The Crusades and the Near East

by Kostick, Conor

  Although the Church preached peace, the practical outcome was war.

  In principle, the Holy War against the infidel allowed for no mercy for the vanquished enemy. The preachers described a situation of victory or death.16 As they did not expect any mercy from their enemy, the crusaders saw no reason to show them mercy. Christian chroniclers described with proud relish bloody victories that included butchering and looting the defeated.17

  On the other hand, Western Christianity had a long tradition of internal peacemaking by treaties and of conflict resolution accompanied by ceremonial gestures, such as satisfactio and deditio.18 Therefore, in facing actual problems of peacemaking – accepting the capitulation of a besieged city, signing a ceasefire 231

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  with a city willing to pay tribute to be left in peace, and so on – the crusaders did not encounter a totally unknown situation. Although, ideologically, they saw no need to make peace with the enemy, when they found it profitable to do so, they had in store an arsenal of rituals and usages that had developed in Europe for intra-Christian peace and conflict resolution. Thus, to some extent, like their Muslim foes, the peace-loving Christians felt there was no need to explain the Holy War called by the pope; it was peace that needed a pretext and rationalization.

  However, in contrast to the Muslim world, for Christianity, it was the idea of Holy War that was new and placed the crusaders in a position in which peacemaking with the infidel was not seen as an option, whereas the notions of peace and of the need for treaty-making were well known.

  In addressing the question of treaty-making under such circumstances we must remember that the leaders of the First Crusade were not just charged with religious zeal to free the Holy Land from what they saw as its unlawful inhabitants; they were also down-to-earth military leaders governed by realistic strategic considerations. Therefore, when approached by an enemy willing to surrender under favourable conditions, or proposing a pact that might seem expedient or as forwarding their main goal, it seems that the crusaders’ problem was not so much one of overcoming religious or ideological qualms but one of language – cultural language. The main difficulty was to find a mechanism acceptable to both cultures to ensure that both sides would trust and keep an agreement. Not just military, the Muslim–Christian encounter has been rightly defined as one of negotiating cultures.19 It is the story of these negotiations, in sharp contrast to their hostile ideology, which I seek to tell here.

  The starting point for consideration of the details of the peacemaking processes is naturally the agreements themselves, their number, dates and terms. Using mainly Arabic sources, Taeko Nakamura charted a list of seventy-two treaties between 1097 and 1145, a period in which the Franks were dominant, ending with their first serious territorial loss, the fall of Edessa.20 More recently, my student Shmuel Nussbaum examined the Latin and French sources in addition and arrived at a table of 109 treaties in the 1097 to 1291 period.21 Although there is a large degree of overlap, by combining both tables and consulting the sources, I arrived at an approximate total of 120 treaties over the two-century period, but with negotiations failing in 11 cases, the final total is 109. The calculation is problematic, because treaties were often renewed and thus the same treaty is counted twice; on the other hand, sometimes negotiations failed and did not in fact end in agreement, although the sources may describe the stages as if they were part of a treaty. But even if the number of treaties is not sufficiently exact for statistical analysis, it suffices for a general impression of the balance of power and to prove that, notwithstanding ideologies of crusade and jihad, treaties were a regular phenomenon in the Latin East. Figure 10.1 shows the balance of power that emerges from comparison of the percentage of initiatives for peace as described in the literary sources, based on Nussbaum’s findings.

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  90

  Muslim initiatives

  80

  Crusader/Frank initiatives

  70

  60

  egtane 50rceP

  40

  30

  20

  10

  0

  1098–1124

  1127–92

  1193–1250

  1252–90

  Years

  Figure 10.1 The pattern of initiative-taking in peace treaties between Muslims and Christians, 1098–1290

  Note: Treaties where the sources do not specify who asked for peace are not included.

