"Blood Libel"

The death of Hugh of Lincoln led to the arrests of so many Jews because of the belief in "blood libel": that the Jews stole/kidnapped/murdered Christians to use their blood in Jewish rituals.

Where this idea started—and why it was readily believed—is hard to pin down. A 10th century Byzantine encyclopedia called the Souda has an entry that "every seven years the Jews captured a stranger, brought him to the temple in Jerusalem, and sacrificed him, cutting his flesh into bits." A 5th century story by Socrates Scholasticus 

Some thought that the Jews were recreating the Crucifixion, but stories of Jews sacrificing non-Jews are older than Christianity. The 1st century Greco-Egyptian writer Apion told the story of Mithridates entering a temple in Jerusalem in the 2nd century BCE and finding a Greek held captive who explained that he was being fattened for sacrifice.

Blood libel accusations in medieval Europe increased at the time of the Crusades, when pro-Christian/anti-Jewish sentiment was spiking. The Crusades also included attempts to force conversion on Jews which were countered by Jews killing their own children to prevent them from suffering conversion. If Jews could kill their own children, the thinking went, then they would have no trouble killing others' children. (In fact, collective homicide/suicide goes back to Masada and was seen more recently—"recent" compared to the Hugh of Lincoln incident, that is—in the Clifford's Tower incident.

There was, of course, a known precedent for Jews to cause children to bleed, and that was the bris, the circumcision ceremony. One such ceremony was tied to another accusation of blood libel. As grisly as the concept is, I want to give some more examples of "little saints" like William of Norwich and Robert of Bury. First, however, let's discuss the case of Harold of Gloucester, where the accusation led to no real action except to...finance a war? I'll try to make sense of that tomorrow.

Pope Urban II

The reign of Pope Urban II was barely more than a decade, but he made some decisions with profound effects for centuries. He was born Odo of Chatillon c.1035, and began studies at the Cathedral school of Reims in 1050. He progressed rapidly and became the grand prior at Cluny. Pope Gregory VII named him the Bishop of Ostia (a suburb of Rome) about 1080. He was a champion of the Gregorian reforms involving moral integrity of clerics and their independence from secular courts.

Pope Gregory VII died in 1085, having named three potential successors. The first, Desiderius, was a pious man who had devoted his life to not being in the public eye, and remained in the office as Victor III for a mere 130 days, after which Odo of Chatillon was made pope by acclamation, taking the name Urban II.

Urban's first challenge was the antipope Clement III, who had been installed by Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV in 1085 after Henry's clash with Gregory over the Investiture Controversy (see Gregory's link above). Urban had to avoid Rome because of Clement, but he traveled around northern Italy and France, holding synods to promote reforms against simony, clerical marriages, and issues of the Holy Roman Emperor and the antipope. (Clerical marriages—rather, the practice of keeping mistresses—were dealt with in England and France simply by instituting a heavy tax on mistresses.)

He became involved in political issues when he supported the rebellion of Prince Conrad against his father, Henry IV. He helped arrange the marriage of Conrad to Maximilian, the daughter of Count Roger I of Sicily (she brought a large dowry that helped Conrad in the fight against Henry).

He also negotiated a compromise between Anselm of Bec and William II of England, which brought him England's support against the antipope.

Urban's most profound undertaking was to preach the Crusade in 1095 (see illustration), starting a papal policy of trying to assert control over the Holy Land that lasted for centuries. He was motivated by a request from the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Comnenos, asking for help against the Turks. Urban offered remission of all sins for those who "took up the Cross."

He also gave Roger of Sicily the authority to appoint bishops, to forward the church revenues to Urban, and to sit in judgment over ecclesiastical issues—the exact opposite of what the Investiture Controversy with Henry IV was supposed to resolve! Other secular rulers did not get these privileges, which led to problems later with Roger's heirs.

Urban died in 1099, in Rome. Had he, then, eliminated the antipope Clement? Not really. Clement outlived and (in some sense) out-reigned Urban. Let's look at the anti-papacy of Clement II tomorrow.

Invading Central Europe

In the same decades that Batu Khan (c. 1207–1255) and another grandson of Genghis Khan, Kadan, were establishing the Golden Horde and consolidating much of Eastern Europe, the desire of the Mongolian Empire to extend its influence over the known world found itself a beachhead from which to launch its efforts.

Spies were sent into Poland, Hungary, and Austria for reconnaissance. Having planned their approach, three separate armies invaded Central Europe, into Hungary, Transylvania, and Poland. The column into Poland defeated Henry II the Pious (the illustration shows the Mongol army with Henry's head on a spear).

The second and third columns crossed the Carpathians and followed the Danube, combining with the Poland column and defeating the Hungarian army on 11 April 1241. They killed half the Hungarian population, then proceeded to German territory. Most of the city of Meissen was burned to the ground. Further advances in Germany were paused when the Great Khan died in 1241 and the chief descendants of Genghis returned to Mongolia to elect his replacement.

The Encyclopædia Britannica describes the conflict thusly:

Employed against the Mongol invaders of Europe, knightly warfare failed even more disastrously for the Poles at the Battle of Legnica and the Hungarians at the Battle of Mohi in 1241. Feudal Europe was saved from sharing the fate of China and the Grand Duchy of Moscow not by its tactical prowess but by the unexpected death of the Mongols' supreme ruler, Ögedei, and the subsequent eastward retreat of his armies. [EB, (2003) p.663]

Central Europe was not completely helpless. Observations of Mongol tactics meant that Hungary, for instance, improved its heavy cavalry and increased fortifications of settlements against siege weapons. Many smaller hostilities between Central and Western Europe entities were put on hold in the face of the common threat.

