Throop - Crusading as an Act of Vengeance, 1095-1216

CRUSADING AS AN ACT OF VENGEANCE, 10951216

For Matt

SUSANNA A. THROOP
Ursinus College, Collegeville, PA, USA

First published 2011 by Ashgate Publishing

Published 2016 by Routledge
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Copyright Susanna A. Throop 2011

Susanna A. Throop has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Throop, Susanna A.

Crusading as an act of vengeance, 10951216.

1. Revenge Religious aspects History To 1500. 2. Crusades.

I. Title

940.18dc22

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Throop, Susanna A.

Crusading as an act of vengeance, 10951216 / Susanna A. Throop.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-7546-6582-3 (hardcover : alk. paper)ISBN 978-1-3155-7520-9 (ebook) 1. Crusades13th-15th centuries. 2. RevengeEuropeHistoryTo 1500. 3. RevengeSocial aspectsEuropeHistoryTo 1500. 4. RevengePolitical aspectsEuropeHistoryTo 1500. 5. RevengeReligious aspectsChristianity. 6. EuropeHistory4761492. I. Title.

D160.T49 2010

909.07dc22

2010038449

ISBN 9780754665823 (hbk)
ISBN 9781315575209 (ebk)
ISBN 9781317156727 (ebk-ePUB)

This work began as my doctoral research at the University of Cambridge. It would never have gotten off the ground without generous assistance from 2001 through 2005 from the Gates Cambridge Trust and my college, Trinity Hall. I would especially like to thank Christopher Padfield, then Tutor for Graduate Students at Trinity Hall, for his support and encouragement.

To my Ph.D. supervisor, Jonathan Riley-Smith, I owe an immense professional and personal debt of gratitude. He vastly improved my skills as a historian with kind guidance, insightful criticism, and the highest expectations. He also believed enthusiastically in me and my research, and provided considerable support during a personally stressful time. I hope that someday I may be as wise, compassionate, and generous a teacher.

I am grateful to many institutions in the U.S. and the U.K. for their help and support while working on this project: the University of Cambridge, the University of Edinburgh, the National Library of Scotland, the University of Glasgow, the University of New Hampshire, and Ursinus College, as well as all the schools involved with the Boston Library Consortium (especially Boston College). Without their assistance and access to their collections, the project would not have been possible.

Scholars on both sides of the Atlantic have helped me refine my ideas and strengthen weak points. In particular, many thanks to Jonathan Riley-Smith, Norman Housley, Hugh Clark, Dallett Hemphill, Ross Doughty, Richard King, Walt Greason, and David McAllister for reading portions of the manuscript. I am also grateful to Paul Hyams, Miri Rubin, Carl Watkins, Nick Paul, Caroline Smith, Iben Schmidt, Jochen Schenck, Rebecca Rist, and William Purkis. In addition, medievalists at the University of Cambridge, the University of Edinburgh, the University of St. Andrews, the Institute for Historical Research in London, and the International Medieval Congress at Leeds listened to papers of mine and provided invaluable suggestions and insight. Thanks are also owed to my students in History 300B (The Crusades) at Ursinus. In a matter of months, they showed me new ways to think about the sources and my conclusions.

Numerous friends and family members have been rooting for this book for years now. In particular, I would like to thank past colleagues at the University of New Hampshire-Manchester and Brookstone. There are many individuals who deserve mention, but I am especially grateful to Tamsin Palmer, George and Deborah Brown, Pamala Abbott, John and Sally Bowkett, Paul Love, Hollie Bowen, Benjamin Throop, Paul and Elaine Hyams, Elizabeth Macaulay Lewis, Carol Lambert, Paul Donovan, Shelagh Walsh, and Pam Rodenhizer.

Last here only because he is so obviously first, I want to thank my husband, Matthew Abbott. He started believing in me back when we were lowly undergraduates, and he hasnt stopped since (knock on wood). Without him urging me to apply for a Gates Cambridge Scholarship, and to be bold enough to contact the eminent Professor Riley-Smith, this research would never have gotten started. Without his tireless love, encouragement, and support, this book would never have been finished. Thank you, Matt, for everything.

NB: Many of the above-mentioned individuals have saved me from embarrassing errors. Any that remain are, of course, completely my own fault.

NB: With the exception of the Hebrew sources, all translations are my own unless otherwise noted.

Sometime in the late twelfth century, roughly around the year 1180, a French scribe wrote down a version of a popular chanson that presumably had been making the rounds. This epic song engaged its audiences with what was arguably one of the most entertaining stories of the times, a narrative of religion, war, and honor that featured an impossible journey, menacing foreign enemies, strange and distant lands, do-or-die battles, treachery and betrayal, miracles and visions, and agonizing crises of faith.

This narrative was, of course, the story of the First Crusade until the crusaders victory at Antioch. The primary concern of this particular version of the story was entertainment, not argument, yet all the same it provided audiences with a clearly stated justification for the events of the First Crusade: vengeance. Even within the first forty laisses of the poem, attention is drawn to the First Crusade as vengeance: