Chapter LIX: The Crusades.—Part I

Preservation Of The Greek Empire.—Numbers, Passage, And Event, Of
The Second And Third Crusades.—St. Bernard.— Reign Of Saladin In
Egypt And Syria.—His Conquest Of Jerusalem.—Naval
Crusades.—Richard The First Of England.— Pope Innocent The Third;
And The Fourth And Fifth Crusades.— The Emperor Frederic The
Second.—Louis The Ninth Of France; And The Two Last
Crusades.—Expulsion Of The Latins Or Franks By The Mamelukes.

In a style less grave than that of history, I should perhaps
compare the emperor Alexius 1 to the jackal, who is said to
follow the steps, and to devour the leavings, of the lion.
Whatever had been his fears and toils in the passage of the first
crusade, they were amply recompensed by the subsequent benefits
which he derived from the exploits of the Franks. His dexterity
and vigilance secured their first conquest of Nice; and from this
threatening station the Turks were compelled to evacuate the
neighborhood of Constantinople. While the crusaders, with blind
valor, advanced into the midland countries of Asia, the crafty
Greek improved the favorable occasion when the emirs of the
sea-coast were recalled to the standard of the sultan. The Turks
were driven from the Isles of Rhodes and Chios: the cities of
Ephesus and Smyrna, of Sardes, Philadelphia, and Laodicea, were
restored to the empire, which Alexius enlarged from the
Hellespont to the banks of the Mæander, and the rocky shores of
Pamphylia. The churches resumed their splendor: the towns were
rebuilt and fortified; and the desert country was peopled with
colonies of Christians, who were gently removed from the more
distant and dangerous frontier. In these paternal cares, we may
forgive Alexius, if he forgot the deliverance of the holy
sepulchre; but, by the Latins, he was stigmatized with the foul
reproach of treason and desertion. They had sworn fidelity and
obedience to his throne; but _he_ had promised to assist their
enterprise in person, or, at least, with his troops and
treasures: his base retreat dissolved their obligations; and the
sword, which had been the instrument of their victory, was the
pledge and title of their just independence. It does not appear
that the emperor attempted to revive his obsolete claims over the
kingdom of Jerusalem; 2 but the borders of Cilicia and Syria were
more recent in his possession, and more accessible to his arms.
The great army of the crusaders was annihilated or dispersed; the
principality of Antioch was left without a head, by the surprise
and captivity of Bohemond; his ransom had oppressed him with a
heavy debt; and his Norman followers were insufficient to repel
the hostilities of the Greeks and Turks. In this distress,
Bohemond embraced a magnanimous resolution, of leaving the
defence of Antioch to his kinsman, the faithful Tancred; of
arming the West against the Byzantine empire; and of executing
the design which he inherited from the lessons and example of his
father Guiscard. His embarkation was clandestine: and, if we may
credit a tale of the princess Anne, he passed the hostile sea
closely secreted in a coffin. 3 But his reception in France was
dignified by the public applause, and his marriage with the
king’s daughter: his return was glorious, since the bravest
spirits of the age enlisted under his veteran command; and he
repassed the Adriatic at the head of five thousand horse and
forty thousand foot, assembled from the most remote climates of
Europe. 4 The strength of Durazzo, and prudence of Alexius, the
progress of famine and approach of winter, eluded his ambitious
hopes; and the venal confederates were seduced from his standard.
A treaty of peace 5 suspended the fears of the Greeks; and they
were finally delivered by the death of an adversary, whom neither
oaths could bind, nor dangers could appal, nor prosperity could
satiate. His children succeeded to the principality of Antioch;
but the boundaries were strictly defined, the homage was clearly
stipulated, and the cities of Tarsus and Malmistra were restored
to the Byzantine emperors. Of the coast of Anatolia, they
possessed the entire circuit from Trebizond to the Syrian gates.
The Seljukian dynasty of Roum 6 was separated on all sides from
the sea and their Mussulman brethren; the power of the sultan was
shaken by the victories and even the defeats of the Franks; and
after the loss of Nice, they removed their throne to Cogni or
Iconium, an obscure and in land town above three hundred miles
from Constantinople. 7 Instead of trembling for their capital,
the Comnenian princes waged an offensive war against the Turks,
and the first crusade prevented the fall of the declining empire.

1 (return) [ Anna Comnena relates her father’s conquests in Asia
Minor Alexiad, l. xi. p. 321—325, l. xiv. p. 419; his Cilician
war against Tancred and Bohemond, p. 328—324; the war of Epirus,
with tedious prolixity, l. xii. xiii. p. 345—406; the death of
Bohemond, l. xiv. p. 419.]

2 (return) [ The kings of Jerusalem submitted, however, to a
nominal dependence, and in the dates of their inscriptions, (one
is still legible in the church of Bethlem,) they respectfully
placed before their own the name of the reigning emperor,
(Ducange, Dissertations sur Joinville xxvii. p. 319.)]

