Tancred, Prince of Galilee
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Tancred of Galilee (also Tancred the Marquis; Template:C. 1075 – 5 or 12 December 1112) was an Italian nobleman of Frankish origin, counted amongst the four main leaders of the First Crusade. He is credited as the first Christian to enter Jerusalem after its conquest in 1099. Present at the foundation of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Tancred became Prince of Galilee and regent of the Principality of Antioch in his uncle Bohemond's behalf.<ref>Ernest Barker (1911). "Tancred (crusader)". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. 26. (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 394-395.</ref><ref>Grabois, Aryeh (2006). In The Crusades - An Encyclopedia. pp. 1143–1145.</ref> He then married princess Cecilie of France, thus becoming son-in-law to King Philip I of the Franks, and brother-in-law to King Fulk of Jerusalem (Cecilie's half-brother).
Despite his usual misidentification as an Italo-Norman, it is well established that Tancred's link to the Norman House of Hauteville was solely through his mother Emma (a sister of Bohemond I of Antioch). His long debated paternal lineage, on the other hand, has since been placed in the Northern-Italian ruling house of the Aleramids, a family of Frankish origin.<ref name=":1">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":2">Template:Cite web</ref>
His first biography, the Gesta Tancredi (c. 1120) by Ralph of Caen, was later fictionalized by Torquato Tasso in Jerusalem Delivered (1581), followed by Claudio Monteverdi in Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda (1624), by Voltaire in Tancrède (1760), and by Gioachino Rossini in Tancredi (1813), among many others. His imagined portrait has also been represented throughout European art history, including by Tintoretto, Lorenzo Lippi, Nicolas Poussin, Luca Giordano, and others.
Origin
Insertion in the House of Hauteville
Tancred the Marquis (Tancredi Marchisio) was probably born in Southern Italy to Odo "the Good Marquis" and Emma of Hauteville, daughter of Robert Guiscard and his first wife Alberada of Buonalbergo. Two early authors (Ralph of Caen and Orderic Vitalis), mistook Emma for Guiscard's sister, leading Fulcher of Chartres and Jacques de Vitry to conclude that Tancred was a cousin and not a nephew of Bohemond I of Antioch. Almost every other author (including William of Tyre, Albert of Aix and Marino Sanuto the Elder) consider Tancred a nephew of Bohemond, and son of his sister ("Tankradus sororis filius Boemundi" in Aix, and "ex sorore nepos" in Tyre and Sanuto). According to David Crawley, this last interpretation is the most plausible considering Tancred's youth at the time of the First Crusade (much younger than his uncle Bohemond).
The controversy of Odo "the Good Marquis"
In regards to Tancred's father, Crawley unfortunately uses an outdated transcription of William of Tyre's text, making Tancred a son of "William the Marquis" (Tancredus Willelmi Marchionis filius). This version was later corrected by the 17th-century philologist Sebastiano Paoli, who proposed the transcription of Tancredus, Willelmi Marchionis frater<ref name=":4">Template:Cite book</ref> (meaning Tancred was the brother and not the son of "William the Marquis"), in accordance with the contemporary statements of Baldric of Dol (Guillelmus Marchisius, Tancred frater) and Guibert of Nogent (Wilhelmus, Marchisi filius, frater Tancredi). Nogent even goes as far as to say that while Tancred followed his uncle Bohemond, his brother William followed Hugh "the Great" of Vermandois (Tancredum Marchionis cuiusdam ex Boemundi, nisi fallor, sorore filium; cuius frater cum Hugone Magno praecesserat, cui Guillelmus erat vocabulum). Most contemporary authors agree that Tancredi Marchisius was a Marquis (Marchisus dictus est in the Historia belli sacri), brother of William the Marquis (Guillelmus Marchisius, Tancred frater in Baldric of Dol) and a son of a Marquis (marchisi filius in Robert the Monk and Guibert of Nogent, and Marchisides in Ralph of Caen). Only Orderic Vitalis names Tancred's father as Odo "the Good Marquis" (Tancredum, Odonis Boni Marchisi filium).
