Talk:First Crusade/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Root causes of the First Crusade

I don't intend on getting into to a long, drawn out argument on semantics, but the sentence labeled as nonsense seems to be universally accepted as true. I'm not going to start pulling quotes as there is likely no source that says exactly that or the source won't be good enough. The article Crusading Movement says as much. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 00:10, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

In part this is the result of using dated sources for assertions that modern academics have now discounted. As Asbridge puts it this battle was once considered by some academics to be pivotal, but it is now consider only one of a number of events leading to Turkish control of Anatolia. It is hard to justify the assertion that this was a cause of events that happened two decades later. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 07:49, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

@Norfolkbigfish. I have to take issue with your changing the article while it was still under discussion. You posted this and then changed the article 4 minutes later. I'm not going to reverse because I don't want get into a big argument on this. But, your description of Asbridge's view is exactly what the article originally said, which is "was one of the root causes of the First Crusade." That's what "root cause" means. Maybe @Firsteleventh could chime in. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 18:46, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

I think that it is a worthwhile piece of context, but appreciate that it is covered in detail in the specific First Crusade entry. Firsteleventh (talk) 18:55, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

Apologies @Dr. Grampinator, I thought the thread was dormant. Asbridge's point was that acdemics do not consider Manzikert pivotal or as a particularly significant defeat (I am doing this from memory but I think it is in Crusades-happy to be correted). The article implied the exact opposite. Happy to revert and amend if @Firsteleventh has a different suggestion, but imho I think it reades better without the assertion. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 07:46, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

Did some checking, he puts it ...hostorians no longer consider this to have been an utterly cataclysmic reversal...it still was a stinging setback that presaged notable Turkish gains (p27). I read that as notable, but not a root cause. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 08:18, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

I think it is worth mentioning that "Byzantium" was under pressure (of which Manzikert formed an important part), which led to Alexios Comnenus calling for help in fighting off the Turks. Tom doesn't really give that much weight in his intro, but there is more on p.34 that may be useful. Firsteleventh (talk) 09:08, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

@Norfolkbigfish, @Firsteleventh. While these discussions are enlightening, you shouldn't make what I consider major changes to stable articles like this without a consensus. The same thing happened with the "secular" discussion, which should not be repeated. Also, I wasn't quite sure what book of Asbridge's you were referencing, but I think it was "The Crusades." And the footnotes at the bottom from a previous discussion make this difficult to follow. Can they be moved somehow?

Definition of root cause: "An initiating cause of a chain of events which leads to an outcome or effect of interest." (Wikitionary)

Quote from Asbridge, the First Crusade, pg. 97: "In 1071 the Emperor Romanus Diogenes suffered the humiliation of defeat and capture at the hands of the Muslim Turks in the Battle of Manzikert, after which much of Asia Minor fell to Islam and the western frontier became destabilised."

So you're saying that Manzikert was not one of the root causes of the First Crusade? Dr. Grampinator (talk) 17:59, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

I think it is a good call to reach a consensus here before changing anything. Firsteleventh (talk) 18:01, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

What I am saying is that Manzikert (or Mantzikert) is notable, but it is a bit of a stretch to argue it was a root cause of the crusades. Asbridge notes that academics have changed their view on the significance of the battle, downgrading it as such, and places it in a continuum of events to set the scene in the 11th century. The battle did not change the status quo, so linking it events of 24 years later doesn't really work. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 08:42, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

@Norfolkbigfish, @Firsteleventh. We're just arguing semantics here. But the fact remains that you made the change during a Talk discussion and are refusing to revert to the original. So it doesn't matter what anyone's view is, the change is made and so it will remain. Please don't make it a Request for Comment like you did last time which ended up changing a perfectly good term used by historians based on poorly sourced definitions. Just out of curiously, can you justify your statement: "assertions that modern academics have now discounted" with anything other than an unsourced mention by Asbridge? Dr. Grampinator (talk) 19:01, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

@Norfolkbigfish, @Firsteleventh. I made some edits to deleted the other use of "root cause" as it was also confusing and to add Ashbridge's words. Please review and comment. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 22:40, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

@Dr. Grampinator - a few comments, as you asked:

