GODFREY OF BOUILLON

born c. 1060 died July 18, 1100, Jerusalem French Godefroi De Bouillon duke of Lower Lorraine (as Godfrey IV; 10891100) and a leader of the First Crusade, who became the first Latin ruler in Palestine after the capture of Jerusalem from the Muslims in July 1099. Godfrey's parents were Count Eustace II of Boulogne and Ida, daughter of Duke Godfrey II of Lower Lorraine. Although he was named heir to the duchy of Lower Lorraine by his uncle in 1076, the Holy Roman emperor Henry IV kept the duchy for his son and left Godfrey with the lordship of Bouillon, in the Ardennes region of France. Godfrey won back his duchy in 1089 as a reward for his loyal service in Henry's war against the Saxons. Impelled by religious motives, a craving for adventure, and his failure as an administrator, Godfrey, with his brothers Eustace and Baldwin, joined the First Crusade in 1096. When Raymond of Toulouse, lay leader of the crusade, declined to become king of Jerusalem, Godfrey accepted the crown but refused the title of king and was called instead Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri (Defender of the Holy Sepulchre). Although Godfrey arranged truces with the Muslim maritime cities of Ascalon, Caesarea, and Acre and successfully beat off an Egyptian attack, he alienated many of the crusade's leading figures. Most of these returned to Europe or took up residence in other parts of Palestine, leaving Jerusalem defenseless. Godfrey also acknowledged himself as a vassal of Daimbert, patriarch of Jerusalem, thus laying the foundation for future struggles between lay and ecclesiastical figures who sought to control the kingdom. On his death he was succeeded by his brother Baldwin I. Despite Godfrey's weakness as a ruler, the tall, handsome, and fair-haired descendant of Charlemagne was later idolized in legend as the perfect Christian knight, the peerless hero of the whole crusading epic.