B. S. Bachrach, ‘The pilgrimages of Fulk Nerra, count of the Angevins, 987–1040’, Religion, Culture and Society in the Early Middle Ages, ed. T. F. X. Noble and J. J. Contreni (Kalamazoo, 1987), pp. 205–17.

Raoul Glaber, Opera, ed. J. France, N. Bulst, P. Reynolds (Oxford, 1989), p. 192. On the Late Antique period, the conversion of Europe and early Christianity see: R. Fletcher, The Conversion of Europe (New York, 1998); P. Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom (Oxford, 1996); J. Herrin, B. Hamilton, The Christian World of the Middle Ages (Stroud, 2003). On the Franks see: E. James, The Franks (Oxford, 1988). On the use of the term ‘Franks’ in the crusading context see: J. S. C. Riley-Smith, The First Crusaders, 1095–1131 (Cambridge, 1997), pp. 64–5. On the Carolingian era and early medieval world see: R. McKitterick, The Frankish Kingdoms under the Carolingians 751–987 (London, 1983); R. McKitterick, The Early Middle Ages: Europe 400–1000 (2001); C. Wickham, Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean, 400–800 (Oxford, 2005).

Popes argued that because Christ’s chief apostle St Peter had been Rome’s first prelate, his successors should be recognised not only as the head of the Latin Church in the West, but also as the supreme spiritual power across the whole Christian world. Not surprisingly, this view did not sit well with the likes of the Greek Orthodox patriarch in Constantinople, and a dispute over this principle and wider doctrine caused an open split, or ‘schism’, between these two arms of ‘European’ Christianity in 1054. On the medieval papacy, Pope Gregory VII and the papal Reform movement see: W. Ullmann, A Short History of the Papacy in the Middle Ages (London, 1974); C. Morris, The Papal Monarchy: The Western Church from 1050 to 1250 (Oxford, 1989); H. E.J. Cowdrey, Pope Gregory VII, 1073–1085 (Oxford, 1998); U.-R. Blumenthal, The Investiture Controversy: Church and Monarchy from the Ninth to the Twelfth Century (Philadelphia, 1988).

Raoul Glaber, Opera, p. 60; M. G. Bull, Knightly Piety and the Lay Response to the First Crusade: The Limousin and Gascony, c. 970–c. 1130 (Oxford, 1993), p. 158. On medieval religion, monasticism and pilgrimage see: M.G. Bull. ‘Origins’, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades, ed. J. S. C. Riley-Smith (Oxford, 1995), pp. 13–33; B. Hamilton, Religion in the Medieval West (London, 1986); C. H. Lawrence, Medieval Monasticism: Forms of Religious Life in Western Europe in the Middle Ages, 3rd edn (London, 2001); J. Sumption, Pilgrimage: An Image of Mediaeval Religion (London, 1975); B. Ward, Miracles and the Medieval Mind, 2nd edn (London, 1987); D. Webb, Medieval European Pilgrimage, c. 700–c. 1500 (London, 2002); C. Morris, The Sepulchre of Christ and the Medieval West: From the Beginning to 1600 (Oxford, 2005).

The heavy costs of functioning as a knight or miles (pl. milites) – particularly those related to equipment and training–made it difficult for less affluent men to operate as milites, although, as yet, the group was not the exclusive domain of the nobility. Virtually all male members of the lay aristocracy were expected to carry out the duties of a knight, and most wealthy lords retained the service of a number of milites as vassals, under contract to protect and farm a parcel of land in return for military service. This convention made it possible for poorer individuals to achieve the status of a miles, acquiring the tools of the trade through employment. On medieval knighthood and European warfare see: J. France, Western Warfare in the Age of the Crusades (London, 1999).

I. S. Robinson, ‘Gregory VII and the Soldiers of Christ’, History, vol. 58 (1973), pp. 169–92; F. H. Russell, The Just War in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, 1975); T. Asbridge, The First Crusade: A New History (London, 2004), pp. 21–31.