3 (return) [ Anna Comnena adds, that, to complete the imitation,
he was shut up with a dead cock; and condescends to wonder how
the Barbarian could endure the confinement and putrefaction. This
absurd tale is unknown to the Latins. * Note: The Greek writers,
in general, Zonaras, p. 2, 303, and Glycas, p. 334 agree in this
story with the princess Anne, except in the absurd addition of
the dead cock. Ducange has already quoted some instances where a
similar stratagem had been adopted by _Norman_ princes. On this
authority Wilken inclines to believe the fact. Appendix to vol.
ii. p. 14.—M.]

4 (return) [ Ἀπὸ Θύλης, in the Byzantine geography, must mean
England; yet we are more credibly informed, that our Henry I.
would not suffer him to levy any troops in his kingdom, (Ducange,
Not. ad Alexiad. p. 41.)]

5 (return) [ The copy of the treaty (Alexiad. l. xiii. p.
406—416) is an original and curious piece, which would require,
and might afford, a good map of the principality of Antioch.]

6 (return) [ See, in the learned work of M. De Guignes, (tom. ii.
part ii.,) the history of the Seljukians of Iconium, Aleppo, and
Damascus, as far as it may be collected from the Greeks, Latins,
and Arabians. The last are ignorant or regardless of the affairs
of _Roum_.]

7 (return) [ Iconium is mentioned as a station by Xenophon, and
by Strabo, with an ambiguous title of Κωμόπολις, (Cellarius, tom.
ii. p. 121.) Yet St. Paul found in that place a multitude
(πλῆθος) of Jews and Gentiles. under the corrupt name of
_Kunijah_, it is described as a great city, with a river and
garden, three leagues from the mountains, and decorated (I know
not why) with Plato’s tomb, (Abulfeda, tabul. xvii. p. 303 vers.
Reiske; and the Index Geographicus of Schultens from Ibn Said.)]

In the twelfth century, three great emigrations marched by land
from the West for the relief of Palestine. The soldiers and
pilgrims of Lombardy, France, and Germany were excited by the
example and success of the first crusade. 8 Forty-eight years
after the deliverance of the holy sepulchre, the emperor, and the
French king, Conrad the Third and Louis the Seventh, undertook
the second crusade to support the falling fortunes of the Latins.
9 A grand division of the third crusade was led by the emperor
Frederic Barbarossa, 10 who sympathized with his brothers of
France and England in the common loss of Jerusalem. These three
expeditions may be compared in their resemblance of the greatness
of numbers, their passage through the Greek empire, and the
nature and event of their Turkish warfare, and a brief parallel
may save the repetition of a tedious narrative. However splendid
it may seem, a regular story of the crusades would exhibit the
perpetual return of the same causes and effects; and the frequent
attempts for the defence or recovery of the Holy Land would
appear so many faint and unsuccessful copies of the original.

8 (return) [ For this supplement to the first crusade, see Anna
Comnena, (Alexias, l. xi. p. 331, &c., and the viiith book of
Albert Aquensis.)]

9 (return) [ For the second crusade, of Conrad III. and Louis
VII., see William of Tyre, (l. xvi. c. 18—19,) Otho of Frisingen,
(l. i. c. 34—45 59, 60,) Matthew Paris, (Hist. Major. p. 68,)
Struvius, (Corpus Hist Germanicæ, p. 372, 373,) Scriptores Rerum
Francicarum à Duchesne tom. iv.: Nicetas, in Vit. Manuel, l. i.
c. 4, 5, 6, p. 41—48, Cinnamus l. ii. p. 41—49.]

10 (return) [ For the third crusade, of Frederic Barbarossa, see
Nicetas in Isaac Angel. l. ii. c. 3—8, p. 257—266. Struv.
(Corpus. Hist. Germ. p. 414,) and two historians, who probably
were spectators, Tagino, (in Scriptor. Freher. tom. i. p.
406—416, edit Struv.,) and the Anonymus de Expeditione Asiaticâ
Fred. I. (in Canisii Antiq. Lection. tom. iii. p. ii. p. 498—526,
edit. Basnage.)]

