St. Louis and the Seventh Crusade

On a dark December day in 1244 the French King, Louis IX, lay dying. On his deathbed he promised God that if he were granted a few more years of life, he would liberate Jerusalem from Muslim rule . Miraculously, Louis recovered, and despite the best efforts of his mother and other advisers to convince him his vow had been made in a moment of madness,  Louis remained undeterred. He began preparations for a new crusade immediately.

 

Louis' crusade that would come to be known as "the Seventh" was predominantly a French affair, not only because it was the brainchild of a French king, but also because the struggle between the papacy and the Holy Roman emperor had reached a state of open warfare. The pope had declared Frederick II ‘deposed’ and called for a ‘crusade’ to enforce his ruling. This effectively precluded German and Italian participation. Nevertheless, France was so wealthy and Louis’ position so strong that with his own resources he was able to launch one of the best organised and financed crusades of the entire era. 

Between 15,000 and 18,000 thousand fighting men were involved; of which as many as 2,800 were knights. Louis systematically collected funds and chartered large numbers of ships, including long-distance horse transports and shallow-draught landing craft, the latter contributing decisively to the capture of Damietta. He also pre-positioned supplies of wine and grain in massive dumps on Cyprus. Louis personally took an active and intense interest in every aspect of the preparations for his crusade. 

On 25 August 1248, King Louis embarked at Aigues Mortes, accompanied by three of his brothers and his queen. He adopted the same strategy as the Fifth Crusade, namely attacking Egypt, expecting that a decisive victory over the Ayyubids in their powerbase would force concessions in the Holy Land. The crusaders wintered in Cyprus, where they enjoyed the hospitality of King Henry and restored the health of their horses while awaiting additional contingents. 

In May 1249, King Louis sailed for Damietta with an army reinforced by numerous Cypriot contingents under the command of the Constable and Seneschal of Cyprus, Guy and Baldwin d’Ibelin, respectively. After a dangerous storm, the fleet arrived off Damietta on 4 June; the next day, Louis undertook a dangerous amphibious landing against armed opposition. Jean de Joinville, the Seneschal of France and participant in this landing, tells the following story in his biography of King Louis:

When the king heard that the standard of Saint Denis was on shore he … refused to be parted from the emblem of his sovereignty, and leapt into the sea, where the water came up to his armpits. He went on, with his shield hung from his neck, his helmet on his head, and lance in hand, ‘till he had joined his people on the shore… . [Here] he put his lance under his armpit, and holding his shield before him, would have charged right in among [the Saracens] if certain sagacious men who were standing around him had allowed it.[i]

Despite multiple attacks by Saracen cavalry, the crusaders held on to their bridgehead on the sands before the city while their horses were brought up in the second wave of landing ships. As night fell, the crusaders prepared to besiege Damietta as the Fifth Crusade had done for a year-and-a-half. They were astonished to learn the entire city had been deserted. The sultan’s troops had retreated upriver, and the garrison and population — feeling abandoned — had fled after them.

 

This was a stroke of luck that allowed the army to take control of a walled city containing ample food, water and shelter, without casualties. Ironically, because the crusaders had expected a long siege, their attack had been launched while the Nile was still flooded. This meant they could not follow-up their surprise victory because they had to wait for the floodwaters to recede. This had the added benefit of allowing temperatures to drop to more tolerable levels for marching and fighting and enabling reinforcements to arrive under Louis’s brother, the Count of Poitiers. 

 

In due time, a war council discussed strategy. The majority favored an attack on Alexandria to facilitate a diplomatic deal benefitting the crusader states. In contrast, Louis’ brother, the Count of Artois forcefully argued that the way to kill a snake was to crush its head: i.e., an assault on Cairo. Louis accepted this advice, and on 20 November 1249, led his army out of Damietta to advance up the Nile towards Cairo. 

