less On the contrary this new City which was of a Figure altogether Irregular yet approaching to Square extended it self in Length from East to West some twelve hundred Paces and in Breadth from South to North about a third part so much Moreover the Ancient City was wholly inaccessible on the South part by reason of the broaken Rocks of the Mount Sion which Invironed it it was also the same upon the East having the deep Valley of Jehoshaphat between the Mount of Olives and Mount Moriah But this New City which had Mount Sion close by the South Side of it was easily Commanded from thence and the Valleys having been in a manner filled up by the Romans it was very accessible particularly upon the North. It continued a long time in this Estate under the Power of the Gentiles till such time as the Great Constantine peopled it with Christians having there builded the Magnisicent Church of the Resurrection which Incloses the Holy Sepulchre where the Pagans had with the most impious Profaneness erected the Temple of the Idol Venus After this quitting the profane Name of Aelia if recovered that venerable Name of Jerusalem a Name Consecrated by the Sacred Records and by so many Holy Mysteries which for ever after to this present time it hath retained It was taken from the Romans by the Persians under the Reign of King Cosroës and by his Successor Restored to the Emperor Heraclius and not long after about the middle of the seventh Age falling into the Hands of the Saracens the Caliph Omar one of the earliest Successors of Mahomet built there a round Temple of eight Angles or Faces for a Mosch in the same place where sometimes stood the Temple of Solomon and tho it did not in the least Resemble that except in the Greatness of the Porch which was raised very high and with fair Galleries in the Middle whereof stands this Round yet doth it to this Day retain that Name About four hundred Years after this the greatest part of Syria and Palestine falling under the Dominion of the Turks they also took Jerusalem from the Sultan of Egypt and thirty eight Years after it was retaken from them by him making use of the Occasion which was offered him by the memorable Victory of the Christians over the Turks in the Battle of Antioch This Saracen Prince who notwithstanding his Ambassy doubted not but the Christians who looked upon Jerusalem as the end of their Enterprise would certainly besiege it year 1099 forgot nothing which was necessary to put it into a Condition to make a good Defence for with great diligence he caused the Walls and Towers to be repaired although they were very strong before having also a double Wall he provided the Place with all manner of Stores both of Ammunition and Provision he caused all the Christians that were able to bear Arms to quit the City and put into it a Garrison of fourty thousand of his Best Soldiers besides that there were twenty Thousand Inhabitants who were Armed and to whom for their Encouragement he promised a perpetual Exemption from all manner of Taxes and Tributes He caused also the Cisterns and Wells for six miles round the City to be filled up and made a most horrible Wast throughout the Country that so the Christian Army at the same Time that they were to Combat with so strong an Enemy within the Walls might have Famine a more terrible Enemy to Combat with in the Field and above all he hoped to destroy them for Want of Water in those dry and barren Countries where the Heat is great and Thirst most insupportable This was the Estate and Posture in which Jerusalem then stood immediately before it was besieged by the Christians whose Army was not in Truth so Numerous as that which defended the Place For of that immense Multitude of the Crusades who passed into Asia and were at the Siege of Nice there came not above sixty thousand of both Sexes among which there were not more than twenty Thousand Foot and fifteen hundred Horse who were in a Condition to fight the greatest part of the rest being dead either with Diseases or in the several Encounters some were returned some wore put into Garrisons in the conquered places and some followed the Princes Baldwin and Bohemond to defend their new Principalities of Edessa and Antioch Nevertheless both Princes and Soldiers were determined either there to perish or to carry the Pince and to accomplish their Vow either by a Devout Death or Glorious Victory After they had therefore repulsed the Enemies who sallied out they began chearfully to form the Siege in this manner Godfrey of Bullen Earl Eustace his Brother and Tancred took their Post upon the West near to the Fortress which they called the Tower of David The Earl of Tholose was upon his Right directly opposite to the Gate of this Tower and after a little while he enlarged his Quarters Southward to the Extremity of Mount Sion over against the Church of the Holy Virgin The Remainder of the City on the South and towards the East was left free in Regard the Hollow Vallius and the Craggy Rocks made the Approaches Extreme Difficult The North side was surrounded by the Duke of Normandy the Earls of Flanders and St. Paul who lay before the Gate which was then called St. Stephens but now Damascus Gate to the Angular Tower near the Valley of Jehosaphat Moreover that they might avoid a tedious Siege like that of Antioch it was resolved to attack the Place by main Force therein also following the Advice of a Solitary who lived with a great Opinion of his Sanctity in a Cave in the Mount of Olives for he had promised the Christians that they should have the Victory that day telling them he had it in Command from God to acquaint them with that Message although it was told him on the other hand that they were not at all provided with necessary Materials for an Attack But as it appeared afterwards in all kind of Affairs but especially in those of War it is a most dangerous Folly to quit the Rules of Art and Prudence blindly to follow the uncertain Ways of pretended Revelations which one ought rarely to trust in Regard they are so often false and when they are true one is not bound to believe them but upon Invincible Proofs and without those one is obliged always rather to follow good Sense and Reason which God hath given to Men next to his Divine Word to be their Rule and Guide However upon the fifth day of the Siege early in the Morning a General Assault was given upon the Word of this Recluse which was looked upon as an Oracle Never was there seen greater Ardor in the Soldiers whose Courage was redoubled by the certainty of their Belief in the Promise of this Holy Man that they should that very day take Jorusalem Some part were drawn up in close Rank and they advanced holdly after
this Reason therefore passing from one Extreme to another he Disrobed himself of all his Authority and made the little Baldwin the Fifth his Nephew year 1182 be crowned King an Infant of about five Years of Age the Son of his Sister Sybilla by the Marquis of Montferrat her first Husband leaving the Government of the Kingdom to the Earl of Tripolis the Man whom he had before most disgraced and who was the declared Enemy of Earl Guy against whom he was so incensed year 1182 that he had recourse to Arms to be Revenged on him But these Matters were composed by the Prudence of William Archbishop of Tyre great Chancellor of the Realm year 1183 who found out Expedients to patch up a kind of Accord between these two quarrelling Lords Then it was Resolved to send with all speed a great Ambassage into the West to desire a quick and powerful Assistance against Saladin who now began to push his Conquests even into Palestine For this Purpose Choice was made of Heraclius the Patriarch of Jerusalem and the two great Masters of the Temple and the Hospital who were then the two most considerable Men of the Holy Land both in regard of the Number and the Valor of the Knights of these two Orders who were now become most Powerful and most Famous throughout all Christendom These Ambassadors Arrived happily at the Port of Brindes but their Negotiation was not answerably happy to that of their Voyage For the different Interests of the Christian Princes at that time were such as would not permit them to ingage in an Enterprise of such Difficulty as was the Leading of an Army of Crusades into Palestine as the Ambassadors desired William King of Sicily was ingaged in a War against the Cruel Andronicus to take Vengeance upon that Tyrant who had horribly Massacred all the Latins that were at Constantinople that so he might with greater Facility usurp the Imperial Throne by putting to Death the young Alexis the Son of Manuel Having therefore been able to procure nothing more from this Prince besides great Promises for the future they crossed through Italy to Verona where Pope Lucius and the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa held a great Assembly of Princes and Prelates to determine the Differences between them and to settle the Affairs of Italy The Emperor who was absolutely resolved to re-settle his Authority which the Wars during the Schism which had been made with the Papal See had so much weakned gave them nothing but fair Words and great Hopes and for the Pope as he ever distrusted the Romans who not long before had Revolted from him he was able to do no more than to give the Ambassadors his Letters to the Kings of England and France wherein he exhorted them to this Enterprise as Alexander the Third his Predecessor had before to little Purpose done The Patriarch therefore and the great Masters of the Hospitallers after having performed their last Duty to the Master of the Temple who Died at Verona passed into France There they were most magnificently Received and Treated by the Order of the King Philip Augustus at Paris to whom they presented the Keys of the Holy City of the Tower of David and the Holy Sepulchre with the Royal Standard in token that they put themselves under his Protection and to oblige him to Succor the Holy Land as if it were his own Kingdom now that it was reduced to such extreme Danger by the Infidels Whereupon a general Assembly of all the Prelates and great Men of the Realm was called at Paris to Debate this great Affair and they considering that the King was not above eight and twenty Years of Age and had no Issue were of Opinion That he ought not in Person to undertake such a dangerous Voyage only Philip promised the Ambassadors that he would move his Subjects throughout the whole Realm to inrowl themselves for this War and that he would at his own Cost furnish all those liberally for their Maintenance who would take up Arms for so Just and Holy a War This Answer was not at all to the Satisfaction of the Patriarch however he contented himself as well as he could upon the Hopes which he had that the King of England upon whom they did particularly rely in Syria would make himself the Head of the Enterprise That King was Henry the Second the Son of Geoffry Earl of Anjou who had married Maud the Empress the Widow of the Emperor Henry the Fourth she was Daughter to Henry the First King of England so that this Henry the Second was Grand-child both to Henry the First and to Fowk d' Anjou King of Jerusalem who was the Father to Geoffry Earl of Anjou and to Amauri King of Jerusalem and by reason thereof he was Cousin German to Baldwin the Fourth who was the late King of Palestine so that doubtless he was more particularly Obliged than any other Prince to Defend that Realm which might one Day descend to him by Inheritance He was also more especially Obliged to it for the Expitation of the Crime which he had Committed year 1183 in permitting the Assassins of St Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury to Murder him in his own Church and he had accepted it as a Penance from the Pope within three Years to lead an Army in Person to the Holy Land More than ten Years were already slip'd away since the Term prefixed and he had not done any thing towards the Accomplishment of his Promise of which he was by a Letter from Pope Lucius reminded in Terms sharp enough who told him plainly that it was impessible for him to escape the severe Judgments of God who would not permit himself to be mocked and whose Vengeance he would have cause to Fear if he persisted willfully in the breach of his Promise All these Considerations made the Patriarch hope for more happy Success to his Negotiation in England in regard that in this pressing Necessity it was probable either that the King would go in Person into Palestine for the satisfaction of his Promise or at least that he would send one of his three Sons to command the Army and bigg with these Expectations he crossed the Sea with his Colleague and in the beginning of the Year following came to London year 1185 Henry who was beforehand resolved not to grant what the Ambassadours came to desire would nevertheless save his Reputation and therefore he did them all the Honour imaginable and took the most plausible Courses to justify his Conduct He therefore sent for them to Reading where the Court then was and gave them a most favourable Audience He very graciously and with great marks of Goodness and Compassion heard the Patriarch Heraclius who in a most passionate Discourse after he had presented him with the Keys of Jerusalem and the Holy Sepulchre represented the piteous Condition to which the Affairs of the Christians in the East were reduced who he said stretched out their beseeching Hands
an answer so little expected seemed to slight it and therefore presently put himself upon his March but at last when he saw these two great Bodies separated from the rest of the Army and that there was reason to fear that many others might be induced to follow their Example so that he should be in a manner wholly diserted by all except the Germans who always continued their Fidelity to him he made a great attempt upon himself and reserving his Vengeance for another time he consented that his Lieutenants should give out his Orders not in his Name but in the behalf of God and Christendom and thereupon the whole Army being reunited they continued their March to Jaffa where they fell to work upon the Fortifications which nevertheless were presently interrupted by the News which was received from Italy For whilest he did all these things directly contrary to the Pope's prohibitions which he despised and contemned Gregory who had been attacked in that time by his Lieutenants who spoiled the Lands of the Church had with the assistance of his Allies raised two good Armies which under the Conduct of King John de Brienne and the Counts de Celano and Aquila his Lieutenants year 1228 did not only drive the Imperialists out of the Marquisate of Ancona into which they had fallen but also pursued them into the Realm of Naples where after they had taken the strong place of St. German they made themselves Masters of all the others even to Capua And in the mean time the confederate Cities of Lombardy sollicited by the Cardinal of St. Martin who was sent Legate to Milan for that purpose declaring themselves for the Pope made War against the other Cities who were of the Emperor's Party And after this not only the Villages of these Provinces but the Families of the same City being divided into these two furious Factions which by an odd name the Original of which is very uncertain were called the Guelphes and the Gibelins the first of which held for the Pope and the other for the Emperor these two Factions did in all places an infinite of mischief silling the Cities and the Villages with Desolations Ruins Massacres and Fires this implacable hatred which they had entertained one against another arming them to their mutual destruction and to the commission of all the most barbarous Inhumanities and most detestable Crimes Such are generally the miserable Consequences of the differences of Princes in which those who take their part having neither their Intentions Sentiments nor Manners frequently run into those transports and excesses of Fury which bring neither Reputation nor Advantage to the Cause which they support and which those Princes are so far from esteeming acceptable Services that they are the first in condemning such false Zeal and horrible brutality year 1229 This news of the Progress of the Pope's Army was such a surprise to Frederick and affrightned him so much that to expedite his return he was resolved to comply with the Sultan almost at any rate and therefore sending Count Thomas with one of his Secretaries to him they concluded a Truce for ten Years upon these conditions That the Sultan should yield the City of Jerusalem to Frederick together with the Cities of Bethlehem Nazareth Thoron and Sajeta or Sidon and the Villages which are directly upon the Road between Jerusalem and Jaffa That it should be lawful for the Christians to fortifie these places and to rebuild the Walls of Jerusalem of which the Emperor might dispose as he pleased excepting only the Temple with its appendages which was to be reserved to the Sarasins with liberty there to perform all the Exercises of their Law That the City of Tripolis the Principality of Antioch and the other places which did not appertain to the Kingdom of Jerusalem should not be comprised in this Treaty and that the Emperor should not permit the Christians to assist them This Treaty was mutually signed between them in the Month of February and though the Patriarch who did not approve of it nor would have any Commerce with the Emperor did not only refuse to perform the Ceremonies of his Coronation but had also interdicted all the Churches of Jerusalem if he should attempt to go thither yet he did nevertheless make his Publick Entry there as it were in Triumph upon the seventeenth day of March followed by his whole Army all the Prohibitions of the Patriarch being not able to hinder him from visiting the Holy Sepulchre The next day which was the third Sunday in Lent he went cloathed in his Imperial Habit with abundance of Pomp and Majesty to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre where after having said his private Devotions there being not found any one who by reason of the interdict durst attempt to celebrate the Divine Mysteries he caused a Crown of Gold to be placed upon the great Altar and without troubling himself about the Ceremonies which the Church is wont to observe in the Coronation of Kings he went himself up to the Altar and taking the Crown he placed it upon his Head and with his own hands crowned himself King of Jerusalem with the mighty Acclamations of the Germans and the Knights of the Teutonick Order who highly approved of this Action as well as the Treaty which the Emperor had made At the same time he writ to the Pope and to all Christian Kings and Princes Letters by which he invited them in most Pompous and Magnisicent Termes to render solemn thanks unto Almighty God who had in this manner by a miraculous Effect of his Power happily finished this Enterprise without Effusion of Christian Blood and almost without Forces which so many great Princes had not been able to execute with the most potent Armies and after so many cruel Battles which had been fought to oblige the Infidels to restore to the Christians the Holy City year 1229 with the Sepulchre of Jesus Christ for which so many Crusades had been made and in Conclusion he made a Relation of all the Advantages which he pretended were to be drawn from this Treaty But on the other part the Patriarch writ to the Pope and to all Christian People long Letters in which he complains bitterly of Frederick whom he treats in such a manner as at the least one must say is very injurious there he indeavours to lay open the Shame the Dishonour and Illusion of the Treaty by which he maintains that Frederick hath betrayed Christianity First because it is most shameful to have the Sarasins share the Holy City with the Christians Secondly because the Sultan of Damascus having never given his consent to the Agreement the Treaty signified just nothing and in short that all those places which were in shew yielded to the Emperor were in reallity as much the Sarasins as they were before since he returned into Europe without fortifying any one of them And in truth Frederick who took no care now but to reimbark himself and to