I. Of the swarms that so closely trod in the footsteps of the
first pilgrims, the chiefs were equal in rank, though unequal in
fame and merit, to Godfrey of Bouillon and his
fellow-adventurers. At their head were displayed the banners of
the dukes of Burgundy, Bavaria, and Aquitain; the first a
descendant of Hugh Capet, the second, a father of the Brunswick
line: the archbishop of Milan, a temporal prince, transported,
for the benefit of the Turks, the treasures and ornaments of his
church and palace; and the veteran crusaders, Hugh the Great and
Stephen of Chartres, returned to consummate their unfinished vow.
The huge and disorderly bodies of their followers moved forward
in two columns; and if the first consisted of two hundred and
sixty thousand persons, the second might possibly amount to sixty
thousand horse and one hundred thousand foot. 11 111 The armies
of the second crusade might have claimed the conquest of Asia;
the nobles of France and Germany were animated by the presence of
their sovereigns; and both the rank and personal character of
Conrad and Louis gave a dignity to their cause, and a discipline
to their force, which might be vainly expected from the feudatory
chiefs. The cavalry of the emperor, and that of the king, was
each composed of seventy thousand knights, and their immediate
attendants in the field; 12 and if the light-armed troops, the
peasant infantry, the women and children, the priests and monks,
be rigorously excluded, the full account will scarcely be
satisfied with four hundred thousand souls. The West, from Rome
to Britain, was called into action; the kings of Poland and
Bohemia obeyed the summons of Conrad; and it is affirmed by the
Greeks and Latins, that, in the passage of a strait or river, the
Byzantine agents, after a tale of nine hundred thousand, desisted
from the endless and formidable computation. 13 In the third
crusade, as the French and English preferred the navigation of
the Mediterranean, the host of Frederic Barbarossa was less
numerous. Fifteen thousand knights, and as many squires, were the
flower of the German chivalry: sixty thousand horse, and one
hundred thousand foot, were mustered by the emperor in the plains
of Hungary; and after such repetitions, we shall no longer be
startled at the six hundred thousand pilgrims, which credulity
has ascribed to this last emigration. 14 Such extravagant
reckonings prove only the astonishment of contemporaries; but
their astonishment most strongly bears testimony to the existence
of an enormous, though indefinite, multitude. The Greeks might
applaud their superior knowledge of the arts and stratagems of
war, but they confessed the strength and courage of the French
cavalry, and the infantry of the Germans; 15 and the strangers
are described as an iron race, of gigantic stature, who darted
fire from their eyes, and spilt blood like water on the ground.
Under the banners of Conrad, a troop of females rode in the
attitude and armor of men; and the chief of these Amazons, from
her gilt spurs and buskins, obtained the epithet of the
Golden-footed Dame.

11 (return) [ Anne, who states these later swarms at 40,000 horse
and 100,000 foot, calls them Normans, and places at their head
two brothers of Flanders. The Greeks were strangely ignorant of
the names, families, and possessions of the Latin princes.]

111 (return) [ It was this army of pilgrims, the first body of
which was headed by the archbishop of Milan and Count Albert of
Blandras, which set forth on the wild, yet, with a more
disciplined army, not impolitic, enterprise of striking at the
heart of the Mahometan power, by attacking the sultan in Bagdad.
For their adventures and fate, see Wilken, vol. ii. p. 120, &c.,
Michaud, book iv.—M.]

12 (return) [ William of Tyre, and Matthew Paris, reckon 70,000
loricati in each of the armies.]

13 (return) [ The imperfect enumeration is mentioned by Cinnamus,
(ennenhkonta muriadeV,) and confirmed by Odo de Diogilo apud
Ducange ad Cinnamum, with the more precise sum of 900,556. Why
must therefore the version and comment suppose the modest and
insufficient reckoning of 90,000? Does not Godfrey of Viterbo
(Pantheon, p. xix. in Muratori, tom. vii. p. 462) exclaim?
——Numerum si poscere quæras, Millia millena militis agmen erat.]

14 (return) [ This extravagant account is given by Albert of
Stade, (apud Struvium, p. 414;) my calculation is borrowed from
Godfrey of Viterbo, Arnold of Lubeck, apud eundem, and Bernard
Thesaur. (c. 169, p. 804.) The original writers are silent. The
Mahometans gave him 200,000, or 260,000, men, (Bohadin, in Vit.
Saladin, p. 110.)]

15 (return) [ I must observe, that, in the second and third
crusades, the subjects of Conrad and Frederic are styled by the
Greeks and Orientals _Alamanni_. The Lechi and Tzechi of Cinnamus
are the Poles and Bohemians; and it is for the French that he
reserves the ancient appellation of Germans. He likewise names
the Brittioi, or Britannoi. * Note: * He names both—Brittioi te
kai Britanoi.—M.]

