The war with the Greeks did not, however, put a stop to pilgrimages from the west, but the travellers now seem to have been obliged to pass by way of Egypt. The geographer, Dicuil, in his treatise De Mensura Orbis Terræ, which he wrote at a very advanced age, in 825, tells us, when speaking of Egypt, that when a youth at school in France, he heard a monk named Fidelis give an account of his travels in Egypt and the Holy Land, to his master, Suibneus, and, from the accuracy with which he cites it, he must have taken notes at the time. He says, that Fidelis went with a party of pilgrims, clerks and laymen, who sailed direct to the mouth of the Nile, no doubt to Alexandria. Proceeding up the Nile a long way, they were struck with astonishment at the sight of the seven "barns" (horrea), built by Joseph, according to the number of the years of abundance, which looked at a distance like mountains, four in one place, and three in another. Curiosity led them to visit the group of three, and near them they found a lion, and eight men and women, all lying dead; "the lion had slain them by its strength, and they had killed the lion with their spears and swords, for the places occupied by both these groups of barns are deserts." They found that these buildings, in their whole elevation, were of stone; at the bottom they were square, in the upper part round, and twisted at the summit in a spire. Fidelis measured the side of one from one angle to the other, and found it to be four hundred feet. Then, entering their ships in the river Nile, they navigated direct to the entrance of the Red Sea, where they entered a port, not far to the east of which was the spot where Moses passed on dry land. Fidelis wished to go to this place, where he expected to see the traces of Pharaoh's chariot wheels, but he could not prevail with the sailors to turn away from their own course. He observed, however, that the sea appeared there to be about six miles across. They sailed thence, without loss of time, along the western part of the Red Sea, or that part which extends itself in a gulf or bay far to the north. From thence we are left to suppose that they proceeded to Palestine[7]. The barns of Joseph were of course the pyramids, with respect to the form of the upper part of which the pilgrim might easily have been deceived; but it will be at once evident to any one acquainted with the geography of Egypt, that the channel by which he passed in a ship from the Nile to the Red Sea, was the ancient canal of Hadrian. This canal is said to have been repaired, and rendered navigable by the Arabs, not long after they had rendered themselves masters of Egypt, but we know that it was finally blocked up by the khalif Abu Giafar Almansor, in 767, to hinder provisions from being sent to the people of Mecca and Medina, who had revolted against his authority. It was therefore previous to this date that Fidelis visited Egypt.
Peace, broken immediately after the departure of Willibald, was not restored till the learned reign of the magnificent Haroun-er-Raschid (786-809), whose name, and his friendship and intercourse with the no less splendid monarch of the west, Charlemagne, have been so often celebrated in history and romance. Their friendship led to the opening of Palestine to the Christian pilgrims on much more liberal terms, and various privileges and comforts were secured for them in the holy city. Pilgrimages now became more frequent, and several are mentioned during the latter part of the eighth and the course of the ninth centuries.
The only one of these pilgrims whose own account of his adventures has been preserved, was a Breton monk, evidently of the celebrated monastery of Mount St. Michel, named Bernard, who is distinguished in the manuscripts by the title of Bernardus Sapiens, or Bernard the Wise, although we have no other testimony to his wisdom except the account of his pilgrimage. This very curious narrative was discovered by Mabillon, in a manuscript of the library of Rheims, and printed in the Acta Sanctorum Ordinis Benedictini. Bernard has given, at the commencement of this narrative, the date of the year in which he started. In Mabillon's text, and in a manuscript of the Cottonian Library, now lost, it is 870; while in another manuscript of the Cottonian Library, still existing, it is given as 970. Internal evidence at once fixes the date of Bernard's pilgrimage to the ninth century, and not to the tenth; and as it is evident that he was at Bari before the siege by Louis II., we can have little hesitation in considering both the dates given by the manuscripts as errors of the scribes, and in fixing Bernard's departure to the year 867.
Bernard left Europe at a time when the Saracens of the west were engaged in hostility with the Christians, and he was obliged to furnish himself with a variety of protections. Although he points at the disadvantageous contrast between the barbarity and turbulence of the western Christians and the well regulated government of the Arabs in the east, it is quite evident that a change had taken place in the condition of the Christians in Syria, and that the pilgrims no longer enjoyed the immunities obtained for them by the emperor Charlemagne. They now, on the contrary, seem to have been subjected to extortions on every side. Bernard, like Fidelis, went by way of Egypt, and proceeded thence into Palestine by land. He is the first traveller who mentions the afterwards celebrated miracle of the holy fire. At Jerusalem Bernard lodged in the hostle which had been founded by Charlemagne, and which was still appropriated to its original destination.
Somewhere near this period a noble Breton of the name of Frotmond, who, with his brother, had committed one of those deeds of blood which so often stain the history of the middle ages, was condemned by the church to a penance, not uncommon in those times. A chain was close riveted round his body and his arms; and in this condition, covered only with a coarse garment, his head sprinkled with ashes, he was to visit, bare-foot, the holy places, and wander about until God should deign to relieve him of his burthen. In the fourth year of his wanderings he returned to France, and went to the monastery of Redon, where he was miraculously delivered from his chains, which had already eaten deep into his flesh, at the tomb of St. Marcellinus. The account of his pilgrimage was collected from the traditions of the monastery long after Frotmond's death, by one of the monks. It is said that he and his brethren went direct to the coast of Syria, and made some stay at Jerusalem, practising there all kinds of austerities. They next went into Egypt, and took up their abode among the monks of the Thebaid, and then went to pray at the tomb of St. Cyprian, on the sea-coast, two leagues from Carthage. They then returned to Rome; but still not obtaining pardon of the pope (Benedict III.), they again passed the sea to Jerusalem, from whence they went to Cana, in Galilee, and then they directed their course to the Red Sea. They next proceeded to the mountains of Armenia, and visited the spot where Noah's ark rested after the deluge. On their way they suffered all kinds of outrages from the infidels, who stripped them naked and scourged them cruelly. This, however, did not turn them from their purpose, and they went subsequently to Mount Sinai, where they remained three years, and so returned to Italy, and thence to France. Frotmond started on his wanderings in the year 868.
