The Crusades: Causes, Purposes, and Progress.
Crusades - a series of several military campaigns of the Catholic countries of Western Europe against Muslims in the Middle East in the period from the end of the 11th century to the end of the 13th century.

Goals of the Crusades.
As already mentioned, the main goal was the liberation of Christian shrines and the city of Jerusalem - so the church said, while it itself had a different goal - to amass wealth and expand its sphere of influence. And it should be said that although the Crusades ended in complete defeat for the Christian world, the Catholic Church still managed to amass wealth and expand its influence in the Christian world.

Land is another important objective for the Papacy and could be obtained through campaigns. After all, the land in the Middle Ages is the greatest wealth. Having new lands, the Vatican would have received new parishioners who would pay tithes and this would significantly replenish their treasury. What actually happened during the Crusades.

As a result, we see that the real goals of the campaigns are only the enrichment of the Papacy. While the rest believed that by doing this they would be able to earn a pass to Paradise and all sins would be washed away for their courage in the fight against the infidels.

Causes of the Crusades.
The main reason for the start of the crusades should be considered economic. Pope Urban II declared that the Christian land could no longer feed the population. Therefore, in order to save the lives of Christians, it was necessary to launch crusades to the rich lands of the Middle East with the aim of conquering them and saving the Christian world.

The religious justification for campaigns is considered to be the goal of returning the holy relics and the holy city - Jerusalem into the hands of Christians.
The Church also promised all participants in the crusades that by doing so they would atone for all their sins and after death they would be able to go to heaven.

In fact, the church was only looking for means of enrichment, and the Middle East was a great place where you could get new lands, and hence wealth, since in the Middle Ages the main wealth was land.

The course of the crusades.
The first crusade was unexpected for the Muslim world, and the solid forces of the crusaders were able to keep a complete victory over the Muslims during the first crusade (1096-1099). The main reason for the defeat for the Muslims is considered to be their fragmentation - they were able to offer common resistance and were defeated one by one, while the crusaders had disagreements, but during the first crusade they tried to fight together.

A huge army of crusaders won a series of victories that provided them with the creation of the so-called states of the crusaders (the County of Tripoli and Edessa, the Principality of Antioch, the Kingdom of Jerusalem).

The crusaders established their own rules in the Middle East and thus the entire local population fell into feudal dependence. During this campaign in 1099, the siege and capture of the city of Jerusalem took place. After the crusaders broke into the city, they killed almost the entire Muslim and Jewish population - there was a real massacre and the whole city was covered in blood. The crusaders only wanted to free the sacred relics, but in the end they killed almost all Muslims, robbed the city and then justified themselves that this was done for the sake of faith.

After the capture of Jerusalem, the first crusade came to an end, as the crusaders conquered everything they wanted, and the church acquired huge wealth and spread its influence.

However, after such actions of Christians, the Muslim world realized the threat and realized that it was necessary to unite in order to defeat the common enemy. And already in the middle of the XII century the Muslim world was united under the banner of Saladin. Jihad began - a holy war, which in 1187 led to the fact that the Muslims recaptured Jerusalem, but allowed all Christians to leave the city peacefully.

Before Jerusalem fell, Saladin captured a number of cities, so that the power of the crusaders in the East began to gradually decline. After the fall of the holy city, the crusades continued, but each ended in defeat for the crusaders.

The further goal for the crusaders was the return of the holy city and the interception of the initiative, which was never achieved. With each new crusade, the Christians only lost their possessions, while the Muslims, meanwhile, regained theirs.

Definitely, the most striking event of this period is considered to be the third crusade, in which the English king Richard I, named the Lionheart for his courage, participated.

King Richard won several great victories over the Saracen army - this is the successful capture of Acre, the victory at the battle of Arthus and the victory at the battle of Jaffa. During these battles, Richard demonstrated his bravery. For example, thanks to his presence and personal prowess, a detachment of 2,000 of his soldiers was able to repel an attack of 20,000 of Saladin's soldiers. Richard himself then fought in the forefront, first on horseback, then on foot, and killed dozens of enemies with his own hands. Richard's courage amazed everyone, including Saladin, who sent a horse to the English king, saying that "the king must fight on horseback."

Richard, naturally, sought to take Jerusalem, but was at a disadvantage, since he did not have siege weapons, and even if they were, after taking the city, there would still be few crusaders to keep him against the huge army of the Saracens.
Although Jerusalem did not fall, Richard managed to achieve free entry of Christians into the holy city to the relics, and his victories were able to strengthen the position of the crusaders for another hundred years.

One of the saddest events for the crusaders was the crusade of children, which took place at the beginning of the 13th century. Then the idea spread that only innocent children's hands could free the holy city and tens of thousands of children who were 12 years old began their journey to the holy land.

However, none of them reached the goal, most of them died of illness on the way, some managed to return home, and the rest were sold into slavery.

In total, the crusaders equipped eight large crusades in the Muslim Middle East, of which only one is considered to be successful - the first.

Reasons for the defeat of the crusaders.
Apart from rare exceptions, the crusaders almost never acted together and fought each for himself - we are talking about barons, counts and kings, about whom there were disagreements among themselves. Each of them wanted to fight side by side with his old enemy and wanted to appropriate the victory for himself. Whereas the Saracens, having understood the threat from the West, united in the face of a common enemy and were able to repulse him.

The climate also played a big role, in which heavily armored Christian troops could not fight effectively, as they languished under the scorching sun and lack of water supplies. Muslims are accustomed to live and fight in such conditions.

Consequences of the Crusades

The results of the campaigns, despite the fact that most of them turned out to be a defeat for Christians, were still mixed. The Church unequivocally came out victorious, since it took possession of great wealth and monastic orders were created under it, which for a long time became its tools.

The most important disadvantage of the campaigns should be considered the final damage to the relationship between the West and the East, which can be traced to this day. Muslims react very sharply to the Western world, which is why there are numerous terrorist attacks and murders.

Also after the fourth crusade, during which the crusaders sacked Constantinople, relations between Western and Eastern Christianity deteriorated. Thus, the Christian world became more fragmented and settled down with serious enemies in the face of Muslims.

On the positive side, however, the crusades contributed to the development of science in the West, as well as culture.

Crusades

1095-1096 - Campaign of poverty or peasant campaign
1095-1099 - First crusade
1147-1149 - Second crusade
1189-1192 - Third crusade
1202-1204 - Fourth Crusade
1202-1212 - Children's crusade
1218-1221 - Fifth Crusade
1228-1229 - Sixth Crusade
1248-1254 - Seventh Crusade
1270-12?? - The Last Crusade

CRUSADES (1096-1270), military-religious expeditions of Western Europeans to the Middle East with the aim of conquering Holy places associated with the earthly life of Jesus Christ - Jerusalem and the Holy Sepulcher.

Background and the beginning of the campaigns

The prerequisites for the crusades were: the traditions of pilgrimages to the Holy places; a change in views on the war, which began to be considered not a sinful, but a good deed, if it was waged against the enemies of Christianity and the church; capture in the 11th century. the Seljuk Turks of Syria and Palestine and the threat of the capture of Byzantium; difficult economic situation in Western Europe in the 2nd half. 11th c.

On November 26, 1095, Pope Urban II called on those gathered at the local church council in the city of Clermont to recapture the Holy Sepulcher captured by the Turks. Those who took this vow sewed patchwork crosses on their clothes and therefore were called “crusaders”. The Pope promised earthly riches in the Holy Land and heavenly bliss in case of death to those who went on the Crusade, they received full absolution of sins, it was forbidden to collect debts and feudal duties from them during the campaign, their families were under the protection of the church.

First crusade

In March 1096, the first stage of the First Crusade (1096-1101) began - the so-called. campaign of the poor. Crowds of peasants, with families and belongings, armed with whatever, under the leadership of random leaders, or even without them, moved east, marking their way with robberies (they believed that, since they are God's soldiers, any earthly property belongs to them) and Jewish pogroms (in their eyes, the Jews from the nearest town were the descendants of the persecutors of Christ). Of the 50,000 troops of Asia Minor, only 25,000 reached, and almost all of them died in the battle with the Turks near Nicaea on October 25, 1096.