Bela IV of Hungary sent messages to the Pope asking for a Crusade against the Mongols. Pope Gregory IX would rather have attention on the Holy Land, although he did eventually agree that the Mongol threat was important. A small Crusade was gathered in mid-1241, but Gregory died in August, and the forces were instead aimed at the Hohenstaufen dynasty.

Mongol attempts to conquer Central Europe continued right up until 1340 with an attack on Brandenburg and Prussia. Fortunately, internal strife in the Golden Horde made Mongol attacks less effective. Lithuania fought back, achieving victory in places including the Principality of Kiev. The Duchy of Moscow also reclaimed many Rus lands. In 1345, Hungary initiated a counter-invasion that captured what would become Moldavia.

I want to go back and talk about the one named casualty in this post: poor Henry II, called "The Pious." We'll look into his reign tomorrow.

A Boring Civil Servant

Richard Barre was likely Norman by birth, probably born at La Barre (hence the name) in northern France c.1130. He studied law at Bologna (illustration is of the Bologna University Library in modern times) at the same time as Stephen of Tournai, who would go on to become Bishop of Tournai in 1192 (we have correspondence between Richard and Stephen from later in their careers). A fellow student wrote of Richard "May you manage the causes of bishops and the affairs of kings." As it happens, that is precisely what Richard wound up doing.

By 1165 he was in the household of King Henry II of England. One of the legal matters on which he advised the king was the dispute with Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket over royal vs. ecclesiastical authority over the church. In September 1169, Barre was sent to Rome to complain to Pope Alexander about the behavior of the papal legates to England, whom Barre claimed agreed to one thing and then changed their minds the next day.

Months later, in late winter 1170, Barre was again sent to Rome to discuss rescinding the excommunication placed by Becket on royal officials. It is believed that Barre's mission was also to receive the pope's blessing to allow Henry's eldest son, the "Young King Henry," to be crowned by someone other than the Archbishop of Canterbury, as was traditional. This was absolutely not allowed.

Barre was sent to Rome again after Becket's murder in December 1170 to make clear to Pope Alexander that Henry had nothing to do with Becket's death. Shortly after this mission, Barre became Archdeacon of Lisieux and was named a royal justice. He was also made chancellor to Young King Henry in 1172, but when the son rebelled against the father Barre chose to abandon the son for the father's service.

He continued to go on missions for the Crown. In early 1198 he went to the continent to meet with German Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, King Béla II of Hungary, and Byzantine Emperor Isaac II Angelos to discuss travel through their lands and permission to gather supplies on an intended Crusade. King Henry's death in 1189 ended the Crusade plans.

After Henry's death, Barre served William Longchamp, who made Barre the Archdeacon of Ely, but when Prince John exiled Longchamp (King Richard was away on Crusade at the time, and John was managing things with the style that earned him the nickname "Bad King John"), Barre had no royal justice duties until Richard's return. Upon Richard's death, the new King John dismissed Barre from royal service; Barre returned to his duties in Ely. He died c.1202.

He wrote a work on the Bible, dedicated to Longchamp, in which he annotated certain passages; it exists in two manuscripts.

There were many people in the Middle Ages who led similar lives. Richard Barre came to my attention because of sci-fi author Duncan Lunan's theory that one of the Green Children of Woolpit was named Agnes and married him.

One of the other events from Richard's life was as odd as the idea that he was married to an alien child. That was the revealing of the body of St. Romanus. Let me tell you about that next time.

The Sword of the Lion

When the First Crusade approached the Holy Land, they were met by the Seljuk Sultan of Rum, Kilij Arslan I. His first encounter with the Europeans came when the Peasants' Crusade, led by Peter the Hermit, overran the castle of Xerigordon at Nicaea. They did so because Arslan sent his spies to give them the impression that the castle was easy pickings. In fact, it was inconsequential to him, but a German contingent raced to take their prize. Once they were settled in it, Arslan sent a force to besiege it and starve them out, knowing that the place had few supplies. He offered a choice: renounce Christianity and become captives, or be put to death.

The tables turned on Arslan after this, because the easy victory led him to believe that all the Crusaders would be easily handled. Unfortunately for him, a far more organized and strategy-oriented army was headed his way. He decided to refocus his attention on his rivalry with the Danishmend Turks, ignoring the soon-to-arrive actual First Crusade. 

As a result, he was away from Nicaea when the Crusaders besieged it in May 1097. Returning to Nicaea, he was defeated by the Crusaders on 21 May. Nicaea was then held by the Byzantines, and Arslan's wife and family were taken captive. She was sent to Constantinople to be held for ransom, but was returned without ransom (for reasons which are a separate chapter of Arslan's story).

Kilij Arslan means "sword lion," and he had a reputation for being a great soldier and leader, but in this case he decided not to go it alone and to ally himself with his Danishmend rivals (as he would later to deal with the Crusade of 1101), attempting to ambush the Crusaders at the end of June near Dorylaeum. The defensive line created by the disciplined Europeans, however, proved too strong for the Turkish mounted archers. The Turkish camp was captured on 1 July by the arrival of Bohemond with reinforcements. According to the Gesta Francorum, the Europeans gained respect for Aslan's tactics and soldiers, claiming "had the Turks been Christian, they would be the finest of all races."

