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

Winter War for Beirut

In the fall of 1231, an army under the command of the Imperial Marshal Riccardo Filangieri seized control of the port city of Beirut. John d'Ibelin, the Lord of Beirut, had just been disseized without a judgment of the court. That should have been the end of the story -- but it wasn't.

Above a 19th-century watercolor of Beirut harbor by Charles Pierron -- before the destruction of the castle. Copyright Christie's Images

As described last week, Beirut had been caught in Cyprus with nearly all his men when the Imperial Marshal struck at his lordship of Beirut. Ibelin knew that his citadel was well-stocked to withstand a siege, but the garrison was too small to withstand a determined assault. If he were to avoid complete defeat, he knew he had to raise a military force capable of breaking the siege of the citadel. The challenges were threefold: 1) he didn't himself command enough knights and men-at-arms to take on the Imperial army; 2) he didn't have any ships to transport his men and horses from Cyprus to the mainland, and 3) it was now late fall, the winter storms had started and the Mediterranean was largely closed to shipping.

Beirut addressed the first two issues by making a dramatic appeal to King Henry of Cyprus for aid. This appeal is notable in that Beirut was Henry's acting regent since the defeat of the Imperial baillies the previous summer. Presumably, Beirut could have simply commanded the resources of Cyprus. Instead, we are told that he went on his knees before the 14-year-old king and begged him for assistance. Pure theater? Probably, but at least the forms of legality were respected, in contrast to the Emperor's actions.

The High Court of Cyprus was summoned and knights and barons came in unprecedented number, "friends and enemies" both. The Lord of Beirut rose and reminded the king that he and his family (meaning his father and brother) had on more than one occasion defeated attempts to depose the Lusignans, a fact for which he had many witnesses and was not in doubt.  Then, according to the chronicler Philip de Novare, who was personally present, Beirut appealed to the king as follows:

"Now it has happened that the Langobards have taken my city and besieged my castle so closely that it is in danger of being lost, and ourselves and all our Syrian men disinherited. Wherefore I pray you, by God and by your honor, for our great services and because we are of one blood and nourished by a common motherland...that you come in person in all your power with me to succor my castle."

At this the lord of Beirut was silent and knelt as if to kiss the foot of the king. The king arose to his feet and all the others knelt, and the king and all the others said that they agreed willingly.... [Novare, LXXXIV]

Not everyone came willingly, as events soon showed, but what Beirut had achieved with his show of requesting aid where he could have commanded it was to leave the youthful king his dignity. The importance of that would become evident within six months.

  
First, however, the entire Cypriot host had to muster and cross to the mainland in the dead of winter. The army collected at Famagusta shortly after Christmas, there to await favorable weather for a crossing.  They waited a long time in weather that Novare describes as terrible. One source claims they did not risk a crossing until after the spring equinox, another that they departed on the first day of lent, that would have been Feb. 25, 1232. Fatefully, Beirut refused to leave any of his bannerets or sons behind on Cyprus. According to Novare, Beirut argued that everything hinged upon the recovery of Beirut and that they needed every single fighting man they had, adding that many battles had been lost for the lack of a single nobleman. He concluded: 

"If we conquer, Cyprus will not need any captains; if we lose, it will be ended with us and the captain who would be in Cyprus could only hold out for a little time and after he would perish... For this I do not wish that any one of my family who bears the name of Ibelin should remain. If we conquer, each will have his part in the honor and profits; if we lose, we will all die together and for God in our rightful heritage, there where most of my relatives have been born and died." [Novare, LXXXVI]

Fine as these sentiments were (and Shakespeare appears to have liked them well enough to include them in Henry V's speech at Agincourt), they ignored a dangerous reality: the five former Imperial baillies might have yielded to peer pressure at the session of the High Court but they remained discontented and opposed to action against the Emperor. Throughout the winter they sought both to absent themselves from the host and to induce other knights and barons to abandon the Ibelin cause. 

At last, the order was given to embark apparently on Cypriot ships as there is no mention of assistance from one of the Italian cities at this point. The fleet sailed at night, according to Novare, in "very bad weather and heavy rain" -- but presumably in better weather than had gone before. The wind drove them to Puy du Constable in the County of Tripoli, where the army safely disembarked. Here, however, the five former baillies with their retinues and followers numbering roughly 80 knights or 20% of the Cypriot feudal host, "fled." These men later turned up in Beirut fighting alongside Filangieri, so one presumes they made it to Tripoli and took ship from there to reinforce the Imperial besiegers.

