[1] The duchy of Lancaster, which was the private property of Henry
IV. before he ascended the throne, was assured to him and his heirs
by a special act of parliament. In the first year of Henry VII. it
was united to the crown, but as a separate property.
CROWN POINT, a village of Essex county, New York, U.S.A., in a township
of the same name, about 90 m. N.E. of Albany and about 10 m. N. of
Ticonderoga, on the W. shore of Lake Champlain. Pop. of the township
(1890) 3135; (1900) 2112; (1905) 1890; (1910) 1690; of the village,
about 1000. The village is served by the Delaware & Hudson Railway and
by the Champlain Canal. Among the manufactures are lumber and
woodenware. Graphite has been found in the western part of the township,
and spar is mined. In 1609 Champlain fought near here the engagement
with the Iroquois Indians which marked the beginning of the long enmity
between the Five (later Six) Nations and the French. Subsequently Dutch
and English traders trafficked in the vicinity, the latter maintaining
here for many years a regular trading-post. In 1731 the French built
here Fort Frederic, the first military post at Crown Point, and the
place was subsequently for many years of considerable strategic
importance, owing to its situation on Lake Champlain, which with Lake
George furnished a comparatively easy route from Canada to New York.
Twice during the French and Indian War, in 1755 and again in 1756,
English and colonial expeditions were sent against it in vain; it
remained in French hands until 1759, when, after Lord Jeffrey Amherst's
occupation of Ticonderoga, the garrison joined that of the latter place
and retreated to Canada. Crown Point was then occupied by Amherst, who
during the winter of 1759-1760 began the construction, about a quarter
of a mile from the old Fort Frederic, of a large fort, which was
garrisoned but was never completed; the ruins of this fort (not of Fort
Frederic) still remain. At the outbreak of the War of Independence, on
the 11th of May 1775, the fort, whose garrison then consisted of only a
dozen men, was captured by Colonel Seth Warner and a force of "Green
Mountain Boys," sent from Ticonderoga by Ethan Allen; and it remained in
American hands save for a brief period in 1777, when it was occupied by
a detachment of Burgoyne's invading army.
CROWTHER, SAMUEL ADJAI (1809?-1891), African missionary-bishop, was born
at Ochugu in the Yoruba country, West Africa, and was sold into slavery
in 1821. Next year he was rescued, with many other captives, by H.M.
ship "Myrmidon," and was landed at Sierra Leone. Educated there in a
missionary school, he was baptized on the 11th of December 1825. In time
he became a teacher at Furah Bay, and afterwards an energetic missionary
on the Niger. He came to England in 1842, entered the Church Missionary
College at Islington, and in June 1843 was ordained by Bishop Blomfield.
Returning to Africa, he laboured with great success amongst his own
people and afterwards at Abeokuta. Here he devoted himself to the
preparation of school-books, and the translation of the Bible and
Prayer-Book into Yoruba and other dialects. He also established a trade
in cotton, and improved the native agriculture. In 1857 he commenced the
third expedition up the Niger, and after labouring with varied success,
returned to England and was consecrated, on St Peter's Day 1864, first
bishop of the Niger territories. Before long a commencement was made of
the missions to the delta of the Niger, and between 1866 and 1884
congregations of Christians were formed at Bonny, Brass and New Calabar,
but the progress made was slow and subject to many impediments. In 1888
the tide of persecution turned, and several chiefs embraced
Christianity, and on Crowther's return from another visit to England,
the large iron church known as "St Stephen's cathedral" was opened.
Crowther died of paralysis on the 31st of December 1891, having
displayed as a missionary for many years untiring industry, great
practical wisdom, and deep piety.
CROYDON, a municipal, county and parliamentary borough of Surrey,
England, suburban to London, 10 m. S. of London Bridge. Pop. (1891)
102,695; (1901) 133,895. The borough embraces a great residential
district. Several railway stations give it communication with all parts
of the metropolis, the principal railways serving it being the London,
Brighton & South Coast and the South-Eastern & Chatham. It stands near
the sources of the river Wandle, under Banstead Downs, and is a place of
great antiquity. The original site, farther west than the present town,
is mentioned in Domesday Book. The derivation indicated is from the O.
Fr. _croie dune_, chalk hill. The supposition that here was the Roman
station of _Noviomagus_ is rejected. The site is remarkable for the
number of springs which issue from the soil. One of these, called the
"Bourne," bursts forth a short way above the town at irregular intervals
of one to ten years or more; and after running a torrent for two or
three months, as quickly vanishes. Until its course was diverted it
caused destructive floods. This phenomenon seems to arise from rains
which, falling on the chalk hills, sink into the porous soil and
reappear after a time from crevices at lower levels. The manor of
Croydon was presented by William the Conqueror to Archbishop Lanfranc,
who is believed to have founded the archiepiscopal palace there, which
was the occasional residence of his successors till about 1750, and of
which the chapel and hall remain. Addington Park, 3(1/2) m. from Croydon,
was purchased for the residence, in 1807, of the archbishop of
Canterbury, but was sold in consequence of Archbishop Temple's decision
to reside at the palace, Canterbury. The neighbouring church, which is
Norman and Early English, contains several memorials of archbishops.
Near the park a group of tumuli and a circular encampment are seen.
Croydon is a suffragan bishopric in the diocese of Canterbury. The
parish church of St John the Baptist appears to have been built in the
14th and 15th centuries, but to have contained remains of an older
building. The church was restored or rebuilt in the 16th century, and
again restored by Sir Gilbert Scott in 1857-1859. It was destroyed by
fire, with the exception of the tower, on the 5th of January 1867, and
was at once rebuilt by Scott on the old lines. In 1596 Archbishop
Whitgift founded the hospital or almshouse which bears his name, and
remains in its picturesque brick buildings surrounding two quadrangles.
His grammar school was housed in new buildings in 1871, and is a
flourishing day school. The principal public building of Croydon is that
erected by the corporation for municipal business; it included
court-rooms and the public library. At Addiscombe in the neighbourhood
was formerly a mansion dating from 1702, and acquired by the East India
Company in 1809 for a Military College, which on the abolition of the
Company became the Royal Military College for the East Indian Army, and
was closed in 1862. Croydon was formed into a municipal borough in 1883,
a parliamentary borough, returning one member, in 1885, and a county
borough in 1888. The corporation consists of a mayor, 12 aldermen and 36
councillors. Area, 9012 acres.
CROZAT, PIERRE (1661-1740), French art collector, was born at Toulouse,
one of a family who were prominent French financiers and collectors. He
became treasurer to the king in Paris, and gradually acquired a
magnificent collection of pictures and _objets d'art_. Between 1729 and
1742 a finely illustrated work was published in two volumes, known as
the _Cabinet Crozat_, including the finest pictures in French
collections. Most of his own treasures descended to his nephews, Louis
Francois (d. 1750), Joseph Antoine (d. 1750), and Louis Antoine (d.
1770), and were augmented by them, being dispersed after their deaths;
the collection of Louis Antoine Crozat went to St Petersburg.
CROZET ISLANDS, an uninhabited group in the Indian Ocean, in 46 deg.-47
deg. S. and 51 deg. E. They are mountainous, with summits from 4000 to
5000 ft. high, and are disposed in two divisions--Penguin or
Inaccessible, Hog, Possession and East Islands; and the Twelve Apostles.
Like Kerguelen, and other clusters in these southern waters, they appear
to be of igneous formation; but owing to the bleak climate and their
inaccessible character they are seldom visited, and have never been
explored since their discovery in 1772 by Marion-Dufresne, after one of
whose officers they are named. Possession, the highest, has a snowy peak
said to exceed 5000 ft. Hog Island takes its name from the animals which
were here let loose by an English captain many years ago, but have since
disappeared. Rabbits burrow in the heaps of scoria on the slopes of the
mountains.
CROZIER, WILLIAM (1855- ), American artillerist and inventor, born at
Carrollton, Carroll county, Ohio, on the 19th of February 1855, was the
son of Robert Crozier (1827-1895), chief justice of Kansas in 1863-1866,
and a United States senator from that state from December 1873 to
February 1874. He graduated at West Point in 1876, was appointed a 2nd
lieutenant in the 4th Artillery, and served on the Western frontier for
three years against the Sioux and Bannock Indians. From 1879 to 1884 he
was instructor in mathematics at West Point, and was superintendent of
the Watertown (Massachusetts) Arsenal from 1884 to 1887. In 1888 he was
sent by the war department to study recent developments in artillery in
Europe, and upon his return he was placed in full charge of the
construction of gun carriages for the army, and with General Adelbert R.
Buffington (1837- ), the chief of ordnance, he invented the
Buffington-Crozier disappearing gun carriage (1896). He also invented a
wire-wound gun, and perfected many appliances connected with heavy and
field ordnance. In 1890 he attained the rank of captain. During the
Spanish-American War he was inspector-general for the Atlantic and Gulf
coast defences. In 1899 he was one of the American delegates to the
Peace Conference at the Hague. He later served in the Philippine Islands
on the staffs of Generals John C. Bates and Theodore Schwan, and in 1900
was chief of ordnance on the staff of General A. R. Chaffee during the
Pekin Relief Expedition. In November 1901 he was appointed
brigadier-general and succeeded General Buffington as chief of ordnance
of the United States army. His _Notes on the Construction of Ordnance_,
published by the war department, are used as text-books in the schools
for officers, and he is also the author of other important publications
on military subjects.
CROZIER, or pastoral staff, one of the insignia of a bishop, and
probably derived from the _lituus_ of the Roman augurs. It is
crook-headed, and borne by bishops and archbishops alike (see PASTORAL
STAFF). The word "crozier" or "crosier" represents the O. Fr. _crocier_,
Med. Lat. _crociarius_, the bearer of the episcopal crook (Med. Lat.
_crocea_, _croccia_, &c., Fr. _croc_). The English representative of
_crocea_ was _crose_, later _crosse_, which, becoming confused with
"cross" (q.v.), was replaced by "crozier-staff" or "crozier's staff,"
and then, at the beginning of the 16th century, by "crozier" (see J. T.
Taylor, _Archaeologia_, Iii., "On the Use of the Terms Crosier, Pastoral
Staff and Cross").
CRUCIAL (from Lat. _crux_, a cross), that which has the form of a cross,
as the "crucial ligaments" of the knee-joint, which cross each other,
connecting the femur and the tibia. From Francis Bacon's expression
_instantia crucis_ (taken, as he says, from the finger-post or _crux_ at
cross-roads) for a phenomenon which decides between two causes which
have each similar analogies in its favour, comes the use of "crucial"
for that which decides between two alternatives, hence, generally, as a
synonym for "critical." The word is also used, with a reference to the
use of a "crucible," of something which tests and tries.
CRUCIFERAE, or Crucifer family, a natural order of flowering plants,
which derives its name from the cruciform arrangement of the four petals
of the flower. It is an order of herbaceous plants, many of which, such
as wallflower, stock, mustard, cabbage, radish and others, are
well-known garden or field-plants. Many of the plants are annuals; among
these are some of the commonest weeds of cultivation, shepherd's purse
(_Capsella Bursa-pastoris_), charlock (_Brassica Sinapis_), and such
common plants as hedge mustard (_Sisymbrium officinale_),
Jack-by-the-hedge (_S. Alliaria_ or _Alliaria officinalis_). Others are
biennials producing a number of leaves on a very short stem in the first
year, and in the second sending up a flowering shoot at the expense of
the nourishment stored in the thick tap-root during the previous
season. Under cultivation this root becomes much enlarged, as in turnip,
swede and others. Wallflower (_Cheiranthus Cheiri_) (fig. 1) is a
perennial. The leaves when borne on an elongated stem are arranged
alternately and have no stipules. The flowers are arranged in racemes
without bracts; during the life of the flower its stalk continues to
grow so that the open flowers of an inflorescence stand on a level (that
is, are corymbose). The flowers are regular, with four free sepals
arranged in two pairs at right angles, four petals arranged crosswise in
one series, and two sets of stamens, an outer with two members and an
inner with four, in two pairs placed in the middle line of the flower
and at right angles to the outer series. The four inner stamens are
longer than the two outer; and the stamens are hence collectively
described as tetradynamous. The pistil, which is above the rest of the
members of the flower, consists of two carpels joined at their edges to
form the ovary, which becomes two-celled by subsequent ingrowth of a
septum from these united edges; a row of ovules springs from each edge.
