From 1095 to 1101. For centuries, thousands of pious Christians
had been making pilgrimages to Jerusalem where the Holy
Sepulcher, the most venerable of relics, was preserved. In 1070
the city was captured by the Seljukian Turks, the Greek emperor
Diogenes was defeated in 1091, and Asia Minor and all Syria
became the prey of the heathens. The idea of sending an army to
rescue the Holy Sepulcher, first conceived by Pope Saint Gregory
VII, was taken up by Pope Blessed Urban II who commissioned
Peter the Hermit, a recluse of Picardy, to preach the crusade.
Urban convoked a council at Clermont-Ferrand in France in
November 1095, and a vast and enthusiastic throng of clergy,
knights, and laymen pledged themselves by vow to depart for the
Holy Land, crying “God wills it.” Several disorganized and
undisciplined bands set out, one led by Peter the Hermit and
Walter the Penniless, but were scattered or slain before ever
reaching Palestine. The regular crusade, however, was well
organized, and contained four principal