Defeats the Turks in Phrygia, i. 111.
Returns home, and dies in prison, i. 248.
Historical notices of, iii. 357 (App.).
——, count of Flanders, a leader of the Crusaders, i. 83.
Surnamed “The Lance and the Sword,” _ib._
Returns to his own country, and is killed by a fall from his horse,
i. 247 and n.
——, count of Paris, i. 83.
His reception by Alexius of Constantinople, i. 94.
Mortally wounded, i. 108.
—— de Vair, slain, ii. 408.
—— de Trils, death of, ii. 165.
—— le Frison, count of Flanders, penitential pilgrimage of, i. 27.
Anecdote of his son, i. 56 n.
Robert the Monk, the chronicler, i. 49 n.
Rodolphe, chancellor of Jerusalem, i. 328.
—— de Rhenfield, duke of Swabia, i. 76.
Romances during the period of the middle ages, iii. 342-344.
Romanus-Diogenes, death of, i. 36.
Rome, early pilgrimages to, i. 21.
A second time the capital of the world, i. 39.
Besieged by Frederick II., emperor of Germany, ii. 293.
Agitated state and desolation of, ii. 296.
Its alarm at the threatened invasions of the Turks, iii. 189.
Possessed by the French, iii. 194.
See _Popes_.
Rosnay, prior of, ii. 409.
Rossi, his speech to the Crusaders, ii. 84.
Rousseau, J. J., his remarks on the Crusaders, ii. 36.
S.
Saadi, the Persian poet, ii. 189 and n.
Sabeans, sect of, i. 4.
Sadoletus, his eloquent exhortation in favour of a crusade against
the Turks, iii. 206.
St. Ambrose, pretended revelation of, i. 164.
St. Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux, incites the nations of Christendom to
the second crusade, i. 329 et seq.
Miracles imputed to, i. 339 and n.
His great influence, i. 343.
Reproaches against, for the misfortunes of the Crusaders, i. 376,
i. 377.
His death and character, i. 380, i. 381.
——, monastery of, i. 22 n.
St. Clair, virgins of, self-mutilated and slaughtered, iii. 86 n.
St. Dominic, order of, its origin, iii. 304.
St. Eusebius, his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, iii. 350.
St. Francis, order of, its origin, iii. 304.
St. George, his miraculous appearance to the Christian army, i. 221.
St. Jerome, his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, iii. 350.
St. John, knights of, i. 281, i. 307.
Heroic devotion of the, i. 308.
Their noble reply to Mahomet II., iii. 186.
Their bravery in the defence of Rhodes, iii. 188, iii. 189.
Driven from Rhodes, 213. Transferred to Malta, iii. 214.
Their brave defence of Malta, iii. 224.
St. Kenelmus, miracles attributed to, iii. 409.
St. Martin, the patron saint of Germany, ii. 31, ii. 32 and n.
St. Paulina, her pilgrimage to the Holy Land, iii. 350.
St. Simeon, port of, i. 140.
SALADIN, genius and fortunes of, i. xx.
Account of, i. 397 and n.
Appointed vizier of Egypt, _ib._
His character, i. 398.
His wars with the Christians of Syria, i. 401, i. 402 et seq.,
i. 417 et seq.
Defeats the Christians at Tiberias, i. 418-423.
His barbarous executions of the Christian knights, i. 424.
His further victories, and capture of numerous cities in Palestine,
i. 425 et seq.
Besieges and captures Jerusalem, i. 426, i. 429, i. 432.
His victorious career, i. 451 et seq.
Defeats the Crusaders at Ptolemaïs, i. 460, i. 466.
His conflicts with Richard I. and Philip of France, i. 478.
Is defeated by Richard at Arsur, i. 487, i. 488.
Destroys Ascalon by fire, i. 490.
Negotiates with Richard, i. 491, i. 499.
Enters into a treaty of peace, i. 500, i. 501.
Character of, i. 504, i. 505 and n.
His death, i. 508.
Dissolution of his empire, i. 509.
His dominions divided among his successors, ii. 2, ii. 3 and n.
The civil wars thence arising, ii. 4 et seq.
——, letter of, detailing his conquest of Jerusalem, iii. 372
(App.).
Sermon made on the occasion, iii. 376.
His contests with Richard I., iii. 395 et seq., iii. 405.
—— tenths, decree of the council of Paris for raising the, iii. 384
(App.).
Salisbury, earl of, engages in the seventh crusade, ii. 360. Slain,
ii. 408.
——, William of, joins Louis IX., ii. 379.
Samosata, city of, i. 123.
SARACENS, their fanaticism and bravery, i. 5.
Their conquests, i. 5, i. 6.
Capture Jerusalem, i. 6.
Defeated by Zimisces, i. 15.
Hostile spirit against the, i. 17.
Their contests with the Crusaders before Antioch, i. 158 et seq.
Reply of their general to the deputies of the Crusaders, i. 168.
Their order of battle before Antioch, i. 170.
Defeated by the Crusaders, i. 173, i. 174.
Insults to the Christian army before Jerusalem, i. 214.
Their preparations for resistance, i. 215, i. 216.
Advance from Cairo, i. 237;
and are defeated with great slaughter on the plain of Ascalon,
i. 240-242.
Defeat the Christians, i. 291.
Their dynasty almost annihilated, i. 382.
Defeat the Christians at Tiberias with immense slaughter,
i. 418-423.
Saracens, defeated by the Crusaders, ii. 18, 29.
Attacked by Louis IX., ii. 383;
and defeated, ii. 403.
Their severe conflicts with Louis, ii. 413 et seq.
Everywhere victorious, ii. 424 et seq.
Capture the king, ii. 428;
and annihilate his army, ii. 429 et seq.
——, divisions among the, iii. 3.
Letter from Daimbert, archbishop of Pisa, and others, detailing
their victories over them, iii. 362-364 (App.).
Letter from St. Louis respecting them, iii. 461.
Defeated by Edward I. of England, iii. 472.
See _Mohammedans_.
—— of Africa, invaded by the Christian forces, iii. 117.
Sarepta, taken by the Crusaders, i. 288.
Saron, forest of, memoir on the, iii. 388 (App.).
Satalia, pillaged by the Christian forces, iii. 183.
Sauria, in Phrygia, miseries of the Crusaders in, i. 113.
Scanderberg of Albania defeats the Turks, iii. 178.
Death of, iii. 180.
Scharmesah, in Egypt, captured by the Crusaders, ii. 397.
Sclaves, notices of the, i. 374.
Scete, solitude of, i. 21.
Scurvy, disease of, among the Crusaders, ii. 418 n.
Sefed, besieged and captured by the Mamelukes, iii. 13, iii. 14.
The inhabitants slaughtered, iii. 15.
Seldjouc, Turkish dynasty of the, i. 31, i. 32.
Tribes of, i. 34.
Their military ardour, i. 34, i. 35.
Dynasty of, almost annihilated, i. 382.
Selim ascends the Ottoman throne, iii. 201.
His warlike disposition, iii. 202.
Conquers the king of Persia and the sultan of Egypt, _ib._
Succeeded by Soliman, iii. 213.
Selim II. ascends the Ottoman throne, iii. 225.
Semlin, assailed by the Crusaders, i. 64.
Senna, brought from Asia, iii. 336.
Sepulchre. See _Holy Sepulchre_.
Serfage, under the feudal system, iii. 283, iii. 284, iii. 289 et seq.
Sergines, bravery of, ii. 426.
Serpents of the river Eleuctra, i. 198.
Various names of, i. 199 n.
Sextus IV. implores the aid of Christian Europe against the Turks,
iii. 189.
Sibila, city of, captured and burnt, i. 40 and n.
Sibylla, daughter of King Amaury, and wife of Guy de Lusignan,
ambition of, i. 413.
Death of, i. 470.
Sicilian vespers, iii. 66.
Sicily, conquered by Henry VI., ii. 20.
Crown of, granted by the pope to Charles, count of Anjou, iii. 21.
Discontents and revolts in, iii. 66.
Sidon surrenders to the Christians, i. 289.
Captured by the Mohammedans, ii. 392.
Surprised by the Turcomans, who slaughter the Christians, ii. 474.
Fortified by Louis IX., ii. 476.
Captured and destroyed by the Saracens, iii. 66.
Sigismund of Hungary, defeated by Bajazet, iii. 128.
Sigur, prince of Norway arrives at Jerusalem, with large forces to
assist Baldwin, i. 289.
Silk of the East, i. 11.
Manufacture of, during the middle ages, iii. 328, iii. 329.
Siloë, fountain of, i. 10, i. 209.
Simeon, patriarch of Jerusalem, i. 42.
Sins to be expiated by visiting the Holy Land, ii. 191.
Sirvente, a poem of the Troubadours, iii. 19, iii. 20 n.
Smyrna, pillaged by the Christian forces, iii. 103.
Captured and destroyed by Bajazet, iii. 133.
Sobieski, king of Poland, defeats the Turks at Vienna, iii. 235.
Soliman, the Turkish chief, extensive conquests of, i. 33.
——, the Ottoman sultan, takes possession of Belgrade and Rhodes,
iii. 213.
Invades Hungary, and defeats the Hungarians, iii. 214, iii. 215.
Besieges Vienna, iii. 217.
Death of, iii. 224.
Soneidanis, a class of Ismaëlians, iii. 428.
Sophronius, patriarch, death of, i. 6.
Sophia, victory of, iii. 137, iii. 139.
Souliers, family of the, i. 41 n.
Spain, crusades in, i. 375.
War with the Saracens and Moors, ii. 201, ii. 268.
Emancipated from Moorish domination, iii. 243.
State of, and changes in, during the age of the crusades, iii. 264
et seq.
Expels the Moors, iii. 266;
and establishes the Inquisition, iii. 267.
Increase of liberty in, iii. 285.
Spies, Turkish, barbarous treatment of, i. 137.
Statuary destroyed at Constantinople by the Latins, iii. 438-440.
Stellion, serpent so named, i. 199.
Stephen, duke of Burgundy, slain at Ramla, i. 282.
——, count of Blois, a leader of the Crusaders, i. 83.
Letter of, i. 95.
——, count of Chartres, slain at Ramla, i. 282.
—— de Salviac, notices of, i. 246.
Sugar, introduced into Europe during the middle ages, iii. 330.
Suger, prime minister of France, styled the “father of his country”,
i. 376.
Death of, and character, i. 380, i. 381.
——, Abbot, i. 330.
His advice to Louis VII., i. 341.
Sunnites, Mohammedan sect of the, iii. 413.
Surnames, on the origin of, ii. 282.
Swabia, royal family of, nearly extinct, iii. 21.
Sweno, king of Denmark, a leader of the Crusaders, i. 133.
Slain, i. 154 and n.
Syria, the cities and territories of, i. 126.
The Crusaders enter, i. 127.
Conquests in, by the Crusaders, i. 183 et seq.
Invade Egypt, i. 390 et seq.
Political state of, at the sixth crusade, ii. 226.
Possessed by the Egyptians and Carismians, ii. 331.
By the sultan of Egypt, ii. 377.
Principal cities captured by the Moguls, iii. 5.
Towns of, destroyed by the Crusaders, iii. 119.
Overrun by Tamerlane, iii. 132.
