FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER XIII
[495] Will. of Tyre, “Hist. Bel. Sacr.,” i. 11. “Pusillus, persona contemptilis, vivacis ingenii, et occulum habens perspicuum, gratumque, et sponte fluens ei non deerat eloquentia.”
[496] Ibid., i. 8–10.
[497] See “The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” 1897, published by Pal. Expl. Fund, 1 vol. octavo, 443 pp.
[498] Röhricht, “Regesta,” Nos. 4, 8.
[499] “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 95–8, 107–8.
[500] Will. of Tyre, iii. 1-viii. 24; Albert of Aix, ii. 20-vi. 50.
[501] Will. of Tyre, xxi. 25.
[502] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 85.
[503] Ibid., Nos. 137, 225, 226.
[504] Her son, Baldwin V., died as a child a year after his uncle Baldwin IV.
[505] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 92, 1120 A. D.
[506] “Latin Kingdom,” pp. 175–80.
[507] John of Würzburg, xiii. and xxviii.
[508] “Citez de Jhérusalem,” “e ces rues apeloit un la juerie”; see Röhricht (1130 A. D.), “Regesta,” No. 133, “in parte Hierosolymorum quæ specialiter Judæaria vocatur.”
[509] Count Rivoira, “Arch. Lomb.,” 1908, p. 630, remarks: “Sospetto che gli artefici di Sicilia lo sfoggiassero direttamente per influenza moresca.”
[510] Apparently a lingua Franca term, Umm-el-Kuzinât, “mother of kitchens,” otherwise Coquinati; “Citez de Jhér.,” and “Regesta,” No. 431.
[511] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 421.
[512] See map (“Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, p. 383), “Jerusalem in 1187 A. D.”
[513] “Regesta,” No. 421.
[514] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 237–9.
[515] Ibid., pp. 264–7.
[516] Ibid., pp. 235–6.
[517] “Excav. at Jer.,” 1898, pp. 68–75, 336.
[518] Zuallardo, “Devot. Viag.,” p. 131; Theodorich (c. 1172 A. D.), “Vallum quoque sive fossatum extrinsecum, muro appositum, et propugnaculis atque minis munitum existit, quod barbicanam vocant.”
[519] For coats-of-arms on pillars at Bethlehem see “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” iii. p. 84. By an unfortunate error the graffiti which I copied on pillars of south door of the cathedral have been printed (together with a tombstone from the Hospital) in the wrong place (“Mem.,” iii. p. 137); they include the names “Isaak,” “David,” “Anton Pico 1636,” and “Piero Vandam 1384.”
[520] Rev. J. Hamlet in Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, April 1887, p. 76.
[521] Zuallardo, “Devot. Viag.,” 1586, p. 207.
[522] John Phocas (1185 A. D.) says that the emperor Manuel (1143–80) adorned the Holy Sepulchre with gold.
[523] Theodorich.
[524] Felix Fabri (c. 1480 A. D.), vol. i. pt. ii. p. 394, translation in the series of the “Pal. Pilgr. Texts Soc.”
[525] “Regesta,” Nos. 142, 189, etc.
[526] Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, Jan. 1899, p. 43, Jan. 1902, pp. 42–56; Robinson, “Later Bib. Res.,” 1852, p. 184, quoting Tobler, who examined this church in 1840.
[527] See “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 203–7.
[528] Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, Jan. 1897, p. 29.
[529] See “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 202–3; “Regesta,” Nos. 347, 447, 462, 568, 572, 630.
[530] John of Würzburg; Theodorich; Ibn el Athîr, quoted by Guy le Strange, “Pal. under the Moslems,” 1890, p. 134.
[531] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., 1883, p. 272.
[532] Röhricht, “Regesta,” No. 214 note, p. 55. The German hospice is noticed in 1173 (No. 496) and 1177 (No. 548).
[533] See back, [p. 15]; Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, July 1895, p. 251.
[534] “Regesta,” No. 461. Besides this, and the Coptic St. George north-west of Hezekiah’s Pool, there was another St. George north-west of the cathedral, north of the Greek Convent of St. Demetrius (Herr Schick, Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, July 1900, p. 253).
[535] Such as Eugenius, Elpidius, and Euphratas, mentioned in a mosaic text as “hermits” on the Mount of Olives. Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, Jan. 1895.
[536] “Regesta,” No. 170.
