THE HISTORY OF THE CRUSADES

Long before pope Urban II made his impassioned plea at Clermont, the Italian cities were fighting the Saracens on land and sea. During the four centuries preceding 1095 they suffered from seemingly endless raids and plunderings; sometimes they allied themselves with the enemy to attack other cities; on occasion they met him with force, and these occasions increased in number and gained in success. Eventually, in 915 the southern cities, in alliance with Byzantine and papal forces, drove the Saracens from their last stronghold on the peninsula, and a century later the northern cities attacked the various Arab maritime bases nearby. Finally, in the eleventh century the Pisans and Genoese raided the African coast itself, and forced terms of peace upon the Saracen leader, among them the promise to refrain from further piracy. With this victory and peace, made in 1087, control over the western Mediterranean passed from the Arabs to the Italian cities.

The first period in the Italo-Arab relations ran from 652 to 827. During these years the Arabs attacked and plundered the south Italian cities and especially the nearby islands almost at will, because the Byzantines and Italians were unable to maintain garrisons everywhere. The attackers shifted their raids in accordance with the Italian defense and preparedness. But they remained mere pirates, since their mainland and maritime forces were occupied elsewhere. The Arabs, by force and diplomacy, had to subdue the Berbers of North Africa; temporarily united with them, the Arabs reached Gibraltar and easily crossed into Spain and advanced to the Pyrenees. Not until the Arabs were stopped in 732 and driven from Gaul in 769, that is, not until they had been stopped in western Europe, did they direct their main attacks upon mid-Europe, upon Italy and its neighboring islands.

The earliest recorded Arab raid upon Sicily took place in 652. A general of Muawiyah I directed it, very likely from Syria, seemingly as part of a determined campaign against Byzantine sea power. Syracuse felt the impact most and lost much of its wealth and treasures and many of its citizens to the plunderers. In 669 an Alexandrian fleet of two hundred ships pillaged Sicily again. These two expeditions, originating in the eastern Mediterranean, were possible because the Arabs had shattered Byzantine eastern naval power in a series of battles between 649 and 655. Western Byzantine naval strength suffered a disastrous defeat in 698, when the Arab land and sea forces of Hassan ibn-an-Nu'man captured Carthage. With its capture the Arabs acquired another maritime base of operations and began their control over the western Mediterranean. Both were of ominous significance for Italy and the Italian cities.

Musa ibn-Nusair, who became governor of North Africa shortly after the capture of Carthage, recognized the possibilities and need of maritime power. At Tunis he ordered the construction of harbor facilities and shipyards, and eventually of a fleet of one hundred ships. Nearby Italy soon felt the results of his activities. In 700 the Arabs took over Pantelleria, in 704 they successfully plundered western Sicily, and in 705 they attacked Syracuse, but lost ships and men in a storm. Elsewhere, the first Arab raid upon Sardinia took place in 711 and upon Corsica in 713, and both islands were soon controlled by Arab forces. Again in 720 Arab raiders touched upon Sicily and in almost every year between 727 and 734; negotiations were undertaken and a truce was signed in 728, but the truce did not prevent the raids of 18o ships in the next year. In 740 the Syracusans preferred to pay tribute to the attackers to avoid a greater loss of property and life. Not till 733 and 734 did the Arabs meet with resistance from Byzantine naval forces, and in 752 and 753 Byzantine ships and defenses again held off the Arabs, this time seemingly intent upon conquest rather than upon plunder. Thereafter, for about fifty years the Italians enjoyed a respite from Arab attacks. When the military successes and advances in Gaul stopped, and as the control of the eastern caliphs lessened, civil wars in North Africa broke out; through them strong-armed Berber and Arab leaders set up independent states in Spain and North Africa. Among these the Aghlabid state around Kairawan, the Idrisid state centered in Morocco, and Umaiyad Spain initiated and carried out raids and campaigns against Italy. When the Aghlabids began in earnest their conquest of Sicily in 827, the Italians realized that a new period in their relations with the Arabs had arisen.

The second period in the Italo-Arab relations, roughly covering the ninth century, was a disastrous period for the south Italian cities. The dukes of these cities fought one another instead of offering a united defense against the Saracens, and quite often in their inter-municipal rivalries they called in the common enemy. In their ambition for power and hope of independence they limited and curtailed the power and forces of old Byzantium in the east, of the new Carolingian empire in the west, and of the Roman papacy, none of which was capable of defeating the Saracens single-handedly. On the other hand, the various Arab groups, even though disunited, were strong enough individually to establish settlements because of the inadequate Christian forces. As a result, all south Italy, cities and country alike, suffered from Arab plunder and occupation. Not until the end of the period, when the two empires had already obtained partial successes and when the papacy offered vigorous leadership, did the south Italian cities make common cause with them, to Garigliano river.

The century began auspiciously. In 805 Ibrahim ibn-al-Aghiab, the emir at Kairawan, signed a ten-year truce and trade agreement with Constantine, the patrician of Sicily; the emir needed his forces and strength to consolidate his holdings in Africa, and he hoped that this arrangement might serve to curb the ambitions of the Spanish Umaiyads and the western Ithisids. In Europe Charlemagne fitted out an Aquitanian and an Italian fleet, partially built and manned by Italians, to patrol the western Mediterranean. But as before, the truce proved ineffective. On his side, the emir at Kairawan was in no position to speak for the other Saracens beyond his state, and Constantine could hardly control the actions and plans of the Byzantine emperor, of Charlemagne, and of the pope. Charlemagne's son, king Pepin of Italy, and his constable Burchard had minor successes, but failed to wrest Corsica from the Arabs in campaigns between 806 and 810. In one of these, in 806, Hadumarus, the first Frankish count of Genoa, lost his life. Both Corsica and Sardinia remained under Arab control. The Aghlabids directed other assaults upon Lampedusa, off the African coast, and upon Ponza and Ischia, off the Italian shore near Naples, all in 812. A Byzantine fleet under the patrician Gregory, refused aid by Naples, but helped by Gaeta and Amalfi, eventually defeated the attackers, and another truce was arranged in the next year. But while the Aghlabids were curbed, Umaiyads from Spain swept over the Tyrrhenian Sea and plundered Nice, Civita Vecchia, Corsica, and Sardinia, despite the defensive measures of Charlemagne and pope Leo III.

