A Destrier's Tale Part XIII: The Horns of Hattin

A Destrier’s Tale

Balian d’Ibelin’s Destrier “Centurion” Tells his Story

Part XIII: The Horns of Hattin

They woke us up in the middle of the night. That had never happened before. And the mood among the humans was like none I’d known before. Worst of all, Lord Balian was angry. I mean boiling mad. Not that he shouted or lashed out at people like the Black Knight had done when he was angry, but you could tell he wanted to bite someone. His eyes were narrowed and his jaw set and no one wanted to cross him, even for a second.

The next strange thing that happened was that Thor and I were saddled up and laden with the long, transport waterskins like the ones the Saracens tie to camels. They were not made for horses — much less destriers. I was insulted and indignant at such a burden, but Ernoul smacked me hard when I tried to protest by nipping him from behind and told me: “Lord Balian’s orders! You’ll do as you’re told, just like the rest of us!”

Hm.

We set out in three divisions. Thor and I, led by Gabriel and Ernoul respectively, were with the middle division around the wagons, carts, and supplies. Ahead of us were knights and infantry led by strangers, while Lord Balian  was behind us with the Red-Crosses. We could only progress at the speed of the slowest, of course, and the sun was hot. The horses of the first division kicked up a lot of dust on that dry road and I was looking forward to a drink long before noon. But when we reached the springs several hours later they were poisoned! I put my nose down to drink and smelt it immediately. I snorted in disgust and stepped backwards. We were all doing that, and the humans understood too. They were really in a tizzy now, running about like a bunch of headless chickens.

I kept looking over my shoulder for Lord Balian, wondering why he wasn’t here to sort things out, but he seemed to have been delayed. There was no sign of him. Ernoul gave me a drink from one of the water skins I’d been carrying myself. The water was almost too hot to drink and not very refreshing, but better than nothing. Thor, however, was still being silly. He wanted his water in a bucket, not out of a skin. I told him he better take what he could get, and he answered that he was a “stud” and didn’t drink “like an unweened foal.” “Suit yourself,” I told him with a snort and drank his share too.

Eventually we set out again, this time striking off the road which made the going very rough for the wagons and carts. They lurched over the uneven terrain, often getting a wheel stuck in a gully or stopped by a rock. The humans were cursing and sweating, smelling even worse than usual, and I could tell they were unhappy. At no earlier muster had the mood been like this, not even at that first one with the Black Knight. The humans were acting like they were scared, looking around like frightened rabbits and they kept looking at this one wagon with a tall gold cross mounted on it and surrounded by Black-Robes. I guess it was something important to them and they seemed afraid of losing it.

When darkness fell we were in the middle of nowhere with no shelter and no water. Now Thor was starting to regret his foolishness. He kept sniffing the barren, dusty ground and pawing it, as if he thought he could dig down deep enough to find the water under the earth. When Gabriel offered him water that night, he didn’t make any stupid remarks about not being a foal and drank from the goat-skin just like I did.

Water or not, however, I was really getting nervous because there was still no sign of Lord Balian. The humans were kneeling in front of the wagon with the big gold cross, and knights were scurrying this way and that in obvious agitation because in the darkness around us other humans and horses were gathering like a swarm of flies at a dung-heap. It could only be Horse-Haters and in greater numbers than ever before. As darkness fell, they howled and yowled like wolves at a full moon, and then lit fires as numerous as the stars over our heads.

Finally, Lord Balian dragged in. That was really the only word for it. Rufus was at the end of his strength and crashed to the ground beside Lord Balian as he dismounted. Ernoul rushed over to give him water, but he was finished. So were the horses of the other knights, while the knights themselves were bristling with arrows. The foot soldiers were in even worse shape — and there were half as many as had been left behind. After Rufus had revived a little, I asked him what happened. “They attacked us all day long,” he gasped out tucking his feet under him to half sit-up. “Mounted archers,” he explained.

“They’re all around us,” I noted nodding toward the surrounding hills.

“We’re finished,” Rufus concluded in utter despair. “Lord Balian kept us behind the footmen, but the Red-Crosses charged them several times. All they got was dead horses! It was as if they didn’t care about their horses at all. As if they were fighting for something else than our safety. Don’t trust the Red Crosses,” he concluded and then his eyes rolled back into his head and he sank into a miserable sleep.

The morning brought the smoke of brush fires from the west and the hot air became almost unbreathable. The army stirred, but it was the stirring of turtles stranded on the beach. Neither horse nor human had any energy after the dry, sleepless night. Only the relentless approach of the fires forced us to advance toward the rising sun.

But there, spread out across two hills that loomed up like two horns on either side of an arid valley was the host of Horse-Haters. They were as numerous as the sand on the shore of the great sea, as numerous as grass in the pastures of Ibelin. We were like a herd of lost lambs surrounded by wolves.

