Download PDF | Francesco Gabrieli - Arab Historians Of The Crusades-Routledge (2010).
254 Pages
INTRODUCTION
The purpose of this book is to help the European reader to see the period of the Crusades from ‘the other side’, through the eyes and the minds of the men who at that time were the enemy. Such an experience is particularly interesting and informative in the case of the mediaeval conflict between Christianity and Islam, two civilizations which then had a great deal in common. They were founded on similar attitudes of mind and religious concepts, and it was their common struggle for universality that brought them into conflict and drove them to fanaticism.
Nowadays the fanaticism has died down, at least among Christians, and the battles are fought on other fields, although the issues are still the same. We no longer speak of daggers and hammers of the Faith; in fact a sympathetic and conciliatory attitude to Islam is characteristic of Christians today; an attitude that may not be shared by the other side. But the violence of the old antagonism still blazes from the pages of the mediaeval chroniclers and polemicists, and we tend still to see the ‘enemy’ of the Crusades in the light of that old theological and racial hatred, which later conflicts have deepened and embittered.
It is only in poetry that Clorinda is brought from the camp of Sulaiman and Argantes to die reconciled with the Faith. Those who wish to rise above this view of history and to see more than one aspect of the situation must take a closer look at the enemy’s attitudes and ideals, his way of life and methods of warfare, as they appear in the pages of the Arab chroniclers and historians of the time.
The evidence they present is as plentiful and as valuable as that of their European contemporaries. Of course the slogans are back-to-front: ‘Christian swine’ has been substituted for ‘Saracen dog’, and the vision of the Holy Rock, upon which the Prophet’s foot rested on the night of his miraculous ascent into heaven, for that of the Holy Sepulchre. The saintly Godfrey is replaced by the saintly Saladin. This is not the place for religious and philosophical pronouncements. All we have tried to do is to offer to the historian and the interested layman a selection of the opposition’s views to set beside the picture presented by European writers. The Crusades burst upon the Muslim empire at a crucial moment in its history.
The wave of Arab conquests had passed and Arab military activity was confined to defence, while the Turks were still building up their military supremacy within the Muslim empire before their great onslaught on the Christian world. Islam had already suffered at Christian hands during the Byzantine wars, particularly during the tenth century, but this violent attack by the Latin empire, on grounds that were fundamentally and conspicuously religious, took the Muslim world completely by surprise and found it in a state of political disunity that obstructed the speed and efficiency of its preparations for war. Grousset’s formula—initial Muslim anarchy versus Frankish monarchy—is an accurate summary of the situation in Syria during the last decade of the eleventh century and the first decade of the twelfth. The land was divided among rival Turkish amīrs, Seljuqid Ata-begs and their vassals.
The Fatimids of Egypt maintained a tenuous control of Palestine. In Baghdād the ‘Abbasid Caliph reigned under the tutelage of the Turkish Sultan, the dignity of his position a mere shadow of what it had been in the days of al-Mansūr and al-Ma’mūn’. The potentates of southern Syria and the Fatimid commanders in Palestine did their feeble best to put up a resistance, but the Crusaders spread like a stain through the empire, while the AntiCrusade, vainly urged and hoped for by Baghdād, remained as ineffective as ever. During the third and fourth decades of the twelfth century Muslim resistance stiffened as a result of the efforts of the Artuqids of Mardīn, Tughtikīn of Damascus and, in particular, Zangi and Nur ad-Din, Ata-begs of Mosul. When the frontier county of Edessa fell to the Crusaders, Zangi turned his attention to Syria with the double aim of uniting it under his rule and driving the Franks back to the sea. Arabism as a political force was now of only secondary importance.
The dynasties that led the counter-attack were Turkish in race and in social and military organization, although their culture was still Arabic. Saladin’s rise to power in some ways interrupted and in others continued this movement toward Turkish supremacy. He was of Kurdish origin, educated in both the Turkish and the Arabic cultures, and profoundly orthodox in his faith and his way of life. He brought Egypt back to the path of orthodoxy as the centre of his empire and gave Arabism new prestige. The two monarchs faced one another on the plain of Hittīn, and the Latin crown of Jerusalem rolled in the dust.
The Third Crusade succeeded in stemming the Muslim advance and propping up the tottering Christian states in Palestine. By the use of diplomacy and force the Ayyubids al-‘Adil and al-Kamil maintained the equilibrium throughout the middle years of the century. They drove back the Fifth Crusade and kept Frederick II within bounds, but they failed to mount an effective counter-offensive against the Christian states. This was left to the Mamlūk Sultans, Turkish slaves from southern Russia and the Caucasus who by the middle of the thirteenth century had taken over the control of Egypt from the enfeebled Ayyubids. It was to these uncivilized soldiers, who perfected the system of military feudalism introduced by the Seljuqids and continued by the Ayyubids, that Islam owed its deliverance both from the Mongol invasions (the victory at ‘Ain Jalūt in 1260 saved Syria) and from the Crusaders.
