Europe's Kings & the First Crusade

This study will examine the reasons why the kings of European countries did not themselves take part in the First Crusade.

The historical realities in Europe at the time of the First Crusade (1096-1099) were such that disruption and instability reigned, and yet, at the same time, "The West was discovering its own internal balance. This was, admittedly, precarious. There were bitter struggles between pope and emperor for the domination of Italy, uprisings among the great feudal lords in Germany and the great vassals of the French crown, the quarrels of Saxons and Normans in England, and the Christians' fight against the IV Moors in Spain, but none of this could prevent Europe from becoming . . . a collection of peoples belonging to one civilization, the product of Western feudalism and of the Catholic religion . . . " (Oldenbourg, 1965, p. 15).

There was at the time of the First Crusade, in other words, great turmoil in Europe, and no source was more responsible for this turmoil than the differences among leaders who would attempt to emerge as dominant. The First Crusade was the result of efforts by the Church, the Pope, to not only liberate Jerusalem from the Moslems, it was also the Church's means of gaining control over Europe as well.

As Mayer writes, "The papacy, reformed and strengthened during the course of the eleventh century, attempted to shake off the protecting hand of the secular power . . . In the nature of things, the pope's most important opponent in t

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se divisions failed even to get to Constantinople. Two of those divisions were destroyed by the Hungarians, and another was wiped out after a wave of slaughter against the Jews in Hungary. Two divisions made it to Constantinople: "The first of these . . . passed through Hungary in May, and reached Constantinople, where it halted to wait for the Hermit, in the middle of July. The second, led by Peter himself, passed safely through Hungary, but suffered severely in Bulgaria, and only attained Constantinople with sadly diminished numbers at the end of July. These two divisions . . . united . . . By the end of October they had perished utterly at the hands of the Seljuks; a heap of whitening bones alone remained to testify to the later crusaders, when they passed in the spring of 1097, of the fate of the people's Crusade" (Barker, 1949, p. 15). The princes' Crusade, the second part of the First Crusade, proved far more organized, far more motivated, and far more militarily prepared than the people's Crusade. Still, the kings were no more tempted to join in this section of the First Crusade than they had been to join in the first part. Again, as Grousset makes clear, the fact that the princes of the nations of Europe led the se

Category: History - E