The Crusades

Sir Walter Scott

The Crusades were driven by religious fervor. Pope Urban the II wanted to unite Europe. The best way to get people to unite is to give them a common enemy. The Crusades were not primarily military operations they were pilgrimages. The Crusades were not an example of early European colonizations of the middle east even though they did create Europeanish kingdoms. The Peasant Crusades were not knights they were poor people. Religion shaped the world. The Crusaders were miraculously successful. The Crusades were a series of religious expeditionary wars blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church, with the stated goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem. Several hundred thousand soldiers became Crusaders by taking vows; the Pope granted them plenary indulgence. In modern usage the term "crusade", or "crusade against...", is often used metaphorically to refer to any idealistically- or ideologically-motivated campaign without religious connotations, as in "Crusade Against Cancer". We endlessly romanticized the story of the Crusades. Theologically Christianity didn't have a idea of a holy war, like war might be just but fighting wasn't something that got you to heaven. The Crusades were enemies with the Muslims, the enemies general was a Kurdish person named Saladin. He was a amazing general. The second Crusades were failure's. Lots of people volunteered For the fourth Crusade, I don't know maybe 35000 maybe. The crusaders comprised military units of Roman Catholics from all over western Europe, and were not under unified command. Religious Context The Holy Land is significant in Christianity because of the land's association as the place of nativity, ministry, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, whom Christians regard as the Saviour or Messiah. The origins of the Crusades were the Christian response to the Islamic invasion of Gaul (France) earlier in the Middle Ages, as well as the deterioration of the Byzantine Empire caused by a new wave of Turkish Muslim attacks. The first Crusades were brought together in 1095 C.E. Whats a better way to show your devotion to god than to put a cross on your armor. By 1100 C.E European nobles held both Jerusalem and Antioch as Latin Christan kingdoms. The third Crusades was the famous. The Crusades were a complete failure. The Crusades Liberated Jerusalem. Pilgrimages kept on stealing stuff on the way. he Reconquista, a long period of wars in Spain and Portugal (Iberia) where Christian forces reconquered the peninsula from Muslims, is closely tied to the Crusades.The term "crusade" is also used to describe religiously motivated campaigns conducted between 1100 and 1600 in territories outside the Levant usually against pagans, heretics, and peoples under the ban of excommunication for a mixture of religious, economic, and political reasons. The Political Situation Palestine had been conquered by the Roman Empire in 63 BCE. Richard The Lionheart was in the crusades. Muslims sacked the christian cities. The Crusaders failed to capture Zara. One of the leaders of the Christians drowned in a river while he was bathing. The fourth crusade was the most crazy one, and the most people volunteered to fight in it. Their were no real leaders. The Crusaders were defeated by the Persians. The Crusaders actually never took back any of the holy land. Saladin died in 1192. The Crusaders made a deal with the venicians, if they caught the rebellious city of Zara, which was christian, they would give them transport. The Christians took Jerusalem, which was a great win for them. Religion did not cause all the wars in history, of course. The Christians called the western Europeans for help against the Muslims. Muslims sacked the christian cities. Sir Walter Scott Idealized the Crusades. The Byzantines called the west for help. Jerusalem in particular holds a significance in Islam as it holds it to be the site of the ascension into heaven of the prophet Muhammad whom Muslims believe to be the foremost prophet of Allah and Jerusalem is often regarded as the third most sacred site in Islam. The fourth Crusade was the last one. The Crusades were stuck in Constantinople. The Crusades were, in part, an outlet for an intense religious piety which rose up in the late 11th century among the lay public. A crusader would, after pronouncing a solemn vow, receive a cross from the hands of the pope or his legates, and was thenceforth considered a "soldier of the Church". This was partly because of the Investiture Controversy, which had started around 1075 and was still on-going during the First Crusade. The fourth Crusades doomed the Byzantine empire.