Hearts and Minds: Diplomatic Maneuvering

By early April 1232, it was evident that Lord of Beirut did not have sufficient force to relieve his castle at Beirut. After smuggling in some 100 fighting men to reinforce the garrison, thereby ensuring its ability to hold out longer, Beirut turned his attention to finding additional allies. The results were both significant and surprising.

The Lord of Beirut undertook a three-pronged effort to increase the forces at his disposal for the difficult task of relieving his beleaguered castle. First, he sought international support from the closest international neighbor, the Prince of Antioch. Secondly, he sought support from a maritime power, the Genoese. Last but not least, he sought support from the burgesses or middle class. 

To secure support from the Prince of Antioch, the Lord of Beirut sent his son and heir, Sir Balian, to meet with the Prince in nearby Tripoli. Sir Balian took with him a marriage proposal sanctioned by (or originating from) King Henry of Cyprus, offering a marriage between King Henry's older sister Isabella and Prince Bohemond's younger son. Philip de Novare traveled with Sir Balian, as did Sir William Viscount, a wise and seasoned jurist. The party with Sir Balian took lodgings with the Templars and were, according to Novare, initially received by the Prince of Antioch with great honor and hospitality. 

Abruptly, however, everything changed. First the Templars closed their doors on them, throwing them out. When they turned to the Hospitallers and Cistercians, who also maintained large houses in Tripoli, the other religious houses likewsie refused them shelter. At the same time, Balian was prevented from rejoining his father by the hostility of the barons controlling the road south.  According to Novare, Sir Balian's life was repeatedly threatened by knights with close ties to the former baillies of Cyprus and allies of the Holy Roman Emperor

Sir Balian was forced to create lodgings for himself and his entourage in an unused grange, cleaning it out and furnishing it as best they could. He also sought to escape from Tripoli by requesting the Genoese to send ships. This route of escape was closed, however, when the rudders of the Genoese ships were removed on orders from the Prince of Antioch. Next, Sir Balian turned to the Sultan of Damascus, Malik al Aschraf, requesting a safe-conduct to pass through Saracen-controlled territory on his way to Acre. The Sultan obliged, but by that time the safe-conduct arrived it was no longer necessary; the direct route had mysteriously re-opened. 

It is impossible with the information available to us to know exactly what was going on here. Novare attributes this sudden change in heart to "forged letters" from the Emperor, requesting Antioch not to render assistance to the Ibelins. Why such letters would have been forged is mysterious since the Emperor was engaged in a very open war against Beirut. For three years before this incident, he had repeatedly sent messengers to various lords of Outremer ordering them to arrest, disseize and otherwise harm the Ibelins.  

Historians largely discount Novare's account of forgeries and his role in exposing them and are inclined to think Antioch simply changed his mind in the middle of the negotiations. Supposedly he (suddenly?) decided Beirut was going to lose his war and wanted to be on the winning side. Given the fact that Sir Balian arrived after his father had already abandoned his attempt to relieve Beirut, this hardly seems logical either. Nothing in Beirut's situation changed radically in the month Sir Balian was in Tripoli.

What might explain the sudden change in attitudes, particularly on the part of clerics, however, was the arrival of news about Sir Balian's excommunication. In March 1232, the pope excommunicated him for his marriage to Eschiva de Montbelliard, a marriage that was within the prohibited degrees. This would explain why all the religious houses refused him lodging and would have made him persona non grata at the court of the Prince as well. We will probably never know. 

Meanwhile, in Acre, the Lord of Beirut with the aid of King Henry had been able to persuade the Genoese to throw in their lot with him. This was not so difficult a task, one presumes, for two reasons. On the one hand, the Genoese had a long history of hostility toward the Hohenstaufens. Under the motto, "our enemy's enemy is our friend" they were undoubtedly sympathetic to Beirut's cause. What turned sympathy into serious support, however, was the lure of the rich profits that could be made in Cyprus. 