Lord Balian took Thor. It broke my heart. I could see it on his face that he expected to die that day — and he chose to die with Thor rather than me. I protested. “I’m your destrier!” I called to him. “Me!” But he didn’t even look over at me. His face was closed. His thoughts and emotions locked inside.

So I was left with the palfreys, pack-horses and draught horses around the baggage train. It was the ultimate humiliation! The others, even Rufus, were too exhausted and thirsty to take an interest in anything, but I couldn’t ignore what was happening only half a mile away. The Saracens used arrows first, as always, and there were so many of them that they overwhelmed our armor — finding the weaknesses, breaking the links.  Men and horses were sinking down under that deadly hail. The Christians tried a charge, but they were too weak. After initial success, they lost momentum in that hoard of Horse-Haters. Meanwhile, the Christian footmen had had enough. They were no longer willing to die for us. They retreated up the slopes of those hills and left the horses almost completely exposed.

At this point, even the humans realized that there was no hope of fighting the Horse-Haters, we had to try to escape. Some Christian knights made a desperate charge that broke through the enemy, but Lord Balian wasn’t with them. When I couldn’t find him among the knights escaping, I tried to find Lord Balian in the shrinking cluster of knights left behind, but he was gone! Just gone! I was still looking, when Ernoul emerged out of nowhere.

The boy was in bad shape. He stank abominably, as only humans do when they’re scared shitless. He was shaking too, but he jumped down from his rather dazed castrate and started saddling me up. Only then did I grasp what had happened. Thor was dead and Lord Balian needed me! The younger horse had failed him!

When I was tacked up, Ernoul remounted his castrate and led me onto the battlefield right up to the corpse of Thor. He didn’t have a wound worth talking about on him; he had collapsed from thirst!  Lord Balian was pretty exhausted too. It took him two tries to mount.

By the time he had mounted, the break in the enemy lines had closed again and we were all trapped. One of the other knights still trapped on that bloody field was suddenly beside us pointing at the infantry cowering on the hill to our right around that wagon with the gold cross. He was pointing toward it and saying we had to go up there, behind the foot soldiers. I didn’t think much of that suggestion. They’d abandoned us once before; they would surely do it again. I preferred the idea of trying to break out.

So did Lord Balian. He pointed at the enemy and the other knight backed down. Lord Balian couched his last lance and all the horses still with him, even the squires on their castrates, clustered around. We got as close together as possible, seeking protection and courage from each other. Then we charged.

He killed two men with his first charge — one with the lance and the second when the first fell backwards and knocked his companion off his horse. After that we were a single killing machine — he with his sword and me with my teeth and hooves. I had no idea how far we were from escape. I certainly couldn’t see the end of the Horse-Hater’s ranks, when something smashed into us from the left. It must have been a whole herd of horses because they knocked several of my comrades down completely and I was staggered. I lost my footing and stumbled so violently that Lord Balian lost his stirrups. He started to fall off, and grabbed my mane desperately to stay on my back. I had recovered my footing and knew that we had to get away from whatever had hit us. It was pure instinct. All of us together were running in the opposite direction which was strangely open.

It was a stampede and the humans had nothing to do with it. Lord Balian was struggling to get back into the saddle and stay with me, and I was determined to get him — and me — out of there! Off that field. I hadn’t reckoned with Lord Balian’s skill, however. He somehow managed to get his seat back in the saddle, pick up the reins and start checking me.

OK. I know I said I’d learned to trust him, but flight was the only thing that made sense in this situation and I wasn’t inclined to listen to him. I guess I did slow down a little, however, out of respect and habit. It was a good thing I did because the next thing I knew we were crashing over the edge of that valley between the horn-like hills and the slope on the far side was so steep we began all slipping and sliding and scrambling.

I sat on my haunches and tore the skin off my hocks as we skidded down that slope, dirt, stones and rocks rolling with us. We crashed through the underbrush and tore up the thorns and bramble as we descended. Lord Balian flung himself off my back and tried to steady me, but he lost his own footing in that rock-and-flesh slide and we only stayed together as we slid down hill because he didn’t let go of my bridle.

Gradually we slowed down and were able to walk side-by-side down a gravel gully. Around us were the other knights and squires of Ibelin and Nablus, and even some of the foot soldiers. With each step we were farther from the battle that still raged, the sounds of it grew ever fainter behind us.

Ahead was a great lake. You could smell the sweet water on the warm, afternoon air. We walked straight into it until the water lapped around my belly, then I put my head down and drank and drank and drank.

There were no more than a couple hundred horses and ten-times that many foot soldiers, but Lord Balian and I were safe. Or so I thought.

