numerous than the besieging army.113 Had the diminished strength and numbers of the Latins allowed them to grasp the whole circumference of four thousand yards (about two English miles and a half), 114 to what useful purpose should they have descended into the valley of Ben Hinnom and torrent of Kedron, 115 or approached the precipices of the south and east, from whence they had nothing either to hope or fear? Their siege was more reasonably directed against the northern and western sides of the city. Godfrey of Bouillon erected his standard on the first swell of Mount Calvary; to the left, as far as St. Stephen's gate, the line of attack was continued by Tancred and the two Roberts; and count Raymond established his quarters from the citadel to the foot of Mount Sion, which was no longer included within the precincts of the city. On the fifth day, the crusaders made a general assault, in the fanatic hope of battering down the walls without engines, and of scaling them without ladders. By the dint of brutal force they burst the first barrier, but they were driven back with shame and slaughter to the camp; the influence of vision and prophecy was deadened by the too frequent abuse of those pious stratagems; and time and labour were found to be the only means of victory. The time of the siege was indeed fulfilled in forty days, but they were forty days of calamity and anguish. A repetition of the old complaint of famine may be imputed in some degree to the voracious or disorderly appetite of the Franks; but the stony soil of Jerusalem is almost destitute of 113 The lively scepticism of Voltaire is balanced with sense and erudition by the French author of the Esprit des Croisades (tom. iv. p. 386-388), who observes that, according to the Arabians, the inhabitants of Jerusalem must have exceeded 200,000; that in the siege of Titus, Josephus collects 1,300,000 Jews; that they are stated by Tacitus himself at 600,000; and that the largest defalcation that his accepimus can justify will still leave them more numerous than the Roman army. 114 Maundrell, who diligently perambulated the walls, found a circuit of 4630 paces, or 4167 English yards (p. 109, 110); from an authentic plan, d'Anville concludes a measure nearly similar, of 1960 French toises (p. 23-29), in his scarce and valuable tract. For the topography of Jerusalem, see Reland (Palestina, tom. ii. p. 832-860). [Cp. above, vol. 2, p. 479. Guy Le Strange, Palestine under the Muslims, p. 83-223.] 115 Jerusalem was possessed only of the torrent of Kedron, dry in summer, and of the little spring or brook of Siloe (Reland, tom. i. p. 294, 300). Both strangers and natives complained of the want of water, which, in time of war, was studiously aggravated. Within the city, Tacitus mentions a perennial fountain, an aqueduct, and cisterns for rain-water. The aqueduct was conveyed from the rivulet Tekoe [Tekua, 10 miles south of Jerusalem], or Etham, which is likewise mentioned by Bohadin (in Vit. Saladin. p. 238 [c. 157]). water; the scanty springs and hasty torrents were dry in the summer season; nor was the thirst of the besiegers relieved, as in the city, by the artificial supply of cisterns and aqueducts. The circumjacent country is equally destitute of trees for the uses of shade or building; but some large beams were discovered in a cave by the crusaders: a wood near Sichem, the enchanted grove of Tasso,116 was cut down; the necessary timber was transported to the camp, by the vigour and dexterity of Tancred; and the engines were framed by some Genoese artists, who had fortunately landed in the harbour of Jaffa. Two moveable turrets were constructed at the expense, and in the stations, of the duke of Lorraine and the count of Toulouse, and rolled forwards with devout labour, not to the most accessible, but to the most neglected, parts of the fortification. Raymond's tower was reduced to ashes by the fire of the besieged; but his colleague was more vigilant and successful; the enemies were driven by his archers from the rampart; the draw-bridge was let down; and on a Friday, at three in the [July 15] afternoon, the day and hour of the Passion, Godfrey of Bouillon stood victorious on the walls of Jerusalem. His example was followed on every side by the emulation