The fruit is a pod or siliqua splitting by two valves from below upwards
and leaving the placentas with the seeds attached to the _replum_ or
framework of the septum. The seeds are filled with the large embryo, the
two cotyledons of which are variously folded. In germination the
cotyledons come above ground and form the first green leaves of the
plant.
[Illustration: FIG. 1.--Wallflower (_Cheiranthus Cheiri_), reduced. 1,
Flower in vertical section. 2, Horizontal plan of arrangement of flower
in _Barbarea_.]
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--_Cruciferae._ Floral Diagram (_Brassica_).]
[Illustration: FIG. 3.--_Cardamine pratensis._ Flower with Perianth
removed. (After Baillon.)]
[Illustration: FIG. 4.--Cruciferous Fruits. (After Baillon.)
A, _Cheiranthus Cheiri._
B, _Lepidium sativum._
C, _Capsella Bursa-pastoris._
D, _Lunaria biennis_, showing the septum after the carpels have fallen
away.
E, _Crambe maritima._]
[Illustration: FIG. 5.--Seeds of _Cruciferae_ cut across to show the
radicle and cotyledons. (After Baillon.)
A, _Cheiranthus Cheiri._
B, _Sisymbrium Alliaria._
Figures 2-5 are from Strasburger's _Lehrbuch der Botanik_, by permission
of Gustav Fischer.]
Pollination is effected by aid of insects. The petals are generally
white or yellow, more rarely lilac or some other colour, and between the
bases of the stamens are honey-glands. Some or all of the anthers become
twisted so that insects in probing for honey will touch the anthers with
one side of their head and the capitate stigma with the other. Owing,
however, to the close proximity of stigma and anthers, very slight
irregularity in the movements of the visiting insect will cause
self-pollination, which may also occur by the dropping of pollen from
the anthers of the larger stamens on to the stigma.
Cruciferae is a large order containing nearly 200 genera and about 1200
species. It has a world-wide distribution, but finds its chief
development in the temperate and frigid zones, especially of the
northern hemisphere, and as Alpine plants. In the subdivision of the
order into tribes use is made of differences in the form of the fruit
and the manner of folding of the embryo. When the fruit is several times
longer than broad it is known as a siliqua, as in stock or wallflower;
when about as long as broad, a silicula, as in shepherd's purse.
[Illustration: FIG. 6.--Honesty (_Lunaria biennis_), showing Flower and
Fruit. Reduced.]
The order is well represented in Britain--among others by _Nasturtium_
(_N. officinale_, water-cress), _Arabis_ (rock-cress), _Cardamine_
(bitter-cress), _Sisymbrium_ (hedge mustard, &c.; _S. Irio_ is London
rocket, so-called because it sprang up after the fire of 1666),
_Brassica_ (cabbage and mustard), _Diplotaxis_ (rocket), _Cochlearia_
(scurvy-grass), _Capsella_ (shepherd's purse), _Lepidium_ (cress),
_Thlaspi_ (penny-cress), _Cakile_ (sea rocket), _Raphanus_ (radish), and
others. Of economic importance are species of _Brassica_, including
mustard (_B. nigra_), white mustard, used when young in salads (_B.
alba_), cabbage (q.v.) and its numerous forms derived from _B.
oleracea_, turnip (_B. campestris_), and swede (_B. Napus_), _Raphanus
sativus_ (radish), _Cochlearia Armoracia_ (horse-radish), _Nasturtium
officinale_ (water-cress), _Lepidium sativum_ (garden cress). _Isatis_
affords a blue dye, woad. Many of the genera are known as ornamental
garden plants; such are _Cheiranthus_ (wallflower), _Matthiola_ (stock),
_Iberis_ (candy-tuft), _Alyssum_ (Alison), _Hesperis_ (dame's violet),
Lunaria (honesty) (fig. 6), _Aubrietia_ and others.
CRUDEN, ALEXANDER (1701-1770), author of the well-known concordance
(q.v.) to the English Bible, was born at Aberdeen on the 31st of May
1701. He was educated at the grammar school, Aberdeen, and studied at
Marischal College, intending to enter the ministry. He took the degree
of master of arts, but soon after began to show signs of insanity owing
to a disappointment in love. After a term of confinement he recovered
and removed to London. In 1722 he had an engagement as private tutor to
the son of a country squire living at Eton Hall, Southgate, and also
held a similar post at Ware. Years afterwards, in an application for the
title of bookseller to the queen, he stated that he had been for some
years corrector for the press in Wild Court. This probably refers to
this time. In 1729 he was employed by the 10th earl of Derby as a reader
and secretary, but was discharged on the 7th of July for his ignorance
of French pronunciation. He then lodged in a house in Soho frequented
exclusively by Frenchmen, and took lessons in the language in the hope
of getting back his post with the earl, but when he went to Knowsley in
Lancashire, the earl would not see him. He returned to London and opened
a bookseller's shop in the Royal Exchange. In April 1735 he obtained the
title of bookseller to the queen by recommendation of the lord mayor and
most of the Whig aldermen. The post was an unremunerative sinecure. In
1737 he finished his concordance, which, he says, was the work of
several years. It was presented to the queen on the 3rd of November
1737, a fortnight before her death.
Although Cruden's biblical labours have made his name a household word
among English-speaking people, he was disappointed in his hopes of
immediate profit, and his mind again became unhinged. In spite of his
earnest and self-denying piety, and his exceptional intellectual powers,
he developed idiosyncrasies, and his life was marred by a harmless but
ridiculous egotism, which so nearly bordered on insanity that his
friends sometimes thought it necessary to have him confined. He paid
unwelcome addresses to a widow, and was confined in a madhouse in
Bethnal Green. On his release he published a pamphlet dedicated to Lord
H. (probably Harrington, secretary of state) entitled _The London
Citizen exceedingly injured, or a British Inquisition Displayed_. He
also published an account of his trial, dedicated to the king. In
December 1740 he writes to Sir H. Sloane saying he has been employed
since July as Latin usher in a boarding-school at Enfield. He then found
work as a proof-reader, and several editions of Greek and Latin classics
are said to have owed their accuracy to his care. He superintended the
printing of one of Matthew Henry's commentaries, and in 1750 printed a
small _Compendium of the Holy Bible_ (an abstract of the contents of
each chapter), and also reprinted a larger edition of the _Concordance_.
About this time he adopted the title of "Alexander the Corrector," and
assumed the office of correcting the morals of the nation, especially
with regard to swearing and Sunday observance. For this office he
believed himself divinely commissioned, but he petitioned parliament for
a formal appointment in this capacity. In April 1755 he printed a letter
to the speaker and other members of the House of Commons, and about the
same time an "Address to the King and Parliament." He was in the habit
of carrying a sponge, with which he effaced all inscriptions which he
thought contrary to good morals. In September 1753, through being
involved in a street brawl, he was confined in an asylum in Chelsea for
seventeen days at the instance of his sister, Mrs Wild. He brought an
unsuccessful action against his friends, and seriously proposed that
they should go into confinement as an atonement. He published an account
of this second restraint in "The Adventures of Alexander the Corrector."
He made attempts to present to the king in person an account of his
trial, and to obtain the honour of knighthood, one of his predicted
honours. In 1754 he was nominated as parliamentary candidate for the
city of London, but did not go to the poll. In 1755 he paid unwelcome
addresses to the daughter of Sir Thomas Abney, of Newington (1640-1722),
and then published his letters and the history of his repulse in the
third part of his "Adventures." In June and July 1755 he visited Oxford
and Cambridge. He was treated with the respect due to his learning by
officials and residents in both universities, but experienced some
boisterous fooling at the hands of the undergraduates. At Cambridge he
was knighted with mock ceremonies. There he appointed "deputy
correctors" to represent him in the university. He also visited Eton,
Windsor, Tonbridge and Westminster schools, where he appointed four boys
to be his deputies. (An _Admonition to Cambridge_ is preserved among
letters from J. Neville of Emmanuel to Dr Cox Macro, in the British
Museum.) _The Corrector's Earnest Address to the Inhabitants of Great
Britain_, published in 1756, was occasioned by the earthquake at Lisbon.
In 1762 he saved an ignorant seaman, Richard Potter, from the gallows,
and in 1763 published a pamphlet recording the history of the case.
Against John Wilkes, whom he hated, he wrote a small pamphlet, and used
to delete with his sponge the number 45 wherever he found it, this being
the offensive number of the _North Briton_. In 1769 he lectured in
Aberdeen as "Corrector," and distributed copies of the fourth
commandment and various religious tracts. The wit that made his
eccentricities palatable is illustrated by the story of how he gave to a
conceited young minister whose appearance displeased him _A Mother's
Catechism dedicated to the young and ignorant_. The _Scripture
Dictionary_, compiled about this time, was printed in Aberdeen in two
volumes shortly after his death. Alexander Chalmers, who in his boyhood
heard Cruden lecture in Aberdeen and wrote his biography, says that a
verbal index to Milton, which accompanied the edition of Thomas Newton,
bishop of Bristol, in 1769, was Cruden's.
The second edition of the Bible _Concordance_ was published in 1761, and
presented to the king in person on the 21st of December. The third
appeared in 1769. Both contain a pleasing portrait of the author. He is
said to have gained L800 by these two editions. He returned to London
from Aberdeen, and died suddenly while praying in his lodgings in Camden
Passage, Islington, on the 1st of November 1770. He was buried in the
ground of a Protestant dissenting congregation in Dead Man's Place,
Southwark. He bequeathed a portion of his savings for a L5 bursary at
Aberdeen, which preserves his name on the list of benefactors of the
university. (D. Mn.)
CRUDEN, a village and parish on the E. coast of Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
Pop. of parish (1901) 3444. It is situated at the head of Cruden Bay,
29(3/4) m. N.N.E. of Aberdeen by the Great North of Scotland railway
company's branch line from Ellon to Boddam. The golf-course of 18 holes
is one of the best in Scotland, and there is a sandy beach, with good
bathing. There is some good fishing at Port Erroll, also called Ward of
Cruden. Prehistoric remains have been found in the parish, and near
Ardendraught, not far from the shore, Malcolm II. is said to have
defeated Canute in 1014. The Water of Cruden, which rises a few miles to
the west, flows through the village into the North Sea. Slains Castle, a
seat of the earl of Erroll, lies to the north of Cruden, but must not be
confounded with the old castle of Slains, about 5 m. to the south-west,
near the point where, according to tradition, the "St Catherine" of the
Spanish Armada foundered in 1588. The Bullers of Buchan are within 2 m.
walk of Cruden.
CRUELTY (through the O. Fr. _crualte_, mod. _cruaute_, from the Lat.
