"The Crusades: series of wars by Western European Christians to recapture the Holy Land from the Muslims." (Encarta "Crusades") The Crusades first began in 1096 and ended in the late 13th century. The term Crusade originally meant that the European's would use all their efforts to regain the power from the Muslims. They wanted to retake the city of Jerusalem, which was holy to Christians because that's where the crucifixion of Jesus Christ occurred. Europeans later used it to allocate any military efforts against non-Christians. The Crusaders also created feudal states in the Near East. The Crusades played an important role of European expansion and colonialism. "They mark the first time Western Christendom undertook a military initiative …show more content…

In anything in life, if there is not an agreement it can make conflicts arise. There were different leaders that marched to Constantinople, and they all met up there. How can they actually want to be victorious, without ever meeting each other before? "The contingents of Robert of Flanders and Bohemond of Taranto went by sea via Italy, while the other major groups, those of Godfrey of Bouillon and Raymond of Toulouse, took the land route around the Adriatic Sea."(Barker,56) As the Crusaders marched east, they were joined by thousands of men and even women. There were anything from poor knights to peasants just looking for a reason to live. Many with all sorts of motives and contributions joined the march. Some followed local lords or well-known nobles or wnet east on their own, some even found the sea and then sailed to Constantinople. Nobody knew what to expect from their journey, and then they did know what to expect when they began the "Holy War." "They knew little about the Byzantine Empire or its religion, Eastern Orthodox Christianity."(Mayer, 67) Few Crusaders understood the Eastern Orthodox religion, which meant they had no clue about the pope; they spoke Greek rather than Latin, and had very different styles of art and architecture. They also had no clue