Editing Second Crusade (section)

== In the East ==
[[File:Deuxième croisade.JPG|thumb|Map of Second Crusade]]

Joscelin II retook the town of Edessa and [[Siege of Edessa (1146)|besieged the citadel]] following Zengi's murder, but Nur ad-Din defeated him in November 1146. On 16 February 1147, the French crusaders met at [[Étampes]] to discuss their route. The Germans had already decided to travel overland through Hungary; they regarded the sea route as politically impractical because [[Roger II of Sicily]] was an enemy of Conrad. Many of the French nobles distrusted the land route, which would take them through the Byzantine Empire, the reputation of which still suffered from the accounts of the First Crusaders. Nevertheless, the French decided to follow Conrad, and to set out on 15 June. Roger II took offence and refused to participate any longer. In France, [[Abbot Suger]] was elected by a great council at Étampes (and appointed by the Pope) to act as one of the regents during the king's absence on crusade. In Germany, further preaching was done by [[Adam of Ebrach]], and [[Otto of Freising]] also took the cross. The Germans planned to set out at [[Easter]], but did not leave until May.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=257, 259}}

=== German route ===
The German crusaders, accompanied by the [[papal legate]] and cardinal [[Theodwin of Santa Rufina|Theodwin]], intended to meet the French in Constantinople. [[Ottokar III of Styria]] joined Conrad at Vienna, and Conrad's enemy [[Géza II of Hungary]] allowed them to pass through unharmed. When the German army of 20,000 men arrived in Byzantine territory, Emperor [[Manuel I Komnenos]] feared they were going to attack him, and had Byzantine troops posted to ensure against trouble. A brief skirmish with some of the more unruly Germans occurred near [[Philippopolis (Thrace)|Philippopolis]] and in [[Adrianople]], where the Byzantine general Prosouch fought with Conrad's nephew, the future emperor [[Frederick I Barbarossa]]. To make matters worse, some of the German soldiers were killed in a flood at the beginning of September. On 10 September, however, they arrived at Constantinople, where relations with Manuel were poor, resulting in the [[Battle of Constantinople (1147)|Battle of Constantinople]], after which the Germans became convinced that they should cross into Anatolia as quickly as possible.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=42}} Manuel wanted Conrad to leave some of his troops behind, to assist in defending against attacks from Roger II, who had taken the opportunity to plunder the cities of Greece, but Conrad did not agree, despite being a fellow enemy of Roger.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=259–267}}

In Anatolia, Conrad decided not to wait for the French, but marched towards [[Iconium]], capital of the Seljuk [[Sultanate of Rum]]. Conrad split his army into two divisions. Much of the authority of the Byzantine Empire in the western provinces of Anatolia was more nominal than real, with much of the provinces being a no-man's land controlled by Turkish nomads.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=43}} Conrad underestimated the length of the march against Anatolia, and anyhow assumed that the authority of Emperor Manuel was greater in Anatolia than was in fact the case.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=46}} Conrad took the knights and the best troops with himself to march overland while sending the camp followers with Otto of Freising to follow the coastal road.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=46}} The Seljuks almost totally destroyed King Conrad's party on 25 October 1147 at the [[second battle of Dorylaeum]].{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=50}}

In battle, the Turks used their typical tactic of pretending to retreat, and then returning to attack the small force of German cavalry which had separated from the main army to chase them. Conrad began a slow retreat back to Constantinople, his army harassed daily by the Turks, who attacked stragglers and defeated the rearguard.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=47}} Conrad himself was wounded in a skirmish with them. The other division of the German force, led by the King's half-brother, Bishop [[Otto of Freising]], had marched south to the Mediterranean coast and was similarly defeated early in 1148.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=267–270}} The force led by Otto ran out of food while crossing inhospitable countryside and was ambushed by the Seljuks near Laodicea on 16 November 1147. The majority of Otto's force were either killed in battle or captured and sold into slavery.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=46}}

=== French route ===
[[File:C croisade2 Louis7.jpg|thumb|upright=0.9|Louis VII of France]]
The French crusaders had departed from [[Metz]] in June 1147, led by Louis, [[Thierry of Alsace]], [[Renaut I of Bar]], [[Amadeus III of Savoy]] and his half-brother [[William V of Montferrat]], William VII of [[Auvergne (province)|Auvergne]], and others, along with armies from [[Lorraine (province)|Lorraine]], [[Brittany]], [[Duchy of Burgundy|Burgundy]] and [[Aquitaine]]. A force from [[Provence]], led by Alphonse of Toulouse, chose to wait until August, and to cross by sea. At [[Worms, Germany|Worms]], Louis joined with crusaders from [[Normandy]] and England. They followed Conrad's route fairly peacefully, although Louis came into conflict with King [[Géza II of Hungary]], when Géza discovered that Louis had allowed a failed Hungarian usurper, [[Boris Kalamanos]], to join his army. Relations within Byzantine territory were also grim, and the Lorrainers, who had marched ahead of the rest of the French, also came into conflict with the slower Germans whom they met on the way.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=259–263}}

