Crusader Syria in the Thirteenth Century

The Rothelin Continuation of the History of William of Tyre with Part of the Eracles or Acre Text

Janet Shirley

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781351947114
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

The Old French 'Rothelin' Continuation of William of Tyre's Historia provides one of the best contemporary narratives of the history of the crusades and of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem in the mid-thirteenth century. Covering the period 1229-61, it has vivid accounts of the disastrous expeditions led by Count Theobald of Champagne (1239-40) and King Louis IX of France (1248-54) as well as of other events in the East. But the text contains far more than this, with a detailed description of Jerusalem itself, songs of protest written by crusaders, and a variety of marvels and adventures, including stories of Alexander the Great, and the poisonous snakes encountered by the Roman army under Cato. This text is here translated into English for the first time, together with a narrative for the same years taken from another Old French Continuation of William of Tyre's work, part of L'Estoire de Eracles. Both accounts are translated from the Receuil des historiens des croisades: Historiens occidentaux vol. 2 (Paris, 1859). An introduction and full notes make these thirteenth-century events and ideas accessible to students of medieval history and to anyone interested in the lives and patterns of thought of people of that time.

The Rothelin continuation
of William of Tyre

CHAPTER 1 1229

How the Saracens attacked the Christians in Jerusalem

Great was the danger in which Frederick¹ left the Christians of the Holy Land in Jerusalem, for the city was completely open and unprotected. The Saracens had demolished all the fortifications, except the Tower of David, while the Christians were besieging Damietta² as we told you earlier.³ Neither the emperor Frederick nor his deputy⁴ did anything to repair the city’s defences. The Saracens in neighbouring towns saw this clearly, and one morning crowds of villainous Saracens gathered and entered Jerusalem, intending to kill the Christians.⁵ The Christians defended themselves vigorously, killing more than 500 and losing only one man, an Englishman.

CHAPTER 2

The condition of the city of Jerusalem on that day

As most good Christians are glad to talk and hear about the holy city of Jerusalem and the holy places where Our Lord died and lived, we will tell you what it was like on the day Saladin and the Saracens took it from the Christians.⁶ Some will want to listen; others can go past this place.

Jerusalem is the most glorious and the most noble city in the world. It lies three days’ journey⁷ from Damascus and is not now situated in the same place as it was when Our Lord Jesus Christ was crucified. Then, but not now, it stood on Mount Sion. The day the Saracens took it there was nothing in that place but a church and a monastery.⁸ It was there that the house stood where Jesus Christ had supper with his apostles and created the sacrament of the altar.⁹ In the same church was the place where he appeared to his apostles on Easter Day after he had been restored to life.¹⁰ In the same church too was the place where he showed the wounds in his hands, feet and side to St Thomas on the octave of Easter.¹¹ And it was there that he apppeared to his apostles on Ascension Day¹² and ate with them; then, when they had accompanied him to the Mount of Olives, he ascended to heaven. To this same place they returned and waited for the Holy Spirit, whom Our Lord himself had promised he would send them. Here too did Jesus Christ send them the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost.¹ In this same church was the place where my lady St Mary died, and from here they carried her to the valley of Jehosaphat for burial and laid her holy body in a tomb. In the place where her tomb stood was the church known as the church of my lady St Mary of Jehosaphat, and an abbey of black monks.² The church on Mount Sion was called the church of my lady St Mary of Mount Sion, and there was an abbey of monks there. These two abbeys stood outside the city walls, one on the hill and the other in the valley. Mount Sion abbey was to the right, southwards, and the one in the valley of Jehosaphat lay to the east, between the Mount of Olives and Mount Sion. Mount Calvary and Our Lord’s tomb were outside the city walls when Jesus Christ was crucified; now they are inside them. The city lay on a slope facing the Mount of Olives, which rises up to the east over the valley of Jehosaphat.

CHAPTER 3

Of the same

In the city of Jerusalem there were four main gates, each one opposite another in the form of a cross, with posterns in between. I will tell you their names in order: the Gate of David lay westwards, directly opposite the Golden Gates which faced east behind the Temple Domini;³ it was built against the Tower of David. You could stand inside this gate and turn right into a street which led past the Tower of David, and so out onto Mount Sion through a postern in the street on the left. Just as you went out of the postern, you saw the church of my lord St James of Galicia, brother of my lord St John the Evangelist. It was there, they said, that St James was beheaded, and that is why the church was built there.⁴ The main street running directly from the Tower of David to the Golden Gates was known as David’s Street from that point to the Exchange. On the left of David’s Tower was a large square where com was sold. A little further down David’s Street, you came to a street on the left called the Patriarch’s Street, because the patriarch lived at the top of it. The patriarch had a gate giving access to the Hospital. Next there was a gate into the church of the Sepulchre, but this was by no means its main gate. Reaching the Exchange where David’s Street ended, you came to Mount Sion Street. Leaving the Exchange, you found a covered street, vaulted over, known as the Street of Plants, and here were sold all the vegetables, fruits and spices of the town. At the top of this street stood a fish market, and behind the fish market was a very large open area where cheeses were sold, and ducks and hens as well. To the right of this market were the stalls of the Syrian goldsmiths, and here were sold the palm fronds which palmers take home from the land beyond the sea. On the left of the market stood the booths of the Latin goldsmiths. Beyond them was a nunnery called St Mary the Great. Next there was an abbey of black monks known as St Mary of the Latins, and after that, on the right, the Hospital.

