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PERIOD VI.

The period of the Crusades; extending from the First Crusade, 1095 years A. C., to the founding of the Turkish Empire, 1299 years A. C.

During this period, we have manifold proofs of the darkness o the times, with a singular mixture of a spirit of adventure, and lofty daring. The age was peculiarly characterised by the crusades, the passion for pilgrimages, the exploits of chivalry, and the production of romances. Barbarism and turbulence extensively prevailed, while the lights of science were few and dim. In England, however, there was the early dawn of literature.

THE CRUSADES.

SECT. 1. In giving an account of the CRUSADES, we include a portion of the history of the principal European nations. For this reason, less of the separate history of those nations will appear during this period, than would otherwise be introduced. The Crusades were common to all Christendom, and all felt a deep interest in them. The other peculiarities of the times, as pilgrimages, chivalry, the feudal system, &c. since they belonged to the established customs and institutions of Europe, will be unfolded in the General Views. In the Crusades, the political and military history of a great part of the world is carried on for a long time.

2. The Crusades were wars undertaken principally during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, by the Christian nations of Europe, on account of religion. They were termed Crusades, from the cross which was the badge of the combatants. The object of these wars was the deliverance of Palestine, and particularly the tomb of Jesus Christ from the dominion of the Turks or Mahometans.

The Turks, or Turcomans, a race of Tartars, having, in 1055, taken Bagdad, and thus overturned the empire of the caliphs, came into the possession of the countries which these caliphs had governed, and the caliphs themselves, instead of temporal monarchs, became sovereign pontiffs of the Mahometan faith. Palestine, and particularly Jerusalem, were of course under the sway of the Turks, and the seat of their religion.

In this situation of things, the resort of pilgrims to the tomb of our Saviour was attended with much difficulty and danger. While the Saracens held possession of the country, the pilgrims were permitted to have free access to the holy city; but its new masters, the Turks, were a more wild and ferocious people. They insulted and robbed those fanatical devotees a circumstance, in such an age, of sufficient importance to arouse all Europe for the deliverance of Jerusalem from the infidels. The Roman pontiffs were the principal instigators of these desperate adventures.

§ In an age of religious enthusiasm, and in an unenlightened state of society, it is not surprising that Judea should have been an object of veneration, or superstitious regard to the Christian world. Here the great events recorded in the sacred scriptures transpired—the chosen people of God subsisted through many generations—unnumbered miracles were performed-the Mosaic and Christian dispensations were set up-even God's own Son, the Messiah, lived, suffered, and died. Here prophets and apostles had preached, and written, and shed their blood in testimony of the truth, and every tenanted part, especially the Holy City, was marked by some divine interposition or manifestation, most dear to the lover of piety..

A country so hallowed, is capable, even now, of exciting the most delightful associations; and though we are in no danger of attempting any thing like a crusade, yet nothing relating to such a land can be contemplated without deep emotion. What sensations then must have been excited in a deeply enthusiastic and superstitious age! And much as we smile at their folly, how easily can we account for the ardour which was displayed by unlettered minds and fanatical tempers, on the subject of the crusades! Connected also, as was a pilgrimage to the holy land, with the idea of merit, and merit even sufficient to purchase salvation, nothing can be conceived more calculated to arouse every honourable and indignant feeling, than the obstructions in the way of such a devotion. It was a hardship not to be endured, that the Christian disciple should be prevented from approaching and musing over, with a sort of adoration, the sepulchre in which his blessed Redeemer was laid,

2 There were five* expeditions of the kind here spoken of, which, during nearly two centuries, drained from Europe most of its life-blood and treasures. All western Europe became involved in these destructive wars, but the French en tered upon them with more enthusiasm than any other na tion.

The first crusade was preached by Peter, commonly styled

* Some reckon a larger number.

the hermit. After having sufficiently excited Christendom by his rude eloquence, he found vast multitudes ready to engage in the hazardous undertaking. The popes, however, had for some time contemplated the same design, and Urban II., the reigning pontiff, availed himself of this opportunity of executing his splendid project of arming the whole of Christendom against the Mahometans, through the instrumentality of Peter. Two general councils were called and held on the subject, one at Placentia and the other at Clermont, and were attended by many thousands. The pope himself harangued the multitude, and offered to all who would engage in the service, plenary indulgence, and full absolution of sins.

Peter, who possessed none of the necessary qualities of a military leader, was placed at the head of this motley crowd of all ages, conditions, and character, amounting to eighty thousand men. They commenced their march towards the East, in the spring of 1096, and were soon followed by an addition of two hundred thousand persons of the same promiscuous description. They were any thing rather than a regularly appointed army, or efficient military force. Their progress was marked by outrages; not more than one third of them reached the scene of action; and those who did, were nearly all cut off in battle on the plain of Nice.

§ Peter the Hermit, was a native of Amiens, in Picardy, (France.) He seems to have been the first effectual mover of this mighty, and it may be properly added, mad project. His own pilgrimage to the tomb of our Saviour, had made him acquainted with the dangers and vexations to which pilgrims were exposed in Asia, and became the occasion or cause of the enterprise in which he embarked. Fired with a sense of his own wrongs, and those of his fellow pilgrims, he sought the gratification of revenge, or at least, the means of preventing the recurrence of those evils, in future. For this purpose he travelled from city to city, and from kingdom to kingdom, representing with a rude but pathetic eloquence, the grievances of the pilgrims, and urging the necessity of making a common effort against the common enemy of Christians and their religion. On this subject he exhorted all whom he met, and hesitated not to call on nobles as well as their vassals-the rich as well as the poor.