The Battle of Hattin is described from the human perspective in:

A divided Kingdom,
      
                          a united enemy,

                                        and the struggle for Jerusalem!


Buy Now in Paperback!  

or Kindle!

The first book in the series, Knight of Jerusalem: A Biographical Novel of Balian d'Ibelin, is a B.R.A.G. Medallion Honoree and finalist for the 2014 Chaucer Awards for Historical Fiction.

A landless knight,

                           a leper king,

                                                and the struggle for Jerusalem!

Buy now!

A Destrier's Tale Part IX: The Arab Mare

A Destrier’s Tale

Balian d’Ibelin’s Destrier “Centurion” Tells his Story

Part IX: The Arab Mare

Christians are very respectful and protective of mares. Even the Black Knight never took one of his mares anywhere near the Horse-Haters. The Christians keep mares where they can raise their foals in peace, and they are only ridden by their own human mares and sometimes human foals. The Saracens, on the other hand, use slave mares in battle. I suppose they might be afraid stallions will rebel and run away. Or maybe they don’t have enough stallions. Whatever the reason, many of them ride mares even when they invade to attack us.

After the other knights had chased the Horse-Haters back where they’d come from, Lord Balian and the other knights, squires and horses from Ibelin who were still alive started for home. We hadn’t gone far before we came upon one of the Saracen slave-horses. Lord Balian said she was an Arab mare.

Like me after my first battle, she was standing forlornly by the spring, evidently abandoned. She was pretty — even caked with dried sweat, covered with dust, and with burs in her mane and tail. She was a rich chestnut color, with a cheeky blaze that curled a little over her left eye. She was dainty, with neat little feet and a rounded rump that was wonderfully inviting.

Somehow she’d managed to get rid of both her bridle and saddle, but her knees were torn open and caked with dried blood still oozing fresh blood here and there. The knees were in such terrible shape, it hurt her to bend them so she couldn’t move without pain. Some of the humans wanted to put her down at once. Dawit wouldn’t hear of it. He protested vehemently to Lord Balian, and although I couldn’t understand his flood of words, his meaning was clear: she was bruised and scraped but she would heal if given care and time. Lord Balian nodded and gave him permission to bring her along with us.

She didn’t want to come at first. She was clearly terrified of the Christians. The Saracens had obviously told her lies about them, saying they would hurt her. But she couldn’t run away from us on account of her stiff, scabbed knees. She tried, of course, tearing all the scabs off and starting a new rush of blood, but when she gave up in despair, Dawit took her in hand. He didn’t just calm her, he had some ointment he rubbed on her knees that made them feel better almost at once. When the men mounted up to continue, Dawit had both her and me on the lead behind him.

I was happy about that because I could tell she was a nice filly and I could sense how frightened she was. I tried to ease her fear and distract her from the pain in her knees by telling her how nice it was in Ibelin. I told her my first owner (I didn’t mention how terrible he was) had been killed in a battle just like hers, but that I’d then been taken in by Lord Balian, nodding to him as he rode ahead of us on Rufus.

“Usman wasn’t killed,” she nickered to me in a soft, sad voice, “he abandoned me!” You should have heard the pain in her voice! She hung her head in shame too.

“Surely he just couldn’t find you,” I comforted her, thinking she might not know how easily humans were killed if unhorsed.

“No,” she sighed, dropping her head even lower with her ears hanging down in misery. “He came and took his precious saddle, but he left me to starve.”

“But why would he do that?” I protested.

She sighed and her nose was all but dragging on the ground. “He blamed me for stumbling. He said I nearly broke his neck. He said I was lucky he didn’t kill me.”

“Well!” I assured her indignantly. “He was right about that because now you’re with us, and we’ll take good care of you. Lord Balian has miles of orchards and he gives us apples and pears and even pomegranates!”

She looked at me sidelong from under her beautiful lashes as if she didn’t believe me, but I could see a flicker of hope in her eyes too. “Really?”

“Really!” Then I asked her to tell me more about herself.

She had lived a very sheltered life it seemed, and was still a virgin. I was glad to learn that because it would have been embarrassing if she’d had more experience than me. In fact, she said she’d hardly been around stallions at all, but she’d had several riders and Usman was only the last in the series. She said she’d fallen a little in love with him because he was so masterful and other men seemed to look up to him, although he was an archer not a lancer.

That evening when we camped and we were all turned out to graze, some of the other stallions came sniffing around. A couple of young studs (you know the kind, brutes that think mares are only good for one thing) tried to harass her. I chased them away in no uncertain terms, biting one so badly that he bled, and Rufus gave me a warning nicker because he belonged to a strange knight who was riding with us for some reason. I didn’t care if I left scars! Amira – that was what Lord Balian later called her — wasn’t in season and she was wounded and frightened and shy. They had no business coming anywhere near her. She stayed near me after that, grazing so close we could swat away each other’s flies and sometimes brushing against one another. I loved that.

