1 00:00:00,180 --> 00:00:05,179 Hi there, my name is John Green, this is Crash Course World History, and today we're going to talk about the Crusades. 2 00:00:05,179 --> 00:00:09,179 Oh, Stan, do we have to talk about the Crusades? I hate them. 3 00:00:09,179 --> 00:00:15,179 Here's the thing about the Crusades, which were a series of military expeditions from parts of Europe to the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. 4 00:00:15,179 --> 00:00:22,179 The real reason they feature so prominently in history is because we've endlessly romanticized the story of the Crusades. 5 00:00:22,179 --> 00:00:26,179 We've created this simple narrative with characters to root for and to root against, 6 00:00:26,179 --> 00:00:30,739 been endlessly idealized by the likes of Sir Walter Scott, and there are knights with swords 7 00:00:30,739 --> 00:00:44,340 and lion hearts. No, Stan, lion hearts. Thank you. 8 00:00:44,340 --> 00:00:48,079 Let's start by saying that initially the Crusades were not a holy war on the part of Europeans 9 00:00:48,079 --> 00:00:52,979 against Islam, but in important ways the Crusades were driven by religious faith. 10 00:00:52,979 --> 00:00:56,899 Mr. Green, Mr. Green, religion causes all wars. Imagine no religion. 11 00:00:56,899 --> 00:00:59,859 I'm going to cut you off right there before you violate copyright me from the past, but 12 00:00:59,859 --> 00:01:02,320 But as usual, you're wrong. 13 00:01:02,320 --> 00:01:05,079 Simple readings of history are rarely sufficient. 14 00:01:05,079 --> 00:01:06,980 By the way, when did my handwriting get so much better? 15 00:01:06,980 --> 00:01:10,099 I mean, if the Crusades had been brought on by the lightning-fast rise of the Islamic 16 00:01:10,099 --> 00:01:14,739 Empire and a desire to keep in Christian hands the land of Jesus, then they would have started 17 00:01:14,739 --> 00:01:15,980 in the 8th century. 18 00:01:15,980 --> 00:01:19,579 But early Islamic dynasties like the Umayyads and the Abbasids were perfectly happy with 19 00:01:19,579 --> 00:01:22,700 Christians and Jews living among them, as long as they paid a tax. 20 00:01:22,700 --> 00:01:26,439 And plus, the Christian pilgrimage business was awesome for the Islamic Empire's economy. 21 00:01:26,439 --> 00:01:30,120 But then a new group of Muslims, the Seljuk Turks, moved into the region, and they sacked 22 00:01:30,120 --> 00:01:34,340 the holy cities and made it much more difficult for Christians to make their pilgrimages. 23 00:01:34,340 --> 00:01:37,420 And while they quickly realized their mistake, it was already too late. 24 00:01:37,420 --> 00:01:40,700 The Byzantines, who'd had their literal asses kicked at the Battle of Manzikert in 25 00:01:40,700 --> 00:01:44,420 1071, felt the threat and called upon the West for help. 26 00:01:44,420 --> 00:01:49,879 So the first official crusade began with a call to arms by Pope Urban II in 1095 CE. 27 00:01:49,879 --> 00:01:53,280 This was partly because Urban wanted to unite Europe, and he'd figured out the lesson 28 00:01:53,280 --> 00:01:55,700 the rest of us learn from alien invasion movies. 29 00:01:55,700 --> 00:01:59,700 best way to get people to unite is to give them a common enemy. 30 00:01:59,700 --> 00:02:03,620 So Urban called on all the bickering knights and nobility of Europe, and he saideth unto 31 00:02:03,620 --> 00:02:07,859 his people, Let us go forth and help the Byzantines, because then maybe they will acknowledge my 32 00:02:07,859 --> 00:02:12,719 awesomeness and get rid of their stupid not-having-me-as-Pope thing, and while we're at it, let's liberate 33 00:02:12,719 --> 00:02:15,139 Jerusalem. I'm paraphrasing, by the way. 34 00:02:15,139 --> 00:02:19,360 Shifting the focus to Jerusalem was really important, because the Crusades were not primarily 35 00:02:19,360 --> 00:02:23,520 military operations. They were pilgrimages. Theologically, Christianity didn't have 36 00:02:23,520 --> 00:02:28,199 an idea of a holy war. Like, war might be just, but fighting wasn't something that 37 00:02:28,199 --> 00:02:30,979 got you into heaven. But pilgrimage to a holy shrine could help 38 00:02:30,979 --> 00:02:35,939 you out on that front, and Urban had the key insight to pitch the crusade as a pilgrimage 39 00:02:35,939 --> 00:02:39,360 with a touch of warring on the side. I do the same thing to my kid every night. 