His applications of this kind were aided by his personal appearance. He was a monk, and exhibited all the austerity of that character. He was an enthusiast, and displayed more than an enthusiast's madness. He travelled bare headed, and with naked arms and legs, having only a part of his body covered with a coarse garment. He seemed wasted with fasting, and exhausted with anxiety

and toil. He bore aloft in his hand a ponderous crucifix, to which he pointed with the most animated gestures; nor did he restrain his prayers, whatever his situation might be, but poured his whole soul in loud and prolonged supplications in the streets and highways.

The body of enthusiasts who crowded around him was immense. Princes, noblemen, artisans, peasants, monks, and even women, manifested equal anxiety to bend their steps to the East, and expel the infidel hordes from the consecrated land. To the vicious and abandoned in character-to the ambitious and disorderly—to robbers, incendiaries, murderers, and other offenders, a fit opportunity was presented of procuring the pardon of their sins, and at the same time of indulging in unbounded lust and rapine.

As Malmsbury curiously observes, "the report of the council of Clermont, wafted a cheering gale over the minds of Christians. There was no nation so remote, no people so retired, as did not respond to the papal wishes. This ardent love not only inspired the continental provinces, but the most distant islands and savage countries. The Welshman left his hunting; the Scotch his fellowship with vermin; the Dane his drinking party; the Norwegian his raw fish." Robert of Normandy, after mentioning in general terms the contributions of men which France and England made to the holy war, thus singularly mixes other nations:

"Of Normandy, of Denmark, of Norway, of Bretagne,
'Of Wales, and of Ireland, of Gascony, and of Spain,
Of Provence, and of Saxony, and of Allemagne,

Of Scotland, and of Greece, of Rome and Aquitain"

At this time, "every wonderful event in the natural world was regarded as an indication of the divine will. Meteors and stars pointed at and fell on the road to Jerusalem. The skies were involved in perpetual storms, and the blaze and terror of anxious and disordered nature showed the terrific harmony of heaven with the sanguinary fury of earth. Man fully responded to the supposed calls of God. The moral fabric of Europe was convulsed; the relations and charities of life were broken; society appeared to be dissolved. Persons of every age, rank, and degree, assumed the cross. The prohibition of women from undertaking this journey was passed over in contemptuous silence. They separated themselves from their husbands where men wanted faith, or resolved to follow them with their helpless infants. Monks, not waiting for the permission of their superiors, threw aside their black mourning gowns, and issued from their cloisters full of the spirit of holy warriors. They who had devoted themselves to a solitary life, mistook the impulses of passion for divine revelations, and thought that heaven had annulled their oaths of retirement. A stamp of virtue was fixed upon every one who embraced the cause; and many were urged to the semblance of religion, by shame, reproach, and fashion. When families divided, nature and fanaticism contended for the mastery. A wife consented to the departure of her husband, on his vowing to return at the end of three years. Another in whom fear

was stronger than hope, was lost in violence of grief. The husband wore the semblance of indifference, unmoved by the tears of his wife and the kisses of his children, though his heart reproached him for the sternness of his countenance. On the other hand, fathers led their sons to the place of meeting-women blessed the moment of separation from their husbands, or if they lamented, it was from the cause they were not permitted to share the honours and perils of the expedition. In some instances, the poor rustic shod his oxen like horses, and placed his whole family in a cart, where was amusing to hear the children, on the approach to any large town or castle, inquiring if the object before them was Jerusalem."

Such was the disordered rabble that attempted the conquest of Palestine, and such the circumstances under which the expedition commenced. Only a small part of the vast multitude ever reached Asia. From the beginning they were illy provided with necessaries, and therefore had recourse to acts of rapine. Their progress, so destructive to the countries through which they passed, was frequently arrested by collision with their inhabitants. The Jews of Germany were the first sufferers; but it was in Hungary and Bulgaria especially, that the outrages committed by the Crusaders were visited upon their own heads. When they arrived at Constantinople, the emperor, Alexius Commenus, to whom they behaved themselves with the utmost insolence and folly, was not slow to rid himself of his troublesome guests. For this purpose he furnihsed them with every aid which they required, and lent his ships to transport them across the Bosphorus.

They thence pursued their march, but the Sultan Solyman meeting them on the plains of Nice, their numbers were too much reduced to offer him any thing else than an easy victory. Of their bones, Solyman erected a pyramid near the city, as a monument of his own fortune, and of their headlong counsels.

3. A new host, which was the most valuable part of this expedition, arrived in the mean time, at Constantinople, as a general rendezvous. The commanders were experienced generals and men of renown. Among them, were Godfrey of Bouillon, by some called commander in chief; Baldwin his brother; Robert, duke of Normandy; Hugh, count of Vermandois; Raymond, count of Thoulouse; Bohemond, prince of Tarentum; and Tancred, his cousin. These and other warlike princes and captains, inspired by religious enthusiasm, or military ardour, pledged themselves to redeem the holy sepulchre from the infidels. The troops, when reviewed in the neighbourhood of Nice, amounted to 100,000 horse, and 600,000 foot, including women and servants.

Alexius, the eastern emperor, did not suffer them to remain long at Constantinople; but after seeking to obtain an as

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