Was The Crusades Justified Essay

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The Crusades are probably some of the bloodiest pages of history. The Christian states of Europe and the Muslims, also called Saracens at the time, were locked in near-constant warfare for two hundred years, from the 11th to the 13th century (“The Crusades”). These wars revolved around the Holy City, where the saviour Jesus trod, Jerusalem. In 1065, Turks took the holy city by force and killed 3000 Christians (“The Crusades”). This started a chain of events that led to the Holy Crusades. In order to fully understand this topic, one should explore the effects of the Crusades, how it impacted society, whether or not the conflict was resolved, whether or not it was justified, and what we can do to prevent such a horrible conflict from happening …show more content…

At the end of the conflict, the christian side failed in several aspects. Around 1272, the final christian city in Syria, Acre, fell to Mamaluke attacks from Egypt (“Minor Crusades”). This marked the fall of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem (“The End of the Medieval Crusades”). One reason the Crusades ended up failing are that the christians were never fully united. The Greek and Roman churches hated each other and prevented united action (“The End of the Medieval Crusades”). Another reason is that they lacked control of the Mediterranean Sea. Instead of being able to go straight to Syria, they had to take a long, overland route from France or Germany through Bulgaria and the Roman Empire’s territory (“The End of the Medieval Crusades”). In addition, the Crusaders never had enough people to colonize a country the size of Syria and absorb its Muslim population (“The End of the Medieval Crusades”). By this time, people had lost faith in the Crusades, and stopped believing in them as “the way of God.” They believed Jerusalem would be best retaken “by love, by prayers, and by the shedding of tears.” (“The End of the Medieval Crusades”)

The Crusades as a whole was one of the bloodiest pages of history yet. It’s impossible to count the number of dead. This is because for the most part, people didn’t record deaths except in large rounded numbers. For example, someone might write that they “killed everyone in a city,” or something along those lines (Nicholson). It’s suspected that writers who recorded things like that were boasting about how amazing their warriors were and what great victories they won

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