40 00:02:39,360 --> 00:02:44,360 I'm not feeding you dinner featuring animal crackers. I'm feeding you animal crackers 41 00:02:44,360 --> 00:02:50,539 featuring dinner. Oh, it's time for the open letter? An open 42 00:02:50,539 --> 00:02:53,340 letter to animal crackers. But first, let's see what's in the secret 43 00:02:53,340 --> 00:02:57,740 compartment today. Oh, it's Animal Crackers. Thanks, Stan. 44 00:02:57,740 --> 00:03:01,060 Hi there, Animal Crackers. It's me, John Green. Thanks for being delicious, but let 45 00:03:01,060 --> 00:03:05,719 me throw out a crazy idea here. Maybe foods that are already delicious do not need the 46 00:03:05,719 --> 00:03:10,280 added benefit of being pleasingly shaped. I mean, why can't I get my kid animal spinach, 47 00:03:10,280 --> 00:03:15,099 or animal sweet potato, or even animal cooked animal? I mean, we can put a man on Mars, 48 00:03:15,099 --> 00:03:20,099 but we can't make spinach shaped like elephants? What, Stan? We haven't put a man on Mars? 49 00:03:20,099 --> 00:03:22,740 Stupid world, always disappointing me. 50 00:03:22,740 --> 00:03:24,139 Best wishes, John Green. 51 00:03:24,139 --> 00:03:25,240 One last myth to dispel. 52 00:03:25,240 --> 00:03:30,000 The Crusades were not an example of early European colonization of the Middle East, 53 00:03:30,000 --> 00:03:33,960 even if they did create some European-ish kingdoms there for a while. 54 00:03:33,960 --> 00:03:38,780 That's a much later post- and anti-colonialist view that comes at least in part from a Marxist 55 00:03:38,780 --> 00:03:39,780 reading of history. 56 00:03:39,780 --> 00:03:43,379 In the case of the Crusades, it was argued, the knights who went adventuring in the Levant 57 00:03:43,379 --> 00:03:47,580 were the second and third sons of wealthy nobles who, because of European inheritance 58 00:03:47,580 --> 00:03:52,979 rules had little to look forward to by staying in Europe and lots to gain, in terms of plunder, 59 00:03:52,979 --> 00:03:53,979 by going to the East. 60 00:03:53,979 --> 00:03:57,659 Cool theory, bro, but it's not true. First, most of the people who responded to the call 61 00:03:57,659 --> 00:04:01,580 to crusade weren't knights at all, they were poor people. And secondly, most of the nobles 62 00:04:01,580 --> 00:04:05,780 who did go crusading were lords of estates, not their wastrel kids. 63 00:04:05,780 --> 00:04:09,520 But more importantly, that analysis ignores religious motivations. We've approached religions 64 00:04:09,520 --> 00:04:13,620 as historical phenomena, thinking about how, for instance, the capricious environment of 65 00:04:13,620 --> 00:04:17,660 Mesopotamia led to a capricious cadre of Mesopotamian gods. 66 00:04:17,660 --> 00:04:21,000 But just as the world shapes religion, religion also shapes the world. 67 00:04:21,000 --> 00:04:24,620 And some modern historians might ignore religious motivations, but medieval crusaders sure as 68 00:04:24,620 --> 00:04:25,620 hell didn't. 69 00:04:25,620 --> 00:04:28,439 I mean, when people came up with that idiom, they clearly thought hell was for sure. 70 00:04:28,439 --> 00:04:32,199 To the crusaders, they were taking up arms to protect Christ and his kingdom. 71 00:04:32,199 --> 00:04:35,660 And what better way to show your devotion to God than putting a cross on your sleeve, 72 00:04:35,660 --> 00:04:40,019 spending five to six times your annual income to outfit yourself and all your horses, and 73 00:04:40,019 --> 00:04:41,259 heading for the Holy Land. 74 00:04:41,259 --> 00:04:45,120 So when these people cried out, God wills it, to explain their reasons for going, we 75 00:04:45,120 --> 00:04:47,500 should do them the favor of believing them. 76 00:04:47,500 --> 00:04:51,180 And the results of the First Crusade seemed to indicate that God had willed it. 77 00:04:51,180 --> 00:04:55,220 Following the lead of roving preachers with names like Peter the Rabbit, Peter the Hermit. 