his League with the Princes of the Crusade The Ambassadours of Alexis slighted The advantagious composition with the Emir of Tripolis The March of the Christian Army to Jerusalem Lidda Rama Nicopolis and Bethlehem taken by the Christians The extraordinary expressions of their Devotion upon the first discovery of the Holy City AFter the Arrival of these Princes at Constantinople Duke Godfrey and Tancred being advanced as far as Nicomedia and having levelled the ways over the Mountains from that Town to the City of Nice they invested that place the sixteenth day of May. They staid some time for the coming of the other Princes and of Peter the Hermit who was gone into Asia to recollect some of those unfortunate Reliques of his Forces which had saved themselves in the Woods And then it was resolved without staying for the Troops of Raymond Earl of Tholose and those of the Duke of Normandy and the Earl of Blois which were not yet come up that they should begin to form the Siege of Nice Nice the Capital City of Bythinia and which is famous to this day for the first and seventh Oecumenical Councils which were held there against the Heresies of the Arians and the Iconoclasts was at this time a fair and spaious City liyng about fifteen or sixteen Leagues from Nicomedia in the middle of a most fertile and pleasant Valley on all sides encompassed with high Mountains except on the Western Quarter where the great Lake of Ascanius which by small Vessels furnisheth it plentifully with all the Commodities of the Country serves instead of a natural Fortification rendring it wholly inaccessible on that side It was encompassed with double Walls of an extraordinary thickness and flanked with very fair and lofty Towers strongly built and placed at convenient distance to defend each other and that part of the Curtain which was between them It was also strengthened without the Counterscarp with a great retrenchment admirably Palisadoed and which was extream difficult of access by reason of the great number of Springs and Rivulets which falling from the Mountains and being stopped by the Fortifications drowned all the adjacent fields to what degrees the defendants pleased Old Soliman who after the Turks had entred the lesser Asia pushed his Conquests by a continual succession of Victories as far as the Propontis had taken extraordinary pains in the fortifying of this City where he established the Seat of his Empire that he might be so much the nearer Constantinople and upon occasion one day pass over more commodiously into Europe The young Soliman who about ten years after succeeded him usually kept a very strong Garrison there but upon the noise which the Enterprize of the Christians of the West were about to make he reinforced it with the choicest of his Troops for he did not doubt but in order to their opening a passage to Jerusalem this place would be the first that would be attacked He himself was gone into Persia year 1097 to request the assistance of all the Princes of his Nation and returning just in the nick of time to succour the City he posted himself in the Mountains at the same time when the Christian Army not suspecting that such a terrible Enemy was so near began the Siege However the Christians applyed themselves to a formal Siege distributing their several Quarters in his open view their Army being far more numerous then his and consisting in above four hundred thousand Combatants Bohemond after he had taken care for Provisions for the Army in a very plentiful manner returning to the Camp posted himself on the Northwest quarter of the City with his Nephew Tancred who extended his quarter on the right hand even to the Lake Godfrey of Bullen with Baldwin took the Right Hand over against the Principal Gate of the City taking up all that space between the North and the East upon that side where the City was most strongly fortified After them upon the South East quarter encamped Hugh the Great in the same place where after their arrival the Duke of Normandy and Count Stephen were to make their attack so soon as they should come up All the South side was reserved for Count Raymond who was upon his way in Bythinia and not far distant from the Camp That part towards the West South-West which lay upon the Lake could not be blocked up so close but that the Enemies had that way the convenience of furnishing themselves with Provisions The Town being in this manner begirt quite round the besiegers began briskly with a General Assault which upon the fourteenth day of May was given at the same time upon all the several Quarters with all kind of military Engines The Combat was maintained all that day till the darkness of the Night obliged them to discontinue it and was again renewed in the Morning with extraordinary fury though without Effect For the besieged were not only gallant men but every minute in expectation of being relieved by Soliman to whom they had dispatched an Express both to inform him of their Condition and to advertise him that he might easily do it by forcing the Christian Camp on that part which lay to the Southward which was but as yet very slenderly guarded but it so fell out that the Letters of the Sultan were intercepted that very day as they were going to the Town to assure the besieged that he would not fail the next morning according to their advice to attack that part of the Camp Notice thereupon was immediately given to Prince Raymond who was not far off who marched with such diligence that by good Fortune the next morning very early he arrived in the Camp He was no sooner begun to make his Lodgement but the Turks descended from the Mountain and divided themselves into two great Bodies to attack the Christian Camp in two quarters One party of them marched to the right towards the South believing according to the advice which they had received from the besieged that the passage there was free whilest the other advanced to the Quarter of Duke Godfrey which lay next the Earl to prevent his sending any succours from that part and thereby to be the better able to put his designed relief into the City year 1097 But the gallant Raymond whom the Turks little expected to have found there received them in so good a posture and charged their Troops who looked for nothing less than such opposition with so much fury that he presently put them into disorder and having routed them and cut the best part of them in pieces the rest were forced to betake themselves to a hasty slight pursuing them to the very foot of the Mountains whilst Godfrey in his quarter dealt in the same manner with those who made the false attack upon his Post Nevertheless the besieged failed not at all in their Courage but made a very obstinate defence under the Protection of their Walls whose strength was so great as
it by Force year 1098 but that it was the ardent Desire which he had to return to the Christian Religion to deliver Antioch his Country from the Servitude and Oppression of the Turks and to give him some undeniable Effects of that Friendship which he might expect from him which obliged him to follow his Advice and wholy to throw himself upon his Word in an Affair of that Importance wherein he must hazard not only his Fortune and his Life but that of his whole Family But that it was but just that in regard he had only entrusted him with the Secret that he should give him Assurance before any thing should be Attempted that he should only depend upon him And that therefore he was absolutely resolved that this should be one Condition without which he would proceed no further That whereas the other Princes had all the same Authority in the Army they would yield the Principality of Antioch to Bohemond to whom only he would deliver it and from whom only he would expect the Accomplishment of his Promises That upon these Terms he would put the three Towers whereof he had the Command into his Possession and by Consequence the Town That he would send his Son as a Hostage to engage for the Truth of his Word and that he desired him singly to consider that he had not a moments time to lose by reason of the Succours which were now at hand and that it was absolutely necessary for him to Act according to these Offers or else to resolve wholy to abandon the Design Now whether this Norman Prince who was mighty Politick had laid the Train in this manner by which he was resolved to accomplish his Ends and therefore made Pyrrhus speak at this rate or whether Pyrrhus himself found it effectually his clear Interest to raise his own Fortunes by the greatness of his Friend and therefore proposed this as the only probable Expedient most certain it is that Bohemond accepted the Condition with all his Heart and that he was extreamly satisfied to see that there was no possibility of taking Antioch but by his single Interest He nevertheless dissembled his Joy that so his Design might succeed the better and failed not the same day at a Council of War with a melancholy Air to complain in these Terms of the present Condition of Affairs he said That those Evils which the Army induâ—ed were Insupportable which they daily Suffered and which daily increased by that long Siege which had now lasted seven Months without making any tolerable Advance and which was yet worse that they were in danger shamefully to abandon the Siege since there was no appearance that they should take Antioch neither by Force which their Condition would not suffer them to attempt nor by Starving them since the so long talked of Succours could not now be at any great Distance There remains therefore added he very Insinuatingly nothing more to be done but to try if there be any one amongst us who before the Succours arrive will endeavour to make himself Master of the Town either by Surprize or by Intelligence and gaining some in the place by Money or Promises or any other way which his Mind can suggest to him as most probable And in short that we may animate one another to this Enterprize I am of Opinion that for the publick Good which every one of us ought to prefer before his private Interest we ought all to promise that if the Design succeeds he shall have the Principality of Antioch for his Reward who shall perform this Exploit and disengage the Army from this Siege which hath so long troubled it There is certainly nothing so clear-sighted as Jealousy nothing that so soon discovers a Rival be it in Love or be it in Honor. And whatsoever Artifice there was in this Discourse of Bohemond these Princes who besides the Interest of Religion for which they made this War had also those of their Glory and their Advancement easily penetrated into the Heart of the Tarentine and making no question by the manner of his Discourse but that he acted for himself they all answered with some kind of Precipitation That they were all Brothers and all Equals and that they would never permit that there should be any Preference among those who had equally served with the others That there was no manner of Justice to divide the Conquest but to those who had shared in the Pains and Danger and that tho Antioch was to have but one Master yet it must be Lot that must chuse him and it was to Fortune only and her Power that the Principality of Antioch was to be owing year 1098 Bohemond seeming not to take the least Notice that this Blow was levelled at him only smiled at the Discourse without making any Reply well considering that whether they would or not Necessity without his Help would mannage this Affair in which he could not now move but to his Disadvantage and so it happened for at the same time News was brought them by those who were sent to make Discovery that the Enemy approached with a most formidable Power Whereupon they went again to the Council where some were of Opinion that they should march out and meet the Enemy with the whole Army others were for leaving only so many as might guard the Trenches in the Camp and to lead the rest to Battle But Bohemond made it appear on the contrary that neither the one nor the other of these Propositions were practicable For in doing the first they raised the Siege and then the Town would infallibly be Relieved that in following the second they must needs run the Hazzard of being beaten since their whole Army lessened by above half was scarce able to oppose the Forces of the City alone Now these things being so clear and that there was no Expedient so proper to draw the Army out of so pressing and manifest a Danger all the Princes except Count Raymond found it more agreeable to Reason that Bohemond if he could gain it should be Master of Antioch than that they should all be affronted by losing it after so tedious a Siege They therefore consented that provided he took the City let the Way be what it would every one should relinquish their Interest to him with condition that the Greek Emperor failed in his part of the Agreement made with him The Prince of Tarentum had now all that he could wish for Alexis had already broke his Word a thousand times so that instantly he sent to Pyrrhus to acquaint him that he was ready to put the Matter in Execution according to those Measures which he should himself prescribe and to desire him to let him know as soon as it was possible Pyrrhus presently sent him an Answer by his Son who was to be the Hostage with the Order which was to be observed which after it had been Communicated to the Princes was executed in this manner He gave
Success of an Assault given against the Rules of War by the Advice of a Hermite who pretended a Revelation for it The Description of Duke Godfrey 's Engines The solemn Procession of the Besiegers about the City The second General Assault for three days together Two Magicians who were Conjuring upon the Walls have their Brains beaten out with a Stone from Duke Godfrey 's wooden Castle The Artifice of Godfrey to drive the Enemies from the Walls He is the first that by the Bridge of his Castle mounts the Walls Jerusalem taken The fearful Slaughter of the Saracens By Godfrey 's Example the whole Army return solemn Thanks to God at the Holy Sepulchre An Assembly of the Princes to chuse a King and a Patriarch The Speech of Robert Duke of Normandy upon this Subject Godfrey of Bullen chosen and proclaimed King of Jerusalem The memorable Battle of Ascalon against the Sultan of Egypt and the Victory of the Christians which concluded this first Crusade The Return of the Crusades The Conquests of Godfrey of Bullen and his Death An Abridgment of the History of the Kingdom of Jerusalem till the time of the second Crusade The Reign of Baldwin the First The flourishing Estate of the Christians in the East till his Death The Reign of Baldwin the Second The Relation of the founding the Military Orders of the Knights Hospitallers The Captivity of King Baldwin His Deliverance His Victories and Death He is succeeded by his Son-in-Law Fowk d' Anjou The Prosperity of his Reign His Death and the Regency of Queen Melesintha during the Minority of Baldwin the Third The Occasion of the second Expedition of the Crusades The Relation of the two Josselins de Courtenay Earls of Edessa The taking of that City by Sanguin Sultan of Alepo and afterwards by Noradin his Son The Character of that Prince and his Conquests over the Christians Applications made to Lewis the young King of France His Character and what moved him to undertake the Crusade He Consults Saint Bernard concerning it The Character of that Saint and the Order he received from Pope Eugenius the Third to Preach the Crusade The General Assemblies of Bourges Vezelay and Chartress for the Crusade It is Published by Saint Bernard in France and Germany The Emperor and King take up the Cross The Abbot Sugere declared Regent in France His Character and Advice concerning the Expedition The Voyage of the Emperor The Description of the Tempest which almost ruined his Army upon the Banks of the River Melas The Fleet of the Crusades take Lisbon from the Saracens The Original of the Kings of Portugal The Character and Perfidy of the Greek Emperor Manuel His underhand Treating with the Turks The miserable Overthrow of the Emperor's Army The Voyage of King Lewis to Constantinople and his Reception The Advice of the Bishop of Langress who Counsels the King to take Constantinople his Speech upon that Subject the reason that his Advice was not followed the Treacheries of Manuel thereupon The Kings Voyage into Asia His Interview with the Emperor Conrade and the Return of that Prince to Constantinople The Description of the River Meander and the famous Passage of the King of France with his Army over it year 1099 JErusalem which after that Herod the Great had beautified it with the most magnificent Structures and had repaired