The spur of Latin aggression
Saladin’s decision to launch an offensive against Frankish Palestine in autumn 1183 was not simply triggered by a desire to affirm his jihad credentials. To an extent, his attacks were also a retaliatory response to recent Latin aggression. In late 1182, during the sultan’s absence in Iraq, the Franks raided the regions surrounding Damascus and Bosra, retaking the Cave de Sueth.
To the south in Transjordan, Reynald of Châtillon initiated a more deliberately belligerent campaign; one for which he had been preparing, probably in concert with the king, for some two years. Saladin’s intelligence network had warned that the lord of Kerak was planning an attack, but the sultan wrongly assumed that this would focus upon the route across the Sinai linking Egypt and Damascus, and so tasked al-Adil to strengthen the fortifications at the key muster point of al-Arish. In fact, Reynald’s scheme was far bolder and more daring, even if it was, in strategic terms, less judicious. In late 1182 to early 1183, five galleys, constructed in sections at Kerak, were transported on camel-back to the Gulf of Aqaba, reassembled and launched on to the Red Sea. This was the first time in centuries that Christian ships had plied these waters. Reynald divided his fleet, with two vessels blockading the Muslim-held port of Aqaba, which he himself then attacked by land, and the remaining three galleys sent south, equipped with Arab navigators and manned by soldiers. Apparently, news of the extraordinary exploits of this small three-ship flotilla never reached the Franks. A sole Latin source recorded that, after their launch, ‘nothing was heard of them and nobody knows what became of them’, and, having inflicted some damage on Aqaba, Reynald returned home.
In the Muslim world, however, the shocking and unprecedented Red Sea expedition caused outrage. For weeks the three Christian galleys wreaked havoc upon the unsuspecting ports of Egypt and Arabia, harassing pilgrims and merchants, and threatening Islam’s spiritual heartland, the sacred cities of Mecca and Medina. It was even rumoured that the Christians intended to steal Muhammad’s body. Only when al-Adil portaged his own fleet from Cairo to the Red Sea were they hunted down. Forced to beach their vessels on the Arabian coast, the Christian crew fled into the desert, but, once cornered, 170 of them surrendered, probably in return for promises of safe conduct. In the event, however, their lives were not spared.
Informed of events while in Iraq, Saladin insisted that an example be made: officially, he argued that infidels who knew the paths to Islam’s holiest sites could not be allowed to live; in private, of course, he must have been only too conscious of an uncomfortable truth. At this very moment of infamous crisis he, the self-proclaimed champion of the faith, was absent, fighting fellow Muslims. Thus, despite al-Adil’s evident disquiet, the sultan demanded retribution for the ‘unparalleled enormity’ of the Latin prisoners’ crimes and, according to Arabic testimony, insisted that ‘the earth must be purged of their filth and the air of their breath’. Most of the captives were sent singly or in pairs to various cities and settlements across the Ayyubid realm and publicly executed, but two were held back for a still more ghastly fate. At the time of the next Hajj they were led to a site on the outskirts of Mecca, where traditionally livestock are offered for slaughter and their flesh given to feed the poor, and here the two unfortunate captives were butchered ‘like animals for sacrifice’ before a baying pilgrim throng. The defilement of Arabia had been punished and the sultan’s image as Islam’s resolute defender affirmed, but the bitter memory of the Franks’ scandalous Red Sea campaign endured, and its architect, Reynald of Châtillon, now became a despised figure of hate.56
A rising tide of conflict?
When Saladin’s attack on the kingdom of Jerusalem finally came in autumn 1183 it exposed profound weaknesses within Christian Palestine. That summer, Baldwin IV’s health again deteriorated. By this stage leprosy had already left his body in ruins, as ‘his sight failed and his extremities were covered in ulcerations so that he was unable to use either his hands or his feet’. No longer able to ride any distance, he had become accustomed to travelling upon a litter. Nonetheless, up to this point, William of Tyre attested that ‘although physically weak and impotent, yet mentally he was vigorous, and, far beyond his strength, he strove to hide his illness and to support the cares of the kingdom’. Now in 1183, however, he was seized by some form of secondary infection, and ‘attacked by [a] fever…he lost hope of life’. Unmanned by this infirmity, desperately fearful that Saladin would unleash a new attack yet wholly unsure where he would strike, the young king was in an appalling dilemma. Summoning his Jerusalemite forces, along with troops from Tripoli and Antioch, to assemble at Saffurya, he himself retired to Nazareth and temporarily passed executive power to his brother-in-law, the heir apparent, Guy of Lusignan.