Up to this point, none of the Italian maritime powers had established a firm foothold on Cyprus. The Italian sea powers had won their privileges on the mainland by providing often vital maritime support to sieges during the early stages of the conquest of the coastal cities of the Levant. (See: https://defendingcrusaderkingdoms.blogspot.com/2018/06/the-italian-communes-in-crusader-states.html) Cyprus, on the other hand, had fallen into the lap of King Richard of England without any contribution by Italian navies. The Genoese were keen (to say the least) to get their foot in the door and secure the kind of trading privileges that promised to enrich their metropolitan city.  They agreed to replace the Cypriot fleet that had been wrecked with a Genoese one.

Far more remarkable was Beirut's success in winning the support -- indeed, as events would prove, the tenacious and passionate support -- of a large portion of the middle class in the commercial heart of the kingdom, Acre.  It was only three years since the people of Acre had expressed their opinion of Frederick Hohenstaufen by pelting him with offal and intestines on his departure. Undoubtedly, this act was not a collective act by responsible citizens, but it must have met with more approval than disapproval as one never hears of outrage much apologies or expressions of contrition on the part of the citizens of Acre to the Holy Roman Emperor. In short, Emperor Frederick was hugely unpopular in Acre because of the way he had behaved during his short sojourn in the Latin East. (For more see: https://defendingcrusaderkingdoms.blogspot.com/2018/10/the-curious-course-of-so-called-sixth.html)

Yet popular or not, what happened next had no precedent in the history of Jerusalem. It seems that after Riccardo Filangieri presented his credentials as the Emperor's deputy in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, a delegation of nobles, headed by the former regent of the kingdom Balian de Sidon firmly objected to the siege of Beirut as it was an attempt to disseize a lord without due process and a judgment of the High Court. Filangieri replied that he was only following orders and that if anyone didn't like what he was doing they could take it up with Emperor Frederick II personally. 

Aside from this being an abject admission of powerlessness, the answer made it clear to everyone -- from baron and bishop to the man on the street -- that Filangieri had no intention whatever of acting as an independent regent or, more important, of respecting the laws and constitution of the Kingdom. That made people nervous.

If Filangieri, in the Emperor's name, was prepared to attack a former regent, what might he do to ordinary knights and burgesses? If Filangieri was prepared to deny a man with close ties to royalty due process and the protection of the law, where was the Rule of Law for the man on the street? While it is claimed that the Lord of Beirut was popular, it was far more self-interest than personal affection that inspired men to take an unusual step: they decided to form a mutual protection society. 

Historian Jonathan Riley-Smith puts it like this:

In Acre there happened to be a confraternity dedicated to St. Andrew and chartered perhaps by Baldwin IV and Henry of Champagne...[It] was unusual in that its membership was not limited to those of one nationality or sect but was open to all.... So barons, knights and burgesses assembed and sent for the confraternity's cousellors and charters. These were read out and the majority  of those present solemnly swore themselves in as members.

Thereafter, they took to calling themselves simply the "Commune of Acre." This implied -- somewhat disingenuously -- that the men who had voluntarily joined represented the entire community of the city. That was hardly the case, but the Commune was sufficiently influential to meet with no opposition in Acre either. They next elected John d'Ibelin, Lord of Beirut, their "mayor," a position that was good only for one year requiring annual elections. As Riley-Smith makes clear, the Commune had no other functions than to resist the Emperor and his minions. 

With the men of the Commune and the ships of the Genoese, Beirut was finally strong enough to make a new attempt at relieving his castle. Indeed, he felt that public sympathy had swung so much in his favor that he could risk an even more dramatic attack: an assault on Filangieri's power base in the city of Tyre.  

