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

Christians established at Jerusalem went to meet the pilgrims, and often exposed themselves to a thousand dangers whilst conducting them on their route. The holy city contained hospitals for the reception of all travellers. In one of these hospitals the women who performed the pilgrimage to Palestine, were received by religious females devoted to the offices of charity. The merchants of Amalfi, Venice, and Genoa, the richest among the pilgrims, and several princes of the West, furnished, by their benevolence, the means of keeping these houses open for all poor travellers. [25]Every year monks from the East came into Europe to collect the self-imposed tribute of the piety of the Christians. A pilgrim was a privileged being among the faithful. When he had completed his journey, he acquired the reputation of particular sanctity, and his departure and his return were celebrated by religious ceremonies. When about to set out, a priest presented to him his scrip and staff, together with a gown marked with a cross; he sprinkled holy water over his vestments, and accompanied him, at the head of a procession, as far as the boundaries of the next parish. On his return to his country, the pilgrim gave thanks to God, and presented to the priest a palm-branch, to be deposited on the altar of the church, as an evidence of his undertaking being happily terminated.

The poor, in their pilgrimages, found certain resources against misery; when coming back to their country, they received abundant alms. Vanity sometimes induced the rich to undertake these long voyages, which made the monk Glaber say, that many Christians went to Jerusalem to make themselves admired, and to be enabled, on their return, to relate the wonders they had seen. Many were influenced by the love of idleness and change, others by curiosity and an inclination to see various countries. It was by no means rare to meet with Christians who had spent their lives in holy pilgrimages, and had visited Jerusalem several times.

Every pilgrim was obliged to carry with him a letter from his prince or his bishop, a precaution which must have prevented many disorders. History does not record a single act of violence committed by one of the travellers who absolutely covered the route to the East. A Mussulman governor, who had seen a vast number of them pass to Emessa, said: “They have not left their homes with any bad design; they only seek to fulfil their law.” [26]

Every year, at the period of the festivals of Easter, numberless troops of pilgrims arrived in Judea to celebrate the mystery of the Redemption, and to behold the miracle of the sacred fire, which a superstitious multitude believed they saw descend from heaven upon the lamps of the holy sepulchre. There existed no crime that might not be expiated by the pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and acts of devotion at the tomb of Christ. We find in the “Acts of the Saints,” that, in the time of Lothaire, this opinion was established among the Franks. An old relation, preserved by a monk of Redon, informs us that a powerful lord of the duchy of Brittany, named Frotmonde, the murderer of his uncle and his brother, presented himself in the habit of a penitent before the king of France and an assembly of bishops. The monarch and the prelates, as an expiation for the blood he had shed, caused him to be tightly bound with chains of iron, and ordered him to visit the holy places, his brow marked with ashes, and his body clothed in a winding-sheet. Frotmonde, accompanied by his servants and the accomplices of his crime, set out for Palestine; after having for some time sojourned at Jerusalem, he crossed the desert, went to the banks of the Nile, traversed a part of Africa, proceeded as far as Carthage, and came back to Rome, where Pope Benedict III. advised him to commence a new pilgrimage, to complete his penance and obtain an entire remission of his sins. Frotmonde saw Palestine a second time, penetrated as far as the shores of the Red Sea, remained three years on Mount Sinai, and went into Armenia, to visit the mountain on which the ark of Noah had rested after the deluge. On his return to his country he was received as a saint; he shut himself up in the monastery of Redon, [27]and died regretted by the cenobites whom he had edified by the relation of his pilgrimages.

Many years after the death of Frotmonde, Centius, prefect of Rome, who had used violence to the Pope in the church of St. Mary the Great, who had dragged him from the altar, and placed him in a dungeon, needed nothing more to expiate this sacrilege than to perform the pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Foulque-Nerra, count of Anjou, charged with crimes, and stained with blood, thought to efface all his cruelties by a voyage to Jerusalem. His brother, whom he had caused to perish in a dungeon, presented himself wherever he went, before his eyes; it appeared to him that the numerous victims sacrificed to his ambition in unjust wars issued from their tombs to disturb his sleep, and reproach him for his barbarity. Pursued everywhere by these frightful images, Foulque left his states, and repaired to Palestine, in the garb of a pilgrim. When he arrived at Jerusalem, he passed through the streets of the holy city with a cord about his neck, beaten with rods by his domestics, repeating in a loud voice these words: “Lord, have pity on a perjured and fugitive Christian.” During his abode in Palestine, [28]he bestowed numerous benefactions, comforted the miseries of the pilgrims, and left everywhere testimonials of his devotion and charity. He returned to his duchy, bringing with him a portion of the true cross, and the stone upon which he had knelt when he prayed before the tomb of Christ.

Foulque, on returning to his dominions, was desirous of having always under his eyes an image of the places he had visited, and caused to be built, near the castle of Loches, a monastery and a church, which bore the name of the Holy Sepulchre. In the midst of the remembrances of his pilgrimage, he still heard the voice of remorse, and set off a second time for Jerusalem. He once more edified the Christians of the holy city by the expressions of his repentance and the austerities of his penance. As he was returning to his duchy, in passing through Italy, he delivered the Roman state from a brigand who plundered the towns and villages, and made war upon all merchants and pilgrims. The pope praised his zeal and his bravery, gave him absolution for his sins, and permitted him to bear about with him the relics of two holy martyrs. When he left Rome, he was conducted in triumph by the people and the clergy, who proclaimed him their liberator. On his arrival in Anjou, he re-established peace in his dominions, which had been in great confusion during his absence. Restored to his country, his family, and his subjects, who had forgotten his cruelties; reconciled with the Church, which declared him its benefactor, he appeared to have no more crimes to expiate, or wishes to form for his old age; but neither the absolution of the pope, nor the peace of his states, nor the blessings of the people—nothing could calm his soul, for ever torn with remorse. He could not escape from the image of his brother, which pursued him still, and recalled to his mind the crimes with which he had stained himself. Without cessation he was before him, pale, disfigured, dragging his chains, and invoking heaven to take vengeance on the fratricide. Foulque resolved to make a third pilgrimage to Jerusalem; he returned into Palestine, watered anew the tomb of Christ with his tears, and made the holy places resound with his groans. After having visited the Holy Land, and recommended his soul to the prayers of the anchorites charged to receive and console pilgrims, he quitted Jerusalem to return to his country, which he was doomed never to see again. He fell sick, and died at Metz. His body was transported to Loches, and buried in the monastery of the Holy Sepulchre, which he had caused to be built. His heart was deposited in a church at Metz, where was shown, for many ages after his death, a mausoleum, which was called the tomb of Foulque, count of Anjou.