CHAPTER 4

Of the same

Straight on from the Hospital was the main entrance into the Sepulchre. In front of this was a fine open area paved with marble. To the left of the door into the Sepulchre was the church of St James of the Jacobites. On the right and adjacent to the entrance were steps leading up to Mount Calvary. At the top of the Mount was a beautiful chapel leading into the church of the Sepulchre. Another flight of steps led down just inside the church entrance. Below Mount Calvary lay Golgotha. On the right was the Sepulchre’s bell-tower, and also a chapel called Holy Trinity.¹ This chapel was large and roomy, for all the brides in the city came to be married there, and it also held the font in which children were baptised. The chapel was directly adjacent to the Sepulchre and had a door leading into the church. Straight on from this door stood the Monument,² and here the church was completely circular, and open above, not covered. The Monument itself was vaulted over, and contained the stone of the Sepulchre. Outside the Monument, at the apsidal end, was an altar called the Chevet,³ where mass was sung every day at dawn. A wide paved area surrounded the Monument, so that processions could move all round it. Next, going east, was the Sepulchre choir where the canons sang; this was long. Between the canons’ choir and the Monument there was an altar where the Greeks sang mass, but there was a partition separating the two, with a door leading from one to the other. In the centre of the canons’ choir stood a marble lectern known as the Compass;⁴ there they read the epistle. To the right of the high altar of the choir was Mount Calvary, so that when they were singing the mass of the Resurrection, the deacon singing the Gospel would turn towards Calvary as he said, ‘Crucifixum’. Then he would turn towards the Monument, saying, ‘Surrexit, non est hic’. And he would point: ‘Ecce locus ubi posuerunt eum’.¹ Then he would turn back and continue his Gospel. In the choir apse was a door by which the canons came in to their stalls on the right.

Between this door and Mount Calvary was a very deep cleft with stairs down into it, and here there was a place called St Helen. That is where St Helen found the cross, the nails, hammer and crown.² Into this cleft, at the time Our Lord was buried, they used to throw the bodies of thieves who had been crucified, hanged, or had their feet, hands or heads cut off. All the justice that was done, was done on Mount Calvary. It was given the name ‘Calvary’ because executions and all the requirements of the law were done here, and it was there they shaved the limbs that criminals were condemned to lose.³

As the canons left the Sepulchre, they had their dormitory on their left and the refectory on their right, next to Mount Calvary. Between these two lay their cloisters and courtyard. In the centre of the courtyard was a large opening through which one could see St Helen’s chapel down underneath it, for otherwise it could not be seen at all.

CHAPTER 5

Of the same

Opposite the Exchange, joining the Street of Plants, was a street known as Mal Cuisinat, Ill Cooked. This was where they cooked foodstuffs which were then sold to pilgrims; and they also washed heads there. It was reached from Sepulchre Street. Just opposite Ill Cooked Street was another called the Covered Street where cloth was sold, and this was all vaulted over; it led to the Sepulchre. The street leading from the Exchange to the Golden Gates was called Temple Street, and had this name because it led first to the Temple and then to the Golden Gates. On the left, going down this street towards the Temple, was the meat market where all the town’s meat was sold. On the right was another street leading to the Hospital; this was called Germans’ Street. On the left above the bridge was the church of my lord St Giles. At the top of this street stood a pair of gates called the Precious Gates, so called because it was through them that Our Lord Jesus Christ entered the city of Jerusalem when he went about on earth. These gates were in a wall which stood between the city and the Golden Gates wall.¹

CHAPTER 6

Of the same

Between the city wall and the Golden Gates wall stood the Temple. This was approached across an open space more than a bowshot in length and more than a stone’s throw wide. The whole area was paved, and so was known as the Pavement. On the right, as you came through these gates, was the Temple of Solomon,² where the brothers of the Temple lived. Directly between the Precious Gates and the Golden Gates was the church of the Temple Domini.³ This was high up, above steep steps. Going up them, you came to another Pavement, an open area, very spacious and paved over its whole extent with marble and entirely surrounding the Temple church. This church was completely circular.⁴ On the left of the Temple’s upper Pavement stood the abbot and canons’ private quarters, and here there were steps leading from the lower Pavement to this upper one and to the Temple. Eastwards, adjacent to the Temple church, was the chapel of the apostle, my lord St James the Less, placed here because it was here he was martyred when the Jews flung him down from the Temple.⁵ Inside this chapel was the place where Our Lord Jesus Christ freed the woman who was a sinner as they were leading her to execution because she had been taken in adultery.⁶

At one end of this Pavement, going towards sunrise, you went down more steps to the Golden Gates. Once down them, you were in a wide open space, approaching the gates. There stood the court which Solomon built.⁷ No one passed through these gates, which in fact were blocked up, and they were unblocked and used only twice a year. A procession went through them on Palm Sunday because Our Lord Jesus Christ came in through them that day and was welcomed in procession;⁸ and another on Holy Cross day in September,⁹ because it was through these gates that the Holy Cross was brought back to the city of Jerusalem when the emperor Heraclius won it in Persia and brought it back to the city through that gate, and people went out in procession to meet him.¹⁰ As no one ever left the city through these gates, there was a postern further along known as the Jehosaphat Gate. People living in that part of the city went out by it. This postern stood on the left of the Golden Gates. To the south you went down from the upper Pavement to the lower Temple, and so to the Temple of Solomon. On the left, going down from the upper Pavement, was the church of the Cradle, where God, they say, was cradled in his childhood.¹

The church of the Temple had four doors set as a cross. The first faced west and gave city-dwellers access to the Temple. By the eastern door you reached the chapel of St James, and then the Golden Gates. The southern door led to the Temple of Solomon and the northern one to the abbey.

CHAPTER 7

Of the same

Now I have told you where the ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Maps and Plans
• The Rothelin Continuation
• The Eracles or Acre Continuation
• Index