The City of Tyre sat on an island, connected to the mainland only by a narrow causeway that was defended by three successive walls. The sea around the city was full of rocks and bad for navigation. Tyre alone -- of all the cities of the kingdom -- had successfully defied Saladin in 1187. It had remained a lonely bastion of Christendom for four years until the arrival of the Third Crusade. For Beirut to think that he might capture Tyre with his rag-tag army of Cypriot and Syrian knights, Genoese and burgesses sounds like hubris, not to say madness.  

Yet despite the apparent futility of his task, Beirut had calculated correctly -- not because he could take Tyre, but because Filangieri could not risk losing it. No sooner did Filangieri learn of Beirut's objective than he abandoned the siege of the citadel of Beirut and sailed in haste to Tyre, leaving his army to follow by land. This prompt, apparently panicked, retreat suggests that Filangieri felt his hold on Tyre was not sufficiently secure. Perhaps he feared that some of the burgesses of Tyre would turn against him if they realized Beirut at the head of the "Commune of Acre" was approaching. Whatever his reasons, Filangieri withdrew to his base at Tyre, the siege of the citadel of Beirut was lifted. Sir Balian took possession of his father's city and castle. Beirut had established the "status quo ante bellum," but the war was far from over. 

The story of Beirut's struggle with Frederick II continues next week. Meanwhile, these events are depicted in detail in my latest release:

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Dr. Helena P. Schrader holds a PhD in History.

She is the Chief Editor of the Real Crusades History Blog.

She is an award-winning novelist and author of numerous books both fiction and non-fiction. Her three-part biography of Balian d'Ibelin won a total of 14 literary accolades. Her current series describes the civil war in Outremer between Emperor Frederick andthe barons led by John d'Ibelin the Lord of Beirut. Dr. Schrader is also working on a non-fiction book describing the crusader kingdoms. You can find out more at: http://crusaderkingdoms.com

The Second Crusade and Its Consequences

Less than a half century after the re-capture of Jerusalem by Christian forces, the new crusader states suffered their first set back. In 1144, the Principality of Edessa was captured by Saracen forces. By 1146 the Principality of Antioch was also threatened, and an appeal went out. The appeal was made not to the Byzantine Emperor, who was deemed untrustworthy by the Latins at this time, but to the West. It had been the Latin world that had provided the forces that had taken Jerusalem in 1099;  it was with the ruling elites in above all in France, England and the Holy Roman Empire that the nobles of Outremer retained cultural, linguistic and family ties.

This call for help elicited an enthusiastic response. For the first (but not the last) time, kings were persuaded to take the cross (i.e., the crusader vow). The Holy Roman Emperor, Conrad III, and the King of France, King Louis VII, both promised to raise armies to come to the aid of the Holy Land. Their efforts have gone down in history as the "Second Crusade."

  

Conrad, the Holy Roman Emperor, raised about 80,000 troops and set out first. The French left later with an estimated 100,000 men. Notably, however, when the King of France knelt before Bernard of Clairvaux to take his crusader vows, he was joined by his queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, who likewise knelt and took the cross. Eleanor did so as the Duchess of Aquitaine and Countess of Poitou – not as Queen of France. The importance of her gesture was to muster support among the barons and lords who owed her, but not Louis of France, homage.

However, Eleanor’s example inspired many other French noblewomen to take the cross as well.  So when King Louis’ crusaders set forth on their crusade, his army included an unnamed number of ladies – or “amazons” as some liked to call them – determined to take part in the crusade themselves.  Most of these women were the wives of noble crusaders, wealthy enough to afford horses and armor, since according to a Greek chronicler writing some fifty years after the event, they rode astride and wore armor.  They were also accompanied by servants and a great deal of baggage.

The first stages of this crusade went remarkably well for the French, with the army making good progress.  Although accounts differ on the extent to which Louis was able to prevent pillaging and abuse of the civilian population along the route, it is clear that the French intention was to pay for provisions and leave the Christian populations in peace. Unfortunately, the German crusaders under Conrad III had behaved rather more badly when they passed through ahead of the French , so that the French often found the cities closed to them, and the price for goods exorbitant.

