Posted: Jun 04, 2010 2:45 am
U-96 wrote:In Spain's case I would think it was unnecessary as there was already papal support for European Christians going to the Iberian Peninsula to aid in the ongoing reconquest of Spain
Stark tries to argue that it was the threat of Islam at the gates of Europe that motivated the Crusades. But a mere 32 years before the First Crusade the then pope had called for Christian knights to aid the Spanish Christian kingdoms against their rivals and the result was ... a paltry handful of knights. Yet in 1097 the response to a call to liberate Jerusalem was responded to by hundreds of thousands. Clearly Stark is wrong.