The Crusades Through Arab Eyes (Saqi Essentials) Read online

  At the time of the arrival of the Franj in Syria, political life was envenomed by the ‘war of the two brothers’, a conflict between two bizarre personalities who seemed to have stepped out of the imagination of some popular story-teller: Riḍwān, the king of Aleppo, and his younger brother Duqāq, king of Damascus. Their mutual hatred was so obstinate that nothing, not even a common threat to both of them, could induce them even to contemplate reconciliation. Riḍwān was barely more than twenty in 1097, but his personality was already shrouded in mystery, and the most terrifying legends about him were rife. Small, thin, of severe and sometimes frightening countenance, he is said (by Ibn al-Qalānisi) to have fallen under the influence of a ‘physician-astrologer’ who belonged to the order of Assassins, a recently formed sect that was to play an important part in political life throughout the Frankish occupation. The king of Aleppo was accused, not without reason, of making use of these fanatics to eliminate his opponents. By means of murder, impiety, and witchcraft Ridwān aroused the distrust of nearly everyone, but it was within his own family that he provoked the most bitter odium. When he acceded to the throne in 1095 he had two of his younger brothers strangled, fearing that they might one day contest his power. A third brother escaped with his life only by fleeing the citadel of Aleppo on the very night that the powerful hands of Riḍwān’s slaves were supposed to close upon his throat. This survivor was Duqāq, who subsequently regarded his elder sibling with blind hatred. After his flight, he sought refuge in Damascus, whose garrison proclaimed him king. This impulsive young man—easily influenced, inclined to fits of anger, and of fragile health—was obsessed by the idea that his brother still sought to assassinate him. Caught between these two half-crazy princes, Yaghi-Siyān had no easy task. His closest neighbour was Riḍwān, whose capital Aleppo, one of the world’s oldest cities, was less than three days’ march from Antioch. Two years before the arrival of the Franj, Yaghi-Siyān had given Riḍwān his daughter in marriage. But he soon realized that his son-in-law coveted his kingdom, and he too began to fear for his life. Like Duqāq, Yaghi-Siyān was obsessed by fear of the Assassins sect. Since the common danger had naturally brought the two men closer together, it was to the king of Damascus that Yaghi-Siyān now turned as the Franj advanced on Antioch.

  Duqāq, however, was hesitant. It was not that he was afraid of the Franj, he assured Yaghi-Siyān, but he had no desire to lead his army into the environs of Aleppo, thus affording his brother an opportunity to strike from behind. Knowing how difficult it would be to prod his ally into a decision, Yaghi-Siyān decided to send as emissary his son Shams al-Dawla—‘Sun of the State’—a brilliant, spirited, and impassioned young man who stalked the royal palace relentlessly, harassing Duqāq and his advisers, resorting by turns to flattery and threat. But it was not until December 1097, two months after the start of the battle of Antioch, that the master of Damascus finally agreed, against his better judgement, to take his army north. Shams went along, for he knew that the full week the march would take gave Duqāq plenty of time to change his mind. And indeed, the young king grew increasingly nervous as he advanced. On 31 December, when the Damascene army had already covered two-thirds of its trajectory, they encountered a foraging Frankish troop. Despite his clear numerical advantage and the ease with which he managed to surround the enemy, Duqāq declined to issue the order to attack. This allowed the Franj to overcome their initial disorientation, recover their poise, and slip away. At the day’s end there was neither victor nor vanquished, but the Damascenes had lost more men than their adversaries. No more was needed to discourage Duqāq, who immediately ordered his men to turn back, despite the desperate entreaties of Shams.

