The Crusades: A Brief History of the Medieval Religious Wars

Did you know the Crusades were motivated as much by political and private self-interest as religious belief? Stick around to learn more about the Crusades. Hello and welcome to World History Encyclopedia. My name is Kelly and in today's video we are going to take a look at the Crusades, what they were, how they started, and their consequences and effects. Don't forget the easiest way to support us is by giving this video a thumbs up and subscribing to our channel so you don't miss out on any new uploads. Before we get into the details of the major Crusades and why they happened, let's start with what the Crusades were. The Crusades were a number of military campaigns organized by the Pope and Western European Christians in order to take back land in the Near East, considered holy by the Christians, which had fallen under the control of Muslims. To participate in a Crusade was considered a sacred act, since the violence which ensued was done in the name of God. Nobles and peasants alike took up arms in order to protect Christian values, and the participants were promised salvation in the afterlife and wealth on earth in return. The Crusades were viewed more as a pilgrimage, and by participating, all the participants' sins would be wiped away. People joined the Crusades for a number of reasons, including the hope of remission of their sins, peer and family pressure, for the chance to gain material wealth, and maybe even lands or titles, the desire to travel to holy sites, to escape debt, or even just to have a decent living with meals included. There are a total of eight official Crusades between 1095 and 1270 CE, along with many unofficial ones. The catalyst for the Crusades can be traced back to the Battle of Manzikert in August 1071 CE, waged between the Christian Byzantine Empire and the Muslim Seljuk Turks, and resulted in the defeat of the Byzantines. When the Seljuk Turks captured Jerusalem from the Fatimids of Egypt, who were rival Muslims, the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos sent an appeal to Pope Urban II to respond to this invasion of such an important holy site. Even prior to this battle, Arab armies had swept through and conquered around two-thirds of the Christian world, so that hadn't helped matters either. Different people participated in the Crusades for different reasons. The Pope wanted to become the head of the Christian Church and strengthen the papacy in Italy, whereas the Emperor was fuelled by the desire to regain lost territory and defeat a threatening rival state. Merchants took part because they wanted to monopolise trade routes that were under Muslim control, whereas the knights were participating with the goal of defending Christianity and gaining material wealth and special favour in the next life. For the ordinary citizen, the idea of the Crusades was an appealing way to gain prestige and honour. They would gain exemptions from some taxes, and may even be released from excommunication. As you might expect, we're going to start with the first, and definitely the most successful of the Crusades. By August of 1096, the year before the First Crusade, over 60,000 men had taken the oath and sworn to become a Crusader, in addition to around 6,000 knights who were involved in the first waves. Before the Crusaders arrived at Jerusalem, the Fatimid Egyptians had regained control over their city and the Seljuk base was in Baghdad, which was not ideal for support or management throughout the war. The first wave didn't go quite as planned when what has been called the People's Crusade took place in the summer of 1096. Despite the Pope deliberately requesting knights to join, many other people who were definitely not knights caught the Crusade bug. A major group known as the Peoples, made up of petty knights and the poor, were led by Meanwhile, an equally humble second group was marching down the Rhine, and when both groups arrived in Constantinople early in the summer of 1096, they never moved on to Jerusalem, but were shipped off to Asia Minor by the Byzantine Emperor Alexios Komnenos, and promptly ambushed and wiped out by the Seljuk army. Not the ideal start to the Crusades. The next wave did a bit better, regardless of the issues of language barriers and the fact that one of their leaders, the Norman Bohemond of Taranto, was an old enemy of the Byzantine Emperor. Despite the Crusaders' tendencies to rape and pillage as they crossed Europe and the Empire's territory, under Alexios' command, they were able to recapture Nicaea in June 1097, and then they claimed victory in July at Dorylaion. The army then split, with the main body headed to Antioch in Syria, which was well fortified and too big to surround fully. After eight months of siege, the Crusader army captured Antioch, but during the eight months, they had suffered from plague, famine, and desertions. Alexios had been misinformed on his way to Antioch that the Crusaders were on the brink of defeat, so he turned and went home. Bohemond of Taranto wasn't too happy to find out that the Byzantines abandoned his army, so when they captured the city, he kept the territory for himself. The Crusader army then marched to Jerusalem, with only around 1,300 knights and 12,500 infantry left. The city was surrounded by massive walls, but after seven months, the Crusaders set up a siege tower during the night at a section of wall which looked weaker, and on the 15th of July 1099, the Crusaders found themselves inside the