The West could not maintain forever its artificial empire across the Mediterranean. The Papacy had diverted the lofty religious impulse of the first Crusades to serve its own ends in the struggle for power in Europe, reducing the Cross to a mere symbol on a flag carried into battle against baptized Christians (in the Crusade against the Albigenses and the war against the Hohenstaufen). Now it had to look on helplessly while Antioch, Tripoli and Acre fell one after the other and the Muslims finally regained control of Palestine.
The Templars’ last stand in the Holy Land was also, unknown to them, a foretaste of the catastrophe that was to befall them in the West. These two eventful centuries, which. brought the whole Christian world into conflict with Islam (although the Greek Church was the innocent victim of Western diplomatic errors) on territory that the Muslims had held for five hundred years, are faithfully recorded by Muslim historians of this and the succeeding era. We have used the term ‘Muslim’ because many of the authors are not Arabic by birth, but ‘Arabic’ would be justifiable on the grounds of the language used (for the Persian historians and those few who had so far written in Turkish, add almost nothing to the history of the Crusades), or ‘Arabo-Muslim’ on the grounds of the spirit that inspired them, although the Arabic-speaking Christian historians of Egypt also had a part to play.
The Frankish invasions, by which the Muslims meant invasions by European Christians as opposed to the Byzantine Rumi, in spite of the havoc and loss of life that they caused, and the cost to Islam of the resistance that led up to the final victory, were never, for Muslim chroniclers, a single subject to be treated in isolation. Although of the greatest importance to them, as to the West, they were always incorporated into the customary literary forms, given their place in annals recording general history, or used in the writing of biographies of the Muslim individuals or dynasties who set themselves up as champions of the Faith.
One would search Muslim historical writings in vain for a composite, specific History of the Wars against the Franks. Such a work can be composed, however, by juxtaposing and interweaving material from the various types of historical writing of the period. First come the general histories of the Muslim world, like Ibn al-Athīr’s classic work, lesser-known annals by Sibt Ibn al-Jauzi and Ibn al-Furāt and later compilations. Next come chronicles of cities and regions: Ibn al-Qalānisi’s of northern Syria and Kamāl ad-Din’s of Mesopotamia, histories of regions and their dynasties like those of al-Maqrizi and Ibn Wasil and purely dynastic ones like Abu Shama’s.
Finally there are the biographies or records of the deeds of a certain person. Among these are the biographies of Saladin by ‘Imād ad-Din and Bahā’ ad-Din and the official biographies of the first Mamlūk Sultans by Ibn ‘Abd az-Zahir. A unique work of the greatest historical and literary value is Usama’s brilliant autobiography. The range of styles is wide: some works are simply dry lists of events, some are written in turgid rhymed prose (saj‘); some are intelligent and accurate, others merely superficial compilations of unsubstantiated facts. What they have in common is, as one would expect, a scornful and hostile attitude toward the impious, fanatical infidels who invaded the territories of Islam. There are few analyses or discussions of the enemy’s military aims. Polemics of this sort had only a brief popularity, during the peace negotiations of the Third Crusade.
The presence of an armed enemy on Muslim soil could arouse only one response—the military reprisals enjoined by the Qur’ān, which commands the faithful to press on into enemy territory until the foe is either exterminated or converted to the True Faith. There could be no real peace (sulh) with the Franks or with any other infidel enemy, only a temporary truce (hudna) when opportune or necessary. The celebrated peace, or truce, of 1192 between Richard and Saladin, was strongly opposed by many Muslims, in principle if not in fact. The two hundred years of the Crusades could not have passed in continuous warfare. There were of course periods of truce, and even, in the twelfth century, cases of ‘unholy alliance’ between Muslims and Christians against the co-religionists of one side or the other.
(Ibn al-Qalānisi gives a frank account of the most scandalous of these alliances, that between the Franks and Damascus to block Zangi’s advance in 1140.) Peace was not however the favourite subject of the Muslim historians—nor perhaps of any historian. Muslim accounts of the Crusades are endless, often merely monotonous, descriptions of battles, skirmishes, ambushes, raids. Slaughter, pillage and devastation are the most common words in the accounts of the Holy War. Only the names of the combatants change. Where the early historians describe the fall of the coastal cities of Syria to the Franks in a welter of blood and flame, two hundred years later we can read of the same scenes, often in the same words but with the roles reversed. Qui gladio ferit gladio perit, although there is always admiration for valour and self-sacrifice, qualities to be found on both sides.
