Montgisard, November 25, 1177

On November 25, 1177 a Frankish army under the command of a 16-year-old leper routed the army of the mighty Sultan of Cairo and Damascus, Salah ad-Din. It was a surprise victory to say the least, and won by a mere fragment of the Frankish chivalry (because a large portion of the knights of the kingdom were campaigning in the north) and the hastily summoned, amateur infantry of the arrière ban. 

In in 1177, Salah-ad-Din (known in the West as Saladin) launched a full-scale invasion of the Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem.  It was less than ten years since Saladin had assassinated his way to power in the Fatimid Caliphate in Cairo, and only three years since the coup d’etat in Damascus by which he had established himself in the heart of Syria. Although he had yet to take the key cities of Aleppo and Mosul (both of which remained loyal to the son of Nur ad Din), Saladin had for the most part united the Caliphates of Cairo and Baghdad for the first time in 200 years. However, his hold on power was precarious. In Egypt his faced suspicion and opposition because he was Sunni, and in Syria he was viewed as a usurper and upstart because he was a Kurd and had stolen the Sultanate from the rightful heir.

A Contemporary Depiction of Salah-ad-Din from an Islamic Manuscript

Saladin countered these internal doubts and dissatisfaction with his rule with the age-old device of focusing attention on an external enemy: the Christian states established by the crusaders along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean. These states represented not merely a military threat to his lines of communication between Egypt and Syria, but had also five times in the 1160s invaded Egypt. These were not all outright wars of aggression, as in three of them the Shia Viziers had requested Christian help against their Sunni enemies, but the fact remained that army of Jerusalem, often aided by Byzantine fleets, had conducted repeated campaigns on Egyptian territory and once come close to capturing Cairo.

Saladin did not simply beat the drum of alarm concerning an external enemy in order to rally his subjects around him; he took up the cry of “jihad” — Holy War. This was a clear attempt to increase his stature vis-a-vis his remaining rivals in Syria. Salah-ad-Din means “righteousness of the faith,” and Salah-ad-Din throughout his career used campaigns against the Christian states as a means of rallying support.

Another depiction of Saladin; Source Unknown

Saladin had not invented jihad. The word itself appears multiple times in the Koran, but with varying meanings. It was also used as justification for the Muslim conquests of the 7^th Century.  It had, however, become less popular in later centuries until Nur ad-Din, the Seljuk ruler of Syria from 1146-1174, reinvigorated the concept. Most historians agree, however, that Nur ad-Din used jihad when it suited him, but remained a fundamentally secular ruler. He had, however, unleashed the jinni from the bottle and the concept of “Holy War” soon gained increasing support in the madrassas and mosques across the Seljuk territories of the Near East. By the time Saladin came to power there was a body of already radicalized youth eager to follow the call to jihad.

Meanwhile, in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, King Amalaric, who had been so intent on conquering parts if not all of Egypt, had died.  He had been succeeded by Baldwin IV, a youth suffering from leprosy. Conscious of his own weakness and immanent death, Baldwin IV sent to the West for aid, and in early August 1177, Count Philip of Flanders reached Acre with a large force of Western knights.

On the advice of the High Court, Baldwin IV offered Philip of Flanders the regency of his kingdom, whose armies were preparing yet another invasion of Egypt aided by a large Byzantine fleet. Flanders, however, insisted on being made king of any territories the joint Christian forces conquered. The idea did not sit well with either the King of Jerusalem or the Emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, both of whom were footing the bill and providing the bulk of the troops for the expedition. The result was that the entire expedition was called off, the Byzantine fleet withdrew and Philip of Flanders took his knights and half the barons of Jerusalem north to attack the Seljuk strongholds of Hama and Harim instead.

A Medieval depiction of a Crusading Host

Salah ad-Din had gathered his forces in Egypt to repel the impending attack. He rapidly learned that not only had the invasion of Egypt been called off, the Byzantine fleet had withdrawn and the bulk of the fighting forces of Jerusalem had moved north. It was a splendid opportunity to strike, and the Sultan seized the opportunity with a force estimated at 26,000 light horse — which leaves open the question of whether there were infantry with him or not. The force also allegedly included some 1,000 mamluks of the Sultan’s personal body guard.