the Temple had been one of the Wonders of the World and one of the fairest Cities of all the East was nothing but a horrible Heap of Cinders and Ruines after its fatal Destruction till such time as the Emperor Adrian who was the last that ruined it caused it to be rebuilt in a manner far different from what it was before For in times-past there was comprised within the Circuit of its Walls four Mountains upon which it was successively Built The first called Salem otherwise Acra which was founded by Melchisedeck The second opposite to that towards the South and which was far higher was the Holy and Famous Mount Sion which David after he had taken the Fortress of the Jebusites joyned to the former by a Wall which invironed it on all parts to distinguish it from the other which in comparison of this new City was called the Lower City The third was the Mountain of Moriah between these towards the East where the Temple of Solomon stood And the fourth upon the North was the Hill Betheza where the same King built a new Town which was afterwards much inlarged by Hezekiah and took in all the Valley between the East and the North to the lower Town This Glorious City of God was afterwards destroyed by the Chaldeans and with the Temple restored to its first Estate in divers Ages by Zorobabel Nehemiah the Machabees and by Herod the Great and was at the last overthrown to the very Ground and laid in Heaps of Rubbish by the Emperor Titus Vespasian three only of the fairest Towers called the Hippico year 1099 Phasele and Mariamne which Herod had Builded escaping the general Desolation for Titus was willing to preserve them as also part of the North Wall of the higher Town to which they were joyned that they might remain as Monuments of the Greatness of his Victory when Posterity should by the Strength of those make a Judgment how Impregnable that City was which he had taken though defended by such mighty Walls and lofty Towers But the Jews Revolting in the time of the Emperor Adrian that Prince after he had made the most horrible Slaughter among the Rebels caused those three Towers and the Wall also to be demolished and razed to the very Foundation thus without designing it intirely accomplishing the dreadful Prediction of the Son of God That the day should come when there should not be one Stone left upon another in that miserable City After this that Emperor to immortalize his own Name in abolishing that of Jerusalem caused a new City to be there Built which according to his own Name was called Aelia giving it also a quite differing Form from the Ancient City whose Memory as well as Name he thought thereby for ever to extinguish For he left out of it the whole Mountain of Sion which had been the best and most Beautiful as well as strongest part of Jerusalem almost all that which had been called the New City and a great part of the Lower Town He made Mount Moriah be levelled and inclosed that and the little Remainder of the New and Low Town as also Mount Calvarie which was nothing but a little Corner of Mount Gihon which was out of the Ancient City towards the West So that this Aelia as it was not by one half so large as Jerusalem so it had quite a differing Figure For the Ancient Jerusalem in its Dimensions approached to a Square though not altogether Regular being something longer than it was broad for it was Extended from North to South a good League the Breadth from East to West being something
the manner of the Ancient Romans covering themselveslike Tortoises with their Bucklers whilst others were extended in long siles and followed them at a just distance year 1099 to have convenient Room to make use of their Bows their Slings and Cross-Bows to drive the Enemy from the Walls with great Stones Darts and Arrows which they showered continually upon them whilest in the mean time the first endeavoured in Despite of pieces of Rock and Beams which they threw down from the Walls to crush them to come at the Wall and with Pick-Axes Mattocks Levers and such sort of Iron Instruments wanting Rams they tried to make a Breach or Passage through the Wall and they acted with so much Force and Courage that they overthrew the Out-Wall and made a Passage to the very Foot of the Inward-Wall but that being too strong to receive any Damage by such pittiful Tools there was no Hope but to force the Place by a Scalade and so little Care had been taken to make Provision relying upon the Promise of the Hermit who told them if they had no more than one Ladder of Osiers they should nevertheless take the City that when they came to make Use of them there was no more than one sound Ladder that was long enough to reach the Walls notwithstanding which these Braves transported with mad Courage being prepossessed with the Belief that they should carry the Town planted that Ladder and mounted with so much Resolution that pushing one another upwards many of them got up to the Top and threw themselves over the Wall where they desperately fought hand to hand against the Saracens who were amazed at this more than Heroick Boldness and there is no doubt but if they had had more Ladders Jerusalem had been that day taken for the Enemies who did not in the least expect such an irregular and brisk Attempt had not brought any of their Engines to the Walls But seeing there could but by one Ladder mount a very few men who must needs be exposed to a Multitude of Enemies without Hope of Succour a Retreat was sounded after having lost in that rash Attempt a great many brave men who yet sold their Lives at so dear a Rate that twice their Number of the Saracens paid theirs in lieu of them Duke Godfrey who was ashamed of the Fault he had committed by preferring the idle Visions of a simple Hermit before the just Rules of Military Art remonstrated to the Princes that if they resolved to carry the Town by Force it was necessary to attack it with good Engines of War since they were to sight with men who having once would not a second time be surprised in their Defence against a Scalade This Advice was approved by all but the difficulty was to know where they should be furnished with Materials to frame them there being never a Forrest in all the Country For as for the famous Enchanted Woods of Ismena Clormea Renaud and Armida and a hundred other such like Inventions of Tasso they are nothing but the agreeable Visions of a Poetical Fancy which takes a great deal of Delight in pleasing others with making new Creations which never were except in his own or the Imaginations of his Readers but which must as the Amusements of Fables and Chimera's be rejected by Historians who are to entertain their Readers with nothing but solid Truth But this is most certain that while they were in this Trouble a Christian of the Country informed the Princes that about three or four Leagues off in the Way that leads to Arabia there was a Valley quite out of any Road where in a great Cavern there was a good Quantity of large Beams of Cedar and Cypress and that there was thereabout some Trees of which they might make very good Use although they were of no considerable Height The Duke of Normandy and the Earl of Flanders went thither with some Troops being Conducted by this Guide where they really found such Wood which they caused to be carried to the Camp They also carried thither all the Planks Joists and Beams of the Houses near the City which they could sind and for a whole Month they wrought all sorts of Engines which are made use of in Sieges as also some of a new Invention according as they were designed by Duke Godfrey and Gaston de Foix Prince of Bearne who took care of the Management of these Works but that which mightily advanced them was that nine great Ships being arrived at Joppa with Provisions from Pisa and Genoa for the Army and despairing to defend themselves in that little Fleet against that of the Saracens which was coming to attack them they broke up the Ships and setting Fire to what they could not carry to the Camp the Seamen applied themselves most industriously to the building of these Engines year 1099 All this time the Army was ready to perish with the excessive Thirst which it indured for the Brook Cedron which divides the Valley of Jehosaphat hath very little Water except in the Winter and the Fountain of Siloe which is at the Foot of Mount Sion toward the South afforded but a very little Water so that there was scarce any to be had but what was to be found two Leagues off and that with great Hazard of falling into the Hands of the Saracens who lay continually in Ambuscades to surprize such whose Thirst constrained them to straggle abroad to seek for Water and besides what was to be had was so little and there were so many People besides the Beasts that were to drink that it became presently pudled and stinking In this Extremity there could be no other Resolution but so soon as ever the Engines which were preparing were sinished to give a General Assault with a sirm Determination either to carry the Place or perish in the Attempt And therefore before the Execution of so dangerous an Enterprize and whilest the Preparations were making it was thought fit that publick Prayers should be made by the whole Army to implore the Mercy of Almighty God and to crave his Blessing and Assistance For this Purpose after a Fast of three days upon Fryday the eighth of July there was a solemn Procession where the Bishops and Clergy barefooted followed by the Princes and Soldiers in their Arms surrounded the City setting out at the Church of Sion and passing by the Oratory of St. Stephen through the Valley of Jehosaphat and so by the Mountain of Olives to the Place from whence Christ Jesus ascended into Heaven Here it was that Peter the Hermit and Arnold the Chaplain to the Duke of Normandy made such Powerful Exhortations to reunite the Hearts of the Army that all the Chiefs and the Soldiers and particularly Tancred and Count Raymond who had had the greatest Differences embraced each other in Token of a mutual Reconciliation and Exhorted one another to revenge those Injuries and Outrages which were offered to Jesus Christ by the Saracens
who at the same time made a Mock-Procession about the Walls within the City as the Christians did without vomiting out a thousand Blasphemies against Christ and offering a thousand Insolencies and Indignities to a Cross which they opposed to that which was carried in this Devout Procession before the Christians The next Morning Godfrey who had resolved to make his Attack upon that Quarter which is between the East and the North because it was the weakest and the most convenient for his Engines to play removed his Camp thither in the Night and employed the three following Days as did the other Princes to dispose of their Engines They had besides Rams Slings to throw great Stones and other such Sort of Engines which were at that time in Use to batter Walls near at hand three great Castles of Wood of a new Structure Every one of them had three Stories whereof the lowest was for the Ingeniers and Workmen who by great Force rolled the Machin upon its Wheels the two others had their Platforms which jetted out from the Work so that the Combatants who were placed in them might from thence fight as upon sirm Ground either with their Enemies at a Distance or near at Hand according as they were able to advance the Machin the middle Story was as high as the Top of the Second Wall which was something higher than the Out-Wall of the City And the third Story which was raised with a narrow Top was so framed that from thence one might see the Enemies so as to have a sair Mark at them with Darts Stones or Arrows even to the very Heart of the City These Wooden rolling Castles had four sides which were covered with Hurdles to prevent the Damage which they might receive by the great Stones thrown from the Walls and the Hurdles were also covered with Raw Hides of Oxen Camels and Horses to resist the Violence of Fire But that which was the Chief Design of these Machines was that upon the side of the third Story towards the Town and which was just above the Platform of the middle Story Level with the Height of the Walls besides the two other Covertures there was a third which was framed with Joists and Planks and so fastned to the Engine above at the third Platform that being suddainly let down by two Pullies it was to fall upon the Wall like a Draw-Bridge thereby to enter into the Town It was resolved that there should be three Attacks and one of these Rolling Castles at every one of them year 1099 Duke Godfrey and Earl Eustace had the first a little below St. Stephens Gate drawing towards the East Duke Robert Prince Tancred and the Earl of Flanders with the second made the second a little lower at the left Hand near the Angular Tower which was afterwards called Tancred's Tower Earl Raymond made his at the opposite Angle at the South-West with the third which could not advance till he had caused certain deep Trenches to be filled up which lay between him and the Wall Upon Wednesday the thirteenth of July the Attack was begun which was continued all the next day with incredible Fury all the great Engines which were placed by the Castles played incessantly upon the Enemies with Huge Stones whilest at the same time the Slings the Archers and Cross-Bows discharged continually upon them the Castles advancing still forward all the Time The Captains stood all this while in the highest Story of the Rolling Castles accompanied with the most considerable and bravest men of the Army to animate their Soldiers by their Example and by the Danger which they ran being above all others exposed as the Mark of the Enemies Arrows Duke Godfrey with his Brother stood upon the highest Platform of his Castle from whence whilest it approached by little and little to the Wall he continually discharged his lusty Arrows into the Town and against those who defended the Walls scarce one of them falling in Vain for as he was without Contradiction one of the strongest men of his Time so he was the most dextrous and the best Marksman of his Age which hath given Rise to the Story which will have it That seeing three Birds flying to the Top of one of the Towers of Jerusalem he shot them all three upon one single Arrow And for this Reason it is that it is the received Opinion that those vast Arrows which are kept in the Armory of the House of Lorrain one of the most Illustrious of the World were his since it cannot be doubted but he was descended from that Noble Stem Godfrey had placed in the second Stage of his Castle the two Brothers Lethold and Engelbert most Vallant Gentlemen of Tournay and Guicher the stoutest man in the whole Army who incountring with a Lyon had cut him in two at one single Blow of his Sword these seconded the Efforts of their Noble Master and being accompanied with a many other Gallant Men they did wonderful Execution with the Sling and Arrows and in playing their Stone Bows which without ceasing poured continual Showers from their Platform upon the Town The other Princes also acted with the like Vigor some levelling the Ground that so the Castles might more easily advance whilest others presented the Scalade in many several places together thereby to make the greater Diversion to the Defendants whilest at the same time the Walls were battered continually with mighty Rams There was one of a Prodigious Magnitude with which after they had overthrown the Out-Wall to make Way for Duke Godfrey's Castle they also played so vigorously against the Inward Wall that therewith they made a very great Breach Those within the Town in the mean time sorgot nothing which might contribute to the rendring the Attempts of the Beliegers fruitless whom they exceeded both in Number of Men and Engines All their Walls were covered with them and they opposed four of an extraordinary Size against the three Rolling Castles from which they discharged Stones of a Prodigious Bigness which hitting the Engines fell upon the Platforms with a Terrible Noise crushing overthrowing and tearing all in pieces breaking the Braces and Posts and crushing all those who did not quickly get Shelter from that furious Tempest The very Air was obscured with that mighty Hail and the Stones which were discharged from one side and the other encountring one another seemed to Combat as well as the Men and with a Terrible Noise fell down together among the Assailants against whom the Besieged shoured down without ceasing their Arrows Darts and Stones to hinder their Approaches they also threw abundance of Pots of Fire and shot Fire Darts against the Machines to burn them and at the same time made a furious Sally at the Breach which was made by the great Ram to which they set Fire which was not without great Difficulty extinguished In short never was there seen so long an Assault nor a Combat maintained with that Equal Obstinacy on
