A History of the Crusades-Vol 2 (22 page)

Now that he was free Baldwin did not honour the
terms that he had accepted. The Patriarch Bernard pointed out to him that he
was only the overlord and regent of Antioch; he had no right to give away its
territory, which belonged to the youthful Bohemond II. Baldwin was willingly
convinced by the argument and sent to tell Timurtash very apologetically that
most unfortunately he could not disobey the Patriarch. Timurtash, who was more
concerned to receive money than territory, forgave the offence for fear of
losing the remainder of the ransom. Discovering Timurtash to be so compliant,
Baldwin next dishonoured the clause by which he had promised to aid him against
the Bedouin emir Dubais. Instead, he received an embassy from Dubais to plan
common action against Aleppo. An alliance was made; and in October the armies
of Antioch and Edessa joined Dubais’s Arabs before the walls of Aleppo. Their
coalition was soon strengthened by the arrival in their camp of the Seldjuk
claimant to the throne of Aleppo, Sultanshah, who had recently escaped from an
Ortoqid prison, together with his cousin Toghrul Arslan, brother of the Sultan
of Rum, who had recently been evicted from Melitene by the Danishmends and was
searching for allies.

1125: Battle of
Azaz

Timurtash made no attempt to defend Aleppo. His
brother Suleiman of Mayyafaraqin was dying; and he wanted to make sure of the
inheritance. He remained at Mardin, leaving the notables of the city to hold
out as best they could. For three months they resisted, while their emissaries,
ill-received by Timurtash, who had no wish to be further bothered about them,
went on to Mosul and aroused the interest of its atabeg, Aqsonqor il-Bursuqi,
who had led the Sultan’s armies against the Franks in 1114. Il-Bursuqi, who
hated the Ortoqids, sent officers to take over the citadel of Aleppo, and
himself, though ill, set out with an army and with the Sultan’s blessing. When
he approached Aleppo he ordered the emir of Homs, Khirkan, and Toghtekin of
Damascus to join him; and both sent contingents. Before this display of force
the Franco-Bedouin alliance broke up. Dubais moved with his tribe eastward,
while Baldwin retired to the fortress of Athareb. At the end of January
il-Bursuqi entered Aleppo, but made no attempt to pursue the Franks. Seeing
this, the King returned to Antioch and went on to Jerusalem, where he arrived
in April 1125, after two years’ absence.

He did not remain there for long; for
il-Bursuqi was more formidable than the Ortoqids. Master of Mosul and Aleppo,
and backed by the Sultan’s authority, he was able to coalesce the Moslems of
northern Syria under his rule. Toghtekin and the emir of Homs submitted to his
hegemony. In March he visited Shaizar, whose emir Sultan, always anxious to be
the friend of everyone of importance, handed over to him the Frankish hostages,
the Princess Joveta and young Joscelin and their comrades. In May, at the head
of a new Moslem alliance, he attacked and captured the Frankish fort of
Kafartab and laid siege to Zerdana. Baldwin hastened northward and led the
armies of Antioch, Tripoli and Edessa, eleven hundred horsemen and two thousand
foot-soldiers, to save Zerdana. The Moslems moved on to Azaz; and there, at the
end of May, took place one of the most bloodthirsty battles in the history of
the Crusades. The Moslems, relying on their superior numbers, attempted a
hand-to-hand contest; but the superior armour and physique of the Franks was
too much for them, and they were decisively beaten. From the rich booty that he
acquired, Baldwin was able to amass the eighty thousand dinars owing for the
ransom of the hostages, each Frankish knight giving up a portion of his share
to rescue the King’s daughter. Though the money was really due to Timurtash,
il-Bursuqi accepted it and returned the hostages. Another sum, sent to Shaizar,
redeemed prisoners and hostages that were still detained there. On their
release, they were attacked by the emir of Homs; but the Munqidhites hurried to
their rescue and sent them on their way.

After the battle a truce was made. The Moslems
kept Kafartab, which was given to the emir of Homs, but no other territorial
changes were made. After leaving a garrison in Aleppo, il-Bursuqi returned to
Mosul. For eighteen months the north was left in peace.

