ABSTRACT
Crusading took many forms in the Middle Ages. The success ofthe First Crusade had an important effect on the way in which Europeans perceived the campaigns of reconquest in Spain, which began to assume an overtly spiritual character. Similarly, territorial wars of expansion against pagan peoples in the Baltic came to be seen as crusades and, in the thirteenth century, so did the wars of attrition fought by the popes against political enemies in Italy. After the Fourth Crusade, the defence of the Latin Empire of Constantinople also attracted crusading privileges. This chapter examines each of these examples as a case study and offers interpretations of the similarities and differences between them.
Crusades and holy wars Even while preaching the first crusade in 1096, Urban II realised that his use of holy war against the Turks in the East could have similar application elsewhere. As we have seen, the late Roman idea of the just war was revived by the papacy in the later eleventh century in a political climate – conflict with the Empire – that required the threat, if not the actual use, of force. Alexander II sanctioned the invasion of England in 1066 on such grounds; Gregory VII allowed that the bearing of arms could in certain circumstances act as a penance; and in 1089 Urban II offered the campaign against Muslim-held Tarragona, in Catalonia, as a substitute for penance (Mayer 1972: 29-32; Bull 1993: 97). In 1096, Urban discouraged Catalan counts from leaving their own territories to join the armed pilgrimage to Jerusalem: fighting the Muslims on their own doorstep was just as