[537] Ibid., Nos. 543 (Lacus Legerii); 504, 537 (L. Germani), “The new cistern” (John of Würzburg), also noticed in the “Citez de Jhérusalem.”
[539] “Regesta,” Nos. 136, 227, 259, 266, 397, 487, 628, 656. The convent is noticed as endowed by King Amaury in 1155 (Nos. 284, 303, 308) before his accession: see Nos. 327, 338.
[540] See back, [p. 155]; “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 388–91.
[541] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 297–301; Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, April 1902, p. 120.
[542] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., p. 385; Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, April 1897, p. 105, Oct. 1902, p. 404.
[543] Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, July 1901, p. 233; “Regesta,” No. 391.
[544] Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, 1890, pp. 158, 306.
[545] “Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem,” pp. 194, 195, 404.
[546] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 398, 399; Pal. Expl. Fund Quarterly, Oct. 1896, p. 311.
[547] “Regesta,” No. 215.
CHAPTER XIV
FRANKS AND MOSLEMS
There is no more charming character in Moslem history than Saladin, the brave and generous sulṭân who settled the Eastern question with Richard Lion-heart of England, and whose life was lovingly written by his faithful follower Beha-ed-Dîn, the ḳâḍdî of Jerusalem.[548] Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn Yûsef el Aiyûbi, “the benefactor of the Faith, Joseph, son of Job,” was born in 1137, and was therefore about fifty years old when he took the Holy City. His father, Aiyûb, son of Shâdi, was a Kurd in the service of the Atabek dynasty, being first governor of Tekrît and afterwards of Ba’albek. Nûr-ed-Dîn of Damascus sent Shirkoh, Saladin’s uncle, to assist Egypt in 1163, and Saladin accompanied him. A series of remarkable events placed him at the head of Islâm in 1174 A. D.; for his uncle died in 1169, and was followed by the Fâṭemite khalîfah El ’Adid, and by Nûr-ed-Dîn himself,[549] whose widow Saladin married. Thus, at a time when Europe was torn by the great quarrel between the emperor Frederick Barbarossa and Pope Alexander III., Islâm was at length united under Saladin as the protector of the ’Abbaside khalîfah.
THE BATTLE OF ḤAṬṬÎN
The raids which Saladin made on the Latin kingdom met at first with little success. He was defeated at Gezer in 1177, and his incursions to Jezreel in 1183 and to Nâblus in 1184 had no permanent effect, nor was he able to take the strong fortress of Kerak, east of the Dead Sea. He was involved in a struggle with the Atabeks at Môsul, and not until he had signed peace with them, on March 3, 1186, was he free to turn his whole force against the Franks. They were well aware of his intentions, and early in the following year King Guy summoned his feudatories to assemble at the great springs a mile west of Sepphoris in Lower Galilee. In March, Renaud of Chatillon broke the truce by capturing a Moslem caravan from Mekkah, and leading his prisoners to Kerak. Saladin marched against him, and meantime an advanced guard of his army, under his son Melek el Afḍal, raided the neighbourhood of Nazareth. On May 1 they encountered near Kefr Kenna the masters of the Temple and Hospital, who had only an hundred and forty knights with them. The knights were defeated, and the master of the Hospital with the marshal of the Temple Order were slain. Saladin at once joined his son, and 50,000 fighting men gathered at the Fountain of Sepphoris to oppose him. The fatal battle of Ḥaṭṭîn was lost by King Guy through a strategical mistake. He was warned by Raymond of Tripoli not to advance, because there was no water on the route. But the Templars were burning with rage at their recent defeat, and the master over-persuaded the king to attack the position which Saladin held covering the springs on the plateau west of Tiberias. The Christians perished from heat and thirst; and, excepting Raymond of Tripoli and Balian of Ibelin, who cut their way out, all the Frank leaders were taken prisoners. They were all well treated except Renaud, whom Saladin slew, as the cause of the war and the most dangerous of the enemies of Islâm. Like Titus, he also considered that priests must die when conquered, and he therefore commanded the execution of all the Templars (except the master) and the Hospitallers. Thus two hundred of the most dreaded defenders of the Latin kingdom, all the surviving knights of both orders, were beheaded as being under religious vows.