• The First Crusade was the response of the Christian world to the expansion of Islam, through the Fatimids and Seljuks, into the Holy Land and Byzantium. is subjective opinion rather than objective fact and as such probably infringes WP:NPOV
• I don't have a copy of Riley-Smith's The Crusades but have read several of the versions of this article and would be very supprised if he wrote this without greater nuance, qualification and/or context.
• The root causes of the crusades continue be a source of argument amongst crusade historians (as for everything else, they are a argumentative lot) and if one cause is mentioned the debate and other causes should be as well.
• As Asbridge put it in his introduction more even handedly A charged and vexatious question remains:did the Muslim world provoke the crusades or were these Latin holy wars of agression? ....in fact , on the basis of all the surviving evidence, the case could be argued in either direction
• The use of Christian world in this context is misleading, the crusades were not a response of Res publica Christiana, it was the acts of the Latin Church only
• if the sentence was amended nad sourced (it should be easy) to something like The crusade was the response of the Latin Church to requests for military aid from Alexios I Komnenos to combat the expansion of the Seljuks, into Anatolia the above would not be issues
• Equally it could be removed entirely without any harm to the article
• If you want to discus cause explicitly it might be worth carving out a new section to do this. A useful start could be the text you excised:While the root causes are varied and continue to be debated, it is clear that the First Crusade came about from a combination of factors earlier in the 11th century in both Europe and the Near East.
• Romanus's 8 days of captivity doesn't warrant the only time in history a Byzantine emperor became the prisoner of a Muslim commander which is largely irrelevent with regards to the subject of this article
• The battle was a stinging setback that presaged notable Seljuk gains is WP:Plagarism unless you include in the text you got this from Asbridge
• He didn't write and contributed to the call for the First Crusade, so this is unsourced. It is wrong as well
• In a c11,000 word article Manzikert is mentioned three times, once is enough. 3 times is as many times as mosr major works mention it - the Oxford Illustrated, for example, mentions it only once and then just to talk about the use of Mamluks. Hardly indicative of a major cause
• worried about the advances of the Seljuks in the aftermath of the Battle of Manzikert of 1071 the source doesn't mention that, so it is unsourced and should be deleted

Norfolkbigfish (talk) 09:45, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

@Norfolkbigfish, @Firsteleventh. All good comments. I'm glad we're getting away from the snipping and back to improving the article. I'm not going to try to respond to all of them at once as there are quite a few. But here goes:

First, I think the term "root cause" should be removed as no one understands it. I don't support a separate section on "Causes..." but think that maybe its own article would be warranted.

Absolutely get rid of two of the mentions of Manzikert. I'll do that when I'm done with this post.

Agree that the capture of Romanus IV is a little much, but then again so is the deaths of Nizam al-Mulk, Malik-Shah and Al-Mustansir Billah. Romanus is usually mentioned in First Crusade books and it provides a little color. There's a lot in the Historical Context section...some might find it interesting, most will jump to Clermont.

We should be able to come up a simple sentence that says what the cause of the First Crusade was. I took a shot at it with: "The First Crusade was the response of the Christian world..." that seems to be understandable. We can play with it, but isn't that the essence? I don't understand why that would be considered my opinion.

Wasn't the First Crusade a response of the Christian world which would include both Latin and Greek Orthodox?

I seriously oppose bringing in the idea that the First Crusade was a Holy War of aggression on behalf of the West. To me, that's a fringe idea that doesn't belong in an introductory article.

More to come after I have time to think. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 17:27, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

You may both enjoy this piece on that, https://apholt.com/2018/04/15/the-first-crusade-as-a-defensive-war-four-historians-respond/ Firsteleventh (talk) 17:31, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

I did enjoy the piece as I have with Holt's other discussions. This is why I miss academics. Some comments:

Franke made the following statement: "(and by ‘recent’ I mean from the mid-1080s to early 1090s, not from Manzikurt in 1071, as is often assumed—I think we were all in agreement on that point)", which I'm sure my colleague will focus on. But I would argue that the Crusaders went to liberate Jerusalem, not Nicaea or Antioch (which I'm sure most had not even heard of). Maybe Manzikert was not the end-all/be-all of Byzantine control, but it started the ball rolling. If not it, then what?

Going back to Holt's piece, I would note that if the Crusades were defensive, then Christianity has not done a very good job, as Jerusalem was controlled by Christians essentially only from 1099–1187 (and a few others), but has been under the control of Muslims until 1967 when the Israelis took it.