Baldwin went back to Palestine, where in the
autumn of 1125, he conducted a raid on Damascene lands and a demonstration
against Ascalon. In January 1126 he decided to lead a serious expedition
against Damascus and invaded the Hauran. Toghtekin came out to meet him. The
armies clashed at Tel es-Saqhab, some twenty miles south-west of Damascus. At
first the Moslems had the better of the fight, and Toghtekin’s Turcoman
regiment penetrated to the royal camp; but in the end Baldwin won the victory.
He pursued the enemy half-way to Damascus, but in view of his heavy losses he
judged it prudent to abandon the campaign and retired, laden with booty, to
Jerusalem.

1126: Arrival of
Bohemond II

In March 1126
Pons of Tripoli attacked the Moslem fortress of Rafaniya, which dominated the
entry to the Buqaia from the Orontes valley. It had long been a Christian
objective since its recapture by Toghtekin in 1105. While its governor appealed
for help to Toghtekin and to il-Bursuqi, Pons applied for King Baldwin’s aid.
The two Christian princes marched quickly on the fortress, long before the
Moslems were ready to come to its rescue; and it surrendered to them after a
siege of eighteen days. Its capture was valuable to the Franks; for it
safeguarded not only the county of Tripoli itself but communications between
Jerusalem and Antioch.

Meanwhile the Egyptians had rebuilt their
fleet. In the autumn of 1126 it set sail from Alexandria to ravage the
Christian coast. Hearing of this il-Bursuqi planned a simultaneous attack in
the north and laid siege to Athareb. Baldwin rightly decided that the latter
was the greater danger and hurried to Antioch. In fact the Egyptians, after
attempting a costly raid on the suburbs of Beirut, found the coastal cities so
well garrisoned that they soon returned to the Nile. In the north Baldwin, who
was joined by Joscelin, obliged the Moslems to retire from Athareb. Neither
side would risk a battle; and the truce was soon re-made. Il-Bursuqi, after
installing his son Izz ed-Din Mas’ud as governor of Aleppo, went home to Mosul.
On the very day of his arrival, 26 November, he was stabbed to death by an
Assassin.

Il-Bursuqi’s death brought chaos to the
Moslems, which worsened when his son Mas’ud, with whom Toghtekin had already
quarrelled, died, probably of poison, a few months later. Aleppo passed to and
fro between Mas’ud’s nominee Tuman, a Mameluk sent by the Sultan called Kutluh,
the Ortoqid Badr ad-Daulah Suleiman, and a son of Ridwan’s, Ibrahim the
Seldjuk.

About the same time Baldwin gladly found himself
relieved of the regency of Antioch. The young Bohemond II was now aged eighteen
and came to take over his inheritance. Abandoning his lands in Italy to his
cousin, Roger II of Sicily, he sailed from Otranto in September 1126 with a
squadron of twenty-four ships, carrying a number of troops and horses. He
landed at Saint Symeon early in October, and came straight up to Antioch, where
King Baldwin welcomed him with every mark of honour. He made an excellent
impression. He had his father’s magnificent appearance, being tall, fair-haired
and handsome, and he showed an air of high breeding that came from his mother
Constance, daughter of King Philip I of France. King Baldwin at once handed
over the principality, with all its possessions, into his hands, with the
utmost scrupulousness. The ambassador from Shaizar was deeply impressed to see
that the King henceforward paid cash to the Prince for the corn consumed by the
horses of the army of Jerusalem. With him the King had his second daughter, the
Princess Alice; and, in conformity with the plan that had been made, the young
couple were married. Bohemond began his reign brilliantly, with an attack on
Kafartab, which he recovered from the emir of Homs; and soon afterwards we hear
of his gallantry in skirmishes against the army of Shaizar.