of Death causing his Litter to be set down in the middle of the Army he lifted up his Hands and Eyes all Bathed in Tears of Joy to Heaven and with great Devotion he returned his hearty Thanks unto Almighty God for all the Benefits which he had received from him but above all for the Favor which he had now done him to let him die like a Prince of the Crusade in making War against the Infidels and that he permitted him to Vanquish with the bare Report of his Approach and the Terror of his Name these Enemies of Christ Jesus and of his Holy Faith And thus did this Christian Hero Transported more with the Excess of his Joy than of his Pains render unto God his generous Soul going to the Eternal Triumphs of a Glorious Immortality in Heaven whilest his Army Victorious by him only without Fighting Re-conducted his Body in the Litter as in a Triumphant Chariot to Edessa there to receive the Honors due to one of the bravest Actions that ever were Performed year 1142 Thus it was that this Illustrious Lord finished his Glorious Life and thus it was that with the Disgrace of refusing to hold the Place of so generous a Father the young Josselin his Son began his Reign which he dishonored by a Vicious and Dissolute Life spent in all manner of Debauches and above all by the Loss of Edessa which was the cause of the Decay and in Conclusion of the Ruine of the Affairs of the Western Christians in the East But is no new thing to observe that what the Wisdom Courage and Vigilance of many great Men have not been able without great Difficulty to Establish should be Ruined in a moment by the Brutality Pusillanimity and Cowardice of one Dissolute and Voluptuous Man This new Earl Josselin quitted the City of Edessa which his Father and the two Baldwins his Predecessors who constantly kept their Court there had taken great Care to Fortifie and Retired to Turbessel a delightful House Situate upon the Banks of Euphrates where like a true Epicure he drowned himself in those Vices and continual Debauches which the mistaken World calls Pleasures without ever regarding the weighty and troublesom Affairs of State But to Ease him of those Toils which attend a Crown Sanguin the most Potent and Able of all the Turkish Princes Sultan of Alepo and Nineveh now called Mosula or Mussula laid hold of this Occasion of the Stupidity of this careless Prince and knowing that there was neither a good Garrison nor any kind of Provisions fit to sustain a Siege in Edessa he presently sate down before it and by a furious Assault Carried the Place before the Unfortunate Josselin who was of himself destitute of any Power to prevent it could procure any Assistance from his Neighbours for he had too much Disobliged Raymond Prince of Antioch with whom he lived in continual Broils to afford him any and Queen Melesintha was at too great a Distance to Assemble so suddenly such an Army as was necessary to relieve the Place So that the Conqueror had Opportunity enough to make a great Progress with his Arms had not his ill Destiny rather than the Christian Arms prevented him for as he was Besieging Cologembar a Town upon the Euphrates he was Slain by one of his Eunuchs who having thus revenged himself of some Affront done him by his Master saved himself by Flight His two Sons divided his Dominions between them Cotebin the Eldest had for his Share Nineveh and Assyria and Noradin the Younger Brother was Sultan of Alepo This young Prince who soon after made himself one of the most Potent Princes of all Asia had nothing about him that was either Turk or Barbarian except the Name and without retaining any thing of the Vices of his Nation he made himself most Conspicuous in his Conduct by all the Virtues and accomplishing Qualities of a great Captain He was equally Wise Provident Moderate Bold and Enterprising Couragious Valiant and Fortunate and what was most rare among Infidels he was a Man of Honor Probity and wondrous Devout in his own Religion which was Mahometan above all he was the most Vigilant of Mankind the Stoutest and most prompt to lay hold upon all Opportunities which presented themselves with the prospect of any noble Action as appeared particularly in the Rencounter I am going to relate Having understood at Nineveh that Earl Josselin being underhand Sollicited by the Inhabitants had Seized upon Edessa with a considerable number of Troops he ran thither immediately with such Forces as he could on the suddain get together to Invest it this he performed so readily that the Earl despairing to resist the Enemies within who yet held the Fortresses and those without who went about to cut off all Provisions from coming to him resolved before all the Passages were obstructed to save himself with his Soldiers by quitting the City which being accordingly put in Execution the greatest part of the Inhabitants who were afraid to fall into the Hands of Noradin would also Accompany him in this dishonorable Flight But that Prince falling upon the infortunate Inhabitants at the same time that those within the Fortresses Sallying out had broken in among them at the Gate which they had set open they were all cut in pieces and then immediately pursuing the flying Army of the Earl which were Retreated some two Leagues to gain a Pass upon the Euphrates he Charged them so briskly that in the End he put them to a total Rout so that the miserable Earl did not without great Difficulty Escape to Samosatia year 1143 where he Arrived almost alone Thus Noradin having no more Enemies able to keep the Field and having so easily Re-gained Edessa quickly made himself Master of the greatest Part of that Principality from whence he Menaced the other three and all that part of Christendom which was in the East with utter Ruin and Desolation In the mean time immediately after the first taking of Edessa by Sanguin there being great reason to fear that that powerful Turk who had the Courage and Ambition of a Conqueror would also indeavour the Conquest of Antioch a Dispatch was immediately sent to request the Succours of all the Princes of the West But the principal Application was made to Lewis seventh King of France to whom the Christian Princes of the East who were all of that Nation had Recourse as to their natural Lord and whom the cross Accident which happened a little after put into the most favourable Disposition in the World to undertake such an Enterprise This Prince was in the very Bloom of his Youth being about twenty four Years of Age he was of a most exact Shape and of a marvellous and in his Sex an uncommon Beauty of a sweet Temper Civil and Obliging extream Pious Tender and Sensible of the least Sufferings of his meanest Subjects whom he most passionately Loved and was no less Beloved by them but above all he
unquestionable he also added That he was ready to renounce his Religion and turn Mahometan Saladin who very well knew him by the Reputation which he had acquired and which had given him the Fame of one of the ablest and most valiant Knights of his Order accepted his Offers and to engage him the more strongly to his Party gave him his Niece in Marriage and in consequence a very good Army with which this infamous Apostate committed most horrid Discorders in Palestine but as he approached to Jorusalem which he believed he should be able to surprize with the third part of his Troops whilst the other desolated all the Country as far as Samaria or Sebastia even to Jericho the small number of Soldiers which were in the City with the Inhabitants sallied out at the Postern-Gates so luckily that the Traytor who expected no such matter was himself surprized and most of his Companions being cut in pieces he was constrained to sly with all the haste his Spurs could help him to thereby to escape the just Punishments which he knew he deserved for his detestable Perfidy This was some little Consolation to poor King Baldwin who had tasted little in his Life but went out of the World some few Days after with this small Satisfaction dying in the twenty fifth Year of his Age and the twelfth of his Reign not less with the Violence of his Disease than with the Grief which he had to see his poor Kingdom destitute of all hopes of Succour and left in the hands of a feeble Infant betwixt eight and nine Years of Age and which was in extream danger to be miserably torn in pieces by the Factions and Ambition of the Great Men. And indeed presently after the death of this Prince year 1186 those dangerous Contests for the Regency began to break out between the Earl of Tripolis and Guy de Lusignan But this Fire became a mighty Blaze by the death of the little King which happened about seven Months after that of his Unkle by a slow Poyson which it is said was given him either by Count Raymond his Governor who had some Pretensions to the Throne or as others believed by his own Mother Sybilla an ambitious and unnatural Woman who was not able to suffer this little Infant to take from her the Hope of being a Queen But let it be as it will that the Malignity of Men's Natures and the Liberty which they give themselves to publish their own Suspicions and the idle Reports of the People for undoubted Truths which hath often given Rise to the Belief of such supposed Crimes This is certain that the death of this Infant King gave the fatal Blow to this unhappy Kingdom year 1186 and to the Liberty of the unfortunate City of Jerusalem King Baldwin the Fourth had two Sisters Sybilla the Mother of this little Baldwin the Fifth which she had by her first Husband William Marquis of Montferrat his second Sister was Isabella the Daughter of Mary the second Wife of Amauri and Niece to Manuel the Emperor of Constaminople who was married to Alfred de Thoron Son to the late Constable of Jerusalem Now Raymond who was the nearest Relation to the deceased Kings pretended that in the present Condition of their Affairs he ought to succeed to the Kingdom to the Exclusion of the Females and he was supported in his Pretensions by the Militia the People and the Judgment of King Baldwin the Fourth who had intrusted him with the Minority of the young King his Nephew excluding from it Guy de Lusignan the second Husband of his Sister Sybilla On the other side all the great Lords of the Realm who were for maintaining the Succession to the lawful Heirs of the Sisters of Baldwin the Fourth were resolute to recognize the Princess Sybilla for their Queen but with this Condition that some Expedient should be found out to break her Marriage with Count Guy of Lusignan with whom they would have nothing to do both in regard that he was not reputed either brave or able as also that they could not endure that a Stranger newly come among them should possess the Throne to the prejudice of so many Lords of the Realm who might sill it more advantageously Nevertheless Sybilla who was altogether as dexterous as she was ambitious having for some time concealed the death of her Son knew so well how to gain the Patriarch and the great Masters of the Temple and the Hospital who made the most powerful Interest that she procured her self and Husband to be crowned almost at the same time that the death of the little King was divulged before the other Pretenders could have the leisure to enterprize any thing against her It is true indeed that they were so transported with Madness at this surprizing Artifice that they offered to declare Alfred de Thoron King but whether it were that he had little Ambition or little Courage he rejected the Tender and went himself immediately to recognize the new King by doing him Homage the others thereupon being astonished with his Action yet followed his Example though they detested in their hearts this Cowardly Submission of his as they termed it and reserved themselves for the future by some Opportunity or other to overthrow that Throne to which they now submitted only in Appearance and Compliance to the present Necessity But it was far otherwise with the Earl of Tripolis for he neither able to suffer nor to dissemble the Injury which he thought he received by preferring his Rival was so transported with Rage and Fury that he immediately retired into his own Estates and presently after to accomplish his Revenge committed a Fact the most black dishonourable and detestable that ever was recorded in any Story This Count Raymond the Third was descended in the Right Line from the famous Raymond Earl of Tholouse who was his third Grandfather and who after he had done so many fair Actions in the first Crusade died in the Year 1105. in the Fortress of Mount Pilgrims about two Miles from Tripolis which he then besieged Bertrand his Son who took that City succeeded his Father in the Earldom which he held of the Realm of Jerusalem and he left for his Successor Pontius de Tholouse his Son who married Cecilia the Widow of the valiant Tancred the Daughter of Philip the King of France which he had by Bertrada de Monfort who had also had by Fowk d' Anjou her former Husband the young Count Fowk who was afterwards King of Jerusalem From this Earl Pontius and Cecilia descended Raymond the Second Nephew to King Fowk and who was also his Brother in Law by the Marriage of the younger Sister of Queen Melesintha the Daughter of King Baldwin the Second and Wife of King Fowk So that Raymond the Third of whom I now speak who was the Son of Raymond the Second was by his Father second Cousin and by his Mother Cousin-german to King Amauri the Father
Few there were who saved themselves by Flight year 1187 except the Perfidious Raymond and his Complices whom the Turks permitted to escape The King seeing that all was lost thought to have saved himself by flying but Tokedin the Nephew of Saladin pursued him so quick that he took him Prisoner as also the true Cross which Rufin the Bishop of Ptolemais according to the Custom carried that Day in the Battle That Bishop was armed with a Curiass contrary to the manner of all the other Prelates who before him had carried that Holy Wood unarmed not so much as one of them having even been wounded whereas he notwithstanding his Armour was shot quite through the Body with an Arrow wherewith he lost both his life and the Cross which he carried Tokedin who took it when he brought the King a Prisoner before his Uncle presented that also to him as the most Glorious Trophy of his Victory There never was any Victory more sad and deplorable to the Vanquished or more complete and advantageous to the Vanquishers a Victory which made the Conquerors Masters of all the rich Equipage of so many Princes and great Lords as were either Slain or taken in that Battle And as Saladin had a mortal Hatred to the Knights of the two Orders of the Temple and the Hospital of Jerusalem he caused the Heads of all of them who were found among the Prisoners to be cut off in his Presence excepting only the great Master of the Temple so that he almost extinguished the whole Orders of them that were in Palestine for not one of these Valiant men had once offered to fly and the greatest part of them perished Nobly with their Swords in their Hands during the Combat He also with his own hand slew the Brave Renaud de Chattillon who after having a long time governed the Principality of Antioch the Heiress whereof the Princess Constantia he had married was since that Governour of the Countries beyond Jordan where he had so often arrested the Course and of Saladin's Victories This Prince who otherwise was a Person of great Humanity when his Anger did not transport him beyond his Reason yet could not bear with this Valiant man who being by him briskly and with a little insulting over his Misfortunes demanded some Questions answered him with an Air as Fierce and Haughty as the other spoke to him insomuch that the Liberty which he ought to have admired in a man whose Courage neither his Misfortune nor his Chains could abate provoked him to that Degree that forgetting himself he cut of his Head with a Blow of his Cimiter dishonouring his Victory by that Brutal Action which was so altogether unworthy of so great a man as he otherwise was And thus by this unmanly Action he made it appear that it was more difficult to vanquish himself than to overcome his Enemies As for the rest whether it were that he repented of so shameful and cruel a Transport or that his Avarice opposed his Cruelty the Fear that he had to lose so many great Ransoms which he might expect from such considerable Prisoners made him treat them with extraordinary Civility especially the King the Great Master of the Temple and the old Marquis of Montferrat the Father-in-Law of Queen Sybilla who being come a little before to Visit the Holy Places would needs make one in that unfortunate Battle But this was the smallest Fruit which Saladin drew from the gaining of this Memorable Day for being a great Captain as able dexterous and diligent in making the best of a Victory as he was Valiant and happy in gaining it and that he knew that the greatest part of the Cities were in a manner destitute of Garrisons and without Defence he therefore immediately marched and presented his Victorious Army before Ptolemais a fair and flourishing City whose Haven was Necessary to receive the Fleet which was to come to him from Egypt There were no Soldiers in the City all those which had been in Garrison having been drawn out to recruit the Army where they perished in that fatal Battle and after so great a Loss there was no Expectation of any Succour for them so that though it was a mighty strong Place yet it was surrendred to him in two days upon the Assurance which he gave to the Native Inhabitants that he would treat them most favourably and that the Latins should have Liberty to retire whither they pleased and that there should not be the least Injury offered either to their Persons or Goods which they might carry away with them He did most exactly keep his Word with them and the Reputation which he had gained of being a just merciful and Generous Prince year 1187 together with the Inability which the other Cities found to defend themselves all the Forces of the Kingdom being so imprudently exposed upon one single Hazzard where they all perished was the Reason that in less than three Months all the other Cities except Tyre Ascalon and Jerusalem yielded and submitted themselves to the Will of the Conqueror He made some little Offer to besiege Ascalon but seeing that Place which was as the Bulwork of the Realm against Egypt was extraordinary strong and well defended he was in the Opinion that if he must imploy his Forces against these three Cities which remainded yet untaken it was much better to begin with the Capital City For he well hoped that after the taking of that the two others seeing themselves separated from one another at the two Extremities of the Kingdom would quickly follow the Fortune of Jerusalem It was then about the middle of September that Saladin came to encamp before Jerusalem with the most powerful and numerous Army that he had ever before had sierce with his Victories and rich with the Spoils of the Vanquished and despising the pitiful Remainders of those who were shut up in the Capital City which he looked upon as the End of his Labours and the Subject of his Future Triumph There was in the City the Queen Sybilla the patriarch Heraclius and Renaud Lord of Sidon or Sajetta who escaped from the Battle and was suspected to be a Accomplice in the Treason of Count Raymond And that which without doubt was a very unlucky Presage to this poor City was that besides the frighted Citizens who trembled to see such a formidable Enemy at their Gates there were but a very inconsiderable Number of Soldiers who had escaped the Defeat and the Inhabitants of the little Villages and Neighbouring Burroughs who were come thither for Refuge Saladin immediately caused the Besieged to be summoned to surrender the City proposing to them Examples of others who had experienced his Clemency Equity and that inviolable Fidelity with which he always kept his Word and Promise He promised them also that besides those advantageous Conditions which he had granted to others and which he offered to them he would confer greater Favours upon them he would maintain the