Meanwhile, the main force of the Cypriot/Ibelin army headed south to the relief of Beirut. The desertion of such a large contingent of men right at the start of the campaign we naturally demoralizing. Beirut, however, countered the dismay by making a show of relief and declaring that he was glad to be rid of the traitor. He reasoned, "as long as they were following him he momentarily waited for them to strike him between the shoulders. Now since they had broken their faith to their lord...had deserted him in the field and were perjured toward  him...they were not people whom it was necessary to fear...." [Novare, LXXXVIII]

King Henry's army advanced south along the coastal road, flanked -- as Richard the Lionheart's troops had been during the Third Crusade -- by their fleet. Unfortunately, the winter storms were far from over and almost immediately a violent storm drove their ships ashore at Botron. Nearly all the vessels were wrecked and with them the Cypriot siege engines and most of their tents. The advance continued overland "through rain and bad weather, through great torrents, deep and overflowing their banks, and through the Pass of the Pagans and the Pass of the Dog, which was most perilous to cross" until the came to the River of Beirut. [Novare, LXXXIX] Here they could be seen from the castle, inspiring great joy and hope of relief.

The castle, meanwhile, had been badly battered by the besiegers. The fosse (dry ditch surrounding the castle), "one of the finest in the world," had been turned into a covered street from which the enemy was digging tunnels under the walls of the castle. A large siege engine had also been set up on a hill outside the city, which caused great damage to the battlements. 

News of the arrival of the Cypriot army under the command of the Lord of Beirut also spread through the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and Beirut's allies started to collect around him. Most important, his nephew the Lord of Caesarea brought up reinforcements. It appeared that a confrontation was, at last, going to take place. The  Imperial army issued forth from Beirut to draw up in battle array on the opposite side of the River of Beirut, but it did not risk crossing the river -- and nor did the Ibelins and their allies. Instead, they faced each other all day, and then both returned to their camps. On another occassion, the Cypriot army crossed the river and got as far as the fosse of the citadel hoping to lure the Imperial forces out for a confrontation. Instead, Filagnieri answered with only a feeble sally that was easily chased back into the city, but left the Ibelins and their allies outside and no closer to their goal.

At some point, during this standoff,  the Patriarch of Jerusalem, the Masters of the Temple and Hospital, and Beirut's other nephew, Balian of Sidon, came to Beirut. They attempted to persuade the parties to negotiate a peaceful settlement. Yet, neither side was ready to compromise. The clergy and Sidon withdrew.


The Imperial Marshal retained the upper hand. He was in firm possession of the town of Beirut, and for obvious reasons, the Lord of Beirut and his allies could not assault him there. Furthermore, the Sicilians had established a blockade of the citadel by sea as well as land by tying their gallies bow and stern on a great chain of iron that cut off the castle on the seaward side. Beirut's army could not penetrate to the citadel either through the enemy-held city or through the sea blockade. They had no choice but to remain on the far side of the River of Beirut, where supplies soon started to run low. Despite his dramatic appeal to King Henry, despite bringing the entire host of the Kingdom of Cyprus (minus 80 "traitors"), despite a hazardous crossing in winter storms, despite bringing his army down the coast in bad weather, and despite support from local supporters, Beirut was unable to muster sufficient force to break the Imperial stranglehold on his citadel, much less force the Imperial forces out of his city. 

Still, Beirut did not concede defeat. Instead, he asked for volunteers willing to risk taking an open boat through the blockade by night and attempting to scramble up the steep embankment to reach the postern of the castle. At once his heir Sir Balian, and his other adult sons Sir Baldwin and Sir Hugh, as well as roughly 100 other armed men -- knights, sergeants, and squires -- volunteered to make the attempt. Novare writes: "...no man was ever so loved by his people, for the vessel was so full of men that the water came up to the bulwarks." [Novare, XCIII] Yet Beirut chose his fourth son Sir John to lead the attempt, ignoring the vehement protests of his elder sons. It is hard to avoid the suspicion that he gave the operation so little chance of success that he did not want to risk his firstborn and heir!

