Today in History: Pope Urban Calls for the First Crusade

On this day (November 27) in 1095, Pope Urban II declared the First Crusade. Urban was responding to a request for help from Eastern Roman Emperor, Alexus Comnenus, although it is highly unlikely that the emperor imagined armies marching west to “help” him. Urban saw the request for aid as an opportunity to strengthen his claims to papal supremacy, but even he must have been shocked by the west’s response as tens of thousands of people “took the cross” to recapture the Holy Land for Christendom.