Siege of Acre (1291)

In 1187, Saladin conquered much of the Kingdom of Jerusalem (also called the Latin Kingdom), including Acre and Jerusalem, after winning the Battle of Hattin and inflicting heavy losses on the Crusaders. The Third Crusade was launched in response; the Crusaders besieged and eventually recaptured Acre in 1191. Acre became the capital of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The religious orders made their headquarters in and around the city, and from there made crucial military and diplomatic decisions. For example, when the Mongols arrived from the East in the mid-13th century, the Christians saw them as potential allies. In 1250, the Mamluk Sultanate arose in Egypt; it was a more dangerous enemy than the Ayyubids. The Mamluks fielded heavy cavalry – a match for the Crusader knights – and were much more hostile. The Crusaders initially attempted to maintain a cautious neutrality with the Mamluks. In 1260, the Barons of Acre granted the Mamluks safe passage through the Latin Kingdom en route to fighting the Mongols; the Mamluks subsequently won the pivotal Battle of Ain Jalut in Galilee against the Mongols. This was an example of atypically cordial relations between the Christians and the Mamluks. However, as early as 1261, after the Battle of Ain Jalut, Sultan Baibars led the Mamluks against the Crusaders. Baibars captured Caesarea, Haifa, and Arsuf in 1265, all the important Crusader holdings in Galilee the following year, and then Antioch in 1268. European states launched a number of minor Crusading expeditions to reinforce the Crusader states, including the abortive Crusade of Louis IX of France to Tunis in 1270, and the minor Ninth Crusade of Prince Edward (later King Edward I) of England in 1271–1272. The expeditions failed to provide the required relief; they were too small, too short-lived, and the interests of the participants were too diverse. in 1289 triggered frantic preparations to save Acre. More seriously, no major reinforcing Crusade was forthcoming. Pope Gregory X was unable to rally support for another great Crusade. Papal advisors blamed the lack of enthusiasm to the laziness and vice of the European nobility and to clerical corruption. A more fundamental reason seems to have been the debasement of the Crusading ideal; Gregory X's predecessors had used Crusades to raise armies against the Papacy's European enemies, such as the Albigensian Crusade declared by Innocent III against the Cathars & a crusade against the Hohenstaufen Emperor Frederick II declared by Innocent IV. The Crusader states continued to deteriorate from continuing attacks and political instability. In 1276, the unpopular "King of Jerusalem" Hugh III moved his court to Cyprus. Under Sultan Al-Mansur Qalawun, the Mamluks captured Lattakia in 1278, and conquered the County of Tripoli in 1289. Qalawun concluded a ten-year truce with the Kingdom of Jerusalem in 1284. Following the fall of Tripoli, King Henry II, son of Hugh III, sent seneschal Jean de Grailly to warn European monarchs of the critical situation in the Levant. Pope Nicholas IV supported Jean by writing letters urging European potentates to act. However, the Sicilian question overshadowed calls for a new Crusade, and Edward I of England was too entangled by troubles at home. Decades of communications between the Europeans and the Mongols failed to secure a meaningful Franco-Mongol alliance. Pretext for attack One Arab account claims that an affair between a rich young wife of the city and a Mussulman was discovered by the husband: The Crusaders feared that Qalawun would use this as a pretext to resume the war, and petitioned the pontiff for reinforcements. According to Michaud, 25 Venetian galleys carrying 1600 men "levied in haste in Italy" were sent. The Italian reinforcements were ill-disciplined and without regular pay; they pillaged indiscriminately from both Muslims and Christians before setting out from Acre. According to Runciman they attacked and killed some Muslim merchants around Acre in August 1290, ==Siege==