1128: The
Succession to the Throne

King Baldwin could at last return to the south
feeling that the death of il-Bursuqi and the coming of Bohemond would leave him
free to see to his own kingdom. He spent the year 1127 so peacefully that we
know nothing of his movements, except for a short campaign east of the Dead Sea
in August. Early in 1128 his faithful friend, the Patriarch Gormond, died. His
successor was another French priest, Stephen of La Ferte, abbot of Saint-Jean-en-Vallee
at Chartres, a man of noble birth, related to King Baldwin. If Baldwin had
hoped that the ties of cousinhood would make for cordial co-operation, he was
soon disillusioned. The new Patriarch at once revived the question of the
agreement that Godfrey had made with the Patriarch Daimbert. He claimed Jaffa
as the autonomous possession of the Patriarchate; and he reminded the King that
as soon as Ascalon should be conquered Jerusalem itself must be yielded up to
him. Baldwin refused to listen to these demands but did not know how to deal
with them. Relations between the royal Court and the Patriarchate worsened
throughout 1129; but an open breach was avoided by Stephen’s death after a
short illness, early in 1130. His friends suspected poison. When the King came
to visit the dying Patriarch, to ask how he was, the latter bitterly remarked: ‘Sire,
I am faring as you desire.’ Indeed, his death was desirable. As his successor
Baldwin secured the election of the Prior of the Holy Sepulchre, William of
Messines, a man of great piety and goodness, though a little simple and
ill-educated. He had no political ambitions and was glad to do whatever the
King wished. In consequence he became universally beloved.

Baldwin’s next important task was to arrange
for the succession to the throne. Queen Morphia had borne him no sons; but
there were four daughters, Melisende, Alice, Hodierna and Joveta. Alice was now
Princess of Antioch, Hodierna and Joveta still were children. Melisende was to
be his successor in conjunction with a suitable husband. In 1128, after
consulting his council, he sent William of Bures, together with the lord of
Beirut, Guy Brisebarre, to France, to ask the King of France, Louis VI, to
select from the French nobility a man suitable for this high position. Louis
recommended the Count of Anjou, Fulk V. Fulk was aged about forty, the son of
Fulk IV, Rechin, and of Bertrada of Montfort, notorious for her adultery with
King Philip I of France. He was the head of a great house that during the last
two centuries had built up one of the richest and most formidable appanages in
France; and he himself, by war, marriage and intrigue, had considerably added
to its extent. That very year he had achieved a family triumph in marrying his
young son and heir, Geoffrey, to the Empress Matilda, the only surviving
legitimate child of Henry I of England and heiress of England and Normandy. A widower
now himself, he had decided to abandon the family lands to his son and to
dedicate himself to the service of the Cross. He had already been to Jerusalem
on a pilgrimage in 1120 and was therefore personally known to Baldwin. So
notable a candidate, backed by the King of France and endorsed by the Pope,
Honorius II, was readily accepted by King Baldwin, who had been anxious that
his arrangements for the succession should be to the liking of the barons of
his kingdom. It would be impossible for any of them to dispute the claims of a
warrior-prince of such eminence, married to their King’s eldest daughter.

Fulk left France in the early spring of 1129,
accompanied by William of Bures and Guy Brisebarre. They landed at Acre in May
and went on to Jerusalem. There, at the end of the month, Fulk and Melisende
were married amid great festivities and rejoicing. The arrangement had the
approval of the whole country, with perhaps one exception. The Princess
Melisende herself was unmoved by the short, wiry, red-haired, middle-aged man
whom political advantages had forced upon her.

1126: The
Assassins at Banyas

With Fulk to aid him Baldwin embarked in 1129
on the great project of his reign, the conquest of Damascus. Toghtekin of
Damascus died on 12 February 1128. He had been for many years the complete
master of the city and the most respected Moslem figure in western Syria. Some
years previously a leader of the Assassins, Bahrain of Asterabad, had fled from
Persia to Aleppo and established himself as leader of the underground Ismaili
movement in northern Syria. But, though he enjoyed the support of Ilghazi, the
people of Aleppo loathed the sect; and Bahram was obliged to move on. Armed
with a recommendation from Ilghazi, he came to Damascus, where Toghtekin
received him graciously. He settled there, gradually gathering adherents round
him, and he won the sympathy of Toghtekin’s vizier, al-Mazdaghani. The sect
grew in power, to the disapproval of the Sunni population of Damascus. Bahram
therefore asked al-Mazdaghani for protection; and at the vizier’s request
Toghtekin handed over to the sect, in November 1126, the frontier-fortress of
Banyas, which was menaced by the Franks, hoping thus to make good use of its
energies. Bahram re-fortified the castle and gathered all his followers round
him. Soon they began to terrorize the neighbourhood; and Toghtekin, though he
still officially protected them, began to plan their elimination, but he died
before he found any suitable opportunity. A few months afterwards Bahram was
killed in a skirmish with an Arab tribe near Baalbek, whose sheikh he had
murdered. His position was taken over by another Persian, called Ismail.