The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land (30 page)

The revitalisation of Jerusalem and Antioch meant that Nur al-Din faced pressure in two key frontier zones. In the north, events centred on Harim. Nur al-Din’s control of this outpost–just a day’s march from Antioch itself–since 1149 had all but neutralised the Frankish principality as a threat to Aleppo. In 1156 the Latins began conducting raids into its suburbs, but for now these were driven back successfully. Nur al-Din even had the grim pleasure of triumphantly parading the heads of Christians taken in these encounters through the streets of Damascus. Meanwhile, to the south, Baldwin III broke his truce with Nur al-Din in 1157, hoping to extend Jerusalemite authority over the Terre de Sueth. A series of largely inconclusive skirmishes followed, particularly in the region of Frankish-held Banyas, although the Latin king narrowly avoided capture in June 1157 when caught in an ambush.

Around this time, however, events conspired to curtail Nur al-Din’s capabilities. Syria had always been prone to earthquakes and now, in the late 1150s, the region was subjected to a succession of severe tremors, gravely damaging many Muslim-held settlements in the area between Aleppo and Homs. A contemporary chronicler in Damascus described how ‘continuous earthquakes and shocks…wrought destruction amongst the [Muslims’] castles, fortresses and dwellings in their districts and marches’. Throughout this dreadful period, Nur al-Din was forced to commit the bulk of his resources to rebuilding work, much of which was frustratingly undone by renewed seismic activity.

Then, in October 1157, Nur al-Din was struck down by a critical illness while lodging in the Summaq. The exact nature of this malady is unknown, but it was so extreme that the great emir soon began to fear for his life. Carried by litter to Aleppo, he quickly made arrangements for his will, designating one of his brothers, Nusrat al-Din, as heir and lord of Aleppo, while Shirkuh was to hold Damascus as his subject. Despite these provisions, civil unrest soon racked Muslim Syria, and Nur al-Din’s condition deteriorated throughout the autumn. Although he survived this first onslaught, his health seems to have remained fragile and, in late 1158, he was again laid low for months by acute sickness, this time in Damascus. Unfortunately, we lack the close eyewitness testimony to gauge accurately the impact of these brushes with death upon Nur al-Din’s state of mind. He is said to have experienced a spiritual awakening in these years, hereafter embracing a more ascetic lifestyle and adopting simpler garb. It is certainly true that, in spite of ongoing Levantine tensions, he took the time to perform the
Hajj
, the pilgrimage to Mecca, in late 1161.
¹⁷

External threats

Spies soon brought the enemy word of Nur al-Din’s debility–it was even rumoured that he was perhaps already dead–and the Franks quickly sought to exploit the confusion gripping the emir’s lands. Their strength was reinforced by the presence of Count Thierry of Flanders, a powerful western noble and veteran of the Second Crusade, who once again had taken the cross and come east. In the autumn of 1157 his troops joined an amalgamated Christian army–with elements from Antioch, Tripoli and Jerusalem and an Armenian force under Thoros–in marching on Shaizar. After a short siege the lower town fell, and the allies appeared to be on the brink of overrunning the citadel when a bitter argument erupted. Hoping to harness Thierry’s wealth and resources for Outremer’s defence, Baldwin III had promised the count hereditary lordship of Shaizar, but Reynald of Châtillon disputed the legality of this plan, claiming that the town belonged to Antioch. With neither side willing to back down, the Christian offensive ground to a halt and, amid mutual recriminations, the allies abandoned the siege, forsaking a rare opportunity to reassert Frankish authority over the southern Orontes. Despite this reversal, the Latins managed to regroup in early 1158. Gathering at Antioch they targeted Harim and, after an energetic siege, forced the surrender of its citadel. On this occasion there was no argument over rights and the town was returned to the principality, thereby restoring a measure of security to its eastern borders.

Byzantium also re-emerged as a force in the Near East in the period. Greek influence in the region had been in abeyance since the death of Emperor John Comnenus in 1143. Power had passed to his son, Manuel, who, after the debacle of the Second Crusade, had been preoccupied with affairs in Italy and the Balkans. In the late 1150s Manuel sought to restore relations with the Franks after the ill will and suspicion engendered in 1147–8–reaffirming imperial authority in Antioch and Cilicia, and establishing closer ties with Frankish Palestine. Marriage alliances were the foundation of this process. In September 1158, King Baldwin III wed a highly placed member of the Comneni dynasty, Manuel’s niece Theodora. She brought with her a lavish dowry in gold. The emperor then took the further step of marrying Bohemond III’s sister, Maria of Antioch, in December 1161.