Realizing he could not stop the conquest of the Holy Land, Arslan decided to spend his time on hit-and-run attempts on the Europeans. He also destroyed crops and water supplies in their path, but could not stop them. His experience here is what made him take the approach of the Crusade of 1101 much more seriously, but in that case he was facing a less-organized group that was easier to defeat.

Why, however, was his wife returned from Constantinople without the ransom the Europeans demanded? There were Byzantines in the Crusade, so clearly the Byzantines were enemies of Arslan. Or were they? I'll explain in the next post.

The Battle of Mersivan

The Crusade of 1101 had high hopes: the First Crusade had already been successful, establishing the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and the Germans, French, and Lombards (joined by Byzantines from Constantinople) who set out as reinforcements at the request of Pope Paschal II thought they would be avoiding any serious battles. They were mistaken, however, when different groups of Turks banded together and met them at the Battle of Mersivan. The Turkish leader, Kilij Arslan I, had his forces push the invaders where he wanted them to go.

The westerners were then at a disadvantage in the Mersivan area, dealing with dry open land bereft of supplies that was more suited to the cavalry regiments of the Seljuk and Danishmend Turks. Over the several days of the battle, the Turks outmaneuvered the Crusaders at every turn, surrounding them on the very first day.

On day two, a raid by the German division failed, and they were cut off from the main army with no supplies or communication. After a relatively inactive third day, the next day saw Turkish reinforcements. The Crusaders tried to break out of their position, inflicting some damage to the Turks, but they failed to achieve their goal. The fifth day saw the Crusaders' camp captured. Shockingly, the knights fled, leaving behind families and priests to be killed or enslaved. The Lombards, mostly peasant class who did not have horses, could not flee and were largely wiped out, although some were captured and made slaves.

This defeat, and the rounding up and destruction of those who fled, taking place just a few years after the First Crusade, taught the Muslim world that the Crusaders were not invincible. The leader of the Turks, Kilij Arslan I, had redeemed himself after the losses brought by the First Crusade, and established a capital at Iconium. I'll tell you more about Kilij Arslan next time.

The First Troubadour

William IX, Duke of Aquitaine and Gascony (1071 - 1127), also Count of Poitiers, had a shaky start in life. He was the son of Duke William VIII of Aquitaine and his third wife, Hildegarde of Burgundy; but the duke's earlier marriages and divorces (and the very close relatedness of the parents) caused the Church to declare the young William illegitimate. William senior had to make a pilgrimage to Rome for approval from Pope Alexander II (who wasn't always so obliging in marital questions).

Our subject was also a Crusade leader, but not of a Crusade that gets talked about, or even included in the numbering system: it is simply called the "Crusade of 1101."

He invited Pope Urban II—who had called for the Crusade in November 1095—to his court for Christmas of that year, during which Urban urged William to take up the Cross. William was more interested, however, in whether his rival, Count Raymond IV of Toulouse, would go on Crusade, leaving Toulouse unguarded (he did). William's wife, Philippa of Toulouse, was Raymond's niece, and William thought she could make a claim to the territory. The pair did capture Toulouse in 1098, and were subsequently threatened with excommunication.

What William is most known for now, however, is his career as the first known troubadour. There are 11 songs attributed to him. A 13th century vida says of him:

The Count of Poitiers was one of the most courtly men in the world and one of the greatest deceivers of women. He was a fine knight at arms, liberal in his womanizing, and a fine composer and singer of songs. He traveled much through the world, seducing women.

He did in one song admit to deceiving two women. Several of his songs show an attitude toward women in the courtly love tradition, however, in that the subject is called midons, "master":

Every joy must abase itself,
and every might obey
in the presence of Midons, for the sweetness of her welcome,
for her beautiful and gentle look;
and a man who wins to the joy of her love
will live a hundred years.
The joy of her can make the sick man well again,
her wrath can make a well man die,

Orderic Vitalis tells us that he wrote and performed "witty measures" of his adventures on Crusade, but the only Crusade in which he participated, as mentioned, was the Crusade of 1101. I'll tell you what happened with that tomorrow.

What About Soap?

Continuing our discussion about medieval hygeine, let's ask about soap and whence it came. The answer depends on how you define "soap." Technically speaking, "soap" is "material you get when you combine fats or oils with an alkali, such as lye." [FDA link]

Soap-like materials were being made in Babylon around 2800 BCE, in clay cylinders inscribed with the phrase “fats boiled with ashes.” Egyptians in 1500 BCE were combining animal and vegetable oils with alkaline salts for cleansing. A Roman legend claims that rainwater running down the slopes of Mount Sapo mixed animal fat and ashes, not only producing soap but giving the substance its name.

Pliny described soap as an invention of the Gauls, made from tallow and ashes. Latin sapo ("soap") may be cognate with Latin sebum ("tallow"). The physician Galen recommends soap for cleaning clothes as well as the body.

By the 7th century CE, Mediterranean countries were making soap using oil from the abundant olive trees. Naples even had a guild for soap-makers in the late 6th century. Records for Charlemagne's court list soap as a product the stewards had to account for.

Soap-making in England didn't seem to happen until the 12th century, possibly motivated by the introduction of soaps brought back by Crusaders from the Middle East. Syria, for instance, produced Aleppo soap, a green bar infused with laurel oil. This popular soap was milder and more pleasant smelling than other soaps, and inspired soap-makers to add aromatics to the mix.

