ABSTRACT
As much as medieval monastic communities asserted themselves to be in the world, but not of it, the early crusading movement intruded upon the lives of religious men and women in numerous ways. Monks, canons, and nuns supported the early crusading movement in a variety of roles: as the Jerusalemites’ financiers; as participants in the expeditions to the east; as chroniclers and critics of holy war; as custodians of the bodies of fallen pilgrims or sacred objects they brought home; and as sanctuaries for crusaders who viewed monastic conversion as a natural next step. As a result, monasteries became repositories of crusading memory where the stories of individual crusaders were preserved and the larger narrative of Jerusalem’s conquest and subsequent loss was endlessly glossed.1 These crusading stories, adorned with exegetical commentary and framed with an eye towards institutional self-interest, became a central part of the commemorative cultures of medieval religious houses.
