Wikipedia Assignment #2 week 7

CRUSADES

The Article in which I decided to work on was titled Crusades.

The Crusades as they have become known consisted of multiple military campaigns of a religious nature. Many of these were fought between the growing Roman Catholic Church and numerous other enemies. These enemies included any political enemy of the pope, Muslims, Slavs (Pagan), Jews, Greek and Russian Orthodox and many others seen as heretics to the Pope. These were with the Popes blessing and often started with a religious aim. the 1st crusade was a call to arms to save Jerusalem from Muslim rule. The 4th crusade included the sack of the Christian city of Constantinople. The 6th crusade did not receive the blessing of the pope. The 7th and 8th crusades were seen as victories and the 9th crusade marked the final crusade of the middle ages. Many pilgrims were making their way to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and during this time the church was destroyed and rebuilt. Many pilgrims were captured and many clergy died. When the Muslims of the area figured out the economic influence of the pilgrims the persecutions stopped but the Christian world was already angry. In 1063 Pope Alexander II gave his blessing to the Iberian Christians in support of their war against the Muslims in their area. Much propaganda and promises of salvation fueled the drive of the Crusades. The first crusade was from 1095-1099 with the plea of Byzantine Emperor Alexius I for assistance at the Council of Piacenza as the first major movement towards the Crusade to Jerusalem. 1099 the city of Jerusalem was attacked by the Franks. The Jews and Muslims of the city combined forces against the invasion. However the Crusaders succeeded in entering the city and proceeded to massacre all the remaining Jews and Muslims. The 2nd Crusade covered the years of 1147-1149 while the 3rd covered 1187-1192. The 3rd Crusade resulted from Saladin, Sultan of Egypt, regaining control of Jerusalem. Pope Gregory VIII called for a crusade in which many prominent figures in leadership of Europe responded, including Richard I of England (Richard the Lionheart). The 4th crusade covered 1202-1204 and was followed by the Children's Crusade of 1212. Many facts of this crusade are either misinterpreted or fictitious but the story is of 37000 children marching on crusade to Jerusalem due to the failure of their elders. None of the children returned home and all were lost at sea or sold into slavery. The 5th Crusade covered 1217-1221 while the 6th Crusade took place from 1228-1229. The 6th Crusade was repeatedly vowed to by the Roman Emperor Fredick II and when he failed to act Pope Gregory IX excommunicated the emperor in 1228. We see the Templars Fight Egypt in the 7th Crusade during 1248-1254. The 8th Crusade was relatively short during 1270 and the 9th and Final Crusade, 1271-1272, of the Middle Ages was demeaned a failure. Many other Crusades of note took place however none on the scale of the Crusades to Jerusalem. Due to the length and knowledge based in this article I will stop my summary here.

-This article is titled Crusades and the search term used was 'Crusades'
-The word count for this article was 10138 words and 24.5 pages printed.
-The Disambiguation Link for this article provided references to Military, Political & Cultural, Entertainment and Sports. It also contained other references and uses including Catholic Kings vs Northern Pagans, Cross References to Film, Use of the term Crusaders in modern culture including a reference to the Boston Crusaders Drum and Bugle Corp (side note i had several friends who marched with this organization in the late 1990's). Many references to Television. Definition provided by this link: one of a series of Wars between Roman Catholic Europe and Muslim Polities or other enemy.
-The Discussion page included notation that the article had been removed from the 'History Good Articles' suggestion list. Needed suggested edits for renomination. Part of 9 wikiprojects and a suggestion for a image subtitle alteration. Also included multiple edit suggestions
- The History page showed 5831 edits starting with December 21, 2001 and the most recent at time of research on October 2, 2008
-This article contained 10 external links including link to Knox, Crusades course through BSU.
-This article contained 1 reference and 49 notes
-There were no further reading links to outside sources however there were 36 see also Wikipedia links.

This article Covered a large amount of information regarding the crusades. I only summarized a small portion of the article due to the magnitude and detail of the article. I would highly recommend it as a starting point for anyone seeking a starting point in the study of the Crusades. I think this article can provide many search suggestions and starting points for the amateur historian as well as the student. The article does focus more on some facts than others and at times can seem very overwhelming. I personally had to reread several sections a couple of times to grasp the full data contained. While it does seem like a very large and daunting article it provides a great amount of information and historical content to the reader. I recommend this article to the history buff or student.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusades