Crusade Before The Crusades? // Sardinia Expedition (1015-1017)

[Music] the first crusade one of the most famous campaigns in all of history that vast and unprecedented European expedition undertaken by tens of thousands of soldiers in order to lay claim to the holy land yet like all wars this one didn't happen in a vacuum as far as the Islamic world was concerned and indeed most educated Europeans at the time this was far from the beginning of hostilities in the eyes of regular Muslims from the Atlantic to the Black Sea and in the words of contemporary Arabic scholars several earlier expeditions and incursions into their lands had been just as important as this one for many Arabic scholars the beginning of the crusading period had been in the ten 60s and ten 70s with the Norman invasion and gradual conquest of the island of Sicily indeed the leader of that campaign the great count Rodger Holtville was the uncle of Boehm and of Toronto one of the integral commanders in the first crusade the knowledge and expertise gained in the Sicily campaign was especially important to the Norman's success in the east many of Bowman's men already being fluent in Arabic by the time the expedition began yet Eartha was sometimes described as Crusades took place too long before the First Crusade in 1064 during the Reconquista in Spain a vast multi-ethnic army officially sanctioned by pope alexander ii rode south to war to seize the strategically important city of barb astray from its Muslim rulers 19th century Spanish scholar Ramon Patel famously called this war a crusade before the Crusades finally in 1087 we have another example of a papal II sanctioned campaign conducted by a multinational Christian army against a Muslim ruler this time it was the Italian maritime powers of Genoa and Pisa facing off against the North African town of Mahdia then under the control of the zeroD ruler tammim urban Maurice a pirate Lord who'd also been active in fighting the Normans in Sicily because a form of indulgence and remission of sins was granted to those who took part by the Pope Victor the Third Crusade scholar Karl Edmond calls this a direct precursor and almost prototyped campaigned to the First Crusade with actual military aid even being provided by Rome to the campaign's commander Hugh of Pisa yet one event much earlier than these undertaken close to a century before the First Crusade was especially important to for crusade scholar Jonathan Riley Smith we should look here if we want to find the very first example of a crusade for this was a paper Lee sanctioned expedition launched by Genoa Pisa and the papacy to reclaim the island of Sardinia from an attacking fleet of Islamic warriors from war-torn al-andalus that had seized it just months before this is the story of the Sardinia campaigns of 10 15 and 10 16 Wars with a good claim to being called the real first crusade this video is sponsored by a personal favorite of mine which I use near enough every single day and have done for several years it's audible the number one 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what are you waiting for go and get yourself some free knowledge now back to the war-torn early Middle Ages in the summer of 1015 dark sales were cited after Sardinian Shore this large island in the northern Mediterranean had seen its fair share of Corsairs in the past heading up from the Emirates on the North African coastline to plunder and sea slaves for the burgeoning markets of Tunisia and most recently from the flourishing pirate bases off war-torn Sicily riffin between Islamic invaders and Byzantine Imperial holdouts though for the most part these had been fairly small-scale operations leaving little lasting impact on the island besides occasionally occupying a few towns and fortresses this time however it was different Sardinia is an ancient place littered with the edifices of Ages gone by [Music] great towers of the neuralgic civilization Phoenician ruins Carthaginian towns and Roman settlements by the early 11th century however the island was ruled over by a multitude of regional lords called judges by the local mostly Christian population these powerful figures perhaps a throwback to the period of Byzantine Eastern Roman influence on the island held the power of life and death over their people at least four of them held sway over the island in the north there was galore ax and log adoro in the center are Berea and in the south Cagliostro ring the goings-on in the wider world content to govern their own affairs besides the occasional border skirmishes fought for land and animals against their neighbors as the citizens of Cagliari gazed out into the mediterranean that summer however it immediately became clear that despite his claims to the contrary their judge would be able to do little against this force out on the horizon just below the skyline was a fully equipped army fierce saber wielding veterans packed into a hundred and twenty highly mobile warships this wasn't just a piratical raiding fleet it was an invasion force come to claim the island as it's owned just as it happened to Crete Sicily Cyprus and Rhodes over the past 300 years since the armies of Islam first spilled forth out of Arabia to take over much of the Mediterranean Sea as Brigade after Brigade of battle-hardened fighters came ashore unopposed that summer quickly rounding up any bewildered and terrified Sardinians they came across as they fanned out