78 00:04:55,220 --> 00:04:57,939 Stan, you're always making history less cool. 79 00:04:57,939 --> 00:04:58,939 Fine. 80 00:04:58,939 --> 00:05:02,819 Following preachers like Peter the Hermit, thousands of peasants and nobles alike volunteered 81 00:05:02,819 --> 00:05:03,819 for the First Crusade. 82 00:05:03,819 --> 00:05:07,879 It got off to kind of a rough start because pilgrims kept robbing those they'd encounter 83 00:05:07,879 --> 00:05:08,879 along the way. 84 00:05:08,879 --> 00:05:12,420 Plus, there was no real leader, so there were constant rivalries between nobles about who 85 00:05:12,420 --> 00:05:14,379 could supply the most troops. 86 00:05:14,379 --> 00:05:18,240 Notable among the notables were Godfrey of Bullion, Bohemond of Toronto, and Raymond 87 00:05:18,240 --> 00:05:19,240 of Toulouse. 88 00:05:19,240 --> 00:05:23,120 But despite the rivalries and the disorganization, the Crusaders were remarkably, some would 89 00:05:23,120 --> 00:05:25,199 say miraculously, successful. 90 00:05:25,199 --> 00:05:28,459 By the time they arrived in the Levant, they were fighting not against the Seljuk Turks, 91 00:05:28,459 --> 00:05:33,220 but against Fatimid Egyptians, who had captured the Holy Land from the Seljuks, thereby making 92 00:05:33,220 --> 00:05:35,660 the Turks none too pleased with the Egyptians. 93 00:05:35,660 --> 00:05:39,740 In Antioch, the Crusaders reversed a seemingly hopeless situation when a peasant found the 94 00:05:39,740 --> 00:05:44,540 spear that had pierced Christ's side hidden under a church, thereby raising morale enough 95 00:05:44,540 --> 00:05:45,740 to win the day. 96 00:05:45,740 --> 00:05:47,540 And then they did the impossible. 97 00:05:47,540 --> 00:05:52,319 They took Jerusalem, securing it for Christendom, and famously killing a lot of people in the 98 00:05:52,319 --> 00:05:53,319 Alaska Mosque. 99 00:05:53,319 --> 00:05:56,699 Now, the Crusaders succeeded in part because the Turkish Muslims, who were Sunnis, did 100 00:05:56,699 --> 00:05:59,300 not step up to help the Egyptians, who were Shia. 101 00:05:59,300 --> 00:06:03,139 But that kind of complicated, inter-Islamic rivalry gets in the way of the awesome narrative. 102 00:06:03,139 --> 00:06:04,939 The Christians just saw it as a miracle. 103 00:06:04,939 --> 00:06:10,699 So by 1100 CE, European nobles held both Antioch and Jerusalem as Latin Christian kingdoms. 104 00:06:10,699 --> 00:06:13,860 I say Latin to make the point that there were lots of Christians living in these cities 105 00:06:13,860 --> 00:06:15,339 before the Crusaders arrived. 106 00:06:15,339 --> 00:06:19,779 They just weren't Catholic, they were Orthodox, a point that will become relevant shortly. 107 00:06:19,779 --> 00:06:23,240 We're going to skip the Second Crusade because it bores me and move on to the Third Crusade 108 00:06:23,240 --> 00:06:25,120 because it's the famous one. 109 00:06:25,120 --> 00:06:28,379 Broadly speaking, the Third Crusade was a European response to the emergence of a new 110 00:06:28,379 --> 00:06:31,540 Islamic power, neither Turkish nor Abbasid. 111 00:06:31,540 --> 00:06:37,860 The Egyptian, although he was really a Kurd, Sultan al-Malik al-Nasr Saleh al-Din Yusuf, 112 00:06:37,860 --> 00:06:39,939 better known to the West as Saladin. 113 00:06:39,939 --> 00:06:44,180 Saladin, having consolidated his power in Egypt, sought to expand by taking Damascus 114 00:06:44,180 --> 00:06:49,600 and eventually Jerusalem, which he did successfully because he was an amazing general. 115 00:06:49,600 --> 00:06:53,459 And then the loss of Jerusalem caused Pope Gregory VIII to call for a third crusade. 