So rapid were Saladin’s marches after this victory that all Palestine and Syria—except the seaboard cities of Tyre and Tripoli, and the northern capital of Antioch—fell into his hands before any help could come from Europe.[550]
SALADIN’S SIEGE
On December 20, 1187, the Moslems appeared on the west side of Jerusalem, but the sulṭân afterwards shifted his camp to the north. We have two accounts of the siege, one by Bernard the Treasurer, the other by Beha-ed-Dîn. Balian of Ibelin had thrown himself into the city, where he found not a single knight. He made fifty new ones, and stripped off the silver ornaments of the Holy Sepulchre, coining them to pay his troops. Saladin offered terms, which were refused. The chronicler records an extraordinary incident, which casts a strange light on the superstitions of the age. “The ladies of Jerusalem took cauldrons, and placed them before Mount Calvary, and having filled them with cold water, put their daughters in them up to the neck, and cut off their tresses and threw them away.”[551] This hair-offering to an offended Deity was a survival of that ancient sacrifice of the first-born which, among Canaanites and Phœnicians, was common in seasons of dire distress, as when the king of Moab slew his son on the wall. On the eighth day of the siege Saladin camped opposite St. Stephen’s Gate, and thus attacked the north wall of the city with mangonels and mines. A breach was effected at the north-east angle of the rampart, but the storming party was repulsed, and at length Balian yielded, and Saladin was only too willing to grant favourable terms. The city was full of starving women and children, and of priests who made processions in vain. On Friday, October 2—the day on which Muḥammad was believed to have ascended to heaven—Jerusalem was given up, and all the lives of the inhabitants were spared. They numbered 7,000 men, besides women and children—probably at least 30,000 in all. The ransom agreed upon is variously stated[552] at 30 and at 70 shillings for each man, payable within 50 days. Meanwhile, all gates were closed except that on the west, where Saracens were admitted to buy what Christians wished to sell. Balian and the patriarch seized the treasure of the Hospital to pay the ransom of the poor; but, as this did not suffice, Seif-ed-Dîn (Saladin’s brother) begged for 1,000 captives, who would remain as slaves, and released them all. Saladin gave 700 others as a present to the patriarch, and 500 to Balian; the remainder of the poor he allowed to depart by the Postern of St. Lazarus without payment. He restored many prisoners to their wives, and “gave largely, from his own private purse, to all the ladies and noble maidens, so that they gave thanks to God for the honour and wealth that Saladin bestowed upon them.” This is the statement of the Christian chronicler. The Moslem account says that—after the ancient manner of Arab princes—the sulṭân bestowed all the treasure he received, amounting to over £100,000, on his emîrs and soldiers, and on the ’Ulema, and dervishes who accompanied the army, keeping nothing for himself. The Christians were safely escorted to Tyre, and 3,000 Moslems who were captives in the city were set free.
The first act of Saladin, entering the city on Friday—the Moslem day of rest—was to attend public prayer in the Aḳṣa Mosque, and to hear a sermon from the khâṭib. He caused the great cross above the Dome of the Rock to be pulled down, and afterwards removed the altar and the marble flagstones from the Ṣakhrah, with the images of Christ already described. He caused a beautiful mimbâr, or pulpit of wood inlaid with ebony and ivory, to be brought from Aleppo. It still stands in the Aḳṣa Mosque, with an inscription giving the name of Nûr-ed-Dîn, and a date answering to 1168 A. D. The mihrâb, or prayer recess, was found covered over by a wall in the Templar Church, and was now again brought to light and cased with marble. The frescoes in the Dome of the Rock were effaced, and covered also with marble veneering on the inside of the outer wall. According to a later account, the Ḥaram was not only swept and purified, but was even washed with rose-water. Two extant inscriptions refer to Saladin’s restorations, and, being very characteristic of Moslem style, may be here given. The first[553] is over the chief mihrâb of the Aḳṣa Mosque, dating from 1188 A. D.: “In the name of God merciful and pitying. Has ordered the repair of this holy mihrâb, and the restoration of the Aḳṣa Mosque—piously founded—the servant of God, and His regent, Yûsef, son of Aiyûb, the father of victory, the conquering king, Ṣalâḥ-ed-dunya-wa-ed-Dîn [benefactor of the world and of the faith], after God had conquered by his hand during the [seventh] month of the year 583. And he asks God to inspire him with thankfulness for this favour, and to make him a partaker of pardon through His mercy and forgiveness.”
