We know nowadays to distrust the hopeful word ‘liberation’.
The Armenians learnt the lesson before us. As Baldwin moved towards the river
Euphrates, the Armenian population rose up to greet him. The Turkish garrisons
that remained in the district either fled or were massacred by the Christians.
The only Turkish lord of any importance in the neighbourhood, the Emir Balduk
of Samosata, who controlled the road from Edessa to Melitene, attempted to
organize resistance but could not take any offensive measures. Two local
Armenian nobles, called by the Latins Fer and Nicusus, joined Baldwin with
their small levies. During the early winter of 1097 Baldwin completed his
conquest of the land up to the Euphrates, capturing the two chief fortresses,
Ravendel and Turbessel, as the Latins adapted the Arabic names Ruwandan and
Tel-Basheir. Ravendel, which commanded his communications with Antioch, he put
under the governorship of his Armenian adviser, Bagrat; while the command of
Turbessel, important for its proximity to the historic ford across the
Euphrates at Carchemish, was given to the Armenian, Fer.
While Baldwin was still at Turbessel, probably
about the new year, an embassy reached him from Edessa. Thoros was impatient
for the arrival of the Franks, whom he now saw delaying on the west bank of the
Euphrates. His position was always precarious; and he was alarmed by the news
that Kerbogha, the terrible Turkish Emir of Mosul, was collecting a huge army
which was destined for the relief of Antioch, but which could easily mop up
Edessa and the Armenian states on its way. But Baldwin was not going on to
Edessa except on terms that suited him. Thoros had expected to use him as a
mercenary, paying him with money and rich gifts; but it was clear now that
Baldwin wanted more than that. The Edessene embassy at Turbessel was now
empowered to offer more; Thoros would adopt Baldwin as his son and heir and
would at once co-opt him as partner in the government of his lands. To Thoros,
who was childless and ageing, it seemed the only solution. It was not what he
would have chosen but, unpopular at home and threatened by his neighbours, he
could not afford to choose. But the less short-sighted amongst the Armenians
were disquieted. It was not for this that Bagrat had schooled Baldwin in
Armenian affairs. Bagrat himself was the first to show his discontent. While
the Franks were still at Turbessel, Fer, who doubtless wished to succeed Bagrat
in Baldwin’s confidence, reported that he was intriguing with the Turks. It is
probable that his intrigues were only with his brother, Kogh Vasil, with whom
he was consulting about the new menace to Armenian freedom. Perhaps he hoped,
too, to make himself prince of Ravendel. But Baldwin was taking no risks.
Troops were rushed to Ravendel to arrest Bagrat, who was brought before Baldwin
and tortured to confess what he had done. He had little to confess and soon
escaped, to take refuge in the mountains, protected by his brother, Kogh Vasil,
till he too was driven to join him in the wilderness.
Expedition
Against Samosata
At the beginning of February 1098, Baldwin left
Turbessel for Edessa. Only eighty knights were with him. The Turks of Samosata
laid an ambush for him where he was expected to cross the Euphrates, probably
at Birejik, but he eluded them, slipping over a ford further to the north. He
arrived at Edessa on 6 February, and was received with the greatest enthusiasm
both by Thoros and by the whole Christian population. Almost immediately Thoros
formally adopted him as his son. The ceremony, following the usual ritual of
the Armenians of the time, was better suited to the adoption of a child than of
a grown man; for Baldwin was stripped to the waist, while Thoros put on a
doubly wide shirt, which he passed over Baldwin’s head; and the new father and
son rubbed their bare breasts against each other. Baldwin then repeated the
ceremony with the princess, Thoros’s wife.
Once established as heir and co-regent of
Edessa, Baldwin saw that his first task must be to destroy the Turkish emirate
of Samosata, which could too easily interrupt his communications with the west.
The Edessenes gladly supported his scheme for an expedition, as the Emir Balduk
was the closest and most persistent of their enemies, continually raiding their
flocks and fields and occasionally extracting tribute from the city itself. The
Edessene militia accompanied Baldwin and his knights against Samosata, together
with an Armenian princeling, Constantine of Gargar, who was vassal to Thoros.
The expedition, which took place between 14 and 20 February, was not a success.