II. The number and character of the strangers was an object of
terror to the effeminate Greeks, and the sentiment of fear is
nearly allied to that of hatred. This aversion was suspended or
softened by the apprehension of the Turkish power; and the
invectives of the Latins will not bias our more candid belief,
that the emperor Alexius dissembled their insolence, eluded their
hostilities, counselled their rashness, and opened to their ardor
the road of pilgrimage and conquest. But when the Turks had been
driven from Nice and the sea-coast, when the Byzantine princes no
longer dreaded the distant sultans of Cogni, they felt with purer
indignation the free and frequent passage of the western
Barbarians, who violated the majesty, and endangered the safety,
of the empire. The second and third crusades were undertaken
under the reign of Manuel Comnenus and Isaac Angelus. Of the
former, the passions were always impetuous, and often malevolent;
and the natural union of a cowardly and a mischievous temper was
exemplified in the latter, who, without merit or mercy, could
punish a tyrant, and occupy his throne. It was secretly, and
perhaps tacitly, resolved by the prince and people to destroy, or
at least to discourage, the pilgrims, by every species of injury
and oppression; and their want of prudence and discipline
continually afforded the pretence or the opportunity. The Western
monarchs had stipulated a safe passage and fair market in the
country of their Christian brethren; the treaty had been ratified
by oaths and hostages; and the poorest soldier of Frederic’s army
was furnished with three marks of silver to defray his expenses
on the road. But every engagement was violated by treachery and
injustice; and the complaints of the Latins are attested by the
honest confession of a Greek historian, who has dared to prefer
truth to his country. 16 Instead of a hospitable reception, the
gates of the cities, both in Europe and Asia, were closely barred
against the crusaders; and the scanty pittance of food was let
down in baskets from the walls. Experience or foresight might
excuse this timid jealousy; but the common duties of humanity
prohibited the mixture of chalk, or other poisonous ingredients,
in the bread; and should Manuel be acquitted of any foul
connivance, he is guilty of coining base money for the purpose of
trading with the pilgrims. In every step of their march they were
stopped or misled: the governors had private orders to fortify
the passes and break down the bridges against them: the
stragglers were pillaged and murdered: the soldiers and horses
were pierced in the woods by arrows from an invisible hand; the
sick were burnt in their beds; and the dead bodies were hung on
gibbets along the highways. These injuries exasperated the
champions of the cross, who were not endowed with evangelical
patience; and the Byzantine princes, who had provoked the unequal
conflict, promoted the embarkation and march of these formidable
guests. On the verge of the Turkish frontier Barbarossa spared
the guilty Philadelphia, 17 rewarded the hospitable Laodicea, and
deplored the hard necessity that had stained his sword with any
drops of Christian blood. In their intercourse with the monarchs
of Germany and France, the pride of the Greeks was exposed to an
anxious trial. They might boast that on the first interview the
seat of Louis was a low stool, beside the throne of Manuel; 18
but no sooner had the French king transported his army beyond the
Bosphorus, than he refused the offer of a second conference,
unless his brother would meet him on equal terms, either on the
sea or land. With Conrad and Frederic, the ceremonial was still
nicer and more difficult: like the successors of Constantine,
they styled themselves emperors of the Romans; 19 and firmly
maintained the purity of their title and dignity. The first of
these representatives of Charlemagne would only converse with
Manuel on horseback in the open field; the second, by passing the
Hellespont rather than the Bosphorus, declined the view of
Constantinople and its sovereign. An emperor, who had been
crowned at Rome, was reduced in the Greek epistles to the humble
appellation of _Rex_, or prince, of the Alemanni; and the vain
and feeble Angelus affected to be ignorant of the name of one of
the greatest men and monarchs of the age. While they viewed with
hatred and suspicion the Latin pilgrims the Greek emperors
maintained a strict, though secret, alliance with the Turks and
Saracens. Isaac Angelus complained, that by his friendship for
the great Saladin he had incurred the enmity of the Franks; and a
mosque was founded at Constantinople for the public exercise of
the religion of Mahomet. 20

16 (return) [ Nicetas was a child at the second crusade, but in
the third he commanded against the Franks the important post of
Philippopolis. Cinnamus is infected with national prejudice and
pride.]

17 (return) [ The conduct of the Philadelphians is blamed by
Nicetas, while the anonymous German accuses the rudeness of his
countrymen, (culpâ nostrâ.) History would be pleasant, if we were
embarrassed only by _such_ contradictions. It is likewise from
Nicetas, that we learn the pious and humane sorrow of Frederic.]

18 (return) [ Cqamalh edra, which Cinnamus translates into Latin
by the word Sellion. Ducange works very hard to save his king and
country from such ignominy, (sur Joinville, dissertat. xxvii. p.
317—320.) Louis afterwards insisted on a meeting in mari ex æquo,
not ex equo, according to the laughable readings of some MSS.]

19 (return) [ Ego Romanorum imperator sum, ille Romaniorum,
(Anonym Canis. p. 512.) The public and historical style of the
Greeks was Ριξ... _princeps_. Yet Cinnamus owns, that Ἰμπεράτορ
is synonymous to Βασιλεὺς.]

20 (return) [ In the Epistles of Innocent III., (xiii. p. 184,)
and the History of Bohadin, (p. 129, 130,) see the views of a
pope and a cadhi on this _singular_toleration.]