Nevertheless, the French reached Constantinople in comparatively good order, and while the common soldiers encamped outside the walls, the nobles, including Eleanor and her ladies, were introduced to the luxuries and splendors of the fabled Queen of Cities. They were lodged in palaces the like of which they had never seen before. They were feted and entertained. 

The news that the Byzantine Emperor had just concluded a 12 year truce with the Turks, however, cast serious doubts upon his reliability.  The mistrust of the Greeks only increased when the Byzantine Emperor tried to make Louis swear to turn over any territories his army conquered to the Emperor. Louis thought he had come to fight the Turks and restore Christian rule – not expand the borders of the Byzantine Empire.  Nevertheless, Louis rejected calls by some of his advisors to capture Constantinople and depose the Greek emperor.  Instead he set out for Jerusalem determined to fulfill his crusading vow – and consult with the King of Jerusalem about further action.

Louis chose to proceed along the southern, coastal route at a leisurely pace until, at the end of October, his army encountered deserters from the German crusade. These reported that the Turks had all but annihilated the Germans and now lay in wait for the French.  A few days later, the French caught up with what was left of the Germans, including Emperor Conrad, who was suffering from a head wound. Together Louis and Conrad’s crusaders followed the Mediterranean coast, finally reaching Ephesus in time for Christmas. Here, however, Conrad decided he was too ill to continue, so he and his nobles took ship back for Constantinople, while what was left of the foot soldiers continued with Louis’s army.

No sooner had the German Emperor departed, than adversity struck the French. Torrential rains lasting four days washed away tents, supplies, and many men and horses. After this catastrophe, Louis elected to strike out inland across the mountains, despite the absence of guides, in an attempt to reach Antioch as soon as possible.  This route, however, crossed through rugged terrain and along bad roads, where the French were constantly harassed by Turkish raiders. By now, at the latest, the “gayness and the gilt” of Eleanor and her lady-crusaders (or amazons) were “all besmirched with rainy marching in the painful field.”

The quote is from Shakespeare's "Henry V." Above Kenneth Brangh in the title role.

Disaster, however, did not overtake them until mid-January, when the commanders of the van took fatal independent action.  They had been ordered to set up camp for the main army at a specific place, and Eleanor was sent with them. (Throughout the crusade, King Louis maintained separation from Eleanor in order not to be tempted to break his vow of chastity during the duration of the crusade.) When the main army reached the designated camp, however, they found it empty. The vanguard with the Queen had decided to move to a more attractive-looking spot down in the valley. The exhausted troops at the rear, including the King with Eleanor’s baggage train, could not possibly catch up and as darkness fell a large gap had been opened between the Christian forces. The Turks quickly exploited the situation. They attacked the main force. The fighting was so intense and close that Louis’ horse was killed under him. Chronicles claim that some 7,000 crusaders died before darkness fell, putting an end to the slaughter. Many in the army blamed Eleanor, because it was one of her more important vassals who had left the main French army in the lurch.

After this disaster, the French returned to the coast, now determined to continue the crusade by ship. They were without supplies, however, and soon reduced to eating their horses before what was left of Louis’ force finally reached Antalia on January 20, 1148.  Here they discovered it was impossible to find sufficient ships for the whole force at prices King Louis was willing to pay. Plague broke out in the crusader camp, decimating a force already on the brink of starvation. At this junction, King Louis VII (not to be confused with his namesake and future saint, Louis IX) abandoned his troops and took ship with his wife and nobles for Antioch. Abandoned by their king, some 3000 French crusaders are said to have converted to Islam in exchange for their lives and food.

Louis and Eleanor, meanwhile, arrived in Antioch. Antioch was a magnificent, walled city, which had been one of the richest in the Roman Empire. At this time it was inhabited by a mixed population of Greek and Armenian Christians ruled by a Latin Christian elite, headed by Raymond of Poitiers, the younger brother of Eleanor’s father, William Duke of Aquitaine. The language of the court at Antioch was Eleanor’s own langue d’oc, and the customs were likewise those of the Languedoc. Within a very short time, Eleanor and her uncle developed such rapport that the king became jealous and then suspicious. The clerical chroniclers are united in condemning Eleanor of forgetting her “royal dignity” – and her marriage vows.

The situation was aggravated by the fact that Raymond of Antioch thought the crusaders had come to restore Christian control over the county of Edessa – and so secure his eastern flank. Louis, in contrast, thought he had come on pilgrimage to Jerusalem and insisted on continuing to the Holy City, rather than following the Prince of Antioch’s military advice. At this junction, with Louis already jealous of Eleanor’s close relationship (sexual or not) with Prince Raymond, she announced that she – and all her vassals – would remain in Antioch, whether the King of France went to Jerusalem or not. Since her vassals made up the bulk of what was left of the French forces, this was an effective veto. Louis threatened to use force to make her come with him as was his right as her husband. Eleanor retorted their marriage was invalid because they were related within the prohibited degrees and demanded an annulment. Louis responded by having her arrested in the middle of the night and carried away from Antioch by force.

After the French King's arrival in Jerusalem, the crusaders, local barons and military orders met to decide on the best strategy for action against the enemy. Although the author of the decision is not clear, the fateful decision was made to try to seize Damascus. The logic was that this would relieve the pressure on the narrowest part of the crusader kingdom -- the lands between Tyre and Tripoli. Ironically, the Muslim ruler of Damascus was one of the Saracen leaders, who had been willing to compromise and negotiate with the crusader kingdoms. The siege made an enemy of a former ally and pushed him into the arms of the jihadists -- which wouldn't have been disastrous if the campaign had been successful.  However, although a siege was established, squabbles among the leaders and then news that a strong Saracen relief army was on the way spread so much panic among the crusaders that the crusading army disintegrated. They had made a new enemy for nothing and squandered the reinforcements from the West.

Worst of all, however, was that this humiliating failure profoundly damaged the entire concept of crusades and crusading in the West.  It demonstrated that “God” was not inherently on the side of the crusaders and that victory was not assured. It also helped restore both unity and confidence among the Saracen leaders.

As a footnote, Queen Eleanor spent the months in Jerusalem while her husband’s crusade came to its final humiliating end outside Damascus. Although nothing is recorded of her activities, clearly her influence on Louis and her role in the crusade was over. Furthermore, despite an attempt to patch up the marriage after their return to France, the birth of a second daughter made a divorce a dynastic priority.  Louis abrogation of Eleanor, however, paved the way for her to marry Henry of Anjou, the future King Henry II of England. Eleanor's rich lands were instrumental in giving the Plantagenet king the means to challenge the Capets for dominance on the continent of Europe throughout the next half-century.

Dr. Helena P. Schrader holds a PhD in History.

She is the Chief Editor of the Real Crusades History Blog.

She is an award-winning novelist and author of numerous books both fiction and non-fiction. Her three-part biography of Balian d'Ibelin won a total of 14 literary accolades. Her most recent release is a novel about the founding of the crusader Kingdom of Cyprus. You can find out more at: http://crusaderkingdoms.com

 

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A Kingdom Divided

 In his introduction to Downfall of the Crusader Kingdom: The Battle of Hattin and the Loss of Jerusalem W.B Bartlett writes

During the latter decades of the twelfth century, Outremer was sleepwalking to disaster. Seemingly oblivious to the dangers of a resurgent Islam, the kingdom began to split apart. The nobles who governed with the king sought to outmaneuver one another, seeking to raise themselves up and bring their political opponents down.