In 827 the Aghlabid conquest of Sicily began in earnest; it was not complete till 902. Ziyadat-Allah I, the third emir of Kairawan, felt himself strong enough to undertake an expedition of expansion, similar to the one into Spain a century before. Like that one, too, the Sicilian expedition was prompted by civil war and by a traitorous appeal for help by Euphemius, the Byzantine leader, who had set himself up as emperor. For Arab help and recognition of his imperial position in Sicily Euphemius agreed to accept the emir as his titular overlord and to pay a tribute consonant with that relationship. After considerable debate the Arab leader agreed to help, but the size of the Arab force indicated that the Arabs had plans quite different from those of Euphemius. A fleet of seventy or one hundred ships carried 10,000 foot-soldiers and seven hundred horsemen from Susa in Tunisia to Mazara in western Sicily, not merely to plunder and return, nor to help a usurper, but to conquer and remain. The Saracens defeated the outnumbered but heroic Byzantine garrisons, disregarded Euphemius and his troops, and moved inward and eastward, toward Syracuse.

That all-important city the Arabs besieged by land and sea for over a year; not until famine and pestilence had decimated some of their forces, and a Byzantine-Venetian fleet threatened the rest, did they raise the siege. They burned their own ships and fled into the interior; driven from Mineo and Enna and abandoning Agrigento, they returned to Mazara, their starting point two years before. Spanish Arabs, who unexpectedly appeared for purposes of plunder, supported the retreating Aghlabids, renewed the attack, and plundered as far as Minco, but then retreated to Mazara, whence they sailed to Spain. At the same time, in 828, a Frankish fleet under count Boniface of Tuscany cleared the waters around Corsica and Sardinia and successfully plundered the African coast between Utica and Carthage. Byzantine land and sea forces, aided by the Venetians, had frustrated for the moment the Arab conquest of the island.

The second effort at conquest, however, succeeded and eventually led to the occupation of the entire island. In 830 an African fleet of three hundred ships and some Spanish squadrons attacked and besieged Palermo, the second city on the island. After a year the strategic port fell to the besiegers, for whom it became the base of operations against the rest of the island and, more significantly, against the mainland. In spite of active Byzantine resistance and occasional successes the Arabs consolidated and increased their holdings. They took a decade to drive out stubborn garrisons and to capture strongholds; by 840 they controlled western Sicily and could turn to other parts of the island. In 843 they captured Messina after a long siege and a surprise land attack; with its capture they controlled the Strait of Messina and so could prevent the entrance of Byzantine naval forces into western waters. Actually, they were assisted by the Neapolitans, on whose behalf they had intervened against duke Sikard of Benevento, when the latter had laid siege to their city in 837. Not only political, but economic considerations, too, prompted the Christians of Naples to aid the enemy, for only in friendly alliance with the Arabs were they able to carry on their commerce since the eastern Mediterranean was already closed to them, by other Arabs and by the Venetians.

With Palermo and Messina in hand, the Arabs turned to the southeastern part of the island, especially toward Syracuse. They easily overran the countryside, and from its plunder and enslaved inhabitants they lived, but much more slowly did they conquer the fortified cities. But by constant attack, through devastation of the countryside, aided by starvation and plague, and on occasion by treachery, they took the cities that guarded the approaches to the all-important port. Modica fell in 845, Lentini in 847, and Ragusa in 848. Stubborn Enna in central Sicily was given to them by treachery in 859. The sea outpost Malta was captured in 870. Syracuse itself fell in 878 after a heroic nine-month defense against Saracen land and sea forces. One Byzantine fleet was defeated and partially captured during the period, and another was awaiting favorable winds in Greece when the siege ended. In 902 Taormina, the last Byzantine stronghold on the island, fell to the Saracens. Here no heroic defense could be made, because the Byzantine admiral Eustace was in conspiracy with the enemy. The Arab conquest of Sicily was complete.

Even before the Arabs had acquired that island base, they had attacked the Italian cities on the mainland. Neither the measures of the Byzantine and Carolingian empires nor the appeals and plans of the Roman popes were sufficient to forestall Saracen plunder and settlement, while the inter-municipal rivalries and the constant strife between the coastal cities and the dukes of Benevento often were opportune for just such activities of the enemy.

The Arabs first appeared on the Italian mainland in 837, when the Napolitans begged them for help against the ambitious duke Sikard of Benevento, who was besieging their city. For the Napolitans it was an act of desperation, since their earlier appeals to Louis the Pious and other Christians remained unanswered. But the Arabs came, lifted the siege of the angry duke, plundered his own lands, and signed a treaty of friendship and trade with Naples. The latter reciprocated by aiding the Saracens at Messina in 842-843. But the friendship did not restrain the Arabs from occupying the islands of Ponta and Ischia and Cape Miseno on the mainland. Arab ships threatened the coastal shipping, and their land forces plundered the countryside. The new duke at Naples, Sergius I, repudiated the earlier policy and initiated an alliance with Gaeta, Amalfi, and Sorrento in 845; these cities fitted out ships to protect the Campanian shores and already in 846 duke Sergius broke up an Arab siege of his own city and led this fleet to victory over the Arabs off Point Licosa. In 846, too, Rome was visited by an Arab force of 73 ships. In spite of the walls rebuilt at the request of pope Gregory IV and the repeated warnings of the imminent attack, Ostia and Porto were overrun, and at Rome the basilica of St. Peter and the cathedral of St. Paul, on the right bank of the Tiber and outside the city-walls, were plundered. The Romans themselves and the small Frankish garrison were unable to stop the enemy, while the land forces of Louis II and the naval forces from the cities arrived too late to prevent the incursion. However, when the Saracens, already laden with Roman treasures, laid siege to Gaeta, they were stopped by allied fleets from Gaeta, Naples, and Amalfi. They were allowed to depart peaceably, only to be destroyed by storm; they lost their ships and their stolen treasures, but they retained their bases for further attack.