III. The swarms that followed the first crusade were destroyed in
Anatolia by famine, pestilence, and the Turkish arrows; and the
princes only escaped with some squadrons of horse to accomplish
their lamentable pilgrimage. A just opinion may be formed of
their knowledge and humanity; of their knowledge, from the design
of subduing Persia and Chorasan in their way to Jerusalem; 201 of
their humanity, from the massacre of the Christian people, a
friendly city, who came out to meet them with palms and crosses
in their hands. The arms of Conrad and Louis were less cruel and
imprudent; but the event of the second crusade was still more
ruinous to Christendom; and the Greek Manuel is accused by his
own subjects of giving seasonable intelligence to the sultan, and
treacherous guides to the Latin princes. Instead of crushing the
common foe, by a double attack at the same time but on different
sides, the Germans were urged by emulation, and the French were
retarded by jealousy. Louis had scarcely passed the Bosphorus
when he was met by the returning emperor, who had lost the
greater part of his army in glorious, but unsuccessful, actions
on the banks of the Mæander. The contrast of the pomp of his
rival hastened the retreat of Conrad: 202 the desertion of his
independent vassals reduced him to his hereditary troops; and he
borrowed some Greek vessels to execute by sea the pilgrimage of
Palestine. Without studying the lessons of experience, or the
nature of the war, the king of France advanced through the same
country to a similar fate. The vanguard, which bore the royal
banner and the oriflamme of St. Denys, 21 had doubled their march
with rash and inconsiderate speed; and the rear, which the king
commanded in person, no longer found their companions in the
evening camp. In darkness and disorder, they were encompassed,
assaulted, and overwhelmed, by the innumerable host of Turks,
who, in the art of war, were superior to the Christians of the
twelfth century. 211 Louis, who climbed a tree in the general
discomfiture, was saved by his own valor and the ignorance of his
adversaries; and with the dawn of day he escaped alive, but
almost alone, to the camp of the vanguard. But instead of
pursuing his expedition by land, he was rejoiced to shelter the
relics of his army in the friendly seaport of Satalia. From
thence he embarked for Antioch; but so penurious was the supply
of Greek vessels, that they could only afford room for his
knights and nobles; and the plebeian crowd of infantry was left
to perish at the foot of the Pamphylian hills. The emperor and
the king embraced and wept at Jerusalem; their martial trains,
the remnant of mighty armies, were joined to the Christian powers
of Syria, and a fruitless siege of Damascus was the final effort
of the second crusade. Conrad and Louis embarked for Europe with
the personal fame of piety and courage; but the Orientals had
braved these potent monarchs of the Franks, with whose names and
military forces they had been so often threatened. 22 Perhaps
they had still more to fear from the veteran genius of Frederic
the First, who in his youth had served in Asia under his uncle
Conrad. Forty campaigns in Germany and Italy had taught
Barbarossa to command; and his soldiers, even the princes of the
empire, were accustomed under his reign to obey. As soon as he
lost sight of Philadelphia and Laodicea, the last cities of the
Greek frontier, he plunged into the salt and barren desert, a
land (says the historian) of horror and tribulation. 23 During
twenty days, every step of his fainting and sickly march was
besieged by the innumerable hordes of Turkmans, 24 whose numbers
and fury seemed after each defeat to multiply and inflame. The
emperor continued to struggle and to suffer; and such was the
measure of his calamities, that when he reached the gates of
Iconium, no more than one thousand knights were able to serve on
horseback. By a sudden and resolute assault he defeated the
guards, and stormed the capital of the sultan, 25 who humbly sued
for pardon and peace. The road was now open, and Frederic
advanced in a career of triumph, till he was unfortunately
drowned in a petty torrent of Cilicia. 26 The remainder of his
Germans was consumed by sickness and desertion: and the emperor’s
son expired with the greatest part of his Swabian vassals at the
siege of Acre. Among the Latin heroes, Godfrey of Bouillon and
Frederic Barbarossa could alone achieve the passage of the Lesser
Asia; yet even their success was a warning; and in the last and
most experienced age of the crusades, every nation preferred the
sea to the toils and perils of an inland expedition. 27

201 (return) [ This was the design of the pilgrims under the
archbishop of Milan. See note, p. 102.—M.]

202 (return) [ Conrad had advanced with part of his army along a
central road, between that on the coast and that which led to
Iconium. He had been betrayed by the Greeks, his army destroyed
without a battle. Wilken, vol. iii. p. 165. Michaud, vol. ii. p.
156. Conrad advanced again with Louis as far as Ephesus, and from
thence, at the invitation of Manuel, returned to Constantinople.
It was Louis who, at the passage of the Mæander, was engaged in a
“glorious action.” Wilken, vol. iii. p. 179. Michaud vol. ii. p.
160. Gibbon followed Nicetas.—M.]

21 (return) [ As counts of Vexin, the kings of France were the
vassals and advocates of the monastery of St. Denys. The saint’s
peculiar banner, which they received from the abbot, was of a
square form, and a red or _flaming_ color. The _oriflamme_
appeared at the head of the French armies from the xiith to the
xvth century, (Ducange sur Joinville, Dissert. xviii. p.
244—253.)]

211 (return) [ They descended the heights to a beautiful valley
which by beneath them. The Turks seized the heights which
separated the two divisions of the army. The modern historians
represent differently the act to which Louis owed his safety,
which Gibbon has described by the undignified phrase, “he climbed
a tree.” According to Michaud, vol. ii. p. 164, the king got upon
a rock, with his back against a tree; according to Wilken, vol.
iii., he dragged himself up to the top of the rock by the roots
of a tree, and continued to defend himself till nightfall.—M.]