_crudelitas_), the intentional infliction of pain or suffering. It is
only necessary to deal here with the legal relations involved. Statutory
provision for the prevention of cruelty to those who are unable to
protect themselves has been particularly marked in the 19th century. The
increase of legislation for the protection of children, lunatics and
animals is a proof of the growing humanitarianism of the age. There was
at one time a tendency among jurists to question whether, for instance,
the prevention of cruelty to animals was not a recognition of a certain
quasi-right in animals, or whether it was merely that such exhibitions
as bull- and bear-baiting, cock-fights, &c., were demoralizing to the
public generally. The true fact seems to be that the first introduction
of such legislation was undoubtedly due to the desire for the promotion
of humanity, but that the principle, for the recognition of which the
time was not yet ripe, had to be excused in the eyes of the public by
the plea that cruelty had a demoralizing effect upon spectators (see A.
V. Dicey, _Law and Opinion in England_, p. 188; T. E. Holland,
_Jurisprudence_, 10th ed., p. 372).
_Cruelty to Animals._--The English common law has never taken cognizance
of the commission of acts of cruelty upon animals, and direct
legislation upon the subject, dating from the 19th century, was due in a
great measure to public agitation, supported by the Royal Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (founded in 1824). Various acts
were passed in 1822 (known as Martin's Act), 1835 and 1837, and these
were amended and consolidated by the Cruelty to Animals Acts 1849 and
1854, which, with the Wild Animals in Captivity Protection Act 1900, are
the main acts upon the subject. There are also, in addition, many other
acts that impose certain liabilities in respect of animals and
indirectly prevent cruelty. The Cruelty to Animals Acts 1849 and 1854
render liable to prosecution and fine practically any act of cruelty to
an animal; such acts as dubbing a cock, cropping the ears of a dog or
dishorning cattle, are offences. The latter practice, however, is
allowed both in Scotland and Ireland, the courts having held that the
advantages to be obtained from dishorning outweigh the pain caused by
the operation. The word "animal" is defined as meaning "any domestic
animal" of whatever kind or species, and whether a quadruped or not. The
act of 1849 also forbids bull- and bear-baiting, or fighting between any
kinds of animals; requires the provision of food and water to animals
impounded; lays down regulations as to the treatment of animals sent for
slaughter, and imposes a penalty for improperly conveying animals. The
Wild Animals in Captivity Protection Act 1900 extends to wild animals in
captivity that protection which the acts of 1849 and 1854 conferred on
domestic animals, making exception of any act done or any omission in
the preparation of animals for the food of man or for sport. The word
"animal" in the act includes bird, beast, fish or reptile. The Dogs Act
1865 rendered owners of dogs liable for injuries to cattle and sheep;
the Dogs Act 1906 extended the owner's liability for injury done to any
cattle by a dog, and further, where a dog is proved to have injured
cattle or chased sheep it may be treated as a dangerous dog and must be
kept under proper control or be destroyed. The Drugging of Animals Act
1876 imposes a penalty on giving poisonous drugs to any domestic animal
unlawfully. The Cruelty to Animals Act 1876 was passed for the purpose
of regulating the practice of vivisection (q.v.). The Ground Game Act
1880, prohibits night shooting, or the use of spring traps above ground
or poison. The Injured Animals Act 1907 enables police constables to
cause any animal when mortally or seriously injured to be slaughtered.
The Diseases of Animals Act 1894 and orders under it are for the purpose
of securing animals from unnecessary suffering, as well as from disease.
Finally, the Wild Birds Protection Acts 1880 to 1904, with various game
acts (see GAME LAWS), extend the protection of the law to wild birds.
The acts establish a close time for wild birds and impose penalties for
shooting or taking them within that time; prohibit the exposing or
offering for sale within certain dates any wild bird recently killed or
taken unless bought or received from some person residing out of the
United Kingdom; the taking or destroying of wild birds' eggs, the
setting of pole traps, and the taking of a wild bird by means of a hook
or other similar instrument.
For the law relating to the prevention of cruelty to children see
CHILDREN, LAW RELATING TO; for cruelty in the sense of such conduct as
entitles a husband or wife to judicial separation see DIVORCE.
(T. A. I.)
CRUIKSHANK, GEORGE (1792-1878), English artist, caricaturist and
illustrator, was born in London on the 27th of September 1792. By
natural disposition and collateral circumstances he may be accepted as
the type of the born humoristic artist predestined for this special form
of art. His grandfather had taken up the arts, and his father, Isaac
Cruikshank, followed the painter's profession. Amidst these surroundings
the children were born and brought up, their first playthings the
materials of the arts their father practised. George followed the family
traditions with amazing facility, easily surpassing his compeers as an
etcher. When the father died, about 1811, George, still in his teens,
was already a successful and popular artist. All his acquisitions were
native gifts, and of home-growth; outside training, or the serious
apprenticeship to art, were dispensed with, under the necessity of
working for immediate profit. This lack of academic training the artist
at times found cause to regret, and at some intervals he made exertions
to cultivate the knowledge obtainable by studying from the antique and
drawing from life at the schools. From boyhood he was accustomed to turn
his artistic talents to ready account, disposing of designs and etchings
to the printsellers, and helping his father in forwarding his plates.
Before he was twenty his spirited style and talent had secured popular
recognition; the contemporary of Gillray, Rowlandson, Alken, Heath,
Dighton, and the established caricaturists of that generation, he
developed great proficiency as an etcher. Gillray's matured and trained
skill had some influence upon his executive powers, and when the older
caricaturist passed away in 1815, George Cruikshank had already taken
his place as a satirist. Prolific and dexterous beyond his competitors,
for a generation he delineated Tories, Whigs and Radicals with fine
impartiality. Satirical capital came to him from every public
event,--wars abroad, the enemies of England (for he was always fervidly
patriotic), the camp, the court, the senate, the Church; low life, high
life; the humours of the people, the follies of the great. In this
wonderful gallery the student may grasp the popular side of most
questions which for the time being engaged public attention. George
Cruikshank's technical and manipulative skill as an etcher was such that
Ruskin and the best judges have placed his productions in the foremost
rank; in this respect his works have been compared favourably with the
masterpieces of etching. He died at 263 Hampstead Road on the 1st of
February 1878. His remains rest in St Paul's cathedral.
A vast number of Cruikshank's spirited cartoons were published as
separate caricatures, all coloured by hand; others formed series, or
were contributed to satirical magazines, the _Satirist_, _Town Talk_,
_The Scourge_ (1811-1816) and the like ephemeral publications. In
conjunction with William Hone's scathing tracts, G. Cruikshank produced
political satires to illustrate the series of facetiae and miscellanies,
like _The Political House that Jack Built_ (1819).
Of a more genially humoristic order are his well-known book
illustrations, now so deservedly esteemed for their inimitable fun and
frolic, among other qualities, such as the weird and terrible, in which
he excelled. Early in this series came _The Humorist_ (1819-1821) and
_Life in Paris_ (1822). The well-known series of _Life in London_,
conjointly produced by the brothers I. R. and G. Cruikshank, has enjoyed
a prolonged reputation, and is still sought after by collectors. Grimm's
_Collection of German Popular Stories_ (1824-1826), in two series, with
22 inimitable etchings, are in themselves sufficient to account for G.
Cruikshank's reputation. To the first fourteen volumes (1837-1843) of
_Bentley's Miscellany_ Cruikshank contributed 126 of his best plates,
etched on steel, including the famous illustrations to _Oliver Twist_,
_Jack Sheppard_, _Guy Fawkes_ and _The Ingoldsby Legends_. For W.
Harrison Ainsworth, Cruikshank illustrated _Rookwood_ (1836) and _The
Tower of London_ (1840); the first six volumes of _Ainsworth's Magazine_
(1842-1844) were illustrated by him with several of his finest suites of
etchings. For C. Lever's _Arthur O'Leary_ he supplied 10 full-page
etchings (1844), and 20 spirited graphic etchings for Maxwell's lurid
_History of the Irish Rebellion in 1798_ (1845). Of his own
speculations, mention must be made of _George Cruikshank's Omnibus_
(1841) and _George Cruikshank's Table Book_ (1845), as well as his
_Comic Almanack_ (1835-1853). _The Life of Sir John Falstaff_ contained
20 full-page etchings (1857-1858). These are a few leading items amongst
the thousands of illustrations emanating from that fertile imagination.
As an enthusiastic teetotal advocate, G. Cruikshank produced a long
series of pictures and illustrations, pictorial pamphlets and tracts;
the best known of these are _The Bottle_, 8 plates (1847), with its
sequel, _The Drunkard's Children_, 8 plates (1848), with the ambitious
work, _The Worship of Bacchus_, published by subscription after the
artist's oil painting, now in the National Gallery, London, to which it
was presented by his numerous admirers.
See _Cruikshank's Water-Colours_, with introduction by Joseph Grego
(London, 1903). (J. Go.*)
CRUNDEN, JOHN (d. 1828), English architectural and mobiliary designer.
Most of his early inspiration was drawn from Chippendale and his school,
but he fell later under the influence of a bastard classicism. He
produced a very large number of designs which were published in numerous
volumes; among the most ambitious were ornamental centres for ceilings
in which he introduced cupids with bows and arrows, Fame sounding her
trumpet, and such like motives. Sport and natural history supplied him
with many other themes, and one of his ceilings is a hunting scene
representing a "kill." His principal works were _Designs for Ceilings_;
_Convenient and Ornamental Architecture_; _The Carpenter's Companion for
Chinese Railings, Gates_, &c. (1770); _The Joiner and Cabinet-maker's
Darling_, or _Sixty Designs for Gothic, Chinese, Mosaic and Ornamental
Frets_ (1765); and _The Chimney Piece Maker's Daily Assistant_ (1776).
Much of his work was either absurd or valueless.
CRUSADES, the name given to the series of wars for delivering the Holy
Land from the Mahommedans, so-called from the cross worn as a badge by
the crusaders. By analogy the term "crusade" is also given to any
campaign undertaken in the same spirit.
1. _The Meaning of the Crusades._--The Crusades may be regarded partly
as the _decumanus fluctus_ in the surge of religious revival, which had
begun in western Europe during the 10th, and had mounted high during the
11th century; partly as a chapter, and a most important chapter, in the
history of the interaction of East and West. Contemporaries regarded
them in the former of these two aspects, as "holy wars" and "pilgrims'
progresses" towards Christ's Sepulchre; the reflective eye of history
must perhaps regard them more exclusively from the latter point of view.
Considered as holy wars the Crusades must be interpreted by the ideas
of an age which was dominated by the spirit of otherworldliness, and
accordingly ruled by the clerical power which represented the other
world. They are a _novum salutis genus_--a new path to Heaven, to tread
which counted "for full and complete satisfaction" _pro omni
poenitentia_ and gave "forgiveness of sins" (_peccaminum remissio_)[1];
they are, again, the "foreign policy" of the papacy, directing its
faithful subjects to the great war of Christianity against the infidel.
