The Glory of the Crusades (33 page)

473
Pernoud,
The Crusaders
, 269.

474
Rega,
St. Francis of Assisi
, chs. 13 & 14.

475
From a total population of 60,000. Madden,
The New Concise History of the Crusades
, 151.

476
Oliver of Paderborn,
The Capture of Damietta
, 94, in Madden,
The New Concise History of the Crusades
, 151.

477
Seward,
The Monks of War
, 66.

478
Tyerman,
God’s War
, 649.

479
Ibid., 739.

480
Maalouf,
The Crusades Through Arab Eyes
, 226.

481
Tyerman,
God’s War
, 740.

482
Carroll,
The Glory of Christendom
, 210.

483
Tyerman,
God’s War
, 756.

484
Carroll,
The Glory of Christendom
, 210.

485
The term is Régine Pernoud’s. See
The Crusaders
, 274.

486
Tyerman,
God’s War
, 745.

487
Ibid., 747.

488
Van Cleve,
Frederick II
, 217 note 5, in Tyerman,
God’s War
, 750.

489
Grousset,
The Epic of the Crusades
, 231.

490
Ibid., 232.

491
Tyerman,
God’s War
, 753.

492
Pernoud,
The Crusaders
, 291.

493
Tyerman,
God’s War
, 740.

8

The End of the Crusader States

If we are conquered, we shall be martyrs; if we triumph, the glory of God and of France, and of all Christendom will be exalted. This is God’s cause; we shall conquer for Christ’s sake. He will triumph in us; he will give the glory, the honor, the blessing, not to us, but to his name.

King St. Louis IX
494

God is pleased! The Kingdom of the Cross has perished.

Abu’l-Tana
495

The king was sick and near death. One attendant even believed he had already died and moved to cover his body with the bed sheet but was stopped by another nurse who “said he still had his soul in his body.” The king heard their debate and, although previously mute, requested they bring him the cross—for he was going on the Crusade.
496

The Saintly King of the Franks

It was a bold and risky decision. Some believed the vow was not binding since the king had taken it while ill and that impaired his judgment. Yet when he had indeed recovered from illness, in December 1244 the king took the cross again in a dramatic manner by ripping the previously sewn cross from his garment and handing it to the bishop of Paris. He then ordered the prelate to give it back to him “so that no one can keep saying that he took it without knowing what he was doing.”
497

The king’s insistence on taking the cross and journeying to the Holy Land was an outgrowth of his deep faith and love for Christ. He yearned to see Jerusalem under Christian control once more. His desire was so great that he was prepared to risk his personal and royal fortunes on the expedition. He was sovereign of the wealthiest region in all Christendom and the king of the most populous Christian country.
498
There was much to lose by going on Crusade, but the “perfect Crusader,” King St. Louis IX, knew that the eternal reward greatly outweighed the temporal risk.
499

The thirteenth century was the “century of St. Louis,” as no man more exemplified the tenor of the age than the saintly king of the Franks.
500
Louis was blond, slender, handsome, gentle though firm, decisive in policy and generous in charity. He was a devout and dutiful son and a loving husband and father. Along with Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, Louis was the most important political figure of the thirteenth century and the central figure in Christendom.
501

Those two men could not have been more opposite in all aspects of their lives. Frederick was the “Crusader without faith” whereas Louis was the “perfect Crusader.” One man seemed to eschew all religious faith whereas the other embraced it and was declared a saint of the Church. Frederick kept a harem of Muslim women whereas, uncharacteristic of the age for monarchy, Louis was a monogamous husband. The two men can be easily distinguished by their ultimate dreams in life: “Frederick II thinking only of his imperial dream and Louis IX of his eschatological dream.”
502
Louis was a product of his times but he also shaped the era in which he lived and his influence (and intercession) continues to the modern world. There was perhaps no greater king in the history of France. He governed his realm peacefully and justly for forty-four years and followed three principles as monarch: devotion to God, self-discipline, and affection for his people.

