The Historians' History of the World 08 [Parthians, Sassanids and Arabs; The Crusades and the Papacy]

Dubbing a Knight on the Field of Battle

The French recruited themselves on the shores of the Ægean Sea, and pursued their march in an easterly direction. They rejected with disdain an offer of Manuel of a protection from Moslem fury, and they gallantly kept up their course with the usual portion of suffering, till they arrived at the banks of the Mæander. They found there the Turks, who having safely deposited their spoils came to dispute with the Latins the passage of the river. The battle was not of long duration; the French made so great a slaughter of their foe, that the bones of the Moslems were conspicuous for years. The crusaders proceeded in good order and discipline through the town of Laodicea, into the barrier mountains between Phrygia and Pisidia. The vanguard of the army advanced beyond the appointed rendezvous. The rearguard, in which was the king, moved forwards with perfect confidence that the heights before them were in possession of their friends. Their ravenous enemy, who always hovered round them, seized the moment when the ranks of the Christians were divided, and casting aside their bows and arrows, fell upon them with tumultuous rapidity, sword in hand. It was in a defile of the mountains that the Turkish tempest burst on the Latin troops. Rocks ascending to the clouds were above the crusaders, and fathomless precipices beneath them. The French could not recover from the shock and horror of the surprise. Men, horses, and baggage were cast into the abyss. The Turks were innumerable and irresistible. The life of the king was saved more by fortune than by skill. He escaped to an eminence with a few soldiers, and in the deep obscurity of the night made his way to the advanced guard. The snows of winter, deficiency of stores, and the refusal of the Greeks to trade with them, were the evils with which the French had to contend. They marched, or rather wandered, for they knew not the roads, and the discipline of the army was broken. They arrived at Attalia (Adalia), the metropolis of Pamphylia, seated on the sea shore near the mouth of the Cestrus. But the unchristian Greeks refused hospitality to the enemies of the infidel name.

[1148-1149 A.D.]

Famine had so dreadfully thinned the ranks of the army, and so many horses and other beasts of burden had perished, that the most sage and prudent among the crusaders advised their companions to turn aside from scenes of desolation, and proceed by sea to Antioch. The king and his soldiers embarked for Antioch. The way-worn pilgrims and the sick were committed to the charge of Thierry, count of Flanders, who was to march with them to Cilicia. But when Louis quitted the harbour, the Turks fell upon the Christians who were left behind, and the escort was found to be feeble and ineffective. The people of Attalia not only declined to open their gates, but even murdered the sick. Every day the Turks killed hundreds of the pilgrims, and as it was evident that flight alone could save the remainder, Thierry escaped by sea. Seven thousand wretched votaries of the cross attempted to surmount the higher difficulties of the land journey to Jerusalem; but the Holy City never opened to their view, and in perishing under Moslem vengeance they thought that the loss of the completion of the pilgrimage was compensated by the glories of martyrdom.

The nobility, the clergy, and people of Antioch received the French king with every demonstration of respect; but no blandishments of persuasion or petulant threats of divorce from his wife Eleanora, could move Louis from his purpose of marching into Palestine. He repaired to the Holy City; entered it in religious procession, while crowds of ecclesiastics and laymen were singing the psalm, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” His arrival had been preceded by that of the emperor of Germany, the dukes of Saxony and Bavaria, and the ruined German band.

A council was held at Ptolemais, composed of the princes, barons, and prelates of Syria and Palestine, and the new commanders from Europe. The misfortunes of the Edessenes were forgotten, or yielded to higher feelings, for though the recapture of the principality of the Courtenais was the great object of the crusade, yet there were Moslem cities in Syria far more dangerous to Jerusalem than the remote city of Edessa. The decree for a march to Damascus was passed, and the emperor of Germany and the kings of France and Jerusalem brought their troops into the field; but the best disciplined parts of the army were the knights of the Temple and St. John. Eager to relieve Damascus from the yoke under which she had groaned for nearly five centuries, the champions of Christianity soon arrived under her walls. Numerous and of long continuance were the engagements between the Latins and the Syrians. The city was apparently in the power of the crusaders, and the people abandoned themselves to despair. But instead of taking possession of Damascus the Latins anticipated the event and thought only to whom the prize should be given. Much time was wasted in intrigues, and after sustaining for a short time the sallies of reinforcements, and rejecting in a council of war the advice of some unsubdued spirits for an attack on Askalon, the Christian army raised the siege of Damascus, and retrograded to Jerusalem in sorrow and in shame. Conrad soon returned to Europe with the shattered relics of the German host, and his steps were a year afterwards traced by the French king, the queen, and most of the French lords.

Among the few men whose virtues and abilities spread some rays of moral and intellectual light over the twelfth century was Suger, the abbot of the celebrated religious fraternity of St. Denis, in France. Strongly imbued with the superstition of his time, his fondest wish was for the overthrow of the Moslems. As minister of Louis VII, however, he had exposed to his royal master the embarrassment of the state finances, the fierce and menacing aspect of the crown vassals, and other circumstances of a political nature, to deter him from quitting his dominions. But the spirit of romantic devotion in the heir of Charlemagne could not be quenched, and Louis well consulted the interests of his kingdom in delivering the sceptre to the charge of the abbot of St. Denis. After his return from Palestine, the king ardently wished to recross the seas, and by martial achievements to obliterate the memory of former disasters. When all thoughts of a crusade had apparently died away, France was astonished at the appearance of a martial missionary in the person of him who had opposed the second holy war. The clergy of the East implored Suger to restore the fortunes of the Holy Land, knowing that he possessed more credit in France than all the other princes and prelates, and that his piety equalled his authority. Papal benediction was bestowed upon him, though the pope was at first amazed at the enthusiasm of a man nearly seventy years of age; but his influence was exerted in vain. Angry at the timidity of his countrymen, his own courage rose; he resolved to conduct a small army to Palestine himself, and his reliance on the favour of heaven made him hope that the vassals of St. Denis alone would be more powerful than the congregated myriads of Europe. All aspirations for glory were humbled by a fever; he died at St. Denis, and his successor in the abbacy pursued the usual duties of his station, without superadding those of a martial description.c