ABSTRACT
This chapter is based on evidence gathered over many years, beginning with some research on the second crusade in the autumn of 1951.1 At that time the number of references to the crusades especially in French charters of the eleventh and twelfth centuries came to my attention. I started to gather them and have continued to do so over the years, mostly in the course of other research and with no particular object in mind. In time I had enough material both for an article on the financing of the crusades2 and for the present paper, in which I shall consider the light that charters can throw on the history of the crusades in general.