TEXTS OF SALADIN
The other text, two years later,[554] is on the tiles inside the drum of the Dome of the Rock: “In the name of God merciful and pitying. Has commanded the renewal of the gilding of this noble dome our lord the sultan, the conquering king, the wise, the just, Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn Yûsef. In the name of God the merciful the pitying ... in the latter third of the month Rejeb,[555] in the year 585, by the hand of God’s poor servant Ṣalâḥ-ed-Dîn Yûsef, son of Aiyûb, son of Shâdi, may God enfold him in His mercy.”
The disappearance of the Franks was regarded with satisfaction by the Eastern Churches: for Saladin followed the commands of the prophet in tolerating their presence; and the sites of which they had been robbed by the Latins fell again into their power. It is said that St. Anne was now converted into a college for ’Ulema (or learned men), of the Shaf’ii sect of orthodox Moslems, and it remained in their hands until 1856, when the site was given to the emperor Napoleon III., who caused the church to be rebuilt, in Norman style, a few years later. The Church of St. Chariton, north of the Holy Sepulchre, was also taken and (according to Mejîr ed Dîn) was endowed by Saladin as a khanḳah or “cloister.” Yâkût (in 1225) says that it was the place of prayer of the Kerrâmi sect.[556] It still bears the name of “Saladin’s Cloister,” and remains in Moslem possession, being on the south side of the old “Street of the Sepulchre,” north of the Latin Chapel of the Apparition, not far from the corner where the street crosses the north end of Patriarch Street. But the great churches remained undisturbed; and such was the bitterness of feeling against the Latin hierarchy that the Armenian Catholicus of Ani wrote to Saladin to report the advance of Frederick Barbarossa, while the emperor Isaac Angelus also allied himself with the sultan, and wrote to say that the Germans would never reach Syria, and could do no harm even if they did.[557]
The sudden collapse of the kingdom of Jerusalem was announced to Europe, and was received with consternation. It was due in great measure to the degeneracy of the third generation of Frank colonists, and to the decay of the ancient just rule which, at first, made native Christians and Moslems alike willing to live under the feudal laws. The third Crusade[558] was at once undertaken as being necessary for the peace of Europe. The hero of this campaign was Richard Lion-heart, and the treaty which he finally made with Saladin, being often renewed later, formed the basis of agreements between Franks and Moslems for nearly a century. Frederick Barbarossa was the first in the field, but he died of a chill in Asia Minor in 1189 A. D., and only some 5,000 Germans reached Acre, out of 200,000 who left Germany, having been much harassed by the Turks on their way by land to Antioch. The French king Philip Augustus brought perhaps 60,000 men to aid King Guy at the siege of Acre in the spring of 1191 A. D., but after the capture of the city he went home, and the French were never very cordial supporters of the English, who, for the first time, appeared in force in Palestine under Richard.[559] After the great battle of Arsûf (between Cæsarea and Jaffa), in which Saladin was badly beaten by Richard, the sulṭân retired with his disheartened army to Jerusalem, where he passed the winter of 1191–2 A. D. On April 13 of the next year the Christian army again advanced to Beit Nûba, at the foot of the Jerusalem hills, and the French were eager to undertake the re-conquest of the Holy City. But Richard knew that Saladin had stopped up all the wells and springs outside, and he remembered the cause of disaster at Ḥaṭṭîn, as did the Templars and Hospitallers, who advised him to march on Egypt. They were only 12 miles from Jerusalem, but the discordant counsels of the leaders led to a final breach with the French, who refused to serve any longer under Richard. Had he known the despondency of the defeated Moslems, the result might have been different; but the lands of the two great Orders were now secured, and the seaports contented the great trading republics of Italy. Richard and Saladin—both exhausted by the conflict—were both anxious to arrive at a settlement, and negotiations went on during the whole winter preceding the final advance now interrupted.