walls. What followed was a mass slaughter of Muslims and Jews, and within a month, Jerusalem was back in the hands of the Christians. They had eventually succeeded in their goals, and many Crusaders left, most being more worse for wear than when they set off in the first place, and not much richer. After the First Crusade, four Crusader states were formed in order to defend the territory. These were the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Edessa, the County of Tripoli, and the Principality of Antioch. These states continuously suffered a shortage of manpower and bickering between the nobles of each. The Second Crusade was sparked by the Muslim Seljuk leader Ahmad-ud-Din Zengi capturing the city of Edessa in 1144 CE. Although this Second Crusade was led by the King of France, Louis VII, and the German King Conrad III, they were not successful. The Crusaders were defeated twice, once in 1147 and again in 1148, and when they tried to end it honorably by sieging Damascus, they failed miserably. By 1159, the County of Edessa ceased to exist. You could pretty much call the Second Crusade an epic fail. The Third Crusade is known as the King's Crusade, since the King of Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, Frederick I Barbarossa, King Philip II of France, and King Richard I, the Lionheart of England, were in command. After the Muslim leader Al-Nasir Saladin Yusuf bin Ayyok, better known as Saladin, who was the Sultan of Egypt and Syria, defeated the Latin East Army, which was made up of the four Crusader states, in the Battle of Hattin in 1187 CE, he then immediately took Jerusalem, which meant, of course, that the Crusaders had to get it back. It probably started worse than the First Crusade, since Frederick didn't even reach the Holy Land, because he drowned in a river on his way. By the time they finally reached Jerusalem, they felt they would be unsuccessful in taking the city, and even if they did, Saladin's army would probably just take it right back. So they resolved this crusade with a treaty that allowed Christian pilgrims to travel to Jerusalem safely, and they got a strip of land around Acre, which was another city close to Jerusalem. The desire to expand this foothold was the inspiration for many of the future Crusades. The Fourth Crusade was the beginning of the end for the Byzantine Empire, with Constantinople, their capital city and the greatest Christian city in the world, as the new target. Between 1202 and 1204, Constantinople was sacked by Venice and its allies, and all of its relics and riches were taken to Venice. The Fifth Crusade saw a change in tactic, with the Western powers focusing on attacking the enemies in Egypt before the Muslims in Jerusalem. Although they won the arduous siege of Damietta on the Nile in 1219, they were then defeated at the Battle of Mansoura in 1221, due to their lack of knowledge and regard for local conditions and logistical support. Number 6 was less about fighting than about clever negotiation, with the Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II, striking a deal with Al-Kamil, the Sultan of Egypt and Syria, between 1228 and 1229, to hand Jerusalem over to Christian control, but allowing Muslim pilgrims to enter the city freely. The Seventh Crusade was pretty much a repeat of the Fifth Crusade, where the Christian army got control of Damietta in Egypt, and then were defeated at Mansoura. Sometimes, repetition is not the key. The Eighth and Final Official Crusade saw King Louis IX of France attack North Africa, but when he died of dysentery whilst attacking Tunis in 1270, the Crusade died along with him. The Mamluk Sultanate, who were in control since they took over from the Ayyubid dynasty, extended their domination all through the Near East, and once they had captured Acre in 1291, the Crusade Estates ceased to exist. The Crusades had many effects and consequences besides the number of deaths and widespread destructions that the wars caused. The Crusades are cited as one of the causes for the end of the Byzantine Empire, Popes became the de facto leaders of the Christian Church, and the Balkans were Christianized, just to name a few political and social effects. Crusading later gave religious justification for the conquest of the New World of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries, and people in general travelled a little more, whereas before they tended to remain in their hometowns. Pilgrimages were more popular, and songs and stories about the Crusades opened up European people's worldview a bit more, even if it was a prejudiced view for many. A complex web of myth, legend, imagery and language was spun about the Crusades by both the Christians and the Muslims, which created heroes and tragedies that were later commonly depicted in art and literature. Do you think modern wars are waged in the name of one thing, but they are really about something else? Let us know what you think in the comments below. If you enjoyed this video, make sure to leave it a thumbs up and subscribe to our channel so you don't miss out on any new uploads. This video was brought to you by World History Encyclopedia. For more great articles and interactive content, head to our website via the link below. World History Encyclopedia is a non-profit organization, so if you'd like to support our work, you can hit the link to our Patreon in the top corner of the screen, or you can find it down in the description below. Thank you so much for watching, and we'll see you soon with another video.