The most intense conflicts of the two centuries took place during the Third Crusade, at Hittīn and the siege of Acre, when the opposing personalities were thrown into highest relief, the fighting was more widespread and its implications more dramatic. The monotonous military chroniclers sound almost inspired. Their accounts of daily life in the camp of Tiberias, of fights to the death under the walls of Acre, of marches and countermarches at Saladin’s command, have something of the atmosphere of religious epic. Equally important, though sometimes tiresomely detailed and confused, are their accounts of the long peace negotiations. It is a pity that the original text has not been preserved as Qalawūn’s treaties were by the Mamlūk historians. For two hundred years Christianity and Islam, face to face in the Holy Land, were officially enemies bound to ceaseless warfare, interspersed only with precarious truces.
This official attitude was accepted by the Muslim historians of the time and limited the range and depth of their approach. They reveal no interest in the social, economic or cultural organization of the Frankish states. Occasionally self-congratulation or contempt leads them to mention cases in which Islam’s superior culture and way of life have made their mark on the enemy, for example the case of the ruler of Shaqīf Arnūn mentioned in biographies of Saladin. He spoke Arabic and studied literature and Islamic law, but the only use he made of his knowledge was to try to deceive the enemy (Saladin, that noble Prince, punished him with nothing worse than imprisonment). The only hint to be found of interest in Frankish customs, ideas and way of life appears not in the serious histories but in the autobiography of the unprejudiced Usama; his accounts have not been forgotten in this volume. When mediaeval Muslims write of Christian beliefs or observances they create a grotesque caricature (see for example ‘Imād ad-Din on the fall of Christian Jerusalem), based on misconceptions that can only be equalled in Christian accounts of Islamic beliefs and practices.
In this respect each side gives as good as it gets and the Crusades were totally ineffective as a means of acquainting either side with the nobler aspects of the other’s faith. It is also clear from the Muslim sources that what little exchange there was of men and ideas was almost always the result of Frankish initiative. William of Tyre, who learnt Arabic and who wrote a history of the Orient (now lost) from Arabic sources, had no parallel in the Muslim camp. The main interest of the Muslim historians is, naturally, their own side and its heroes. It is this aspect of their work, complementing the European sources, that is also of greatest interest to Western readers.
In their opening chapters the Arab historians give us frank and lucid discussions of the success of the First Crusade (there is a bitter passage in Kamāl ad-Din accusing the rival amīrs in Syria of blindly and selfishly welcoming the Frankish invasion and profiting by it). They greet with relief, although sometimes with reservations about the claims to legitimacy that were advanced, the rise of the great champions of the Muslim resistance: Tughtikīn, Zangi, Nur ad-Din, Saladin. Damascus’ brave fight against the besieging Franks is the most distinguished example of resistance in open warfare by local and municipal troops. Not long after this, still in the first stage of the war, Zangids, Ayyubids and Mamlūks in succession took over the responsibility for controlling and unifying the defence, theoretically the duty of the Caliph in Baghdād.
The Caliphate, already a mere shadow of its former self, disappeared altogether in the course of the Crusades, having done nothing more effective than issue pious exhortations and homilies, and messages of congratulation to the victorious champions of the Faith. The annals of the Anti-Crusade are those of certain Muslim dynasties—Zangid, Mamlūk and others—whose members carried the burden of the Holy War for a variety of reasons, both religious and political, and sometimes sacrificed their whole lives to the cause. It is understandable that their chroniclers, out of piety, gratitude and devotion to the dynasty, have been generous with their eulogies. Towering above them all, wringing admiration even from the enemy, is Saladin himself.
His origins were obscure, his rise to power unorthodox and violent. He was destined to become the incarnation, for good or ill, of the power and prestige, and also the humanity and nobility, of the oriental civilization of the Middle Ages. At the same time, he was an inflexibly orthodox defender of its faith. The portrait of him drawn by Bahā’ ad-Din and ‘Imād ad-Din, clearly that of the Muslim optimus princeps, is that of the pious leader rather than of a gallant knight, and it fails to explain the fascination that this man exerted on his contemporaries and successors, friends and ene-mies alike. But the legend which gives him a place in Dante’s Limbo and in so many tales and epics is not to be found in his own country where the deeds of the less humane Baibars are more widely celebrated.
There are vivid accounts in Muslim chronicles of both these heroes of the Islamic counter-offensive, as well as of Zangi, Nur ad-Din, al-Kamil and other great defenders of Islam. Faithful characterization is one of the great merits of Muslim historians and is practised (with other motives) in the brief but illuminating sketches of enemy leaders: Baldwin II’s shrewdness, Richard Cœur de Lion’s prowess in war, the indomitable energy of Conrad of Montferrat, Frederick II’s diplomacy and sceptical irony; all were noted and independently confirmed by Muslim historians.
