Richard the Lionheart: a reading from Andrew Ehrenkreutz

In spite of their triumph at Acre, the Crusaders did not pursue their original intention of liberating Jerusalem. Most of them, including the King of France, immediately returned home. Responsibility for continuing the war against Saladin was assumed by the intrepid King of England. Despite the small number of his troops and obvious logistic limitations, Richard maintained the strategic and tactical initiative, skillfully exploiting available Christian naval support. He extended the Crusader beachhead southward. On 6 September 1191, Arsuf was captured. Three days later, Jaffa, and on 20 January 1192, the Crusaders entered Assalon. The acquisition of that gateway to Egypt allowed Richard to harass Saladin's communications lines with his main base of supply. Indeed, on 20 June, Richard's troops intercepted a great caravan, laden with supplies, en route from Egypt to Saladin's camp in Jerusalem. According to an Arab chronicler, the Crusaders captured 3,000 camels, 3,000 horses, 500 prisoners, and a large amount of supplies. Naturally, the presence of an aggressive Christian king in Assalon brought back painful memories of Al-Murik and his Egyptian campaigns. While inflicting humiliating reverses on the Muslim enemy, the English king did not rule out a negotiated end to the conflict. Following a series of diplomatic exchanges, the belligerents agreed to suspend hostilities, and on 2 September 1192, they signed a three-year truce. The Crusaders were to hold a strip of coastal territory from Tyre to Jaffa. Assalon was restored to Saladin, but its fortifications were to be demolished so that it would cease to function as a military base. Finally, both Christians and Muslims were to have free passage through the whole of Palestine, which meant that Christian pilgrims could visit the Holy Sepulchre and other venerable sites in Jerusalem and elsewhere. Because Christian Europe had intervened, the Kingdom of the Crusaders, which only five years earlier was threatened with total extinction, re-established itself on the Syrio-Palestinian littoral to serve as a focal point of aggressive plans against the Muslims for another century.