 

Meanwhile, the Sultan al-Sahil Ayyub had died and been succeeded by his son, Turan Shah. Because the latter was not present in Egypt, so the sultan’s Mamluks assumed temporary command of the Egyptian army. They concentrated at Mansourah while the crusaders made slow but steady progress marching up the Nile. Throughout the march, King Louis’ fleet kept his army well supplied and held open the lines of communication to Damietta, where the Queen of France remained with a substantial garrison. At Mansourah, a well-fortified town positioned strategically at the junction of two branches of the Nile, progress ground to a halt. 

 

The crusaders could not advance on Cairo without first crossing over one branch of the Nile and taking Mansourah. All attempts to bridge the river failed. Then on 8 February 1250, an Egyptian traitor revealed a ford to the crusaders, and King Louis’ army started crossing the Nile. Unfortunately, the advance guard was placed under the command of Louis’ impetuous brother Robert, Count of Artois. He rushed ahead against the King’s explicit orders. Artois succeeded in overrunning the Saracen camp outside the city walls but foolishly followed the fleeing Saracen troops into the city itself, where the French were trapped in the narrow, irregular streets and set upon by the entire population. Not one of them escaped, and the Count of Artois’ body was hung from the walls in triumph. With the main body of troops, King Louis was able to withstand a counterattack and fight his way forward to successfully occupy the camp vacated by the Saracens, but the city remained firmly in Saracen hands.

 

This bloody, indecisive and bitter victory was the turning point in the crusade. While the crusaders remained encamped before Mansourah, the Saracens transported disassembled ships by camel and reassembled them upriver. These Saracen warships systematically started to systematically intercept Louis’ supply ships. By April, Louis’ army was starving and diseased. Both scurvy and dysentery had decimated the ranks. Louis, himself desperately ill, gave the order to retreat. The Saracens harassed the crusaders every step of the way, until Louis, no longer able to ride or stand, surrendered. 

The first thing the sultan did was to order the execution of all the sick and wounded among the poor; only those well enough to be enslaved were spared. The nobles were held for ransom, and the bargaining began. With threats of torture, including showing Louis the instruments of torture to be employed, the sultan attempted to force the king to surrender the formidable castles of the crusader kingdoms still in Frankish hands. Louis replied that the sultan could do with him as he pleased, but he could not surrender the fortresses because he did not control them. The sultan eventually settled for the return of Damietta as the king’s ransom and payment of 800,000 bezants for all the other prisoners. Although the sultan was then assassinated by his Mamluks, the terms of the treaty were respected, and Louis and most of the high-ranking nobles were released upon the return of Damietta and payment of half the ransom. 

The bulk of those released had had enough crusading and returned home at once, but King Louis sailed for Acre instead. He was determined to remain in the Holy Land until the last of the prisoners had been returned. He also set about strengthening the defences of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. He accomplished the latter by extensively refortifying Acre, Caesarea, Jaffa and Sidon at his own expense. He also arranged for a permanent garrison of 100 French knights at Acre supported by appropriate, if unnamed, numbers of sergeants, archers and support troops, bringing the total commitment close to 1,000 men. Meanwhile, Louis tenaciously and sagely negotiated with the Muslim states, who were again at war with one another and willing to court the Franks. 

Ultimately, Louis signed a truce with the new rulers of Egypt, the Mamluks, because they still held thousands of captives. He concluded a treaty with them in 1252 that secured the release of the remaining prisoners and cancelled his outstanding debt of 400,000 bezants. In 1254 he signed a truce with Damascus and Aleppo as well. These treaties secured a comprehensive if temporary peace for the Kingdom of Jerusalem. On 24 April 1254, Louis sailed for home. Despite the tragic end of his crusade, he left the Kingdom of Jerusalem stronger than before. As Thomas Madden put it: ‘The contrast between Louis IX and Frederick II could not have been more stark’.[ii]

---

[i] Jean Joinville, The Life of Saint Louis, trans. M.R.B. Shaw (London: Penguin Classics, 1963), 204.

[ii] See note 4, Madden, The Concise History of the Crusades, 163.

 The bulk of this entry is an excerpt from Dr. Schrader's comprehensive study of the crusader states.

Order now!

