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The Crusade cycle is an Old French literary cycle of chansons de geste concerning the First Crusade and its aftermath.
The cycle contains a number of initially unrelated texts, collated into interconnected narratives by later redactors. None of the poems in the cycle survive independently, and the thirteen separate collections are all organized in different orders with different texts. The manuscripts were all written between approximately 1350 and 1425, in northeastern France, probably in Picardy.
The original poem in the cycle was the Chanson d'Antioche , which is the basis for the "historical" section of the cycle. The original Chanson d'Antioche is lost, but it was edited in the 12th century by Graindor de Douai, who also edited the Chanson de Jérusalem , and possibly wrote the Chanson des Chétifs himself.[ citation needed ] These three chansons form the basis for the rest of the cycle, and are more historically oriented than the Romances that grew up around them.
The protagonist of these three chansons is Godfrey of Bouillon, around whom the rest of the cycle is based, in a much more romanticized form. These connect Godfrey with the legend of the Swan Knight. Even medieval redactors recognized that this part of the cycle was fanciful and did not quite match the historical chansons, and they are usually separated in the manuscripts. The first episode chronologically within the cycle is the Naissance du Chevalier au Cygne, which survives in two forms, the Elioxe and the Beatrix. In the former, Elioxe has children with King Lothair; in the latter, Beatrix is married to King Orient. In both cases, they have seven children, who are all turned into swans. All but one are able to transform back into humans; this swan then leads the boat of one of his brothers, known as the Swan Knight. Some manuscripts have a version that combines both stories into one.
The Swan Knight's adventures bring him to the defense of the dispossessed Duchess of Bouillon, whose land has been seized by Regnier of Saxony, whom he challenges to a duel. The Swan Knight defeats Regnier and wins the daughter of the Duchess in marriage. They have a daughter, Ida, who can see the future and knows that she is destined to be the mother of Eustace, Godfrey, and Baldwin. The Swan Knight, however, must leave Bouillon when his wife asks his true identity. After leaving Bouillon, his name is revealed to be Elias, and his brother, the swan who led his boat, finally regains his human form. Meanwhile, Elias' kinsmen, the knights Pons and Gerart, decide to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, but cannot because the land is under Muslim control. They are seized by Cornumarant, the king of Jerusalem, but he befriends them and allows them to complete their pilgrimage. After drifting at sea for many months they return to Bouillon and recognize Elias as the Swan Knight.
Years later, Ida is married to Count Eustace of Boulogne, and has three children, Eustace, Godfrey, and Baldwin. Eustace and Godfrey grow up to become knights, with all the appropriate adventures and duels. Meanwhile, Cornumarant's mother Calibre, who, like Ida, can see the future, predicts the coming of Godfrey and his brothers as well as the later crusades against Saladin. Cornumarant decides to visit Godfrey, whose kin he once hosted in Jerusalem, and on the way meets various future leaders of the First Crusade: Bohemund, Tancred, Raymond IV of Toulouse, Adhemar of Le Puy, Hugh of Vermandois, and Robert Curthose, among others. Cornumarant intends to assassinate Godfrey but is overcome by the latter's glory; he realizes he can never hold Jerusalem if Godfrey invades, thus planting the idea for the crusade in Godfrey's mind. Cornumarant, returns to Jerusalem and is accused of treason for not having accomplished his task; many battles and duels are fought. During this time, Godfrey arrives and attacks the cities of Syria.
This leads to the original, and undoubtedly the most famous, poem in the cycle, the Chanson d'Antioche. Its subject is the preaching of the First Crusade, the preparations for departure, the tearful goodbyes, the arrival at Constantinople and the siege and taking of Antioch, where King Corbaran (a corruption of the name of Kerbogha, the atabeg of Mosul who came to Antioch's defence in 1098) is defeated by Godfrey and the Crusaders. The lost original poem was said to have been composed by Richard le Pèlerin, who was present during the siege. Although a fictionalized account of the First Crusade, it is based on historical events and is not as fabulous and romanticized as the poems dealing with Godfrey's early life.
Following the capture of Antioch, Corbaran returns home with the Christian chétifs ("captives"). Corbaran is accused of treason by the sultan for losing the battle, and one of the Christian prisoners must fight a duel in his place. The chétifs then attack and kill the dragon Sathanas, in perhaps the most fanciful episode of the cycle. In a third episode, Arpin of Bourges saves Corbaran's son from various misadventures, and the chétifs are set free to join the rest of the crusaders on the way to Jerusalem.