As such a _novum salutis genus_, the Crusades connect themselves with
the history of the penitentiary system; as the foreign policy of the
Church they belong to that clerical purification and direction of feudal
society and its instincts, which appears in the institution of "God's
Truce" and in chivalry itself. The penitentiary system, according to
which the priest enforced a code of moral law in the confessional by the
sanction of penance--penance which must be performed as a condition of
admission to the sacrament of the Eucharist--had been from early times a
great instrument in the civilization of the raw Germanic races. Penance
might consist in fasting; it might consist in flagellation; it might
consist in pilgrimage. The penitentiary pilgrimage, which seems to have
been practised as early as A.D. 700, was twice blessed; not only was it
an act of atonement in itself, like fasting and flagellation; it also
gained for the pilgrim the merit of having stood on holy ground. Under
the influence of the Cluniac revival, which began in the 10th century,
pilgrimages became increasingly frequent; and the goal of pilgrimage was
often Jerusalem. Pilgrims who were travelling to Jerusalem joined
themselves in companies for security, and marched under arms; the
pilgrims of 1064, who were headed by the archbishop of Mainz, numbered
some 7000 men. When the First Crusade finally came, what was it but a
penitentiary pilgrimage under arms--with the one additional object of
conquering the goal of pilgrimage? That the Pilgrims' Progress should
thus have turned into a Holy War is a fact readily explicable, when we
turn to consider the attempts made by the Church, during the 11th
century, to purify, or at any rate to direct, the feudal instinct for
private war (_Fehde_). Since the close of the 10th century diocesan
councils in France had been busily acting as legislatures, and enacting
"forms of peace" for the maintenance of God's Peace or Truce (_Pax Dei_
or _Treuga Dei_). In each diocese there had arisen a judicature
(_judices pacis_) to decide when the form had been broken; and an
executive, or _communitas pacis_, had been formed to enforce the
decisions of the judicature. But it was an easier thing to consecrate
the fighting instinct than to curb it; and the institution of chivalry
represents such a clerical consecration, for ideal ends and noble
purposes, of the martial impulses which the Church had hitherto
endeavoured to check. In the same way the Crusades themselves may be
regarded as a stage in the clerical reformation of the fighting laymen.
As chivalry directed the layman to defend what was right, so the
preaching of the Crusades directed him to attack what was wrong--the
possession by "infidels" of the Sepulchre of Christ. The Crusades are
the offensive side of chivalry: chivalry is their parent--as it is also
their child. The knight who joined the Crusades might thus still indulge
the bellicose side of his genius--under the aegis and at the bidding of
the Church; and in so doing he would also attain what the spiritual side
of his nature ardently sought--a perfect salvation and remission of
sins. He might butcher all day, till he waded ankle-deep in blood, and
then at nightfall kneel, sobbing for very joy, at the altar of the
Sepulchre--for was he not red from the winepress of the Lord? One can
readily understand the popularity of the Crusades, when one reflects
that they permitted men to get to the other world by fighting hard on
earth, and allowed them to gain the fruits of asceticism by the ways of
hedonism. Nor was the Church merely able, through the Crusades, to
direct the martial instincts of a feudal society; it was also able to
pursue the object of its own immediate policy, and to attempt the
universal diffusion of Christianity, even at the edge of the sword, over
the whole of the known world.
Thus was renewed, on a greater scale, that ancient feud of East and
West, which has never died. For a thousand years, from the Hegira in 622
to the siege of Vienna in 1683, the peril of a Mahommedan conquest of
Europe was almost continually present. From this point of view, the
Crusades appear as a reaction of the West against the pressure of the
East--a reaction which carried the West into the East, and founded a
Latin and Christian kingdom on the shores of Asia. They protected Europe
from the new revival of Mahommedanism under the Turks; they gave it a
time of rest in which the Western civilization of the middle ages
developed. But the relation of East and West during the Crusades was not
merely hostile or negative. The Latin kingdom of Jerusalem was the
meeting-place of two civilizations: on its soil the East learned from
the West, and--perhaps still more--the West learned from the East. The
culture developed in the West during the 13th century was not only
permitted to develop by the protection of the Crusades, it grew upon
materials which the Crusades enabled it to import from the East. Yet the
debt of Europe to the Crusades in this last respect has perhaps been
unduly emphasized. Sicily was still more the meeting-place of East and
West than the kingdom of Jerusalem; and the Arabs of Spain gave more to
the culture of Europe than the Arabs of Syria.
2. _Historical Causes of the Crusades._--Within fifteen years of the
Hegira Jerusalem fell before the arms of Omar (637), and it continued to
remain in the hands of Mahommedan rulers till the end of the First
Crusade. For centuries, however, a lively intercourse was maintained
between the Latin Church in Jerusalem, which the clemency of the Arab
conquerors tolerated, and the Christians of the West. Charlemagne in
particular was closely connected with Jerusalem: the patriarch sent him
the keys of the city and a standard in 800; and in 807 Harun al-Rashid
recognized this symbolical cession, and acknowledged Charlemagne as
protector of Jerusalem and owner of the church of the Sepulchre.
Charlemagne founded a hospital and a library in the Holy City; and later
legend, when it made him the first of crusaders and the conqueror of the
Holy Land, was not without some basis of fact. The connexion lasted
during the 9th century; kings like Alfred of England and Louis of
Germany sent contributions to Jerusalem, while the Church of Jerusalem
acquired estates in the West. During the 10th century this intercourse
still continued; but in the 11th century interruptions began to come.
The fanaticism of the caliph Hakim destroyed the church of the Sepulchre
and ended the Frankish protectorate (1010); and the patronage of the
Holy Places, a source of strife between the Greek and the Latin Churches
as late as the beginning of the Crimean War, passed to the Byzantine
empire in 1021. This latter change in itself made pilgrimages from the
West increasingly difficult: the Byzantines, especially after the schism
of 1054, did not seek to smooth the way of the pilgrim, and Victor II.
had to complain to the empress Theodora of the exactions practised by
her officials. But still worse for the Latins was the capture of
Jerusalem by the Seljukian Turks in 1071. Without being intolerant, the
Turks were a rougher and ruder race than the Arabs of Egypt whom they
displaced; while the wars between the Fatimites of Egypt and the
Abbasids of Bagdad, whose cause was represented by the Seljuks, made
Syria (one of the natural battle-grounds of history) into a troubled and
unquiet region. The native Christians suffered; the pilgrims of the West
found their way made still more difficult, and that at a time when
greater numbers than ever were thronging to the East. Western Christians
could not but feel hampered and checked in their natural movement
towards the fountain-head of their religion, and it was natural that
they should ultimately endeavour to clear the way. In much the same way,
at a later date and in a lesser sphere, the closing of the trade-routes
by the advance of the Ottoman Turks led traders to endeavour to find new
channels, and issued in the rounding of the Cape of Good Hope and the
discovery of America. Nor, indeed, must it be forgotten that the search
for new and more direct connexions with the routes of Oriental trade is
one of the motives underlying the Crusades themselves, and leading to
what may be called the 13th-century discovery of Asia.
It was thus natural, for these reasons, that the conquest of the Holy
Land should gradually become an object for the ambition of Western
Christianity--an object which the papacy, eager to realize its dream of
a universal Church subject to its sway, would naturally cherish and
attempt to advance. Two causes combined to make this object still more
natural and more definite. On the one hand, the reconquest of lost
territories from the Mahommedans by Christian powers had been proceeding
steadily for more than a hundred years before the First Crusade; on the
other hand, the position of the Eastern empire after 1071 was a clear
and definite summons to the Christian West, and proved, in the event,
the immediate occasion of the holy war. As early as 970 the recovery of
the territories lost to Mahommedanism in the East had been begun by
emperors like Nicephoras Phocas and John Zimisces: they had pushed their
conquests, if only for a time, as far as Antioch and Edessa, and the
temporary occupation of Jerusalem is attributed to the East Roman arms.
At the opposite end of the Mediterranean, in Spain, the Omayyad
caliphate was verging to its fall: the long Spanish crusade against the
Moor had begun; and in 1018 Roger de Toeni was already leading Normans
into Catalonia to the aid of the native Spaniard. In the centre of the
Mediterranean the fight between Christian and Mahommedan had been long,
but was finally inclining in favour of the Christian. The Arabs had
begun the conquest of Sicily from the East Roman empire in 827, and they
had attacked the mainland of Italy as early as 840. The popes had put
themselves at the head of Italian resistance: in 848 Leo IV. is already
promising a sure and certain hope of salvation to those who die in
defence of the cross; and by 916, with the capture of the Arab fortress
on the Garigliano, Italy was safe. Then came the reconquest of the
Mediterranean islands near Italy. The Pisans conquered Sardinia at the
instigation of Benedict VIII. about 1016; and, in a thirty years' war
which lasted from 1060 to 1090, the Normans, under a banner blessed by
Pope Alexander II., wrested Sicily from the Arabs. The Norman conquest
of Sicily may with justice be called a crusade before the Crusades; and
it cannot but have given some impulse to that later attempt to wrest
Syria from the Mahommedans, in which the virtual leader was Bohemund, a
scion of the same house which had conquered Sicily. But while the
Christians of the West were thus winning fresh ground from the
Mahommedans, in the course of the 11th century, the East Roman empire
had now to bear the brunt of a Mahommedan revival under the Seljuks--a
revival which, while it crushed for a time the Greeks, only acted as a
new incentive to the Latins to carry their arms to the East. The
Seljukian Turks, first the mercenaries and then the masters of the
caliph, had given new life to the decadent caliphate of Bagdad. Under
the rule of their sultans, who assumed the role of mayors of the palace
in Bagdad about the middle of the 11th century, they pushed westwards
towards the caliphate of Egypt and the East Roman empire. While they
wrested Jerusalem from the former (1071), in the same year they
inflicted a crushing defeat on the Eastern emperor at Manzikert. The
result of the defeat was the loss of almost the whole of Asia Minor; the
dominions of the Turks extended to the sea of Marmora. An appeal for
assistance, such as was often to be heard again in succeeding centuries,
was sent by Michael VII. of Constantinople to Gregory VII. in 1073.
Gregory listened to the appeal; he projected--not, indeed, as has often
been said, a crusade,[2] but a great expedition, which should recover
Asia Minor for the Eastern empire, in return for a union of the Eastern
with the Western Church. In 1074 Gregory actually assembled a
considerable army; but his disagreement with Robert Guiscard, followed
by the outbreak of the war of investitures, hindered the realization of
his plans, and the only result was a precedent and a suggestion for the
events of 1095. The appeal of Michael VII. was re-echoed by Alexius
Comnenus himself. Brave and sage as he was, he could hardly cope at one
and the same time with the hostility of the Normans on the west, of the
Petchenegs (Patzinaks) on the north, and of the Seljuks on the east and
south. Already in 1087 and 1088 he had appealed to Baldwin of Flanders,
verbally and by letter,[3] for troops; and Baldwin had answered the
appeal. The same appeal was made, more than once, to Urban II.; and the
answer was the First Crusade. The First Crusade was not, indeed, what
Alexius had asked or expected to receive. He had appealed for
reinforcements to recover Asia Minor; he received hundreds of thousands
of troops, independent of him, and intending to conquer Jerusalem for
themselves, though they might incidentally recover Asia Minor for the
Eastern empire on their way. Alexius may almost be compared to a
magician, who has uttered a charm to summon a ministering spirit, and is
surrounded on the instant by legions of demons. In truth the appeal of
Alexius had set free forces in the West which were independent of, and
even ultimately hostile to, the interests of the Eastern empire.
The primary force, which thus transmuted an appeal for reinforcements
into a holy war for the conquest of Palestine, was the Church. The
creative thought of the middle ages is clerical thought. It is the
Church which creates the Carolingian empire, because the clergy thinks
in terms of empire. It is the Church which creates the First Crusade,
because the clergy believes in penitentiary pilgrimages, and the war
against the Seljuks can be turned into a pilgrimage to the Sepulchre;
because, again, it wishes to direct the fighting instinct of the laity,
and the consecrating name of Jerusalem provides an unimpeachable
channel; above all, because the papacy desires a perfect and universal
Church, and a perfect and universal Church must rule in the Holy Land.