Geographical details respecting, iii. 485 (App.).
See _Palestine_.
T.
Tabor, Mount, churches built on, i. 1.
Described, ii. 227.
Attacked by the Crusaders, _ib._
Tamerlane, history and extensive conquests of, iii. 132, iii. 133.
Defeats Bajazet at Ancyra, iii.133.
Tancred “the Brave,” character of, i. 86, i. 87.
His inflexible virtue, i. 96.
Hostile encounter with Baldwin, i. 118, i. 119.
“Tower of”, i. 217 and n.
Enters Jerusalem by storm, i. 222.
Takes possession of Tiberias and various other cities, i. 267.
Attacked by the sultan of Damascus, who is defeated by Godfrey,
i. 273.
His quarrel with Baldwin, i. 276, i. 277.
His death and character, i. 290.
Tarenta, remedy for the bite of a, i. 199 n.
Tarentum, principality of, i. 85.
Tarsus, city of, i. 116.
Disputes among the leaders of the Crusaders at, i. 117.
Taken possession of by Baldwin, i. 118.
Tartars, invasions of the, i. 255; ii. 265.
Defeat the Latins, ii. 166, ii. 167.
Their manners and customs, ii. 313.
History and conquests of, ii. 316 et seq., ii. 322, ii. 487; iii. 8,
iii. 95, iii. 132.
Government of the, ii. 321.
Capture Bagdad, iii. 4.
Their conquests in Syria, iii. 6.
Beaten and expelled by the Mamelukes, iii. 7.
The pope sends missionaries to them, iii. 94.
Their contests with the Mussulmans revive the hopes of the
Christians, _ib._
They send ambassadors to the pope, iii. 95.
Conquests of Tamerlane, their great leader, iii. 132, iii. 133.
Tasso, his “Jerusalem delivered”, i. 202 n., i. 205.
His account of the battle of Ascalon, i. 243 n.
His heroes more wonderful than those of Homer, i. 258.
Memoir of his enchanted forest, iii. 388 (App.).
Tatius quits the camp of the Crusaders, i. 135.
Taurus, Mount, sufferings of the Crusaders in passing, i. 126.
Taxation, created on the fall of feudalism, iii. 293.
Temelicus, defeated by the Saracens, i. 14.
Temory, Paul, Archbishop of Colotza, is appointed commander against
the Turks, and defeated, iii. 214, iii. 215.
Templars, the, i. 307.
Their devoted bravery, i. 308; ii. 414; iii. 88.
Defeat and slaughter of, i. 415, i. 416.
Their grand master taken prisoner by Saladin, i. 422.
Their conquests and possessions, ii. 9; iii. 98.
Their quarrels with the Hospitallers, ii. 9, ii. 10; iii. 2.
Accusations against, iii. 99.
Hammer’s notes on their apostasy, iii. 494-500 (App.).
Temugin, the Tartar chief, notices of, ii. 317 et seq.
Death of, ii. 321.
Thaher, governor of Aleppo, ii. 3.
Themal, bravery of, i. 13 n.
Theodore, governor of Edessa, i. 121 and n.
Theodosius, column of, at Constantinople, ii. 157 and n.
Theopolis, the ancient name of Antioch, i. 128.
Theriaca, a medicine brought from Antioch, iii. 336.
Thessalonica, possessed by Boniface, ii. 150;
by Baldwin, iii. 160.
Thevet, André, i. 41 n.
Thibault III., count of Champagne, engages in the second crusade,
i. 330.
—— IV., count of Champagne, engages in the fifth crusade, ii. 45.
His death and character, ii. 54.
—— V., king of Navarre, engages in the holy war, ii. 286, ii. 290.
Thierri, count of Flanders, i. 359.
Thimariots of Turkey, iii. 240.
Thoron, castle of, besieged, ii. 23-28.
Thrace entered by the Crusaders, i. 67.
Tiberias, taken possession of by Tancred, i. 267.
Captured by Saladin, i. 407.
Battle of, disastrous to the Christians, i. 418-423.
Letter from Saladin, detailing the battle of, iii. 372 (App.).
Togrul-Beg, elected king of the Turks, i. 31.
His victorious career, i. 31, i. 32.
Tolosa, victory of, over the Moors, ii. 201.
Tortosa, successful attack on by the Crusaders, i. 189.
Capture of, i. 254.
Retaken by the Mussulmans, i. 453.
Toucy, Chevalier de, ii. 466.
Tournaments of the middle age, iii. 296.
Tours, council of, for promoting the cause of the Crusaders, ii. 287.
Toutousch, the Turkish general, conquests of, i. 33.
Traconite, the country of, i. 318.
Tripoli, emir of, defeated by the Crusaders, i. 196.
The city of, captured by them, i. 287.
Riches of, i. 288.
Flourishing state of, i. 306.
Besieged by Saladin, i. 453.
Taken by storm, and the Christians slaughtered, iii. 69.
The city destroyed, iii. 70.
Recaptured and burnt by the Crusaders, iii. 119.
Tristan, duke of Nevers, death of, iii. 42.
Troncs, receipts of, in France, for the expenses of the crusades,
iii. 473;
and their expenditure, iii. 474 et seq.
Troubadours, songs of, during the middle ages, ii. 306, ii. 307;
iii. 342.
Their poetry for the crusades, iii. 452 (App.).
Trouvères during the middle ages, iii. 342.
“True cross,” a piece of, placed in the church of Drontheim, i. 289.
Captured by Saladin, i. 422.
Fragment of it taken from Constantinople, ii. 142 and n.
Tunis, the Crusaders under Louis IX. arrive at, iii. 37.
Historical notices of, iii. 37, iii. 38.
Captured, iii. 39.
Great mortality among the Crusaders at., iii. 41.
Death of Louis IX. at, iii. 46.
A truce concluded, iii. 50.
Turbessel, capture of, i. 121.
Turcoman, the surname of Ezz-Eddin Aybek, governor of Egypt, ii. 445.
TURKS, or TURCOMANS, their victorious and sanguinary career, i. 31 et
seq.
Embrace the Mussulman faith, i. 31.
Their social barbarism, i. 37.
Their power at the time of the first crusade, i. 97;
and the contests with them, i. 100 et seq.
Cruel treatment of, by the Crusaders, i. 137.
Their defeat before Antioch, i. 140, i. 141.
Defeat the Crusaders, i. 252, i. 253.
Cause of their victories, i. 255 n.
Their incursions in Palestine, i. 303.
Defeat the Germans, i. 351;
and are beaten by the French, i. 353.
Dynasties of, almost annihilated, i. 382.
Capture Sidon, and slaughter the inhabitants, ii. 474.
——, renewal of the crusades against, attempted, iii. 93.
Their conquest of Asia Minor, iii. 113.
The seat of their empire at Adrianople, _ib._
Their origin from the Tartars, iii. 120.
Their history and conquests, iii. 121 et seq.
Their invasion of Greece, iii. 122.
A crusade against, determined on, iii. 125, iii. 126.
Contests with, iii. 127.
Defeated by Tamerlane, iii. 132, iii. 133.
Their barbarities to the Christians, iii. 135.
Besiege Constantinople under Mahomet II., iii. 148 et seq.
Capture it, and annihilate the Greek empire, iii. 156.
Crusades against, undertaken, A. D. 1438-1481, iii. 159.
They penetrate into Hungary, iii. 166.
And are defeated at Belgrade, iii. 167.
Their extensive conquests, iii. 171, iii. 174, iii. 180, iii. 225.
Invade Hungary and different parts of Europe simultaneously,
iii. 187-189.
Defeated by the Hungarians, iii. 187.
Besiege Rhodes, iii. 188, iii. 189.
Capture Otranto, _ib._
Complete the overthrow of all the rival powers of the East,
iii. 203.
Defeat the Hungarians, iii. 215.
Capture Cyprus, iii. 225.
Defeated at the naval battle of Lepanto, iii. 226.
Succours against implored by Pope Alexander VII., and a Christian
confederation formed, iii. 233, iii. 234.
Their military power begins to decline, iii. 230, iii. 231,
iii. 236.
General review of their conquests, iii. 231 et seq.
Conclude a peace with the Christian forces in Hungary, iii. 234.
Defeated by Sobieski at Vienna, iii. 235.
Causes and history of their decline, iii. 236 et seq.
Their present political position, iii. 244 et seq.
TURKS, letter of Bohemond and others, detailing the defeat of the
Turks, iii. 360 (App.).
Letter to Pope Urban, detailing the victories of the Crusaders over
them, iii. 365.
Tyre, commercial greatness of, i. 300.
Siege and capture of, i. 300, i. 301.
Besieged by Saladin, i. 451.
Its heroic defence, i. 452.
Captured and destroyed by the Saracens, iii. 89.
U.
Universities of Europe during the middle ages, iii. 337, iii. 339.
Urban II., Pope, his interview with Peter the Hermit, i. 42.
Receives the ambassadors of Alexis Comnenus, i. 44.
Convokes a council at Plaisance, i. 45.
At Clermont, i. 46 et seq.
His inciting speech in favour of the crusades, i. 48-50.
—— V. adopts the project of a new crusade, iii. 113.
And convokes a meeting at Avignon, iii. 113-114.
V.
Valeran, bishop of Berytus, ii. 334.
Varangians, account of the, ii. 83 n.
Vaudois, religious principles of the, ii. 197.
Papal crusade against, ii. 199 and n.
Venetians embark for the Holy Land, and destroy the fleet of the
Saracens, i. 298.
Enter Jerusalem, i. 299.
Conquer Tyre, i. 301.
Return to Italy, i. 302.
Refinement of the, ii. 182.
Their contests with the Genoese, iii. 2.
Venice forbids intercourse with the Mussulmans, i. 15.
Commercial greatness of, ii. 48.
Dandolo, the doge, ii. 49.
Engages to assist the Crusaders, ii. 50, ii. 51.
Sums advanced by, ii. 53.
Pecuniary exactions of, ii. 59.
Her wealth and greatness, ii. 183, ii. 184.
Her possessions captured by the Turks, iii. 184.
Bajazet II. declares war against, iii. 197.
Her active preparations for defence, iii. 198.
Her commercial ambition, iii. 200.
Hélian’s diatribe against, _ib._
Rejoicings at, after the victory of Lepanto, iii. 226.
State of, during the age of the crusades, iii. 263.
Vermandois, Crusaders of the, i. 81.
Vermandois, count de, i. 83.
Led a prisoner to Constantinople, i. 89.
His treatment avenged, i. 90.
His bravery before Antioch, i. 170, i. 174.
Returns to Europe, i. 177.
Dies of his wounds, i. 254.
Vertot, abbé de, the historian, iii. 188.
Victor III., Pope, incites the Christians to take arms against the
infidels, i. 39, i. 40.
Vida, the Italian poet, his enthusiasm for the crusades, iii. 203.
Vienna, council of, convoked by Clement V. to promote a crusade,
iii. 97.
Besieged by the Turks, iii. 217, iii. 218, iii. 235.
Relieved by Sobieski, king of Poland, _ib._
Villehardouin, Geoffrey, marshal of Champagne, ii. 46 and n.
His address to the Venetians, ii. 50, ii. 51 and n.
His history of the contests between the Greeks and Latins, ii. 175.
