The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land (62 page)

In spite of the relatively temperate nature of Muslim–Latin relations, the Ayyubids probably would have looked to achieve further territorial gains at Outremer’s expense had it not been for a number of additional considerations underpinning the history of the crusader states and the wider Near East.
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The Military Orders

In the course of the thirteenth century, the religious movements that combined the professions of knighthood and monasticism–the Military Orders–assumed increasingly dominant and essential roles in Outremer’s history. The problems that had beset the crusader states from their inception, those of isolation from the West and shortages of human and material resources, only deepened after the Third Crusade. The extension of the crusading ideal into the likes of Iberia and the Baltic, the holy wars against papal enemies and heretics, and the diversion of assets to defend the newly formed polity of Latin Romania all served to exacerbate the predicament of the Frankish Levant. So too did the endemic political factionalism within the surviving crusader states.

Against this background, the Templars and Hospitallers came into their own; and these two well-established orders were joined by a third major group–the Teutonic Knights. This movement was founded during the Third Crusade, when German crusaders set up a field hospital outside Acre around 1190. In 1199 Pope Innocent III confirmed their status as a new knightly order and they enjoyed a particularly close association with the Hohenstaufen dynasty and Germany. In the years that followed, the Teutonic Knights, like the Templars and Hospitallers before them, embraced an increasingly militarised role. By this point it had become customary for Templars to wear a white mantle emblazoned with a red cross, while the Hospitallers bore a white cross on a black background. Teutonic Knights, by contrast, adopted a white mantle with a black cross.

As a result of their increasing military, political and economic power, these three orders became the essential bedrocks of the Latin East, and their fundamental contribution to Outremer’s continued survival was already apparent when James of Vitry arrived in Acre. The influence enjoyed by each of the orders was closely related to the papal support they continued to receive, because this preserved their independence from local ecclesiastical and political jurisdiction, as well as their exemption from tithes. The orders also possessed an incredible capacity to attract charitable donations from the nobles of Christian Europe, acquiring great swathes of land in the West. All three orders also accrued land on the island of Cyprus.

Their popularity and supranational status had long enabled the Military Orders to recruit new members (and thus supply Outremer with manpower) and to channel wealth from the West to the war for the Holy Land–with a levy, or ‘responsion’, of one-third on their income being sent east. By the late twelfth century, the orders had developed such an elaborate and secure international system of financial administration that they effectively became the bankers of Europe and of the crusading movement. In what was essentially the first use of a cheque, it became possible to deposit money in the West and receive a credit note that could then be cashed in the Holy Land.

The Military Orders’ martial role also became ever more embedded. The Templars and Hospitallers could each field around 300 knights in the Levant, plus perhaps 2,000 sergeants (lower-status members). Simply in numerical terms this meant that they often contributed half or more of the total Frankish fighting force in times of war. Their highly trained, well-equipped troops were also willing and able to serve throughout the year and not just for limited periods as with an army raised through a normal feudal levy. Surviving copies of the ‘Rules’ (or written regulations) governing the lives of members indicate just how much emphasis was placed upon strict and absolute military discipline in the field. The Templar Rule, for example, provided detailed guidance on everything from marching to setting up camp and foraging, always with a strong emphasis on rigid obedience to a chain of command and unity of action–the critical prerequisites for success and survival among heavily armoured troops. Transgressions were punished harshly. Offenders might be temporarily deprived of their habit and thrown in irons, or even ejected from the order.

Alongside the undoubted strengths of the three main Military Orders, there were some difficulties and dangers to be faced in the course of the thirteenth century. With the weakening of royal and princely authority in the likes of Acre and Antioch, the capacity for the orders to pursue their own distinct goals and objectives increased, as did the potential for damaging rivalry between the three movements–the Templars and Hospitallers, for example, backed different parties during the dispute regarding the Antiochene succession. The orders’ wider roles in other theatres of conflict, including the Teutonic Knights’ extensive commitments on the Baltic frontier, also acted as a drain on the Levantine war effort.

Over time, groups like the Templars also experienced a gradual decline in the flow of donations from Latin patrons, partly related to shifts in attitudes towards religious life and the waning of interest in Outremer’s fate. Because they stood in the front line of the holy war and were, over the decades, the recipients of such extraordinary largesse on the part of Latin Christendom’s populace, the Military Orders also had to face significant, even swingeing, criticism when setbacks in the struggle against Islam were suffered. On the whole, these latter considerations only came into play after around 1250, and even then the Templars, Hospitallers and Teutonic Knights still retained access to massive reserves of manpower and wealth.
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Crusader castles

Through the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the Military Orders became intimately associated with the great ‘crusader’ strongholds of the Near East because by 1200 they were the only Latin powers in the Levant who could afford the exorbitant costs associated with building and maintaining castles, and who also had the men needed to garrison these fortresses. With the massive haemorrhage of territory suffered after 1187, castles came to play an ever more vital role in defending the fragmented and exposed remnants of the crusader states. And dwindling numbers of Frankish settlers in the Levant further increased the reliance upon the physical defences offered by fortifications.

No medieval castle was entirely impregnable, nor could a fortress stop an invading army in its tracks. But strongholds did help the Military Orders to dominate portions of territory and defend frontiers; they also served as relatively secure outposts from which to launch raids and offensives, and functioned as administrative centres. In the thirteenth century, however, with far less land under their control than before, the Christians had to depend upon fewer fortresses that either were positioned near the sea (so as to facilitate support) or possessed highly evolved systems of defence. Under these conditions, only the Military Orders could develop and hold castles of sufficient size and strength.