of valour; and, about four hundred and sixty years after the conquest of Omar, the holy city was rescued from the Mahometan yoke. In the pillage of public and private wealth, the adventurers had agreed to respect the exclusive property of the first occupant; and the spoils of the great mosque, seventy lamps and massy vases of gold and silver, rewarded the diligence, and displayed the generosity, of Tancred. A bloody sacrifice was offered by his mistaken votaries to the God of the Christians; resistance might provoke, but neither age nor sex could mollify, their implacable rage; they indulged themselves three days in a promiscuous massacre; 117 and the infection of the dead bodies produced an epidemic disease. After seventy thousand Moslems had been put to the sword, and the harmless Jews had been burnt in their synagogue, they could still reserve a multitude of captives whom interest or lassitude persuaded them to 116 Gierusalemme Liberata, canto xiii. It is pleasant enough to observe how Tasso has copied and embellished the minutest details of the siege. 117 Besides the Latins, who are not ashamed of the massacre, see Elmacin (Hist. Saracen. p. 363), Abulpharagius (Dynast. p. 243), and M. de Guignes (tom, ii. p. ii. p. 99), from Aboulmahasen. Election and reign spare. Of these savage heroes of the cross, Tancred alone be- Eight days after this memorable event, which Pope Urban of Godfrey did not live to hear, the Latin chiefs proceeded to the election. lon. A.D. of a king, to guard and govern their conquests in Palestine. of Bouil 1099, July 23-A.D. 1100, July 18 Hugh the Great and Stephen of Chartres had retired with some loss of reputation, which they strove to regain by a second crusade and an honourable death. Baldwin was established at Edessa, and Bohemond at Antioch; and the two Roberts, the duke of Normandy 121 and the count of Flanders, preferred their fair inheritance in the West to a doubtful competition or a barren sceptre. The jealousy and ambition of Raymond were condemned by his own followers, and the free, the just, the unanimous voice of the army proclaimed Godfrey of Bouillon 118 The old tower Psephina, in the middle ages Neblosa, was named Castellum Pisanum, from the patriarch Daimbert. It is still the citadel, the residence of the Turkish aga, and commands a prospect of the Dead Sea, Judea, and Arabia (D'Anville, p. 19-23). It was likewise called the Tower of David, rúpyos raμueYeléσTATOS. [The Phasael of Josephus, B. J. 5, 4, 3.] 119 Hume, in his History of England, vol. i. p. 311, 312, octavo edition. 120 Voltaire, in his Essai sur l'Histoire Générale, tom. ii. c. 54, p. 345, 346. 121 The English ascribe to Robert of Normandy, and the Provincials to Raymond of Toulouse, the glory of refusing the crown; but the honest voice of tradition has preserved the memory of the ambition and revenge (Villehardouin, No. 136) of the count of St. Giles. He died at the siege of Tripoli, which was possessed by his descendants. Ascalon. August 12 the first and most worthy of the champions of Christendom. His magnanimity accepted a trust as full of danger as of glory; but in a city where his Saviour had been crowned with thorns the devout pilgrim rejected the name and ensigns of royalty; and the founder of the kingdom of Jerusalem contented himself with the modest title of Defender and Baron of the Holy Sepulchre. His government of a single year, 12 too short for the public happiness, was interrupted in the first fortnight by a summons to the field, by the approach of the vizir or sultan of Egypt, who had been too slow to prevent, but who was impatient to avenge, the loss of Jerusalem. His total overthrow in the battle of Ascalon sealed the establishment of the Latins in Syria, and signalised the valour of the French princes, who, in this action, bade a long farewell to the holy wars. Some Battle of glory might be derived from the prodigious inequality of num-A.D. 1099, bers, though I shall not count the myriads of horse and foot on the side of the Fatimites; but, except three thousand Ethiopians or Blacks, who were armed with flails or scourges of iron, the barbarians of the South fled on the first onset, and afforded a pleasing comparison between the active valour of the Turks and the sloth and effeminacy