The Crusades Essays

The Crusades of the High Middle Ages (a.d. 1050-1300) was a period of conquest or rather, reconquest, of Christian lands taken from Muslims in the early Middle Ages. It is an era romanticized by fervent Christians as the time when Christianity secured its honorable status as the true religion of the world. The affect of the Crusades is still with us today. It sailed from Spain and Portugal to the Americas in the fifthteenth century aboard sailing ships carrying conquistadors who sought new territory and rich resources. They used the shield and sword of Christianity to justify a swift conquest of mass territory and the subjugation of the indigenous peoples; a mentality learned, indeed,

In 1095, Pope Urban II called for an army to go to the Holy Land, Jerusalem. This was what was later known as the ‘First Crusade’. A crusade is a religious war or a war mainly motivated by religion. The first crusade consisted of 10’s of thousands of European Christians on a medieval military expedition to recover the Holy Land from the Muslims. This doesn’t mean that the first crusade was just motivated by religion. Throughout this essay, I will be suggesting the main reasons of why people went on crusades and which different people went for specific reasons and why.

There were both positive and negative effects of The Crusades, although the positives did outweigh the negatives. The two major negative effects were anti-Semitism and the orchestrated attacks by Venice. Many Crusaders in Europe were so religiously fuming, that they turned their anger towards the Jews. They would at times massacre a whole community as a result of their religious rage. During the fourth crusade, crusaders began fighting Christians instead of Muslims. After helping Venetian merchants defeat their Byzantine trade rivals in 1204, the crusaders captured and looted Constantinople. They actually ransacked the capital of the Byzantine Empire, the empire in which they began to fight for, not against. There also were many positive effects of The Crusades, one being the increase of trade. Even before the Crusades, merchants began to enjoy some of the luxury goods that were brought from the Byzantine Empire. The crusaders that

The Crusades took place in the Middle East between 1095 and 1291. They were used to gain a leg up on trading, have more land to show hegemony, and to please the gods. Based upon the documents, the Crusades between 1095 and 1291 were caused primarily by religious devotion rather than by the desire for economic and political gain.

The Crusades were a series of wars over the holy lands such as Jerusalem between European Christians and the Ottoman Empire between the 11th and 15th centuries. They fought for many reasons such as control over religious sights, access to trade and protection of fellow christians.

The crusades were a series of brutal medieval wars that began in 1095 and ended in1496. Fought in the high middle ages between the Christians and the Muslims. There were eight crusades over all, the first crusade being mainly spilt into two parts, the official crusades and the peasant crusade or better known as the people crusade. With only lasting a few years, both the peasants and official crusades were quite similar and different in their own ways.

Because of the response the people had to Pope Urban II call to arms a wave of religious enthusiasm swept across Europe. In 1096 Peter the hermit created an army of peasants and soldiers. They traveled to Constantinople, this movement was called the peoples crusade. The outcome of the people’s crusade was tragic because almost all of them died.

The Crusades, a series of wars, are an extremely important part of history in the 12th century, occurring during the Middle Ages. The Middle East or the Holy Land was always a place that Christians traveled to to make pilgrimages. The Seljuk Turks eventually took control of Jerusalem and all Christians were not allowed in the Holy City. As the Turks power grew, they threatened to take over the Byzantine Empire and Constantinople. The Byzantine Emperor, Alexius I, asked Pope Urban II for help and Pope agreed, hoping to strengthen his own power. He He united the Christians in Europe and In 1095, Pope Urban II waged waged war against muslims in order to “reclaim the holy land.”