Priviledges the Honours and the Dignities which they injoyed under their Kings These were honourable Terms and though the Defendants had not overmuch Courage yet they had some Shame left to prevent their yielding so soon So that an Answer was given like men of Bravery that they were resolved to defend the Place to the last Extremities But this Courage was not lasting being but counterfeit For Saladin having for ten days together made continual false Attacks upon the West to draw thither the greatest Number of the Defendants did at the same time batter the Walls where they were weakest and almost ruinous upon the North Part of the City So that having made a large Breach and that they saw he was now preparing for a General Assault the Besieged sent out to him to capitulate upon the Fourteenth day of the Siege Saladin who was determined to take not to ruin the City admitted the Treaty and at last it was finished though with Conditions much less favourable and advantageous then those which they were offered before For now he was resolved that every own should redeem his Liberty by paying a certain Imposition or Poll-Money according to the difference of Ages and Conditions That all the Franks and Latins with such as were descended from them should depart the City and not be suffered to carry away any more of their Goods then what they could bear upon their Backs And that no Christians except Greeks Syrians Armenians and Jacobites should for the Future be permitted to inhabit there There never was a Spectacle more moving or more lamentable then to see so many People of all sorts of Conditions constrained to quit the Holy City which their Fathers had so gloriously conquered and for which they never before had that Tenderness and Passion as now that they must leave it But this is the usual Folly of Mankind that they rarely perfectly know the Good things which they possess with Ease till they are upon the Point of relinquishing them for ever During the whole Night which was to usher in that Gloomy day of parting nothing was to be heard but the Groans the Lamentations and the Howlings of Despair year 1187 the piteous Cries of the Women and Children the men the Youths and the Aged who deplored the Misfortune of the Holy City which was now to be delivered into the Hands of the Infidels and their one Exile which in those sad Moments they could not but look upon as the greatest of their Punishments Above all it was the Greatest Difficulty for them to leave the Holy Sepulchre which they bedewed with their Tears and gave it those last Kisses which were to bid it eternally farewel Then was to be seen the weeping Mothers loaden with their little Infants who must now march out before they could go the Husbands supporting them with one Hand and with the other leading those which were but just able to go the stronger carrying on their Backs those whom either Age or Weakness had made impotent and the Remainder every one carrying the Money and the most portable of their best Moveables which they had in this Order marched out of the City every one loaden with something which either Nature or Piety Necessity or Charity obliged them to take Care of In this time Saladin who would not make his Entry into the City till all the Franks and Latins were departed obliged them by his Presence to make the more hast for such was the Vanity of this Proud and insulting Conqueror that he would himself assist at this deplorable Spectacle which he considered as one of the fairest Flowers in his Triumphant Gerland The Patriarch with all the Clergy of Jerusalem marched first in a Condition far different from that wherein he was accustomed to appear upon the solemn days with the sacred Wood of the true Cross which the Emperor Heraclius had formerly recovered from the Infidels and which was now unhappily newly fallen into their Hands again under this unfortunate Prelate Heraclius according to the Remark which was pubickly made by one upon him who justly reproached him with the Disorders of his Life so little conformable to the Sanctity of his Character After him came the Queen Sybilla accompanied with the two little Princesses her Daughters and all the People of Quality Saladin who was Civil and Courteous much above what could be expected from one of his Nation who generally were not guilty of being over polished in their Manners descended from his Throne and receiving her with abundance of Honour and Respect gave her all the Consolation she was capable of in her great Misfortune by the Hopes which he made her entertain of the Liberty of her Husband upon a reasonable Composition He also according to his Promise gave her a good Convoy to conduct her and her whole Retinue to Ascalon whither she resolved to retire After this he saw the Common People pass bye whose sad Equipage and miserable Condition and above all the Woful Cries of some Women touched him so nearly that the Generous Compassion which he had made him in this Rencounter do an Action which the Roman Historians would have judged worthy of the Vertue of the Heroes of Ancient Rome For as in this general Grief and Sorrow which sadly appeared through the whole Company of these poor afflicted Exiles he observed that the Women and the young Ladies of Quality as well as the rest who had nothing of the noble Air beheld him after a manner infinitely touching whilest with piteous Cryes and their Hands stretched out towards his Throne they seemed in that posture of Suppliants to beg some Favor from him whereupon he commanded all the Company to stop and sent to know of these Ladies what it was which they desired of him They returned in Answer that besides the Subject of their Sadness and Affliction which was common to them with the rest of their Nation who were turned out of their Habitations and this beloved City they had something which was more particular having lost in the Battle of Tiberias some their Husbands others their Fathers or near Relations who possibly might be in the number of the Captives They therefore most humbly Requested of his Majesty that he would not deprive them of that last Refuge which they had after the loss of their Estates in the Persons of those who were so dear unto them and so necessary to them in that Extremity of Misery and Poverty to which they now found themselves reduced Whereupon that generous Prince who had nothing Barbarous except his Birth when his Choler to which he was too much a Subject permitted him to be himself was so nearly touched with the Words and the Tears of these poor afflicted Ladies year 1187 that he instantly commanded that diligent Search should be made among the Prisoners and that such as they named if they were found there should be imediately set at Liberty and bestowed upon their Intercessions and their charming Tears and
by which the Army must certainly have perished if the Marquis had not taken Care from time to time to supply them abundantly with his Fleet. This absolutely gained him all the Commanders and the Souldiers who took his Part against Guy de Lusignan who now had nothing left but the vain Shadow of Royal Majesty without the least Substance of Power or Authority Thus the Army being extremely diminished did nothing now but act upon the Defensive in their Retrenchments opposing the Assaults of Saladin on the one side and the Sallies of the Besieged on the other till the Arrival of the two Kings whose Voyage and Actions it is now time for me after having given myself and the Reader a moments Breath to recount unto him THE HISTORY OF THE CRUSADE OR The Expeditions of the Christian Princes for the Conquest of the Holy Land PART II. BOOK III. The CONTENTS of the Third Book The beginning of the Reign of Richard Caeur-de-Lion King of England and his Preparations for the Holy War The Preparations of Philip the August The Conferences of Nonancour and Vezelaï between the two Kings The Portraict of Philip the August The Character of Richard King of England The Voyage of the two Kings to Messina An Adventure of the English Fleet. A Quarrel between the English and the Messineses The taking of that City The Quarrel between the two Kings and their new Accommodation The Relation of the Abbot Joachim and his Character His Conference with King Richard The Departure of King Philip and his Arrival before Acre The Departure of Richard The Relation of the Conquest of the Kingdom of Cyprus by that Prince His Arrival before Acre A new Difference between the two Kings and the true Causes of it Their Accord The Reduction of the City of Acre The extreme Violence of King Richard The Return of Philip the August The March of Richard The Battle of Antipatris The single Combat between King Richard and Sultan Saladin A noble Action of William de Pourcelets who saved the Life of that King Richard presents himself before Jerusalem at an unseasonable Time and therefore retires and disperses his Army into Quarters The Marquis Conrade slain by two Assassins of the old Mountain The Discription of that Government and those People A wicked Action of the Templers which hindred their Conversion The Cause of the Marquis his Death Richard accused of that Crime His Innocence is proved Isabella Marries Count Henry and is declared Queen of Jerusalem Guy de Lusignan made King of Cyprus Richard pretends a second time to besiege Jerusalem defeats the Enemies takes the Caravan of Egypt but retires by a cunning Agreement A Calumny against Richard which he clears by a most memorable Action The Battle of Jassa and the taking of that Place from the Sarasins by Richard His Treaty with Saladin and his unfortunate Return He is taken and imprisoned His Deliverance the Justice which he demanded and which he obtains A new Division among the Princes of the East appeased by the Count de Champagne The Death of Saladin and his Elogy Division happens among the Infidels which gives Occasion to a fourth Crusade year 1190 T The Crusade which had been so solemly sworn in the Holy Field and which the War that was kindled between the two Kings had so long time retarded had at length its Effect by the perfect Understanding which for some time there was between Philip the August and Richard sirnamed Caeur-de-Lion at the beginning of the Reign of this new King For so soon as he had received the Sword as Duke of Normandy at our Ladies Church in Roan and the Crown of England at Westminster with the general Applause of all his Subjects who saw that he took quite differing Courses from his Father who was not at all beloved he had no other Thoughts but of making Preparations for the Holy War Above all things he applied himself to the procuring a good Treasury of Gold and Silver but not by charging the People with the rigorous Exaction of Saladins Tenth as did his Father who when he had received it made use of it in the War between the two Crowns For this purpose he took the way of selling all the Dignities which he could all Offices and the Lands of his Demesnes at a very low rate thereby to intice the Avarice or the Ambition of unwary Purchasers who easily suffered themselves to be imposed upon with those cheap Bargains not foreseeing that he had Design of Reassumption after his Return as he did without any other Reimbursment than by allowing upon the Foot of the Account what they made over and above their Charges of the Demesnes during the time that they injoyed them But he dissembled the matter so well and on one side seemed so truly to have a design to sell all that he could and on the other shewed so many Marks of a ruined Constitution which both his constant Fatigues of War and his Debauches gained an easy Credit to that the Purchasers without any Difficulty suffered themselves to be perswaded that he would never return and that he had no other Prospect than of the present as not having any hopes of living long And for these Reasons it was that very many straitned themselves to lay hold of this occasion of Profit whereby he drew from them vast Summs turning every thing into Money even to protesting to those who were astonished at his Proceedings that if he could find a Chapman who was able to buy of him the City of London he should make no Difficulty to sell it to him But he drew the greatest Advantages from diverse Prelates of his Realm that were extraordinary Rich from whom he drew all the Money that they had by selling to them temporal Dignities which they were mighty glad to add to their Bishopricks or their Abbies It was by this Stratagem that he drew into the Net the Bishop of Durham year 1190 an old Man equally Covetous and Ambitious by persuading him to purchase the Earldom of that Province which he would unite to his Bishoprick For that Prelate who was ready to die with the Desire which he had to be Earl of Northumberland gave him for that Title all the Riches which he had for a long time been hoarding up out of the Revenue of his Bishoprick as well as those other less honest Markets which he had made And to this he threw in also all the Money which he had reserved purposely to defray his Expences in the Voyage which he had undertaken to make to Jerusalem thereby renouncing his Vow his Conscience and his Honour that so he might become great in this World out of which his old Age was even now ready to chase him which made the King very pleasantly to say when he had gotten all his Money That he was about to work a kind of Miracle and to make a young Earl out of an old Bishop He also seized upon all the Estate of
to the Camp which with the Forces of the Levant and other Succours come from Europe made more than three hundred thousand men that they were reduced into a worse Condition than before by this fatal Discord which divided all the Christian Lords and armed them one against the other The Knights of the Temple the Duke of Burgundy all the Party of the Marquis Conrade and the Germans declared themselves for Philip. Richard had of his Party besides his own Subjects the Hospitallers the Pisans and those among the Levantine Princes who favoured Guy de Lusignan the Flemings who were for the Young Baldwin the Nephew of their deceased Earl and who some twelve Years after obtained the Empire of Constantinople as also some French men among others Henry Earl of Champagne whom Richard had gained by his excessive Liberalities so that the Camp seemed more dangerously besieged than the City being attacked from without by the Army of Saladin and more miserably within by this fearful Division which had ruined all unless God who was resolved to crown the Zeal of these two great Princes notwithstanding all the disorders of their Passions had appeased this Tempest and unexpectedly brought a Calm among them by the undertaking of some of the Wisest and most prudent Persons of both Armies who made a Composure of all Differences between the two Kings on this manner It was ordained That they should confirm their former Treaty and most inviolable and exactly keep it on one side and the other That they should devide between them whatsoever they should take from the Infidels That when one of the two Kings should give an Assault to the City the other should oppose Saladin in defending the Lines and for the difference between Guy de Lusignan and the Marquis de Montferrat it should be referred to the Determination of certain Judges equally chosen on both sides And not long after a solemn Judgement was rendred thereupon by which it was decreed That Guy de Lusignan should for the remainder of his Life continue King of Jerusalem but that his Children if he should marry again should have no sort of Pretentions to that Crown the Reversion and Succession whereof should remain to the Marquis and those Children he should have by the Princess Isabella his Lady Sister to the late Queen Sybilla That in the Interim he should have the Moity of the Revenues of the Realm together with the Principalities of Tyre of Sydon and Baruth by holding them of the Crown and that Geoffry de Lusignan should upon the same Conditions hold the Counties of Jaffa and Caesarea This being done and the Peace in this manner confirmed at least in Appearance between the two Kings nothing was now thought upon but how to press forward the Siege and it was done with so much Vigor by continual battering the Walls both Night and Day and redoubling the Attacks that the Besieged Sarasins now dispairing to be able long to defend the Place against so great Forces as were now become unanimous offered to surrender provided they might be assured of their Lives and Liberty to retire whither they pleased without carrying any thing away with them more than their wearing Apparel The Kings who were assured they could carry the Place thought to make a considerable Advantage of that dispair to which so many Brave men were reduced whom they believed Saladin would not suffer to perish and therefore would hearken to no Terms unless Saladin would restore the true Cross Jerusalem and all the Cities which he had taken after the Battle of Tyberias Saladin who was obliged to turn his Arms against the Son of Noradin who attempted to take from him Mesopotamia was willing to consent to these very Terms provided that the Kings should assist him against his Enemies in Person with thirty thousand Men nay he was contented that it should be done by their Lieutenants and with fewer Troops to which he would join his provided they would serve him one Year But whether the two Kings judged it unworthy of their Majesty which they thought must suffer an Abasement in serving an Infidel or that the Son of Noradin on the other side solliciting them to joyn with him against Saladin They believed that by such a favourable diversion they should be able with Ease to take from him all those Cities they absolutely refused these Conditions And therefore they began now more furiously than ever to attack the City in one of which Assaults Alberic Clement Mareschal of France after he had already gained the Walls was slain in the City year 1191 That which was of mighty Service to the Besiegers was that a disguised Christian who was in the Town and who was one of the Council gave them frequent Advertisement by Letters which he threw into the Camp of all the Resolutions which were taken by the Sarasins so that all their Enterprises being discovered were rendred ineffectual but this Important Service was never recompensed in regard the Intelligencer could never be known after the taking of the City which was at last constrained to surrender For on the one hand Saladin who was obliged to retire had sent to them to make the best Terms they could on the other there was no more Expectation of Succour for them by the Sea where the Christians were absolute Masters and the French who by prodigious Labour had drawn their Mines to the very Foundations of the Wicked Tower and the eleventh of July had overthrown all the Walls and were just now ready to set Fire to the Wooden Pillars which supported it therefore the sive Admirals or Emirs who commanded the Garrisons Caracos Mesiock Helsedin Limathos and Jordic hung out a Flag of Parley and after having treated with the Commissioners of the two Kings the next morning the Agreement was perfected in these Articles That they should immediately surrender the place with all the Gold Silver and Moveables the Ammunition Arms and Provisions which were in it without retaining any thing to themselves more than their wearing Apparel That they should procure from Saladin the true Cross together with all the Christians which he detained Captives and that he should pay to the two Kings one hundred thousand of those pieces of Gold which were called Besans from the Name of Constantinople otherwise called Bysance where they were minted with the Effigies of the Greek Emperor that in Expectation of the Performance of the Treaty they with the whole Garrison should remain Prisoners at War and that if Saladin did not in forty days accomplish these Articles they should be wholly at the Discretion of the two Kings who should dispose of their Lives and Liberties as they should judge convenient Thus was the City of Ptolemais or Acre taken at the last by the Christians after one of the longest and most memorable Sieges which have been ever seen and with the loss of as many brave men as might have conquered all Asia for besides an Infinite Number of
