Children's Crusade

The Children's Crusade (Latin peregrinatio puerorum ) was an event that broke up in the early summer of 1212, thousands of children, adolescents and adults from Germany and France under the leadership of visionary boy to an unarmed crusade to the Holy Land. The train seems to have been resolved on the shores of the Italian Mediterranean.

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Terminology: peregrinatio puerorum

The name Children's Crusade is a translation of the term often used in the sources peregrinatio puerorum. However, both peregrinatio ( Crusade ) as well as puer ( child) allow for multiple possibilities of interpretation.

Puer

The participants of the Children Crusade were not, as the name implies, only children, but for the most part young people and other groups of adults. It was with them predominantly consisted of members of lower social classes.

Possibly based the idea of a children's crusade on a linguistic misunderstanding. The Latin word " puer " does not only mean "child" or " boy ", but also " servant ". This especially youngest children of peasant families were referred, often more than found a job as a shepherd or laborer and so formed a poor rural underclass. This interpretation of the name has been confirmed by several more recent research on the part.

Other researchers point to a shift in meaning of the term puer, which had begun in the 13th century and is related to the newly established voluntary poverty movement.

Peregrinatio

Less controversial than the term child is the term crusade. The term crusade is used in German only from the 17th century. In the sources of the Children's Crusade, the terms peregrinatio ( pilgrimage ), iter ( way ) and expeditio ( campaign ) may be used. These terms, by specifying the target Jerusalem and a reference to the wearing of the sign of the cross ( crucisignati ) is quite the common contemporary name for crusade. Although the participants of the Children's Crusade were unarmed and no papal crusade call was preceded, the term crusade in research is considered to be accurate.

( See also the interpretation of the term peregrinatio change from the original name of a form of life ( life in a foreign country ) to denote the Christian pilgrimage. Peregrinatio See Lemma. )

If the result is still the talk of children's crusade, it must always be understood in the extended meaning of " puer " and " peregrinatio ".

Source location

The source location to the children crusades is so far scanty, as not a single eyewitness account of a participant has been preserved. At the 50 contemporary sources, notably entries in monastic annals, are to be found. According to Peter Raedts however can be regarded as relevant by these, only the 20 that are incurred prior to 1220. The authors of the sources that have arisen 1220-1250, can be considered as contemporaries nevertheless still. The sources that have emerged after 1250, but mainly come from second or third hand.

Some historians assumed that the Pastor Ellen, the Flagellantenbewegung and the children pilgrimages to Mont -Saint -Michel are in conjunction with the Children's Crusade; these correlations are due to other conditions of origin and actual annual figures but as implausible, partly because these movements have never had the liberation of Jerusalem to the destination.

The legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin heard in the context of the colonization of the East and probably with the Children's Crusade nothing to do ( cf. interpretation of the Pied Piper ).

The legends and legends for children crusade has begun very early. In this regard, three main chroniclers of the thirteenth century is important. It is Alberic of Trois- Fontaines, Matthew Paris, and Vincent of Beauvais. Their reports to the Children's Crusade are very myth-shrouded and were very well received in later historiography. Since they are considered as " witnesses ," their entries were well into the 19th century regarded as credible and often copied as-is.

On the basis of classified as credible sources, the chronology and the path of the Children's Crusade can be approximately reconstructed. At the same time the lack of sources indicates implausible interpretations. Thus, the Loire was for the French train, which had led, according to Alberic of Trois -Fontaines of the Île -de -France to Marseille, southern, not a single Chronicle listing.

Context

In 1187, the Crusaders suffered a massive defeat at the Battle of Hattin. Saladin reconquered the kingdom of Jerusalem and there he managed to capture the true cross of Christ. In the subsequent Third Crusade (1189-1192), although the city of Acre was retaken, a recovery of Jerusalem, however, was a failure. The Fourth Crusade of 1204 was a complete failure, since he was diverted to the Christian Constantine Opel and ended with the conquest and looting of the city. In this crisis the crusade in northern France was a movement of voluntary poverty. Preachers like Peter of Blois, Alain de Lille, Fulk of Neuilly and others were of the view that only a movement of the innocent and the poor will be able to recapture the grave of Christ.

In the first half of the 12th century, the lay movement of the Cathars was developed, which was widespread, particularly in Occitania (southern France ). When all the countermeasures of the Church against the heretics little fertilized cried the Pope Innocent III. 1208 after the assassination of Pierre de Castelnau crusade against the Albigenses on. A large number of noble and commoner people from the area of ​​Ile- de -France followed the call and joined under the bishop of Chartres in 1210 the crusade army to.

1211 crossed an Almohad army under Sultan Muhammad an-Nasir, the Strait of Gibraltar and conquered Christian areas of Spain returns, so among other things, the Order Castle of the Order of Calatrava in Salvatierra ( a medieval castle in the province of Ciudad Real in Spain, 1199-1211 seat of the Order ). Then cried the Pope Innocent III. a crusade on. At the same time, the Pope called on the whole of Christendom to pray in processions for beating the inimicos Christianitatis ( enemies of Christianity ). The company finally ended on July 16, 1212 with the victory of the Christians over the Muslims at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa.

