The Third Crusade

[Minischoles]

I'll come right out and say it, this is for help with an essay i'm doing for my university course in History.

The essay title is:

Was the Third Crusade a failure

Each semester we're given a choice of essay questions, that correspond to a lecture we'll be given, and unfortunately for me this semester around the essay title that captured my interest is in week 6, when the essay is due in week 7. So not wanting to have to produce an essay inside a week, i'm posting here and on a few other history boards I know of, asking for:
a) book recommendations
b) any general information you might have.

I'm not looking for massive detail, I would just like some suggestions of what to include and how to narrow it down (as I only have 2,000 words to play with), and writing a full account of the third crusade would use that all up without any room to form my argument against it.

Thanks in advance for any help that is given.

[Thanas]

Runciman, A History of the Crusades: Volume 2, The Kingdom of Jerusalem and the Frankish East (Cambridge University Press 1952) is really the only book you need for that essay. Look for many of the updated volumes. The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades might be useful too.

I have not read the following book, but I suggest you do so: James Reston, Jr.: Warriors of God – Richard The Lionheart and Saladin In The Third Crusade. Anchor Books, New York, 2002.

If you can read German, I would further suggest using Hans Eberhardt Mayer: Geschichte der Kreuzzüge. Stuttgart 2005 as well as Alfried Wieczorek, Mamoun Fansa, Harald Meller (EDS.): Saladin und die Kreuzfahrer, Mainz 2005. It is a companion publication to an exhibition and includes many small and comprehensive essays.


As for what you need to include, I suggest you focus on the squabbles between the different Kings.

[Minischoles]

Runciman, A History of the Crusades: Volume 2, The Kingdom of Jerusalem and the Frankish East (Cambridge University Press 1952) is really the only book you need for that essay. Look for many of the updated volumes. The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades might be useful too.

I have not read the following book, but I suggest you do so: James Reston, Jr.: Warriors of God – Richard The Lionheart and Saladin In The Third Crusade. Anchor Books, New York, 2002.

If you can read German, I would further suggest using Hans Eberhardt Mayer: Geschichte der Kreuzzüge. Stuttgart 2005 as well as Alfried Wieczorek, Mamoun Fansa, Harald Meller (EDS.): Saladin und die Kreuzfahrer, Mainz 2005. It is a companion publication to an exhibition and includes many small and comprehensive essays.


As for what you need to include, I suggest you focus on the squabbles between the different Kings.

Thanks, i'll be hitting the library later today so i'll be taking a look for all of those, and thats the third reccomendation i've had for the german book, I may have to go and buy that.

[TC Pilot]

If you can, look for God's War by Christopher Tyreman. It's fairly new, and ought to give you a.... thorough look at the Third Crusade, and act as a nice counterpart to Runciman.

Out of curiousity, do you have a position in mind yet? The Crusades are a favorite topic of mine.

[Stark]

Thanas, I'm curious of your opinion of Runciman. I've heard it's more 'narrative' than history, but I found it quite informative and it certainly directed me to other sources or areas of study.

[Thanas]

Thanas, I'm curious of your opinion of Runciman. I've heard it's more 'narrative' than history, but I found it quite informative and it certainly directed me to other sources or areas of study.

Well, there are two things to consider. A) It is written in the English tradition of treating history as a tale to be told and B) the book is from the 1950s. Back then everybody (except certain "serious" german historians) wrote in a more flowery style. The book itself has been constantly updated, so the age is not that much of the issue. As for the style, it does not bother me much.

In short, I am quite appreciative of him and his works and consider them to be very worthy and useful if you use them together with Ostrogorsky and modern works like those of Lilie. I prefer Ostrogorsky and Lilie when it comes to Byzantine Civilization and the interplay with the crusades, but that may just be personal preference.

[Minischoles]

If you can, look for God's War by Christopher Tyreman. It's fairly new, and ought to give you a.... thorough look at the Third Crusade, and act as a nice counterpart to Runciman.

Out of curiousity, do you have a position in mind yet? The Crusades are a favorite topic of mine.

I don't actually have a position yet, I prefer to gather a decent amount of knowledge about the essay i'm going to do first before I take a position and start planning the essay out, and since I have 7 weeks i'm gonna take some time to read through the book suggestions (just ordered the german one, found one of the others but the second is on loan).

