As most of you probably don't know, the crusades wasn't just a bunch of mindless fanatics out to slaughter muslims - as common belief, it was actually a new way to erase your sins and for the papacy it was a new source of man power which could give papacy more influence over Christendom and, indeed, other parts of the medieval world... also before we start shouting, in a biast manner no doubt, about how the muslims are these almighty freedom fighters on a righteous jihad against the oppressive and demonic crusaders, let's take a moment to think about how, when, the Christians took these cities and, excluding Jerusalem and a handful of others, how muslims were treated... they were still allowed to worship their gods an' such and they paid less tax than under their previous muslim overlords, this, I suspect, wasn't out of the good will of the leaders of the 1st Crusade, but it did ensure political, social and economic stability which the region had long been without and the locals gladly welcomed this change. On the matter of atrocities we cannot be biast for both sides (Muslim & Christian) commited such acts of babarism, but this was to be expected of medieval war, we hear stories of christians butchering muslims, but the muslims also butchered christians, lobbing heads at the worn down crusader army at Antioch and other such settlements, there is also the story of a priest and a woman (possibly a nun, or a young girl) whom went out to gather water for the troops, on one such occassion, when the muslims on the walls saw them, they quickly sent out a group to retrieve the man and woman, as they arrived closer both man and woman still did not see them, and so, both were killed, the woman, raped and had her throat slit... the man, beheaded, thenthe muslims took the bodies back into the city and the next morning launched the bodies into the Christian camp. This was just one of the many acts of barbarism throughout this violent period. So both sides were just in the early parts of the Crusade, but we can all agree, that acts of great clemency were displayed during this dark period in history and do not mistake me for being biast towards the Crusaders, because it is not my intent... I just think nobody should be biast to any side in the Crusades.
the crusades were thousands of knights and their warriors. Germans, British and french (to name some) who would never have even liked each other answered the popes call to defend "the holy land". the crusades were going well at first, but they started to go bad later on. the Muslims had better tactitions than the crusaders (and better organisation).
Ah the crusades. Muslim's Vs. Christians, Catholic vs. Orthodox, no one really new what they were fighting for or why. I think Urban just wanted to stop Christians fighting each other in Europe.
Indeed that was his goal... but the previous Pope Gregory, I believe was the master mind behind using the sinful masses of noblemen and commoners for the Papacy's interest, Urban just succeeded where Gregory failed, and using the horror stories of how Christians were treated in the Levant made his job that bit easier.
Indeed, but when the Byzantines failed to arrive at Antioch... the Crusader's felt betrayed and therefore didn't see fit to just simply 'give' their newly conquered land back the Emperor.
Oh yes! The 4th Crusaders were blind with greed, and, in turn were foolish in their actions upon the Byzantines.
I'm no huge fan of the Turks, but the Byzantines just sucked. No excuse for their incompetence and inability to deal with those Arabian upstarts BEFORE things got all out of hand. No one ensured their downfall more than themselves. Shame that the Abbasid Caliphate was too frail to actually control Anatolia, otherwise we might have some considerably less ugly architecture in Istantiumople today.
So you are just gonna ignore the fact that the Byzantine Empire was still holding on fine until the crusaders sacked Constantinople?
The Arabs cheated. They waited until mighty Byzantium had worn themselves out with a multitude of glorious victories. Even then, they couldn't take Constantinople. A testament to the glory and power of mighty Byzantium.. I agree, those Turks really made a mess of the city.
