Quote Originally Posted by Advo-san
@Knight Templar. I mostly agree with you.
Glad to hear it

Quote Originally Posted by Advo-san
What a lovely debate!!
Agree.


And now about your post:
1) Me too, read it many, many times....great book
2)Yes, I think main reason was Muslim union
a) Zengi became ruler of Aleppo and Mosul in 1128. , 16 years before he conqured Edesa. Maalouf pointed that union of Aleppo and Mosul under one ruler was strong enough to oppose crusaders.
b)I don't realise how do you mean "loss of Egypt"? It would mean crusaders once owned Egypt, but lost it, but they never did. I'll list crusader attempts to gain Egypt:

I King Badouin I conqured Farama in 1118. . He ment to go foward, but got sick and died.
II As I said in my previous post, king Amaury attacked Egypt 5 times in 6 years, but every time he was repelled or forced to turn away. His main opponent was Chirkuk.
III 5th crusade, crusaders conquered Damietta, but were ruined by stupid Pelagius's decisions, so they were forced to withdraw to Europe without achieving anything. But remember sultan al-Kamel in his ceasefire offers never offered crusaders Egypt, but Jerusalem.
IV 1st crusade of Louis IX, he managed to conquer Damietta, but was defeated by Mamluks.

As you can see, every crusaders attempt to conquer Egypt ended unsuccessfully.

he land of the Nile could easily be conquered by the Crusaders, if only they had cooperated with the Byzantines.
I read one very good book about Byz history by George of Ostrogor (apologies for possible wrong spell)The Empire was under Comnen dynasty (1081-1185) in that time, they had enough wars at home (mostly victorious), they could hardly think of Egypt. Dynasty had three important rulers, Alexius I, John II and Manuel I.

Alexius I (1081-1118)-when he became emperor, he succeded weak and ruined Empire. In almost 40 years of his reign, he maneged to gain western Lesser Asia, and repel Pecheneg and Norman attacks. Conclusion: he used most of his forces and energy to re-estabilish strong Empire, had enough wars at home, couldn't think of Egypt. Besides, Egyptian vizier al-Afdal was his ally.
John II (1118-43), wise and capable emperor, lead wars with Hungarians, Serbs, Pechenegs. Conclusion: as wise emperor, he most certinaly realised he can't attack Egypt.
The only Comnen who maybe thought of Egypt was Manuel I (1143-80), known as temperate ruler. But he was in more wars than any of his ancestors Comnens (lon wars with Croatian-Hungary kingdom and Normans, Serb rebellions, disaster for Byz army and Myriocephalon 1176. in the battle against Turks).Conclusion: he maybe thought of Egypt, but surely couldn't afford one more war.

After Comnen dynasty (1185-1205), Empire got weak, emperors had to think about saving Empire from Bulgars, Germans, crusaders, not about Egypt.
What I'm trying to say was Empire couldn't, with all his problems, go to war in Egypt with crusaders.

- Besides that, many times (p.e: after the death of Saladin) had the Crusaders the chance to shatter the fragile Muslim union, but they never seized the opportunity. They delivered Damascus to the hands of the Sultan actually...
You're correct, but how do you mean delivered (crusaders never owned Damascus)?

- What I 'm trying to say is that Muslim Union was of course the result of the work of great Muslim leaders, but the Crusaders could have prevented it; but they didn't...
I entirely agree.

3) You also focus on the idea of the Crusade. IMHO all Crusades were (and still are....) just a way for the nobles to gain lands and riches. ALL of them, included the first one. But this doesn't mean that the Crusaders didn't see Outremer as their Home.
3) You're right abou gaining new lands and richies, but crsuaders in the 1st crusades were mostly united, which was not the case with later crusaders.

I can see you are reffering to the letter that Saladin sent to Richard: "This is my land, I m here to stay, while you will eventually leave...." But with Barbarossa this wasn't the case; the german army was loaded with smaller counts and dukes and a whole legion of second-born nobles that were ready to colonize the land, in case the Crusade was successfull. The Emperor's army was followed by women, children, craftsmen. Some of them might returned back to the HRE, but not the majority. Since Barbarossa was in peace with the Pope and the Italians there was no obvious reason for the whole army to return, unlike Richard's army that had to quickly disengage from Outremer in order to fight the French.
I must say, interesting theory. But, do you really think they could hold out in Outemer for a long time, surrounded by Muslims? Besides, I was refering to Saladin's letter.

.Damaskus and Jerusalem were in muslim hands for barely 2 centuries, Antioch and Edessa even less time. No. The Crusades should have successfully re-established the status-quo ante between Christians and Muslims in the syrian frontier.
About status quo- yes, but crusaders were far away from Byzantines, who owned these lands before (I mean way of life, culture, art. science). Byzantines aprecciated Arabs, they lived near Arabs for centuries. But crusaders were acting like barbars, treir science (medicine for example) for primitive etc.
Secondly, how do you mean 2 centuries for Antioch and Jerusalem. Byzantines lost Antioch in 1084. , crusaders conquered it in 1098 (14 years). Jerusalem was in Muslim hands from 638. to 1099, much more then 2 centuries.