116 00:06:53,459 --> 00:06:55,939 Three of the most important kings in Europe answered the call. 117 00:06:55,939 --> 00:07:01,519 Philip, cowardly schemer II of France, Richard Lionheart I of England, and Frederick I of 118 00:07:01,519 --> 00:07:05,279 am going to drown anticlimactically on the journey while trying to bathe in a river, 119 00:07:05,279 --> 00:07:10,459 Barbarossa, of the not-holy, not-Roman, and not-imperial Holy Roman Empire." 120 00:07:10,459 --> 00:07:14,120 Both Richard and Saladin were great generals who earned the respect of their troops, and 121 00:07:14,120 --> 00:07:18,699 while from the European perspective the Crusade was a failure because they didn't take Jerusalem, 122 00:07:18,699 --> 00:07:23,180 it did radically change crusading forever by making Egypt a target. 123 00:07:23,180 --> 00:07:27,300 Richard understood that his best chance to take Jerusalem involved first taking Egypt, 124 00:07:27,300 --> 00:07:31,180 but he couldn't convince any crusaders to join him because Egypt had a lot less religious 125 00:07:31,180 --> 00:07:32,939 value to Christians than Jerusalem. 126 00:07:32,939 --> 00:07:36,100 So Richard was forced to call off the Crusade early, but if he had just hung around until 127 00:07:36,100 --> 00:07:39,399 Easter of 1192, he would have seen Saladin die. 128 00:07:39,399 --> 00:07:42,879 And then Richard probably could have fulfilled all his crusading dreams, but you know, then 129 00:07:42,879 --> 00:07:44,620 we wouldn't have needed the Fourth Crusade. 130 00:07:44,620 --> 00:07:48,199 Although crusading continued through the 14th century, mostly with an emphasis on North 131 00:07:48,199 --> 00:07:52,660 Africa and not the Holy Land, the Fourth Crusade is the last one we'll focus on because it 132 00:07:52,660 --> 00:07:53,660 was the crazy one. 133 00:07:53,660 --> 00:07:55,160 Let's go to the Thought Bubble. 134 00:07:55,160 --> 00:07:59,420 So a lot of people volunteered for the Fourth Crusade, more than 35,000, and the generals 135 00:07:59,420 --> 00:08:03,040 didn't want to march them all the way across Anatolia because they knew from experience 136 00:08:03,040 --> 00:08:08,600 that it was a dangerous and b hot. So they decided to go by boat, which necessitated 137 00:08:08,600 --> 00:08:12,699 the building of the largest naval fleet Europe had seen since the Roman Empire. The Venetians 138 00:08:12,699 --> 00:08:18,660 built 500 ships, but then only 11,000 crusaders actually made it down to Venice because like, 139 00:08:18,660 --> 00:08:23,220 oh, I meant to go, but I had a thing come up, etc. There wasn't enough money to pay 140 00:08:23,220 --> 00:08:27,959 for those boats, so the Venetians made the crusaders a deal. Help us capture the rebellious 141 00:08:27,959 --> 00:08:31,839 city of Zara and will ferry you to Anatolia." 142 00:08:31,839 --> 00:08:36,200 This was a smidge problematic, crusading-wise, because Zara was a Christian city, but the 143 00:08:36,200 --> 00:08:41,200 Crusaders agreed to help, resulting in the Pope excommunicating both them and the Venetians. 144 00:08:41,200 --> 00:08:46,000 Then, after the Crusaders failed to take Zara and were still broke, a would-be Byzantine 145 00:08:46,000 --> 00:08:50,940 emperor named Alexius III promised the Crusaders that he would pay them if they helped him 146 00:08:50,940 --> 00:08:57,379 out, so the excommunicated Catholic Crusaders fought on behalf of the Orthodox Alexius, 147 00:08:57,379 --> 00:09:01,179 soon became emperor in Constantinople. But it took Alexius a while to come up with the 148 00:09:01,179 --> 00:09:04,860 money he'd promised the Crusaders, so they were waiting around in Constantinople, and 149 00:09:04,860 --> 00:09:09,620 then Alexius was suddenly dethroned by the awesomely named Mortsophilus, leaving the 150 00:09:09,620 --> 00:09:12,679 Crusaders stuck in Constantinople with no money. 