd (1992; originally published in French, 1983); Aziz S. Atiya, Crusade, Commerce, and Culture (1962), which places the Crusade movement in the context of contemporary developments, Eastern as well as Western; Ernest Barker, The Crusades (1923, reprinted 1971); and Richard A. Newhall, The Crusades, rev. ed. (1963). Two significant studies are Francesco Cognasso, Storia delle crociate (1967); and H.E. Mayer, The Crusades, 2nd ed. (1988; originally published in German, 1965).A useful work on the institutions of the crusader states is Joshua Prawer, Toldot mamlekhet ha-Tsalbanim be-Erets Yisra'el, 2 vol. (1963), also available in a French translation, Histoire du Royaume latin de Jrusalem, 2nd ed., 2 vol. (1975). Still indispensable are John L. LaMonte, Feudal Monarchy in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 1100 to 1291 (1932, reprinted 1970); and Jean Richard, The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, 2 vol. (1979; originally published in French, 1953). Dana C. Munro, The Kingdom of the Crusaders (1935, reprinted 1966), contains the Lowell lectures given in 1924 by the dean of American Crusade historians. Norman Housley, The Avignon Papacy and the Crusades, 13051378 (1986); and Kenneth M. Setton, The Papacy and the Levant, 12041571, 4 vol. (197684), examine the papal contribution to the crusading movement. Peter W. Edbury (ed.), Crusade and Settlement (1985), contains 31 papers by experts.James A. Brundage (ed.), The Crusades: Motives and Achievements (1964), presents the points of view of different scholars. T.S.R. Boase, Kingdoms and Strongholds of the Crusaders (1971), is a study of Crusade architecture with illustrations. R.C. Smail, Crusading Warfare, 10971193 (1956, reissued 1972), studies the campaigns of the 12th century. A more detailed analysis of the campaigns and the enduring appeal of crusading is found in Norman Housley, The Later Crusades, 12741580: From Lyons to Alcazar (1992); and Christopher Marshall, Warfare in the Latin East, 11921291 (1992). Emmanuel Sivan, L'Islam et la Croisade: Idologie et propagande dans les ractions musulmanes aux Croisades (1968), is an important analysis of the Muslim reaction to the Crusades. Rgine Pernoud, La Femme au temps des Croisades (1990), considers the role of women. Treatments of specific crusader states include Eric Christiansen, The Northern Crusades: The Baltic and the Catholic Frontier, 11001525 (1980), a thorough treatment; P.M. Holt, The Age of the Crusades: The Near East from the Eleventh Century to 1517 (1986); and Christopher Tyerman, England and the Crusades, 10951588 (1988). A good collection of essays covering the intellectual and cultural history of crusader states is Vladimir P. Goss and Christine Verzr Bornstein (eds.), The Meeting of Two Worlds: Cultural Exchange Between East and West During the Period of the Crusades (1986). The problems of motivation and interpretation of the Fourth Crusade are analyzed by Donald E. Queller, The Fourth Crusade: The Conquest of Constantinople, 12011204 (1977); and John Godfrey, 1204, the Unholy Crusade (1980).Useful selections of sources in English translation are James A. Brundage, The Crusades: A Documentary Survey (1962); Francesco Gabrieli (compiler), Arab Historians of the Crusades (1969, reissued 1989; originally published in Italian, 1957); and Rgine Pernoud, The Crusades (1962; originally published in French, 1960). Marshall W. Baldwin The Editors of the Encyclopdia Britannica The crusading movement and the first four Crusades The Fourth Crusade and the Latin Empire of Constantinople Pope Innocent III, despite manifold problems in the West, was the first pope since Urban II to be both anxious and able to consider the Crusade a major papal concern. In 1198 he broached the subject of a new expedition through legates and encyclical letters. In 1199 a tax was levied on all clerical incomeslater to become a precedent for systematic papal income taxesand Fulk of Neuilly, a popular orator, was commissioned to preach. At a tournament held by Thibaut III of Champagne, several prominent French nobles took the cross, and others joined later. Among them was Geoffrey of Villehardouin, who was to write one of the principal accounts of the Crusade. Contact was made with Venice to provide transport. The involvement of Venice proved to be fateful. The republic had acquired considerable trading privileges within the Byzantine Empire, and the growing number of Venetian merchants had long incurred the hostility of the Greeks. In 1171 Manuel Comnenus had ordered the arrest of Venetians, and 11 years later an aroused citizenry massacred a large number of Latins in Constantinople and insulted a papal legate. Further, following the advice of recently returned crusaders, the new Crusade was to be directed against Egypt, now the centre of Muslim power in the Levant but a government with which Venice