Defending the Crusader Kingdoms

Friday, August 1, 2025

A Templar Miscalculaton: The Battle on the Litani

Baldwin IV was a fighting a king -- despite his leprosy. He had to be. His Kingdom was under near perpetual attack. Between his dramatic victory at Montgisard and the annihilation of the Christian army at Hattin, were three other battles in which the Templars played a -- not always heroic -- role. Today I look at the Battle on the Litani in 1179.

In the winter of 1178/79 the rains failed. By the summer of 1179 a severe drought gripped the Levant, ignoring the political divide and destroying crops and livestock in Muslim and Christian communities alike. Against this backdrop, a large Saracen force crossed the River Jordan and started raiding deep in Frankish territory in May 1179. This force laid waste to Frankish towns and villages and captured livestock that could be driven back to Saracen territory to replenish herds that had died in the drought. Significantly, the Saracen forces consisted entirely of cavalry and were commanded by Farukh Shah, a nephew of Salah ad-Din and one of his most effective subordinate commanders, and the Sultan himself. Thus despite the economic component of capturing livestock, the raid was more like a “reconnaissance in force” similar to the raid of 1187 (that led to the disaster at the Springs of Cresson) than a simple “cattle rustling” operation.

The Frankish response was decisive. King Baldwin IV, now aged 18, rapidly mustered a powerful cavalry force of his own. This included not only his most important baron, Raymond, Count of Tripoli, as well as Baldwin, Lord of Ramla and Mirabel, but also the Templars under their Grand Master, Odo de St. Amand. The King led his troops in person riding, as he had at Montgisard, despite being handicapped in the use of his hands by leprosy.

On June 10, the Frankish army surprised Farukh Shah’s division while it was herding captured livestock through the valley between the Litani River and the Upper Jordan. While the Templars, who were in the vanguard, continued toward the Jordan, the King attacked with the secular forces. The Frankish cavalry surprised the Saracens, driving them back across the Litani and possibly taking Farukh Shah himself temporarily captive.

However, the Templars pressing ahead toward the Jordan spotted Salah ad-Din’s much the larger, main force. Rather than falling back to regroup with the rest of the Frankish army or sending word and summoning the King to bring up reinforcements, the Templar Grand Master, Odo de St. Amand, ordered an attack against the numerically superior Saracen forces. While it is unclear what effect the initial Templar charge had on the enemy, the Saracens soon turned the tables. The surviving Templars broke and fled back toward the main feudal army around the King.

At this point in time, however, the feudal army was already scattered across the valley floor “mopping up” after their successful action against Farukh Shah. They were in no position to form a cohesive force. Salah ad-Din’s cavalry, hot on the heels of the Templars, fell upon the dispersed Christian forces, killing and capturing large numbers of Christian knights and nobles, including Baron Baldwin of Ramla and Mirabel, Hugh of Tiberius, and, according to Arab sources, some 270 knights and nobles altogether.

The King’s household managed to rally around Baldwin IV. They extricated him from the field with help of reinforcements from Reginald of Sidon. This was, of course, vital, as his capture would have had even more serious consequences than the other losses incurred. But his escape was a very near thing. Baldwin was unhorsed during the — evidently heated — engagement, but because his leprosy had lamed his arms he was unable to remount. The King had to be carried off the field on the back of a Frankish knight. The eighteen-year-old king, who just two years earlier had led his chivalry to a stunning victory over Salah ad-Din at Montgisard, was now forced to face the fact that he could no longer command his armies from horseback. In a society in which the mounted warrior, the knight, was the incarnation of manly virtue and prowess, it must have broken Baldwin’s heart. Not that he surrendered to his disability entirely: in the future he would lead his armies from a litter.

Meanwhile, among the captives was the Templar Grand Master, Odo St. Amand. Unlike his successor Gerard de Rideford, St. Amand had the courage and honor to refuse ransom in accordance with the Templar Rule. He died miserably in a Saracen dungeon. Yet honorable and correct as his stance was it tragically paved the way, indirectly, for the election of the disastrous and unscrupulous Gerard de Rideford.

The Templars had, to be sure, increased their reputation as fearless fighters willing to take on any odds, and this reputation may have enhanced their prestige among potential young recruits from the feudal class, particularly in the West. Yet it also cost them credibility among more prudent leaders. William of Tyre undoubtedly expressed the opinion of a wide segment of the elite in Outremer in blaming the Templars for the defeat on the Litani. The reasoning was simple: if the Templars had not attacked independently, the Frankish forces might well have finished off Farukh-Shah and then, as a combined force, put Salah ad-Din to flight too.

