The Crusades
Candace Gregory-Abbott
MW 3-4:15 pm, BRH 210
Office:
TAH 3059
Email: cgregory@csus.edu
Tel# 278-3824
Homepage: www.csus.edu/indiv/g/gregoryc
Office Hrs: MW 11-12
Tues 4-5 pm
Catalog Description: The Crusading movement from the eleventh through
the thirteenth centuries. Explores the eight “official” Crusades,
and explores the concept of “crusading” as Christian Holy War.
The course extensively covers the intersection of Byzantine, Islamic,
Catholic, and Jewish cultures in the Middle Ages, and incorporates
religious, social, military, and political, history.
Learning Objectives:
1. The study the concept of “crusading” as it was used, separately and
concurrently, by the various cultures of the Middle Ages:
Catholic, Byzantine, Islamic, and Jewish.
2. To trace the political, military, and economic events that led to
the first Crusade in 1096, and the establishment of the “Crusader
Kingdoms” in the Middle East.
3. To explore the eventual collapse of the Crusader Kingdoms.
4. To explore how the Crusades were an intersection of cultures in the
Middle Ages: Byzantine, Western Europe, Islamic, and Jewish, in
the Middle East and within Europe.
5. To explore how the concept of Crusading was used against Christians
and non-Christians.
6. To explore how the Crusades helped to shape the political,
religious, and cultural identity of Western Europe, the Byzantines, the
Islamic Middle East, and Jews.
7. To examine the lives of all levels of crusading society, from rulers
to women to peasants.
8. To develop the student’s research and writing abilities through two
in-class essay exams, and three out of class writing projects, as well
as emphasizing the student’s ability to discuss reading materials in
class.
Course Description:
The Crusades of the eleventh through thirteenth centuries were the most
significant encounter between cultures in the Middle Ages. The
Crusades brought together, sometimes but not always violently,
Christians (Catholic, Byzantine, Armenian, and Coptic), Muslims (in
both the Middle East and in Iberia), and Jews (in Europe, the Byzantine
Empire, and Palestine). Students will read extensively on the
eight main Crusades as well as later attempted and proposed
Crusades. The concept of “crusading” will also be discussed in
detail, in reference to the Middle Ages in particular, but also in
reference to early modern and contemporary uses of the term
“crusade.” The course will follow a chronological outline of the
major Crusades, and incorporate political, cultural, economic, military
technology, religious, and social history. The course is designed
to fit into the Hellenic Studies Minor and the Middle East and Islamic
Studies Minor, in addition to the History department as a whole.
Students will read extensively in the current Crusade historiography
and primary sources, as well as exploring contemporary views of the
Crusades through film, and ultimately students will write a long
research paper.
Texts:
Hans Eberhard Mayer, The Crusades
S. J. Allen and Emilie Amt, The Crusades: A Reader
Eric Christiansen, The Northern Crusades
Zoe Oldenbourg, Massacre at Montsegur: A History of the
Albigensian Crusade
Not in Bookstore:
Joshua Prawer, The Crusaders’ Kingdom
P. H. Newby, Saladin in His Time
John France, Western Warfare in the Age of the Crusades: 1000 -
1300
Further readings on reserve.
Requirements:
This is primarily a lecture course, although discussion by students of
the readings is strongly encouraged and at times required.
Readings are assigned daily and are to be done BEFORE you come to
class. All work is due on the assigned date; NO LATE WORK WILL BE
ACCEPTED. I will not accept work via email; you must bring a
printed copy to class. Students are required to write a research
paper, and write two short book reports on secondary sources places on
reserve. There will also be a midterm and a final exam of short
answer and essay questions. All written work must be turned in at
class time or to my office; I will not accept papers via email.
Attendance / Tardy:
Attendance is mandatory and will be checked daily. You are
allowed to miss three classes over the course of the semester.
After those three absences, each subsequent absence will result in a
loss of FIVE points from your final grade. If you miss more than
five classes, you will receive an F for the course. Naturally,
there are sometimes extenuating circumstances that will require you to
miss a course. Each student must see me personally (or via email)
if that is the situation.
Tardiness will not be tolerated. You are allowed to be tardy
three (which is defined as arriving after the class roll has been
called); after three, you will lose five points from your final exam
grade for each subsequent tardy. More than five tardies will
result in an F for the course. If you are late to class, or must
leave class early, please be as quiet and unobtrusive as possible.