In the autumn of 1096, a knightly militia from different parts of Europe set off on its way, its leaders were Gottfried of Bouillon, Raymond of Toulouse and others. By the end of 1096 - the beginning of 1097 they gathered in Constantinople, in the spring of 1097 they crossed to Asia Minor, where, together with the Byzantine troops, began the siege of Nicaea, they took it on June 19 and handed it over to the Byzantines. Further, the path of the crusaders lay in Syria and Palestine. On February 6, 1098, Edessa was taken, on the night of June 3 - Antioch, a year later, on June 7, 1099, they besieged Jerusalem, and on July 15 they captured it, having committed a cruel massacre in the city. On July 22, at a meeting of princes and prelates, the Kingdom of Jerusalem was established, to which the county of Edessa, the principality of Antioch, and (since 1109) the county of Tripoli were subordinate. The head of state was Gottfried of Bouillon, who received the title of "defender of the Holy Sepulcher" (his successors bore the title of kings). In 1100-1101, new detachments from Europe set off for the Holy Land (historians call this a "rearguard campaign"); the borders of the Kingdom of Jerusalem were established only by 1124.

There were few immigrants from Western Europe who permanently lived in Palestine, a special role in the Holy Land was played by spiritual and knightly orders, as well as immigrants from the seaside trading cities of Italy, who formed special privileged quarters in the cities of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

Second crusade

After the Turks conquered Edessa in 1144, on December 1, 1145, the Second Crusade (1147-1148) was announced, led by King Louis VII of France and King Conrad III of Germany, and turned out to be ineffective.

In 1171, Salah ad-Din seized power in Egypt, who annexed Syria to Egypt and in the spring of 1187 began a war against Christians. On July 4, in a battle that lasted 7 hours near the village of Hittin, the Christian army was defeated, in the second half of July the siege of Jerusalem began, and on October 2 the city surrendered to the mercy of the winner. By 1189, several fortresses and two cities remained in the hands of the crusaders - Tire and Tripoli.

Third crusade

October 29, 1187 was declared the Third Crusade (1189-1192). The campaign was led by the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire Frederick I Barbarossa, the kings of France Philip II Augustus and England - Richard I the Lionheart. On May 18, 1190, the German militia captured the city of Iconium (now Konya, Turkey) in Asia Minor, but on June 10, while crossing a mountain river, Frederick drowned, and the German army, demoralized by this, retreated. In the autumn of 1190, the crusaders began to lay siege to Acre, the port city and sea gate of Jerusalem. Acre was taken on June 11, 1191, but even before that, Philip II and Richard quarreled, and Philip sailed home; Richard undertook several unsuccessful offensives, including two against Jerusalem, concluded on September 2, 1192, an extremely unfavorable treaty for Christians with Salah ad Din, and left Palestine in October. Jerusalem remained in the hands of the Muslims, and Acre became the capital of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

Fourth Crusade. Capture of Constantinople

In 1198 a new, Fourth Crusade was announced, which took place much later (1202-1204). It was supposed to strike at Egypt, which belonged to Palestine. Since the crusaders did not have enough money to pay for the ships for the sea expedition, Venice, which had the most powerful fleet in the Mediterranean, asked for help in conquering the Christian (!) City of Zadar on the Adriatic coast, which happened on November 24, 1202, and then prompted the crusaders move on Byzantium, the main commercial rival of Venice, under the pretext of intervening in dynastic strife in Constantinople and uniting the Orthodox and Catholic churches under the auspices of the papacy. April 13, 1204 Constantinople was taken and brutally plundered. Part of the territories conquered from Byzantium went to Venice, on the other part the so-called. Latin Empire. In 1261, the Orthodox emperors, who had entrenched themselves in Asia Minor, which was not occupied by Western Europeans, again occupied Constantinople with the help of the Turks and Venice's rival, Genoa.

Children's Crusade

In view of the failures of the crusaders in the mass consciousness of Europeans, the belief arose that the Lord, who did not give victory to the strong, but sinful, would grant it to the weak, but sinless. In the spring and early summer of 1212, crowds of children began to gather in different parts of Europe, declaring that they were going to liberate Jerusalem (the so-called crusade of children, not included by historians in the total number of crusades).

The church and secular authorities regarded this spontaneous outburst of popular religiosity with suspicion and prevented it in every possible way. Some of the children died on the way across Europe from hunger, cold and disease, some reached Marseilles, where clever merchants, promising to transport the children to Palestine, brought them to the slave markets of Egypt.

Fifth Crusade

The Fifth Crusade (1217-1221) began with an expedition to the Holy Land, but, having failed there, the crusaders, who did not have a recognized leader, transferred military operations to Egypt in 1218. May 27, 1218 they began the siege of the fortress Damietta (Dumyat) in the Nile Delta; the Egyptian sultan promised them to lift the siege of Jerusalem, but the crusaders refused, took Damietta on the night of November 4-5, 1219, tried to build on their success and occupy all of Egypt, but the offensive bogged down. On August 30, 1221, peace was concluded with the Egyptians, according to which the soldiers of Christ returned Damietta and left Egypt.

sixth crusade

The Sixth Crusade (1228-1229) was undertaken by Emperor Frederick II Staufen. This constant opponent of the papacy was excommunicated on the eve of the campaign. In the summer of 1228, he sailed to Palestine, thanks to skillful negotiations he entered into an alliance with the Egyptian sultan and, as a help against all his enemies, Muslims and Christians (!), He received Jerusalem without a single battle, where he entered on March 18, 1229. Since the emperor was under excommunication, the return of the Holy City to the bosom of Christianity was accompanied by a ban on worship in it. Frederick soon left for his homeland, he had no time to deal with Jerusalem, and in 1244 the Egyptian sultan again and finally took Jerusalem, massacring the Christian population.

Seventh and Eighth Crusades

The Seventh Crusade (1248-1254) was almost exclusively the work of France and its King Louis IX Saint. Egypt was again the target of the attack. In June 1249, the crusaders took Damietta for the second time, but were later blocked and in February 1250 surrendered in full strength, including the king. In May 1250, the king was released for a ransom of 200 thousand livres, but did not return to his homeland, but moved to Acre, where he waited in vain for help from France, where he sailed in April 1254.

In 1270, the same Louis undertook the last, the Eighth Crusade. His target was Tunisia, the most powerful Muslim maritime state in the Mediterranean. It was supposed to establish control over the Mediterranean in order to freely send troops of the crusaders to Egypt and the Holy Land. However, soon after the landing in Tunisia on June 18, 1270, an epidemic broke out in the crusader camp, Louis died on August 25, and on November 18, the army, without entering into a single battle, sailed home, carrying the body of the king with them.

Things in Palestine were getting worse, the Muslims took away city after city, and on May 18, 1291, Acre fell - the last stronghold of the Crusaders in Palestine.

Both before and after that, the church repeatedly proclaimed crusades against the pagans (a campaign against the Polabian Slavs in 1147), heretics and against the Turks in the 14th-16th centuries, but they are not included in the total number of crusades.

Lesson 29: "Crusades. Reasons and participants

Crusades and their aftermath.

The purpose of the lesson: To reveal the main reasons for the crusades to the East and the goals of their participants. Show the role of the church as an inspirer and organizer of these campaigns. Contribute to the formation of students' ideas about the aggressive and colonial nature of the crusade.

Plan for studying new material:

Causes and Participants of the Crusades.

The First Crusade and the Formation of the Crusader States.

Subsequent campaigns and their results.

Spiritual and knightly orders.

Consequences of the Crusades.

At the beginning of the lesson, the teacher can update students' knowledge about the role of the Catholic Church in the life of medieval society.

Turning to the study of a new topic, the teacher pays attention to the disclosure of the truereasons for the crusades:

The desire of the popes to extend their power to new lands;

The desire of secular and spiritual feudal lords to acquire new lands and increase their income;

The desire of Italian cities to establish their control over trade in the Mediterranean;

The desire to get rid of the robber knights;

Deep religious feelings of the crusaders.

Crusades - the military-colonial movement of Western European feudal lords to the countries of the Eastern Mediterranean inXI- XIII centuries (1096-1270).

Reason for the Crusades:

In 1071, Jerusalem was captured by the Seljuk Turks and access to the Holy Places was cut off.

Appeal of the Byzantine Emperor AlexeiIComnena to the Pope with a request for help.

