A History of the Crusades-Vol 3 (26 page)

1229: Precarious Position
of
Jerusalem

Of all the great Crusaders the Emperor
Frederick II is the most disappointing. He was a man of great brilliance, who
knew the mentality of the Moslems and could appreciate the intricacies of their
diplomacy; and he saw that there must be some understanding between them and
the Christians, if Frankish Outremer was to endure. But he failed to comprehend
the nature of Frankish Outremer. The experience and achievements of his Norman
ancestors and his own temperament and conception of Empire led him to seek to
build a centralized autocracy. He found it too hard a task in Europe, outside
of his Italian lands. In Cyprus he might have achieved it, had he chosen his
instruments better. But in the diminished kingdom of Jerusalem the experiment
was bound to fail. The kingdom was little more than a group of towns and
castles, strung precariously together without a defensible frontier. A
centralized government was no longer possible. The local authorities, wearisome
though their mutual quarrels and jealousies might be, had to be trusted with
the government under a tactful and respected leader. These authorities were the
lay barons and the Military Orders. Frederick alienated the lay barons by
trampling upon the rights and traditions of which they were proud. The Military
Orders were even more important, for they alone, now that lay knights preferred
to seek their fortunes in Frankish Greece, could provide recruits to fight and
settle in the East. But they, though their masters sat on the King’s council
and though they might obey him as commander-in-chief on the battlefield, owed
allegiance only to the Pope. They could not be expected to aid a ruler whom the
Pope had excommunicated and branded as an enemy to Christendom. Only the
Teutonic Knights, whose Order was the least important of the three, were
prepared, because of their master’s friendship with the Emperor, to defy the
Papal ban. It was remarkable that with so few assets and with such hatred
roused against him Frederick was able to win a diplomatic success as startling
as the recovery of Jerusalem itself.

In fact the recovery of Jerusalem was of
little profit to the kingdom. Owing to Frederick’s hurried departure it
remained an open city. It was impossible to police the road up from the coast;
and Moslem bandits continually robbed and even killed the pilgrims. A few weeks
after Frederick had left the country fanatical Moslem imams in Hebron and
Nablus organized a raid on Jerusalem itself. The Christians of all rites fled
for safety to the Tower of David, while the governor, Reynald of Haifa, sent to
Acre for help. The arrival of the two
baillis,
Balian of Sidon and
Garnier, with an army, obliged the raiders to retire. The Moslem rulers
repudiated any connection with the raid; and when a larger garrison was left in
the city and some minor fortifications were built, there was a little more
security. The Patriarch lifted his interdict and came to reside there for part
of the year. But the situation was precarious. The Sultan could have recaptured
Jerusalem at any time that he chose. In Galilee, where the castles of Montfort
and Toron were rebuilt, the Christian hold was stronger. But, with the Moslems
in Safed and Banyas, there was no guarantee of permanence.

Frederick’s main legacy, both in Cyprus
and in the kingdom of Jerusalem, was a bitter civil war. In Cyprus it started
at once. The five
baillis
there had been instructed to exile all the
friends of the Ibelins from the island. They had agreed also to pay a sum of 10,000
marks to Frederick, and the castles, still garrisoned by Imperial troops, were
not to be handed over to them till they paid a first instalment. They raised
the money by levying heavy taxes and by confiscating the property of the Ibelin
party. It chanced that one of John of Beirut’s most devoted supporters, the
historian poet Philip of Novara, was in the island, and the
baillis
offered
him a safe-conduct to come to Nicosia and discuss some sort of truce between
themselves and the Ibelins. But when Philip arrived they changed their minds
and arrested him. After an angry scene in front of the boy-King, who knew
Philip well but was unable to intervene, the
baillis
granted him bail;
and he fled to the House of the Hospital, wisely, for armed men broke into his
own house that night. He sent off an appeal, written in doggerel, to John of
Ibelin at Acre, to come and rescue him and save the property of all his
friends. John at once fitted out an expedition at his own expense and managed
to force a landing at Gastria, north of Famagusta. He then moved cautiously to
Nicosia, where he met the
baillis’
army. It was much larger than his
own, but less enthusiastic. After some parleys the Ibelins gave battle on 14
July. A spirited attack by John’s knights, led by his son Balian, combined with
a sortie from the Hospital organized by Philip of Novara, decided the day. The
baillis
fled with their troops to the three castles of Dieu d’Amour, Kantara and
Kyrenia. John followed and laid siege to all three. Kyrenia was soon captured,
but Dieu d’Amour, where Barlais had taken the young King and his sisters, and
Kantara were almost impregnable. They only surrendered in the summer of 1230,
from starvation. John’s peace terms were generous. Of the five
baillis,
Gavin
of Chenichy had been killed at Kantara, and William of Rivet, who was his
half-brother, had fled from Kyrenia to seek help in Cilicia and had died there.
The other three were unpunished, to the annoyance of many of John’s friends.
John would not even allow Philip of Novara to make a satirical poem about them.
A messenger was sent in the King’s name to the potentates of Europe to justify
the steps that had been taken against the Emperor. John himself took over the
government, till King Henry should come of age in 1232.