Soaps are used for cleaning different things. The soaps used in the household for hand washing, etc., are called in the industry "toilet soaps." That term, as you can imagine, makes me think about medieval toilets, a topic I have never tackled (and only mentioned once) in almost 1200 posts. I think it's time to correct that omission. Stay tuned.

Edward I - King

Lord Edward returned from the Ninth Crusade to a country that had not had a king in residence for a couple years. His father, Henry III, had died 16 November 1272. Word reached Edward in Sicily while he was recuperating from an assassination attempt in the Holy Land. Instead of traveling directly to England, however, Edward made a "good will" tour.

He went through Italy, visiting Pope Gregory X, whom he had known as Teobaldi Visconti on Crusade. He visited his uncle, Philip I, to receive homage from him. He in turn traveled through France and paid homage to Philip III for Edward's domains there. He spent time in the Duchy of Gascony, suppressing a rebellion and taking stock of his feudal possessions.

He arrived in England on 2 August 1274, almost two years after Henry's death. He had already been proclaimed king upon his father's death, so the coronation on 19 August was a formality. Once he was officially crowned, he removed the crown, announcing his intention not to don it again until he had reclaimed all the lands that his father had lost.

As in Shakespeare's Henry V, "the courses of his youth promised it not." The stories of a callow teen gave way to an able administrator and a devoted and gentle family man, though not without bouts of temper and intimidating behavior. He was a good and chivalrous soldier, and a pious churchgoer with particular devotion to the Virgin Mary and Saint Thomas Becket. Despite his piety, however, he still clashed with the archbishops of Canterbury and with the popes over the question of taxing the churches.

He had a particular interest in the legend of King Arthur, visiting the "grave" of Arthur and Guinevere at Glastonbury Abbey to underscore to the Welsh that Arthur was not returning to lead them. He held two Round Table events with feasting and tournaments.

He maintained correspondence with the Mongol Empire—still smarting from their overthrow in the Middle East by the Mamluks—promising to go on Crusade again with them if the pope approved. Further Crusades were also inhibited by potential wars on the continent, in which Edward took a hand in negotiating truces. When a Tenth Crusade might have been implemented, news came of the fall of Acre in 1291, and crusading fever abated.

Mindful of the unrest during his father's reign that led to rebellions and the Second Barons' War, he undertook an overhaul of the administrative systems, and ordered an inquest of the entire country, inviting complaints about abuse by royal officials. The resulting records, called the Hundred Rolls, were like a second Domesday Book, and became a foundation for deterring what rights and possessions were held by others, and which should revert to the Crown. (This was not without controversy, since it seemed to be done largely to increase Edward's possessions.)

Because these posts are supposed to be short and digestible snacks rather than feats, things like a constitutional crisis, war with Wales, disputes with Scotland, expelling the Jews, and overhauling the coinage can all be left for their own self-contained posts. To wrap up this drawn-out biography of Edward I, I will tell you that on 6 July 1307, suffering from dysentery while traveling northward to deal with Robert the Bruce, he was awakened by his servants to rise for the day, and died in their arms. He was 68 years old.

If only he had someone who could have used the royal touch on him, he might have been healed. I will explain that reference tomorrow.

Edward I - Crusader

In 1271, Edward, Duke of Gascony, went on a continuation of the Eighth Crusade that is sometimes called the Ninth Crusade and sometimes Lord Edward's Crusade. The Eighth had been started in 1270 by King Louis IX of France, but Louis died of dysentery when he reached Tunisia in Northern Africa. The Treaty of Tunis that followed resulted in freedom of Christians to preach and build churches in Tunisia, and the Crusaders went home.

To the east, the Mamluk sultan of Egypt, Baibars, defeated the Mongols and began attacking Christian crusaders, who appealed to Europe for aid. Edward and his brother Edmund were going to join Louis at Tunis, but were delayed because of their father's uncertainty whether he wanted to join (he was 63 at the time; I can personally understand his reluctance). The brothers reached Tunis mere days after the signing of the treaty, and opted to stay in Sicily at the invitations of Charles of Anjou, Louis' younger brother, while deciding what to do next.

Other crusaders went home, but Edward chose to continue, arriving at Acre on 9 May 1271 with a mere 1000 men, 225 of whom were knights. It was currently under siege by Baibars, who abandoned the siege rather than have the European military surround him. Baibars chose other goals, such as capturing Montfort Castle. Edward wrote to Abaqa Khan, current ruler of the Mongols, to promote a Franco-Mongol Alliance. Abaqa replied in the affirmative, asking for a date when they could jointly attack Baibars and the Mamluks.

Edward launched some raids with little effect, but the arrival of his brother Edmund with reinforcements emboldened him to larger attacks, especially when joined by local Templar, Hospitaller, and Teutonic Knights as well as 10,000 horsemen sent by Abaqa. The Mongol forces, however, after some victories and successful looting, retreated back across the Euphrates and left the Europeans to their own devices.

(Side note: during this time, Teobaldi Visconti, papal legate who had been to England to aid Henry in the Second Barons' War and had chosen to accompany Edward on Crusade, received word that he had been elected Pope; he returned to Rome as Gregory X. He also reached out to Abaqa Khan.)

In December 1271, lacking the Mongols, Edward and his forces took Acre after repelling another Mamluk siege. Edward realized the forces needed to maintain Christian occupation in the Holy Land were too meager. Understanding that peaceful negotiation was the only way forward, he managed a truce with Baibars of 10 years, 10 months, and 10 days. One month later, there was an assassination attempt on Edward, wounding him and delaying his return to England.

