Battle of Ramla

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The name Battle of Ramla refers to a series of clashes that took place in the early years of the Kingdom of Jerusalem .

Ramla ( Hebrew רמלה, Ramlāh; Arabic الرملة, ar-Ramlah, colloquially Ramleh) was an important city on the road from Jerusalem to Ascalon , the largest Fatimid fortress in Palestine . From here the Egyptians launched constant attacks on the newly established kingdom, which often led to confrontations between the two places.

First battle of Ramla

The first battle of Ramla took place on September 7, 1101.

Al-Afdal Shahanshah , the Fatimid regent of Egypt, had a new army set up after the defeat of Ascalon in 1099, which in mid-May 1101 - Baldwin I was still busy with the conquest of Caesarea Maritima - under the leadership of the Mamluk Sa'ad ad Dalauh el-Qawasi was moved to Askalon. Baldwin was able to prevent the attempt to penetrate from here to Jerusalem with a bolt at Ramla. While Sa'ad withdrew to Ascalon to await reinforcements, Baldwin had Ramla fortified and otherwise observed the proceedings from Jaffa . Through an intercepted letter he learned at the end of August that reinforcements had arrived and that the attack was imminent.

On September 4th, the Egyptians marched in front of Ramla. On September 6th, the Christians decided to attack at dawn, even though they only had 260 horsemen and about 900 foot soldiers. Compared to the 11,000 horsemen and 21,000 foot soldiers on the Fatimid side, however, they were well trained and equipped. The first two groups (under the command of a knight named Berwold or the Lord of Haifa , Waldemar Carpenel ) were however destroyed, the third (under the command of Hugo von St. Omer , the new prince of Tiberias ) from the Egyptians to the Escaped. At this moment Baldwin attacked surprisingly, pushed into the center of the enemy and created a panic reaction that spread to the right wing. Baldwin had the fleeing Egyptians followed to Ascalon and only then returned to Ramla to plunder their camps.

Second battle of Ramla

Second battle of Ramla, depiction 1475

The second battle of Ramla took place on May 17, 1102. An Egyptian army of around 20,000 strong under the command of Sharaf el-Ma'alis, son of the vizier Malik al-Afdal, set out from Ascalon for Jerusalem.

Baldwin, who had gathered an army of several thousand men in Jaffa and stationed reserve troops in Galilee, was wrongly informed about the strength of the Egyptians due to inadequate educational work. He set out from Jerusalem to fight the supposedly weak enemy himself. He was accompanied by Konrad, the marshal of Emperor Heinrich IV , and Hugo VI. von Lusignan , Stephan von Blois and Stephan von Burgund , who had already been on their way back to Europe, but were shipwrecked due to a storm and had to turn back. Stephan von Blois had reminded the council of war that the situation had not been adequately explored, but was not taken seriously because everyone was of the opinion that he had already failed in the siege of Antioch and only because of the urging of his wife Adela from Normandy had gone back to the Holy Land to restore his honor.

On May 17th, Baldwin and his troop, only 500 men strong, met the Egyptian army. Immediately after their discovery, the crusaders were attacked, so that a retreat was no longer possible. Baldwin decided on a counterattack that almost drove the enemy to flee. But then the Egyptians realized that the knights were not the vanguard, but the entire force. Baldwin and his men were surrounded and many died on the battlefield. Only a few crusaders, including Baldwin himself, were able to get through and get to Jaffa to safety or retreat to Ramla, where they were surrounded by the Egyptians at nightfall.

In Ramla, only one tower was suitable to serve as a bastion, in which all Christians then holed up. During the night Baldwin managed to escape from Ramla. He reached Arsuf two days later , where he could use an English ship to break through the Egyptian sea blockade and escape to Jaffa.

On the morning of May 18, the ring around the tower was closed. The Egyptians piled up bundles of brushwood to smoke out their opponents. They responded with a sortie in which many perished and others, including Marshal Konrad, were captured and taken to Egypt. Hugo VI was among the dead. von Lusignan, Stephan von Blois, Stephan von Burgund and Gottfried von Vendôme .

The Egyptians now failed to use the victory on the battlefield to march on the barely defended Jerusalem. Instead, they turned to Jaffa and stayed outside the city until the arrival of a fleet of German and French crusaders on May 27 enabled Baldwin to fail to force the Fatimid army to retreat to Ashkelon, and again to seize the Fatimid camp.

Third Battle of Ramla

The third battle of Ramla, depiction from the 13th century

The third battle of Ramla took place on August 27, 1105 and is considered to be the bloodiest.

Again it was al-Afdal who sent out an army, this time under the command of his son Saraf al-Maʿāli; the Egyptian army, 5,000 horsemen and an unknown number of foot soldiers, gathered again in Ascalon. After they set out, 1,300 Turkish archers on horseback joined them from Damascus . Baldwin took up position in front of Ramla, coming from Jaffa. His armed forces included 500 horsemen, 2,000 foot soldiers from the main army, as well as the garrisons from Galilee, Haifa and Hebron.

The first attack by the Christians in the early morning of August 27th was parried by archers. The decision in favor of Baldwin was only made in the afternoon after a long and bloody fight. This was not least due to the fact that the Egyptians wanted to conquer Haifa at the same time, for which they had used the left wing of their army, which significantly weakened them.

Baldwin was again able to seize the Egyptian camp, but, as weakened as he was meanwhile, had to refrain from pursuing the fleeing enemy.

After the third battle of Ramla, the Fatimid viziers stopped making large-scale attempts to retake Palestine.

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