ABSTRACT
The Second Crusade was preached in 1145 by the new Pope, Eugene III. In 1147, with new religious fervour, Pope Eugene III, who, along with Bernard of Clairvaux, had preached the Second Crusade, authorized the "Wendish Crusade", a campaign of German Crusaders against the Polabian Slavs or "Wends" in northeastern Germany. The Latin documents of the Baltic Crusade of 1199-1266 give us a flavour of the fantastic quality of the Crusader ideas about the "Saracens" whom they were fighting to Christianize and of what went through their minds as they set out on their "crusade". Although the Crusaders won their first battle, Bishop Berthold was mortally wounded and the Crusaders were repulsed by the "Saracens". In 1143, both Emperor Johannes Komnenos of Byzantium and King Foulques of Jerusalem died, leaving Joscelin with no powerful allies to help him defend Edessa against the "Saracens".