  1098–1124

  During the first two decades of the principality of Antioch’s history (1098–1128) the Muslim powers were forced to cultivate a generally submissive and conciliatory relationship with the Franks. The treaties reached included clauses setting tribute payments to the Christians and were, according to Thomas Asbridge, built on the eleventh-century Iberian precedent of the so-called Taifa states and their tributary status, known to at least some of the crusaders.22 For the Muslim side, this situation was familiar from its relations with the Byzantine Empire. Asbridge sees the difference in willingness to make peace not just as one of political power, but of general outlook:

  It is worth noting that the Latins of Antioch did not share their neighbours’ willingness to negotiate or purchase peace in times of crisis. When the principality faced disaster in 1105 or 1119, the Franks did not appear to have even tried to negotiate, relying instead upon military force, risking battle even when they lacked resources and manpower.23

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  But when the Muslim side showed willingness to submit to crusader rule, this was usually accepted, notwithstanding the ideal of total war. As the balance of power during the first decade of the Latin kingdom and the Syrian principalities was usually in favour of the Franks, treaties, both of tribute and condominium, were signed and implemented.

  Thus, during this period of overwhelming crusader superiority over the Muslim principalities, we find a minority of Frankish requests for agreements with the Muslims, only 15 per cent of a total of 33 requests attested in the literature, as opposed to Muslim initiation of 46 per cent of the agreements.24

  1127–92

  With the unification of Syria under Zengi, Nur al-Din and Saladin, the religious slogan of jihad was used as a power-enhancing mechanism to forward their political aims. The gradual unification of Muslim territories, the fall of Edessa in 1144, and the ascendancy of jihad have been identified as points of decline on the Christian side.25 This period saw a shift in the balance of power from crusader superiority until its great defeat at Hattin. The Franks now had to learn to accept that the shoe could be on the other foot. By then, though, a process of acculturation had taught them to accept elements of Eastern usage, and, when necessary, to ask for peace. It is, however, illuminating to note William of Tyre’s negative reaction to the signing of a treaty placing them on an equal footing with their adversary, Saladin, in 1180, seven years before the great disaster at the Battle of Hattin: ‘The conditions were somewhat humiliating to us, for the truce was concluded on equal terms, with no reservations of importance on our part, a thing which is said never to have happened before.’26

  The Frankish historian and diplomat thought it permissible to make peace only when the Franks were the victors and found a status of equality humiliating.

  However, it seems inconceivable that the Franks had never been in a situation of equality, not to mention inferiority, before 1180. That such a shift in diplomatic balance is documented only at a rather late date may stem from the Muslim side’s ideological preference for demonstrating its need for a truce even when it was in fact not the weaker party. At the time Saladin’s propagandists depicted him as a leader who was pursuing jihad and was not making truces from a position of weakness; their explanation was that in this case he had economic motivations for agreeing to a truce. The historian and diplomat William of Tyre saw this shift in diplomatic protocol as a watershed, as marking a new period.

&nb
sp; During this period, enhanced Muslim military strength, due to unification under the leadership of Zengi, Nur al-Din and Saladin, is reflected in a reduction of the number of Muslim-initiated requests for agreements from 46 per cent in the previous period to 35 per cent.27 Note, however, that Saladin in fact fought more intra-Muslim wars to enhance his own rule in Egypt and Syria than jihad against the Franks, and it was his great victories at Hattin and Jerusalem that enabled his propagandists to paint him as the ideal Muslim ruler fighting only for the faith.28

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  1193–1250

  For the third period, during which the Franks ruled the coastal region and the Muslims ruled the internal region of the Holy Land, the balance of power was largely determined by shifts in internal Ayyubid politics and crusader attempts at incursion on Ayyubid lands, strengthened by crusades from the West.29 The tiny crusader kingdom did occasionally succeed in obtaining additional territory by treaty (especially from 1129 to 1144), but modern historians usually depict them as clearly inferior to the Ayyubids. The balanced number of peace-agreement-initiating requests seems to point to military parity,30 or a balance of diplomatic power that enabled the Franks to appear stronger than they were in reality. In general, both this and the preceding period were characterized by a relatively even number of ceasefire initiatives.

