Crusader Knight (Trade Editions)

CRUSADER KNIGHT 1187-1344 AD

T E XT BY

DAVID NICOLLE PhD COLOU R B Y

CHRISTA HOOK

[•};i~•Jii MILITARY

Forst published on Great Bntaon on 1996 by Osprey Publlshong. Elms Coull, ChapaC Way. Bolley, Oxford OX2 9lP

Dedication For Suzanne and Georges-Eric, on a far distant shore though westward rather than easterly.

Unlled Kingdom Email ospreyOosprey·publoshong.co.uk

Publisher 's note

· · Copyroght 1996 Osprey Publishing ltd Reprinted 1999

Also published as Warrior 18 Knight of Outremer t 187· 1344 AD All rights reserved.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of provate study.

research, cnhclsm or review, as permitted under the Copyroght . Designs and Patents Act, 1988, no part or this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted on any form or by any means. electronic. electrical, Chemical. mechanocal, optocal. photocopying. recording or olherwose. wothovlthe pnor permossoon of the copyright

owner. Enqu•nes should be

addressed to the Publoshers ISBN 1 85532 934 4 Edoted by lain MacGregor Designed by The Black Spot

Readers may wish to study this title in conjunction with the following Osprey publications: MAA 75 Armies of the Crusades MAA 155 Knights of Christ MAA 171 Saladin & the Saracens MAA 259 The Mamluks MAA 287 Byzantine Armies 1118-1461 AD Campaign 19 Hattin 1187 Warrior 10 Saracen Faris 1050- 1250 AD

Artist's note

Ftlmset on Great Brotain by KOI, Newton le Willows Printed through World Print Ltd., Hong Kong

For a catalOgue of all books published by Osprey Milttary. AutomoiMt and Aviation please write to:

Readers may care to note the original paintings from which the colour plates In this book were prepared are available for private sale. All reproduction copyright whatsoever Is retained by the publisher. All enquiries should be addressed to:

The Mar1<etong Manager. Osprey Publishing. PO Box 140. Welhngborough. Northants. NN8 4ZA. Umted Kingdom VISIT OSPREY' S WEBSITE AT:

hrtp.J/Www.osprey·publishing.co.uk

Scorpio Gallery. P.O. Box 475, Hailsham. E. Sussex BN27 2SL The publishers regret that they can enter onto no correspondence upon this matter.

CRUSADER KNIGHT 1187-1344 AD

INTRODUCTION any books on the Crusades assunw that the Crtts<Jder states in the Middle East were shadows of their Iarmer selves following Saladin's great vic torr at the battle of H auin in II R7. Outremcr, as medieval westerners called the remaining Latin or Catholic enclave~ in the eastern Mediterranean. was no longer a threat to Islam a nd their military e li tes generally prefe rred to live in peace, focusing on trade as much as the ddcnce of Christendom's holy places. Following the Crusade of 1239-4 1 the Kingdom ofJerusalem expanded again, but then fell back following the battJe of La Forbie in 1244 - a disaster in that it was more fin a l than Hattin. The reafter fea r ol' an alliance between the Crusade rs and the Mongol invaders convinced the Mamluks to destroy th e Latin states once and for all . But the fall of Acre in 129 1 was not the end of the ston. The Annen ian Kingdom of C:ilicia sun in:d for almost a century whik the Crusader Kingdom of Cyprus outlasted the Middle Ages. Another Outrcmer had meanwhile been created around the Aegean and eventua lly into t·he Black Sea following t11e Fourrh Crusade ol' 1204. In fact Outremcr on ly sun·ived because Europeans dom inated the seas while its gradual collapse usuall)' resulted from insufficient manpower to hold fortified places. evertheless this fa ll still cam e as a terrible shock to Christendom.