At Rome pope Leo IV wisely began the refortification of the city. The old walls and towers, partially destroyed in 846, were rebuilt and others were added, and the Porta Portuensis was constructed to guard and close the Tiber in case of another sea attack. All the Vatican area in which St. Peter's stood was walled in, to become the Civitas Leonina. The costs of construction were borne by the church and individual monasteries, by the nobles and citizens of Rome, and by the people of the Frankish empire, in which the emperor Lothair ordered a general subscription for the purpose. Leo IV also provided fortified places of refuge for Corsicans and others at Lorto and Leopoli, and at Orte and Ameria in interior Tuscany. Before the defenses were finished, however, the Saracens appeared. In 849 a large Saracen fleet assembled off the Sardinian coast and then sailed toward Ostia. The south Italian cities recognized the common threat and Caesarius, son of duke Sergius I of Naples, led a fleet from Naples, Gaeta, and Amalfi northward. Received with caution by the Romans, then hailed with joy, the fleet was blessed by pope Leo IV before giving battle to the enemy. During the battle a storm destroyed most of the enemy ships; many survivors were hanged, and others were put to work on the walls and towers. Of the Italian fleet little is known, but at least it had waylaid the Saracens until the storm approached. In the same year the Saracens also raided the Italian coast from Luni to Provence.

The Saracens were also active in the Adriatic and in southeast Italy, and here as on the other side of the peninsula they were aided by the differences among the Italians. In 838 they occupied Brindisi and ravaged the area about, but were driven out of the burnt-out city by duke Sikard of Benevento. In 840 his successor settled down in these southern bases, while others, some in compliance with the orders of Radelgis of Benevento, some in defiance of him, moved into the interior. Saracen bands plundered from Cannae to Capua and moved northward. Duke Siconolf of Salerno also called upon the Saracens of Taranto to join him against Radelgis and the Saracens at Bari. The rivalry of the two men brought the Saracen peril to all south-central Italy. Under the circumstances king Louis II, pope Leo IV at Rome, the doge Peter of Venice, and duke Sergius of Naples in 847 took a hand against the two dukes and the Saracen danger which the ducal rivalry had encouraged. The two dukes were forced to agree to a truce and to join the drive against the Saracens. An imperial force defeated and drove one Saracen group back to Bari, but it could not take the city; another force defeated the Saracens who were in the employ of Radelgis at Benevento. Unfortunately, the Arabs still maintained their control over Bari and Taranto, in which they strengthened the walls and towers, and over the southern provinces of the peninsula. In these areas other Arabs settled to give protection to the coastal bases. From them the Saracens repeatedly raided the interior and threatened Monte Cassino and San Vincenzo. King Louis, called in by the monasteries in 852, again failed before the walled cities. Within the same decade the threatened monasteries bought off other Saracen bands, and cities like Naples and Capua were plundered, all the duchy of Benevento was overrun, and most of Campania also, As long as the Saracens held their naval bases, they remained a threat, since neither the imperial nor the ducal forces were willing or able to drive them out

Finally, in 866 Louis II now emperor, heeded the persistent pleas of Benevento and Capua. He recruited large forces in north and central Italy and compelled the south Italian dukes and cities to abandon their local rivalries and to join him in a full-scale campaign against the Saracens at Bari. He carried out a methodical, but often interrupted, plan of attrition against the enemy by destroying or occupying the fortress towns in the approaches to the naval base. Canosa, Venosa, and Matera were occupied, but again he could not take Bari because of the lack of sea power. In 868 a large Byzantine fleet did appear before the city, but then the imperial land forces were inadequate and the four hundred Byzantine ships sailed back to Corinth when negotiations for the marriage between Louis's daughter and Basil I's son failed to reach a satisfactory conclusion. A Venetian force, however, crippled a Saracen fleet off the port of Taranto in 867. The emperor also had to protect his land forces against attack from the rear by those Saracens who were coming into Italy through Naples, since there duke Sergius II, in order to maintain his independence of the emperor, had aligned himself with the enemy. However, the emperor was fortunate in having the active support of Venice and the Dalmatian towns. While their naval forces blockaded the port, he attacked the city on the land side. After four years of intermittent warfare the emperor successfully concluded the campaign by taking Bari in 871. It was a decisive blow to the Arabs and initiated the gradual lessening of their power on the mainland. But the leadership and success of the emperor Louis were repaid with treachery. Sergius of Naples, Waifar of Salerno, Lambert of Spoleto, and Adelchis of Benevento conspired against him, their henchmen ambushed him, and they held him prisoner till he swore never to return to southern Italy. In that way they hoped to maintain their independence of imperial sovereignty. But when a force of 30,000 African Saracens threatened Salerno it was another story. In 872 the traitors again welcomed the imperial forces, which drove out the Saracens and raised the siege of Salerno.