The cycle then returns to Godfrey, now outside Jerusalem, who recruits the chétifs into his army. Bohemund is present at the siege of Jerusalem, unlike the historical Bohemund, who remained behind in Antioch. Cornumarant and the Saracens repeatedly attack the crusader camps, and the crusaders assault the city and are repulsed again and again. Finally the city is taken, but none of the leaders wishes to become king; a sign from God, however, indicates that Godfrey should be crowned. In further battles, Peter the Hermit is captured, and Cornumarant is killed. Most manuscripts end at this point but some continue on to describe the capture of other cities, the death of Godfrey, and the reign of Baldwin, who attacks Egypt and engages in battles with "Dodequin" (the historical Toghtekin of Damascus).
There is also a much shorter prose work, known as the Godefroi de Buillon, a summary of the entire cycle. The author of this work complains about the length of the poetic cycle, and focuses less on the fantastical life of Godfrey and more on the historical crusade. It is one of the first works of prose fiction in French literature.
The Chanson d'Antioche was first edited by Alexis Paulin Paris in 1848. Subsequent editors of the cycle as a whole include Stengel in 1873, Smith in 1912, Krüger in 1936, Duparc-Quioc in 1955, Sumberg in 1968, and the critical editions published by the University of Alabama (1977–2003).
The University of Alabama editions are divided as follows:
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Eustace III was the count of Boulogne from 1087 succeeding his father, Eustace II. He joined the First Crusade, being present at Nicaea, Dorylaeum, Antioch, and Jerusalem. After fighting in the battle of Ascalon, he returned home. Initially offered the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Eustace was at Apulia when he received news of Baldwin of Bourcq's election to the throne. On his return to Boulogne, he founded a Cluniac monastery in Rumilly, retired as a monk, and died in 1125.
The First Crusade (1096–1099) was the first of a series of religious wars, or Crusades, initiated, supported and at times directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The objective was the recovery of the Holy Land from Islamic rule. While Jerusalem had been under Muslim rule for hundreds of years, by the 11th century the Seljuk takeover of the region threatened local Christian populations, pilgrimages from the West, and the Byzantine Empire itself. The earliest initiative for the First Crusade began in 1095 when Byzantine emperor Alexios I Komnenos requested military support from the Council of Piacenza in the empire's conflict with the Seljuk-led Turks. This was followed later in the year by the Council of Clermont, during which Pope Urban II supported the Byzantine request for military assistance and also urged faithful Christians to undertake an armed pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
Godfrey of Bouillon was a French nobleman and pre-eminent leader of the First Crusade. First ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from 1099 to 1100, he avoided the title of king, preferring that of prince (princeps) and Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri, or Advocate of the Holy Sepulchre. Second son of Eustace II, Count of Boulogne, Godfrey became Lord of Bouillon in 1076 and in 1087 Emperor Henry IV confirmed him as Duke of Lower Lorraine, a reward for his support during the Great Saxon Revolt.
Albert of Aix(-la-Chapelle) or Albert of Aachen; Latin: Albericus Aquensis; fl. c. 1100) was a historian of the First Crusade and the early Kingdom of Jerusalem. He was born during the later part of the 11th century, and afterwards became canon (priest) and custos (guardian) of the church of Aachen.
Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse, sometimes called Raymond of Saint-Gilles or Raymond I of Tripoli, was a powerful noble in southern France and one of the leaders of the First Crusade (1096–1099). He was the Count of Toulouse, Duke of Narbonne and Margrave of Provence from 1094, and he spent the last five years of his life establishing the County of Tripoli in the Near East.
The chanson de geste is a medieval narrative, a type of epic poem that appears at the dawn of French literature. The earliest known poems of this genre date from the late 11th and early 12th centuries, shortly before the emergence of the lyric poetry of the troubadours and trouvères, and the earliest verse romances. They reached their highest point of acceptance in the period 1150–1250.
The Chanson d'Antioche is a chanson de geste in 9000 lines of Alexandrin in stanzas called laisses, now known in a version composed about 1180 for a courtly French audience and embedded in a quasi-historical cycle of epic poems inspired by the events of 1097–99, the climax of the First Crusade: the conquest of Antioch and of Jerusalem and the origins of the Crusader states. The Chanson was later reworked and incorporated in an extended Crusade cycle, of the 14th century, which was far more fabulous and embroidered, more distinctly romance than epic.
The story of the Knight of the Swan, or Swan Knight, is a medieval tale about a mysterious rescuer who comes in a swan-drawn boat to defend a damsel, his only condition being that he must never be asked his name.