Edward went to Sicily in September 1272 to further recuperate.

There was never another Crusade to the Holy Land, despite discussions and requests in that direction. The Mamluks continued to re-take the areas that the Europeans had occupied. In 1275, Abaqa wrote to Edward, asking him for help against the Mamluks. Edward said he would consider it if the pope called for a Crusade, and thanked Abaqa for his earlier help. Abaqa wrote with the same request, apologizing for not providing more aid in 1271.

In 1291, pilgrims from Acre killed 19 Muslim merchants after being attacked by brigands. This was used as a pretext to attack Acre, the last Crusader state. With Acre out of Christian hands, the era of Crusades and a political presence in the Holy Land was over. The illustration is an 1835 oil painting titled "The Return of the Crusader" but often called "The Last Crusader," by Karl Friedrich Lessing.

But that was all in Edward's future. While resting in Sicily, he received news that his father had died. He began his journey back to England, where he was crowned King Edward I on 19 August 1274. We will see what kind of king he was next time.

The Peace of God Reception

The Peace of God and the Truce of God wrought changes in the chivalric culture of Western Europe. Starting in the 11th century, knighthood began to develop a religious component. The ritual for knighthood included fasting, a night of prayer, confession, and a symbolic bath/baptism.

Many rulers embraced this melding of religion with their secular roles. Robert the Pious (King of the Franks, 996 - 1031), embodied the new church policies in an oath:

I will not infringe on the Church in any way. I will not hurt a cleric or a monk if unarmed. I will not steal an ox, cow, pig, sheep, goat, ass, or a mare with colt. I will not attack a villain or villainess or servants or merchants for ransom. I will not take a mule or a horse male or female or a colt in pasture from any man from the calends of March to the feast of the All Saints unless to recover a debt. I will not burn houses or destroy them unless there is a knight inside. I will not root up vines. I will not attack noble ladies travelling without husband nor their maids, nor widows or nuns unless it is their fault. From the beginning of Lent to the end of Easter I will not attack an unarmed knight.

(Robert was so pious that he is given credit for some miraculous healings.)

Years later, when Pope Urban II wanted to call for a Crusade, he used the concept of the Peace and Truce to re-direct violent behavior from their fellow man to the Saracen:

Oh race of the Franks, we learn that in some of your provinces no one can venture on the road by day or by night without injury or attack by highwaymen, and no one is secure even at home. Let us then re-enact the law of our ancestors known as the Truce of God. And now that you have promised to maintain the peace among yourselves you are obligated to succour your brethren in the East, menaced by an accursed race, utterly alienated from God.

Not everyone believed that the Truce of God made sense. No less a theologian and scholar than St. Thomas Aquinas writing in the 13th century felt the Truce of God was unnecessarily limiting. Protecting the country was sufficiently important that it should also be fought for on feast days and holy days.

The ritual for confirming a knight included one blow, the only blow he was allowed to take without defending himself. Tomorrow let's look at the ritual and history of being slapped.

Barbarossa!

Born about 1122-23, Frederick (Friedrich) was born in France to the Duke of Swabia. He grew up learning the noble arts of hunting and riding and martial activity, but not the less-necessary arts of reading and writing.

In 1147, as his father lay dying, Frederick decided to accompany his uncle, Conrad III (who was King of Germany) on the Second Crusade. Frederick's father was angry at his brother for taking Frederick away when soon the Duke's widow would need support. The Duke died in the first week of April, and (now Duke) Frederick departed on Crusade at the end of May.

A few months later, Frederick was "tested" by his uncle. A Crusader was robbed and killed in a monastery outside Adrianople in Turkey, and Conrad ordered Frederick to avenge the death. Frederick destroyed the monastery and killed the perpetrators. His military training served him well on Crusade, and he was noted for being victorious "before all others," even though the Crusade itself failed.

In 1152, Conrad died, and the only two people at his deathbed—Frederick and the bishop of Bamberg—agreed that he wished Frederick to be named king, rather than Conrad's own son (who was only six years old at the time). A few days after being crowned King of the Germans, Frederick was crowned "King of the Romans," a title used to by kings of Germany from 1002CE onward to denote they considered themselves Holy Roman Emperor. 

He made it his goal to truly restore the wide-reaching boundaries enjoyed by Charlemagne, and the first step was to unite all the various princes of territories in German lands, and then to extend his authority to Italy. After making concessions in Germany to get everyone on his side, he began a total of six expeditions to Italy, beginning with Sicily, under Norman control by King William I of Sicily. From 1154 until the 1170s, he managed to conquer parts of Italy, but stirred up a great deal of anti-German sentiment and rebellion. An alliance with Constantinople helped the Italian city-states in northern Italy to defeat Frederick, a shock to Europe. It was his time in Italy that gave him the nickname Barbarossa, which means "red beard" in Italian. This nickname became so entwined with his career that it was carried back to Germany, where he was referred to some times as Kaiser Rotbart, "Emperor Red Beard."

In 1187, the aging emperor received letters from the European rulers in some Crusader states in the East to come to their aid. Frederick declined to join this Third Crusade, and urged Philip II of France to go, but later changed his mind and chose to "take up the cross."

This change of heart regarding the Third Crusade involved the Archbishop of Cologne and the Jews of Strasbourg, which I will explain next time.

To Cook a King

Yesterday we discussed the problem of decay when a corpse had to be transported over a long distance. A medieval historian named Boncompagno coined the term mos Teutonicus ("German custom") to describe how Germans dealt with death of an aristocrat on Crusade.

