Though the First Crusade was proclaimed in 1095, Muslim historians think of the Crusades as beginning ten years earlier with the fall of Toledo in Spain. In fact the reaction against Arab imperialism had begun long before that; just as Muslim armies had occupied the Middle East, North Africa and Europe, so the Christian counterattack was on several fronts.
In the West the Arabs had overrun Spain and struck deep into France, to within a hundred and fifty miles of the English Channel, before they were beaten back by Charles Martel between Poitiers and Tours in 732, though that did not prevent the Muslims from holding positions on the coasts of Languedoc and Provence for several decades to come. Throughout the eleventh century Pisa, Genoa and Catalonia fought campaigns In the Western Mediterranean to free Sicily, Sardinia and Majorca from Arab rule. In 1063 Pope Alexander II gave his Papal blessing to Iberian Christians In their wars against the Muslims, granting a remission of sins to those who were killed In battle. The recovery of Toledo from the Arabs In 1085 was a major victory; the northern third of Spain was now back In Christian hands, though not until the fall of Granada In 1492 would the Reconquista succeed In driving the Muslims out of the Iberian peninsula altogether.
In the East the Byzantines were scoring victories In the Eastern Mediterranean already In the tenth century, recapturing Crete from the Muslims In 961 and Cyprus four years later. The Byzantines also recovered great swathes of territory In the Middle East. In 969 they captured Antioch, and shortly afterwards they took Aleppo and Latakla along with a coastal strip extending clear down through Syria nearly to Tripoli In northern Lebanon. The Muslim Inhabitants were left undisturbed and the local Muslim leaders were made vassals of the Byzantine Empire, but now they were made to pay taxes from which the Christians were exempted, while destroyed churches were rebuilt and the freedom to convert from Islam to Christianity or vice versa was guaranteed.
In 975, under the Emperor John Tzimiskes, the Byzantines launched a crusade with the Intention of recovering Jerusalem, which was still an overwhelmingly Christian city. Marching out with his army from Antioch, Tzimiskes took Damascus, then advanced into Palestine where Nazareth and Caesarea opened their gates to him and the Muslim authorities at Jerusalem pleaded for terms. But first the Emperor turned towards the Mediterranean to clear the enemy from coastal castles-only to die suddenly in 976 before he could return his attention to Jerusalem. For the next century the Byzantines remained in control of northern Syria but got no closer to the Holy Land.
World History