The Edessenes were poor soldiers. They were surprised by the Turks and a
thousand of them were slain; whereupon the army withdrew. But Baldwin captured
and fortified a village called St John, close to the Emir’s capital, and
installed the greater number of his knights there, to control the movements of
the Turks. As a result there was a decline in the number of Turkish raids; for
which the Armenians rightly gave Baldwin the credit.
Soon after Baldwin’s return to Edessa a
conspiracy against Thoros began to be hatched in the city, with the support of
Constantine of Gargar. To what extent Baldwin was involved can never be known.
His friends denied it; but according to the testimony of the Armenian writer
Matthew he was informed by the conspirators of their intention to dethrone
Thoros in his favour. The people of Edessa had no love for Thoros nor any
gratitude for the agility with which he had preserved the independence of their
city. They disliked him for being a member of the Orthodox Church and a titular
official of the Empire. He had not been able to protect their harvests nor
their merchandise from raiders; and he had extorted high taxation from them.
But, till Baldwin appeared, they could not afford to dispense with him. Now
they had a more efficient protector. It needed therefore no prompting from the
Franks to provoke a conspiracy; but it is hard to believe that the conspirators
would have ventured to go far without securing the approval of the Franks. On
Sunday, 7 March, the conspirators struck. They whipped up the populace to
attack the houses in which Thoros’s officials lived, then marched on the prince’s
palace in the citadel. Thoros was deserted by his troops; and his adopted son
did not come to his rescue but merely advised him to surrender. Thoros agreed
and asked only that he and his wife might be free to retire to her father at
Melitene. Though Baldwin apparently guaranteed his life, Thoros was not allowed
to go. Finding himself imprisoned in his palace, he attempted on the Tuesday to
escape from a window but was captured and tom to pieces by the crowd. The fate
of the princess, Baldwin’s adoptive mother, is unknown. On Wednesday, 10 March,
Baldwin was invited by the people of Edessa to assume the government.
Baldwin and
Thoros
Baldwin had achieved his ambition of obtaining
a principality. Edessa was not, indeed, in the Holy Land; but a Frankish state
on the middle Euphrates could be a valuable element of defence for any state
that might be set up in Palestine. Baldwin could justify himself on the lines
of broad Crusading policy. But he could not legally justify himself before all
Christendom. Edessa, as a city that had belonged to the Emperor before the
Turkish invasions, was covered by the oath that he had sworn at Constantinople.
He had moreover acquired it by displacing and conniving at the murder of a
governor who was, officially at least, a recognized servant of the Empire. But
Baldwin had shown already in Cilicia that his oath meant nothing to him; while
at Edessa Thoros himself was ready to barter away his rights without reference
to his distant suzerain. But the episode was not unnoticed by Alexius, who
reserved his rights till he should be in a position to enforce them.
Later Armenian historians, writing when it was
clear that the Frankish domination had brought about the utter ruin of the
Armenians of the Euphrates, were severe in their condemnation of Baldwin. But
they were unjust. There is no moral excuse for Baldwin’s treatment of Thoros,
as the embarrassed attitude of the Latin chroniclers well shows. Thoros had
behaved in a similar manner to the Turk Alphilag, whom he had invited to save
him from the Danishmends three or four years before and had caused to be
murdered; but he acted then to save his city and his people from infidel
tyranny; nor had Alphilag adopted him as his son. It is true that adoption was
a less serious thing in Armenian custom than in western law; but that cannot
lessen Baldwin’s moral guilt. But the Armenians should not blame him; for it
was by Armenians that Thoros was actually murdered; and Baldwin was invited to
take his place with the almost unanimous approval of their race. The Armenian
princes whom the Crusaders were to eject and who alone distrusted the value of
their aid were men who had served the Empire in olden days. They were disliked
by their compatriots for their allegiance to the Emperor, and, still more, for
having become members of the Orthodox Church. These former Byzantine officials
such as Thoros and Gabriel alone had had sufficient experience in government to
preserve the existence of Armenian independence on the Euphrates. But their
ungrateful subjects, with their loathing of Byzantium, with their readiness to
forgive in a Latin the heretical errors that damned a Greek eternally in their
eyes, had only themselves to blame if their Frankish friends were to lure them
to disaster.