  1252–90

  During the period of the Mamluk sultanate, when the Muslims achieved ascendancy, and before the final defeat of the Latin kingdom, we find cynical use of agreements to push the Franks out of the Latin East. The overriding consideration was what would bring greater benefit: war or peace? Note, however, that the religious definition of muhadana made designation of practical needs an integral part of treaty formulation. The Muslim leader, even when he was the stronger party, would explicitly state the necessity that permitted him to seek peace, a convention the triumphant Baybars included in his treaties. During Baybars’ reign, when the Franks had to ask for peace time and again and were granted at most an unstable ceasefire, the diplomatic tone emphasized the inferior status of the Franks both in terms of territory and in terms of initiating and paying for the ceasefire . But even then it was necessary to mention the fidah – the return of captives by the Franks – because exchange or ransoming of captives was one of the legally accepted pretexts to end war.31 This period saw the highest proportion of Frankish-initiated requests for ceasefires: 77 per cent of a total of 26 requests.32

  This periodization of the two-century-long series of negotiations between Muslims and Franks is naturally arbitrary. In his book on crusader castles, which focuses on military encounters, Ronnie Ellenblum suggests a different scheme.

  Based on the frequency of hostilities, he divides the twelfth century into three stages: 1099–1115, 1116–67 and 1168–87.33 He sees the second period as one of Frankish military superiority over their Muslim neighbours, and accordingly as a period of relative security for the Franks. His third period includes the unification of Muslim forces under Nur al-Din and Saladin and the subsequent deterioration in Frankish security and, following William of Tyre, 1180–7 is considered a sub-period, one of constant pressure by Saladin on the Franks until their defeat at Hattin.34 Taking the treaties and peace negotiations as the criterion for periodization, one arrives at comparable but not similar results. As we have seen, William of Tyre, who was contemporary to the treaty of 1180 and well aware 235

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  of the military pressure Ellenblum sees as a watershed, still found equality in treaty negotiations to be novel and humiliating. He could not prophesy the fall at Hattin, but still ended his book on a gloomy note, expressing fear for the future.35

  He clearly did not see the 1167–80 period as one of inferior Frankish status.

  But whatever scheme one adopts, the data clearly demonstrate a correlation between military–political shifts in the balance of power and requests for ceasefires with the underdog generally seeking cessation of hostilities. Whereas the first and last periods’ results are as expected, the state of near equilibrium characterizing the two middle periods does not seem to fit the modern evaluation of the balance of power. With hindsight, the second period is usually seen as one of sharp decline on the Frankish side, and the third period as one of clear Muslim supremacy.

  Apparently, in contemporary eyes, the picture was different or perhaps was portrayed differently for religious or ideological reasons. Because Muslim ideology accepted a truce only when absolutely necessary,36 the Muslims employed formal wording that placed them as the underdog long after they were in fact equal to, or even stronger than, the Franks. This might explain the discrepancy between the balance of power in the second half of the twelfth century as perceived by modern historians and as reflected by William of Tyre and statistical analysis.

  The political significance of who initiates the request for peace negotiations is emphasized by Baha al-Din’s description of the negotiations between Richard the Lionheart and Saladin’s representatives in 1192. According to the chronicler, the Muslim mediator al-Adil made a point of noting: ‘We did not make any request of you. It was you who asked us,’37 thereby marking the inferiority of the Latin side.

  Comparison of the treaties over the whole period points to some changes in the way agreements were reached over the course of the two-century period of coexistence. If initial contacts were characterized by oral agreements between the sides regarding surrender or lifting of a siege for monetary recompense, often emphasizing the gestures involved, towards the end of the period we find the sides drawing up formal written agreements, with fixed clauses defining the obligations assumed by each. As written treaties are sometimes mentioned during the earlier period too, they must have existed, even if they have not survived. But, more plausibly, the extant treaties from the thirteenth century prove that by then a mutual language had been agreed and a common diplomatic protocol had emerged.38

  Analysis of the treaties mentioned in literary sources also enables elicitation of the underlying reasons for initiation of ceasefire agreements, revealing that military issues were most prevalent. Other factors promoting Muslim–Frankish agreements were: the need for military cooperation in the face of some common enemy;39 renewal of expired agreements; economic or internal difficulties, such as lack of rainfall, the low level of the Nile, or the weakening of the regime by opposition forces; or, simply, the realization that no advantage would ensue from further conflict.40 Not surprisingly, a greater number of treaties is attested both for periods in which one side showed marked superiority and for periods of intensive warfare, making the renewal or signing of treaties a necessity.

