A History of the Crusades-Vol 2 (15 page)

Jawali established himself in the Euphrates
valley and from there he entered into negotiations with Ridwan of Aleppo. They
agreed first to displace Kilij Arslan and then together to attack Antioch. In
June 1107 they led four thousand men against Mosul. Kilij Arslan, operating far
from his home, had an even smaller army, but he came out to meet the allies on
the banks of the river Khabar. Despite his personal bravery, he was utterly
defeated, and himself perished when fleeing across the river.

1107: Release of
Joscelin

The elimination of Kilij Arslan affected the
whole Oriental world. It removed a potential danger from Byzantium at the
crucial moment when Bohemond was about to attack the Balkans; it enabled the
Seldjuk Sultanate of Persia to endure for nearly a century; and it was the
first serious stage in the severance of the Anatolian Turks from their brothers
farther east. At the moment it deprived Moslem Syria of the one force capable
of bringing it unity.

Jawali was now able to enter Mosul, where he
soon made himself odious by the savagery of his rule. Nor did he show more
deference to his overlord the Sultan Mohammed than Jekermish had shown. After a
year Mohammed planned to replace him, and sent against him an army led by the
Mameluk Mawdud, who for the next few years became the chief protagonist of
Islam.

During all this commotion Baldwin of Le Bourg had
been living as a prisoner at Mosul, while his cousin, Joscelin of Courtenay,
had passed at Soqman’s death into the hands of Ilghazi, who was planning to
turn his nephew Ibrahim out of Mardin. Ilghazi needed money and allies. He
therefore agreed to release Joscelin for the sum of twenty thousand dinars and
the promise of military aid. Joscelin’s subjects at Turbessel willingly
promised the ransom-money; and Joscelin was released in the course of 1107.
Thanks to the arrangement, Ilghazi was able to capture Mardin. Joscelin then
sought to secure the release of Baldwin, who, with all Jekermish’s belongings,
was in Jawali’s power. The moment was well chosen; for Jawali needed help
against the coming attack of Mawdud. He demanded sixty thousand dinars, the
release of the Moslem captives held at Edessa, and a military alliance. While
the negotiations were in progress, Jawali was driven from Mosul, where he had
found no support from the citizens, who opened their gates to Mawdud. He
established himself in the Jezireh, taking Baldwin with him.

Joscelin succeeded in finding thirty thousand
dinars without great difficulty. He came himself with the money to the castle
of Qalat Jabar, on the Euphrates, where Jawali now lived, and he offered
himself as hostage if Baldwin might be released to raise the remainder of the
ransom. Jawali was moved by the gesture and impressed by the gallantry of the
Frankish prince. He accepted Joscelin in Baldwin’s place, then, a few months
later, partly from chivalry and partly from self-interest — for he greatly
desired this Frankish alliance — he set Joscelin free, relying on his word that
the money would be paid. His trust was justified.

1108:
Christian and Moslem against Christian and Moslem

Tancred had now been for four years the master
of Edessa, where his cousin, Richard of the Principate, governed in his name.
He had no wish to give it up to Baldwin. When Baldwin appeared at Edessa, he
agreed to raise the required thirty thousand dinars, but he refused to hand
back the town unless Baldwin swore allegiance to him. Baldwin, as vassal to the
King of Jerusalem, could not agree, and went angrily to Turbessel, where
Joscelin joined him; and they sent to Jawali for help. Tancred marched on
Turbessel, where there was a slight skirmish, after which the combatants sat
down to an embarrassed banquet together, to discuss the question once more. No
settlement was reached; and Baldwin, after sending as a present to Jawali a
hundred and sixty Moslem captives whom he freed and re-equipped, moved north to
find other allies. Richard’s government of Edessa was harsh and extortionate
and was particularly resented by the Armenians. Baldwin therefore went to visit
the leading Armenian prince of the neighbourhood, Kogh Vasil of Kaisun, who had
recently enhanced his prestige by inducing the Armenian Catholicus to live
under his protection. Kogh Vasil received Baldwin at Raban and promised him
aid; while the Armenian Oshin, governor of Cilicia under the Byzantines, glad
to take any action against Tancred, sent three hundred Petcheneg mercenaries to
Baldwin. With these confederates Baldwin returned to Turbessel. Tancred was not
prepared to offend the whole Armenian world; and the Patriarch of Antioch,
Bernard, brought his influence to bear on Baldwin’s behalf. With a bad grace
Tancred withdrew Richard of the Principate from Edessa, where Baldwin was
received with rejoicing.

