116 ([return])
[ Renaudot, Hist. Patriarch. Alex. p. 479.]
1161 ([return])
[ Arnulf was first chosen, but illegitimately, and degraded. He was ever after the secret enemy of Daimbert or Dagobert. Wilken, vol. i. p. 306, vol. ii. p. 52.—M]
117 ([return])
[ See the claims of the patriarch Daimbert, in William of Tyre (l. ix. c. 15-18, x. 4, 7, 9,) who asserts with marvellous candor the independence of the conquerors and kings of Jerusalem.]
Without this indulgence, the conqueror would have almost been stripped of his infant kingdom, which consisted only of Jerusalem and Jaffa, with about twenty villages and towns of the adjacent country. [118] Within this narrow verge, the Mahometans were still lodged in some impregnable castles: and the husbandman, the trader, and the pilgrim, were exposed to daily and domestic hostility. By the arms of Godfrey himself, and of the two Baldwins, his brother and cousin, who succeeded to the throne, the Latins breathed with more ease and safety; and at length they equalled, in the extent of their dominions, though not in the millions of their subjects, the ancient princes of Judah and Israel. [119] After the reduction of the maritime cities of Laodicea, Tripoli, Tyre, and Ascalon, [120] which were powerfully assisted by the fleets of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa, and even of Flanders and Norway, [121] the range of sea-coast from Scanderoon to the borders of Egypt was possessed by the Christian pilgrims. If the prince of Antioch disclaimed his supremacy, the counts of Edessa and Tripoli owned themselves the vassals of the king of Jerusalem: the Latins reigned beyond the Euphrates; and the four cities of Hems, Hamah, Damascus, and Aleppo, were the only relics of the Mahometan conquests in Syria. [122] The laws and language, the manners and titles, of the French nation and Latin church, were introduced into these transmarine colonies. According to the feudal jurisprudence, the principal states and subordinate baronies descended in the line of male and female succession: [123] but the children of the first conquerors, [124] a motley and degenerate race, were dissolved by the luxury of the climate; the arrival of new crusaders from Europe was a doubtful hope and a casual event. The service of the feudal tenures [125] was performed by six hundred and sixty-six knights, who might expect the aid of two hundred more under the banner of the count of Tripoli; and each knight was attended to the field by four squires or archers on horseback. [126] Five thousand and seventy sergeants, most probably foot-soldiers, were supplied by the churches and cities; and the whole legal militia of the kingdom could not exceed eleven thousand men, a slender defence against the surrounding myriads of Saracens and Turks. [127] But the firmest bulwark of Jerusalem was founded on the knights of the Hospital of St. John, [128] and of the temple of Solomon; [129] on the strange association of a monastic and military life, which fanaticism might suggest, but which policy must approve. The flower of the nobility of Europe aspired to wear the cross, and to profess the vows, of these respectable orders; their spirit and discipline were immortal; and the speedy donation of twenty-eight thousand farms, or manors, [130] enabled them to support a regular force of cavalry and infantry for the defence of Palestine. The austerity of the convent soon evaporated in the exercise of arms; the world was scandalized by the pride, avarice, and corruption of these Christian soldiers; their claims of immunity and jurisdiction disturbed the harmony of the church and state; and the public peace was endangered by their jealous emulation. But in their most dissolute period, the knights of their hospital and temple maintained their fearless and fanatic character: they neglected to live, but they were prepared to die, in the service of Christ; and the spirit of chivalry, the parent and offspring of the crusades, has been transplanted by this institution from the holy sepulchre to the Isle of Malta. [131]
118 ([return])
[ Willerm. Tyr. l. x. 19. The Historia Hierosolimitana of Jacobus a Vitriaco (l. i. c. 21-50) and the Secreta Fidelium Crucis of Marinus Sanutus (l. iii. p. 1) describe the state and conquests of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem.]