——, William of, prince of Achaia, engages in the seventh crusade,
ii. 379.
Visions and prodigies, reliance of the Crusaders on, i. 192.
Vitri destroyed by Louis VII. of France, i. 330.
Volkmar, a priest, instigates the Crusaders to the greatest cruelties,
i. 70.
W.
Walcknaer’s “Itinerary,” i. 3 n., i. 199 n.
Wales, journey through, relating the manners of the inhabitants in
the twelfth century, iii. 408 (App.).
Walter the Penniless, general of the Crusaders, i. 62.
——, count of Cæsarea, his accusations against the count of Jaffa,
i. 313.
Warna, battle of, iii. 143.
West, Christians of the, aroused against the East, i. xix.; i. 3,
i. 20, i. 21.
Institutions of the, in their infancy, i. 36, i. 37.
Enthusiasm in favour of the crusades, i. 54.
Agitated state of the, ii. 195.
Alarm among the Christian nations, at the fall of Constantinople,
iii. 159 et seq.
William, king of Sicily, engages in the holy war, i. 453.
—— IX., count of Poictiers, sets out for the East, i. 249 and n.
—— Rufus, duke of Normandy, i. 82.
——, count de Nevers, i. 249.
Defeated by the Turks, i. 253.
——, archbishop of Tyre, preaches in support of the holy war, i. 436,
i. 444.
His speech, i. 437, i. 438.
——, viscount de Melun, deserts the camp of the Crusaders, and is
retaken, i. 135.
—— de Clermont, bravery of, iii. 80.
Slain, iii. 80, iii. 87.
—— of Malmesbury, the chronicler, iii. 356.
—— of Tyre, the historian, i. 17, i. 41, i. 54, i. 62, i. 65, i. 147
n. et passim.
Wine of Gaza, celebrated, i. 11.
Wolf IX., duke of Bavaria, a leader of the Crusaders, i. 249.
Defeated, i. 253.
Worms, diet at, convoked by Henry VI. of Germany, ii. 13, ii. 14.
Y.
Yemen, a province of Arabia, ii. 3 n.
Yve, son of Hugh de Grandmenil, i. 83.
Z.
Zara, city of, revolts against the domination of Venice, ii. 60.
Siege of, ii. 63.
Zengui, prince of Mossoul, conquests of, i. 306, i. 320.
Attacks the Christian fortresses, i. 315.
Besieges and captures Edessa, i. 321-325.
Assassinated, i. 326.
Zimisces, emperor of the Greeks, i. 14.
Conquests of, i. 15.
His violent death, i. 36.
Zizim, disputes the Turkish empire with Bajazet, and visits Europe,
iii. 191.
Joins the Christian crusade against the Turks, iii. 195.
His death, _ib._
SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER.
M. MICHAUD has told the story of the crusades with such fulness and
accuracy that, so far as these religious pilgrimages in arms are
concerned, nothing need be added. The movement of the West upon the
East is traced and described in minute detail, with every accessory
of personal incident and achievement, and the work has been done so
thoroughly that probably no later historian will feel drawn to the same
field. It may be profitable, however, to supplement this trustworthy
and spirited narrative by a rapid survey of the wide and fruitful
changes which the crusades directly and indirectly introduced into
the social and political life of Europe. It is one of the gains of
time that its lapse discloses those larger relations of great events
which are hidden from the observation of an earlier age; and while
the earlier historian has the advantage of being near the historical
movement which he describes, and of collecting at first hand the
fullest information of its origin, direction, and personality, the
later writer is far more fully equipped for the work of setting the
movement in right relation to its social and political environment.
Thucydides must remain preëminently the historian of the Peloponnesian
War; but Grote and Curtius, largely deriving their facts from him,
are able to discuss the decisive struggle between Athens and Sparta
with wider grasp of the elements of Greek character and politics which
brought about the conflict, and to trace its influence in later Greek
history. This chapter will add no newly discovered facts concerning
the crusades; but, taking advantage of later studies in this important
field, it will indicate some of the results of these expeditions as
they have disclosed themselves in the subsequent political development
of Europe.
The Council of Clermont in 1095 found the feudal system fully developed
in Western Europe. The Holy Roman Empire which, in the person of
Charlemagne, had given brief promise of a restoration of authority to
government, and of cohesion to society, had become a mere shadow among
the warring, aggressive factions of feudalism. The tremendous energy of
Charles was potent enough to drive back the boundaries of barbarism,
and make for a little time a comparatively clear field for efforts
toward an organized and stable society; but the task of subduing the
social and political anarchy about him was too great even for a ruler
of his genius. The time was not ripe, and when the laboriously gathered
lines of power fell from the strong hand, there was no successor to
grasp them. Anarchy became well-nigh universal. The royal authority
was everywhere, with here and there a passing exception, a vague and
indefinite thing, hemmed in and jealously watched by barons, more
powerful than the king in everything but name. Society was broken up
into small communities, with apparently no common direction of movement
or impulse of progress. Every castle was a centre of power, which
might be hostile to every other authority about it. There were no
common ties binding races into the larger fellowship of kindred aims
and aspirations. Men of the same blood were arrayed in more deadly
hostility to each other than were men of alien races.
No large enterprises were possible, because the community of sentiment
and the harmony of action which made them possible, were alike absent.
The principle of individualism—the greatest contribution of the
northern races to the political development of Europe—had reached its
fullest growth, and everywhere asserted itself in the most aggressive
forms. Western Europe had gone so far in this direction that no further
progress in the arts, industries, and institutions of civilization
was possible without the introduction of a new element into the
problem. What was needed was the cohesive influence of some common
purpose, which should give a new unity by disclosing to men the larger
possibilities of organized social and political life. Organization is
the necessary condition of progress, and so long as Europe remained
without the conception of government with well-defined powers,
regularity of administration, and ability to suppress opposition and
impress its authority, in all sections of its territory, with a firm
and steady hand, no forward movement was possible.
This spell of political and social impotence was broken by the
crusades. Peter the Hermit was a voice crying in the wilderness, the
forerunner of a historical movement which was to be the salvation of
Europe. Returning from Syria with a heart hot with indignation at the
insults and persecutions which beset the pilgrim to the Holy Sepulchre,
his call to arms had all the authority which a genuine religious
conviction could give it, and all the persuasive eloquence of a call
for which men had been longing and waiting in silence and despair. No
one will deny the strength of the religious sentiment which, in answer
to that message, speedily marshalled the hosts of the first crusade;
but the restless life of oppressed and burdened races found in the
new enterprise an outlet through which it poured itself like a rising
tide. For the first time in its history Western Europe had a common
purpose and united in a common undertaking. In the farthest hamlet
the overshadowing power of the feudal lord became for the time being
tributary to the authority of the Church, summoning Europe to fight
its battles and protect its sacred places. Europe awoke to the fact,
unsuspected before, that it was larger than its warring feudatories,
that the possibilities of its life were far more varied and rich than
men had dreamed under the iron pressure of the feudal system, and thus
the needed element of association and coöperation asserted itself.
Like all great social and political changes, the transition from feudal
communities to national organization was unconscious and undiscovered.
In the minds of the crusaders and of the communities whose faith they
represented and whose impulse they carried into action, no clearly
defined ideal of national life answered the call of Peter. That ideal
grew slowly, but its roots were planted in this movement. Spaniards,
Germans, Italians, Englishmen, and Frenchmen found themselves acting
in harmony for a common purpose. They bore different banners, they
marched under different leaders, they took different roads; but a
common impulse sent them forth and a common goal drew them on. Their
community of sentiment was often marred by mutual jealousies, and their
unity of action impaired by mutual antagonisms; but the substantial
harmony which underlay these disorders and which secured the positive
results of the earlier crusades, gave Europe a conception of life which
it had thoroughly learned before the last crusaders returned from their
fruitless quest.
That which drew together various nationalities and races, disclosing
to them the religious and social aims and tastes which they possessed
in common, brought about a similar result through the widely separated
ranks of society. European society had no homogeneity when the first
crusade was preached. It was divided into ranks sharply discriminated
from each other, bound together by the pressure of external force,
rather than by the cohesive power of organic structure. There was no
mutuality of interest or feeling. King, baron, burgher, and peasant
were so widely apart by virtue of the education of their circumstances
that they could not understand each other. That common language of
experience and aspiration, which to-day finds a response among men of
all social ranks, would have been incomprehensible in the age of the
first crusade. Baron and peasant had indeed acted together in feudal
warfare; but only as the lower was forced to serve the higher, the
weaker to do the work of the stronger. No common impulse had ever
before stirred the common humanity of all classes; no call had ever
before summoned them as individuals to a service in which each stood
in a spiritual equality with every other. Men had moved in classes
before, but they moved as classes and not as men.
The Church had seen its early dream of an imperial power with which it
could keep itself in friendly and influential alliance fade like a mist
before the iron individualism of feudalism, and had been compelled to
begin almost anew its conquest over the governing powers of Europe.
The work which a few skilful ecclesiastics could have done at the
courts of kings in a few capital cities was relegated for centuries
to an army of priests attached to baronial households, and conducting
the sacred offices of their religion in the chapels of castles over
the vast territory of Western Europe. The Church and feudalism were
in radical antagonism; they represented ideas which could not, in the
extremes in which each held them, be harmonized in practical life. The
Church had yielded to feudalism, as in an earlier age she had yielded
to the barbarian conquest of Southern Europe, because surrender, in
form at least, was inevitable. But, in the latter case, as in the
former, the struggle was renewed at once upon a new plan of action. The
orderly campaign by massing of forces at a few strategic points was
abandoned for incessant watchfulness and a perpetual skirmish along an
immensely extended frontier. Every barony became a scene of action,
every castle a stronghold to be won by the most skilful devices of the
spiritual warfare. The Church was the only representative of the idea
of universal authority and order, but as yet no occasion had arisen by
which it might profit to make that conception an active principle in
society. It was in deadly antagonism to the system which broke society
up into small, hostile communities; but the time had not come when it
could bring to bear a force powerful enough to destroy its antagonist,
or to set at work an influence which would inevitably result in the
disintegration of the feudal order.
The preaching of the first crusade was an opportunity which the
Church was quick to recognise and to follow up with that persistent
and consummate ability which characterized all its earlier and much
of its later history. It was possible now to call not only separate
feudatories but all Europe to arms. Feudalism would keep men divided
into fixed classes, and society broken up into permanent groups; the
Church, on the other hand, would prevent the oppression of one class by
another by binding all in a universal allegiance to herself, and would
impress upon society the unity of a common service and a common faith.
The crusades sprang out of a feeling which was as strong in the heart
of the peasant as in that of the noble. A great cause and a universal
sentiment gave the Church the opportunity for which it sought. A
solemn council made the preaching of Peter the Hermit the voice of the
Church herself. Feudal distinctions were forgotten in the enthusiasm
of a service which transcended in its sanctions and its aims all
earthly duties, and in which earthly differences were for the moment
laid aside. The power of the feudal nobility, hitherto the dominant
authority in Western Europe, became, for the time being, secondary to
that of the Church. Men were summoned no longer to the service of their
lords, but to the service of their Church. The change was radical. It
was the introduction of a principle which is still struggling to assert
itself in practical legislation and political action. Its development
has been slow, but it has revolutionized society, and what its ultimate
outcome is to be no man can predict. King, baron, burgher, and peasant
found themselves side by side in the same cause, one class serving
another, not by virtue of a feudal but of a spiritual authority;
comrades in arms in an enterprise which addressed what was common and
eternal in them all rather than what was distinctive and conventional.
