A History of the Crusades-Vol 1 (26 page)

The capture of Saruj, which was followed a few
months later by that of Birejik, with its ford over the Euphrates, by clearing
the roads between Edessa and his fortresses of Turbessel and Ravendel,
consolidated Baldwin’s county and ensured his communications with the main
Crusade. At the same time it taught the Moslems that the Count of Edessa was a
power to be taken seriously; and they concentrated on his destruction. Their
determination and the value of a Frankish Edessa to the Crusades were
illustrated in May, when Kerbogha, on his way to relieve Antioch, paused to
eliminate Baldwin. For three weeks he battled vainly against the walls of
Edessa before he abandoned the attack. His failure raised Baldwin’s prestige;
and the time that he had lost saved the Crusade.

The Plot Against
Baldwin

The Armenians also had not taken Baldwin
seriously enough. They resented the flow of Frankish knights into their
territory, and the favours that Baldwin bestowed on them. Nor did the Frankish
knights placate the Armenians, whom they treated with disdain and often with
violence. The notables of Edessa found themselves excluded from the Count’s
council where only Franks were represented; but the taxes that they paid were
no lower than in Thoros’s day. Moreover Armenian estates in the countryside
were being granted to the new-comers; and the farmers were bound to them by the
tighter feudal custom of the west. Late in 1098 an Armenian revealed to Baldwin
a plot against his life. Twelve of the chief citizens of the town were said to
have been in touch with the Turkish Emirs of the Diarbekir district. Baldwin’s
father-in-law, Taphnuz, was at Edessa at the time; his daughter’s wedding had
taken place only a short time before. It was said that the conspirators wished
to put him in Baldwin’s place or at least to oblige Baldwin to share the
government with him. On hearing the report Baldwin struck at once. The two
leading plotters were arrested and blinded; their chief associates had their
noses or their feet cut off. A large number of Armenians suspected of
complicity were flung into gaol and their fortunes were confiscated. But, after
the manner of wise orientals, they had hidden their money well enough for it to
elude Baldwin’s inspectors; so Baldwin graciously allowed them to buy their
freedom at prices ranging from twenty to sixty thousand bezants a head.
Taphnuz, whose association with the plot could not be proved, nevertheless
thought it wise to hasten back to his mountains away from his terrible
son-in-law. He took with him most of the countess’s dowry, of which he had only
handed over seven hundred bezants.

Baldwin’s fierce crushing of the conspiracy
ended the risk of trouble from his Armenian subjects. He continued to employ a
few of them in high posts, such as Abu’l Gharib, whom he made governor of
Birejik. But as more Franks joined him, attracted by his renown, he could
afford to ignore the orientals. His renown was now, less than a year after his
coming to Edessa, already tremendous. While the main Crusading army was still
toiling on the way to Jerusalem, he had founded a rich and powerful state deep
in Asia and was feared and respected throughout the eastern world. He had
started out on the Crusade a youngest son, penniless and dependent on the
charity of his brothers. He had been utterly overshadowed by great nobles such
as Raymond of Toulouse or Hugh of Vermandois or by experienced adventurers such
as Bohemond. Already he was a greater potentate than any of them. In him the
Crusade could recognize the ablest and most astute of its statesmen.

A
pilgrim of the late eleventh century

The
Emperor Alexius I before Christ

Antioch
from across the River Orontes. The fortified bridge is in the foreground. The
section of the wall where the Crusaders entered the city is on the right, on
the slope behind the city buildings

Ramleh

The
port of Jaffa

Jerusalem
from the south

Plan
of Jerusalem

The
mouth of the Dog River

CHAPTER III

BEFORE THE WALLS
OF ANTIOCH

‘
Only the
trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat
thou shalt
destroy and cut them down; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that
maketh war with thee
,
until it be subdued.’
DEUTERONOMY XX, 20

The city of Antioch lies on the river Orontes,
some twelve miles from the sea. It was founded in the year 300 B.C. by Seleucus
I of Syria and called after his father. It soon rose to be the chief city in
Asia; and under the Roman Empire it was the third city in the world. To the
Christians it was especially holy; for there they had first been given the name
of Christian; and there Saint Peter had founded his first bishopric. In the
sixth century A.D. earthquakes and a sack by the Persians had diminished its
splendour; and after the Arab conquest it had declined, to the profit of its
inland rival Aleppo. Its recovery by Byzantium in the tenth century restored
some of its greatness. It became the chief meeting place of Greek and Moslem
commerce and the most formidable fortress on the Syrian frontier. Suleiman ibn
Kutulmish captured it in 1085. On his death it passed to the Sultan Malik Shah,
who installed as governor the Turcoman Yaghi-Siyan. Yaghi-Siyan had now ruled
the city for ten years. Since Malik Shah’s death his nominal suzerain had been
the Emir Ridwan of Aleppo; but he was an un-dutiful vassal and preserved practical
independence by playing off against Ridwan his rivals Duqaq of Damascus and
Kerbogha of Mosul. In 1096 Yaghi-Siyan had even betrayed Ridwan during a war
against Duqaq whom he now called his overlord; but his aid had not enabled
Duqaq to take Aleppo, whose Emir never forgave him.