The next day already, she was must happier. She held her head higher, lifted her ears and she even started to pick up her feet, not shuffle along as she had the day before. Dawit was pleased with her progress too, pointing it out to Lord Balian. He smiled at us and nodded. When we paused for water later, he came back and inspected her with interest for the first time, checking over her knees and noting her other cuts and scrapes. Then he turned to me and put his palm on my forehead under my forelock. It had been nearly a year before I had overcome the memory of the Black Knight’s beatings enough to let him do that. “Found a lady, have you?” he asked me. I leaned against him and rubbed my head on his shoulder to tell him she certainly was a lady and he had to treat her right.

When we got back to Ibelin, everyone who had been left behind was aflutter at our return. They made a huge feast, you could smell it everywhere, and Mathewos ordered the grooms to give us all proper baths and we had molasses pellets in our feed that night and the deepest, softest bedding ever. Still, I was a little sad because Amira and I were separated for the first time since we’d met; she was given a stall with the other mares at the other end of the stables.

After that we rarely had a chance to exchange more than a nicker or two. I always greeted her when I was led in or out and she invariably stood with her head over her stall door when I came or went. I saw that her knees healed perfectly except for some scars. Once, when we went out to the tiltyard, she was in the paddock, and she lifted her tail and galloped along beside the fence to show me how beautifully she moved and how fast she was. I could have watched her all day! Lord Balian laughed at me and patted my neck, admitting she was a “fine filly.”

Then one evening not long afterwards, when Dawit was bringing me in from the paddock at dusk, Amira was waiting for me in her stall and as I passed her she muttered in a very soft nicker: “I’m in season.”

I stopped dead in my tracks and I looked at her. Our eyes met. She wanted me!

Dawit was clicking and tugging at the lead, but I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed by desire. Dawit laughed and yanked down firmly on the lead. “Get it out of your head!” He told me firmly ‘though kindly. “She’s not for the likes of you!”

Not for me? The shock broke my resistance for the moment, and he led me to my stall and turned me loose inside. But I wasn’t interested in my feed or even water any more. Amira wasn’t for me? Why not? And if not for me, then for who? Surely they weren’t going to let one of the household stallions have her? How could they? I was Lord Balian’s destrier! Rufus? No, he was as much a virgin as I was. Gladiator? For the first time I looked at my predecessor with anger and jealousy. He got all the mares, just because he wasn’t good for anything else! To make matters worse he started called down to Amira, “hey little Arab? Ready for a real stallion at last?”

Amira didn’t dignify him with an answer, and I screamed at her, “Don’t believe him! He’s a broken down nag! He can’t walk on four legs and he’s got rotten teeth!” (Which wasn’t true, but I hated him in that moment.)

“Centurion!” She cried in a high-pitched terrified whinny: “Don’t let him rape me! I don’t want anyone but you! Please, Centurion.”

I screamed back to her that I would rather die than let any other stallion near her.

All our whinnying, of course, upset the humans. Matthewos came out and admonished me to “behave” — as if I was the one causing trouble! Then he ordered one of the junior grooms to take Amira and a couple of the other mares outside to the paddock.  A half hour later they came to get Gladiator too. He pranced out with his crooked, lame-assed gait, flicking his tail at me and all but crowing in triumph.

I started making runs at the stall door to break it down. When that didn’t’ work, I turned around and kicked at it with the full force of my hind legs, twice, three, four times. The door held. I started pacing around my stall again, I was sweating and I swung my head back and forth at knee level as I tried to think how to escape and rescue Amira.

Someone must have told Lord Balian what a state I was in because suddenly he was at the stall door. It was completely dark by now and the stable was lit only by some oil lamps. Lord Balian never came to the stables after dark, but he was here and Mathewos with him.

“He won’t drink or eat,” Mathewos reported accurately.

I flattened my ears on my head and snapped furiously at Mathewos. He knew perfectly well what the problem was!

Lord Balian did too. He glanced over his shoulder at Amira’s empty stall. “There’s nothing wrong with him that Amira can’t cure.”

Mathewos shook his head firmly. “They are a bad match, my lord. Too similar in temperament. Any foal they produce will be more nervous than nine cats, and, as for looks, greys and chestnuts don’t mix. You’re likely to get either ugly markings or a roan.”

Lord Balian nodded, and said, “I’m sure you’re right, Mathewos. Let me walk him a bit.”

Obviously that was an order not a request, and Mathewos had no choice but to hand him my halter but his whole expression and demeanor expressed his disapproval. Lord Balian stepped into the stall and looked me in the eye. I was so agitated I glowered back at him, but I also figured if he took me out of the stall, I had a better chance to break free so I let him slip the halter over my head. Then I followed him out of the stables, across the ward, and out the postern that led to the paddocks.