into the central southern plain it soon became clear that they were Muslim though the terrified locals could scarcely understand where exactly they had originated from Norwood most of them have had any idea even if it were explained for them it must have seemed like the end of the world and for many it was [Music] those unfortunate enough to be captured and come into close proximity of the leader of the fleet might have noticed that though a devout Muslim warrior Lord he himself was blue-eyed and fair-haired in fact he had been born a slave his mother just like tens of thousands of others had been rounded up and taken from the wild river lands of Eastern Europe during the mid 10th century perhaps at first aboard the long ships of the fearsome ruse warriors to the north of the Black Sea of course he himself likely had a little notion of what that life would have been he like thousands of other circle Eber or Slavs bought from the burgeoning slave trade had spent his entire life in modern day Spain in the Caliphate of al-andalus then for the higher echelon of society undoubtedly one of the most advanced and cultured regions in the world though foremost a brutal and unforgiving land like most of his male kinsmen that boy had been drilled into service in the elite Khalifa army and fortunately for him he would eventually gain access to those privileged higher echelon of society gaining the patronage of the most powerful man in the peninsula a caliph in all but name the Vizier to the ineffective and useless caliph al Hakim his name was eben Ali Amir better known to history as al Mansoor the Caliph Hisham was descended from a man often regarded as one of the greatest rulers in history Abdullah Rahman the supposed owner of hundreds of thousands of books who oversaw a golden age in al-andalus Hisham had succeeded his father in 976 at the age of just 14 immediately showing much more interest in the pursuits of pleasure rather than governing his realm in his stead aroused the celebrated religious scholar and warrior ii bin ali emir already a veteran of innumerable Wars and battles by this time including a significant amount of time spent amongst the Berbers of northern Africa a religious zealot who regularly crucified those he considered to be heretics or apostates al-mansour known to the Christian inhabitants of Europe as Almanzo looked down not just on Christians but also on the native Muslim and Aleutians who he saw as weak and decadent preferring instead to employ cadres of Berber cell sorts stoic veiled warriors from northern Africa a precursor to those Almoravids who would invade on mass at the end of the 11th century to counterbalance the increasingly powerful kings of north and spain al-mansour saw something in the young slavic slave soldier eventually buying his freedom converting him to islam paying for his education raising him to his service and giving him the name Mujahid alsa club' perhaps to reflect his devotion to islam and to holy war the aspect of rule which distinguished al-mansour from his predecessors whereas Abdel Rahman had for the most part sought diplomacy with his Christian subjects and neighbors al-mansour gave them nothing but the sword waging ruthless attack after attack against the northern christian kingdoms so brutal that many saw him as the very embodiment of the Antichrist come to herald the end of the world in the year 1000 though one of the greatest rulers of al-andalus in fact it was these very attacks that inadvertently led to the breakup of the Caliphate after his death in 1002 almost as soon as he died faced with the reign of his equally vicious yet not as capable son Sancho a low vicious pogroms against almond sauce / bus tour through the Caliphate in the 1000s and the ten tens culminating in Sancho loz death in 1009 and the brutal sack of the capital of Cordoba in 1030 by the vengeful Berbers after their number had in turn been massacred inside of the walls the city that had once been the envy of the world now lay scorched and ruined never again would it regain its former greatness though it had already been fragmenting prior to this point the caliphate now erupted into all-out civil war between rival factions all over the realm former administrators in provincial capitals declared their own independence some attempting to legitimize themselves through a puppet caliph [Music] lamech Iberia would never be United again the age of the taifa states have begun [Music] in the rapid succession of power grabs that followed Sun Shui Lowe's death in 1009 Mujahid had come out pretty well solidifying control over the western coast as well as the Balearic Islands prior to this he may have served as the governor of Denia under al-mansour sons after 1002 within a few years just like many of the other states he had set up his own rival puppet Calif Almaty his man were loyal to some of them having served with him for decades others under al-mansour before him yet of course still there were murmurings of dissent amongst the most devout it was true that Mujahid had no muslim blood in him the caliph al Rahman had been fair-haired and blue-eyed - the result of European concubines over the centuries though he had darkened himself up whenever in public Mujahid couldn't hide his lineage everyone knew it but what he could do was reward his followers with new lands and new titles and he knew just the place to go to do it Sardinia by ten eleven dénia had been the first toy