was closely related commercially. Venetian policy under the aging and blind but ambitious Doge Enrico Dandolo was therefore potentially at variance with that of the Pope and the crusaders. Nevertheless, an agreement was made providing for payments to the Venetians for transportation and an equal division of conquests. The crusader army that arrived at Venice in the summer of 1202 was somewhat smaller than had been anticipated, since some of the crusaders were travelling directly from France. Even so, there were not sufficient funds to pay the Venetians. Accordingly, the crusaders accepted the suggestion that in lieu of payment they assist the Venetians in the capture of the Hungarian city of Zara. This was done despite the opposition of many crusaders both to the diversion of the enterprise and to the attack on a Christian city. Innocent was informed of the plan, but his veto was disregarded. Reluctant to jeopardize the Crusade, Innocent gave conditional absolution to the crusadersnot, however, to the Venetians. The fall of Zara (November 1202) added to the Pope's already considerable misgivings over the transformation of the whole undertaking from a Crusade under papal auspices to one under lay direction. After the death of Thibaut of Champagne, the leadership of the Crusade passed to Boniface of Montferrat, a friend of the Hohenstaufen Philip of Swabia. Both Boniface and Philip had married into the Byzantine imperial family. In fact, Philip's brother-in-law, Alexius, son of the deposed and blinded emperor Isaac Angelus, had appeared in Europe seeking aid and had made contacts with the crusaders. Innocent was aware of a plan to divert the Crusade to Constantinople in order to gain the throne for Alexius, who promised subsidies to the crusaders. Accordingly, Innocent ordered Boniface of Montferrat to publish immediately his original letter excommunicating the Venetians, which he had refused to do, and forbade any attack on Constantinople. But the papal letter arrived after the fleets had left Zara, and in the summer of 1203 Constantinople fell, Alexius III was deposed, and Alexius IV was crowned as coemperor with his father. All Innocent could do was reprimand the leaders and order them to proceed forthwith to the Holy Land. No doubt he hoped that a union of the churches would result and the Crusade thereby promoted. A few crusaders left, but most did not. Following the assassination of the new emperor by a resentful Greek population, the Venetians and crusaders themselves took over the city and the government of the empire. It was decided that 12 electors (six Venetians and six crusaders) should choose an emperor who would have one-quarter of the imperial domain. The other three-quarters were to be divided. The clergy of the party not belonging to the emperor elect were to have Hagia Sophia and choose a patriarch. A small amount of property was specifically designated to support the clergy. The rest was to be considered booty and divided. On April 13, 1204, the great city fell and was subjected by the rank and file to pillage and massacre for three days. Many priceless icons, relics, and other objects later turned up in western Europe, a large number in Venice. However much Innocent III may have hoped that a friendly Constantinople would aid the Crusade and promote the reunion of Eastern and Western churches, he was aghast at the sack of Constantinople and castigated the crusaders and Venetians in no uncertain terms. But the situation was beyond his control, especially after his legate, on his own initiative, had absolved the crusaders from their vow to proceed to the Holy Land. When order had been restored, the crusaders and the Venetians proceeded to implement their agreement; Baldwin of Flanders was elected emperor and the Venetian Thomas Morosini chosen patriarch. But the lands parcelled out among the leaders did not include all the former Byzantine possessions. The imperial government continued in Nicaea, and an offshoot empire of Trebizond, at the eastern end of the Black Sea, lasted until 1461. There was also established a Byzantine Despotate of Epirus, and the Bulgarians remained hostile. Various Latin-French lordships throughout Greecein particular, the duchy of Athens and the Principality of the Moreadid provide cultural contacts with western Europe and promoted the study of Greek. There was also a French impact on Greece. A collection of laws, the Assises de Romanie, was edited. The Chronicle of the Morea appeared in both French and Greek (and later Aragonese) versions. Impressive remains of crusader castles and Gothic churches can still be seen. Nevertheless, the Latin Empire always rested on shaky foundations, and in 1261 a sadly diminished domain was reconquered from the Latins by Michael Paleologus with the aid of the Genoese, the traditional rivals of Venice. It is difficult to see in the Fourth