had obstinately resisted celestial calls. The fancied possession of Divine favour was productive of a feeling of contempt and uncharitableness for such as had been deserted by heaven in the day of battle. The Muselmans found it convenient, indeed, to tolerate that which they could not destroy, and to enjoy their triumph by protracted oppression. Conversion or tribute was the choice offered to Christians. Two pieces of gold was the annual price of the safety of every individual infidel in Jerusalem: a patriarch and an episcopal establishment of clergy were permitted, and the congregation of the tributaries lived in the quarter of the city where the church of the re offered up; the tears they shed; the sighs they breathed. They then viewed the other parts in the city venerable in the imagination, and particularly some direful effects of Saracenian zeal. Their grief at the sight of holy ruins nourished their devotion, and they wished to bathe in the river Jordan, and to kiss with divine rapture all the places where Christ had exercised his ministry; but troops of Arabs were ever on the watch to fall upon the traveller; and it consequently was dangerous to go far from Jerusalem. A party of Geonese arrived in the Holy Land for the objects of trade and religion. From them the Germans purchased a return to Europe; they embarked at Jaffa, and were landed at Brundisium.surrection stood. The protection which After viewing with religious veneration the monuments of the martyrs at Rome, the archbishop and his flock returned to Germany, and Ingulph took the road for France. Of more than thirty Norman horsemen who had accompanied our English pilgrim, scarcely twenty remained, and they pursued their way to their homes on foot, ill, weary, and pennyless. The state of the Latin pilgrims and residents in the Holy Land was that of sunshine and storms; and the vicissitudes did not arise from any uncertainty in Muselman law, but from the different characters of those who, from time to time, moved the machine of government. The propagation of religion was the active principle of Islamism, and war the instrument. Consistently with this spirit, such of the Christian nations as had been subjugated by the Moslems, were treated by their conquerors with stronger feelings than the common fierceness and cruelty of victors. The Koran considered its foes as the enemies of God, and genuine Islamism hated and despised those who * Ingulphi Historia, p. 903, 904, in the Scriptores post Bedam. Mariani Scoti Chronica, p. 429. Sic igitur civitate Deo amabili et sacrosancta, peccatis nostris exigentibus, infidelium, subjectá hostium ditioni, jugum indebitæ servitutis continuis passa est laboribus per annos quadringentos nonaginta, conditionibus alternis. Nam frequenti rerum mutatione, dominos mutavit frequentius: secundum quorum dispositionem, plerumque lucida, plerumque nubila, recepit intervalla; et ægrotantis more, temporum, præsentium, gravabatur, aut respirabat, qualitate. Archb. of Tyre, p. 630. they were seemingly entitled to did not * Archb. of Tyre, p. 630. Eginhart, 80, 81. This delivery of the keys to Charlemagne has given birth to controversy. Some writers have maguified it into a surrender of the Holy Land: and others, astonished at the liberality of a Saracen, have denied the story altogether. The plain fact is, Harun gave Charlemagne, as lord of the Christians, dominion over the temple to which the European population had flocked. The Christians were not relieved from the capitation tax at least, if Harun remitted it, his successors enforced it. In Moslem countries seldom is the act of a sovereign considered binding on his successor. The common story of Charles' journey to Palestine is fabulous. ity of Charlemagne.* The state of the Christians increased in misery under the Fatimate caliphs. Hakem, the third prince, passed all former limits of cruelty. He called himself the personal image of God, and his audacity awed several thousand people into a belief in his claims. He hated and persecuted alike both Jews and Christians, but as vanity and fanaticism had not altogether obliterated all traces of education, he tolerated the Muselmans. At his command the church of the resurrection and the rock of the sepulchre were greatly injured. But with the versatility of unprincipled passion he ordered, before his death, that the church should be restored. His successors, however, imitated his example, and despised his command. Long established custom was considered no privilege from an increase to the tribute. All religious ceremonies and processions were prohibited. Property was insecure; children were torn from their parents; the daughters were led to prostitution, the sons to apostacy. The fortitude of the Christians triumphed, and with the pecuniary aid of the Greek emperor, and perhaps by the influence of an eminent Muselman woman that had secretly renounced the errors of her fathers, they restored the edifice which commemorated the most wonderful passage in their Redeemer's life. This work was accomplished amidst a thousand dangers. The Moslems did not cease to torment them. The lives of the Christians were often sacrificed, and though, according to the principles of Muhammedan jurispru Mabillion, Acta Ben. sec. 3. p. 2. Three centuries before the time of Charlemagne there was a monastery at Jerusalem for the reception of travellers. Greg. Turv. de