For Nur al-Din the implication of these unions was at once obvious and disquieting: the ancient eastern Christian opponent of Islam, Byzantium, would again be directing its legendary might towards the Levant. And, while the Latins stood as both a threat and annoyance to his ambitions, the lord of Aleppo and Damascus appears to have seen in the Greeks a more enduring and intractable menace. Awe, apprehension and resolution thus fused to condition Nur al-Din’s response when Manuel Comnenus led a huge army into northern Syria in October 1158.

That autumn the emperor received Reynald of Châtillon’s submission, accepting his penance for the recent assault on Cyprus, and brought the increasingly independent Roupenid Armenians to heel. In April 1159, with his recalcitrant subjects cowed, Manuel rode, in full majesty, through the gates of Antioch, surrounded by his resplendent Varangian Guard, attended by his servant, Prince Reynald. Even King Baldwin showed his humility by following some distance behind, mounted, but unadorned by any symbols of office. The message was obvious: as ruler of the eastern Mediterranean’s Christian superpower, Manuel’s eminence was unparalleled. Should he wish, he might carve a swathe through Syria.

Nur al-Din, only now in spring 1159 recovering from his second bout of infirmity, took this threat to heart, summoning troops from as far afield as Mosul to fight under the banner of
jihad
and strengthening Aleppo’s fortifications. Even so, when the Christian armies assembled at Antioch in May under Manuel’s leadership, readying themselves for a direct assault on Aleppo itself, the Muslims must have been significantly outnumbered. On the brink of such a dreadful confrontation a more bluntly bellicose Seljuq lord, of Zangi’s ilk, might simply have embraced the coming struggle with proud defiance, and likely suffered decimation. In his dealings with Damascus, however, Nur al-Din had shown a gift for the subtleties of diplomacy. Now he set out to test Manuel’s commitment to the prosecution of a costly campaign on Byzantium’s far-eastern frontier. Dispatching envoys, Nur al-Din proposed a truce, offering to free some 6,000 Latin prisoners captured during the Second Crusade and to support the Greek Empire against the Seljuqs of Anatolia. To the dismay of his Frankish allies, the emperor quickly agreed these terms, ordering the immediate cessation of his campaign.

This startling turn of events is profoundly instructive. Manuel’s behaviour could perhaps have been predicted–once again the interests of Byzantium had been prioritised above those of Outremer. But Nur al-Din’s conduct revealed that he was no intransigent
jihadi
ideologue, bent upon conflict with Christendom. Instead, he had employed pragmatism to defuse a confrontation with one of Islam’s true global rivals. Amid the dealings between Nur al-Din and Manuel, the crusader states almost seemed like an insignificant sideshow.

Throughout these years Nur al-Din’s actions suggest that, in spite of his apparent spiritual awakening and emergent patronage of
jihad
propaganda, he continued to view Latin Outremer as simply one opponent among many within the complex and entangled matrix of Near and Middle Eastern power politics. At the start of the 1160s, he made no concerted attempt to exert direct military or diplomatic pressure on the Franks–indeed, the emir allowed two opportunities for action to pass by. In 1160 Reynald of Châtillon was captured by one of Nur al-Din’s lieutenants and imprisoned in Aleppo (where he would remain for the next fifteen years), but rather than exploit a period of Antiochene weakness as the young Bohemond III came to power, Nur al-Din elected to agree a new two-year truce with Jerusalem. Then, in early 1163, when King Baldwin III died of illness aged just thirty-three, Nur al-Din again failed to react. One Latin chronicler put this down to the emir’s innate sense of honour, writing that:

This quote from William of Tyre reflects the archbishop’s deep-seated admiration for Baldwin III, but Arabic sources give no indication that Nur al-Din’s decision making was influenced by compassion at this point. In part, his inaction can be explained by the fact that he had begun, as we shall see, to direct his attention south, towards Egypt. But it was also a function of his continuing preoccupations in Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, and of his failure to prioritise the
jihad
against the Franks.
¹⁸

TRIAL AND TRIUMPH

From the spring of 1163 onwards, however, Nur al-Din’s perception of his own role within the war for the Holy Land seems to have altered, prompting a deepening of his commitment to the cause. In May the emir led a raiding party into the county of Tripoli’s northern reaches, making camp in the Bouqia valley–the broad plain between the Ansariyah Mountains to the north and Mount Lebanon to the south. News of his whereabouts spread, and the Franks of Antioch, recently reinforced by a group of pilgrims from Aquitaine and by Greek soldiers, decided to launch an attack under the command of the Templar Gilbert of Lacy.