In 1095 Pope UrbanIIcalled for a campaign to the East and the liberation of the tomb of the Lord. The motto of the knights: "God wills it."

Total was done8 trips:

The first is 1096-1099. The second - 1147-1149. Third - 1189-1192.

Fourth - 1202-1204. ……. Eighth - 1270.

Using the possibilities of a computer presentation, the teacher can invite students to get acquainted with the social composition of the participants in the crusades, their goals and the results achieved.

Participants of the Crusades and their goals:

Members

Goals

results

Catholic Church

Spread of Christianity in the East.

Expansion of land holdings and an increase in the number of taxpayers.

Didn't get land.

kings

The search for new lands in order to expand the royal army and the influence of royal power.

Increased craving for a beautiful life and luxury.

Dukes and Counts

Enrichment and expansion of land holdings.

Changes in life.

Inclusion in trade.

Borrowing oriental inventions and cultures.

Knights

Search for new lands.

Many died.

Land was not received.

Cities (Italy)

Merchants

Establish control over trade in the Mediterranean.

Interest in trade with the East.

The revival of trade and the establishment of control of Genoa and Venice over trade in the Mediterranean.

Peasants

The search for freedom and property.

The death of people.

At the end of the work with the table, students must independently draw a conclusion about the nature of the crusades (aggressive).

Traditionally, the first, third and fourth crusades are considered in detail in history lessons.

First crusade (1096-1099)

Spring 1096 Autumn 1096

(campaign of the peasants) (campaign of the knights of Europe)

defeat victory

1097 1098 1099

Nicaea Edessa Jerusalem

Antioch

Work with the map in the workbook of E.A. Kryuchkova (task 98 pp.55-56) or assignments on the contour map “Western Europe in the 11th-13th centuries. Crusades "(indicate the states of the crusaders and mark their borders).

Crusader states

Jerusalem Edesskoe Antiochskoe Trypillia

kingdom kingdom kingdom kingdom

(main state

in the Eastern Middle

earthsea)

Meaning of the First Crusade:

Showed how powerful the Catholic Church has become.

Moved a huge mass of people from Europe to the Middle East.

Strengthening the feudal oppression of the local population.

New Christian states arose in the East, Europeans seized new possessions in Syria and Palestine.

Reasons for the fragility of the crusader states:

along with feudal relations, feudal fragmentation and civil strife were inevitably transferred here;

there were few lands convenient for cultivating, and therefore there were fewer people willing to fight for them;

the subjugated locals remained Muslim, leading to double hatred and fighting.

Consequences of conquest:

plunder;

the seizure of land, the introduction of feudal relations;

huge taxes (from 1/3 to 1/2 of the crop + taxes to the king + 1/10 - churches);

creation of spiritual and chivalric orders.

Reasons for the start of the second crusade:

Results of the first Struggle Liberation Call for a new

crusade conquered Edessa crusade

campaign of peoples from the crusaders to the campaign

Second crusade (1147-1149) - led the German

Emperor ConradIIIand the French king LouisVII.

The campaign against Edessa and Damascus ended in the defeat of the crusaders.

Third Crusade (Three Kings Campaign) (1189-1192) –

Friedrich Barbarossa for Jerusalem Salah ad-Din (Saladin)

Richard the Lionheart (united Egypt, Mesopotamia)

Philip II. tamiya, Syria, returned

Jerusalem)

2-year siege of Acre

Truce.

Jerusalem was not returned, but Salah ad-Din agreed

on the admission of Christian pilgrims to Jerusalem shrines.

Reasons for the defeat of the Third Crusade:

death of Frederick Barbarossa;

Philip's quarrel IIand Richard the Lionheart, Philip's departure in the midst of battle;

not enough strength;

there is no single trip plan;

strengthened the forces of Muslims;

there is no unity among the crusader states in the Eastern Mediterranean;

huge sacrifices and difficulties of campaigns, there are no longer so many who want to.

Fourth Crusade (1202-1204) - arranged by dad

Innocent III

Capture of Zadar Capture of Constantinople pogroms and robbery

The collapse of the Byzantine Empire

Fighting Christians

Formation of the Latin Empire (before 1261)

Opened robbery

essence of campaigns

loss of religious

essence of campaigns

In this campaign, the predatory, predatory goals of the crusaders were most clearly manifested.

Gradually, the crusaders lost their possessions in Syria and Palestine. The number of participants in the campaigns decreased. Lost spirit.

The most tragic in the crusader movement was the organized

in 1212 the children's crusade.

Question:

Why did the Catholic Church support the call to send children to empty the tomb of the Lord?

Answer:

The Church claimed that adults are powerless to free the tomb of the Lord, because they are sinful, and God expects a feat from children.

some of the children returned home;

As a result, a part died of thirst and hunger;

part sold by merchants into slavery in Egypt.

Eighth Crusade (1270)

to Tunisia and Egypt

Defeat.

Loss of all their lands in the Muslim world.

In 1291, the last stronghold of the crusaders fell - the fortress of Acre.

The story of the Crusades is the story of how two different worlds failed to learn tolerance for each other, of how the seeds of hatred sprouted.

One of the main consequences of the conquests of the crusaders in the East was the creation of spiritual and knightly orders.

Signs of spiritual knightly orders:

led by masters;

obeyed the Pope, did not depend on local authorities;

their members renounced property and family - became monks;

but - had the right to bear arms;

created to fight the infidels;

had privileges: exempted from tithes, subject only to papal court, had the right to accept donations and gifts;

they were forbidden: hunting, dice, laughter and unnecessary talk.

Three major orders of chivalry

Templars

Hospitallers

Teutons

The order of the knights of the temple ("temple" - temple) - "templars".

Created in 1118-1119.

Residence in Jerusalem.

The symbol is a white cloak with a red eight-pointed cross.

The order supported heretics.

Engaged in usury and trade.

In 1314, the master of the order de Male was burned at the stake, and the order ceased to exist.

The order of horsemen of the hospital of St. John of Jerusalem - Ionites.

Created in XIcentury in Jerusalem.

The hospital was founded by the merchant Mauro.

The symbol is a white eight-pointed cross on a black mantle, later on a red cloak.

Later they settled on the island of Rhodes (Rhodian knights), then on the island of Malta (Knights of Malta).

The Order of Malta still exists today. Residence in Rome.

Order of the House of Saint Mary of the Teutonic.

("Teutonic" - German)

Created in XIIcentury in Jerusalem.

A hospital for German-speaking pilgrims was founded.

The symbol is a white cloak with a black cross.

AT XIIIcentury merged with the Livonian Order.

Defeated at the Battle of Grunwald in 1410.

From them the Nazis borrowed the cross.

In Germany, the Teutonic Order still exists.

As homework, students may be asked to complete the table:

positive

negative

the disasters of the peoples of the East;

collapse of the Byzantine Empire;

Consequences of the Crusades:

positive

negative

the revival of trade between West and East;

an impetus to the development of European trade, the transfer of control over trade in the Mediterranean to Venice and Genoa;

new crops came to Europe from the East (watermelons, sugarcane, buckwheat, lemons, apricots, rice);

windmills spread to the East;

Europeans learned how to make silk, glass, mirrors;

there have been changes in European life (washing hands, bathing, changing clothes);

Western feudal lords were even more drawn to luxury in clothing, food, weapons;

increased people's knowledge of the world around them.

the disasters of the peoples of the East;

huge sacrifices on both sides;

destruction of cultural monuments;

increased hostility between the Orthodox and Catholic churches;

collapse of the Byzantine Empire;

the contradictions between the Muslim East and the Christian West became even deeper;

weakened the influence and power of the pope, who failed to implement such grandiose plans.

Consequences of the Crusades:

positive

negative

the revival of trade between West and East;

an impetus to the development of European trade, the transfer of control over trade in the Mediterranean to Venice and Genoa;

new crops came to Europe from the East (watermelons, sugarcane, buckwheat, lemons, apricots, rice);

windmills spread to the East;

Europeans learned how to make silk, glass, mirrors;

there have been changes in European life (washing hands, bathing, changing clothes);

Western feudal lords were even more drawn to luxury in clothing, food, weapons;

increased people's knowledge of the world around them.

the disasters of the peoples of the East;

huge sacrifices on both sides;

destruction of cultural monuments;

increased hostility between the Orthodox and Catholic churches;

collapse of the Byzantine Empire;

the contradictions between the Muslim East and the Christian West became even deeper;

weakened the influence and power of the pope, who failed to implement such grandiose plans.