Other pilgrimages are mentioned as having taken place before the end of the ninth century, at which time new wars broke out between the Greeks and the Saracens, in the course of which the whole of Judea was taken from the Mohammedans by the emperor John Zimisces, and the holy places were again thrown open to pilgrims from all parts. On the death of Zimisces, in 976, the Greek empire again sunk into weakness, and Palestine was snatched from them by the Fatimite khalifs of Egypt, whose policy it was at first to treat the Christians with lenity, seek commercial relations with the Franks, and encourage the pilgrimages to the holy places. But all these fair prospects were soon cut short by the accession to the throne of Hakem, the third khalif of the Fatimite dynasty, who threw his kingdom into confusion by his cruel despotism, and who made the unfortunate Christians feel the whole weight of his fury. They were everywhere oppressed and massacred, their churches were taken from them, profaned, and destroyed, and the holy places were deserted. During the whole of the eleventh century the Christians of Syria were thus treated with every kind of indignity. Pilgrims still made their way to Jerusalem, and a great number of brief notices of their adventures are preserved by the numerous writers of the age; but they brought back with them little more than complaints of the profanations to which the holy places were exposed, and of the wretched condition to which their brothers in faith had been reduced. The celebrated Gerbert, afterwards pope, under the name of Sylvestre II., was one of the first who made the pilgrimage during the persecutions of Hakem; and on his return, in 986, he published a letter, in which he made Jerusalem deplore her misfortunes, and supplicated the whole Christian world to come to her aid. The French and the Italians were excited to vengeance, and they began to make pilgrimages in armed bodies, and even to attack the coasts of Syria. This only served to exasperate their enemies, who interdicted the Christians in their dominions from the exercise of their religion, took from them their churches, which they profaned by turning them into stables and to still more degrading purposes, and threw down the church of the Sepulchre, and the other sacred places in Jerusalem, in 1008. According to the best authorities the church of the Holy Sepulchre was rebuilt by Hakem's grandson, Al-Mostanser-Billah, between 1046 and 1048, in consequence of a treaty with the Byzantine emperor.
The news of these events threw all Christian Europe into consternation, and excited every where the desire for vengeance on the infidels; but it increased the eagerness for pilgrimage, and, in spite of all the insults and perils to which they were exposed, devotees of all ranks and conditions made their way to Jerusalem in crowds. New revolutions were, however, taking place there; for another people, the Seldjouk Turks, having rendered themselves masters of Persia, and established there a new dynasty of monarchs, the Abassides, passed forwards into Mesopotamia, and then conquered Syria from the Fatimites. The Seldjouks took Jerusalem in 1071, massacred both Saracens and Christians, and delivered up to pillagers the mosques as well as the churches. The fate of the pilgrims under the new rulers of Palestine was more deplorable than ever. They were not allowed to enter the gates of Jerusalem without payment of a very heavy tax; and, as most of them had been plundered on the way, if they had anything to tempt the merciless rapacity of the infidels, the greater part remained outside, to perish by hunger or by the sword. Those who gained admission into the city only entered to suffer new outrages, and, which was still worse, to see everything they held most sacred trodden under foot and defiled by unbelievers.
The Turks, in their turn, became divided and enfeebled; and the Fatimites made a successful effort to recover their power in Syria. In 1096 Jerusalem was delivered, by capitulation, to the general of the khalif Al-Mostaali-Billeh; but the change of masters seems to have ameliorated in no degree the condition of the Christians.
The cry of the eastern Christians had, however, already made itself effectually heard throughout Europe. The voice of Peter the Hermit was first raised in 1095, in the November of which year he stood by the pope, Urban II., at the council of Clermont, and the first crusade was proclaimed. The vast army of invaders assembled in the autumn of 1096, traversed Europe and Asia Minor, and those who escaped from the terrible sufferings and losses it experienced on the road reached Palestine in 1099, and took Jerusalem by assault on the 15th of June. Ten days after the conquerors elected Godfrey of Boulogne king of Jerusalem.
The first pilgrim who followed the crusaders, who has left us a personal narrative, was an Anglo-Saxon named Sæwulf. Our only information relating to this personage, beyond what is found in his own relation, occurs in a passage of William of Malmesbury which appears to relate to him. This writer, in his History of the English Bishops[8], tells us that Sæwulf was a merchant who frequently repaired to bishop Wulstan, of Worcester, to confess his sins, and as frequently, when his fit of penitence was over, returned to his old courses. Wulstan advised him to quit the profession in which he met with so many temptations, and embrace a monastic life; and, on his refusal, the bishop prophesied that the time would arrive when he would take the habit which he now so obstinately refused. William of Malmesbury says that he himself witnessed the fulfilment of this prediction, when in his old age the merchant Sæwulf became a monk in the abbey of Malmesbury. It is fair to suppose that, in a moment of penitence, the merchant sought to appease the divine wrath by undertaking the pilgrimage to Jerusalem, the road to which had then been laid open by the first successes of the crusaders. Nothing in the narrative proves that our traveller was a monk.