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Baldwin, M. W. (ed.) / The first hundred years
(1969)
XII: The Foundation of the Latin States, 1099-1118, pp. 368-409
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Ch. XII THE FOUNDATION OF THE LATIN STATES 39' would have to have the sanction of pope Paschal II. He saw the pope in 1105. As a result Paschal appointed bishop Bruno of Segni as legate to preach a new crusade. Although the reports of the Council of Poitiers where the crusade was formally launched in i io6 mention the "way to Jerusalem" rather than Byzantium, it seems likely that Paschal succumbed to the anti-Byzantinism of the day and fell in with Bohemond's plans. At any rate there is no record that the pope denounced Bohemond's purpose when it became publicly apparent. Indeed, in his relations with the Norman, Paschal does not emerge as a strong character. The prince of Antioch made a triumphal tour of Italy and France in I 105—i io6, everywhere greeted as a hero of the First Crusade, and everywhere calling for volunteers for his new venture. As bases for propaganda against Alexius he carried in his train a pretender to the Byzantine throne, and circulated copies of the anonymous Gesta Francorum et aliorum Hierosolimitanorum, a pro-Norman chronicle of the First Crusade, which Bohemond had brought over from Antioch and into which he seems to have had inserted a passage saying that Alexius had promised Antioch to him. By the fall of 1107 Bohemond was able to sail from Apulia to Albania with 34,000 men. He took Aviona and laid siege to Dyrrachium (Durazzo). Alexius however was ready for Bohemond. He blockaded him by land and sea and forced the proud Norman to ask for terms in September ~ io8. The treaty required Bohemond to take an oath of vassalage for Antioch in western style, and to return to Italy. Bohemond, a broken and discredited man, never went back to Antioch. He spent the few remaining years of his life in Apulia, dying there in i i ~ Bohemond's death ended the career of one of the boldest and most ambitious men of the time. He saw in the First Crusade an opportunity to establish himself as a powerful prince. He did succeed in founding a principality at Antioch, but it was much less than he had expected. His seizure of this city in 1098, his denuncia30 For Bohemond's war with Alexius, see F. Chalandon, Essai sur le règne d'Alexis 1 Comnine (1081—1118) (Paris, 1900), pp. 242—250; R. B. Yewdale, Bohemond 1, Prince of Antioch (Princeton, 1924), pp. 106—133; S. Runciman, Crusades, II, 47—51. For Bohemond's use of the Gesta Francorum, see A. C. Krey, "A Neglected Passage in the Gesta and its Bearing on the Literature of the First Crusade," Munro Essays, pp. 57—78. For the view that Bohemond deceived Paschal II as to his real intentions, see M. W. Baldwin, in Bulletin of she Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences, III (r~4.~), 283—284. See also J. L. LaMonte, "To What Extent was the Byzantine Empire the Suzerain of the Latin Crusading States ?" Byzantion, VII (1932), 253—264.
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