first eight to mint its own coins its power partly stemming from the fleet housed in its Harbor its shipyards according to the historian muhammad al-idrisi was very good and very old by 10:15 faced with increasingly aggressive Christian kingdoms to the north and factionalism tearing through the Muslim kingdoms of the south the violence would spill out far into the northern Mediterranean in the previous decade and earlier ships from dénia may have been launching periodical rates thus far east and perhaps even further to the Ligurian and Tuscan coastlines to raid the relatively rich Italian city-states maybe even leaving small enclaves behind on Mediterranean Shores but now these attacks would come to a head Mujahid wasn't an Arab nor was he a Berber nor did he have any Muslim blood in him and now without the support of his benefactor he faced serious assaults on his legitimacy only one road lay open to him holy war aboard the remnants of the Khalifah fleet Mujahid and his man soon made landfall on Sardinia they were quick to round up as many of the locals as they could they could use the labor and to extract vital intel on the political situation on the island all the signs were good and it wasn't long before the first of many judges solutio of Cagliari was overcome his lands seized he didn't know what hit him massively outgunned by this elite force from al-andalus the 12th century Pizan Chronicle libéré mayor licinus writes that within just a few weeks Mujahid controlled all of the Sardinian coastal plain yet he was about to get more than he bargained for likely seen as little more than pests and prey during the days of the unified caliphate the Italian maritime cities of Pisa and Genoa were about to take center stage hearing of the civil war in al-andalus old scores would soon be settled conflict between Andalusia and the Italian city-states had been raging for decades by this time and with other Islamic powers in the eastern Mediterranean for much longer [Music] perched in excellent geographic positions on the edge of the sea Pisa and Genoa were already old by the turn of the millennium having played off innumerable powers over the preceding thousand years becoming polities in their own right growing ever more rich from trade over the years often doing business with Muslim bias now they would go on the offensive for the first time in a baptism of fire the very beginnings of powerful maritime empires that would thrive for centuries to come and a rare period of cooperation between these two rivals around the turn of the millennium a Muslim Enclave may have been already established on the rugged Sardinian coastline by Mujahid's predecessor sitting not far from the holy city of rome itself we know that in 1004 Pope John the 18th urged his subjects to expel the Muslims from the island a request perhaps linked to another military exploit recorded in the annals for in that year a fleet of pirates though we don't know where they originated had sailed up the river arno to sack the city of Pisa itself the peasants seemed to have had prior warning as in the next year they were able to launch a successful attack on a Muslim base off Reggio a thorn in the side of Italian ambitions for centuries finally in 1011 the peas and annals record that a fleet from Spain came again to destroy the city what other Iberian power had the resources to launch such an attack than Mujahid perhaps as a precursor to his invasion of Sardinia the peasants must have been ready for this attack for they were far from crippled within months of his making landfall on Sardinia a joint peas and Genoan fleet arrived to confront him although the liber Mela caninus written by a peasant completely excludes the Genoese it talks of the peas and noblemen like lions rushing their prey taking turns to Road the galleys such was their desire to fight the Saracens Mujahid and his man apparently unprepared for a prolonged battle fled the island the withdrawal must have been a massive blow for the Muslims sometime amidst the confusion Mujahid sir Ali Iqbal aldo allah was captured he would only be ransomed back in 1032 16 years later of course Mujahid had only temporarily withdrawn he would be back in the next year with a much larger army reinforced by 1,000 cavalryman from the belayer axe it seems that upon his arrival the italians also pulled out leaving the Sardinians to their fate [Music] Mujahid vengeance would be swift the Italians had not only defied him but seized his son and he would make the Sardinian suffer because of it perhaps making contact with Garrison's that had remained on the island over the winter according to the contemporary German chronicler Tia Tamar of Mercer burg a beachhead was also established at loonie on the Italian coast between Genoa and Pisa the surrounding countryside pillaged without resistance perhaps in an effort to convince the Italians to stay away from the island he then set about constructing a vast fortress to act as his base of operations for the rest of the conquest similar daring invasions had been successfully carried out before on Sicily Cyprus Malta and Crete that last one also waged from al-andalus Mujahid every bit cut from the same cloth as his benefactor al-mansour that ruthless warlord who had overwhelmed army after army and town after town in the twilight years of the 1st millennium ad was likely convinced that this attack would be no different al-mansour had been a brutal and ruthless