As soon as we were beyond the walls I froze and lifted my head to find out where Amira was. There were several different paddocks, you see. I lifted my head and sniffed the air. She had already seen me. She lifted her voice and squealed in a frenzy of passion. “Centurion!”

That was all I needed. I bolted. If Lord Balian had tried to stop me, I would have dragged him with me. But he didn’t. He just let me go. I galloped straight past a dismayed Gladiator, who was in one of the small paddocks by himself, and I screeched to a halt opposite Amira. Now there was only the fence between us but there wasn’t space to make a running start at that fence. I started running back and forth in the lane between the paddocks, while Amira kept pace with me, calling my name. I was on the brink of trying to take that fence from a standstill, when Lord Balian appeared again. He unlatched and opened the gate to let me in. I put my head down and my tail up and galloped right past him to Amira.

When our passion had been sated, we grazed together side-by-side just as we had the first days we met. Later, we lay down to sleep a bit and she stayed so close I could feel her warmth against me. It was the most beautiful night of my whole life.

Mathewos was wrong about our foal to. Well, half wrong. I have to admit that she wasn’t pretty by most standards. Her coat was a very light chestnut, a bit of a roan to be honest, and she had a white face and four white socks, but she was the sweetest little filly you’ve ever seen. Born in love, she came into the world full of it, and when Lord Balian’s timid daughter Helvis needed a horse that she could trust absolutely and always, Lord Balian’s choice fell on our Ginger. But that is getting ahead of my story.

Life in the Kingdom of Jerusalem in the last decade before the fall of Jerusalem to Saladin is described (from human perspective) in:

Book II of  the Balian d'Ibelin TrilogyBuy Now in Paperback!  

or Kindle!

Centurion is also a character in Book I of this Biographical Novel:

A landless knight,

                       a leper king,                                                                                          and the struggle for Jerusalem!

Knight of Jerusalem: A Biographical Novel of Balian d'Ibelin, Book I, is a B.R.A.G. Medallion Honoree and finalist for the 2014 Chaucer Awards for Historical Fiction.

Buy now!

The Battle of Hattin

July 4 marks not only U.S. Independence Day but also the anniversary of 

the Battle of Hattin, fought in 1187.

 The Battle of Hattin

The devastating defeat of the combined Christian army at the Battle of Hattin on July 4, 1187, was one of the most significant disasters in medieval military history.  Christian casualties at the battle were so enormous, that the defense of the rest of the Kingdom of Jerusalem became impossible, and so the defeat at Hattin led directly to the loss of the entire kingdom including Jerusalem itself. The loss of the Holy City, led to the Third Crusade, and so to the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Friedrich I “Barbarossa”, and extended absence from his domains of Richard I “the Lionheart.” Both circumstances had a profound impact on the balance of power in Western Europe. Meanwhile the role of the critical of Pisan and Genoese fleets in supplying the only city left in Christian hands, Tyre, and in supporting Richard I’s land army resulted in trading privileges that led to the establishment of powerful trading centers in the Levant. These in turn fostered the exchange of goods and ideas that led historian Claude Reignier Condor to write at the end of the 19^th Century that: “…the result of the Crusades was the Renaissance.” (The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem 1099 to 1291 AD, The Committee of Palestine Exploration Fund, 1897, p. 163.)

The importance of Hattin to contemporaries was not just the magnitude of the defeat, but the unexpectedness of it.  In retrospect, the victory seems inevitable. Muslim states had always surrounded the crusader kingdom (as they hem in Israel today) and the Muslim rulers could always been able to call on much larger military forces than their Christian opponents.  In the early years of Latin presence in the Holy Land, the divisions among the Muslim leaders, most especially the rivalry and hatred between Shiite Caliphate of Cairo and the Sunni Caliphate of Damascus, had played into Christian hands.  However, once Saladin had managed to unite Syria and Egypt under a single, charismatic leader the balance of power clearly tipped to the Muslims.

This ignores the fact that Christian armies under Baldwin IV of Jerusalem and Richard I of England defeated Saladin on the battlefield more than once.  Saladin was a powerful, charismatic and clever commander, who knew how to deploy his forces effectively and use terrain to his advantage — but he was not invincible. Indeed, he was dealt a defeat every bit as devastating as Hattin in November 1177 at the Battle of Montgisard. His invading army was annihilated, and he himself had to flee on the back of a pack-camel. In July 1182, the Christian army under Baldwin IV stopped another full-scale invasion by Saladin, forcing him to withdraw across the Jordan with comparatively few Christian losses. In June the following year, 1183, the Christian army confronted yet another invasion on an even larger force and again forced Saladin to withdraw — this time without even engaging in an all-out battle.

