Baldwin I of Jerusalem

“ Baldwin endeavoured to console them by his discourses: “My dear companions,” said he to them, “you who have suffered so many evils and braved so many perils, why do you allow yourselves to be overcome by grief? Remember that you are still in the territories of the Saracens, and that you stand in need of all your customary courage. Consider that you only lose in me a single man, and that you have among you several warriors who surpass me in skill. Think of nothing but of returning victorious to Jerusalem, and of defending the heritage of Christ. ”

“ The figure of Godfrey is clouded with legends and miraculous stories. We hardly seem to see, through the mist of years, the features of the short-lived David of the new kingdom. But that of Baldwin, the new Solomon of Jerusalem, stands out clear and distinct. This king, calm, cold of speech, self-reliant, like Saul, a head taller than anybody else, who will not be seen abroad without a mantle upon his shoulders, who lets his beard grow, and looks out upon the world with those keen bright eyes of his, and that strong projecting upper lip, is indeed a man, and not a shadow of history. ”

“ In a reign of thirteen years, Baldwin II. extended the kingdom of Jerusalem to its widest limits. His reign is marked by almost incessant fighting in northern Syria. In 1119, after the defeat and death of Roger of Antioch, he defeated the amirs of Mardin and Damascus at Danith; in subsequent years he extended his sway to the very gates of Aleppo. In 1123 he was captured by Balak of Mardin, and confined in Kharput with Joscelin, his successor in the county of Edessa, who had been captured in the previous year. ”

“ It was the first defeat the Christians had experienced since their arrival in Palestine. As it was confidently said that Baldwin had been slain at the taking of Ramla, this loss added greatly to the general consternation. The great bell of Jerusalem announced the approach and invasion of the Saracens. The priests, the monks, the pilgrims, clothed in sackcloth and barefooted, went in procession through the streets of the holy city; women and children filled the churches, and with tears in their eyes and uplifted hands implored the mercy of Heaven. ”

“ He was succeeded in 1118 by du Puy, while Baldwin II was the Latin King of Jerusalem. The Hospital had been recognized by the Archbishop of Caesarea in 1112, and had widely extended its sphere of usefulness. It was King Baldwin who was anxious to stamp upon the Order a military character, similar to that conferred upon the Order of the Temple in 1130. This was natural since the kingdom was isolated, surround [Pg 141] ed by fanatic enemies and always beset by and in danger from them. ”

“ Two bishops, who were with Baldwin, then advised him to implore the mercy of Heaven; and, at their desire, the king of Jerusalem alighted from his horse, fell on his knees, confessed, and received absolution. Springing to his feet, he resumed his arms, and rushed upon the enemy at the head of his two remaining battalions. The Christian warriors fought like lions, animated by their war-cry “Victory or Death!” Baldwin had attached a white kerchief to the point of his lance, and thus pointed out the road to carnage. ”

“ The reigning king of Jerusalem at this moment was Baldwin IV, grandson of that Fulk V, Count of Anjou, whom we saw, more than fifty years before this date, handing over his French possessions to his son Geoffrey, newly wedded to Matilda the Empress, and departing for the Holy Land to marry its heiress and become its king. Baldwin was therefore the first cousin of Henry II, and it was not unnatural that his kingdom should turn in the midst of the difficulties that surrounded it to the head of the house of Anjou now so powerful in the west. ”

“ THE CHRISTMAS CORONATION In the year of our Lord 1101, on the very birthday of the Saviour and at the birthplace of the King of kings, Bethlehem is to witness the most gorgeous, striking scene in all its varied and dramatic history; for the long, cruel centuries of Moslem domination are over at last, the banners of the victorious Crusaders now float proudly above the ramparts of Jerusalem, and the mighty Baldwin, Count of Flanders by inheritance and Prince of Edessa by right of conquest, is to be crowned this Christmas Day the first Christian king of Palestine. ”