22 (return) [ The original French histories of the second crusade
are the Gesta Ludovici VII. published in the ivth volume of
Duchesne’s collection. The same volume contains many original
letters of the king, of Suger his minister, &c., the best
documents of authentic history.]

23 (return) [ Terram horroris et salsuginis, terram siccam
sterilem, inamnam. Anonym. Canis. p. 517. The emphatic language
of a sufferer.]

24 (return) [ Gens innumera, sylvestris, indomita, prædones sine
ductore. The sultan of Cogni might sincerely rejoice in their
defeat. Anonym. Canis. p. 517, 518.]

25 (return) [ See, in the anonymous writer in the Collection of
Canisius, Tagino and Bohadin, (Vit. Saladin. p. 119, 120,) the
ambiguous conduct of Kilidge Arslan, sultan of Cogni, who hated
and feared both Saladin and Frederic.]

26 (return) [ The desire of comparing two great men has tempted
many writers to drown Frederic in the River Cydnus, in which
Alexander so imprudently bathed, (Q. Curt. l. iii c. 4, 5.) But,
from the march of the emperor, I rather judge, that his Saleph is
the Calycadnus, a stream of less fame, but of a longer course. *

Note: * It is now called the Girama: its course is described in
M’Donald Kinneir’s Travels.—M.]

27 (return) [ Marinus Sanutus, A.D. 1321, lays it down as a
precept, Quod stolus ecclesiæ per terram nullatenus est ducenda.
He resolves, by the divine aid, the objection, or rather
exception, of the first crusade, (Secreta Fidelium Crucis, l. ii.
pars ii. c. i. p. 37.)]

The enthusiasm of the first crusade is a natural and simple
event, while hope was fresh, danger untried, and enterprise
congenial to the spirit of the times. But the obstinate
perseverance of Europe may indeed excite our pity and admiration;
that no instruction should have been drawn from constant and
adverse experience; that the same confidence should have
repeatedly grown from the same failures; that six succeeding
generations should have rushed headlong down the precipice that
was open before them; and that men of every condition should have
staked their public and private fortunes on the desperate
adventure of possessing or recovering a tombstone two thousand
miles from their country. In a period of two centuries after the
council of Clermont, each spring and summer produced a new
emigration of pilgrim warriors for the defence of the Holy Land;
but the seven great armaments or crusades were excited by some
impending or recent calamity: the nations were moved by the
authority of their pontiffs, and the example of their kings:
their zeal was kindled, and their reason was silenced, by the
voice of their holy orators; and among these, Bernard, 28 the
monk, or the saint, may claim the most honorable place. 281 About
eight years before the first conquest of Jerusalem, he was born
of a noble family in Burgundy; at the age of three-and-twenty he
buried himself in the monastery of Citeaux, then in the primitive
fervor of the institution; at the end of two years he led forth
her third colony, or daughter, to the valley of Clairvaux 29 in
Champagne; and was content, till the hour of his death, with the
humble station of abbot of his own community. A philosophic age
has abolished, with too liberal and indiscriminate disdain, the
honors of these spiritual heroes. The meanest among them are
distinguished by some energies of the mind; they were at least
superior to their votaries and disciples; and, in the race of
superstition, they attained the prize for which such numbers
contended. In speech, in writing, in action, Bernard stood high
above his rivals and contemporaries; his compositions are not
devoid of wit and eloquence; and he seems to have preserved as
much reason and humanity as may be reconciled with the character
of a saint. In a secular life, he would have shared the seventh
part of a private inheritance; by a vow of poverty and penance,
by closing his eyes against the visible world, 30 by the refusal
of all ecclesiastical dignities, the abbot of Clairvaux became
the oracle of Europe, and the founder of one hundred and sixty
convents. Princes and pontiffs trembled at the freedom of his
apostolical censures: France, England, and Milan, consulted and
obeyed his judgment in a schism of the church: the debt was
repaid by the gratitude of Innocent the Second; and his
successor, Eugenius the Third, was the friend and disciple of the
holy Bernard. It was in the proclamation of the second crusade
that he shone as the missionary and prophet of God, who called
the nations to the defence of his holy sepulchre. 31 At the
parliament of Vezelay he spoke before the king; and Louis the
Seventh, with his nobles, received their crosses from his hand.
The abbot of Clairvaux then marched to the less easy conquest of
the emperor Conrad: 311 a phlegmatic people, ignorant of his
language, was transported by the pathetic vehemence of his tone
and gestures; and his progress, from Constance to Cologne, was
the triumph of eloquence and zeal. Bernard applauds his own
success in the depopulation of Europe; affirms that cities and
castles were emptied of their inhabitants; and computes, that
only one man was left behind for the consolation of seven widows.
32 The blind fanatics were desirous of electing him for their
general; but the example of the hermit Peter was before his eyes;
and while he assured the crusaders of the divine favor, he
prudently declined a military command, in which failure and
victory would have been almost equally disgraceful to his
character. 33 Yet, after the calamitous event, the abbot of
Clairvaux was loudly accused as a false prophet, the author of
the public and private mourning; his enemies exulted, his friends
blushed, and his apology was slow and unsatisfactory. He
justifies his obedience to the commands of the pope; expatiates
on the mysterious ways of Providence; imputes the misfortunes of
the pilgrims to their own sins; and modestly insinuates, that his
mission had been approved by signs and wonders. 34 Had the fact
been certain, the argument would be decisive; and his faithful
disciples, who enumerate twenty or thirty miracles in a day,
appeal to the public assemblies of France and Germany, in which
they were performed. 35 At the present hour, such prodigies will
not obtain credit beyond the precincts of Clairvaux; but in the
preternatural cures of the blind, the lame, and the sick, who
were presented to the man of God, it is impossible for us to
ascertain the separate shares of accident, of fancy, of
imposture, and of fiction.

