Kingdom of Jerusalem: foundation and life in the kingdom

2024 Author: Harold Hamphrey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:06

It's no secret that the Middle East today is one of the most turbulent regions of our planet, and threats to European civilization come from there. There is an opinion that the roots of these phenomena should be sought in the depths of centuries, because they are an echo of the Crusades. That is why, in order to understand the reasons for the confrontation between East and West, as well as to find ways for their peaceful coexistence, some researchers recommend carefully studying history. For example, the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Edessa and neighboring states are of interest, where Christians who arrived from Europe and their descendants eventually learned to coexist peacefully with the local Muslim population.

Backstory

The Kingdom of Jerusalem appeared on the world map in 1099 as a result of the capture by the crusaders of the city where he was crucifiedSavior. They arrived in the region at the call of Pope Urban II, to whom the Byzantine emperor Alexei I addressed with a request to protect Christians from the Turks. This was preceded by the Battle of Manzikert. The defeat of Byzantium led to the loss of Armenia and the eastern part of Asia Minor, which, according to historians, was the beginning of the end of this great empire. In addition, there were rumors about the atrocities of both Sunnis and Shiites against Christians in Palestine.

Protection of fellow believers was not the only reason that made the pope bless the soldiers for the Crusade. The fact is that by this time relative stability had been established in most of Europe, and thousands of well-trained knights were left without work, which led to armed clashes over the most trifling reasons. Sending them to the Middle East ensured peace and also gave hope for future economic growth (through trophies).

Initially, the liberation of Jerusalem was not included in the plans of the Crusaders. However, later they changed, and on July 15, 1099, the city was captured and… plundered.

Foundation

The undisputed leader of the crusaders was Gottfried of Bouillon, who in medieval chronicles is credited with all the virtues of a real knight, faithful to Christian commandments. Having founded the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the barons and counts turned to him with a request to become the first ruler of the new state. Remaining true to his principles, Gottfried refused the crown, arguing that he could not wear it where the Savior himself wore the crown of thorns. The only thing he agreed to was to acceptthe title of "Defender of the Holy Sepulcher".

Reign of the first king of the Kingdom of Jerusalem

Gotfried of Bouillon died in 1100 without male offspring. His brother Baldwin was immediately crowned and began to rule Jerusalem, although he did not take any part in its siege and liberation, as he was busy capturing the Armenian Christian principalities of Tarsus, Tel Bashir, Ravendan and Edessa. Moreover, in the last city-state, he was adopted by the ruler Thoros and married his daughter. She went down in history as the first Queen of Jerusalem, Arda of Armenia. However, after subsequently killing his father-in-law and founding his own county of Edessa, Baldwin divorced, which brought the wrath of the pope.

However, being a skilled politician, Baldwin the First expanded the kingdom of Jerusalem, capturing several port cities, and became the lord of Antioch and the county of Tripoli. Also, under him, the number of residents of the Catholic faith increased there.

Baldwin died in 1118, left no heirs.

Kings of the Kingdom of Jerusalem before the Second Crusade

The successor of the childless Baldwin the First, bypassing his brother, who is in France, was his relative - Count of Edessa de Burk. He also expanded the borders of the state. In particular, de Burke managed to make his vassals the ruler of the Principality of Antioch - the infant Bohemond II, the grandson of the King of France, and in 1124 he took Tyre.

Long before he ascended the throne, in order to strengthen his position in the region, Baldwin de Burkemarried the daughter of the Armenian prince Gabriel - Morphia (see Jean Richard, "The Kingdom of Jerusalem in Latin", the first part). She gave her husband three daughters. The eldest of them - Melisende - became the third and one of the most famous queens of Jerusalem. Before his death, her father took all measures so that his widower-in-law, Fulk of Anjou, could not divorce her and pass the throne to his children from his first marriage. For this, even during his lifetime, Baldwin the Second declared his first grandson, bearing his name, and his daughter co-rulers.

After the murder of Fulk while hunting, Melisende became the sole ruler of the kingdom and was known as the patroness of the church and the arts.

