FK's Fictional World

The Historical Crusades

c. 1193-1203
Nick is born.

The Third Crusade mobilizes to recover Jerusalem.

England's King Richard II, the Lionhearted, retakes Acre and defeats Saladin the Great at Arsuf.  Richard and Saladin negotiate a peace that fixes the frontiers of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, omitting its namesake city, but guaranteeing Christians access to its holy sites under Muslim rule.

Saladin the Great dies.  His empire begins to disintegrate.

The Fourth Crusade, sidetracked and broke, besieges Christian Constantinople.

c. 1204-1213
Fleur is born.

The Children's Crusade ends in slavery or death for most of its young pilgrims.  This is the origin of the Pied Piper legend.

During his coronation as Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, King of Germany and Sicily, pledges to lead a Crusade.  Frederick will be called "the wonder of the world" for his intelligence, and "the baptized sultan" for his religious equivocation.

The Fifth Crusade mobilizes, gathering in Italy and planning to recover Jerusalem by pressing its overlord, the Egyptian Sultan, in his own land.  Its leaders wait for Emperor Frederick II and his armies, but he never arrives.

c. 1218-1225
Nick is in Carreg, Wales.

c. 1219-1226
Nick takes the Cross (i.e. vows Crusade) and goes east.

April.  The Crusading army sails for Acre, a three-week sea voyage from Italy.

May 24.  The Crusaders depart Acre for Egypt.

August 17.  The fortress protecting the port of Damietta falls to the Crusaders.

September.  The Crusaders lay siege to the city of Damietta.  The Egyptian army harries them, then fortifies its position.

February 5.  Egyptian internal politics cause their forward encampment to suddenly fall to the Crusaders.

The Egyptian Sultan el-Malik al-Kamil requests negotiations.  He offers the Crusaders Jerusalem and a thirty-year truce in exchange for their departing Egypt.  Of the Crusade's leaders, King John of Jerusalem wishes to accept, but Papal Legate Archbishop Pelagius refuses.  The Sultan sweetens his offer with cash.  Pelagius again declines.

Brother Francis -- the Poor Man of Assisi -- having accompanied the Crusaders to Damietta, sets out deliberately for the Egyptian forces, is captured, and attempts to convert the Sultan to Christianity.  Al-Kamil listens to Francis's preaching for several days, then sends him away in safety.

August 29.   The Crusader army advances and is routed.  Sultan al-Kamil renews his previous peace offer, adding new inducements.  Again, Pelagius declines, counting on the arrival of Frederick II's army.  It never comes.

November 4.  The Crusaders take the city of Damietta, now undefended because most of its inhabitants have starved to death.

May.  Much of Emperor Frederick II's army arrives at Damietta, without him.

July 17.  One of the largest Crusader armies ever assembled marches from Damietta toward Cairo.  Egyptians encamp at Mansourah.  The Crusaders fortify positions at Sharimshah, a triangular projection with river on two sides and a dry canal on the third.

King John of Jerusalem again urges acceptance of Sultan al-Kamil's peace terms.  Legate Pelagius again declines.

August 26.  The rising Nile cuts off the Crusaders, who begin to retreat.  The Egyptians attack with great success, utterly crushing the Crusaders.

August 28.  Legate Pelagius opens surrender negotiations with Sultan al-Kamil.

August 30.  Pelagius and al-Kamil settle terms.  The Crusaders will evacuate and observe an eight-year truce with Egypt.  Both sides will return all prisoners.

September 8.  The Crusaders leave Egypt by ship from Damietta.

Emperor Frederick II formally renews his Crusader vow in the presence of Pope Honorius III, King John of Jerusalem, and the Grand Masters of the Military Orders.  He promises to launch on June 24, 1225.

June 25.  Having missed his own deadline, Emperor Frederick II extends his Crusader vow again, this time for August 15, 1227.

November.  Frederick marries Yolanda (aka Isabelle), daughter of King John of Jerusalem.  Though John is still alive, and the inheritance passes through Yolanda directly to her offspring, Frederick soon claims Jerusalem's kingship for himself.

September 8.  Emperor Frederick II finally embarks on his long-promised Crusade, almost immediately contracts malaria, and returns to Sicily.

Pope Gregory IX excommunicates Frederick for Crusade-related procrastination (putting it off) and tergiversation (being two-faced about it).

1228
Nick becomes a vampire in Paris.

Immured in Emperor Frederick II's harem in Palermo, Yolanda bears him a son, and dies within days.  Officially, little Conrad IV, not his father, is now King of Jerusalem.

June 28.  Frederick, no longer ill, embarks again for the Levant.  The Pope reemphasizes his excommunication.

July 21.  While most of his army sails directly to Acre, Frederick stops at Limassol, Cyprus, and attempts to appropriate Crusader-ruled Cyprus and Beirut as his own.  The Lord of Beirut manages to direct the dispute into judicial channels.

September.  Frederick joins his troops at Acre and promptly begins negotiating with the Egyptian Sultan's ambassadors.  This is the Sixth Crusade.

1229
Nick, Lacroix and Janette visit Castle Brabant.

February.  In Jaffa, Emperor Frederick II and Egyptian Sultan el-Malik al-Kamil peacefully negotiate a landmark treaty granting the Crusaders rule of Jerusalem, Nazareth and Bethlehem, with Muslim access to holy sites guaranteed under Christian governance, as well as a ten-year truce, trading rights, and freedom for all prisoners on both sides.  The Sultan further offers to return a famous fragment of the True Cross captured in Saladin's day, but it turns out to have been lost.

March 18, Sunday.  Frederick crowns himself King of Jerusalem.

March 19, Monday.  Jerusalem falls under interdict due to Frederick's excommunication.

Frederick's forces attack Christian Cyprus, seizing all its fortifications and finances.

May 1.  Frederick departs Acre at daybreak, in secret.  The people who happen to see him go pelt his party with tripe.