Method of Assessment
Final Grade Components:
30% Research Paper (10-12 pages,
typed)
15% Midterm Exam
20% Final Exam
15% (each) Two Book Reviews (5 pages, typed)
5% Participation
Grading Scale:
A 93-100
A- 90-92
B+ 88-89
B 83-87
B- 80-82
C+ 78-79
C 73-77
C- 70-72
D+ 68-69
D 63-67
D- 60-62
F 59 and below
Cell Phones:
Please turn off all cell phones or beepers before class begins.
If your cell phone rings in class, you will be asked to leave and will
miss that day’s class.
Integrity and Scholarship:
If you are caught cheating on a writing assignment, test, the final
exam, or a daily quiz, or any other assigned work, you will receive an
F for the course. You are held accountable for all university
guidelines in regard to plagiarism and cheating.
Plagiarism:
University policy on plagiarism states, “Plagiarism is a form of
cheating. At CSUS plagiarism is the use of distinctive ideas or works
belonging to another person without providing adequate acknowledgement
of that person’s contribution. Regardless of the means of
appropriation, incorporation of another’s work into one’s own requires
adequate identification and acknowledgement. Plagiarism is doubly
unethical because it deprives the author of rightful credit and gives
credit to someone who has not earned it. Acknowledgement is not
necessary when the material used is common knowledge. Plagiarism at
CSUS includes but is not limited to:
1. The act of incorporating into one’s
own work the ideas, words, sentences, paragraphs, or parts thereof, or
the specific substance of another’s work without giving appropriate
credit thereby representing the product as entirely one's own. Examples
include not only word-for-word copying, but also the "mosaic" (i.e.,
interspersing a few of one’s own words while, in essence, copying
another’s work), the paraphrase (i.e., rewriting another’s work while
still using the other’s fundamental idea or theory); fabrication (i.e.,
inventing or counterfeiting sources), ghost-writing (i.e., submitting
another’s work as one’s own) and failure to include quotation marks on
material that is otherwise acknowledged; and
2. Representing as one’s own
another’s artistic or scholarly works such as musical compositions,
computer programs, photographs, paintings, drawing, sculptures, or
similar works. For more information on plagiarism, and how to avoid it,
go to: read the University Policy Manual, at
http://www.csus.edu/admbus/umanual/Uma00150.htm
This syllabus can and may be changed at any time.
Reading and Writing Assignments
Week 1 29 – 31 January
Mediterranean in 1095: Manzikert, the Seljuks, and theories of War
Reading:
Mayer: Chaps. 1 and 2
Allen and Amt: #10 “Matthew of Edessa on the Seljuk Conquests”
#11 “Gregory VII’s Call for Assistance to the
Greeks”
#2 “Augustine of Hippo on the Just War”
#3 “Quran: Excerpts on War”
Week 2 5 – 7 February
First Crusade: The Peasants’ Crusade and Massacres of Jews
Reading:
Mayer: Chap,3
Allen and Amt: #12 “Urban’s Call for a Crusade” Five
Versions
#13 “Albert of Aachen on the Peasants’ Crusade”
#14 “Solomon bar Samon on the Massacres of the
Jews”
#15 “Anna Comnena’s Alexiad”
#20 “Raymond of Aguiliers on the Fall of
Jerusalem”
#22 “Abu l-Muzaffar al-Abiwardi on the Fall of
Jerusalem”
Week 3 12 – 14 February
Crusading Ideals: Templars, Hospitallars, Teutonic Knights, and
Chivalry
Reading:
Prawer: Chap. XIV (On Reserve)
Christiansen: Chap. 3
Allen and Amt: #54 “Stories of Women Crusaders”
#50 “Rule of the Templars”
#69 “Rule of the Teutonic Knights”
#49 “Bernard of Clairvaux: In Praise of the
New
Knighthood”
Paper Topics Due
Week 4 19 – 21 February
Crusader States: Tensions between Byzantines, Armenians, and
Catholics
Reading: Mayer: Chaps. 4 and 8
Prawer: Chaps. IV and V (On Reserve)
Allen and Amt: #24 “Fulcher of Chartres’s
History”
#26 “Laws of the Kingdom of
Jerusalem”
#28 “John of Wurzburg’s Pilgrim
Guide”
#30 “Memoirs of Usamah ibn
Munquidh”
#32 “Burchard of Mount Sion and
the People of Palestine”
Week 5 26 – 28 February
Second Crusade: Consolidation of European Power Among Byzantine
and Muslim
Neighbors
Reading:
Mayer: Chap. 5
Prawer: Chaps. VIII and IX (On Reserve)
Allen and Amt: #34 “Ibn al-Athir on the Fall of Edessa”
#33 “Ibn al-Qalanisi on Zengi and Nur ad-Din”
#37 “John Kinnamos: The Deeds of John
and Manuel
Comnenus”
Online, “William of Tyre: The Fiasco at
Damascus, 1148.”