[hongi]

Runciman was a noted Byzantinist and it rubs off on the way he portrayed the Crusades and the Latin Christians i.e sometimes unfavourably. He's the one who was responsible for the famous phrase 'the Holy War itself was nothing more than a long act of intolerance in the name of God, which is a sin against the Holy Ghost." He's also absolutely brutal in regards to the Fourth Crusade (then again, who wouldn't be?), decrying the Westerners for screwing up the whole place, allowing the Muslims to enslave the Balkans, destroying the greatest Christian civilisation of the time etc etc.

[Thanas]

Runciman was a noted Byzantinist and it rubs off on the way he portrayed the Crusades and the Latin Christians i.e sometimes unfavourably.

A bit blunt, but there is no way to describe the crusades in any way but "unfavourably".

[TC Pilot]

Well, the Fourth Crusade, sure, but I always find some merit in the other major (1-3) ones.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Well, the Fourth Crusade, sure, but I always find some merit in the other major (1-3) ones.

They were pretty hopelessly disorganized though, and the cause was hurt much by infighting and personal agendas.

[Thanas]

Well, the Fourth Crusade, sure, but I always find some merit in the other major (1-3) ones.

Which merit would that be?

[TC Pilot]

They were pretty hopelessly disorganized though, and the cause was hurt much by infighting and personal agendas.

No doubt. The success of the First Crusade is pretty miraculous, owing as much to the Crusaders' abilities as to pure luck and Muslim disunity. Who knows what might have been accomplished had far more disciplined forces gone instead.

Which merit would that be?

Well, in spite of religious intolerance, pogroms, and downright barbarity at times, assisting in rolling back the Turkish conquests in Anatolia, seizing Jerusalem, and carving a kingdom out of the Levant for a century would be of some merit.

But then again, I may be a wee bit biased toward one side more than the other...

[Thanas]

Which merit would that be?

Well, in spite of religious intolerance, pogroms, and downright barbarity at times, assisting in rolling back the Turkish conquests in Anatolia, seizing Jerusalem, and carving a kingdom out of the Levant for a century would be of some merit.

But then again, I may be a wee bit biased toward one side more than the other...

Well, those gains have to be taken with a grain of salt IMO. While the first crusade was undoubtedly a success for the christian side (and for the Byzantine empire), the Byzantines sitll had to expend a lot of resources in order to prevent the Crusaders from acting out of hand, including using armies to smash crusader forces when they got out of hand. The fighting in Anatolia and the siege of fortified places was largely done by Byzantine engineers and troops. The second crusade, which was a huge hassle to deal with. The third crusade even resulted in Byzantine territory to get lost and Byzantine cities to be plundered. Plus, the crusades spurred the Muslims into action, a mobilization of forces previously unheard of occurred under Saladin.

Finally, the Byzantines had a hard time to deal with the crusader states, who even resorted to preying upon byzantine merchant ships. So I guess there always is the negative side to it.

[TC Pilot]

Certainly the Crusaders did as much harm (if not more) than good in terms of Byzantium's longevity, but for all that they did to help the empire's fall, the only truely significant blow came in the way of the sack of Constantinople in the Fourth Crusade. Once they lost Anatolia to the Turks, and failed to reclaim it, it was more a question of when the empire falls, rather than if.

[Thanas]

I disagree. The loss of Anatolia was a heavy blow, yes, but it is not like the Empire had no other venues of recruiting manpower. For example, there is an argument to be made that the army of the Kommeni was one of the best the Romans ever had. Are you familiar with the work of John Haldon on them?

No, what really crippled the empire was the loss of Constantinople in 1204 and the subsequent damage caused by the crusaders to the infrastructure of the city.

[TC Pilot]

I disagree. The loss of Anatolia was a heavy blow, yes, but it is not like the Empire had no other venues of recruiting manpower. For example, there is an argument to be made that the army of the Kommeni was one of the best the Romans ever had. Are you familiar with the work of John Haldon on them?

Nope. I've only managed to read Ostrogorsky's History of the Byzantine State and parts of Runicman's work on the Fall of Constantinople, and that's what I'm basing my conclusion on.

