of his infant kingdom, which consisted only of Jerusalem and Jaffa, with
about twenty villages and towns of the adjacent country. Within this
narrow verge, the Mahometans were still lodged in some impregnable
castles: and the husbandman, the trader, and the pilgrim, were exposed
to daily and domestic hostility. By the arms of Godfrey himself, and of
the two Baldwins, his brother and cousin, who succeeded to the throne,
the Latins breathed with more ease and safety; and at length they
equalled, in the extent of their dominions, though not in the millions
of their subjects, the ancient princes of Judah and Israel. After
the reduction of the maritime cities of Laodicea, Tripoli, Tyre, and
Ascalon, which were powerfully assisted by the fleets of Venice, Genoa,
and Pisa, and even of Flanders and Norway, the range of sea-coast
from Scanderoon to the borders of Egypt was possessed by the Christian
pilgrims. If the prince of Antioch disclaimed his supremacy, the counts
of Edessa and Tripoli owned themselves the vassals of the king of
Jerusalem: the Latins reigned beyond the Euphrates; and the four cities
of Hems, Hamah, Damascus, and Aleppo, were the only relics of the
Mahometan conquests in Syria. The laws and language, the manners and
titles, of the French nation and Latin church, were introduced into
these transmarine colonies. According to the feudal jurisprudence, the
principal states and subordinate baronies descended in the line of
male and female succession: but the children of the first conquerors, a
motley and degenerate race, were dissolved by the luxury of the climate;
the arrival of new crusaders from Europe was a doubtful hope and a
casual event. The service of the feudal tenures was performed by six
hundred and sixty-six knights, who might expect the aid of two hundred
more under the banner of the count of Tripoli; and each knight was
attended to the field by four squires or archers on horseback. Five
thousand and seventy sergeants, most probably foot-soldiers, were
supplied by the churches and cities; and the whole legal militia of the
kingdom could not exceed eleven thousand men, a slender defence against
the surrounding myriads of Saracens and Turks. But the firmest bulwark
of Jerusalem was founded on the knights of the Hospital of St. John, and
of the temple of Solomon; on the strange association of a monastic and
military life, which fanaticism might suggest, but which policy must
approve. The flower of the nobility of Europe aspired to wear the cross,
and to profess the vows, of these respectable orders; their spirit
and discipline were immortal; and the speedy donation of twenty-eight
thousand farms, or manors, enabled them to support a regular force of
cavalry and infantry for the defence of Palestine. The austerity of
the convent soon evaporated in the exercise of arms; the world was
scandalized by the pride, avarice, and corruption of these Christian
soldiers; their claims of immunity and jurisdiction disturbed the
harmony of the church and state; and the public peace was endangered by
their jealous emulation. But in their most dissolute period, the knights
of their hospital and temple maintained their fearless and fanatic
character: they neglected to live, but they were prepared to die, in the
service of Christ; and the spirit of chivalry, the parent and offspring
of the crusades, has been transplanted by this institution from the holy
sepulchre to the Isle of Malta.
The spirit of freedom, which pervades the feudal institutions, was felt
in its strongest energy by the volunteers of the cross, who elected for
their chief the most deserving of his peers. Amidst the slaves of Asia,
unconscious of the lesson or example, a model of political liberty was
introduced; and the laws of the French kingdom are derived from the
purest source of equality and justice. Of such laws, the first and
indispensable condition is the assent of those whose obedience they
require, and for whose benefit they are designed. No sooner had Godfrey
of Bouillon accepted the office of supreme magistrate, than he solicited
the public and private advice of the Latin pilgrims, who were the best
skilled in the statutes and customs of Europe. From these materials,
with the counsel and approbation of the patriarch and barons, of the
clergy and laity, Godfrey composed the Assise of Jerusalem, a precious
monument of feudal jurisprudence. The new code, attested by the seals of
the king, the patriarch, and the viscount of Jerusalem, was deposited in
the holy sepulchre, enriched with the improvements of succeeding times,
and respectfully consulted as often as any doubtful question arose in
the tribunals of Palestine. With the kingdom and city all was lost: the
fragments of the written law were preserved by jealous tradition and
variable practice till the middle of the thirteenth century: the code
was restored by the pen of John d'Ibelin, count of Jaffa, one of the
principal feudatories; and the final revision was accomplished in the
year thirteen hundred and sixty-nine, for the use of the Latin kingdom
of Cyprus.
The justice and freedom of the constitution were maintained by two
tribunals of unequal dignity, which were instituted by Godfrey of
Bouillon after the conquest of Jerusalem. The king, in person, presided
in the upper court, the court of the barons. Of these the four most
conspicuous were the prince of Galilee, the lord of Sidon and CÊsarea,
and the counts of Jaffa and Tripoli, who, perhaps with the constable and
marshal, were in a special manner the compeers and judges of each other.