According to an anonymous Christian chronicler from northern Syria, the news of Saladin’s invasion plunged Jerusalem into despair. The king was just 16 years old, had no battle experience of his own, and his most experienced commanders (or many of them) were besieging Hama. The Constable of the Kingdom, the competent and wise Humphrey de Toron II, was gravely ill. But according to Archbishop William of Tyre, Baldwin’s former tutor now his chancellor and our best contemporary source, Baldwin rallied his forces and with just 376 knights made a dash to Ascalon, the southern-most stronghold of his kingdom.

Arriving there only shortly before Saladin himself on November 22, King Baldwin took control of the city, but then hesitated to risk open battle with the Saracens because of the imbalance of forces.  Thus, while King Baldwin's dash to Ascalon had been heroic, it had been less than wise strategically. Salah ad-Din was now in a position to bottle up the King and his knights inside Ascalon, and nothing lay between Saladin and Jerusalem except scattered garrisons. Rather than wasting time besieging a fortified city with a strong garrison, Saladin left a force of undefined size to maintain the siege of Ascalon and moved off with the bulk of his troops.

But this was where Salah ad-Din miscalculated. The Sultan and his emirs were so confident of victory that they took time to plunder the rich cities of the coastal plain, notably Ramla and Lydda, but also as far inland as Hebron. In Jerusalem, the terrified population sought refuge in the Citadel of David.

The Citadel of David as it appears today.

But Baldwin IV was not yet defeated. With the number of Saracen troops surrounding Ascalon dramatically reduced, he risked a sortie. Even more impressive, he somehow managed to get word to the Templars in the fortress of Gaza, and they sortied out to rendezvous with the King. Together this mounted force started to shadow Saladin’s now dispersed and no longer disciplined army. Frankish tactics, however, required a combination of cavalry and infantry, so King Baldwin could not engage the enemy  until he had infantry as well. He therefore issued the arrière ban, a general call to arms that obligated every Christian to rally to the royal standard in defense of the realm. Infantry started streaming to join him.

On the afternoon of November 25, King Baldwin’s host of about 450 knights (375 secular knights and 84 Templars from Gaza), with their squires, Turcopoles and infantry in unspecified numbers caught up with the main body of Saladin’s troops at a place near Montgisard or Tell Jazar, near Ibelin (modern day Yavne).  The Sultan, as he later admitted to Saracen chroniclers, was caught off-guard. Before he could properly deploy his troops, the main force of Christian knights, led (depending on which source you believe) by Reynald de Chatillon, “the Ibelin brothers” or the Templars, smashed into Saladin’s still disorganized troops, apparently while some were still crossing or watering their horses in a stream.

A modern portrayal of the Battle of Montgisard by Mariusz Kozik

Although the battle was hard fought and there were Christian casualties, the Sultan’s forces were soon routed.  Not only that, Salah ad-Din himself came very close to being killed or captured and allegedly escaped on the back of a pack-camel. Yet for the bulk of his army there was no escape. Those who were not slaughtered immediately on the field, found themselves scattered and virtually defenseless in enemy territory. Although they abandoned their plunder, it was still a long way home — and the rains had set in.  Cold, wet, slowed down by the mud, no longer benefiting from the strength of numbers, they were easy prey for the residents and settlers of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.  The latter, after the sack of Lydda, Ramla and other lesser places, had good reason to crave revenge. Furthermore, even after escaping Christian territory, the Sultan’s troops still found no refuge because once in the desert the Bedouins took advantage of the situation to enslave as many men as they could catch in order to enrich themselves. Very few men of the Sultan’s army made it home to safety in Egypt.

Saladin was badly shaken by this defeat. He had good reason to believe it would discredit him and initially feared it would trigger revolts against his rule. Later, he convinced himself that God had spared him for a purpose. Certainly he was to learn from his defeat. He never again allowed himself to be duped by his own over-confidence and his subsequent campaigns against the crusader states were marked by greater caution. It was not until the crushing defeat of the Frankish armies at Hattin in July 1187 — almost ten years later — that he had his revenge.

The Battle of Montgisard is an important episode in "Knight of Jerusalem," the first book in a three part biography of Balian d'Ibelin.