 

 

"St. Louis Knight" is a novel set against the backdrop of the Seventh Crusade and St. Louis' sojourn in the Holy  Land. A Templar novice and King Louis are the central characters. 

It is now available in audiobook as well as paperback and ebook.

Buy Now!

 

 A crusader in search of faith --
A lame lady in search of revenge --
And a King who would be saint.

St. Louis' Knight takes you to the Holy Land in the 13th century, and a world filled with knights, nobles, prophets -- and assassins. 

(Available in Audiobook)

 

Dr. Helena P. Schrader is also the author of six books set in the Holy Land in the Era of the Crusades.

                         

           Buy Now!                                                  Buy Now!                                                    Buy Now!

 

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"The Tale of the English Templar" is a fictional work that depicts the destruction of the Knight's Templar. 

An escaped Templar, an intrepid, old crusader, and a discarded bride

embark on a quest for justice in the face of tyranny. 

Find out more at: https://helenapschrader.net/the-english-templar/

 

 

 

Dangerous Entanglements: The Ayyubid Alliance

 The Second Kingdom of Jerusalem reached its pinnacle in the year 1243. Not only were the last vestiges of Hohenstaufen rule expelled from Outremer in that year, but also the Franks reoccupied Jerusalem including the Temple Mount. Yet this very success was like a Trojan Horse; the seeds of the kingdom's destruction were hidden in the apparent victory. This did not, however, immediately become apparent.

 

 

The reoccupation of Jerusalem had been made possible by a new alliance with as-Salih Ismail (now the ruler of Damascus) and his cousin an-Nasir Daud, who controlled Transjordan. These princes offered the Franks additional and substantial territorial concessions in exchange for an offensive alliance directed at their hated rival (and relative) in Cairo: as-Salih Ayyub. This treaty differed significantly from earlier treaties, particularly the truce with Frederick II in that it recognised Christianity’s higher claim to Jerusalem and the right of the Christians to build fortifications. Furthermore, it gave the Franks the territory around Jerusalem necessary for its defence and viability. In short, it laid the foundation for what could have been a more sustainable Frankish state. 

Meanwhile, the Egyptians allied themselves with the Kharasmians, a Turkish tribe displaced by the Mongol invasions of 1220. Whether this alliance provoked the Damascene approach to the Franks or was itself a response to the Frankish/Damascene alliance is unclear. In any case, in 1244, the Kharasmians swept into Syria and rapidly took control of the regions of the kingdom recently restored to Frankish rule. In August, they took Jerusalem and engaged in an orgy of destruction that left churches desecrated, the Holy Sepulchre gutted, and at least 5,000 mostly native Christians dead. 

The Franks and their Ayyubid allies mustered their armies and prepared for the showdown with Egypt. The Frankish army probably equaled it in size that which had been fielded at Hattin in 1187 with as many as 1,200 knights, but with one striking difference: as many as 1,100 of those knights were members of the military orders rather than civilian knights. Also striking is that the muster took place in Acre, where the Saracen leaders were welcomed and hosted by the Knights Templar. The combined Frankish/Saracen army advanced via Jaffa and Ascalon to Gaza on the border of the kingdom. On 17 October 1244, this army confronted the Egyptian Ayyubid forces and their Kharasmian allies. In a battle lasting two days, the Egyptians and Kharasmians won the upper hand. They shattered the Damascene/Transjordan wing first, setting it to flight, and then ground down the Franks.  

Muslim casualties amounted to 25,000 men, while the Franks lost 16,000. These casualties included the Master of the Teutonic Knights along with nearly all 400 Teutonic Knights, 312 Templars, 325 Hospitallers and all fighting members of the Knights of St. Lazarus. Both the Templar and Hospitaller Masters were taken prisoner along with thirty-four other Templars, twenty-six Hospitallers and three Teutonic Knights. Also among the prisoners was the Lord of Jaffa, Walter de Brienne, who was tortured in front of Jaffa to persuade the city to surrender. The garrison steadfastly refused to submit, and Brienne died of his injuries in captivity months later. 