Homework:

Tutorials:

A - §§ 22, 23; B - §§ 25, 27; Br - § 24; B - § 17; D - § 4.4; D - §§ 22, 23; K - § 30;

KnCh - ss.250-264, 278-307.

Filling in the table: "Consequences of the Crusades."

Raising the issue of the Crusades. Causes of campaigns, their cultural and social significance. The development of Western Europe during the Crusades (XI-XIII centuries). The influence of the Crusades on religious relations in Europe and the World.

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LLC Training Center "PROFESSIONAL"

Abstract by discipline:

"Geography"

On this topic:

"What were the causes of the Crusades?"

Artist: Matveeva Diana Viktorovna

Kandalaksha

2016

Introduction

Even in ancient times, the struggle began for dominance in the countries of Western Asia, especially in Syria and Mesopotamia, as well as for the mastery of Egypt. These countries were one of the richest and most cultural regions of the world at that time. Through them lay the path of international trade. Byzantium and Iran, Iran and Arabs, Arabs and Byzantium fought for dominance in these countries. At the end of the XI century. the feudal states of Western Europe also entered the struggle.

The conquest of Palestine by the Turks had important political consequences. While Arabs held Jerusalem, Christian pilgrimshad free access to his shrines, because the Arabs did not oppress Christians at all and even respected their shrines. For Christian peoples, this or that reception that the pilgrims who came there met in the Holy Land could not be indifferent, since there were quite a large number of these pilgrims. When, however, the Turks captured Jerusalem, the treatment of the new masters of the holy city with the pilgrims who came to it became completely different. Turks of steel oppress them and extort money from them. News of this came to Europe, and the idea arose in her to take up arms forliberation of the tomb of the Lord from the hands of the unbelievers. (Later legend attributed the initiative of the whole movement to one pilgrim,Peter Hermitwho preached the need for a campaign in Palestine). From the end of the XI century. for two centuries, militias were sent from Western Europe to Palestine in order to achieve this blessed goal. Separate enterprises of this kind received in history the namecrusades. Various Western European peoples took part in the crusading militias, but mainly the French and Germans. The enterprise became popular in society because, in addition to its noble goal, it corresponded to the aspirations of certain classes of the population.Feudal knighthoodwas belligerent andlooking for conquest. Among enslaved peasantrythere were also many people who, being dissatisfied with their heavy burden, were ready to go to new landsfor the sake of finding a better share. This public mood skillfully usedCatholic Church who took under your protectionthe idea of ​​the crusades and for their own purely political reasons.

1. The Crusades are an important milestone in the history of the World

The Crusades (1095-1291) - a series of military campaigns in the Middle East undertaken by Western European Christians to liberate the Holy Land from Islam.

Many social strata of Western European society were involved in the Crusades: kings and commoners, the highest feudal nobility and clergy, knights and servants. People who took the vow of a crusader had different motives: some sought to enrich themselves, others were attracted by a thirst for adventure, and others were driven exclusively by spiritual motives.

Thanks to the legends, the crusades were surrounded by a halo of romance and grandeur, chivalrous strength and courage. But stories about gallant crusading knights, of course, abounded in exaggeration. In addition, they overlook the “insignificant” historical fact that, despite the courage and heroism shown by the crusaders, as well as the appeals and promises of the popes and the strong confidence in the rightness of their cause, the Christians did not manage to liberate the Holy Land. The crusades only led to the Muslims becoming the undisputed rulers of the Middle East.

1. Causes of the Crusades

The beginning of the crusades was laid by the popes, who were nominally considered the leaders of all events of this kind. Popes and other masterminds of the movement have promised heavenly and earthly rewards to all who risk their lives for a holy cause. The campaign to attract volunteers was successful due to the religious motives that dominated then in Western Europe. But whatever their personal motives for participating, the warriors of Christ were confident that they were fighting for a just cause.

The immediate cause of the crusades was the growth in power of the power of the Seljuk Turks and their conquest in the 1070s of the Middle East and Asia Minor. Natives of Central Asia, at the beginning of the century, the Seljuks penetrated into the regions subject to the Arabs, where they were first used as mercenaries. Gradually, however, they became more and more independent, conquering Iran in the 1040s, and Baghdad in 1055.

Then the Seljuks began to expand the boundaries of their possessions to the west, leading an offensive against the Byzantine Empire. The defeat of the Byzantines at Manzikert in 1071 made it possible for the Seljuks to reach the shores of the Aegean Sea, conquer Syria and Palestine, and in 1078 (other dates are also indicated) take Jerusalem.

The threat from the Muslims forced the Byzantine emperor to turn to Western Christians for support. The fall of Jerusalem disturbed the Christian world.

The conquests of the Seljuk Turks coincided with a religious revival in Western Europe in the 10th-11th centuries, which was largely initiated by the activities of the Benedictine monastery of Cluny in Burgundy, founded in 910 by the Duke of Aquitaine, William the Pious. Through the efforts of the abbots, who persistently called for the purification of the church and the spiritual transformation of the Christian world, the abbey became a very influential force in the spiritual life of Europe.

In the XI century. increased the number of pilgrimages to the Holy Land. The "infidel Turk" was portrayed as a defiler of shrines, a barbarian and a pagan whose presence in the Holy Land is intolerable to God and man. In addition, the Seljuks threatened the Christian Byzantine Empire.

To many kings and barons, the Middle East was a world of opportunity. Lands, income, power and prestige - all this, they believed, would be a reward for the liberation of the Holy Land. In connection with the expansion of the practice of inheritance based on primogeniture, many younger sons of feudal lords, especially in northern France, could not count on participation in the division of their father's lands. Having taken part in the crusade, they could already hope to acquire the land and position in society that their older brothers had.

Crusades gave the peasants the opportunity to free themselves from lifelong serfdom. As servants and cooks, the peasants formed the convoy of the crusader troops.

For purely economic reasons, the cities were interested in the crusades. For several centuries, the Italian cities of Amalfi, Pisa, Genoa and Venice fought the Muslims for dominance over the western and central Mediterranean. By 1087, the Italians had driven the Muslims out of southern Italy and Sicily, established settlements in North Africa, and taken control of the western Mediterranean Sea. They undertook sea and land invasions of the Muslim territories of North Africa, seeking trade privileges from the locals. For these Italian cities, the crusades meant only the transfer of hostilities from the Western Mediterranean to the Eastern.

1. Beginning of the Crusades

The beginning of the Crusades was proclaimed at the Council of Clermont in 1095 by Pope Urban II. He was one of the leaders of the Cluniac reform, and devoted many meetings of the council to discussing the troubles and vices that irritated the church and clergy. In his speech, the Pope emphasized the sanctity of Jerusalem and the Christian relics of Palestine, spoke of the plunder and desecration to which they are subjected by the Turks, and also mentioned the danger threatening Christian brothers in Byzantium. Then Urban II urged his listeners to take up the holy cause, promising everyone who goes on a campaign, remission of sins, and everyone who lays down his head in it, a place in paradise. The pope urged the barons to stop the destructive civil strife and turn their ardor to a charitable cause. He made it clear that the crusade would provide the knights with ample opportunities to gain land, wealth, power and glory - all at the expense of the Arabs and Turks.

The response to the speech was the cries of the audience: “God wants it!” (“Deus vult!”). These words became the battle cry of the crusaders. Thousands of people immediately made a vow that they would go to war.

Pope Urban II ordered the clergy to spread his call throughout Western Europe. The archbishops and bishops (the most active among them was Ademar de Puy, who took over the spiritual and practical leadership of the preparation of the campaign) called on their parishioners to respond to it, and preachers like Peter the Hermit and Walter Golyak conveyed the words of the pope to the peasants.

These hordes went through the Balkans to Constantinople, expecting that the Christian brothers would show them hospitality as the executors of a holy cause.

However, the locals met them with contempt, and then the soldiers of Christ began to loot. Real massacres were played out between the Byzantines and the hordes from the west. Those who managed to get to Constantinople were not welcome guests of the Byzantine emperor Alexei and his subjects. They were settled outside the city, fed and hastily transported through the Bosporus to Asia Minor, where the Turks soon dealt with them.