But the Saracen threat continued, and the Christian defense deteriorated in the last decades of the century, before the final decisive battle. The death of the emperor Louis II introduced civil war among the claimants to the imperial throne, and the eventual winner, Charles the Bald, could have little interest in southern Italy when his authority was questioned and his own Gallic domains were threatened. In southern Italy itself the cities and their dukes fought one another as before, made commercial and military agreements with the Saracens instead of presenting a united front, and so permitted the enemy to regain the initiative. In the Adriatic Saracens, possibly from Crete, in 887 ravaged the Dalmatian coast, especially the island of Brazza, and appeared before Grad and burned out Comacchio in 875, but Venetian squadrons maintained their supremacy there, even though limited by the Saracen occupation of Sicily and Crete. On land, only the revived Byzantine authority at Bari stopped the ravages in southeast Italy and in 880 a Byzantine force regained Taranto.

But these successes were neutralized by setbacks on the west coast. There, fear of the revived Byzantine power, hope of avoiding Saracen plunder, and expectation of commerce with Sicily prompted the Italian cities again to align themselves with the Moslems. Naples, Gaeta, Salerno, Capua, even Amalfi, joined with the Saracens to raid the Roman littoral in 876 and 877; Naples served as the base of Saracen operations. Pope John VIII was unable to prevent the spoliation of monastic lands and the capture of monks and nuns. Since he could not obtain aid from Charles the Bald, he was dependent upon the south Italian cities, who already had made common cause with the enemy, and upon Byzantium with which he was in conflict over the status of the patriarch Photius. Eventually, by threat and cajolery, by promise and gift, by negotiation to have the hated Byzantines patrol the Tyrrhenian Sea, he momentarily detached the cities from their Saracen alliance, but they returned to it when it served their interests. Amalfi agreed to protect the Roman coast against attack, but withdrew when the promised papal subsidy was not completely paid. Thus in 878 pope John VIII had to buy off the Saracens. To his dismay, the Amalfitans not only refused to return the 10,000 mancitsi already paid to them, but they formed an alliance with the Saracens. A proposal for combined action by Salerno, Benevento, and the Byzantine forces, which had already gained control over Calabria, also was nullified by the petty rivalry between the two cities over Capua after the death of its duke in 879. The cities and duchies of southern Italy refused to form a common anti-Saracen front under papal auspices; they cooperated with the Byzantines and aligned themselves with the Saracens in accordance with their individual ambitions and needs. As a result of this policy, the abbeys of San Vincenzo on the Volturno and the more famous Monte Cassino were burned and destroyed around 883, the abbey of Farfa was besieged in 890, and Subiaco was also destroyed. The Arabs entrenched themselves firmly and comfortably along the Garigliano river at Trajetto and, more closely to Rome, at Ciciliano and Saracinesco; from these bases they plundered at will. Finally, pope John X succeeded in organizing a successful campaign against them. He won over the Byzantines, some of the south Italian princes, and even cities like Naples, Gaeta, Capua, and Salerno. At the Garigliano river, in 915, this alliance — and pope John was on the field — defeated the last remaining Arab force on the Italian mainland; even in this battle the princely leaders of Naples and Gaeta connived to help the enemy escape. It was of no use; the Saracens were hunted down; and the period of Arab occupation in Italy was over.

In the final period of these relations, the chief, although not the exclusive, activity came from the northern cities of the peninsula. Like those of the south, they at first suffered from Arab attacks, but unlike those of the south they never formed alliances with them and very quickly took the offensive against them. To Genoa and Pisa falls the honor of having done most to clear the western Mediterranean of the Arab menace.

From Sicily and from Africa the Arabs harassed the southern cities after the events of 915. Taking Reggio in 918, the Arabs overran Calabria and sold many inhabitants into slavery in Sicily and Africa. They easily overcame the Byzantine resistance and laid siege to Naples. By continued threats and assaults upon Christian shipping they extorted tribute from the coastal cities, and when the latter refused to pay, they attacked them as well. Such was the case in 1016-1017 when Salerno was besieged and occupied, only to free itself with the aid of pilgrims returning from Jerusalem. In the southeast both Taranto and Bari suffered from similar assaults in 1002. Bari was saved by the timely aid of a Venetian fleet which came to the aid of the Byzantine forces. In a three-day battle the Venetians won a brilliant victory to enhance their own prestige and the standing of the doge Orseolo II. But smaller raids always took place and shipping was never secure.

In the tenth century the northern littoral also felt the fury of the Arab bands. Here around 888 Spanish Arabs established themselves at La Garde-Freinet (Fraxinetum) in Provence, in an almost impregnable position. On land they very soon controlled the Alpine passes and so endangered, and at times stopped altogether, the course of pilgrims and merchants between the west and Italy. They destroyed the abbey of Novalesa in 906 and plundered Aix-en-Provence around 935. In 931 a Byzantine fleet and Provençal land forces attacked, but did not eliminate, the base; and a more successful attack in 942 was partially nullified by king Hugh of Italy, who made a separate peace with the Arabs on their promise to hold the Swabian passes against Berengar of Ivrea. In 972 the Arabs finally overreached themselves by capturing the revered abbot of Cluny, St. Maiolus, and fellow pilgrims in the Great St. Bernard Pass. The cluniacs raised the enormous ransom demanded by the Arabs, but the count of Provence and Ardoin of Turin united to clear the enemy out of the passes and La Garde-Freinet.

Genoa and Pisa also suffered from various Arab fleets. In 934 and 935 the whole area between Genoa and Pisa suffered from attacks originating in Africa. Genoa especially was subjected to massacre, many women and children were enslaved, and many of the treasures of the city and churches were robbed. But Pisa suffered on several other occasions, in 1004, 1011…. In 1015 Spanish Arabs from Denia and the Baleares occupied Sardinia and raided the coast between Genoa and Pisa. From their many bases the Arabs easily controlled the western waters and so limited the economic life of the north Italian cities. In the previous period the coastal cities had suffered, to be sure, but the Saracens, once in control of or in alliance with these cities, were more active in the country and against the monastic centers. In this period, the country was relatively safe, but the coastal cities suffered most because their all-important commerce was being ruined, for they were the special targets of the Arab raiders, and their ships were the special goal of the Arab pirates.