Despite these apparent successes, it was clear to the King of Jerusalem that Saladin was getting stronger with each new invasion attempt.  Saladin had increased his own power base from Cairo and Damascus to Aleppo, Homs and Mosul, while the Christians had no new infusions of blood, territory or income. In consequence, in 1184 Baldwin IV sent a frantic plea to the West, begging for a new crusade and offering the Western leader — whoever he might be — the keys to the kingdom. The lack of response reflected Western complacency about the threat to Jerusalem and implicit confidence in the ability of Baldwin and his barons to continue to defeat Saladin’s attempts to push the Christian kingdom into the sea.

It was because of Baldwin’s earlier successes against Saladin, that the news of Hattin and the loss of Jerusalem shocked the West, allegedly causing the immediate death of Pope Urban III. How was it possible that a young and vigorous king, Guy I, could lead the same army to defeat that a youth suffering from leprosy (and only commanding his armies from a liter) had led to victory again and again?  

Rarely in human history has a defeat been so wholly attributable to poor generalship on the losing side as at Hattin. To be sure, Saladin set a trap for the Christian armies. The bait was the citizens and garrison of Tiberius under the command of the Countess of Tripoli, who were besieged in the citadel after the fall of the city on July 2.  The Christian army was mustered at Sephorie, only some 15 miles to the west. The pleas for help from the Countess and Tiberius naturally evoked a response from the Christian army, most notably her four grown sons.  But the Count of Tripoli himself warned that it was a trap and opposed the decision to go to the aid of Tiberius. Tripoli’s reasoning convinced the majority of his peers and the council of war composed of the leading barons agreed to stay where they were and force Saladin to come to them. However, the Grand Master of the Temple went separately and secretly to King Guy after the council dispersed and convinced him to order the advance for the following day. In short, although warned, King Guy took the bait.

To relieve Tiberius, the Christian army had to cross territory that was at this time of year devoid of fodder for the horses and where water sources were widely dispersed. With Saladin’s forces already occupying the springs at Cafarsset, on the southern route from Sephorie to Tiberias, the Christian had no choice but to follow the northern track, which led via the springs of Turan. Intense heat and harassment by the enemy slowed the Christian march to a crawl, and by noon on July 3, the Christian army had advanced only six miles to the springs of Turan.  With nine miles more to go, it was clear the army could not reach Tiberius before nightfall and prudence alone should have dictated a halt at Turan, where men and horse could rest and drink. Instead, King Guy against all reason ordered the advance to continue. Immediately, Saladin sent his troops to occupy Turan, thereby not-only blocking the Christian retreat but harassing the Christian rear-guard and further slowing the rate of advance.

A depiction of the Christian army advancing toward Hattin carrying the “True Cross”

from the film “The Kingdom of Heaven”

When darkness fell on July 3, the Christian army was still six miles short of its objective and forced to camp in an open field completely surrounded by enemy forces.  The Christians had been marching and fighting for hours without water in the intense heat of a Palestinian summer. Men and horses were exhausted and further demoralized by the sound of Saracen drums surrounding them and the countless campfires advertising the enemy’s strength. 

By morning, those fires were brush-fires intentionally set ablaze to windward of the Christian army in a maneuver that dried their already parched throats further while half-blinding them with smoke. Out of the smoke came volleys of arrows, and again “some of the Christian lords” urged King Guy to charge Saladin’s position at once, in an attempt to win the battle by killing the Sultan.  King Guy instead chose to try to march the entire army toward the springs of Hattin, still some three miles away and cut off by one wing of Saladin’s army.

While the Christian cavalry tried to drive off the Saracen cavalry in a series of charges and counter-charges, the infantry stumbled forward until, half-blinded by smoke, constantly attacked by the enemy and near dying of thirst, the morale of the Christian infantry broke.  As casualties mounted, some of the infantry retreated up the slopes of the “horns” of Hattin, two steep hills that flanked the plane on which the army had camped and now marched and refused to fight any more. 

Meanwhile, the Count of Tripoli with his knights and Lord Reginald of Sidon finally broke-through the surrounding enemy, charging east toward the Lake of Tiberius.  The Christian infantry that had not fled up the slopes tried to follow in the wake of the cavalry, but the Saracens under the command of one of Saladin’s nephews stepped aside to let the armored knights through and then closed ranks again, cutting off the Christian infantry that was cut down or taken captive.

By now it was later afternoon, and with the infantry either already slaughtered or refusing to come down from the hilltop, King Guy ordered his knights to retreat up the slope as well. By now, many of the knights were fighting on foot because their horses became vulnerable once the infantry cover was withdraw.  It was probably at this stage in the battle that the relic, believed to be a piece of the cross on which Christ was crucified, was lost. The Bishop of Acre, who had been carrying it, was killed, and the effect on Christian morale of the loss of this most precious relic — believed to have brought victory in dozens of earlier battles was devastating.