For the moment all was rosy. Baldwin took the
title of Count of Edessa and made it clear that he intended to rule alone. But
his Frankish troops were few in number; he was forced to rely upon Armenians to
work for him. He found several that he could trust; and his task was made
easier by the discovery in the citadel of a vast store of treasure, much of
which dated from the days of the Byzantines and to which Thoros by his
exactions had greatly added. The new-gotten wealth enabled him not only to buy
support but to carry off a master-stroke of diplomacy. The Emir Balduk of
Samosata had been frightened by the news of Baldwin’s accession. When he saw
preparations being made for a fresh attack on his capital he hastily sent to
Edessa offering to sell his emirate for the sum of ten thousand bezants.
Baldwin accepted, and entered Samosata in triumph. In the citadel there he
found many hostages that Balduk had taken from Edessa. He promptly restored
them to their families. This action, together with his elimination of the
Turkish menace from Samosata, enormously increased his popularity. Balduk was
invited to take up residence at Edessa with his bodyguard, as mercenaries of
the Count.
Baldwin’s
Marriage
As Baldwin’s successes became generally known,
several western knights, on their way to reinforce the Crusading army at Antioch,
turned aside to share in his fortune, while others left the dreary siege of
Antioch to join him. Amongst these were Drogo of Nesle and Rainald of Toul and
Raymond’s vassal, Gaston of Beam. Baldwin rewarded them with handsome gifts
from his treasury and, to settle them, encouraged them to marry Armenian
heiresses. He himself, a widower and childless now, set the example. His new
countess was the daughter of a chieftain known to the Latin chroniclers as
Taphnuz or Tafroc. He was a wealthy prince owning territory nearby and
apparently was related to Constantine of Gargar; and he had connections with
Constantinople, whither he ultimately retired. It is possible that he was the
same as Thatoul, the ruler of Marash, whose alliance would certainly be of value
to Baldwin. He gave his daughter a dowry of sixty thousand bezants and a vague
promise that she should inherit his lands. But the marriage brought her no
happiness; and no children were born of it.
Baldwin thus laid down the principles of the
policy that he was later to establish for the kingdom of Jerusalem. The control
of the government was to be kept by the Frankish prince and his Frankish
vassals; but orientals, both Christian and Moslems, were invited to play their
part in the state, which a general fusion of races would in the end blend into
a corporate whole. It was the policy of a clear-sighted statesman; but to
knights newly come from the West, pledged to dedicate themselves to the Cross
and to extirpate the infidel, it seemed almost a betrayal of the vows of a
Crusader. It was not to set up Baldwin and his like in semi-oriental monarchies
that Urban had appealed to the faithful at Clermont.
Nor was it at first an easy policy to follow.
The Moslems regarded Baldwin as a transitory adventurer of whom use might be
made. Between Edessa and the Euphrates, to the south-west of the city, lay the
Moslem town of Saruj. It was tributary to an Ortoqid prince, Balak ibn Bahram,
but had recently revolted. Balak now wrote to Baldwin asking to hire his
services for its reduction; and Baldwin, delighted by the opportunity thus
opened to him, agreed to perform the task. The citizens of Saruj thereupon sent
secretly to Balduk to come and save them. Balduk and his troops slipped out of
Edessa and were admitted to Saruj. But Baldwin followed on his heels, bringing
with him a number of siege engines. Balduk and the men of Saruj lost heart. The
latter at once offered to give up their town to him and to pay him tribute,
while the former came out to meet him, declaring that he had hurried ahead
merely to take over the town for him. Baldwin was undeceived. He accepted
Balduk’s apology and apparently restored him to favour; but a few days later he
demanded that the Emir’s wife and children should be handed to him as hostages.
When Balduk demurred, he arrested him and cut off his head. Meanwhile a
Frankish garrison was placed in Saruj, under Fulk of Chartres; who is not to be
confused with the historian Fulcher. The episode taught Baldwin that the
Moslems could not be trusted. Henceforward he saw to it that any of them
dwelling in his territory should be leaderless; but he allowed them freedom of
worship. If he was to hold a town like Saruj, where the population was almost
entirely Arab and Moslem, he could not do otherwise. But his tolerance shocked
western opinion.