CHRONOLOGY 11 87 Muslims re-conquer a lmost all the Kiugdom ofJerusalc m and other

Crusader sta tes. 1189 Kingdom oi'Jerusalem begins counter-attack. 1191 Richard I of England conquers Cyprm from Byzantines. 1204 Fourth Crusade captures Byzantine capital of Constantinople (Istanbul); establishment of the Latin Empire of Roman ia. 1229-33 Civil war in Latin Kingdom of Cyprus. 1244 Muslims (Khwarazrnian freebooters) retake Jerusalem; defeat of Kingdom ofJerusalem at battle of La Forbie. 1256-58 Civil war in Kingdom of jerusalem (War ofSt Saba~). 1261 Byzantines retake Constantinople ( Istanbul) and much of southern Greece. 1268 Mamluks conquer Antioch,Jaffa and other parts of the Crusader states. 1271 Charles of Anjou, King of :'\aples and icily, recogni1ed as King of ru~n~.

3

1277-78 Charles of Anjou bll}'S Kingdom of Jerusalem and take'i oYer

Latin Principality of Achaea. 1282 Invasion of Sicily by Aragone:.e; stan of Angevith eapolitan and Aragonese rivalry in eastern Mediterranean. 1286 Kingdom ofJerusalem under King of Cyprus. 129 1 Muslims conquer Acre, end of Kingdom of.Jcrusalem. 1311 Catalan freebooters conquea· Principality of Athens. 1334 Crusader League defeats Turks in Gulf of Edrernit. 1344 Crusader League seizes lzmir from Turks. Crusaders and residents

European knights bad been taught to despise their ~1uslim foes as cowarcl'l who fought from a rlistancc, supposedly because the) had so lillie hloocl in their veins that they fe. Amongst these mahonesi were men of exu·aordinar y geographical knowledge. Tedisio d 'Orio of Kafra in the Crimea was said to be interested in opening a trade route w China by travelling westwards, hm.ing learned what so many Arab geographers a h·ead) knew - that the world was round a full 200 years before Christopher Columbus.

'Christ before Pilate'; wallpainting c . A D 1200 In the Hermitage of St Neophytos, Enktol stra . Though made when Cyprus was ruled by western Crusaders, the arms and armour of Pilato's guards are In purely Byzanti ne style.

11

ABOVE Crac des Chevaliers (now Hisn ai-Akrad) in western Syria w as too expensive for the secular authorities to garrison and so was handed over to the Military Orders. (Author's photograph)

One of the most notable characteristics of the knightly class of Outremer in the 13th and 14th centuries was their willingness to fight for a remarkable variety of leaders. The knights of Outremer, in fact, formed a pool of highly experienced mercenaries for the Catholic and Orthodox Christian armies of the Middle East and south-east Europe. The role of kn ights from Outremer in Muslim armies was naturally more controversial. A large number of troops from the Latin states in Syria and Palestine, inducting some knights, went over to Islam fo llowing the disastrous battle of Hattin in 1187 and there were also references to 'Frankish' troops fighting for the Ayyubids against rival Muslim rulers, some probably being mercenaries from the Latin states. A few members of the Latin elite also stayed following the collapse of the Crusader states, even hold ing fiefs under Mamluk overlordship for a decade or so. A much greater number of kn ights from Outrerner and elsewhere certain ly served in the Sa!juq Turkish armies in Ana.tolia, even having their own za'im, or leader, in the firs Lhalf of the 13th century. Motivation and pay

'Crusaders massacre the Muslim population of Antioch'; Universal

History of William of lYre, Acre, ad 12g0-91. The leading knights c arry oval shields characteristic of many troops during the final years of t he Crusader states. (Bib. Laurenziana, M s. Plut. LXI . 10, f .60v, Florence)

Religion was the main motivation behind the Crusades and the Church tried to maintain such fanaticism by proclaiming Muslims LO be sumrna culpabilis- the ' most blameworthy' people. Even though religious motivation had declined by the 13th century a knight could win great prestige by serving in the Holy Land. A poem by Rutebeuf in praise of Geoffrey de Sergines, commander of the French Regiment in Acre, shows the mixture of religion and glory which motivated later 13thcentury knights: B~fore

12

I could finish telling of his great valour and worth, His good breeding and good sense, it would be wea1·isome l think He held his liege lord so deaT that he went with him l.o avenge God :f shamP beyond the sea. Easil:y he will fJay what he owes God,

Fm· he pays Him uow evrry day al Jaffa where he rests, If thr>re is any rf'sl in hi~ warfare. 111ere he wish~- to use his time, An ill neighbour and r1 lrrriblr, and rruel and pitiless The Saracens find him, for he never ceases to 11wke war on them.

