The Crusader States by Malcolm Barber (review)

The last fifteen years have seen a flood of books about the history of the Crusades. The tendency in many of these surveys is to focus primarily on the crusading expeditions, while offering only a cursory consideration of the states that Western Europeans established in the wake of the First Crusade. Thankfully, one of the more versatile medieval scholars over the past three decades has rectified this trend. In The Crusader States, Malcolm Barber has produced a work that is stimulating and illuminating, though also a bit conceptually puzzling.

For Professor Barber, the creation and maintenance of the crusader states is “one of the most extraordinary achievements” of the medieval period (p. 356). The crusader states consisted of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Tripoli, the Principality of Antioch, and the County of Edessa. After the First Crusade, most of the participants returned to Europe. The few Latin Christians who remained, called the “Franks” by contemporaries in the region, tended to be the leaders of the now completed crusade, along with their households, retainers, and kinsmen. However, Barber reminds us that a number of peasants also remained in the East, as they often lacked the resources to finance their return trip and these new states offered appealing opportunities that might not have been present back in France.

With such limited manpower, maintaining and consolidating the control of the crusader states would prove to be an especially demanding endeavor. Barber excels at conveying the tenuous position of the crusader states from their very outset, emphasizing that religious conviction and military boldness were crucial ingredients to the survival and development of these Latin states during the decade of their existence. The Fatimid caliphate in Egypt as well as Muslim warlords in Syria posed a regular threat. Zengi is often credited as the first Muslim leader in the region to utilize jihad in order to galvanize an anti-Frank coalition, culminating in his capture of Edessa in 1144. Barber questions this depiction, viewing Zengi as more opportunistic than ideological. In addition to suggesting some sensible revisionism to the standard view of Zengi, he also highlights an earlier attempt at jihad revival against the crusader states. Back in Baghdad in 1110, Sultan Muhammad invoked jihad in an attempt to rally some of the prominent Turkish leaders in Syria into a more effective opposition toward the Franks. His efforts resulted in a more aggressive and collaborative Muslim pushback against the crusader states over the next several years. However, the assassination of Mawdud of Mosul in 1113 and the proclivity for infighting among the Syrian emirs impeded a substantial united front from fully developing.

While local Muslim rulers were a frequent threat, rivalry and turmoil among the Frankish leadership was often just as much of a problem for the stability of the crusader states. Indeed, these problems were manifest from the beginning. Baldwin of Bourcq, who controlled Edessa (r. 1100–1118), and Tancred, who eventually ruled Antioch, were both First Crusade veterans, and their mutual loathing put their states in a precarious position. It has been suggested that their quarreling had obstructed a unified Christian effort in 1104 at the disastrous Battle of Harran, where Baldwin was captured by the Muslims. Tancred occupied Edessa during his rival’s captivity and even initially refused Baldwin entrance to the city upon the latter’s release from imprisonment. When a Turkish coalition attacked Edessa in 1110, one chronicler speculated that Tancred was behind these events, while another contemporary commentator claimed that Baldwin had initially coaxed this Turkish force into the region hoping to direct them against Tancred.

Of course, this internal bickering was not limited to the earliest period. Factionalism, particularly in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, recurred regularly. For example, tensions between Queen Melisende and her son Baldwin III over who controlled the kingdom nearly resulted in civil war. Even more damaging was the political turmoil that permeated the kingdom in the 1180s, which greatly benefited the military agenda of the celebrated Muslim general...