1. 1st Crusade (1096–1099)

The 1st crusade itself began in 1096. Several feudal armies took part in it, each with its own commander in chief. Three main routes, by land and by sea, they arrived in Constantinople during 1096 and 1097. The campaign was led by feudal barons, including Duke Gottfried of Bouillon, Count Raymond of Toulouse and Prince Bohemond of Tarentum. Formally, they and their armies were subordinate to the papal legate, but in fact they ignored his instructions and acted independently.

Crusaders, moving overland, took away food and fodder from the local population, besieged and plundered several Byzantine cities, and repeatedly clashed with Byzantine troops. The presence in the capital and around it of a 30,000-strong army, requiring housing and food, created difficulties for Byzantium. Differences between the emperor and the commanders of the crusaders escalated.

Relations between the emperor and the knights continued to deteriorate as the Christians moved east. The Crusaders suspected that Byzantine guides were deliberately ambushing them. The army turned out to be completely unprepared for the sudden raids of the enemy cavalry, which managed to escape before the knightly heavy cavalry rushed in pursuit. The lack of food and water exacerbated the hardships of the campaign. Wells along the way were often poisoned by Muslims. Those who endured these most difficult trials were rewarded with the first victory, when Antioch was besieged and taken in June 1098. Here, according to some testimonies, one of the crusaders discovered a shrine - a spear with which a Roman soldier pierced the side of the crucified Christ. It is reported that this discovery greatly inspired the Christians and contributed in no small measure to their further victories and advancement. The fierce war lasted another year, and on July 15, 1099, after a siege that lasted about a month, the crusaders took Jerusalem and betrayed all of its population, Muslims and Jews, to the sword.

Gottfried of Bouillon was elected king of Jerusalem, who chose the title of “defender of the Holy Sepulcher”. Gottfried and his successors got to control the state, nominally united. It consisted of four states: the county of Edessa, the principality of Antioch, the county of Tripoli and the kingdom of Jerusalem itself. The king of Jerusalem had rather conditional rights with respect to the other three, since their rulers had established themselves there even before him, so that they fulfilled their vassal oath to the king only in the event of a military threat. In addition, the power of the king was significantly limited by the church: since the crusades were carried out under the auspices of the church and were nominally led by the Pope. The Patriarch of Jerusalem was an extremely influential figure here.

During this time, at least ten important centers of commerce and trade developed. Among them are Beirut, Acre, Sidon and Jaffa. In accordance with privileges or awards of authority, Italian merchants established their own administration in coastal cities. Usually they had their own consuls (heads of administration) and judges here, acquired their own coin and system of measures and weights. Their legislative codes extended to the local population.

The backbone of the Crusader army was formed by two orders of chivalry - the Knights Templar (Templars) and the Knights of St. John (Johnites or Hospitallers). They included mainly the lower strata of the feudal nobility and the younger offspring of aristocratic families. Initially, these orders were created to protect temples, shrines, roads leading to them and pilgrims; it also provided for the establishment of hospitals and care for the sick and wounded. Since the orders of the Hospitallers and Templars set religious and charitable goals along with military ones, their members, along with the military oath, took monastic vows. The orders were able to replenish their ranks in Western Europe and receive financial assistance from Christians who could not take part in the crusade, but were eager to help the holy goal.

Due to such contributions, the Templars in the 12-13 centuries. essentially turned into a powerful banking house that carried out financial intermediation between Jerusalem and Western Europe. They subsidized religious and commercial enterprises in the Holy Land and gave loans here to the feudal nobility and merchants in order to get them already in Europe.

3.2. Subsequent Crusades

3.2.1 2nd Crusade (1147–1149)

When Edessa was captured by the Muslims in 1144, Bernard of Clairvaux, head of the Cistercian monastic order, persuaded the German Emperor Conrad III (reigned 1138–1152) and King Louis VII of France (reigned 1137–1180) to undertake a new crusade. This time, Pope Eugene III issued in 1145 a special bull on the crusades, in which there were precisely formulated provisions that guaranteed the protection of the church to the families of the crusaders and their property.

The forces that could be attracted to participate in the campaign were huge, but due to the lack of interaction and a well-thought-out campaign plan, the campaign ended in complete failure. Moreover, he gave a reason to the Sicilian king Roger II to make trips to the Byzantine possessions in Greece and on the islands of the Aegean Sea.

3.2.2 3rd Crusade (1187–1192)

If the Christian commanders were constantly in contention, then the Muslims, under the leadership of Sultan Salah ad-Din, united in a state that stretched from Baghdad to Egypt. Salah ad-din easily defeated the divided Christians, in 1187 he took Jerusalem and established control over the entire Holy Land, with the exception of a few coastal cities.

The 3rd Crusade was led by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, the French King Philip II Augustus and the English King Richard I the Lionheart. The German emperor drowned in Asia Minor while crossing a river, and only a few of his soldiers reached the Holy Land. Two other monarchs who competed in Europe took their strife to the Holy Land as well. Philip II Augustus, under the pretext of illness, returned to Europe to try, in the absence of Richard I, to take away the Duchy of Normandy from him.

Richard the Lionheart was left as the sole leader of the crusade. The feats he accomplished here gave rise to legends that surrounded his name with a halo of glory. Richard won Acre and Jaffa from the Muslims and concluded an agreement with Salah ad-Din on the unhindered admission of pilgrims to Jerusalem and to some other shrines, but he failed to achieve more. Jerusalem and the former Kingdom of Jerusalem remained under Muslim rule. The most significant and long-term achievement of Richard in this campaign was his conquest of Cyprus in 1191, where as a result an independent Cypriot kingdom arose, which lasted until 1489.

3.2.4 4th Crusade (1202–1204)

The 4th Crusade announced by Pope Innocent III was mainly French and Venetian. According to the initial agreement, the Venetians undertook to deliver the French crusaders by sea to the shores of the Holy Land and supply them with weapons and provisions. Of the expected 30 thousand French soldiers, only 12 thousand arrived in Venice, who, due to their small numbers, could not pay for the chartered ships and equipment. Then the Venetians offered the French that, as a payment, they would assist them in attacking the port city of Zadar in Dalmatia, subject to the Hungarian king, which was Venice's main rival in the Adriatic. The original plan - to use Egypt as a springboard for an attack on Palestine - was put on hold for the time being.

Having learned about the plans of the Venetians, the Pope forbade the campaign, but the expedition took place and cost its participants excommunication. In November 1202, the combined army of the Venetians and the French attacked Zadar and thoroughly plundered it. After that, the Venetians suggested that the French once again deviate from the route and turn against Constantinople in order to restore the deposed Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angelos to the throne. A plausible pretext was also found: the crusaders could expect that in gratitude the emperor would give them money, people and equipment for an expedition to Egypt.

Ignoring the Pope's ban, the crusaders arrived at the walls of Constantinople and returned the throne to Isaac. However, after an uprising took place in Constantinople and the emperor and his son were deposed, hopes for compensation melted away. Then the crusaders captured Constantinople and plundered it for three days. The greatest cultural values ​​were destroyed, many Christian relics were plundered. In place of the Byzantine Empire, the Latin Empire was created, on the throne of which Count Baldwin IX of Flanders was seated.

The empire that existed until 1261 included only Thrace and Greece, of all the Byzantine lands, where the French knights received feudal inheritances as a reward. Thus, they benefited the most from the crusade, but its participants never reached the Holy Land.

The Pope tried to extract his own benefits from the current situation - he removed the excommunication from the crusaders and took the empire under his protection, trying to strengthen the union of the Greek and Catholic churches, but this union turned out to be fragile, and the existence of the Latin Empire contributed to the deepening of the split.

3.2.5 5th Crusade (1217–1221)

At the 4th Lateran Council in 1215, Pope Innocent III announced a new crusade. The performance was scheduled for 1217, it was led by the nominal king of Jerusalem, John of Brienne, the king of Hungary, Endre II, and others. In Palestine, hostilities proceeded slowly, but in 1218, when new reinforcements arrived from Europe, the crusaders shifted the direction of the strike to Egypt and captured the city of Damietta, located on the seashore.

The Egyptian sultan offered the Christians to cede Jerusalem in exchange for Damietta, but the papal legate Pelagius, who was waiting for the legendary Christian “King David” to approach from the east, did not agree to this. In 1221, the crusaders attempted an unsuccessful capture of Cairo, fell into a difficult situation and were forced to surrender Damietta in exchange for a retreat.