Sure enough, the boat was seen by the Sicilians and there was a great deal of shouting and shooting. Worse, when the Ibelin men landed and started up toward the castle, the garrison thought they were being assaulted by the enemy and started to hurl boulders, lances and other missiles at them. Eventually, someone (presumably Sir John) managed to convince the garrison that this was a relief effort and the reinforcements were welcomed "with great joy."

From the shore, of course, it wasn't entirely clear what was happening out in the dark, and Beirut, thinking all was lost, threw himself face down on the earth with his arms outstretched like a cross praying to God. Finally, lights and faint cheering from the castle reached him. He could give thanks rather than begging for assistance. 

Nor was this perious mission merely a gallant gesture. According to Novare, the reinforced garrison thereafter "defended themselves more vigorously, made a countermine against the miners, killed the miners without and within the mine, recaptured the fosse by force and fired the covered street...made many brave sallies and ... burned several engines." [Novare, XCIV] Beirut, meanwhile, confident that his castle could hold out for months more, moved his army to Acre where it could be better provisioned and began a diplomatic offensive to gain more allies.
  

The story of the Lord of Beirut's confrontation with the Holy Roman Emperor continues next week. Meanwhile, the events described here are depicted in more detail in:

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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

An Emperor, A King and a Wronged Vassal:

Emperor Frederick sailed away from the Kingdom of Jerusalem on May 1, 1229 -- still wearing the intestines his furious subjects had pelted at him. He never again set foot in the Holy Land. However, until his death in December 1250 he continued to call himself "King of Jerusalem." In those 21 intervening years, he made numerous attempts to exert his authority in Jerusalem and to control the kingdom of Cyprus as a vassal state. He was consistently foiled by a coalition of forces led by the very man he had tried to disseize, humiliate and exile: John d'Ibelin, Lord of Beirut. 

Today I begin a five-part series looking at the second phase of the conflict: Emperor Frederick's attempt to eliminate Beirut by force of arms.

On his departure from the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Frederick named two men, Balian de Sidon (a grandson of the Balian d'Ibelin who defended Jerusalem in 1187) and Garnier l'Aleman (Werner von Egesheim) as his baillies. In Cyprus, he left five men (who paid him 10,000 silver marks for the privilege) as his baillies. (See: The Emperor's Men) As described in The Battle of Nicosia and The Sieges of Kantara and St. Hilarion) the baillies on Cyprus were militarily defeated but then pardoned by the still under-aged king Henry I under the tutelage of the Lord of Beirut. 

Emperor Frederick received the news of the defeat of his appointed baillies in his Kingdom of Sicily. His immediate reaction is not recorded, but just over a year later in the autumn of 1231, he outfitted a fleet of 32 ships filled with more fighting men than he had taken with him on his "crusade" of 1228. This force of 600 knights, 100 squires, 700 foot soldiers, and 3,000 armed sailors was commanded by one of Frederick's most trusted officers, the Imperial Marshal, Riccardo Filangieri. Frederick's orders were to expel the Ibelins from their lands and titles and restore Imperial control over both the Kingdoms of Jerusalem and Cyprus. 

 

News of the Emperor's fleet and intentions was brought to the Lord of Beirut in Acre -- either by an Ibelin spy in the Emperor's camp or by an Imperial defector/traitor. Beirut was at this point acting regent of the Kingdom of Cyprus for the 14-year-old King Henry I. Believing that Filangieri's first port of call would be Cyprus, he gathered his men and allies, denuding his base of Beirut of fighting-men, and took ship for Cyprus, arriving almost simultaneously with the Imperial fleet. 

Significantly, Filangieri himself was not with the ships that made landfall on the south coast of Cyprus and anchored off Limassol. Instead, the Emperor was represented by the Bishop of Melfi. The presence of an apparently large (but probably not very large) armed force under the Lord of Beirut's heir, Sir Balian, dissuaded the Imperial forces from attempting a landing, but the Bishop of Melfi requested an interview with King Henry.

