Gibbon's The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire
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Chapter LIX: The Crusades. Part I.
Preservation Of The Greek Empire. -- Numbers, Passage, And Event, Of The
Second And Third Crusades. -- St. Bernard. -- Reign Of Saladin In Egypt
And Syria. -- His Conquest Of Jerusalem. -- Naval Crusades. -- Richard
The First Of England. -- Pope Innocent The Third; And The Fourth And
Fifth Crusades. -- The Emperor Frederic The Second. -- Louis The Ninth
Of France; And The Two Last Crusades. -- Expulsion Of The Latins Or
Franks By The Mamelukes.
In a style less grave than that of history, I should perhaps compare the
emperor Alexius ^1 to the jackal, who is said to follow the steps, and
to devour the leavings, of the lion. Whatever had been his fears and
toils in the passage of the first crusade, they were amply recompensed
by the subsequent benefits which he derived from the exploits of the
Franks. His dexterity and vigilance secured their first conquest of
Nice; and from this threatening station the Turks were compelled to
evacuate the neighborhood of Constantinople. While the crusaders, with
blind valor, advanced into the midland countries of Asia, the crafty
Greek improved the favorable occasion when the emirs of the sea-coast
were recalled to the standard of the sultan. The Turks were driven from
the Isles of Rhodes and Chios: the cities of Ephesus and Smyrna, of
Sardes, Philadelphia, and Laodicea, were restored to the empire, which
Alexius enlarged from the Hellespont to the banks of the Mæander, and
the rocky shores of Pamphylia. The churches resumed their splendor: the
towns were rebuilt and fortified; and the desert country was peopled
with colonies of Christians, who were gently removed from the more
distant and dangerous frontier. In these paternal cares, we may forgive
Alexius, if he forgot the deliverance of the holy sepulchre; but, by the
Latins, he was stigmatized with the foul reproach of treason and
desertion. They had sworn fidelity and obedience to his throne; but he
had promised to assist their enterprise in person, or, at least, with
his troops and treasures: his base retreat dissolved their obligations;
and the sword, which had been the instrument of their victory, was the
pledge and title of their just independence. It does not appear that the
emperor attempted to revive his obsolete claims over the kingdom of
Jerusalem; ^2 but the borders of Cilicia and Syria were more recent in
his possession, and more accessible to his arms. The great army of the
crusaders was annihilated or dispersed; the principality of Antioch was
left without a head, by the surprise and captivity of Bohemond; his
ransom had oppressed him with a heavy debt; and his Norman followers
were insufficient to repel the hostilities of the Greeks and Turks. In
this distress, Bohemond embraced a magnanimous resolution, of leaving
the defence of Antioch to his kinsman, the faithful Tancred; of arming
the West against the Byzantine empire; and of executing the design which
he inherited from the lessons and example of his father Guiscard. His
embarkation was clandestine: and, if we may credit a tale of the
princess Anne, he passed the hostile sea closely secreted in a coffin.
^3 But his reception in France was dignified by the public applause, and
his marriage with the king's daughter: his return was glorious, since
the bravest spirits of the age enlisted under his veteran command; and
he repassed the Adriatic at the head of five thousand horse and forty
thousand foot, assembled from the most remote climates of Europe. ^4 The
strength of Durazzo, and prudence of Alexius, the progress of famine and
approach of winter, eluded his ambitious hopes; and the venal
confederates were seduced from his standard. A treaty of peace ^5
suspended the fears of the Greeks; and they were finally delivered by
the death of an adversary, whom neither oaths could bind, nor dangers
could appal, nor prosperity could satiate. His children succeeded to the
principality of Antioch; but the boundaries were strictly defined, the
homage was clearly stipulated, and the cities of Tarsus and Malmistra
were restored to the Byzantine emperors. Of the coast of Anatolia, they
possessed the entire circuit from Trebizond to the Syrian gates. The
Seljukian dynasty of Roum ^6 was separated on all sides from the sea and
their Mussulman brethren; the power of the sultan was shaken by the
victories and even the defeats of the Franks; and after the loss of
Nice, they removed their throne to Cogni or Iconium, an obscure and in
land town above three hundred miles from Constantinople. ^7 Instead of
trembling for their capital, the Comnenian princes waged an offensive
war against the Turks, and the first crusade prevented the fall of the
declining empire.
