A panic terror now overspread the land, and under its resistless impulse all hastened to place themselves in subjection to the conqueror. Even the most strongly fortified coast towns fell one after the other; Tyre, Tripolis, and Antioch alone upheld their independence. Askalon demanded as the price of its surrender the release of the captive king. Jerusalem held out in its own defence a few days longer; but what could the few knights that remained avail against an enemy so mighty? On the 2nd of October, 1187, Saladin took formal possession of the Christian capital, to shouts of “Allah akbar!” instead of the “Christ victorious!” that had been heard in former times.[d]
Jerusalem became the refuge for such of the Christians as had escaped the swords or the chains of the Turks. One hundred thousand people are said to have been in the place; but so few were the soldiers, and so feeble was the government of the queen, that the Holy City was no object of terror. Saladin declared his unwillingness to stain with human blood a spot which even the Turks held in reverence, as having been sanctified by the presence of many of God’s messengers. He offered the people, on condition of the surrender of the city, money and settlements in Syria. Prudence suggested the acceptance of this offer, but, clinging to that feeling of superstition which had given birth to the holy wars, the Christians declared that they would not resign to the infidels the place where the Saviour had died. Saladin was indignant at this rejection of his kindness, and swore to enter the place sword in hand, and retaliate the dreadful carnage which the Franks had made in the days of Godfrey de Bouillon. The people cast their eyes on Balean of Ibelin as their commander. The veteran organised the forces, and put arms into the hands of the citizens.
During fourteen days there were various engagements; but the Christians, though brave to desperation, could never destroy the military engines of the Moslems. At the end of fourteen days the Latins discovered that the walls near the gate of St. Stephen’s were undermined. From that moment the defence of the city was abandoned; the clergy prayed for the miraculous protection of heaven, the soldiers threw down their arms and crowded into the churches. The consternation was augmented by the discovery of a correspondence between some Greeks that were in the place and the Moslems. The Latins then recollected the proffered clemency of Saladin, and a deputation of them implored a renewal of it. But he urged the force of the oath which he had taken, and that it was ridiculous to capitulate for a fallen town. “But,” said he, “if you will surrender the city to me, I will behave to you with mercy, and allow you to redeem the inhabitants.”
After some deliberation, the Christians resolved to trust the generosity of the conqueror. Saladin stipulated that the military and nobles should be escorted to Tyre, and that the Latin population should become slaves, if they were not ransomed at the rate of ten crowns of gold for a man, five for a woman, and one for a child. After four days had been consumed by the miserable inhabitants in weeping over and embracing the Holy Sepulchre and other sacred places, the Latins left the city and passed through the enemy’s camp. Children of all ages clung round their mothers, and the strength of the fathers was used in bearing away some little portion of their household furniture. In solemn procession the clergy, the queen, and her retinue of ladies followed. Saladin advanced to meet them, and his heart melted with compassion, when they approached him in the attitude and with the air of suppliants. The softened warrior uttered some words of pity, and the women, encouraged by his sympathising tenderness, declared that one word of his would remove their distress.
It is the generous remark of an enemy that Saladin was in nothing a barbarian but in name. With courteous clemency he released all the prisoners whom the women requested, and loaded them with presents. This action, worthy of a gentle and Christian knight, was not the consequence of a transient feeling of humanity; for when he entered the city of Jerusalem, and heard of the tender care with which the military friars of St. John treated the sick, he allowed ten of the order to remain in their hospital till they could complete their work of humanity.
[1188-1189 A.D.]
The infidels were once more established in Jerusalem. The great cross was taken down from the church of the sepulchre, and for two days dragged through the mire of the streets. The bells of the churches were melted, and the floors and walls of the mosque of Omar were purified with Damascene rose-water. Prayers and thanksgivings were offered to heaven for the victory; all individual merit was forgotten, and the conquest of Jerusalem was attributed to the bounty of God, and his desire for the universal influence of Islamism. Askalon, Laodicea, Gabala, Sidon, Nazareth, Bethlehem—all those places and their territories fell when their great support was gone, and Tyre was almost the only town of consequence which remained to the Christians.
Saladin attacked it with all his efforts, but the spirit of freedom triumphed over the thirst of conquest, and the Moslems were necessitated to raise the siege. Some time after the capitulation of Askalon, Guy de Lusignan, the grand master of the Templars, and others obtained their liberty; and the husband of Sybilla solemnly renounced to Saladin his title to the kingdom of Jerusalem. The unprincipled Guy took the road for Tyre, and announced his resolve to enter the city as sovereign lord.
After the fall of Jerusalem, Saladin carried his conquering army into the principality of Antioch. Five and twenty towns submitted, and Antioch itself became tributary to the Moslems. The victories of Saladin and the loss of Jerusalem were melancholy contrasts to those hopes of the triumphs of Christianity over Islamism which the Council of Clermont had held out to Europe. In the eighty-eight years that the crusaders possessed the Holy City, peace seldom dwelt about her walls; surrounded by numerous hostile nations, she was in a continual siege, and as great a number of her wars were undertaken for the maintenance of her existence as for the purposes of conquest. In the time of Godfrey de Bouillon, Asia was in a state of more than usual imbecility. The Arabian and Tatarian storms were spent, the caliphs were pontiffs rather than sovereign princes, and the great empire of their predecessors was dismembered and scattered.
But states which are formed by arms, not by policy, are as quick in their rise as rapid in their decay, and ruin and disorder are the scenes of ambition. The passions and abilities of the enterprising lords of Syria raised several powerful governments; the hostile aspect of the Moslems increased in terror when the imperial and royal crowns of Germany and France were broken; and the crescent triumphed over the cross when Saladin united and led the Moslem nations to the conquest of Jerusalem. In the strength of body, and personal and military prowess, the Turks and the Franks were equal; but the Turks were in multitudes, the Franks were few; and as the twelfth century was an age of war rather than of policy, the Latins did not by intellectual superiority raise themselves above their enemies. The Christians scrupled not to break treaties[55] with the Moslems; they never attempted to conciliate the foe, or to live in terms of large and liberal intercourse. Except in the case of Egypt, they allowed the Saracenian nations to unite, without making any endeavour to break their force; and they were too proud and too ignorant to win any members to their cause from the great confederacy of atabegs. Conciliation could only be the result of weakness; a tender pitying forbearance of error was held a criminal indifference by armed saints. The Moslem contempt of infidels was not more sincere than was the hatred which the Christians felt for the supposed enemies of God.[c]