This is by no means an isolated view, and most modern fiction about the period has followed the portrayal whether it is Cecilia Holland’s Jerusalem in which, according to the New York Times review, she brings to life the “atmosphere of conspiracy, betrayal…and political intrigue….” or Ridley Scott’s “Kingdom of Heaven” in which the fictional Tiberius condemns the struggles for power and land that he claims corrupted the ideals of the Holy City.
I question this interpretation.

The character of Tiberius, loosely based on Raymond of Tripoli, in the film "The Kingdom of Heaven."

But let’s be realistic. There has never been a kingdom or state that has been entirely without factions — not even totalitarian dictatorships.  To expect a state to have perfect harmony and unity is not merely idealistic, it is naive. Where there is power, there will be differences of opinion on policy, and where there are competing policy options there will be factions — usually aggravated by personalities, rivalries and the prospect of personal gain associated with proximity to power or the execution of one policy over another.

It is, in short, absurd to expect the Kingdom of Jerusalem to be without factions supporting competing policies.  Whether these can be divided into “hawks” and “doves” or “insiders” and “outsiders” is not the issue here. The fact is that the mere presence of advisors advocating competing policies and/or even passionate rivalry between powerful noblemen in a medieval kingdom is neither unusual nor inherently self-destructive.

The question is whether the divisions within the Kingdom of Jerusalem in the second half of the twelfth century mortally crippled the kingdom to the point where the threat posed by Salah-ad-Din was ignored.  Let's look at the historical record.

The Arms of the Kingdom of Jerusalem

Although it is safe to say that no kingdom on earth would have welcomed the ascension of a man suffering from leprosy, the High Court of Jerusalem took no longer than usual to recognize Baldwin IV as his father’s heir.  Furthermore, a powerful regent was rapidly installed who peacefully surrendered the keys to the kingdom to the leper prince when he turned fifteen. No sign of exceptionally destructive factions here, despite the explosive situation of a leper boy being heir to the throne.

Just a little over a year after Baldwin IV came of age, the Kingdom of Jerusalem faced the first full-scale invasion led by Salah-ad-Din.  The Count of Tripoli, the Hospitallers and hundreds of other knights from the Kingdom were at the time laying siege to Hama in Syria; Salah-ad-Din invaded from Egypt and immediately invested Ascalon. It was a very dangerous situation. The sixteen-year-old king, with no experience of battle whatsoever, gathered his forces — some 376 knights — and rode to the relief of Ascalon. He then broke out of Ascalon, met up with a Templar force from Gaza and called up the army of Jerusalem. And they came. At Montgisard, under Baldwin IV’s personal leadership, the Christian army dealt Salah-ad-Din a devastating and humiliating defeat. The bulk of the Saracen army was killed or captured, and Salah-ad-Din barely escaped on a pack camel. Nothing about this suggests a kingdom divided against itself — nor blind to the threat posed by Salah-ad-Din.

A Depiction of Montgisard, Copyright Fireforge Games

The very next year, King Baldwin ordered the construction of a castle at Jacob’s Ford — a clear indication that he recognized the threat posed by the Kurdish leader. Two years later, during the next invasion by Salah-ad-Din, Baldwin again successfully mustered his forces and successfully broke the Saracen vanguard.  Unfortunately, the Templars (who were not under Baldwin’s command) were routed by Salah-ad-Din’s main forces at the same time. When the Templars fell back, the entire Christian army withdrew. While the Templars lack of coordination is certainly to be condemned, it has nothing to do with internal rivalries or factions among the barons of Outremer.

The first hint of serious internal divisions surfaces in 1180. According to William Archbishop of Tyre, who was chancellor to Baldwin IV and so not only a contemporary but an insider, Baldwin IV’s illness had taken a dramatic turn for the worse by this time. It was clear, therefore, that the crown of Jerusalem would pass through Baldwin’s older sister Sibylla to whoever her husband might be; Sibylla in 1180 was a twenty-year-old widow. 