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  Muslim willingness to enter into agreements was largely conditioned by the pragmatic or political needs of the rulers. In the early period, individual leaders of the local principalities acted in their own best interests, as seen from what reportedly motivated Shams al-Khilafa, the governor of Ascalon, who made a truce with Baldwin I in 1111: his being ‘more desirous of trading than of fighting and inclined to peaceful and friendly relations and the securing of the safety of travellers’.41 But whereas in Muslim sources this was viewed as a valid and even honourable pretext, William of Tyre felt that ceasing fighting for economic reasons indicated greed, and he castigated Amalric for his readiness to negotiate a treaty after the conquest of Bilbeis in 1169 because of the large tribute the Egyptians offered.42 However, this does not mean that the chronicler was unaware of the economic advantages of peace. In another famous diatribe William lamented the end of peace with Egypt:

  From a quiet state of peace [ quieto et tranquillo penitus status] into what turbulent and anxious condition has an immoderate desire for possessions plunged us! All the resources of Egypt and its immense wealth

  served our needs; the frontiers of our realm were safe on that side; there was no enemy to be feared on the south. The sea afforded a safe and

  peaceful
passage to those wishing to come to us. Our people could enter the territories of Egypt without fear and carry on commerce and trade under advantageous conditions. On their part, the Egyptians brought to the realm foreign riches and strange commodities unknown to us, were at once an advantage and an honour to us.43

  Although William admitted that peace had its sunnier sides, for him war was the honourable task of a chivalrous, fighting society. Nonetheless, even these fighting societies engaged in peaceful contacts, as we have seen. Notwithstanding the use of jihad to forward political aims under Zengi, Nur al-Din and Saladin, the Ayyubid period (the third period in Figure 10.1) saw many peaceful contacts with the Franks. 44 During the Mamluk period, however, we witness almost cynical use of agreements to push the Franks out of the Latin East. Although we have charted the shifting balance of power and changed historical circumstances in the Latin East as underlying the conventions of treaty-making, note that initiating negotiations is not always a clear-cut sign of objective military inferiority on the local scene, and that the global political situation, the real reason behind a diplomatic move, sometimes receives no mention in the treaty itself.

  Thus, for example, as Kedar has recently shown,45 Ayyubid willingness to extend the treaty with the Latin kingdom in 1204 and to cede Kafr Kanna and Nazareth to the Franks did not stem from the balance of power in the Holy Land itself, but rather from the rumours that had reached the East about the preparations for the Fourth Crusade in the West. It may well have seemed expedient for the Muslim side to make concessions to the Franks in order to prolong the ceasefire; concessions which perhaps later proved unnecessary.46 Thus the Fourth 237

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  Crusade impacted on the balance of power in the Holy Land even though most of its crusaders never landed in Acre.47

  Similarly, Ibn Wasil’s explanation that the Egyptian sultan al-Kamil had to cede Jerusalem to Christian rule in 1229 because he had promised it to Frederick II perhaps sounds like a shallow excuse for a move that seemed irrational to local Muslims in light of the imbalance between Frederick’s small military presence (and dwindling local backing) and Ayyubid resources.48 But to a Muslim leader, aware of the danger of Khwarizmian intervention in Syria and the Holy Land, as well as the still unstable division of the Ayyubid Empire between Saladin’s heirs, a treaty with the greatest lay power in Christendom might not have seemed so out-landish.49 The emperor’s naval superiority, grounded in the backing of the Sicilian navy, was not apparent on the local scene, but it was evident to an Egypt-based sultan who well remembered the Latin conquest of Damietta a decade earlier.50