Urban II’s tour of Europe in 1095 initially had no great hopes of ending the fighting among the Western feudal warlords. But as the pope preached to increasing numbers of followers in town after town, a current was building. Urban’s climactic, dramatic speech at Clermont was extraordinarily powerful as the pope told his awed and captive audiences of the tortures, eviscerations, decapitations and forced circumcisions of pilgrims. He went on to scold the knights of Christendom for their feuding and oppression of helpless women and children. He urged them instead to ‘advance boldly, as knights of Christ….On whom…is the task of recovering this territory incumbent, if not upon you [on whom] God has conferred remarkable glory in arms, great courage, bodily energy, and the strength to humble the hairy scalp of those who resist you….Expel that wicked race from our Christian lands!’

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The exhortations filled the Western knights with shame and then rage, until they burned with a desire to destroy the accursed perpetrators of such depredations. Urban then offered the knights eternal salvation as a compensation for ‘taking the cross.’ He reaffirmed the Truce of God and granted papal protection of the lands and possessions of any warrior joining the holy crusade.

The Council of Clermont had an amazing effect on the Western warriors. Robert Guiscard’s eldest son, Bohemond, immediately lifted the siege of Amalfi and swore an oath not to fight against Christians again until the ‘heathens’ were defeated. Thousands of other Christian warriors, eager to gain God’s blessing, joined Bohemond and others who flocked to Urban’s call.

Although the Crusades became a test of faith, many who fervently took the cross in the heady days of 1095-96 were ill-prepared for the enormous expense involved. The Clermont decree did not promise the Crusaders wealth. In fact, the Crusaders’ financial problems were only the beginning of their difficulties. Cost to a German knight serving in Italy in the 11th century is estimated to have been double his annual income. On that basis, four to five times his income would have been necessary to sustain him in the Holy Land. Money was raised as it is today, by taxing tenants and mortgaging lands. The very real problems of expenses, obtaining transport and provisions, as well as staff work, would delay the start of the military expedition for another year.

Byzantine Emperor Alexius I Comnenus expected to see a manageable number of Western mercenaries trickle into his capital, to be amalgamated into his imperial armies. The massed forces that appeared before the gates of Constantinople in 1097, however, most certainly did not view themselves as mere ‘helpers’ for Alexius! In fact, the Western Europeans had no great respect for the Byzantine military because of its disastrous defeat by the Turks at Manzikert in 1071, and Robert Guiscard’s victory over them at Durazzo 14 years after that. The foolish and poorly prepared earlier civilian Crusaders, led by the likes of Peter the Hermit, though attracting great numbers of disaffected adherents, had been destroyed long before reaching the Holy Land. It could only have been with profound amazement and dismay that Alexius found tens of thousands of elite Western warriors outside his walls, demanding provisions and shelter.

The newly arrived Crusaders marched under their regional military commanders: Raymond of Toulouse, Bohemond of Taranto, Godfrey of Bouillon and his brother Baldwin, and Robert of Normandy with Stephen of Blois. The papal legate, Bishop Adhemar, ostensibly was in charge of coordinating and smoothing the relationships and political tempers of the diverse leadership. Pope Urban’s plan for a united effort was thwarted; four distinct regional armies, instead of one united one, marched at their own paces, each under its own separate secular heads, to the gathering point at Byzantium.

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