Prelude to the battle Sultan Qalawun dissolved the truce with Acre, and the Mamluks began mobilizing by October 1290. Qalawun died in December and was succeeded by his son, Al-Ashraf Khalil (sometimes spelled Chalil Nonetheless, the Crusaders dispatched a peace delegation, led by Sir Philip Mainebeuf, to Cairo; the delegation was imprisoned. A significant portion of the troops were volunteers. The army included a substantial artillery train Notable historians in the Mamluks' ranks included Baybars al-Dewadar, and Abulfeda in the Haman contingent. The Crusaders' appeals for aid met with little success. England sent a few knights, including Otto de Grandson of Savoy. The only noteworthy reinforcements came from Henry II of Cyprus, who fortified the walls and sent troops led by his brother Amalric, Lord of Tyre. Burchard von Schwanden suddenly resigned as Grand Master of the Teutonic Order and left Acre for Europe; he was succeeded by Konrad von Feuchtwangen. The only major contingent to leave were the Genoese, who concluded a separate treaty with Khalil. Many women and children were evacuated from Acre to Cyprus in March. Siege begins Sultan Khalil and the Egyptian army arrived at Acre on 6 April 1291, Henry II of Cyprus arrived on 4 May with reinforcements The Mamluks poured through the breaches; by 9a.m. the outcome seems to have been beyond doubt. and forced the Crusaders to retreat to the Gate of St. Anthony. Guillaume de Beaujeu was mortally wounded defending the Gate of St. Anthony. made a failed attempt to retake the Accursed Tower. Acre was in Mamluk hands, except for the seaside Templar fortress at the western tip of the city. A battle ensued, but this time the Christians had the advantage. Of the 400 horsemen who entered the fortress, only a handful escaped. The others were either killed or beheaded. The battles were fierce and relentless. This wasn't just the last stand at Acre, it was the last stand of the crusader states. When the fighting stopped, Peter de Severy received another letter from the Sultan. In it, he stated that his men deserved their deaths for their undisciplined behavior. Furthermore, he asked the marshal to leave his fortress to discuss terms. It was a lie. Trying to spare the civilian population under his protection, Peter de Severy opened the gates and stepped forward with a delegation of Knights Templar. Before they could reach the enemy's encampments they were killed by the Sultan's troops. Further offers of amnesty were rejected by the Crusaders. On 28 May, the final tower surrendered; Mamluk mines were prepared to destroy the tower making further resistance useless. The tower collapsed after prisoners and booty had been removed; according to Mamluk accounts, a few sightseers and looters were killed. News of the Mamluk victory caused celebrations in Damascus and Cairo. In Damascus, Khalil entered the city with chained Crusader prisoners and captured Crusader standards – carried upside-down in defeat. The Sultan returned to Cairo with the gate of the Church of Saint Andrew from Acre, which was used to construct a mosque and released Philip Mainebeuf's delegation. Furthermore, celebrations were described as: “The entire city had been decorated, and sheets of satin had been laid along his triumphal path through the city leading to the palace of the governor. The regal sultan was proceeded by 280 fettered prisoners. One bore a reversed Frankish banner; another carried a banner and spear from which the hair of slain comrades was suspended. Al-Ashraf was greeted by the whole population of Damascus and the surrounding countryside lining the route, ulama [legal scholars], mosque officials, Sufi sheiks, Christians and Jews, all holding candles even though the parade took place before noon.” ==Aftermath==

The fall of Acre signaled the end of the Jerusalem crusades. No effective crusade was raised to recapture the Holy Land afterwards, though talk of further crusades was common enough. By 1291, other ideals had captured the interest and enthusiasm of the monarchs and nobility of Europe and even strenuous papal efforts to raise expeditions to retake the Holy Land met with little response. The Latin Kingdom continued to exist, theoretically, on the island of Cyprus. There the Latin kings planned to recapture the mainland, but in vain. Money, men, and the will to do the task were all lacking. One last effort was made by King Peter I in 1365, when he successfully landed in Egypt and sacked Alexandria. Once the city was taken, however, the Crusaders returned to Cyprus. As a crusade, the episode was futile, and this and further coastal raids over the following decades in 1410–11 led to destructive counter-raids Mamluk campaigns against Cyprus (1424–1426) by the Mamluk Sultanate; in 1426 Cyprus was forced into Mamluk vassalship with a hefty yearly tribute. The 14th century witnessed other organized campaigns such as the Crusade of Nicopolis & Crusade of Varna but these enterprises differed in many ways from the 11th- and 12th-century expeditions which are properly called Crusades. The crusades of the 14th century aimed not at the recapture of Jerusalem and the Christian shrines of the Holy Land, but rather at checking the advance of the Ottoman Empire into Europe. While many of the crusaders in these 14th-century undertakings looked upon the defeat of the Ottomans as a preliminary to the ultimate recapture of the Holy Land, none of the later crusades attempted any direct attack upon Palestine or Syria. ==Historiography==

Two short works dedicated to the siege were produced by contemporaries on the basis of eyewitness accounts: the Hystoria de desolacione of Thaddeus of Naples and the anonymous Excidium Acconis. These survive in four and six manuscripts, respectively. The Gestes des Chiprois, written a generation later and surviving in a single manuscript, is the other main source from the crusaders' perspective. The Gestes des Chiprois is the only surviving eyewitness account and does not suffer the partial flaws of the Excidium Acconis. ==Notes==