it upon second Thoughts never to perform Philip having after this Manner gained the Consent of Alexis instantly dispatched the Ambassadors of the Princes together with his own and those of his Brother-in-Law Alexis who arrived at Zara about the middle of December The Doge presently gave them Audience in his Palace at Zara where all the Princes and great Lords of the Crusade being assembled the principal of the Ambassage who had order to omit nothing that might oblige the Republick and the Princes to conclude the Treaty according to his Instructions addressed his Discourse to that august Assembly to this Effect My Lords if you see appear in our Faces more Assurance and more Joy than may seem becoming poor and miserable dispoiled Persons who come to implore your Assistance it is to be attributed to our Hopes for besides the Knowledge which we have of the Generosity of so many illustrious Princes and great Personages as compose this August Assembly we have Commission to assure you that we do not present our selves before you with the least intention to retard your glorious Enterprise for the Conquest of the Holy Land but to present you with a Way most Safe Easy and absolutely Necessary not only happily from this Moment to begin it but in consequence most certainly to atchieve it with all the Glory and Advantage which you can hope or desire For the Subject of our Ambassy is to request that those Arms which you design to carry into Egypt and by that Way to enter into Palestine may be employed to render you Masters of Constantinople by placing there the true Heir the Prince Alexis and by overturning the Imperial Throne of the Vsurper who hath seized upon it by the most perfidious Cowardice and the most detestable Treason that ever was See my Lords the shortest and most infallible Way of Conquering the Holy Land and without which it will be always impossible You know generous French nor is it unknown to all Germany what happened to the late King Lewis and to the Emperor Conrade for want of assuring themselves of Constantinople before they passed any further as they were advised by a most able Politician This very Oversight was the cause of the loss of two such flourishing Armies as might with ease have triumphed over all the East if they had been Masters of that great City which is the very Key of Europe and Asia without which one cannot but with extreme Difficulty and a thousand Dangers receive either by Sea or Land those Assistances which are absolutely necessary for the Maintenance of an Army either in Egypt or Syria Nor is it probable that you can repose any sort of Confidence in that perfidious Man who is now Master of it for how can he be trusted who hath so basely betrayed his own Brother who hath banished all the Latins who hath so barbarously affronted the Emperor Philip and Philip King of France both the Allies of these two poor Princes year 1202 whom this wicked Tyrant and Vsurper hath despoiled of their Dominions This Tyrant Barharous and Cruel as he is yet will neither have the Courage nor the Power to resist your invincible Arms which are supported by the Justice of the Cause nor is there any thing so fearful and so basely Mean and Cowardly as a perfidious guilty Tyrant the terrible Images of whose Crimes continually pursue him with the dreadful Fear of Vengeance and render him the most Jealous Vneasy and Fearful of Mankind And so soon as the Prince Alexis shall be seen at the Head of this flourishing Army of French and Venetians at whose very Names the usurping Tyrant will grow pale and tremble all Greece which groans under the load of his servitude will declare themselves for this amiable Prince whom they adore and the Tyrant who is in Execration with the whole World believing that he is Surrounded with so many Enemies armed for his Destruction as there are Men in Constantinople will indeavour by an early Flight to save himself and leave you an easy Conquest over a City willing to be Overcome And for the Advantages which you shall draw from a Conquest so Easy and so Glorious besides what I have already said that it appears of absolute Necessity for the happy Accomplishing of the Holy War it is convenient to let you understand that you are to expect not only Words but real Performances not altogether Contemptible For this Purpose I am to inform you my noble Lords that the Prince Offors and we have ample and full Power to treat with you upon these Conditions First That so soon as he shall be Re-established in the imperial Throne of Constantinople he will pay you two hundred thousand Marks in Silver to be divided between the Confederates for the Charges of the War and to make Provision for the Army Secondly That he will accompany you in Person with an Army to the Conquest of Egypt or if it shall please you better that he shall send along with you ten thousand choise Men and maintain them at his own Charge there for one Year and further that he will during his Life maintain five hundred Knights well Armed for the Preservation of the Conquests which shall be made in the Holy Land And lastly which ought doubtless to be the most powerful Argument of any which I have hitherto used he promises and engages inviolably upon his Faith that if it shall please God by your Assistance to raise him to his Throne that he will reduce his whole Empire under the Obeisance of the Roman Church from which it hath been so long time separated by the Heresie and Schism After this my Lords Judge if the Means which we propose to you for the Execution of your Enterprise of the Holy War is not more Safe more Easy and most Advantageous to you and to the whole Church and in short the Thing of the World most capable to acquire for you Immortal Fame on Eurth and Glory in Heaven This Discourse which seemed so reasonable and persuasive was very diversly received by that Assembly who resolved to take some time to deliberate upon such sair Propositions In truth the Venetians and the greatest Party of the French who besides the Interest of the publick and the common Cause of Christianity found also therein their own made not the least doubt but that the Propositions ought to be accepted but those who had before used their utmost Efforts to hinder the Seige of Zara opposed them with abundance of Heat and above all the rest the Abbot du Val de Sernay who was constantly in the Head of the discontented Party made a mighty Noise with his Monks protesting against this Diversion and urging that they could not with a safe Conscience turn those Arms against Christians which they had taken up for a Holy War against the Infidels for the Deliverance of the Holy Sepulchre On the contrary the Abbot de Los of the same Order a Man of
in vain for them to expect from the Tyrant and which was really due to them in Virtue of the Treaty which they had made with the late Emperor Alexis And in the last place to make themselves Masters of Constantinople and consequently of all the Empire of the East which was the thing of the World the most glorious for the Crusades the most advantageous to the Church and the most necessary for the Conquest of the Holy Land as had been but too evident in all the other Crusades and without which they could difficultly Expect to be Successful and especially when they should have this Tyrant their mortal Enemy possessed of it who would certainly employ all his Power and his Malice for their Destruction especially since now there could not be the same Scruple which was made against the Advice of the wise Bishop of Langress who counselled Lewis the Young by all means to seize upon Constantinople before he passed any further in regard that there could not be the least Colour that the War against an Usurper and a Parricide against Rebels and Traitors was unjust or unlawful All the Bishops the Abbots and even the Friends of the Pope were so far from opposing this Resolution that they endeavoured to promote it with all their Power assuring the Army that in the Execution of this Enterprise they should obtain the same Indulgences which the Pope had granted to those who went to combat against the Infidels So that all mens minds being perfectly well disposed to it and the Army fully resolved to perform their Duty the War was again begun both by Land and Sea and to encourage them in the very beginning they met with a lucky Presage of the Success of the Enterprise by a most signal Victory which was obtained against the Tyrant Murtzuphle year 1204 For Henry the Brother of Count Baldwin accompanied with James de Avesnes Baldwin de Beavoir Eudes and William de Chamlite with a good Party of the most Valiant men of the Army resolved to endeavour the surprise of the City Philea anciently Phinopolis situate some five or six Leagues from the Camp on the Thracian Side near the Mouth of the Bosphorus upon the Euxine Sea After they had in order to it marched all night early in the morning they came before the Place without being discovered and presently presented the Scalade and notwithstanding all the Resistance of the Inhabitants who as soon as they perceived their Danger ran from all parts to repulse them these brave men took it by Force And the City being a Place of great Traffick and consequently very rich they made there a mighty Booty which together with the Prisoners and abundance of Provisions which they found there they sent down the Chanal in their Barks to the Camp And having refreshed themselves for two days they returned loaden with the Spoils the remainder of their Booty towards the Camp But Murtzuphle being advertised thereof by Night drew out of Constantinople with a great Party of his Army and having placed himself in Ambush near a Wood by which they must of Necessity return he suffered the first Squadrons to pass by and immediately with all his Forces fell upon the Rereguard which was led by Prince Henry Now although this Surprise was very suddain and unexpected yet this Brave Prince shewed his great Courage and admirable Resolution for without being in the least daunted to see so great an Army ready to charge him and the Emperor in Person at the Head of them or to find himself with such a Handful of men divided from the rest who were already advanced a good way into the Forest and who could not come up to him in any Order but by filing off in small Parties by reason of the Straitness of the Passage he notwithstanding all these disadvantages made Head against the Enemy and generously sustained their first Charge when it came to his turn charging them also so vigorously that he still gained Ground of them till such time as his Companions hearing the Noise of the Combat made hast to his Assistance and drew up in Order without the Wood. Then seeing that he should be seconded by his Party he charged with so much Fury upon the Greeks who were already in Disorder that they all took the Rout and followed the Emperour who to make more hast in his Flight lightned himself of his Buckler and his Arms and yet notwithstanding had like to have left his Life too behind him had it not been for the Swiftness of an excellent Horse to whose Heels and the Spurs of his own Fear he that day owed his Life He left however twenty of the most principal Men of his Army among the Slain together with a great Number of private Soldiers and many Prisoners with all his Baggage and that which most rejoyced the Army was that together with the Great Standard of the Empire they took that famous Image of the Blessed Virgin which the Grecian Emperors were accustomed to have carried before them in all their Battles as the invincible Companion of the Romans as Nicetas saith who tells us that the Emperor Zimisces after he had conquered the Bulgarians caused it to be carried in the Triumphant Chariot which was prepared for himself protesting that it was to the Virgin represented by that Image to whom he ought to render that Honor since to her he owed the Victory However the taking of this Banner and Image was looked upon as a happy Presage that they should gain the Empire of Constantinople since the Blessed Virgin to whom that Imperial City was dedicated by the mighty Constantine seemed to forsake it to pass into the French Camp as it were to guide and conduct them in their Entrance into the City Murtzuphle astonished with this Blow began now to think of attempting the ways of Artifice having for that purpose obtained a Conference with the Doge of Venice but with all his Arts he was not able to delude this clear sighted blind old man who by the Eyes of his Soul saw through all his Juggles and Slight of Hand So that all things were prepared to give a general Assault upon the City by Sea for in regard that on that side there was only a single Wall it was believed that the French who were to land upon the Key making their Attack there whilest at the same time the Venetians should make theirs by sighting upon their Ships the place might soon and most easily be carried year 1204 On the other side the Tyrant who was a Soldier and who saw that his safety wholly depended upon his strong Resolution of a stout defence failed nor to give all necessary Orders for opposing the Latins in the best manner that he could he marched quite through the City in his Habiliments of War his Sword by his side and a huge Horsemans Mace in his Hand encompassed with his Guards and with a mind fierce and resolute he endeavoured to encourage
this Tower were so terrified with this Heroick Confidence of these two men and much more by the dreadful Blows which they bestowed making Heads Arms and Legs fly off where ever they sell that losing their Courage and Judgement they made all the hast they could to get out of their reach and with Precipitation abandoned the Tower to these two Heroes and those who thronged up after them with desire to pertake of the Honor of the Action Those who sought ashoar and those who were upon the Gallies to support them seeing that those who were aboard these two Ships had planted their Ensigns upon this Tower and the Greeks already took the Fright were so ashamed to see themselves behind hand that some of them with Precipitation throwing themselves ashoar whilest others planted the Ladders against the Walls the one and the other mounting in Shoals pushing overthrowing with their Bucklers and with huge Blows killing all those who in this horrible disorder into which Fear and Dispair had driven the Greeks made any resistance and continually pursuing their Point with a Courage extremely heightned by the Hopes of Victory they quickly made themselves Masters of four other Towers and there planted their Victorious Ensigns At the same time they who fought upon the Key and they who descended from the Gallies and Ships where they were employed continually to shoot against the Curtain inraged to think that they should be the last in the taking of Constantinople ran to the Gates and with their Rams broak three of them open they also who were already gotten into the Town over the Walls having opened the others which were between the Towers which they had taken the whole Army entred year 1204 and drew up in order between the Walls and the Heads of the Streets which abutted upon the Haven that so they might not be surprized indisorder but be in a Condition regularly to attack any that should be commanded to oppose them For they saw the Emperor advantageously posted before them upon his Hill and who had put his Troops in Battalia before his Tents upon the rising Grounds which lay on each Hand of him so that he seemed either resolved to charge the Confederate Army to drive them again out of the City or at least firmly to expect them in his advantageous Post if they should venture to attack him and however to prevent them from proceeding further But by the Cowardice of his men or possibly his own and the fear he was in to fall into the hands of the Princes wanting the Resolution of a Valiant man to conquer or to die nobly with his Sword in his Hand he did neither the one nor the other for the Greeks did no sooner see the Knights in their glittering Armour mount their charging Horses with the Visors of their Helmets down and the Lance in the rest begin to move to run against them having at the Head of them a brave Lord of great Stature whom their fear made them magnifie into a Giant but they instantly disbanded and with all the hast they could began to run and save themselves some out of the City by the Dorean Gate others in the Palace and in the Churches which they Barricadoed to defend themselves The Emperor at full Speed threw himself into the great Palace which had one Gate upon the Propontis and the greatest part of the Lords and Officers