This could hardly be refused, and the Bishop went ashore accompanied by two knights to meet with the King, notably in the presence of the Lord of Beirut, who was, after all, still nominally at least his baillie. Notably, the Eracles (a less pro-Ibelin source than Philip de Novare) describes the meeting between the Emperor's spokesperson and King Henry in great detail. According to this contemporary source, via his envoy Emperor Frederick addressed the young king as his vassal, and "ordered him" to "dismiss and require to leave your land, John d'Ibelin, his children, his nephews, and his relatives."

The imperious tone strikes any reader familiar with Frederick Hohenstaufen as authentic. He clearly viewed himself as dealing with a subordinate -- and a child subordinate at that. He had recently brought his own son, the crowned "King of the Romans," to heel. Frederick no doubt expected little opposition for a fourteen-year-old, who had to date been his prisoner and pawn, married three years earlier to the woman of his choice, and besieged for nearly a year by the very men Frederick was asking him to disseize and expel. Perhaps he assumed that Henry resented or even hated the Lord of Beirut for that siege. Certainly, the fact that he was demanding a fellow monarch to break the constitution of his kingdom by disseizing vassals without due process does not appear to have bothered the Emperor in the least.  

The Hohenstaufen had miscalculated. After hearing the Emperor's "orders," Henry took counsel with his advisors and on his return allowed his seneschal and celebrated jurist, Sir William Viscount, to deliver his answer. While this may sound as if Henry was not free to speak for himself and that the answer was formulated not by the king by his advisors (including the Lord of Beirut himself), subsequent events belie that interpretation. We must assume that Henry wholeheartedly backed the sentiments expressed in the answer that Viscount gave. 

Viscount pointed out that King Henry "greatly marveled" at the Emperor's demands because to follow them he would put himself in the wrong -- i.e. violate feudal law and custom. Henry also reminded the Emperor via the Bishop of Melfi that he was himself a relative of Beirut so that the Emperor's demand that he expel "all Beirut's relatives" was an order for him to expel himself from his own kingdom. 

Perhaps something was lost in translation then or now. Perhaps the Emperor did not mean to suggest Henry quit his own kingdom. Perhaps he thought it was obvious he didn't mean that. However, Henry appears to have been deeply offended by the demand nevertheless as subsequent events made clear. Meanwhile, the Bishop of Melfi had no choice but to withdraw, his job as an ambassador for Emperor Frederick complete if unsuccessful. 

Meanwhile, Marshal Filangieri had caught up with the rest of his fleet. Without attempting a landing or seeking an interview with King Henry, he ordered his fleet to sail by night making directly for Beirut's lordship and power base: Beirut.

It is impossible to know if this had been the plan all along. It is possible that the man who brought the Lord of Beirut the news about Imperial intentions to land on Cyprus was an Imperial plant. Perhaps the mission to King Henry had been a ruse, intentionally designed to lure the Lord of Beirut away from his city with the bulk of his fighting men. Or, maybe, Filangieri had simply improvised brilliantly. Either way, it was an astute tactical move. Arriving off Beirut by night, Filangieri's forces "took the city unawares," according to the close ally and intimate of the Ibelins, Philip de Novare. Immediately, Novare tells, "as might a timid priest," the Bishop of Beirut surrendered the port city -- the source of much of the Lord of Beirut's wealth and revenue.

Although the citadel of Beirut held out under a skeletal garrison, Emperor Frederick via his deputy Filiangieri had decisively won the opening round of this renewed confrontation with the Lord of Beirut. 

The story of Frederick's confrontation with Beirut continues next week. Meanwhile, the story forms the basis of The Emperor Strikes Back:

Buy Now!

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

Commanding a Crusade

"A crusade army was, in effect, a loosely organized mob of soldiers, clergy, servants, and followers heading in roughly the same direction for roughly the same purposes. Once launched, it could be controlled no more than the wind or the sea."

Professor Thomas Madden in The Concise History of the Crusades

When speaking or writing about the crusades, it is easy to forget just how different they were from modern military campaigns, not just in terms of weapons, clothes, and transport but with regard to structure and command and control.

First and foremost, as Professor Madden so eloquently pointed out, crusades were not regular armies with a clear command structure and officers nor were they composed of soldiers bound by discipline. Instead, they were collections of pilgrims led by prominent pilgrims whose presence (and pocketbooks) inspired greater or smaller numbers of other men to join them in their great undertaking. Not even the Holy Roman Emperor nor the various crusading kings from Richard the Lionheart to St. Louis commanded the troops of the crusades they led in the modern sense of the word. They literally could not order any action -- unless they had first persuaded their followers to follow their lead and their proposed course of action. 