But it would be a mistake to regard the Crusades (as it would be a
mistake to regard the Carolingian empire) as a _pure_ creation of the
Church, or as _merely_ due to the policy of a theocracy directing men to
the holy war which is the only war possible for a theocracy. It would be
almost truer, though only half the truth, to say that the clergy gave
the name of Crusade to sanctify interests and ambitions which, while set
on other ends than those of the Church, happened to coincide in their
choice of means. There was, for instance, the ambition of the adventurer
prince, the younger son, eager to carve a principality in the far East,
of whom Bohemund is the type; there was the interest of Italian towns,
anxious to acquire the products of the East more directly and cheaply,
by erecting their own emporia in the eastern Mediterranean. The former
was the driving force which made the First Crusade successful, where
later Crusades, without its stimulus, for the most part failed; the
latter was the one staunch ally which alone enabled Baldwin I. and
Baldwin II. to create the kingdom of Jerusalem. So far as the Crusades
led to permanent material results in the East, they did so in virtue of
these two forces. Unregulated enthusiasm might of itself have achieved
little or nothing; enthusiasm caught and guided by the astute Norman,
and the no less astute Venetian or Genoese, could not but achieve
tangible results. The principality or the emporium, it is true, would
supply motives to the prince and the merchant only; and it may be urged
that to the mass of the crusaders the religious motive was all in all.
In this way we may return to the view that the First Crusade, at any
rate, was _un fait ecclesiastique_. It is indeed true that to thousands
the hope of acquiring spiritual merit must have been a great motive; it
is also true, as the records of crusading sermons show, that there was a
strong element of "revivalism" in the Crusades, and that thousands were
hurried into taking the cross by a gust of that uncontrollable
enthusiasm which is excited by revivalist meetings to-day. But it must
also be admitted that there were motives of this world to attract the
masses to the Crusades. Famine and pestilence at home drove men to
emigrate hopefully to the golden East. In 1094 there was pestilence from
Flanders to Bohemia: in 1095 there was famine in Lorraine. _Francigenis
occidentalibus facile persuaderi poterat sua rura relinquere; nam
Gallias per annos aliquot nunc seditio civilis, nunc fames, nunc
mortalitas nimis afflixerat._[4] No wonder that a stream of emigration
set towards the East, such as would in modern times flow towards a newly
discovered gold-field--a stream carrying in its turbid waters much
refuse, tramps and bankrupts, camp-followers and hucksters, fugitive
monks and escaped villeins, and marked by the same motley grouping, the
same fever of life, the same alternations of affluence and beggary,
which mark the rush for a gold-field to-day.
Such were the forces set in movement by Urban II., when, after holding a
synod at Piacenza (March, 1095), and receiving there fresh appeals from
Alexius, he moved to Clermont, in the S.E. of France, and there on the
26th of November delivered the great speech which was followed by the
First Crusade. In this speech he appealed, indeed, for help for the
Greeks, _auxilio ... saepe acclamato indigis_ (Fulcher i. c. i.); but
the gist of his speech was the need of Jerusalem. Let the truce of God
be observed at home; and let the arms of Christians be directed to the
winning of Jerusalem in an expedition which should count for full and
complete penance. Like Gregory, Urban had thus sought for aid for the
Eastern empire; unlike Gregory, who had only mentioned the Holy
Sepulchre in a single letter, and then casually, he had struck the note
of Jerusalem. The instant cries of _Deus vult_ which answered the note
showed that Urban had struck aright. Thousands at once took the cross;
the first was Bishop Adhemar of Puy, whom Urban named his legate and
made leader of the First Crusade (for the holy war, according to Urban's
original conception, must needs be led by a clerk). Fixing the 15th of
August 1096 as the time for the departure of the crusaders, and
Constantinople as the general rendezvous, Urban returned from France to
Italy. It is noticeable that it was on French soil that the seed had
been sown.[5] Preached on French soil by a pope of French descent, the
Crusades began--and they continued--as essentially a French (or perhaps
better Norman-French) enterprise; and the kingdom which they established
in the East was essentially a French kingdom, in its speech and its
customs, its virtues and its vices. It was natural that France should be
the home of the Crusades. She was already the home of the Cluniac
movement, the centre from which radiated the truce of God, the chosen
place of chivalry; she could supply a host of feudal nobles, somewhat
loosely tied to their place in society, and ready to break loose for a
great enterprise; she had suffered from battle and murder, pestilence
and famine, from which any escape was welcome. To the Normans
particularly the Crusades had an intimate appeal. They appealed to the
old Norse instinct for wandering--an instinct which, as it had long
before sent the Norseman eastward to find his El Dorado of Micklegarth,
could now find a natural outlet in the expedition to Jerusalem: they
appealed to the Norman religiosity, which had made them a people of
pilgrims, the allies of the papacy, and, in England and Sicily,
crusaders before the Crusades: finally, they appealed to that desire to
gain fresh territory, upon which Malaterra remarks as characteristic of
Norman princes.[6] No wonder, then, that the crusading armies were
recruited in France, or that they were led by men of the stock of the
d'Hautevilles. Meanwhile newly-conquered England had its own problems to
solve; and Germany, torn by civil war, and not naturally quick to
kindle, could only deride the "delirium" of the crusader.[7]
3. _Course of the First Crusade._--The First Crusade falls naturally
into two parts. One of these may be called the Crusade of the people:
the other may be termed the Crusade of the princes. Of these the
people's Crusade--prior in order of time, if only secondary in point of
importance--may naturally be studied first. The sermon of Urban II. at
Clermont became the staple for wandering preachers, among whom Peter the
Hermit distinguished himself by his fiery zeal.[8] Riding on an ass from
place to place through France and along the Rhine, he carried away by
his eloquence thousands of the poor. Some three or four months before
the term fixed by Urban II., in April and May 1096, five divisions of
_pauperes_ had already collected. Three of these, led by Fulcher of
Orleans, Gottschalk and William the Carpenter respectively, failed to
reach even Constantinople. The armies of Fulcher and Gottschalk were
destroyed by the Hungarians in just revenge for their excesses (June);
the third, after joining in a wild _Judenhetze_ in the towns of the
valley of the Rhine, during which some 10,000 Jews perished as the
first-fruits of crusading zeal, was scattered to the winds in Hungary
(August). Two other divisions, however, reached Constantinople in
safety. The first of these, under Walter the Penniless, passed through
Hungary in May, and reached Constantinople, where it halted to wait for
the Hermit, in the middle of July. The second, led by Peter himself,
passed safely through Hungary, but suffered severely in Bulgaria, and
only attained Constantinople with sadly diminished numbers at the end of
July. These two divisions (which in spite of good treatment by Alexius
began to commit excesses against the Greeks) united and crossed the
Bosporus in August, Peter himself remaining in Constantinople. By the
end of October they had perished utterly at the hands of the Seljuks; a
heap of whitening bones also remained to testify to the later crusaders,
when they passed in the spring of 1097, of the fate of the people's
Crusade.
Meanwhile the knights had already begun to assemble in March 1096. In
small bands, and by divers ways, they streamed gradually southward and
eastward, in a steady flow, throughout 1096. But three large divisions,
under three considerable leaders, were pre-eminent among the rest.
Godfrey of Bouillon, with his brother Baldwin, led the crusaders of
Lorraine along "the road of Charles the Great," through Hungary, to
Constantinople, where he arrived on the 23rd of December. Raymund of
Toulouse (the first prince to join the crusading movement) along with
Bishop Adhemar, the papal commissary, led the Provencals down the coast
of Illyria, and then due east to Constantinople, arriving towards the
end of April 1097. Bohemund of Otranto, the destined leader of the
Crusade, with his nephew Tancred, led a fine force of Normans by sea to
Durazzo, and thence by land to Constantinople, which he reached about
the same time as Raymund. To the same great rendezvous other leaders
also gathered, some of higher rank than Godfrey or Raymund or Bohemund,
but none destined to exercise an equal influence on the fate of the
Crusade. Hugh of Vermandois, younger brother of Philip I. of France, had
reached Constantinople in November 1096, in a species of honourable
captivity, and had done Alexius homage; Robert of Normandy and Stephen
of Blois, to whom Urban II. had given St Peter's banner at Lucca, only
arrived--the last of the crusaders--in May 1097 (their original
companion in arms, Count Robert of Flanders, having left them to winter
at Bari, and crossed to Constantinople before the end of 1096).
Thus was gathered at Constantinople, in the spring of 1097, a great
host, which Fulcher computes at 600,000 men (I. c. iv.), Urban II. at
300,000, and which was probably some 150,000 strong.[9] Before we follow
this host into Asia, we may pause to inquire into the various factors
which would determine its course, or condition its activity. On the
Western side, and among the crusaders themselves, there were two factors
of importance, already mentioned above--the aims of the adventurer
prince, and the interests of the Italian merchant; while on the Eastern
side there are again two--the policy of the Greeks, and the condition of
the Mahommedan East. We have already seen that among the princes who
joined the First Crusade there were some who were rather _politiques_
than _devots_, and who aimed at the acquisition of temporal profit as
well as of spiritual merit. Of these the type--and, it may almost be
said, the inspirer of the rest--was Bohemund. From the first he had an
Eastern principality in his mind's eye; and if we may judge from the
follower of Bohemund who wrote the _Gesta Francorum_, there had already
been some talk at Constantinople of Antioch as the seat of this
principality. Bohemund's policy seems to have inspired Baldwin, the
brother of Godfrey of Bouillon to emulation; on the one hand he strove
to thwart the endeavours of Tancred, the nephew of Bohemund, to begin
the foundation of the Eastern principality for his uncle by conquering
Cilicia, and, on the other, he founded a principality for himself in
Edessa. Raymond of Provence, the third and last of the great
_politiques_ of the First Crusade, was, like Baldwin, envious of
Bohemund; and jealousy drove him first to attempt to wrest Antioch from
Bohemund, and then to found a principality of Tripoli to the south of
Antioch, which would check the growth of his power. The political
motives of these three princes, and the interaction of their different
policies, was thus a great factor in determining the course and the
results of the First Crusade. The influence of the Italian towns did not
make itself greatly felt till after the end of the First Crusade, when
it made possible the foundation of a kingdom in Jerusalem, in addition
to the three principalities established by Bohemund, Baldwin and
Raymond; but during the course of the Crusade itself the Italian ships
which hugged the shores of Syria were able to supply the crusaders with
provisions and munition of war, and to render help in the sieges of
Antioch and Jerusalem.[10] Sea-power had thus some influence in
determining the victory of the crusaders.
In the East the conditions were, on the whole, favourable to the
crusaders. The one difficulty--and it was serious--was the attitude
adopted by Alexius. Confronted by crusaders where he had asked for
auxiliaries, Alexius had two alternative policies presented to his
choice. He might, in the first place, have frankly admitted that the
crusaders were independent allies, and treating them as equals, he might
have waged war in concert with them, and divided the conquests achieved
in the war. A boundary line might have been drawn somewhere to the N.W.
of Antioch; and the crusaders might have been left to acquire what they
could to the south and east of that line. Unhappily, clinging to the
conviction that all the lands which the crusaders would traverse were
the "lost provinces" of his empire, he induced the crusaders to do him
homage, so that, whatever they conquered, they would conquer in his
name, and whatever they held, they would hold by his grant and as his
vassals. Thus Hugh of Vermandois became the man of Alexius in November
1096; Godfrey of Bouillon was induced, not without difficulty, to do
homage in January 1097; and in April and May the other leaders,
including Bohemund and the obstinate Raymond himself, followed his
example. The policy of Alexius was destined to produce evil results,
both for the Eastern empire and for the crusading movement. The West had
already its grievances against the East: the Greek emperors had taken
advantage of their protectorate of the Holy Places to lay charges on
the pilgrims, against which the Papacy had already been forced to
remonstrate; nor were the Italian towns, with the exception of favoured
Venice, disposed to be friendly to the great monopolist city of
Constantinople. The old dissension of the Eastern and Western Churches
had blazed out afresh in 1054; and the policy of Alexius only added new
rancours to an old grudge, which culminated in the Latin conquest of
Constantinople in 1204. On the other hand, the success of the crusading
movement was imperilled, both now and afterwards, by the jealousy of the
Comneni. Always hostile to the principality, which Bohemund established
in spite of his oath, they helped by their hostility to cause the loss
of Edessa in 1144, and thus to hasten the disintegration of the Latin
kingdom of Jerusalem. Yet one must remember, in justice to Alexius, the
gravity of the problem by which he was confronted; nor was the conduct
of the crusaders themselves such that he could readily make them his
brethren in arms.