Not suddenly, but by the slow processes of growth which belong to great
moral changes, men forgot their abasement and slavery under feudalism
in the dawning light of a liberty conferred by a superior and a
spiritual power. A conception of a higher authority than that lodged in
the hands of the feudal lord took root in the mind of Europe and became
fruitful of vast change. In Syria the leaders of the crusades were
not able to keep their followers in subjection when they attempted to
follow their personal ambitions. The commanding purpose which drew them
thither overmastered all private designs and made insubordination a
virtue. An influence more powerful than feudalism entered into European
life with the crusades, and was perhaps the most far-reaching and
potential effect which they produced upon the world.
The crusades found Europe stationary and without the power of progress.
Society had crystallized into forms so rigid and fixed that strong
pressure from without was essential to any movement toward liberation.
Not only were communities circumscribed and reduced in numbers, and
individuals held in their places by a power against which it was
hopeless to strive; but the whole population was bound to the soil by a
system of servitude the most exacting and the most pervasive known in
history. Contiguous communities spoke dialects differing so widely as
to make communication between men of the same race almost as difficult
as between men of widely separated nationalities.
There was almost no interchange of knowledge, no commerce of ideas.
Where men were born they spent their lives, and were buried with
no sense of any larger relationships in life than those of the
locality which formed their little sphere of action. Feudalism, in
disintegrating society and reducing the individual to an unimportant
factor in a vast system, had paralyzed the power of development,
which comes only through interchange and combination of energy. The
Chinese Empire of a century ago was hardly more securely walled in
from external influence and condemned to absolute stagnation than were
the countries over which feudalism had spread its iron network. Into
this close, dense atmosphere the crusades sent a vigorous current of
new thought. The hopeless and weary routine to which great populations
were condemned explains much of that enthusiasm with which multitudes
rushed into a dangerous and laborious service. Men were stifled in an
air which they and their fathers before them had breathed without any
possibility of change. In the crusade epoch the religious impulse was
strong, but the impulse toward freedom was doubtless the sentiment next
in importance.
Between 1095 A.D. and 1291 A.D., there was an immense change. The first
crusade found men of all nationalities eager to follow its leaders,
the preachers of the last crusade appealed to deaf ears. Europe was
indifferent to the cause which for two centuries had found orators as
eloquent as Bernard of Clairvaux and leaders as pure as Godfrey, as
daring as Richard, as devoted as St. Louis, and yet religious zeal was
not dead, nor had the sanctions of religion lost their sacredness.
The secret of the change in European sentiment lay in the enlargement
and liberation of European life which the crusades had secured. There
was a comparatively free interchange between the different sections.
The incessant movements of the crusading hosts, the intermingling of
so many different races had broken down many barriers and set many
unifying influences at work. The German knew the Frenchman, and the
Frenchman the Englishman, and this mutual knowledge was fruitful in
quickened and stimulated life everywhere. Men began to better their
condition by a change of location. Emigration, which in the earlier
centuries of the Christian era had changed the face of Europe and then
had been checked by feudalism, began once more in ways so small and
insignificant as to remain long unnoticed, but of immense importance in
the light of subsequent history.
The modification and disintegration of the feudal system is
unquestionably the greatest contribution of the crusades to the
development of humanity. This result was brought about, as has been
shown, by the liberation of thought and life throughout Western
Europe; but there were other and important elements which entered into
the solution of the problem of European progress.
The expeditions to the East were, for that age, enormously expensive.
Very many of the great feudal lords who fitted out expeditions were not
able, out of their ordinary resources, to meet the necessary outlay.
Money was raised by all kinds of expedients. Cities took advantage
of the needs of their feudal lords to purchase their freedom, great
estates that for centuries had increased by continued accumulation and
conquest were encumbered or sold. There was an interchange of landed
property altogether unprecedented in European history. Many great fiefs
disappeared entirely during the two centuries which saw the gathering
of the successive expeditions for the East. By purchase and by escheat
and confiscation, which the disorder of the times made possible, the
royal authority made immense inroads into the territory of feudalism,
and when the last hopeless struggle in Syria was over, the principle of
centralization, represented everywhere by the royal power, had gained
vastly upon the extreme individualism of feudalism.
The advance of the Church in influence and authority was, however, the
most immediate and marked result of the crusades. Religious ideas,
Guizot declares, had experienced no change, but power had changed hands
no less than property. The Church, quick to profit by every opportunity
which the troubled age and the vicissitudes of war afforded, had pushed
steadily forward, occupying every defenceless position and fortifying
every exposed point. The authority which Urban had exercised at the
Council of Clermont, in calling all men to arms as subjects of the
Church, was asserted upon every occasion with that steadiness and
universality of policy which is one of the secrets of papal power. A
new principle of allegiance was substituted for feudal subordination.
Differences between great barons were settled by the voice of the
Church, and in the councils of kings the pope spoke by his personal
representatives. Legates from Rome became familiar figures in every
capital, and the persistence with which they made themselves heard
in all public matters rapidly and continually enlarged the popular
conception of the scope and weight of the authority of Rome.
In the East results of equal moment were brought about by the campaigns
of the crusaders. Communication was reopened between the East and the
West. The rude hand of war threw open the doors, which were never again
to remain permanently closed.
The fierce struggles of the contending parties did not blind them
to the fact that each had much to learn from the other. Oriental
magnificence and culture had charms even for the warriors whose mailed
hands were sworn to destroy the civilization under which they were
developed. The positive and immediate gain to Western knowledge was
doubtless less than was formerly believed, but the ulterior gain is
incalculable. If the West is not indebted to the East for the art of
printing and the compass, it is indebted for a substantial enrichment
of thought, for a great enlargement of mental horizon. The interchange
of thought which was set in motion by the crusades is still to work
out its richest results; and in contemporaneous history there is no
more impressive feature than the confluence of these two ancient
civilizations.
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FOOTNOTES:
[1] We find copious details upon these disputes, and their origin, in
_Sanuti_, which we have thought it best to abridge.
[2] We have adopted the version of M. Deguignes as the most probable.
(See _History of the Huns_.)
[3] One of the principal difficulties that an historian of this epoch
experiences, is, to preserve the connection in his narrative, from
having to speak at the same time of the West and of the East, of
the Christians, the Mamelukes, and the Tartars. Here a new people
start up upon the stage, there an old empire falls to decay: all the
events are hurried and confounded together, and the march of history
is embarrassed among so many ruins. We endeavour to be as clear as
possible.
[4] Many chronicles say that Oulagon shut the caliph up in the midst of
all his treasures, and left him to die of hunger: this circumstance is
not at all probable, and has not been acknowledged by M. Deguignes.
[5] Most historians have taken their accounts of this war of the Moguls
from an esteemed work, entitled _Fragmentum de Statu Saracœnorum_;
it, however, contains many errors, and ought to be rectified in
several places by the study of the Oriental historians. Some valuable
information respecting this war of the Tartars may also be found in the
Armenian Hayton, and in Sanuti; but these authors must be read with
precaution and suspicion.
[6] Bela IV., king of Hungary, wrote to the pope, that if he were not
speedily succoured he should form an alliance with the Tartars. The
pope reproved him warmly. Alexander IV. wrote to all Christian princes,
prelates, and communities, to consult upon the means of resisting the
barbarians, as well in the East as in the West. In Raynaldi—the year
1262, Nos. 29 and 30—his letter may be seen, in which he enters into
many details upon the levy of soldiers, and upon subsidies. This letter
has been preserved by Matthew Paris, who speaks of the councils held on
this subject; some facts relative to the invasion of the Tartars may
likewise be found in William of Nangis and Matthew of Westminster, as
well as in the _Collection of Councils_.
[7] This singular fact is related by the Arabian historian Aboulfeda,
and repeated by M. Deguignes, vol. iv. p. 133.
[8] This circular is reported by Raynaldi, Nos. 68 and 69. The motives
alleged by the pope, in his letter, astonish the wise Fleuri, who
observes upon the spirit of contradiction which we have mentioned.
[9] These expeditions of Bibars are related with all their details
in the chronicles of Ibn-Ferat and in Makrizi. Although we have much
abridged our account, we fear we shall be accused of tediousness. We
have yielded to our inclination of filling up the deficiencies which
exist in all the chronicles of the West in their accounts of this
period. The life of Bibars has likewise been of great service to us.
[10] The Arabian chronicles describe this event in a very obscure and
equivocal manner; they scarcely mention the massacre of the prisoners,
and say but little of the capitulation; they accuse the Franks of
having taken Mussulman prisoners away with them, which is not very
probable.
[11] We are afraid M. Michaud carries the partialities of Biography
into the pages of History: in the former, such are sometimes excusable;
in the latter, never. Our readers who look back to the taking of
Jerusalem or Ptolemaïs, will at once see how weak is the claim of the
Christians to a superiority over their adversaries in mercy. As to
the religious portion of the account, history teems with wholesale
conversions of conquered armies and nations. See Charlemagne and our
own Alfred, for instance. We thought that the idea of Mahometanism
being _a religion of the sword_ was exploded. Gibbon positively denies
it to be so, and asserts that no precept or passage of the Koran
inculcates it.—TRANS.
[12] Sanuti is almost the only Christian writer that affords
information on the taking of Sefed.
[13] “I cannot tell the amount,” says Joinville, “of what the king laid
out for the fortification of Jaffa, it was so great. He closed the
canal between the two seas, he built twenty-four towers, and cleansed
the ditches without and within. There were three gates, of which the
legate built one, and likewise part of the walls. And in order to show
you what the king must have expended, I will tell you what the legate
said when I asked him how much that gate and the wall had cost him.
I had reckoned that the first cost him five hundred livres, and the
latter three hundred livres; but he told me, as God might help him,
that the gate and the wall had cost him thirty thousand livres.”
[14] This little incident is quite dramatic, and, in good hands, would
not look badly on canvass. Would it not assist art, if historians,
when forcibly struck by the scenes they describe, would suggest to
painters, who so frequently prove they are at a loss for subjects by
their injudicious choice, events, persons, and passions fit for the
pencil?—TRANS.
[15] This letter of Bibars, which was written by his secretary, the
author of the life we have of this sultan, does not only speak of the
taking and the destruction of Antioch, but of the ravages committed
by the Mamelukes in the territory of Tripoli. This letter is of great
length, but we find in it more declamatory sentences and Oriental
figures than facts for the pen of the historian.
[16] Sirvente is a kind of poem peculiar to the troubadours.
[17] This _sirvente_, which is attributed to a knight of the Temple,
has been translated by the Abbé Millot, who appears to have altered the
sense of it. It is printed in the fourth volume, p. 131, of the _Choix
des Poésies des Troubadours_, by M. Raynouard, perpetual secretary
to the French Academy. We make use of a literal translation that M.
Raynouard has kindly communicated to us.
[18] These details, as well as the most of those that precede them,
concerning the Mussulmans, are taken from the valuable chronicle of
Ibn-Ferat.