To be pedantic (no surely not :-) ) the UK controlled Jerusalem for three decades in the 20th century Mandate for Palestine Norfolkbigfish (talk) 09:48, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

I still contend this argument doesn't belong in Wikipedia, which is for general audiences not academics. An article such as this should summarize more detailed articles when available. Battle of Manzikert states that it "is also interpreted as one of the root causes for the later Crusades, in that the First Crusade of 1095 was originally a western response to the Byzantine emperor's call for military assistance after the loss of Anatolia." which is pretty much was said in the original write-up.

Regardless of Urban's intent (which will never be precisely ascertained), the fact is that Jerusalem was taken by a hostile Muslim regime and Byzantium was incapable of protecting pilgrims. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 20:46, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

@Dr. Grampinator-musings only at this point but you hit the, or rather a, nail on the head with the key objective being Jerusalem. When it comes to what set the ball rolling the rise of an assertive, muscular Papacy through the Gregorian Reform is key. Byzantium requested support after Manzikert but there was no response. It again requested support at Piacenza and again there was no response. But when Urban preached at Clermont there was a massive response, perhaps because he preached a Passagium generale to Jerusalem instead? It is worth noting that Jerusalem was under Muslim rule from the 7th century without any great concern. What changed?

As for this argument it is normal, and expected, to articulate both sides of any debate in WP, if there is debate. If you wanted to avoid this it would be better to excise the sentence on response for the reasons above and concentrate on objective facts that historians can agree on e.g. Urban preached for a crusade after Alexios asked for military support but Alexios wasn't expecting a crusade, rather a mercenary detachment. That is fairly uncontentious.

One last thing, what you and I think is immaterial. What ever the outcome it needs to be closely sourced to a reputable crusade academic or two. There are plenty who discuss this. Personally, I find Asbridge fairly neutral on the matter. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 22:56, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

I will also try to contribute to the topic of whether the crusades were a response of the Christian world and why they happened in that moment. I think the term response fits pretty well. The motivation for the response was of course varied.

• For Pope Urban II the response seems to have been primarily "long-term" thinking in which he thought that a new era was beginning that had started with the reconquest of Toledo (1085), Southern Italy and Sicily and that would not only reunite formally the Eastern&Western church but also renew Christianity as a whole. I would suggest reading Paul E.Chevedden's "The Islamic View and the Christian View of the Crusades: A New Synthesis" on this topic as well as "Crusade creationism versus Pope Urban II's conceptualisation of the crusades". I would also maintain that the response was of both churches as the crusaders collaborated (at least until after the First Crusade) with both the patriarch of Antioch as well as the patriarch of Jerusalem. On the other hand, Alexios Komnenos responded to the abysmal situation that threatened his rule primarily through the Turks and then by his own noble who were discontent with his handling of it, with him being even called "abandoned by God". For this I would recommend reading Peter Frankopan's Call from the East.
• Then there is a good amount of people who responded to the tales of suffering Christians were undergoing as reported by pilgrims, soldiers who had been in Byzantine employment and others who had been to the East (e.g. Goibertus of Marmoutier who very probably knew Stephen of Blois and who had been in the reconquered city of Nicomedia just years before the 1st Crusade, see "A relic collector" in Zwischen Polis, Provinz und Peripherie: Beiträge zur Byzantinistischen Geschichte und Kultur). These tales were than exaggerated by Byzantine propaganda as well as in public preaching as possibly seen in the recreation of Urban II's speech at Clermont by the chroniclers of the 1st Crusade. *For many others it was simply convenient. I think here of Bohemond of Taranto who was checked in his ambitions by his half-brother and uncle, Robert II of Normandy who was a disaster as a duke and Godfrey who ruled over a pretty unruly duchy and had had to fight for it a long time.
• Also, and call me a materialist here, I would assume the years before the call for the crusade were also important. As Conor Kostick in "The Social Structure of the First Crusade" shows, there were many famines and plagues in the years preceding the call, especially in 1094 and 1095, before the situation got better in 1096. Combined with the reports of Guibert of Nogent that there were families with all their livelihood on carts pulled by oxen I think the response to the reports of unrest and violence in the Holy Land and Byzantium motivated people to start going. Together with this is an argument I have no one to quote except myself that it seems to me that for many this could have been a opportunity to gain money by fighting this threat which especially in these times, maybe together with Byzantine propaganda and recruitment offices (see here Frankopan) would have motivated many soldiers to go East. I see this in context with the slogan at Dorylaeum as reported by the Gesta Francorum "Today, if God wants, you will be rich" and Henry of Esch and Baldwin of Hainaut hastening towards Constantinople to claim their share (as recounted by Runciman).