The criticism would be particularly valid if the Templars had been ordered to provide the attacking main force with reconnaissance of Salah ad-Din’s whereabouts and/or serve as a shield to prevent him from falling on the King’s flank or rear while he engaged Farukh-Shah. However, we don’t know what orders, if any, were given to St. Amand, and so should reserve judgement. Ultimately, the battle was not decisive, and the secular captives were ransomed to live and fight another day.

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Friday, July 25, 2025

The Templars and the Battle of Montgisard

The dramatic Christian victory at Montgisard has been largely forgotten because the subsequent Saracen victory at Hattin negated its impact. Nevertheless, it is a dramatic story worth retelling.

A modern portrayal of the Battle of Montgisard by Mariusz Kozik

In in 1177, Salah-ad-Din (known in the West as Saladin) launched the first of what were to be several full-scale invasions of the Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem. At this time Saladin had effectively united the Caliphates of Cairo and Baghdad for the first time in 200 years, but his hold on power was still precarious. In Egypt his faced suspicion and opposition because he was Sunni, and in Syria he was viewed as a usurper and upstart because he was a Kurd and had stolen the Sultanate from the rightful heir.

A Contemporary Depiction of Salah-ad-Din from an Islamic Manuscript

Saladin countered these internal doubts and dissatisfaction with the age-old device of focusing attention on an external enemy: the Christian states established by the crusaders along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean. These states represented a clear and serious military threat to his lines of communication between Egypt and Syria. But Saladin did not simply beat the drum of alarm concerning an external enemy in order to rally his subjects around him; he also took up the cry of “jihad” — Holy War. This was a obvious attempt to increase his stature vis-a-vis his remaining rivals in Syria. Salah-ad-Din means “righteousness of the faith,” and throughout his career Salah-ad-Din used campaigns against the Christian states as a means of rallying support.

Another depiction of Saladin; Source Unknown

Meanwhile, in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, King Amalaric, who had been led five expeditions into Egypt, had died. He had been succeeded by Baldwin IV, a youth suffering from leprosy. Conscious of his own weakness and immanent death, Baldwin IV sent to the West for aid, and in early August 1177, Count Philip of Flanders reached Acre with a large force of Western knights.

On the advice of the High Court, Baldwin IV offered Philip of Flanders the regency of his kingdom, whose armies were preparing yet another invasion of Egypt aided by a large Byzantine fleet. Flanders, however, insisted on being made king of any territories the joint Christian forces conquered. The idea did not sit well with either the King of Jerusalem or the Emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, both of whom were footing the bill and providing the bulk of the troops for the expedition. The result was that the entire expedition was called off, the Byzantine fleet withdrew and Philip of Flanders took his knights and half the barons of Jerusalem north to attack the Seljuk strongholds of Hama and Harim instead.

A Medieval depiction of a Crusading Host

Salah ad-Din had gathered his forces in Egypt to repel the impending attack. He rapidly learned that not only had the invasion of Egypt been called off, the Byzantine fleet had withdrawn and the bulk of the fighting forces of Jerusalem had moved north. It was a splendid opportunity to strike, and the Sultan seized the opportunity, invading with a force estimated at 26,000 light horse — which leaves open the question of whether there were infantry with him or not. The force also allegedly included some 1,000 mameluks of the Sultan’s personal body guard.

Salah ad-Din's army crossed into Frankish territory from Egypt and significantly by-passed the Templar stronghold at Gaza. Presumably, Salah ad-Din considered it too tough a nut to crack. Laying siege to a Templar fortress would, he calculated, cost far too much time and too many lives. Salah ad-Din (as throughout his career) preferred "soft targets.

Significantly, the Templars let the Saracen army pass without offering any resistance. The Templars were said to have gathered a large fighting force at Gaza, thinking this would be the target of the invasion. (Howarth, p. 132; Robinson, p. 131.) Furthermore, the Master of the Temple had taken personal command at Gaza in anticipation of this confrontation. The new Master was Odo de Saint Amand. He was a man William of Tyre (who knew him personally) described as "dictated by the spirit of pride, of which he had an excess." (Barber, p. 109.) Two years later, Saint Amand would be responsible for a Templar charge that very nearly cost the Kingdom of Jerusalem their king, and landed him in a Saracen prison. So it is unlikely that the Templars failed to respond to Salah ad-Din's invasion out of indifference or fear. Furthermore, as my essay on the Siege of Ascalon highlighted, the Templars were capable of impetuous acts in which they took on forces much larger than their own. The most likely explanation is that despite an ethos that viewed numbers as irrelevant in the face of faith, the size of the invading army was simply too daunting for the roughly 300 knights collected at Gaza.