It was only a temporary truce. Baldwin was
faithful to his friendship with Jawali. He sent him back many Moslem captives;
he allowed the mosques to be rebuilt in the town of Saruj, whose population was
mainly Moslem; and he disgraced and executed the chief magistrate of Saruj, who
was particularly unpopular as a renegade from Islam. This alliance alarmed
Ridwan of Aleppo. Jawali threatened his possessions on the Euphrates. He
countered by raiding a convoy of merchandise, including some of Baldwin’s
ransom-money, sent from Turbessel to Jawali’s court. In September 1108 Jawali
attacked and captured the town of Balis, on the Euphrates, only fifty miles
from Aleppo, and crucified Ridwan’s chief supporters in the town. Ridwan at
once sought help from Tancred. Early in October Baldwin and Joscelin brought
their knights, a few hundred in number, to join Jawali’s army at Menbij,
between Aleppo and the Euphrates. Jawali had with him some five hundred Turks
and rather more Bedouins, who were under the son of the emir Sadaqa of the Banu
Mazyad. The united army numbered about two thousand men. Ridwan had about six
hundred men to oppose to them; but Tancred came up with a force of fifteen
hundred. The battle, Christian and Moslem against Christian and Moslem, was
hard contested. Jawali’s troops were gradually pushing the Franks of Antioch
back with heavy losses, when the Bedouin noticed the horses that Baldwin’s
knights kept in reserve and could not resist the temptation that they offered.
They deserted the field in order to steal and ride off with them. Seeing them
go, Jawali’s Turks turned and fled; and Baldwin and Joscelin were left almost
alone. They, too, were obliged to fly with the remnant of their troops, each of
them barely escaping capture. The Christian losses on the battlefield were said
to have numbered nearly two thousand.

Joscelin retired to Turbessel and Baldwin to
Dulak, north of Ravendel, where Tancred made a half-hearted attempt to besiege
him, but desisted on the rumour of Jawali’s approach. Eventually Baldwin and
Joscelin regained Edessa. They found the city in a panic. The citizens, fearing
that Baldwin was dead and that they might again be subjected to the hated rule
of Richard of the Principate, had held an assembly in the Church of St John,
where the Latin bishop was invited by the Armenians of the city to join in the
establishment of an interim government, till the situation should be clearer.
When Baldwin arrived two days later he suspected treason; he believed that the
Armenians had been planning to regain their independence. He struck swiftly and
severely. Many Armenians were arrested and some were blinded. The Armenian
bishop only saved his eyes by paying a heavy fine subscribed by his flock.
There was a forced exodus of Armenians from the city. What had really happened
is unknown; but it is clear that Baldwin must have been thoroughly alarmed so
drastically to reverse his Armenian policy.

1109:
Reconciliation of Frankish Princes

In spite of his own victory and in spite of
Jawali’s decision a few months later to reconcile himself with his overlord the
Sultan, who gave him a command far away in Persia, Tancred did not attempt any
further move to evict Baldwin from Edessa. Instead, in the autumn of 1108, he
led an expedition against Shaizar, where after miraculously slaying a small
company of the enemy whom he caught in a cave, he allowed himself to be bought
off by the gift of a superb horse. Next spring he became involved in the
quarrel between William-Jordan and Bertrand of Toulouse for the possession of
the Frankish lands in the Lebanon. His acceptance of William-Jordan as his
vassal was countered by King Baldwin’s speedy intervention as overlord of all
the Franks in the East. When the King summoned Tancred with the other Frankish
leaders to accept his arbitration in the camp before Tripoli, he did not dare
to disobey. Before the assembled princes the King not only divided the Toulousain
inheritance, but he obliged Tancred and Baldwin of Edessa and Joscelin to be
reconciled and to work together against the infidel. Tancred, in admitting the
King’s right to arbitrate, acknowledged his suzerainty. In return, he was
allowed to retain William-Jordan as his vassal, and he was given back the title
of Prince of Galilee, and the ownership of the Temple at Jerusalem, with the
promise that he could resume the government of the fief were Bohemond to return
to Antioch. These advantages were lessened w
^h
en William-Jordan was
murdered and his lands passed to Bertrand, who recognized King Baldwin alone as
his overlord. Tancred was, however, encouraged to attack Jabala, the last
possession of the Banu Ammar, which he captured in July 1109, thus bringing his
frontier down to march with Bertrand’s.