The final stages of the Battle of Hattin as depicted in the film “The Kingdom of Heaven”

But still King Guy did not surrender.  What few knights were still mounted made one (or two) last desperate charge(s) to try to kill Saladin, who was mounted and clearly identifiable among his troops.  This charge was probably lead by Balian d’Ibelin. While the charge came close enough to Saladin for him to have to shout encouragement to his men, like Tripoli before him, once Ibelin was through the enemy, he had no chance of fighting his way back up-hill through the ever thickening ranks of the enemy closing in on their prey. Within minutes, King Guy’s last position was over-run and he along with most of his barons were taken prisoner.

Of the roughly 20,000 Christian soldiers who had set out from Sephorie, only an estimated 3,000 infantry managed somehow to escape into the surrounding countryside and eventually take refuge in the castles and walled towns then still in Christian hands. Of the 1,200 knights and barons that mustered for the battle, only four barons, Tripoli, Sidon, Edessa and Ibelin, escaped capture along with maybe 100 - 200 knights. The remainder including the King of Jerusalem, the Masters of the Temple and Hospital, the Constable Aimery de Lusignan, the Lords of Oultrajourdain, Toron, Gibelet, and others — effectively the entire nobility of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. While the majority of these lords and knights were held for ransom, the 230 Templars and Hospitallers that survived the battle were executed at Saladin’s orders.

Medieval painting of prisoners being led away (here by a Christian king)

As a result of these losses, both killed and captured, the kingdom was effectively denuded of defenders. King Guy had issued the equivalent of the “levee en masse” of the Napoleonic era, the arriere ban, and every able-bodied fighting man had mustered at Sephorie. Left behind in the castles, towns and cities were women, children, the old and the ill. There were no garrisons capable of offering an effective resistance. Worse, even if there had been, there was no point to resistance since there was no army capable of coming to the relief of a city under siege. Thus when Saladin’s army appeared before the walls of one fortress or city after another, the citizens had the choice of surrender in exchange for their lives and such valuables as they could carry or hopeless resistance. Since the rules of contemporary warfare dictated that resistance justified massacre, rape and enslavement, it is hardly surprising that the Christian cities and castles capitulated one after another, starting with Nazareth, and the Acre on July 8, followed by Haifa, Caesarea, Arsuf, Jaffa, Ramla, Ibelin, Darum, Sidon, Beirut, Gibelet, Nablus, Beirut and Ascalon.

By mid-September only isolated castles and two cities defied Saladin: Tyre which was particularly defensible and to which he barons of Tripoli and Sidon and the garrisons of the surrendered cities withdrew, and Jerusalem itself.  But the siege of Jerusalem is material for another post….

The Grand Master's Squire: Excerpt from "St Louis' Knight" 3

Geoffrey was seeing it again in his head. The confusion in a darkness lit only by the unsteady light of smoking torches. Wounded men and horses seemed to be staggering about everywhere, and the moans and cries of man and beast punctuated the night. Other men wandered about asking after one friend or another. Abandoned Saracen equipment, clothing, and weapons still littered the ground, tripping the unwary, while those with the strength left in them were trying to erect tents. The stench of open latrines and foul water combined in Geoffrey’s mind with the constant beating of the enemy drums as they shouted “Allah is Great!” from the ramparts of Mansourah. They must have lit huge bonfires, because the city appeared aglow from the inside; the men on the walls shaking their swords and bows triumphantly were silhouetted against that orange light.

Geoffrey had been dazed, unable to grasp what had happened in such a short space of time. All his brothers from Limassol ― knights, squires, and sergeants ― were dead. They had been one hundred strong when they sailed for Egypt, a significant contingent of the Templar force, and they were no more. Geoffrey had lost the one man who gave him a chance when all others spoke against accepting him into the Temple. He’d lost the men who’d taught him fighting and the ethos of the Temple. He’d lost his best friends ― and there would not even be a Mass for their souls, because their bodies were all in the hands of the heathens shouting “Allah is Great!”

Suddenly someone was tugging at his sleeve and saying he must come to the surgeon’s tent. The Grand Master had regained consciousness. He had followed numbly, without a will of his own. Sonnac, a bandage covering the gaping hole in the right side of his face where his eye had been, was struggling to sit up. “Geoff!” he called out in a rasping, ruined voice at the sight of the young man. “Geoff, come kneel and put your hands in mine that I may take you into the Order at last.”

Sonnac knew how much that meant to his squire. Sonnac knew that, unlike other squires, Geoffrey wanted to be a Templar. He understood that Geoffrey wanted to be knighted, not for itself, but because it was the prerequisite for joining the Order.