SALADIN’S PRAYER
Beha-ed-Dîn tells a remarkable story connected with this episode.[560] Saladin, in Jerusalem, was in deep anxiety as to the future of his empire, when this faithful friend advised him to, visit the Aḳṣa Mosque, and to pray humbly for aid, which he did “in a low voice, his tears rolling down on the prayer-carpet.” “In the evening of the same day (a Friday), we were on duty with him as usual, when behold, he received a despatch from Jurdîk, who was then commanding the advanced guard. It was in the following words: ‘The whole of the enemy’s force came out on horseback, and took up their position on the top of a tell, after which they returned to their camp. We have sent spies to see what is going on.’ On Saturday morning another despatch came, which ran thus: ‘Our spy has returned, and brings news that discord is rife among the enemy. One party is anxious to push on to the Holy City; the others wish to return to their own territory. The French insist on advancing on Jerusalem.’” This was the great debate already mentioned, and “on the following day ... they broke up their camp.” It was thus not the Christians only who believed that Providence was on their side. King Richard was ill and discouraged, and in his absence at Acre Saladin captured Jaffa, but was soon driven back on return of the great champion of Christendom. At length the two leaders agreed to a truce, to last for three years and eight months from September 2, 1192. The plains were to remain in undisturbed possession of the Christians—that is, of the two Orders, and of the Italian republics, which had their quarters in each seaside town—and two Latin priests, with two deacons, were to be allowed to remain in Jerusalem, with a like number in Bethlehem. All those of the Christian army who desired were allowed to visit the Holy City as pilgrims before returning home, that in this manner their vows might be fulfilled.
Thus King Richard left Palestine for ever, but his name is even now not forgotten in villages along the line of his great flank march from Acre to Jaffa. His words, as he gazed on the half-reconquered land from his ship, are said to have been, “O Holy Land, I commend thy people to God. May He permit me to visit thee again, and to aid thee.” But only once again was any Christian king to be crowned in Jerusalem, and only one other interesting historic episode remains to be described. Saladin died, worn out, at the age of fifty-six, on February 21, 1193, and Richard, after two years of captivity in Austria, died before the fortress of Chalus in Normandy in 1199 A. D. The next champion of Christendom was of a very different stamp, and the heroic age had now passed away. Saladin’s dying advice to his son gives us the secret of his success, which had enduring results. “I commend you,” he said, “to the Most High, the giver of all good. Do thou His will, for that is the way of peace. Beware of blood: trust not in that, for spilt blood never sleeps; and seek the hearts of thy people, and care for them.... I have become great because I won men’s hearts by gentleness and kindness. Nourish no hatred of any, for death spares none. Deal prudently with men, for God will not pardon if they do not forgive. Yet, as between Him and thee, He will pardon if thou dost repent, for He is most gracious.”
FREDERICK II.
Jerusalem plays no part in the history of the Frankish occupation of the Palestine plains during the thirteenth century, except in the time of the emperor Frederick II. Saladin had repaired the walls of the city in 1192, but his nephew Melek el Mu’aẓẓam, ruling in Damascus, feared that the Franks fighting in Egypt would succeed in capturing the Holy City, and would hold it as a fortress in future. In 1219 he ordered all the walls and towers to be demolished, except those of the Ḥaram and of the citadel.[561] Jerusalem thus remained defenceless for ten years, till the arrival of Frederick II. This brilliant emperor was a type of the most advanced culture of his age—a culture which Europe owed to nearly a century and a half of contact with the ancient civilisation of Byzantium and Syria. On November 9, 1225, he married Yolande, daughter of John of Brienne, who, as husband of Mary the rightful heiress, claimed to be king of Jerusalem. Yolande died within three years, but Frederick II. disputed with John the right to the kingdom. The emperor was a good Arabic scholar, and was in communication with Melek el Kâmil (Saladin’s nephew), the sultan of Egypt, on questions of science and philosophy. The successors of Saladin were at strife, and the rulers of Cairo and Damascus were equally anxious to secure alliance with the Christians. As early as 1226 we find the emperor encouraging the Teutonic Order in Germany.[562] They had acquired a large property in Upper Galilee six years before, and were now given “free use of waters, grazing, and wood,” throughout the empire. In spite of papal excommunications, constantly renewed, Frederick II. reached Acre on September 7, 1228; and on February 18 next year he made a treaty, near Jaffa, with his friend Melek el Kâmil, which was to last till 1240 A. D. Jerusalem and Bethlehem were given up to the Christians, with all the lands of the three Orders, in the plains and in Galilee; but it was stipulated that the walls of Jerusalem should not be rebuilt, and that the mosque should remain in Moslem possession.[563] On March 17, 1229, Frederick entered Jerusalem, and crowned himself king of the Latin kingdom, thus peacefully regained, on the following day. In April of the same year he sealed a deed, at Acre, which gave to the Teutonic Order “the house, in the city of Jerusalem, that is in the quarter of the Armenians, near the Church of St. Thomas [of the Germans], which was formerly the garden of King Baldwin; six acres of land and a house, which the brothers of the Order possessed in the said city before the loss of the Holy Land.” This clearly applies to the German Hospice already described in the preceding chapter.