Crusade anything but unmitigated disaster to the cause of either Christianity or the Crusade. Not only had a promising Crusade been diverted, but the new Latin principalities proved to be more attractive to Westerners who might otherwise have gone to the Levant and even to a number of former residents of the states of Syria. The rift between the Eastern and Western churches widened, and Greek popular resistance to any schemes of reunion with the empire intensified. The Byzantine Empire, for centuries a bulwark against invasion from the East, was damaged beyond repair. The crusading movement and the first four Crusades The era of the Second and Third Crusades The Second Crusade The crusader states of the 12th century. It had long been apparent that Edessa was vulnerable, but its loss came as a shock to Christians both East and West. Urgent pleas for aid soon reached Europe, and Pope Eugenius III in 1145 issued a formal crusade bull, the first of its kind, with precisely worded provisions designed to protect crusaders' families and property and reflecting contemporary advances in canon law. Legates were designated. The Crusade, energetically supported by Louis VII, was preached by St. Bernard of Clairvaux in France and, with interpreters, even in Germany. As in the First Crusade, many simple noncombatant pilgrims responded. But, since Emperor Conrad III, though at first reluctant to leave Germany, had been won over by Bernard's eloquence, the Second Crusade, unlike the First, was led by two of Europe's major rulers. The situation in the East was also different. Manuel Comnenus was favourably disposed toward the West and, because of his interest in Antioch, was concerned over the power of Zangi, the Muslim ruler of Aleppo. He was able to assist the crusaders with guides and supplies but contributed no troops. In anticipation of the arrival of the western armies and more aware than they of the delicate power balance in the Levant, he had made peace with the Seljuqs of Iconium in 1146. Above all, Manuel was alarmed by the possibility of an attack by Roger II, the Norman king of Sicily. Conrad left in May 1147, accompanied by many German nobles, the Kings of Poland and Bohemia, and Frederick of Swabia, his nephew and heir. On leaving Hungary and entering Byzantine territory, he agreed to an oath of noninjury. Conrad's poorly disciplined troops created tension with the Byzantines in Constantinople, where they arrived in September. Both Conrad and Manuel, however, remained on good terms, and both were apprehensive about the moves of Roger of Sicily, who during these same weeks seized Corfu and attacked the Greek mainland. Conrad, rejecting Manuel's advice to follow the coastal route around Asia Minor, moved his main force past Nicaea directly into Anatolia. On October 25, at Dorylaeum, not far from the place where the first crusaders won their victory, his army, weary and without adequate provisions, was set upon by the Turks and virtually destroyed. Conrad, with a few survivors, retreated to Nicaea. Meanwhile, about a month behind the Germans, Louis VII, accompanied by his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine, followed the land route across Europe and arrived at Constantinople on October 4. A few of his more hotheaded followers, on hearing that Manuel had made a truce with the Turks of Iconium and totally misunderstanding the motives, accused the Emperor of treason and urged the French king to join Roger in attacking the Byzantine emperor. Louis preferred the opinion of his less volatile advisers and agreed to restore any imperial possessions he might capture. In November the French reached Nicaea, where they learned of Conrad's defeat. Louis and Conrad then started along the coastal route, the French now in the van, and reached Ephesus. Conrad became seriously ill and returned to Constantinople to the medical ministrations of Manuel. He eventually reached Acre by ship in April 1148. The French passage from Ephesus to Antioch in midwinter was harrowing in the extreme. Supplies ran short, and the Byzantines were blamed. But Antioch was finally reached in March 1148, and the crusaders were welcomed by Prince Raymond, Queen Eleanor's uncle. Raymond urged an attack on Aleppo, the centre of power of Nureddin, son and successor of Zangi. But King Louis, who resented Eleanor's open espousal of Raymond's project, left abruptly for Jerusalem and forced the Queen to join him. At Jerusalem, where Conrad had already arrived, a brilliant assembly of French and German notables assembled with Queen Melisend, her son Baldwin III, and the barons of Jerusalem to discuss how best to proceed. Despite the absence of the northern princes and the losses already suffered by the crusaders, it was possible to field an army of nearly 50,000 men, the largest Crusade army so far assembled. After considerable debate, which revealed the