Such news having reached Jerusalem, the people huddled uneasily, citizens, clerics, princes. Around the Holy Sepulcher they marched, chanting psalms, beseeching God to deliver His children since the enemy host camped near Ascalon. Next the lords consulted among themselves, how best to defend the city, how to confront al-Afdal. Duke Godfrey with Count Robert of Flanders set out on the ninth day of August to observe these Babylonians and sent back word by the bishop of Martirano that so far as they could see the plains were spangled with tents.
On the tenth of August, beseeching God’s mercy, Count Raymond set forth accompanied by the duke of Normandy, Robert Curthose. They came to a river where they saw a great many Arabs tending herds of cattle, sheep, and camels, which made them think the army of al-Afdal must be near. Two hundred knights rode ahead prepared for combat. When the Arabs saw these knights they deserted their animals and fled. Had God regarded them as He regarded us, said the chaplain Raymond d’Agiles, they should have fought, since they were three thousand armed men. Some few herdsmen these knights slew, others caught and forced to divulge information. So the Franks learned that al-Afdal was encamped not five leagues distant. Therefore, confessing their sins and negligence, persuading themselves that the enemy must be timid as hinds, docile as sheep, certain that God would deal with unbelievers on His own account, they passed the night wakefully.
Horns and trumpets announced the dawn. God multiplied this army, said chaplain Raymond, so its numbers did not seem inferior. Animals came to join these pilgrims, miraculously forming herds albeit no one drove them, halting if the army halted, advancing when it advanced.
Al-Afdal’s soldiers loitered in camp, having been informed that the Christians were few, wretchedly armed, riding feeble horses. Also, stargazers and soothsayers admonished them not to move until the seventh day of the week. Such was the hubris of these infidels that when the battle commenced each hung a water bottle around his neck so he might slake his thirst while pursuing Christians.
But what they envisioned proved false. Tancred, whose name terrified misbelievers throughout the Holy Land, burst into their camp and sent many flying. Count Robert, seeing al-Afdal’s standard adorned with a gold apple on the tip of a silver lance, rode furiously against the bearer and struck him down. Blinded by terror, stupefied, Satan’s troops looked with vacant eyes at these knights of Jesus Christ. Horrified, fearing to advance, some in the excess of fright climbed trees. Others groveled on the earth to be speared like fish. Others crouched, pretending to hide. Many rushed to a sycamore grove, which the Franks set afire, so they were all burned. Others scattered and fled toward the sea, dashed into the waves. On every side they were butchered, drowned, burned. Voices of corruption silenced.
Al-Afdal, distraught with grief, watched what happened. He asked himself if ever such a thing had occurred since the world began. How is this? he asked. We are destroyed by a regiment of Christians that I might crush in the hollow of my hand. I have brought every manner of instrument and weapon and machine. Here I have assembled two hundred thousand Islamic knights, yet with loose bridles they flee down the road. Alas, I am ruined by a poor and beggarly race. Alas, it will be told throughout the land. Whereupon al-Afdal escaped the wreckage, leaving a field strewn with bucklers, daggers, shields, quivers, lances, arrows, to say nothing of innumerable proud and wicked soldiers whose tainted blood discolored the earth, whose black souls plunged screeching into eternal night.
His fanciful painted tent, his jeweled sword, his concubines, all were seized by the living host. For twenty silver marks Duke Robert Curthose bought the vainglorious standard. Truly this battle attested the power of divine intervention since the Cross of our Lord, mighty against enemies, accompanied these Franks. Therefore the pomp of Egypt could not prevail.
Archbishop Daimbert, Duke Godfrey, and Count Raymond, laboring as one, composed a message to His Holiness. They described how a vast Christian army marched upon Antioch, how this army was so immense that it might have covered all of Romania and drunk up all the rivers and eaten every growing thing. And although the Saracens resisted, they were easily defeated. Yet some in the army being puffed with conceit neglected to thank God, for which reason He detained the army for nine months beneath the walls of Antioch and so humbled it that nearly all the good horses died. And when Antioch succumbed there were many who did not worthily magnify Him but attributed victory to their own strength. Therefore came such a multitude of Turks that none dared venture outside the walls. And hunger weakened them. But God, having chastised them, mercifully consoled and fortified them and revealed the Lance that had lain buried since the time of the apostles, so they were able to overcome the enemy and proceed into Syria where they captured many strongholds. Yet they suffered again from lack of food and were obliged to eat the bodies of heathen. And they suffered grievously for lack of water during the siege of Jerusalem, but God delivered up the city on