Louis’s Family

The saint was born on April 25, 1214 at Poissy on the Feast of St. Mark the Evangelist. His later biographer and personal friend, John of Joinville, who lived to the advanced age of ninety-three and wrote his life of Saint Louis thirty years after the king’s death, noted the significance of Louis’s birth, the celebrations performed on the Feast of St. Mark, and his two Crusades:

On this day, people carry the cross in processions in many places, and in France they are called black crosses. So, this was like a prophecy of the great multitude of people who died on these two Crusades, the one in Egypt and the other when he died at Carthage for there was much great mourning over these in this world and many great joys that arise from them in heaven for those who died as true Crusaders on these two great pilgrimages.
503

Louis was close to his brothers and sister. Robert, his most beloved brother, was only two years younger and they were constant companions.
504
He accompanied Louis on his first Crusade to Egypt and was killed in a battle with Muslim forces. Alphonse was born in 1220 and accompanied his saintly brother on both Crusades, dying on the return trip from Tunis in 1271. The youngest brother, Charles, became king of Naples and Sicily and died in 1285. Although he was close to his brothers, it was Louis’s sister, Isabelle, who was most similar to the king. From her youth Isabelle was a deeply pious woman who took a vow of chastity and refused to marry Conrad, the son of Frederick II. Instead, “she lived at court, dressed modestly, and practiced exercises of remarkable piety.”
505
Eventually, Louis built a convent for a group of Poor Clares in 1259, to which Isabelle retired in 1263. His devout sister never took the habit but lived a holy life as a laywoman. She died in 1269, right before Louis’s departure on his second Crusade. Her sanctity of life was recognized by the Church centuries after her death and she is known as St. Isabelle of France.
506

In spring of 1234, the twenty-three year old king married thirteen-year-old Marguerite of Provence. Their marriage was fruitful: Eleven children were born to the royal couple,
the first in 1240. Louis was the ancestor of all subsequent kings of France, a fact recalled by the priest on the scaffold with Louis XVI in 1793 when he called the condemned monarch “a son of St. Louis.”
507

A Life of Faith

Even in an age of faith, the king’s personal piety and sanctity stood out. He was concerned for his own salvation but even more so for the salvation of his subjects, which he considered “his highest duty.”
508

His personal piety involved wearing simple clothing, especially after his return from the Crusade, and a regimented prayer life. Louis awoke each night at midnight to participate with his royal chaplains in the Liturgy of the Hours and said fifty “Hail Mary’s” each evening, kneeling and standing for each prayer.
509
Louis’s prayer life was augmented by penitential practices including fasting, the wearing of a hair shirt, and the special personal practice of not laughing on Fridays. The king greatly enjoyed life and joking so the mortification of not laughing one day a week was a serious and difficult penance.
510
Louis recognized the need for grace to refrain from sin as well as the need to beg the Lord’s mercy for committed sins, so he went to confession weekly and maintained both a daytime and nighttime confessor in order to receive the sacrament when needed.
511

The First Crusade of King St. Louis IX
512

Within two months of Louis’s taking the cross in December 1244, Pope Innocent IV authorized Odo of Châteauroux to preach the Crusade in France. While Odo preached the Crusade and recruited warriors to join the king, Louis began the massive material preparations required. He entered into agreements with the Italian cities of Genoa and Venice to provide transports for his army while royal agents spent the following two years stockpiling food and supplies, especially in Cyprus.
513

Continuing the practice of First Crusade warriors, King St. Louis IX prepared himself spiritually for his armed pilgrimage to the Holy Land. However, because he was king, he extended these practices to encompass his entire kingdom. In 1247 he appointed royal investigators to inquire throughout the realm about complaints against royal officials in order to settle any grievances before he left on the Crusade. He entrusted this task to mendicant friars whose duty was “to draw up a list of all the injustices committed by the agents of the king or in the name of the king in order to wipe them out and satisfy any royal subjects who had been wronged.”
514

Crusading was expensive, and financing the expedition was borne mostly by the king. Louis heavily subsidized his fellow Crusaders, including his later biographer, John of Joinville. Joinville’s experience was typical and provides a picture of how important the king’s financial contributions were to the campaign. Joinville took the cross for Louis’s expedition, receiving the pilgrim staff from the Cistercians, and made his spiritual preparation by walking barefoot as a penitent touring local shrines before his departure.
515
He initially refused to swear fealty to the king, since he was not originally his vassal, and decided to travel independently to Outrémer. In order to finance his Crusade he heavily mortgaged his lands, but his funds were not enough and he ran out of money while in Cyprus. Desperate, he reached out to the king and entered into royal service upon which the king granted him 800
livres tournois (l.t.)
. Louis’s total expenditures on the Crusade would amount to 1.5 million
l.t.
or six times the annual royal income.
516

The king left Paris on June 12, 1248 after receiving the insignia of a pilgrim and the oriflamme at St. Denis. Louis went as a penitent to the cathedral of Notre Dame, where he participated in Mass, and then walked barefoot to the abbey of St. Antoine-des-Champs. Recognizing the penitential nature of the Crusade and his desire to engage fully in the spiritual opportunities afforded from such a journey, the king changed his appearance. He eschewed rich and costly clothing and accouterments and dressed instead as a humble and simple penitent throughout the expedition.
517