Over time Sunni Islam also developed four distinct ‘schools’ of law or madhabs: the Hanafi, Shafi‘i, Hanbali and Malaki. During the crusader period these various ‘schools’ gained popularity and support with different groups and in different regions. The Syrian city of Damascus was a Hanbali centre, for example, while the Zangid Turkish dynasty tended to support the Hanafites and the Kurdish Ayyubids were Shafi‘ites.

On the history of medieval Islam, the rise of the Seljuqs, and the Near East on the eve of the First Crusade see: H. Kennedy, The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates: The Islamic Near East from the Sixth to the Eleventh Century (London, 1986); J. Berkey, The Formation of Islam: Religion and Society in the Near East, 600–800 (Cambridge, 2003); C. Cahen, ‘The Turkish invasion: The Selchükids’, A History of the Crusades, ed. K. M. Setton, vol. 1, 2nd edn (Madison, 1969), pp. 135–76; Hillenbrand, The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives, pp. 33–50; C. Cahen, Introduction à l’histoire du monde musulman médiéval, Initiation à l’Islam, vol. 1 (Paris, 1982); C. Cahen, Orient et Occident aux temps des croisades (Paris, 1983); P. M. Holt, The Age of the Crusades: The Near East from the Eleventh Century to 1517 (London, 1986), pp. 1–22; T. el-Azhari, The Saljuqs of Syria during the Crusades 463–549 A.H./1070–1154 A.D. (Berlin, 1997); S. Zakkar, The Emirate of Aleppo 1004–1094 (Beirut, 1971); J.-M. Mouton, Damas et sa principauté sous les Saljoukides et les Bourides 468–549/1076–1154 (Cairo, 1994); M. Yared-Riachi, La politique extérieure de la principauté de Damas, 468–549 A.H./1076–1154 A.D. (Damascus, 1997); A. F. Sayyid, Les Fatimides en Égypte (Cairo, 1992).

The basic building block of Muslim armies was the ‘askar–the personal military entourage of a lord or emir. These forces were dominated by highly trained professional ‘slave-soldiers’ (who came to be termed mamluks), initially drawn from the Turkic peoples of Central Asia and the steppe-lands of Russia, but later supplemented by Armenians, Georgians, Greeks and even eastern European Slavs. Within the Seljuq world, large armies were commonly levied through the use of the ‘iqta system–whereby an emir was granted rights to the revenues from a parcel of land in return for an obligation to field his ‘askar for wars and campaigns. This procedure later was adopted in Egypt. On medieval Islamic warfare see: H. Kennedy, The Armies of the Caliph (London, 2001); Hillenbrand, The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives, pp. 431–587.

On Islamic jihad in the Middle Ages see: E. Sivan, L’Islam et la Croisade (Paris, 1968); Hillenbrand, The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives, pp. 89–103; B. Z. Kedar, ‘Croisade et jihad vus par l’ennemi: une étude des perceptions mutuelles des motivations’, Autour de la Première Croisade, ed. M. Balard (Paris, 1996), pp. 345–58; H. Dajani-Shakeel and R. A. Mossier (eds), The Jihad and its Times (Ann Arbor, 1991); R. Firestone, Jihad. The Origins of Holy War in Islam (Oxford, 2000); D. Cook, Understanding Jihad (Berkeley, 2005). According to Shi‘ite theology the duty to wage an external jihad would not become active until the Last Days. Thus the Isma‘ili Shi‘ites of Egypt and Twelver Shi‘ites like the Munqidh clan of Shaizar fought wars against the Franks, but did not regard themselves as being engaged in a holy war.

Al-Azimi, ‘La chronique abrégée d’al-Azimi’, ed. C. Cahen, Journal Asiatique, vol. 230 (1938), p. 369; J. Drory, ‘Some observations during a visit to Palestine by Ibn al-‘Arabi of Seville in 1092–1095’, Crusades, vol. 3 (2004), pp. 101–24; Hillenbrand, The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives, pp. 48–50.