What Were the Crusades?īy the end of the 11th century, Western Europe had emerged as a significant power in its own right, though it still lagged behind other Mediterranean civilizations, such as that of the Byzantine Empire (formerly the eastern half of the Roman Empire) and the Islamic Empire of the Middle East and North Africa.ĭid you know? In a popular movement known as the Children's Crusade (1212), a motley crew including children, adolescents, women, the elderly and the poor marched all the way from the Rhineland to Italy behind a young man named Nicholas, who said he had received divine instruction to march toward the Holy Land.
The bloody, violent and often ruthless conflicts propelled the status of European Christians, making them major players in the fight for land in the Middle East. In all, eight major Crusade expeditions occurred between 10. The Crusades were a series of religious wars between Christians and Muslims started primarily to secure control of holy sites considered sacred by both groups.
