Page 105 - Encyclopedia Of World History

crusades, the 455

England N
THE FIRST Holy
CRUSADE 1096 Roman Poland
Empire

Atlantic
France
Ocean Hungary
Lyon
Genoa
Bulgaria B l a c k S e a
Spain
Constantinople
Rome
Byzantine Empire
Sicily Edessa
Antioch
Tripoli
Acre
M e d i t e r r a n e a n S e a
Muslim lands
Jerusalem
Crusader states
Invasion route
0 400 mi
0 400 km

and foreign, waged holy war against a variety of Islamic everyone who made the journey to the East a full indul-
powers in the peninsula. In the process, crusading left a gence. Thus was born the First Crusade in 1096, phe-
deep imprint on Iberian Christian culture. Finally, on 2 nomenon that many western contemporaries referred to
January 1492, the combined crusader forces of the as the “Jerusalem journey” and saw as a special type of
Catholic Monarchs, Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella penitential pilgrimage—an armed pilgrimage with mili-
I of Castile, captured Granada, the last Moorish strong- tary as well as spiritual objectives.
hold on the peninsula. Between 1096 and 1101 three major waves of cru-
One of the witnesses of the Catholic Monarchs’ tri- saders, each numbering in the tens of thousands,
umphal entry into the city on 6 January was a Genoese marched east.The first and third waves met with disaster,
sea captain who understood that now, with the dream of but the second wave, known also as the Crusade of the
the reconquest of Spain realized, the Catholic Monarchs Great Lords, managed to capture Jerusalem on 15 July
might fund his enterprise to reach the court of the Mon- 1099.
gol Great Khan of Cathay by sailing west. For he claimed Jerusalem and a number of other key sites captured by
that reestablishing direct contact with the Great Khan the second wave became the nuclei for four crusader
would be a positive step toward the recovery of Jerusalem states: the county of Edessa (1097–1150); the princi-
—a natural extension of the victory at Granada. pality of Antioch (1098–1268); the kingdom of
Jerusalem (1099–1291); and the county of Tripoli
The Jerusalem Journey (1109–1289).Although free of control from any mother
In response to pleas for help from the Byzantine emperor, country in Europe, the four states are often cited as
Alexius I, whose lands in Anatolia (modern Asiatic examples of early European colonialism. Whatever they
Turkey) were being lost to Seljuk Turkish advances, Pope were, the four states were western Christian enclaves in
Urban II delivered a sermon at Clermont in France on 27 lands where the populations were predominantly eastern
November 1095 calling upon the knighthood of the West Christian and Muslim.
to aid the Christians of the East and also to liberate Some intermarriage and cultural exchange on a per-
Jerusalem. Convinced that “God wills it,” the pope offered sonal level took place, as was evident in the Franks (as all