The Crusades

Setting the stage…Europeans undertook a series of military expeditions (9) toreclaim the holy lands (Jerusalem) from the Muslims.

Why did the Christians consider these lands holy?

Why did the Muslims consider these lands holy?

-This was where Jesus was killed and resurrected…

-This was where Muhammad ascended to heaven…

In the 600s AD, Jerusalem fell to Muslim Arabs. Christians andJews were allowed to live there peacefully…

In the 1000s ad, the Seljuk Turks (Muslims from Asia) tookOver and closed the city to Jewish and Christian pilgrims…

Reasons for the Crusades• The Byzantine Empire was

in severe decline and no longer could act as a buffer between the Muslim East and the Catholic West

• Christian pilgrims visiting the holy sites in Jerusalem began experiencing increased harassment and danger

Mobilization of the Crusades• Pope Urban traveled to various cities for nine months

preaching the Crusade and offering extraordinary inducements to include a plenary indulgence remitting all punishments due to sin for those who died on the Crusade

• Serfs were allowed to leave the land to which they were bound

• Citizens were exempted from taxes• Debtors were given a moratorium on interest• Prisoners were freed and death sentences were commuted by

a bold extension of Papal authority to life service in Palestine

The Crusaders

• The variety of motivations resulted in a varied assembly– Men tired of hopeless poverty– Adventurers seeking action– Merchants looking for new markets– Lords whose enlisting serfs had left them

laborless– Sincerely religious individuals wanting to

rescue the land of Christ

The Council of Clermont

• Southern France 1095 Urban challenged Christians to take up their weapons and join the holy war.

– All who die in battle against the pagans shall have remission of sins.

– Set out to meet foes with slogan “God wills it!” (Deus Volt!)

Fighting the Crusades

Crusaders left France in 1096 in First Crusade. In all, eight Crusades set out between 1096 and 1291 to claim or protect the Holy Land.

First Crusade Knights

• Crusaders in two groups, peasants and knights

• Unskilled peasants answered Pope’s call– Eager to fight non-Christians in

Holy Land– On the way attacked and

slaughtered German Jews despite protests

– Fell to Seljuk Turkish army at Jerusalem

• Better trained in warfare than peasants, but unprepared for hardship of journey

• Traveled three years • Siege of Jerusalem victory for

Crusaders, disaster for city• Renamed four states in Holy Land,

intended to be strongholds against future Muslim conquests

Crusades

•The victors formed four Latin crusader states, which were surrounded by Muslims.•These kingdoms depended on supplies from Europe coming through Italian cities.•Genoa, Pisa, and especially Venice grew rich and powerful.

•In the 1120s the Muslims began to strike back. When one of the Latin states fell, the monastic leader Saint Bernard of Clairvaux attained the help of King Louis VII of France and Emperor Conrad III of Germany in a Second Crusade. •It failed entirely.

The Crusade of Kings• In 1187 Jerusalem fell to the

Muslims under Saladin. • Three Christian rulers then

agreed to lead a Third Crusade: Emperor Frederick Barbarossa of Germany; Richard I (Richard the Lionhearted) of England; and Philip II Augustus of France.

• The Crusade was not successful.

• Frederick drowned while crossing a river

• Philip went home • Richard negotiated an

agreement with Saladin allowing Christian pilgrims access to Jerusalem.

• After Saladin’s death in 1193, Pope Innocent III started a Fourth Crusade.

• Again, not very successful

Children’s Crusade

• As a final gasp of the Crusades• there were two “children’s crusades.” In 1212 a

German youth named Nicholas of Cologne brought thousands of children to the pope, saying that God had inspired him to lead the children to the Holy Land.

• The pope sent them home. • At about the same time, a group of twenty thousand

French children sailed for the Holy Land.

Children’s Crusade

• Two ships went down at sea, and the remainder of the children was sold into slavery on reaching North Africa.

The End…

• The crusaders sacked Constantinople in 1204.• A Byzantine army recaptured the city in 1261,

but the empire was never again a great Mediterranean power.

• The shrunken empire continued for another 190 years until the Ottoman Turks conquered it in 1453.

• http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/mefrm.htm

The effects of the CrusadesEconomic Changes

• Historic evidence of trade between Muslims, Byzantines, Europeans prior to Crusades• Crusades enhanced existing trade• Returning Crusaders brought more goods, spices, textiles, to Europe• Increase in trade added to changing European economy during Middle Ages

Political Changes Social Changes

• Crusades led to deaths of many knights, nobles

• Lands left vulnerable• Other ambitious nobles took control of

unoccupied lands• Nobles then had more power,

influence in Europe

• Some Europeans respected other cultures, others intolerant

• Many viewed non-Christians as enemies, persecuted Jews

• Holy Land Jews saw Crusaders as cruel invaders

• Relations strained for centuries