[19] “He was of opinion,” says William de Nangis, “that the kingdom of
France had undergone great disgrace in the first pilgrimage.” Le père
Maimbourg expresses himself thus upon the king’s determination:—“St.
Louis, great saint as he was, could not help thinking that much shame
lay upon him for having succeeded so ill in Egypt.”
[20] _Hist. de St. Louis_, by Filleau de la Chaise.
[21] See the letters of Clement, in Duchesne, epist. 269.
[22] Joinville, when present at the mass in the chapel, heard two
knights conferring; one said, that if the king took the cross, it would
be one of the most fatal days ever seen in France; for if we take the
cross, we shall ruin the king; and again, if we take the cross, we
shall lose God’s grace, because we do not take the cross for the sake
of him.
[23] When our readers look back to the means employed in former
crusades to extort money from all classes, as well as from the clergy,
we think they will partake of our surprise at this assertion. The
clergy had been, in most cases, the recipients of the taxes upon the
laity, and according to our author himself, had not always proved
trustworthy collectors.—TRANS.
[24] All these details upon the tenths are of great importance for
the history of the crusades: for this negotiation the following
authorities may be consulted: Raynaldi, No. 59; the _Spicilège_, vol.
xiii. p. 221; the _Supplement_ to Raynaldi, book lxix. No. 42; Fleury’s
_Ecclesiastical History_, and the _Acts_ of Rymer.
[25] As historians, we should hesitate to assert this, and should
advise our readers to adopt it with much caution, and many
limitations.—TRANS.
[26] This dissertation, which has been sent to us by the author, bears
for title, _An Historical Dissertation upon the Part the Spaniards
took in the Wars beyond the Seas, and upon the Influence of these
Expeditions, from the Eleventh to the Fifteenth Century_, by Don
Fernandez de Crevarette. This work, in which a learned criticism and
a sound erudition prevail, contains many valuable documents; we shall
often have occasion to quote it.
[27] Migeray thus describes the murder of Conradin:—“As Charles had
determined to go into Africa with the king, St. Louis, not knowing what
to do with Conradin and Frederick, whom it was dangerous to keep, and
still more to release, in a kingdom filled with faction and revolt, he
ordered them to be brought to trial before the syndics of the cities of
the kingdom.”
[28] For the preparations for the voyage of Louis IX., William
of Nangis, Geoffrey de Beaulieu, the _Gestes_ of St. Louis, the
continuator of Matthew Paris, and Joinville, may be consulted.
[29] “It is true that before the king Louis took the cross, he had had
several messages from the king of Tunis, and at divers times, and many
had been sent to him; these messages gave Louis to understand that the
king of Tunis was willing to become a Christian, and that he would the
more willingly change his faith if an opportunity should occur in which
his own honour and the welfare of his people would be secured. The good
Christian king believed that if he and his renowned hosts should come
to Tunis suddenly, scarcely could the king of Tunis refuse or excuse
such a reasonable opportunity for receiving holy baptism,” &c.—_Annals
of the Reign of St. Louis_, by William of Nangis.
[30] Some classical authorities name it Tunetum; others, Tunes.—TRANS.
[31] Louis makes use of the expression: “Je vous dis le _ban_,” &c.
which word cannot be used in this sense in English, but is very
effective in French, and was employed in many legal proclamations
connected with royal or seignorial rights,—as, for instance: _ban_ is
a proclamation by which all who held lands of the crown of France were
summoned to serve the king in his wars.—TRANS.
[32] William of Nangis says on this subject:—“This was great treachery
on the part of the Saracens, and great simplicity on the part of the
Christians.”
[33] Geoffrey de Beaulieu has given an account of these instructions
in Latin. They are in old French in Joinville and in the _Annals of
the Reign of St. Louis_. These three authors give them with remarkable
differences. Moreau, in the twentieth volume of his _Discours sur
l’Histoire de France_, gives another new version, which he declares to
have been copied from one of the registers of the Chamber of Accounts,
in which, probably, Philip le Hardi was desirous this monument should
be preserved. It is this version we have principally followed in the
extract we have here given.
[34] Details upon the death of St. Louis may be found in Geoffrey de
Beaulieu, William of Chartres, William of Nangis, and in a letter
from the bishop of Tunis, reported by Martenne; Joinville relates a
few circumstances of it; but it is very much to be regretted that the
good seneschal was not present at the last moments of St. Louis; how
touching would his relation have been! and how much better would it
have been than that which is given to us by eyewitnesses, who have
written with such unfeeling dryness and conciseness!
[35] This letter, which has been translated into Latin, may be found
in the collection of Martenne. We will give an extract from it in our
Appendix.
[36] We read in the life of Bibars and in the chronicle of Ibn-Ferat,
that the sultan of Cairo was much dissatisfied with the conduct of the
king of Tunis. The peace which the latter made, left the Crusaders
at liberty to carry their arms into Egypt. Bibars would have wished
the Christian army to have been detained on the coast of Africa. He
threatened to dethrone his ally, and told the ambassadors of the
king of Tunis, that such a prince as he was not worthy to reign over
Mussulmans.
[37] For the events that followed the death of St. Louis, see Duchesne,
and _le Spicilège_, vol. i.
[38] We hope our readers, while they peruse the latter part of
this otherwise good paragraph, will not forget that we are only
translators.—TRANS.
[39] Among the numerous panegyrics of Louis IX. there are few that have
stood the test of time. Voltaire has drawn a fine portrait of the good
king. M. Dampmartin, in his work upon the kings of France, has spoken
of this great prince with ability and truth.
[40] Words of the _Bull of Canonization_.
[41] The Arabian chroniclers have preserved several of these treaties:
we find in the extracts from Oriental manuscripts, a treaty between the
sultan of Cairo and the little city of Tortosa. When reading the titles
and the dependencies of the masters and the inhabitants of Tortosa, we
may fancy we read the lease of a bailiwick or a farm, made before a
notary.
[42] In Ibn-Ferat we may read the letter which the sultan of Cairo
wrote on the subject of the princess of Berouth, who had left her
little principality without the consent of the sultan. (See the
extracts from Arabic manuscripts.)
[43] This account is much longer in Ibn-Ferat; whilst endeavouring
to preserve the tone and the Oriental colouring of it, we have felt
it necessary to abridge it. The chronicle of Ibn-Ferat, which is
a collection of many other chronicles, contains several different
versions; this appears to us the most probable, and, at the same time,
the one best calculated to show what were the resources of the nations
of Asia against the excesses of despotism.
[44] Many historians think that Charles’s preparations were intended to
be directed against Constantinople. Without contradicting this opinion,
we may believe that the king of Sicily thought likewise of the kingdom
of Jerusalem. Charles was always very secret in his political projects;
and very frequently the dissimulation of princes causes as much
embarrassment to historians as it could have done ill to the countries
exposed to its attempts.
[45] The text of this treaty may be read in the life of Kelaoun.
[46] M. de Sacy has translated a treaty concluded between the sultan
of Egypt and the kings of Sicily and Arragon. The following is one
of the clauses of this treaty:—“If the case should happen that the
pope of Rome, the kings of the Franks, of the Greeks, of the Tartars,
or others, should ask the king of Arragon or his brothers, or should
cause to be asked in the states of their dominions, auxiliary troops or
any succour, whether of cavalry, infantry, money, vessels, clothing,
or arms, the said princes would give no consent to it, either openly
or in secret; they would grant them no succour, and would consent to
nothing of the kind. If the king of Arragon should learn that one
of the above-named kings should have any intention of carrying war
into the states of the sultan, or to cause him any prejudice, he will
send and advise the sultan of it, and will inform him on what side
his enemies propose to attack him, and that with the shortest delay
possible, before they shall be put in motion, and he will conceal
nothing concerning it from him.” This treaty is very long, and provides
against all difficulties. We may here make a general remark, which is,
that most of the treaties made between the Orientals and the Christians
surpass, in some sort, the sagacity of modern diplomacy; so much
mistrust gave foresight to the negotiators and the contracting powers.
[47] We can find no document on this subject in the chronicles of the
West; our guide has been Ibn-Ferat.
[48] All these curious details upon Ptolemaïs, its morals, and the
mode of living of its inhabitants, are furnished by Herman Cornarius
(Ekard’s Collection). A more extensive extract will be found in our
analysis of the German authors.
[49] We find this fact in two Austrian chronicles, which have
for title, one, _Chronicon Anonymi Leobensis_; the other, _Thomœ
Ebendorfeiri de Haselbach Chronicon_. The first says that the legate
called together the people of Ptolemaïs, that he launched against them
the anathemas of the Church, and then embarked to return to Rome. This
last circumstance appears to us improbable, and we have, therefore,
passed it over in silence.
[50] This circumstance is related in the life of the sultan Kelaoun.
(See the extracts from Arabian manuscripts in our Appendix.)
[51] For the siege of Ptolemaïs we have consulted Sanuti, Herman, and a
manuscript relation. This relation, written in the French of the time,
appears to have been drawn from a letter from John de Vile, marshal of
the hospital of St. John, who wrote to his brother, William de Vile,
prior of St. Gilles, in Provence. Either John de Vile was at Ptolemaïs,
or he wrote from the evidence of some Hospitallers who had escaped the
swords of the Mussulmans, and had retired to the isle of Cyprus. This
manuscript chronicle, which we often use, is divided into twenty-two
chapters It is in the King’s Library, No. 1290.
[52] This fact is related in the chronicle we have before quoted.
[53] A manuscript account of the siege and taking of Acre by the
Saracens.
[54] This extraordinary fact is related in a discourse addressed to
Pope Nicholas IV. by Brother Arsene, a Greek priest, who had been on
a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the time of the siege of Ptolemaïs. This
account is found in Muratori; we have translated it entirely, as will
be seen in our Appendix.
[55] This fact is likewise attested by the chronicle of Herman
Cornarius, which we have already quoted.
[56] A German chronicle of Thomas Ebendorft relates the miraculous
stories that were circulated among the Saracens. According to this
chronicle, when a Christian expired, another issued from his mouth, _ex
ore_. There were two souls in every body; _in uno corpore duo fuerunt
hominis_.
[57] The Arabian chronicles speak of the sieur de Télema or Barthélemi,
who never ceased to provoke the fury of the Saracens. The Western
chronicles say nothing of him; one of them merely says that a Frank,
banished from Ptolemaïs on account of murder, took refuge with the
sultan of Egypt, and pointed out to him the means of taking the city.
[58] Wadin, the author of a chronicle entitled _Annales Minorum_,
tom. ii. p. 585, quotes a circumstance which St. Antonine relates in
the third part of his _Somme Historique_. After having said that the
greater part of the French Cordeliers were killed by the Saracens, he
adds these words: “But not one of the virgins of St. Claire escaped.”