The condition of Asia Minor and Syria in 1097 was almost altogether such
as to favour the success of the crusaders. The Seljukian sultans had
only achieved a military occupation of the country which they had
conquered. There were Seljukian garrisons in towns like Nicaea and
Antioch, ready to offer an obstinate resistance to the crusaders; and
here and there in the country there were Seljukian armies, either
cantoned or nomadic. But the inhabitants of the towns were often hostile
to the garrisons, and over wide tracts of country there were no forces
at all. Accordingly, when the crusaders had captured the town at Nicaea,
and defeated the Seljukian field-army at Dorylaeum their way lay clear
before them through Asia Minor. Not only so, but they could count, at
the very least, on a benevolent neutrality from the native population;
while from the Armenian principalities in the S.E. of Asia Minor, which
survived unsubdued in the general deluge of Seljukian conquest, they
could expect active assistance (the hope of which will explain the
north-easterly line of march which they followed after leaving
Heraclea). But the purely military character of the Seljukian occupation
helped the crusaders in yet another way. Strong generals were needed in
the separate divisions of the empire, and these, as has always been the
case in Eastern empires, made themselves independent in their spheres of
command, because there was no organization to keep them together under a
single control. On the death of Malik Shah, the last of the great
Seljukian emperors (1092), the empire dissolved. A new sultan,
Barkiyaroq or Barkiarok, ruled in Bagdad (1094-1104); but in Asia Minor
Kilij Arslan held sway as the independent sultan of Konia (Iconium),
while the whole of Syria was also practically independent. Not only was
Syria thus weakened by being detached from the body of the Seljukian
empire; it was divided by dissensions within, and assailed by the
Fatimite caliph of Egypt from without. In 1095 two brothers, Ridwan and
Dekak, ruled in Aleppo and Damascus respectively; but they were at war
with one another, and Yagi-sian, the ruler of Antioch, was a party to
their dissensions. Ridwan and Yagi-sian were only stopped in an attack
on Damascus by news of the approach of the crusaders, which led the
latter to throw himself hastily into Antioch, in the autumn of 1097.
Meanwhile the Fatimites were not slow to take advantage of these
dissensions. A great religious difference divided the Fatimite caliph of
Cairo, the head of the Shiite sect, from the Abbasid caliph of Bagdad,
who was the head of the Sunnites. The difference may be compared to the
dissension between the Greek and the Latin Churches; but it had perhaps
more of the nature of a political difference. In any case, it hampered
the Mahommedans as much as the jealousy between Alexius and the Latins
hampered the progress of the Crusade. The crusading princes were well
enough aware of the gulf which divided the caliph of Cairo from the
Sunnite princes of Syria; and they sought by envoys to put themselves
into connexion with him, hoping by his aid to gain Jerusalem (which was
then ruled for the Turks by Sokman, the son of the amir Ortok).[11] But
the caliph preferred to act for himself, and took advantage of the wars
of the Syrian princes, and of the terror inspired by the advance of the
crusaders to conquer Jerusalem (August 1098). But though the leaders of
the First Crusade did not succeed in utilizing the dissensions of the
Mahommedans as fully as they desired, it still remains true that these
dissensions very largely explain their success. It was the disunion of
the Syrian amirs, and the division between the Abbasids and the
Fatimites, that made possible the conquest of the Holy City and the
foundation of the kingdom of Jerusalem. When a power arose in Mosul,
about 1130, which was able to unify Syria--when, again, in the hands of
Saladin, unified Syria was in turn united to Egypt--the cause of Latin
Christianity in the East was doomed.
We are now in a position to follow the history of the First Crusade. By
the beginning of May 1097 the crusaders were crossing the Bosporus, and
entering the dominions of Kilij Arslan. Their first operation was the
siege of Nicaea, defended by a Seljuk garrison, but eventually captured,
with the aid of Alexius, after a month's siege (June 18). Alexius took
possession of the town; and though he rewarded the crusading princes
richly, some discontent was excited by his action. After the capture of
Nicaea, the field-army of Kilij Arslan had to be met. In a long and
obstinate encounter, it was defeated at Dorylaeum (July 1); and the
crusaders marched unmolested in a south-easterly direction to Heraclea.
Here Tancred, followed by Baldwin, turned into Cilicia, and began to
take possession of the Cilician towns, and especially of Tarsus--thus
beginning, it would seem, the creation of the Norman principality of
Antioch. The main army turned to the N.E., in the direction of Caesarea
(in order to bring itself into touch with the Armenian princes of this
district), and then marched southward again to Antioch. At Marash, half
way between Caesarea and Antioch, Baldwin, who had meanwhile wrested
Tarsus from Tancred, rejoined the ranks; but he soon left the main body
again, and struck eastward towards Edessa, to found a principality
there. At the end of October the crusaders came into position before
Antioch, which was held by Yagi-sian, and began the siege of the city,
which lasted from October 21, 1097, to June 3, 1098. The great figure in
the siege was naturally Bohemund (who had also been the hero of
Dorylaeum). He repelled attempts at relief made by Dekak (Dec. 31, 1097)
and Ridwan (Feb. 9, 1098); he put the besiegers in touch with the
Genoese ships lying in the harbour of St Simeon, the port of Antioch
(March 1098)--a move which at once served to remedy the want of
provisions from which the crusaders suffered, and secured materials for
the building of castles, with which Bohemund sought--in the Norman
fashion--to overawe the besieged city. But it was finally by the
treachery of one of Yagi-sian's commanders, the amir Firuz, that
Bohemund was able to effect its capture. The other leaders had, however,
to promise him possession of the city, before he would bring his
negotiations with Firuz to a conclusion; and the matter was so long
protracted that an army of relief under Kerbogha of Mosul was only at a
distance of three days' march, when the city was taken (June 3, 1098).
The besiegers were no sooner in the city, than they were besieged in
their turn by Kerbogha; and the twenty-five days which followed were the
worst period of stress and strain which the crusaders had to encounter.
Under the pressure of this strain "spiritualistic" phenomena began to
appear. It was in the ranks of the Provencals, where the religiosity of
Count Raymund seems to have extended to his followers, that these
phenomena appeared; and they culminated in the discovery of the Holy
Lance, which had pierced the side of the Saviour. The excitement
communicated itself to the whole army; and the nervous strength which it
gave enabled the crusaders to meet and defeat Kerbogha in the open
(June 28), but not before many of their number, including even Count
Stephen of Blois, had deserted and fled.
With the discovery of the Lance, which became as it were a Provencal
asset, Count Raymund assumes a new importance. Mingled with the
religiosity of his nature there was much obstinacy and self-seeking; and
when Kerbogha was finally repelled, he began to dispute the possession
of Antioch with Bohemund, pleading in excuse his oath to Alexius. The
struggle lasted for some months, and helped to delay the further
progress of the crusaders. Raymund, indeed, left Antioch in November,
and moved S.E. to Marra; but his men still held two positions in
Antioch, from which they were not dislodged by Bohemund till January
1099. Expelled from Antioch, the obstinate Raymund endeavoured to
recompense himself in the south (where indeed he subsequently created
the county of Tripoli); and from February to May 1099 he occupied
himself with the siege of Arca, to the N.E. of Tripoli. It was during
the siege of Arca that Peter Bartholomew, to whom the vision of the Holy
Lance had first appeared, was subjected, with no definite result, to the
ordeal of fire--the hard-headed Normans doubting the genuine character
of any Provencal vision, the more when, as in this case, it turned to
the political advantage of the Provencals. The siege was long
protracted; the mass of the pilgrims were anxious to proceed to
Jerusalem, and, as the altered tone of the author of the _Gesta_
sufficiently indicates, thoroughly weary of the obstinate political
bickerings of Raymund and Bohemund. Here Godfrey of Bouillon finally
came to the front, and placing himself at the head of the discontented
pilgrims, he forced Raymund to accept the offers of the amir of Tripoli,
to desist from the siege, and to march to Jerusalem (in the middle of
May 1099). Bohemund remained in Antioch: the other leaders pressed
forward, and following the coast route, arrived before Jerusalem in the
beginning of June. After a little more than a month's siege, the city
was finally captured (July 15). The slaughter was terrible; the blood of
the conquered ran down the streets, until men splashed in blood as they
rode. At nightfall, "sobbing for excess of joy," the crusaders came to
the Sepulchre from their treading of the winepress, and put their
blood-stained hands together in prayer. So, on that day of July, the
First Crusade came to an end.
It remained to determine the future government of Jerusalem; and here
the eternal problem of the relations of Church and State emerged. It
might seem natural that the Holy City, conquered in a holy war by an
army of which the pope had made a churchman, Bishop Adhemar, the leader,
should be left to the government of the Church. But Adhemar had died in
August 1098 (whence, in large part, the confusion and bickerings which
followed in the end of 1098 and the beginning of 1099); nor were there
any churchmen left of sufficient dignity or weight to secure the triumph
of the ecclesiastical cause. In the meeting of the crusaders on the 22nd
of July, some few voices were raised in support of the view that a
"spiritual vicar" should first be chosen in the place of the late
patriarch of Jerusalem (who had just died in Cyprus), before the
election of any lay ruler was taken in hand. But the voices were not
heard; and the princes proceeded at once to elect a lay ruler. Raymund
of Provence refused to accept their nomination, nominally on the pious
ground that he did not wish to reign where Christ had suffered on the
cross; though one may suspect that the establishment of a principality
in Tripoli--in which he had been interrupted by the pressure of the
pilgrims--was still the first object of his ambition. The refusal of
Raymund meant the choice of Godfrey of Bouillon, who had, as we have
seen, become prominent since the siege of Arca; and Godfrey accordingly
became--not king, but "advocate of the Holy Sepulchre," while a few days
afterwards Arnulf, the chaplain of Robert of Normandy, and one of the
sceptics in the matter of the Holy Lance, became "vicar" of the vacant
patriarchate. Godfrey's first business was to repel an Egyptian attack,
which he accomplished successfully at Ascalon, with the aid of the other
crusaders (August 12). At the end of August the other crusaders
returned,[12] and Godfrey was left with a small army of 2000 men, and
the support of Tancred, now prince of Galilee, to rule in some four
isolated districts--Jaffa, Jerusalem, Ramlah and Haifa. At the end of
the year came Bohemund and Godfrey's brother Baldwin (now count of
Edessa) on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The result of Bohemund's visit was
new trouble for Godfrey. Bohemund procured the election of Dagobert, the
archbishop of Pisa, to the vacant patriarchate, disliking Arnulf, and
perhaps hoping to find in the new patriarch a political supporter.
Bohemund and Godfrey together became Dagobert's vassals; and in the
spring Godfrey even seems to have entered into an agreement with the
patriarch to cede Jerusalem and Jaffa into his hands, in the event of
acquiring other lands or towns, especially Cairo, or dying without
direct heirs. When Godfrey died in July 1100 (after successful forays
against the Mahommedans which took him as far as Damascus), it might
seem as if a theocracy were after all to be established in Jerusalem, in
spite of the events of 1099.