3.2.6 6th Crusade (1228–1229)

This crusade, sometimes called "diplomatic", was led by Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, grandson of Frederick Barbarossa. The king managed to avoid war, through negotiations he received Jerusalem and a strip of land from Jerusalem to Acre. In 1229 Frederick was crowned king in Jerusalem, but in 1244 the city was again conquered by the Muslims.

3.2.7 7th Crusade (1248–1250)

It was led by the French king Louis IX Saint. The military expedition undertaken against Egypt turned out to be a shameful defeat. The crusaders took Damietta, but on the way to Cairo they were utterly defeated, and Louis himself was captured and forced to pay a huge ransom for his rescue.

3.2.8. 8th Crusade (1270)

Not heeding the warnings of advisers, Louis IX again went to war against the Arabs. He aimed a strike at Tunisia in North Africa. The crusaders ended up in Africa at the hottest time of the year and survived the plague that killed the king himself (1270). With his death, this campaign ended, which became the last attempt of Christians to liberate the Holy Land.

Christian military campaigns in the Middle East ceased after the Muslims took Acre in 1291.

Conclusion

Although the crusades did not achieve their goal and, started with general enthusiasm, ended in destruction and disappointment, they constituted a whole era in European history and had a serious impact on many aspects of European life and life.

Byzantine Empire

Perhaps the crusades really delayed the Turkish conquest of Byzantium, but they could not prevent the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The Byzantine Empire was in decline for a long time. Her final death meant the appearance of the Turks on the European political scene. The sack of Constantinople by the crusaders in 1204 and the Venetian trade monopoly dealt the empire a mortal blow from which it could not recover even after its revival in 1261.

Trade

The biggest beneficiaries of the crusades were the merchants and artisans of the Italian cities, who provided the armies of the crusaders with equipment, provisions and transport. In addition, the Italian cities, especially Genoa, Pisa and Venice, were enriched by the trade monopoly in the Mediterranean countries.

Italian merchants established trade relations with the Middle East, from where they exported various luxury items - silks, spices, pearls, etc. to Western Europe. The demand for these goods brought super-profits and stimulated the search for new, shorter and safer routes to the East. Ultimately, these searches led to the discovery of America. The crusades also played an extremely important role in the emergence of the financial aristocracy and contributed to the development of capitalist relations in Italian cities.

Feudalism and the Church

In the crusades, thousands of large feudal lords laid down their heads, in addition, many noble families went bankrupt under the burden of debts. All these losses ultimately contributed to the centralization of power in Western European countries and the weakening of the system of feudal relations.

If the first campaigns helped to strengthen the authority of the Pope, who assumed the role of spiritual leader in the holy war against the Muslims, then the 4th crusade discredited the power of the Pontiff even in the person of such an outstanding representative as Innocent III.

The Crusades were of great historical importance. This was the largest clash between the Christian and Muslim worlds, between which there was a struggle at all. It began in the era when the caliphate had already broken up into separate states, but there was no agreement between Christians either. In the history of Western Europe, these campaigns were a direct continuation of other conquest enterprises of the feudalknighthood ; with campaigns in the Holy Land, one might say, the militant movements of the Middle Ages ended.

Finally, these wars not only separated, but also brought together separate peoples.Knights of different countries, participating in a common cause, constantly clashed with each other, and their visits to Byzantium and Muslim countries brought them into contact with material and spiritual culture alien to them. Merchants followed the warriors to the East, and the Crusades even created the entire Venetian and Genoese tradesecond half of the Middle Ages. The crusaders got acquainted with new countries and peoples, with their way of life and concepts, and in this era they brought with them to Europe a lot of new knowledge and customs, which, of course, undermined the former cultural exclusivity of the West..

Bibliography

1. The era of the Crusades. M., 1914
2. Fences M. Crusades. M., 1956
3. Zaborov M. Introduction to the historiography of the Crusades (Latin chronography of the XI-XIII centuries). M., 1966
4. Zaborov M. Historiography of the Crusades (XV-XIX centuries). M., 1971
5. Zaborov M. History of the Crusades in Documents and Materials. M., 1977
6. Fences M. Cross and sword. M., 1979
7. Zaborov M. Crusaders in the East. M., 1980
8. Cardini F. The origins of medieval chivalry. - M. 1987

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The origin of the Crusades

By the beginning of the 11th century, the people who inhabited Europe did not know much about the rest of the world. For them, the center of all life on earth was the Mediterranean. At the center of this world, the Pope ruled as head of Christianity.

The capitals of the former Roman Empire, Rome and Constantinople, were located in the Mediterranean basin.

The ancient Roman Empire collapsed around 400 BC. into two parts, western and eastern. The Greek part, the Eastern Roman Empire, was called the Middle East or Orient. The Latin part, the Western Roman Empire, was called the Occident. The Western Roman Empire ceased to exist by the end of the 10th century, while the Eastern Byzantine Empire still existed.

Both parts of the former large empire were located north of the Mediterranean Sea. The northern coast of this elongated body of water was inhabited by Christians, the south - by peoples who profess Islam, Muslims, who even overcame the Mediterranean Sea and entrenched themselves on the northern coast, in Italy, France and Spain. But now the Christians set out to push them out of there.

There was no unity in Christianity itself either. Between Rome, the seat of the western head of the church, and Constantinople, the seat of the east, there has long been a very strained relationship.

A few years after the death of Muhammad (632), the founder of Islam, the Arabs from the Arabian Peninsula moved north and took possession of vast territories of the Middle East. Now, in the 11th century, Turkic tribes from Central Asia have moved here, threatening the Middle East. In 1701, they defeated the Byzantine army near Manzikert, captured Jewish and Christian shrines not only in Jerusalem itself, but throughout Palestine, and proclaimed Nicaea their capital. These conquerors were the Turkic-speaking tribes of the Seljuks, who converted to Islam only a few years ago.

At the end of the 11th century, a struggle for power broke out in Western Europe between church and state. From March 1088, Urban II, a Frenchman by birth, became Pope. He was going to reform the Roman Catholic Church to make it stronger. With the help of reforms, he wanted to strengthen his claims to the role of the only vicar of God on earth. At this time, the Byzantine emperor Alexei I asked the pope for help in the fight against the Seljuks, and Urban II immediately expressed his readiness to help him.

November 1095. Not far from the French city of Clermont, Pope Urban II spoke before a huge crowd of people gathered - peasants, artisans, knights and monks. In a fiery speech, he called on everyone to take up arms and go to the East in order to win back the tomb of the Lord from the infidels and cleanse the holy land from them. The Pope promised forgiveness of sins to all participants in the campaign.

The news of the upcoming campaign in the Holy Land quickly spread throughout Western Europe. Priests in churches and holy fools on the streets called to take part in it. Under the influence of these sermons, as well as at the call of their hearts, thousands of the poor rose up in the holy campaign. In the spring of 1096, from France and Rhineland Germany, they moved in discordant crowds along roads that have long been known to pilgrims: along the Rhine, Danube and further to Constantinople. They were poorly armed and suffered from food shortages. It was a rather wild procession, since on the way the crusaders mercilessly robbed the Bulgarians and Hungarians, through whose lands they passed: they took away cattle, horses, food, killed those who tried to protect their property. With grief in half, putting many in skirmishes with local residents, in the summer of 1096 the peasants reached Constantinople. The end of the campaign of the peasants was sad: in the autumn of the same year, the Seljuk Turks met their army near the city of Nicaea and almost completely killed them or, capturing them, sold them into slavery. Of the 25 thousand "Christ's army" survived only about 3 thousand people.

First crusade

In the summer of 1096 for the first time in history, a huge Christian army of representatives of many peoples set off on a campaign to the East. This army did not consist of noble knights at all; peasants inspired by the ideas of the cross and poorly armed townspeople, men and women, also participated in the campaign. In total, united in six large groups, from 50 to 70 thousand people made this campaign, and most of them traveled most of the way on foot.

From the beginning, separate detachments led by Hermit and knight Walter, nicknamed Golyak, set out on a campaign. They numbered about 15 thousand people. Knight Golyak was followed first of all by the French.

