ABSTRACT
The Crusades represent one of the best, and undoubtedly most controversial, examples of the complex relationship between war and tourism. Obviously they were not a tourist endeavor, but rather religious-sponsored wars intertwined with elements of conquest and occupation, which stimulated conflict in the Holy Lands for several centuries following; a contemporary issue explored later in chapters by Krakover and Isaac. The ultimate goal of the First Crusade (1096 to 1099) was to regain the “Holy Lands” and recapture Jerusalem for Christianity. Jerusalem presents a complicated case. It is a holy city to the three major Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – and, according to Cline (2005), it has been destroyed twice, besieged twenty-three times, attacked fifty-two times, and captured and then recaptured forty-four times. Furthermore, it is still highly emotive today. With that in mind, we wish to be clear that it is not the purpose of this chapter to debate the rights and wrongs of the Crusades, nor the reasons for them, nor their intents, or even to investigate the history of tourism in Jerusalem, but rather to explore how the Crusades contributed to the enabling of tourism.
