By Sword and Fire

by Sean McGlynn

  Hervey’s response is more utilitarian, direct and traditional in terms of military attitudes, but its simplicity should not detract from its practicality. He mocks Raymond’s faint-hearted stance: ‘As if any foreign country is to be conquered by acts of mercy rather than by fire and slaughter!’ He makes his own case forcefully. Enemy races did not submit to clemency but ‘… rather bowed their necks in submission under the compulsion of armed might and terror bred of cruel treatment. While peoples are still proud and rebellious they must be subdued by all possible means and clemency must take a back seat.’ He accuses Raymond of ‘criminal compassion’ and being ‘bent on increasing the number of enemies’. He moves on to raise the question of practical personal safety more explicitly than Raymond: ‘We have now within our camp a greater number of our enemy than of our own people.’ Thus they were not only surrounded by danger on all sides outside the camp, but also within it. ‘What happens if these men free themselves … and make a sudden rush to seize our arms?’ Playing on his men’s fears, he adds that had they been the ones caught, the Irish would not have given them any quarter. He concludes with the classic medieval military rationale that lies behind the majority of atrocities committed in war during the Middle Ages: he urges that the prisoners be executed so ‘that the deaths of these men may inspire fear in others, and as a result of the example we make of them this lawless and rebellious people may shrink from engaging our forces in the future.’

  Unsurprisingly, Hervey won the argument: the experienced warriors listening to him understood full well the dreadful underlying principle of the application of terror. The message sent out by the executions was unequivocal; that the ‘discomfited’ Irish understood it is confirmed by the author of The Song of Dermot and the Earl.

  The absolute accuracy of the exchange and its undoubted fabrications with classical allusions to Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great has to be questioned; what matters is that it reveals the medieval mindset not to be one of unremitting and universal advocacy of violence. Both sides of the debate offer sensible and practical thinking. That Raymond lost it does not automatically weaken his contention that self-preservation merits clemency: on occasion the same case was made successfully in other medieval conflicts. That Hervey won it merely reflects the established military orthodoxy of the time. Gerald makes clear his own position: ‘The victors, acting on bad advice, misused their good fortune by displaying deplorable and inhuman brutality.’15 It has been suggested that Gerald of Wales harboured a grudge against Hervey, and was using his actions at Waterford to incriminate him. More usually it was the case that politically neutral or friendly commentators were far more accommodating of such extreme action; the sheer ruthlessness of military commanders like Henry V and Richard the Lionheart and countless others rarely did their reputations as champions of chivalry any harm. We cannot know what might have happened had Raymond’s advice been taken; but Hervey’s counsel did the English no injury: by 1171, Strongbow was King of Leinster. Such was his success that Henry II of England felt compelled to launch a major expedition to Ireland during 1171–2 to subdue him, forcing all to submit before the Crown.

  Hattin, 1187, and Acre, 1191

  Once again, we are taking examples from the expanding frontiers of Christendom where the clash of cultures and, as at Verden, religion, might be expected to add intensity and bitterness to wars of conquest. From the time of the West’s conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 on the First Crusade, when chroniclers gleefully reported the crusaders wading knee-deep in the blood of the massacred Muslim inhabitants of the city, the crusades are notorious for their free falls into savagery, with religious fanaticism being the main culprit behind the excesses of wars – crusade or jihad – fought in the name of God. Hence there is to this day a widely held belief that religion is the cause of so many of the world’s conflicts, as can be seen today in the Shia–Sunni Muslim civil war in Iraq. But the reality is that politics uses religion more than religion uses politics, even as far back as the Age of Faith in the medieval world. Religious fundamentalism is an insufficient explanation for two notorious, but in many ways representative, atrocities from the Third Crusade. The terrible events at Hattin and Acre involve two figures regarded as epitomizing the very essence of chivalry: Richard the Lionheart and Saladin.

  The Latins’ victory in the First Crusade was one of the most outstanding military campaigns of the entire Middle Ages. But it was not a victory that could be easily sustained. Manpower shortages and a resurgent Islamic enemy put enormous pressures on the crusading states; despite the formation of the military orders, the famous Knights Templar and Hospitaller, the northern city of Edessa was lost in 1144. This prompted the Second Crusade of 1146–8, under the leadership of the French king, Louis VII, and the first Hohenstaufen German emperor, Conrad III. While the crusade brought in a temporary influx of much needed men, held together only by the discipline of the Templars, it ended ignominiously at Damascus with very little to show for the huge enterprise.

  The crusader states were left exposed and when Saladin arrived on the scene and largely united the Muslims under his sultanate by 1186, they were left ever more vulnerable. As much by diplomatic skills as by military ones, Saladin made substantial inroads into the Latin states, isolated castle garrisons often surrendering without resistance to him, relying on his reputation as a merciful victor. In 1187, having lost some momentum during a serious illness, Saladin invaded the Latin states and based his strategy on seeking a major engagement with the crusaders. He had a number of reasons for such a strategy: it was difficult to maintain his forces in the field for long periods of time; the crusaders had been weakened by losses earlier in May that year, the military orders suffering particularly heavily, and Saladin would have wished to capitalize on this; and the crusaders’ defence-in-depth strategy, in which they relied on the impressive strength of their castles, made a decisive victory difficult for Saladin. To draw the crusaders out, at the beginning of July Saladin besieged and took the town of Tiberias in eastern Galilee, leaving its citadel holding out. Usually, besieging armies felt vulnerable to the possibility of being caught between a relief army and the garrison; but this was what Saladin wanted the crusaders to hope for, as he deployed his forces for the trap. The leaders of the crusading forces debated fiercely over what to do. Count Raymond of Tripoli, whose wife was in the citadel at Tiberias, actually advised against a relief army, as he astutely reasoned that this was exactly what Saladin wanted. However, he was goaded for lack of vigour and his loyalty was questioned. The hawks won the day and the crusaders took the bait. A relief army under King Guy of Jerusalem quickly made its way to the beleaguered town.

  Guy had emptied his fortress garrisons to make up his field army. He had need to. Despite generous estimates of his army allowing him 1,200 knights, perhaps 4,000 lighter cavalry and some 15,000 infantry, he was facing a Muslim army that outnumbered his by three to two. The army approached Tiberias in traditional battle order: Count Raymond took charge of the vanguard; Balian of Ibelin led the Hospitallers and Templars in the rearguard; and at the centre was the notorious Reynald of Châtillon with King Guy and the Holy Cross, that most sacred of relics on which it was believed Christ had been crucified. Before they could reach Lake Tiberias and its essential waters, on the 3 and 4 July Saladin engaged them between the hills known as the Horns of Hattin.

  The battle was to prove one of the most decisive of the whole crusading period. During the night, Saladin’s army harried the crusaders’ camp. In a letter after the battle, Saladin wrote that he ‘kindled fire against him [the enemy], giving off sparks, a reminder of what God has prepared for them in the next world. He then met them in battle, when the fires of thirst had tormented them’.16 Short of water as they were, the smoke would have exacerbated the already telling thirst of men and horses alike, thereby weakening and demoralizing them before the battle was fully engaged. Although six knights and some sergeants deserted to Saladin, the effect on the infantry was, as we shall see in a
moment, more crucial. Saladin’s army was well supplied with water from the lake, which a train of camels carried to reservoirs created for his men. The constant rain of arrows pouring onto the crusaders served to dispirit them further. On 4 July, the vanguard attempted to spearhead the way to the lake, which was quickly blocked. The whole army became severely pressed. In the centre division, King Guy was met with desperate requests for help by both the van- and rearguards.

  Known for his vacillation, Guy first decided to help Raymond, who calculated that the force of the two divisions combined might be enough to break through the Muslim ranks and thereby reach the vital waters of the lake. But Guy changed his mind, and made the fateful decision to instead move back to help Balian and the military orders. Whether on his own initiative or commanded by the King, Raymond led a downhill cavalry charge in a drastic attempt to break enemy lines. The Muslims in his path simply moved to one side and let his knights through, launching a fierce missile assault on them as they passed. They then closed the gap behind the crusaders, leaving them entirely cut off from the main army and unable, through losses and fatigue, to launch an uphill assault. Raymond had little choice but to make good his escape as best he could; with a dozen knights he fled the scene of battle. For this action, his name was traduced by many chroniclers, who branded him a traitor.