Frederick II. was obliged to hurry home to Europe on May 1, having been in Palestine less than eight months; for John of Brienne resented this usurpation of his throne, and as the vassal of the Pope invaded the emperor’s possessions in Apulia. The emperor did nothing for the Templars nor the Hospitallers, because they had obeyed Pope Gregory IX., and had refused to help him. Thus the ancient Templars’ Hospice remained a mosque in Jerusalem, and a text dating 1236 A. D. speaks of the restoration of part of the Aḳṣa by Melek el Mu’aẓẓam ’Aisa of Damascus, during the ten years of Christian occupation of the Holy City.
THE KHAREZMIANS
In the last year of the peace thus established, the Templars began to arrange for alliance with Damascus against Egypt, thus reversing the policy of Frederick II. Hermann, the grand master, explained[564] to the lord of Cæsarea that, the Saracen princes being engaged in civil war, one of them was ready even to become a Christian; and he broke the treaty, which he regarded as having expired with the death of Melek el Kâmil the year before, in favour of the new alliance. The Christians began to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, but Dâûd Emîr of Kerak fell upon them,[565] and a massacre followed; all that had been erected was overthrown, and the Tower of David was dismantled. In 1240 Count Thibaud of Champagne came to the rescue of the Orders, though forbidden to go by both Pope and emperor. He was entirely defeated at Gaza, but Hermann succeeded in making his treaty with Ṣâleḥ ’Imâd-ed-Dîn of Damascus.[566] The Egyptians then called to their aid the wild Kharezmian Turks, who were being pressed west by the Mongols, and thus wrought a terrible vengeance on their Syrian kinsmen. In 1244 these hordes advanced through Syria pillaging and slaying. Templars, Hospitallers, and all other Christians fled before them from Jerusalem, leaving only the poor and the sick. The city had been given up to them without conditions under the new treaty, and the walls appear to have been hastily rebuilt; but they were easily stormed, and not only were all the remaining Christians murdered, but it is said that, by ringing the bells, the Kharezmians lured back others, who, seeing banners with crosses displayed on the walls, supposed that some unexpected rescue had come, but who, thus deceived, were also massacred.[567] The tombs of the Latin kings were desecrated, probably in search of treasure; but they were not—as is often stated—destroyed, for they were still visible in the sixteenth century, and were only removed after the great fire of 1808.
The Kharezmians joined their Egyptian allies at Gaza, where a great battle was fought against the Christians and the Syrian Moslems, who met with a crushing defeat. The victors proceeded to take Damascus, but here the Turks and Egyptians fell out, and after two pitched battles the Kharezmians fled north, and dispersed in Asia Minor. Jerusalem was not restored to the Christians, but was occupied by Melek es Ṣâleḥ Nejm ed Dîn, the sulṭân of Egypt. Frederick II. was indignant with the Templars, and laid all the blame on them for not having accepted the treaty which Richard, Count of Cornwall (who afterwards became titular emperor in 1257), had made with Melek es Ṣâleḥ of Egypt in 1241,[568] instead of that which Hermann the grand master contracted in 1244 with Melek es Ṣâleḥ Ism’aîl of Damascus. Frederick had already protested against the conduct of the Order because “they took away from the dominion of the Emperor the Temple of the Lord in Jerusalem, intending to build in it a fortress contrary to the emperor’s honour”; for he considered himself still bound by his agreement not to fortify the Holy City, and he therefore commanded the Templars to desist from the work. After the Gaza defeat they never had any further opportunity of disobeying his orders; and, in 1146, Melek es Ṣâleḥ of Egypt wrote to Pope Innocent IV. to say “that he was sorry the Holy Sepulchre had been destroyed, and promised to punish the malefactors, and would give the keys of the said sepulchre to his faithful ones, who would never open it except to pilgrims, and that he desired to contribute to its restoration and adornment.”[569]
THE FALL OF ACRE
Jerusalem was never again in the hands of the Christians, and is little noticed in the latter half of the thirteenth century. St. Louis never even attempted its conquest, during the four years that he spent in the East from 1250 A. D. Ten years later Bibars usurped the throne of Saladin’s family, and proceeded victoriously to drive the Franks out of Syria. He was arrested in his designs by Prince Edward, afterwards Edward I. of England,[570] with whom he made a truce for ten years and ten months, which secured what remained of their possessions in Palestine to the Christians; but it did not include the recession of Jerusalem. Bibars was succeeded in Egypt by Ḳalâ’un, who had been a slave, but who became sulṭân about 1279 A. D. With him other truces were made, but the lands held by Templars and Hospitallers dwindled gradually, and the county of Tripoli met the same fate that had overtaken Antioch in the reign of Bibars. On the death of Ḳalâ’un the various agreements lapsed; and a massacre of Moslems, in March 1291, led to the siege of Acre by his son Melek el Ashraf, and to the fall of this last city held by the Franks on May 18 in the same year.