The knights of the Latin states in the Aegean were more down ro earth in their motivation, many simply abandoning the Latin Emperor in Constantinople when he could no longer pay them. Several generations later the Catalan Grand Company which invaded Aegean Outremer found no difficuliy in making long-term aHiance with the .\1uslim Turks of this area. By the 1330s the Italian rulers of some Aegean states also became illil< lwflrleri or 'non-.\iluslim frontier lords' under Turkish smerainty. Although ·c oncepts of chivalr y changed by the 13th century, war was . not regarded as wicked but could be just, or even holy, the sin of fighling an unjusr war falling on a leader, not his men. As far as the knights were concerned, the chivalric law of a r ms on ly served as a restra in ing principle if both sides agreed. Consequently, combat against nonChristians or non-noble infantry or in areas where the ancient code of vendetta took precedence over the newer concept of ch ivalry, could all degenerate into barbarism. Paradoxically knighthood itself had taken on a religious veneer; the o ld practice of a priest blessing a new knight's sword to protect it from the Devil having developed into a solemn dubbing ceremony. At the same time there were clear differe nces in the attitudes or nonh European knights and their southern (mediterranean) counterparts. These were reflected in Outremcr where northern ideals predominated in earlier decades, southern in later years. Southerners rare I)' took knighting ceremonies and chivalric ideals so seriously, nor did they glor·ity warfare and the military life to the same extent. In urbanit.ed Italy the 'girdle of knighthood' was even given ro young men of bourgeois or working-class or·igin, provided their famil iel> were rich enough to provide th e expensive eq uipment demanded of a cavalryman. Nevertheless, social stt~tus remained important in the Crusader states, 1he 13th-century Kingdom of Jerusalem con tinually rewriting its lai·I-'S to preserve a feuda l stn rclllre which no longer had much mean ing. Money was essential to the knighlly eli te whether serving as mercenaries or in a feuda l array. A fi ef worth 900 to 1,000 besants a years was thought necessary to support a knight in the east, many being money fi efs. Yet knights could not always rely on income li·01n fiefs or from employmen t as mercenaries, one report telling of an llalian who had 10 pawn his dagger, shield and armour, though notably not his sword and horse, when he fell into dc b1. .\1eanwhile, the system of restor meant that the King of J erusalem paid for losses of horses or military equipmenL when his knights served ou1side the Kingdom. Pay varied considerably across Ou1remer but in general a

Donor figure and his horse on an Icon of St Nicholas from the Church of St Nicholas tis Steyis, K alopetrla, Crusader Kingdom of Cyprus, late 13 th century. This knight is in purely w est ern equipme nt while the front-only c aparison of his horse Is in a Medite rranean style associ ated with Italy and Spain. (Byzantine Museum, Arc.h blshop Makarios Ill Fo undation, Nic osia)

13

mercenary knight received twice·or three times as much as a crossbowman, this ref1ecting the knight's superior status and the cost of his arms, armour and horses. The Ordnance of Nicolas de joinville (1323-5) tried to fix the pay for cavalry in the Latin Principality of Achaia at 800 hyfJe,tmes for a year's service b)' a knight recruited overseas, 600 hyjJelperes if recnuted locally, with 400 and 300 hype1peres, respectively, for squires. Horses we re the most expensive item that a knight needed. They were also amongst the most important booty, . which in turn led to an infusion of superior orientcll equine genes into European bloodstock. In the Crusader stc