First modern edition of an undeservedly neglected account of the events of the First Crusade. Baldric of Bourgeil's Historia Ierosolimitana is a fascinating Latin prose account of the events of the First Crusade (1095-99), and a clarification of their miraculous meaning. It was composed around 1105 by Baldric, the abbot of Bourgueil, who later became the archbishop of Dol. It is a crucial text, yet, in part because its manuscript tradition has not been fully explored, it has been hitherto neglected. This volume presents the first critical edition of the text for nearly 150 years. Importantly, the editor has established that the text exists in over three times as many manuscripts as originally thought, thus indicating a far greater impact, geographically and chronologically, for Baldric's work than has been previously considered, and placing it at the forefront of crusade accounts of the period. In addition to a careful examination of the greatly extended manuscript tradition, the editor's critical analysis explores Baldric's career; his writing style; the dating and reception of his text; the amplification of the language, narrative and characters found in his recapitulation of his primary source, the Gesta Francorum; the influence of the text on medieval authors from Orderic Vitalis to Humbert of Romans; and its perspective on the crusade as a means of protecting the familia Christi . Dr STEVEN BIDDLECOMBE has taught widely in a number of universities.

The Historia Ierosolimitana is a prose narrative of the events of the First Crusade written at the abbey of Bourgueil in the Loire Valley around 1105. Its author, the abbot Baldric, used the anonymous Gesta Francorum for much of the factual material presented, but provided literary enhancements and amplifications of the historical narrative and the characters found therein, in order, as Baldric says, to make the Historia a more worthy account of the miraculous events it describes. This volume provides the first modern-language translation of the Historia, with a full introduction setting out its historical, social, political and manuscript contexts, and notes. It will contribute to a revised exploration of the First Crusade, and facilitate much wider debates about the place of history writing in medieval culture, textuality and manuscript transmission. SUSAN B. EDGINGTON is a Teaching and Research Fellow at Queen Mary University of London; STEVEN J. BIDDLECOMBE edited the Latin text of Baldric's Historia (2014); having taught at a number of universities, most recently at Nottingham Trent; he is currently an independent scholar.

The first translation of Baldric's Historia Ierosolimitana, a spirited account of the First Crusade, into modern English.

First comprehensive study of miracles in Crusade narrative, showing how and why they were deployed by their authors.

Crusade scholarship has exploded in popularity over the past two decades. This volume captures the resulting diversity of approaches, which often cross cultures and academic disciplines. The contributors to this volume offer new perspectives on topics as varied as the application of Roman law on slavery to the situation of Muslims in the Latin East, Muslim appropriation of Latin architectural spolia, the roles played by the crusade in medieval preaching, and the impact of Latin East refugees on religious geography in late medieval Cyprus. Together these essays demonstrate how pervasive the institution of crusade was in medieval Christendom, as much at home in Europe as in the Latin East, and how much impact it carried forth into the modern era. Contributors are Richard Allington, Jessalynn Bird, Adam M. Bishop, Tomasz Borowski, Yan Bourke, Sam Zeno Conedera, Charles W. Connell, Cathleen A. Fleck, Lisa Mahoney, and C. Matthew Phillips.

The First Crusade (1095-1101) was the stimulus for a substantial boom in Western historical writing in the first decades of the twelfth century, beginning with the so-called "eyewitness" accounts of the crusade and extending to numerous second-hand treatments in prose and verse. From the time when many of these accounts were first assembled in printed form by Jacques Bongars in the early seventeenth century, and even more so since their collective appearance in the great nineteenth-century compendium of crusade texts, the Recueil des historiens des croisades, narrative histories have come to be regarded as the single most important resource for the academic study of the early crusade movement. But our understanding of these texts is still far from satisfactory. This ground-breaking volume draws together the work of an international team of scholars. It tackles the disjuncture between the study of the crusades and the study of medieval history-writing, setting the agenda for future research into historical narratives about or inspired by crusading. The basic premise that informs all the papers is that narrative accounts of crusades and analogous texts should not be primarily understood as repositories of data that contribute to a reconstruction of events, but as cultural artefacts that can be interrogated from a wide range of theoretical, methodological and thematic perspectives. MARCUS BULL is Andrew W. Mellon Distinguished Professor of Medieval and Early Modern Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; DAMIEN KEMPF is Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Liverpool. Contributors: Laura Ashe, Steven Biddlecombe, Marcus Bull, Peter Frankopan, Damian Kempf, James Naus, L an N Chl irigh, Nicholas Paul, William J. Purkis, Luigi Russo, Jay Rubenstein, Carol Sweetenham,

In Warfare and the Miraculous in the Chronicles of the First Crusade, Elizabeth Lapina examines a variety of these chronicles, written both by participants in the crusade and by those who stayed behind. Her goal is to understand the enterprise from the perspective of its contemporaries and near contemporaries. Lapina analyzes the diversity of ways in which the chroniclers tried to justify the First Crusade as a “holy war,” where physical violence could be not just sinless, but salvific. The book focuses on accounts of miracles reported to have happened in the course of the crusade, especially the miracle of the intervention of saints in the Battle of Antioch. Lapina shows why and how chroniclers used these miracles to provide historical precedent and to reconcile the messiness of history with the conviction that history was ordered by divine will. In doing so, she provides an important glimpse into the intellectual efforts of the chronicles and their authors, illuminating their perspectives toward the concepts of history, salvation, and the East. Warfare and the Miraculous in the Chronicles of the First Crusade demonstrates how these narratives sought to position the crusade as an event in the time line of sacred history. Lapina offers original insights into the effects of the crusade on the Western imaginary as well as how medieval authors thought about and represented history.

The Uses of the Bible in Crusader Sources sets out to understand the ideology and spirituality of crusading by exploring the biblical imagery and exegetical interpretations which formed its philosophical basis. Medieval authors frequently drew upon scripture when seeking to justify, praise, or censure the deeds of crusading warriors on many frontiers. After all, as the fundamental written manifestation of God’s will for mankind, the Bible was the ultimate authority for contemporary writers when advancing their ideas and framing their world view. This volume explores a broad spectrum of biblically-derived themes surrounding crusading and, by doing so, seeks to better comprehend a thought world in which lethal violence could be deemed justifiable according to Christian theology. Contributors are: Jessalynn Bird, Adam M. Bishop, John D. Cotts, Sini Kangas, Thomas Lecaque, T. J. H. McCarthy, Nicholas Morton, Torben Kjersgaard Nielsen, Luigi Russo, Uri Shachar, Iris Shagrir, Kristin Skottki, Katherine Allen Smith, Thomas W. Smith, Carol Sweetenham, Miriam Rita Tessera, Jan Vandeburie, Julian J. T. Yolles, and Lydia Marie Walker.