Maybe I would phrase the hopefully simple sentence differently, I would possibly leave out the Fatimids. It seems to me that for the majority of the rule of the Fatimids over Jerusalem Western Europe perceived them not as a threat and were fine to go to Jerusalem while it was under their dominion. Only once Jerusalem had been taken in 1073 by the Turk Atsiz do the ideas of a military expedition in the East come up. I would also possibly go as far as stating that it was not a response against Islamic expansion as such as all the dealings of the crusaders with the local Arabs would show (sending an embassy to the Fatimids, writing Duqaq that they did not desire his territory, Godfrey accepting the alliance with the Muslim Emir of Azaz, Omar). Therefore maybe my suggestion would be to write it was the Christian response to the Turkish invasion of the Holy Land and Byzantium. Please do not get me wrong! I am not advocating for bashing the Turks but there arrival there definitively upset the local balance of power. This not only in a political way but also in a economical way as there way of living as nomads with cattle they had to feed was quite distinct from the fairly urbanised societies they encountered there. PontiffSulivahn (talk) 16:46, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Text & map inconsistent?

So, about the Byzantine empire, the text says, “ territorial recovery of the empire reached its furthest extent in 1025.”

But if I’m reading the accompanying map right, a significant portion of modern day Turkey was outside the empire in 1025, but within it by 1081.

Furthermore, the text says it stretched eastward to Iran, but the map (which doesn’t show modern borders) looks to me like it only extended east of Turkey in 1081.

What gives? 2600:6C60:6A00:175:75BA:F824:3C51:8F6 (talk) 15:47, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

Map was created by @Amitchell125, I suspect there is a very good answer. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 16:29, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 June 2023

Onilaalex (talk) 12:31, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

Just to know that the country Walachia participated in the first crusade

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. M.Bitton (talk) 14:19, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 June 2023 (2)

·Walachia

86.122.74.154 (talk) 16:55, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Cannolis (talk) 18:05, 30 June 2023 (UTC)

New map

I'd like to add a freely-licensed map showing where the participants on the First Crusade came from.

File:Origin of the First Crusaders.jpg - Wikimedia Commons

It's the outcome of a project that's discussed here

History Matters - Mapping the First Crusaders (sheffield.ac.uk) Charleslincolnshire (talk) 08:19, 13 July 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 22 November 2023

Lacking military discipline, in what likely seemed to the participants a strange land (Eastern Europe), Peter's fledgling army quickly found itself in trouble despite the fact they were still in Christian territory.[36] The army led by Walter fought with the Hungarians over food at Belgrade,

Austria, Hungary, Serbia etc. are not Eastern Europe, unless you define that as everything that is not Western Europe (aka the NW corner of the continent with Italy and Iberia). The second sentence is a downplaying of events. The Hungarians (Christians) in Zemun were massacred and Belgrade residents (also Christians) fled and both cities were burned down by the crusaders as is stated on the People's Crusade page.

Remove the apologetics, pilgrims regularly passed through this "strange land" earlier on their way to Jerusalem. Change "in what likely seemed to the participants a strange land (Eastern Europe)," to "being outside their lands of origin, Peter's army" or something like that. Add that Zemun and Belgrade were burned down and Christians in at least Zemun were massacred. 78.2.116.124 (talk) 23:16, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Shadow311 (talk) 17:00, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Byzantine-Seljuk map mistakes

1025 and 1081 should be swapped, and did they still hold southern Italy by 1081? Compoteleon (talk) 22:40, 2 February 2024 (UTC)

The Byzantines? The Catepanate of Italy fell in 1071. Dimadick (talk) 16:13, 3 February 2024 (UTC)

Capitalization

We're very irregular about capitalizing the word "Crusader" in this and other articles on the Crusades. 2600:1702:6D0:5160:1CC8:15C3:9DD1:387B (talk) 18:41, 19 February 2024 (UTC)

England and the First Crusade

@Anvib: There were some English that participated in the First Crusade, but the Kingdom of England was not one of the belligerents. If you read Christopher Tyerman's book England and the Crusades, you will realize that. On page 15, he states "...English involvement in the First Crusade was minimal and peripheral." The fact that an English fleet provided some supplies at Antioch does not make them a combatant. Asbridge's work on the First Crusade has exactly one reference to England, and that's the supply at Antioch. Please amend your edit. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 22:13, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

I agree that English participation in the First crusade was more limited and peripheral however that doesn't change the fact that the Kingdom participated. If you question the participation of the Kingdom of England on this basis, then you could also have to for many of the other listed belligerents. And I again refer to the following: :https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Crusade#/media/File:Origin_of_the_First_Crusaders.jpg

and :https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_forces_of_the_First_Crusade

both of which reference direct participation from the Kingdom of England.

