MEDIEVAL TOTAL WAR CRUSADE SERIES

The dispute between the Marquis and Guy was resolved with the army deciding that the Marquis should be king. These were interrupted by SaladinвЂ™s surprise attack on Jaffa, which was beaten off by RichardвЂ™s quick response. Until the exhaustion of the participants combined with their own internal disagreements and RichardвЂ™s domestic problems led to negotiations.

MEDIEVAL TOTAL WAR CRUSADE SERIES

The war then continued as a series of skirmishes between the two sides. However, on the advice of the native Franks the attempt was abandoned. In the following year the Christian army marched on Jerusalem reaching Beit-Nuba within twelve miles of the city. This was followed by the rebuilding of the fortifications of Jaffa, whose walls together with those of Ascalon had been demolished on the orders of Saladin to deny the Christians strong points on the coast. The army was harassed and shadowed by SaladinвЂ™s army, culminating in the battle of Arsuf, a clear victory for the crusaders. King Richard was now the sole leader of the crusade and after the siege of Acre marched southwards along the coast. SaladinвЂ™s failure to meet the terms of the surrender resulted in Richard executing his prisoners. Philip after the siege decided to return home, leaving the Duke of Burgundy as commander of the French contingent. Saladin was unable to break the siege and the garrison surrendered on terms in 1191. The increased strength of the besiegers meant that they were able to place the garrison of Acre under severe pressure. The two kings mediated a settlement between them, with Philip taking the side of his cousin the Marquis and Richard, Guy, as his family were his vassals in Poitou. The crusader army at this time was divided by the dispute between Guy and the Marquis for the throne of Jerusalem вЂ“ the latter had under dubious circumstances married Isabella the previous king Baldwin IVвЂ™s sister. Richard took longer to arrive and on route captured the strategic island of Cyprus. Despite this Philip was the first to arrive at Acre, where he took command of the siege and was able to revitalise its conduct. The kings Richard Plantagenet of England and Philip Augustus of France set off together on crusade. Only a small part of the expedition was able to join the siege of Acre. The death of the emperor in Cilcian Armenia during a river crossing led to the virtual disintegration of the expedition, with his eldest son, Frederick, unable to assert his control over the German nobility. His army experienced a difficult passage on the land route across Southern Europe and Anatolia on its journey to Palestine. Despite the small size of the Frankish army it was soon reinforced by a steady flow of arrivals from Europe.ДЇrederick Barbarossa the Holy Roman Emperor, was the first important ruler to set off on crusade in May 1189. His delayed response was to establish a camp the other side of the besiegers and on a number of occasions attempted to break the siege. Saladin made an ultimately crucial error by failing to intercept GuyвЂ™s army. King Guy after his release from captivity (July 1188) was refused entry to Tyre by the Marquis and instead besieged the important city of Acre. A Sicilian expedition under the command of the admiral Margarit played a crucial early role in protecting the cities of Northern Syria in 1187. This crusade was characterised by a vast array of expeditions from across Christendom, with contingents ranging from Sicily to Scandinavia.

News of the fall of Jerusalem led to the creation of the Third Crusade. His only significant setback was the failure to capture the important coastal city of Tyre, saved by the fortunate arrival of the Marquis of Montferrat. So total was this victory that Saladin was rapidly able to conquer almost all of the cities and towns of Palestine. At the battle of Hattin in 1187 he was able to inflict a crushing defeat on the army of the Kingdom of Jerusalem led by King Guy of Lusignan. By 1183 he had succeeded in uniting Muslim Syria and Egypt under his control, thereby becoming the most powerful Muslim ruler in two centuries. Muslim strength and unity culminated under Nur Al-DinвЂ™s successor, Saladin, a Kurd who had been his lieutenant. Their successes put the Syrian Franks under increasing pressure which was compounded by the debacle of the Second Crusade. This was changed by the rise of the Turkish ruler Zengi (1085-1146), who in 1144 captured the important city of Edessa and his son Nur al-Din (d.1174). The mainly French inhabitants of these states, known as Franks, in their wars against their Muslim neighbours were able to profit from their disunity. The crusader states of Outremer (Land beyond the sea) had been established during the course of the First Crusade (1096-1099), a venture created by Pope Urban II to liberate the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, ostensibly in response to an appeal to the West by the Byzantine emperor Alexius Comnenus.

Medieval total war crusade