[Footnote 1: Anna Comnena relates her father's conquests in Asia Minor
Alexiad, l. xi. p. 321--325, l. xiv. p. 419; his Cilician war against
Tancred and Bohemond, p. 328--324; the war of Epirus, with tedious
prolixity, l. xii. xiii. p. 345--406; the death of Bohemond, l. xiv. p.
419.]
[Footnote 2: The kings of Jerusalem submitted, however, to a nominal
dependence, and in the dates of their inscriptions, (one is still
legible in the church of Bethlem,) they respectfully placed before their
own the name of the reigning emperor, (Ducange, Dissertations sur
Joinville xxvii. p. 319.)]
[Footnote 3: Anna Comnena adds, that, to complete the imitation, he was
shut up with a dead cock; and condescends to wonder how the Barbarian
could endure the confinement and putrefaction. This absurd tale is
unknown to the Latins. *
Note: * The Greek writers, in general, Zonaras, p. 2, 303, and Glycas,
-
334 agree in this story with the princess Anne, except in the absurd
addition of the dead cock. Ducange has already quoted some instances
where a similar stratagem had been adopted by Norman princes. On this
authority Wilken inclines to believe the fact. Appendix to vol. ii. p.
-
-- M.]
[Footnote 4: 'Apo QulhV in the Byzantine geography, must mean England;
yet we are more credibly informed, that our Henry I. would not suffer
him to levy any troops in his kingdom, (Ducange, Not. ad Alexiad. p.
-
]
[Footnote 5: The copy of the treaty (Alexiad. l. xiii. p. 406--416) is
an original and curious piece, which would require, and might afford, a
good map of the principality of Antioch.]
[Footnote 6: See, in the learned work of M. De Guignes, (tom. ii. part
ii.,) the history of the Seljukians of Iconium, Aleppo, and Damascus, as
far as it may be collected from the Greeks, Latins, and Arabians. The
last are ignorant or regardless of the affairs of Roum.]
[Footnote 7: Iconium is mentioned as a station by Xenophon, and by
Strabo, with an ambiguous title of KwmopoliV, (Cellarius, tom. ii. p.
121.) Yet St. Paul found in that place a multitude (plhqoV) of Jews and
Gentiles. under the corrupt name of Kunijah, it is described as a great
city, with a river and garden, three leagues from the mountains, and
decorated (I know not why) with Plato's tomb, (Abulfeda, tabul. xvii. p.
303 vers. Reiske; and the Index Geographicus of Schultens from Ibn
Said.)]
In the twelfth century, three great emigrations marched by land from the
West for the relief of Palestine. The soldiers and pilgrims of Lombardy,
France, and Germany were excited by the example and success of the first
crusade. ^8 Forty-eight years after the deliverance of the holy
sepulchre, the emperor, and the French king, Conrad the Third and Louis
the Seventh, undertook the second crusade to support the falling
fortunes of the Latins. ^9 A grand division of the third crusade was led
by the emperor Frederic Barbarossa, ^10 who sympathized with his
brothers of France and England in the common loss of Jerusalem. These
three expeditions may be compared in their resemblance of the greatness
of numbers, their passage through the Greek empire, and the nature and
event of their Turkish warfare, and a brief parallel may save the
repetition of a tedious narrative. However splendid it may seem, a
regular story of the crusades would exhibit the perpetual return of the
same causes and effects; and the frequent attempts for the defence or
recovery of the Holy Land would appear so many faint and unsuccessful
copies of the original.
[Footnote 8: For this supplement to the first crusade, see Anna Comnena,
Alexias, l. xi. p. 331, &c., and the viiith book of Albert Aquensis.)]
[Footnote 9: For the second crusade, of Conrad III. and Louis VII., see
William of Tyre, (l. xvi. c. 18--19,) Otho of Frisingen, (l. i. c.
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