4. _The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem under the First Three Kings,[13]
1100-1143._--The theocracy, however, was not destined to be established.
Godfrey had died without direct heirs; but in far Edessa there was his
brother Baldwin, ready to take his place. Dagobert had at first
consented to the dying Godfrey's wish that Baldwin should be his
successor; but when Godfrey died he saw an opportunity too precious to
be missed, and opposed Baldwin, counting on the support of Bohemund, to
whom he sent an appeal for assistance.[14] But a party in Jerusalem,
headed by the late "vicar" Arnulf, opposed itself to the hierarchical
pretensions of Dagobert and the Norman influence by which they were
backed; and this party, representing the Lotharingian laity, carried the
day. Baldwin was summoned from Edessa; and when he arrived, towards the
end of the year, he was crowned king by Dagobert himself. Thus was
founded, on Christmas day 1100, the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem; and thus
was the possibility of a theocracy finally annihilated. A feudal kingdom
of Frankish seigneurs was to be planted on the soil of Palestine,
instead of a _dominium temporale_ of the patriarch like that of the pope
in central Italy. Nor were any great difficulties with the Church to
hamper the growth of this kingdom. For two years, indeed, a struggle
raged between Baldwin I. and Dagobert: Baldwin accused the patriarch of
treachery, and attempted to force him to contribute to the defence of
the kingdom. But in 1102 the struggle ceased with the deposition of the
patriarch and the victory of the king; and though it was renewed for a
time by the patriarch Stephen in the reign of Baldwin II. (1128-1130),
the new struggle was of short duration, and was soon ended by Stephen's
death.
The establishment of a kingdom in Jerusalem in 1100 was a blow, not only
to the Church but to the Normans of Antioch. At the end of 1099 any
contemporary observer must have believed that the capital of Latin
Christianity in the East was destined to be Antioch. Antioch lay in one
of the most fertile regions of the East; Bohemund was almost, if not
quite, the greatest genius of his generation; and when he visited
Jerusalem at the end of 1099, he led an army of 25,000 men--and those
men, at any rate in large part, Normans. What could Godfrey avail
against such a force? Yet the principality of Godfrey was destined to
higher things than that of Bohemund. Jerusalem, like Rome, had the
shadow of a mighty name to lend prestige to its ruler; and as residence
in Rome was one great reason of the strength of the medieval papacy, so
was residence in Jerusalem a reason for the ultimate supremacy of the
Lotharingian kings. Jerusalem attracted the flow of pilgrims from the
West as Antioch never could; and though the great majority of the
pilgrims were only birds of passage, there were always many who stayed
in the East. There was thus a steady immigration into the kingdom, to
strengthen its armies and recruit with new blood the vigour of its
inhabitants. Still more important perhaps was the fact that the ports of
the kingdom attracted the Italian towns; and it was therefore to the
kingdom that they lent the strength of their armies and the skill of
their siege-artillery--in return, it is true, for concessions of
privileges so considerable as to weaken the resources of the kingdom
they helped to create. While Jerusalem possessed these advantages,
Antioch was not without its defects. It had to meet--or perhaps it would
be more true to say, it brought upon itself--the hostility of strong
Mahommedan powers in the vicinity. As early as 1100 Bohemund was
captured in battle by Danishmend of Sivas; and it was his captivity,
depriving the patriarch as it did of Norman assistance, which allowed
the uncontested accession of Baldwin I. Again, in 1104, the Normans,
while attempting to capture Harran, were badly defeated on the river
Balikh, near Rakka; and this defeat may be said to have been fatal to
the chance of a great Norman principality.[15] But the hostility of
Alexius, aided and abetted by the jealousy of Raymund of Toulouse, was
almost equally fatal. Alexius claimed Antioch; was it not the old
possession of his empire, and had not Bohemund done him homage? Raymund
was ready to defend the claims of Alexius; was not Bohemund a successful
rival? Thus it came about that Alexius and Raymund became allies; and by
the aid of Alexius Raymund established, from 1102 onwards, the
principality which, with the capture of Tripoli in 1109, became the
principality of Tripoli, and barred the advance of Antioch to the south.
Meanwhile the armies of Alexius not only prevented any farther advance
to the N.W., but conquered the Cilician towns (1104). No wonder that
Bohemund flung himself in revenge on the Eastern empire in 1108--only,
however, to meet with a humiliating defeat at Durazzo.
Thus it was that Baldwin waxed while Bohemund waned. The growth of
Baldwin's kingdom, as it was suggested above, owed more to the interests
of Italian traders than it did to crusading zeal. In 1100, indeed, it
might appear that a new Crusade from the West, which the capture of
Antioch in 1098 had begun, and the conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 had
finally set in motion, was destined to achieve great things for the
nascent kingdom. Thousands had joined this new Crusade, which should
deal the final blow to Mahommedanism: among the rest came the first of
the troubadours, William IX., Count of Poitiers, to gather copy for his
muse, and even some, like Stephen of Blois and Hugh of Vermandois, who
had joined the First Crusade, but had failed to reach Jerusalem. The new
crusaders cherished high plans; they would free Bohemund and capture
Bagdad. But each of the three sections of their army was routed in turn
in Asia Minor by the princes of Sivas, Aleppo and Harran, in the middle
of 1101; and only a few escaped to report the crushing disaster. Baldwin
I. had thus no assistance to expect from the West, save that of the
Italian towns. From an early date Italian ships had followed the
crusaders. There were Genoese ships in St Simeon's harbour in the spring
of 1098 and at Jaffa in 1099; in 1099 Dagobert, the archbishop of Pisa,
led a fleet from his city to the Holy Land; and in 1100 there came to
Jaffa a Venetian fleet of 200 sail, whose leaders promised Venetian
assistance in return for freedom from tolls and a third of each town
they helped to conquer. But it was the Genoese who helped Baldwin I.
most. The Venetians already enjoyed, since 1080, a favoured position in
Constantinople, and had the less reason to find a new emporium in the
East; while Pisa connected itself, through Dagobert, with Antioch[16]
rather than with Jerusalem, and was further, in 1111, invested by
Alexius with privileges, which made an outlet in the Holy Land no longer
necessary. But the Genoese, who had helped with provisions and
siege-tackle in the capture of Antioch and of Jerusalem, had both a
stronger claim on the crusaders, and a greater interest in acquiring an
eastern emporium. An alliance was accordingly struck in 1101 (Fulcher
II. c. vii.), by which the Genoese promised their assistance, in return
for a third of all booty, a quarter in each town captured, and a grant
of freedom from tolls. In this way Baldwin I. was able to take Arsuf and
Caesarea in 1101 and Acre in 1104. But Genoese aid was given to others
beside Baldwin (it enabled Raymund to capture Byblus in 1104, and his
successor, William, to win Tripoli in 1109); while, on the other hand,
Baldwin enjoyed other aid besides that of the Genoese. In 1110, for
example, he was enabled to capture Sidon by the aid of Sigurd of Norway,
the Jorsalafari, who came to the Holy Land with a fleet of 55 ships,
starting in 1107, and in a three years' "wandering," after the old Norse
fashion, fighting the Moors in Spain, and fraternizing with the Normans
in Sicily. At a later date, in the reign of Baldwin II., Venice also
gave her aid to the kings of Jerusalem. Irritated by the concessions
made by Alexius to the Pisans in 1111, and furious at the revocation of
her own privileges by John Comnenus in 1118, the republic naturally
sought a new outlet in the Holy Land. A Venetian fleet of 120 sail came
in 1123, and after aiding in the repulse of an attack, which the
Egyptians had taken advantage of Baldwin II.'s captivity to deliver,
they helped the regent Eustace to capture Tyre (1124), in return for
considerable privileges--freedom from toils throughout the kingdom, a
quarter in Jerusalem, baths and ovens in Acre, and in Tyre one-third of
the city and its suburbs, with their own court of justice and their own
church. After thus gaining a new footing in Tyre, the Venetians could
afford to attack the islands of the Aegean as they returned, in revenge
for the loss of their privileges in Constantinople; but the hostility
between Venice and the Eastern empire was soon afterwards appeased, when
John Comnenus restored the old privileges of the Venetians. The
Venetians, however, maintained their position in Palestine; and their
quarters remained, along with those of the Genoese, as privileged
commercial franchises in an otherwise feudal state.
In this way the kingdom of Jerusalem expanded until it came to embrace a
territory stretching along the coast from Beirut (captured in 1110[17])
to el-Arish on the confines of Egypt--a territory whose strength lay not
in Judaea, like the ancient kingdom of David, but, somewhat
paradoxically (though commercial motives explain the paradox), in
Phoenicia and the land of the Philistines. With all its length, the
territory had but little breadth: towards the north it was bounded by
the amirate of Damascus; in the centre, it spread little, if at all,
beyond the Jordan; and it was only in the south that it had any real
extension. Here there were two considerable annexes. To the south of the
Dead Sea stretched a tongue of land, reaching to Aila, at the head of
the eastern arm of the Red Sea. This had been won by Baldwin I., by way
of revenge for the attacks of the Egyptians on his kingdom; and here, as
early as 1116, he had built the fort of Monreal, half way between Aila
and the Dead Sea. To the east of the Dead Sea, again, lay a second strip
of territory, in which the great fortress was Krak (Kerak) of the
Desert, planted somewhere about 1140 by the royal butler, Paganus, in
the reign of Fulk of Jerusalem. These extensions in the south and east
had also, it is easy to see, a commercial motive. They gave the kingdom
a connexion of its own with the Red Sea and its shipping; and they
enabled the Franks to control the routes of the caravans, especially
the route from Damascus to Egypt and the Red Sea. Thus, it would appear,
the whole of the expansion of the Latin kingdom (which may be said to
have attained its height in 1131, at the death of Baldwin II.) may be
shown to have been dictated, at any rate in large part, by economic
motives; and thus, too, it would seem that two of the most powerful
motives which sway the mind of man--the religious motive and the desire
for gain--conspired to elevate the kingdom of Jerusalem (at once the
country of Christ, and a natural centre of trade) to a position of
supremacy in Latin Syria. During this process of growth the kingdom
stood in relation to two sects of powers--the three Frankish
principalities in northern Syria, and the Mahommedan powers both of the
Euphrates and the Nile--whose action affected its growth and character.
Of the three Frankish principalities, Edessa, founded in 1098 by Baldwin
I. himself, was a natural fief of Jerusalem. Baldwin de Burgh, the
future Baldwin II., ruled in Edessa as the vassal of Baldwin I. from
1100 to 1118; and thereafter the county was held in succession by the
two Joscelins of Tell-bashir until the conquest of Edessa by Zengi in
1144. Lying to the east of the Euphrates, at once in close contact with
the Armenians, and in near proximity to the great route of trade which
came up the Euphrates to Rakka, and thence diverged to Antioch and
Damascus, the county of Edessa had an eventful if brief life. The county
of Tripoli, the second of these principalities, had also come under the
aegis of Jerusalem at an early date. Founded by Raymund of Toulouse,
between 1102 and 1105, with the favour of Alexius and the alliance of
the Genoese, it did not acquire its capital of Tripoli till 1109. Even
before the conquest of Tripoli, there had been dissensions between
William, the nephew and successor of Raymund, and Bertrand, Raymund's
eldest son, which it had needed the interference of Baldwin I. to
compose; and it was only by the aid of the king that the town of Tripoli
had been taken. At an early date therefore the county of Tripoli had
already come under the influence of the kingdom. Meanwhile the
principality of Antioch, ruled by Tancred, after the departure of
Bohemund (1104-1112), and then by Roger his kinsman (1112-1119), was,
during the reign of Baldwin I., busily engaged in disputes both with its
Christian neighbours at Edessa and Tripoli, and with the Mahommedan
princes of Mardin and Mosul. On the death of Roger in 1119, the
principality came under the regency of Baldwin II. of Jerusalem, until
1126, when Bohemund II. came of age. Bohemund had married a daughter of
Baldwin; and on his death in 1130 Baldwin II. had once more become the
guardian of Antioch. From his reign therefore Antioch may be regarded as
a dependency of Jerusalem; and thus the end of Baldwin's reign (1131)
may be said to mark the time when the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem stands
complete, with its own boundaries stretching from Beirut in the north to
el-Arish and Aila in the south, and with the three Frankish powers of
the north admitting its suzerainty.
