During the 1000s the Seljuk Turks, people from central Asia who had adopted the Muslim faith, conquered Palestine and attacked Asia Minor, which was part of the Byzantine Empire. When the Turks threatened the capital city of Constantinople, the Byzantine emperor appealed to the pope in Rome. Because Christian pilgrims going to Palestine came home with reports of persecution from the Turks, the Byzantine emperor's appeal for help found a reception in Europe.

Pope Urban I wanted to regain the Holy Land from the Muslims. He called a great meeting of church leaders and French nobles at Clermont France in 1095. At the meeting he encouraged the powerful feudal nobles to stop fighting with each other, and to jo

The crusaders received a hostile reception in Constantinople. The Byzantine emperor had asked for some assistance, but now, seeing three armies approaching the city, he feared they might capture and plunder the capitol. After much discussion the Byzantines allowed the crusaders to pass through Constantinople to begin their long, hot march across Asia Minor toward Palestine.

Urban's request made his listeners very enthusiastic and they joined in one big cry, "God wills it!" From Clermont people traveled through France preaching the cause. The people who joined the expeditions sewed a cloth cross on their clothes. They were called crusaders, from the Latin word cruciata, which means, "marked with a cross."

In Europe the Crusades increased the power of kings and decreased the power of feudal lords. Kings imposed new taxes and led armies drawn from their entire countries. The church also got more political power because of its leadership role in initiating the crusades.

French and Norman nobles led the First Crusade that lasted from 1096 to 1099. In three organized armies, they marched across Europe to Constantinople.

There were many more Crusades until 1291, when the Muslims captured the last Christian stronghold, in Acre. Fore 200 years a constant flow of Europeans streamed into the Holy Land. Over that period, however, the religious zeal of the crusaders had steadily dwindled.

In 1187 the Muslim leader Saladin recaptured Jerusalem. Two years later the Third Crusade, the "Crusade of the Three Kings," began and lasted until 1192. King Richard of England, King Philip Augustus

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