  Having fought his way back to the rearguard, Guy ordered his men to go on the offensive. When repeated cavalry charges exhausted the knights’ horses, and Muslim archery had taken its toll on their chargers, they continued to attack on foot. Some infantry joined the dismounted knights, but most took refuge on one of the Horns, rejecting the King’s pleas to protect the Holy Cross; they replied to the King that they were dying of thirst and would not fight. As the crusaders retreated uphill the Cross was lost. With Muslim forces concentrated on King Guy’s position, Balian escaped with some of the rearguard. Exhausted, surrounded and parched with thirst, the remaining crusaders threw down their arms and surrendered.

  It was a crushing defeat. Despite the escape of Raymond and Balian, almost the entire leadership of the crusader kingdom was captured, including Reynald of Châtillon, the Masters of the Templars and Hospitallers, and the King himself. The infantry, as usual, suffered the heaviest losses, though large numbers still managed to escape. Despite the intensity and ferocity of the fighting, relatively few knights had been killed in combat – a testament to their armour, which had earned them the name of ‘men of iron’ from the Muslims. But the real bloodbath was yet to come.

  The first casualties would have been the captured Turcopoles: as apostates from Islam they would have been slaughtered on the spot. The leading crusaders were another matter. Saladin had King Guy and Reynald brought to his tent. The King was offered some sweetened water: in Arabic custom the captive was safe if his captors gave him either food or drink. Guy passed on the drink to Reynald, at which Saladin said to his interpreter: ‘Tell the King, “You are the one giving him a drink. I have not given him any drink”.’17 For Saladin had sworn some time before to kill Reynald. Reynald had been a thorn in Saladin’s side for a long while. Castellan of the powerful and famous fortress at Kerak, he ignored truces to prey on Muslim trade routes and embarrassed Saladin in a number of ways: in 1186, he captured the Sultan’s sister in a caravan that passed provocatively close to Reynald’s stronghold; in 1182, he had set out to attack Mecca, which severely dented Saladin’s prestige as Protector of Islam’s Holy Places; and in most of their encounters, the ruthless adventurer had got the better of him. According to Ibn Shaddad, at Hattin Reynald was offered the chance to convert to Islam. Reynald refused: he had between 1160 and 1176 spent seventeen years as a Muslim captive, during which time he had come to utterly despise his enemy. Instead, according to one Latin chronicler, he now displayed his customary fiery arrogance and defiance. At this, Saladin took a sword and struck Reynald on the shoulder, severing his arm. Guards then dragged him from the tent and beheaded him. Saladin dipped his fingers in Reynald’s blood and sprinkled it on his own head in an acknowledgement that vengeance had been taken. This done, he reassured King Guy, shaking in fear at what had befallen Reynald, that his safety was assured. Reynald’s head was later dragged through Damascus. Saladin had just cause to execute Reynald, but this was not his only motive: not only did he wish revenge on him for the setbacks he had caused the Sultan; he was also removing once and for all an effective and therefore dangerous enemy.

  Enemy prisoners were so abundant witnesses record seeing up to thirty at a time being led by their captor on a single rope. This excess of supply over demand drastically slashed their sale values as slaves, with the new going rate down to 3 dinars; one captive was even exchanged for just a shoe. However, one group of prisoners held their price: the Templars and Hospitallers. Saladin now changed his mind over the fate of these fighting monks of the military orders, numbering nearly 240 in total. Rather than be held captive or sold into slavery, they were to be killed. His command for execution was sent out, Saladin compensating anyone holding a Templar or Hospitaller with 50 dinars per man. The prisoners were brought before Saladin. Only conversion to Islam would save their lives; despite the ideological fervour of the orders, a few did so. The grisly task was left to amateur executioners. Imad ad-Din reports graphically and gleefully what happened. Saladin

  ordered that they should be beheaded, choosing to have them dead rather than in prison. With him was a whole band of scholars and sufis and a certain number of devout men and ascetics; each begged to be allowed to kill one of them, and drew his sword and rolled back his sleeve. Saladin, his face joyful, was sitting on his dais; the unbelievers showed black despair…. There were some who slashed and cut cleanly, and were thanked for it; some who refused and failed to act, and others took their places. I saw there the man who laughed scornfully and slaughtered … how much praise he won, the eternal rewards he secured with the blood he had shed, the pious works added to his account with a neck severed by him!18

  As Saladin wrote in a letter: ‘Not one of the Templars survived. It was a day of grace.’19

  A Latin chronicler offers an alternative version, equally religious in its appeal, in which the knights are willing Christian martyrs who ‘joyfully offered their neck to the smiter’s sword’.20 A Templar zealot called Nicholas, possibly half-crazed with fear of his imminent death, had actually recruited other knights to take the Templars’ tonsure, thereby sealing their fate, too, but as martyrs. There was then a rush to be the first executed, Nicholas ‘obtaining the glory of martyrdom first’.21 As a last insult, the victims were left unburied.