retrenched themselves in that Quarter and in the Palace of Blaquerness All the rest following that Example ran in a dreadful disorder through the Streets to gain their Houses the Victors still being at their Heels who in this first fury which was not easie to be stopped in the taking of a City by Assault overthrew and killed all that they could reach making a most horrible Slaughter among these miserable People and above all the Latins who had inhabited Constantinople made the most cruel carnage to revenge themselves for having been banished out of it upon the great Conflagration of that unfortunate City The Night which now came on apace favourably for the Greeks stopped the Current of this Fury a retreat was sounded and the Princes having rallied their men in an open Place distributed them into three Quarters and ordered them to fortifie themselves there not doubting but that they must have more fighting work to gain the rest of the City and that the Greeks would not fail to retrench themselves in so many advantageous Posts which they might very easily be able to defend as in our time we have known the People of Naples and the Spaniards retrench one against the other in divers Quarters of the Streets and in the Monasteries and to fight for several Months in one City as if it had been a great Province in which one is obliged to take several Cities and Forts to make a Conquest of the whole Thus the whole Army was posted near the Towers and the Wall which they had taken and which they were able to defend the Duke of Venice encamped close by the Walls to be near his Ships if any Attempt should in the Night be made against them The Earl of Flanders by a happy Presage lodged himself in the Imperial Tents which Murtzuphle had lest ready for him upon the Hill where he was posted during the Assault Prince Henry and the Earl of Blois his men lay upon his right and retrenched themselves before the Palace of Blaquerness and Marquis Boniface took his Lodgement to the left in a quarter lying more to the East where certain Soldiers fearing to be surprized by the Greeks set sire to some Houses that as they thought lay too near them and so occasioned a third sire which reduced the greatest part of that quarter of the City into Ashes As for the Earl of Blois he was not at the taking of the City being extremely ill that day with a sit of a terrible Quartane Ague which kept him in his Bed and hindred him from being at the Attack which was no small Affliction to him who was as desirous of being present there as he was stout and courageous being esteemed as he really was one of the most Brave and Valiant men of his time But all these Precautions of the Confederates were unnecessary for early the next morning being drawn up in Battalia and expecting to be incountred with at least a hundred thousand Enemies they were met with nothing but Processions which from all Quarters came before them bearing the Crosses year 1204 the Banners and Images of Saints to implore the Clemency of the Victors For while the Princes were in this manner retrenching themselves in their several Ports Murtzuphle who had ordered all things ready for his concealed Design issuing out of the Palace ran about the Streets and the Market Places animating the People to defend their Liberty against this Handful of Desperado's as he termed them who had now shut themselves into a Place from whence it was impossible for them to escape provided
above fourscore of these miserable men being saved upon the broken Planks A Party also of Frieselanders who hitherto had so well behaved themselves having abandoned their Companions were no sooner returned into Frieseland but they were miserably swallowed up by the Sea which having this Year broken the Banks and passed all the Bounds overflowed all the Country with such a fearful deluge that above a hundred thousand Persons were swallowed up of the merciless Waves But nevertheless the loss which the Christian Army suffered by this desertion was quickly repaired by the Arrival of diverse Troops of Crusades who being excited by the Letters which Pope Honorius had writ continually to all the Princes of Europe arrived one after another during all the Autumm The Cardinal d' Albanâ— the Popes Legate for the Holy War arrived with the first accompanied with a fair Troop of the Nobility of Rome whom the Pope who was himself of the first of those orders had obliged to take upon them the Cross that so they might draw others by their Example There came also from Germany the Low Countries Venice Genoa and Pisa and many from France who inbarked at Genoa with Robert de Corceone an English man Cardinal of St. Stephen upon Mount-Coelius whom the Pope ordered to accompany them in this Voyage The most signal of those who with the consent of Philip the August went from France were the Counts Hervey de Nevers Hugh de la Marche Miles de Barr upon the Seine with his Sons and the Lords John d' Artois Ponce de Grancey Ithier de Tacy Savary de Mauleon and among the Prelates William Arch-Bishop of Bourdeaux William de Beaumont Bishop of Anger 's Gautier Bishop of Autun Miles de Chastillon de Nantueil Bishop Elect of Beauvais with Andrew his Brother and Peter de Nemours Bishop of Paris the Son of Gautier great Chamberlain of France and Brother to the Bishop of Meaux and Noyon This good Prelate after he had for ten years governed with great Wisdom the Church of the Capital City of the Realm where he took great care to maintain the Purity of the Faith against the Errors of Amauri of Chartres which he caused to be condemned resolved also to signalise his Zeal against the Infidels by taking upon him the Cross with which he gloriously consummated that kind of Martyrdom at Damiata where he died after the taking of the City Prince Oliver also the Son of Henry the third King of England came by the same passage in September with the Earls of Chester Winchester and Arundel and William de Harcourt accompanied with a Gallant Troop of English who had devoted themselves to the Holy War The Legate being arrived with so considerable a Succour presented to the King of Jerusalem the Duke of Austria and the other Princes the Letters by which the Pope after having extremely commended the Cardinal informed them that he had sent him principally to create and preserve a perfect Union in the Army and to animate them to do well by going before them not with the Pomp and Majesty of a Prince to command but with that humility worthy of Jesus Christ whom he represented and for whose Cause the Crusades in taking up his Cross had obliged themselves to combat But it must be avowed that this good Prelate did very ill acquit himself of his Charge and acted directly contrary to the Intentions of the Pope and the good Instructions which he had given him For at the first Conference which he had with King John de Brienne to whom all the Chief of the Crusades yielded Obedience he told him plainly and without a Complement that he was resolved to command the Army alledging for his reason that the Church having commanded the Crusade and that the Crusades who were come to the relief of the Holy Land were not Subjects of the King of Jerusalem but depended upon the Church by the Authority whereof they had taken upon them the Cross The King was extremely surprized with such a foolish Proposition which he had so little expected but as he was very discreet he did not declare it lest he should be obliged openly to break with a man whose Ambition year 1218 which keeps no measures especially when it is supported by a great name might carry him to dangerous Extremities in abusing a Power and Authority which Jesus Christ hath not given to the Church but for the spiritual Kingdom which is not of this World as he himself assures us and hath nothing to do with the Temporal On the other side notwithstanding this as this Prince had a great Soul he was resolved to do nothing to stain his Honour or to lessen the August Character of Royalty which he was resolved to support with the utmost Vigour against all that should enterprize any thing against it He therefore kept fair with the Legate he made no direct answer to any thing which he said but would turn the discourse to some other Subject always treating him with extraordinary Civility but in the same time he continued more positively than ever to give out his Orders independant of any other Person and caused them to be exactly obeyed and acted in all things so like an absolute Master and a King that the good Legate at last perceived that he had to do with a Prince who in rendring to God with a profound Veneration that which was due to him knew also continually how to maintain the Rights that appertained to Caesar This nevertheless did not fail to occasion some Trouble in the Army by dividing the principal Officers for those who found themselves any ways dissatisfied with the King inclined always to the Legate and he finding himself able to do nothing more usually came to the Council only to give his Opinion in contradiction to the King But at length the Arrival of the Sultan Meledin who came down the Nile to Damiata with a potent Army before the Christians had passed the River to besiege the City by Land obliged all the Commanders to re-unite and recover the time which they had wasted and lost by an extreme Negligence and seriously to dispose themselves to Combat the Enemy After some light Skirmishes wherein the Sarasins were constantly beaten upon the thirtieth of November there arose such a furious Tempest that the Sea repelling the Waters of the Nile and breaking over all the Banks the whole Army had like to have perished by the Inundation many of the Ships were driven ashoar and beaten in pieces and four great Vessels upon which there were Castles built in order to attack the City were driven by the Wind and the Waves against the Towers and the Walls where they were unfortunately Consumed by the Wildfire which the Besieged with ease threw into them in the sight of the Christians who during that dreadful Storm were not able to Relieve them Several Knights of the Temple who were in another great Ship which the Tempest had also forced to
the whole Army was divided and in perpetual contests for several days But the Sultan who made use of that Opportunity to endeavour to put some succour into the place during this discourse of Peace the King's Party which was the least reunited again with the Legate Hereupon the Conferences for Peace were broken and it was resolved to pursue the Siege with all imaginable Vigor But it lasted not long for one of the Towers which lay upon a Corner of the Town being by the force of the Machins so ruined that it was easie to enter by the Breach and there appearing no great number of Defendants to secure the Breach the Legate made choice of a very dark night wherein the Wind blew very loud to cause it to be attacked The Soldiers approached the Tower and the Gate adjoining which they set on sire and passed to the second Wall whilest others clapt up Ladders and scaled the first Wall in diverse places without resistance then the King being immediately advertised of this strange Success led his Troops thither in good order and with the same facility gained the second Wall and the next morning being the fifth of November by break of day they took the third Wall with so little resistance that there was but one man lightly wounded in his Foot Immediately the Christian Standards were planted upon the Towers which the Sultans perceiving they retired with precipitation setting fire to their Camp and Bridge that so they might not be pursued Thus Damiata which had cost so much Blood and labour for eighteen Months was in one night taken by the Christian Army without Noise without Tumult there being none left in this fair and great City in Condition to defend it For the extreme Famine which they had indured and the diseases which followed upon it had made such a horrible ravage that of eighty thousand Soldiers and Citizens which were in it at the Beginning of the Siege there were scarcely lest three thousand alive and of those not above one hundred who were able to bear Arms. All the Streets and houses were filled with dead and dying Persons which the living who with extreme weakness expected the same Fate were not able to bury so that the Army was forced for a long time to encamp without the City before they could get it cleansed There were found in the City infinite Riches in Vessels of Gold Silver Pearls precious Stones Silks and all manner of Indian Drugs and Spices year 1219 But the Sarasins during the Siege having buried most of their Money and notwithstanding that the Legate had denounced the Anathema against those who should conceal any of the Booty which he ordered to be brought together to make a just distribution among the whole Army yet particular persons concealed the greatest part of the Booty so that there could never be got together above four hundred thousand Crowns in Money which was distributed among the Soldiers There were about four hundred among the Prisoners who were the most considerable who were reserved to be exchanged for those who had been taken by the Enemies during the Siege year 1220 The Principal Mosque which was supported by one hundred and fifty Marble Pillars and invironed by five curious Galleries with a noble Cupelo in the middle upon which was a lofty Spire was consecrated to God in honour of the blessed Virgin and upon the Feast of the Purification the Cardinal Legate accompanied by the Patriarch the Bishops and Clergy of Ptolemais followed by the King the Princes the Lords and all the Chief Commanders went in Solemn Procession there to celebrate the Sacred Mysteries of the Christian Religion after which they built a new Bridge which joyned the City and the Fort which they had during the Siege built upon the other bank of the Nile and then Damiata by the consent of the Legate and the whole Army was annexed to the Realm of Jerusalem and to add to the good Fortune some few dayes after a Party of a thousand Soldiers being commanded to go abroad for Forrage and Provisions failing up the second branch of the River Nilus which is called the Tanitique the Egyptians terrified by their comming cowardly abandoned the strongest of their Castles which was built upon the Ruines of the Famous City of Tanis in Ancient Time the Capital City of Egypt and the Residence of the Pharaohs the place where Moses to move the heart of that obdurate Prince wrought all those memorable Prodigies which are recorded in the Holy Story in the Book of Exodus It is also reported that in a place near Damiata the Christians found a Book written in Arabick the Author whereof who assures us that he was neither Jew Christian nor Mahometan predicted the Victories of the great Saladin the taking of Ptolemais by the Kings of England and France that of Damiata nine and twenty Years after and that one day there should come a King from the East whose name should be David and another from the West whom he does not name who joyning together should overthrow the Empire of the Mahometans and recover the City of Jerusalem But as one cannot judge of the Truth of this Prophecy by the former part of the things which it doth predict since they were already come to pass when the Book was found so it must be Posterity who only can be able to make a certain judgment of the truth of the second part when it shall happen to be accomplished which we have not yet seen The End of the Third Part. THE HISTORY OF THE CRUSADE OR The Expeditions of the Christian Princes for the Conquest of the Holy Land PART IV. BOOK I. The CONTENTS of the First Book The Condition the manners and the Religion of the People of Georgia who resolve to join with the Princes of the Crusade but are hindred by an irruption of the Tartars into their Country The Emperor Frederick sends a considerable relief to Damiata The return of King John de Brienne to the Army of the Crusades The Legate Pelagius opposeth his advice and makes them resolve upon a Battle against Meledin who once more offers Peace upon most advantageous Terms The Legate occasions the refusal of them The humour and discription of this Legate An account of the miserable adventure of the Christian Army which by the innundation of the Nile is reduced to the Discretion of Meledin The wise Policy of this Sultan who saves the Army by a Treaty which he was willing to make with the Crusades This misfortune is followed by the Rupture of Frederick the Emperor with the Pope The Character of that Emperor The Complaints of Pope Honorius against him His Answers and their Reconciliation A famous Conference for the Holy War King John de Brienne comes to desire assistance throughout Europe The death of Philip the August His Elogy his Will and his Funerals New Endeavours of the Pope and the Emperor for the Holy War The Marriage of Frederick with
