They were also extremely useful in diverting the activities of warring and often lawless nobles into a constructive war outside the confines of Europe. At the root of so much of this activity lay the penitential system of the Church, where a priest might enjoin a man at the confessional to carry out some physical or moral penance before being admitted to the sacrament of the Eucharist. The penitentiary pilgrimage was the most important of these. The pilgrim not only atoned for his sins by the suffering and discomfort of his hard and often extremely dangerous journey, but he then enjoyed the blessing of having visited the Holy Places and stood on sacred ground. The Crusaders’ aim was to secure the pilgrimage routes and protect the pilgrims from their Moslem enemies. This was the seed from which sprang the Knights Templar, the Teutonic Knights and the formidable Order of St John.

The First or People’s Crusade came about largely on account of the declining powers of the Byzantine Empire and the steady encroachment of the Turks, who were rightly seen as the greatest threat to Christendom. They had seized Jerusalem in 1071 and, although not totally intolerant, they had made the passage of pilgrims even more difficult than it had been when the area had all come under Byzantine rule. The schism between the Church of the East and the Catholic Church was something that had long troubled the papacy. With the decline of Byzantium, if western Christians could establish themselves in the East, there seemed a chance that ultimately the whole of Christendom might be united under Rome. After the terrible defeat of the Byzantine armies by the Turks at Manzikert in 1071 the pilgrim routes through Asia Minor became increasingly hazardous since all the large cities were now in Turkish hands. The Byzantine emperor, Michael VII, appealed to the West to come to the aid of Eastern Christendom against the Turks. At the time Michael’s appeal was unavailing. But that of his successor, Alexius Comnenus, was to be answered.

In 1095 at the Council of Piacenza in Italy envoys from Alexius begged the Pope, Urban II, to send troops to help them recover Asia Minor for Christendom. This time the situation was more favourable for western intervention. Urban II was a strong Pope, who had firmly established the papal position at home. He now looked hopefully east, dreaming of a united Christendom and the recovery of Christian lands held by the enemies of the Faith. Later in the same year, at the Council of Clermont, he made the famous speech which led to the First Crusade. He called upon his listeners to go to the aid of their brethren in the East. Christendom was in peril, and if the Turks succeeded in overthrowing the Byzantine Empire their next objective would be the rest of Europe. Jerusalem itself, he pointed out, was in the hands of the enemies of Christ; the pilgrims who tried to make their way to the Holy Places were suffering as never before under any other Moslem rulers. He called upon the leaders of western Europe to cease their murderous un-Christian feuds and wars, and to unite against the common enemy. The war to which he summoned them was a just and holy one, sanctified by God. Those who took part in it, were they to die in battle, would have all their sins remitted. Life here on earth was miserable at its best and always afflicted by evil. Heaven awaited them. He called upon them to die for their faith and to take up the sword against the enemies of Christ.

The response was electric. Urban II had triggered off a thunderstorm that was to roll across the Mediterranean for generations. ‘God wills it! God wills it!’ his listeners cried, It was November when Urban addressed the Council. His intention was that the crusaders should leave in the summer of the following year. They would march to Constantinople, where the Byzantine emperor would have transports ready to take them across to Asia Minor.