Becoming an adult, her eldest son Baldwin the Third decided that it was time to do everything possible so that the Kingdom of Jerusalem of the Crusaders came under his authority. He got into a confrontation with his mother, who fled with his younger brother Amaury. As a result of the intervention of the clergy, the son gave the city of Nablus under the control of Melisende, but she continued to engage in diplomatic activities for the benefit of the kingdom.

Second Crusade

After the fall of Edessa in 1144, Melisende sent a message to the Pope asking for help in liberating the county. It was not ignored, and the pontiff announced the start of the Second Crusade. In 1148, troops from Europe, led by the French king Louis VII, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine and the German emperor Conrad, arrived in the Latin-Jerusalem kingdom. Being 18years old, the young Baldwin the Third showed sufficient prudence, supporting the position of his mother and his constable, who believed that Aleppo should be attacked in order to quickly again hoist the flag of the Kingdom of Jerusalem over Edessa. However, the arriving monarchs had very different plans. They intended to capture Damascus, despite the fact that the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem had good diplomatic relations with this city-state. As a result, the "guests" from Europe won, which subsequently had disastrous consequences for Christians in the Middle East.

Conrad and Baldwin, who went to Damascus, achieved nothing and were forced to lift the siege. The retreat of the Christians encouraged their enemies, and the losses caused great damage to the fighting capacity of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. So after Louis and Conrad with their armies left the Middle East, the situation there became much more tense than before.

Amory First

Baldwin the Third barely managed to conclude a truce with Damascus, and his victory in 1158 on Lake Tiberias restored the country's former authority. This allowed the king to marry the niece of the emperor of Byzantium - Theodora Komnenos. Four years later, the monarch died, possibly from poisoning, leaving no heirs.

After the death of Baldwin III, the kingdom of Jerusalem was headed by his brother, who ascended the throne under the name of Amory the First. In 1157, he married Agnes de Courtenay, daughter of Josselin, Count of Edessa, and great-granddaughter of the Armenian king. Kostandin the First. The church did not want to bless this marriage, since the young people had a common great-great-grandfather, but they insisted on their own. The couple had three children: Sybil, Baldwin and Alix. Nevertheless, Agnes did not become queen, although for most of the next century the kings of the Kingdom of Jerusalem were her direct descendants.

Amory the First directed his efforts to seize territories in Egypt and increase his influence in this country, which he partially succeeded. At the same time, he married for the second time with the niece of the emperor of Byzantium, Mary, strengthening ties with this state. She bore him a daughter, Isabella.

The situation in the Middle East changed dramatically after in January 1169 Caliph al-Adid appointed the then little-known Salah ad-Din vizier. In 1170, the latter with an army invaded the lands of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and captured Eilat. All appeals of Amory the First to the European monarchs remained without a response. In 1974, without outside support, he laid siege to Banias, which was often called the key to the gates of Jerusalem. Unsuccessful and infected with typhoid fever, he returned to his capital, where he died. Before his death, he gave the city of Nablus to his wife Mary and their common daughter Isabella, and also appointed his son Baldwin, who at that time was only 13 years old, as heir.

Rulers of the Kingdom of Jerusalem: descendants of Amory the First

Having ascended the throne, the young Baldwin the Fourth was completely under the influence of his mother, Agnes de Courtenay. Soon he fell ill with leprosy, and this disease becamecause of his early death (at the age of 24). However, from the moment he came of age until his death, the young king, despite his illness, managed to prove himself a wise ruler.

Since it was obvious that the young man would not be able to leave offspring, his sister Sibylla was married to Guillaume de Montferrat. Thus, she became a relative of the King of France and the Holy Roman Emperor. The marriage did not last long, as the husband died a few months after the wedding, without seeing the birth of his son Baldwin.

Meanwhile, the leper king defeated the army of Salah ad-Din at the Battle of Montgisard. From that time on, his skirmishes with the Muslim troops did not stop until the conclusion of peace in 1180. Then the widowed Sibylla was married to Guy de Lusignan. However, soon the new son-in-law lost the favor of the monarch, who decided to make his sister's young son, Baldwin de Montferrat, his heir.