power player using tales of his ferocity in order to keep his foes in line and more often than not seeing them simply surrender rather than suffer the horrific torturous death they assumed awaited them most notably in the northwest of Spain lay the holy site of santiago de compostela spiritual heartland of the kings of leon in august 9 97 a great muslim army descended upon the shrine burning and pillaging everything they found tearing the cathedral itself down and dragging its bells back to Cordoba as trophies to be used as lamps in the Grand Mosque pulled all the way back to the Capitol by the human cargo of slaves captured of the prisoners some were used as slave labor others were taken down to the river Guadalquivir publicly decapitated their heads paraded through the marketplace before being hung from the main gates of the Citadel it's likely that Mujahid was present during this attack [Music] upon completion of his new stronghold in 1016 according to the peas and chronicles Mujahid took several of the prisoners present and had them bricked up alive inside the walls the others he let go free to spread the rumors across the island [Music] meanwhile in Rome a new pope had recently been elected only in his 30s at the time Benedict the 8th as a reputation as a particularly warlike and aggressive man knowing that the Muslims would not stop at Sardinia he had to act the presence of a Sardinian Cardinal at his court alario Chou may have spurred him to action even more leading to his active involvement in a campaign to the island Benedict even granted privileges to those who took part in the upcoming expedition granting it a vermilion banner and leading some writers to call the expedition an early crusade T at maar of Mercer Berg called those who took part in the campaign protectors of Christ going on to relate a particular incident when Mujahid sent a sack of chestnuts to the Pope in order to illustrate the number of soldiers he would unleash on Christendom if the Pope didn't leave Sardinia to him in response T Atma writes that Benedict sent back a sack of millet to represent the Christian soldiers who would meet him t Atma even says that the Pope raised and sent a fleet of his own probably meaning that he encouraged the maritime republics to send fleets on his behalf though some of those involved may well have been hired mercenaries this campaign was unprecedented in history by the time this proto crusading force arrived on Sardinia in May 1016 murmurings of descents were already being hurt in Mujahid scamp it seems the tales of Sardinia and riches had been grossly exaggerated and Mujahid's man had very little in terms of plunder to show for their troubles faced with the prospect of yet more hard-fought campaigns across the mountainous terrain of the interior the army may have already been on the verge of mutiny by the time the Italians arrived and when they did their mere presence was enough to shatter the Muslim resolve knowing when he was beaten Mujahid again pulled out this time for good during the ensuing retreat according to the peas and sources a storm battered the Andalusia and galleys this is a common trope for Christian victories at this time and as almost no sources remain to tell Mujahid side of the story we simply can't be sure whether this was the case though according to the Italian account written a century later they picked off the remaining Muslim ships one by one including in a particularly curious account Mujahid smother a Christian captured as a slave earlier in her life apparently choosing to willingly remain behind with her people rather than return to Andalusia Mujahid soon made it back to denia with the remnants of his fleet which in reality may have still been significant as he was able to quickly regain control [Music] there he found that his puppet caliph al moitie had attempted to seize power for himself he was exiled to africa where he would spend the rest of his days an especially curious figure Mujahid spent the rest of his long reign peacefully engaged in the arts and literature even writing books of poetry now lost and ushering in a flourishing period of culture in his court a tradition that was carried on by his son and heir Ali when he was finally successfully ransomed back by 10:30 to [Music] back in Sardinia meanwhile if the Islanders had thought the actions of the mainlanders had been entirely for their own salvation they were sorely mistaken of course the city-states proceeded to conquer the island for themselves before fighting over the spoils the peasants were the eventual victors in the war securing papal privileges installing their own churchmen on the island writing the Jeannot ins out of history and using sardinia as a stepping-stone to wage war against other Islamic enclaves on the Italian sea notably destroying the pirate base of bond in 1034 celebrating their victories with frescoes all over the palaces in the center of the city it would be many decades yet before the crusading era would properly begin but when it did both Genoa and Pisa would be there to play a part of shirring in a period of maritime supremacy over their corners of the Mediterranean [Music] you

Channel: History Time

Views: 130,447

Rating: 4.8365593 out of 5

Keywords: sardinia, crusades, crusade, sardinia expedition, historu, history, history documentary

Id: VlEQBxCMIZI

Length: 33min 8sec (1988 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 31 2020