That threat convinced the two northern communes that more than mere defensive measures were necessary. In the eleventh century Pisa and Genoa took the offensive, at times in joint enterprises, at times singly, to make the Tyrrhenian Sea and, if possible, the western Mediterranean safe for Christian merchants and ships. Pisa carried out a small raid of vengeance against Reggio and united with the Genoese in the larger expedition against the new Arab settlements on Sardinia. In 1015 the fleets of the two cities, encouraged by pope Benedict VIII, finally drove the Arabs from the island and the Pisans occupied it; al-Mujahid barely escaped, leaving wife and sons in the hands of the Italians. Several years later, in 1034, the Pisans, and possibly also the Genoese and Provençals, carried the offensive to Bona, the Saracen base in North Africa; the captured booty they gave to the monastery of Cluny. In 1062 or 1063 the Pisans forced their way into the harbor of Palermo and destroyed the Saracen arsenal, burned five merchantmen, and used the booty from a sixth to start construction of their duomo, Santa Maria Maggiore. In 1087 a combined force of Italian cities again carried the attack to an African base, this time against Mandia. From this base, Saracen pirates had plundered and captured Italian ships and merchants. Therefore pope Victor III found it easy to persuade the victims, Pisans, Genoese, Romans, and Amalfitans, to send a force of three to four hundred ships arid 30,000 men against such an enemy; the expedition served under the papal legate, bishop Benedict of Modena. The assault was tremendously successful, even though Tamim had warning of the threat. The Italians captured all of Zawilah, a merchant suburb, and almost all of Mandia itself before Tamim asked for terms of surrender. He paid out, according to various Arab sources, 90,000 to 100,000 dinars of gold and granted to the Pisan and Genoese merchants free access to Mandia and the area under his jurisdiction. In addition he freed his Christian prisoners and promised to stop piratical raids. The incidental plunder in gold, silver, silks, and vessels was extraordinary, and with it the Pisans and the Genoese began the construction of their churches dedicated to St. Sixtus, on whose feast day (August 6) the victory was gained!

In the Pisan annals of Bernardo Maragone the next reference is to the call of pope Urban II and to the Pisan participation in the First Crusade. It is not surprising. The Italian cities had fought and defeated the Arabs in the western Mediterranean, often upon the request of the Roman popes and under the leadership of papal legates. They had carried the battle to the Arab bases in Africa, Spain, and the Mediterranean islands, and in the last great campaign of 1087 they had won commercial rights and privileges. For them participation in the First Crusade was natural.

It is a common trait among men and women to wish to visit the sites connected with the lives of those whom they admire; and the idea of pilgrimage has played a large part in most of the great religions of the world. Before ever the Christian era began pious Buddhists were traveling to pay their respects at the shrines where the Buddha and his chief disciples had lived and taught. Later on Islam was to teach that the journey to Mecca should be the aim of every pious Moslem.

From the earliest times Christians felt a desire to see for themselves the places hallowed by the incarnate God, where Christ was born and preached and suffered. They inherited from the Jews a particular respect for the city of Jerusalem, and as the scene of the crucifixion it became doubly holy to them. Moreover, there soon arose a feeling that the martyrs when suffering for the faith were able to grant a special remission of sins, a libellus or warrant of reconciliation with God; and gradually it was believed that the spot where a martyrdom had occurred acquired something of the remissory power. Calvary, sanctified by the greatest martyrdom of all, was inevitably held to be peculiarly potent. At the same time relics, either the bodily remains of the saints or objects that had played a part in the life of Christ or of a saint, were popularly supposed to possess the same power; and in time, through stages that we cannot now trace, the church gave recognition to what had become an almost universal belief.

During the first two centuries of the Christian era it was not easy to make the pilgrimage to Palestine. Jerusalem itself had been destroyed by Titus, and the Roman authorities did not approve of journeys thither. The fall of Jerusalem had resulted in the triumph of St. Paul's conception of Christianity over that of St. James, and the church sought to stress its universality at the expense of its Jewish origins. But the holy places were not forgotten. It is significant that Hadrian, when he rebuilt Jerusalem, deliberately erected a temple to Venus Capitolina on the site of Calvary. When, after the triumph of the Cross, the empress Helena came to Palestine, the tradition that she found there was strong enough for her to be able to identify all the sacred sites. Even before her time pilgrims had travelled to Palestine. We hear of a bishop, Firmilian of Caesarea-Mazaca (Kayseri), who visited Jerusalem early in the third century, and of another Cappadocian bishop; Alexander, who followed a few years later. Origen about the same time talks of the "desire of Christians to search after the footsteps of Christ."

The official recognition of Christianity, combined with Helena's voyage and her pious labors, which her son Constantine endorsed by building the great churches of the Holy Sepulcher at Jerusalem and the Nativity at Bethlehem, let loose a stream of pilgrims bound for Palestine. The first to leave an account of his travels was a man from Bordeaux, who wrote out his itinerary in the year 333, when the emperor had barely completed his buildings. Some fifty years later an indefatigable lady called Aetheria, who probably came from France or Spain, wrote in detail of her experiences, which included a visit to Egypt and to Mount Sinai. About the end of the century St. Jerome moved to Palestine and settled at Bethlehem, and in his train came a number of fashionable but godly ladies from Rome. By the beginning of the next century the number of monasteries and hostels in Jerusalem where pilgrims could be housed was said to be over three hundred?