The old Crusader spirit had quite died out after the departure of Prince Edward in 1272. The Popes continued to oppose the policy of permanent agreements with the Moslems of Syria and Egypt. They fixed their hopes on the Mongols, who were popularly supposed to be ruled by Christians. For the Mongol khâns were educated as Confucians, and tolerated every religion of their subjects. They never succeeded in overcoming the power of the sulṭâns of Egypt, and the policy of Frederick II. would have been more favourable to the Christian cause in the East than that of the Popes proved to be. The failure of Nicholas IV. to arouse enthusiasm when Acre was about to fall was due partly to the increased education of Europe which had undermined the ancient zeal for the Church, partly to the fact that when money for a Crusade was raised, it was used for other purposes than the recovery of Jerusalem, and spent in wars against Constantinople and Egypt, and partly to its being found practically simpler for the three great Orders and the Italian republics to make their own separate treaties with Moslem rulers. It had become a recognised custom to permit the presence of priests and Franciscans in Jerusalem, and the pilgrims were a source of revenue to the Moslems, who allowed them to visit the holy places lying beyond the lands held by the Templars. There was also great discontent already, roused by the pride and tyranny of the Church of Rome. At the time when Acre fell, Pope Nicholas IV. was refusing to recognise the heir of the reigning emperor, Rudolph of Hapsburg, while Edward I. of England and Philip IV. of France were about to declare war on one another. Melek el Ashraf thus reaped the advantage of the great struggles which were preparing the way in Europe for the Reformation.
(West)
MAP OF JERUSALEM.
About 1308 A. D.
Jerusalem was disappearing from history, being now regarded as a city chiefly precious to the pilgrims and the devout Moslems. The only new buildings to be described are additions made to the mosque. Either Ḳalâ’un or his son built the north-west minaret of the Ḥaram; and the latter, whose name was Muḥammad, rebuilt the south wall, and added the existing cloisters on the west side of the enclosure. He has left a text in the Dome of the Rock, dating about 1319 A. D., recording further restorations of Saladin’s work; while the dome of the Aḳṣa also bears one of his inscriptions dating 1327 A. D. The north-east minaret was not added till thirty years later, according to an extant text.[571]
MARINO SANUDO
The ancient map of the city in the early years of the fourteenth century, which is to be found in the elaborate work of Marino Sanudo, has been already mentioned. This writer presented his book to the Pope, and was zealous in endeavouring to revive the enthusiasm of Europe for the recovery of Palestine, but his efforts met with no success. His map represents the Holy City much as it was in Saladin’s time. The House of Caiaphas and the Cœnaculum appear surrounded by the wall of the barbican. The Pool of Bethesda is shown in its present site at the Birket Isrâïl, and St. Stephen’s Gate is on the east instead of on the north; but the mediæval pool west of St. Anne is also marked as a “piscina.” The apocryphal “Upper and Lower Gihon” are shown on the west; the Church of the “Spasm” is at the corner where the Via Dolorosa bends south, just where its remains have now been found. These are the chief features of the map demanding notice.