1229: Queen Alice claims the Throne of Jerusalem

Meanwhile the kingdom of Jerusalem was
peacefully governed by Balian of Sidon and Garnier the German. In the autumn of
1229 Queen Alice of Cyprus had come to Acre to put in a claim to the crown. The
regency of Cyprus, which she still nominally held, offered nothing but trouble.
She had divorced young Bohemond of Antioch on the grounds of consanguinity; for
they were cousins in the third degree. Now she declared that, though the
Emperor’s son Conrad was legally King of Jerusalem, he had forfeited his right
by failing to come to his kingdom. The High Court should therefore hand the
Crown on to the next legitimate heir, which was herself. The Court rejected her
claim. Conrad was a minor and his presence therefore not essential; but it was
agreed to send an embassy to Italy to ask that Conrad be sent out within a year
to the East in order that homage might be paid to him in person. Frederick
replied that he would do what he thought best.

On 23 July 1230, Frederick made his peace
with the Pope by the Treaty of San Germano. He had been on the whole victorious
in Italy, and he was ready now to make concessions over the control of the
Church in Sicily in order to be absolved from his excommunication. His
reconciliation with the Papacy strengthened his hand in the East. The Patriarch
Gerold was told to lift the interdict from Jerusalem, and was reproved for
having laid it without reference to Rome. The Military Orders no longer felt
obliged to stand aloof; and the barons could no longer count on ecclesiastical
support. The Emperor waited his time. In the autumn of 1231, telling the Pope
that he must send out an army for the defence of Jerusalem, he collected some
600 knights, 100 sergeants, 700 armed infantrymen and 3000 marines, and
dispatched them under his Marshal, the Neapolitan Richard Filangieri, in
thirty-two galleys. Filangieri was given the title of Imperial Legate.

John of Ibelin was at Acre when an agent
of his, who had come from Italy in a ship belonging to the Teutonic Knights,
warned him of the approaching armada. He guessed that its first objective would
be Cyprus and hastened to collect all his men from Beirut, leaving only a small
garrison in the castle, and set sail for Cyprus. When the Imperial fleet arrived
off the coast of Cyprus Filangieri learned that John was with King Henry at
Kiti and Balian of Ibelin held Limassol. He sent an ambassador to see the King
with a message from Frederick telling him to banish the Ibelins and confiscate
their lands. Henry replied that John was his uncle and that in any case he
would not dispossess his own vassals. Barlais, who was present and spoke up for
Frederick, would have been lynched by the crowd had John not rescued him.

1231: Commune set up at Acre

On his ambassador’s return Filangieri
sailed straight for Beirut. The town, which was ungarrisoned, was handed over
to him by its timorous bishop; and he began to lay siege to the castle. Leaving
it closely invested, he occupied Sidon and Tyre and appeared at Acre. There he summoned
a meeting of the High Court and showed it letters from Frederick appointing him
as
bailli.
The barons confirmed the appointment, whereupon Filangieri
proclaimed the forfeiture of the Ibelin lands. At this all the barons
protested. Estates could not be confiscated unless the High Court to decided,
after the owner had had the chance of defending his case. Filangieri haughtily
replied that he was the Emperor’s
bailli
and would carry out the Emperor’s
instructions. So gross a violation of the constitution shocked even such
moderates as Balian of Sidon and Odo of Montbeliard, who hitherto had been
ready to support the Emperor. The whole of the baronage moved over to John of
Ibelin’s party. The merchants of Acre, with whom John was popular and who
resented Filangieri’s high-handed methods, added their support. Most of them,
together with a few of the nobles, belonged to a religious fraternity dedicated
to St Andrew. Using that as a basis they set up a commune to represent the
whole of the local bourgeoisie, under twelve consuls, and they invited John of
Ibelin to be their first mayor. But Filangieri was formidable. He had a good
army, mainly of Lombards, that he had brought with him. The Teutonic Knights
and the Pisan community were his faithful friends. The Patriarch and the
Hospital and the Temple held aloof. They none of them cared for Frederick, but
since his reconciliation with the Pope they were uncertain where their duty
lay.