The Crusades required soldiers to travel across the Mediterranean Sea to reach Jerusalem. Hence, Italian merchants built fleets to carry to Crusaders to the Holy Land. According to the Description of the Economic Impact of the Crusades, after the crusades, Italian merchants “used those fleets to open new markets” and “kept these trade routes open” (Document 2). When the Crusaders came back from the Holy Land, new items such as sugar, cotton, and rice entered Europe for the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire. Once Europeans were exposed to luxuries, they wanted more and more. Trade increased all throughout Europe, and the West entered a period of economic expansion. However, not only did Europe experience perks from the crusades, but so did the Muslims. The passage Description of some of the Effects of the Crusades describes how Muslim rulers “encouraged trade with European businessmen” (Document 5). Because Europe was in desperate need of the Islamic Empire’s sugar, cotton, and rice, Islam markets experienced new wealth and riches. Thus, both Europe and the Muslim Empire benefited from an increase in

In recent decades the First four Crusades have become a major era of historical interest, which has led historians to try and explain these dynamic events. While much of this era has remained a mystery, recent years have allowed historians to learn more and answer some of the mysteries of the First four Crusades. Motivated by anything from the prospect of spiritual freedom to the promise of new land, the crusaders invaded and overtook cities from Muslim forces. Contributing factors such as stolen land and vengeance of mistreated Christians fed the fire that fueled the crusaders will to fight. Outcomes varied from crusade to crusade, as did the response from the Islamic state 's, all of which shaped the world we live in today.

In the 10th century the first crusade took place in the Holy Lands. The crusade was a medieval military expedition that the Europeans created to regain the Holy Lands from the Seljuk Turks. Throughout the first crusade many different countries, religions and people were involved, some of these were Pope Urban II, Christians, Seljuk Turks, Europeans, Muslims and Jews. In 1096-1099 people went on the first crusade to take back the Holy Land. They did this for many different reasons, some of these reasons are money, power, taking back the Holy Land and going to heaven. The people who took part in the pilgrimages to Jerusalem were to wear the sign of the cross. The first crusade commenced with Pope Urban II making a speech at the Clermont in France.

Before the first Crusade, Western Europe had become a place with not much progress, confined from other civilizations and hidden in the Dark Ages that had gone down on Western Christendom after the collapse of the Roman Empire. At the time of the first Crusade, the Middle East and Western Europe were greatly divided. The Crusades contributed to the end of Western Europe’s global isolation by introducing an era in which Western Europe came into direct contact with the large trade routes that united their civilization with Asia.

The First Crusades was a military group that was started by Christians in Europe who wanted to gain back the Holy Land that was being occupied by the Muslims. Pope Urban II preached a sermon at Clermont Ferrand on November 1095. Most histories consider this speech to be the spark the fueled a wave of military campaigns to gain back the Holy Land. This speech was meant to unite the Europeans and to gain back what was taken from them. The holy land was a small area on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. The First Crusades was a very successful military expedition that was driven by religious faith to reclaim Jerusalem and other holy places that fell under Muslim control. driven by religious faith. They wanted to gain back the Holy Land that was once theirs. Arabs and the Muslim Turks otherwise known as the Seljuk Turks were the Muslims that invaded and conquered land rightfully occupied by the Christian’s. Many European men, women, and children joined the Crusades and fought in the Middle East. Pope Urban II granted forgiveness of all sins to those who died in battle thus assuring them ascendancy into heaven. Which gave those who volunteered to fight assurance. Nobles and peasants responded in great numbers to the call and marched across Europe to the capital of the Byzantine empire. Having the support of the Byzantine emperor helped make them a stronger army. The Crusaders took over many of the cities on the Mediterranean coast and built a large number of fortified castles across the Holy Land to protect their newly established territories. Soon after seizing power the Seljuks face a very different challenge to Islamic civilization. It came from Christian Crusaders. Knights from western Europe who were determined to capture portions of the Islamic world that made up the holy land of biblical times. Muslim political division and element of surprise made the first of the Crusaders assaults, between 1096 and 1099, by far the most successful. Much of

The Crusades were Christian military expeditions undertaken between the 11th and the 14th century to recapture the Holy Land from the Muslims. The word crusade, which is derived from the

The Crusades: A Short History, written by British Historian Jonathan Riley-Smith, offers a broad overview of this part of the medieval era, but he also explores how historians have attempted to explain these events in modern terms. Riley-Smith also makes sure to note all major contributors to the Crusade movement and their personalities. Numerous scholars have wondered whether this was a political or religious mission. This helps to spark the question of why people would leave their homes and their families to risk their lives invading a land that was thousands of miles away for religious reasons. In his book, Riley-Smith makes this era come alive for the modern reader. He does