The abbess of this order, who possessed a masculine spirit, having
learnt that the enemy had entered the city, called all her sisters
together by the sound of the bell, and by the force of her words
persuaded them to hold the promise they had made to Jesus Christ, their
spouse, to preserve their chastity: “My dear daughters, my excellent
sisters,” said she, “we must, in this certain danger of life and
modesty, show ourselves above our sex. The enemies are near to us; not
so much to our bodies as to our souls; these barbarians, who, after
having satisfied their brutal lusts upon all they meet, slay them with
their swords. In this crisis we cannot hope to escape their fury by
flight, but we can by a resolution, painful it is true, but sure. Most
men are seduced by the beauty of women; let us deprive ourselves of
this attraction, let us seek a preservative for our modesty in that
which serves as a cause for its violation. Let us destroy our beauty
to preserve our virginity pure. I will set you the example; let those
who desire to meet their heavenly spouse imitate their mistress.” At
these words she cut her nose off with a razor; the others did the same,
and boldly disfigured themselves, to present themselves more beautiful
before Jesus Christ. By these means they preserved their purity, for
the Saracens, on beholding their bleeding faces, conceived a disgust
for them, and killed them all, without sparing one.
[59] Quand il fut revenu au milieu de la cité, son dextrier fut molt
las, et lui-même aussi; le dextrier resista en contre les espérons, et
s’arresta dans la rue comme qui n’en peut plus. Les Sarrasins, à coups
de flèches, ruèrent à terre frère Guillaume; ainsi ce loyal champion de
Jesus-Christ rendit l’âme à son Créateur.
[60] Among the marvellous accounts to which the destruction of the
Christian colonies in Syria gave birth, history has preserved the
following:—“In the year 1291, the house of the holy Virgin at
Nazareth, in which she conceived the Son of God, was transported by
angels to the top of a little mountain in Dalmatia, on the shore of
the Adriatic Sea: three years afterwards it was transported to another
shore of the same sea, in a wood which belonged to a widow named
Loretto. There have been since built upon this spot a small city and a
magnificent church, which still preserve the name of this widow.”
[61] We are not able to add anything to the learned researches of M.
Raynouard upon the condemnation of the Templars. We refer our readers
to his work, and to our Appendix.
[62] This article of the will of Charles-le-Bel is related by Ducange.
It has been remarked that it is dated the 24th of October, 1324, and
that Charles died in 1327: we may suppose that the date is incorrect,
or that Charles-le-Bel did not perform his vow.
[63] We have before us a will made at this period, in which a gentleman
of the name of Castellen, already illustrious in the times of the
crusades, gives a sum for the expenses of the holy war. We regret we
are not able to publish the text of this document, which has been
communicated to us by the family of the testator.
[64] A memoir on the part which the Spaniards took in the crusades,
read at the Academy of Madrid, describes the labours, the adventures,
and wanderings of Raymond Lulli. The _Histoire Ecclesiastique_ of
Fleury may likewise be consulted.
[65] We have taken these particulars of Raymond Lulli from the Spanish
dissertations upon the crusades, which we have already quoted in the
preceding book.
[66] See what Sanuti himself relates in his book, from which we shall
take many extracts.
[67] It appears almost incomprehensible that our author should, in
these reflections, omit that which must strike every one else as the
principal cause of the change he affects to lament. In the days of
Peter the Hermit, a crusade was a golden day-dream, in which ambition
and cupidity indulged as strongly as piety or superstition. But
experience had not only proved it to be “a baseless fabric,” but a
cruel and a bitter scourge to all who had embarked in one. The first
Crusaders were visionary—later ones must have been mad.—TRANS.
[68] Et venoist à tous seigneurs moult grande plaisance, et
spécialement à ceux qui vouloient le temps dispenser en armes,
et qui adonc ne le tuvoient mie bien raisonnablement employer
ailleurs.—_Froissart._
[69] The eternal production of the Holy Ghost, which proceeds from the
Father and the Son.—TRANS.
[70] Our readers will observe by this, that the crescent, which has
generally, but falsely, been taken as the standard of all Saracens,
belongs to the Ottomans: it has never been mentioned in this history
before.—TRANS.
[71] The character of Constantine was worthy of being celebrated by
the epic muse. One of our most distinguished statesmen has undertaken
this glorious task.—See the poem of _The Last Constantine_, by M. de
Vaublanc. [We wonder our author is not here struck by the very palpable
reflection, that empires, kingdoms, and other institutions, which
have richly merited their fall, frequently expire under the immediate
rule of men who have not been instrumental in bringing about their
ruin—they are but the last step of a headlong declivity,—if they are
of adamant they must yield. The history of his own country and of ours
might have supplied him with hints for such a reflection.—TRANS.]
[72] For the siege of Constantinople, the very detailed account of
Gibbon, and the rapid but complete picture of M. Salabury, in his
_History of the Turkish Empire_, may be consulted.
[73] Olivier de la Marche, after giving a description of the festival
and of the divers spectacles offered to the eyes of the guests, adds:
“Such were the dainty mundane dishes of this festival, of which I will
leave others to speak, to give an account of a pitiable portion of it,
which appears to me of more consequence than the others,” &c.
[74] Olivier de la Marche says, that the duke of Burgundy had already
undertaken, three years before, to make a crusade against the Turks, in
an assembly held at Mons.
[75] Some modern historians who have spoken of these vows of the
knights, have exaggerated the fantasticalness of them. I find, among
others, in one of these historians, this sentence: “In short, what
gives the best idea of the devotion of these new Crusaders is, that one
vowed that if, _up to the moment of his departure, he could not obtain
the favours of his mistress, he would marry the first demoiselle he
should meet with having twenty thousand crowns_.” We have found nothing
like this in either Montstrelet or Olivier de la Marche, who are the
only authors of the times who speak of this festival.
[76] We smile when reading this strange scene of safe and ignorant
boasting; but if a Grand Turk ever indulges in mirth, we should think
it would have excited the laughter of Mahomet, if he chanced to hear of
it.—TRANS.
[77] He should have reminded him of glorious old Henry Dandolo.—TRANS.
[78] Nothing can be more unaccountable than such reflections! What did
these wretched outcasts know or care about the dangers of Europe? What
they sought was relief from the destitution they suffered; and if the
Turks had been in Europe, they would have enlisted with them.—TRANS.
[79] Jacques Cœur was condemned to death, and his property was
confiscated. Charles VII. contented himself with banishing Jacques
Cœur; but his property was not restored for a long time. Sixty of the
clerks of Jacques Cœur subscribed together, and made up a sum of 60,000
crowns, with which he retired to the isle of Cyprus and reëstablished
his trade. He founded an hospital for pilgrims there, and a Carmelite
convent, in which he was buried. Jacques Cœur built many houses at
Marseilles, Montpellier, and Bourges: among others, the beautiful house
which is now the municipality. It was Louis XI. who reinstated the
memory of Jacques Cœur. The inscription which is here mentioned must
have been also in the hospital for pilgrims at Cyprus.
[80] The saying of the Abbé de Vertot was but an expression of
politeness addressed to somebody who offered him documents, not in the
interests of truth, but in the interest of some families, who wished
that their names should be mentioned. In fact, if the documents they
offered him concerned the truth, they had nothing to do but to publish
them; now, we see nothing that has been published upon the siege of
Rhodes that proves that the Abbé de Vertot was mistaken, or forgot
anything of importance. It has not even been attempted to attack the
authenticity of the facts he relates by any criticism that has survived
to our times. There only remains the famous expression, _my siege is
completed_, without any one having sought to explain in what sense and
upon what subject this expression was made.
[81] Mahomet II. took Constantinople in 1453, and died in 1481.—TRANS.
[82] The reflections this passage gives birth to might fill pages; but
almost the most striking is, to observe how the operations of men’s
minds and industry, in their progress, obliterate that which is gone
before, and then again, after a season, which season has done its work
in spreading civilization and intelligence, return to old courses.
Though science is bringing us back to the old route to India, what
wonders the discovery of Vasco de Gama has effected for the progress of
the GREAT SCHEME!—TRANS.
[83] To what extent this sort of profanation is carried, even by
so-called civilized nations, may be seen by the story (we hope not a
true one) of Sir Sidney Smith and a party of English sailors, after
the siege of Acre, singing “God save the king,” in full chorus, in the
great mosque of Omar, at Jerusalem.—TRANS.
[84] This is the passage of the ordinance that relates to the banners
that were to be carried in procession:—“There shall be made, at the
same time, a handsome banner, upon which shall be painted our holy
father the pope, in his full pontificals, accompanied by several
cardinals and other prelates, being in pontificals, and mitred with
white mitres; the pope shall be on the dexter, the king on the
sinister, armed completely in white except his armour of state, which
shall be borne by his squire, accompanied by several princes and other
lords, all armed; on the other side of the said banner, histories and
other pictures, full of Turks and other Infidels.”
[85] All these documents are unpublished, and very voluminous; we will
give some extracts from them in our Appendix.
[86] Some writers have pretended, against the opinion of Bossuet
and David Hume, that Luther was not drawn into his opposition by a
motive of jealousy, and by a sentiment of self-love. In spite of their
objections, the fact is demonstrated. The learned Mosheim, in his
history, has not thought proper to justify Luther on this head; which
is besides of very little importance.
[87] The fruit became ripe in the age of Leo, and therefore he
generally has the merit of the cultivation. Nicholas V. promoted the
growth of intelligence and the arts quite as earnestly as Leo, and
with more prudence and less pretension. But this is a common error: no
age was ever more forgetful that all knowledge is progressive, than
the present; we enjoy much, and claim all the merit of it; but very
unjustly.—TRANS.
[88] This question, we think, will admit of another decision. M.
Michaud confounds the aristocracy with the middle class. When a
class becomes raised, by any means, to an hereditary superiority,
not purchased by individual merit of any other kind, manners are too
frequently set at defiance, and morals become corrupt. What he says
of the middle class is quite correct. The whole history of the world
cannot furnish such an instance of stability and prosperity, as is now
offered in England by the influence of an intelligent, prudent, moral
middle class.—TRANS.
[89] Will not much of this apply to all religions, all times, and
all countries? Success hallows everything—it makes rebellion,
revolution; assassination, patriotism; crimes, virtues. The Jesuits
are said to be the warmest religionists in the world. Could Mussulman
priests have expressed more delight in the advent and success of the
strongest despotism that Europe ever witnessed, than they have done
recently?—TRANS.
[90] I look for you six months hence on the shores of the Hellespont.
[91] The last capitulations are of the reign of Louis XV.
[92] This resignation is expressed in a very singular manner in an
extract from the manuscript of the library of Berne,—“Upon the cause
why the Saracens possess the Holy Land.”
Brother Vincent, in a sermon which he made, and which had for its text,
“Ecce ascendimus Hierosoleman,” gives three reasons for it:—“The
first,” said he, “is to excuse the Christians; the second is for the
confusion of the Saracens; and the third is for the conversion of the
Jews. As to the first reason, we ought all to know that there is no
Christian, however holy, who does not sin, and has not sinned, except
Jesus and his mother, the glorious Virgin Mary; and God is not willing
that Christians should sin in the land in which Jesus Christ, his son,
suffered the passion for the sins of men; and would account it a great
offence. But He is not thus offended by the Saracens; for they are
dogs. It would displease the king if his children or his knights should
make water in his chamber; but when a dog makes water there, he takes
no account of it.”
See _Catalogus Codicum MSS. Bibliothecæ Bernensis_, &c. tom. i. p. 79.
[93] This account of the crusades at first appeared in the _Mercury_,
and was afterwards printed in a little volume. It is now merged in
Voltaire’s _Histoire Générale_.