Anvib (talk) 23:29, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

I agree. There's not rationale for many of them. The Republic of Genoa did not even exist when the First Crusade started. On the Eastern side, Armenia and the Marionites were not participants, but the Byzantine empire was. As to the Crusaders, maybe the Christian forces of the First Crusade should be the guide. (Full disclosure: I wrote that article back in 2017.) I support a major-league scrub. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 00:33, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

"The fact that an English fleet provided some supplies at Antioch" There is a more obvious connection to England than that. One of the leaders of this crusade was Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy. He was the brother and (at the time) heir of William II of England. Dimadick (talk) 13:58, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Read my comment above. The experts on the subject say no. Do you have a source that says the Kingdom of England participated in the First Crusade? Dr. Grampinator (talk) 17:25, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

You have got to love WP pedantry :-). The belligerents section is fundamentally flawed and it would be better to delete it entirely. In Feudal society it is probably wrong to say that a particular polity engaged, as opposed to particular leaders and their affinity. For example the kingdom of France is on the list along with a subordinate list of supposed territories even though it wasn't to come into existence for roughly a century and although some are vassals of the King of the Franks it would be wrong to say the were part of the Kingdom of France. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 17:57, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Tell me about it. I would be just as happy to have Western Europe and Byzantine Empire on the left and the Seljuks and Fatimids on the right. No further breakdown. The Commanders and Leaders is OK, but could be improved. Just list them. As it is right now, the value-added is minimal. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 19:19, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Agree entirely :-) Norfolkbigfish (talk) 08:29, 1 March 2024 (UTC)

Three columns for the Belligerents infobox?

Having followed the discussion above on England I started to wonder whether it would not make sense to split the section on Belligerents in three: Crusaders & Byzantium, Seljuk Turks and the Fatimids.

The reasoning is as follows. As the article states in the beginning, one crucial reason was the Seljuk conquests in the Middle East which then led emperor Alexios to ask for military aid in 1095. At this time, Jerusalem had been for around 20 years under Turkmen and then Seljuk turbulent rule (see Atsiz massacre of 1077, street fights in 1093 under Sökmen,...) which created difficulties for the visiting pilgrims. Thus, the Franks set of to liberate the lands fallen into Seljuk hands and then march on Jerusalem and not to make war on all Muslims. Already at Nicea in March 1097, emperor Alexios suggested the crusaders sent ambassadors to the Fatimid caliph because of the shared interest to maintain the Turkish threat (let's remember that Atsiz had tried to invade Egypt in 1076 and that the Seljuks portrayed themselves as strict Sunnites and fighters against the Shiite Fatimids). The embassy of the Fatimid caliph then met the crusaders at the siege of Antioch in February 1098 and it could be that they even fought in the battle of the lake of Antioch on February 9 (see Albert of Aachen: https://books.google.es/books?id=29ivdUpWBj8C, page 237 (chapter iii, 62)). Though it is not certain and most of the sources are written with hindsight after Jerusalem had fallen, it seems that when they left in March 1097, some kind of arrangement had been made, possibly even an alliance. Stephen of Blois writes that the Fatimids had "established peace and concord with us". Ibn Zafir writes al-Afdal, the Armenian Fatimid vezier said that it was better that the Franks occupy the Syrian ports "so that they could prevent the spread of the influence of the Turks on the lands of Egypt" (note that many coastal places were independent or under Turkish hand such as Antioch or Tripolis and see for the quote the Carolina Hillenbrand pp. 44-47). Hillenbrand and others suggest further that there might have been a plan to divide Seljuk lands and that al-Afdal would have liked to have a buffer state between him and the Seljuks.

With the Crusaders binding the Seljuk attention in northern Syria, the Fatimids were then able to go to war against the southern Seljuk towns and reconquer Jerusalem in August 1098. The Frankish ambassadors celebrated Easter 1099 in the reconquered Jerusalem together with the Fatimids. The break with the Fatimids came only in April 1099 when the diplomatic discussions before Arqa broke down, likely also influenced by the breakdown of the alliance between (most of) the crusaders and Alexios. Even then did the crusaders only went straight after Jerusalem, not conquering any further places on their way. Moreover, the Fatimids did not join the Turks in an alliance to expel the crusaders but this joining of arms happened several decades later (under Nur ad-Din? unfortunately I am not well-read on when they actually joined arms).

One option could be to include the Fatimids on both columns and give an entrance date into the conflict (like Russia here in the infobox on the Seven Years' War) but I think this still gives a wrong impression as if the Fatimids and the Crusaders or the Seljuks and Fatimids were united.

Therefore, I think these events could be best reflected by having three columns with the crusading forces (maybe we could use here the Wiki pages on the armies of each crusader lord?) & Byzantium in the first, the Seljuk forces in the second and the Fatimids in the third. This shows better the existing division and complexity in the Middle East and will also give the readers the incentive to see the conflict as more than just Christians vs. Muslims.

What do you think?

PS: Here some sources on the topic: Asbridge, Thomas S.(2007). Knowing thy Enemy: Latin Relations with Islam at the Time of the First Crusade in Knighthoods of Christ Essays on the History of the Crusades and the Knights Templar, Presented to Malcolm Barber, pp. 17-25 https://www.google.com/books/edition/Knighthoods_of_Christ/mgskDwAAQBAJ France, John (1994). Victory in the East, pp. 325-327 https://archive.org/details/victoryineast00john/page/324/mode/2up Hillenbrand, Caroline (2000). The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives, pp. 44-47 https://books.google.com/books?id=UalnoF5MBHMC Köhler, Markus (2013). Alliances and Treaties between Frankish and Muslim Rulers in the Middle East, especially pp.44-54 https://eprints.soas.ac.uk/14644/1/Kohler%20alliances%2C%20published%20version%20prelim%20and%20ch.%201.pdf PontiffSulivahn (talk) 16:52, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

I don't object to this per se, but think it might be a little too esoteric for this article. The text doesn't really support this and I think adding this material to the article would just confuse things. I suggest a seperate article discussing the complex relations among all the parties. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 20:57, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

@PontiffSulivahn makes a good point, that the InfoBox as it currently stands is factually inaccurate. Currently it implies the Seljuks and Fatimids were allied, which is clearly untrue. I would go further, it implies a dualist Muslim v Christian contest. This lacks nuance. The Byzantines were not, by definition, either on crusade or part of the crusade. There may have been some common interest in Anatolia, a desire for restituition of Antioch and logistical support but this was in Byzantine interests; their respective objectives were different and many Crusaders were enimies of the Empire.

As such the box needs an edit, and I would suggest four columns rather than 3, or it needs deleting. Norfolkbigfish (talk) 08:52, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Good point, the dualist view is far to simplified, especially as this article is about the First Crusade and not about Crusader involvement in the Holy Land in general where it could be considered.

I think with respect to Byzantium the more recent view is to emphasise their role in bringing the crusade to be and the close collaboration they maintained throughout the campaign up to the split at Arqa.

Any suggestions on how to proceed?

@Dr. Grampinator, which text specifically do you have in mind?

Also, if you do not mind I will change as a start the list of belligerent Western Europe to the different crusader armies. Neither was Western Europe involved in this as a whole nor as a "state entity". Happy to discuss it though. PontiffSulivahn (talk) 18:13, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

I'm thinking that the entire upper part of the Infobox can go. But then the right side should have three bold titles: Seljuks of Rum, Seljuk Empire, Fatimid Dynasty. The same basic information is conveyed. Dr. Grampinator (talk) 19:06, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 1 October 2024

Add the following during the section on the Siege of Antioch: Firouz, a pivotal figure during the Siege of Antioch, was a Christian who had converted to Islam and held a key position in the city as a tower commander. Discontented with his treatment under the Muslim leaders and motivated by personal grievances, Firouz secretly negotiated with Bohemond. His betrayal allowed the Crusaders to infiltrate the city by guiding them through the city's defenses in the middle of the night. Firouz’s actions directly facilitated the fall of Antioch to the Crusaders, marking a decisive moment on the Crusader's path to Jerusalem Scamilosteez (talk) 02:34, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Jamedeus (talk) 02:39, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

Persecution of Christians

i don't think this part of the page is neutral enough, and more then that "even bishops are defiled with the sin of sodomy and it is now trumpeted abroad that one bishop has succumbed to this abominable sin." i thaught muslims were strict toward sodomy ? i wish if anybody have the ability to give more better express about this part of the page — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.172.212.73 (talk) 21:46, 9 December 2024 (UTC)