As these peasant crowds marched through Hungary, they had to endure fierce clashes with an embittered population. The ruler of Hungary, taught by bitter experience, demanded hostages from the crusaders, which guaranteed a rather “decent” behavior of the knights towards the Hungarians. However, this was an isolated case. The Balkan Peninsula was plundered by the "Christ warriors" who marched across it.

In December 1096 - January 1097. The crusaders arrived at Constantinople. The largest army was led by Raymond of Toulouse, and the papal legate Ademar was in his retinue. Bohemond of Tarentum, one of the most ambitious and cynical leaders of the first crusade, set off with an army to the East across the Mediterranean. Robert of Flanders and Stefan Blausky reached the Bosphorus by the same sea route.

As early as 1095, Emperor Alexei I of Byzantium appealed to Pope Urban II with an insistent request to help him in the fight against the Seljuks and Pechenegs. However, he had a slightly different idea of ​​the help he asked for. He desired to have mercenary warriors who were paid from his own treasury and obeyed him. Instead, along with the miserable peasant militia, knightly detachments led by their princes approached the city.

It was not difficult to guess that the goals of the emperor - the return of the lost Byzantine lands - did not coincide with the goals of the crusaders. Understanding the danger of such "guests", seeking to use their military zeal for his own purposes, Alexei, by cunning, bribery and flattery, obtained from most of the knights a vassal oath and an obligation to return to the empire those lands that would be recaptured from the Turks.

The first goal of the knightly army was Nicaea, once the site of large church cathedrals, and now the capital of the Seljuk Sultan Kılıç-Arslan. October 21, 1096 the Seljuks had already utterly defeated the peasant army of the Crusaders. Those peasants who did not fall in battle were sold into slavery. Among the dead was Walter Golyak.

Peter the Hermit by that time had not yet left Constantinople. Now, in May 1097, he joined the knights with the remnants of his army.

Sultan Kylych-Arslan hoped to defeat the newcomers in the same way, and therefore did not take the approach of the enemy seriously. But he was destined to be severely disappointed. His light cavalry and infantry armed with bows and arrows were defeated by the western cavalry in open battle. However, Nicaea was located in such a way that it was not possible to take it without military support from the sea. Here the Byzantine fleet provided the necessary assistance to the crusaders, and the city was taken. The crusader army moved on and on July 1, 1097.

the crusaders managed to defeat the Seljuks in the former Byzantine territory from Dorilei (now Eskisehir, Turkey). A little further to the southeast, the army split up, most of them moved to Caesarea (now Kayseri, Turkey) in the direction of the Syrian city of Antioch. On October 20, with fighting, the crusaders made their way through the Iron Bridge on the Orontes River and soon stood under the walls of Antioch. In early July 1098, after a seven-month siege, the city surrendered. The Byzantines and Armenians helped take the city.

Meanwhile, some French crusaders established themselves in Edessa (now Urfa, Turkey). Baldwin of Boulogne founded his own state here, stretching on both sides of the Euphrates. It was the first state of the crusaders in the East, to the south of it several more of the same subsequently arose.

After the capture of Antioch, the crusaders advanced along the coast to the south without any special obstacles and captured several port cities along the way. June 6, 1098 Tancred, nephew of Bohemond of Tarentum, finally entered Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, with his army. The way to Jerusalem opened before the knights.

Jerusalem was thoroughly prepared for the siege, food supplies were plentiful, and in order to leave the enemy without water, all the wells around the city were rendered unusable. The crusaders lacked ladders, battering rams and siege engines to storm the city. They themselves had to extract wood in the vicinity of the city and build military equipment. It took a lot of time and only in July 1099. The Crusaders succeeded in taking Jerusalem.

They quickly scattered throughout the city, seizing gold and silver, horses and mules, taking their homes. After that, weeping with joy, the soldiers went to the tomb of the Savior Jesus Christ and made amends for their guilt before Him.

Shortly after the capture of Jerusalem, the crusaders took possession of most of the eastern Mediterranean coast. In the occupied territory at the beginning of the XII century. four states were created by the knights: the kingdom of Jerusalem, the county of Tripoli, the principality of Antioch and the county of Edessa. Power in these states was built on the basis of the feudal hierarchy. It was headed by the King of Jerusalem, the other three rulers were considered his vassals, but in fact they were independent. The church had a huge influence in the states of the crusaders. She also owned large land holdings. On the lands of the crusaders in the XI century. spiritual and knightly orders, which later became famous, arose: the Templars, the Hospitallers and the Teutons.

With the conquest of the Holy Sepulcher, the main goal of this crusade was achieved. After 1100 The crusaders continued to expand their holdings. From May 1104 they owned Akkon, a major trading center on the Mediterranean. In July 1109 they captured Tripoli and thereby rounded off their possessions. When the crusader states reached their maximum size, their area stretched from Edessa in the north to the Gulf of Aqaba in the south.

The conquests in the first crusade did not mean the end of the struggle. This was only a temporary truce, as there were still more Muslims than Christians in the East.

Second crusade

The crusader states were surrounded on all sides by the peoples whose territory they had captured. Therefore, it is not surprising that the possessions of the invaders were continually attacked by the Egyptians, Seljuks and Syrians.

However, Byzantium, at every opportunity, also participated in the battles against the Christian states in the East.

In 1137 Byzantine emperor John II attacked Antioch and conquered it. The states of the crusaders were so at odds with each other that they did not even help Antioch. At the end of 1143 Muslim commander Imad-ad-din Zengi attacked the county of Edessa and wrested it from the crusaders. The loss of Edessa aroused anger and grief in Europe as well, for fear arose that now the Muslim states would oppose the invaders on a broad front.

At the request of the King of Jerusalem, Pope Eugene III again called for a crusade. It was organized by Abbé Bernard of Clairvaux. March 31, 1146 in front of the newly built St. Magdalene in Wezelay, in Burgundy, he exhorted his listeners in fiery speeches to take part in the crusade. Countless crowds followed his call.

Soon the whole army set out on a campaign. The German king Conrad III and the French king Louis VII stood at the head of this army. In the spring of 1147 The crusaders left Regensbukg. The French preferred the route through the Mediterranean. German troops, on the other hand, passed through Hungary without any special incidents and entered the Byzantine lands. When the army of the cross passed through Anatolia, it was attacked by the Seljuks near Dorilei and suffered heavy losses. King Conrad managed to save and get to the Holy Land only thanks to the Byzantine fleet.

The French also had no better than the Germans. In 1148 not far from Laodicea, they were subjected to a fierce onslaught of the Muslims. The help of the Byzantine army turned out to be completely insufficient - apparently, Emperor Manuel, in the depths of his soul, wished for the defeat of the crusaders.

Meanwhile, Conrad III, Louis VII, the patriarch and king of Jerusalem held a secret council about the true goals of the crusade and decided to seize Damascus with all available forces, promising them rich booty.

But with such a decision, they only pushed the Syrian ruler into the arms of the Seljuk prince from Aleppo, who was advancing with a large army and with whom relations in Syria were previously hostile.

It soon became clear that the second crusade would not achieve its goal of regaining lost Edessa. July 3, 1187 near the village of Hittin, west of the Lake of Gennesaret, a fierce battle broke out. The Muslim army outnumbered the Christian forces. As a result, the crusaders suffered a crushing defeat.

Countless of them were killed in battle, and the survivors were taken prisoner. This defeat had fatal consequences for the crusader states. They no longer had a combat-ready army. In the hands of the Christians there were only a few powerful fortresses in the north: Krak-de-Chevalier, Châtel Blanc and Margat.

Third crusade

So Jerusalem fell. The news shocked the entire Christian world. And again in Western Europe there were people who were ready to fight against the Muslims. Already in December 1187. at the Strasbourg Reichstag, the first of them accepted the cross. In the spring of the following year, the German Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa followed suit. There were not enough ships, so it was decided not to go by sea. Most of the army moved on land, despite the fact that this path was not easy. Previously, treaties were concluded with the Balkan states in order to provide the crusaders with unhindered passage through their territories.

May 11, 1189 The army left Regensburg. It was headed by the 67-year-old emperor Frederick I. Due to the attacks of the Seljuks and the unbearable heat, the crusaders advanced very slowly, epidemic diseases began among them. June 10, 1190 Emperor drowned while crossing the mountain river Salef. His death was a heavy blow to the crusaders. They did not have much confidence in the eldest son of the emperor, and therefore many turned back. Only a small number of loyal knights continued their journey under the leadership of Duke Frederick.

