Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/361

 EXPANSION OF CHRISTENDOM 311 belong more to the realm of mysticism or romance than to that of sober history. One fears that they may even have exaggerated the losses and sufferings of the crusaders in order to make their victories seem the more remarkable. The word " crusade" is derived from the practice of "taking the cross" — after the example and precept of Christ — which was adopted by those who went Definition on the First Crusade and was then followed in of a crusade the subsequent expeditions. The crusader wore a cross of cloth upon his breast on his way to the Holy Land; upon his return after fulfilling his vow he bore the cross upon his back between the shoulders. A crusade has been defined as "a religious war, preached in the name of the Church, stimulated by solemn grant of ecclesiastical privileges, made by a more or less cosmopolitan army, and aiming either directly or indirectly at the recovery of holy places." Or, we may say more specifically that the crusades were initiated by the pope ; that remission of sins was promised to sincere crusaders; that the various feudal states, monarchies, and city republics of western Europe shared in the movement; and that the main object was to recover Jerusalem from the Mohammedans. The crusading movement was launched by the Pope Urban II, in 1095 in a speech before a great concourse of two hundred and fifty bishops, four hundred abbots, Speech of many feudal lords and knights, and a multitude Urban II of the people at a council at Clermont- Farrand in south central France. It is possible that the Emperor Alexius had appealed to the pope for aid against the Turks ; at any rate, if he had not, one of his predecessors had al- ready made such an appeal to Gregory VII. But in either case the Byzantine emperor merely wished some auxiliary mercenary troops to help him reconquer Asia Minor from the Turks. On the other hand, at Clermont the pope broached the idea of an independent Western enterprise, having for its chief aim, not to help the Byzantine Empire, but to recover Jerusalem and the holy places. The Turks had taken Jerusalem in 1078, since when the pilgrims had