Third Crusade.— In 1187, Saladin took Jeru salem from the Christians and the zeal of the West blazed out once more. The three principal monarchs of Europe, Frederick Barbarossa, em peror of Germany, Philip Augustus, king of France, and Richard Cceur de Lion, of England, offered to lead their armies in person against the Saracens. Frederick's army succeeded in reach ing the Holy Land only after having overcome an immense Turkish army at Philomelium, May 1190. Not long after his victory Barbarossa was drowned in the river Kalykadnos and this took all the spirit out of his troops. His son Frederick led the army to the siege of Acre, but after his death, in January 1191, the German army abandoned the expedition. Philip- ,nd, Richard agreed to unite their forces at Messina, in Sicily. Here they stayed until the spring of 1191. Philip reached. the Holy Land on the day before Easter and joined the other Crusaders before Acre. Richard's fleet was dispersed by a violent storm and his wife and mother were detained as prisoners on the island of Cyprus, to which their vessel had been driven, by Isaac Comnenus, the heartless, despotic ruler of the island. On Richard's arrival from Rhodes, where his vessel had been compelled to put in, he succeeded in taking Isaac and his daughter prisoners and had himself proclaimed kin of Cyprus. 'Twas not until the beginning of June that he joined the French at Acre. Owing to jealousies between the two monarchs, the French king abandoned the expedition shortly after the fall of Acre. Richard succeeded in many won derful exploits against the Saracens, but was not able to accomplish much in regaining territory. He did mot succeed in recapturing Jerusalem, J and, though he defeated Saladin at Azoof and captured Jaffa, he at last despaired of the cap ture of Jerusalem and made a truce with Saladm by which the sea-coast from Tyre to Jaffa re mained in the possession of the Crusaders, and Christians were allowed full liberty to visit the Holy Sepulchre, The Fourth Crusade was due to the zeal of Pope Innocent III. Its chief promoters were Godfrey of Champagne, Baldwin, Count of Flan ders, and Dandolo, the old Doge of Venice. The Marquis of Monteferrat was chosen leader of the expedition. The Crusaders assembled at Venice and were induced by Dandolo to attack Zara in Dalmatia, a town which had formerly belonged to the Venetians but which had re nounced its allegiance. This was contrary to the wish of the Pope, who excommunicated the Crusaders for their failure to fulfil their vow of proceeding to the Holy Land. News now came to the Crusaders' camp that there was a revolution in Constantinople and their aid was asked for one of the claimants to the throne. Dandolo seems to have been mainly responsible for 'encouraging the Crusaders to accept the invitation to proceed. to Constantinople, and as a result the crusade was entirely diverted from its original purpose. In 1203, Constantinople Was taken by the Crusaders, who established therein a Latin empire.
Children's Crusade.—The failure of so many expeditions to the Holy Land proved very discouraging and people began to wonder if there was not some cardinal fault in the make up of the parties that went on the Crusade. It began to • be said that the Holy Land would never be captured, except by those who were innocent. Accordingly, when Stephen, a French peasant boy, in June 1212, began to preach a chfldreo's crusade, he made many converts to his opinion that possibly children might accom plish what adults had failed in. Some 30,000 P`rench children are said to have taken part in the expedition.. A like movement began in Germany and soon proved to have almost as great a following. Over 20,000 German chil dren crossed the Alps into Italy. Both expedi-.
lions, as might have been expected, came to grief. • The French children were tempted on board vessels -by designing slave merchants in Marseilles, and many of them •were sold into slavery. Many of the German children lost their lives through the hardships they had to endure on the march. Some were lost at sea and some settled down here and there through out Italy.
These expeditions represent a phase of that tendency to psychic contagion that sometimes comes over even intelligent people in an in explicable way, and it is from this standpoint that they have been very much discussed in recent years. The Children's Crusade corre sponds to the witch baiting of more modern times, or to some of the many spiritual mani festations of older periods. Some doubts have been thrown on phases of the history of the Children's Crusade, as for instance the fate of the French children, but there seems good reason to believe the account given here to be correct. Consult Winkelmann, 'Geschichte Kai ser Frederichs II) and Rfihricht's article in 'Sy bels Histor. Zeitschrift,' (1876). In English there is the popular account by Gray, The Children's Crusade) (New York 1871), and in French, 'Des Essards La croisade des enfants> (Paris 1875).
Fifth Crusade.— After an interlude of five years, after the Children's Crusade, a Hungarian expedition went to Egypt and captured Dami etta. There was so much disaffection among the Crusaders themselves, however, that the expedition had to be abandoned. This is some times spoken of as the Fifth Crusade. What is more usually called the Fifth Crusade was led by Frederick II of Germany and owed its inception to Pope Honorius II and to Pape Gregory IX. A pestilence broke out in the army just as it was ready to sail and this de layed the expedition. Frederick seems to have lost heart after this and retired to Pozzuoli, near Naples, thus incurring the displeasure of Pope Gregory IX, who put him under a ban of excommunication. The next year, nevertheless, Frederick went to the Holy Land and without giving battle succeeded by negotiation with the Sultan in securing for himself the kingdom of Judea, only on condition, however, of tolerating In this kingdom the Mohammedan religion. He was crowned king and concluded a truce with the Sultan for 10 years; but this was soon broken.
The Sixth and Seventh crusades were led by Saint Louis IX of France. He considered that the centre of the Moslem dominion was in t and he resolved to strike his blow there. Egypt re siege to Damietta and captured the city in June 1249. In his march up the Nil; how ever, his army became involved in the mazes of swamp and streams of the river and was defeated. Forced to retreat, it was overtaken by the army of the Sultan, where resistance was hopeless, and the king and his whole army had to surrender. Louis's ransom was the city of Damietta. After waiting for a time for reinforcements, he returned home. Twenty years later the saintly king undertook the Seventh Crusade. He landed his army in 1270 op the northern coast of Africa and after a large number of his knights had perished, he himself died before Tunis. Peace was con cluded and the French Crusaders returned home. About the same time an English army under Prince Edward, afterward Edward I, proceeded to Syria. Finding that little could be accom plished, they concluded a truce for 10 years and then returned to England. For about 20 years after this, the remnants of the Latin kingdom in Palestine succeeded in maintaining themselves independent. Acre was captured by the Sultan of Egypt in 1291, just 100 years after it had been originally taken by Richard Coeur de Lion, and this obliterated the last remnant of the kingdom that had been founded by the Crusaders.