No, what really crippled the empire was the loss of Constantinople in 1204 and the subsequent damage caused by the crusaders to the infrastructure of the city.

Oh, no doubt it was the death blow, and no doubt the Crusaders didn't really help things by constantly raiding their coasts and cities and so forth, but it's hardly a major cause of the Byzantine collapse, all things considered.

[Thanas]

I disagree. The loss of Anatolia was a heavy blow, yes, but it is not like the Empire had no other venues of recruiting manpower. For example, there is an argument to be made that the army of the Kommeni was one of the best the Romans ever had. Are you familiar with the work of John Haldon on them?

Nope. I've only managed to read Ostrogorsky's History of the Byzantine State and parts of Runicman's work on the Fall of Constantinople, and that's what I'm basing my conclusion on.

I suggest you read Haldon, J. F., Warfare, state and society in the Byzantine world. 565-1204, London 1999. He devotes a great deal of detailed research on the Komnenian army.

Oh, no doubt it was the death blow, and no doubt the Crusaders didn't really help things by constantly raiding their coasts and cities and so forth, but it's hardly a major cause of the Byzantine collapse, all things considered.

The crusader raiding? No. The crusade of 1204? Yes. Although that wasn't the death blow either - it was a very heavy blow, but the death blow came way later.

[TC Pilot]

The crusader raiding? No. The crusade of 1204? Yes.

Well, remember back to the fact that I wasn't including the Fourth Crusade.

[Thanas]

To elaborate a bit more:
Greece was the major source of manpower and a huge economic factor, both which were ruined by the crusades and subsequent power struggles. In fact, the decline can already be seen by the loss of the standing army - while the Komneni were able to field large troops, the average Byzantine standing army later on was in the low thousands and they were hard pressed to field troops numbering more than 10.000 later on.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

I thought the damage to the treasury after the 4th Crusade was disastrous and irrecoverable. Unless I am wrong.

[Thanas]

I thought the damage to the treasury after the 4th Crusade was disastrous and irrecoverable. Unless I am wrong.

There is always the trouble with such statements, considering the empire continued to exist for another 249 years. Of course, those years appear to us as a continual decline, but I think declaring the era as such is a bit too easy and reminds me too much of declaring the period since 300 as an era of continual decline regarding the Western empire. There were many resurgences, like the Mongol/Byzantine alliance.

[Maxentius]

Several historians also like to blame the Crusades for a further breakdown in relations between Byzantium and the West, especially the First Crusade. The Crusaders saw Alexios I Komnenos "steal" Nikaea from them, and the very same Emperor could be perceived by the Crusader lords to have left them fully bereft of aid when when of the European Princes, I forget exactly whom, deserted the Crusade and fled back towards Europe, spouting some tale of woe and how the entirety of the crusading army had been wiped out.

There was already an engendered distrust of Byzantines amongst the European aristocracy, and the events wherein Alexios forced the surrender of Nikaea to him, "abandoned" the crusading army at Antioch, and forced the turnover of the majority of conquered lands to Byzantine hands, only seems to have given this resentment a deeper fortification. Personally, I'm not exactly sure just how much veracity there is to this theory, but it does make at least a little bit of sense. I wouldn't exactly call this lingering schism a direct cause for the 4th Crusade, as let's face it, Byzantium and the West really weren't great friends to begin with, especially considering the Great Schism and Charlemagne's coronation as Imperator Romanorum.

[Thanas]

^Oh, that theory definitely has some merit. There also was the problem of deep issues with communication. For example, little of the crusaders spoke greek and the latin in the west had often degraded to a point that the Byzantines couldn't understand it. For example, even the papal envoy to Constantinople couldn't even communicate without a translator. Three guesses what happened in the markets or on the streets.

[Maxentius]

^Oh, that theory definitely has some merit. There also was the problem of deep issues with communication. For example, little of the crusaders spoke greek and the latin in the west had often degraded to a point that the Byzantines couldn't understand it. For example, even the papal envoy to Constantinople couldn't even communicate without a translator. Three guesses what happened in the markets or on the streets.

As I recall there was at least one riot that Imperial troops put down. And another abortive attempt by one of the Princes to actually storm the Theodosian walls. I'm sure that was a brilliant idea.