Battle of the Jakobsfurt

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Battle of the Jakobsfurt
Aerial view of the crusader castle "Chastellet du Gué de Jacob" from the south
Aerial view of the crusader castle "Chastellet du Gué de Jacob" from the south
date August 24-30, 1179
place Jakobsfurt in today's Israel
output Ayyubid victory
Parties to the conflict

Kingdom of Jerusalem Kingdom of Jerusalem Templar Order
Knights Templar

Ayyubids Ayyubids

Commander

Baldwin IV of Jerusalem

Saladin (Salah ad-Din)

Troop strength
circa 1500 unknown
losses

800 combatants killed,
700 in captivity

unknown

Conflict between Crusaders and Ayyubids , 1177–1187

The battle of Jakobsfurt , a ford across the Jordan in what is now Israel , lasted from August 24th to 30th, 1179. It marked the turning point in the reconquest of the Holy Land by Saladin's troops . In the course of this battle, Saladin's troops captured the crusader castle Chastellet du Gué de Jacob, which was still under construction, and destroyed it to the ground. The construction of the castle, which was to control the crossing over the Jordan, had only begun in 1178.

prehistory

The Kurdish general Saladin, who had ruled Egypt since 1169, was one of the most powerful opponents of the Crusader states . After the unsuccessful siege of Gaza in 1170 and advances into Yemen , Saladin gained control of Damascus in 1174 . At the same time, the leadership of the Franks eroded, since in 1174 the king of Jerusalem Amalrich I died. His underage son Baldwin IV , who then ascended the throne, was only able to pursue government business to a limited extent. Internal power disputes over the future succession to the throne tied up additional forces, because Baldwin IV was considered unfit for marriage because of a leprosy disease . The prospects of effectively countering Saladin in these circumstances were slim. Nevertheless, Baldwin IV was able to achieve a great victory in the battle at Montgisard on November 25, 1177, as a result of which Saladin fled to Egypt and from there only returned to Damascus in the late spring of 1178 to put Frankish territories under pressure with the local army to put. According to the teachings of Montgisard, he no longer wanted to attack the Frankish troops who were superior in battle in the heart of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, but instead wanted to press distant front positions and weakly defended Franconian castles. The Franks, on the other hand, endeavored to develop their own front lines and raid enemy territory in order to counter the military threat posed by the Muslims. This also included building new crusader castles quickly close to Muslim-controlled areas.

Strategic importance

The main purpose of the crusader castles was to secure the areas conquered by the Franks at strategically favorable locations. These included, in particular, the few fords across the Jordan that were passable for an advancing force; otherwise the river was a natural line of defense. The ford of Jacob, north of the Sea of ​​Galilee - which was also of religious significance for the crusaders, since, according to biblical tradition, Jacob met his brother Esau at this point - was of strategic importance in several respects.

For one thing, it was only a day's journey from Damascus and thus threatened the army stationed there by Saladin. On the other hand, the ford lay on one of the main routes from Damascus to Acre . Control of the ford could therefore seriously impair communication between Damascus and Saladin's main bases in Egypt. Their effective control would also have prevented a rapid penetration of enemy forces into Galilee and protected the Templar castle Safed , located to the southwest, from a direct threat.

Chastellet on Jakobsfurt

Unworked stones indicate the completion of the wall in a great hurry

The plans to secure the crossing at the Jakobsfurt with a mighty crusader castle according to the most modern standards of that time were pushed by Baldwin IV with great effort from the year 1178. According to William of Tire , Baldwin tried to secure the west bank of the Jordan with the newly founded castle Chastellet since October 1178, using a large part of the Jerusalem army and before the mobilization of Saladin's troops in Damascus.

Located on a small hill, with the main gate on the south side and three further gates on the other sides, the castle should probably have a double wall. The unconquered fortress Krak des Chevaliers , which, with its defense towers and double walling that could hardly be conquered, was considered to be one of the best-protected fortresses. The Chastellet on Jakobsfurt was never completed, however, as Saladin recognized the threat it posed and took countermeasures in good time. Although the medieval report by William of Tire claims that the fortress was completed about six months after construction began, recent archaeological investigations do not support this representation. Rather, they suggest that the unfinished castle was only sparsely and quickly fortified before the siege by Saladin's troops. The fact that it had several defense towers and a second wall could not be proven either, and in view of the construction time it seems unlikely. At the time of the siege there was probably only one tower.

The battle of Jakobsfurt and the victory of Saladin

Before Saladin decided on a direct confrontation with the army stationed at Jakobsfurt, which might have cost him high losses, he tried diplomatically to dissuade Baldwin IV from further expanding the fortress. A fully developed fortress like Krak des Chevaliers would have been a serious threat both to Damascus and to the further progress of the conquests, so Saladin tried to dissuade Baldwin IV from this construction project by offering large sums of money.

Baldwin turned down an initial offer of 60,000 dinars , whereupon Saladin increased the amount to 100,000 dinars. When this offer was also rejected by Baldwin, Saladin decided to attack with his troops from Damascus as quickly as possible and besiege the castle. After the experience at Montgisard, Saladin shied away from a frontal attack on the fully assembled Jerusalem army. In the months before the actual siege, both sides therefore tried to test the strength of their opponents by carrying out minor combat operations in the surrounding area.