The ultimate goal was to have a complete skeleton to take home and bury. The first step was to remove the entrails. Internal organs were not going to be preserved, and not considered an important part of the ultimate result, so they would be buried. Often, however, the heart would be carefully saved.

Then the body hd to be "de-fleshed." The most efficient way to do this (with minimal handling of the corpse) was to boil it. As Boncompagno wrote:

The Germans remove the intestines from the corpses of high-ranking men when they die in foreign countries, and let the rest boil in cauldrons until all the meat, tendons and cartilage are separated from the bones. These bones, washed in fragrant wine and sprinkled with spices, are then taken back to their homeland.

The boiling process would take hours. Now, the likelihood of having a cauldron large enough for the body seems dubious. On the other hand, an enormous retinue of nobles and their households making a long journey would have equipment for feeding a lot of people. It is possible that there were copper tubs for heating water/cooking that could accommodate an adult corpse. In the case of Frederick I Barbarossa who drowned during the Third Crusade in 1190, however, the report is that he was cut up and cooked. In 1167, he had ordered the same for several bishops and princes who were with him during his conquest of Rome and died from dysentery, delivering their bones to their respective homes.

Modern science has taken an interest in this practice: the bones of Emperor Lothar III were said to be the end result of mos Teutonicus after he died crossing the Alps in 1137. Scientific analysis of the breakdown of amino acids suggests that they were boiled for six hours. Modern forensic analysis has likewise taken advantage of remains that were preserved by methods other than putting them in the ground where they could thoroughly decompose. Richard I Lionheart's heart was preserved and sent to Notre Dame. It has been confirmed to 1) be a heart, and 2) have been embalmed with myrtle, daisy, mint, and frankincense, giving clues to medieval embalming preservation techniques.

The Church looked down on mos Teutonicus, as did other nations. The French much preferred taking the time and effort to embalm the body. The English were fine with dividing body parts, such as sending the heart to a separate place for sentimental reasons. The Church wanted the entire body intact for resurrection at the final trump. Pope Boniface VIII issued a papal bull in 1299 (re-issued in 1300, in case they weren't listening the first time) condemning the practice of separating the body.

(Later years have ignored this bull. Keeping a memento—sometimes grisly—of a loved one is not uncommon. Napolean's heart was given to Josephine, Chopin's heart was put in a crystal jar, Thomas Hardy's heart—what was left after being cut out and partially eaten by a cat—was to be buried in Stanford, Dorset. Mary Shelley supposedly had Percy Shelley's heart in a box; I say "supposedly" because the lump saved from his cremation could have been anything; the eyewitness who grabbed it, burning his hand in the process, said it was the heart. It's more poetic that way.)

As often happens, I have discovered in relating all the above that I have mentioned Frederick I Barbarossa more than once in the history of this blog without every going into detail about who he was. Tomorrow I will correct that oversight. Until then...

Thomas Becket, Aftermath

It's a rare medieval post that starts with a Star Wars reference, but here it is (spoilers!): when Obi Wan confronts Darth Vader, he warns his former pupil "If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine." As it turns out, the murder of Thomas Becket by knights acting (so they believed) on Henry II's wishes gave to the problematic and disgraced Archbishop of Canterbury a level of celebrity I doubt he would have achieved otherwise.

Henry's involvement—deliberate or not—in the murder tarnished his reputation; the death of Becket was one of the points brought against him during a rebellion in 1173. But let's focus on the immediate events after 29 December 1170.

The four knights responsible fled northward, to the castle of one of their number, Hugh de Moreville. Regardless of their "good intentions"—they thought they were carrying out orders of a king—the murder of an archbishop was not going to be without consequence. They might have thought to get to Scotland, where English law would not follow them. The four were excommunicated by Pope Alexander III. They were not in immediate danger of secular punishment: Henry did not confiscate their lands, which would have been appropriate for the circumstances. When they appealed to him for advice on their future in August 1171, however, he refused to help them. They ultimately went to Rome to seek forgiveness from the Pope, whose penance for them was to go to the Holy Land and support the Crusading efforts.

Back to Canterbury and 29 December 1170: the monks began to prepare the body for burial. Legend says they were astounded to find that he wore a hair shirt under his clothing: a sign of great piety, to willingly do penance through discomfort. His coffin was placed beneath the floor of the cathedral, with a hole in the stone floor where pilgrims could stick their heads in and kiss the tomb. The martyr's tomb became an enormously popular pilgrimage site; from martyr to saint took only two years: he was canonized by Alexander III on 21 February 1173.

Fifty years after his death, his bones were put into a shrine of gold and jewels—affordable because of the radical increase in donations and offerings due to the popularity of St. Thomas of Canterbury—and given a more prominent place behind the high altar. Sadly, the shrine and bones were destroyed by Henry VIII in 1538, and all mentions of Becket's name were to be eliminated. Despite Henry's efforts, Thomas Becket is still one of the most popular and best-known martyrs and saints in English history.

As was typical for prominent figures, especially saints, several legends cropped up about him with no evidence, but several locales tried to connect themselves to a now-famous figure. I'll share some of the more outrageous stories next.

Jacques de Vitry

It seems unfair that I mention Jacques de Vitry here and here and here, and don't really tell much more than he was a cardinal. He was actually an important figure in his lifetime, a historian of the Crusades and a theologian.