  The defection of Duqāq aroused the greatest bitterness in Antioch, but the defenders did not give way. Curiously, in these early days of 1098, it was among the besiegers that disarray prevailed. Many of Yaghi-Siyān’s spies had managed to infiltrate the enemy army. Some of these informants were acting out of hatred of the Rūm, but most were local Christians who hoped to win the emir’s favour. They had left their families in Antioch and were now seeking to guarantee their security. The information they sent back encouraged the population: although the defenders in the besieged city had abundant supplies, the Franj were vulnerable to starvation. Hundreds had died already, and most of their mounts had been slaughtered for food. The expedition encountered by the Damascene army had been sent out to find some sheep and goats, and to pilfer some granaries. Hunger was compounded by other calamities that were daily undermining the invaders’ morale. A relentless rain was falling, justifying the light-hearted nickname the Syrians had bestowed upon Antioch: ‘the pissoir’. The besiegers’ camp was mired in mud. Finally, there was the earth itself, which trembled constantly. The local people of the countryside were used to it, but the Franj were terrified. The sounds of their prayers reached into the city itself, as they gathered together to plead for divine mercy, believing themselves victims of celestial punishment. It was reported that they had decided to expel all prostitutes from their camp in an effort to placate the wrath of the Almighty; they also closed down the taverns and banned dice games. There were many desertions, even among their chiefs.

  News such as this naturally bolstered the combative spirit of the defenders, who organized ever more daring sorties. As Ibn al-Athīr was to say, Yaghi-Siyān showed admirable courage, wisdom, and resolution. Carried away by his own enthusiasm, the Arab historian added: Most of the Franj perished. Had they remained as numerous as they had been upon their arrival, they would have occupied all the lands of Islam! A gross exaggeration, but one that renders due homage to the heroism of the Antioch garrison, which had to bear the brunt of the invasion alone for many long months.

  For aid continued to be withheld. In January 1098, embittered by Duqāq’s inertia, Yaghi-Siyān was forced to turn to Riḍwān. Once again it was Shams al-Dawla who was charged with the painful mission of presenting the most humble excuses to the king of Aleppo, of listening unflinchingly to all his sarcastic cracks, and of begging him, in the name of Islam and ties of kinship, to deign to dispatch his troops to save Antioch. Shams was well aware that his royal brother-in-law was not susceptible to this type of argument, and that he would sooner lop off his own hand than extend it to Yaghi-Siyān. But events themselves were even more compelling. The Franj, whose food situation was increasingly critical, had just raided the lands of the Seljuk king, pillaging and ravaging in the environs of Aleppo itself, and for the first time Riḍwān felt his own realm threatened. More to defend himself than to aid Antioch, he decided to send his army against the Franj. Shams was triumphant. He sent his father a message informing him of the date of the Aleppan offensive and asked him to organize a massive sortie to catch the besiegers in a pincer movement.

  In Antioch, Riḍwān’s intervention was so unexpected that it seemed heaven-sent. Would it be the turning-point of this battle, which had already been raging for more than a hundred days?

  Early in the afternoon of 9 February 1098 look-outs posted in the citadel reported the approach of the Aleppan army. It included several thousand cavalry, whereas the Franj could muster no more than seven or eight hundred, so severely had their mounts been decimated by famine. The besieged, who had been anxiously awaiting the Aleppans for several days now, wanted the battle to be joined at once. But Riḍwān’s troops had halted and begun to pitch their tents, and battle-orders were postponed to the following day. Preparations continued throughout the night. Every soldier now knew exactly where and when he had to act. Yaghi-Siyān was confident that his own men would carry out their side of the bargain.

  What no one knew was that the battle was lost even before it began. Terrified by what he knew about the fighting abilities of the Franj, Riḍwān dared not take advantage of his numerical superiority. Instead of deploying his troops, he sought only to protect them. To avoid any threat of encirclement, he had confined them all night to a narrow strip of land wedged between the Orontes River and Lake Antioch. At
dawn, when the Franj attacked, the Aleppans may as well have been paralysed. The narrowness of the land denied them any mobility. Their mounts reared, and those horsemen who fell were trampled underfoot by their comrades before they could rise. Of course, there was no longer any question of applying the traditional tactics, sending successive waves of cavalry-archers against the enemy. Riḍwān’s men were forced into hand-to-hand combat in which the heavily armoured knights easily gained an overwhelming advantage. It was carnage. The king and his army, now in indescribable disarray and pursued by the Franj, dreamed only of flight.

  The battle unfolded differently under the walls of Antioch itself. At first light, the defenders launched a massive sortie that compelled the attackers to fall back. The fighting was intense, and the soldiers of Yaghi-Siyān were in an excellent position. Slightly before midday, they had begun to penetrate the camp of the Franj when news came in of the Aleppans’ debacle. Sick at heart, the emir ordered his men to fall back to the city. Scarcely had they completed their retreat when the knights who had crushed Riḍwān returned, carrying macabre trophies from the battle. The inhabitants of Antioch soon heard great guffaws of laughter, followed by muffled whistles. Then the fearfully mutilated severed heads of the Aleppans, hurled by catapults, began to rain down. A deathly silence gripped the city.