151 00:09:12,679 --> 00:09:16,679 Christian warriors couldn't very well sack the largest city in Christendom, could they? 152 00:09:16,679 --> 00:09:20,480 Well it turns out they could, and boy did they. They took all the wealth they could 153 00:09:20,480 --> 00:09:25,000 find, killed and raped Christians as they went, stole the statues of horses that now 154 00:09:25,000 --> 00:09:30,299 adorned St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice and retook exactly none of the Holy Land. 155 00:09:30,299 --> 00:09:33,860 Thanks Thought Bubble. So you'd think this disaster would discredit the whole notion 156 00:09:33,860 --> 00:09:38,139 of crusading, right? No. Instead, it legitimized the idea that crusading didn't have to be 157 00:09:38,139 --> 00:09:42,000 about pilgrimage, that any enemies of the Catholic Church were fair game. Also, the 158 00:09:42,000 --> 00:09:46,840 Fourth Crusade pretty much doomed the Byzantine Empire, which never really recovered. Constantinople, 159 00:09:46,840 --> 00:09:51,940 a shadow of its former self, was conquered by the Turks in 1453. So ultimately, the Crusades 160 00:09:51,940 --> 00:09:56,360 Crusades were a total failure at establishing Christian kingdoms in the Holy Land long term. 161 00:09:56,360 --> 00:10:00,759 And with the coming of the Ottomans, the region remained solidly Muslim, as it mostly is today. 162 00:10:00,759 --> 00:10:04,200 And the Crusades didn't really open up lines of communication between the Christian and 163 00:10:04,200 --> 00:10:07,620 Muslim worlds, because those lines of communication were already open. 164 00:10:07,620 --> 00:10:11,360 Plus, most historians now agree that the Crusades didn't bring Europe out of the Middle Ages 165 00:10:11,360 --> 00:10:15,879 by offering it contact with the superior intellectual accomplishments of the Islamic world. 166 00:10:15,879 --> 00:10:18,179 In fact, they were a tremendous drain on Europe's resources. 167 00:10:18,179 --> 00:10:22,299 For me, the Crusades matter because they remind us that the medieval world was fundamentally 168 00:10:22,299 --> 00:10:23,519 different from ours. 169 00:10:23,519 --> 00:10:27,720 The men and women who took up the cross believed in the sacrality of their work in a way that 170 00:10:27,720 --> 00:10:30,179 we often can't even conceive of today. 171 00:10:30,179 --> 00:10:34,360 And when we focus so much on the heroic narrative or the anti-imperialist narrative or all the 172 00:10:34,360 --> 00:10:38,980 political infighting, we can lose sight of what the Crusades must have meant to the Crusaders. 173 00:10:38,980 --> 00:10:43,700 How that journey from pilgrimage to holy war transformed their faith and their lives. 174 00:10:43,700 --> 00:10:48,019 And ultimately, that exercise in empathy is the coolest thing about studying history. 175 00:10:48,019 --> 00:10:49,019 Thanks for watching. 176 00:10:49,019 --> 00:10:50,019 We'll see you next week. 177 00:10:50,019 --> 00:10:52,340 Crash Course is produced and directed by Stan Muller. 178 00:10:52,340 --> 00:10:54,240 Our script supervisor is Danica Johnson. 179 00:10:54,240 --> 00:10:57,480 Our graphics team is Thought Bubble and the show is written by my high school history 180 00:10:57,480 --> 00:10:59,379 teacher Raoul Meyer and myself. 181 00:10:59,379 --> 00:11:01,639 If you enjoyed today's video, don't forget to like and favorite it. 182 00:11:01,639 --> 00:11:04,340 Also, you can follow us on Twitter or at Facebook. 183 00:11:04,340 --> 00:11:05,639 There are links in the video info. 184 00:11:05,639 --> 00:11:07,539 Last week's Phrase of the Week was Ali Frazier. 185 00:11:07,539 --> 00:11:11,399 You can guess at this week's Phrase of the Week or suggest future ones in comments where 186 00:11:11,399 --> 00:11:15,139 you can also ask questions that our team of historians will endeavor to answer. 187 00:11:15,139 --> 00:11:16,139 Thanks for watching. 188 00:11:16,139 --> 00:11:18,840 I want to apologize to my prudish fans for leaving both buttons unbuttoned, and as we 189 00:11:18,840 --> 00:11:23,659 say in my hometown, don't forget to be awesome.