of the natives of Egypt. After suspending before the holy sepulchre the sword and standard of the sultan, the new king (he deserves the title) embraced his departing companions, and could retain only with the gallant Tancred three hundred knights and two thousand foot-soldiers for the defence of Palestine. His sovereignty was soon attacked by a new enemy, the only one against whom Godfrey was a coward. Adhemar, Bishop of Puy, who excelled both in council and action, had been swept away in the last plague of Antioch; the remaining ecclesiastics preserved only the pride and avarice of their character; and their seditious clamours had required that the choice of a bishop should precede that of a king. The revenue and jurisdiction of the lawful patriarch were usurped by the Latin clergy; the exclusion of the Greeks and Syrians was justified by the reproach of heresy or schism; 123 and, under the iron yoke of their deliverers, the Oriental Christians regretted the tolerating government of the Arabian caliphs. 122 See the election, the battle of Ascalon, &c. in William of Tyre, l. ix. c. 1-12, and the conclusion of the Latin historians of the first crusade. 123 Renaudot, Hist. Patriarch. Alex. p. 479. The kingdom of A.D. 10991187 [6] Daimbert, Archbishop of Pisa, had long been trained in the secret policy of Rome: he brought a fleet of his countrymen to the succour of the Holy Land, and was installed, without a competitor, the spiritual and temporal head of the church. The new patriarch 124 immediately grasped the sceptre which had been acquired by the toil and blood of the victorious pilgrims; and both Godfrey and Bohemond submitted to receive at his hands the investiture of their feudal possessions. Nor was this sufficient; Daimbert claimed the immediate property of Jerusalem and Jaffa: instead of a firm and generous refusal, the hero negotiated with the priest; a quarter of either city was ceded to the church; and the modest bishop was satisfied with an eventual reversion of the rest, on the death of Godfrey without children, or on the future acquisition of a new seat at Cairo or Damascus. Without this indulgence, the conqueror would have almost Jerusalem. been stripped of his infant kingdom, which consisted only of Jerusalem and Jaffa, with about twenty villages and towns of the adjacent country." 125 Within this narrow verge, the Mahometans were still lodged in some impregnable castles; and the husbandman, the trader, and the pilgrims were exposed to daily and domestic hostility. By the arms of Godfrey himself, and of the two Baldwins, his brother and cousin, who succeeded to the throne, the Latins breathed with more ease and safety; and at length they equalled, in the extent of their dominions, though not in the millions of their subjects, the ancient princes of Judah and Israel.126 After the reduction of the maritime 124 See the claims of the patriarch Daimbert, in William of Tyre (1. ix. o. 1518, x. 4, 7, 9), who asserts with marvellous candour the independence of the conquerors and kings of Jerusalem. [Arnulf was first elected Patriarch, but was deposed and replaced by Daimbert. Cp. Guibertus, vii. c. 15. Albert of Aix says that Daimbert owed his election chiefly to money, collectione potens pecuniae quam electione novae ecclesiae (vii. c. 7).] 125 Willerm. Tyr. 1. x. 19. The Historia Hierosolymitana of Jacobus a Vitriaco (1. i. c. 21-50) and the Secreta Fidelium Crucis of Marinus Sanutus (1.iii. p. 1) describe the state and conquests of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem. [The work of Marinus (edited in Bongarsius, ii. p. 1 sqq.) was written A.D. 1306-1321. This Marinus Sanutus is distinguished as senior from his later namesake, author of the Chronicon Venetum. The first Book of the work of James de Vitry is printed in Bongarsius, i. p. 1047 sqq., along with Bk. iii., which is by a different author. Bk. ii. seems never to have been printed since the old edition of Moschus, 1597. For the history of the kingdom of Jerusalem, cp. below, p. 335, note 1.] 128 An actual muster, not including the tribes of Levi and Benjamin, gave David an army of 1,300,000 or 1,574,000 fighting men; which, with the addition of women, children, and slaves, may imply a population of thirteen millions, in a |