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Montgisard Revisited -- The Consequences of the Christian Victory

A modern portrayal of the Battle of Montgisard by Mariusz Kozik, copyright Marius Kozik

As described last year, Baldwin IV of Jerusalem crushed and humiliated Saladin at the Battle of Montgisard on Nov. 25, 1177. Although Saladin had invaded with a force estimated at 26,000 light horse and an unspecified number of infantry, he was decisively defeated by a force under the command of Baldwin IV numbering something less than 500 knights, also supported by unquantified numbers of foot soldiers.  Baldwin IV was at this time an untried youth of 16, already suffering from leprosy. Saladin, in contrast, was a highly successful leader already 41, who had proved himself repeatedly in both defensive and offensive warfare. 

Just ten years later, however, on July 4, 1187 the entire Christian army with an estimated 1,600 knights, thousands of Turcopoles and tens of thousands of infantry was obliterated by Saladin at the Battle of Hattin. The garrisons of the cities and towns of the kingdom had been denuded to bring together this record force, and after the battle there were insufficient fighting men left alive in freedom to defend the rest of the kingdom. City after city and castle after castle surrendered to Saladin. Within a year, the once proud Kingdom of Jerusalem that had stretched from modern-day Turkey to the Red Sea, encompassing much of modern-day Lebanon, Israel and Jordan, had been reduced to a single city: Tyre. 

Despite the Third Crusade that recovered the coast of the Levant for Christendom, the Kingdom of Jerusalem was never again self-sustainable, much less a threat to the Muslim states surrounding it. It survived almost a hundred years longer, but from 1187 onwards it was living on borrowed time. The defeat at Hattin has so over-shadowed the victory at Montgisard, that Montgisard is treated as little more than a footnote in history, a curiosity rather than a event of historical significance. 

This is somewhat oversimplified because it ignores two important consequences of Montgisard. First, that Saladin learned his lesson and never again showed contempt for his Christian opponents. He was, as a result of Montgisard, a far more cautious commander when engaging the Franks in the decade that followed. He was careful to retain control of his troops (for the most part), and avoided pitched battles with the Franks unless he had chosen the position and believed himself at a clear advantage. 

Second, the victory at Montgisard (and subsequent victories of King Baldwin, especially at Le Forbelet and Kerak) lulled Western rulers into a sense of complacency. Baldwin's frantic appeals for sustainable assistance in the form of a king ready to take up his burden fell on deaf ears. No monarch in Western Europe understood just how precarious the situation of the Kingdom of Jerusalem was -- until Jerusalem fell.

Had Baldwin IV been defeated at Montgisard, it is highly unlikely that this would have led to the loss of the Kingdom. The bulk of the Christian army was not even at Montgisard; it was engaged in an offensive campaign in the north. Thus even the complete obliteration of Baldwin's force at Montgisard would not have denuded the kingdom of fighting men as did the defeat at Hattin did ten years later. The defeat would have created a highly dangerous situation in which Saladin might well have seized control of key assets from Ascalon to Jerusalem itself. However, an intact fighting force and the kingdom's most experienced commanders such as Humphrey de Toron II and Raymond de Tripoli, would still have been in a position to come to the relief of any city taken by Saladin.  In short, the Christian kingdom would have been in a difficult, but not hopeless, situation, and the West might have been alerted to the danger facing the crusader states before it was too late.

Even the death of Baldwin IV at Montgisard would not have had disastrous consequences. It would have shortened his own life by less than a decade, and it would have made Sibylla queen before her marriage to Guy de Lusignan. As a reigning queen, she would probably have been a more attractive bride to a Western ruler. At a minimum, her marriage would have been negotiated by the High Court of Jerusalem with a mind to what was best for the kingdom, not Sibylla's personal inclinations. 

Satisfying as the victory at Montgisard seemed at the time -- and it was widely seen as a sign of Divine favor for Baldwin and his kingdom -- in retrospect it contributed to the disaster at Hattin. Montgisard did not make Hattin inevitable. Many other developments (e.g. William of Montferrat's survival, Sibylla's marriage to the Baron of Ramla, the successful coronation of Isabella instead of Sibylla etc.) could also have averted the catastrophe at Hattin. Nevertheless, with the wisdom of hindsight, Montgisard was perhaps too successful for the long term good of the Christianity in the Holy Land.

The Battles of Montgisard and Hattin are key events in my novels Knight of Jerusalem and Defender of Jerusalem respectively.

A landless knight, 

a leper king,

and the struggle for Jerusalem.

 A divided kingdom,

a united enemy,

and the struggle for Jerusalem

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