conflicting purposes of crusaders and Jerusalem barons, it was decided to attack Damascus. How the decision was reached is not known. Damascus was undoubtedly a tempting prize, but Unur, the Turkish commander, also fearful of the expanding power of Nureddin and the one Muslim ruler most disposed to cooperate with the Franks, was now forced to seek the aid of his former enemy. And Nureddin was not slow to move toward Damascus. Not only was the campaign mistakenly conceived, it was badly executed. On July 28, after a five-day siege, with Nureddin's forces nearing the city, it became evident that the crusader army was dangerously exposed, and a retreat was ordered. It was a humiliating failure, attributable largely to the conflicting interests of the participants. Conrad left immediately and stopped at Constantinople, where he agreed to join the Emperor against Roger of Sicily. Louis's reaction was different. His resentment against Manuel, whom he blamed for the failure, was so great that he accepted Roger's offer of ships to take him home and agreed to a plan for a new Crusade against Byzantium. Fortunately the plan was soon abandoned. The Second Crusade had been promoted with great zeal and had aroused high hopes. Its collapse caused deep dismay, and subsequent expeditions, perhaps wisely, were more limited in their objectives. The Muslims, on the other hand, were enormously encouraged. They had confronted the danger of another major Western expedition and had triumphed over it. The crusader states to 1187 During the 25 years following the Second Crusade the Kingdom of Jerusalem was governed by two of its ablest rulers, Baldwin III and Amalric I. In 1153 King Baldwin captured Ascalonthe last major conquest of the Franks. The victory extended their coastline southward. But its possession was offset in the next year by the occupation of Damascus by Nureddin, one more stage in the encirclement of the crusader states by a single Muslim power. In 116061 the possibility that the Fatimid caliphate in Egypt, shaken by palace intrigues and assassinations, might collapse and fall under the influence of Muslim Syria caused anxiety in Jerusalem. Thus, in 1164, when Nureddin sent his lieutenant Shirkuh to Egypt accompanied by his own nephew, Saladin, King Amalric decided to intervene. After some manoeuvring, both armies withdrew, as they were to do again three years later. Meanwhile, Amalric, realizing the necessity of Byzantine cooperation, had sent Archbishop William of Tyre as envoy to Constantinople. But in 1168, before the news of the agreement that William of Tyre had arranged reached Jerusalem, the King set out for Egypt. The reasons are not clear, and there had been considerable division among the barons. At any rate, the venture failed, and Shirkuh entered Cairo. On his death (May 23, 1169), Saladin, then Nureddin's deputy, was left to overcome the remaining opposition and master Egypt. When the Byzantine fleet and the army finally arrived in 1169, there was some delay, and both armies were forced by inadequate provisions and seasonal rains to retreat once again, each side blaming the other. In 1171, Saladin obeyed Nureddin's order to have the prayers in the mosques mention the Caliph of Baghdad instead of the Caliph of Cairo, who was then in his final illness. Thus ended the Fatimid caliphate and the great division in Levantine Islam from which the Latins had profited. Ominous developments followed the deaths of both Amalric and Nureddin in 1174. In 1176 the Seljuqs of Iconium defeated the armies of Manuel Comnenus at Myriocephalon. It was a shattering blow reminiscent of Manzikert a century earlier. When Manuel died in 1180, all hope of effective ByzantineLatin cooperation vanished. Three years later Saladin occupied Aleppo, virtually completing the encirclement of the Latin states. In 1185 he agreed to a truce and left for Egypt. In Jerusalem, Amalric was succeeded by his son Baldwin IV, a boy of 13 suffering from leprosy. Despite the young king's extraordinary fortitude, his precarious health necessitated occasional regencies and created a problem of succession until his sister Sibyl bore a son, the future Baldwin V, to William of Montferrat. Her marriage in 1180 to Guy of Lusignan, a newcomer to the East and brother of Amalric, the constable, accentuated existing rivalries among the barons. A kind of court party centring around the queen mother, Agnes of Courtenay, her daughter Sibyl, and Agnes' brother, Joscelin III, and now including the Lusignans was often opposed by another group composed mostly of the so-called native baronsold families, notably the Ibelins, Reginald of Sidon, and Raymond III of Tripoli, who through his wife was also lord of Tiberias. In addition to these internal problems, the kingdom was more isolated than ever. Urgent appeals to the West and the efforts of Pope Alexander III had brought little