Since the original negotiations between Louis and Manuel I, Manuel had broken off his military campaign against Rûm, signing a truce with his enemy Sultan [[Mesud I]]. Manuel did this to give himself a free hand to concentrate on defending his empire from the crusaders, who had gained a reputation for theft and treachery since the First Crusade and were widely suspected of harbouring sinister designs on Constantinople. Nevertheless, Manuel's relations with the French army were somewhat better than with the Germans, and Louis was entertained lavishly in Constantinople. Some of the French were outraged by Manuel's truce with the Seljuks and called for an alliance with Roger II and an attack on Constantinople, but Louis restrained them.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=268–269}}

[[File:Manuelcomnenus.jpg|thumb|left|Emperor Manuel I|alt=A standing male, dressed in elaborate robes with a fancy hat. He has a halo around his head and is holding a long staff in one hand.]]
When the armies from Savoy, [[Auvergne (province)|Auvergne]] and [[Montferrat]] joined Louis in Constantinople, having taken the land route through Italy and crossing from [[Brindisi]] to [[Durazzo]], the entire army took ship across the [[Bosporus]] to Anatolia. The Greeks were encouraged by rumours that the Germans had captured Iconium, but Manuel refused to give Louis any Byzantine troops. [[Roger II of Sicily]] had just invaded Byzantine territory, and Manuel needed all his army in the [[Peloponnese]]. Both the Germans and French therefore entered Asia without any Byzantine assistance, unlike the armies of the First Crusade. Following the example set by his grandfather [[Alexios I]], Manuel had the French swear to return to the Empire any territory they captured.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|p=269}}

The French met the remnants of Conrad's army at [[Lopadion]], and Conrad joined Louis's force. They followed Otto of Freising's route, moving closer to the Mediterranean coast, and arrived at [[Ephesus]] in December, where they learned that the Turks were preparing to attack them. Manuel also sent ambassadors complaining about the pillaging and plundering that Louis had done along the way, and there was no guarantee that the Byzantines would assist them against the Turks. Meanwhile, Conrad fell sick and returned to Constantinople, where Manuel attended to him personally, and Louis, paying no attention to the warnings of a Turkish attack, marched out from Ephesus with the French and German survivors. The Turks were indeed waiting to attack, but in at the [[Battle of Ephesus (1147)|Battle of Ephesus]] on 24 December 1147, the French proved victorious.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=270–271}} The French fended off another Turkish ambush at the [[Battle of the Meander]] in the same month.

They reached [[Laodicea on the Lycus]] early in January 1148, just after Otto of Freising's army had been destroyed in the same area.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=51}} Resuming the march, the vanguard under Amadeus of Savoy became separated from the rest of the army at the [[Battle of Mount Cadmus]], where Louis's troops suffered heavy losses from the Turks (6 January 1148). Louis himself, according to [[Odo of Deuil]], climbed a rock and was ignored by the Turks, who did not recognize him. The Turks did not bother to attack further and the French marched on to [[Attalia]], continually harassed from afar by the Turks, who had also burned the land to prevent the French from replenishing their food, both for themselves and their horses. Louis no longer wanted to continue by land, and it was decided to gather a fleet at Attalia and to sail for Antioch.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=50}} After being delayed for a month by storms, most of the promised ships did not arrive at all. Louis and his associates claimed the ships for themselves, while the rest of the army had to resume the long march to Antioch. The army was almost entirely destroyed, either by the Turks or by sickness.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=272–273}}

=== Journey to Jerusalem ===
[[File:RaymondOfPoitiersWelcomingLouisVIIinAntioch.JPG|thumb|Raymond of Poitiers welcoming Louis VII in Antioch|alt= Painting of two men meeting in front of a city gate. Both men are in front of crowds of other people. The one on the left is bareheaded and holds his hat in one hand while he bows to the other figure, who is dressed in blue embroidered robes and wears a crown.]]

Though delayed by storms, Louis eventually arrived in Antioch on 19 March; Amadeus of Savoy had died in [[Cyprus]] along the way. Louis was welcomed by Eleanor's uncle [[Raymond of Poitiers]].

Raymond expected him to help defend against the Turks and to accompany him on an expedition against Aleppo, the Muslim city that functioned as the gateway to Edessa, but Louis refused, preferring instead to finish his pilgrimage to Jerusalem rather than focus on the military aspect of the crusade.{{sfn|Brundage|1962|pp=115–121}}

Eleanor enjoyed her stay, but her uncle implored her to remain to enlarge family lands and divorce Louis if the king refused to help what was assuredly the military cause of the Crusade.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=54}} During this period, there were rumours of an affair between Raymond and Eleanor, which caused tensions in the marriage between Louis and Eleanor.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|pp=18, 54}}

Louis quickly left Antioch for [[County of Tripoli|Tripoli]] with Eleanor under arrest. Meanwhile, Otto of Freising and the remnant of his troops arrived in Jerusalem early in April, and Conrad soon after.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|pp=49–50}} [[Patriarch Fulk of Jerusalem|Fulk]], the [[Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem]], was sent to invite Louis to join them. The fleet that had stopped at Lisbon arrived around this time, as well as the Provençals who had left Europe under the command of [[Alfonso Jordan]], [[Count of Toulouse]].