Elmehec having been strangled in a Bath by his own Wise after he had reigned five years the Admirals who revenged his death by the Punishment of this Murderess of her Husband by common consent made choice of his Son Almansor who was within a year dethroned by one of his Emirs whom the rest placed upon the Throne and made him Sultan giving him the name of Melech Elvahet This new Sultan who was a great Captain searing that the Tartars after having conquered Palestine would come pouring into Egypt resolved to prevent them For this purpose therefore having drawn together all the Forces of Egypt he entred into Palestine and made an Alliance with the Christians of the Country against their Common Enemies and after he had for three days refreshed his Army about Ptolemais he marched directly against the Tartars who ravaged Galilee and upon the third of October gave them Battle in the Plain of Tiberias where he cut the greatest part of them in pieces and routed the rest and slew their General Cathogoba upon the place and having thus delivered himself from this formidable Enemy he returned covered with Glory and loaden with Spoils into Egypt But a while after one of his principal Emirs whose name was Bondogar or Bendocdar who continually importuned him to turn his Victorious Arms against the Christians seeing that contrary to the Custom of these Barbarians he would not violate the Faith which he had given them he most barbarously murdered him and caused himself to be chosen Sultan by the Mamalukes who infinitely esteemed him for his Courage And in truth as he was the most brave the most able and Politick so he was also the most wicked persidious and most cruel of all these Barbarians For to the end that he might reign in safety he put to death all that he could find of the race of the former Sultans and in a little time fourscore of the Admirals also fell under diverse Pretexts as Sacrifices to his Jeasousie being in reality guilty of no other Crime but the fear of the Tyrant who believing that they were as wicked as himself was under the continual apprehensions whilst they were living that they should treat him one day in the same cruel manner as he had done his Predecessor and by this procedure he rendred himself so terrible to all his Subjects that no person durst so much as adventure to make a Visit to an acquaintance or to talk with a particular Friend lest it might raise a Jealousie in the Sultan which did not fail to be followed by the death of him against whom it was conceived But as for any thing else he had whatever was requisite to make him a Conqueror for he was Bold undertaking fearless cunning vigilant sober chast not permitting his Souldiers either Wine or Women which he said weakned both there Bodies and their Minds and took away from them all the Vigour of Warriours and above all he had Fortune for his Reward and a constant Success when ever he acted by himself Such a Person was Bendocdar who had not slain his Predecessor but because he refused to make War against the Christians against whom consequently he did not fail presently to lead the Victorious Army which had defeated the Tartars year 1261 This was most fatal to the Christians of the Holy Land For the Infidels having at first defeated the Troops of the Lords of Baruth and Giblet with those of Ptolemais year 1262 and the Templers who were got together to oppose this Enemy who surprized them he wasted and ruined all the Country as far as to Antioch after which he came and presented himself with thirty thousand Horse before Ptolemais year 1263 ruined the Suburbs and came up to the very Gates of the City not a man daring to Sally out to oppose him he ruined the Church and Monastry of Bethlehem year 1264 took Cesarea by Treason the City and Castle of Assur by a long Seige and the impregnable Fortress of Sephet by composition But the Persidious Infidel basely broke his Articles year 1265 for he put to Death the Governour and the whole Garrison which consisted in six hundred Men because that having given them one Nights time to resolve whether they would save their Lives by turning Mahometans they were so incouraged by the Fathers James of Pavia year 1266 and Jeremy of Geneva two fervently Religious of the Order of St. Francis and by the Prior of the Temple that the next Day they all unanimously chose to lose their Heads which were accordingly taken from them to receive the Glorious Crown of Martyrdom As for the two Cordeliers and the generous Prior of the Temple who had so well animated the others to suffer for the sake of Christ they also received the Palms of Victory but after a manner more Glorious than the rest For the Tyrant furiously incensed against them for having snatched the Prey out of his hands and robbed him of what he thought to have made the Glory of his Victory was so filled with Rage and Madness against them that he caused them to be roasted alive and cruelly beaten with Cudgels whilest they were in this dreadful manner exposed to the Flames and afterwards causing them to be dragged to the place where the others were beheaded he caused their Heads also to be cut off there But he had the amazing displeasure to see that God did Honor to his Martyrs by a Heavenly Light which he himself with all his Sarasins saw shining every Night about their Bodies insomuch that he was obliged for the hiding of their Glory and his own Infamy to inclose the place with a mighty high Wall to hinder the sight of this wonder so confounding to his and so honourable to the Christian Religion year 1267 But he still pursuing the Torrent of his Conquests which found nothing that was able to stop their impetuous Course took the City and Castle of Jaffa by treachery a little after the Death of Count John for he never durst attempt it so long as that Noble Earl lived He also made himself Master of the Fortress of Beaufort and the most part of the places which appertained to the Templers And after having ravaged all the plain Country about Acre Tyre and Sidon and burnt the Suburbs of Tripolis he turned once again short upon Antioch year 1268 He found that great City so unprovided of all manner of necessaries to sustain a Siege by reason of the absence of Prince Conrade Cousin of Conradin to whose assistance he was gone into Italy that he took it without resistance slew there seventeen thousand Men and carried above a hundred thousand into Captivity Thus this City so illustrious that it was sometimes called the Eye of the East in regard of its admirable Beauty and which the first Crusades were not able to take but with a nine Months Siege which a thousand Heroick Actions which were there done have rendred so Famous in History was taken in a
themselves between the two Parties On the other side the Sultan Melech Sais retook the Fortress of Margath and made himself Master of the Castle of Laodicea and that of Crac which was one of the strongest places in Syria year 1287 and as at last he was preparing to lay Siege to Tripolis he abandon'd all upon the news which he had of the Death of his Son and returned into Egypt where Elsis one of his Emirs who was mightily esteemed by the Mamalukes tumbled him from the Throne and was chosen Sultan in his place by the name of Melech-Messor This Sultan who was a great Souldier re-entred presently into Syria where he besieged Tripolis year 1288 and at last took it by Assault Seven thousand Christians were there Slain year 1289 and the rest saved themselves by Sea partly in Cyprus and partly in Ptolemais The Sultan who was as able and dexterous as he was Valiant caused this great City to be demolished that so he might not be forced to keep a whole Army in Garrison there and after having taken several places thereabout he made a very advantageous Truce for two Years thereby to frustrate the Design of the Forces which he foresaw would be sent out of Europe against him And indeed a very considerable assistance which the Pope sent at his own charges into the East upon twenty Venetian Gallies arriving not till after the conclusion of this Truce was constrained to return without doing any thing It happened also that an infinite conflux of People of all Nations without Order and without Leaders coming to Ptolemais and finding no imploy committed so many disorders indifferently upon the Lands of the Christians and the Sarasins that the Sultan who only wanted an occasion to break the Truce to his advantage laid hold of that which he believed very favourable to execute the design which he had upon Ptolemais whilest the Christian Princes whom he knew to be ingaged in Wars one against another in Europe had neither Power nor Will to assist it year 1290 For this purpose as he had always a powerful Army on Foot he entred suddainly in the Month of October in the year following and advanced towards Phoenicia and then when he was upon the point of going to invest Ptolemais the Emir whom he had made his Lieutenant thinking by the favour of the Souldiers to obtain his place gave him Poison whereof he died But this did not prevent the Execution of the Design For the Mamalukes who loved Melech-Messor extremely pull'd the Traitor who had poisoned him in a thousand pieces upon the spot and Proclaimed his Son Ely Sultan by the name of Melech-Seraph This new Prince resolved to pursue the design of his Father who at his Death conjured him not to suffer his Body to be Interred before he had taken the City and driven out the Christians And for this purpose therefore without giving them leisure to make any advantage of this so sudden and great change turning short to the left hand towards the Sea he came and laid Siege before Acre or Ptolemais upon the fifth of April year 1291 in the year one thousand two hundred ninety one with an Army of one hundred and sixty thousand Foot and threescore thousand Horse Ptolemais of whose Situation and Strength I have given an account in the fifth Book of this History was at this time one of the fairest richest and most flourishing Cities of all the East by reason of the great Commerce of all the Merchandises which were brought thither from Egypt and Asia by Land and Sea to be from thence transported into Europe And as it was become the Capital City of the Realm since the taking of Jerusalem and the Sanctuary where all the Christians of Palestine took Refuge after the loss of their Cities so it was also then more Populous than ever it had been and such great Industry had been used in these late times in fortifying it that it was thought to be impregnable above all having at least thirty thousand Men well Armed to defend it besides eighteen thousand Crusades who were arrived there a little before without a Commander But this unfortunate City had within its Walls two kinds of Enemies infinitely more formidable than all the Forces of the Sarasins and which were the cause of its being lost year 1291 The first was the division which occasioned most fearful Disorders in regard that besides that there were two Factions which held one of them for the King of Cyprus and the other for the King of Sicily the Venetians the Genoese the Pisans the Florentines the English the Templers the Hospitallers the Teutonick Knights the Princes of the Country and even the Patriarch and the Legate of the Pope would every one so divide the Government as to be independent upon all others so that it might be said that there were in Ptolemais so many different Cities as there were quarters possessed by these Orders and different People who were not only without a Head whose Supreme Authority and Orders they should all obey but who were for the most part in Arms one against another And that which was yet more deplorable and which doubtless was the principal cause of the Desolation of this unfortunate City was that the Corruption of manners was so great and the irregularities of Peoples Lives or rather the inundation of all manner of Crimes and even of the most Infamous and Scandalous Vices were so excessive and horrible that the Divine Justice was even necessitated to exterminate such an abominable Race of Men who calling themselves Christians by their Actions so Wicked and Impious Blasphemed that and his Sacred Name among the Infidels So that one may say as one of the Authors of that time does who was a long time in the Holy Land and averrs it for a deplorable Truth That of all the People which inhabited Syria and Palestine the Christians were the most notoriously lewd and wicked The Sultan who had such a numerous Army and composed of expert Souldiers and above all his Mamalukes who were extreme brave attacked the City upon the Land side by main Force battering the Walls and the Towers Night and Day making abundance of Mines every where and sapping the Foundations of the Towers particularly those of the Tower called Judasses or the Cursed Tower which was as it were the Fortress of the City The besiged also at first defended themselves vigorously being in continual hopes of relief by the way of the Sea which they had open and being united for their better defence under one Chief whom by common consent they chose among all the Captains which was William Beaujeu Great Master of the Temple a most Valiant Man and perfectly skilful in Martial Affairs But there arrived to their assistance only five hundred Foot and two hundred Horse who were conducted by the King of Cyprus And the Great Master of the Temple being unfortunately slain with a poisoned Arrow they lost their Courage
the Shoar near the City seeing after they had fought most valiantly for a long time that it was impossible to resist the infinite number of the Sarasins who having on all sides surrounded them and making themselves Masters of the Vessel threw themselves in Shoals upon her they imitated Samson and resolved to bury themselves together with their Enemies for boreing Holes in the Ship they let in the Water so fast that during the Combat she sunk in a Moment to the Bottom nothing but the top of the main Mast appearing above the Water And certainly all had been lost if God in Mercy had not been intreated by the incessant Prayers and Tears of the Bishops who continued Night and Day in Prayers to implore his Pity and Compassion and that upon the third day he was pleased to cause the Tempest to cease so that the River returned to its Chanal and the Waters again came to their old Course to run within their Banks As soon as the Tempest was over the Army which had saved themselves by getting upon the higher Grounds returned to their Camp and some time after ten Soldiers Friselanders and Germans performed an Action so Heroick as astonished both the Sarasins and Christians who were equally the Spectators and Admirers of it For the Enemy having repaired their Bridge of Boats which hindred the Ships from passing up the River to the Place where the Army was resolved to pass the Nile these ten brave resolute Men having put themselves into two Shallops undertook to gain it and break the Bridge They set upon it then in open day and mounting it chased those who defended it with dreadful Blows of the Sword from their Posts and having made themselves Masters of it whilest some of them fought at the Entrance of the Bridge to defend it against all the Forces of the City year 1218 as sometimes the famous Horatius Cocles had done at Rome opposing the whole Army of Porsenna upon a Bridge of the Tiber others of them broak this Bridge of Boats and in despight of the fearful Tempest of Stones Darts and Wildfire which were showred upon them from the Ramparts and Towers of the City they brought off diverse of the Boats which composed the Bridge as it were in Triumph to their Companions who with the loud noise of Drums Trumpets and Acclamations celebrated the Praises of their Victory and an Action which well deserves to be consecrated to their eternal Glory and the Knowledge of Posterity by immortal History So that this Obstacle being removed all the Ships sailed up above the City year 1219 and the Engines being sitted for the Combat the Resolution was taken to pass to the other side of the River and Land in the sight of the Sultan who had fortified all the Bank with good Retrenchments behind which his Army was drawn up in Battalia in the great Lines which being ranged upon a rising Ground like a kind of Amphitheatre gave them the Opportunity of discharging all their Arrows and Darts together upon the Enemy without being in danger of hurting one another And in truth it did not only seem a most temerarious Action to attempt a Passage so well defended but wholly impossible to succeed But God was pleased in an instant to open it against all Appearance by one of the most extraordinary Events imaginable and which could not reasonably be attributed to any thing besides that Providence which he hath for those whom he hath taken into his Protection For the same Night which was the fourth or fifth of February and that all things were disposed to adventure the Passage the Morrow of the following Day the Sultan Meledin with his Emirs and the principal Commanders of the Army leaving in his Camp the most resolute of his Troops to receive the Enemy not doubting but they would be able to do it he posted with full speed towards Caire as if he had been pursued by a victorious Army after a mighty Overthrow nor could there ever be assigned any Reason for this precipitate Flight but that sort of Terror which God sometimes fills the Hearts of those withal whom he will punish and of which we find frequent Examples in the Holy Scriptures A Christian Renegade who had for a long time served the Sultan and who was big with the Desire of being the first Discoverer of a thing so astonishing came running to the Bank of the Nile and called aloud in French that they should pass over immediately for that the Sultan had forsaken his Men and was fled desiring them presently to send a Skiff as they did to take him in that so they might be the better assured of what he told them In this time the Army of the Sarasins seeing themselves abandoned by the Sultan believing themselves betrayed they disbanded and presently fled after him in the greatest Fear and Disorder So that the Christians ravished to see such a visible Effect of the divine Protection passed the River without Resistance but not altogether without Difficulty in regard that the Banks of the Nile were so Muddy and Slimy on that side that the Horses whom they led by the Bridles being up to the Saddle Skirts in the Quick-Sands and Quagmires did not gain the Bank without extreme Trouble which made it clearly appear that if there had been but a few Defendants it had been almost impossible to have forced it As soon as all the Army was passed over they entred into the Camp of the Sarasins which they plundred and then they took up their Quarters about the City which was invironed with good Lines and a great Ditch which was drawn from one Part to the other to the River Nile upon which they built a Bridge of Boats that so they might have a Communication with those who were incamped on the other side the River to guard the Ships upon which the Attack was to be made upon the side next the Water There was necessity however of making use of all manner of Precautions for as the City was extreme strong so there were in it fourty thousand Men who were resolved to make a brave Defence it was also Winter and many Diseases especially the Scurvy raged among the Soldiers and many died of them The Siege was like to prove long so that the Enemies had leisure to come to the Relief of the Besieged with potent Armies The first that appeared was Coradin who after he had gathered all the Troops that he possibly could in Syria year 1219 to which he joined all that could be drawn of the dismantled Garrisons he marched directly to Jerusalem and before he passed further he set on all hands to work to demolish that Holy City which then was held to be Impregnable he â—ased the Walls and all the Towers to the very Foundations the Tower of David only excepted which could not defend it self singly and in short reduced that strong and famous City to the condition of a miserably Village either that