“ Once defeated, the prestige of the conquerors was gone. And when the Mohammedans managed to recover their old self-confidence, the kingdom of Jerusalem was as good as lost, and its destruction was only a matter of time.
Baldwin’s chief difficulty was not in raising armies, for there were always plenty of men to be got among the pilgrims, but in paying an army when he had raised it. The pilgrims brought daily large sums in offerings to the Church of the Sepulchre, to which the patriarch acted officially as treasurer. ”

“ The growth of Baldwin’s kingdom, as it was suggested above, owed more to the interests of Italian traders than it did to crusading zeal. In 1100, indeed, it might appear that a new Crusade from the West, which the capture of Antioch in 1098 had begun, and the conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 had finally set in motion, was destined to achieve great things for the nascent kingdom. ”

“ And he strove to free himself from the stranger's grasp.
"THOU THE KING!" HE EXCLAIMED; "THOU THAT BALDWIN OF JERUSALEM WHOM MEN DO CALL THE HERO OF THE JORDAN!"
But the palmer caught him round the neck with a strong embrace. "What warrant, lad?" he exclaimed heartily. "Why, the warrant of a brother, good my lord. Thousands of leagues have I travelled to seek and succor thee. Little brother of Jerusalem, here am I known only as a gray palmer at the holy shrines, but from the Rhine to Ratisbon and Rome am I hailed as Conrad, King of Germany and Holy Roman Emperor!" ”

“ The defection of Baldwin was not ultimately detrimental to the crusades, since his kingdom made a barrier on the north and east against the Turkish and Saracenic hordes, and prevented their interfering more readily with the Christians’ march upon Jerusalem, of which Baldwin himself was one day to be king. ”

“ KING BALDWIN II.—KING FOULQUE—KING BALDWIN III.—EXPLOITS OF ZENGHI—RISE OF NOURREDIN. Baldwin du Bourg was elected to the vacant throne of Jerusalem, Eustace, brother of Godfrey, having declined to contest it, magnanimously saying to his partisans, “Not by me shall a stumbling-block enter into the Lord’s kingdom.” Baldwin II. was well advanced in years, experienced in council and in field, having been one of the companions of Godfrey in the first crusade, and during the reign of Baldwin I. having held the government of Edessa. ”

“ Taking with him a few knights, the king went himself and overran the country sword in hand. Some of them escaped by flight, leaving their flocks and herds behind; some buried themselves in the forests; some were made slaves; and some were mercilessly slaughtered. The booty in cattle and horses was immense, and Baldwin found, by this act of iniquity, a means of paying off, at least, the most pressing of his creditors. But his subsequent misfortunes 292were attributed to this perfidy, the worst which a Christian king of Jerusalem had as yet displayed. ”

“ They and their fathers for ages had believed that a certain visible system had been established on earth by God's own hand, and sustained by His almighty power. It seemed to them as if the very foundations of the universe were shaken, when their temple, their priesthood, their glorious Jerusalem, their beautiful fertile Palestine, vanished like a dream, and left them the beggars and outcasts of mankind. ”

“ BALDWIN IV., the son of Amalric I. by his first wife Agnes, ruled in Jerusalem from 1174 to 1183, when he had his nephew Baldwin crowned in his stead. Educated by William of Tyre, Baldwin IV. came to the throne at the early age of thirteen; and thus the kingdom came under the regency of Raymund II. of Tripoli. Happily for the kingdom whose king was a child and a leper, the attention of Saladin was distracted for several years by an attempt to wrest from the sons of Nureddin the inheritance of their father—an attempt partially successful in 1174, but only finally realized in 1183. ”

“ In the seven years of his brother’s reign, Baldwin de Courtenai had not emerged from a state of childhood, and the barons of Romania felt the strong necessity of placing the sceptre in the hands of a man and a hero. The veteran king of Jerusalem might have disdained the name and office of regent; they agreed to invest him for life with the title and prerogatives of emperor, on the sole condition that Baldwin should marry his second daughter, and succeed at a mature age to the throne of Constantinople. ”