The building blocks of a crusading army were individual pilgrims who had sufficient funds to finance such a long journey -- or could persuade someone else to finance it for them. The most common means to obtain the latter in the context of the crusades was to offer to serve in the entourage of a wealthier man. Thus, whether archer, sergeant or other foot-soldier, a man of modest means and common birth would look to attach himself to a knight or lord who would undertake to feed him and pay him wages throughout the journey in exchange for his "service."

Individual knights (with their squire, horses and one or more servants) would likewise attach themselves to a wealthier lord. These individual knights (their squire and servants like their horses being part of the "unit" that made a knight) were then "household" knights attached to another knight or lord. 

Wealthier knights that could afford to pay/provision other knights were known as "bannerets." They did not have to be noblemen or lords. A knight-banneret was simply a knight that commanded other knights, and usually some infantry (archers, pikemen) and maybe a couple of mounted sergeants as well. However, noblemen were all bannerets in the sense that they commanded other knights, at a minimum the knights of their own household or entourage. Most noblemen, however, were wealthy enough to engage not only their own household knights, sergeants, and soldiers, but to pay and provision other bannerets. Kings generally had the resources and prestige to solicit the support of many of their own barons as well as other independent knights.

Yet these relationships were fluid. As Professor Jonathan Riley-Smith words it:

The petty lords...and knights were independent and their allegiances constantly shifted as circumstances changed and the ability of princes to reward them and their little entourages came and went. [Jonathan Riley-Smith, The Crusades: A History (New York: Bloomsbury, 2014) 62-63.

Nor was it just the "petty lords" and individual knights that changed their "employers" at whim. A famous case occurred in the Third Crusade, when the comparatively wealthy Henri, Count of Champagne, ran short of funds and asked for a loan from his uncle the King of France, in whose force he was then serving. The penny-pinching Philip II turned him down, so Henri turned to his other uncle, the King of England. Richard I gave generously, and Henri transferred his allegiance, bringing glittering band of Champagnois knights to serve under the banner of the King of England. 

This was possible because a crusade was not a "nationalist" undertaking and oaths of fealty that bound vassals to their lords at home were irrelevant in the context of a pilgrimage far beyond the borders of their liege's territory. Indeed, it could be argued that oaths of fealty were temporary suspended or superseded by the oath to God to fight for Christ. Thus knights of the Holy Roman Empire might choose to ride under a French or English banner, and vice versa. The reputation of an individual commander as a man who looked after his men, paid well, or divided booty liberally thus impacted the size of their troop.

That said, at the core of any band of soldiers under a banner was the leader surrounded by his household, his dependants (servants) and his kin. Most lords had brothers, uncles, nephews and cousins, who rode with them. Good lords retained the loyalty of those of their vassals who had embarked on the crusade with them. They traveled surrounded by these well-knit groups of men who knew each other well and spoke the same language. 

What these structures meant for the command of a crusade was that there was never a single unified command, with the possible exception of St. Louis' two crusades. All the other crusades, starting with the First, were characterized by fragmented leadership. 

During the First Crusade there were four different attempts to designate a commander-in-chief, and had the Byzantine Emperor agreed to lead the campaign he would undoubtedly have assumed this function without dissent -- but he didn't. None of the western leaders, however, was strong enough to either intimidate or inspire the other princes to subordinate themselves to him. 

The Second Crusade notoriously nearly fell apart because King Louis could not agree with the Prince of Antioch on a goal. The Third Crusade was weakened by the bickering between Philip of France and England of Richard, and later by the French refusal to follow Richard. The Fourth Crusade was characterized by assemblies at every stage along the way at which everyone discussed what to do next. With each decision that took the crusaders closer to the sack of Constantinople, more crusaders refused to follow the leadership and struck off on their own. The Fifth Crusade was riven by rivalries and bitter fights over strategy and spoils between the pope's representative, the Holy Roman Emperor's deputy and the King of Jerusalem. The Sixth Crusade saw the absurd situation of an excommunicated Emperor unable to command the forces of the military orders and alienating the local barons into revolt. 

