Joseph François Michaud - The History of the Crusades (Vol.1-3)

The sultans of Damascus and Mossoul, with several emirs of Mesopotamia, assembled an army of thirty thousand fighting men, and penetrated through the mountains of Libanus into Galilee. During more than three months the banks of the Jordan and of the Lake of Genesareth were devastated by the horrors of war. The king of Jerusalem placed himself at the head of his knights to encounter this redoubtable enemy, and was defeated by the Saracens on the plains near Mount Tabor. Roger of Sicily, who had been governor of Antioch since the death of Tancred, and the counts of Tripoli and Edessa, came with their troops to the assistance of Baldwin. The Christian army, although it then mustered under its banners eleven thousand combatants, took up its encampment on the mountains, and did not dare to risk a battle. The Christians, intrenched upon the heights, beheld their fields ravaged and their cities burnt. All the banks of the Jordan seemed to be in flames; for a vast number of Saracens from Ascalon, Tyre, and other Mussulman cities, had taken advantage of the reverses of the Christians to lay waste many of the provinces of Palestine. The country of Sechem was invaded, and the city of Naplouse delivered up to pillage. Jerusalem, which was without defenders, shut its gates, and was in momentary fear of falling again into the power of the infidels.

The Turks, however, dreading the arrival of fresh pilgrims from the West, abandoned Galilee, and returned to Damascus and Mossoul. But other calamities soon followed those of war. Clouds of locusts from Arabia finished the devastation of the fields of Palestine. A horrible famine prevailed in the county of Edessa, the principality of Antioch, and all the Christian states. An earthquake was felt from Mount Taurus to the deserts of Idumea, by which several cities of Cilicia were reduced to heaps of ruins. At Samosata, an Armenian prince was swallowed up in his own palace; thirteen towers of the walls of Edessa, and the citadel of Aleppo, fell down with a fearful crash; the towers of the highest fortresses covered the earth with their remains, and the commanders, whether Mussulmans or Christians, fled with their soldiers to seek safety in deserts and forests. Antioch suffered more from the earthquake than any other city. The tower of the northern gate, many public edifices, and several churches were completely destroyed.

Great troubles always inspired the Christians with feelings of penitence. A crowd of men and women rushed to the church of St. Peter of Antioch, confessed their sins to the patriarch, and conjured him to appease the anger of Heaven. The shocks, nevertheless, were renewed during five months; the Christians abandoned the cities, and, a prey to terror, wandered among the mountains, which now were more thickly inhabited than the greatest cities. The few who remained in cities constantly formed religious processions, put on habits of mourning, and totally renounced pleasures of every kind. In the streets and the churches nothing was heard but lamentations and prayers; men swore to forgive all injuries, and were profuse in their charities. At length Heaven appeared to be appeased; the earthquake ceased its ravages, and the assembled Christians celebrated the mercy of God by a solemn festival.

Scarcely were the Christians delivered from these alarms than a new tempest threatened Syria and Palestine. [241]Maudoud, prince or governor of Mossoul, had been killed by two Ismaëlians, as he was coming out of a mosque. As the prince of Mossoul was considered the most firm support of Islamism and the most redoubtable enemy of the Christians, the caliph and the sultan of Bagdad placed him in the rank of the martyrs, and resolved to revenge his death. They accused the Franks and the sultan of Damascus of the murder of a Mussulman prince. A numerous army set out from the banks of the Tigris, and advanced towards Syria, to punish at the same time both the Christian and Mussulman infidels. The warriors of Bagdad, united with those of Mossoul, penetrated as far as the lands of Aleppo, and carried destruction and death wherever they went. In this pressing danger the Saracens of Damascus and Mesopotamia did not hesitate to form an alliance with the Christian princes. The king of Jerusalem, the prince of Antioch, and the count of Tripoli united their troops with those of the Mussulmans. The Christians were full of zeal and ardour, and were eager for battle, but their new allies were not willing to give them the advantage of a victory, as they mistrusted the soldiers of Christ, and used every effort to avoid a decisive engagement, in which they dreaded the triumph of their auxiliaries as much as that of their foes. After having ravaged the territory of Aleppo, and the banks of the Euphrates and the Orontes, the warriors of Bagdad returned to their own country without trying their strength with their formidable adversaries. The Christians in this campaign did not illustrate their arms by any very brilliant exploits, but they kept up the division among the Saracens, and the discord of their enemies was more serviceable to them than a great victory.

The king of Jerusalem, no longer having the Turks of Bagdad or the Turks established in Syria to contend with, turned his attention towards Egypt, whose armies he had so frequently dispersed. [242]He collected his chosen warriors, traversed the desert, carried the terror of his arms to the banks of the Nile, and surprised and pillaged the city of Pharamia, situated three days’ journey from Cairo. The success of this expedition gave him room to hope that he should one day render himself master of a great kingdom, and he was returning triumphant, and loaded with booty, to Jerusalem, when he fell sick at El-Arrich, on the confines of the desert which separates Egypt from Palestine. His life was soon despaired of, and the companions of his victories, assembled around him, could not conceal their deep sorrow. Baldwin endeavoured to console them by his discourses: “My dear companions,” said he to them, “you who have suffered so many evils and braved so many perils, why do you allow yourselves to be overcome by grief? Remember that you are still in the territories of the Saracens, and that you stand in need of all your customary courage. Consider that you only lose in me a single man, and that you have among you several warriors who surpass me in skill. Think of nothing but of returning victorious to Jerusalem, and of defending the heritage of Christ. If I have fought a long time with you, and my many labours give me the right of addressing a prayer to you, I conjure you not to leave my bones in a foreign land, but to bury them near to the tomb of my brother Godfrey.”

The king of Jerusalem then caused his servants to be assembled and gave them orders for his sepulture. After having nominated Baldwin du Bourg as his successor, he expired, surrounded by his companions, who, though deeply grieved, endeavoured to conceal their tears, that the Saracens might not learn the great loss the Christians had experienced.

Baldwin lived and died in the midst of camps. During his reign, which lasted eighteen years, the inhabitants of Jerusalem were annually warned of the approach of the Saracens by the sound of the great bell; and they scarcely ever saw the wood of the true cross in the sanctuary, for this sacred relic always accompanied the armies to battle, and its presence not unfrequently was sufficient to give victory to the Christians.

During the time he occupied the throne of Jerusalem, the only means Baldwin had of keeping up his necessary army arose from the tenths of the produce of the cultivated lands, some taxes upon commerce, the booty obtained from enemies, and the ransom of prisoners. When peace lasted some months, or war was unsuccessful, the revenues of the state were diminished to half their usual amount, and could not meet the most necessary expenses. The forces of the kingdom were scarcely sufficient to defend it in the hour of danger. Baldwin could never undertake any great enterprise except when reinforcements arrived from the West; and when pilgrims who bore arms returned to their own country, he was often obliged to abandon an expedition which he had begun, and sometimes found himself without means of resistance, when exposed to the attacks of an enemy always eager to avenge his defeats.