Lohengrin is a character in German Arthurian literature. The son of Parzival (Percival), he is a knight of the Holy Grail sent in a boat pulled by swans to rescue a maiden who can never ask his identity. His story, which first appears in Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, is a version of the Knight of the Swan legend known from a variety of medieval sources. Wolfram's story was expanded in two later romances. Richard Wagner's opera Lohengrin of 1848 is based upon the legend.
Godfrey IV, known as the Hunchback, was Duke of Lower Lorraine from 1069 until his death in 1076, succeeding his father Godfrey the Bearded.
Eustace I Granier, also known as Eustace Grenier or Eustace Garnier, called in Latin Eustachius Granarius in the charters, was a Flemish crusader who took part in the First Crusade. He became lord of Caesarea in 1101 and lord of Sidon in 1110. On 18 April 1123, he was elected constable and bailiff of Jerusalem during the captivity of Baldwin II of Jerusalem. Shortly before his death, he defeated a Fatimid army at the Battle of Yibneh near Ibelin.
Eustace Grenier is quoted in a text in verse written during his life in honour of the knights of the diocese of Thérouanne who accompanied Baldwin of Boulogne to the Holy Land.
Contemporary authors and historians identify Eustace Grenier as a nobleman from the diocese of Thérouanne in the County of Saint-Pol. Alan V. Murray, historian of the Crusades, writes: "However, his origins can be established with a high degree of certainty. The Versus de viris illustribus diocesis Tarvanensis qui in sacra fuere expeditione identifies him as a Fleming from the diocese of Therouanne".
Murgleys, or Murgleis is the sword of Ganelon, a traitorous French (Frankish) count and nemesis to the titular hero of the epic La chanson de Roland.
Gouffier of Lastours was a knight from Lastours in the Limousin in France, who participated in the First Crusade. He was lord of the Château de Lastours, near Nexon, Haute-Vienne.
The Talbot Shrewsbury Book is a very large richly-illuminated manuscript made in Rouen (Normandy) in 1444/5. It was presented by John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury to the French princess, Margaret of Anjou, in honour of her betrothal to King Henry VI. It contains a unique collection of fifteen texts in French, including chansons de geste, chivalric romances, treatises on warfare and chivalry, and finally the Statutes of the Order of the Garter. The work is an excellent example of book production in Rouen in the mid-fifteenth century and provides a rare insight into the political views of the English military leader and close confidant of the crown, John Talbot.
Pierre Desrey de Troyes was a French chronicler, historian, genealogist and translator. Relatively little is known of his life, but his work is of value to historians.
Baudouin de Sebourc is a fourteenth-century French chanson de geste which probably formed part of a cycle related to the Crusades, and may well be related to Bâtard de Bouillon. The poem was likely composed c. 1350 in Hainaut.
Baldwinand Arnold(Ernoul) of Beauvais were brothers who participated in the First Crusade, although it is uncertain which army they were associated with. Their stories are recorded in the Chanson d'Antioche.
The Gran conquista de Ultramar is a late 13th-century Castilian chronicle of the Crusades for the period 1095–1271. It is a work of compilation, translation and prosification of Old French and Old Occitan sources, mixing historical material with legends drawn from the epic chansons de geste. It was produced under royal patronage by Sancho IV and probably his father, Alfonso X.
The Siège d'Antioche is a Norman French rhyming poem about the First Crusade, produced either in England or Normandy in the late 12th century. It is about 19,000 lines in length and covers the period from the Council of Clermont in November 1095 to the battle of Ascalon in August 1099. It carries a spurious attribution to Archbishop Baldric of Dol and is known in full from two manuscripts and in part from two fragments. The older manuscript is Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 77 from the 13th century. The younger is known as the Spalding manuscript and is London, British Library, MS Add. 34114 from the 14th century. There is no complete published edition of the text. Jennifer Gabel de Aguirre has published a partial edition. A complete edition is a work in progress of a variable team at Fordham University.
The title of Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri, or Advocate of the Holy Sepulchre, has been ascribed to Godfrey of Bouillon in his role as the first Latin ruler of Jerusalem. In the aftermath of the First Crusade, there was disagreement among the clergy and secular leaders as the leadership of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. There was opposition to the naming of a king over the Holy City and the wearing of a crown in the city where Christ suffered with a crown of thorns. The original sources differ on the actual title assumed by Godfrey. However, it is generally accepted by most modern historians that, once Godfrey was selected to be leader, he declined to be crowned king instead taking the titles of prince (princeps) and advocate or defender of the Holy Sepulchre.