Precisely because there was no commander-in-chief, the crusades were -- in the words of Professor Riley-Smith -- "run by committees and assemblies." On the one hand, each armed band engaged in the routine process familiar from government at home in which a lord (read banneret) consulted with his principle followers over any major decision. On the other hand, all the principle lords regularly met in "council" as necessary in order to make command decisions. Last but not least, the crusade leadership would call assemblies of the entire host in which proposals were put to the entire body of pilgrims, great and small.

This may surprise those unfamiliar with the Middle Ages. Yet medieval society was anything but authoritarian. On the contrary, society was communal and consensual as well as hierarchical. The medieval peasant was not a slave taking orders, but a member of society required to participate in consensus-building in daily life. At the village level, for example, basic decisions about planting, crop rotation and harvesting were taken communally. In the courts, judgments were reached by a jury, not handed down by the lord or judge. 

On crusade, "the non-noble elements...periodically acted in concert to influence the decisions of the leaders who regularly consulted them." [Riley-Smith, 63] During the First Crusade, for example, the common soldiers threatened to elect their own leaders unless the princes agreed to leave Antioch and the march to Jerusalem. In the Third Crusade, the common soldiers twice forced Richard the Lionheart to undertake a march toward Jerusalem against his better judgment. Only with great difficulty was Richard able to dissuade them from making a costly attempt at an assault -- both times in an assembly of crusaders where every man had a voice. 

Thus, while the lack of a unified command may strike us as a severe weakness for a military campaign, it was also a reflection of society and an important check on the leadership that was constantly required to explain and justify itself and its actions. 

  
Two of my novels, both winners of multiple literary awards, describe crusades: 
"Envoy of Jerusalem" describes the Third Crusade
 and "Rebels against Tyranny" describes the Sixth.

                               Best Christian Historical Fiction 2017 and 2019

                                                                   

  

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 Franks of Cyprus

Just as the native population of Cyprus differed in character from the local populations found on the mainland of Syria, the Frankish elite that established itself on Cyprus differed in subtle but significant ways from the elite of the early crusading states.

The Frankish Abbey of Bellapais as it looks today.

Frankish rule was established on the island of Cyprus not by crusaders who had slogged their way across Europe and Asia in a grueling campaign characterized by hardship, attrition, and blood, but rather by the disinherited descendants of those first crusaders. The first Frankish lord, Guy de Lusignan, had the dubious honor of being responsible for the loss of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and with it the respect of the vast majority of his subjects. When he arrived in Cyprus in late 1192 with only a few supporters as landless as himself, he was a deposed king unable to completely come to terms with his fate and always wishing himself back in his "real" throne of Jerusalem.

Fortunately for the history of Cyprus, Guy de Lusignan died within two years of his arrival in Cyprus and it was his far more competent elder brother Aimery, who shaped the future kingdom. Aimery, although not born in Outremer, came from a family with a profound history of crusading. Aimery's great-grandfather, Hugh VI of Lusignan, had fought the Muslims in Spain and joined the crusade of 1101. His grandfather Hugh VII took part in the Second Crusade. Aimery's father Hugh VIII died in a Saracen prison. All three of Aimery's brothers, Hugh IX, Geoffrey, and Guy took part in the Third Crusade. Aimery, however, was the first of his family to settle in Outremer, something he did in roughly 1170. He married into one of the established families, the Ibelins, and he rose to be Constable of the Kingdom under Baldwin IV. When Aimery stepped into his brother's shoes as Lord of Cyprus in 1194, he was far more a "Poulain" (a Frankish native) in his outlook than an outsider. That meant he understood compromise, adaptation, and survival in an "alien" environment.

He was surrounded, furthermore, by other "Poulains" rather than crusaders. His wife, Eschiva d'Ibelin, belonged to the third generation of settlers in the Holy Land; she and her parents had both been born there and her grandfather had come to Outremer sometime before 1115 -- possibly with the First Crusade. The knights with Aimery were likewise men who had lost their lands in Syria -- men who had once held fiefs in Oultrejourdain and Galilee, in Hebron and Bethsan and Nazareth or in Ascalon and Gaza -- all those areas of the former Kingdom of Jerusalem that had not been recaptured in the course of the Third Crusade. They too knew that survival in the Near East required more than force of arms; it required cooperation with the native population and exchange in the form of trade and diplomatic relations with the surrounding states.

