Outremer

Outremer (from Old French outre mer, oltre mer beyond the sea 'or' overseas ') is a in the literature about the Crusades familiar term for the entirety of the four so-called Crusader States, founded after the First Crusade to the Levant. The term Outremer is appropriate inasmuch as after a short time only a few of the immigrant West Europeans Crusaders were in the proper sense.

Distinguished from the designation France d' outre- mer or DOM -TOM ( Département d' outre- mer - Territoire d' outre- mer), which is used for the French overseas territories.

In Old French, the term was used outremer one hand, in the original meaning " beyond the sea, overseas " without any link to a particular sea or land. In individual cases, but could be meant as France from England's point of view, on the other hand, the Holy Land ( Terre Sainte ) in general and the Crusader States in particular. At this latter use is linked to the way the current research literature.

In addition, a native of Roman Syria term was used in the Middle Ages for the four Crusader states. Termed francs in the contemporary sources with Western Europeans who settled there after the First Crusade in the region, this represented a privileged minority, while the majority of the population consisted of non-Catholic Christians, Jews and Muslims. Although Syriac, Armenian and Greek was used in the respective parts of the region, was used as the common language of the indigenous population Arabic. The " Franconian " settlers spoke largely French - in the County of Tripoli mainly Occitan.