Marty, lib. i. c. 11. It seems that the first, or at least one of the first houses for the reception of indigent sick, was the one which was built at Rome by Fabiola, a Roman lady, in the course of the fifth century. Houses of reception for travellers were absolutely necessary when religious journeys were considered a moral duty; and, as the obligation included the poor as well as the rich, many of those houses were charitable establishments. Jerome built a hospital at Bethlem; and his friend Paula caused several to be erected on the road to that village, in order that the devout idlers, as she says, might fare better than the mother of God, who, on her necessary jour ney thither, could find no inn. See the Epistle of Jerome, cited in Beckman's History of Inventories, vol. iv. p. 471. dence, even a true believer should be condemned to the bowstring for the murder of a tributary infidel, yet the friends of the victims to fanaticism could never obtain legal justice. Every new governor gratified his avarice and savageness at the expense of the Christians, and each murmur of grief and 'outery of indignation, were answered by the threat that the church of the resurrection should be destroyed.* In considering the state of Jerusalem under the Seljukian and Ortokite Turks, we must give the fullest import to words of wretchedness. These people were newly converted Moslems; they fought in the name and for the support of the doctrines of the Abassidan caliphs, and their enthusiasm was fresh and vigorous. The Fatimites were regarded as enemies; and when the Seljuks conquered Jerusalem, the swords of the Turks were plunged with undistinguishing cruelty into the hearts of Egyptians and Christians. The conquerors had not been long enough in the south to have shaken off any of their original and native barbarity. They lived in tents near the towns which they seized, and the hardihood of their savage simplicity mocked the elegant defencelessness of luxury and commerce. The cruelties which the Christians experienced in the days of the Fatimite caliphs gave rise to new feelings in the nations of the west. Every pilgrim brought home tales of public sacrilege or individual misery; and though some gloomy minds might consider afflictions as the essence of pilgrimages, and were therefore slow in separating the superfluous from the necessary pains, yet upon general considerations it was evidently a disgrace that the followers of Christ should dwell only by sufferance in the country of their master, and that paganst should * Archb. of Tyre, p. 631; Grester, 63; Renaudot, Hist. Pat. Alexand. p. 390, 397, 400, 401. Pagan and Paynim are words in frequent use among the writers of the middle ages, for those who followed the doctrines of the Arabian prophet. Le Souldan, says Joinville, estoit le plus puissant roy de toute Payennie. See Du Cange, glossary, article Paganismus. The people of the west thought that the Saracens adored a plurality of gods, and that Muhammed himself was an object of worship. Mahoun signified the Devil, and Mawmettes idols, in old English. * be possessors of a land which he had con- | mined to lead the sacred host, and to secrated by his presence. At the close commit the custody of the Holy See to of the tenth century, Pope Sylvester II., his great compeer, Henry IV. of Gerthe ornament of his age, entreated the many. But all ideas of a crusade soon church universal to succour the church died away, and the Pope deserted the of Jerusalem, and to redeem a sepulchre general interests of religion in his ambiwhich the prophet Isaiah had said should tious attempts to establish the supreme be a glorious one, and which the sons of dominion of papal royalty over the the destroyer Satan were making inglo- whole of Europe. rious.* Pisa was the only city which was roused to arms, and all her efforts were mere predatory incursions on the Syrian coast.f The loss of Georgia and Armenia was quickly followed by other disasters, and the Turkish power advanced to Constantinople. After having subdued almost all In the next century, political events in the countries of Asia, which owed allethe Grecian and Saracenian worlds occa- giance to the throne of Bagdad, the Sulsioned a renewal of the endeavour to tan, Malek Shah, commanded his relation, arm Christendom against Islamism. The Soliman, to subjugate the territories which conquest of Jerusalem by the generals of were situated between Syria and the BosMalek Shah has been already mentioned. phorus. The mighty conquest was Not long before that event, Alp Arslan achieved, and the generous Sultan elehad added the Grecian provinces of vated his victorious Emir to the dignity Georgia and Armenia to the Tartarian of prince over these fresh acquisitions. monarchy. Constantinople trembled for Nice, in Bithynia, was the capital of the her safety, and the emperor Manuel VII. new kingdon of the Seljuks, and the about the year 1073, supplicated the aid Grecian Emperor, Alexius Comnenus, of Pope Gregory VII., expressed deep after having endeavoured to recover Asia respect for his Holiness, and attachment Minor, was obliged, by the formal into the Latin church. The spiritual sove-strument of a treaty, to acknowledge the reign immediately commanded the pa- power of his enemies. The city of Antriarch of Venice to proceed to Constan- tioch had been wrested from the Saratinople, and arrange