But all the nobles, who held their lands immediately of the crown, were
entitled and bound to attend the king's court; and each baron exercised
a similar jurisdiction on the subordinate assemblies of his own
feudatories. The connection of lord and vassal was honorable and
voluntary: reverence was due to the benefactor, protection to the
dependant; but they mutually pledged their faith to each other; and the
obligation on either side might be suspended by neglect or dissolved
by injury. The cognizance of marriages and testaments was blended with
religion, and usurped by the clergy: but the civil and criminal causes
of the nobles, the inheritance and tenure of their fiefs, formed the
proper occupation of the supreme court. Each member was the judge and
guardian both of public and private rights. It was his duty to assert
with his tongue and sword the lawful claims of the lord; but if an
unjust superior presumed to violate the freedom or property of a vassal,
the confederate peers stood forth to maintain his quarrel by word and
deed. They boldly affirmed his innocence and his wrongs; demanded the
restitution of his liberty or his lands; suspended, after a fruitless
demand, their own service; rescued their brother from prison; and
employed every weapon in his defence, without offering direct violence
to the person of their lord, which was ever sacred in their eyes. In
their pleadings, replies, and rejoinders, the advocates of the court
were subtle and copious; but the use of argument and evidence was often
superseded by judicial combat; and the Assise of Jerusalem admits in
many cases this barbarous institution, which has been slowly abolished
by the laws and manners of Europe.
The trial by battle was established in all criminal cases which
affected the life, or limb, or honor, of any person; and in all civil
transactions, of or above the value of one mark of silver. It appears
that in criminal cases the combat was the privilege of the accuser, who,
except in a charge of treason, avenged his personal injury, or the death
of those persons whom he had a right to represent; but wherever, from
the nature of the charge, testimony could be obtained, it was necessary
for him to produce witnesses of the fact. In civil cases, the combat was
not allowed as the means of establishing the claim of the demandant;
but he was obliged to produce witnesses who had, or assumed to have,
knowledge of the fact. The combat was then the privilege of the
defendant; because he charged the witness with an attempt by perjury to
take away his right. He came therefore to be in the same situation as
the appellant in criminal cases. It was not then as a mode of proof that
the combat was received, nor as making negative evidence, (according to
the supposition of Montesquieu; ) but in every case the right to offer
battle was founded on the right to pursue by arms the redress of an
injury; and the judicial combat was fought on the same principle, and
with the same spirit, as a private duel. Champions were only allowed to
women, and to men maimed or past the age of sixty. The consequence of a
defeat was death to the person accused, or to the champion or witness,
as well as to the accuser himself: but in civil cases, the demandant
was punished with infamy and the loss of his suit, while his witness and
champion suffered ignominious death. In many cases it was in the option
of the judge to award or to refuse the combat: but two are specified,
in which it was the inevitable result of the challenge; if a faithful
vassal gave the lie to his compeer, who unjustly claimed any portion of
their lord's demesnes; or if an unsuccessful suitor presumed to impeach
the judgment and veracity of the court. He might impeach them, but the
terms were severe and perilous: in the same day he successively fought
_all_ the members of the tribunal, even those who had been absent; a
single defeat was followed by death and infamy; and where none could
hope for victory, it is highly probable that none would adventure the
trial. In the Assise of Jerusalem, the legal subtlety of the count
of Jaffa is more laudably employed to elude, than to facilitate, the
judicial combat, which he derives from a principle of honor rather than
of superstition.
Among the causes which enfranchised the plebeians from the yoke of
feudal tyranny, the institution of cities and corporations is one of
the most powerful; and if those of Palestine are coeval with the first
crusade, they may be ranked with the most ancient of the Latin world.
Many of the pilgrims had escaped from their lords under the banner of
the cross; and it was the policy of the French princes to tempt their
stay by the assurance of the rights and privileges of freemen. It is
expressly declared in the Assise of Jerusalem, that after instituting,
for his knights and barons, the court of peers, in which he presided
himself, Godfrey of Bouillon established a second tribunal, in which
his person was represented by his viscount. The jurisdiction of this
inferior court extended over the burgesses of the kingdom; and it was
composed of a select number of the most discreet and worthy citizens,
who were sworn to judge, according to the laws of the actions and
fortunes of their equals. In the conquest and settlement of new cities,
the example of Jerusalem was imitated by the kings and their great
vassals; and above thirty similar corporations were founded before
the loss of the Holy Land. Another class of subjects, the Syrians,
or Oriental Christians, were oppressed by the zeal of the clergy, and
protected by the toleration of the state. Godfrey listened to their
reasonable prayer, that they might be judged by their own national laws.
A third court was instituted for their use, of limited and domestic
jurisdiction: the sworn members were Syrians, in blood, language, and
religion; but the office of the president (in Arabic, of the _rais_)
was sometimes exercised by the viscount of the city. At an immeasurable
distance below the _nobles_, the _burgesses_, and the _strangers_, the
Assise of Jerusalem condescends to mention the _villains_ and _slaves_,
the peasants of the land and the captives of war, who were almost
equally considered as the objects of property. The relief or protection
of these unhappy men was not esteemed worthy of the care of the
legislator; but he diligently provides for the recovery, though not
indeed for the punishment, of the fugitives. Like hounds, or hawks, who
had strayed from the lawful owner, they might be lost and claimed: the
slave and falcon were of the same value; but three slaves, or twelve
oxen, were accumulated to equal the price of the war-horse; and a sum of
three hundred pieces of gold was fixed, in the age of chivalry, as the
equivalent of the more noble animal.
End of Volume V.