The fathers of the church were not altogether happy about this new fashion. Even Jerome, though he recommended a visit to Palestine to his friend Desiderius as an act of faith and declared that his sojourn there enabled him to understand the Scriptures more clearly, confessed that nothing really was missed by a failure to make the pilgrimage. St. Augustine openly denounced pilgrimages as being irrelevant and even dangerous. Of the Greek fathers, St. John Chrysostom, while wishing that his episcopal duties did not prevent him from traveling, mocked at the sight of a whole world in motion merely to look at Job's dung-hill.  St. Gregory of Nyssa remarked that pilgrimages were nowhere enjoined by Holy Writ, and he saw no merit in visiting Jerusalem, which was a rather ordinary town, indeed fuller than most towns of wicked persons, merchants, actors, and prostitutes." But the general public ignored such strictures, preferring to believe that the interesting journey brought spiritual merit as well.

In the middle of the fifth century the empress Eudocia, wife of Theodosius, settled in Jerusalem. It was then highly fashionable to reside there; and the empress showed her support of another fashion when she sent to her sister-in-law at Constantinople one of the most precious relics that she could find there, a portrait of the Mother of God said to have been painted by St. Luke. To many of the pilgrims crowding to Palestine half the point of the journey was the possibility of buying some important relic with which to sanctify their churches at home. The greater number of the early saints and martyrs had lived in the east, and it was in the east that their relics could be found. It was now generally held that divine aid could be obtained at the graves of the saints, as the Spaniard Prudentius and the Italian Ennodius taught, while St. Ambrose himself believed in the efficacy of relics and sought to discover some. St. Basil of Caesarea was a little more cautious. He was prepared to believe that relics might have some divine power, but he wished to be absolutely certain of their authenticity. Here again popular enthusiasm was undeterred by the caution of the fathers. The major Christian relics remained in the east, those of Christ being gradually moved from Jerusalem to Constantinople and those of the saints being preserved at their native homes. But it was often possible for a lucky pilgrim to acquire some lesser relic, while others were brought to the west by enterprising merchants. Not only did the hope of successful relic-hunting send more and more pilgrims to the cast, but also the arrival and possession of the relic of some eastern saint in their home town would inspire western citizens to visit the lands where their new patron saint had lived, Whole embassies would be dispatched with orders to bring home relics. Avitus, bishop of Vienne, sent special envoys to find him a piece of the True Cross at Jerusalem. St. Rhadegund, ex-queen of Clothar the Frank, employed agents who brought her a rich haul, including a fragment of the Cross, acquired at Constantinople, and the finger of St. Mamas of Cappadocia, several of whose other bones were obtained by pilgrims from Langres. Women were particularly zealous in this pursuit. It was a lady from Guienne who returned home with a phial containing the blood of St. John the Baptist, and a lady from Maurienne who brought back his thumb.

Throughout the sixth century pilgrims continued to visit the east in great numbers, and several Itineraries were written to help them on their way, such as those of the travelers Theodosius and Antoninus Martyr. There were still constant trade connections with the east; and it was not difficult for a pilgrim to obtain a passage in a merchant-ship, probably Syrian-owned, traveling between Provence or Visigothic Spain and the ports of Syria and Egypt."

With the Arab conquest of Syria and Egypt, the pilgrim-traffic was necessarily interrupted. For some centuries there was no sea-borne trade between the Moslem east and the Christian west. Pirates infested Mediterranean waters. The new rulers of Palestine were suspicious of strangers; and in any case the journey was increasingly expensive, and wealth in the west was declining. But intercourse was not entirely broken off; and the western church still thought with sympathy and longing of the holy places. Many of the popes were still of oriental origin and had oriental connections. In 652 pope Martin I was accused of friendly dealings with the Moslems and acquitted himself by showing that his motive was to be able to send alms to Palestine. While most pilgrims now contented themselves with journeys to nearer shrines, such as Rome, there were still some hardy enough to brave the perils of the east. In 670 the Frankish bishop, Arnulf, set out on travels that brought him to Egypt, Syria, and Palestine and home by Constantinople, but he was away for many years and suffered many hardships. We hear of other pilgrims of the time, such as the Picard, Vulphy of Rue, and the Burgundians, Bercaire and Waimer of Montier-en-Der.

In the eighth century the numbers increased. Pilgrimage was now fashionable amongst the English and the Irish, and seems to have been encouraged by the appearance of numerous Pognitentiedia, little books written by some hierarch recommending types of private penance. They were used first by the Celtic church; and the Anglo-Saxon expansion, combined with the missionary activities of such Celts as St. Columban, introduced them into general usage in the western church, They recommended pilgrimage as a means of penance, though they did not mention specific clesti¬nations.2° The most eminent of the English pilgrims was Willibald, who was to die as bishop of Eichstacht in Bavaria. In his youth, from 722 to 729, he made a long and uncomfortable journey from Rome to Jerusalem and back.21 Relations between the west and the Moslems soon, improved. When Charlemagne entered into some sort of alliance with the caliph Harun ar-Rashid, there was a sufficient number of pilgrims coming to Jerusalem for the emperor to find it worth while to obtain permission to have a hostel set up for them in the holy city. There were women again amongst the pilgrims, and there were Spanish nuns living attached to the Holy Sepulcher. There was another slight interruption in the course of the ninth century, owing to the growth of Moslem power in the Mediterranean and the establishment of Arabs in Crete and Sicily and southern Italy. When the Breton Bernard the Wise set out in 870, he had to obtain a passport from the Moslem emir of Bari, which, however, did not permit him to land at Alexandria. When he eventually reached Jerusalem he found Charlemagne's establishments still in working order, but they were shabby and the number of visitors had sadly declined. At the same time the beginning of the Norse invasions of the west added to the perils of travel and brought poverty in their train. Pilgrimages were for a while too expensive for the average man and woman.