Oblivious to this threat, an advance party of Zangid troops were shocked to see a large Christian army marching out of the foothills of the Ansariyah range. After a brief skirmish they were put to flight and raced back towards Nur al-Din’s main encampment, hotly pursued by the enemy. A Muslim chronicler later described how the two forces ‘arrived together’, so that, overcome by surprise, ‘the Muslims were unable to mount their horses and take up their weapons before the Franks were amongst them, killing and capturing many’. A Latin contemporary recorded that ‘[Nur al-Din’s] army was almost annihilated [while] the prince himself, in despair of his very life, fled in utter confusion. All the baggage and even his sword were abandoned. Barefooted and mounted on a beast of burden, he barely escaped capture.’ Muslim sources confirm the scale of this defeat and the ignominy of Nur al-Din’s retreat, adding that, in his desperation, he mounted a steed whose legs were still hobbled and was saved only by the bravery of one of his Kurds, who rushed in to sever the tether at the cost of his own life.

Stunned and humiliated, Nur al-Din scuttled back to Homs with a handful of survivors. The horror of this unheralded disaster seems to have left a scar on his psyche and the nature of his reaction over the coming months is revealing. Filled with rage and impassioned determination, he is said to have vowed: ‘By God, I shall not shelter under any roof until I avenge myself and Islam.’ We might suspect this to be pure invective, but it was followed by practical action. At significant cost, Nur al-Din paid for the replacement of all weapons, equipment and horses out of his own purse–a responsibility not usually shouldered by Muslim warlords–so that ‘the army was restored as if it had not suffered any defeat’. He also ordered that the lands of any slain soldiers be passed on to their families, rather than reverting to his control. Most strikingly, when the Franks sought, later that year, to agree a truce, the emir flatly refused.
¹⁹

Nur al-Din now sought to build a coalition with the Muslims of Iraq and the Jazira, gathering a mighty army to prosecute a retaliatory attack on the Latins. Stories of his devout dedication to ‘fasting and praying’ spread through the Near East, and he also began actively recruiting the support of ascetics and holy men throughout Syria and Mesopotamia, urging them to publicise the Latins’ manifold crimes against Islam. The impetus of
jihad
was gathering pace.

By the following summer, Nur al-Din was ready to strike, and his strategic objectives were audacious. Numerical estimates of his forces have not survived, but we know that he was followed by troops from his own Syrian territories as well as those from the eastern cities of Mosul, Diyar Bakr, Hisn Kifr and Mardin. He must have been confident about the strength of his army, because he set out both to make territorial conquests and to lure the Christians into a decisive battle. Nur al-Din advanced on Harim, which had remained in Antiochene hands since 1158, laying siege to its citadel and initiating a bombardment campaign with siege engines. As he must have expected, the Franks soon sought to make a counter-attack. In early August 1164 an army probably in excess of 10,000 men, including some 600 knights, marched from Antioch under the command of Prince Bohemond III, Count Raymond III of Tripoli and Joscelin III of Courtenay, alongside Thoros of Armenia and the Greek governor of Cilicia.

At news of their approach, Nur al-Din marched his army to the nearby Latin-held settlement of Artah, on the Antiochene plain, hoping to draw his enemy further away from the security of Antioch. Then, on 11 August, when the Christian allies made a nervous feint towards Harim, he closed to engage their forces on open ground. As the battle began, Nur al-Din’s right flank made a feigned retreat, tempting the Latin knights into a hasty charge. Left isolated and vulnerable, the Christian infantry faced a ruinous assault and were swiftly overrun. With the tide of the battle moving in the Muslims’ favour, the mounted Frankish elite reversed their headlong advance, only to find themselves enveloped as Nur al-Din’s right wing halted its supposed flight to ‘[come] back on their heels’, and his centre turned to engage them at close quarters. An Arabic chronicle described how ‘[the Christians’] spirits sank and they saw that they were lost, left in the middle, surrounded on all sides by the Muslims’. Aghast, a Latin contemporary conceded that: ‘Overwhelmed and shattered by the swords of the enemy, [the Franks] were shamefully slain like victims before the altar…Regardless of honour all threw down their arms precipitately and ignominiously begged for life.’ Thoros fled the field, but ‘to save their lives even at the cost of shame and reproach’, Bohemond, Raymond and Joscelin all surrendered; ‘chained liked the lowest slaves, they were led ignominiously to Aleppo, where they were cast into prison and became the sport of the infidels’.