The sultan of Cairo followed up his victory by conquering his Muslim opponents’ territories in Transjordan and Syria, thereby re-establishing the dominance of the sultan of Cairo over the Ayyubid empire. Yet he made no attempt to subdue the Kingdom of Jerusalem. While this sounds astonishing, there were good reasons for restraint. First and foremost, As-Salih Ayyub was not engaged in ‘jihad’. He had fought the Franks not because of their religion but because they were allied with his Muslim enemies. His self-interest in continued trade with and through the crusader states remained intact.  

Furthermore, he knew that while the losses of the military orders at La Forbie were huge, the secular chivalry had suffered hardly at all. The great lords of Beirut, Sidon, Toron, Caesarea and Arsuf do not appear to have been engaged in the battle. Their fighting capacity remained undiminished, as did the entire feudal host of Cyprus, a significant point since, at this time, King Henry of Cyprus was recognised as the regent of Jerusalem by the local barons. Clearly, in an all-out assault on the heart of the crusader kingdom, the Franks would have been able to put up a tenacious defence. The sultan of Cairo wisely sought to avoid such a confrontation possibly because he was also facing an increasingly dangerous threat from the Mongols in the north. 

Finally, the Ayyubid fear of a new crusade sat deep — and not unjustified. In December 1244, a dying young man vowed that if God would grant him a reprieve, he would recapture Jerusalem for Christendom.  He experienced a miraculous recovery and was to prove one of the most determined and tenacious of all crusaders: King Louis IX of France.

The story continues next week. 

 

The bulk of this entry is an excerpt from Dr. Schrader's comprehensive study of the crusader states.

Order now!

Dr. Helena P. Schrader is also the author of six books set in the Holy Land in the Era of the Crusades.

                         

           Buy Now!                                                  Buy Now!                                                    Buy Now!

 

          Buy Now!                                               Buy Now!                                                      Buy Now!

"The Tale of the English Templar" is a fictional work that depicts the destruction of the Knight's Templar. 

An escaped Templar, an intrepid, old crusader, and a discarded bride

embark on a quest for justice in the face of tyranny. 

Find out more at: https://helenapschrader.net/the-english-templar/

 

"St. Louis Knight" is a novel set against the backdrop of the Seventh Crusade and St. Louis' sojourn in the Holy  Land. A Templar novice and King Louis are the central characters. 

It is now available in audiobook as well as paperback and ebook.

Buy Now!

 

 A crusader in search of faith --
A lame lady in search of revenge --
And a King who would be saint.

St. Louis' Knight takes you to the Holy Land in the 13th century, and a world filled with knights, nobles, prophets -- and assassins. 

(Available in Audiobook)

 

The Barons' Crusade 1239 - 1241

 After nearly a decade of fraternal fighting, the Sultan al-Ashraf died in 1237, leaving al-Kamil the victor in the Ayyubid power-struggle — until he died a year later. The Ayyubid empire  disintegrated yet again into warring factions, this time with the brothers, sons and nephews of al-Kamil all at each other’s throats just as Frederick II’s truce with al-Kamil expired in 1239. A golden opportunity had opened up for crusades-minded knights and nobles in the West. 

(Below a stained glass portrait depicting the English crusader Simon de Montfort, Sixth Earl of Leicester)

Since the end of Frederick II's truce had been anticipated for some time, large contingents of crusaders started to arrive to resume hostilities almost at once. These included a substantial army under a number of prominent French nobles, the most senior of which was Thibaut, Count of Champagne and King of Navarre. The factions within the Kingdom of Jerusalem temporarily overcame their differences and joined these forces to confront the Ayyubids. The latter, meanwhile, re-occupied the defenseless Jerusalem in December.