As regent, Guy thus held the office of Frankish commander-in-chief when Saladin invaded Galilee in late September 1183. He stood at the head of one of the largest Frankish hosts ever assembled in Palestine–containing some 1,300 knights and 15,000 infantry–albeit one that was still dwarfed by the Muslim force. With little or no experience of directing such an army in the midst of full-blown warfare, Guy’s abilities were sure to be taxed, but by the measure of military science he did an effective, if unspectacular job. When Saladin once again pillaged Bethsan, Guy made an ordered advance, using infantry to screen his mounted knights while on the move, and, barring minor skirmishes, avoided committing to a hasty pitched battle. Hoping to tempt the Latins into breaking formation, Saladin withdrew north a short distance, but no pursuit was forthcoming and the two sides took up defensive positions within a mile of one another, near the village of Ayn Jalut. A stalemate held for nearly two weeks, despite efforts on the sultan’s part to provoke an attack, and in mid-October the Muslim army retreated across the Jordan. The Franks had survived the storm.
Throughout the campaign Guy followed the established principles of ‘crusader’ defensive strategy almost to the letter, maintaining troop discipline, seeking to limit enemy mobility by advancing to offer a threat, yet steering clear of risky confrontation. Yet, in spite of this cautious competence, he was roundly criticised by his rivals at court for allowing Saladin to raid the kingdom unchallenged, and chided for tentative timidity unbecoming of knightly culture. The reality was that, tactically sound as it might be, guarded inaction was rarely popular with Latin soldiers. Even established sovereigns and seasoned field commanders struggled to enforce orders that, on the face of it, appeared humiliating and cowardly–in 1115 Roger of Salerno had to threaten to blind his men to keep them in line, and, in the years to come, Richard the Lionheart would experience similar difficulties with troop control. Guy was an unproven general, newly risen to the regency, whose right to rule was open to question. What he needed most in autumn 1183 was a firm show of martial defiance, perhaps even a brazen military victory, to win over doubters and silence critics. At the very least, he had to demonstrate that he possessed the force of will to quell Jerusalem’s independent-minded aristocracy. In effect, by doing what was right for the defence of the realm, Guy did himself a grave disservice. It is not surprising that his political opponents seized upon this opportunity to besmirch his reputation.57
After a brief pause, in late October 1183 Saladin moved south into Transjordan to besiege Kerak. This was a more determined attack, for he came equipped with heavy siege weaponry, including a number of siege engines with which to assail the castle, but it was also a convenient opportunity to rendezvous with his brother al-Adil, who had travelled from Egypt to assume lordship over newly conquered Ayyubid territory in northern Syria. The sultan’s investment of Kerak also coincided, perhaps deliberately, with the celebration of a high-profile Frankish wedding between Humphrey IV of Toron and the king’s half-sister, Isabella, presided over by Reynald of Châtillon, his wife Stephanie of Milly and Isabella’s mother, Maria Comnena. Saladin may have had one eye on capturing such an eminent crop of Christian nobles, for their ransoms would prove a handsome boon.* A story later circulated that–even in
the midst of the siege–Lady Stephanie courteously sent food from the nuptial banquet out to the sultan, and that in return he promised not to bombard that part of the fortress occupied by the newly-weds. If there is any truth to this tale, which is not mentioned in the Muslim sources, then Saladin’s apparent gallantry may, in part, have been motivated by a desire to preserve the lives of such valuable hostages.
