Who Takes the Blame?: Purity, Authority, and Blame Narratives in Popular Crusade Movements

Bird R. McGuire
Dr. Stephanie Russell, Faculty Mentor

Over a century after the success of the First Crusade in reclaiming Jerusalem, and following the failures of three additional officially-sanctioned crusading movements, two groups of laypeople undertook their own journey to the Holy Land. The Children’s Crusade of 1212 and the Shepherd’s Crusade of 1251 both failed to retake, or even reach, Jerusalem, which challenged contemporary conceptions that the laity would find success due to divine favor. Through the next 200 years, historians and religious writers reformed the story of both crusades, creating explanations for the crusaders’ failure that only expanded over time. This paper explores how those narratives developed and how they differed between the two popular crusading movements, centering concepts of innocence, legitimate authority, and the validity of identifying as a crusader to explain who received blame for the failures of each crusade.

 

Keywords: crusades, Children's Crusade, Shepherd's Crusade, history, authority, innocence, blame

Topic(s):History

Presentation Type: Oral Presentation

Session: TBA
Location: TBA
Time: TBA