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Osprey - General Military - Knight - The Warrior and ... - Brego-weard

Osprey - General Military - Knight - The Warrior and ... - Brego-weard

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hen in March of 1095 Pope Urban II<br />

made a speech to an assembly of French<br />

nobility <strong>and</strong> clergy at Clermont, in<br />

which he explained that the Christians in the East,<br />

both Catholic <strong>and</strong> Orthodox, were facing daily<br />

attacks <strong>and</strong> depredations from the Muslim<br />

population <strong>and</strong> lords, <strong>and</strong> offered those who would<br />

unite against this common foe remission of their sins,<br />

few could have expected the huge impact that his<br />

words would have on both East <strong>and</strong> West.<br />

<strong>The</strong> response was enormous. Apart from the<br />

30,000 untrained <strong>and</strong> ill-prepared followers of Peter<br />

the Hermit's Peasants' Crusade, who were the first to<br />

arrive in the Holy L<strong>and</strong> <strong>and</strong> were quickly destroyed<br />

by the Seljuk Turks, forces were gathered from the<br />

lordships of northern France, Italy <strong>and</strong> Germany -<br />

maybe 35,000, with some 5,000 knights.<br />

But whilst the number of those who took up the<br />

cross was a shock to all, not least the Byzantines<br />

whom they were ostensibly there to support, they<br />

were not wholly unknown to the peoples of the<br />

eastern Mediterranean. Normans had entered<br />

southern Italy as part of the armies of the northern<br />

Lombards around 1000, <strong>and</strong> had fought for <strong>and</strong><br />

against the Byzantine emperor for almost a century.<br />

In 1081 Normans under Robert Cuiscard had<br />

defeated his forces at the battle of Dyrrachium, as<br />

they carved out a kingdom in southern Italy <strong>and</strong><br />

the Balkans.<br />

<strong>The</strong> knights by whom they were defeated at<br />

Dyrrachium <strong>and</strong> who they saw cross their territory<br />

on their way to Jerusalem left a lasting impression on<br />

the Byzantines. 'A Frank on horseback is invincible,<br />

<strong>and</strong> would even make a hole in the walls of<br />

Babylon,' wrote Anna Comnena, the emperor's<br />

daughter. His armour made him invincible <strong>and</strong><br />

his initial charge was unstoppable. But she <strong>and</strong> her<br />

father were also aware of his weaknesses. It was<br />

essential to target his horse with arrows, since<br />

'directly he gets off his horse, anyone who likes can<br />

make sport of him'. <strong>The</strong> knight was also rash in battle<br />

<strong>and</strong> quick to pursue. After the initial charge knights<br />

were disorganized <strong>and</strong> weak.<br />

<strong>The</strong>ir leaders were as fickle <strong>and</strong> impetuous as<br />

their knights. Unlike the comm<strong>and</strong>ers of Byzantine<br />

armies who were generals steeped in the traditions of<br />

classical military learning, men like Godfrey de<br />

Bouillon, Bohemond of Taranto <strong>and</strong> Raymond de<br />

St Gilles - three of the key comm<strong>and</strong>ers - were war<br />

leaders, as much the warrior as their men. Arrogant<br />

<strong>and</strong> wilful, they were divided by personal<br />

animosities <strong>and</strong> pride. 'So many <strong>and</strong> such great<br />

disputes arose between the leaders of our army,'<br />

writes the crusader Raymond of Aguilers, 'that almost<br />

the whole army was divided.' With no clear secular<br />

leader it was only the Pope's representative, Bishop<br />

Adhemar, who held the forces together, <strong>and</strong> even he<br />

was unable to stop some from setting off alone, such<br />

as Baldwin of Boulogne, who went on to establish<br />

the County of Edessa, or Stephen of Blois, who left<br />

the crusade <strong>and</strong> returned home.<br />

<strong>The</strong> victories of the First Crusade, with its capture<br />

of Jerusalem, cannot, in fact, be put down to the<br />

power <strong>and</strong> effectiveness of the heavy cavalry. Whilst<br />

the knights' charges were important in their winning<br />

of the battles of Dorylaeum <strong>and</strong> Ascalon, it was<br />

the capture of Antioch <strong>and</strong> Jerusalem by siege that<br />

secured the crusade's success. Victory came as a<br />

result of the disunity of the Islamic world, divided on<br />

ethnic <strong>and</strong> religious grounds between the Seljuk

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