News of Kerak’s siege reached the Latin court in Jerusalem at a moment when the Franks were already ensnared in dispute. Against expectations, the leper king’s fever abated and a modicum of strength returned to Baldwin’s enfeebled frame. In the aftermath of the events at Ayn Jalut, he and Guy of Lusignan squabbled over rights to the realm and, perhaps with his mind poisoned by the views of Raymond III and the Ibelin brothers, the young monarch turned on Guy, rescinding his regency. Even as Kerak lay under threat, Baldwin convened a council to discuss the selection of a new heir and, in the end, the choice fell to Sibylla’s infant son by her first husband–the nephew and namesake of the king, Baldwin (V). On 20 November 1183, this five-year-old boy became heir designate, crowned and anointed as co-ruler in the Holy Sepulchre. Even William of Tyre had to admit that ‘the opinions of wise men over this great change were many and varied…for since both kings were hampered, one by disease and the other by youth, it was wholly useless’. The archbishop nonetheless made his own, thinly veiled, views apparent, concluding that this settlement had, at least, stifled any lingering hope harboured by the ‘entirely incompetent’ Guy of one day ascending to the throne.58
With this new arrangement sealed, Baldwin IV set out for Transjordan, hoping to relieve Kerak. In light of the king’s continued frailty, he probably had to be carried upon a litter, and Raymond of Tripoli was appointed as field commander of the Frankish army. Despite the Latins’ delayed reaction, Saladin had been unable to overcome Kerak’s expansive dry moat and, with the Christian host approaching, the sultan abandoned his siege on 4 December 1183. Overall, his attack had proved half-hearted and he was certainly unwilling to confront the Franks in open battle. The leper king was thus able to enter the desert fortress in the guise of a victorious saviour.
That winter an open rift developed between Baldwin IV and Guy of Lusignan, and throughout the first half of 1184 the Latin kingdom remained in a weakened state of disunity. Saladin, however, focused upon the diplomatic struggle for Mosul and made no move to threaten the Franks until late summer. Around 22 August he initiated another siege of Kerak, but after the leper king mustered what remained of his waning strength to assemble a relief force the sultan retreated once again, establishing a well-defended camp some miles to the north. When the Latins made no effort to attack he moved on. After prosecuting a short-lived raiding campaign up the Jordan valley and a brief attack on Nablus, Saladin retired to Damascus.
Throughout his two expeditions against the kingdom of Jerusalem, in 1183 and again in 1184, Saladin pursued a strategy of cautious aggression, continuing to pressure and test the Franks, taking minimal risks and avoiding battle when the enemy refused to fight on his terms and at a site of his choosing. These encounters have often been presented as measured, gradually escalating steps on the path to all-out invasion, but they might equally be interpreted as tentative jabs in a struggle that was, as yet, of only secondary importance to the sultan. It is notable that, throughout the early 1180s, Saladin’s jihadi offensives against the Latins were focused, almost exclusively, upon two specific regions which were of strategic, political and economic significance for the Ayyubid realm: Transjordan, the crucial land route linking Egypt and Damascus, which also served as a major thoroughfare for commercial caravans and pilgrim traffic to Arabia; and Galilee, the Latin-held region which posed the greatest threat to Damascus.
The truth is that, in this period, Saladin showed no determination to prosecute a decisive invasion of Palestine and made no dogged attempt to confront the Franks in open battle. In real terms, Latin dominion of Jerusalem remained unchallenged. The sultan did wage war against Outremer, but his efforts seem, at least in part, to have been driven by the need publicly to substantiate his declared dedication to jihad–on occasion his attacks appear almost as token gestures. Looking back with the benefit of hindsight, it is evident that, because of the Franks’ extreme vulnerability, a committed Ayyubid offensive against the kingdom of Jerusalem might have brought Saladin outright victory, particularly in 1183–4. In the sultan’s defence, however, it is far from certain that he actually knew the true, crippling depth of dissension and weakness to which the Christians had been brought.