Sibylla as depicted in Ridley Scott's "The Kingdom of Heaven"

For whatever reasons (and they are controversial), the Baron of Ramla and Mirabelle with the backing of the Count of Tripoli and the Prince of Antioch considered himself the best candidate for Sibylla’s hand, but Sibylla — with or without her brother’s consent — married a young French noblemen of dubious character, Guy de Lusignan. 

Now Guy de Lusignan was a younger son with no title or wealth, and, more important, he had allegedly been expelled from the realm and territories of Baldwin IV’s first cousin, Henry II Plantagenet, for killing the Earl of Salisbury by stabbing him in the back.  Not a very savory character, to say the least, and I submit it is entirely understandable that the barons of Jerusalem did not think him a suitable man to become their liege lord — not to mention be crowned in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and wear a crown of gold where Christ had worn a crown of thorns…..

The Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem today.

And yet! The uproar did not tear the country apart. To be sure, Ramla refused to do homage to the new Count of Jaffa (the title given by Baldwin to his sister’s husband) — but he still brought his troops to muster at each of the subsequent invasions by Salah-ad-Din — as did the other barons. Admittedly, in 1182 during the full-scale invasion that led to the battle at La Forbelet, Baldwin IV was still personally in command of the army, leading from a litter. But a year later, in September 1183, Baldwin IV had officially abdicated his authority, retaining only the title of King, the city of Jerusalem and an annual income of 10,000 gold pieces, while naming Guy de Lusignan regent.  Yet the barons of Jerusalem all mustered — even Tripoli and Antioch and Ramla. It was allegedly the largest army ever mustered by the crusader kingdoms. Indeed, the force was so big that Salah-ad-Din preferred not to give battle and withdrew to lay siege to the castle of Kerak on his way home to Egypt instead.

View from Kerak Castle today.

Nevertheless, something happened here that has escaped the pages of history. William of Tyre had been passed over for the post of patriarch and apparently lost his insider knowledge. He was to die shortly afterward, and with him, we lost our window into what was happening inside the Kingdom of Jerusalem at this crucial moment. But one thing is clear, the barons of Jerusalem refused to go to the relief of Kerak under the leadership of Guy de Lusignan. Baldwin IV — whether reluctantly or furiously — dismissed him from the regency and had himself dragged in a litter all the way to Kerak with his army around him. Salah-ad-Din abandoned the siege rather than face the leper in a liter across a battlefield.

Baldwin IV returned from Kerak determined to find a way to dissolve his sister’s marriage to Guy de Lusignan. Why? Regardless of possible personal slights, the most obvious reason is simply that the barons of Outremer, who had rallied readily enough in September of 1183, were by November of the same year not prepared to follow Lusignan. Baldwin IV knew he could not leave his kingdom in the hands of a man who did not command the respect of the barons. 

So here is a dangerous rift — but hardly one in which the kingdom is “sleepwalking to disaster.” Baldwin IV was obviously acutely aware of the danger. He sent out a desperate, indeed almost pathetic, plea to the most powerful Christian monarchs, the Holy Roman Emperor, the King of France, and the King of England, to come to Jerusalem’s aid. He offered whichever Western monarch would come to the defense of Outremer the keys to the Tower of David, effectively offering to abdicate — and bypassing both his sisters — turn the crown over to whoever would pick up the burden of defending Jerusalem.

The Tower of David in the Citadel of Jerusalem

Baldwin IV’s appeal went unheeded, and so to prevent Guy de Lusignan from becoming king Baldwin had his nephew, Sibylla’s son by her first husband, crowned in his own lifetime as Baldwin V. At Baldwin IV’s death, the crown passed seamlessly to Baldwin V and the Count of Tripoli was named regent by the High Court of Jerusalem. Again, there is amazing unity here.

