Tancred’s height played a part as it always did, his reach being that much greater than those who lined up beside him, which meant he had to show restraint so as not to advance too quickly. But right now it was the billowing smoke blowing across the platform, stinging his eyes and affecting his vision, that seemed the greater problem. Right before him a gap appeared, he having chopped the lower arm of his immediate opponent, who was so immobilised by the loss that he temporarily blocked the way to those at his rear. That allowed for the briefest glance to right and then left, which engendered an immediate shout.
‘My Lord Godfrey, look to our left.’
Having made that call Tancred was forced to once more fully engage with the enemy, and with Godfrey likewise fighting hard there was a gap before circumstances allowed him to comply with the cry from the younger man. Yet when he did, what he saw had a similar effect on him: the top of the eastern tower that framed the St Stephen’s Gate was emitting a great mass of smoke, which, caught by the wind was blowing across to envelop the combatants.
‘Close up!’ Godfrey shouted, immediately pulling back, a command obeyed by both Tancred and the knight on de Bouillon’s left, Ludolf of Tournai.
Able to retire to a point from which he could assess the situation, the gap the Duke left was quickly filled by a supporting knight from the reserve. This was Ludolf’s brother Engelbert, who moved up and called to be allowed to act as a replacement, entering the line with his vigour fresh and his passion for the fight at full stretch.
Godfrey, to get a better view, dropped down one level and, cutting through what remained of the wattle screen, peered out of the side of the siege engine. What he saw lifted his already bubbling spirits: if the gate tower was on fire that meant the interior wooden frame that formed the support for the stonework was ablaze. Such a conflagration, being embedded, would be impossible to extinguish.
If weakened enough, and it would be as the fire progressed, it was only a matter of time before the whole edifice collapsed, which would take with it the supporting pillars of the gate itself, causing that to sag open, thus fully opening the way into the city for the whole mass of Godfrey’s fighters. An added danger lay on the wooden parapet on which the defenders fought: that too could catch fire, and being constructed the way it was, with open slats, it would burn quickly and ferociously.
The panicked cries from above, albeit they were in Arabic, indicated to the Duke of Lower Lorraine that he was not alone in seeing the danger and drawing the requisite conclusion. To seek to hold a section of the walls when the means to outflank you were imminent, and the ground beneath your feet could disappear, was madness. A call from one of his knights, telling him that the Fatimids were weakening, posed the possibility for Godfrey that he would not be in action at the most vital moment.
Slashing at the wattle and knocking one of his own men out of the way, he was on a ladder and climbing at a furious scrabble, able to catch sight of his men, now standing on the very top of the ramparts. By the time he joined them they were on the parapet, now doing combat with an enemy that seemed more intent on disengagement than continued resistance.
All along the battlements the men led by Godfrey, Robert of Flanders and Tancred were pushing over the crest of the walls and occupying a wooden fighting platform on which only those trapped by the inability to get clear were still contesting the ground. Massively outnumbered, they were to die for that, while it soon became apparent that the remainder of their comrades had fled.
Before the Zion Gate, Raymond of Toulouse was seeking by personal example to inspire an attack rapidly running out of energy. His voice was hoarse from shouting that his men should continue to advance in the face of a defence that had not lost one iota of its power since the previous day. If anything it seemed more potent. There was no weakening of Raymond’s sword arm for it had yet to be employed; no one, him included, could get close enough to the walls.
With his siege tower unusable — his men refused to enter it and climb — there were only ladders with which to seek to overcome the Egyptians, that and the rocks fired by his lighter mangonels and they were as nothing compared to what the Fatimids were raining down in response on his stuttering advance.
Much as he hated to contemplate retirement there seemed little choice, and in doing so he knew he would be faced with a complete rethink of the ways needed to take the city, which was complicated by the fact that time must be short. The Vizier al-Afdal must be aware that the city was besieged and that would force him to leave Cairo and come to its rescue. The Crusade, still without the walls of Jerusalem, faced possibly a worse dilemma than they had at Antioch.
Suddenly the air, which had been full of rocks and arrows, was clear of both. Looking up at the battlements there were no heads peering over, bows at the ready and eyes roving to pick a target. It took time to register, time before the advance broke from a stumbling walk into a run, men amazed, none more so than Raymond himself, that they could raise their ladders without interference, even more so when that applied to their ascent and the crossing of the ramparts themselves.
The parapet, when they occupied it, was empty, which induced an amazed pause as the likes of Raymond sought to glean some meaning from what had just occurred. It did not take too long to realise that the defence had collapsed because it was breached elsewhere, which meant Godfrey and his men were inside Jerusalem, and with a head start on the sack of the city. From the fervour of battle, it soon became the Provencal purpose to be equally dedicated to the pursuit of plunder.
Jerusalem paid a high price for its resistance, with later chroniclers, such as Aguilers, seeking to exalt the success, claiming that ten thousand Muslims gave up their lives to appease God. That this was an untruth was not allowed to interfere with the glory of the capture of the Holy City, yet there were those who later spoke the truth: if that number died, to be eventually burnt in great mounds outside the walls, the frames of the siege engines used as kindling, there were as many Christian victims as Muslims.
The sack was brutal as every Crusader sought personal enrichment, many succeeding given Jerusalem was a place full of the means to do so: rich in gold, even more so than in metal, as well as silver, fashioned into objects designed to venerate the memory of Jesus Christ, a massive number given as gifts by pilgrims that had preceded the Crusade in more peaceful times.
Following the frenzy of acquisition men would later gather to pray and hear Mass in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a church from which they were quick to eject any who adhered to another branch of the Christian faith — Armenians, Copts, Nestorians and Maronites. They did not ask for forgiveness for the acts of barbarity which they had just carried out: houses invaded and left wrecked, women ravaged, babies dashed against pillars and young children slain, bodies of both sexes sliced open to seek any wealth that might have been consumed to hide it from view.
The Crusaders did not see the need: what they had done had been carried out for the greater glory of the god they worshipped and one who had shown them divine favour, not a single worshipper present doubting this to be an absolute truth. Three years had passed since they took their crusading vows and left their homes, hearths and wives to fulfil that pledge, three years in which they travelled a thousand leagues, conquered disease, hunger, battle, despair and the elements. How else could they have overcome such obstacles without that their God had strengthened their resolve as well as the arms with which they wielded their blessed weapons?
Conquest did not end dispute, for there still existed the vexed question of to whom control of Jerusalem should devolve. The churchmen demanded it be a divine, yet that faltered on the fact that there was no one of sufficient stature to fill the office of bishop, a man who could command the necessary respect.