[94] Two memorials obtained prizes; one was by M. Hercen, the other by
M. Choisseul d’Aullecourt. Both are remarkable for erudition and spirit
of criticism; they marked out the way we have followed, and we take
pleasure in acknowledging all we owe them.
[95] When a person moderately read in French history remembers the
selfish, sensual, _wicked_ characters here so unduly eulogized, he may
forgive himself for the smile with which he must read the “impotent
conclusion.”—TRANS.
[96] Say, rather—rendered so infamous by his cruelties.—TRANS.
[97] The chronicle of Tours tells us, with the greatest simplicity,
that Charlemagne was called the _Great_ on account of his _great good
luck_; thus historians confounded, as the vulgar do, glory with fortune.
[98] These must be exceedingly remote times, indeed; such as we have no
account of. The oldest poems, the oldest histories, describe no such
state; the savage tribes of the forest and the desert have something
of a pride of ancestry, and are known as the sons of their fathers,
as well as Achilles was known as Pelides, or Gaul as the son of
Morni.—TRANS.
[99] It does not become us, as translators, to enter into controversy
with our original, otherwise, much might be said in reply to this
truly _conservative_ paragraph. But, as readers of history, we think
we may be permitted to observe, that _the advantages_ pointed out in
the first lines of it do not appear in the history of Venice. She
was never so great or so prosperous as when purely mercantile. When
territory was acquired, and nobility arose, corruption and decay soon
followed.—TRANS.
[100] And yet we cannot think that the custom of the Scotch _lairds_,
who assume the name of their estates, can be traced to this source,
although they do it in the same way. It seems probable that the French
_de_, generally admitted as a proof of gentility, at least, was adopted
upon such an occasion; but even this _de_ is subject to doubt, as
implying the lord _of_ the estate, country, or city, or the man who
raised himself into note _from_ the country or city.—TRANS.
[101] How was it, then, that William of Normandy, on his conquest of
England, two centuries before, created so many of his knights, earls
and barons, giving them titles of the places and estates he at the
same time bestowed? Philip-le-Hardi, no doubt, gave the newly-created
nobles means to support their honours and nobility was connected with
property, as it had been.—TRANS.
[102] In this suggestive passage we are sorry to find the prejudices
of our original inducing him to give a false colouring to his picture.
Monarchs granted no immunities to the people out of love for either
liberty or the people, but to gain their assistance against their
enemies, the great vassals or barons—thence the consequences; the
principle was carried so far, that the monarch was elevated into the
despot; and then another change ensued; when his power was so complete
that his old enemies looked upon him as the source of all honours
and riches, they united with him; both joined in their endeavours to
oppress and plunder the people; and then came the last phase.—TRANS.
[103] And yet he lived under Richelieu, in the nominal reign of Louis
XIII., and in the reign of Louis XIV.!—TRANS.
[104] Most political economists call man’s labour _property_; M.
Michaud has shown that the bulk of the people, under the feudal system,
paid society _labour_, _life_, and _liberty_; and yet he calls these
_nothing_!—TRANS.
[105] I do not recollect this prediction; but I perfectly remember
Montesquieu foretells that _France will perish by the sword_.—TRANS.
[106] What can this mean? Taxation is as old as governments of any
kind.—TRANS.
[107] Servez Dieu, et il vous aidera: soyez doux et courtois à tout
gentil-homme en otant de vous tout orgueil; ne soyez flatteur ne
rapporteur; car telles manières de gens ne viennent pas à gran le
perfection. Soyez loyal en faits et en dits; tenez votre parole; soyez
secourables à pauvres et orphelins, et Dieu vous le guerdonnera.
[108] Le Père Hélyot, in his _Histoire des Ordres Monastiques_, vol.
i. p. 263, expresses himself thus, when speaking of the order of St.
Lazarus:—“What is very remarkable is, that they could only elect as
grand-master, a leprous knight of the hospital of Jerusalem, which
lasted up to the time of Innocent IV., that is to say, about the year
1253, when, having been obliged to abandon Syria, they addressed the
pontiff, and represented to him, that always having had, from their
foundation, a leprous knight for grand-master, they found themselves in
the impossibility of electing one, because the infidels had killed all
the leprous knights of their hospital at Jerusalem. For this reason,
they prayed the pontiff to allow them to elect, for the future, as
grand-master, a knight who had not been attacked by leprosy, and who
might be in good health; and the pope referred them to the bishop of
Trascate, that he might accord them this permission, after having
examined if that could be done according to the will of God. This is
reported by Pope Pius IV., in his bull of the year 1565, so extended
and so favourable to the order of St. Lazarus, by which he renews all
the privileges and all the gifts that his predecessors had granted
to it, and gives it fresh ones. Here is what he says of the election
these knights ought to make of a leprous grand-master:—Et Innocentius
IV., per eum accepto, quod licet de antiquâ approbatâ et hactenùs
pacificè observatâ consuetudine obtentum esset, ut miles leprosus domûs
Sancti-Lazari Hierosolymitani in ejus magistrum assumeretur; verùm quia
ferè omnes milites leprosi dictæ domûs ab inimicis fidei miserabiliter
interfecti fuerant, et hujusmodi consuetudo nequiebat commodè
observari: idcircò tunc episcopo Tusculano per quasdam commiserat, ut,
si sibi secundùm Deum visum foret expedire fratribus ipsis licentiam,
aliquem militem sanum et fratribus prædictæ domûs Sancti-Lazari in ejus
magistrum (non obstante consuetudine hujusmodi de cætero eligendi)
auctoritate apostolicâ concederet.
[109] For serfs this might be a blessing, but for free labour it was
complained of as an evil. La Fontaine’s Cobbler, when describing his
state to the Financier, says:—
“Chaque jour amène son pain, Tantôt plus, tantôt moins: le mal est que
toujours (Et sans cela nos gains seraient assez honnêtes), Le mal est
que dans l’an s’entremêlent des jours Qu’il faut chômer; on nous ruine
en fêtes; L’une fait tort à l’autre; et monsieur le curé De quelque
nouveau saint charge toujours son prôné.”
Every day brings its bread; sometimes more, sometimes less: the worst
is that always (and without that our gains would be very tolerable),
the evil is, that in the year so many days creep in in which we must
be idle—we are ruined in festivals; one treads upon the heels of
another; and master curate is always introducing some new saint into
his sermon.—
TRANS.
[110] We are constantly withheld, by the respect due from translators
to originals, from making remarks in opposition to our author, when
he lays down the historian’s pen to get into the philosopher’s
chair. In the course of this chapter, our readers must have observed
much reflection that is not deep, and some passages that are
contradictory of others; but all has one great merit—_it is extremely
suggestive_.—TRANS.
[111] How could the clergy be said to pay for these wars? What became
of the vast sums raised by the sale of indulgences of all kinds? The
clergy had the collecting of the offerings of the faithful, which we
have seen was sometimes _profitable_. Besides, the barons and knights
paid for their own and their vassals’ equipments as long as they had a
coin left; then the king or leader, as Louis IX. did, sometimes helped
them.—TRANS.
[112] This is one of innumerable instances in the course of the work,
in which the reader must regret that M. Michaud was not aware he was
writing for the world; his views, and, I am sorry to say, his biasses,
are exclusively French.—TRANS.
[113] Surely he should have added to these, the human passions and
mundane interests of these ignorant, independent tyrants.—TRANS.
[114] Is not there always some such dominant principle in society? Is
not _money_ now as powerful as brute force or skill in arms were in the
middle ages?—TRANS.
[115] Nothing has been better said upon the influence of the clergy
and religion, in the middle ages, than that which we read in a work
entitled _Des Intérêts et des Opinions_, by M. Fievée:—“At a time
in which the Church imposed public penitences, whilst the tribunals
only ordered judgments by arms, we cannot see how the high police
could not have fallen into the hands of the ecclesiastics; and it was
because they alone exercised it, that, in the civil wars, fortunate
princes confided to the monks the guarding of princes, from whom
the fate of battle or treachery took the rights they possessed to
share the kingdom. It was necessary that the void left by the laws
should be filled up, or the state would perish; and the priests alone
enjoyed a moral authority sufficiently great to supply the weakness of
legislation;—exalted passions, more powerful virtues, great crimes,
great remorse; a proud independence, salutary fears; an excess of
force, and no regulations; courage in everything and everywhere: such
was, at this period, the state of society;—it is easy to perceive that
religion alone contended with barbarism.” We regret not to be able to
quote more than a fragment of a work filled with ingenious perceptions
and profound views, upon the march of civilization in the middle ages.
[116] The author of _A Memoir to serve as a New History of Louis
XII_. carries the first appearance of judicial reform in France to
the reign of that monarch. He has prosecuted on this subject learned
researches, and his work has given us much information upon the spirit
and the march of our legislation in the middle ages. Although we do
not always agree as to the consequences of the principles he develops,
particularly as to their application to that which is passing at
present, we take pleasure in rendering justice to the rare sagacity
with which he has cleared up questions which have been scarcely
perceived by our best historians.
[117] La Fontaine.
[118] And yet Marseilles had been a flourishing port for ages. In the
early crusades it did not belong to the French monarchy.—TRANS.
[119] “A skilful man, appointed to view and make a report of a thing,”
in this case; but it has several other meanings; as a man of worth,
probity, or even valour.—TRANS.
[120] Hotspur says to his lady—
“Swear me, Kate, like a lady, as thou art,
A good mouth-filling oath!”
The queen’s anathema upon Joinville, is, in the original, something of
this character.—TRANS.
[121] M. de Choiseul d’Aillecourt gives in his _Mémoire_ a very
extended nomenclature of the inventions brought from the East into
Europe by the Crusaders.
[122] And has not this been the case with all rich and prosperous
nations? What invariably follows this high state of opulence, of the
fine arts, and their attendant sensuality, is a question for every
great nation that is so circumstanced to ask itself.—TRANS.
[123] We are not positive whether the small-pox was known in Europe
previously to the Crusaders. Its introduction amongst us is frequently
attributed to them; and we observe, in reading the history of Mahomet
and his successors, many persons were marked with the scars left by
this disease. We wonder Michaud does not mention it.—TRANS.
[124] The Moors of Spain may be adduced as an example against this
opinion. It is true that the Moors of Granada cultivated the arts and
sciences for a long time, and with much success; but what became of
them when they returned to the coast of Africa?
[125] Lord Bolingbroke said: “After all, it is Nicholas V. to whom
Europe is obliged for its present state of learning” (Spence).—TRANS.
[126] The best answer to this is, that the too widely extended
Mussulman power was as much split into sections by discord and ambition
as Europe was. At the time of the first crusade there was no dread of
invasion from the East; and the invasion of the Christians produced
unanimity in defence of Mahomedanism.—TRANS.
[127] It is somewhat remarkable, that in this very interesting summary,
Michaud makes no mention of the exact sciences. We are generally
supposed to be indebted to the Arabians for great improvement, if
not for entire knowledge of mathematics; and although that knowledge
may have come to us through Spain, we cannot think mention of the
circumstance would have been out of its place here.—TRANS.
[128] Although we cannot pretend to be perfectly acquainted with all
the saints of these ages, we think this may be the same Paulinus who
had been bishop of Nola, and who, if not the first inventor of bells,
was the first who applied them to sacred purposes.—TRANS.