28 (return) [ The most authentic information of St. Bernard must
be drawn from his own writings, published in a correct edition by
Père Mabillon, and reprinted at Venice, 1750, in six volumes in
folio. Whatever friendship could recollect, or superstition could
add, is contained in the two lives, by his disciples, in the vith
volume: whatever learning and criticism could ascertain, may be
found in the prefaces of the Benedictine editor.]

281 (return) [ Gibbon, whose account of the crusades is perhaps
the least accurate and satisfactory chapter in his History, has
here failed in that lucid arrangement, which in general gives
perspicuity to his most condensed and crowded narratives. He has
unaccountably, and to the great perplexity of the reader, placed
the preaching of St Bernard after the second crusade to which i
led.—M.]

29 (return) [ Clairvaux, surnamed the valley of Absynth, is
situate among the woods near Bar sur Aube in Champagne. St.
Bernard would blush at the pomp of the church and monastery; he
would ask for the library, and I know not whether he would be
much edified by a tun of 800 muids, (914 1-7 hogsheads,) which
almost rivals that of Heidelberg, (Mélanges tirés d’une Grande
Bibliothèque, tom. xlvi. p. 15—20.)]

30 (return) [ The disciples of the saint (Vit. ima, l. iii. c. 2,
p. 1232. Vit. iida, c. 16, No. 45, p. 1383) record a marvellous
example of his pious apathy. Juxta lacum etiam Lausannensem
totius diei itinere pergens, penitus non attendit aut se videre
non vidit. Cum enim vespere facto de eodem lacû socii
colloquerentur, interrogabat eos ubi lacus ille esset, et mirati
sunt universi. To admire or despise St. Bernard as he ought, the
reader, like myself, should have before the windows of his
library the beauties of that incomparable landscape.]

31 (return) [ Otho Frising. l. i. c. 4. Bernard. Epist. 363, ad
Francos Orientales Opp. tom. i. p. 328. Vit. ima, l. iii. c. 4,
tom. vi. p. 1235.]

311 (return) [ Bernard had a nobler object in his expedition into
Germany—to arrest the fierce and merciless persecution of the
Jews, which was preparing, under the monk Radulph, to renew the
frightful scenes which had preceded the first crusade, in the
flourishing cities on the banks of the Rhine. The Jews
acknowledge the Christian intervention of St. Bernard. See the
curious extract from the History of Joseph ben Meir. Wilken, vol.
iii. p. 1. and p. 63.—M.]

32 (return) [ Mandastis et obedivi.... multiplicati sunt super
numerum; vacuantur urbes et castella; et _pene_ jam non inveniunt
quem apprehendant septem mulieres unum virum; adeo ubique viduæ
vivis remanent viris. Bernard. Epist. p. 247. We must be careful
not to construe _pene_ as a substantive.]

33 (return) [ Quis ego sum ut disponam acies, ut egrediar ante
facies armatorum, aut quid tam remotum a professione meâ, si
vires, si peritia, &c. Epist. 256, tom. i. p. 259. He speaks with
contempt of the hermit Peter, vir quidam, Epist. 363.]

34 (return) [ Sic dicunt forsitan isti, unde scimus quòd a Domino
sermo egressus sit? Quæ signa tu facis ut credamus tibi? Non est
quod ad ista ipse respondeam; parcendum verecundiæ meæ, responde
tu pro me, et pro te ipso, secundum quæ vidisti et audisti, et
secundum quod te inspiraverit Deus. Consolat. l. ii. c. 1. Opp.
tom. ii. p. 421—423.]

35 (return) [ See the testimonies in Vita ima, l. iv. c. 5, 6.
Opp. tom. vi. p. 1258—1261, l. vi. c. 1—17, p. 1286—1314.]

