ABSTRACT
In the spring of 1128 emissaries from Jerusalem had reached Angers to offer Count Fulk V of Anjou the hand of King Baldwin IF s eldest daughter Melisende. Fulk had it from the sultan of Babylon when Christ raised him to be king of Jerusalem. The first sign of a renewed Christian concern with the garrison at Ascalon is to be found in 1132, probably early in the year when King Fulk was absent in the north. The patriarch and citizens of Jerusalem built Chastel Hernaut in the foothills of the Judaean hills to protect the road to their city from Egyptian raiders. The major Egyptian expedition by land had approached the Kingdom of Jerusalem in 1118, shortly after Baldwin II's accession. One’s first reaction to the appearance in Jerusalem in September 1131 of an embassy from Kutayfat is that, having already shown some favour to the Christian community in Egypt, he must have been looking for a Christian ally.