response. Baldwin IV died in March 1185, leaving, according to previous agreement, Raymond of Tripoli as regent for the child king Baldwin V. But when Baldwin V died in 1186 the court party outmanoeuvred the other barons and, disregarding succession arrangements that had been formally drawn up, hastily crowned Sibyl. She in turn crowned her husband, Guy of Lusignan. In the midst of near civil war, Reginald of Chtillon, lord of Kerak and Montral, broke the truce by attacking a caravan. Saladin replied by proclaiming jihad against the Latin kingdom. In 1187 Saladin left Egypt, crossed the Jordan south of the Sea of Galilee, and took up a position near the riverbank. Near Saffuriyah (modern Zippori) the crusaders mobilized an army of perhaps 20,000 men and including some 1,200 heavily armed cavalry, probably the equal of Saladin's. In a spot well chosen and adequately supplied with water and provisions, they awaited Saladin's first move. On July 2 Saladin blocked the main road to Tiberias and sent a small force to attack the town, hoping, since Count Raymond's wife was there, to lure the crusaders into the open. Nevertheless, it was Raymond who at first persuaded the King not to fall into the trap. But, late that night, others, accusing the Count of treason, prevailed upon the King to change his mind. It was a fateful decision. For, after an exhausting day's march on July 3, a terrible night spent without water, surrounded and constantly harassed, and a long day of fighting near the Horns of Hattin on July 4 with smoke from grass fires set by the enemy pouring into their faces, the foot soldiers broke and fled, destroying the essential coordination with the cavalry. When Saladin's final charge ended the battle, most of the knights had been slain or captured. Only Raymond of Tripoli, Reginald of Sidon, Balian of Ibelin, and a few others escaped. The King's life was spared, but Saladin killed Reginald of Chtillon and ordered the execution of some 200 Templars and Hospitallers. Other captive knights were treated honourably, and most were later ransomed. Less fortunate were the foot soldiers, most of whom were sold into slavery. Virtually the entire military force of the Kingdom of Jerusalem had been destroyed. Saladin quickly followed up his victory at Hattin. Pausing only to take Tiberias, he moved toward the coast and seized Acre. By September 1187 he and his lieutenants had occupied most of the major strongholds in the kingdom and all of the ports south of Tripoli, except Tyre, and Jubayl and Botron (al-Batrun) in the County of Tripoli. On October 2, Jerusalem, then defended by only a handful of men under the command of Balian of Ibelin, capitulated to Saladin, who agreed to allow the inhabitants to leave after paying a ransom. Though Saladin offered to release the poor for a specified sum, several thousand apparently were not redeemed and probably were sold into slavery. In Jerusalem, as in most of the cities captured, those who elected to remain were Syrian or Greek Christians. Somewhat later Saladin permitted a number of Jews to settle in the city. Meanwhile, Saladin continued his conquests in the north, and by 1189 all the kingdom was in his hands except Belvoir (modern Kokhov ha-Yarden) and Tyre. The County of Tripoli and the Principality of Antioch were each reduced to the capital city and a few outposts. The larger part of the 100-year-old Latin establishment in the Levant had been lost. The decline of the crusading movement The later Crusades and the decline of the Latin enclaves The Latin East after the Third Crusade Saladin died on March 3, 1193, not long after the departure of the Third Crusade. One of the greatest of the Muslim leaders and a man devoutly religious and deeply committed to jihad against the infidel, he was, yet, respected by his opponents. His death led once again to divisions in the Muslim world, and his Ayyubid successors were willing to continue a state of truce with the crusaders, which lasted into the early years of the 13th century. The truce was politically and economically advantageous to both sides, and the Italians were quick to make profitable trade connections in Egypt. The Franks were able to adjust themselves to a new situation and to organize what in effect was a new titular kingdom of Jerusalem centring at Acre, generally known as the Second Kingdom. In 1194 Amalric of Lusignan succeeded his brother Guy as ruler of Cyprus, where he later accepted investiture as king from the chancellor of the emperor Henry VI. In 1197, following the death of Henry of Champagne, Amalric succeeded to the throne of Jerusalem-Acre, and in 1198 he married the thrice-widowed Isabel. He chose, however, to govern his two domains separately, and in Acre he proved to be an excellent administrator. The Livre au roi (Book of the King), an important section of the Assises de Jrusalem, dates from his