Other judgments carry less authority; for example the description of the saintly Louis IX as a cunning rogue: is it cunning to end a life of austere faith and quixotic idealism in a foolish expedition to Tunisia in the height of summer? (Yet how vividly he springs to life, in all his dignified affability, in Ibn Wasil’s account of his conversation with an Egyptian plenipotentiary in the prison at Mansura.) The Arab histories of the Crusades compare favourably with their Christian counterparts in their rich accumulation of material and chronological information (although this is not always consistent either internally or with the dating given in European sources) and in their faithful characterization. We would not expect from them either serene impartiality in their attitude to the enemy, or originality and depth of understanding.
The views expressed are those of mediaeval Muslim historians in general, alternating between pragmatism and mechanical, pietistic theology. One man stands out as a true historian from the ranks of more or less diligent chroniclers: Ibn al-Athīr. His reputation among Orientalists has recently diminished, because of the free and tendentious use he makes of his sources, but the qualities that reduce his reliability as documentary evidence are those of an original thinker, outstanding among so many passive compilers of facts. Although for this period the Arabs have no historian of the stature of William of Tyre, their general level of scholarship is probably higher than that of their Christian contemporaries. It is noticeable that the Arabs are for the most part more experienced in the techniques of their art and more professional in their approach. The reason for this has been mentioned: the Arab histories of the Crusades are usually only a section of a general historical panorama.
This volume is by no means the first attempt in the West to show the other aspect of the Crusades. More than a century ago, at the end of Michaud’s Bibliothèque des Croisades, that great scholar Reinaud, Michele Amari’s teacher, produced a volume of Chroniques Arabes (Paris, 1829), in which he strung together as a continuous narrative translations and paraphrases of passages from various mediaeval Arab historians. They were taken from the manuscripts of the Bibliothèque du Roi, then almost entirely unedited.
This pioneer work, which is still of use to the non-Arabist, was designed to give a coherent account of the Crusades from Arabic sources rather than to present those sources for their own sakes. This was also the aim of the section called ‘Historiens Orientaux’ of the great Recueil des Historiens des Croisades, published in the second half of the nineteenth century under the auspices of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres. Most of the Oriental section was edited by Barbier de Meynard, and the five volumes published (Paris, 1872–1906) contain extracts, in the original and in translation, of such historians as Ibn al-Athīr, Abu Shama and Abu l-Fidā.
This imposing work is ill-adapted for reading as a continuous narrative, and has also been criticized for its choice of extracts and for errors in the text and the translations. Nevertheless it remains a standard work of reference for both Orientalists and mediaevalists. This volume—a very modest work compared with either of these two—of course includes passages from both. Most of the excerpts, however, are taken directly from the original texts, nearly all of which have now been published or are available in the collection of photostats of historical manuscripts at the Fondazione Caetani per gli studi musulmani in Rome. Seventeen authors are represented; certainly not an exhaustive list of all the Muslim sources for the Crusades, but including all the most important ones and as many as possible of the various types of historical literary writings mentioned earlier.
The translation is inevitably fairly free, for a literal translation would be impossible to read easily for any length of time. The precise references given will enable Arabists to verify particular points. While acknowledging our debt to earlier translators, where they have existed, and apologizing for our inevitable errors, we hope that the best interpretation of these passages will be found here, based on emendations to the text that will easily be reconstructed by the specialist. The criteria of choice will be quite obvious: historical importance, human or literary interest and amusing or picturesque detail—without much historical importance perhaps, but the sort of vivid image that remains fixed in the memory, and is almost too appealing to Muslim historians and modern anthologists.
The second section of the book, devoted to Saladin and the Third Crusade, is inevitably, by both these criteria, the largest. We hope that the book as a whole will give a picture of the period that is both clear in outline and accurate in detail, and that as far as space allows the authors’ characteristic styles will be revealed. I have come to the end of several months spent in the company of these Muslim historians of the Crusades, listening again to their fierce and fanatical hostility to our ancestral faith, their zeal and love for their own faith and its traditions, and their admiration for the champions and martyrs who devoted themselves to its defence.
I have studied the Muslim world for many years, but I must confess that never before have I experienced such a sympathetic comprehension and respect for a civilization whose faults and failings need no emphasis but which possessed inspiring qualities of endurance, dedication and self-sacrifice, amazing elasticity and powers of recuperation, and an unyielding faith in the absolute and supreme Law. When qualities such as these are shown by an enemy they tend to be described in terms of their associated defects. It is time for us, without either denying our own faith or shirking the facts, to give them the name they deserve. Rome, September 1957. In this second edition certain errors have been corrected and the bibliography brought up to date. June 1963.
FRANCESCO GABRIELI
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