the terms of friend- cens by the Emperor Diogenes; but the ship and reunion. An encyclical letter general whom the Byzantine court had was sent from Rome to the states and appointed governor, basely deserted his princes of the west, acquainting them allegiance, entered into the alliances with with the melancholy fact, that the pagans the Muselmans, and even offered to were overcoming the Christians. The oblige his new friends by renouncing his people of Christ had been slain like religion. His son, however, from mosheep, and their remorseless murderers tives unrecorded and inscrutable, called had carried their devastations even to the in the aid of the Nissian monarch. walls of the Imperial city. The faithful Soliman quickly made himself master of ought to lament for the misfortunes of Antioch: but he declined to pay the acthe empire, and the miseries of their customed tribute to Aleppo; a war enbrethren they should not, however, sued, and the Moslem lords of both cities lament only; but, following the example were slain. Asia Minor became the of their Divine master, they should give scene of great disorders: Nice was ruled up their lives for their friends. Accord- by Abulcasem, a general of Soliman; ingly, fifty thousand men prepared them- but the Greeks began to raise their heads, selves to rescue the Christians of the when they saw the Turks no longer supeast, and to arrest the march of Islamism. So highly was Gregory elated at the ambitious prospect, which the application of Manuel and the armament of Europe opened to his mind, that he even deter Bouquet, Recueil des Historiens, &c. vol. x. p. 426. The lives of the Popes in Muratori, Rer. Scrip. Ital. vol. iii. pars 1, p. 400. * Ep. Greg. lib. I. 49, II. 31, 37, in Labbe, Concilia, vol. 10. It is evident from the letters of Gregory, that the extinction of heresy, the union of the two churches, and the general triumph of the Christian over the Moslem cause, were the great objects of the Pope. Palestine does not seem to have been much thought of. There is only one allusion to it. He says, that 50,000 people had agreed to march to the sepulchre of Christ if he would lead them. ported by the great Seljukian Sultan. The lord of Nice entertained the daring hope of subjugating the Greek empire, but Alexius Comnenus baffled all his designs, and even regained much of Nicomedia. Malek Shah claimed the sovereignty over all the countries which had been torn from the Greeks and Saracens. Abulcasem refused submission; took up arms against his liege lord, and solicited and obtained the promise of aid from the Greek emperor. Alexius resolved to send only a small army, which should not co-operate with his ally; but should, in the general disorganization of affairs, possess itself of Nice. His troops marched into Asia Minor; the soldiers of the Seljukian Sultan took flight; and the Greeks gained a partial sovereignty over the capital of Bithynia. Malek Shah continued his endeavours to fix his imperial dominion on all the Turkish states. His religion gave way to his politics; he even offered to marry the daughter of the Greek emperor, and to restore him all the Grecians territories at that time in Turkish power, if the court of Constantinople would join him in chastising the rebellion of his Emir, Abulcasem, and of several other generals, who, on the death of Soliman, had divided his kingdom. Alexius took no vigorous measures to strengthen his southern frontier, but endeavoured to preserve the friendship both of the Sultan and Abulcasem. The final issue of this crooked policy was prevented, however, by the death of both his Turkish rivals. The family of Soliman gained their liberty when their jealous master, Malek, died; the people of Nice rejoiced to see the children of their former lord, and Kilidge Arsland became sole and undisputed Sultan of Bithynia.* Though the soldiers of Gregory did not march into Palestine, and the state of Asia was not affected by his preparations, yet the public mind of Europe received additional conviction that a war with the Muselmans in the east was both virtuous and necessary. The unparalleled bar barities of the Ortokites were heard of with indignation in the west. The bloodthirstiness of the lords of the Holy City was only checked by their avarice. To * De Guignes, tome ii. livre xi. p. 1-11. tome i. p. 245. prohibit the Christians from pilgrimages and commerce would have proved a serious loss to the revenues of the state; but the Turks considerably increased the capitation tax, and as their cruelties made holy journeys more meritorious, the number of pilgrims suffered no diminution. The wealthy stranger was immediately and violently robbed. Though the simple palmer was the emblem of religious poverty, yet as the Turks could not appreciate the force and self-denial of his pious fervour, they thought it was impossible that any one could have undertaken so long a journey without possessing a large pecuniary viaticum. Unrestrained by humanity in the rigor of their search, they ripped over the bodies of their victims, or waited the slower consequences of an emetic of scammony water.