Omnipotence itself cannot escape the murmurs of its discordant
votaries; since the same dispensation which was applauded as a
deliverance in Europe, was deplored, and perhaps arraigned, as a
calamity in Asia. After the loss of Jerusalem, the Syrian
fugitives diffused their consternation and sorrow; Bagdad mourned
in the dust; the cadhi Zeineddin of Damascus tore his beard in
the caliph’s presence; and the whole divan shed tears at his
melancholy tale. 36 But the commanders of the faithful could only
weep; they were themselves captives in the hands of the Turks:
some temporal power was restored to the last age of the
Abbassides; but their humble ambition was confined to Bagdad and
the adjacent province. Their tyrants, the Seljukian sultans, had
followed the common law of the Asiatic dynasties, the unceasing
round of valor, greatness, discord, degeneracy, and decay; their
spirit and power were unequal to the defence of religion; and, in
his distant realm of Persia, the Christians were strangers to the
name and the arms of Sangiar, the last hero of his race. 37 While
the sultans were involved in the silken web of the harem, the
pious task was undertaken by their slaves, the Atabeks, 38 a
Turkish name, which, like the Byzantine patricians, may be
translated by Father of the Prince. Ascansar, a valiant Turk, had
been the favorite of Malek Shaw, from whom he received the
privilege of standing on the right hand of the throne; but, in
the civil wars that ensued on the monarch’s death, he lost his
head and the government of Aleppo. His domestic emirs persevered
in their attachment to his son Zenghi, who proved his first arms
against the Franks in the defeat of Antioch: thirty campaigns in
the service of the caliph and sultan established his military
fame; and he was invested with the command of Mosul, as the only
champion that could avenge the cause of the prophet. The public
hope was not disappointed: after a siege of twenty-five days, he
stormed the city of Edessa, and recovered from the Franks their
conquests beyond the Euphrates: 39 the martial tribes of
Curdistan were subdued by the independent sovereign of Mosul and
Aleppo: his soldiers were taught to behold the camp as their only
country; they trusted to his liberality for their rewards; and
their absent families were protected by the vigilance of Zenghi.
At the head of these veterans, his son Noureddin gradually united
the Mahometan powers; 391 added the kingdom of Damascus to that
of Aleppo, and waged a long and successful war against the
Christians of Syria; he spread his ample reign from the Tigris to
the Nile, and the Abbassides rewarded their faithful servant with
all the titles and prerogatives of royalty. The Latins themselves
were compelled to own the wisdom and courage, and even the
justice and piety, of this implacable adversary. 40 In his life
and government the holy warrior revived the zeal and simplicity
of the first caliphs. Gold and silk were banished from his
palace; the use of wine from his dominions; the public revenue
was scrupulously applied to the public service; and the frugal
household of Noureddin was maintained from his legitimate share
of the spoil which he vested in the purchase of a private estate.
His favorite sultana sighed for some female object of expense.
“Alas,” replied the king, “I fear God, and am no more than the
treasurer of the Moslems. Their property I cannot alienate; but I
still possess three shops in the city of Hems: these you may
take; and these alone can I bestow.” His chamber of justice was
the terror of the great and the refuge of the poor. Some years
after the sultan’s death, an oppressed subject called aloud in
the streets of Damascus, “O Noureddin, Noureddin, where art thou
now? Arise, arise, to pity and protect us!” A tumult was
apprehended, and a living tyrant blushed or trembled at the name
of a departed monarch.

36 (return) [ Abulmahasen apud de Guignes, Hist. des Huns, tom.
ii. p. ii. p. 99.]

37 (return) [ See his _article_ in the Bibliothèque Orientale of
D’Herbelot, and De Guignes, tom. ii. p. i. p. 230—261. Such was
his valor, that he was styled the second Alexander; and such the
extravagant love of his subjects, that they prayed for the sultan
a year after his decease. Yet Sangiar might have been made
prisoner by the Franks, as well as by the Uzes. He reigned near
fifty years, (A.D. 1103—1152,) and was a munificent patron of
Persian poetry.]

38 (return) [ See the Chronology of the Atabeks of Irak and
Syria, in De Guignes, tom. i. p. 254; and the reigns of Zenghi
and Noureddin in the same writer, (tom. ii. p. ii. p. 147—221,)
who uses the Arabic text of Benelathir, Ben Schouna and Abulfeda;
the Bibliothèque Orientale, under the articles _Atabeks_ and
_Noureddin_, and the Dynasties of Abulpharagius, p. 250—267,
vers. Pocock.]

39 (return) [ William of Tyre (l. xvi. c. 4, 5, 7) describes the
loss of Edessa, and the death of Zenghi. The corruption of his
name into _Sanguin_, afforded the Latins a comfortable allusion
to his _sanguinary_ character and end, fit sanguine
sanguinolentus.]

391 (return) [ On Noureddin’s conquest of Damascus, see extracts
from Arabian writers prefixed to the second part of the third
volume of Wilken.—M.]

40 (return) [ Noradinus (says William of Tyre, l. xx. 33) maximus
nominis et fidei Christianæ persecutor; princeps tamen justus,
vafer, providus’ et secundum gentis suæ traditiones religiosus.
To this Catholic witness we may add the primate of the Jacobites,
(Abulpharag. p. 267,) quo non alter erat inter reges vitæ ratione
magis laudabili, aut quæ pluribus justitiæ experimentis
abundaret. The true praise of kings is after their death, and
from the mouth of their enemies.]