That night in the camp before Mansourah, Geoffrey knew that Master de Sonnac wanted to reward him with that which meant most to him, but he also knew that the vows involved saying the Lord’s Prayer. He knew that the Knights Templar said the Lord’s Prayer in place of Mass when circumstances made it impossible to hear Mass. The Lord’s Prayer was central to their devotion. But what had, until that day, seemed self-evident, had abruptly been transformed into a demon standing between Geoffrey and what he wanted most in the world.

As Geoffrey stood in the tent staring at the wounded Grand Master, he became conscious of the blood drying on the links of his chain mail, his surcoat shredded and soiled, but between him and the Master crowded the ghastly ghosts of his dead brothers: some headless, some limbless, some gushing blood from wounds to their heads, others clutching their gutted stomachs or clinging to their disemboweled intestines.

Suddenly Geoffrey thought: if this is God’s Will, then I cannot say “Thy Will be done!” I cannot say it!

Sonnac, seeing him hesitate, tried to smile encouragingly. “Come, Geoff. If this is the last thing I do, let me make you a Templar.”

“No!” Geoffrey screamed back at him. “No! I don’t want to be servant to a senseless God! If this is God’s Will, than he is a monster! And Christ ― Christ died on a cross in Jerusalem, but he was not God’s son, and was not our Savior!”

Still full of fury, Geoffrey had spun about and fled, leaving the astonished Grand Master struggling to rise. He heard the exclamation of horrified priests and surgeons, and he was shocked by his own words as much as anyone. But there was no place to go in the crusader camp. There was no escape except out into the desert to be killed by the Bedouins.

Geoffrey could not remember what he’d done next. He’d stumbled about in the dark until he’d found himself at the horse lines. There he sank down in misery beside the remnants of a once-great cavalry, and begged forgiveness from his stallion. The tall, dark gray had not only carried him and his armor all the way here, to the middle of nowhere; he had today taken the burden of two fully armored knights, and with the strength of an angel, he had jumped over a barricade to bring both Geoffrey and the wounded Grand Master to safety. But now he stood with hanging head and swollen fetlocks, covered in cuts and probably bruises, too. We can’t even give you a decent meal, Geoffrey thought. What right have we, he asked himself, to take these gentle, loyal creatures into so much misery and almost certain death?

Read more... buy now!

St. Louis and the 7th Crusade -- Two Reviews

Last week I described the 7th Crusade; this week I'd like to talk about two books that deal with it.

Chronicles of the Crusades by Jean de Joinville and Geoffroy de Villehardouin

This is a rare book which offers us two contemporary accounts of the crusades through the eyes of participants -- and not just monkish chroniclers but fighting men.

Although the two accounts are by different authors (Geoffroy de Villehardouin for the Fourth Crusade and Jean de Joinville for the Seventh), they both offer stark, un-romanticized and often critical reports. These men are describing military campaigns not creating works of art. They are both soldiers and statesmen, intimates of the leaders of the respective campaigns, offering an analysis of events rather than poets trying to inspire. The clear, unembellished style is in part attributable to an outstanding modern translation of the medieval French by M.R.B. Shaw, but the descriptions of appalling conditions, fear, brutality, and betrayal are all the work of the original authors.

To be sure, Joinville's stated intention is to pay tribute to his beloved late King and to justify King Louis' reputation for saintliness. Joinville's handling of Louis is, in this sense, unabashedly biased. But this in no way detracts from the authenticity of his account of the Seventh Crusade. On the contrary, Joinville's Louis can only shine if he shows how very dark the surroundings were. I was particularly struck by Joinville's willingness to admit and describe his own fears, uncertainties and mistakes.

These accounts are also invaluable to historians because the narrators explain events in terms they consider self-evident -- but which are often alien to us, reminding us of the great differences in social attitudes between then and now.  Thus, while human emotions, motives and behavior is strikingly similar to today, other aspects of society are strikingly different. Likewise, details like how horses were loaded on ships or how provisions were pre-positioned and stored for the king of France are described lucidly, providing the novelist and historian with invaluable details of medieval military operations.

I highly recommend these accounts -- just don't expect them to be tales of brave knights and fair ladies. These are the accounts of real men about real wars.

 

Everything is Light by Robert Shea

This is a surprisingly well written tale, with an excellent portrayal of King Louis IX of France. Although the book starts with the fall of the last Cathar fortress of Montsegur in 1244, it provides a historically sound, comprehensible and (again) un-romaticized introduction to the key issues involved in the Albigensian crusades. It avoids the use of magic and mystery, far too common in modern writing about the Cathars, and instead presents complex, believable characters deserving of sympathy but flawed and inconsistent -- as we all are. This is without doubt the best book I have read on this fascinating episode in history.