Book Report #1 Due
Week 6 5 – 7 March
Wendish Crusade: War and Conversion in Northern Europe
Reading:
Christiansen, Chaps. 2 and 3
Allen and Amt: #64 “Charter to German Settlers”
#66 “Proclamation of Northern European
Crusades”
#67 “Helmold’s Chronicle of the Slavs”
#70 ‘Nikolaus von Jeroschin on the Prussian
Crusades”
7 March: Midterm due by 5 PM
Week 7 12 – 14 March
Saladin and the Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem
Film excerpts: The Crusades
King Richard
and the Crusaders
Saladin
Kingdom of
Heaven
Reading:
Saladin in His Time, Newby: Chaps.2, 4, 7-9 (On Reserve)
Allen and Amt: #39 “Baha ad-Din’s Life of Saladin”
#40 “Imad ad-Din on the Battle of Hattin”
#41 “Roger of Wendover on the Fall of
Jerusalem”
#42 “Letters on the Fall of Jerusalem”
Online, “Aymeric, patriarch of Antioch: The
Decline of
Christian Power in the Holy Land, 1164, Letter to Louis VII of France.”
Week 8 19 – 21 March
Third Crusade: Richard Coeur-de-Lion, Philip Augustus, and
Frederick Barbarossa
Reading:
Mayer: Chap. 7
Newby: Chaps. 10 – 11 (on Reserve)
Allen and Amt: #43 “Taxation and Regulations for the Third
Crusade”
#40 “Accounts of the Third Crusade”
Richard I, song “Je ne puis”
26 – 28 March Spring Break, No Class
Week 9 2- 4 April
Warfare Technology and Culture: Muslim and Christian
Reading:
Western Warfare in the Age of the Crusades, John France:
Chaps. 2 – 3, 7 (On Reserve)
Michael Routledge, “Songs” On Reserve
Prawer: Chap. XVII (On Reserve)
Allen and Amt: #55 “Crusading Songs”
Week 10 9 – 11 April
Fourth Crusade and the Conquest of Constantinople
Reading:
Mayer: Chap. 9
Allen and Amt: #57 “Accounts of the Fourth Crusade”
#58 “Documents on the Sack of Constantinople”
Online: “Geoffry de Villehardouin Chronicle of
the Fourth
Crusade and The Conquest of Constantinople”
Online: “Robert de Clari: The Capture of Constantinople”
Online: “Nicetas Choniates: Capture of Constantinople,
1204”
Book Report #2 Due
Week 11 16 – 18 April
Albigensian Crusade
Reading:
Oldenbourg: Chaps. I, V – VI, XII
Oldenbourg: “Repressive Measures and Decrees …against the
Cathars”
Allen and Amt: #60 “William of Tudela’s Song of the Cathar
Wars”
#59 “Bernard of Gui’s Manual for Inquisitors”
Week 12 23 – 25 April
Children’s Crusade and Crusading in the Baltic
Reading:
Mayer: Chap. 10
Christiansen: Chap. 4
Allen and Amt: #61 “Accounts of the Children’s Crusade”
Film, Lionheart
Week 13 30 April – 2 May
Fifth Crusade: Damietta, Cyprus, and the Crusader States in the
Thirteenth
Century
Reading:
Mayer: Chap. 10 (review)
Allen and Amt: #63 “Oliver of Paderborn and the Fifth
Crusade”
30 April and 2 May: No Class
Week 14 7 – 9 May
Sixth Crusade: Frederick II and Thibaud of Champagne
Reading: Mayer: Chap. 11
Allen and Amt: #71 “Philip
of Novara on Frederick II’s Crusade”
#72 “Frederick
II on His Taking of Jerusalem”
#73 “Responses
to Frederick II’s Crusade”
Research Papers Due
Week 15 14 – 16 May
Seventh and Eighth Crusade: Louis IX and the Collapse of the
Crusader
States
Reading: Mayer: Chaps. 13 and 14
Robert Chazan, European Jewry and the First Crusade,
“The Church, the Jews, and the Later Crusades”
(On Reserve)
Oldenbourg: Chap. VII
Allen and Amt: #84 “Joinville’s Life of St. Louis”
#87 “Ibn ‘Abd al-Zahir’s Biography of Baybars”
#88 “Ludolph von Suchem on the Fall of Acre
and
Jerusalem”
23 May: Final due by 5 PM