By the beginning of the tenth century conditions in the Mediterranean had improved. The Moslems had lost their foothold in southeast Italy and were soon to lose their last pirate-nests in southern France. Crete was recovered for Christendom half way through the century; and the Byzantine fleet was already able to provide an effective police force. The Italian maritime cities were beginning to open up direct commerce with the Moslem ports. In the east the Abbasid caliphate was declining. Its vice-roys in Palestine were ready to welcome visitors who brought money into the country and who could be taxed; and when the Fatimid’s succeeded to the possession of Palestine, the appearance of good-will increased. It was now not difficult for a pilgrim to take a boat at Venice or Bari or Amalfi which would take him direct to Alexandria or some Syrian port. Most pilgrims, however, preferred to sail in an Italian ship to Constantinople and visit the renowned collection of relics there, and then go on by land to Palestine. Land travel was always cheaper than sea travel, and the Byzantine roads through Anatolia down into Syria were excellent, Most of the pilgrims had no other motive than a pious desire to see the holy places; but that certain holy places endowed the visitor with peculiar spiritual merit was now generally accepted. Shrines such as those of St. James at Compostela in Spain or of the archangel Michael at Monte Gargano in Italy, and all the shrines at Rome itself were held to have this quality, but those connected with the actual life of Christ in Palestine naturally outshone the others, The penitential value of a pilgrimage was also widely recognized. The first pilgrim whose name has survived as having made his journey for definitely expiatory reasons was a nobleman called Frornond who went from France to Jerusalem in the mid-ninth century. In the tenth century we hear of many distinguished criminals who followed his example. The crime of murder in particular needed such an expiation. The system had a practical value, for it removed criminals from the community for several months; and if they survived the arduous journey they returned spiritually refreshed.

The names of the pilgrims that are known to us are all of eminent personages, such as Hilda, countess of Swabia, who died on her journey in 969, or Judith, duchess of Bavaria, sister-in-law to Otto I, who was in Palestine in 970. Amongst the pilgrim-noblemen of the tenth century were the counts of Ardêche, Arcy, and Anhalt, Vienne, Verdun, and Gorizia. Amongst the churchmen were the bishop of Olivola, who made his journey in 920, and the abbots of Aurillac, Saint-Cybar, Saint-Aubin, and Flavigny. St. Conrad, bishop of Constance, made the pilgrimage on three separate occasions, and St. John, bishop of Parma, no less than six. Most of these important travelers were accompanied by a number of humbler followers who took advantage of the security that a large and distinguished company offered. It is doubtful if during the early years of the century many poor folk ventured to set out without the protection of some magnate. But in 910 count William I of Aquitaine founded the abbey of Cluny, and in a few decades Cluny became the center of a vast ecclesiastical nexus, closely controlled by the mother-house, which itself owed obedience to the papacy alone. The Cluniacs took an interest in pilgrimage, and soon organized the journey to the Spanish shrines. By the end of the century they were popularizing the journey to Jerusalem and were building hostels along the route for the benefit of poorer pilgrims. They particularly encouraged pilgrims from the neighborhood of their great houses. It was due to their persuasion that the abbot of Stavelot visited Palestine in 990 and the count of Verdun in 997. The great abbot Odilon, though he never succeeded in making the journey himself, induced many of his friends to go. The dukes of Normandy and the counts of Anjou both were devoted patrons of the Cluniac movement; and we find Fulk Nerra of Anjou making three journeys to Palestine, all well merited by his sins, and Richard III of Normandy collecting alms for the Palestinian shrines, which his brother duke Robert visited at the head of a large company in 1035. But it was the poorer folk that the Ourtiacs particularly helped and enabled to go east in smaller independent groups.26

Political events aided the Cluniacs in their work. About the beginning of the eleventh century the mad caliph al-Hakim began to persecute the Christians throughout his dominions and to destroy their churches, including the church of the Holy Sepulcher itself; and during his reign pilgrimage was dangerous. Later, he persecuted the Moslems as well; and after his death there was a reaction in favor of religious toleration. The Byzantine emperor Romanus III made a treaty with al-Hakim's successors allowing him to rebuild the Sepulcher, and the treaty was confirmed in the time of Constantine IX, who sent his own workmen to set about the work. The frontier between Byzantium and the Fatimid caliphate now ran to the Mediterranean near the town of Tortosa; and the frontier-officials were used to pilgrims. In Europe the Hungarians were converted to Christianity in 975; and in 1019 the emperor Basil II, the "Bulgar-slayer", annexed the whole Balkan peninsula to the empire. A pilgrim from central Europe or Flanders could therefore travel through the lands of the western emperor till he reached the Hungarian frontier near Vienna. He then crossed Hungary to the Byzantine frontier-town of Belgrade, and on through the Byzantine empire past Constantinople till he reached the Fatimid frontier between Latakia and Tortosa. It was a simple journey and, for a pilgrim that went by foot, not at all expensive. Pilgrims from France or Italy preferred to go by road to Apulia and cross the narrows of the Adriatic, a short and cheap sea-journey, to Dyrrachium and so on to Constantinople by the Via Egnatia, now cleared of all dangers from Bulgarian marauders. There were several hospices in Italy at which a pilgrim could stay, and a great hospice at Melk in Austria. At Constantinople the hospice of Samson was reserved for western pilgrims and the Cluniacs had a hospice nearby, at Rodosto (Tekirdagh); and at Jerusalem, when many of the older hospices fell into decay the merchants of Amalfi built about 1070 a great hospital dedicated to St. John the Almsgiver.

