Seljuk Turks
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The First Crusade was launched in 1095 by Pope Urban II with the dual goals of reconquering the sacred city of Jerusalem and the Holy Land and freeing the Eastern Christians from Islamic rule. What started as an appeal by Byzantine Emperor Alexius I Comnenus for western mercenaries to fight the Seljuk Turks in Anatolia quickly turned into a wholescale Western migration and conquest of territory outside of Europe. Both knights and peasants from many nations of Western Europe travelled over land and by sea towards Jerusalem and captured the city in July 1099, establishing the Kingdom of Jerusalem and other Crusader states. Although these gains lasted for less than two hundred years, the First Crusade was part of the Christian response to the Islamic conquests, as well as the first major step towards reopening international trade in the West since the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
Sources
Primary sources
- Albert of Aix, Historia Hierosolymitana
- Anna Comnena, Alexiad
- Guibert of Nogent, Dei gesta per Francos
- Fulcher of Chartres, Historia Hierosolymitana
- Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum, (anonymous)
- Ibn al-Qalanisi, The Damascus Chronicle of the Crusades
- Michael the Syrian, Chronicle
- Peter Tudebode, Historia de Hierosolymitano itinere
- Raymond of Aguilers, Historia Francorum qui ceperunt Iherusalem
- William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea
