Jerusalem, the City of Herod and SaladinBesant, Walter
History
Jerusalem, the City of Herod and Saladin
Besant, Walter
Jerusalem -- Description and travel; Jerusalem -- History
Our history of the Christian kingdom draws to a close. In the midst
of these troubles, the miserable king, who had mercifully been
deprived of his senses, for the disease, when it has devoured the
fingers and toes, and eaten into the vigour and strength of a man,
fastens mysteriously on his intellect, and devours that too, died,
or rather ceased to breathe, and was buried with his fathers. We are
not told what epitaph was chosen for him. Surely, of all men, on
Baldwin’s tomb might have been carved the word, “Miserrimus.”
Little Baldwin the Fifth died a day after his uncle, poisoned, as
was supposed, by his mother and Guy de Lusignan. It is possible. The
women whom Baldwin the Second left behind him, his daughters
Milicent, Alice, Hodierne, were bad themselves, and the mothers of
worse daughters. Of Sybille we can say little, except that she was
known to have had a guilty love for Guy before their marriage—the
king was actually uncertain at one time whether to stone to death
his sister’s paramour, or to make him her husband!—that she was
completely under his rule, and that she was ambitious, bold, and
intriguing.
CHAPTER XIV.
KING GUY DE LUSIGNAN. A.D. 1186-1187.
Heu! voce flebili cogor enarrare
Facinus quod accidit nuper ultra mare,
Quando Saladino concessum est vastare
Terram quam dignatus est Christus sic amare.
_Contemporary Poem._
When the little King Baldwin had been buried,[69] Sybille went to
the Patriarch, the Grand Master of the Templars, and the Grand
Master of the Hospitallers, to ask their advice and assistance. The
first two bade her be under no anxiety, because they would procure
her coronation, the former out of love for her mother, the Lady
Agnes, and the latter out of the great hatred he bore for Raymond of
Tripolis. And they advised her to send at once for Renaud de
Chatillon, as a man likely to be of great service to her. Unluckily
for Renaud, he came. At the same time she was to send to the Count
of Tripoli and the barons, summoning them to her coronation, because
the crown had devolved upon her. These, however, refused to be
present, and sent a formal protestation against the coronation.
Heraclius and the Master of the Templars laughed at the protest, but
the Master of the Hospitallers refused to attend the ceremony. The
gates of the city were shut, and no one allowed to enter or go out.
The barons, who were at Nablous, sent a trustworthy messenger,
disguised as a monk, to see what went on. Denied admittance at the
gates, he went to the lazar house, which was close to the walls, and
where he knew of a little postern. Here he was admitted, and, like a
modern reporter, went to the church and took notes of the
proceedings. The Queen elect was brought into the church by Renaud
and the Master of the Templars. The patriarch asked the latter for
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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