At the end of April 1179, Saladin attempted for the first time to besiege the Chastellet Castle on Jakobsfurt, but after a few days had to retreat to his camp in front of Banyas due to strong resistance . From there he launched raids on food supplies in Galilee and Lebanon . Baldwin gathered his army and tried to prevent Saladin from doing so, but suffered such great losses in two battles that he retired to Jerusalem to reorganize his army. For example, the Grand Master of the Knights Templar, Odo von St. Amand , was captured along with 270 Knights Templar. Saladin used this window of time to take Chastellet Castle, even before the arrival of Baldwin's army, which was to attack with reinforcements from the nearby city of Tiberias on the Sea of ​​Galilee. On August 24, 1179, Saladin and a large army from Damascus attacked the workers of Chastellet who were busy building it.

According to estimates, 1,500 men of the Jerusalem army then holed up in the still unfinished castle and resisted Saladin's troops using long-range units. Areas of the wall that had not yet been completed were barricaded as a makeshift. Saladin began the siege and had the Franks in the castle covered with a rain of arrows by Arab archers , who took up positions east and south of the castle. On the east side of the Jordan he had a tent camp built, on the one hand to collect wood for the siege and on the other hand to bombard the castle with heavy siege weapons .

While the Franks entrenched themselves inside the castle, the Muslim troops undermined the wall on the northeast side. After a failed first attempt, in which the tunnel that had been created in the shortest possible time, was not long and wide enough, Saladin set the wooden support beams of the tunnel on fire, whereupon it collapsed on the second attempt, together with the wall above. To quickly extinguish the first fire, Saladin had promised each water carrier a dinar for each load of water, because time was of the essence - Baldwin IV was already on the move with a large army. After a siege of less than five days, on August 29, 1179 the Arab army finally succeeded in penetrating the fortress through the breach in the wall and overpowering the Franks there before reinforcements from Tiberias arrived.

It is believed that around 800 francs were killed and 700 captured in the course of the battle, including many artisans building the castle. How high the losses were on the part of Saladin's troops is still unknown.

After the battle

A large part of the Franks captured were executed by Saladin, who otherwise treated prisoners rather mildly. Long-range fighters in particular could not expect a merciful judgment from Saladin, as they had inflicted the greatest losses on the Muslim side. Saladin heard the prisoners personally and sentenced not only Frankish fighters to death but also Muslims who had converted to Christianity and had helped the Templars. In order to make the fortress unusable, he had the corpses of his enemies and the killed horses thrown into the castle well, thus poisoning the water. He had the walls of the castle razed and the rest set on fire. So the advancing reinforcements from Tiberias, who came six hours too late to intervene effectively in the battle, recognized the outcome from afar and turned back. Baldwin IV experienced the loss of Chastellet as a great personal defeat. He made no further attempt to fortify the Jakobsfurt.

literature

  • Ronnie Ellenblum: Frankish Rural Settlement in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 1998, ISBN 0-521-52187-4 , pp. 270-277.
  • David Nicolle : Crusader Castles in the Holy Land 1097-1192 (= Fortress. 21). Osprey, Oxford 2004, ISBN 1-84176-715-8 , pp. 53-56.
  • Joshua Prawer: The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. European colonialism in the Middle Ages. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London 1972, ISBN 0-297-99397-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Ronnie Ellenblum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , p. 273.
  2. ↑ Hans Eberhard Mayer : History of the Crusades. (= Kohlhammer-Urban pocket books. Vol. 86). 10th, completely revised and expanded edition. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-17-018679-5 , pp. 151-152.
  3. ↑ Hans Eberhard Mayer: History of the Crusades. (= Kohlhammer-Urban pocket books. Vol. 86). 10th, completely revised and expanded edition. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-17-018679-5 , pp. 156-157.
  4. ↑ Hans Eberhard Mayer: History of the Crusades. (= Kohlhammer-Urban pocket books. Vol. 86). 10th, completely revised and expanded edition. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-17-018679-5 , pp. 160-161.
  5. ↑ Steven Runciman : History of the Crusades (= dtv. 4670). Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-423-04670-8 , pp. 718-719.
  6. ↑ Ronnie Elle Blum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , p. 262.
  7. ↑ a b Malcolm Barber: Jacob's Ford. In: Alan V. Murray: The Crusades. To Encyclopedia. Volume 2: D - J. ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara CA et al. 2006, ISBN 1-576-07862-0 , p. 649.
  8. ↑ a b Ronnie Ellenblum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , p. 264.
  9. ↑ Ronnie Elle Blum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , pp. 264-265.
  10. ^ A b Thomas Asbridge : The Crusades. War for the Holy Land. Simon & Schuster, London 2010, ISBN 978-0-7432-6860-8 , p. 312.
  11. ↑ Steven Runciman: History of the Crusades (= dtv. 4670). Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-423-04670-8 , pp. 719-720.
  12. ↑ Steven Runciman: History of the Crusades (= dtv. 4670). Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-423-04670-8 , p. 720.
  13. ^ A b Thomas Asbridge: The Crusades. War for the Holy Land. Simon & Schuster, London 2010, ISBN 978-0-7432-6860-8 , p. 313.
  14. ↑ Ronnie Elle Blum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , pp. 271-273.
  15. ↑ Ronnie Elle Blum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , p. 271.
  16. ↑ Ronnie Elle Blum: Crusader Castles and Modern Histories. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2007, ISBN 0-521-86083-0 , p. 272.
  17. ↑ Thomas Asbridge: The Crusades. War for the Holy Land. Simon & Schuster, London 2010, ISBN 978-0-7432-6860-8 , p. 314.