Ralph of Caen also states that Tancred belonged to "a most prestigious lineage" and had "excellent parents, the Marquis and Emma" (clarae stirpis germen clarissimum, parentes eximios Marchisum habuit et Emmam). Modern and contemporary scholars have long debated the origin of Odo "the Good Marquis", mostly agreeing that the title of marquis was unknown to the Normans (Sebastiano Paoli)<ref name=":4" /> and must therefore have proceeded from a Northern-Italian root (Ludovico Muratori). Vittorio Poggi and Edoardo d'Angelo both agreed that it would be wiser to trace him in the North-Italian Frankish dynasty of the Aleramids,<ref name=":1" /> whose senior line of Savona recurrently married to the Hautevilles during the 12th century (e.g. Adelaide del Vasto and Enrico del Vasto).<ref name=":1" /><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Following this theory, Crawley attempts to find an equivalent to Otto "the Good Marquis" but only searches in the cadet branch of Monferrato. It is Claudio Martinotti Doria who first manages to identify Tancred's father with the Aleramid Marquis Otto IV of Savona, son of Otto III and brother of both Boniface del Vasto and Manfred I (father of Adelaide and Enrico).<ref name=":2" /><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> These findings concur with Evelyn Jamison's arguments stating that "the Good Marquis" was the same Otto (or Ottone) who commanded a division of Roger I's troops in Taormina in 1078, and only later was styled Ottobonus, or "Otto the Good", since at least 1094.<ref>Evelyn Jamison, "Some Notes on the Anonymi Gesta Francorum, with Special Reference to the Norman Contingent from South Italy and Sicily in the First Crusade", Studies in French Language and Mediaeval Literature Presented to Professor Mildred K. Pope (Manchester University Press, 1939), pp. 183–208, at 196–97.</ref>
First Crusade
In 1096, Tancred joined his maternal uncle Bohemond on the First Crusade, and the two made their way to Constantinople. There, he was pressured to swear an oath to Byzantine Emperor Alexius I Comnenus, promising to give back any conquered land to the Byzantine Empire. Although the other leaders did not intend to keep their oaths, Tancred refused to swear the oath altogether. He participated in the siege of Nicaea in 1097, but the city was taken by Alexius' army after secret negotiations with the Seljuk Turks. Because of this, Tancred was very distrustful of the Byzantines.
In 1097, the Crusaders divided their forces at Heraclea Cybistra and Tancred entered the Levant by passing south through the Cilician Gates.<ref name="gesta-tancredi-2005">Template:Cite Q</ref> He displayed the skills of a brilliant strategist by seizing five of the most important sites in Cilicia Pedias, which included the ancient cities of Tarsus and Adana, the great emporium at Mopsuestia, and the strategic castles at Sarvandikar and Anazarbus.<ref name="edwards">Template:Cite book</ref> The last three settlements were annexed to the Principality of Antioch. During their fourteen-year occupation of Anazarbus the Crusaders built the magnificent donjon atop the center of the fortified outcrop. At Sarvandikar, which controlled the strategic Amanus Pass, Tancred imprisoned Raymond of Saint-Gilles in 1101–1102.<ref>Matthew of Edessa, Recueil des historiens des croisades, Documents arméniens, vol. 1, reprint: Farnborough, 1967, p. 57.</ref>
He assisted in the siege of Antioch in 1098. One year later, during the assault on Jerusalem, Tancred, along with Gaston IV of Béarn, claimed to have been the first Crusader to enter the city on July 15.Template:Refn When the city fell, Tancred along with other crusading armies participated in the sacking of the city. His biographer Ralph of Caen is cited to have said that "Tancred was one of the most active participants in the decimation of the conquered Saracens."<ref name=":0" /> During the final stages of the battle Tancred gave his banner to a group of the citizens who had fled to the roof of the Temple of SolomonTemplate:Broken anchor.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite book</ref> This should have assured their safety, but in the confusion of the moment, they were massacred by other Crusaders who were sacking the city.<ref name=":0" /> The author of the Gesta Francorum ("Deeds of the Franks") records that when Tancred realized this he was "greatly angered". However, his fury was calmed by the argument that the possibility of a counterattack meant it was too dangerous for the defenders of Jerusalem to be left alive.<ref name=":0" /> When the Kingdom of Jerusalem was established, Tancred became Prince of Galilee.