Sea routes were not abandoned, but were used now mainly by pilgrims from the Scandinavian sphere. From the early years of the tenth century the emperor at Constantinople recruited Norsemen for his palace guard, and by the end of the century they were numerous enough to form a separate regiment, the Varangian Guard. Many Scandinavians would come, either by the old route up and down the Russian rivers and across the Black Sea, or still more, now, past Britain and the Strait of Gibraltar, to Constantinople, and after serving for some years in the emperor's armies and amassing a comfortable fortune there, they would visit Palestine before returning home. Others came merely to visit the holy places. A Varangian officer called Kolskeggr went to Palestine in 992. Harald Hardrade, most illustrious of the Varangians, was therein 1034. The missionary to Iceland, Thorvald Kodransson, made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem about the year 990. After Olaf Trygvasson, first Christian king of Norway, mysteriously vanished in woo, many Norse pilgrims claimed to have seen him at the holy places. The Norse princes were particularly given to the crime of murder, and expiatory pilgrimages were therefore common amongst them. The half-Dane, Svein Godwinsson, set out barefoot with a party of Englishmen to seek pardon for a murder, and died of exposure while crossing the mountains of Anatolia. Lagman, king of the Isle of Man, who killed his brother, found peace for his conscience at Jerusalem. Most of the Scandinavian visitors made a round trip, coming by way of Gibraltar and returning by the Russian route.

By the middle of the eleventh century pilgrimages were under-taken on an enormous scale. An endless flow left western Europe in the early spring, uncertain when they would return, traveling sometimes in tiny groups and sometimes in parties of a thousand or more. The great pilgrimage led by German bishops in 10064 to 1065 was said to number over ten thousand men and women and probably in fact numbered seven thousand. It seems that great lords were allowed. to bring an armed escort, so long as it was well under control. But most pilgrims traveled unarmed. The pilgrimage was seldom risky to life, apart from the hazards of the weather in the Anatolian mountains. The roads were usually well policed, and food and water were usually available. The pilgrims were usually given a cordial reception by the local Orthodox at Jerusalem.31 But there were difficulties at times. When the Normans began to attack the Byzantine possessions in southern Italy, Norman pilgrims were treated very coldly by the emperor's officials. There were occasional troubles in Syria when some local emir rebelled against Fatimid rule. In 1055 the Byzantine governor of Latakia refused an exit-visa to bishop Lietbert of Cambrai, on the grounds that it was not safe for Christians to cross the frontier. The bishop, furious at this solicitude, was forced to go instead to Cyprus. He met several hundred Christians who had been turned out of Palestine. The great German pilgrimage, which crossed into Moslem territory against the advice of the Byzantines, found conditions there very unsatisfactory. It must, indeed,  have been difficult for the Moslem authorities to find food for so large and sudden an invasion, and the numbers roused resentment amongst the local Moslem population. There was trouble near Tripoli and a serious skirmish at Ramia. There were perpetual complaints of taxes and tolls levied by local authorities on travelers. The emperor Basil II told his customs-officials to levy a tax on pilgrims and their horses. Pope Victor H asked the empress Theodora to rescind the order in 1056. At the same time he complained that her officials levied taxes at the Holy Sepulcher itself. Presumably the Byzantines claimed the right to collect money there to pay for the work of restorations.

Such inconveniences were not frequent. Throughout the middle years of the eleventh century the travelers grew in numbers, encouraged by the ecclesiastical authorities. Eleventh-century literature bears frequent testimony to the desirability of the pilgrimage. The pilgrim was the exile of Christ, peregrinus or the poor man of Christ, pauper Christi. It seemed to the German pilgrims of 1064 that their coming to Jerusalem was the fulfillment of a prophecy? Pope Gregory VII condemned Cencius, who led a revolt against him in 1075, to the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. There seems to have been some doubt how effective one pilgrimage alone was in remitting the sins of great sinners. In 1049 the citizens of Narni saw a multitude of men dressed in glowing raiment passing through their town, and one of these radiant beings declared that they were all souls who had earned everlasting felicity, but were still obliged to continue without ceasing on an endless penitential journey to the holy places. So essential was it considered now to make the pilgrimage that the heroes of the past were provided by popular legend with a journey to the Holy Land. King Arthur was said to have visited Jerusalem, while the pilgrimage of Charlemagne came to be given universal credence. The  effect of it all was to create and sustain in the west an undying interest in the Holy Land and the road to Jerusalem, and to rouse indignant interest when the road seemed likely to be blocked.

The Turkish invasions of Palestine from 1071 onwards did not at first interfere much with the pilgrims. The first Turkish governors were cultured princes who had no wish to suppress a harmless source of revenue. But the collapse of Fatimid power meant the emergence of a number of petty emirates along the road from the north, and every petty emir wished to extract his share of tolls. Every few miles there was a new greedy and officious tax-collector; and when Turkish governor Artuk died in 1091, his sons were less complaisant, fearing that the Christians were working for a Fatimid restoration; and a large number of priests were exiled from the city. The Turkish invasions of Anatolia increased the difficulties of pilgrims. In the course of wars and raids and migrations of whole districts, roads went out of use, villages decayed, bridges fell down, and wells dried up or were deliberately blocked.dm A few well armed and equipped expeditions like that of count Robert I of Flanders in 1089 succeeded in penetrating through to the Holy Land; but most pilgrims suffered the fate of Peter the Hermit who was turned back with insults by the Turks while he was still on his way.

That such difficulties should arise at a moment when the pilgrimage to Jerusalem played so large a part in the minds of western Europeans gave a great impetus to any movement that advocated direct action. Pope Urban's phenomenal success when he preached the crusade at Clermont was due to his combination of the idea of pilgrimage with that of the holy war.

THE HISTORY OF THE CRUSADES