An Example of a Crusader Stronghold -- here Margat, a Hospitaller Castle

Meanwhile, according to an anonymous Christian chronicler from northern Syria, the news of Saladin’s invasion plunged Jerusalem into despair. The king was just 16 years old, had no battle experience of his own. His most experienced commanders (or many of them) were besieging Hama. The Constable of the Kingdom, the competent and wise Humphrey de Toron II, was gravely ill. Nevertheless, Baldwin rallied his forces and with just 376 knights made a dash to Ascalon, the southern-most stronghold of his kingdom.

Baldwin and his improvised force of secular knights arrived in Ascalon only shortly before Salah ad-Din with his whole army on November 22. King Baldwin took control of the city, but then hesitated to risk open battle with the Saracens because of the imbalance of forces. Thus, while King Baldwin's dash to Ascalon had been heroic, it had been rash as well. Salah ad-Din was now in a position to keep the King and his knights bottled up inside Ascalon with only a fraction of his forces, while taking the rest of his army and striking at the now unprotected Jerusalem

This was exactly what Salah ad-Din did, and it might have resulted in the fall of Jerusalem had Salah ad-Din not made a major error. The Sultan and his emirs were so confident of victory that they took time to plunder the rich cities of the coastal plain, notably Ramla and Lydda, but also as far inland as Hebron. In Jerusalem, the terrified population sought refuge in the Citadel of David.

The Citadel of David as it appears today.

But Baldwin IV was not yet defeated. With the number of Saracen troops surrounding Ascalon dramatically reduced, he risked a sortie. He also somehow managed to get word to the Templars at Gaza of his plans and requested that they rendezvous with him.

The Templars were not vassals of the King of Jerusalem and were not obliged to do as he asked. But Saint Amand did not hesitate to join the King. He sortied out of Gaza with his entire mobile force of just 84 knights, plus an unknown number of sergeants and Turcopoles.

Together this mounted force started to shadow Saladin’s now dispersed and no longer disciplined army. Frankish tactics, however, required a combination of cavalry and infantry, so King Baldwin could not engage the enemy until he had sufficient infantry as well. He issued the arrière ban, a general call to arms that obligated every Christian to rally to the royal standard in defense of the realm. Infantry started streaming to join him.

On the afternoon of November 25, King Baldwin’s host of about 450 knights (375 secular knights and 84 Templars from Gaza), with their squires, Turcopoles and infantry in unspecified numbers caught up with the main body of Saladin’s troops at a place near Montgisard or Tell Jazar, near Ibelin (modern day Yavne).

The Sultan, as he later admitted to Saracen chroniclers, was caught off-guard. Before he could properly deploy his troops, the main force of Christian knights, probably led by the Baron of Ramla, in whose territory the battle took place, smashed into Saladin’s still disorganized troops, apparently while some were still crossing or watering their horses in a stream. Although Ramla and his younger brother, Balian d'Ibelin, distinguished themselves in fighting, the disciplined Templar knights were undoubtedly a key factor in victory.

Modern Depiction of Montgisard by Zvonimir (copyright Medieval World) with the the Templars and the Ibelins at the forefront of the Frankish cavalry.

Although the battle was hard fought and there were heavy Christian casualties, the Sultan’s forces were soon routed. Not only that, Salah ad-Din himself came very close to being killed or captured and allegedly escaped on the back of a pack-camel. For the bulk of his army there was no escape. Those who were not slaughtered immediately on the field, found themselves scattered and virtually defenseless in enemy territory. Although they abandoned their plunder, it was still a long way home — and the rains had set in. Cold, wet, slowed down by the mud, no longer benefiting from the strength of numbers, they were easy prey for the residents and settlers of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The latter, after the sack of Lydda, Ramla and other lesser places, had good reason to crave revenge. Furthermore, even after escaping Christian territory, the Sultan’s troops still found no refuge because once in the desert the Bedouins took advantage of the situation to enslave as many men as they could catch in order to enrich themselves. Very few men of the Sultan’s army made it home to safety in Egypt.

Saladin was badly shaken by this defeat. He had good reason to believe it would discredit him and initially feared it would trigger revolts against his rule. Later, he convinced himself that God had spared him for a purpose. Certainly he was to learn from his defeat. He never again allowed himself to be duped by his own over-confidence and his subsequent campaigns against the crusader states were marked by greater caution. It was not until the crushing defeat of the Frankish armies at Hattin in July 1187 — almost ten years later — that he had his revenge not just on the Frankish kingdom but specifically on the Knights Templar as well.