Through the first half of the thirteenth century all three of the major orders devoted vast amounts of money and energy either to modifying and extending existing castles, or, in the case of the mighty Teutonic fortress of Montfort (inland from Acre), to designing and building new fortresses from scratch. From the 1160s, the Franks had begun to construct strongholds with more than one set of battlements–so-called ‘concentric castles’–but this approach reached new heights after 1200. Huge advances were also made in stone-cutting techniques, the ability to erect the sturdier (but architecturally more complex) rounded forms of defensive tower and the employment of sloping walls to prevent sapping. In addition, improvements in the designs of vaulted ceilings enabled the Latins to construct massive storerooms and stables–essential for supplying large garrisons. During this golden age of castle building, the Military Orders constructed some of the most advanced fortifications of the medieval era.
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After arriving in the Levant, James of Vitry, the new bishop of Acre, toured many of these fortresses in early 1217 and described his visits in a letter written that spring. The most impressive fortress included in James’ itinerary was Krak des Chevaliers, on the southern edge of the Ansariyah Mountains, overlooking the Bouqia valley. A Hospitaller possession since 1144, Krak had long been regarded as a formidable stronghold, not least because of its natural defences–being positioned on the end of a steeply sloping ridge. Saladin made no attempt to besiege the site after his victory at Hattin. In the early thirteenth century, the Hospitallers undertook a massive rebuilding programme (probably ongoing when James visited), and, when these alterations and improvements were completed, Krak had been shaped into a near-perfect fortress, capable of housing a garrison of 2,000 men.

Still standing to this day, the castle is arguably the most spectacular monument of the crusading age. Hewn from limestone, possessed of an elegant beauty of proportion, its unparalleled craftsmanship speaks of the same dedication to flawless precision and architectural excellence witnessed in the massive Gothic cathedrals that were constructed in western Europe at this same time. Its elaborate defensive system includes two lines of walls, with an inner moat and an outer circuit of rounded towers and box machicolations (protruding constructions that gave archers and defenders easier lines of fire). The castle is entered through a confined, upward-sloping tunnel, reinforced with numerous murder holes and gateways. And throughout, the quality of masonry is extraordinary–the limestone blocks were cut so precisely that virtually no mortar can be seen.
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Commerce and economy in Outremer

Much as the Military Orders and castles like Krak des Chevaliers helped to sustain Outremer’s defensive integrity, the continued survival of the crusader states can actually be traced, above all, to another factor, beyond the sphere of war: trade. The Franks who settled in the East had maintained commercial contacts with the wider Levantine world through the twelfth century, but after the Third Crusade the scope, extent and significance of these links increased. Over time, the neighbouring Latin and Islamic powers of the Near East developed such close ties of commercial interdependence that the Muslims of Syria and Egypt preferred to allow the Christians to retain their meagre footholds along the coast, rather than risk any interruption of trade and income.

Frankish control of Syria’s and Palestine’s ports–the gateways to Mediterranean commerce–proved vital in this regard. Other wider forces also worked to Outremer’s advantage. Until the thirteenth century, the Egyptian port of Alexandria had functioned as the economic hub of trade between East and West. After 1200, however, the pattern and flow of commercial traffic gradually shifted. The Latin conquest of Constantinople in 1204 affected the distribution of markets and, more critically still, the advent of the Mongols revitalised overland trade routes from Asia. The Latin East was the net beneficiary of these processes, while Egypt slowly lost its dominant position. Alexandria continued to enjoy a lively trade in high-value goods from the Indies, including spices like pepper, cinnamon and nutmeg, and drugs and ‘medicines’ such as ginger, aloe and senna leaves. Egypt likewise continued to be Europe’s main supplier of alum (an essential ingredient for leather tanning). But in most other regards, Outremer became the Levant’s leading centre of trade.

The simple fact that the Latins had been settled in the East for more than a century had given them time to establish and solidify the complex networks of transport and communication needed to exploit this opportunity. And the crusader states’ economic vitality had been further buttressed in this same period by the investment in, and refinement of, the hugely profitable industrial production of goods like sugar cane, silk and cotton, and glassware that could be grown or manufactured in the remaining Latin territories and then shipped to the West and sold.

All of this meant that, in the course of the thirteenth century, Frankish cities like Antioch, Tripoli, Beirut and Tyre enjoyed remarkable prosperity. Without a doubt, though, Outremer’s leading centre of commerce was Acre. After the Third Crusade, Acre became the new capital of Frankish Palestine and home to the realm’s crown residence, the royal citadel. Within the confines of the ‘old’ twelfth-century city, each of the realm’s leading powers had their own compound–from the Templars, Hospitallers and Teutonic Knights to the Italian merchants of Venice, Pisa and Genoa–and many of these became walled enclaves, enclosing multi-storey buildings. The city also contained numerous markets, some of which were covered to offer shelter from the intense heat of summer, and other buildings given over to industry. Acre’s sugar plant had been dismantled by the Ayyubids in 1187, but glass and metal workshops remained, as did a street of tanneries, while a plant producing high-quality soap was situated in the Genoese quarter.

Before 1193 there had been large open expanses within the circuit of the city battlements, particularly in the landward areas to the north and east, away from the busier seaward promontory and docks. Now, Acre rapidly became heavily urbanised and densely populated, and this eventually led to the extension of the main walls northwards to incorporate the suburb known as Montmusard. And despite the fact that the many sections of the city had remarkably advanced sewage systems, this intensive growth meant that the crowded metropolis became subject to quite horrendous levels of pollution, and the associated dangers of illness and disease. Much of Acre’s waste, including that from the royal slaughterhouse and fish market, was poured into the harbour, which became known as ‘Lordemer’ (the filthy sea). By the mid-thirteenth century, the situation had become so extreme that a church in the Venetian quarter had to have its main windows facing the port blocked off to prevent the wind blowing refuse on to the altar.