A reconciliation of the Frankish princes under
King Baldwin’s leadership was needed; for early in 1110 the atabeg Mawdud of
Mosul, in obedience to the instructions of his master the Sultan, organized an
expedition against the Franks. With the help of Ilghazi the Ortoqid and his
Turcoman troops and of the emir of Mayyafaraqin, Soqman el-Qutbi, who was
popularly known as the Shah of Armenia, he marched on Edessa in April. On the
news that the Moslem troops were mustering Baldwin of Le Bourg sent Joscelin to
Jerusalem to beg urgent help from King Baldwin and to voice his suspicion that
Tancred was encouraging the enemy. Tancred’s friends, for their part, made a
similar, but less convincing, charge against Baldwin. The King was engaged in
the siege of Beirut, and would not move till he had captured it. Then he
hurried north, avoiding Antioch, partly to save time and partly because he did
not trust Tancred, and arrived before Edessa at the end of June. As he approached
the city he was joined by Armenian forces sent by Kogh Vasil and by the lord of
Birejik, Abu’lgharib, chief of the Pahlavouni. Mawdud had been besieging Edessa
for two months, but had not been able to penetrate its fortifications. When the
knights of Jerusalem came into sight, their banners waving and their armour
gleaming in the sun, he retired to Harran, hoping to lure them to make a rash
offensive.

Baldwin of Le Bourg emerged gladly from his
fortress to meet his cousin and overlord, and at once complained of Tancred.
The King therefore sent to Antioch to demand that Tancred should come in force
to join the Christian coalition and to answer these accusations. Tancred
himself hesitated; but his Great Council insisted that he should obey the
summons. On his arrival he promptly made a counter-claim against Baldwin of Le
Bourg. The province of Osrhoene, in which Edessa was situated, had always, he
said, depended upon Antioch throughout history, and he was its rightful
overlord. King Baldwin answered sternly that as the chosen king he was leader
of eastern Christendom, in whose name he demanded that Tancred be reconciled
with Baldwin of Le Bourg. If Tancred refused and preferred to continue his
intrigues with the Turks, he would no longer be considered as a Christian
prince but would be combatted mercilessly as an enemy. The assembled knights
approved the royal words; and Tancred was obliged to make his peace.

1110: Evacuation
of Edessene Countryside

The united Frankish army then marched in
pursuit of Mawdud, who retreated farther to draw it on into hostile territory,
intending to outflank it by a sudden swerve to the north. King Baldwin was
warned in time and stopped to besiege the castle of Shinav, to the north-west
of Harran. But there the coalition dispersed. Tancred heard rumours that Ridwan
of Aleppo was preparing to attack Antioch. Messengers came from Palestine to
tell the King of a threatened Egyptian move against Jerusalem. The campaign in
the Jezireh was abandoned. Tancred retired to Samosata; and Baldwin of Le
Bourg, on the King’s advice, took the decision that it was useless to try and
protect the country east of the Euphrates. He had wept to see how it was
ravaged by Mawdud while he was besieged at Edessa. He planned to keep garrisons
only in the two great fortresses of Edessa and Saruj and in a few smaller
castles, but to make no attempt to guard the frontiers. The Christian
population was advised to leave the land for the safer territory on the right
bank of the great river. The advice was taken. The Christians of the
countryside, mostly Armenians, collected their belongings and moved slowly
westward. But spies had informed Mawdud of what was being planned. He came up
quickly on their tracks. When he reached the Euphrates he found the Frankish
leaders already across the river; but their two great ferry boats had been
overladen with soldiers and had sunk before the civilians had crossed. He fell
on them, unarmed as they were; and scarcely a man, woman or child survived. The
fierce elimination of these Armenian peasants, politically unreliable but
prosperous and hardworking, who had been settled in Osrhoene since before the
opening of the Christian era, dealt the province a blow from which it never
fully recovered. Though Frankish Counts might rule on in Edessa itself for a
few more years, it had been proved that the Frankish dominion beyond the
Euphrates was doomed to inevitable failure; and the failure brought ruin to the
miserable native Christians who had submitted to its government.