It is also important to recognise that, while Arabic and Latin chronicles and biographies, concerned with political and military events, convey a sense of mounting tension between Christian Outremer and Ayyubid Islam in the 1180s, other contemporary sources offer a different perspective. The Iberian Muslim pilgrim and traveller Ibn Jubayr passed through the Holy Land in this precise period, joining a Muslim trade caravan from Damascus to Acre in autumn 1184 and witnessing a degree of cross-cultural contact and coexistence that he found extraordinary:
One of the astonishing things talked of is that though the fires of discord burn between these two parties, Muslim and Christian, two armies of them may meet and dispose themselves in battle array, and yet Muslim and Christian travellers will come and go between them without interference. In this connection we saw Saladin [depart] with all the Muslim troops to lay siege to the fortress of Kerak, one of the greatest Christian strongholds lying astride the road [to Mecca and Medina] and hindering the overland passage of the Muslims…
This sultan invested it, and put it to sore straits, and long the siege lasted, but still the caravans passed successively from Egypt to Damascus, going through the lands of the Franks without impediment from them. In the same way the Muslims continuously journeyed from Damascus to Acre [through Frankish territory], and likewise not one of the Christian merchants was stopped or hindered [in Muslim territory].
This fascinating and revealing evidence suggests that a pulsing current of commerce continued unabated throughout these years, connecting the two worlds of Christendom and Islam. Ibn Jubayr’s testimony seems to belie any notion of these two rival powers being pitted against one another in a vehement and implacable conflict. If his vision of the Levantine world was representative–and it has to be remembered that Ibn Jubayr was an outsider who spent only a few months in the region–then Saladin’s apparent failure urgently to prioritise jihad perhaps becomes more understandable.59
Whatever the true depth of enmity between Islam and the Franks, over the next year the crisis of leadership within the kingdom of Jerusalem deepened. In autumn 1184 Baldwin IV’s condition once again deteriorated and it eventually became clear that he was dying. Despite his own continued misgivings about Raymond of Tripoli’s loyalty, Baldwin appointed the count as regent–the only realistic alternative for the post being Reynald of Châtillon, who was closely engaged in the defence of Transjordan. Around mid-May 1185 Baldwin IV died at the age of just twenty-three, and was buried alongside his father Amalric in the Holy Sepulchre. For much of his troubled reign Baldwin struggled with a nightmarish predicament–aware that he was incapable of ruling effectively, yet unable to secure an acceptable replacement or to orchestrate a successful transfer of power, even as the threat of Muslim invasion increased. Throughout he showed great physical courage in enduring his disability. Even so, he failed to contain or control the ambitions of his most powerful subjects and suffered significant lapses of judgement, most notably in his decision to withdraw his support for Guy of Lusignan in late 1183. He must be remembered as a tragic figure–one who strove to defend the Holy Land, yet presided over a decade of perilous decline.
TRANSFORMATION
In 1185, Saladin once again turned his attention to the subjection of Muslim Mesopotamia. Renewed attempts to reach a negotiated settlement with Mosul in early 1184 had failed, even as the sultan continued to extend his influence in the region, winning the support of neighbou
ring Iraqi settlements through a mixture of intimidation, persuasion and outright bribery. By 1185, however, it was clear that a second expedition beyond the Euphrates would be necessary if Ayyubid authority was truly to be imposed, and Mosul bent to his will. With Syria and Egypt afforded a margin of protection by a one-year truce agreed with Raymond of Tripoli that spring, Saladin set out east from Aleppo with a large army in the company of Isa and al-Mashtub, and they were later joined by Keukburi.
Still concerned to uphold his image as a defender and unifier of Muslims, Saladin dispatched envoys to Baghdad to justify this campaign, drawing upon a now familiar array of allegations. At first, it seemed that Izz al-Din of Mosul would be willing to negotiate a settlement, but his attempts at diplomacy proved desultory and were probably designed simply to stymie Ayyubid military impetus. Before long, the sultan committed to a second siege of Mosul through the scorching summer. This proved to be a largely uneventful affair–indeed, progress was so slow that Saladin even considered a wildly ambitious plan to break Mosuli resistance by diverting the mighty River Tigris away from the city, cutting its water supply. In August he moved north to mop up easier conquests in the Diyar Bakr region of the Upper Tigris and by autumn most of Mesopotamia’s Muslim potentates had either been won over to his cause or forced into submission. As yet, Izz al-Din remained unbowed, but his resistance appears to have been ebbing.
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