Godfrey of Bouillon's Reign - Episode 1: Who was He?

Real Crusades History #28

Godfrey of Bouillon (French: Godefroy de Bouillon, German: Gottfried von Bouillon, Latin: Godefridus Bullionensis; 18 September 1060 – 18 July 1100) was a Frankish knight, and one of the leaders of the First Crusade from 1096 until its conclusion in 1099. He was the Lord of Bouillon, from which he took his byname, from 1076 and the Duke of Lower Lorraine from 1087. After the successful siege of Jerusalem in 1099, Godfrey became the first ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. He refused the title of King, however, as he believed that the true King of Jerusalem was Christ, preferring the title of Advocate (i.e. protector or defender) of the Holy Sepulchre (Latin: Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri). He is also known as the "Baron of the Holy Sepulchre" and the "Crusader King". 

Godfrey of Bouillon - Who was He? 

If you watched my series of videos on the First Crusade, you’ll know that Godfrey of Bouillon was one of the important leaders of that Crusade. He was the second eldest son of Eustace II of Boulogne, a companion of William the Conqueror in the conquest of England, and Ida of Lorraine. Through his maternal uncle Godfrey the Hunchback, he inherited the Duchy of Lorraine in 1087. In 1096 Godfrey committed himself to the cause of Pope Urban II and set out on Crusade, leading an army of Lorrainers, Walloons, and Germans. William of Tyre, who lived in the late twelfth century and therefore never knew Godfrey, provides us with a fairly well-known description of Godfrey (read William of Tyre, p. 387). 

There is certainly a great deal of idealism in William’s description. By the time of William of Tyre’s life in the late twelfth century, Godfrey was one of the legendary founding figures of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and much myth surrounded him. However, Willliam’s physical description is probably fairly accurate, while his belief that Godfrey was an excellent ruler, was shared by Godfrey’s own contemporaries. 

Steven Runciman, who is now acknowledged by most historians to be unreliable, and whose’ extreme bias against the Crusaders colored all of his writing, described Godfrey as a “weak and foolish man” (Runciman, p. 3). But this tells us more about Runciman’s own bias than anything. Renowned historian Regine Pernoud disagrees with Runciman, stating (Pernoud, p. 83-84). 

The First Crusade (1095–1099) was the first of a number of crusades that attempted to capture the Holy Land, called on by Pope Urban II in 1095. It started as a widespread pilgrimage of western Christendom and ended as a military expedition by Roman Catholic Europe to regain the Holy Land taken in the Muslim conquests of the Levant (632–661), ultimately resulting in the capture of Jerusalem in 1099. 

It was launched on 27 November 1095 by Pope Urban II with the primary goal of responding to an appeal from Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos, requested that western aid to help repel the invading Seljuk Turks from Anatolia. An additional goal soon became the principal objective—the Christian reconquest of the sacred city of Jerusalem and the Holy Land and the freeing of the Eastern Christians from Muslim rule. 

During the crusades, nobility, knights, peasants and serfs from many regions of Western Europe travelled over land and by sea, first to Constantinople and then on towards Jerusalem. The Crusaders arrived at Jerusalem, launched an assault on the city, and captured it in July 1099, massacring many of the city's Muslim and Jewish inhabitants. They also established the crusader states of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Tripoli, the Principality of Antioch, and the County of Edessa. 

It was the first major step towards reopening international trade in the West since the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Due to the First Crusade being largely concerned with Jerusalem, a city which had not been under Christian dominion for 461 years, and that the crusader army, on seizure of lands, had refused to honor a brokered promise before the seizure to return gained lands to the control of the Byzantine Empire, the status of the First Crusade as defensive or aggressive in nature remains unanswered and controversial.