Although their names are largely lost now, we know that two sons of the Lord of Bethsan, Philip and Baldwin, went to Cyprus. A Renier de Jubail, evidently of the family holding that Syrian lordship, and a certain Reynald of Soissons, who had lost his fief in Nablus, also numbered among the knights of Cyprus. Notably, Humphrey of Toron, another man who had lost his claim to the crown of Jerusalem, was with Guy on the island. Guy and Humphrey had been married to two sisters, both Princesses of Jerusalem, and through their own actions had lost the support of the barons of the Kingdom; they must have made a sad pair. Like Guy, Toron disappears from the record before the end of the 12th century.

Aimery, in contrast, looked forward rather than back. In 1196, he obtained from the pope a bull establishing a Latin ecclesiastical hierarchy on the island with an Archbishop at Nicosia and four suffragans. More significantly, he surrendered Cyprus to the Holy Roman Emperor in exchange for a crown. Aimery styled himself "King of Cyprus" from 1196 onwards, and in 1247, Pope Innocent IV formally absolved the bonds between Cyprus and the Holy Roman Empire, making Cyprus a fully independent and autonomous kingdom.

Meanwhile, the island had benefitted from waves of settlers -- from the Latin East rather than the West. According to the legend recorded in the Continuation of the History of William of Tyre, Guy had sent "to Armenia, to Antioch, to Acre and through all the land" saying he would "give generously" to all settlers -- significantly not just knights but "sergeants and burgesses" too. The same account further stresses that they came: "shoemakers, masons and Arabic scribes...." [1] In short, it was not just the military elite that was invited to settle in Cyprus but everyone -- even the poor and possibly non-Latins as the reference to Arabic scribes suggests. In the second half of the 13th century, Cyprus would experience regular waves of refugees from Syria and Palestine as one metropolitan area after another fell successively to the Mamlukes. The waves became a veritable "flood" of refugees when, in 1291, the last vestiges of the crusader states on the mainland collapsed under the Mamluk onslaught.[2] Eventually, the Franks made up roughly one-quarter of the population of Cyprus, which put their number between 25,000 and 30,000.

Long before that flood, however, Cyprus benefitted from the arrival of other powerful families of Outremer: the Montbelliards, the Briennes, the Montforts, and, of course, the Ibelins. These were not landless families like most of the refugees, but powerful lords that retained significant landholdings and titles on the mainland. They had both resources and interests outside the Kingdom of Cyprus which proved both an advantage and a disadvantage. On the one hand, their holdings in Syria enabled them to bring resources and men to Cyprus, on the other hand, their interests in Syria often led them to draw resources out of Cyprus to prop-up their holdings on the mainland. Critically, and often overlooked, Cypriot fiefs enabled knights who had lost their fiefs on the mainland to maintain their character as land-holders. The lack of a Syrian fief did not necessarily mean that a knight inherently became part of the urban class, living in utter dependence on the handouts from the crown; many knights such as Philip de Novare held land-fiefs from the Syrian barons with property on Cyprus.

Of these families, the most important and most controversial was the Ibelins. The leading historian on the history of Cyprus, Prof. Peter Edbury,  argues that because Balian d'Ibelin was an inveterate opponent of Guy de Lusignan as King of Jerusalem "there was certainly no place for Balian of Ibelin" or his sons on Cyprus.[3] Yet Balian's sons already headed the witness list in 1217. Significantly, they also took part in the Fifth Crusade as vassals of the King of Cyprus rather than vassals of the King of Jerusalem. Last but not least, it was one of those sons, Philip, who was elected regent of Cyprus for the infant Henry in 1218. Had the Ibelin's really only "just arrived" this would be a meteoric rise indeed. But as Edbury himself admits the evidence is extremely scanty, with just five royal charters surviving for the years 1210-1217. In short, the absence of evidence may not be proof of the absence of presence. Certainly, Balian's son John "prospered during Aimery's reign" in Jerusalem.[4] Why should he not have prospered under the same king in Cyprus? (For more on this see: https://defendingcrusaderkingdoms.blogspot.com/2018/11/the-rise-of-house-of-ibelin.html)

