Dimitri’s Reviews > Crusaders: The Epic History of the Wars for the Holy Lands > Status Update

The single greatest advantage the Franks had held since the collapse of the Fatamid Empire in the 12thC. Had been naval supremacy along the Med coast with their large number of ports, into which fresh crusaders could arrive with every spring sailing from the West. In destroying Caesarea (5.3.1265), Baybars showed he had appreciated the lesson of history. He wanted to remove the possibility of crusading for good.

Under Innocent III crusading became not only a matter of defending the far-flung boundaries of between the Latin Christian world the realms of Islam, but as a political tool to coerce secular rulers everywhere to do the Pope's bidding. During his 18 years as Pope, Innocent proclaimed 6 crusades and inspired a seventh; not one of them reached Jerusalem. The most notorious occured (against the Albigensians).

"Alltough all this* had occured before Odo's** time, it was a famous story with two powerful lessons. First, the enemies of Cluny and Christ could be easily conflated. Second, punitive military action was often the only language such people understood."

*the kidnapping of Majolus, abbot of Cluny, by muslim raiders in 972 near St.Tropez.
** future pope Urban II