Alfonso himself did not reach Jerusalem; he died at [[Caesarea Maritima|Caesarea]], supposedly poisoned by [[Raymond II of Tripoli]], the nephew who feared his political aspirations in the county. The claim that Raymond had poisoned Alfonso caused much of the Provençal force to turn back and return home.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=54}} The original focus of the crusade was [[Edessa]], but the preferred target of [[King Baldwin III]] and of the [[Knights Templar]] was Damascus.{{sfn|Brundage|1962|pp=115–121}}

In response to the arrival of the crusaders, the regent of Damascus, [[Mu'in ad-Din Unur]], started making feverish preparations for war, strengthening the fortifications of Damascus, ordering troops to his city and having the water sources along the road to Damascus destroyed or diverted. Unur sought help from the Zangid rulers of Aleppo and Mosul (who were normally his rivals), though forces from these states did not arrive in time to see combat outside of Damascus. It is almost certain that the Zangid rulers delayed sending troops to Damascus out of the hope that their rival Unur might lose his city to the crusaders.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|p=55}}

=== Council of Palmarea ===
{{Main|Council of Acre}}
The nobility of Jerusalem welcomed the arrival of troops from Europe. A council to decide on the best target for the crusaders took place on 24 June 1148, when the [[High Court of Jerusalem]] met with the recently arrived crusaders from Europe at Palmarea, near [[Akko|Acre]], a major city of the crusader [[Kingdom of Jerusalem]]. This was the most spectacular meeting of the Court in its existence.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=50}}{{sfn|William of Tyre|Babcock|Krey|1943|loc=vol. 2, bk. 17, ch. 1, pp. 184–185: "it seems well worth while and quite in harmony with the present history that the names of the nobles who were present at the council... should be recorded here for the benefit of posterity&nbsp;... to name each one individually would take far too long."}}

In the end, the decision was made to attack the city of Damascus, a former ally of the Kingdom of Jerusalem that had shifted its allegiance to that of the Zengids, and attacked the Kingdom's allied city of [[Battle of Bosra (1147)|Bosra]] in 1147.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|pp=54–55}} Historians have long seen the decision to besiege Damascus rather than Edessa as "an act of inexplicable folly". Noting the tensions between Unur, the ''atabeg'' of Damascus, and the growing power of the Zangids, many historians have argued that it would have been better for the crusaders to focus their energy against the Zangids. More recently, historians such as David Nicolle have defended the decision to attack Damascus, arguing that Damascus was the most powerful Muslim state in southern Syria, and that if the Christians held Damascus, they would have been in a better position to resist the rising power of [[Nur ad-Din (died 1174)|Nur ad-Din]]. Since Unur was clearly the weaker of the two Muslim rulers, it was believed that it was inevitable that Nur ad-Din would take Damascus sometime in the near future, and thus it seemed better for the crusaders to hold that city rather than the Zangids.{{sfn|Nicolle|2009|pp=37–38}} In July their armies assembled at [[Tiberias]] and marched to Damascus, around the [[Sea of Galilee]] by way of [[Banias]]. There were perhaps 50,000 troops in total.{{sfn|Runciman|1952|pp=228–229}}

=== Siege of Damascus ===
{{Main|Siege of Damascus (1148)}}
[[File:Siege of Damascus.jpg|thumb|Siege of Damascus]]

The crusaders decided to attack Damascus from the west, where orchards would provide them with a constant food supply.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=50}} They arrived at [[Darayya]] on 23 July. The following day, the Muslims were prepared for the attack and constantly attacked the army advancing through the orchards outside Damascus. The defenders had sought help from [[Sayf al-Din Ghazi I]] of Mosul and Nur ad-Din of Aleppo, who personally led an attack on the crusader camp. The crusaders were pushed back from the walls into the orchards, leaving them exposed to ambushes and guerrilla attacks.{{sfn|Brundage|1962|pp=115–121}}

According to [[William of Tyre]], on 27 July the crusaders decided to move to the plain on the eastern side of the city, which was less heavily fortified but had much less food and water.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=50}} It was recorded by some that Unur had bribed the leaders to move to a less defensible position, and that Unur had promised to break off his alliance with Nur ad-Din if the crusaders went home.{{sfn|Brundage|1962|pp=115–121}} Meanwhile, Nur ad-Din and Sayf al-Din had arrived. With Nur ad-Din in the field it was impossible for the crusaders to return to their better position.{{sfn|Brundage|1962|pp=115–121}} The local crusader lords refused to carry on with the siege, and the three kings had no choice but to abandon the city.{{sfn|Riley-Smith|1991|p=50}} First Conrad, then the rest of the army, decided to retreat to Jerusalem on 28 July, though for their entire retreat they were followed by Turkish archers who constantly harassed them.{{sfn|Baldwin|Setton|1969|p=510}}