The arms of Ibelin

The importance of the Ibelins is that they exemplify the nobility in Frankish Cyprus. While the daughters of the house married with the Lusignans a half-dozen times, the sons of the family dominated the Cypriot administration. Indeed, from 1230 to 1300 they monopolized the office of constable and from 1240 to 1360 that of seneschal -- all without making the office hereditary.[5] Yet they never threatened the status of the king. Edbury puts it this way: 

It is possible to see the Ibelins as over-mighty subjects attempting to dominate the crown, or alternatively as loyal cousellors and close kinsmen to whom kings would turn as a matter of course for advice and service. The history of the years before 1233 might lead one to suppose that the Ibelins were out to establish themselves as 'mayors of the palace,' intent on controlling and exploiting the crown for their own advantage. In fact the political developments in Cyprus during the remainder of the thirteeth century make it look as if the second alternative -- that the Ibelins were loyal counsellors -- was nearer to the truth. [6]

While this might have to do with the sterling character of the members of the House of Ibelin, it might also have to do with the fact that the Lusignan kings retained control of all the castles, the mint, and the judiciary -- in contrast to the situation in the Kingdom of Jerusalem. On the mainland, the major barons of the Kingdom of Jerusalem -- the Prince of Galilee, the Lords of Oultrejordain and Sidon -- were quasi-independent. Not only did they have the right to administer justice in their domains, they also maintained massive fortifications (Kerak and Montreal in Oultrejourdain come to mind) and large retinues of knights, turcopoles, and sergeants. In short, the barons of Jerusalem had independent power-bases from which they could, if they wanted to, defy the King of Jerusalem. Reynald de Chatillon allegedly did just that, when he told King Guy of Jerusalem that the king's peace with Saladin did not apply to the barony of Oultrejourdain at all. 

Chatillon's powerbase at Kerak today

The Kings of Jerusalem had little choice but to accept the situation because they were dependent on their barons for the defense of a threatened realm. The Kings of Cyprus, on the other hand, were surrounded not by jihadist states but by water. The fiefs they distributed brought their holders income and status, without requiring the investment of large sums of money in the construction, recruitment, and maintenance of expensive fortresses and garrisons. The nobles of Cyprus had more money for the pleasures of life -- hunting, hawking, patronage of the arts and church. For the kings, it meant that the nobility was not well-positioned to rebel, and far more dependent on royal patronage for status and prestige.

It was for their wealth and their love of pleasure that the Cypriot nobles became famous. At least one visitor, Ludolph von Sudheim, claimed in 1340 that the Cypriot knights and nobles were the "richest in the world." He noted that the Count of Jaffa (despite the title, a Cypriot) had 500 hunting dogs, others had dozens of falconers, while still others kept leopards for hunting. They also engaged in frequent tournaments. The Lusignan palace in Nicosia was considered one of the finest in the world, with a great throne room, many golden ornaments, tapestries, paintings, organs, clocks, multiple baths and fountains, gardens and a menagerie.[7]  (p. 175)

Unfortunately, the Lusignan palaces were all destroyed during the Ottoman occupation. We have only fragments of them left in the museums of Cyprus.

The character and lifestyle of the Franks on Cyprus are carefully reconstructed in my novels set in Lusignan Cyprus such as:

                                                                   

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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

[1] Continuation of William of Tyre (139) quoted in Peter Edbury, The Kingdom of Cyprus and the Crusades 1194-1374, (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1991, 16.

[2] Angel Nicolaou-Konnari and Chris Schabel, eds. Cyprus: Society and Culture 1191-1374 (Boston: Brill, 2005)

[3] Peter Edbury, "Franks," Cyprus: Society and Culture 1191-1374, 87.

[4] Edbury, John of Ibelin, John of Ibelin and the Kingdom of Jerusalem, (Bury St. Edmunds: Boydell Press, 1997) 29.

[5] Peter Edbury, "Franks," Cyprus: Society and Culture 1191-1374, 89.

[6] Peter Edbury, Kingdom of Cyprus, 71.

[7] Hazard, Harry W ed., A History of the Crusades: The Art and Architecture of the Crusader States, Vol. 4 (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1977) 175.