“ But from Hungary to Syria disaster followed disaster, and of the thousands of knights and spearmen who entered the Crusade only a miserable remnant reached Palestine, led on by Conrad, Emperor of Germany, and Louis, King of France. The land they came to succor was full of jealousy and feud, and the brave boy king alone gave them joyful welcome. But young Baldwin had pluck and vigor enough to counterbalance a host of laggards.
"Knights and barons of Jerusalem," he said, as he and the pilgrim emperor entered the audience-hall, "'t is for us to act. Lay we aside all paltry jealousy and bickering. ”

“ Where the lamps are most numerous and the light from the windows of the transepts shines brightest, Baldwin of Flanders kneels before the great altar and bows his proud head in a semblance of humility as the jeweled crown is placed upon his brow by the noble Daimbert, archbishop of Pisa, patriarch of Jerusalem and temporal lord of many a broad fief and populous village in Judea.
Surely now the veteran warriors chant again that martial Psalm with which they have advanced so often to the assault of infidel strongholds, “Let God arise, let His [Pg 112] enemies be scattered.” ”

“ During the reign of Baldwin II (1118-1131) the Crusader states reached their approximate maximum, and all three of the northern principalities — Tripoli, Antioch and Edessa — owed nominal allegiance to the king of Jerusalem. Their remarkable success must have inspired the Franks with con- fidence and an optimistic outlook. But in reality the pro- spects were not so bright. Except in the very north and south, the area was limited to the littoral — a narrow Christian territory set against a dark background of Islam. Not a town was more than a day's march from the enemy. ”

“ And with Godfrey, as we have said before, vanish for ever those shadowy figures of saints and dead bishops who were wont to fight with the army. King Baldwin believed in no saints’ help, either in battle or in the world, and did not look for any. Jerusalem, henceforth, has to get along without many miracles. For the appearance of saints and other ghostly auxiliaries is like the appearance of fairies—they come not, when men believe in them no more ”

“ Having spent some time in Italy and taken part in the fighting on the way to the Holy Land, he became chaplain to Baldwin, who was chosen king of Jerusalem in 1100, and lived with Baldwin at Edessa and then at Jerusalem. ”

“ The Turks inhabiting that city then, who were the first instigators of outrage against the Franks, were the first to give way. Thus, Baldwin, coming safely to Edessa, found nothing to disappoint his expectations: for being received with surpassing favour by the prince, and soon after, on his being killed by his faithless citizens, obtaining the lawful sovereignty of the city, for the whole time during which the Franks were labouring at Antioch and at Jerusalem, he was not free from hostilities; worsting his opponents in repeated attacks. ”

“ They showed us where the great Godfrey and his brother Baldwin, the first Christian Kings of Jerusalem, once lay buried by that sacred sepulchre they had fought so long and so valiantly to wrest from the hands of the infidel. But the niches that had contained the ashes of these renowned crusaders were empty. Even the coverings of their tombs were gone—destroyed by devout members of the Greek Church, because Godfrey and Baldwin were Latin princes, and had been reared in a Christian faith whose creed differed in some unimportant respects from theirs. ”

“ In the first book of the Jerusalem Delivered, when the Eternal turns his eyes on the Crusaders, he sees in Edessa the ambitious Baldwin, who only aspires to human grandeurs, with which he is solely occupied. ”

“ Like human gossamers; they perish when
They fade, and are forgot in worldly ken.” Baldwin did not hesitate one moment to exchange his rich and luxurious principality of Edessa for the greater dignity, with all its thorns and cares, of the crown of Jerusalem. He made over his power to his cousin Baldwin Du Bourg, and himself, with a little army of four hundred knights and one thousand foot, started on his perilous journey, through a country swarming with enemies. He got on very smoothly, despite the paucity of his numbers, until he reached Beyrout. ”

“ Tancred, the bravest, if not the best, of all, was to follow within a very few years, and Baldwin found himself for the last six years of his reign without a single one of the old princes, except his cousin, Baldwin du Bourg, to quarrel with, to help, or to look to for help. And, still more to complicate matters, the crusade, which the ambition of Bohemond had directed against the Greek Empire for his own purposes, had alienated the sympathies, such as they were, and the assistance of the Greek Empire, and deprived the Christian Kingdom of every hope from that quarter. ”