Genesis: Stefan von Cloyes

As in the octave after Pentecost 1212, Pope Innocent III. had arranged processions in space of Chartres, some of these processions the control of the clergy seemed to have withdrawn and become independent. With flags, crosses, candles and censers these processions were taken through different cities of the Paris Basin and had sung: Domine deus, exalta Christianitatem et redde nobis veram crucem ( Lord God, raise Christianity and give us the true cross back ). A chronicler of Laon reported that nearly the same time a young shepherd, named Stefan in Cloyes, a village near Vendôme, had occurred, which had stated that Jesus had appeared to him in the guise of a poor pilgrim, and gave him a letter for the given the French king. From all over France trailer it had been poured. The crowd, which had grown to 30,000 people was, Stefan followed to St. Denis, where some of these miracles had worked and was recognized as a leader. But the king Philippe Auguste have resolved the motion, after he had asked the master of Paris. Stephen of Cloyes have obeyed him and the large amount had scattered.

This is the last message from Stefan from Cloyes. However, not all participants seem to have gone home. The end of June, beginning of July 1212 a group of Pueri in Rocourt near encountered in Saint- Quentin. They were there involved in social unrest or were even their triggers ( occasione puerorum ). It was apparently in this dispute between the clergy and the laity to the distribution of alms. Then the traces of the Pueri lose. They may have moved on to Liège. This is indicated by the entry of Renier of Liege, probably a contemporary, in the annals of his monastery. He mentioned an amazing movement of Pueri from France and Germany ( de Romano quam regno Teutonico ), in the majority Shepherd, which showed the intention to cross the sea to reach what was the powerful and Kings have failed, namely the regain Holy grave. Renier fixes the event at the beginning of July 1212. Liège attracted by the young Crusaders continue, probably via Aachen to Cologne, where they united with the German train.

German train: Nicholas of Cologne

Between Easter and the White Sunday of the year 1212 gathered in the Rhineland and Lower Lorraine throngs of " pueri " in order to embark on the road to Jerusalem. From the sources it has no external cause can be seen. In some sources, a certain Nicholas, a boy from Cologne, named as leader. This angel had appeared, who had asked him to liberate the holy grave of the Saracens. God would support the train and share the sea, so that they would get as the Israelites feet wet in the Holy Land. The Chronicle of Trier reported that Nicholas was wearing a cross mark in the form of dew as a sign of his election to yourself.

On the basis of entries in various chronicles of the train can be reconstructed about. From Cologne, the Group has moved to Speyer and Trier from there further south. The trip will have been quite exhaustive. A chronicle of Cologne reported that many of the participants had died of hunger and thirst before crossing the Alps. Where exactly the Alps have been crossed, is difficult to see from the sources. The accumulation of entries in Bavarian and Austrian chronicles leads to the assumption that the train over the Brenner arrived in Lombardy.

About Cremona and Piacenza the crusade participants finally arrived in Genoa on 25 August. The city of Genoa chronicler noted that to the 7,000 men, women and children ( " pueros et puellas " ) had come into the city. Some had already left the city the next day, obviously disappointed that the wonders of the marine division had failed.

After the " debacle of Genoa ", the train seems to have split. Some moved on to Marseilles, another part went to Rome. There they are according to the Annals of Marbach Pope Innocent III. have visited, so that they would be released from the crusade vow. A larger group is said to have tried to climb ships to Palestine in Pisa and Brindisi. The few who succeeded in doing so, were eventually sold as slaves to the Saracens.

None of the participants crusade seems to have ever reached the Holy Land. Some have remained in Italy, where they hired themselves out as servants and maids. All sources agree that found back of the thousands who had crossed the Alps, just the way. On the way home they were received often gleefully. The Marbach annalist noted, not without mockery, that those who are drawn to the outward journey singing in droves to the south, had come now meekly, barefoot, hungry and ridiculed by all home.

French train to Alberic of Trois -Fontaines

From Alberich, a monk from the monastery of Trois- Fontaines, comes a story about the Children's Crusade, referred because of lack of comparable sources of most researchers today as implausible. The story, which also contains many historical myths in addition to, rather widespread and is the basis for the so-called " French train ".

After Alberich the crusade of small children ( expeditio infantium ) of Vendôme moved to Paris. When they were about 30,000 together, they moved to Marseille, to cross the sea and fight against the Saracens. The children had been lured to seven large ships of two poorly -minded merchants and captains, Hugo Ferreus ( " the Iron " ) and Wilhelm Porcus ( " The Pig" ). After two days, they were caught in a storm and two of the ships were sunk off Sardinia. Pope Gregory IX. (1227-1241) would later donated in honor of a church of the New innocents on the island of San Pietro these children. The remaining five ships had gone on to Bejaia and Alexandria, where the children were sold as slaves to the Saracens. Among these slaves also four hundred clerics that would have been. Not enough, in the same year the children had been sold on to Baghdad, where eighteen of them have died as martyrs. Eighteen years after the Children's Crusade (1230 ) would still be seven hundred children, now in manhood, found to be slaves in Alexandria.

As unlikely and fantastic the story of Alberich may sound, it is rumored again and again.

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