* Every year the passion of indignation and the desire of revenge gained force in the breasts of the Latins, and the chivalric character of the times could not brook the insults of the Muselmans. That flame was still alive which had consumed the Roman empire; arms were more powerful than the laws; barbarian fierceness than Christian mildness. Possession of land was the consequence of valour, and to the minds of nations of warriors the mode of tenure should be the same as the mode of acquisition. Continental Europe was divided among an armed aristocracy: the names and titles of king and emperor were held by the successors of Charlemagne ; but the barons were the peers rather than the subjects of their feudal lords. The sword encouraged and decided disputes; no one would acquire by labour what he could gain by blood: martial excellence was the point of ambition; for it was the sole road to distinction, the only test of merit. Like the Muselmans, the Christians thought that conquest was the surest proof of divine approbation, and that heaven would never sanction the actions of the wicked. The feudal law in the eleventh century was a mere military code, a system of provisions for attack and defence; the voice of religion was seldom heard amidst the din of arms; Guibert, a good witness for the events of the first crusade, mentions the singular circumstance in the text, p. 480. and fierceness, violence, and rapine, pre- the terrors of excommunication and anavailed in the absence of social order and thema. Christianity could not immedimorals. Private war desolated Europe, ately and directly change the face of the nobles were robbers, and most cas- the world; but she mitigated the horrors tles were but dens of thieves, and re- of the times by infusing herself into warceptacles of plunder. Churchmen as like institutions. As the investiture of well as laymen held their estates by the the toga was the first honour conferred return of military service. They often on the Roman youth, so the Germans accompanied their armed vassals with were incited to ideas of personal consethe lord in his warlike expeditions; and quence, by receiving from their lord, it would have been remarkable, if at all their father, or some near relation, in a times the only office which they per- general assembly, a lance and a shield. formed was that of encouraging the sol- Each petty prince was surrounded by diers to battle.* As the clergy were many valiant young men, who formed taken from the people at large, it was his ornament in peace, his defence in natural that they should on many points war.* Military education was common possess popular feelings and manners. with the German and other conquering They partook, therefore, of the violent nations, both in their original settlements, character of the age. Some made roband in their new acquisitions: and when bery a profession; and the voice even of the wisest among them would not have been listened to in national assemblies if they had not been clad in armour.t The ecclesiastical writers of the time call their superiors tyrants rather than pastors, and reprehend them for re-him to swear always to protect her, and sorting to arms rather than to civil laws and church authority. Yet the clergy did much towards accustoming mankind to prefer the authority of law to the power of the sword. At their instigation private wars ceased for certain periods, and on particular days, and the observance of the Truce of God‡ was guarded by * The words of Guido, an abbot of Clairville, are remarkable: - Olim not habebant castella et arces ecclesiæ cathedrales, nec incedebant pontifices loricati. Sed nunc propter abundantiom temporalium rerum, flamma, ferro, cæde possessiones ecclesiarum prælati defendunt, quas deberent pauperibus erogare. Du Cange, Gloss. Lat. art. Advocatus. Bishops often appear in old romances in a military as well as a sacerdotal capacity. The laws, at variance with opinion, prohibited the clergy from bearing arms. They were repeatedly threatened with the loss of ecclesiastical situations if they went to war. Baluzius, Capitularia Regum Francorum, p. 164 and p. 932. This benevolent practice was of high origin. Tacitus mentions, as the only remarkable circumstance among the Angles and many other nations, that at particular seasons the symbol of the earth was carried in sacred procession through the countries where the supposed mother of all things was worshipped, and that during this religious journey the voice of foreign wars and domestic broils was hushed. Germania, c. 40. the tribes of the north had renounced Christian morality added the obligations His *Tacitus calls them comites: and subsequent Latin writers, milites. These words do not convey the idea of obligation to service which are contained in the German word knecht, or the Saxon cniht. Du Cange, article Militare. Du Cange shows that religious ceremonies were used in the investiture of knights, before the Crusades. See, too, Muratori, Antiquitates Italiæ Med. Ævi. Dissert. 53. The minute ceremonies of initiation differed in various countries. The order of knighthood, like the priesthood, was called a holy order. The candidate had his sponsers: he confessed his sins, was regenerated in the bath, received the communion, and, in short, every thing was done that could impress a stamp of sanctity upon the society. Religion gave the character and objects of the institution; and war became, in some measure, virtue. Every freeman was qualified to be a cavalier, and as knights, as well as princes, barons and bishops, might create knights, there was no difficulty in acquiring the name of a soldier. |