  Yaghi-Siyān offered words of encouragement to those closest to him, but for the first time he felt the vice tighten around his city. After the debacle of the two enemy brothers, he could expect nothing more from the princes of Syria. Just one recourse remained open to him: the governor of Mosul, the powerful emir Karbūqa, who had the disadvantage of being more than two weeks’ march from Antioch.

  Mosul, the native city of the historian Ibn al-Athīr, was the capital of Jazīra, or Mesopotamia, the fertile plain watered by the two great rivers Tigris and Euphrates. It was a political, cultural, and economic centre of prime importance. The Arabs boasted of its succulent fruit: its apples, pears, grapes, and pomegranates. The fine cloth it exported—called ‘muslin’, a word derived from the city’s name—was known throughout the world. At the time of the arrival of the Franj, the people of the emir Karbūqa’s realm were already exploiting another natural resource, which the traveller Ibn Jubayr was to describe with amazement a few dozen years later: deposits of naphtha. This precious dark liquid, which would one day make the fortune of this part of the world, already offered travellers an unforgettable spectacle.

  We approach a locality called al-Qayyara [the place of tar], near the Tigris. To the right of the road to Mosul is a depression in the earth, black as if it lay under a cloud. It is there that God causes the sources of pitch, great and small, to spurt forth. Sometimes one of them hurls up pieces, as though it were boiling. Bowls have been constructed in which the pitch is collected. Around these deposits lies a black pool; on its surface floats a light black foam which washes up on the banks and coagulates into bitumen. The product looks like a highly viscous, smooth, shiny mud, giving off a sharp odour. Thus were we able to see with our own eyes a marvel of which we had heard tell, the description of which had seemed quite extraordinary to us. Not far away, on the banks of the Tigris, is another great source; we could see its smoke rising from afar. We were told that when they want to extract the bitumen it is set on fire. The flame consumes the liquid elements. The bitumen is then cut into pieces and transported. It is known throughout these lands as far as Syria, in Acre and in all the coastal regions. Allah creates whatever he wills. Praise be upon him!

  The inhabitants of Mosul attributed curative powers to the dark liquid, and immersed themselves in it when they were ill. Bitumen produced from oil was also used in construction, to ‘cement’ bricks together. Because it was impermeable, it was used as a coating for the walls of public baths, where its appearance was similar to polished black marble. But as we shall see, it was in the military domain that oil was most widely employed.

  Apart from these promising resources, Mosul was of vital strategic importance at the start of the Frankish invasion; its rulers had acquired the right to inspect Syrian affairs, a right the ambitious Karbūqa intended to exercise. He considered Yaghi-Siyān’s call for help a perfect opportunity to extend his own influence. He immediately promised to raise a great army. From that moment on, Antioch was on tenterhooks anticipating Karbūqa’s arrival.

  This providential figure was a former slave, a condition the Turkish emirs did not consider in any sense degrading. Indeed, the Seljuk princes used to appoint their most faithful and talented slaves to posts of responsibility. Army chiefs of staff and governors of cities were often ex-slaves, or mamlūks, and so great was their authority that it was not even necessary to manumit them. Before the Frankish occupation was complete, the entire Muslim Middle East would be ruled by Mamluk sultans. As early as 1098 the most influential men of Damascus, Cairo, and several other major cities were slaves or sons of slaves.

  Karbūqa was among the most powerful of these. This authoritarian officer with the greying beard bore the Turkish title of atabeg, literally ‘father of the prince’. Members of the ruling families suffered a staggering mortality rate in the Seljuk empire—through battles, murders, and executions—and rulers often left heirs who had not yet reached their majority. Tutors were assigned to protect the interests of these heirs, and to round out his role as adoptive father, a tutor generally married his pupil’s mother. These atabegs naturally tended to become the real holders of power, which they often subsequently transmitted to their own sons. The legitimate prince then became no more than a puppet in the hands of the atabeg, sometimes even a hostage. Appearances were scrupulously respected, however. Armies were often officially ‘commanded’ by children of three or four years of age who had ‘delegated’ their power to the atabeg.