reign. He also dealt wisely with Saladin's brother, al-'Adil of Egypt. On Amalric's death in 1205 the kingdoms of Cyprus and Jerusalem-Acre were divided, and in 1210 the latter was given to John of Brienne, a French knight nominated by Philip Augustus, who came east and married Conrad's daughter, Mary. There were also readjustments in the two now-reduced northern states. When Raymond III of Tripoli died (1187), his county passed to a son of Bohemond III of Antioch, thus uniting the two principalities. In general, Antioch-Tripoli continued to pursue the relatively independent course laid down by Bohemond III. Armenia was more closely involved in Latin politics, partly as a result of marriage alliances with the house of Antioch-Tripoli. King Leo II of Armenia joined the crusaders at Cyprus and Acre. Desirous of a royal crown, he had approached both Pope and Emperor, and in 1198, with papal approval, royal insignia were bestowed by Archbishop Conrad of Mainz, in the name of Henry VI. At the same time, the Armenian Church officially accepted a union with Rome, which, however, was never popular with the lower clergy and general populace. The Fifth Crusade In Europe after the Fourth Crusade something of the original crusading fervour was still found in certain areas of society. Even children became the victims of mass hysteria; in 1212, in the so-called Children's Crusade, thousands of youngsters from France and Germany set out to free the Holy Land, only to be lost, shipwrecked, or sold into slavery. But there was considerable disillusionment among the nobility, especially when the same religious indulgence was promised in a Crusade against heretics in southern France and later against secular opponents of the popes. Innocent III, nevertheless, despite his preoccupation with the kings of England and France, a civil war in Germany, heresy, the advance of Islam in Spain, and his strenuous efforts to promote widespread ecclesiastical reform, renewed his efforts to organize another expedition. Preachers were designated; even troubadours contributed to the propaganda. The final canon promulgated by the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 was an elaborate Crusade plan repeating earlier prohibitions on the transport of military supplies to Muslims. Levies on clerical incomes were again authorized. The young emperor Frederick II had promised Innocent to go, but Honorius III permitted him repeated postponements to settle the affairs of Germany. Thus, the first contingents of the Fifth Crusade left without him. Nor did they accomplish anything significant until the arrival of a Frisian fleet with more German crusaders enabled a force to set out for Egypt in May 1218 under the leadership of John of Brienne. An attack on Egypt had been in the planning since the time of the Third Crusade, not as the objective of permanent conquest but as a bargaining point for the recovery of Jerusalem. By August the crusaders had captured a strategic tower at Damietta (Dumyat). In September the expedition organized under papal auspices and consisting mainly of French crusaders arrived under Cardinal Pelagius as legate. Since Pelagius regarded the crusaders as being under the jurisdiction of the church, he declined to accept the leadership of John of Brienne. Moreover, he was an imperious person who did not hesitate to interfere in military decisions. By February 1219 the Muslims were seriously alarmed and offered peace terms that included the cession of Jerusalem. King John and many of the crusaders were eager to accept. But Pelagius, supported by the military orders and the Italians, refused. Damietta was finally taken on November 5, 1219. For over a year no progress was made, though Pelagius remained optimistic, still expecting the arrival of Frederick II and convinced, by rumour, of the imminent approach of a legendary oriental Christian King David. In July 1221 he ordered an advance toward Cairo, but Nile floods forced him to retreat and to agree to a truce of eight years and an exchange of prisoners, terms far less favourable than those he had previously rejected. The Fifth Crusade, the last in which the papacy took an active part, was an impressive effort against a divided Muslim opposition. Coming close to success, it failed largely because of divided leadership and the frequently unwise decisions of Pelagius. It might perhaps have succeeded if Frederick II had set out as promised, and it is significant that disillusioned critics blamed Emperor and Pope as well as Pelagius. All in all, it was a dreary episode, relieved only by the presence of Francis of Assisi, to whom Pelagius reluctantly gave permission to cross the lines, where he was courteously received by Sultan al-Kamil. Francis' visit to the East was a preliminary step in the establishment of a Franciscan province in the Holy Land, a step soon imitated by the Dominicans.