Regency of Antioch
In 1100, Tancred became regent of Antioch when Bohemond was taken prisoner by the Danishmends at the Battle of Melitene. He expanded the territory of the Latin principality by capturing land from the Byzantines, although over the next decade Alexius attempted, unsuccessfully, to bring him under Byzantine control. In 1104, he also took control of the County of Edessa when Baldwin II was taken captive after the Battle of Harran. After Baldwin's release in late 1108, he had to fight Tancred (probably in early 1109) to regain control of the county; Tancred was eventually defeated and returned to Antioch. After Harran, Bohemond returned to Europe to recruit more Crusaders, again leaving his nephew as regent in Antioch. Tancred's victory over Radwan of Aleppo at the Battle of Artah in 1105 allowed the Latin principality to recover some its territories east of the Orontes River.<ref>Smail, p. 28</ref>
In 1108, Tancred refused to honour the Treaty of Devol, in which Bohemond swore an oath of fealty to Alexius, and for decades afterwards Antioch remained independent of the Byzantine Empire. In late September 1108, near Turbessel, Tancred, with 1,500 Frankish knights and infantry and 600 Turkish horsemen sent by Fakhr al-Mulk Ridwan, confronted Baldwin II and the 2,000 men of Jawali Saqawa, atabeg of Mosul. Tancred and Ridwan routed Jawali's men, who took refuge in Turbessel. Later on, Tancred, who had initially refused to abandon Turbessel to Baldwin II, decided at the assembly in Château Pèlerin in April 1109 to give up Turbessel in return for his restoration to his old domains in the Kingdom of Jerusalem.Template:Sfn
In 1110, he brought Krak des Chevaliers under his control, which would later become an important castle in the County of Tripoli. Tancred remained the regent of Antioch for Bohemond II until his death in 1112 during a typhoid epidemic. He had married Cecile of France, but died childless. Tancred was buried in the porch of St. Peter, the cathedral of Antioch.Template:Sfn
The Gesta Tancredi is a biography of Tancred written in Latin by Ralph of Caen, a Norman who joined the First Crusade and served under Tancred and Bohemond. An English translation was co-published in 2005 by Bernard S. Bachrach and David S. Bachrach.
Character
Ralph of Caen details Tancred's personality in his chronicle and biography of him in the Gesta Tancredi. Ralph notes how Tancred was well aware of the innate sinfulness of the knightly profession and the violence it entailed, and how this led him to give up his life in Norman-dominated southern Italy to take part in Pope Urban II's call for an armed pilgrimage to the Holy Land.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Tancred is described by Ralph as a very pious, violent hawk of a man. He was a shrewd, opportunistic warrior bred for conquest with a combative nature, but it also showcases a very pragmatic side of him concerning the even distribution among his men of the plunder gained following the despoliation of the mosques of Jerusalem after the city's conquest by the Crusaders in 1099.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
In fiction
Tancred appears as a character in Torquato Tasso's 16th-century poem Jerusalem Delivered, in which he is portrayed as an epic hero and given a fictional love interest, the pagan warrior-maiden Clorinda. This poem was the inspiration for the 1957 film The Mighty Crusaders, about the Siege of Jerusalem in June–July 1099. He is also loved by the Princess Erminia of Antioch. Portions of Tasso's verses were set by Claudio Monteverdi in his 1624 dramatic work Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda. He also appears in one of the scenes in Imre Madách's The Tragedy of Man. In Tom Harper's Siege of Heaven he is depicted as a violent psychopath. His portrayal is similar although slightly more humorous in Alfred Duggan's novel Count Bohemond.
Tancred also appears in Sir Walter Scott's 1832 novel Count Robert of Paris, as one of the Crusade leaders who returned to Constantinople from Scutari to ensure a fair contest between Count Robert and his challenger. The novel Tancred, or the New Crusade by Benjamin Disraeli centres around the adventures of an imagined modern descendant and namesake of the Prince of Galilee. Rossini's opera Tancredi is based on Tasso, via Voltaire's play Tancrède of 1759.
Modern fictional portrayals of Tancred include Sharon Kay Penman's novel Lionheart.
Notes
References
Sources
- Edwards, Robert W., The Fortifications of Armenian Cilicia: Dumbarton Oaks Studies XXIII, Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, Trustees for Harvard University (1987). Template:ISBN
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- Robert Lawrence Nicholson, Tancred: A Study of His Career and Work. AMS Press, 1978.
- Peters, Edward, ed., The First Crusade: The Chronicle of Fulcher of Chartres and Other Source Materials, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998)
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- Smail, R. C. Crusading Warfare 1097–1193. New York: Barnes & Noble Books, (1956) 1995. Template:ISBN
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External links
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