[129] M. Michaud says, we must consider this Itinerary as the first
account of the voyage to the Holy Land that we are in possession of.
Bordeaux, at the time of the pilgrims’ departure, was one of the
principal cities of the Gauls. It is situated at the mouth of the
Garonne, in the Bay of Biscay, and is strongly associated with English
history, as having been for a long time the residence of the Black
Prince, and the birth-place of the unfortunate Richard II.—TRANS.
[130] Our readers will judge, by two or three humorous traits in this
description, that our monk of Malmesbury had no objection to a joke.
The national characteristics here mentioned are curious, as proving how
long our northern friends have been jeered at for their _scratching
propensities_, and that the love of drinking was peculiar to the Dane
before it was reprobated by Hamlet:—
“This heavy-headed revel, east and west, Makes us traduced, and taxed
of other nations: They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase Soil
our addition,”
[131] This was St. Hugh, consecrated in the year 1081, by Pope Gregory
VII., the same who, a short time after, received St. Bruno and his
companions, and gave them the solitude of the Chartreuse, to found a
new order there. The church of Tours was then governed by Rodolph II.
[132] Saladin here speaks of the battle of Tiberias.
[133] The count of Tripoli.
[134] To understand this phrase, we must remember that the author of
the letter compares the fortifications of Jerusalem to a _necklace_.
[135] This is a most extraordinary circumstance and proclaims to us not
only the fame of Saladin, the monarch of such a distant country, but
likewise the fear in which he was held in Europe. Notwithstanding his
greater proximity, we did not call our income-tax the _Buonaparte tax_,
as we might have done.—TRANS.
[136] Here is a little bit for the antiquaries of _Clerkenwell_, which
is, no doubt, meant by this.—TRANS.
[137] This is a valuable hint for poets, painters, and
novelists.—TRANS.
[138] This may appear improbable; but there is no doubt Richard was a
perfect horseman; and we very well remember Mr. Goldham, of the London
and Westminster volunteer light-horse, performing the broad sword
exercise with a sword in each hand, and his horse at speed, before
George III., in Hyde Park.—TRANS.
[139] Although our chronicler does not tell us so, we may presume
that when one of Richard’s troop cut down a Turkish horseman, he did
not leave his saddle long empty, and that such accessions enabled the
Christians to make an effective pursuit.—TRANS.
[140] If any limner had the skill to paint Richard’s countenance at
parting with such a friend as his “good sword,” this would make a fine
picture. The feelings, which must have nearly suffocated his lion
heart, would furnish matter for a poem.—TRANS.
[141] We give a translation of this extract because it is very curious;
but we have no faith in it with respect to the date; it appears to us
to be much more modern, and some parts of the language inconsistent
with others.—TRANS.
[142] But, as in most such cases, religion was rather the cloak than
the basis of ambition. The Mussulman empire, after the three first
caliphs, became too large and too complicated to be governed by a
simple Arab; and the miraculous conquests of the sect naturally made
the generals who achieved them ambitious of governing what they
conquered. The religious feud was but an excuse.—TRANS.
[143] This doctrine prevailed among the Ismaëlians of Persia
during nearly fifty years; but Djelah-ed Din, grandson of Hassan,
reëstablished the worship in its purity.
[144] Dai, an Arabian participle, signifies properly him who
calls,—_advocans_; and by extension it designates a person who
preaches to men, and invites them to embrace some doctrine. The title
of _dai_ was common in the first century of Islamism. Every sect had
its own.
[145] A passage of the historian Mirkhoud supports this account; he
informs us that Hassan, after getting possession of the castle of
Altamont, caused a canal to be dug, and brought water from a great
distance to the foot of his castle. Fruit-trees were planted round it,
and he encouraged the inhabitants to sow the land. It was thus that
the air of this place, which had been unwholesome, became pure and
salubrious.
[146] M. Jourdain, who addressed this interesting letter to me, has
published a work entitled _La Perse, ou le Tableau de l’Histoire du
Gouvernement, de la Littérature, de cet Empire, des Mœurs et Coutumes
des Habitants_. This work, in five vols. in 18mo., contains many new
notions and curious details, and does honour to the talent as well as
to the erudition of the Orientalist.
[147] The original of this fragment is in the _Bibl. Græc._ of
Fabricius, vol. vi, p. 405, and in the first volume of the _Imperium
Orientiale_ of Bandière. It is not in the editions of Nicetas.
[148] Coins worth two shillings and fourpence each.
[149] This is an extraordinary description of what must have been a
surprising work of art; but we cannot reconcile the idea we entertain
of a basilisk with that of the animal mentioned—we thought a basilisk
was a kind of serpent.—TRANS.
[150] Vincent Bellev. _Specul. Hist._ book xxx. chap. 5; Albert
Stad. _Chron._ fol. 202; Godefr. Monach. _Annal. ap. Frch. Collect.
Alberici_, p. 489; Sicard. _Chron. ap. Murat._ vol. vii. p. 623.
[151] Thomas de Cantipr. _De Apibus_.
[152] _Chron. Argent, ap. Urtii, Collect._ vol. i. p. 1.
[153] Jacob de Vorrag. _Chron. Januense, ap. Murat._ vol. ix. p. 46.
What proves the error of this date is, that Bizarre (_Hist. Genuens._),
who has copied this chronicle, places the event under the year 1212. I
do not know by what authority John Massey places it in his chronicle in
1210.
[154] See the _Chron. Anon._ of Strasburg, Godfrey the Monk, James of
Varagine, and Bishop Sicard.
[155] Alberic enters into copious details; and though this historian
generally sins on the side of extravagant credulity, his evidence
cannot, in this case, be doubted.
[156] Jacques de Vorrag.
[157] Albert de Stadt.
[158] _Anonymous Chronicle_ of Strasburg.
[159] This account is furnished by Alberic, and is confirmed by Thomas
of Champré and Roger Bacon.
[160] _Chron. Augus._; _Chron. Argent._
[161] Godfrey the Monk.
[162] _Opus Majus_, p. 254, ed. in fol.
[163] See Marin, _Storia Civile e Politica del Commercia de’
Veneziani_, vol. i. p. 206; Do Guignes, _Mémoires sur le Commerce des
Francs dans le Levant_, &c.; vol. xxxvii. of _Les Mémoires de l’Acad.
des Inscr._
[164] Videmus anno incarn. Di. 1213, infinitam puerorum multitudinem
spiritu deceptionis arreptos, cum signaculo crucis iter
Hierosolymitanum agressos fuisse, periisseque diversis in locis; et
maximam ex eis multitudinem per malefices quosdam Sarracenis in mari
venditos extitisse.—_Lib. de Apibus._
[165] Forsan vidistis aut audivistis pro certo quod pueri de regno
Franciæ semel occurrebant in infinitâ multitudine post quemdem malignum
hominem, ita quod nec à patribus, nec à matribus, nec ab amicis
poterant detineri, et positi sunt in navibus et Sarracenis venditi, et
non sunt adhuc 64 annis.—_Opus Majus_, p. 254.
[166] We promised to give in the Appendix some letters and the Bull of
this pope relative to the crusade of 1197; but as the contents of these
pieces are all alike, with the exception of some trifling expressions,
we shall confine ourselves to this one.
[167] Lord, know that he who shall not go to that land where God was
both living and dead, and who shall not take the cross beyond the
seas, shall have no chance of going into Paradise: he who has pity and
remembrance of the Lord, ought from war and vengeance to deliver his
land and his country.... Now, every valiant bachelor will go who loves
God and honours the holy mountain; they who act wisely will go to God,
the base and the vile will stay behind: they are blind, as I think, who
in their lives offer no assistance to God, and lose the glory of the
mount for such a trifle. God suffered for us on the cross; and will say
to us on the day to which all will come:—“You who helped me to bear my
cross, you shall go where angels dwell, and shall there see both me and
my mother Mary; and you from whom I have received nothing, descend all
into the depths of hell!”
[168] Mrs. Hemans’ beautiful poem, _Messages to the Dead_, is upon this
subject; and in a note, quoted from Mr. Brunton’s _Discipline_, she
says that the custom was not uncommon in the Highlands.—TRANS.
[169] In the regulations which were made for the Prussian converts, the
popes particularly condemned the funeral customs of these people. “The
neophytes,” say these regulations, “promise not to burn their dead,
and not to bury with them men, or horses, arms, clothes, or valuable
things. They will no longer have those impostors called _ligastons_,
who resemble pagan priests, and who, at funerals, praise the dead for
robberies, impieties, and other sins,” &c. These regulations enable us
to become acquainted with many of the ancient customs of the Prussians.
[170] This is a most remarkable resemblance to the word signifying bard
in Welsh, and to the name of the Welsh bard, _par excellence_.—TRANS.
[171] The reader may remember they were left in the camp with the duke
at Burgundy.
[172] This passage is very obscure.
[173] These instructions were inscribed in a register of the Chamber
of Accounts. To facilitate the reading of them to the public, some
impressions have been modernized.
[174] That is, the papers or accounts. We have given it exactly as it
stands, that our readers may the more plainly perceive the nature of
these documents.—TRANS.
[175] By which we may perceive that _dining_ at parish meetings is not
a custom confined to modern times.
[176] By which we learn that the charge of a notary was one livre per
diem.
[177] This must be Henry VII. from the dates, the contemporary princes,
and the character given of the monarch.—TRANS.
[178] How amusing, and, at the same time, wonderfully instructive it
is, to read these schemes of philosophers and statemen a hundred and
fifty years after they have occupied their thoughts by day and their
visions by night!—TRANS.
[179] Words intertwined with the letters of the cipher of the Grand
Seignor.
[180] This passage being the basis of all the privileges of the French
in Turkey, it often serves as a motive in the requests of ambassadors,
and as a foundation for the firmans of the Grand Seignor.
[181] Much more is wanting to show that the informations received
against the Templars furnished either moral or legal proof of the
existence of the Bafometic figures. The act of accusation says not one
word of it. There is no mention of it in the great procedure instituted
at Paris, or in the numerous depositions of the witnesses whom the
inquisitor and the commissaries of the pope questioned. Of the six
witnesses heard at Carcassonne, who declared that an idol was presented
to them, only two designated it in FIGURAM BAFOMETI. One, Gaucerand de
Montpesat, when brought to Paris, retracted all preceding confession;
there only then remained one single witness, of whose ulterior conduct
and end nothing is known. It is proved, that of the other four persons
interrogated at Carcassonne, Jean Cassauhas and Peter de Mossi
retracted their first deposition, and Jean Cassauhas was burnt in that
city.
[182] The pretended truncated cross, which M. Hammer believed he
recognised upon the medals, which otherwise have nothing to do with the
Templars, is nothing but the effect of the superposition of a hand upon
the upper part of an ordinary cross; this hand, which holds the cross
by the top, is found upon many medals and coins which M. Hammer himself
would not dare to attribute to the Templars.
[183] Raimundus de Agiles says of the Mahometans: In ecclesiis autem
magnis Bafumarias faciebant ... habebant monticulum ubi duæ erant
Bafumariæ. The troubadours employ Baformaria for mosque, and Bafomet
for Mahomet.