The French and English units left Vezelay only at the end of July 1190, because discord constantly arose between France and England. Meanwhile, the German army, supported by the Pisan fleet, laid siege to Akkon. April 1191. the French fleet arrived, followed by the English. Saladin was forced to capitulate and surrender the city. He tried in every possible way to avoid a predetermined ransom, and then the English king Richard I the Lionheart did not hesitate to order the killing of 2,700 Muslim prisoners. Saladin had to ask for a truce. The victors, following the English king, withdrew to the south and headed through Jaffa towards Jerusalem. The Kingdom of Jerusalem was restored, although Jerusalem itself remained in Muslim hands. The capital of the kingdom was now Akkon. The power of the crusaders was limited mainly to the coastline, which began just north of Tire and stretched to Jaffa, and in the east did not even reach the Jordan River.

Fourth Crusade

Next to these unsuccessful enterprises of the European knights, the 4th Crusade stands completely apart, which equalized the Orthodox Christians-Byzantines with the infidels and led to the death of Constantinople.

It was initiated by Pope Innocent III. His first concern was the position of Christianity in the Middle East. He wanted to try on the Latin and Greek churches again, to strengthen the dominance of the church, and at the same time his own claims to the supreme headship in Christendom.

In 1198 he launched a grand campaign for another campaign in the name of the liberation of Jerusalem. Papal messages were sent to all European states, but, in addition, Innocent III did not ignore another Christian ruler - the Byzantine emperor Alexei III. He, too, according to the Pope, had to move troops into the Holy Land. He diplomatically, but not ambiguously, hinted to the emperor that in the event of the intractability of the Byzantines in the West, there would be forces that were ready to oppose them. In fact, Innocent III dreamed not so much of restoring the unity of the Christian Church as of subordinating the Byzantine Greek Church to the Roman Catholic.

The fourth crusade began in 1202, and Egypt was originally planned as its final destination. The way there lay through the Mediterranean Sea, and the crusaders, despite all the thoroughness of the preparation of the "holy pilgrimage", did not have a fleet and therefore were forced to turn to the Venetian Republic for help. From that moment on, the route of the crusade changed dramatically. The doge of Venice, Enrico Dandolo, demanded a huge sum for his services, and the crusaders were insolvent. Dandolo was not embarrassed by this: he offered the "holy army" to compensate for the arrears by capturing the Dalmatian city of Zadar, whose merchants competed with the Venetian ones. In 1202 Zadar was taken, the army of crusaders boarded the ships, but ... did not go to Egypt at all, but ended up under the walls of Constantinople. The reason for this turn of events was the struggle for the throne in Byzantium itself. Doge Dandelo, who liked to settle scores with competitors through the hands of the crusaders, conspired with the leader of the "Christian Host" Boniface of Montferrat. Pope Innocent III supported the enterprise - and the route of the crusade was changed for the second time.

Besieged in 1203. Constantinople, the crusaders achieved the restoration on the throne of Emperor Iisak II, who promised to pay generously for support, but was not so rich as to keep his word. Enraged by this turn of affairs, the “liberators of the holy land” in April 1204. They took Constantinople by storm and subjected it to pogrom and plunder. After the fall of Constantinople, part of the Byzantine Empire was captured. On its ruins, a new state arose - the Latin Empire, created by the crusaders. She did not stand for long, until 1261, until she collapsed under the blows of the conquerors.

After the fall of Constantinople, calls to go and liberate the Holy Land subsided for a while, until the children of Germany and France went on this feat, which turned out to be their death. The four crusades of the knights to the East that followed did not bring success. True, during the 6th campaign, Emperor Frederick II managed to liberate Jerusalem, but the “infidels” regained what they had lost after 15 years.

After the failure of the 8th campaign of the French knights in North Africa and the death of the French king Louis IX there, the calls of the Roman priests for new exploits "in the name of the faith of Christ" did not find a response.

The possessions of the crusaders in the East were gradually captured by Muslims, until at the very end of the 13th century. The Kingdom of Jerusalem did not cease to exist.

True, the crusaders existed in Europe for a long time. The German knights who were defeated on Lake Peipus by Prince Alexander Nevsky were also crusaders.

Popes up to the 15th century organized campaigns in Europe in the name of the extermination of Heresies, but these were only echoes of the past. The tomb of the Lord remained with the "infidels." The great battle that lasted 200 years is over. Crusader domination was ended once and for all.

These are the military-colonization movements of Western European feudal lords, part of the townspeople and the peasantry, carried out in the form of religious wars under the slogan of the liberation of Christian shrines in Palestine from the rule of Muslims or the conversion of pagans or heretics to Catholicism.

The classical era of the Crusades is considered the end of the 11th - the beginning of the 12th century. The term "Crusades" appeared no earlier than 1250. The participants in the first Crusades called themselves pilgrims, and campaigns - pilgrimage, deeds, expedition or sacred road.

Causes of the Crusades

The necessity of the Crusades was formulated by the Pope Urban after graduation Clermont Cathedral in March 1095. He determined economic reason for the crusades: the European land is not able to feed the people, therefore, in order to preserve the Christian population, it is necessary to conquer rich lands in the East. Religious argumentation concerned the inadmissibility of storing shrines, primarily the Holy Sepulcher, in the hands of infidels. It was decided that the army of Christ would set out on a campaign on August 15, 1096.

Inspired by the appeals of the pope, crowds of thousands of ordinary people did not wait for the deadline and rushed to the campaign. The miserable remnants of the entire militia reached Constantinople. The bulk of the pilgrims died on the way from deprivation and epidemics. The Turks dealt with the rest without much effort. At the appointed time, the main army went on a campaign, and by the spring of 1097 it was in Asia Minor. The military advantage of the crusaders, who were opposed by the disunited Seljuk troops, was obvious. The crusaders captured cities and organized crusader states. The native population fell into serfdom.

History and aftermath of the Crusades

Consequences of the first trip there was a significant strengthening of positions. However, his results were inconsistent. In the middle of the XII century. intensifies the resistance of the Muslim world. One after another, the states and principalities of the crusaders fell. In 1187 Jerusalem was conquered with all the Holy Land. The tomb of the Lord remained in the hands of the infidels. New Crusades were organized, but they all ended in total defeat..

During IV Crusade Constantinople was captured and savagely sacked. In place of Byzantium, the Latin Empire was founded in 1204, but it was short-lived. In 1261 it ceased to exist and Constantinople again became the capital of Byzantium.

The most monstrous page of the Crusades was children hike, held around 1212-1213. At this time, the idea began to spread that the Holy Sepulcher could only be emptied by innocent children's hands. From all European countries, crowds of boys and girls aged 12 years and older rushed to the coast. Many children died along the way. The rest reached Genoa and Marseilles. They didn't have a plan to move forward. They assumed that they would be able to walk on water “like on dry land”, and the adults who were engaged in the propaganda of this campaign did not take care of the crossing. Those who came to Genoa dispersed or perished. The fate of the Marseille detachment was more tragic. Merchants-adventurers Ferrey and Pork agreed "for the sake of saving their souls" to transport the crusaders to Africa and sailed with them on seven ships. The storm sank two ships along with all the passengers, the rest were landed in Alexandria, where they were sold into slavery.

There were eight Crusades in total to the East. By the XII-XIII centuries. include the campaigns of the German feudal lords against the pagan Slavic and other peoples of the Baltic. The indigenous population was subjected to Christianization, often by force. On the territories conquered by the crusaders, sometimes on the site of former settlements, new cities and fortifications arose: Riga, Luebeck, Revel, Vyborg, etc. In the XII-XV centuries. organized crusades against heresies in Catholic states.

Results of the Crusades are ambiguous. The Catholic Church significantly expanded its zone of influence, consolidated land ownership, and created new structures in the form of spiritual and chivalric orders. At the same time, the confrontation between the West and the East intensified, jihad became more active as an aggressive response to the Western world from the Eastern states. The IV Crusade further divided the Christian churches, planted in the consciousness of the Orthodox population the image of the enslaver and enemy - the Latin. In the West, a psychological stereotype of distrust and hostility has been established not only towards the world of Islam, but also towards Eastern Christianity.