Unfortunately, Baldwin V died within a year. Defying Baldwin IV’s wishes and without the consent of the High Court of Jerusalem, Sibylla had herself crowned Queen of Jerusalem and then placed the crown on her husband’s head as her consort.  This was a clear “coup d’etat,” a usurpation of the throne. And here — in the summer of 1186 — the Kingdom started to crack.  Faced with a usurpation, a number of barons considered crowning a rival king, the husband of Baldwin IV’s younger sister, Isabella. But the young man, Humphrey de Toron, rejected the role of rival-king and paid homage to Guy de Lusignan.  So, reluctantly, did all the other barons with two notable exceptions.

The key here is that despite a clear case of usurpation, the danger of division was fully recognized. Humphrey de Toron must be credited with putting the well-being of the kingdom ahead of his personal ambitions, and the bulk of the other barons likewise swallowed their distaste of Lusignan and did homage. The two exceptions were the Baron of Ramla, Guy de Lusignan’s erstwhile rival for the hand of Sibylla, and the Count of Tripoli. Ramla took the unprecedented course of turning his entire inheritance over to his younger brother, Balian d’Ibelin, and leaving the kingdom, never to be heard of again. Tripoli simply withdrew to his own territories and concluded a separate peace with Salah-ad-Din.

This was an act that can best be described by the German term “Landesverrat.” In contrast to “Hochverrat” (treason against the state or government), Landesverrat is treason against the nation. Tripoli might have legally been correct not recognize Guy de Lusignan as his overlord, but by allying himself with the man who had vowed to drive the Christians from the Holy Land, he hurt more than King Guy, he hurt all the crusader states and their inhabitants.

The Sea of Galilee, part of Raymond de Tripoli's lands by right of his wife.

King Guy threatened to invade Tripoli’s territories and “force” his submission, but the rest of the Christian leadership — from the Grand Masters of the Military Orders to the Patriarch of Jerusalem — recognized that this was suicidal in the face of Salah-ad-Din’s threat. No one was stumbling blindly to destruction here except, perhaps the two embittered protagonists themselves!  

Guy was prevailed upon to send mediators instead of troops. The Masters of the militant orders, the Archbishop of Tyre and two leading barons, including Balian d’Ibelin, whose brother had been such an inveterate opponent of King Guy, were sent to Tripoli to effect a reconciliation between Tripoli and King Guy. They were ultimately successful.

When Salah-ad-Din again invaded the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Raymond de Tripoli was among the commanders who mustered, bringing with him one of the largest contingents of troops. His voice in the war councils was a voice of reason, but it went unheeded. Despite this — and unlike the fictional characters of Tiberias and Balian d’Ibelin in “The Kingdom of Heaven,” when Guy de Lusignan marched the Christian army out onto the Horns of Hattin, he led the entire army of Jerusalem including Tripoli and Ibelin. To destruction.

In retrospect, perhaps more division would have served the Christian kingdom better. If Raymond de Tripoli (with the men of Tripoli and Galilee) and Balian d’Ibelin (with the troops of Nablus, Ramla, Mirabelle, and Ibelin) had not been at Hattin, the Kingdom — or at least Jerusalem — might have been defensible even after this devastating defeat. But no one believed that the combined forces of Jerusalem could be so poorly led that they would be obliterated by the same man the Leper King had forced to withdraw on no less than five occasions. And had Tripoli and Ibelin failed to muster, they would have been blamed for the defeat. With the benefit of hindsight, we know that Guy de Lusignan alone lost Jerusalem. 

My award-winning biographical novel of Balian d'Ibelin in three parts is set in the Kingdom of Jerusalem in the last quarter of the 12th Century.

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Dr. Helena P. Schrader holds a PhD in History.

She is the Chief Editor of the Real Crusades History Blog.

She is an award-winning novelist and author of numerous books both fiction and non-fiction. Her three-part biography of Balian d'Ibelin won a total of 14 literary accolades. Her most recent release is a novel about the founding of the crusader Kingdom of Cyprus. You can find out more at: http://crusaderkingdoms.com