When news of the attack on Beirut reached
Cyprus, John of Ibelin begged King Henry to come with the island’s forces to
its rescue. The young King agreed and ordered the whole army of the kingdom to
set sail. Meanwhile John heard of his election as Mayor of Acre. Though it was
risky to leave Cyprus unguarded, John believed that the mainland must first be
saved; and, as a precaution, Barlais and his friends were obliged to accompany
the expedition. John had hoped to leave Cyprus at Christmas 1231; but, owing to
stormy weather, it was not till 25 February that the army could sail from
Famagusta. The ships made a swift passage through a great rain-storm and
anchored off the little port of Puy du Connetable, just south of Tripoli. There
Barlais and his friends, eighty knights in all, secretly landed and went to
Tripoli, leaving their equipment behind. Filangieri sent a ship to take them to
Beirut. John followed them ashore with most of his men while the Cypriot fleet
sailed southward but ran into bad weather off Botrun. A few ships were wrecked
and others damaged, and much material lost. When John passed through Jebail,
some of the infantry deserted. At last he reached Beirut and fought his way
into the castle. Thence he appealed to the barons to rescue him. Many came, led
by his nephew, John of Caesarea. But Balian of Sidon still hoped for a
compromise. He hurried to Beirut with his former
co-bailli,
Gamier, with
the Patriarch and the Grand Masters of the Hospital and the Temple. But
Filangieri refused to consider terms that would leave the Ibelins in possession
of their lands, and the negotiators would agree to nothing less.

Having reinforced his garrison at Beirut,
John moved to Tyre where he was well received and won many recruits,
particularly from the Genoese. He also sent an embassy under his son Balian to
Tripoli to arrange for the marriage of King Henry’s younger sister Isabella
with Bohemond’s second son, Henry. But Bohemond had not much faith in the
Ibelin cause and treated the embassy with scant courtesy. Filangieri, however,
was nervous. He had made his headquarters at Tyre, leaving the command at
Beirut to his brother Lothair. He now ordered Lothair to raise the siege and
join him at Tyre.

In the meantime Barlais, reinforced by
Lombard troops, crossed back to Cyprus and began to overrun the island. One by
one the castles fell to him, except for Dieu d’Amour, where the King’s sisters
took refuge, and Buffavento, the most impregnable of all, to which the lady
Eschiva of Montbeliard, King Henry’s cousin and Odo’s niece, fled disguised as
a monk, with ample provisions, and which she held for the King. Her first
husband, Walter of Montaigu, had been killed by Barlais’s men at the battle of
Nicosia, and she had recently married Balian of Ibelin; but as they were
cousins the marriage had been kept secret. Balian heard of the invasion when he
was at Tripoli from two Genoese sea-captains, who offered help but whose ships
were impounded by Bohemond.

1232:
Battle of Casal Imbert

At the end of April the Genoese agreed, in
return for concessions in Cyprus, to aid the Ibelins in an attack on Filangieri
at Tyre. The army moved northwards to Casal Imbert, some twelve miles away. But
there John met the Patriarch of Antioch, Albert of Rezzato, who had recently
been appointed Papal Legate in the East and had come south to mediate. He had just
visited Tyre and heard Filangieri’s new terms. John said correctly that they
must be given to the High Court, and he rode back to Acre with the Patriarch,
taking an escort that seriously depleted his army. Late in the night of 2 May
Filangieri, who knew of John’s departure and had perhaps even arranged it with
the Patriarch, came out with all his forces from Tyre and fell upon the
unsuspecting and ill-guarded Ibelin camp. Anselm of Brie, who was in command
with the young Ibelin lords, fought with supreme bravery; but the camp was
captured. The young King of Cyprus was hurried half-dressed to the safety of
Acre. The other survivors took refuge on a hill-top.