Born at Vitry-sur-Seine (hence the surname) near Paris about 1160, he studied at the recently founded University of Paris. After an encounter with Marie d'Oignies, a female mystic, he was convinced to become a canon regular (a priest in the church, as opposed to a monk), so he went to Paris to be ordained and then served at the Priory of Saint-Nicolas d'Oignies. He strongly preached for the Albigensian Crusade.

On the other hand, he was fascinated by the Beguines, a lay Christian group that operated outside the structure of the Church, and asked Honorius to recognize them as a legitimate group.

His reputation was such that in 1214 he was chosen bishop of St. John of Acre, in the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem. From that experience he wrote the Historia Orientalis, in which he recorded the progress of the Fifth Crusade, as well as a history of the Crusades, for Pope Honorius III. He never finished the work. Besides leaving many sermons, he also wrote about the immoral life of the students at the University of Paris. 

In 1229, Pope Gregory IX made de Vitry a cardinal. A little later he died (1 May 1240) while still in Jerusalem. His body was returned to Oignies. His remains were held in a reliquary. In 2015, a research project determined that the remains in the reliquary likely were, in fact, de Vitry's. Forensic work on the skull and DNA evidence contributed to a digital reconstruction of his head and face.

The Beguines were only mentioned here briefly, and deserve more attention. They will come next.

Mortgaging Children

This is the story of Philip of Courtenay (1243 - 15 December 1283). He was one of the Latin Emperors of Constantinople—the empire was established after the disastrous and mis-guided (literally) Fourth Crusade—even though the Byzantine Empire had re-established control in 1261. Technically he was an "Emperor in Exile."

He was born in Constantinople, the child of Baldwin II and Marie of Brienne. Baldwin was the last of the Latin Emperors who actually ruled from Constantinople. The difficulty with the "Latin Emperors of Constantinople" was that they didn't have the resources they would have enjoyed at home. They weren't landowners living off rents. Baldwin's "territory" was essentially the city itself, and he did not have the resources to control the country around him, where life just went on.

Baldwin went westward to beg for money, asking Rome and France to help support him financially. One plan was to supplant the Marchioness Margaret of Namur (a sometimes independent state, now basically a city in Belgium) to have the Namur revenues. It didn't matter to him that Margaret was his sister. Baldwin didn't stay to manage Namur, however, and after it was invaded by the Count of Luxembourg, Baldwin sold the rights to his cousin, Count Guy of Flanders.

Baldwin left Marie and a regency council behind while he traveled Europe begging. In 1238 they sold the Crown of Thorns to Venice for 13,134 hyperpyrons. Around that time Baldwin got money from Louis IX of France in exchange for some other relics, of which Constantinople had many.

But this is about his son, Philip, and you can guess where this is going. Baldwin and Marie borrowed 24,000 hyperpyrons from Venetian merchants. The mortgage, the surety for this loan, was their son, Philip of Courtenay. Philip was five years old at the time. He was sent to Venice to live in the household of two merchant brothers. He was there from 1248 until he was 17, in 1260, when the mortgage was paid with the help of Alfonso X of Castile.

Mortgaging your child seems like a cruel act by a desperate parent. As difficult as it is to argue with that, as usual, medieval sensibilities were different from ours, and never more so than in the idea of a hostage. In fact, the meaning and practice of "hostage" is my next topic.

The Mortgage

"Mortgage" is a Late Middle English word from Old French, and literally means "dead pledge"; folk etymology will say the name signifies the debt dying when it is repaid. The use of "mort" originally had a different meaning.

When the Normans invaded the British Isles, they introduced an item of Norman law called a "gage of land." Say I was a landowner in need of money; for a sum from a lender, I (the gagor) would give possession but not ownership to the lender (the gagee) until I paid off the loan.

There were two types of gages: living and dead. In the living gage (Norman vifgage) and the dead gage (mortgage). With the living gage, any profit made by the lender while in possession of the land—such as selling the produce from it—went toward reduction of the debt. The dead gage did not reduce the debt, however much the land might have produced for the lender.

During Henry II's reign (1154-1189), he tried to right some wrongs that occurred under his predecessor King Stephen (1135-1154), during which many properties had been improperly seized. In the Assize of Clarendon, Henry created the right of novel disseisin ("new/recent dispossession"), by which the gage could go to the royal court and claim improper dispossession. The cases were dealt with swiftly, which was a plus, but they did not actually determine proper ownership: they merely judged whether the land should go back into the original landowner's possession, and the question of ownership was left for later. Yes, it could get messy.

Novel disseisin made the lender's life difficult, since the gage could at any time make a claim to repossess the land. The practice could easily be abused by a gage.

A frequent use of mortgage after 1095 was for the money needed to afford to go on Crusade. But who had the money to lend? Surprisingly, because of generous gifts, monasteries often had the cash to offer—interest feee, of course. Because so many Crusaders came back with less money than they started with, or no money at all, or never came back because they died on Crusade, monasteries gained lots of land for grazing their sheep or planting vines.

Keep in mind, however, that mortgages were not as common as they are today when everyone wants to own a house. Things were different when generations of families stayed in one building, and cottages could be built by one's own labor, or with the help of friends and family.

Speaking of mortgages and family, however, have you ever heard of mortgaging your children? You will, if you come back tomorrow.

Book Burning

The rounding up and burning of the Talmud and other important Jewish works, and the Disputation of Paris, in France in the early 1240s were not the only events of their kind. Western civilization had a tradition of harassing Jews by denying them their sacred and important texts.