  Just such a strange spectacle was seen in the last days of April 1098, as nearly thirty thousand men gathered to set out from Mosul. The official edict announced that the valiant fighters would be waging the jihād against the infidels under the orders of an obscure Seljuk scion who, presumably from the depths of his swaddling clothes, had entrusted command of the army to the atabeg Karbūqa.

  According to the historian Ibn al-Athīr, who spent his entire life in the service of the atabegs of Mosul, the Franj were seized with fear when they heard that the army of Karbūqa was on its way to Antioch, for they were vastly weakened and their supplies were slender. The defenders, on the contrary, took heart. Once again they prepared for a sortie to coincide with the approach of the Muslim troops. With the same tenacity as before, Yaghi-Siyān, ably seconded by his son Shams al-Dawla, checked the grain reserves, inspected the fortifications, and encouraged the troops, promising them a rapid end to the siege, ‘with God’s permission’.

  But his public self-assurance was a mere façade. The real situation had been worsening for several weeks. The blockade of the city had been tightened, it was more difficult to get supplies, and—this was even more worrying—information from the enemy camp was increasingly scanty. The Franj, who had apparently realized that their every word and deed was being reported to Yaghi-Siyān, had decided on drastic action to deal with the problem. The emir’s agents had occasion to watch them kill a man, roast him on a spit, and eat his flesh, while shouting that any spy who was discovered would suffer a similar fate. The terrified informants fled, and Yaghi-Siyān no longer had detailed information about his besiegers. As a seasoned military man, he considered the situation highly disquieting.

  He was reassured only by the knowledge that Karbūqa was on the way. He was expected by the middle of May, with his tens of thousands of fighters. Everyone in Antioch impatiently awaited that moment. Rumours circulated day after day, propagated by citizens who mistook their desires for reality. There would be a spate of whispering and a dash to the ramparts, maternal old women asking questions of callow soldiers. The answer was always the same: no, the rescuing troops were not in sight, but it would not be long now.

  The great Muslim army was a dazzling s
ight as it marched out of Mosul, with countless lances glinting in the sun and black banners (emblem of the ‘Abbasids and the Seljuks) waving in a sea of white-robed cavalry. Despite the heat, the pace was brisk. The army would reach Antioch in less than two weeks if it maintained its rate of advance. But Karbūqa was troubled. Shortly before the army’s departure, he had received some alarming news. A troop of Franj had taken Edessa, known to the Arabs as al-Ruhā', a large Armenian city situated north of the route leading from Mosul to Antioch. The atabeg could not help wondering whether the Franj of Edessa might not advance behind him as he approached the besieged city. Was he not running the risk of being caught in a pincer movement? In the early days of May, he assembled his principal emirs to announce that he had decided to take a different route. He would first head north and settle the problem of Edessa in a few days; then he would be able to engage the besiegers of Antioch without risk. Some protested, reminding him of Yaghi-Siyān’s anxious message. But Karbūqa silenced them. Once his decision was made, he was as stubborn as a mule. While his emirs grudgingly obeyed, the army headed for the mountain passes leading to Edessa.

  The situation in the Armenian city was indeed worrying. The few Muslims who had been able to leave had brought news of strange events there. In February a Frankish chief by the name of Baldwin had arrived in command of hundreds of knights and more than two thousand foot-soldiers. Thoros, an old Armenian prince and ruler of the city, had appealed to him to strengthen the city garrison against repeated attacks by Turkish warriors. But Baldwin refused to act as a mere mercenary. He demanded to be formally named the legitimate successor of Thoros. The latter, aged and childless, agreed. An official ceremony was held, in accordance with Armenian custom. Thoros dressed in a loose-fitting white robe, and Baldwin, naked to the waist, slipped under his ‘father’s’ frock and pressed their bodies together. Then it was the turn of the ‘mother’, the wife of Thoros, against whom Baldwin now crept, between robe and naked flesh, before the amused regard of the onlookers, who whispered that this rite, conceived for the adoption of children, seemed somewhat inappropriate when the ‘son’ was a great hairy knight.