"Pope Urban II did not tell crusaders to murder Jews, but that is what happened when at least 100,000 knights, vassals and serfs, unmoored from ordinary social restraints but bearing the standard of the cross, set off to crush what they considered a perfidious Muslim enemy in a faraway land. Why not practice on that older group accused of perfidy — the Jews?
The city of Trier, on the Moselle River, was one of the early stops. The Jews were, according to a Hebrew chronicle, offered the choice of conversion, exile or death — similar to the choices offered by groups like the Islamic State and Boko Haram. After the Jews of Trier made an unsuccessful attempt, by paying off a bishop, to persuade the crusaders to bypass their community, they sought refuge in the prelate’s palace.
The chronicle recounts that “the bishop’s military officer and ministers entered the palace and said to them: ‘Thus said our lord the bishop: Convert or leave this place. I do not wish to preserve you any longer.’ ” It goes on: “ ‘You cannot be saved — your God does not wish to save you now as he did in earlier days.’ ”
The anonymous author of the chronicle, known as Text S to scholars, probably did not witness all of the events he describes. However, scholars of the First Crusade generally consider the text authentic. Furthermore, Christian accounts — also most likely written decades later but at a time when many survivors would have been alive — tell essentially the same story.
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Albert of Aix, a Christian born in the late 11th century, describes atrocities in Mainz — another stop on the crusaders’ rampage through the Rhineland — by a band headed by one Count Emico. Again, there is a bishop who initially promises the Jews protection for what Albert describes as an “incredible amount of money.” But Emico and his Christian soldiers broke into the hall where the Jews were held.
“Breaking the bolts and doors, they killed the Jews, about seven hundred in number, who in vain resisted the force and attack of so many thousands. They killed the women, also, and with their swords pierced tender children of whatever age and sex ... Horrible to say, mothers cut the throats of nursing children with knives and stabbed others, preferring them to perish thus by their own hands rather than to be killed by the weapons of the uncircumcised.”
Albert reports that a small number of Jews escaped because they agreed to be baptized “because of fear, rather than because of love of the Christian faith.” With all of the money taken from the Jews, Emico and “all that intolerable company of men and women then continued on their way to Jerusalem.”"
The city of Trier, on the Moselle River, was one of the early stops. The Jews were, according to a Hebrew chronicle, offered the choice of conversion, exile or death — similar to the choices offered by groups like the Islamic State and Boko Haram. After the Jews of Trier made an unsuccessful attempt, by paying off a bishop, to persuade the crusaders to bypass their community, they sought refuge in the prelate’s palace.
The chronicle recounts that “the bishop’s military officer and ministers entered the palace and said to them: ‘Thus said our lord the bishop: Convert or leave this place. I do not wish to preserve you any longer.’ ” It goes on: “ ‘You cannot be saved — your God does not wish to save you now as he did in earlier days.’ ”
The anonymous author of the chronicle, known as Text S to scholars, probably did not witness all of the events he describes. However, scholars of the First Crusade generally consider the text authentic. Furthermore, Christian accounts — also most likely written decades later but at a time when many survivors would have been alive — tell essentially the same story.
Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story
Continue reading the main story
Albert of Aix, a Christian born in the late 11th century, describes atrocities in Mainz — another stop on the crusaders’ rampage through the Rhineland — by a band headed by one Count Emico. Again, there is a bishop who initially promises the Jews protection for what Albert describes as an “incredible amount of money.” But Emico and his Christian soldiers broke into the hall where the Jews were held.
“Breaking the bolts and doors, they killed the Jews, about seven hundred in number, who in vain resisted the force and attack of so many thousands. They killed the women, also, and with their swords pierced tender children of whatever age and sex ... Horrible to say, mothers cut the throats of nursing children with knives and stabbed others, preferring them to perish thus by their own hands rather than to be killed by the weapons of the uncircumcised.”
Albert reports that a small number of Jews escaped because they agreed to be baptized “because of fear, rather than because of love of the Christian faith.” With all of the money taken from the Jews, Emico and “all that intolerable company of men and women then continued on their way to Jerusalem.”"