In the spring of 1185, after the death of his uncle, the boy became king, but he reigned for only a year. Then the second husband of his mother, Guy de Lusignan, actually began to rule the country, to whom Sibylla publicly gave the crown, removing it from her head. Thus, with the exception of the reign of Baldwin de Montferrat, the Ardennes-Anjou dynasty owned the state of the crusaders in the Holy Land from 1090 to 1185 (Richard, "Kingdom of Latino-Jerusalem", the first part).

Surrender of the city

During the reign of Guy de Lusignan, terrible misfortunes occurred that led the country to collapse. Allbegan with the Battle of Hattin in 1187, when the army of the Kingdom of Jerusalem was defeated by the troops of Salah ad-Din. Guy de Lusignan himself was captured, and in 1187 Sibylla and the famous crusader knight Balian de Ibelin were forced to organize the defense of Jerusalem. The forces were unequal, and it became obvious that the besieged Christians were in danger of extermination. Balian de Ibelin proved to be the most skillful diplomat, having achieved the surrender of the city on honorable terms. After leaving Jerusalem, Sibylla wrote a letter to Salah ad-Din asking him to let her husband go and was able to reunite with him in 1188.

The Crusader State of Jerusalem in the 13th century

In the summer of 1190, Sibylla and her daughters died during a plague. Although her husband Guy de Lusignan continued to consider himself king, Isabella, the daughter of Amory the First from her second marriage, began to rule the country. She was divorced from her first husband and married to Conrad of Montferrat. The latter received confirmation of his title, but did not have time to be crowned, as he was killed by two assassins. Just 8 days later, Isabella, pregnant with his daughter Mary, married Henry of Champagne on the advice of Richard the Lionheart. The marriage ended with the death of the spouse from an accident. Isabella then remarried Guy de Lusignan's brother, who became known as Amaury the Second.

The king and queen died almost simultaneously in 1205, allegedly from poisoning with stale fish.

They were succeeded by the Queen's eldest daughter Maria de Montferrat. She married Jean de Brienne and died after childbirth. Her daughter Iolanthe wascrowned, but her father ruled the country. At the age of 13, she was married to the Holy Roman Emperor. As a dowry, Frederick II received the title of King of Jerusalem and pledged to join the crusade. In Palermo, the queen gave birth to a daughter and a son, Conrad. In 1228, after her death, Frederick sailed to the Holy Land, where he was crowned. There he did not find anything better than to start a war with the Templars, trying to capture Acre, where the patriarch was. However, the emperor soon changed his mind and decided to take weapons with him, leaving the Christian population of the kingdom of Jerusalem almost defenseless.

Before his shameful secret escape to Europe, he entrusted the administration of the state to Balan of Sidon.

Change of title

The capture of the kingdom by the Khorezmians in 1244 put an end to the history of the domination of the Crusaders in the Holy Land. Nevertheless, over the next few centuries, some European aristocratic dynasties passed down the title of monarch of Jerusalem. In 1268 it was abolished. He was replaced by the title of King of Jerusalem and Cyprus. Hugo the Third, the son of Isabella de Lusignan, became its first bearer. He changed the coat of arms of Cyprus, adding to it the symbols of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. His descendants held this title until 1393. After it was changed, since Jacques the First also became the king of Armenia.

Life of ordinary people in Christian states in the Holy Land

The new generation, born in Palestine, considered it their homeland and had a negative attitude towardscrusaders who had recently arrived from Europe. Many knew local languages and married Christian women of other faiths in order to acquire relatives who could provide support in difficult situations. Moreover, if the aristocrats lived in cities, then the local population - mostly Muslim - was engaged in agriculture. Only Franks were drafted into the army, and Eastern Christians were obliged to supply it with food.

In art, literature and multimedia products

The most popular work about the Kingdom of Jerusalem was the film by Ridley Scott "Kingdom of Heaven", which tells about the confrontation with Salah ad-Din and the surrender of Jerusalem. Some events from the history of the state of the crusaders are reflected in computer games. For example, in Assassin's Creed. By the way, the new Stainless steel 6.1 mod is also available today. The kingdom of Jerusalem (voice, engine, land types and climate updated) is presented there quite realistically, and each region has its own resources.

Now you know who ruled such Crusader states as the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Edessia and Antioch, and what events took place in the Middle East after the end of the First Crusade and before the Christians actually lost control over the region.