first crusade

[JHPier]

The crusaders of the First Crusade had three lucky escapes:

- At the battle of Doryleon the crusaders were marching in two groups when the foremost was attacked and given a hard time by the Seljuks. The Seljuks failed to spot or realize that they were engaging only part of the enemy, so when the rest of the crusaders turned up the Seljuks were badly defeated.

So WI they had realized the full extent of the crusader host?

- At the Crusader siege of Antioch they ambushed and defeated a relief army (of 10.000 men?) from Aleppo with a much smaller (allegedly 700) force.

So WI they had been defeated and (presumably) forced to raide the siege?

- When being besieged in Antioch themselves by an army collected by Kerbogha of Mosul Kerbogha was defeated due to his failing to support his detachments close to the walls close enough and his retreating prematurely before the Crusader onslaught leading to the other Muslim commanders abandoning the field.

So WI he had been a competent commander?

Would there have been more crusades if the first one had ended in disaster?

Would the absence of crusader states make relations between Islam and Christendom today any better?

(I don't think the transmission of ancient learning would be much affected: Spain and esp. Sicily were rather mor important in that regard)

 

[carlton_bach]

I don't think there would be further crusades as we know them if the first one fails. Also, this may be a PR disaster for the papacy it never recovers from entirely. Of course they might be able to turn things around - 'for our sins' etc. - but I don't see Europe's landless nobles go off on another such wild goose chase.

That doersn't mean no military adventuring in the area. I fully expect the Siculo-Normans and Italians to be about the Med, and there will be other European fighters to help (Europe at the time suffered an acute surplus of armoured bullies). However, Jerusalem will probably not be as central to their imagination, and while they may take it at some point, their focus will be on sugar fields and trade outposts. I also suspect this will accelerate the Reconquista and the Christianisation of Eastern Europe, and possibly help defenses in the Black Sea region as manpower is now available for the established 'Holy Wars'.

I don't see this doing anything much for Christian-Muslim relations today provided grand history unfolds as it did. The Crusades are a propaganda tool and painful historical memory, but I don't think any Muslim today hates Christians over the massacre in 1099. There are much fresher and more acute memories involved. There would, however, have to be a different historical identity construct.

What would happen in the Mideast? Without the Crusades, we likely get no Ayyubids. Will the Fatimids survive longer? Will a dominant Seljuq dynasty be able to base itself in Syria? How will the Italian cities' trade patterns differ?