Emperor Justinian in 553 forbade Jews to use the Secunda Editio (Latin: "Second Edition"), apparently referring to the Midrashic commentaries on Scripture. Centuries later, Crusaders marching through Germany decided to defend Christianity long before reaching the Holy Land by confiscating Jewish works as they passed through cities, leaving behind them piles of ash.

A decade before the Disputation of Paris, a public burning of Maimonidean writings took place in Montpellier France. Like the Disputation, this was started by an "internal" dispute. Solomon ben Abraham of Montpellier was extremely orthodox and was opposed to Moses ben Maimon's philosophy, so he invited Dominican and Franciscan inquisitors to look at the writings of one whom Solomon considered a heretic. The burning took place in December 1233. The inquisitors did not stop there. About a month after the Montpellier event, the Talmud became a target; copies of it and others—an estimated 12,000 volumes—were burning publicly in Paris.

The burning of the Talmud became a common event. Louis IX ordered more confiscations in 1247 and 1248; he produced an ordinance about this in 1254, which was upheld by Philip III in 1284 and Philip IV in 1290 and 1299.

In July 1263, the Disputation of Barcelona took place at the court of King James I of Aragon between another convert from Judaism to Christianity, the Dominican Friar Pablo Christiani, and the leading Jewish scholar Moshe ben Nachman, called Nachmanides. The debate was chiefly on the question "Was Jesus the Messiah?" The Disputation is a play by Hyam Maccoby, based on the Disputation; it was made into a film in 1986 starring Christopher Lee. You can watch it on YouTube.

The Christians claimed victory, but King James gave Nachmanides 300 gold coins, and to explain that, I should next tell you about James of Aragon.

Ranulph Glanvill

Ranulph de Glanvill is the reason I started dailymedieval.com, to pay some attention to the countless people, places, and paraphernalia of the Middle Ages that would never get any attention in the Modern Era, but were of course significant in their time. 

We don't know much now about his early life, except that he was born about 1112 at Stratford St. Andrew in Suffolk. His public activity is first noted as Sheriff of Yorkshire, Warwickshire and Leicestershire until he was removed from office in 1170 along with several other sheriffs for corruption.

Whatever his offense, it did not prevent his re-appointment as Sheriff of Lancashire by 1173, then Sheriff of Westmoreland in 1174. During the Battle of Alnwick in 1174, when William I of Scotland invaded Northumbria, Ranulph was the leader of an English force that met and captured William. King Henry II appreciated this, and later appointed Ranulph Chief Justiciar of England. This sounds like he was made "Chief Justice," but that is not the case. The Chief Justiciar had authority comparable to the modern Prime Minister, as the monarch's chief minister.

As Henry's right-hand man, he was effectively the regent when Henry was absent from the kingdom. He was also entrusted to custody of Eleanor of Aquitaine, when Henry saw fit to confine his queen to Winchester Castle. (There were good reasons for this, which we will someday get to.)

After Henry's death, Richard I imprisoned him until he paid a ransom. Why? A possible reason is that Richard just wanted to raise money to continue his favorite pastimes: fighting and Crusading. Ranulph went on Crusade and died in 1190 at the Siege of Acre. Considering his age, I would not be surprised if Richard coerced Ranulph into "taking the cross."

During his lifetime, he founded two abbeys and a leper hospital. Of course, he also produced the Treatise of Glanvill, discussed in the previous post. Next time, we'll look at some of the medieval legal terms addressed and codified on the Treatise.

The Battle of Hattin

 The Horns of Hattin is an extinct volcano whose twin peaks overlook Hattin in the Lower Galilee. In 1187, a battle took place between the forces of Saladin and Crusaders that was devastating for the Crusaders.

At the time, there were many Western European forces in the Middle East, due to the Second Crusade, and Jerusalem was in Christian hands, with Guy of Lusignan currently the King of Jerusalem. Still, the desire was to have the entirety of the Holy land under Christian control, which meant further conflict. Likewise, Muslim forces wanted the Christians to withdraw.

Saladin controlled much of the territory surrounding the Crusader forces and promised his people that he would drive the Christians from Jerusalem. Saladin had made a private treaty with the Franks in 1185 to give them Jerusalem if the Crusaders would stop waging further battles. There was peace until 1187 when a Muslim caravan was raided by Raynald of Châtillon. Saladin swore he would kill Raynald and sent a force to raid an area held by the Franks. The Templars lost about 150 knights and 300 foot soldiers in this battle (the Battle of Cresson), which was a severe blow to Frankish morale.

Guy was advised to move against Saladin, and on 3 July 1187, his forces started marching towards the Sea of Galilee (known at the time as Lake Tiberias). They were harried constantly nay Muslim archers, and along the way found little fresh water to replenish their supplies. The Muslim forces prevented them from reaching Lake Tiberias and fresh water, and set fires to the dry grass to annoy the Franks further with smoke and heat.

Three times the Frankish forces charged Saladin's, and three times they were beaten back, the third time being definitive. Many European nobles were taken captive that day. Guy of Lusignan and Raynauld of Châtillon were taken to Saladin. Saladin offered water to Guy, a sign that Guy would be treated well; Guy offered the water to Raynauld, but Saladin slapped it from his hand, charging Raynauld with breaking the truce. Raynauld was executed.

Guy of Lusignan was taken to Damascus as a prisoner (released in 1188). Two-hundred Templars and Hospitallers were beheaded, as were many others. A piece of the True Cross was taken from the Crusaders and sent to Damascus, about which I will have more to say next time.