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Positive And Negative Effects Of Christian Crusades

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European Christians began a series of nine wars between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries known as the Crusades. The Christian crusades sought to reconquer the Holy Land of Jerusalem from the Muslims and had both a positive and negative impact on the Eastern and Western worlds.
The positive effects of the Crusades were unexpected. The original goal of the Crusades was to repossess former Christian holy lands under Muslim rule in order to strengthen Christian Ideology throughout Europe. The Crusaders were able to capture the Syrian city of Antioch at the end of the first Crusade, but they were not able to maintain their control over the city for long. However, trade between the Europeans and the Middle Eastern territories was beginning to develop. Venetian and northern Italian city merchants built fleets of large ships that could carry Christian crusaders to Jerusalem. These ships were also used to trade goods between the Middle East and …show more content…

In the effort to conquer the Holy Land, the Crusades created a lasting animosity between Christians and Muslims. The Christians committed horrific atrocities in the name of Christianity. Entire communities of Jewish people were slaughtered. (Document 1). When the Crusaders reached Constantinople and destroyed its city, library and looted its treasures, it weakened the Byzantine Empire and pitted Christian people against other Christians. Instead of uniting the Greek and Latin Christian churches, the split between them became permanent. It also led to a loss of respect and credibility to the religious aims of the Crusaders. (Document 4). The ending of the last Crusade did not make the crimes committed during the Crusades vanish. In the Muslim world, Crusaders were viewed as nefarious and barbaric. The inhumane massacring of the Muslims and Jews and other non Christians caused a deep feeling of bitterness toward European Christians, that lasted many years (Document

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