The Latin power thus established and organized in the East had to face
in the north a number of Mahommedan amirs, in the south the caliph of
Egypt. The disunion between the Mahommedans of northern Syria and the
Fatimites of Egypt, and the political disintegration of the former, were
both favourable to the success of the Franks; but they had nevertheless
to maintain their ground vigorously both in the north and the south
against almost incessant attacks. The hostility of the decadent
caliphate of Cairo was the less dangerous; and though Baldwin I. had at
the beginning of his reign to meet annual attacks from Egypt, by the end
he had pushed his power to the Red Sea, and in the very year of his
death (1118) he had penetrated along the north coast of Egypt as far as
Farama (Pelusium). The plan of conquering Egypt had indeed presented
itself to the Franks from the first, as it continued to attract them to
the end; and it is significant that Godfrey himself, in 1100, promised
Jerusalem to the patriarch, "as soon as he should have conquered some
other great city, and especially Cairo." But the real menace to the
Latin kingdom lay in northern Syria; and here a power was eventually
destined to rise, which outstripped the kings of Jerusalem in the race
for Cairo, and then--with the northern and southern boundaries of
Jerusalem in its control--was able to crush the kingdom as it were
between the two arms of a vice. Until 1127, however, the Mahommedans of
northern Syria were disunited among themselves. The beginning of the
12th century was the age of the atabegs (regents or stadtholders). The
atabegs formed a number of dynasties, which displaced the descendants of
the Seljukian amirs in their various principalities. These dynasties
were founded by emancipated mamelukes, who had held high office at court
and in camp under powerful amirs, and who, on their death, first became
stadtholders for their descendants, and then usurped the throne of their
masters. There was an atabeg dynasty in Damascus founded by Tughtigin
(1103-1128): there was another to the N.E., that of the Ortokids,
represented by Sokman, who established himself at Kaifa in Diarbekr
about 1101, and by his brother Ilghazi, who received Mardin from Sokman
about 1108, and added to it Aleppo in 1117.[18] But the greatest of the
atabegs were those of Mosul on the Tigris--Maudud, who died in 1113;
Aksunkur, his successor; and finally, greatest of all, Zengi himself,
who ruled in Mosul from 1127 onwards.
Before the accession of Zengi, there had been constant fighting, which
had led, however, to no definite result, between the various Mahommedan
princes and the Franks of northern Syria. The constant pressure of
Tancred of Antioch and Baldwin de Burgh of Edessa led to a series of
retaliations between 1110 and 1115; Edessa was attacked in 1110, 1111,
1112 and 1114; and in 1113 Maudud of Mosul had even penetrated as far as
the vicinity of Acre and Jerusalem.[19] But the dissensions of the
Mahommedans made their attacks unavailing; in 1115, for instance, we
find Antioch actually aided by Ilghazi and Tughtigin against Aksunkur of
Mosul. Again, in the reign of Baldwin II., there was steady fighting in
the north; Roger of Antioch was defeated by Ilghazi at Balat in 1119,
and Baldwin II. himself was captured by Balak, the successor of Ilghazi,
in 1123, but on the whole the Franks held the upper hand. Baldwin
conquered part of the territory of Aleppo (in 1121 and the following
years), and extorted a tribute from Damascus (1126). But when Zengi
established himself in Mosul in 1127, the tide gradually began to turn.
He created for himself a great and united principality, comprising not
only Mosul, but also Aleppo,[20] Harran, Nisibin and other districts;
and in 1130, Alice, the widow of Bohemund II., sought his alliance in
order to maintain herself in power at Antioch. In the beginning of the
reign of Fulk of Jerusalem (1131-1143) the progress of Zengi was steady.
He conquered in 1135 several fortresses in the east of the principality
of Antioch, and in this year and the next pressed the count of Tripoli
hard; while in 1137 he defeated Fulk at Barin, and forced the king to
capitulate and surrender the town. If Fulk had been left alone to wage
the struggle against Zengi, and if Zengi had enjoyed a clear field
against the Franks, the fall of the kingdom of Jerusalem might have come
far sooner than it did.[21] But there were two powers which aided Fulk,
and impeded the progress of Zengi--the amirate of Damascus and the
emperors of Constantinople. The position of Damascus is a position of
crucial importance from 1130 to 1154. Lying between Mosul and Jerusalem,
and important both strategically and from its position on the great
route of commerce from the Euphrates to Egypt, Damascus became the
arbiter of Syrian politics. During the greater part of the period
between 1130 and 1154 the policy of Damascus was guided by the vizier
Muin-eddin Anar, who ruled on behalf of the descendants of the atabeg
Tughtigin. He saw the importance of finding an ally against the ambition
of Zengi, who had already attacked Damascus in 1130. The natural ally
was Jerusalem. As early as 1133 the alliance of the two powers had been
concluded; and in 1140 the alliance was solemnly renewed between Fulk
and the vizier. Henceforth this alliance was a dominant factor in
politics. One of the great mistakes made by the Franks was the breach of
the alliance in 1147--a breach which was widened by the attack directed
against Damascus during the Second Crusade; and the conquest of Damascus
by Nureddin in 1154 was ultimately fatal to the Latin kingdom, removing
as it did the one possible ally of the Franks, and opening the way to
Egypt for the atabegs of Mosul.
The alliance of the emperors of Constantinople was of far more dubious
value to the kings of Jerusalem. We have already seen that it was the
theory of the Eastern emperors--a theory which logically followed from
the homage of the crusaders to Alexius--that the conquests of the
crusaders belonged to their empire, and were held by the crusading
princes as fiefs. We have seen that the action of Bohemund at Antioch
was the negation of this theory, and that Alexius in consequence helped
Raymund to establish himself in Tripoli as a thorn in the side of
Bohemund, and sent an army and a fleet which wrested from the Normans
the towns of Cilicia (1104). The defeat of Bohemund at Durazzo in 1108
had resulted in a treaty, which made Antioch a fief of Alexius; but
Tancred (who in 1107 had recovered Cilicia from the Greeks) refused to
fulfil the terms of the treaty, and Alexius (who attempted--but in
vain--to induce Baldwin I. to join an alliance against Tancred in 1112)
was forced to leave Antioch independent. Thus, although Alexius had been
able, in the wake of the crusading armies, to recover a large belt of
land round the whole coast of Asia Minor,--the interior remaining
subject to the sultans of Konia (Iconium) and the princes of Sivas,--he
left the territories to the east of the western boundary of Cilicia in
the hands of the Latins when he died in 1118. Not for 20 years after his
death did the Eastern empire make any attempt to gain Cilicia or wrest
homage from Antioch. But in 1137 John Comnenus appeared, instigated by
the opportunity of dissensions in Antioch, and received its long-denied
homage, as well as that of Tripoli; while in the following year he
entered into hostilities with Zengi, without, however, achieving any
considerable result. In 1142 he returned again, anxious to create a
principality in Cilicia and Antioch for his younger son Manuel. The
people of Antioch refused to submit; a projected visit to Jerusalem,
during which John was to unite with Fulk in a great alliance against the
Moslem, fell through; and in the spring of 1143 the emperor died in
Cilicia, with nothing accomplished. On the whole, the interference of
the Comneni, if it checked Zengi for the moment in 1138, may be said to
have ultimately weakened and distracted the Franks, and to have helped
to cause the loss of Edessa (1144), which marks the turning-point in the
history of the kingdom of Jerusalem.
5. _Organization of the Kingdom._--Before we turn to describe the Second
Crusade, which the loss of Edessa provoked, and to trace the fall of the
kingdom, which the Second Crusade rather hastened than hindered, we may
pause at this point to consider the organization of the Frankish
colonies in Syria. The first question which arises is that of the
relation of the kingdom of Jerusalem to the three counties or
principalities of Antioch, Tripoli and Edessa, which acknowledged their
dependence upon it. The degree of this dependence was always a matter of
dispute. The rights of the king of Jerusalem chiefly appear when there
is a vacancy or a minority in one of the principalities, or when there
is dissension either inside one of the principalities or between two of
the princes. On the death of one of the princes without heirs of full
age, the kings of Jerusalem were entitled to act as regents, as Baldwin
II. did twice at Antioch, in 1119 and 1130; but the kings regarded this
right of regency as a burden rather than a privilege, and it is indeed
characteristic of the relation of the king to the three princes, that it
imposes upon him duties without any corresponding rights. It is his duty
to act as regent; it is his duty to compose the dissensions in the
principality of Antioch, and to repress the violences of the prince
towards his patriarch (1154); it is his duty to reconcile Antioch with
Edessa, when the two fall to fighting. The princes on their side acted
independently: if they joined the king with their armies, it was as
equals doing a favour; and they sometimes refused to join until they
were coerced. They made their own treaties with the Mahommedans, or
attacked them in spite of the king's treaties; they dated their
documents by the year of their own reign, and they had each their
separate laws or assizes. There was, in a word, co-ordination rather
than subordination; nor did the kings ever attempt to embark on a policy
of centralization.
The relation of the king to his own barons within his immediate kingdom
of Jerusalem is not unlike the relation of the king to the three
princes. In Norman England the king insisted on his rights; in Frankish
Jerusalem the barons insisted on his duties. The circumstances of the
foundation of the kingdom explain its characteristics. As the crusaders
advanced to Jerusalem, says Raymund of Agiles (c. xxxiii.), it was their
rule that the first-comer had the right to each castle or town, provided
that he hoisted his standard and planted a garrison there. The feudal
nobility was thus the first to establish itself, and the king only came
after its institution--the reverse of Norman England, where the king
first conquered the country, and then plotted it out among his nobles.
The predominance of the nobility in this way became as characteristic of
feudalism in the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem as the supremacy of the
crown was of contemporary feudalism in England; and that predominance
expressed itself in the position and powers of the high court, in which
the ultimate sovereignty resided. The kingdom of Jerusalem consisted of
a society of peers, in which the king might be _primus_, but in which he
was none the less subject to a punctilious law, regulating his position
equally with that of every member of the society. In such a society the
election of the head by the members may seem natural; and in the case of
Godfrey and the first two Baldwins this was the case. But the conception
of the equality of the king and his peers in the long run led to
hereditary monarchy; for if the king held his kingdom as a fief, like
other nobles, the laws of descent which applied to a fief applied to the
kingdom, and those laws demanded heredity. Yet the high court, which
decided all problems of descent, would naturally intervene if a problem
of descent arose, as it frequently did, in the kingdom; and thus the
barons had the right of deciding between different claimants, and also
of formally "approving" each new successor to the throne. The conception
of the kingdom as a fief not only subjected it to the jurisdiction of
the high court; it involved the more disastrous result that the kingdom,
like other fiefs, might be carried by an heiress to her husband; and the
proximate causes of the collapse of the kingdom in 1187 depend on this
fact and the dissensions which it occasioned.