The later history of Jerusalem may be very briefly summed up.[572] Immediately after the loss of Acre, the Turks of Asia Minor began to become powerful. The Osmanli sulṭâns of Iconium were descended from ’Othmân, a Kharezmian vassal of the Seljuk family, which, down to 1288, retained power in Asia Minor. The new dynasty made their capital at Broussa, and already threatened Constantinople before they were crushed by Timur at Angora in 1402. The Osmanlis soon recovered, and when they at length conquered Byzantium, in 1453, the terror of the Turk fell on Europe, and led incidentally to the toleration of the Protestants in Germany. In 1516 the sulṭân Selîm invaded Syria, and in the next year he entered Cairo. He thus attained a practical right to the title of Khalîfah of the Prophet, because that office was always purely elective, and was bestowed on the “guardian of the two shrines” (Ḥâmi el Ḥaramein) of Mekkah and Jerusalem, which the present sulṭân still is. Besides this claim, Selîm was acknowledged by El Mutawakkil, son of ’Amr el Ḥakîm, a descendant of the ’Abbaside khalifs found living, as titular khalîfah, in the Egyptian capital, as well as by the sherîf of Mekkah. The walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt, in 1542, by Sulṭân Suleimân, and are noticed by Pierre Belon, the naturalist, in the following year, as being “new.” They are those which still exist, and Suleimân’s name is recorded in an inscription upon them at the Jaffa Gate, as also in another which shows that he restored the Birket es Sulṭân, or old “Pool of the Germans,” in the upper Hinnom Valley. His gift of beautiful windows, and his other work, in the Dome of the Rock have already been noted. In 1555 the Franciscans were allowed to place a new roof on the Holy Sepulchre, and to execute repairs in the interior of the chapel, as already mentioned.
ZUALLARDO
The most interesting description of the Holy City under the early Turkish sulṭâns is that of Zuallardo[573] in 1586. He was a Fleming, long resident at Rome, and was made a knight of the papal Order of the Holy Sepulchre in the Church itself, by means of the sword and gilt spurs supposed to have belonged to Godfrey of Bouillon, which are still shown in the Latin Chapel. His work is remarkable for its illustrations, which, though very rough, are of considerable value, as has already been shown. His sketch of the south façade of the cathedral is, however, very inaccurate, as it does not show the windows over the double entrance gates, while the view of the rotunda, showing the mosaics of the eleventh century still remaining on the drum, above the gallery, has been considerably touched up by the engraver. Zuallardo represents the present minaret at the Jaffa Gate, which was probably erected in 1542, but does not show any minaret at the mosque on the summit of Olivet, which had replaced the Church of the Ascension. He speaks of the “House of Herod,” which (as noticed in the first chapter of this book) is not now one of the holy places. His drawings of the House of Caiaphas and House of Annas suggest that they have been altered since his time. The Church of St. John—now called the “Dormition of the Virgin”—which was recently granted to Catholics by the present German emperor, is mentioned. It was not a very early sacred site, though noticed about 1321 A. D. by Marino Sanudo. Zuallardo also speaks of the “Retreat of the Apostles”—the tomb probably of Ananus—and of anchorites in the Kidron Valley. The Jews were in the habit of throwing stones at Absalom’s tomb, and he shows the stone-heaps there, which still remain. The carved lions at the east gate were already there—no doubt since 1542; the old Church of the Spasm was still visible, and the “Chapel of the Mocking” (St. Sophia) in the Antonia citadel is noticed, as well as the extant “Chapel of the Flagellation.” Several other sites, as described or pictured in this account, have been already mentioned, such as the tombs of the Crusader kings, and the Sepulchre itself. The remains of the chapel at Siloam were not yet covered with earth, and are described as those of a church of the Salvatore Illuminatore.
In 1808 occurred the disastrous fire in the cathedral which destroyed much of the twelfth-century work. The dome was again restored about 1860 by the emperor of the French. In 1831 Jerusalem submitted to ’Aly Pasha of Egypt, and a revolt of the Bedawîn against him was quelled in 1834. Six years later the Holy City reverted to the Turkish sulṭân ’Abd el Mejîd. Since that time the most remarkable event has been the large increase of 40,000 Jews to its population, due mainly to the Russian persecutions of 1881.
We have thus traversed the long ages during which Jerusalem has been, for four thousand years, a holy city. It can never be anything else. Whatever be the outcome of the regeneration of the Turkish empire, Jerusalem can never be a very great centre of trade. It will remain what it has been for so many centuries—the Holy City. To the Jew it is the city of David and Solomon, to the Christian the city where our Lord was crucified, to the Moslem also a city sanctified by many traditions, and by the memory of the proud days when it was won for Islâm by Omar and by Saladin. Perhaps, in the distant future, we may learn more of the ancient remains now hidden under the platform of the Ḥaram, or of those beneath the houses of the present town; in these pages all that has been so far discovered of importance has, in the author’s belief, been described, and the very sanctity of the place makes it as yet impossible to explore some of its most interesting remains. But the Holy City may still be described in the words of the Psalmist: “Jerusalem is builded as a city of gathering together to itself; for thither the tribes go up” (Psalm cxxii. 3).