  Both accounts emphasize the religious dimension of the slaughter, with both victims and executioners alternatively acting for the glory of God; Saladin explained away his actions as a way of purifying the land of the infidel. But there are problems with focusing on just this aspect. For a start, crusading indulgences took care of the Christians’ spiritual needs in death; a tonsure was not prerequisite for a martyr’s death. And the role of ‘holy men’ in the massacre is clearly designed to gloss the atrocity with a spiritual motive, while at the same establishing Saladin as a holy warrior. It is not easy to determine Saladin’s explicit motives for taking the Templars and Hospitallers prisoner, only to kill them two days later. One modern historian has said that Saladin had no choice: as monks, the knights of the military orders would not become apostates (although some actually did); and as part of the orders, they would not receive ransoms. Yet this does not mean they had to be killed: imprisonment, slavery and exchange were other options. In 1157 Bertrand of Blancfort, Grand Master of the Temple, was captured by Muslim forces, but released two years later. In 1179, another Grand Master, Odo of Saint-Amaund, was seized by Saladin but died in prison; his body was exchanged for a Muslim leader held by the crusaders. And at Hattin, the Grand Master was spared again: Gerard of Ridefort was released within the year (as was the King). Political, financial and military considerations took precedence over religious ones.

  Pro
paganda on both sides depicted the pagans and infidels as dogs condemned to Hell. Yet both sides were perfectly capable of arranging amicable truces and agreements that suited each other. The famous civility between Saladin and Richard the Lionheart was reciprocated at various levels throughout the Holy Land. Balian of Ibelin, who led the rearguard at Hattin, was a personal friend of Saladin. Even the implacable Reynald of Châtillon was party to treaties made with the Muslims when it suited him. Count Raymond of Tripoli’s period of captivity (eight years in Aleppo) brought him to a greater understanding of Islam and he came to respect his captors. But it went further than truces: Muslims would ally with Christians against other Muslims, just as Christians would ally with Muslims against other Christians. In just one relevant example, only two years before Hattin, Raymond of Tripoli had entered an alliance with Saladin against no less a person than the king of Jerusalem, Guy of Lusignan. Two months before the battle, Raymond had briefly even given Saladin permission to lead the Muslim army through his territory so that the Sultan could attack the King. In most respects, holy war was waged in the Middle East little differently from how it was waged in the West: ever-changing alliances reflected the potential for political gain; principles were displayed from time to time, but they rarely superseded pragmatic opportunities.

  As noted above, for some historians Saladin’s magnanimity, rather than his severity, had proved to be a military asset: he could be trusted to treat his prisoners mercifully, so encouraging swift capitulation to him. But like any medieval military commander, Saladin was no stranger to ruthless measures in war, frequently killing captives, whether military or civilian, and even after promises of quarter had been given. His actions in 1179 at Bait al-Ahzan, just north of the Sea of Galilee, are instructive. Here, when the crusaders’ castle was about to fall, the Christians asked for quarter; none was granted. This did not mean that all the garrison was killed – perhaps half was taken prisoner – but that no guaranteed protection was afforded to the defeated defenders. An Arab chronicler reports that although many crusaders were killed indiscriminately, Saladin gave direct and specific orders that the garrison’s crossbowmen were to be executed. This was a testament to the crossbowmen’s efficacy: the casualties they inflicted earned them the particular enmity of the Muslims. Capture and slavery would equally have neutralized these men, so the killing of them seems to be sending a warning message to demoralize others who would replace them. It is also a possibility that their deaths would help sate the Muslim troops’ thirst for revenge for their fallen comrades; mercy may have gone down badly with the victorious troops.