Despite a defeat at Gaza in November (caused by crusaders foolishly ignoring the advice of the Masters of the Military Orders and their own senior commanders), Navarra took advantage of infighting among the Ayyubids to obtain a highly advantageous treaty with al-Kamil’s brother al-Salih Ismael. This restored to Christian control the hinterland behind Sidon, the castles of Beaufort, Belvoir, and Safad, the towns/castles of Toron and Tiberias, along with obtaining promises of the surrender of Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nazareth, and Galilee to Frankish control in exchange for Frankish help in defeating Ismael’s cousin Da’ud, who had taken control in Damascus. The crusaders rapidly re-establishing control in the northern territories and started to raid into Galilee. Da’ud came under enough pressure to likewise make concessions to the crusaders in exchange for peace. In late summer 1240, he signed an agreement that ceded to the crusaders nearly everything that had belonged to the Kingdom of Jerusalem in 1187, except the region around Nablus (which was predominantly Muslim) and the Transjordan. The treaty may, however, have included dangerous clauses about providing assistance to Da’ud in a war against his cousin Ayyub, who had recently seized power in Egypt.

Meanwhile, in October 1240 an English force composed of 800 knights led by Richard, Duke of Cornwall, sailed into Acre. Cornwall was not only the brother of King Henry III of England, he was the new brother-in-law of Frederick II since the marriage of his sister Isabella to Frederick in July 1235. He was accompanied by another brother-in-law, the husband of his sister Eleanor, Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester. Cornwall rebuilt the citadel at Ascalon and opened the lines of communication to Da’ud only to discover the latter no longer needed crusader assistance and was not inclined to honor the terms of the agreement he’d signed with Navarre. Cornwall promptly switched tack and accepted a deal offered by Ayyub of Egypt that included a prisoner-exchange, including prisoners captured at the fiasco at Gaza the previous year. Cornwall demonstratively sided with Frederick II in his conflict with the rebellious barons of Outremer and handed over Ascalon to Frederick’s representatives before departing the Holy Land on 3 May 1241 bound for England via Sicily.

Significantly and enigmatically, however, he carried with him a proposal signed by Balian of Beirut and other leading rebel barons, which put forward a proposal to end the dispute between the barons and the Emperor. The rebel barons laid out conditions for reconciliation as follows: 1) a full pardon for all rebels including the Ibelins, 2) the appointment of a baillie acceptable to them who would hold power in the entire kingdom until Conrad came to the kingdom in person, and 3) the promise that the interim baillie swear to uphold the laws and customs of the kingdom. In exchange, the lords and burgesses of Jerusalem would swear to obey Frederick’s baillie. Most important, the letter identified by name the Imperial baillie they were willing to accept, namely, Frederick’s brother-in-law Simon de Montfort. Frederick ignored the letter and no more is heard of the proposal.

We can only speculate on what Montfort had done or said to win the support of the rebel barons, but it is undoubtedly significant that he shared a cousin with the leader of the rebel barons, Balian of Beirut. More intriguing, in light of Simon de Montfort’s later role as the leader of a baronial revolt in England, it appears that Balian of Beirut and his spirit of rebellion against arbitrary royal authority impressed Simon de Montfort as much as the other way around!

The bulk of this entry is an excerpt from Dr. Schrader's comprehensive study of the crusader states.

Buy now!

Dr. Helena P. Schrader is also the author of six books set in the Holy Land in the Era of the Crusades.

                         

           Buy Now!                                                  Buy Now!                                                    Buy Now!

 

          Buy Now!                                               Buy Now!                                                      Buy Now!

"The Tale of the English Templar" is a fictional work that depicts the destruction of the Knight's Templar. 

An escaped Templar, an intrepid, old crusader, and a discarded bride

embark on a quest for justice in the face of tyranny. 

Find out more at: https://helenapschrader.net/the-english-templar/

 

"St. Louis Knight" is a novel set against the backdrop of the Seventh Crusade and St. Louis' sojourn in the Holy  Land. A Templar novice and King Louis are the central characters. 

It is now available in audiobook as well as paperback and ebook.

Buy Now!

 

 A crusader in search of faith --
A lame lady in search of revenge --
And a King who would be saint.

St. Louis' Knight takes you to the Holy Land in the 13th century, and a world filled with knights, nobles, prophets -- and assassins. 

(Available in Audiobook)